[Update 21.4.0] Hydroid Revisited Feedback

[FXEvolution]

First impressions of Hydroid revisit:

Passive: It doesn't synergize with the rest of his kit. Having the passive be a 50% to spawn a tentacle on kill or something something similar would work better for his kit as a whole.

Tempest Barrage: It's alright. Hitting enemies in Undertow doesn't help too much considering Undertow is dealing Finisher Damage while the barrage deals Impact. Maybe having it so that Tempest barrage deals Finisher Damage to enemies in Undertow.

Tidal Surge: Once again, a fine ability. It's function with undertow works well and the mobility it gives is great. Same as before, while you're in undertow, Tidal surge deals Finisher damage to compensate the range decrease.

Undertow: So I can live with the range decrease; I really can. However, if you're going to decrease the range, actually make the ability good. Moving around in Undertow is a downside to the ability because enemies won't stay in your undertow if you move away, whether by moving slowly away, or by use of Tidal Surge. Enemies that are in undertow should stay in the undertow. Edit: Another thing, why is Undertow's movement speed so slooooow!? I understand it's to try and make players to use Tidal Surge to move around, but this is slower than Ivara's walking speed on her 3, except Ivara has the bonus of being able to roll, use parkour, use weapons, make the team invisible, deal high amounts of damage with her 4; do I need to continue?

Tentacle Swarm: Again with the range nerf... why? I know that having the tentacles close together is a bonus to some people, but why does using more energy bring the range up to less than half of the original base range? Edit: Turns out the energy cost was changed to 50 at base and 100 at charged. My point still stands that the range is less fully charged than it was previously. (Which was 18m originally for those who don't know.) To reiterate, if you're going to nerf the range, make the ability better as a whole. For starter's, from what I could tell from my testing, Tentacles won't hit enemies that are in the Undertow. Having it so that, like tempest barrage, nearby tentacles would deal finisher damage to enemies in undertow would make the abilities synergize together more.

Overall: He still needs more work. Synergy wise, I like how he plays a lot more, but from a practical standpoint, his abilities feel unfinished, with some of them getting nerfed for no reason other than DE doesn't like laziness or looting. This is what exactly what happened with the Oberon Rework as well; being afraid something will be too good and releasing something disappointing. Hydroid was a less than stellar warframe before the revisit, so I believe he deserves better. I hope there will be more changes added in the very near future, DE.

Edited August 11, 2017 by FXEvolution
To add more of my thoughts after more play-testing

[Aelurus]

I suggest Undertow to only partially submerge enemies, with water still encasing them to make them look that they are still drowning. This way teammates can still shoot at enemies sucked in Hydroid's undertow. Right now, Hydroid can still hold tanky enemies provided he has enough energy and prolong missions.

[Aleximoose]

The only problem I have is the kraken that was added and the tentacles, I feel the creature itself should be more animated and more of it should be exposed, it should also have its own attack animation for any enemy that gets close, also the Tentacles could look like actual tentacles with suction cups and such, the colours of them and the Kraken should copy Hydroids colour scheme other than that great work, he may be my new favourite (Maybe a passive change would make him even better).

[FoxFX]

UPSIDES FOR HYDROID'S NEW TEMPEST BARRAGE AND TENTACLE SWARM

• Great synergy with both abilities and Undertow
  • Tempest Barrage can now damage trapped enemies in Undertow
  • Tentacle Swarm clusters within Undertow's range
• The Ability Charge Mechanic shows a new take in trying to make some abilities stronger by "charging" up the attack

 

DOWNSIDE FOR HYDROID'S NEW TEMPEST BARRAGE AND TENTACLE SWARM

The Charge mechanic introduced for Hydroid forces players to focus their attention on charging the ability and could slow down their gameplay as well as leave them relatively open to any attack. Warframe's greatest selling point is the fast-pace and mobility the Warframes have. The hold mechanic of Tempest Barrage and Tentacle Swarm seems to counteract the fast-paced action Warframe has to offer.

