Melee: Present and Future goals!

[ri7ua1z23]

will be interesting to see what happens to old wu-kong.

[HyokaChan]

Yep, just as I thought, far too many things in this game is considered "objects". This means that new melee no more punchthrough nerf is incredibly bad. Have you tried fighting nullifiers with melee in an object heavy environment? You used to be able to wear their bubble down with melee even if you couldn't reach the inside of the bubble. Now clipping issues mean that bubble is invincible. Arctic eximus bubbles are just as bad.

 

Yes, I'm aware running inside the bubble is the best way to take down the nullifier, but that also takes away any buffs I have running.

[CrazyValkyr]

39 minutes ago, HyokaChan said:

Yep, just as I thought, far too many things in this game is considered "objects". This means that new melee no more punchthrough nerf is incredibly bad. Have you tried fighting nullifiers with melee in an object heavy environment? You used to be able to wear their bubble down with melee even if you couldn't reach the inside of the bubble. Now clipping issues mean that bubble is invincible. Arctic eximus bubbles are just as bad.

 

Yes, I'm aware running inside the bubble is the best way to take down the nullifier, but that also takes away any buffs I have running.

Agreed. I've been doing some testing, along with few other people; sometimes, the hits fail to register on the enemies, when they clearly should've hit, in clear LoS and even point-blank range - and finally, related - Can't kill a Nullifier bubble reliably, due to the wonky hit-detection. It seems that it takes Null-bubbles as objects, and therefore, can't hit through them. Had to literally walk to into it, to deal with the pesky Nullifier on several occassions. (And no, using a gun is not a solution, some of us would like melee to be as viable as standalone thing, as we've had it until now).

So, once again, I understand the desire to remove the biggest offender - Whips hitting through the walls, but as it is, removal of punchthrough of melee altogether is too punishing and frustrating, given the game is not even originally built for that, with all the clutter and unreliable collision-detection. I would rather melee to not be a small version of RNG of if my attacks hit or not; that can get you killed on higher levels.

Some other observations I've had - These wonky hit-detections seem to be more apparent with thicker crowds + the more range bonus you have. Also; slower weapons. When you swing too fast (I run Warcry-spec'd Valkyr), it's much easier to miss, but the moment you run a slower weapon, it is rather annoying.

Overall, my impression stands - that if they release further changes they have revealed so far (reduce of range, removal of scaleability of normal attacks; with focus on 'heavy' attacks), it will kill the fun and efficient melee, that was possible to be played as a standalone, niche-style as we've known. Not a fan, sorry.

[GrimR3APER]

I want a rework to melee, but a few things bother me with yours. First, it had better not take all of my damn combo counter with one trashy charged heavy. Second, please don't make blocking a S#&$ty "resource-driven" mechanic. All I can think of when you suggest that is "stamina"... ugh makes me shudder at the thought. If you are going to have a melee weapon equipped that means when you aren't taking damage (blocking) you aren't dealing damage (attacking) so please just give us this one free damage negator. It'd work perfect for helping all frames and it really wouldn't break the game because whats a good reason for not letting us have it? Idk.

 

A thing or two i'd like to see, please let us use a normal heavy attack with the heavy button. I remember the first charged attacks and having another type of attack to use freely made melee more fun. Having the heavy attack button solely used for charged heavy attacks is a waste. I want to be able to use a heavy attack in normal combat to change the pace up and to make my own combos. Just something that'd be a fun addition in my mind.

I saw in another post about aerial combat with melee, and just yes to that, and it also mentioned wall attacks. Making wall attacks usable would be cool, and letting us knock enemies into the air and follow them slashing around would be fun.

I want to be able to have as much fun using all of the "inefficient" mechanics (such as air attacks, wall attacks, heavies, maybe aerial throws?) on their own as I would using the stance combos. I want to be able to throw together my own little combo using a slide attack that cuts one dude in half, then hitting another with a charged heavy that sends him flying towards the corner of a wall, bullet jumping onto the wall after him and nailing the guy mid-air with a wall attack, slashing the dude a few more times mid-air before aiming my ground slam at another guy running towards me, and finishing with an actual combo from my stance on the last dood around. Being able to do THAT would satisfy my definition of an enjoyable melee experience, and I could technically do all of that with the systems we have in the game right now :

• We have slide attacks
• The rework shows charged heavies fling opponents
• We have (unusable) wall attacks
• We sorta have a useful air attack
• The rework shows aimable slams

I want to be able to enjoy all of the melee systems and not feel like I'm not having fun when I'm not using the "cheese" or "most efficient" style of playing, because that's what I find enjoyable. Just using what I can and making it up as I go.

