Melee: Present and Future goals!

[TrinXT]

On 2018-05-11 at 8:09 PM, [DE]Rebecca said:

Combo Counter minimum hits per tier adjusted significantly so higher tiers can be reached more quickly and easily. Combo Counter damage multiplier may apply to heavy attack only and all points are spent on attack

Isn't this an indirect nerf to Warframe abilities like Whipclaw, Slash dash, Exalted blade, Blade storm, Iron jab, Hysteria, Landslide? Since they gain damage from the Combo multiplier's damage bonus...and Augments like Rising storm and Surging dash lose their use for their abilities since the abilities won't gain damage from the multiplier any more. Will those augments be changed?

[ganjou234]

I hope Fist weapons get looked at.

They need to feel more devastating, even against groups.

Shield and Sword Stances also need looking at. The Eleventh Storm stance needs buffs.

[Xolgys]

any news ? maybe some info about the melee balance pass ? eagerly awaiting that change especially for some older weapons.

[IVSnakeVI]

46 minutes ago, Xydeth said:

any news ? maybe some info about the melee balance pass ? eagerly awaiting that change especially for some older weapons.

They said it just need some final polish to some weapons

[DreadWarlock]

On 2018-07-18 at 2:00 PM, (PS4)Pauloluisx said:

I hope you've seen MCGamerCZ's video on this, as his suggestion of giving each melee a unique mechanic (such as hammers and big earth shaking ground slams, as in a special move to use with the combo counter).

 

I think this would add a lot of value to the melee choices, as all would be good choices and only depend on player preference rather than solely stats like range.

Hey this guy(MCGamerCZ's) stole my idea! Although mine went even further and added special abilities even within certain weapons of certain weapon types.

Also, Melee needs to be made faster, not just cetain weapons,, all weapons need to be made faster. Of course while keeping the status quo of Heavy Blades and Hammers being slower than Longswords and Machete weapons, etc.

[Xolgys]

vor 16 Minuten schrieb IVSnakeVI:

They said it just need some final polish to some weapons

they talked about the complete melee 3.0 overhaul. i am talking about the devblog announcing the planned stat changes to the melee weapons.

[DreadWarlock]

16 hours ago, ganjou234 said:

I hope Fist weapons get looked at.

They need to feel more devastating, even against groups.

Shield and Sword Stances also need looking at. The Eleventh Storm stance needs buffs.

For Fist and sparring weapons, all that needs to be changed is that they need some footwork. they deserve to be more mobile than other kinds of weapons in order to make up for their small reach. They also need to be Fluid, sparring weapons need to have both combos overhauled, Brutal Tides has too few options, and the other one is immobile as a rock and fails to use everything at your warframe's disposition, it needs more roudhouse kicks or low kicks, it needs some painful unch/elbow attacks, knee strike combos with a upwards kick sending enemies away from you, setting them up for slide attacks. Rather they just need to play a bit of Tekken or street fighter, or King of Fighters really. I'm sure they have so many Ideas we might even get new stances from that. 

[IVSnakeVI]

2 minutes ago, Xydeth said:

they talked about the complete melee 3.0 overhaul. i am talking about the devblog announcing the planned stat changes to the melee weapons.

i guess they will post that after the next devstream

[DrakeUK]

One thing I'd like to see in the future for melee, is that the weapon stance mods actually effect how the tenno holds the weapon (the actual pose of the tenno when in melee mode).

We already have unique combo animations for all stances so we're kinda half way there already.    

 

[SirSovereign]

I still don't get why DE feels the need to "fix" things that are not broken.. I understand wanting to bring new things to life, but taking away the combo counter the way it is and making most melee obsolete (without the use of blood rush, weeping wounds, and gladiator mods) just doesn't sit well with... hardly anyone. 

 

As for channeling, I understand why they'd steer away from it (hardly anyone uses it besides for the damage boost), but maybe channeling just needs to be a passive bonus added when you only wield the melee weapon itself instead of using energy as fuel for it... getting rid of channeling makes a lot of arcanes and mods awkwardly worthless as well

[(PSN)ghinellil]

Channeling will be eliminated?

