Get ready, Tenno. (Warframe)

[rhoenix]

- Since I got lucky in trades, I rushed the Equinox (otherwise, it would have been 4 more days).

Just couldn't stand the thought of me beating you to a new frame, could you?

That's what started it, yeah - I admit it. Then I chose to give into my impatience, and traded a couple prime parts for platinum.

[rhoenix]

Ok, so here's my excited post about Equinox.

You all knew it was coming sooner or later, despite how true or not true Hotfoot's accusation of me being a polyframerist is. I will neither confirm nor deny anything on that count.

But - here's why Equinox has me all kinds of enamored: it allows for a great variety of gameplay, as well as a versatile skillset. About the only thing Equinox can't handle well is being properly defensive, and even then you can still heal and support allies. Also, Equinox gets a minor Equilibrium effect for free - you get a small amount of energy when you pick up a Health orb, and a small amount of health when you pick up an Energy orb. This bonus appears to stack with the Equilibrium mod.

Ability 1 simply switches between Night Aspect, and Day Aspect. The switch takes about 2 seconds to complete, and you gain temporary bonuses after doing so. When you switch to Night aspect, you gain a boost to Armor and Shields that gradually wears off over the next 30 seconds. Switching to Day Aspect gives you a boost to damage, and a boost to movement speed that gradually wears off over the next 30 seconds. This bonus is affected by +power strength mods, and the duration is affected by +duration mods.

Ability 2 (Night): Rest: causes target (and nearby targets with +range mods) to fall asleep, allowing you to use Finisher melee attacks on them. (This is what lets Equinox pretend to be a stealth frame, btw.) More power str means that the target will take more damage before waking up, and +duration mods make the state last longer.

Ability 3 (Night): Pacify: causes all enemies within the active radius to inflict reduced damage to you, while still drawing threat. Drains energy according to how many enemies are in range. (Tank mode? What?) Damage reduction is dependent on Power strength.

Ability 4 (Night): Mend: accumulates damage you inflict on enemies to a pool, with a constant energy drain while accumulating. Activate the ability again to expend the accumulated damage as an AoE Heal on yourself and all allies in range. (Hi Trinity! What's going on?) Damage healed is affected by power str, while range is affected by +range mods.

Ability 2 (Day): Rage: causes target (and nearby targets with +range mods) to take additional damage from your attacks and abilities, while also speeding up their movement. (This is hilarious against bosses). The amount of extra damage enemies take and their movement bonus are affected by +power strength mods. Range mods increase the radius of effect, and +duration mods affect how long targets are affected.

Ability 3 (Day): Provoke: causes all allies within the active radius to gain a boost to ability power strength. Causes an energy drain whenever an ally uses an ability while within range. (FIRE EVERYTHING!) This bonus is affected by power strength.

Ability 4 (Day): Maim: accumulates damage you inflict on enemies to a pool, with a constant energy drain while accumulating, as well as an automatic Slash proc on all enemies that enter the active radius (damage per tick for Slash is dependent on +power str). Activate the ability again to expend the accumulated damage as a massive AoE burst of Slashing damage (again, affected by power strength).


Due to how the abilities work, the two Aspects benefit from having a similar combination of mods. +Range and +Power mods work exceptionally well here, and +efficiency mods and the Rage mod help you use those abilities for longer, and more often. +Duration mods primarily affect how long certain abilities will last on enemies or allies, but this isn't as necessary as +Power, +Range, or +Efficiency mods.

In short, the ability to rapidly change between tank and assault, between support and damage is not to be underestimated. Sure, frames like Rhino, Frost, Valkyr, and Chroma make better tanks, Trinity and Oberon are better healers, and Nova, Ember, and others make better nukers - but none of them can step far outside their role the way Equinox can and does so easily.

The parts are a little annoying to get, mainly because you have to farm Tyl Regor for a total of eight different parts before you can build it (you need the Night Helmet, Chassis, and Systems, the Day Helmet, Chassis, and Systems, as well as the Night Aspect and Day Aspect blueprints) - and I know RNGesus and Lootcifer both like to screw with people's dreams. On the other hand, once you do, it is so, so worth the time and effort you spent to get it.

[rhoenix]

So, Baro's stock yesterday was terrible. He sold a Primed Heavy Impact mod for melee, a Primed Slip Magazine for pistols, a Prisma Liset skin, and the Prisma Tetra weapon.

The Prisma version of the Tetra is less awful than its counterpart, but that doesn't make it a great weapon. Good for MR, basically - as even if you put multiple forma into this gun to put on an interesting mod setup, it's still going to be "meh."

On the other hand, the huge boost all Shotguns got with u17 is wonderful (the Hek, Strun Wraith, and Tigris are all wonderful now), and the Supra is indeed now less terrible.

[rhoenix]

A few quick notes:

- Storage Containers in the Dojo apparently don't let you stash materials so other people can use or withdraw, and I don't see a way of adding this capability to the Dojo.
- the new sidearm Twin Grakatas, besides being dakka-hilarious, are a great argument for using the Primed Pistol Mutation mod. With sidearm mods, the Twin Grakatas are a bit scarier than the regular version, though at the expense of a longer reload time.

[rhoenix]

So - some fun with Warframe Lore, since I need a writing project anyway. I'm enclosing this a spoiler tag, since this does contain information learned during the Natah quest.

To get the Natah quest, just run missions at random until you see the lights flicker blue (not red, like what would be normal if you're about to get jumped) - once they do, search the mission until you find a thin, glowing blue thing, and make sure to scan it before it disappears. They tend to show up much more on Uranus, particularly with Tyl Regor's new Assassination mission.

Once you scan one, you'll receive notification at the end of the mission that you've unlocked the Natah quest - the reward for which is some juicy lore, plus an Exilus Adapter to unlock the new Mobility slot on a single Warframe. You can of course get more Exilus Adapters from Cephalon Simaris, using Simaris rep points, on the second floor of any Relay.

LORE/HISTORY OF THE LOTUS:

Spoiler: show

It is still unknown how the Lotus ended up leading or directing the Tenno, but it is known now that she is a living, though rogue, Sentient. Her mission originally was to gain the Orokin Empire's trust by working with the Tenno, bring down the Orokin Empire, and then eliminate the Tenno.

This suggests many strong things for how the tide of the war turned once the Tenno got involved, that the Sentients felt a good option was to attempt subverting the Tenno to attack the Orokin Empire for them. From that, it seems likely that the Sentients felt their victory was assured until the Tenno became a factor in the war.

Natah, or the Lotus as she's known now, was evidently successful with the first part of her directive - the Tenno started an uprising against the Orokin for still-unknown reasons, and the Lotus led them to the hidden Void Towers to sleep, also for unknown reasons.

However, she did not follow through on the second part of her directive, which was to destroy the Tenno. Instead, she hid them away in "the second dream," as she put it, to be awoken later on.