[N7Paladin]

Here is a Tip... JUST STOP SPIN ATTACK SPAMMING. Problem solved. Spin attack should have a cool down and if you do that you will never have to worry about Spin2win meta. Everything else about melee is fine. Spin2win is the problem and it's caused by peoples ability to constantly Spam spin attacks.

[Fylas]

@[DE]Rebecca    so how does this not passing trough objects work exactly? does it include crates?  canisters etc? does it include corpses? cause those are objects too, and you'd be absolutely insert expletive here in a survival map when covered in guts of recycled grineer. Personaly I loved being able to stab enemies trough walls with my primed reach staff which no longer gives stealth boosts thanks to melee hit sounds unless your loki or banshee which do not need to do that in the first place. This whole rework sounds more like everyone is being punished because of a few slide slash bots. Would it not be more prudent to find ways to identify and ban/block bots then to punish the players that like to melee in weird ways? I'm sure bots find a way to circumvent some of the detection methods but at the very least the ones using primed reach and maiming strike getting banned will seriously hurt the bot farm potential as those two mods don't exactly grow on trees.  Then there's the other changes that aren't even in yet, is the base damage of all melee getting tripled since only a single heavy attack gets the combo treatment now? is atlas's ONE PAWNNNCH move getting it's damage significantly increased since it no longer scales with combo counter? Will it kill the melee counter in a single strike?  If so, will it at least get a boost in area or aoe on impact to compensate for the lack of constant dps?  What about combo duration mods and focus abilities? If you completely overhaul the damage and amount of combos needed to reach specific multipliers either their value and cost justification borders either on complete and utter uselessness that is a waste of points and space or at the very least SERIOUSLY devalued in terms of being a factor if the total amount of combos required for the next threshold goes down by say 50% then the need for duration modifiers for combos goes down by a lot too. So either those effects need to be overhauled as well or end up becoming a waste. 

 

Speaking of comboing melee. Have you thought about tweaking some abilities so they better flow into melee combinations? For example valkyr's cable pull If you change it to a dual trigger where simple press is fire at whatever is there while if you hold the button it would only trigger if you target a enemy  her cable ability would be far more useful for melee style combat as you no longer end up flying past the enemy if you miss their head or body by 3 pixels. And justify a better augment then "tarzan no need energy to swing".  ;_; 

Also, Channeling always had a use beyond cool factor, if you liked stealth play you could use channeling with low energy cost to  get rid of corpses  to avoid getting spotted more easily. It was very immersive :<. You could build on that by for example adding death scream suppression to channeled stealth finishers, being able to kill a grineer or corpus right out of sight next to another would totally be worth energy! 😄 

@N7Paladin I'd be actually for that then a straight out melee nerf, even just 2-3 seconds would be a huge hit to spammers and bots. I use it sometimes too but rarely more then like twice in ten seconds if more then once XD. 

 

[Ramrr]

@[DE]Rebecca  After week of work, checking Warframe and seeing that 90% of melee's I use most of the time can't kill enemy stuck in the wall is disappointing on level of hearing that Santa doesn't exist as child. It's realistic - yes, but Warframe isn't realistic game, also it's a lot less fun. Don't punish people for playstyle that some only use (I will admit of using it sometimes but it's boring. sliding through corridors with Scoliac is more fun that face sliding your face against wall). Introduce alternative that make it more fun. Don't take away my toys like Orthos and Zenistar (current and proposed changes are taking them away). Realism isn't something that this game is built on with super ninja space powers and spoiler mode. Make it deal 1/2 or 1/4 damage while attacking through walls, to make wall sliding less profitable while still maintaining that for everyone who from time to time want to kill that corrupted gunner stuck in the ceiling and/or wall. Or maybe punish people who use botting for that instead of punishing us all?

Regarding other changes. Combo counter applying only to heavy hits would be acceptable only if it wouldn't reset the counter. Make it not add to counter on its own and allow us to build combo with fast swings before switching to pulverize mode. Also please make attack speed affect charge attack rate. Maybe make combo retention mods or rework combo duration into combo duration/retention stat. with maximum combo retention upon successful heavy attack at level of 95% or let's say each heavy attack consumes 10 stacks or so. That way you can still build up your stacks and use some of them on heavy attacks without weakening you down to ground and basement.