 

SUGGESTION FOR HYDROID'S NEW TEMPEST BARRAGE AND TENTACLE SWARM

 

I would suggest turning both Tentacle Swarm and Tempest Barrage into toggle attacks:

• Players will simply need to tap the ability once to "prepare" Tempest Barrage/Tentacle Swarm and starting the toggle
• While activated, it will charge up Temepst Barrage/Tentacle Swarm for each second the user holds onto the ability
• Activating the ability again will release the attack
• This is similar to how Ash's Bladestorm rework, but in this scenario, the ability charges up in damage/range/# of tentacles the longer the user toggles on the ability
• UPSIDE TO THIS SUGGESTION: This allows Hydroid users to just tap the ability to charge up so they have more freedom to move and attack enemies much like how Ash's Bladestorm favors mobility for Ash

 

ADDITIONAL SUGGESTIONS

TENTACLE SWARM

• I would personally prefer Tentacle Swarm NOT grabbing enemies and slamming them but instead of slamming the ground and knocking down enemies it hits. This would allow the full effect of Pilfering Swarm to mean something a bit more
• A NEW INCENTIVE TO USE TENTACLE SWARM WITH UNDERTOW: Make casting Tentacle Swarm with Undertow act as an AOE grabbing enemies dragging them into Undertow but it would grab at a farther range and the pull could deal some damage. This might be affect by the charge mechanic in some way.

UNDERTOW

• Volt has a passive that allows him to gain extra Electric damage for the next attack he does, perhaps there can be a similar route with Hydroid and Undertow:
  • Make Hydroid gain some stacking buff (with a maximum) the longer Hydroid stays in Undertow. The buff is consumed upon casting Tentacle Swarm or Tempest Barrage increasing the damage it would deal or some other effect

ENEMIES KILLED IN UNDERTOW GRANT HYDROID ENERGY

Edited August 11, 2017 by FoxFX

[Azamagon]

1 minute ago, chainchompguy3 said:

While it's not too significant nor enforced, Hydroid is generally seen as a CC frame: he may very well be intended to have no significant sources of damage, in lieu of having all 4 of his abilities be significant CC.

 

Also, as far as I am aware, barrages are more meant as a means of Suppressive fire, rather than a damaging attack. If you want to eliminate an enemy, you make careful and precise strike. Barrages are generally for making aggressive oppentent go on the defensive, as you are pretty much guaranteed to land at least a few hits in the barrage. Not to mention that if they try to come closer during the barrage, they risk turning it into a shotgun-assault for themselves.

 

...actually, that last bit there would be interesting to see on hydroid. Having it so that, say, the explosions have a significantly increased chance of occurring around hydroid's position, if in radius. Enemies that come closer get more punishment, thus ensuring more survivability for our wee little pirate-frame.

While all his abilities have CC, it's important to not have too much overlapping, as that causes kit redundancy. What's the point of 4 different CC's if they don't do SOMETHING different as well?

Tidal Surge is CC, but it also gives mobility, collects enemies in front of you and gives you brief damage immunity. So Tidal Surge feels different.
Undertow is CC, with slowly scaling damage, and grants invulnerability. So Undertow feels different.

But Tempest Barrage and Tentacle Swarm though, they both hurt and CC at range in an area. Differentiating their niches, to reduce overlap, thus seems like a good idea. Making Tempest Barrage more focused on damage and Tentacle Swarm focused on steadying CC seems like a good direction to me (as that even makes the abilities complement one another).

And yeah, while a barrage is generally more suppressive, it can also be looked upon as artillery fire. And artillery fire isn't exactly weaksauce. That was what I meant with it fitting as the highly damaging attack.

[TheGrimCorsair]

Nah. None of this is needed, though they do need to look at how the game registers inputs for Tempest Barrage as is, given that the game does seem to pick up inputs if you press-release-press to charge up another cast of Barrage. Dunno if the same happens with Tentacles.

[TheGrimCorsair]

Tempest Barrage is quick and low duration while Tentacle Swarm is slow to cast with a high duration. They're sufficiently different to both have a place in Hydroid's kit.

[FoxFX]

Added new bullet point:

 

A NEW INCENTIVE TO USE TENTACLE SWARM WITH UNDERTOW: Make casting Tentacle Swarm with Undertow act as an AOE grabbing enemies dragging them into Undertow but it would grab at a farther range and the pull could deal some damage. This might be affect by the charge mechanic in some way.