This gets complicated when it was also revealed that there are Sentients still in the Origin System (e.g. the Sol system) - that not all of them were defeated. At least one survived, along with several Sentient drones. It gets more complicated when it's discovered that the one for certain who survived is a parent of Natah, and that this parent does not approve of what Lotus had done.

In short, the Tenno have been following the orders of a Sentient this entire time. Tenjin, the PvP/Conclave Syndicate leader, makes it clear that he still holds allegiances to the fallen Orokin Empire, and that he does not like or trust the Lotus, for reasons not well known. His reaction to finding out Lotus' true origins was predictable.

So, this leads to the question of "what now?"

The Tenno have discovered that they were basically used by the Sentients in the shadows to bring down the very Empire that created them, and that the same one who led them to do so then is the one leading them today. Moreover, the Sentients appear poised to make a comeback invasion to the Origin System.

Just how truly successful the Tenno's counterattack against the Sentients was back in the day is now much less clear - if the Sentients were working to give the impression that the Tenno were winning to make Natah's task of using them to destroy the Orokin Empire, then the Tenno's "victory" against them is much more suspect, particularly if there are Sentients waking up and making an appearance now.

From the way events have been shown so far, it sounds likely that the Sentients were prepared to gleefully invade the Origin System soon, but finding out Natah/Lotus not only didn't kill off the Tenno, she's leading them now came as a nasty shock. Her parent said to her that "you are riven, and I will not be able to stop them from trying to reclaim you" before he left. If that's true, then Lotus is effectively a rogue double-agent, now pursuing purely her own agenda, and not that of the Orokin Empire or the Sentients.

Where this goes from here is anyone's guess.

[rhoenix]

A small thing recently added were Kurias - small objects scattered throughout the different maps and tilesets that, when scanned, each reveal a single line of a poem about the beginnings of the Grineer Twin Queens.

Once you've found all of them, all you really get is to see the complete poem, as well as a Kuria decoration for your ship. So, not quite as rewarding as, say, the Holocrons in SW:TOR, but it is a thing nonetheless.

They are hidden in small, out of the way places, and the video below shows the locations of all of them.

[youtube][/youtube]

Quite a bit more lore has been added with this update, and I hope more of it keeps coming. Little things like this are what make a game feel like a full experience.

[B4UTRUST]

So - some fun with Warframe Lore, since I need a writing project anyway. I'm enclosing this a spoiler tag, since this does contain information learned during the Natah quest.

To get the Natah quest, just run missions at random until you see the lights flicker blue (not red, like what would be normal if you're about to get jumped) - once they do, search the mission until you find a thin, glowing blue thing, and make sure to scan it before it disappears. They tend to show up much more on Uranus, particularly with Tyl Regor's new Assassination mission.

Once you scan one, you'll receive notification at the end of the mission that you've unlocked the Natah quest - the reward for which is some juicy lore, plus an Exilus Adapter to unlock the new Mobility slot on a single Warframe. You can of course get more Exilus Adapters from Cephalon Simaris, using Simaris rep points, on the second floor of any Relay.

LORE/HISTORY OF THE LOTUS:

Spoiler: show

It is still unknown how the Lotus ended up leading or directing the Tenno, but it is known now that she is a living, though rogue, Sentient. Her mission originally was to gain the Orokin Empire's trust by working with the Tenno, bring down the Orokin Empire, and then eliminate the Tenno.

This suggests many strong things for how the tide of the war turned once the Tenno got involved, that the Sentients felt a good option was to attempt subverting the Tenno to attack the Orokin Empire for them. From that, it seems likely that the Sentients felt their victory was assured until the Tenno became a factor in the war.

Natah, or the Lotus as she's known now, was evidently successful with the first part of her directive - the Tenno started an uprising against the Orokin for still-unknown reasons, and the Lotus led them to the hidden Void Towers to sleep, also for unknown reasons.

However, she did not follow through on the second part of her directive, which was to destroy the Tenno. Instead, she hid them away in "the second dream," as she put it, to be awoken later on.

This gets complicated when it was also revealed that there are Sentients still in the Origin System (e.g. the Sol system) - that not all of them were defeated. At least one survived, along with several Sentient drones. It gets more complicated when it's discovered that the one for certain who survived is a parent of Natah, and that this parent does not approve of what Lotus had done.

In short, the Tenno have been following the orders of a Sentient this entire time. Tenjin, the PvP/Conclave Syndicate leader, makes it clear that he still holds allegiances to the fallen Orokin Empire, and that he does not like or trust the Lotus, for reasons not well known. His reaction to finding out Lotus' true origins was predictable.

So, this leads to the question of "what now?"

The Tenno have discovered that they were basically used by the Sentients in the shadows to bring down the very Empire that created them, and that the same one who led them to do so then is the one leading them today. Moreover, the Sentients appear poised to make a comeback invasion to the Origin System.

Just how truly successful the Tenno's counterattack against the Sentients was back in the day is now much less clear - if the Sentients were working to give the impression that the Tenno were winning to make Natah's task of using them to destroy the Orokin Empire, then the Tenno's "victory" against them is much more suspect, particularly if there are Sentients waking up and making an appearance now.

From the way events have been shown so far, it sounds likely that the Sentients were prepared to gleefully invade the Origin System soon, but finding out Natah/Lotus not only didn't kill off the Tenno, she's leading them now came as a nasty shock. Her parent said to her that "you are riven, and I will not be able to stop them from trying to reclaim you" before he left. If that's true, then Lotus is effectively a rogue double-agent, now pursuing purely her own agenda, and not that of the Orokin Empire or the Sentients.

Where this goes from here is anyone's guess.

It brings up some interesting questions on the Stalker, as well. The G3 and Zanuka make sense as is, but the Stalker has always been a bit of a mystery as to who he is and why he's doing all this. But from his codex file plus this lotus information, I'm guessing he was either a young/fresh tenno that wasn't corrupted by the Lotus's plans or an Orokin soldier of some other variety that was present when the shit hit the fan and the Tenno took out the Orokin Empire. Having witnessed the destruction and what came in the aftermath after the Tenno went into stasis he pieced together bits from multiple other Warframes and basically cobbled together a unique frame for himself or perhaps found a prototype warframe and used it to gain revenge on the Tenno.

Makes me wonder if we would ever get the ability to modify warframes in such a manner, a prototype warframe that you need to make that defaults with no powers but you can add on abilities from any other warframe you possess but must have at least one part of that frame to sacrifice to gain the power.