Blocking is channeling change - HUGE NO! I like using my Ack and Brunt with all shield ally defense mods on my rhino/inaros/nidus. It was doing something for team (taunting and protecting) while i have had a choice of taking damage on myself or spending energy to negate it. Merging those 2 is again taking away playstyle from players while introducing new players of trap, that blocking is good. It's not, especially when it drains energy based on damage dealt and or attack. I don't see any way to make it feasible unless you tie it in to combo counter somehow but that is counter intuitive with heavy attacks. As much as you'd like to make this game into next Dark Souls but in space, Warframe is a crowd corridor shooter, where corridors are mostly small, and where currently any obstacle between you and enemy makes you deal them no damage with melee.

4/10 Rework plans - Makes me want to quit the game so far.

[Eutuxia]

Today I was not able to melee damage a nullifier's bubble who was like 3-4 steps above me on the stairs in ceres which wasnt a problem before. I was able to melee through rails in the same map though... what is going on?! 😐

[Kaadu]

Giant post ahead

tl;dr:
Aside from spin to win current melee is slow and inflexible.
Channelling should use a unique resource.
Whatever control scheme duel wielding uses, make it consistent with non duel wielding.
Allow unequipped melee to open crates

General Melee Feel:
Currently, (non spin to win) melee combat is too slow compared to the normal pace of the game. Each styles combos are kind of a waste of time, since as soon as your attack your enemy, they should be dead.
When you are using a gun: when you fire your weapon at an enemy, they will die in a fraction of a second. Also you don't need to run over to the enemies position to attack them.
With melee: you usually have to expose yourself to more enemy fire and actually run over to your target. Most ranged enemies should be taken out in a single attack once you close the gap. Only enemies with a ground slam and dedicated melee enemies should be able to take a hit (represented by blocking or special attacks like ground slamming that reduce melee damage).
Styles are cool, they give your weapon more personality, but a styles unique attacks need to be able to be expressed within only a couple button presses. Instead of the slow final strikes in a series.

The first attack of any style should be able to quickly open a crate in front of you. This is very important.

The ability to cancel any melee attack into a dodge sounds very cool. If you dodge cancel a quick melee attack, when the dodge is over will you have your gun equipped? I feel that queuing the 'put away sword' animation after the dodge would be annoying.
The current throwing weapon system (where you charge and aim) when duel wielding should be standard for throwing weapons.

Heavy Attacks and Combos:
The special features of a style should be simple and quick to execute. I think something simple like the dynasty warriors controls would work well.
There is a series of light attacks, and after any light attack you can use the heavy attack button to use a specific special attacks based on your style.
The specific attack is determined by how many light attacks you have done before cancelling into heavy.
You can also use heavy attack with zero light attacks, for a basic heavy.
For the basic heavy: probably it would feel good to have two/three heavy attacks that flow into each other, so you can mash heavy for some wide sweeping attacks.
The light combo should not last more than ~3 attacks. Putting special attacks behind more than that would (probably) make it take too long to access those moves.

Mixed Duel Wield/Controls:
"You'll be able to dual wield any one-handed weapon with any secondary weapon"
How are the controls going to work with that? How are you going to bind light melee, heavy melee, block, fire and alt fire/zoom?
Having a separate control scheme just for duel wielding sounds confusing. Whatever the final control scheme is make it consistent.

Here is my attempt:
- Change the quick melee button to be a quick melee / quick ranged button. It changes based on what weapon is equipped.
- The quick ranged button will use your secondary weapon.
- Since E now fires a gun when your melee is equipped, melee attack is moved to the left mouse button.
- Heavy melee attack is on block + melee. Blocking does not cancel melee attacks, but using a heavy attack will cancel a normal melee attack.
- When using the quick x button, before the weapon is lowered pressing right click will swap to the quick weapon and block / zoom.
- When you have a 1 hand pistol and 1 hand melee weapon: when equipping either, both are visually equipped at once and you use the quick button to quickly swap to either weapon. Since both are already held, you don't need to put the quick weapon away when you are done with it. New animations will be needed for using a single pistol in the off hand.
- When you can duel wield: using the quick swap from your primary weapon (by blocking when using quick melee) will equip duel wielding.

Channelling:
"block = channel" is a terrible idea with the current channelling system that will just drain your warframe energy for a tiny benefit.

I don't think that damage reflect is good, even 100% damage reflect will barely tickle enemies. That function could be removed.
100% damage resist from the front does sound good on paper, as long as you can access block quickly when you need it and it doesn't tank your energy. The other effects like parrying enemies, increased damage and whatever mods you have on should also stay.