[vaarnaaarne]

On 2018-07-21 at 12:12 AM, DreadWarlock said:

For Fist and sparring weapons, all that needs to be changed is that they need some footwork. they deserve to be more mobile than other kinds of weapons in order to make up for their small reach. They also need to be Fluid, sparring weapons need to have both combos overhauled, Brutal Tides has too few options, and the other one is immobile as a rock and fails to use everything at your warframe's disposition, it needs more roudhouse kicks or low kicks, it needs some painful unch/elbow attacks, knee strike combos with a upwards kick sending enemies away from you, setting them up for slide attacks. Rather they just need to play a bit of Tekken or street fighter, or King of Fighters really. I'm sure they have so many Ideas we might even get new stances from that. 

Mobility and reach is generally the issue that will make or break a stance and weapon (unless it simply lacks sufficient damage modifiers or such). This is indeed the biggest problem for Fist and Sparring, as the reach is simply too little, horizontal AoE is non-existant, and the forward momentum that Gaia's Tragedy and Brutal Tide have is simply too awkward to use, they move too far with very few enemies hit while at it because of the far too limited reach. It shouldn't be too much of a problem to visually justify bumping up range on Fist/Sparring/whatever to an acceptable level, if the moves are flashy enough you wouldn't even need something like a shockwave visual effect. The secondary problem that Sparring and Fist have is that they're effectively workable with Atlas only because they have absolutely no knockdown immunity mid-combo, which I would say would be something that'd be also important for melee than just being faster at getting around in a fight than shooting.

If one were to think of a stance that should be viewed as something of a baseline that other stances should gather around, I would argue it'd be Tempo Royale since it has just about the ideal combination of everything (save cue-a-finisher moves, but that's better off as kind of a specialist thing IMO), it moves fast, it hits fast, hard and wide (and far due to weapons associated), knocks down enemies in groups, and is rarely vulnerable to knockdown mid-combo. Plus in the current IMO flawed way inputs work, it has two good reliable input combo loops, which leads us to...

The problem with the current way inputs (don't) work. I would say playing Tekken is ill-advised, Warframe is too fast for the way stance inputs are currently handled. It'd be a better option to axe all Hold, Delay, and other commands and instead focus on having multiple attack buttons which have their own stance-determined combo loops that can be switched between fluidly. Making melee inputs better and more suited to Warframe's speed is a more important thing than changing how channeling or combo counter works IMO. Melee inputs need to be reliably and perpetually accessed because of the speed of Warframe, particularly swing speeds possible for many weapons as it's often most desirable to swing really fast, and enemies do not individually last long so the combo system should be more modeled after something like Koei's Warriors games or Platinum's MGR or NieR:A. A second melee attack button is all that's really needed in that regard.

EDIT: So in short, what melee needs is at least two attack buttons, axing superfluous combos with awkward/inappropriate inputs, faster mobility, and sufficiently far-reaching horizontal swings in the combos available.

 

Also, more weapons need to blow things up to gibs, since that always makes a weapon worthy of using more. Best kick in the game is part of the Blind Justice RMB combo, because it can bisect enemies and send those giblets flying while at it.

[DreadWarlock]

6 hours ago, vaarnaaarne said:

Mobility and reach is generally the issue that will make or break a stance and weapon (unless it simply lacks sufficient damage modifiers or such). This is indeed the biggest problem for Fist and Sparring, as the reach is simply too little, horizontal AoE is non-existant, and the forward momentum that Gaia's Tragedy and Brutal Tide have is simply too awkward to use, they move too far with very few enemies hit while at it because of the far too limited reach. It shouldn't be too much of a problem to visually justify bumping up range on Fist/Sparring/whatever to an acceptable level, if the moves are flashy enough you wouldn't even need something like a shockwave visual effect. The secondary problem that Sparring and Fist have is that they're effectively workable with Atlas only because they have absolutely no knockdown immunity mid-combo, which I would say would be something that'd be also important for melee than just being faster at getting around in a fight than shooting.