[rhoenix]

It brings up some interesting questions on the Stalker, as well. The G3 and Zanuka make sense as is, but the Stalker has always been a bit of a mystery as to who he is and why he's doing all this. But from his codex file plus this lotus information, I'm guessing he was either a young/fresh tenno that wasn't corrupted by the Lotus's plans or an Orokin soldier of some other variety that was present when the shit hit the fan and the Tenno took out the Orokin Empire. Having witnessed the destruction and what came in the aftermath after the Tenno went into stasis he pieced together bits from multiple other Warframes and basically cobbled together a unique frame for himself or perhaps found a prototype warframe and used it to gain revenge on the Tenno.

Makes me wonder if we would ever get the ability to modify warframes in such a manner, a prototype warframe that you need to make that defaults with no powers but you can add on abilities from any other warframe you possess but must have at least one part of that frame to sacrifice to gain the power.

Yeah, the "Low Guardian" and "High Guardian" thing could very well be a reference to the Tenno who stayed loyal to the Orokin, versus the Tenno who revolted. The Corpus call the Tenno "Betrayers," presumably for similar reasons - the only Tenno around now are the ones who took down the Orokin Empire.

The Kurias above at least show some more of the origins of the Grineer, but nothing further has been shown about the Tenno themselves, or why the Tenno took down the Orokin leadership once the war against the Sentients was "over."

From that, it's even likely that the Stalker is one of the Tenno who stayed loyal to the Orokin, and did not side with the Lotus on that fateful day.

[rhoenix]

This is a free double affinity weekend, starting today. If you need to level stuff, now's the best time.

EDIT: And yes, if you currently already have an Affinity Booster active, you'll get 4x Affinity this weekend. Got Forma?

[rhoenix]

So, I logged into Warframe before work for a bit today. My Tigris being done building now, and given that this is double XP weekend, I decided to take it for a spin.

Summary: I only like the Hek slightly more, though it's close.

[table=][tr=][td=]Weapon[/td][td=]Hek[/td][td=]Tigris[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]MR[/td][td=]4[/td][td=]4[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Weapon Type[/td][td=]Shotgun[/td][td=]Shotgun[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Weapon Slot[/td][td=]Primary[/td][td=]Primary[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Fire Rate[/td][td=]2.17[/td][td=]2.0[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Pellets[/td][td=]7[/td][td=]4[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Magazine[/td][td=]4[/td][td=]2[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Reload[/td][td=]2.0[/td][td=]1.8[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Damage (Total)[/td][td=]525.1[/td][td=]1050.0[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Damage (Impact)[/td][td=]78.8[/td][td=]105.0[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Damage (Puncture)[/td][td=]341.3[/td][td=]105.0[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Damage (Slashing)[/td][td=]105.0[/td][td=]840.0[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Crit %[/td][td=]10%[/td][td=]5%[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Crit Multiplier[/td][td=]2.0x[/td][td=]2.0x[/td][/tr]
[tr=][td=]Status %[/td][td=]25%[/td][td=]25%[/td][/tr][/table]

As you can see, the Tigris' damage qualifies as "offensive," and the Hek even doing half as much is monstrous now. The small pellet count of both guns does make sure that multishot won't be giving you too many more pellets, but each pellet will do an impressive amount of damage.

The Hek is more accurate at range, with a tighter spread for the pellets, but the Tigris pretty much acts like a shotgun with its spread - it sucks at further than medium range.

The main difference between the two is how they fire. The Hek is a shotgun with a 4-shot semi-auto magazine, whereas the Tigris is just double-barreled, and will fire off both barrels consecutively for a shot - unless you hold down the fire button between shots, or use alt-fire. This mechanic stays in effect even if you add magazine size mods, to the point where you can unload four shots in rapid succession with the Tigris.

On the other hand, the Hek has a great counterargument - the Scattered Justice mod, available from the Steel Meridian syndicate. This mod adds the Steel Meridian effect meter, as well as adding +200% multishot, all for a measly 7 mod energy. This mod, all by itself, very much evens the score between the two guns.

That said, even with that mod equipped, the Tigris is better equipped to erase hardened targets very quickly (like bosses), whereas the Hek is more a general-purpose shotgun.

[rhoenix]

Baro Ki'Teer this time has the following:

- Primed Point Blank (excellent)
- skin for Kubrow (meh)
- Prisma Shade sentinel (note that this is an actual sentinel, not a skin)

Get Primed Point Blank at the least, and the Prisma Shade if you like the Shade, or if you just want more MR.

[rhoenix]

The Void skyster is back this Friday. Which relay he'll show up at is as of yet unknown.

[rhoenix]

Update 17.3 just came out, which added Syndicate Primary weapons - one for each of the six major Syndicates. They each have the same basic requirements as getting the Syndicate Sidearm weapons - which is that you have to be at max rank for affinity with that particular Syndicate, and that you have 125k rep to spend.

For obvious reasons, this is impossible to do with all six at once, but you can trade these weapons in the Trading chat for the others.

[youtube][/youtube]

Steel Meridian: Vaykor Hek
Arbiters of Hexis: Telos Boltor
Cephalon Suda: Synoid Simulor
Perrin Sequence: Secura Penta
New Loka: Sancti Tigris
Red Veil: Rakta Cirnos

[rhoenix]

(this is a rant/essay I'm planning on posting on the Warframe forums, after thinking about this subject for the past few months, as well as a discussion had last night with some friends on Skype regarding this very thing.)

Ok, this is a rant that's been building for a while now. All my evangelism for this game pretty much stemmed from being enamored with with the ideas of the game, and the relentless hope that the execution of those ideas would eventually catch up to the ideas themselves.

Short answer is that after two plus years of being a public beta, where the game has been released for Xbox One and PS4 as well as PC, there's more stuff, and some nicer graphics, but there's only a slightly better game after all this time, content, and updates. The game itself has had many graphical updates, weapons, and warframes added, some boss updates done, but the game itself doesn't really feel any more cohesive as an experience since open beta. There are many contributing factors for this, and I'll write them up in a long-winded and detailed way below.

Mind you, these thoughts are from a person who paid money way back in the day to get the Grandmaster's pack. I ask that you not weigh that as you read this, but rather that I've been playing the game since the Braton Vandal was available.


1. Slots.
Problem: With the avalanche of weapons that have been released over time, the severely limited number of slots has only grown into more of an irritation. Even granting that this is a F2P game, knowing that you'll have to spend real-world money at some point just to have all the weapon, sentinel, and warframe options on hand that you want is annoying. It basically amounts to paying a membership fee on a regular basis, given the large number of weapons that are continually released.

Solution: Give each player 30 weapon slots, 10 Sentinel/Sentinel Weapon/Kubrow Slots, and 10 warframe slots to start. Inventory space upgrades shouldn't be basically infinite, as they are now. Show progressive upgrades a player can get, such as Weapon Storage I, II, and III, each of which would give you an additional 10 weapon slots, for a total of 30 additional with all three upgrades. Warframe and Sentinel slots would grant 5 slots for each upgrade, for a total of 15 additional slots. In addition, reimbursing the players who've already spent platinum on slots should be done, giving them a cache of rare 5 cores, or a few free colors & skins or something. Basically, make those who've spent money on the slots in the past feel properly reimbursed, and make new players feel like they have tangible elbow room with which to work.


