Vile's Atlas Revisted

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

Good news to all my fellow vets and our budding lackeys out there: Oberon is finally getting the full body lift he needed. Years of alternatively begging and demanding have finally paid off. We can all run around the void as an irradiated goat/butterfly/paladin guardian of nature without the fear of being ridiculed by our allies or prematurely dispatched by our enemies.

 

Good on DE for committing to the resolution of our "Oberon Dilemma". I can't wait to explain to New Loka the irony of using radiation to defend nature.

 

Now I'm going to level a new slide under the "Needs Basic Mechanic Rework Consideration" microscope.

 

The Tenno community's favorite punching-bag: Atlas.

 

Yeah, I'm a fan of Atlas. Go ahead and crucify me. I know his shortcomings better than you do, but I can also acknowledge his strengths.

 

And after a fair amount of Atlas gameplay, I like to think that I have formulated a means to broaden Atlas's appeal to more than the diehard meleeframe fans.

 

I call it "Atlas Revisited," inspired by DE's recent commitment to their horned paladin. "Revisited" instead of "Reworked," because on the whole, Atlas's skills actually work. They're just a little gimmicky. Atlas doesn't require a complete overhaul. The mechanics behind his skills just need a rethink.

 

Now for relevance's sake, I'm going to take a little trip into the past to visit an archaic warframe build known as "Miasma Saryn." She was basically Blade Storm Ash before Blade Storm Ash got nerfed. But rather than straight up nerfing this archaic OP Saryn, DE decided to "Revist" her skillset's entire mechanics.

What they gave us was a slower killer than Miasma Saryn, but a potent killframe nonetheless. It was a brilliant move on DE's part, and all it took was a little inter-ability dynamism.

I can't help but feel that the tantamount successes of the Saryn Revisit influenced DE's later Warframe development. Let's look at the first genuine article of community shock, Inaros.

Inaros's skill synergy is minor, limited to Devour and Sandstorm's ability to heal Inaros whilst our residential sand king is in the middle of reenacting a certain Tasmanian loony-toon. But Inaros took the community by storm thanks to the sheer tankiness of the frame, combined with his subtle (should I say "covert" instead?) lethality and CC/healing support base.

 

Inaros can do a little bit of everything, from taking hits, to decimating the endgame, to supporting his teammates with health restore, to bringing the opposing army to a helpless standstill as they pick sand out of their eyes and scarabs out of their nether regions. Mechanically, Inaros is a brilliant design.

 

Article number two is Titania, who followed in the wake of Inaros's landmark success. Given that it was a a hard act to follow, we can't blame Titania for being a "minor" flop. Two of her skills (Spellbind and Tribute) suffer from classic Oberon Syndrome (where other frames just do it better); While both Lantern and Razorwing have their own gimmicky mechanical issues (Lantern floating out of its effective range; Razorwing's inability to revive teammates/access consoles/interact with mission objectives/lackluster survivability/terrible melee).

Nevertheless, Titania remains one of my most used frames, simply because she introduced a new style of gameplay to WF. Flying around the map as Mini-Me is ridiculously entertaining and frequently hysterical. Try doing a four-man Lephantis run with Razorwing Titania. The opening cinema for Lephantis's second stage will have you and your teammates rolling on the floor absolutely beset by laughter.

And following Titania was the gamebreaking Nidus and Octavia: Two frames that change everything we vets think of when we consider supportframes. No longer are we forcing the newbie in our clan to use Trinity for co-op endgame so that we can party with our favorite killframe. Nope, now we can mass maim, murder, and slaughter hordes of hapless high leveled Grineer WHILE simultaneously providing team support! What a novel concept!

Limbo and Oberon's ascension from the bottom tier and into the Tenno community's loadout consideration tier is the icing on the evolving meta's cake. But one misbegotten Warframe has not benefited from the evolving meta and all of its new appliances. One Warframe has only been further eschewed from popular consideration while his brethren transcended to new levels of notoriety.

 

Atlas is still the unloved whipping boy of the Warframe community, and the developing meta has only provided further justification for his ridicule and estrangement.