[Achievement-get]

If Hydroid's 4 is active while he's in Undertow, and is deactivated, any enemies that are grabbed by tentacles within the puddle should be dragged down into the puddle.

[Azamagon]

14 minutes ago, TheGrimCorsair said:

Tempest Barrage is quick and low duration while Tentacle Swarm is slow to cast with a high duration. They're sufficiently different to both have a place in Hydroid's kit.

While Tentacle Swarm is a bit slower to cast, Tempest Barrage has a delay before it starts taking effect. This, in essence, makes them about the same in the "winding up" department.

Tentacle Swarm, however, has a huge advantage in that, once it is cast, it's instantly at the ready with multiple tentacles all over the place. Tempest Barrage is much worse in that regard, since it only affects small areas here and there, in small instances. It's not nearly as "lingering" as Tentacle Swarm is.

Both are now also castable while moving (onehanded), although this could be prevented in the past anyway by aim-glide casting Tentacle Swarm.

In essence; Tentacles Swarm is VASTLY superior.
Tempest Barrage's augment is the ONLY thing that makes it do something worthwhile. Something which only works against 2 factions and which doesn't synergize with Tentacle Swarm either (since it mostly deals Finisher damage).

They need to be more different, imo.

Edited August 11, 2017 by Azamagon

[EchoesOfRain]

So with the new Hydroid Revisit, I've noticed that the flailing of the enemies has not been changed on Tentacle Swarm, which has always been a huge issues. Tentacle Swarms new little Kraken buddy gave me an idea for a way to rework Tentacle Swarm a bit to become more reliable

 

Undertow: Remove the invulnerability, but prevent Hydroid from picking up any enemy aggro at all. Put Curative Undertow on at base, and let Pilfering Swarm affect enemies that  have been snatched manually into Undertow  and die under its effects(to make room for a new Tentacle Swarm augment). 

Tentacle Swarm. Casting the skill uncharged acts as current, spawning tentacles that swipe at enemies, but instead of flailing them around they drag enemies into the Kraken's own Undertow. Enemies will take increasing damage over time while in Undertow, but if players shoot at the kraken head the damage is spread out throughout all of the enemies within both the Kraken's undertow., and Hydroid's. If Hydroid charges Tentacle Swarm, the same amount of tentacles are stationary within the same area, but the extra tentacles now follow the Kraken, who now moves around with its own AI. New augment; Enraged Tentacle Swarm. The Kraken head now taunts enemies to shoot at it. If enough damage is done to it by enemies, it becomes enraged and moves more quickly, while also swiping its tentacles at a higher rate, for a certain amount of time.

Also, allow range mods to increase the length of the Tentacles to compensate for being more spread out

[ThymeL0rd]

Haven't played him extensively yet so more technique and art feedback as opposed to how he plays.

I've found in a small room with a lot of enemies casting tentacle swarm makes it difficult to move around the room, whether it is due to the failing tentacles or the bodies I am not sure.

 

Also a little disappointed from an art viewpoint: The Kraken is awfully cool looking but all he does is sink away after a few seconds; even if he could sit and roar for the duration that would be cool. It would also be nice if the artstyle of the tentacles matched the Kraken. I know Oberon's hallowed ground visuals were updated after the rework to have the grass and ferns so here's hoping they will do similar to Tentacle Swarm?

 

Edit: How come all videos I see they have cool transparent tentacles but mine are white and an eyesore?? Which option do I not have enabled? Also, why does Tidal Surge Still lose all momentum upon hitting anything taller than a threshcone, its annoying as heck

 

Thanks for the Update though,Hydroid plays much more nicely, even if not perfect. :)

Edited August 11, 2017 by ThymeL0rd

[Shadedraxe]

1 hour ago, Chipputer said:

But Hydroid isn't bad. He's never been bad. He's just been a relic of older thoughts on how to balance the game, as a whole, and a little too heavy on the RNG for most people.