2. Weapons.
Problem: In short, it's beginning to feel like Warframe should just include a random weapon generator a la Borderlands, and be done with it. Now don't get me wrong, the many different types of weapons have been all cool to see - but how they all fit into the game in terms of efficacy is another matter entirely. Some weapons are very obviously top-tier, others are very obviously not top-tier, and there a huge number of weapons that get sorted into those categories. The only reason to try out most of them is for Mastery Rank (which will be discussed later).

Solution: Use the specialty type for a weapon to determine it's tier. To determine a weapon's tier, the type should make it clear - Primed and Prisma weapons should be top tier, Vandal and Syndicate weapons just below Primed & Prisma in terms of capability, and regular weapons at the bottom tier. I would also like to introduce a new type, which would be Bonded - you should be able to take any regular-tier weapon and upgrade it to a Bonded, which would have slightly better stats, on par with Vandal or Syndicate weapons, but not Primed or Prisma. On that note though, it should be possible to upgrade a Bonded weapon to a Prisma weapon sometimes through Baro Ki'Teer.


3. Mods.
Problem: Over time, it's become accepted that there are a few good mods per category, and many weird and/or useless ones. Some of the weirder ones have an interesting concept behind them (Combustion Beam), but lose efficacy quickly as enemies get past level 20 or so. Most of the mods for the Exilus mod slot are terrible (Maglev, etc.), and the Exilus mods don't add any to Warframe capacity the way Aura mods do.

Solution: Remove the more weird and esoteric mods (such as Maglev, Intruder, Provoked, etc.) altogether, while giving players who had them rare 5 cores in compensation. The idea is that any mod that drops should be potentially useful, not as Transmute or Fusion fodder most of the time. Future mods should be added carefully with this in mind. Exilus mods should be reduced in energy cost, and add that amount directly to a Warframe's mod energy pool, rather than subtracting it.


4. Lore.
Problem: Beyond the obvious stuff, there has been very little released as to the lore for the game, and only one mission that adds flavor and immersion to the player - the Namah quest is the first one I've seen that actually does feel at all immersive. The Kuria added are a nice idea, but all they do is show some poetry relating to the Twin Queens, and nothing else. The planets each receiving makeovers for theme and such is nice, but don't really add any story, lore, or immersion to the player.

Solution: Each planet should have its own questline, specific to the faction and planet in question, and every mission taken in that region should show some tangible progress on that questline. For instance: Mercury should be about shredding Vor's powerbase properly before you finally take him out. Every mission along that quest should be for a specific purpose toward the next goal of the quest, with specific commentary, lore, or information on that mission for that quest. A player should be able to repeat a previous mission to more or less do the same mission selection they can now, but the interface should also reflect how each mission is a node along the completion of that planet's questline(s). The Void should have several questlines available.


5. Missions.
Problem: Certain mission types, even setting aside the lack of lore or commentary (as in #4 above), get fairly boring and predictable to repeat. Exterminate missions sometimes give extra items, but no real variability except in terms of what faction you face. Sabotage is actually a good mission example now, since you always have the option of hunting down the lockers - but the others really do feel lackluster in comparison.

Solution: For Survival & Defense, every 5 minutes (in Survival) or every 5 waves (in Defense), a leader enemy-type shows up. This leader would be a buffed version of the level range of Eximus enemies available, and would randomly give extra affinity or a random extra item when killed. The player should be notified appopriately when this leader appears. For Extermination, there should be several leader type enemies (one for every 25 enemies, about) that would appear, each of which which would have the chance of extra loot or affinity when killed.


6. Gear.
Problem: Transmutation should be applicable for more than just mods.

Solution: As one example, one should be able to transmute 4 Void keys of one type to get 1 key of the next tier - e.g. being able to transmute 4 tier 1 survival keys to get 1 tier 2 survival key, or transmute 4 small health restores to get 1 medium health restore. This would not affect blueprints of course, just completed items.


7. Player item customization.
Problem: Weapon rebalancing can strike the playerbase fairly hard, especially if the player's invested Forma, and/or a Catalyst/Reactor in a given item.

Solution: Make sure players have adequate notifications (both in-game and otherwise) regarding weapon or warframe rebalancing, and that they always have the option of regaining the Forma and Catalysts/Reactors they've invested into a given item. Having the Simulacrum available from the Liset would go a great distance toward helping players make sure they like a given weapon as well. They'll still have to re-level the item if they decide later that they want to re-add Forma and such to it, of course - but as time-consuming as those things can be, the player should still have the option of resetting a given weapon or warframe to level 0, and getting back the Forma and Catalyst/Reactor they've invested.


In conclusion, there are many excellent ideas within Warframe, and the ideas are good enough to bear re-examining in order to bring them to their full potential. These are but one player's perspective on this, after having played this game for quite a long time - but I'm starting to truly feel burned out on the game, even with the new Syndicate primary weapons being added recently. Having the changes I've listed above would go quite a long way toward making me fall for Warframe once more.

[rhoenix]

Warframe and I had a long fight and a time of not talking to each other. I called Warframe shallow and disjointed beneath the surface, and Warframe responded by making its exterior shinier.

Fuck, I might just be part magpie. Or, I still enjoy the visceral "one versus an army" type of thing. Or both.

Anyway - the Syndicates now offer Primary weapons as well. I only have the Synoid Simulor of the six available so far, but this weapon makes me happy. The original Simulor was interesting and unique, but felt too clunky and slow to really be of use.

So then Cephalon Suda released their (her?) version of the gun.

Oh, Billy.

