Melee: Present and Future goals!

[SixDimensions]

5 minutes ago, (PS4)ATreidezz said:

And please do something about wall attacks, rarely used is a soft way of describing it. 

You're not wrong. The Wall Attack is rarely used. However, if I remember correctly, if you jump and melee that little dash forward is treated as a wall attack.  Obviously so long as it's not a slam attack. If anyone else can confirm or deny please do

[Hyohakusha]

The fact that that enemies counting as objects was a "feature" is disgusting. One tiny bandaid isn't going to change the fact that this is a blanket nerf to the base mechanics of one of the central features of this game. Or the fact that it's using Maiming Strike as an excuse, and then gutting every aspect of melee EXCEPT Maiming Strike. As I've said multiple times, Rivens are responsible for the Maiming Strike hate. +200% range rivens are the reason behind "I have nothing to kill" syndrome. Instead of simply adjusting the disposition of Scoliac rivens, or removing Maiming Strike, the environment becomes a limiter, and the combo meter becomes a useless limiter that only functions on a single attack that will be useless due to the way the game functions, and range will be capped. Instead of re-balancing rivens, they're "re-balancing" the entirety of melee, lying about the reasons behind it, and not even doing anything to address what they cite as the base cause for those adjustments. But when those Rivens sell for 4-6k platinum, its pretty obvious why they won't address that. And if those rivens allow you to hit the range cap without Primed Reach and save a slot? Whooo.

So don't expect maiming spin to win to go anywhere. Primed Reach/ Primed Pressure Point/ Organ Shatter/ Maiming/ 3x 90% elementals and Primed Fever Strike. There's your new meta. New players? Hope you weren't thinking this was going to leave you more enemies to kill, because it won't. Vets? Enjoy not even being able to open boxes, let alone hit enemies consistently with half of your gear. People in the middle? Well, you'll have less that's worth grinding for, and therefore less to grind, so I guess that's one positive.

[Kalvorax]

On 2018-05-11 at 12:09 PM, [DE]Rebecca said:

• While channeled blocking is useful on paper (hello 100% damage block + enemy hits reflected back), channeled damage has never really been celebrated beyond 'cool factor'. Getting rid of a separate channeling button frees up an input allowing us an additional attack button to use in combos making them easier to perform.
• Channeling is blocking, blocking is channeling! Normal blocking now performs like channeled blocking currently does. Experiments such as constant energy drain or a separate resource, blocked hits adding to Combo Counter are ongoing.

im curious on if this will make parrying viable now if you are adding channeling to it....yes there isnt much use, but its still fun to be able to open enemies to finishers when properly parried. (looks at God of War and For Honor)

[Urlan]

16 minutes ago, Kalvorax said:

im curious on if this will make parrying viable now if you are adding channeling to it....yes there isnt much use, but its still fun to be able to open enemies to finishers when properly parried. (looks at God of War and For Honor)

Forgive me if I am understanding this wrong, but it seems like Rebecca is saying that Channeling is being removed, while Channeled Blocking is staying as the default block with its energy costs (which are what make it prohibitive in the first place) or an additional cost brought in to modify it further. That will require a change to most existing channeling mods like Life Strike for instance.

[DreadWarlock]

On 2018-05-22 at 5:46 AM, LonghornRed said:

 

21 hours ago, SortaRandom said:

I still feel very against the LoS requirement.

 

I understand not wanting people to cheese missions by slidespamming behind a corner. But the problem with melee weapons isn't that this tactic is possible, it's that MaimingStrike+BloodRush makes this tactic borderline meta. Corner spamming (and, for that matter, slidespam itself) was NEVER an issue in the game before MS+BS was released.

I'm running a pure-Status melee build, which was not overpowered at all. Yet it got hit by the LoS change, and my melee weapon (which produces 100% of my damage output) is now super unreliable and kills things half as fast. Meanwhile, MS+BS can still get you >700% crit chance on a non-crit melee weapon.

 

This is not how you balance things. MaimingStrike+BloodRush (i.e. their multiplicative interaction) is STILL the most overpowered thing about melee weapons, sticking a mile over nearly every other build choice. It makes slidespam meta, and that happened to synergize very strongly with lazy corner spamming (which is why corner spamming became an issue in the first place). Blanket-nerfing melees as a whole did not solve this issue.