 

And I like Atlas. And I know of a couple other diehard Atlas fans who will defend him to the death. But I have to admit, even Atlas's most prominent set suffers from easily rectifiable mechanical issues. So now I'm going to dispense with the jocularity and adopt a far more serious tone for my "Atlas Revisited" proposition. I'm going list off the problems Atlas's skills have, before offering my input on how best to resolve them. Starting with Landslide.

 

Problem: Endgame damage.

 

Resolution: Landslide IS Atlas's skill. It's the skill that everyone builds for when they compile an Atlas set. With a proper build, Landslide hits unarmored targets unbelievably hard. However, once you get into the endgame, Landslide's base Impact damage starts reinforcing the Tenno community's ire for impact damage.

 

Impact is a terrible damage type, practically useless against armored targets, and in the endgame, enemy armor levels escalate into the realm of nigh-indestructibility. Puncture damage can hold its own against endgame armor (Because it was intended to), and slash has a useful DoT proc that ignores armor. But Impact deals REDUCED damage to armor, which puts poor Landslide Atlas at a severe endgame disadvantage. My idea for resolving this issue is quite simple.

Increase Landslide's base status chance to 25%.

How does that fix the issue without a complete overhaul or making Atlas OP? Here's my reasoning:

Landslide can one-shot most unarmored targets in early/mid game. It doesn't need more power, and the increased status chance won't make Atlas any better at one-shotting softies. But the increased status chance will make Landslide better at handling late game threats. A "little" bump to crit chance (...say raise it to 10%) wouldn't hurt or overpower Landslide either, but the status increase takes priority over a crit chance increase. Why the modest boosts?

Because Landslide is affected by both Drifting Contact and the majority of acolyte melee mods. It wouldn't be too hard to overpower Atlas with a base 20% crit chance. Landslide is beefy enough without redcrits, though the possibility of achieving redcrits with Landslide, should your combo multiplier reach asininely high levels, provides a tantalizing endgame allure.

There is also a "synergy" I would propose for Landslide, but I'll cover that when I get to Atlas's least used skill.

 

Now for Tectonics.

 

Problem: This skill is a joke, made even more hysterical with the ideology disseminated by the Trump administration. Tectonics, much like a borderwall, is completely ineffective at keeping invading aliens out. Though in Tectonic's case, it comes down to implementation, rather than embracing reality.

The wall is too small. There. I said it.

Tectonics was designed with chokepoint control in mind. Atlas wasn't built to be the new Frost. Whereas Frost was always intended to conjure up a frozen fortress from thin air, Atlas was intended to block a single doorway/hallway with a pile of rocks. The problem with Tectonics is that tile sets are constructed using a variety of assets. There is a distinct lack of feasible locations to effectively deploy tectonics. Let's look at Corpus doors for a moment, because they commonly come in three different sizes. You have your Corpus broom closet door, which is of the ideal door frame width for Tectonics; you have your Corpus hall door, which has a little too much width for Tectonics to adequately cover; and then you have your Corpus galley door, which bears twice the width of Tectonic's wall.

Seeing the issue here?

 

Tectonics can't cover it, pun erroneously intended. And that's just doorways. There is only ONE hallway that Tectonics actually works in, and that hallway is exclusive to Grineer ship tile sets.

 

Resolution: Make the wall bigger. But don't just make it "bigger." Make it "better". What am I getting at?

-Ability Synergy.

I'm proposing a synergy here, between Atlas's Tectonics and Petrify. Say that Atlas popped Tectonics in a corpus galley door. It's still the same small Tectonic wall that Atlas uses to cover corpus broom closet doors, but Atlas needs to make it bigger. So Atlas pries open his single eye, and glares at the tiny Tectonic wall with his petrification beam. Embarrassed for its ineffective size, and thoroughly intimidated by Atlas's stone-cold stare, the Tectonics wall decides its high time to start making gains.

With the aid of Atlas's Petrify, the Tectonic wall begins to grow, filling out the galley doorframe that it was deployed to cover. As an added bonus, Atlas's continuous use of Petrify heals the wall over time, keeping it in tip-top shape for a pittance of the energy cost that would have been required to recast it.

