(Finalized) Yet another idea for ember--simple ideas, using existing assets; allows ember to scale w/o OP-ness

[Maka.Bones]

This is a compilation of the very best, and most practical Ideas that I've seen on the forums--or that I could come up with. Ember would be significantly better, even if only one of these ideas were implemented ingame. So I don't mean for this to be an all-inclusive re-work; it can be modular if that's the desire. But all of it can still work together, without making ember OP.

Passive:

Immolation: ~~many posts keep suggesting the increased damage/counter as a passive, so I thought i'd add it as well. Main idea was inspired by @xarvh's concept~~

• Immolation counters increase her power str by 2%, and efficiency by 0.5%, and decay at a rate of 4/s, after 5 seconds that another counter hasn't been acquired. 
• Each time she kills an enemy with a fire-source she gets 2 counters. If she procs heat on enemies, she gets 1 

Or

*Thermal Shock: Heat damage caused by ember's abilities, make enemy armor less effective. ~~Thermal shock is a real thing in physics, not only applicable to pottery~~

• This would let ember's abilities scale better against high-armor targets, without making her completely ignore/destroy the enemy armor.

. It could be done in one of the following ways:

1. Allow ember's abilities to damage enemy armor, like it's another HP bar. So if an attack would deal 2k hp damage, but it only dealt 200 hp damage--because of the armor absorbing the damage. It would also subtract (15% of 1,800= 270--the damage absorbed by the armor) 270, from the enemy's total armor. (similar to shattering impact)
2. Allow ember's abilities to remove armor, like shattering impact does. (again, thanks to @silentwarrior8902)
3. Each heat proc, can also produces a corrosive proc.
4. Flat out ignoring 15% of enemy armor. (My least favorite option, but maybe easiest to implement)

 

~Trivia~ Thermal shock IRL: 

Spoiler

Thermal shock occurs when an object is rapidly cooled from high temperature. The surface layers contract against the inner layers, leading to the development of tensile stress and the propagation of cracks.  https://www.britannica.com/technology/refractory#ref609258

If room temp is 23deg C, and ember's heat abilities are 2,800 degrees C (average temperature of oxygen when it ignites), then the room temperature would be applying a constant cooling effect to anything ember has attacked. Armor that has withstood damage from ember, would then become less effective. 

 

Article of damage to industrial components, caused by thermal shock: http://www.powermag.com/focus-on-om-october-2007/?pagenum=2

 

*1) Fireball: most suggestions i've read, still agree that her new fireball--is awesome, but--needs more *cowbell* 

Suggestions for fireball, & augments:

Spoiler

• Allow fireball to benefit from primary, or secondary weapon mods. As well as a combo counter & damage multiplier for each time it lands on an enemy (like snipers have).
• Also double the napalm duration, in proportion to how long it is charged.  Increased cost of energy/s that it's charged, as long as the damage increase is exponential.

or

• or a 1.25s charge time, for the max damage/duration/cost we currently get

~~Fireball Augment~~

*Inferno: an augment that causes fireball to explode, causing the napalm to spread on enemies in a 10ft radius of the original impact. (Meaning that instead of one single napalm, it makes a few other--smaller & weaker--napalm sources, within that 10ft radius. This would help us spread it faster, if we want to use it as a CC ability)

*Fireball Frenzy: Allow the napalm to give this buff to allies, as well as ourselves.  (Thinking of @xarvh, @BigPapiPimp, and @TypeSaber. Idea credit goes both to Xarvh, and TypeSaber)

 

2) Accelerant: 

Spoiler

I would not suggest this if the first idea on this post for ember's 4) WoF, was implemented. 

• channeled accelerant, instead of "spam 2" accelerant--with Increased stun duration, if the above augment(inferno) isn't added. Would consume the same energy amount, as the previous WoF did. all the other stats would remain the same. The effects extinguish, if enemies/allies leave the aura. 

      ~~Channeled accelerant would allow us to focus on casting fireballs, instead of pressing "2" with every 3 fireballs, or every 5 seconds... whichever comes first.