 Which is why only heavy attacks will be affected by the Combo Counter multipliers, if effectively murders the Spin-2-Win tactic on the new Melee System. and frankly I not against the range nerf either, with the current mods some melee weapons get way out of control by just adding one range mod. I mean hitting 20m with a melee weapon, really? in most maps this pretty much the same as using a gun, only you'll hit much more enemies and cause much more damage. Sadly these mods are pretty good for daggers, fist weapons and Sparring weapons, at it makes possible for you to reliably land all hits from tehir combos whenever Stagger procs.

[Kalvorax]

45 minutes ago, Urlan said:

Forgive me if I am understanding this wrong, but it seems like Rebecca is saying that Channeling is being removed, while Channeled Blocking is staying as the default block with its energy costs (which are what make it prohibitive in the first place) or an additional cost brought in to modify it further. That will require a change to most existing channeling mods like Life Strike for instance.

from what im understanding, everything channeling-wise but channeled blocking is getting removed. Basically, when we block post 3.0 it will be like we are channeling while blocking currently....permanently.

[Cephalon_Umbra]

just nerf the riven dispo for range already thats a real fix to melee and not this nonsense

[Urlan]

2 hours ago, Kalvorax said:

from what im understanding, everything channeling-wise but channeled blocking is getting removed. Basically, when we block post 3.0 it will be like we are channeling while blocking currently....permanently.

With all the complete energy drain that entails, not enthused about that then.

[Kainosh]

There is no need for 2 slam attacks.    Better separate Aerial melee and Slams.   

 

"Heavy attack" midair = Slam.     Tap - vertical.   Hold - aimed (according to my personal research that one is unnecessary.  Better add momentum to vertical slam and enable WSAD / L-stick steering on it).  

"Light attack" midair = Aerial melee. 

 

Its much cleaner that way. 

[(PSN)Gin_Da_Merciless]

Since there is a free button with the removal of channeling i feel that can be used to switch stances. Switching during combos would do an attack that stuns enemies and starts a new combo.  

The reload button can be used for finishers and stealth kills. I feel having regular attacks as the button to do finishers can be rather annoying when there are a bunch of enemies open for finishers. Also more finisher animations would be great. 

Pressing the weapon swap button would be the new heavy attack button and you would have to hold it to switch weapons (only when your not meleeing though).  There would be heavy attack combos as well as light but less buttons for heavy than light.

Aerial combos? Light attacks for combos and heavys will ground slam. 

Since there combining blocking and channeling i feel they should reduce the energy cost significantly since u have no choice, Im guessing they’ll do that anyway, but put in a mechanic where i time your block to get some form of reward. Could be energy back, all enemies get debuffed, stuns, melee dmg up or even pairs of these.  When blocking you can aim your melee swings horizontally (light) and verticaly (heavy).  Blocking and finisher button would do an alternate ser of finishers/stealth kills when theres an opening.

Holding light, heavy attack during combos, stance switch and finisher button will drain a portion of the combo meter.  These will activate lifestrike and the longer you hold a button the more it drains the combo increasing power, range, crit dmg, status and crit chance.  Combos can still be performed with the entire meter.  Holding ground slam would have an aoe effect.

[Urlan]

3 hours ago, (PS4)marcellusg90 said:

Since there is a free button with the removal of channeling i feel that can be used to switch stances. Switching during combos would do an attack that stuns enemies and starts a new combo.  

The reload button can be used for finishers and stealth kills. I feel having regular attacks as the button to do finishers can be rather annoying when there are a bunch of enemies open for finishers. Also more finisher animations would be great. 

Pressing the weapon swap button would be the new heavy attack button and you would have to hold it to switch weapons (only when your not meleeing though).  There would be heavy attack combos as well as light but less buttons for heavy than light.

Aerial combos? Light attacks for combos and heavys will ground slam. 

Since there combining blocking and channeling i feel they should reduce the energy cost significantly since u have no choice, Im guessing they’ll do that anyway, but put in a mechanic where i time your block to get some form of reward. Could be energy back, all enemies get debuffed, stuns, melee dmg up or even pairs of these.  When blocking you can aim your melee swings horizontally (light) and verticaly (heavy).  Blocking and finisher button would do an alternate ser of finishers/stealth kills when theres an opening.

Holding light, heavy attack during combos, stance switch and finisher button will drain a portion of the combo meter.  These will activate lifestrike and the longer you hold a button the more it drains the combo increasing power, range, crit dmg, status and crit chance.  Combos can still be performed with the entire meter.  Holding ground slam would have an aoe effect.

Interesting ideas, but its likely that the new melee system would have to work with both active melee and sword and gun melee which would likely still need that reload for reloading.

[(PSN)Gin_Da_Merciless]

1 hour ago, Urlan said:

Interesting ideas, but its likely that the new melee system would have to work with both active melee and sword and gun melee which would likely still need that reload for reloading.