As for the offensive portion of Tectonics? Building a bigger wall would result in a much bigger boulder with a higher damage output. Instead of rolling a cute little rock collection into a couple of enemies, Atlas could literally nuke a platoon with a small mountain. Given how unwieldy Tectonics aiming is, and the skill's poor damage, a gradual buildup from boulder to bluff would make the offensive use of Tectonics that much more feasible.

And voila! We've not only made Tectonics useful without endangering Frost's cornerstone on the wall market, but we've also given Petrify a purpose! Which brings me neatly to Atlas's single most useless skill:

 

Petrify, or as I like to call it: "Atlas's Excuse for a Revisit."

 

Look, we can call this Atlas's CC ability all day, but seriously folks...

You have to build Atlas for Petrify to make it a feasible CC ability, and building Atlas as such not only ruins his other three abilities, but is akin to building a set WITHOUT WEAPONS.

Problem: You cannot shoot, melee, or use abilities while Petrify is active. Petrify does no damage, is limited to a line-of-sight conical projection, requires charge up time to petrify enemies, and reduces your movement speed to snail-pace while disabling all of your sick space ninja parkour abilities. Be glad this isn't Darksouls, because Atlas would be begging for a backstab every time he triggered Petrify.

 

Petrify is like activating a debuff on yourself, and for what? To turn enemies into stone? Wouldn't it be more effective to just shoot them instead?

Proposition: Dynamism and derestriction.

I'll start with derestriction. It's the more relatable topic to tackle.

You all know how Volt can pick up his Barriers and still use his secondary? Do you think that Petrify would better if Atlas could do some damage with that free arm as well? Limit Atlas's actions during Petrify to the use of his secondary and the use of his other abilities (ability usage would auto-toggle Petrify off), and suddenly, Petrify becomes a strategic skill, with similar applications to Assimilate Nyx's Absorb.

Now for the fun part, and the proposition that makes Petrify one of Atlas's most useful skills: Ability Synergy.

I've already covered Petrify's proposed Synergy with Tectonics, so now I'll cover the other two skills. Starting with Landslide.

A percentage of Landslide's damage dealt to Petrified enemies is converted into "stoneskin" (Atlas's version of Ironskin). This would give Atlas improved survivability, and better synergy with his "Path of Statues" aug. The percentage of "stoneskin" health accrued doesn't need to be anything massive, BUT instead of maintaining a static value following application, (Like Frost's Icy Avalanche Aug), stoneskin would rather use an accumulative formula.

Say Atlas Landslides a petrified Infested Charger for 200K. A percentage of that (Say 2%) would be converted into stoneskin health. Immediately after blowing up the Infested Charger, Atlas Landslides an Ancient Disruptor for 38K. A percentage of that 38K would be ADDED to Atlas's current stoneskin health.

I reserve the percentages converted, and whether or not Atlas's armor value would affect the total stoneskin health percentage gained for DE's suspect testing. I don't have the tools required to figure that out on anything other than paper. But it would be pretty cool if stoneskin also added a visible effect to Atlas, such as boulder armor building up with his stoneskin values, to the point that Atlas would eventually resemble one of his Rumblers.

 

Now for Petrify's synergy with the Rumblers. When Rumblers damage petrified enemies, Rumblers regain a percentage of their max health. On top of that, any Petrified enemies killed by Rumblers or Atlas's other abilities would add a few seconds to the Rumbler's duration. Finally, Rumblers within the effective radius of active Petrify would gain increased damage, melee speed, and movement speed for a few seconds. This affect would be constantly reapplied and reset if Atlas continuously used Petrify on his Rumblers.

Combined with Atlas's ability to shoot his secondary while using Petrify, Rumblers could effectively keep the offense going with Atlas's fire support. With all the strategic synergies that my proposed Petrify rework adds, you couldn't afford to not use this skill!

Which brings us to Atlas's final, and perhaps most disappointing skill: Rumblers.

