Enemy defenses, procs and certain augments/abilities.

[Azamagon]

So, in this thread here -> https://forums.warframe.com/topic/815138-theres-hope-for-mag/ I had some ideas for Mag which inspired some bigger ideas of change, for the game in general. Let's just dig right in:

Enemy defenses:

Grineer have armor. Corpus have shields. Infested have ... nothing.
So, I had an idea for a new "defense" mechanism for Infested, which I call Carapace (this addition will come to some other nerfs for infested, more to that later)

Carapace is like a hybrid of shields and armor:
Like shields, it is a seperate "health"-layer, which is ablative but also regenerates if not hurt for a while.
Like armor, it reduces damage taken to real health.
Unique to Carapace; It is hurt AT THE SAME TIME as real health (similar to armor in many older games, like Doom and such). Further this defense is entirely circumventable by attacking in different areas of their body. Carapace only exists on ONE part of each infested unit. For example (just hypothetical examples):
Chargers' Carapace area is their shieldlike neck. All Runners' and Crawlers' Caparace area could be on the torso (Dead Space vibes: Attack their limbs and heads!). Ancients' Carapace could be their entire frontside, except for their head (giving them a reason to have such slow turnrates too). Stuff like that.

Something along those lines, so all factions have their own unique "defense".

EDIT: However, this alone would make Infested quite the chore to deal with. So, some counternerfs would occur:
* General amount of health would be lowered.
* The Ancient's auras would all be less powerful: Healer+Disruptor auras are reduced from 90% to 75% reduction, and the Toxic ancient's no longer provides the defensive aura (the resistance to Toxic and Gas damage), it only provides its offensive part of the aura now.
* Ancient's hooks could potentially be removed entirely.

Armor-reducing abilities and augments:

This one will be short and simple; Any ability or augment which currently reduces armor (like Avalanche, Fracturing Crush, Sonic Fracture, Seeking Shuriken etc) would now also lower enemy Shields and Carapace, so these abilities and augments don't feel so factionspecific, but rather useable as general debuffing tools. Armor would probably still be what these debuffs are the most effective against, but CAN now be used anywhere.

Status procs (and some damage resistances):

Certain procs are WAY too faction specific, or simply not very useful in the grand scheme of things. So, here's some thoughts towards that:

Physical types:

• Impact - Proc is honestly fine, its CC should never be neglected. Resistances though, could be better. It could be MUCH better against all Corpus units, for one.
• Slash - Is fine, but I think some tiny utility on it would be neat. Like, enemies suffering slash-procs appear on your radar (you track their bleeding)?
• Puncture - Resistances are fine for Puncture, but the Proc is not very good. My thought here was; If Slash is mainly offensive, and Impact is mainly defensive, why not let Puncture be something in between? So, keep the current effect it has (enemies deal 30% less damage, stack multiplicatively) but ALSO make it so the enemy suffers 30% more damage taken, this bonus being dealt as Puncture damage (so it's damagebonus works best against armored enemies), also possibly stacking multiplicatively with itself.

In short:
* Impact could be better damagewise (all Corpus layers?)
* Slash gets tiny utility (enemy radar)
* Puncture gets added utility (damage amp, best against armor)

Singular elements:

• Heat - Good all around. Inability to stack the DoT is a bit annoying though (Won't remove that though, I think Heat-characters should have ways to circumvent that in other ways, so that's a different thread all together)
• Cold - Also good all around.
• Toxic - Quite good, but could need some utility. Poisons tends to actually have lots of utility (like slowdown, reduce damage dealt etc, but those are all used already. Can anyone think of something unique, yet fitting? That'd be really helpful here!)
• Electric - Proc is good, for CC at least. But the damage and resistances leaves MUCH to be desired. It could, for example, be VERY strong against both Grineer and Corpus flesh (like up to +50%-ish strong) and a bit less harshly penalized against Alloy Armor (say, only -25%).

In short:
* Electric needs better damagevalues
* Toxic needs some utility (not sure what yet!)

Combined elements:

• Blast - Is ok, but could get some damagebonus against shields (25%?)
• Radiation - Is fine as it is against enemies, but friendly fire for allies is... too trolly. Make it reduce player accuracy, seems more fitting imo. Gives incentive to use melee more, too.
• Gas - Is ok-ish, but should it really be so weakened against the two flesh-types? Isn't that where it makes the most sense to deal more damage? Also, it lacks utility, but solving Toxic's utility would solve the utility of Gas too. Also, its effectiveness against Infested (along with Toxic damage) is HIGHLY hampered by Toxic Ancients. Imo, Toxic Ancients should only provide its current offensive part of its aura, but not the defensive part, so this element is more viable against the Infested.
• Viral - Is great as it is (considering it pretty much means a 100% damage-amp against health for the duration).
• Corrosive - A good element, but is far too pidgeonholed against armor.
  To make it useful against any faction - A unit procced by Corrosive now also causes an instant small AoE-splash of acid, which increases all damage taken by 15% for 6 seconds on all affected units. This is NOT stackable, it simply refreshes if it gets reapplied on the same unit.
  Further, similar to Armor, Carapace is also permanently reduced a chunk by Corrosive procs (making its effect fit with the Ancient's weakness to it)
• Magnetic - This one has multiple problems; Its proc only works against one (and a half, if you count Corrupted) faction, and its damagevalues are too bad (it kind of goes against its proc, in a way too). Further, it is absolutely disgustingly overpowered against players, due to the 100% energywiping.
  I'd start by making it generally useful against enemies: On top of its current effects, Magnetic procs will also disallow enemies to use any special abilities or auras, and will briefly immobilize enemies (2 seconds?), while also slowing down the movement of other enemies that get near it. Note that the immobilization still allows them to fight, but they can't move around by themselves.
  Damagevalues need to be better too: Make it stronger against Robotics, Ferrite Armor and Machinery (we could use some durable Grineer Machinery enemies btw) and less harshly penalized against Alloy Armor.
  Lastly: Only make it half a player's energy, and disallow Energy orb pickups (so we can't waste them) while the debuff is active. The immobilization effect would NOT affect players though.

In short:
* Blast gets stronger against shields
* Gas remains as is, but Toxic Ancients no longer defend against Gas and Toxic damage (indirect buff)
* Radiation no longer procs friendly fire on players, it procs reduced accuracy instead
* Corrosive also procs a weak and temporary AoE damage-amp, and now permanently reduces Carapace too (just like Armor)
* Magnetic no longer removes all energy on players (just halves it), and now also disallows enemies to use abilities+auras and briefly immobilizes them while also slowing down the movement of enemies that get near the Magnetized target (shieldreduction effect remains as is, for both enemies and players). Also, generally better damage against Robots/Machines/Ferrite and less penalty against Alloy.

By doing these changes, you'd see much more variety in what elements are brought to the various factions too. Underused elements like:
Blast+Toxic - This would be even more against Corpus
Magnetic+Heat - This would an interesting and powerful CC-combo against Infested
 

It's getting late here and I'm probably being too rambly now, so I'll stop here.
Thoughts and opinions?

 

Edited July 10, 2017 by Azamagon

[Diarmut]

What the infested lack in strength, they more than make up for in numbers, ancients with damage nullifying auras, and a slew of others things to break the tempo of any Tenno, I believe that the infested are currently pretty strong by all means, and don't need any extra stuff.

[(PSN)theelix]

Why would you add more survivability to infested? 

They already get damage buff from random juggernaut that never goes away. They get armor as well as CC from moa clouds on top of Ancient's damage reduction and disruptors utility buff and toxin's pure damage + ignore shields buff. 

They're potato faction for completely different reasons. 

[Azamagon]

9 minutes ago, Diarmut said:

What the infested lack in strength, they more than make up for in numbers, ancients with damage nullifying auras, and a slew of others things to break the tempo of any Tenno, I believe that the infested are currently pretty strong by all means, and don't need any extra stuff.

Ah, of course I forgot to mention this part: This should probably come with some alteration on their other strengths; Their main health might be reduced a bit to compensate for the addition of Carapace, and the Ancient's auras could stand to be less powerful (Like: Toxic Ancient's no longer has the Toxic+Gas resistance, and the Healer+Disruptor's defensive auras would be reduced from 90% to 75%). So, it's a nerf+buff for the Infested, all while giving the players more options to tackle them.

EDIT: I'll edit the OP to clarify this!

Edited July 10, 2017 by Azamagon

[Aeon94]

I think some of status procs should be like ; 

• Radiation - Weakens enemies and reduces their damage by 15% ( stacks 3 times ) for 8 sec.
  • or Radiation stays as it is and Toxin gets this effect.
• Puncture - Causes affected enemies to take 20% more damage for 5 sec and next attack / hit after proc has 10% chance to ignore armor.
• Magnetic - Disables Eximus auras and jams enemies' weapons for 2 sec. ( or immobilizes them if they are melee units )
• Heat - Each heat proc causes enemies to take 0.3% of their missing health as bonus damage per sec for 5 sec , stacks 10 times. Damage is reduced by armor and other resistances. 
• Cold - Each cold proc slows enemies' movement and firerate / attack speed by 15% per stack for 5 sec , stacks 4 times. Enemies get frozen for 3 sec after 4th stack and lose 30% of their current armor or shield. Enemies died under frozen effect shatter and apply cold proc to nearby enemies.
• Electricity - Stuns an enemy for 6 sec and nearby enemies around him for 4 sec. Each enemy affected by electricity proc increases its damage by 5% up to 50%. It also has 1% chance to insta-kill non-boss or non-elite enemies. ( Elite enemies are Stalker, Zanuka and G3 )

 

Edited July 11, 2017 by Aeon94