If one were to think of a stance that should be viewed as something of a baseline that other stances should gather around, I would argue it'd be Tempo Royale since it has just about the ideal combination of everything (save cue-a-finisher moves, but that's better off as kind of a specialist thing IMO), it moves fast, it hits fast, hard and wide (and far due to weapons associated), knocks down enemies in groups, and is rarely vulnerable to knockdown mid-combo. Plus in the current IMO flawed way inputs work, it has two good reliable input combo loops, which leads us to...

The problem with the current way inputs (don't) work. I would say playing Tekken is ill-advised, Warframe is too fast for the way stance inputs are currently handled. It'd be a better option to axe all Hold, Delay, and other commands and instead focus on having multiple attack buttons which have their own stance-determined combo loops that can be switched between fluidly. Making melee inputs better and more suited to Warframe's speed is a more important thing than changing how channeling or combo counter works IMO. Melee inputs need to be reliably and perpetually accessed because of the speed of Warframe, particularly swing speeds possible for many weapons as it's often most desirable to swing really fast, and enemies do not individually last long so the combo system should be more modeled after something like Koei's Warriors games or Platinum's MGR or NieR:A. A second melee attack button is all that's really needed in that regard.

EDIT: So in short, what melee needs is at least two attack buttons, axing superfluous combos with awkward/inappropriate inputs, faster mobility, and sufficiently far-reaching horizontal swings in the combos available.

 

Also, more weapons need to blow things up to gibs, since that always makes a weapon worthy of using more. Best kick in the game is part of the Blind Justice RMB combo, because it can bisect enemies and send those giblets flying while at it.

I mean, if you watch any Kung Fu movie or just play games in which a character uses only their fists, you'll see that every single strike uses the fighter's whole body. The power behind their punches staggers the opponent and throw them backwards so when they combine their moves(combo) they usually attack while moving forward to not let up on the pressure. Here Your tenno attacks while keeping himself in place. This is what reduces the range in which your attacks hit. There are also many spinning attacks in martal arts, that in a real fight would not be practical because our punches and kicks would be stopped by an enemy's body. Tenno and their warframes are powerful enough that they can simple remove the enemy out of the way, so a single body would not stop the momentum of their attacks. I don't mind hitting only a few enemies, as long as the immediate threats are dealt with in a timely manner, while not losing mobility in the process, I can see that Fist and Sparring weapons could be made to work if only they had that mobility. Some claw combos can provide this, because its animations are easy to control and they are fast enough that you can simply move after the punishment. However the same cannot be said of Fist and Sparring weapons. 

[DreadWarlock]

16 hours ago, SirSovereign said:

I still don't get why DE feels the need to "fix" things that are not broken.. I understand wanting to bring new things to life, but taking away the combo counter the way it is and making most melee obsolete (without the use of blood rush, weeping wounds, and gladiator mods) just doesn't sit well with... hardly anyone. 

 

As for channeling, I understand why they'd steer away from it (hardly anyone uses it besides for the damage boost), but maybe channeling just needs to be a passive bonus added when you only wield the melee weapon itself instead of using energy as fuel for it... getting rid of channeling makes a lot of arcanes and mods awkwardly worthless as well

Melee IS broken. As it currently stands you either play only melee in order to build up the combo meter or you use your guns. As soon as you change between each weapon types, your meter dies and your melee ceases to work, this is very annoying. Also they are not making melee obsolete. 

The problem here is that you guys are failing to see how melee will get even more versatile with the changes. All because you have been far too dependant on the Acolyte mods.(this is a similar situation to what happened in the beam weapons rework, with people blind to the massive base damage buff for amprex, crying about the crit chance nerf. To which, if they bothered to make the calculations they'd see that the numbers would be higher after the rework because there wouldn't be that big of a dependancy on red(now orange) crits.)

What you fail to see is that the Acolyte mods are very overrated for normal play. If you have a Riven with crit stats(which is important because the only reason those acolyte mods are important is bacause melee crit mods are prety much the worst crit mods in the game) you'll see that with a proper amount of crit chance you don't need acolyte mods. Only people who go far beyond normal playable levels, such as endurance run players will ever gain enough bonuses from thos Acolyte mods to justify their importance. 