• Increase the weapon damage bonus, from Flash Accelerant

 

3) Fireblast/Heatdrive: 

Spoiler

 Fireblast: 

• add DR to her fireblast zone--it can give her overheat's DR as a buff (similar concept to boeing's plasma shield; it deflects incoming attacks by displacing the air with superheated plasma).
• Increase the bonus damage to weapons, and allow it to scale with power str--atm, Ember is both the most exposed warframe when giving weapon buffs, and gives the weakest buff to weapon damage.

Or preferably, replace it with 

Heatdrive: because almost every single fire-based, superpowered character, can use fire to fly/give them propulsion. 

250 Damage - Causes guaranteed heatprocs against enemies who have accelerant on them.

• Each successful enemy hit, would give ember an overall damage multiplier.  (like landslide, but it affects all of ember's damage--not just melee)~_{Thx to @syndrex For helping me come up with this idea}

35 energy cost

20m range

Ember rapidly increases the temperature of the air behind her, causing it to give her forward propulsion. This effect staggers enemies within 10m, and makes ember invulnerable while she moves (only lasts about 0.8s, or less). Picture the "Charge" ability, from vanguards in Mass Effect... not an actual flying ability. Can be done by adopting itzal's 1st ability, or operator void dash, with an added  10m impact, or blast proc.

• or maybe just make heatdrive a timed self-buff, that works like Fire Drift; with added DR

 

*4) World on Fire: Give WoF the resonating quake treatment.

• My favorite idea for ember so far is to deplete the damage at max range, instead of decreasing the range after 10s. ( 100%damage when enemies are within melee range, and  0%damage at the range limit). It would keep ember from being used to clear lowbie content, or steal ally kills... but would allow the effective use of firequake, as a CC. This idea was from @silentwarrior8902 I wouldn't suggest the "channeled aura" accelerant, if this was implemented. 

~Other ideas are:

Spoiler

>If accelerant becomes an aura, then WoF needs to change. 

  --Change it into Ember's original WoF, but make it a single-cast heavy damage ability, which can leave behind some fire /aoe--instead of a toggled DoT that follows her.

• Either an initial burst of heavy damage--with some leftover/minor DoT, that can proc heat status & benefit from firequake. Kinda like dis (and like a better version of fireblast)

Or

• It leaves behind a timed WoF, that can proc heat status & benefit from firequake.--just change the anchor point to be ember's location, make it scale with duration, and cost slightly more energy (a larger flat energy cost, but 0/s).
• Number of active ones per map should be limited to 1, or 2 (similar to frost's snowglobe). Actually for low str, high duration builds that intend to be CC; it wouldn't be bad if the amount that can be spawned, scaled with duration (at 300 duration, they could spawn 3)

 

>If ember's accelerant isn't made into a channeled aura, but fireblast gives DR--or was changed into heatdrive--then keep WoF as it is now (range reduction + energy increase, and all)

>If neither Accelerant, nor fireblast changed, then I would suggest the "Overheat" meme--but strictly to melee range.

 

These suggestions can be implemented by using existing assets (the augment would be a new asset, but it can use existing mechanics)

Edited March 21, 2018 by Maka.Bones
Spanish is my first language, so this had to undergo a lot of editing. Still though... almost every fire-based fictional character, has a flying ability.

[chainchompguy3]

Maaaaaaaybe just make the "Flying" and "Heatdrive" thing just a boost to bullet-jump height for a duration after casting fireblast or something.

Keep it simple.

New powers are rarely simple.

[Maka.Bones]

5 minutes ago, chainchompguy3 said:

Maaaaaaaybe just make the "Flying" and "Heatdrive" thing just a boost to bullet-jump height for a duration after casting fireblast or something.

Keep it simple.

New powers are rarely simple.

 

1 hour ago, Maka.Bones said:

• or maybe just  make it a timed self-buff, that works like Fire Drift; with added DR.

Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. That's why I added the smaller bullet at the bottom. (I didn't mean it to be flying btw... more like a cannonball/charge effect)

However If WoF becomes an upgraded fireblast, then it would make fireblast redundant. So i think it would be better if it was just a self-buff, like mirage's eclipse buff. That way ember can also retain DR wherever she goes. 