- The orbs both guns fire do not damage enemies by themselves; it's only when two or more orbs are in proximity to each other that damage is dealt. It takes at least four in close proximity to create a singularity. This singularity has a lifespan and area of effect based on how many orbs went into creating the singularity (minimum 8 seconds), before or after the singularity forms. When the lifespan runs out, the singularity will explode, dealing Electricity (not Magnetic) damage in a wide radius.
- Pressing alt-fire will force a premature detonation of all active singularities. All of them. At once.
- Both versions deal a base damage type of Magnetic, and not a physical damage type (impact, slash, or puncture). This automatically gives the weapon a bias against enemies that use shields. While Magnetic is only 50% effective against alloy armor, the gun's functionality make it work just fine against Grineer and Infested, presuming you add Radiation or Corrosive to it. Against the Corpus or the Void enemies however, this gun is a portable version of Ragnarok, and only gets more so with more Forma added.
- Both versions need at least 4 shots ending in the same area to generate a Singularity. The Synoid version does AoE damage in a radius about 2x as large as the original.
- The Entropy effect of the Syndicate meter on this gun, when filled, will release an AoE burst dealing 1000 Magnetic damage with a 100% status chance (which means anyone who survives will only have Shields as a fond memory of happier, earlier times), will give you Energy equal to 25% of your 'frame's max energy capacity, and give you a base Energy boost for 30 seconds.
- Reload times (3 seconds for the base weapon, and 2 seconds for the Synoid version), magazine size (10 for the original, versus 15 for the Synoid), and fire rate (2.0 rounds/sec for the base version, 2.667 rounds/sec for the Synoid version) are all greatly improved.
- Both versions have a base crit% of 10%, which is not enough to mod for. Even considering that most of the damage you'll be dealing will be against multiple enemies at once, it's still not worth modding for.
- Split Chamber operates strangely on both these weapons. Each time Multishot activates, it will indeed fire a second orb, which will reduce the total number of shots in one place necessary to create a singularity, but won't do any additional damage by itself. For this reason, I've been leaving Split Chamber off, and just using Shred for the punch-through, and faster fire rate for more reliable damage. I don't know if this is a bug or not, but it's a thing.

Conclusion: Stack different types of elemental damage on this thing.

Conclusion for taking this gun to 11: Forma it once, to change the utterly useless D polarity into a V. Add three more Forma for two more V polarities and a - polarity, giving you a total of 4 V polarity slots, and 2 - polarity slots. Once done, the build I will use is Serration, Heavy Caliber, Shred, Wildfire, Infected Clip, Stormbringer, Hellfire, and Malignant Force. This will make for a massive amount of additional Heat and Corrosive damage, and you can easily swap a few mods around to change it to Radiation damage instead, to do maximum damage against Grineer.

This is a great assault weapon, capable of reducing a large crowd of enemies into paste in short order. It isn't silent, which makes sense, but the Synoid version of this gun is good enough that I don't need to compare it against another weapon. Once you hit the point where enemies take more than one explosion to kill them, the gun's effect of constant damage to enemies within area of its orbs makes it great for crowd control as well.

[rhoenix]

Update 18 is here, and it appears to be enough to pull me back into the game for a while.

- two new frames: Wukong (presumably Monkey Sage), and Ivara (stealth archer).
- new main quest: The Second Dream
- new function: Focus

Daily Login Rewards
This seems like such a small thing, but after so long of the login rewards being utterly useless or ridiculous, seeing this overhauled so it isn't terrible is one of those small changes that's nice.

Focus
You get your first Focus Lens from the quest Second Dream, along with an excellent melee weapon. At the end of this quest, Lotus will give you a few questions, and then give you a Focus Lens, which allows you to choose one of five schools when activated, each of which gives you a different 5th ability. Once you have the 5th ability, you can use Focus XP to purchase upgrades for it (see below on Focus Schools).

Changing a focus lens is possible, including adding a Greater Focus Lens, which requires four Focus Lenses to make. The basic Focus Lens adds 2.5% of received affinity into Focus XP to upgrade your progress in your chosen school(s), while the Greater Focus lens converts 6.8% of received affinity. Note that only rank 30 gear can earn you Focus XP, so if the item with the Focus Lens equipped isn't level 30, you won't receive any Focus XP until you level it to 30 again.

Focus Schools
The five different schools for Focus are as follows:

Madurai (Fire): Gives you the Phoenix Gaze 5th ability (AKA "Super-Saiyan Dragonball Z Beam"), which is a beam weapon that inflicts high damage on all enemies in its path. Upgrades for it include passively boosting your physical damage for all abilities and weapons after using the Phoenix Gaze, giving the beam greater AoE, lighting affected enemies on fire, and adding explosions.

Vizarin (Water): Mending Tides is this school's 5th (AKA "I say be HEEEEEEALED"), which heals you and nearby allies. Upgrades for it allow you to revive fallen allies with it, increase the distance at which shared affinity is given to teammates for kills and ability use (which is awesome), and gives allies affected by Mending Tides heightened defenses (Protection Ward and shield boosts).

Naramon (Air): The School of Screwing With People. Grants the Mind Spike 5th ability (AKA "Random Drunken Nyx"), which Confuses affected enemies (basically, the Radiation proc). Upgrades for it include granting automatic critical hits on affected enemies using melee weapons, opening them up for melee Finishers, disarming affected enemies, and can even grant you and allies Invisibility for a short time.

Unairu (Earth): This school grants the Basilisk Flare 5th ability (AKA "The Police Procedure"), which operates similarly to Atlas' ability Petrify, in that it can turn enemies to stone, preventing them from acting or moving for a short time. Upgrades for it upgrade your and your allies' armor, give all your melee weapons a chance to petrify enemies for the remainder of the mission after using Basilisk Gaze once, and reducing affected enemies' armor.

Zenurik (Void): My favorite school so far, Zenurik gives you the 5th ability Void Pulse (AKA "Hey Morons, Touch The Sky"), which acts like the Vauban's skill Bastille, in that it suspends and incapacitates nearby enemies for a short time. Upgrades for it include passively giving you Energy Regeneration (identical in effect to the Aura mod Energy Siphon) for the remainder of the mission after using Void Pulse, increasing Warframe energy efficiency for the remainder of the mission after using it once, gives you enemy radar, and even can make enemies affected by Void Pulse also take on the Bullet Attractor debuff.

Sorties:
A new daily mission type in u18, Sorties are basically endgame-type missions. There are three of them per day, in increasing difficulty - the first has enemies around level 60, the second has level 80 enemies, and the final one has level 100 enemies.

Though I wouldn't recommend taking sub-rank 30 gear on these missions, they can reward you with parts for the new Ivara stealth archer frame, legendary fusion cores, Focus Lenses, Primed mods, and other good and rare loot. Note that these missions are currently the only way to get more Focus Lenses, but their purportedly high chance for other good stuff only sweetens the deal. Obviously, these missions practically require having a group, unless you think you're Tenno enough to handle them solo.

Conclusion: So, along with Syndicates to earn stuff for, we now also have Foci, and more endgame-level content besides Baro Ki'Teer's shop and the two raids. Previous frames are still being rebalanced (Ember, and Rhino soon), and it's feeling like the game is giving a more cohesive feel now. The various Quests are numbering enough now to actually begin to feel like a storyline, rather than as interesting diversions.

New Exilus mods have also been added (the Drift series, all received through running the Orokin Moon test) that aren't wastes of time, and give nice dual-stat boosts.

So, does the game fix all the things I've grumbled about in the past? No, but they're making some visible progress.

[rhoenix]

Focus Lens update:

- putting the Lens on a Warframe grants 2.5% conversion of affinity to Focus XP, at a rate of 100% bonus for abilities, and 50% for weapon kills.
- putting the Lens on a weapon grants 2.5% conversion of affinity to Focus XP, at a rate of 50% for weapon kills.