What this means is that, since they have already confirmed that they are changing the stats in all melee weapons, those Acolyte mods will become much less important(You can hardly build up a 2.5 multiplier on normal missions, which means you get way less bonuses from those acolyte mods than you think).  The new combo meter will build up much faster allowing you to make proper use of it on continuous heavy attacks. What they want to make here is a more simplified system in which everything will have a use. Instead of the current slide focused meta.

It's only a downgrade from the point of view of Spin attack spammers. It's a massive buff overall.

[(PSN)TheRallykiller]

On 2018-07-18 at 12:00 PM, (PS4)Pauloluisx said:

I hope you've seen MCGamerCZ's video on this, as his suggestion of giving each melee a unique mechanic (such as hammers and big earth shaking ground slams, as in a special move to use with the combo counter).

 

I think this would add a lot of value to the melee choices, as all would be good choices and only depend on player preference rather than solely stats like range.

I know I chatted it during a devstream about 1 year ago, and Steve saw my chat and mentioned the devs had something in ideation.  I know I, and many others here, have also reiterated the idea in this and other threads, so hopefully MC has the "pull" to get the dev's attention on this one.

 

[(PSN)TheRallykiller]

56 minutes ago, DreadWarlock said:

Melee IS broken. As it currently stands you either play only melee in order to build up the combo meter or you use your guns. As soon as you change between each weapon types, your meter dies and your melee ceases to work, this is very annoying. Also they are not making melee obsolete. 

The problem here is that you guys are failing to see how melee will get even more versatile with the changes. All because you have been far too dependant on the Acolyte mods.(this is a similar situation to what happened in the beam weapons rework, with people blind to the massive base damage buff for amprex, crying about the crit chance nerf. To which, if they bothered to make the calculations they'd see that the numbers would be higher after the rework because there wouldn't be that big of a dependancy on red(now orange) crits.)

What you fail to see is that the Acolyte mods are very overrated for normal play. If you have a Riven with crit stats(which is important because the only reason those acolyte mods are important is bacause melee crit mods are prety much the worst crit mods in the game) you'll see that with a proper amount of crit chance you don't need acolyte mods. Only people who go far beyond normal playable levels, such as endurance run players will ever gain enough bonuses from thos Acolyte mods to justify their importance. 

What this means is that, since they have already confirmed that they are changing the stats in all melee weapons, those Acolyte mods will become much less important(You can hardly build up a 2.5 multiplier on normal missions, which means you get way less bonuses from those acolyte mods than you think).  The new combo meter will build up much faster allowing you to make proper use of it on continuous heavy attacks. What they want to make here is a more simplified system in which everything will have a use. Instead of the current slide focused meta.

It's only a downgrade from the point of view of Spin attack spammers. It's a massive buff overall.

To your point, I think DE recognizes the functional disparity in melee—some weapons have passives and special effects, others don't, there's no rhyme or reason to some build/MR requirements vs. other melee choices...there's just overall inconsistency.

Look at the Sibear.  Huge resource requirements, semi-similar performance to other 2-handed weapon types (at best), and based on time investment and other melee options a general underperformer.  This frosty hammer is indicative of the issue with melee: significant differentiation for each weapon, and how to take this loadout slot go beyond the metric of "can you get X to kill lvl 120's in the Simulacrum?".

[SirSovereign]

2 hours ago, DreadWarlock said:

It's only a downgrade from the point of view of Spin attack spammers. It's a massive buff overall.

There's a whole lot of "you fail to see" in there, then you throw this in.. I only play with sword, rapier, and heavy blade weapons so none of this describes me.. I use crit rivens so I can reach number like 500%+ crits so it multiplies the multiplier itself, gives slash and viral procs and ends enemies with scaling.. Which is what Acolyte mods are for.

 

 

The whole reason the combo change is a downgrade is because the damage multiplier only applies to heavy attacks and the combo counter is spent when using that heavy attack.

[maddragonmaster]

was in deep thought about the heavy attacks and was wondering if some would have special heavy weapon attack?.