This post sounds like the reaction people had to Oberon's rework even though Oberon mains were reporting massive increases in their efficiency within their squads (which only got better when DE improved him based on the feedback presented).

You have to quit thinking that a frame that doesn't see much use is bad. If that were appropriate logic then Banshee would be considered a bad frame.

I didn't think hydroid was bad. I liked him a lot. I was optimistic when I read the simple additions to the rework. But then I found out they nerfed his range drastically and made him such an energy hungry frame. Currently He's not that good. Undertow's synergy was a great idea. It's fun to use until you run out of energy. Not everyone with access to earth has the mods or the zenurik passive that makes his whole kit worth using. A really poorly implemented rework. He needs further tweaks (you know, like Oberon did, which was a frame I also liked before and now like even more after the rework). The point of the other post was that frames shouldn't strive to be either fun or good, BUT BOTH!!!

Edited August 11, 2017 by Shadedraxe

[tnccs215]

7 hours ago, tnccs215 said:

[EDIT 2]: Played a lot more with him. Although his CC and low-mid level damage both improved, we still face two issues:

1 - With Tentacle swarm having a minimum cost equal to Tempest Barrage's maximum cost, the already present redundancy between these two abilities was not only left unfixed, but was indeed aggravated. Truth is, being both abilities RNG- based CC abilities with non-scaling damage capabilities, the similarities are still too much for us not to simply use the best of the two (i.e. Tentacle Swarm) all the time. It is true that Tempest Barrage can be casted in several places simultaneously.... however, it's base duration is also so small one's probably better off simply recasting tentacle swarm. We need something to differentiate these two abilities further if we want both to be useful.

2 - he has borderline no damage scaling. Taking into account how unreliable his CC is by design, and the existence of various damage bonus and interactions between all abilities, it stands to reason that Hydroid is probably both meant to damage and CC in good amounts - and therefore that he should get a buff to his scaling damage.

With these things in mind, I think that making Tempest Barrage deal base damage + % enemy health is a good solution for both issues. On one hand, it differentiates Tentacle Swarm from Tempest Barrage: where one has superior CC and finisher type damage, the other has scaling damage capabilities. On the other, it grants Hydroid exactly what he lacks: scaling damage.

This is my take on it, at least.

 

Edited my post on the fifth page. quoting for visibility.

[PsiWarp]

I noticed that tentacles (particularly after casting a charged 4) sometimes don't move. It's probably for performance and may have something to do with enemy detection, but this is a golden opportunity to make Tentacle Swarm less annoying and actually helpful to a precision-reliant team.

Suggested change: when players are looking directly at tentacles, tentacles will not move if they are holding enemies captive. They will still do damage over time, but they won't be flailing around, so that players can actually shoot those enemies glued to them.

It's like Anti-Matter Drop with its "look at it to slow it down" feature. It would go a long way to making Hydroid less random and more reliable as a CC teammate.

[tnccs215]

17 minutes ago, Azamagon said:

While Tentacle Swarm is a bit slower to cast, Tempest Barrage has a delay before it starts taking effect. This, in essence, makes them about the same in the "winding up" department.

Tentacle Swarm, however, has a huge advantage in that, once it is cast, it's instantly at the ready with multiple tentacles all over the place. Tempest Barrage is much worse in that regard, since it only affects small areas here and there, in small instances. It's not nearly as "lingering" as Tentacle Swarm is.

Both are now also castable while moving (onehanded), although this could be prevented in the past anyway by aim-glide casting Tentacle Swarm.

In essence; Tentacles Swarm is VASTLY superior.
Tempest Barrage's augment is the ONLY thing that makes it do something worthwhile. Something which only works against 2 factions and which doesn't synergize with Tentacle Swarm either (since it mostly deals Finisher damage).

They need to be more different, imo.

Fully agreed. 

I wrote before, but I think it merits repeating: Hydroid also lacks any form of scaling damage - something that, judging by the fact all of his abilities only affect enemies by CC or damage dealing  (i.e. no enemy debuffing, no allied buffing, etc), he probably really needs.

Ence, killing two birds with one stone, adding damage based on current/maximum enemy health to Tempest Barrage seems like a simple, and effective, solution to both issues.