Additional lenses can be received from the Sortie missions. Greater Lens blueprints are found in the market for 200,000 credits each, and require 4 lenses to craft - but once completed, grants 6.8% conversion of affinity when placed on a weapon or warframe, instead of 2.5%.

[B4UTRUST]

Until Jan 5th, the following have been pulled out of the Void Vault and are farmable again. After the 5th they go back into the vault for who knows how long:
Frost Prime - Latron Prime - Reaper Prime. Latron Prime Stock is a gimmie part at this point, on a 28 day mission alert at very low level on Mercury. Enjoy it while you can and happy hunting.

Frost Chassis - T3 Def Rot C
Frost Helmet - T4 MD
Frost BP - T3 Sabotage
Frost Systems - T4 Sabotage
Latron Receiver - T2 Capture, T1 Survival
Latron BP - T3 Capture
Latron Barrel - T2 Survival Rot C
Reaper Handle - ODD Rot C
Reaper BP - T3 Def Rot C
Reaper Blade - T1 Survival Rot C

[rhoenix]

Prime Stuff
As a followup to B4's post above, get the Latron Prime and Frost Prime if you don't already have either one. The Latron Prime is seriously one of the very best primary weapons in the game, and very well worth the time and effort spent to get it. The Frost Prime is one of the very best defensive tanks in the game, and well worth adding to your suit closet.

The Reaper Prime is weak sauce, good only for mastery rank, pretty much.

Focus School info update
After some tinkering and number crunching, the two best schools currently appear to be Vizarin, and Zenurik. Note that currently, affinity earned by teammates does not transfer into your Focus XP pool, though presumably this will be fixed shortly, as the same bug affected the Syndicate Reputation system in its early days.

- Vizarin allows you to be a group healer when you're not using Trinity or Oberon, which is no small thing. If you use Trinity or Oberon mainly though, it's less useful, but does still work nicely as a group heal/revive that can be used for free every 3 minutes. It does allow you to use a different frame and still be an effective healer though, which is good for versatility.

- Zenurik is great for crowd control, and once you get a couple buffs, good for team energy regen and even ability efficiency as well. If you don't do the healer thing as much, this is probably the school you want to start with.

[rhoenix]

As a lore/story point though, between the Natah and the subsequent Second Dream quests, many questions about the Tenno, the Stalker, and the Lotus get answered.

Some get answered in ways I really didn't expect, and the answers of course raise more questions. However, the quality of those two quests was excellent, and my hope is that they are the bar that all future quests must meet or exceed in terms of quality.

Between those two quests, many questions about the past are answered. Of course, this leaves the pressing question of "what are the motivations and goals now?"

...Especially since the Sentients definitely look ready to invade the Sol system again. Between those two quests, you (as the player) have succeeded in thwarting at least one highly-placed Sentient, and making him very, very angry.

Then again, that's the Tenno's primary job description, and the Tenno aren't dreaming any longer.

[rhoenix]

In this post, I'm going to talk about things brought up during the Natah & Second Dream quests. I'll put them in spoiler tags for those that haven't completed the two quests, but are still considering playing.

Spoiler: show

So, first, some background on the fateful ship Zariman, from Ember Prime's Codex entry.

Three figures waited behind a simple table. Their attention on a single chair, bathed in light. An old woman's voice from the shadow: 'Send her in'. Across the room a security officer, stern and plain, opened the door. The outline of a young woman appeared at the door. She hesitated, but only for an instant, then crossed the room and sat.
There was a gasp as the light hit her face. Her right eye was bright and blinking, but her left was a greasy slit. Her skin had been burned moon-white. Her mouth was a sagging gash without lips or expression. Her military beret was pulled snug over a scarred and hairless scalp.

The old voice: 'Your name is Kaleen.' Kaleen nodded. 'You were the principal investigator of the Zariman?' Kaleen's voice was a jagged whisper, a rigid face. 'Yes.'

Kaleen coughed, straightened: 'The Zariman was lost making the fold from Saturn to the Outer gates. Mechanical failure. I notified families and filled a report with the inspectors. Nothing ever returns from the fold, so I closed the case.'

'But you reopened the case, days later.'

'I didn't believe it myself until I stepped aboard the ship. It was completely intact, full environmental, as if it had never left.'

'And the crew was gone.'

'Not exactly.' Kaleen hesitated. 'We thought it was empty but we began to find...' Her face twitched at remembered pain, 'We began to find children hiding in the ship.'

'And that is when you violated procedure?'

Kaleen bowed her head, a tear welling in her sightless eye. 'They were children. They were afraid. They needed comfort.'

'So you broke quarantine and this happened to you.'

There was silence as Kaleen touched her face, 'So what have you done with them?'

The old woman gestured for the officer to take Kaleen away. The meeting was over. When Kaleen reached the door she twisted out of his grip and shot back, 'Why would you do that? Why did you put children on military ship?'

'We didn't. That would violate procedure.'

I included that text for some context. In short, we know the Orokin empire exposed the entire crew to the Technocyte virus (the same that made the Infested what they are), "accidentally" lost the ship in the Void, and then let it bake for a few months in this barely-understood plane of reality.

Note that the Orokin didn't really understand the Void or how it worked, though they knew enough about it to achieve FTL travel and communications using it as a medium. The concept of the Warp from Warhammer 40k doesn't appear to be a bad analogy to describe the Void, though it appears to lack the daemons and such.

So, this was ostensibly done because the Sentients had come, and managed to hack all the high technology the Orokin ran their empire on during their assault. Higher-tech weaponry, such as energy weapons, appeared to be ineffective against the Sentients, since the Sentients adapted to the different energy types very quickly. The Orokin Empire was getting stomped in this war, and this led to them performing experiments on their own citizens and children, and it's heavily implied that they didn't ask people to sign up for it.

The children aboard the Zariman survived, though none of the actual crew did. In what can be considered a plan going horribly right, or horribly wrong, the Technocyte virus did not run rampant in the children, though they were changed by the experience. It's unknown what combination of factors went into this, and how much them being bathed in the Void's radiation the entire time affected the process. The result though was that all the children could draw directly on the Void without needing an intermediary of some kind, though they had no real control or knowledge of what they were doing.

From the Rhino Prime's codex entry:

Red lights flashing on stark, white walls. Davis is running ahead of me, dropping his notes. We're running for our lives. The fear gives me a strange perspective - I'm out of my body. I've forgotten how I got here. I don't recognize this place.

Davis and I slam pinned against a cell door and he shouts at me. I give him a dumb look. I can't hear him, the sirens, anything, only the muffled throb of terror in my head. I turn away from Davis down the hall and I see it. The hulking mass, flickering red, glinting like steel and fresh blood. Its skin changes, flowing like mercury when I'm blinded by the sudden muzzle-flashes. They do no good. The beast surges forward and the security men become crimson mist and gore.