I would prefer that channelling draw from a different pool than warframe energy, since warframe energy is what lets you do your cool unique warframe powers. I think just having channelling use a unique resource would fix most of it's issues.
How about weapons have a 'channelling meter' that can be reloaded with a short animation when the melee weapon is equipped. Possibly the reload animation should limit your movement and not be able to be shortened, since recharging a 100% block might be too good (even though it would only last a second against higher level enemies). At least make players move behind something for safety when recharging. And if you are blocking you aren't killing.
For convenience and quick accessibility of 100% damage resist block, the channelling meter should recharge slowly over time while the melee weapon is not equipped or in use from quick attack. Your melee weapon charge should be visible somewhere even when the weapon is not equipped.
Also, breaking the above rule about blocking not cancelling normal melee attacks, blocking does cancel the first quick melee attack so you can quickly block from any weapon.
Channelling is activated if you block or reload your melee weapon. While channelling is active, pressing reload or equipping another weapon will deactivate channelling. While channelling is already full, pressing reload will just turn on channelling.
Giving weapons a channelling meter could allow different weapons to have different base amounts of channelling available.
Excalibur's exalted blade shares the normal weapons channelling state and channelling amount. it doesn't have a separate meter.

Combo Meter:
I haven't really thought amount the combo meter, since I haven't made a pure melee build. Whatever it turns out like it should be used to allow pure melee players some advantage over only occasionally pulling out your quick melee.
Also, with duel wield being an option. Two handed weapons should build the combo advantage faster than one handers.
My first idea for an advantage besides more damage is to improve the amount of channelling you can store the longer your combo (or improves efficiency). And reloading your channelling pauses the combo drain. Holding reload extends your reload to pause the decay longer. After a reload the combo pause can't occur again until you get x more combo points.
Without a combo you should still be able to quick melee to cut down some close by mooks.

Unequipped Melee:
If you don't equip a melee weapon, you can use your fists. These are just for stealth takedowns, opening crates and attacks that ragdoll. Most importantly opening crates.

[lxMattAranxl]

2 hours ago, Kaadu said:

If you don't equip a melee weapon, you can use your fists. These are just for stealth takedowns, opening crates and attacks that ragdoll. Most importantly opening crates

That's actually a smart idea when you think about it... we had to do that if we get caught by a Zanuka, so that could actually be a smart thing to implement, despite not much damage output. Hope they put that idea in.

 

One could LITERALLY go "Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes" theme and it could actually work.

[(PSN)Zelgorath]

16 hours ago, HyokaChan said:

Yep, just as I thought, far too many things in this game is considered "objects". This means that new melee no more punchthrough nerf is incredibly bad. Have you tried fighting nullifiers with melee in an object heavy environment? You used to be able to wear their bubble down with melee even if you couldn't reach the inside of the bubble. Now clipping issues mean that bubble is invincible. Arctic eximus bubbles are just as bad.

 

Yes, I'm aware running inside the bubble is the best way to take down the nullifier, but that also takes away any buffs I have running.

Personally, I take down Nullifier bubbles by taking out the projector above the bubble. 1 shot takes out the Arctic Eximus Ice Bubble, 2nd shot takes out the projector. 31k damage per shot Arca Plasmor. 2nd shot normally eats the Eximus and his entourage... If you are playing melee only, might as well get into the bubble.

[_junguler]

what's the point of asking for feedback if you gonna ignore us and do whatever you decided to do anyway?

[Seinra]

On 2018-05-11 at 4:09 PM, cursedmoon13 said:

Wow, that was fast.

Edit: Okay, so my post ends here, as little as that is. Apparently, many posts got merged into mine, and I only found out after getting a message from @lihimsidhe, whose content is demarcated below, as requested. Guess I've found myself the de facto curator of some other people's content. I work the next few days, but if anyone else would like to receive credit for their own posts, message me and I'll get to it when I can. We're working on the honors system here, as that's all I can manage.

 

Thank you for the workshop! That was quick, gonna read it.

EDIT: Well I read itl, I heard this on the Devstream, but if the combo counter is going to be removed from having any effect on basic attacks, the damage of melee weapons will need to be brought up significantly. These days, using the combo counter to ramp up your damage is a staple, and it'll be a huge nerf if we lose that multiplier effecting our basic attacks.

My other questions is about mods like Blood Rush, will they continue to have an effect on basic attacks? Or will they too only apply to the heavy attack? Lastly, will we get an increase for the decay timer on Melee combo counter or will the lower hits per tier make this a non-issue?