Problem: Their damage and Health doesn't scale with enemy levels.

Resolution: Make their damage and health scale to enemy level.

 

That's pretty much it. I don't think the that Atlas above would be anywhere near as gamebreaking as Nidus or Octavia, but he would be extremely feasible (and fun) for endgame play. I post this well aware of my own hubris in assuming that DE would even consider my proposition, but they've made leaps and bounds in both Warframe development and retrofitting with the aid of player feedback, so I share my feedback with DE in good faith.

Edited April 26, 2017 by (XB1)Vile Slanders

[Somb3rBivalve]

Dis be good

My only complaint is that it would be annoying to have to build your wall up with petrify every time you want to block a chokepoint. It would be cool if it was like vauban's trip wire where it simply extended itself as far as it needed until it hit the nearest 2 obstacles, and the longer the wall, the less effective health it has with a cap on its absolute maximum range. Not sure how hard that would be to code though, given that the wall is made out a collection of rock meshes rather than a texture (if that makes sense)

I've always thought that a way to pilot around the boulder as its rolling around would be cool, but whatever.

[crimsonspartan1]

Rumblers aren't even bad. Have a lot of power strength, health and armour mods on, and also have the rumbler augment and you have a really tanky and powerful rumbler which taunts the enemies into attacking it. And don't forget to include lots of duration as well so you can have the super tanky rumbler up and running for a long time

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

25 minutes ago, Somb3rBivalve said:

Dis be good

My only complaint is that it would be annoying to have to build your wall up with petrify every time you want to block a chokepoint. It would be cool if it was like vauban's trip wire where it simply extended itself as far as it needed until it hit the nearest 2 obstacles, and the longer the wall, the less effective health it has with a cap on its absolute maximum range. Not sure how hard that would be to code though, given that the wall is made out a collection of rock meshes rather than a texture (if that makes sense)

I've always thought that a way to pilot around the boulder as its rolling around would be cool, but whatever.

I kind of consider Tectonics a holdout skill. Reserved for defensive situations, rather than run and gun situations. I'd imagine that power strength would influence Petrify's Tectonic charge speed, but the idea is that you'd only need to throw down a wall in a single location, and then just maintain it with occasional blasts of Petrify. The subtle synergy behind Petrify and Tectonics is that while you charge your wall, you're still petrifying enemies.

Then end result is that you could throw down a wall, petrify a mob swarming a defense objective while simultaneously building the wall up, before launching a mountain into a gaggle of petrified foes. Pretty much the equivalent of shooting fish in a barrel, only real difference is that Atlas could fill his barrel with fish and prime his gun at the same time.

Edited April 26, 2017 by (XB1)Vile Slanders
"@#&$" is not just a noun, it's also a verb. Silly Canadians and their silly english...

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

Just now, crimsonspartan1 said:

Rumblers aren't even bad. Have a lot of power strength, health and armour mods on, and also have the rumbler augment and you have a really tanky and powerful rumbler which taunts the enemies into attacking it. And don't forget to include lots of duration as well so you can have the super tanky rumbler up and running for a long time

Tankiness is only half of the equation. We want them to do more than just take hits. I'd frankly like to see some damage dealt too. Not only that, but the Titanic Rumbler Aug is one of the worst aug mods in existence. Do the math: 2 Rumblers equates to 200% health, 200% damage and 2 distractions. 1 Rumbler equates to 150% health, 135% damage and 1 distraction.

200 > 150; 200  > 135; 2 > 1. Regular Rumblers are better than a Titanic Rumbler, across the board, and Titanic Rumbler's taunt only works on enemies that are not currently engaged (which makes it useless).

[GrayArchon]

These sound like good ideas. As an aside, I love your writing style.

[Wrum]

these changes would make me actually want to try and get atlas despite the pain in the butt archwing sections.(seriously who's idea was it to make archwing missions part of the quest to get the earth frame????)

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

3 minutes ago, Wrum said:

these changes would make me actually want to try and get atlas despite the pain in the butt archwing sections.(seriously who's idea was it to make archwing missions part of the quest to get the earth frame????)