I'm a statue, a cornered animal. A gate opens inside me and recognition floods in. I have seen this monster before. I have cut its shell and eviscerated its brothers. I have given it pain and measured its response. I have crafted then rejected countless like it. But I've never seen this beast so close, without the shield, without restraints. I have never seen it... free.

I know I will die so I just watch with curious acceptance. The beast squats down, shovelling a heap of gore into its mouth. It is watching me with vague eyes, a sense of recognition, ancestral memory. It knows who I am and what I've done. It rears up like a bear and roars, shattering the lights and casting us into darkness. I can hear it lumbering toward me, its metal fingers rending the walls, but I know I am dead. I close my eyes and stand ready to pay.

I feel the pull on my arm and realize Davis got the cell open. He tugs me into the cell beyond and I fall on my back. I see Davis standing at the open door, waiting, as the monster tears towards us.
Suddenly I could live through this I shout, "Davis, close the goddamn door!" - But he shakes his head eyes wide as moons. He shouts, "Watch!" over the roaring and rending of metal.

Then silence. Davis is panting, laughing? The beast fills the doorway, inches from him, dripping in blood, but still without violence. It stands there, looking at its hands. Davis whispers, "No one would have believed me."

I crawl up the wall to stand, opposite the door. I've never seen this cell, a cold place with an array of shelves. A morgue? "Where are we, Davis?"

"This is where they keep them. The ones from Zariman."

I'm thrown, what was the Zariman? The ship that never returned? "Davis, what's going on?"

Davis turns to me, a smile forming - "What's going on is..." he turns back to the beast now silent and calm. "...big, fat promotions."

From here, it was fairly plain to see that the children from the Zariman were immediately experimented on after they were recovered, and seen as nothing more than test subjects.

From the Second Dream quest, we know now that the children eventually chosen to become the pool of Tenno were given the warframes as remotely-operated foci - essentially, another body they could not only focus their Void abilities through, but use as if these warframes were their own bodies.

They began turning the tide of the war, eventually beating back the Sentients, and eradicating the ones remaining. The Sentient deep-cover operative Natah was sent in at this point as a last-ditch effort to turn the fortune of war back toward favoring the Sentients. Somehow, she got directly involved in command & control of Tenno missions, and with the Tenno's successes under her direction, she oversaw the eradication of the Sentients still present in the Sol System.

Being now responsible for directing the Tenno who killed off her remaining brothers & sisters in the Sol System, Natah then fulfilled the first stage of her actual directives from her Sentient bosses - she convinced the Tenno that the Orokin Empire had to fall, and to fall during the sunrise of their victory over the Sentients.

Presumably, this didn't take too much convincing. The children had been seen as "other" regardless, seen as separate and necessarily different than the Orokin, despite being Orokin children. The implied experimentation done upon the children while they were still alive goes quite a way toward giving a plausible reason that they'd listen, let alone enact the plan. So, with the one who would become the Stalker watching in muted horror, the Tenno cut down those who led the Orokin Empire.

From the Stalker's Codex entry:

Some have walked these desolate worlds while you have slept. Some like me. I remember what you did. I remember the day.
The Tenno appeared at the Terminus, gleaming and victorious. Our cold and gold Emperors, breathless, bathed you in savior's silk. Then came the sound. Across all our worlds, all at once, the ceremonial Naga drums. A royal salute to the honored Tenno. Ten solemn beats to declare the suffering was over. I watched from a distance, with the rest of the low Guardians. With each beat terror began to crush my throat. The Tenno were not stoic and silent. They were waiting. They were poised. I tried to call out but only a strangled whisper escaped.

When the ninth beat rang a torrent of blood filled the stadium, loosed by Tenno blades. The drums, the Empire, fell silent forever.

Now I hunt, dividing your numbers. Watching from that dark place, cataloging your sins, I am the ghost of retribution. You may forget but you are not innocent.

At this point, Natah was to move onto stage 2 of her mission orders from the Sentients - clean up any evidence of her (and by extension, the Sentients') involvement by killing off all the Tenno who survived. According to the Natah quest, she chose not to because she felt a strong connection and kinship with these children - she could not bring herself to kill them, and in that moment, saw herself as their foster mother. At this point, she leaves the name Natah behind, and for reasons still unknown, chooses the new name Lotus for herself.

She chose instead to have the actual Tenno (the people) moved to Earth's moon Luna and hidden, and have the Tenno move their Warframes to safe spots - and then put them all to sleep, where they would not be found by the Sentients or the remaining Orokin. She cloaks their memories while they sleep, giving them amnesia - the Tenno remember how to run, fight, slash, and shoot, but nothing of what they are. Most importantly, they forget that they are still children remotely operating drone suits - likely an added precaution with a heavy cost that Lotus chose, to ensure that one of their number would be less likely to betray the others.

This inference, plus the Stalker's behavior during the Second Dream quest, suggests that the Stalker was in fact a Tenno, and did not forget what happened (and did not forget that he is not his warframe), though he slowly grew insane over time.

What we're left with now is where she was during the past thousand years after the Orokin Empire fell, and what she was up to while the Tenno slept. Just as importantly, it also brings up the issue of her motivations in the present.

Looking at her one way, she's a former Sentient infiltrator and spy who managed to get placed high enough in the Orokin government to control the Tenno, encouraged the Tenno to betray and murder the Orokin leadership, and then betrayed her actual Sentient bosses by not killing the Tenno off afterward. So, she's a betrayer twice over, leaving her with no clear allegiances, other than her self-professed kinship with the Tenno - the only fighting force that was capable of stopping her former masters, the Sentients.

Looking at her another way, she's a former Sentient infiltrator who grew a conscience when the reality of what she was charged with doing became clear. Because she'd likely be privy to all sorts of information about the Orokin that the average Orokin citizen wasn't aware of, she may have seen both the Sentient and Orokin empires as corrupt and decadent, seeing the children who had been forcibly molded into soldiers (and who didn't have anyone else) as the people who were most like her. Children molded into being soldiers, and told to have no higher aspirations other than living weapons, just as she was. So, she then made her own option.

No matter the reasons she actually chose to do what she did, what we know so far is that she isn't allying with the Corpus or Grineer, she isn't trying to make overt friendly contact with the remaining Orokin (such as Temjin, who really doesn't like her), and she doesn't seem to be trying to establish friendly relations with the Sentients, despite their pending invasion in the present.

So far, from her words and actions in the present, she never went out of her way to show the truth of things to the Tenno, but she didn't shy away from explanations when asked, either. She also seems keen on not allying with any present faction, keeping the Tenno as their own entity, only temporarily allied (at most) with the Grineer or Corpus to achieve certain ends in the Sol System.