[(PSN)Tomplexthis]

1 hour ago, Chipputer said:

But Hydroid isn't bad. He's never been bad. He's just been a relic of older thoughts on how to balance the game, as a whole, and a little too heavy on the RNG for most people.

This post sounds like the reaction people had to Oberon's rework even though Oberon mains were reporting massive increases in their efficiency within their squads (which only got better when DE improved him based on the feedback presented).

You have to quit thinking that a frame that doesn't see much use is bad. If that were appropriate logic then Banshee would be considered a bad frame.

banshee... bad, lol

one of the greatest things in warframe, is the unused frames people tend to "hate"

Zephyr Hydroid, and Banshee

 

unused yes, but bad, No... just no

Shes iconic in interception

 

unused yes, but bad, No... just no

Shes iconic in interception

Zephyr for capture/exterminate/spy, and Hydroid for survival, and now Zenistar Harrow for defense

Edited August 11, 2017 by (PS4)Tomplexthis

[leadwolf1]

OK I just went to do a orkin survival in the void, Question Did you really upgrade the armor? does not seem like it. with running around and using all abilities still downed very easily. I did not puddle for I was trying to run like a mission would. A faster pace. There was another hydroid as well that went down just as fast I would like to hear if others had same response. try to run with 2 hydroids no puddleing and no running away fight as if it was a normal survival. have a total of 4  full squad. there was also a glitch that froze map and pick ups as well as stating I was 75% revived even though I was running around and playing as well as it did not reset even after going down over and over again , I could not even see my shields and health to even know when I was close to dying. I think you need to double check tankiness for higher end missions with corpus and grineer as well as void. still a farming frame and not too viable for so called end game frame

 

[(PSN)Tomplexthis]

2 minutes ago, leadwolf1 said:

OK I just went to do a orkin survival in the void, Question Did you really upgrade the armor? does not seem like it. with running around and using all abilities still downed very easily. I did not puddle for I was trying to run like a mission would. A faster pace. There was another hydroid as well that went down just as fast I would like to hear if others had same response. try to run with 2 hydroids no puddleing and no running away fight as if it was a normal survival. have a total of 4  full squad. there was also a glitch that froze map and pick ups as well as stating I was 75% revived even though I was running around and playing as well as it did not reset even after going down over and over again , I could not even see my shields and health to even know when I was close to dying. I think you need to double check tankiness for higher end missions with corpus and grineer as well as void. still a farming frame and not too viable for so called end game frame

 

this is due to the armor bug that hasny been addressed at all

regardless of armor, you get 1 shot all the time

i have the issue with chroma, oberon, rhino, and Valkyr Prime

theres just something not working right with armor damage reductions, it needs overhauled

Spoiler

there is definetly something wrong with the armor/damage system

 

 

Edited August 11, 2017 by (PS4)Tomplexthis

[TigranZ]

I can safely say as someone who has stuck with Hydroid for a long time now, that his rework does feel a lot less clunky than he was before. However that being said, he does still suffer from severe damage drop-off after getting to the mid/high tier enemies. So some overall damage scaling could do with a bit of love just to bring him up to speed ready for his prime release (whenever that may be).

The only other thing that really bugs me is that from the picture we got teased of seeing the Kraken (which personally I was hyped for), seeing him only appearing for a few seconds before just sinking back into the depths without really doing anything was quite disappointing. Either him/her/it (depends what you name it really) sticking around until the duration ends or just overall being more included in how Hydroid's 4th ability actually works would be a huge improvement imo.

Overall though the rework gave much more mechanical synergies to his kit, even if not an awful lot was changed despite it being so close to the chest until its release.

[Prince-of-Space]

While I think this rework is a good upgrade over the old Hydroid, I feel like its not enough to get people to play him.

Limbo's rework and Oberon's rework both addressed the biggest complaints about the 'frames - Limbo's was that his whole kit was far too much micromanagement without payoff, and Oberon's was that he just couldn't compare to Trinity. Giving Limbo far more enjoyment out of his micromanagement while allowing him to duck in and out of the Rift at whim, and giving Oberon his own utility that Trinity couldn't provide both gave these characters new life and made them more played.