Edited March 8, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[chainchompguy3]

4 minutes ago, Maka.Bones said:

 

Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. That's why I added the smaller bullet at the bottom. (I didn't mean it to be flying btw... more like a cannonball/charge effect)

However If WoF becomes an upgraded fireblast, then it would make fireblast redundant. So i think it would be better if it was just a self-buff, like mirage's eclipse buff. That way ember can also retain DR wherever she goes. 

Ah, right. Sorry. Didn't notice that little bullet point.

And you did well enough to imply that it would be a "cannon-ball/charge effect". My issue with it was Entirely that it was a new power, not that I was worried Titania was getting competition or anything.

 

As for WoF becoming better Fireblast, ehhh.

That seems like it's even more complicated, for another reason though...

You may be writing an Ember suggestion, but that doesn't make you immune to Torches and Pitchforks.

Edited March 8, 2018 by chainchompguy3

[Maka.Bones]

5 minutes ago, chainchompguy3 said:

As for WoF becoming better Fireblast, ehhh.

That seems like it's even more complicated, for another reason though...

You may be writing an Ember suggestion, but that doesn't make you immune to Torches and Pitchforks.

It would be identical to the original WoF, but timed, and it wouldn't follow ember.

For coding/visual purposes, they just need to set the "anchor" to the location where ember is standing. Also make it duration based/increase the energy cost. Should be easy to do.

Oh, and I encourage torches and pitchforks. The more feedback, the better. 

Edited March 8, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[Maka.Bones]

10 minutes ago, chainchompguy3 said:

And you did well enough to imply that it would be a "cannon-ball/charge effect". My issue with it was Entirely that it was a new power, not that I was worried Titania was getting competition or anything.

They could use the same visual effects & mechanics, as itzal's teleport. Then they could add an 8m, AoE stagger. Maybe add a little fire "splash" effect, that's purely for aesthetics.

Edited March 8, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[chainchompguy3]

8 minutes ago, Maka.Bones said:

It would be identical to the original WoF, but timed, and it wouldn't follow ember.

For coding/visual purposes, they just need to set the "anchor" to the location where ember is standing. Should be easy to do.

Oh, and I encourage torches and pitchforks. The more feedback, the better. 

Alright, alright.

If you wanna play with fire, go ahead.

 

Personally, what I've said so far is the furthest extent of my care for Ember (Completely outside of my personal playstyle.)

So I'm afraid I don't have too much constructive criticism beyond this one final note:

Thank you for not suggesting that she be made directly more tanky. I'll assume the best, and attribute this to you sharing my opinion that she should remain a fragile, "Why would I use powers for anything other than damage?!" type frame, to fill that fundamental niche.

 

So I'll bid you good luck, and take my leave.

Edited March 8, 2018 by chainchompguy3
Hopefully this activity brought this thread up in "Popularity".

[Maka.Bones]

1 minute ago, chainchompguy3 said:

So I'll bid you good luck, and take my leave.

Cheers; best of luck to you as well.

[Maka.Bones]

9 minutes ago, chainchompguy3 said:

Thank you for not suggesting that she be made directly more tanky. I'll assume the best, and attribute this to you sharing my opinion that she should remain a fragile, "Why would I use powers for anything other than damage?!" type frame, to fill that fundamental niche.

I think there are more ways to have survivability, than to just be straight-up tankier.  The idea of a glass cannon, is that they stay alive by killing the enemy faster than the enemy can attack them (follows the philosophy of Best defense, is a strong offense). Without that, the glass cannon playstyle isn't effective. 

Casters are also made survivable by having crowd controlling, or movement abilities.  I worked around those concepts.

Edited March 8, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[(PSN)Fairfied]

Any idea one of us came up with would probebly be better than what they’ve done to her.  Thanks for the good work

[Maka.Bones]

1 hour ago, (PS4)Fairfied said:

Any idea one of us came up with would probebly be better than what they’ve done to her. Thanks for the good work

Thanks for the recognition!

[BigPapiPimp]

5 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

1) Fireball:  Buff the damage increase that it gets from charging it--exponential damage increase,

Great minds think alike.