In conclusion, whatever the Lotus is currently planning (or even if she has a true plan) is unknown, but all alliances enacted appear to be very individual, such as an individual Tenno's standing with the Syndicates (which have been canonically stated to be "everyone who isn't Corpus, Grineer, or Infested"). There are no broader alliances being hinted at or established, strongly suggesting that whatever she has planned, it involves keeping the Tenno as their own entity.

Whether this is because she fears losing the power she usurped a thousand years ago, or whether she genuinely sees all the Tenno as her children (and therefore wants the best for them, and for them to determine their own destinies) is unknown.

[B4UTRUST]

Spoiler: show

I'd like to add something concerning the Stalker and Second Dream at this point. During the cinematic on the ship after the stalker fight bit, Hunhow is talking after the Stalker stabs your frame. He says "But you're asking yourself... Was I one of these wretched things? You know the answer. You still hate them. You still hate... yourself." Before this, at one point in time the Lotus has made reference that the Stalker had 'found out the truth' and it had driven him mad.

My interpretation of this is that the Stalker is a tenno who is no longer a true tenno. All the true tenno were put into the second dreaming by the Lotus. The Stalker, or the tenno that became the stalker found out about the truth of what he was and what had been done to them. And he killed himself. While he was inhabiting the frame. I think the self hatred of being some sort of monster child used as a tool drove him to this and drove him insane. Some combination of the technocyte virus, psychic ability, psychic trauma and sheer force of will and hatred kept his mind and will alive inside the frame. He became stuck, not truly living or truly dead, possessing an empty frame. And because he wasn't in a tenno body any longer he wasn't put to sleep with the others. He was left awake, inhabiting the frame through the years, letting his isolation and his self-hatred grow and fester and it became a hatred for all tenno.

When he sends you love letters after you assassinate a target it's because you've revealed yourself and made yourself more visible and thus he can track you for awhile. He doesn't care that you assassinated someone, only that you've put yourself on his radar for a time and he seeks revenge.

The other explanation is that he is an Orokin wearing Orokin armor and has just spent countless years training and developing skills and tech to fuck up the tenno for their betrayal. I prefer to think it's the first explanation, though, it just has a better feel to it.

[rhoenix]

Spoiler: show

Your take on the Shadow makes sense - the way he looked at his hands as your Tenno does at the end of the Second Dream strongly implies a bit of self-realization. It may be only be a stylistic choice, but the Stalker's suit in that scene looks remarkably like the suit your Tenno wears (especially the helmet), though with lots of additional stuff added.

Whether he's a literal ghost in a frame, whether he's still wearing the suit he got from the Zariman and just added stuff to it over time (making him the only known Tenno to run around "live" and without a frame), or whether his own body is hidden away even from himself is up for conjecture, but the Second Dream quest implied quite a bit of internal turmoil within the Stalker. Instead of attacking as he normally does, all he did was play keep-away after he ambushes you in your own ship. When he finally brings you down and even holds the Tenno pilot by the neck, even with Hunhow cheering him on in his own twisted way, the Stalker seemed very reluctant to attack a Tenno pilot directly.

The frame you're piloting from afar? No problem, he'll gleefully jump your shit and stab the frame in the chest. The Tenno pilot? Probably hits far too close to home with him, perhaps even triggering a memory or three of his own past.

What is clear is that before this, he seemed (to Hunhow, at least) like a proper free agent that could be "drafted" for the Sentients' ends. After this quest, I definitely wouldn't count on him being an ally if I were a Sentient, and he isn't your ally if you're Tenno either, but where exactly he sits on the scale is unclear. What is clear is that he hasn't allied with any real faction as a faction, and has been pursuing mostly his own personal ends. Where this leads him from here is unknown, but some things during the Second Dream quest make me think that he won't always be the Tenno's determined enemy.

[rhoenix]

So, not to encourage people to spend Platinum, but the in-game Market has Greater Lenses for 40p each.

EDIT: So, don't bother trading for a regular one in the Trading channel, unless you can get one for 5-10p.

[rhoenix]

So, Ivara was released recently. Her three parts are found exclusively from Spy missions of varying difficulties (lvl 1-15, then lvl 15-25, then lvl > 25), which can make her a little annoying to get, but if you have Loki, it's not bad.

Ivara is the first female stealth frame, and is designed around the Robin Hood archetype. Due to how her stealth skill (Prowl, her 3rd) functions, she can't run through a mission as fast as Loki or even Ash can - but as a stealth sniper, she's exceptional.

Her innate passive ability is 30m enemy radar at all times. This stacks with mods and abilities that grant the ability to see enemies on the minimap.

Her first ability, Quiver, lets you select one of four different specialty arrow types to fire: Dashwire (creating a zipline between where you stand and where you fire, which can be very useful), Noisemaker (will get enemy units' attention if they haven't already been alerted, but will not set off alarms), Cloak (creates a cloaking area in a radius around where the arrow hits, allowing you to create stationary stealth areas), and Sleep arrows (which, surprisingly, put all enemies within a radius to sleep for a time). Tapping 1 will change the active arrow type, and holding it down will fire the selected arrow.

Her 2nd, Navigator, lets you have a projectile-eye view of a projectile you just fired. This does not work with hitscan weapons (such as most rifles), but does for bows, throwing daggers, and the like. This shifts your view to right above the projectile, and lets you guide it, speed it up, slow it down, and most importantly, fly through enemies. It will keep working until the projectile either hits a wall, or you run out of energy.

Her 3rd is Prowl, which functions differently than Loki's Invisibility or Ash's Smoke Screen - the stealth will break if you run, bullet jump, or roll, which is the downside. The upside is that you get a bonus to headshot damage (based on power strength) while Prowl is active, and Prowl will let you pickpocket enemies you stand near, effectively giving you another RNG roll for drops before the enemy unit dies.

Her 4th is Artemis Bow, which functions similarly to Excalibur's Exalted Blade, in that the ability basically gives you a new primary weapon to use while the ability is active. It uses 35 energy base to activate, and has no duration - instead, it costs 15 energy per spread of arrows you fire with it, and even better, Energy Siphon still works while Artemis Bow is active. The damage from the arrows not only depend on power strength, but also on what rifle mods you have equipped (this has no effect for shotgun mods if your primary is a shotgun, for instance). It can even apply the elemental damage you have equipped on your rifle. Uncharged shots fire the arrows in a vertical line, charged shots fire the arrows as a horizontal line. As a bonus, right-clicking will fire the currently selected arrow type from Quiver.

I'm still not sure whether I like her as a stealth frame more than my beloved Loki, but as a sniper, she's fantastic. Creative uses of her abilities are not only possible, they're practically encouraged, which is something I truly like. Stealth sniping one's way through a mission is great, and if you're up against Infested, using Artemis Bow to clear out entire groups of them at once (assuming you have Shred or another form of punch-through on your equipped rifle) is almost therapeutic.