It should still work i said reload would be for finishers mainly meaning certain conditions needed to bet met.  Enemy has to be on the ground, blind or sleep. Something like that.  It would be for interacting.  Why cant it be used to reload if your not close enough or in a situation like that.

Thanks for the feedback Urlan

Also i forgot to say this before.

Combo attacks can include light, heavy and the stealth/finisher button input where you are able to hold the button anytime during the combo to use some combo meter.  That way there would be no need for hold, pause and directional inputs to make melee more comfortable.  

Since sword and gun melee could be something melee should have a special attack when not in certain situations. It could be grabs, spin attacks, a short leaping ground slam, rushing attack, glaive throw.

[Messkoo]

One of the most important thing to do to balance melee for me is to change the foot movement.

Warframe is a very dynamic, and you can run,jump, slide,  attack   in a realy pleasant flow but some weapons animations have too momentum and break this  gameplay, for me  this weapon become useless. For example take quick attack from dual blade : first one, this weapons don't have a really good reach, and when you start striking your warframe is struck in place and so you miss many time because your enemies are going away. in other hand, you have some weapon (quick attack)  that don't suffer from this like polearms, nikana etc. Some combo animations have the same issue too.

It will be good  if the movement speed is not linked with the attack/combo animation.

 

[Kaminarion]

What if channeling increased attack speed and range while keeping the energy drain per second.

I know I would use it then.

[Kinetos]

3 hours ago, Kaminarion said:

What if channeling increased attack speed and range while keeping the energy drain per second.

I know I would use it then.

And I would stop using it. I avoid dynamic changes to my melee attack speed like the plague. I choose my attack speed in the Arsenal based on timing, not raw speed. Changing the speed changes the timing. Not maxing speed has not resulted in me failing missions.

[Kinetos]

4 hours ago, (PS4)marcellusg90 said:

It should still work i said reload would be for finishers mainly meaning certain conditions needed to bet met.  Enemy has to be on the ground, blind or sleep

Then why not use the contextual action button to do this contextual action?

I've heard controllers don't have a leftover "reload" button in melee mode,so how would it work for them?

I'll be against suggestions to add functionality to specific bindings that do unrelated things.I'm in favor of adding new bindings that happen to share default keys instead. If a new finisher keybind is added with the default key R,that would be superior to just making reload and finisher the same binding. It would allow people like myself to rebind their controls without undue restrictions. Imo this is one of the biggest problems with Archwing, it doesn't have separate control settings and bindings, everything is just tacked on to ground bindings and can't be separated.

But in this instance I think the contextual action key is appropriate. Finishers *are* a contextual action,so adding to that binding is appropriate. It is available in gun and melee mode AND on m+kb and controller

[ToKeSia]

maiming strike is not something too op, it just swift and fast killing in low level mob, trying your quick melee with some weapon like zaw, it's deal massive damage than maiming, enemies melt in second , and large range (12-14m)

[(PSN)Gin_Da_Merciless]

1 hour ago, Kinetos said:

Then why not use the contextual action button to do this contextual action?

I've heard controllers don't have a leftover "reload" button in melee mode,so how would it work for them?

I'll be against suggestions to add functionality to specific bindings that do unrelated things.I'm in favor of adding new bindings that happen to share default keys instead. If a new finisher keybind is added with the default key R,that would be superior to just making reload and finisher the same binding. It would allow people like myself to rebind their controls without undue restrictions. Imo this is one of the biggest problems with Archwing, it doesn't have separate control settings and bindings, everything is just tacked on to ground bindings and can't be separated.

But in this instance I think the contextual action key is appropriate. Finishers *are* a contextual action,so adding to that binding is appropriate. It is available in gun and melee mode AND on m+kb and controller

if you mean like when your activating something like an elevator or picking up stars then yes like that just on enemies for finishers. Since melee does nothing else i say why not add a feature where with whatever melee weapon you have you do something unique like throw the glaive since theres no other thing for it in melee. Its not like you’ll be mashing it like the light attack button which gets annoying when there is a crowd of enemies open for finishers and you forced to single target all of them or use your abilities and guns which im tryna avoid doing.

[Bodosbox]

Hi Digital Extreme and fellow players,

 

 

Melee weapons and the 'spin to win' mechanic are on the edge of being 'nerfed'.  That could be a good thing but overall I think that's a wrong decision.

 

 

I am posting this BEFORE the possible update.  I have more than 2700 hours of time played (in game). I am mostly speaking about end-game content (level 70+).

