Oberon - This is not "synergy"

[Casval_Rouge]

Yes this is about Oberon, but more importantly this is about DE's perception of power synergy, and why I respectfully disagree.  And I hope I'll never see something worst than this in the future...

 

You can't force synergy within a warframe's kit by just adding additional bonuses to each power when used in conjunction to another.  That's a combo, not synergy.  Difference here is, a combo dictates the order of the powers casted and not adhering to the order will diminish the overall strength of the powers, usually significantly.  And if the power by itself is effective for its own energy cost, that's synergy.  That means you can use one of the power without others and have impactful results.  Now you use in combination with other powers that also work well together, you'll get synergy.

Examples of bad "synergy" - Oberon's Renewal buffs armor if targets are affected by Hallowed Ground.  Hallowed Ground + Reckoning equals armor reduction.  

That's a combo.  Why?  Because a heal is nothing if it doesn't increase EHP noticeably.  All healing does is to keep you topped off and feel like you're safer.  Now if the warframe that's healed has significant EHP by themselves, then a heal is massively effective.  But if you have say, 15 armor, healing you for 400 HP isn't much of an increase.  Not saying it isn't helpful, but if Renewal gives you an extra 200 armor?!  That's a massive improvement to your survivability.  In fact if there's one praise I would give DE for this rework is that the armor is a flat increase.  That's what I've asked for years ago for Oberon.  Also isn't that the point of a heal, to improve survivability directly?

Reckoning is a poor ultimate, but more accurately, it is poor for its cost.  It is a 15m radius knockdown, minor blind, and moderate damage, and radiation proc.  The health orb proc is near irrelevant given its poor damage output.  However when combined with HG, it gets a damage buff AND armor debuff.  So that's Avalanche then?  But Avalanche does all that on its own!  So why does Oberon has to make sure his targets are affected by HG first? 

Point is, Renewal is a powerful ability when used with Hallowed Ground, but merely situationally good without.  However that in itself isn't that much of a problem.  The problem is that Hallowed Ground on its own is terribly ineffective for its cost.  If both of the combo pieces do well on their own, that's not a forced combo, and if they also work together well without adhering to an order, that's good synergy.  But Hallowed Ground doesn't do much on its own.  In fact, since this rework, all it really does is minimal aoe damage.

But why?  Well because perhaps DE thought they added bonuses when other powers are used with HG, it needs a nerf to balance it out.  That in my opinion is a big mistake.  Because that means you're only really spending 50 energy just to make sure your 3 & 4 aren't terrible.  Because DE don't like a single power that can be spammable and be good enough.  But instead of making actual power synergies to encourage interesting usage of powers, they forced combos upon everyone.

Now that we have tried out the rework, and base on my opinion of what is poor implementation of "synergy", I have to say I am very disappointed by the changes.  Not because Oberon isn't a usable Warframe, but that it is a wasted opportunity to make actual improvements to a Warframe.  After how many years since Warframe went into closed beta?  The many kit designs are still worst than Warcraft 3 from 2002.  Let alone MOBAs of today's market.       
 

 

[Hrodgrim]

If Hallowed Ground and Renewal had their effects combined into a single power, then they would be a good power. This would also give us room for something that could truly be useful. You're not wrong about Hallowed Ground not doing anything. It's only forced on us to have various buffs that only serve to make the receiving powers on par with other similar powers. Frost's Avalanche is a more effective version of Reckoning, Nezha's Fire Walker is a more effective version of Hallowed Ground.

[Rawbeard]

10 minutes ago, Casval_Rouge said:

You can't force synergy within a warframe's kit by just adding additional bonuses to each power when used in conjunction to another.

but this is exactly what they did, so I guess they can...

[(PSN)robotwars7]

6 minutes ago, Rawbeard said:

but this is exactly what they did, so I guess they can...

to paraphrase an iconic Jurassic Park quote, "they spent so long figuring out if they could, they didn't stop to think if they should"..

[Dreadwire]

I think DE need to define what oberon is.

he is not a great healer and not a great buffer or support.

i wonder if the new priest wf would suffer the same fate

[Soulden]

Saryn and Mag say hi

[SenorClipClop]

Not to nitpick, but....

Synergy: the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.

Call it what you want, but if one power and another power combine efforts to produce something stronger, that is by definition synergy. Yes, some Warframes can feel a bit flowchart-y with the effects they apply, but even so it discourages some of us from just spamming the one power that's least balanced and nothing else.

[Chipputer]

Considering all you need to do is use the powers as normal and if you happen to be standing on Hallowed Ground you get some special effects, I don't see exactly why that isn't synergy.

[Hrodgrim]

1 minute ago, SenorClipClop said:

Not to nitpick, but....

Synergy: the interaction or cooperation of two or more organizations, substances, or other agents to produce a combined effect greater than the sum of their separate effects.

Call it what you want, but if one power and another power combine efforts to produce something stronger, that is by definition synergy. Yes, some Warframes can feel a bit flowchart-y with the effects they apply, but even so it discourages some of us from just spamming the one power that's least balanced and nothing else.

This is grasping for straws. Just because we're criticizing Oberon does not mean we don't appreciate the work going into him. We just want him to really shine and stick out like almost all other frames do (with the exceptions of Zephyr and Volt to a minor extent). Currently these powers, though they do work together, are not synergy. They're one pretty good power spread across two buttons and a hefty energy cost.

[Doomsknightmare]

3 hours ago, (PS4)robotwars7 said:

to paraphrase an iconic Jurassic Park quote, "they spent so long figuring out if they could, they didn't stop to think if they should"..

That's a precise quote and I hope now DE has learned the lesson. DE, U R NO GOD.

[Rekkou]

Agreed, if Hallowed Ground give you armor and Renewal give you healing, isn't using both of them at the same time already becomes survival synergy? why they have to remove the armor buff from hallowed ground just to add it as "synergy" with renewal? That's like splitting the ending of your first movie and then attach it to a sequel to force people watch both of them.