...The same people who thought that an environmentally friendly frame should utilize Radiation to defend nature?

It's called irony, just appreciate it.

[(XBOX)Godlike13]

2-4 sounds good. Im hesitant about buffs to Landslide though. I could see buffing Landslide backfiring like with Limbo's rework.

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

Just now, (Xbox One)Godlike13 said:

2-4 sounds good. Im hesitant about buffs to Landslide though. I could see buffing Landslide backfiring like with Limbo's rework.

I highlighted the reasoning and possible concerns for Landslide's buff. Believe me, Landslide seems insanely powerful up to unarmored enemy level 100, but after that, its damage output begins to drop dramatically. Ancient Disruptors and Ancient Healers both ruin Landslide's damage; Combas, Scrambus, Bursa, and Nullifiers prevent Landslide from doing anything; and Grineer armor makes Landslide about as effective damage-wise as chucking pebbles.

Landslide needs status chance primarily for Corrosive and Radiation procs. Corrosive for stripping armor, and radiation for breaking enemy buffs. You hit a level 80 Corpus Tech with Landslide, and the raw initial damage will kill him well before the Gas Proc does. So again, I don't see this buff affecting low-mid level gameplay that much, if at all.

 

[(XBOX)Godlike13]

I don't know. A well modded Landslide still smashes the crap out of level 100/sortie lvl Grineer. Ancient Disruptors and Ancient Healers aren't much of a problem either. Nullifiers are a pain but there's nothing you can do about that. Now higher status sounds ok in theory, but i don't know if its attack speed is fast enough to even effectively apply corrosive procs, and it doesn't really need CC procs like radiation as it naturally rag dolls. Though now that i think about a status buff seems harmless. A crit buff though, that could be dangerous. But status. Why not. That does sound good actually. 

Edited April 26, 2017 by (XB1)Godlike13

[(XBOX)Vile Slanders]

27 minutes ago, (Xbox One)Godlike13 said:

I don't know. A well modded Landslide still smashes the crap out of level 100 Grineer. Ancient Disruptors and Ancient Healers aren't much of a problem either. Nullifiers are a pain but there's nothing you can do about that. Now higher status sounds ok in theory, but i don't know if its attack speed is fast enough to even effectively apply corrosive procs, and it doesn't need a CC procs like radiation as it naturally rag dolls. Though, now that i think about a status buff seems harmless. A crit buff though, that could be dangerous. 

Yes, I agree that crit chance is a bit of a red zone on Landslide. 10% is sufficiently low that crit builds would prove massively less effective without a high combo counter, though they'd eventually surpass standard raw damage builds when the combo counter was high enough.

 

In other words, you wouldn't see Atlas nuking roomfuls of enemies just by swinging his fists (RIP Nuke Limbo), and he'd only start proving his crit grit in late game when his combo multiplier was sufficiently high. Couple this with crit Atlas's total reliance on maintaining both his energy and his combo multiplier, and the lack of damage diversity engendered by the melee weapon mod slots consumed to pull off a crit Atlas...

...And One-Punch Atlas starts looking evermore like an unobtainable fantasy.

 

I wouldn't be using radiation procs for CC. I'd be using radiation procs to deny Infested of their buffs. Killing lone Ancient Healers and Disruptors at any level with any frame isn't all that hard. It's the buff that they transfer to their allies that makes them such a pain. When it takes four Landslides to drop a single Charger (who is immune to the full effects of your ragdoll, thanks to his Ancient Healer buddy), you've got an efficiency issue on your hands. When the first Landslide deals reduced damage, but also procs radiation...

Well, that Charger goes down in two Landslides, and his surrounding buddies get ragdolled thanks to the newly irradiated and thoroughly useless Ancient Healer on their team.

And yes, the Corrosive proc wouldn't be all that effective at stripping enemy armor. But if the AoE of Landslide would proc Corrosive on multiple enemies, you could weather down a group of armored foes with a few punches.