[Schpam]

 

Channeling Focus shouldn't be tied to the Void Energy Pool of the Warframe.  Energy is so critical to what makes the abilities that define the nature of the Warframe  that spending energy as a form of ammo for your sword doesn't feel like a practical trade-off.  You don't ask this of Firearms, yet Guns are just as effective at the goal of burning down enemies as quickly as possible.  Instead firearms use their own resource, ammo.  Melee should be similar, except you build up a charge by connecting combo's of repeated strikes on targets. You then spend that charge through channeling to enhance and enable more powerful forms of attacks, AoE, Crowd Control, Knockdowns/knowbacks and finishers (ect). 

• If you had a separate Focus bar for building up combo's you could segment the bar into tiers that trigger increasing damage or chance multipliers as the segments fill up.  Then players could trigger bonus actions by pressing the focus button during combo sequences to add specialty actions to the sequence.  Different bonus actions would spend different amounts of the accumulated Focus on the bar. Such as a heavy ground-slam AoE Interrupt for 1 bar segment, or a Mega Finisher for 3 segments.

In order for a Combo System to function, it needs to be effective and reliable. The current system I find cumbersome.  5 button combo's are not reliable. Locking players into animations that are dependent on timing buttons is not consistent. Hold a button just a tad too long, or not long enough or pressed out of sequence and suddenly your Warframe is trapped in an unintended sequence that is difficult to reset without stopping for a moment that could get you killed. Compounding the sense of "desync" in your timing of actions, this is made worse by the sense of network latency being a factor in how responsive combo's feel. In some situations I can reliably execute a basic attack reliably on demand... in other situations, not for the life of me.

• Imagine this like Street Fighter II: Everyone can perform Ryu's Fireball consistently, yet very few people (in my neighborhood growing up) could ever get Zangief's 360 pile-diver to execute on command when it was desirable.

I don't want to see Melee be reduced to mashing one button, but that's all hosing down individual targets or AoE nuking groups of them essentially amounts to when using firearms and Warframe abilities. Even if I could consistently perform the finger-gymnastics required to execute fancy channeled melee combo's reliably on cue, what is the point of troubling yourself when a fellow teammate blows away the same targets from a far with a gun or his super power ability?  At that point it's about it solely being fun to melee and not being the most effective tactic to advance to the next wave of enemies. 

So, if you are going to add depth to the mechanics of melee with a lattice of these extra actions a player has to perform over and above that expected of shooting guns and casting abilities... then you need to deliver a proportionately more spectacular payoff for the effort of learning the skills and putting in the effort to make it work as a system.

Combos should be simpler to execute reliably, and most importantly, dynamically in real-time under the hectic action of gameplay.  On paper, it seems feasible to have 5 button combo's with intricate animations that look awesome, but when you factor in actual gameplay conditions over an internet connection, these are not practical. Reliably executing the timing of some of these actions over a network is unreliable at times and that can be frustrating and ineffective. Being locked into even a simple animation sequence of 1 second can be very disruptive to the flow of control a player fells over their character when it triggers an unwanted combo sequence. Oddly enough, this isn't a problem with longer animation sequences where it is obvious what is happening, such as when I Stealth Kill, Ground Pound or my favorite, mount and wolverine an enemy with my Venka.  

Combos should be quick to execute reliably. Each combo on a Stance Mod should be labelled with a purpose. For example;

• STRIP - A short rapid sequence of attacks designed to damage the target by stripping hit points off of it and building up combo multipliers (or focus charge).
• OPENER - Targets are protected from being stripped of their health using Armor, Shields and their own counters like Dodging, Blocking and Slams. An Opener is designed to open up a target to make it more vulnerable to being stripped, knocked down or having a finisher used on them.  Openers are designed to apply Status Procs to Targets to soften them up.
• INTERRUPT - An attack designed to interrupt a targets current action (Like a MOA preparing to stomp the ground). Interrupts opt to generally stun, knockback or knockdown targets giving the player space to move or as a means of mitigating harm or momentarily hobbling an agile target.