 

 

Why 'nerfing' spin to win is a wrong decision ?

 

 

1. Too many enemies are shooting at you. Consequently, you have to be mobile.

2. Being mobile is not compatible with the vast majority of primary and secondary weapons (except for some weapons like ignis/amprex/atomos...) because aiming is vital to do damage.

3. Therefore, melee weapons are quite the only option to survive. Being efficient is mandatory or you will die. It means that most enemies have to be eliminated in a few seconds.

4. Introducing a new melee combat system requires new mechanics and a more complex combat system. It means that cognitive charge for our brain will be higher than before. For most people, playing a game is doable after work, at the evening, which means that your brain is tired and that you don't want to invest a massive cognitive charge in it. Spin to win is perfect to avoid that.

5. In psychology, flow is a state that all game designers and User Experience designers try to have for 'their' gamers. In Warframe, we are more on the boredom side that on the frustration side (only applies to experimented gamers/'veteran'). If the melee update arrives, we'll probably be much more (too much) on the frustration side.

The below diagram (source : https://www.gamified.uk/2012/11/30/flow-and-satisfaction/) shows how flow works. (I hope we'll see it)

 

 

 

Feedback about the previous change (melee weapons can no longer go through walls) :

I haven't seen any difference, it's just more boring to have to go on the other side of the wall to kill the hidden enemy. The gif video that DE have shown (an excalibur killing enemies and not moving) is irrelevant precisely because you are not moving : you waste time to do this and you're not going through the mission.

Yet, I can no longer kill the Jackal with my loki on kuva flood missions by exploiting the pylon. Well, I'll take Inaros now and that's it.

As I do syndicate missions, I have to destroy all crates to get medaillons/datums... Melee weapons not going through walls and not destroying crates is really frustrating now.

 

 

Trail/lead :

Redesigning a game mechanic requires time and investment. Instead of reworking melee system, DE game designers could improve primary and secondary weapons and most importantly, investing this time in new and more challenging content.

 

 

Improving primary and secondary weapons :

The most frustrating thing while playing with primary and secondary weapons is the reload system. Having to jump/move to avoid getting killed in order to reload is breaking the fun. Having a max 1 sec reload time would be a decent alternative to melee weapons.

Restricting Mastery Rank on Maiming Strike, riven mods with maiming strike and other unique mods :

Sure, doing spin to win at MR 1-10 is not a good way to discover the game. Therefore, DE could lock the access to Maiming strike and other powerful mods to MR 20+. It would mean that you have accessed to the 'end-game' content and powerful mods only if you have played other weapons.

General change :

Who was the game designer that decided to implement frozen crates all over corpus maps ? That was an awful idea. Each time i destroy one of them, i swear. That's not good for the flow.

Creating community surveys about next updates :

I haven't seen any surveys about how the game could change and how players would like to see it. It could be a good decision to hire a User Experience Designer (well, here i am :D) to create and lead surveys and improve general operations.

 

 

If you have read everything : congratulations ! More seriously, thank you for your time and remember that this is just feedbacks, so don't get upset.

 

 

Best regards to all DE staff and gamers,

 

 

Bodo

[(XBOX)Evilpricetag]

On ‎2018‎-‎05‎-‎23 at 10:29 AM, SixDimensions said:

You're not wrong. The Wall Attack is rarely used. However, if I remember correctly, if you jump and melee that little dash forward is treated as a wall attack.  Obviously so long as it's not a slam attack. If anyone else can confirm or deny please do

Not sure about that, I know after Valkyr comes off her grapple hook, a melee will be a wall attack.

[(XBOX)Evilpricetag]

I wasnt aware of Venka Primes passive, I know I should wait until this is released, but the new combo counter feels like it will be as annoying as channeling even if its only 150 hits to 4x... I dont think a single power hit is much payoff.

[-CLM-Joker]

On 2018-05-12 at 1:23 AM, (PS4)wart_13 said:

Spin to win through walls is NOT a maiming strike issue. It's an uninhibited range problem. Maiming strike is damage, reach is the "through walls" part.

True, but you can't deny that without maiming strike you wouldn't be able to use the tactic Megan showed as efficiently and at high-levels. So yeah, Maiming Stike (or the crit on spin riven stat) is not a problem alone, but it's part of the problem and hasn't been touched.

[Catfission]

Just make n (3 seems a good number) or more consecutive slide attacks into a wall stagger/knockdown the player.