Edited April 26, 2017 by (XB1)Vile Slanders

[Drufo]

I think Landslide is fine as it is, but I agree with the other changes suggested. Also, there should be an added mechanic to petrified enemies, currently they are immobile but they gain status immunity, which sucks if you like status weapon (and in high level mission they are really useful those procs)

[Azamagon]

I really like a lot of your suggestions here.

Landslide I'd say probably doesn't need any buffing. Some status, sure, but nothing else.

The Petrify + Tectonics to grow the wall is a very creative way to improve its road-blocking capacity without making it too obstructive by default. I like it :)

The Petrify + Landslide giving rock armor... sounds a BIT too strong imo for a base effect. If that was Ore Gaze's replacement though, I think that'd be a great augment (I'd use it for sure). I'd maybe let Petrify cause killed petrified enemies cause some small healing (Like 5% of max hp?) to any ally that kills them (Rumblers and other minions included). THAT could be a reasonable base bonus.

Now, if you don't mind, I'll show you some of my ideas (my own and inspired by others) on how I'd revisit Atlas (note that quite a few of the ideas are yours!):

Landslide

• Niche: His main damageskill.
• Untouched, but POSSIBLY a small status chance buff to it.
• Augment: Also untouched, it's decent as is.

Tectonics

• Niche: Versatile multipurpose utility! Defense, damage-extender, CC-skill, enemy-gatherer, path blocker, mobility... Lots of stuff
• A possible idea would be to be able to cast the ability at range (similar to placing Loki's Decoy). Also, to add to that, in an area around where it was summoned, enemies are knocked down
• Making it into a rolling boulder also gives it a "gravity"-effect (Think Vauban's Vortex) in a moderate area around it, catching enemies to move them where you want
• Atlas using Landslide on a wall shatters it into a rockshotgun, combining Tectonics and Landslide's damage together, but split evently among the rocks shards.
• Atlas pressing context when near a wall (default X-key) causes him to make the wall into a boulder with Atlas inside it, making it a mobility / defensive / gapcloser ability too (since he'd be invulnerable while rolling)!
• Atlas using Petrify on the wall, causing it to grow upwards and sideways, improving its size and thus its roadblocking capabilities (As per Vile Slanders' suggestion)
• Augment: Remains the same, but the boulders can now also start rolling aas boulders (all at once) if you HOLDCAST the ability!

Petrify

• Niche: Defensive CC ability, damage-amp and "ability repair". His true "emergency" button, if you will.
• Atlas can use his sidearm when this ability is active (As per Vile Slanders' suggestion), but still moves slowly and all that
• All damage taken from the front is HIGHLY reduced while Petrify is active (as it petrifies the attacks). Think like 75% damage reduction, moddable with Power Strength (capped at 95%)
• Enemies who are petrified suffer more damage taken, the more petrified they are (think 50% more when fully petrified? Modifiable with Power Strength)
• Enemies who are killed when petrified causes a small amount of healing in an AoE around them. Heals ANY allies, minions included (Thus also Rumblers).
• Using Petrify on Tectonics (on top of its growth) and/or on Rumblers repairs their health. (As per Vile Slanders' suggestion). Could possibly also extend the Rumblers' duration (by directly petrifying them and/or by killing Petrifed enemies, partly as per Vile Slanders' suggestion )
• Augment: Instead of a loot ability, it aids his survivability / sustainability. Petrified enemies killed with Landslide add Stoneskin (similar to Iron Skin) to Atlas. (As per Vile Slanders' suggestion)

Rumblers

• Niche: Fighting buddies, distraction, melee aiders
• When Rumblers attack enemies, they add to Atlas' melee combo counter
• Rumblers inside a nullifier area rapidly lose health over time and can't attack, instead of instantly dieing.
• Damage dealt by Rumblers increases their explosion-death damage.
• Augment: Buffed in numbers: 200/250/300/350% health and damage. No longer has movement penalty. Taunt works better.

Loads of synergies there :)
What do you guys think?

[Wrum]

16 hours ago, (Xbox One)Vile Slanders said:

...The same people who thought that an environmentally friendly frame should utilize Radiation to defend nature?

It's called irony, just appreciate it.

fair nuff