 

I noticed the channeling changes when I watched devstream 111 and I wonder what's happening to life strike? Will I still be able to use it as a reliable source of healing?

 

I'm looking forward the changes 🙂

Spin to win is efficient but definitive not the most enjoyable way playing warframe ^^'

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EDIT: Everything from this line to the next is actually a post by @lihimsidhe that got merged with mine somehow. Credited as per request.

• This discussion is also on /r/warframe
• tl;dr: Melee 3.0 Mapping Mockup

Before I begin with Warframe's combat system, I'd like to briefly talk about Devil May Cry's combat system.  Without going into too much detail the player does not have to choose between 'firearm mode' or 'melee mode' as a Tenno does. The player has access to all their moves from a default 'stance'.  It also has a unified combo system.  Meaning that regardless of the weapon a DMC player has the combos they learned for their first weapon works on any subsequent weapon they acquire.

While there is a lot more to DMC's combat than that, Capcom's approach has created a combat system that is near peerless in its execution.

Warframe is a different game on many levels so a straight copy and paste into Warframe wouldn't work well as any of us would hope.  However, there are 4 things Warframe can import from DMC that would work wonders:

• The elimination of 'firearm mode' and 'melee mode'.  
• The implementation of universal combos.
• An emphasis on aerial combat
• A combo counter that rewards variety over repetition.

I feel if the below suggestions were followed not only would it be of a lesser scope than what DE has planned, it would salvage mechanics with great potential that have languished for years, and it would be a more accessible system overall that gives rise to depth built on the backs of proven legends such as Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden.

Dedicated melee and firearm modes are the primary obstacle holding Warframe's combat back.

Quite simply I'm suggesting a quick firearms/quick melee system instead.

How It Would Work

Quick Melee Is the Gateway to All Combos. Any combo a stance grants can be executed with the quick melee button.  However, considering Berserker and Fury are a thing, the commands to execute said combos need to account for this. I'd also suggest that the travel distance that some combos force upon a Tenno be more varied between stances; I personally don't like when a combo string has me moving wildly about but some Tenno may love it. Give us that choice.

Quick Fire is the Gateway to All Shooting. Simply press the fire button and you fire regardless if you are deep in a combo or not. Allow Quick Fire to cancel at least some melee attacks. By doing so you'll see players invent their own combos; trust me on that.

Combos Have Universal Inputs. Glad to see this in the OP.  Once a new player learns the combos for their MK-1 Bo or Skana, they now know how to execute all combos Warframe will throw at them.

• At Least Two Types of Combos Per Stance. An AoE focused one (because Warframe is a horde game) and a single target focused one (for that rare enemy that actually demands more than passing effort. Ex: Nox).  Without a stance a weapon still has a combo string.  This string is still accessible once a stance is equipped.

Aerial Combat. As it stands if a Tenno executes an aerial attack they can not attack again for 1-2 seconds and I have no idea why.  If players could launch enemies into the air and pursue them with flurries of aerial attacks, I would wager a lot of Tenno would find that fun and useful. However, Warframe should ditch the 'floatiness' of enemies being attacked while airborne unless mods or Warframe/Operator/Archwing abilities call for that.

• Make Wall Attacks Useful, Please. I have tried my hardest to use these in combat and despite my best efforts they just aren't.  Simply allow them to travel in the direction a player is aiming, removing the end roll animation, with a massive buff to speed and distance traveled and viola! #wallAttacksSaved.
• Not all Down Attacks Should Be Slam Attacks. A Tenno's option while in the air is either to do an attack that prevents them from attacking for 1-2 seconds period, a momentum killing slide attack, or a slam attack.  Slam attacks make sense for the Fragor but what about a Ceramic Dagger? Sometimes I'd rather just do a downwards aiming non slam attack from the air as I dart around like... a ninja.
• Aerial Combos. Either allow all of of a weapon's combo to be used in the air or convert at least one existing combo to be used in the air.

Combo Meter Skews Towards Variety, Not Repetition. Reward players more who don't do the same exact attack over and over and over.  1 hit should always add something to the combo counter.  But reward the player more who has explored the depths of what Warframe's combat system has to offer and uses the full bag of tricks at his or her disposal regularly.