Hydroid's rework does not address his main issue - that, in my opinion, and from what I've seen others saying, is that his damage and his crowd control is far too random and inconsistent.

While the charge up mechanic is unique and interesting, you are 'stuck' in charging up for a couple of seconds, meaning that your general dps goes down. And, even with 170% range, the area of effect is not worth the 95 energy it cost to summon at max charge (at 105% efficiency - more efficiency would make this better, but not by much). 

The Undertow and Tidal Surge changes are really nice, but Undertow isn't really Hydroid's bread-and-butter, so while its really nice that he has so much synergy with his other abilities while using it, its... Not really what he wants to be using all the time, especially given the energy costs. And given the fact that, while Hydroid is dealing damage to them per second, and Tempest Barrage can also hit them inside the Undertow now, it does effectively make the enemy invulnerable, leading to a Limbo-Nyx situation where Hydroid can just hold enemies for as long as he likes to frustrate other players, especially when playing a Defence map. 

Additionally, Hydroid's passive was untouched, which is almost completely useless - I run with a Jat Kittag with Shattering Storm, which allows me to summon passive tentacles at the end of my RMB combo, but by the time I actually summon a passive tentacle, the thing I'm attacking is typically already dead. From what we've seen with other Warframe passives, frames with stronger straight up abilities tend to have weaker passives (Mesa, Frost, Ember), while frames with weaker abilities tend to have stronger passives (Nyx, Inaros, Harrow) (please keep in mind when I say stronger and weaker abilities, I mean, almost completely, in terms of damage output, rather than usability). 

Hydroid fits the first category, weak passive, higher damage - but Mesa's Peacemaker, Frost's Avalanche, or Ember's... Everything will hit everything within range for just straight damage. And here we come back to the original issue of Hydroid's DPS - its too random, too inconsistent for viable dps-ing, unlike Mesa's Peacemaker (everything within range dies instantly) or Ember's World on Fire (everything within range will be consistently and repetitively damaged over time). 

I decided to test this by doing 10 waves on Orokin Derelict Defence, trying purely to use Tempest Barrage and Tentacle Swarm. While I had no issues with getting through all 10 with ease, I was frustrated at the slow speed it took for tentacles to kill larger units like Ancients, Boilers and Broodmothers, as well as having the frustration of tentacles spawning in places that were inconvenient for defending the defence point. Tentacles would last an entire wave, so duration was fine - but depending on where they spawn from, there were still many, many enemies coming through to actually hit the point. And these are purely melee units - imagine trying to do this against Grineer, or worst yet, Corpus with their Nullifiers. I also got grabbed off my feet many, many times, despite having my Tempest Barrage active - the CC was far too inconsistent to be useful. And the worst part is, as anyone who has played with a Hydroid would know, when a tentacle takes so long to kill an Ancient (especially an Eximus, which you want to kill asap), the flailing tentacle makes it hard to get a good shot off on them, meaning they're just sapping at your energy or health that little bit longer. 

The biggest issue about all this is that I just tested all this out on the new Hydroid. And yet, I'm still having the exact same complaints about the new Hydroid as I was having about the old Hydroid (also keep in mind, Hydroid was not a flash-in-the-pan Warframe for me - he is still currently sitting at the top of my Most Used Warframe at 25.4%, with Mesa, my main Warframe, trailing behind at 17.7%, despite the fact I do not use Hydroid, like, at all anymore). 

(also in case anyone wants to be like "Well you must be a newbie if your most used frame is Hydroid of all things)

All in all - these changes are nice and really needed, but they do not fix Hydroid's core problems as a Warframe, and these changes will not make him more played.

Edited August 11, 2017 by Prince-of-Space
added more evidence

[Sabre7]

As it stands, his core problems remain.

- He still lacks reliable cc. His 1 and 4 rely a lot on RNG, and that can make it not only frustrating to use, but also ineffective very often. We never want to rely on rng for cc, as we use cc to make up for our squishiness, especially against sortie + level enemies.