5 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

3) Fireblast: add DR to her fireblast zone--it can give her overheat's DR as a buff (similar concept to boeing's plasma shield; it deflects incoming attacks by displacing the air with superheated plasma)

I like the base of the idea, but I’m kinda of bored with flat damage mitigation, maybe we can get harrow’s or trinity’s to princess carry embers around now while they start fires.

Is everyone married to the idea of making her tangier though? What about enemies who are already on fire can have their heat dot increase based on their max health and the time they stay inside the circle? Or maybe fire damage dealt to enemies inside the circle ignore shields and armor?

plus it goes against everything I’ve learned about not standing in the fire! (But I guess embers all about that).

Edited March 9, 2018 by BigPapiPimp

[Maka.Bones]

28 minutes ago, BigPapiPimp said:

Great minds think alike.

I like the base of the idea, but I’m kinda of bored with flat damage mitigation, maybe we can get harrow’s or trinity’s to princess carry embers around now while they start fires.

Is everyone married to the idea of making her tangier though? What about enemies who are already on fire can have their heat dot increase based on their max health and the time they stay inside the circle? Or maybe fire damage dealt to enemies inside the circle ignore shields and armor?

plus it goes against everything I’ve learned about not standing in the fire! (But I guess embers all about that).

Fire already does bonus damage to flesh. It gets +50% anyway, so that's where the passive I suggested comes into play. 

 

The alternate replacement for fireblast, is my prefered choice tbh. It doesn't make ember takier, but it allows her more survival

Edited March 9, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[DeckChairVonBananaCamel]

we have valkyr with her channeled claws, ivara with a channeled bow, mesa with channeled pistols... what about channeled casting?

like instead of WoF being "oh look some explosions" and instead you put your weapons away and become Fire Lord Ozai, some sort of love child of Tim the enchanter and Goku, some sort of wicked-ass fire mage.

You'd be reduced to unarmed hand to hand melee, but all your attacks would result in streams of fire shooting out like a firebender from avatar.
Your abilities would get a big old boost to damage output as well as a great big reduction to energy usage whilst WoFing
Various normal maneuvers would leak fire as well; sliding sets fire to the ground, bullet jumping emits a fire nova ect.
And the magnitude of these bonus's would take into account equipped mods across your whole loadout, but only the heat damage ones!

[xarvh]

The changes are interesting.
I'm not sure about the details, for example, how much would Heat Drive cost? How far would it push Ember?
These are important, because if it gives invincibility, I could stay invincible for as long as I can spam it, which would have important consequences for game balance.

The main issue I see is that there is a lot of new stuff, so it might  be hard to convince DE to spend the developer-hours to implement this.

[BigPapiPimp]

13 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

Fire already does bonus damage to flesh. It gets +50% anyway, so that's where the passive I suggested comes into play. 

 

The alternate replacement for fireblast, is my prefered choice tbh. It doesn't make ember takier, but it allows her more survival

I hear ya, I just thought it would be a good addition do those of us who don’t live in a perfectly kitted world, where enemies occasionally are able to keep their armor on. 

I’d miss the bonus fire damage to weapons the ability just got if we lose it though. Even if it isn’t as fun as flying.

So long team buff ember! We hardly new ye.

Edited March 9, 2018 by BigPapiPimp

[Maka.Bones]

You can get a better weapon damage buff from flash accelerant, and it actually scales with power str. 

6 hours ago, BigPapiPimp said:

I hear ya, I just thought it would be a good addition do those of us who don’t live in a perfectly kitted world, where enemies occasionally are able to keep their armor on. 

I’d miss the bonus fire damage to weapons the ability just got if we lose it though. Even if it isn’t as fun as flying.

So long team buff ember! We hardly new ye.

You can get a better weapon damage buff from flash accelerant, which actually scales with power str. The current weapon buff really isn't that great, because it forces ember to stand in a very narrow place with no defenses, and it's a flat +50% fire damage (which if you're building for viral, or corrosive, it will actually hurt your procs)

So I don't really see the value in it 

[Maka.Bones]

In addition... if I wanted weapon buffs, then I would just play a warframe which could do that much better. Like Mirage, chroma, Nova, mesa, banshee, rhino

[Maka.Bones]

7 hours ago, xarvh said:

The changes are interesting.
I'm not sure about the details, for example, how much would Heat Drive cost? How far would it push Ember?
These are important, because if it gives invincibility, I could stay invincible for as long as I can spam it, which would have important consequences for game balance.