Channeling Becomes a Universal Buff Mode. Available at the execution of a single command (single key or multi key press), the Warframe surges with void power. A warframe's parkour, firearms, melee, blocks, archwing, operator, abilities, etc are all buffed in some way either innately or via mods.  Adjust the energy economy to be proportionate to the buff granted. 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. Even when a Tenno goes through the trouble, the payoff is hardly worth it. It's as the old saying goes: if you can't beat them, join them. Remove the melee mode requirement for channeling, make the buffs worthwhile and it will see a massive upswing in use. The potential for channeling is staggering; don't sacrifice an ocean of potential by merging it with block... which is still locked behind a cumbersome, restrictive, dedicated melee mode.  PLEASE. If Warframe ever becomes an anime, channeling will be the signature 'I'm going to destroy you with overwhelming power' moments. Meanwhile it still can be that exact thing in the actual game.  PLEASE!!!

Block Anytime, Anywhere. The Tenno either can execute a single command (single key or multi key press)  to block. Allow most actions to be cancelled into blocks. Blocking always should have been a fallback action for when a Tenno finds themselves in trouble regardless of what they are doing. This is another clear example how dedicated firearm/melee modes hold back Warframe's potential. Get ready for block damage % to matter just as much as base damage, status, and crit.  Also I can't mention blocking in a serious manner without referencing this. 🙂

Charged Attacks. Take inspiration from Ninja Gaiden.  If charged attacks evoke a sense of power and unleash a massively amped up attack, I'd wager Tenno would use them.  Especially in solo.  However give Tenno the option between consuming some of the combo counter - all of the combo counter.  There's no need for a separate key for heavy attacks when holding in one key can accomplish the same thing. Just make the charged payoff scale to the time held in instead of 'must hold in for x time or you get nothing'. You'd be surprised to see how much more charged attacks would be used when they can be tailored to the situation.

Roll Cancelling.  Quite simply, I'm very happy to see this in the OP. Go the extra step and allow us to cancel our rolls by hitting roll again. Give roll cancelling a cooldown period equivalent to the duration of a roll to prevent abuse.

Cosmetic Stances. Finally some players may be really fond of the cosmetic animation of carrying their firearms with all other weapons holstered or carrying their melee weapon with all other weapons holstered.  Also there's the issue that the idle animations we assign to our warframes don't prompt in missions.  Simple fix: the cosmetic stance of a warframe is determined by the last type of action they performed with the types being: firearms, melee, and abilities with abilities prompting an all weapons holstered, idle animations when still cosmetic stance.

The biggest problem still remains though: DE could create the most exquisite combat system known to man BUT the enemies in Warframe are dumb as #*!%.  Fodder.  Trash mobs.  And Warframe gears Tenno with the Infinity Gauntlet to steal candy from a baby.  But that's a whole other day, a whole other story.

tl;dr: Change the existing firearm/melee modes into a quick firearm/quick melee system, remove the cooldown for aerial attacks, make wall attacks worth it, gradient charged attacks > separate key for heavy attacks, reward varied combos more than repetitive ones, channeling's potential is stunted by being locked behind a dedicated melee mode.

Update: @GrayArchon and @NightmareT12 have brought up valid concerns about how all this can work on console controllers.  I will explain how.

The PS4 has two features the XB1 controller does not: a touch pad and motion/tilt controls.  So this means any new mapping scheme has to work on an XB1 controller first. If a mapping scheme can be addressed by an XB1 controller it can scale up to the PS4 and PC.

https://support.xbox.com/en-US/xbox-one/accessories/xbox-one-wireless-controller

Counting the X, Y, A, B, Left Bumper, Right Bumper, and 4 directional pad inputs that's 10 mappings.  A factorial is a mathematical operation to figure out how many combinations are possible if a given quantity of things is known which in this case is 10.  What is the factorial of 10?  I used this online factorial calculator and got this:

3,628,800

If we count holding any button in as a separate mapping the total mappings jump up to 20 which gives us a factorial of:

2.4329020082e+18 (not even sure what this means other than its huge)

Out of the millions of combinations of buttons on an XB1 controller the proposed melee rework would require additional mappings in the single digit quantity.  Hope this clears things up.

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Awesome work [DE]Rebecca and the whole Warframe team... needed a change to melee 🙂

 

Thanks Rebecca! Just two things:

• What will happen to current Channeling VFX? Should they be tied to combo counter now? They're a HUGE part of Prime Accessories specially.
• Can we please, PLEASE, have animation cancelling into Warframe powers? (AKA I'm mid combo but I need to recast X-> Animation stops and casting begins!) It's been one of the things that have frustrated me the most over this years since Melee rework landed back in 2014

Also super excited to regain heavy attacks and see where this is going 🙂

 

Yes. I've been meaning to ask about this for ages, and I am glad that this is coming.