Stringing multiple sequences of STRIPs, OPENERs and INTERRUPTs into unbroken chains create more intricate combo's that can lead to larger payoffs like mega finishers or AoE and Crowd-Control effects.  Consideration should perhaps also be given to things like:

• TRANSITIONS - After killing the current target, an action that transitions the player into a position to attack the next nearby target so the combo chain can continue. Such as an automatic dash or bounding-glide into the next target.
• GRAPPLE - Mount large enemies to directly deal damage to vulnerable locations. Or propel small targets away from the player, using them like a projectile to rag-doll additional enemies as a finisher combined into an interrupt.

Lastly, some issues with the current melee actions I'm having are related to the previously mentioned mechanical problems of performing an action over the network.  Simply put, actions that relate to timing a button (long press, short press) are not always registered or are easy to misuse. ie: Accidentally press too long or let go to soon. This is common in frantic situations when mauled by a group of enemies and I might use too much pressure on a button triggering a long press instead of a short one which breaks a combo sequence causing everything to fail.  Which is frustrating and can make melee combo's more cumbersome and unreliable to perform on top of the basic mechanic itself.

I am also frequently prone to experiencing failed actions that involve looking up or down. Such as aiming down at a fallen enemy to execute the ground-pound attack.  Sometimes this is flawless, other times, usually in very hectic situations, this fails to register even though I'm clearly and deliberately standing over the target looking straight down at them.  I suspect this is a network issue and executing this action faster then the game detects that I am looking down, before attacking it.  Or it could just be a hit-detection problem and not sensing that I am actually aiming at a fallen target.  It is especially noticeable when the downed enemy is on a slope and not level with the player.

I would therefore suggest not relying on these prerequisites to executing combo's in any sequence too much if at all.  Better to use alternating buttons that can be easier to definitively detect a deliberate separate action. And of course, keep the button chains short, thus more reliable to execute and easier to remember.

 

In closing, I don't think Melee is broken. It just needs some mechanical tuning to adjust how effectively it achieves the desired result of being as practical to employ as it is fun and cool looking to watch and play.

 

[vaarnaaarne]

Changing channeling is really something I don't see worth doing. One key advantage of melee is the ability to use Life Strike for reflexive healing, and it's an advantage that is important for melee. If anything, the only "problem" there is that you have to take Life Strike for channeling to be worth anything.

Complex sequences and single-target based qualifiers for attacks would not work in Warframe. Warframe is a fast-paced horde killing game (which is also why the projected change to heavy attacks does not work; heavy attacks right now are simply incompatible with Warframe's basic gameplay model), it is simply too fast and goes through individual enemies too rapidly for such a combo system to work. This is the problem of the present too, the only properly working combos are basic, RMB hold, and forward hold, everything else is too unreliable for sufficiently fast swing speed. The proper way to improve combos is to instead have more than one attack button and MAYBE have holding down RMB change the combo each of those have.

The key to game design is the same as to engineering, you want just what you need for the job, not all you could have for the job. Having something that's simple, focused and polished will work better than having something that's needlessly complex.

 

13 hours ago, DreadWarlock said:

I mean, if you watch any Kung Fu movie or just play games in which a character uses only their fists, you'll see that every single strike uses the fighter's whole body. The power behind their punches staggers the opponent and throw them backwards so when they combine their moves(combo) they usually attack while moving forward to not let up on the pressure. Here Your tenno attacks while keeping himself in place. This is what reduces the range in which your attacks hit. There are also many spinning attacks in martal arts, that in a real fight would not be practical because our punches and kicks would be stopped by an enemy's body. Tenno and their warframes are powerful enough that they can simple remove the enemy out of the way, so a single body would not stop the momentum of their attacks. I don't mind hitting only a few enemies, as long as the immediate threats are dealt with in a timely manner, while not losing mobility in the process, I can see that Fist and Sparring weapons could be made to work if only they had that mobility. Some claw combos can provide this, because its animations are easy to control and they are fast enough that you can simply move after the punishment. However the same cannot be said of Fist and Sparring weapons.  

Indeed Warframes aren't subject to human limitations anyway so there's little need to even try to be "realistic" with how the moves can look and work. There's no problem in an attack animation that would simply be impossible for anyone to actually pull off, what's required is simply proper flourish and game functionality.