The main issue I see is that there is a lot of new stuff, so it might  be hard to convince DE to spend the developer-hours to implement this.

There actually isn't much "new stuff". Just changes to existing abilities/mechanics. The only new thing is Heatdrive... Which again, would use existing visual effects from itzal's 1st ability. Plus I also take into consideration that maybe not all of the ideas from this post might be used

Also, I believe I mentioned that the invincibility from Heatdrive would only last 0.8s (maybe less, because itzal's animation is fast). Travel distance should only be 15m-20m, and cost would be about 30-40 energy (similar to Excalibur's 1st ability, but it doesn't build up melee counters, or do much damage, if at all... Notice I didn't mention it doing *any* damage, so it's purely a movement/cc ability)

Most iframes don't make you completely invincible. Throughout the the entire animation. There's usually a gap in the very start, and very end of the animations in which the character is still vulnerable. And like Excalibur, sure you can spam it... But you'll run out of energy eventually. Excalibur can actually kill enemies with his 1st though, but ember wouldn't be able to kill enemies just by spamming it. She would need to stop,  to engage in combat.

I actually don't need to give specific details like that though, because devs usually have a formula they use, to calculate the energy cost of said abilities... Are you sure you're not just making up reasons to dislike my idea? -_-

Edited March 9, 2018 by Maka.Bones

[Maka.Bones]

12 hours ago, DeckChairVonBananaCamel said:

we have valkyr with her channeled claws, ivara with a channeled bow, mesa with channeled pistols... what about channeled casting?

like instead of WoF being "oh look some explosions" and instead you put your weapons away and become Fire Lord Ozai, some sort of love child of Tim the enchanter and Goku, some sort of wicked-ass fire mage.

You'd be reduced to unarmed hand to hand melee, but all your attacks would result in streams of fire shooting out like a firebender from avatar.
Your abilities would get a big old boost to damage output as well as a great big reduction to energy usage whilst WoFing
Various normal maneuvers would leak fire as well; sliding sets fire to the ground, bullet jumping emits a fire nova ect.
And the magnitude of these bonus's would take into account equipped mods across your whole loadout, but only the heat damage ones!

That... Yes. Yes please. I would absolutely love that.

[SixDimensions]

12 hours ago, DeckChairVonBananaCamel said:

(snip)

^ I doubt they would do it but I would totally support it.  Hell if they did something like this with any frame I would be happy to try it out

[BigPapiPimp]

3 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

You can get a better weapon damage buff from flash accelerant, which actually scales with power str. The current weapon buff really isn't that great, because it forces ember to stand in a very narrow place with no defenses, and it's a flat +50% fire damage (which if you're building for viral, or corrosive, it will actually hurt your procs)

So I don't really see the value in it 

It’s just another little thing on top, no big deal, personally I’d care I like running ember buffs (but I think I’m the only one who would voice it, or who might care at all).

[BigPapiPimp]

3 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

In addition... if I wanted weapon buffs, then I would just play a warframe which could do that much better. Like Mirage, chroma, Nova, mesa, banshee, rhino

Yeah I agree, it’s why I want to see DE really push embers numbers on these kinds of things.

[xarvh]

9 hours ago, Maka.Bones said:

I actually don't need to give specific details like that though, because devs usually have a formula they use, to calculate the energy cost of said abilities... Are you sure you're not just making up reasons to dislike my idea? -_-

Yes, I'm pretty sure. =P

[BigPapiPimp]

On 3/9/2018 at 10:46 PM, xarvh said:

Yes, I'm pretty sure. =P

It’s fine to give premises when they have a clear floor and ceiling. You don’t always need to put time in hammering out every detail, it’s especially myopic when creating or reviewing entirely new abilities with no current in game implementation. In such cases I think it’s best to state the high and low end capacity of such abilities based on other in game actions.

It lets others reading find their own compromise in the abilities spectrum of potential power.

so as far as energy costs go, anywhere from 5 to 100 would be a safe bet :P.

Edited March 13, 2018 by BigPapiPimp