 

 

 

 

 

But, about moving channeling away. I'll get to the point - what of Channeling Mods?

 

Will the interaction between Blood Rush + Maiming also be looked at? That's another factor of the spin2win "meta"

 

Will any Melee dispositions be changed with these changes? This is not just a melee issue, but I feel it is important. Melee through level geometry was never really a problem, it was due to the Scoliac having a 1.3 disposition as a whip.

The combo meter is getting heavily nerfed. What will the relevance of heavy attacks be if you ruin your entire Blood Rush stack for one attack? These changes will also heavily affect Ash, Excalibur, and a few more frames. The combo meter for some Warframes' kits is crucial for damage output and I hope this is addressed.

I was hoping for more Quality of Life than nerfing most of the reason Melee is powerful. I am still going to stay optimistic of the changes presented, but the geometry change and combo meter changes will be quite devastating. Increasing base damage to compensate does not really address the problem. What will this mean for weapons such as Zenistar? Range stats on Rivens will mostly become useless on high disposition weapons as any sort of geometry will gimp the potential of your weapon.

 

I like what I see

Will there be additional variations between weapons - eg. Tonbo and such polearms with dual blades being split into staves?

Edit: orthos in its make seems to be more aligned to a staff than a polearm or glaive (in the traditional sense) as something as the tonbo is - such a change could bring greater variation to play styles

Edit 2: nikana sheathed and open blade stances - will there be any options to remove the auto sheath/keep the blade out for the nikana coming with the melee update?

Eg. Decisive judgement vs tranquil cleave in the animation difference in styles of attack

 

This is going to be interesting..

 

"Combo Counter damage multiplier may apply to heavy attack only and all points are spent on attack."

"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."

pls no

"We're still working on how/if to include the 'cool factor' of Channeling in combat."

Channeling is one of those things where it is incredibly powerful and far more people would use it if it did not detract away from other things, chiefly ability use. The fact of the matter is that channeling drain is simply too high in it's current state to make it worthwhile (unless using certain passives on spoiler mode) when asked whether a player wants to swing their melee a few times for a bit of extra damage or clear the entire map with a massive ability it's pretty clear what they are going to pick. That being said the loss of channeling damage will be a very big one for everyone out there who likes to main melee and knows and appreciates just how good it is. I'm not even gonna get into combo counter because I feel like other people will do a plenty on that front to address why that is just not the greatest idea.... to put it nicely.

 

Sounds good, let's see how it plays out in addition to the Melee rebalance.

 

You could have the old channeling fx activate on hitting a certain number in the combo counter. 

 

I have a question about Zaws now, how will the existing arcanes that effect channeling be changed and reworked? I just finished building Exodia Brave and I've been having fun with it, making a channeling crit build sword zaw with it, allowing me to actually use channeling efficiently, and even gain energy from it.

 

Will ash bladestorm still scale off combo?

 

My biggest question is what's going to happen to Acolyte mods like Blood Rush and Weeping Wounds.

EDIT: You know that DE could have removed the spin-to-win spam if they didn't let Memeing Strike and it's relevant Riven modifiers be boosted by Blood Rush.

 

 

Was just on the DevStream and I have to say I'm excited, I hope to get my hands on it soon

 

One on the most important option about dual wielding melee and secondary would be to be able to have an option to set Right click for right weapon and left click for left weapon ; Cause no one need to aim pistol when dual wielding, and using left click and melee quick attack doesnt feel right when actually holding the melee weapon.

 

That'd be fun and practical.

THIS is what Warframe needs right now! 👏 👏

[Kawalorn]

For now I just really hope DE won't forget to buff things like Atlas's Landslide too, since abilities like that also rely on combo counter.

[Mugudugud]

It's a very poor decision to nerf something to make something else used more. So far I was having fun in the game - I had an option to grind if I felt like it or do something else if I did not wanted to grind stuff. Sometimes I use heavily spin2win, sometimes i don't. If you take options away from me, just because you feel something is overused in the game, then you take away fun from me and from those players that currently overuse this mechanics and enjoy it.

I suggest you make more fun options for the players, so they would want to enjoy the game differently than by nerfing stuff people are using to make them play the game differently.

Reworking channeling is a good thing and I commend you for that, but the other changes.....I hate current mele not being able to pass through objects, and reading about how combo counters would no longer apply to normal mele attacks?!... Really?! Pff....

Do you know how high the prices went at some point for Maiming strike and the blood rush combo? I bet I would not be the only one feeling been cheated if you break it.