- He has no form of incoming damage reduction to make up for his unreliable cc

- His 4th often causes more harm than good, as it randomly flails enemies around, making it harder for the entire team to kill enemies, and overall reducing kills per second, as they do low damage on their own.

- He has no form of scaling damage

- He has little group utility (other frames can provide better results with less effort, and more consistently, in a wider variety of mission types)

- Trying to actually combo his skills together is a huge drain on his energy pool, especially when his '3' does not even allow for energy regen.

(Sidenote: People say his pilfering swarm is a nice augment, but I'd argue he doesn't really even have that going for him, as pilfering swarm really slows down kills per second which indirectly probably reduces drops more than pilfering swarm provides...)

And while I would appreciate a complete rework much more, I can understand that DE may not want to spend so much of their resources on a rework with so much content coming down the pipeline. That being said, I think they can still do a lot more with Hydroid's current ability kit without having to scrap everything.

 

These are some ideas:

Passive: Hydroid can regen. energy while toggled abilities are active. While Hydroid has an active toggle ability, his energy regen is increased by 1.5x (I realize DE once mentioned in their design philosophy that passives are more meant to add flavor than to actually necessarily be a viable and helpful ability, but I don't feel like spawning a single tentacle from smash attacks is really adding much flavor and it really feels out of place in his kit anyway)

1) Tempest Barrage: When tempest barrage is charged, it gains a bonus utility that increases Hydroid's armor by an amount based on the number of enemies hit (or he gains armor by a % of the enemies hit).

                Augment: When barrages hit an enemy, the water ball explodes, dealing a percent of its dmg as aoe to another enemies, and proc status effects (similar to gas procs). and change it to shred armor instead of just corrosive proc.

2) Tidal Surge: Hydroid drags enemies with him along the current, and can cancel this ability into his 3rd during its animation. Collision with enemies in tidal surge regen. energy.

3) Undertow: Each enemy caught inside undertow provides a small amount of energy regen.

4) Tentacle Swarm: Leave its current behavior casted outside of undertow alone, I guess. But, when casted while undertow is active, its behaviour changes. Tentacles burst out of undertow in an aoe and grab the nearest enemies. Charging the ability increases the range of the pull, number of enemies pulled, and makes the tentacles harden, slowly constricting enemies caught by the neck, and exposing them for easy headshots. The tentacles will stop flailing. Then, enemies will be pulled into the undertow and submerged. Cancelling undertow will reveal enemies still caught in the kraken tentacles, held in place.

With this kind of kit design, a synergistic combo can be achieved. Cast 3 --> Charge 4 --> Cancel 3 --> Cast 1 on tightly bound enemies to strip armor. Here's a diagram I drew up to kind of explain:

 

Having a kit like this would provide a lot more synergy between his skills, and effectively solve a lot of his current annoyances. Problems solved:

- His 1 would be a lot more consistent when its hitting a small area with enemies clustered nicely by his 4, allowing for good armor shredding. Giving him bonus armor buff on charged 1's would also address his squishiness issue, which lets him actually utilize the charging mechanic without having to worry as much about dying.

- His 2 would continue offering mobility, but at a reduced cost, or even heal his energy, because he essentially needs to combo his skills now. He also seems like a caster frame more than ever with the current rework. Additionally, it keeps in theme with water and being fluid, in that it can cancel into 3.

- His 3 is now a good skill to restore energy so he can cast his other abilities more frequently. There is actually a good reason to cast his 4 when inside undertow now, with the behaviour change in this state.

- He now has scaling cc and utility, allowing him to provide some degree of value in any mission, even when his damage gets outscaled. Charging it also removes the annoying flailing that often causes more harm than good, and it exposes enemies to headshots, which is a boon to the entire team.

- These changes actually recycle mechanics that have already been implemented across other frames in the game, so it seems like something they can pull off with relatively less effort than a full rework.

Edited August 11, 2017 by Sabre7

[Xiusa]

Was really under the impression that his Tentacle Swarm would summon a pet that would do something more interesting than what it already does. Instead it's just a visual addition to the ability and offers nothing of value; it literally sits there then sinks away

[RandomQuestions]

 

[Ventura_Highway]

Your title sounds like one for a light novel.