Mobility for melee in Warframe is kind of a strange thing, since while the game has an extensive melee option the basic control scheme is one of a third person shooter. Since you are essentially always forward-facing, your mobility has to rather reflect ability to reorient that forward facing and have the option to either stand still or move forward fast while keeping up the meatgrinder. With a proper set up you'll always be within potential swinging range with a good weapon and stance, and you optimally want to always be within swinging range since the you want a single combo to kill entire groups of enemies at minimum and constantly moving to the next group. These are things Fist and Sparring are outstandingly bad at doing and maintaining, since they have no knockdown protection whatsoever and they only hit only a small area while the only forward moving attacks tend to be unwieldy to use, hit poorly, and/or are next to impossible to truly control.

[(PSN)TheRallykiller]

My big question is "WHERE IS MELEE 3.0 RIGHT NOW?"

Devstream 113 seemed to imply that something was very much in the works and on its way...

I am curious where they had to stop taking feedback/suggestions just to keep the update/change moving forward.

[(PSN)Touha9]

They pretty much confirmed it was near completion and just being polished up, and that we would have a deep dive into it on the next Devstream.  Man, I wish the stream was this Friday and we didn't have to wait until next week to hear more!

[(PSN)TheRallykiller]

12 minutes ago, (PS4)Touha9 said:

They pretty much confirmed it was near completion and just being polished up, and that we would have a deep dive into it on the next Devstream.  Man, I wish the stream was this Friday and we didn't have to wait until next week to hear more!

That's the impression I got as well.

Guess we'll have to wait a little less than 2 weeks to see the 3.0 dev build [fingers crossed].

[(XBOX)ZenithLord 42]

After reading through the thread and having awhile to contemplate on melee in its current state and the changes that want to be implemented, here are a few of my thoughts! 

1. Melee should always have been blocked by solid objects! The change to finally stop melee passing through, well everything, is long overdue! 

2. "Spin to Win" has also been long overdue for a rework! The mechanic is okay, but the combination of ranged melee weapons, weapons passing through objects, and the ability to mod for insane damage on spin attacks really made it the go to way to dispatch hordes of enemies! 

The main problem really comes from the ability to slide attack and roll, slide, and bullet jump indefinitely. Dodge mechanics would be a non-issue if they didn't cover more ground than running and the enemies weren't so spread out! 

Decrease the distance dodge maneuvers cover, but only decrease bullet jumps a little! An overall decrease in distance would actually let us benefit more from mods that give us bonuses for dodge mechanics! 

3. Percentage based modding can be a major issue in a game where a spin to win melee is a problem. Giving us a percentage based system allows us to reach absurd damage values and can cause us to abuse the system rather than use the system. 

 I'm not going to go into the calculations, but when you have higher number values, any increase by percentage will provide significant increase overall to damage values. Adding in Maiming Strike which gives a flat 90% to be a critical hit on top of a high range, high damage, high critical chance, high critical damage, combo counter building, Blood Rush modded Atterax; you could easily get damage values bordering on the absurd! 

Maiming Strike isn't really the problem, the combination of all of these things (percentage based damage values, range, combo counter, etc...) plus Maiming Strike has put us in the current "Spin to Win" situation. 

The only way to fix this is to give us one system of modding that doesn't use a percentage based system that compounds the problem by using more percentage based options! We need more flat numerical additions as opposed to exponential increases! If I need to do x amount of damage I don't need to (insert convoluted Blood Rush critical chance damage value calculation here)! 

4. Channeling shouldn't be combined with blocking, but should be integrated into more mods to give it an actual use. 

5. Charge attacks are okay, again, when it is easier to slide and spin, the feature won't be used. 

 

 

Really, the main issue is the modding system giving us increases to damage values that are already good and not increasing damage values that aren't very good. Mods like Maiming Strike help bad weapons become better by giving us a flat increase instead of a percentage. All of the other issues such as channeling and "spin to win" really are just symptoms. 

I've tried to offer my opinion on changes, but frankly any rework that tries to fix things that are cheese (spin to win) and fix things that are niche (channeling) isn't going to change a thing until the mod system is looked at! I sound like a broken record... 

[Soupf8]

Will the mod [Dispatch Overdrive] grant a movement speed buff from blocking, or finisher kills?