[vitreloy]

One thing I like to point out is using macros is actually good for the player well-being. It can prevent Repetitive Stress Injury by reducing the need to repeat hitting mouse button and keyboard for long duration of time.

[Prime-Alpha974]

Merci D.E, je suis impatient de constater le fruit de votre travail 🙂 Vivement ces changements on vous soutiens!

[hooperinius]

All melee needs is a nerf to max range. Cap it at 100% boost.

Macros and a change to how melee combos work on PC would be great as this game is a carpal tunnel fest.

[TmzOS]

The wall nerf is fine if you use some logic, but some things here are just too much or can be unnecessary. The game have much more important things to create and fix instead of "trying to fix melee" (like decent deluxe skins and really cool gun skins [NOT TENNOGEN], more game modes, more useful mods, more weapons, more optimizations on PoE [critical because some of your players can't go to PoE just because it still heavy to their PCs], etc). I'm not a "main melee player" (I just do the spin to win sometimes when I'm very lazy).

- Channeling is bad? Increase the damage, reduce the energy cost. Buff all channeling mods (some are just bad designed).
- Slam is unpopular? INCREASE DAMAGE in a smart way, like Arca Titron.
- Macros are useful and necessary, some ppl have health problems with repeated or complex actions in games.
- Block is not usefull? Buff this to block more (maybe in tiers: 80% block (whips, 2h weapons), 85% [dual wield/claws], 90% block [1h weapons], 95% block + immunity to knockback [shields]).

I just see this as a way to reduce the insane infinite scaling of melee (and possibly to destroy the hard work of some players who got expensive/rare mods and stop the extreme endgame content). Be careful DE, you have more critical things to do before this, this game will be always exploitable in many ways (and still very bound to PvE instead of PvP, not justifying that "effort" like other games).

// It's not a rant.. rlx

[(PSN)AbBaNdOn_IGN]

Reducing Channeling down to a single block button is dumb.  It could have been built up to compete with crit-combo builds or turned into something that we would want to sacrifice crit-combo build for.  Extra loot, affinity,  building energy instead of wasting it.  

Im all for killing spin to win through walls but the rest of the changes were not very well thought out.  

I did try to make channeling builds when I got into melee.  The thing I will miss the most is the visual effects of having your energy get brighter.

[UndPanzer]

i find it funny that DE still tries to say what is fun and what is not, it pisses me off how they trying to turn this game on devil may cry sound fun on their minds 

[Xymos]

55 minutes ago, UndPanzer said:

i find it funny that DE still tries to say what is fun and what is not, it pisses me off how they trying to turn this game on devil may cry sound fun on their minds 

So spinning like an idiot is better? Yeah sure mate 

[UndPanzer]

1 minute ago, Xymos said:

So spinning like an idiot is better? Yeah sure mate 

10 seconds trying to kill a monster while there is another twenty monsters to kill like #*!%ing dante doesn't look like an improvement to me, but what do i know? let the guys who are happy with doing daily sortie be the specialist  

[Lorechill]

1 hour ago, UndPanzer said:

i find it funny that DE still tries to say what is fun and what is not, it pisses me off how they trying to turn this game on devil may cry sound fun on their minds 

Iirc, in a devstream, Steve said it can't turn to that coz this is a horde game. It's more likely they'll go the Dynasty Warrior combo route -- fast attack > strong attack combinations -- in which melee can deal with both vast groups of enemies and single targets alike. It's probable and evident with the new Dynasty Warriors 9 combat system in which combos aren't tied to any specific character(which extremely angered many fans including myself) but to the weapons used. It could go a lot of different ways. --We get a set combo per weapon type and stances only determine the 'strong attack/s' or each stance would have a unique move set but still follow the new ala-DW9 system, etc....

[motorfirebox]

Hey, while you're at it: NORMALIZE THE SPEED STAT ACROSS ALL WEAPON TYPES. As it stands, the melee speed stat only tells you how quickly the weapon executes combo animations. Because combo animations vary wildly across weapons and stances, the speed stat really only lets you compare weapons of the same type (dual daggers, nikana, etc.). It doesn't allow you to compare a nikana with sword, because nikanas and swords use different combos and therefore have different animations.

In order to normalize this and allow comparison across weapon types, what we need first is a numerical indication of a stance's animation speed—an average, I suppose, of the number of individual strikes in each of the stance's combos. The weapon's speed stat would then be applied to the stance's speed, and the resulting value would be displayed in the stat column.