/thread

[Mach25]

On 2018-05-11 at 7:22 PM, Mach25 said:

Adding on to this, i would recommend the following to address melee rework: Keep the combo counter affecting both base and heavy attacks, make heavy melee pull, say 5x off the combo counter to execute a heavy attack (adjustable, dependent upon how quickly combos counters can be built). You want a rhythm to the game - think along the lines of the Batman Arkham series. That is a universally lauded game series, they have combo counters as well as takedown, i.e. heavy attacks and it works very well.

I remember I said this earlier. Now, if combo increases were reserved solely for heavy attacks, then a base buff of melee weapons to at least 3x would work very well with this system, I think. I'm not sure if this has been addressed yet, but since combo counter is being used, how about a decay in melee counter instead of evaporation after 1 second without a mod or focus school selection? Addressing the issue of melee, please give us a way to get up quickly on our own and make handspring optional - knockdowns and the subsequent "Smell the Folgers" recovery animation can get you killed very fast. I'll try to format this post so as to increase legibility:

 

1. Player-Instigated Knockdown recovery.

Give us the option to do a roll recovery to the side or back handspring (whatever the proper term for it is called) by pressing the roll key in a direction as an alternative to handspring.

In one of your trailers, you showed a Warframe doing a kind of backwards handspring when an enemy did a ground slam - please give us that option to use in-game as well. Enemy knockdowns are common in melee combat and, on higher levels, that extra slot for handspring or constitution would be better served as a survivability or damage increase mod. By giving players the ability to do for themselves, this would engage them even more in the action!

 

 

2. Foot Speed for Ninjas, not Turtles

Increase base foot speed in an option to enable "expert" mode so we can close on the enemy very quickly on foot a la Hollywood. For example, the speed boost Saryn gets after using her Molt ability makes her feel very ninja-esque. In every iteration of ninjas, they always have fast foot speed - flips and the like were meant to get over gaps of roofs, dodge attacks, etc. Tight corridors and obstacles contained within can mess up your ability to bullet jump and get to an enemy quickly. Not everyone likes Volt (whose speed can mess up your and other players' ability to pull off melee combos - there was a thread talking about this here:

As well, who's going to put on Sprint Boost as opposed to Corrosive Projection, once they understand the game mechanics and how armor scales in this game, especially at the higher levels? Or Energy Siphon, for additional energy? And who's going to swap out a mod that increases power strength/efficiency/duration that will enable folks to use powers as they like - the very thing that attracts people to the game -  or a mod that increases the utility or survivability aspects of their favorite frame(s), for Rush? It is absolutely jarring to do all these cool flips and rolls and feel like a ninja, then run like Grandpa Jones. It looks disjointed, to say the least. A buddy suggested longer strides when running faster, while in addition, I suggest a base runspeed boost. This is all available to players in a so-called "expert mode." Please do consider implementing these suggestions - it would improve the quality of life.

 

 

3. Combo Duration.

As you did with Saryn's spores, to deal with the broken rhythm of the game, please give melee combo's a decay rate instead of total evaporation after 1 second. This would enable us to pull off heavy attacks more efficiently - their popularity was very high, hence you brought them back. 

A question - will there be a requirement for a minimum number of hits before a heavy attack is pulled off? That aside, as such, it seems that a good compromise would be an innate combo counter - mods that deal with combo duration can simply slow the decay rate for combo counters instead of taking up a slot to maintain the ability of a person to pull off a charge attack, nor will a person be forced to stick with Naramon to maintain their combos. I'll leave further feedback once Melee 3.0 drops.

 

 

4. Heavy melee combo counter

A concern of mine is the thorough depletion of our combo counter. Might I suggest, say a 33% depletion of the bar instead of a complete draining? Will speak more on the issue once the revisions have been released.

 

 

Summation: Dealing with these issues (possible 3.0 - 4.0x base damage boost, base footspeed, player-instigated roll recovery, combo counter decay), this would help to make your rework even more successful.  All of my other concerns have been addressed quite admirably - the new melee system looks so darn good, my patience wears thin! I totally got the Assassin's Creed Origins feel while I was watching the devstream - it absolutely did not help that you were using Inaros! 🙂

[(XBOX)CynNex]

On 2018-05-11 at 9:09 PM, cursedmoon13 said:

The reason channeling isn't in widespread use is because by time the average player switches to melee mode to use it, Mr. xXSpin2WinYOLOXx just cleared half the room.

Note sure this is the case.  For myself and most of the players I know, the primary reason none of us use channeling is because it devours energy that we need to power our Warframe abilities.

We don't always want to be relying Zenurik and/or Arcane Energise (for those of us who have it, remember, not everyone does) and if we run around channelling all the time that is very much what we will need to do.