[2019] Dev Workshop - Cannot Cast in the Air: Friend or Foe?

Greetings, Tenno!

Can a Rhino Stomp the air? How can a Banshee Sound Quake, when there is no ground around to fracture? Well, with new technology, comes new questions; 

So, what if we got rid of restrictions on air-casting?

As many of you are aware, Warframe has been adapting and changing up gameplay to make it smoother and much more ‘Space Ninja’ in its action. Recently we have seen the introduction of the Melee Rework: Phase 1 (which is still in progress), but as an interesting side effect, we have found that some new systems that we have introduced could potentially be applied to other game systems... in this case, Ability use.

Right now, there are certain powers that just cannot be cast in the air. Some of those powers are easy to address, and we simply remove the restriction. Voilà! However, some of the powers would look a little... strange. While we want to be magical space ninjas, stomping the air bends the suspension of disbelief a little too far, at least from an animation or design perspective.

So, enter the Aimed Ground Slam:

 

The idea is that we take the mechanics used in the new Melee rollout and apply them to powers that require the floor, potentially with new effects. See above that Rhino can ACTUALLY cast Stomp in air now, which results in slamming into the ground to cast!

We will also take some powers that simply don't need the ground slam and remove the in-air checks, such as Trinity's Link. While these are a couple of the Abilities limited by in-air casting, it could also open up opportunities for additional air effects on power usage. As with all of our Dev workshops, we are sure you guys would have some good ideas to share!

 

Look, Trinity freely casts Link in air!

Let’s see your thoughts, Tenno!

2 minutes ago, Loza03 said:

Hmmm...

How about going one step beyond? In cases similar to rhino, why not give it a buff depending on how high in the air it is? Longer start up and more situational, but more power. Could be a fun dynamic!

 

Just now, Godzelda123 said:

I think the Rhino stomp needs it's own custom animation if you let us use it from the air. The animation you showed here, almost looks like he's teleporting to the ground, which is a little jarring. 

 

Kinda the same with Trinity here, since her feet are totally flat and it looks like she's standing on nothing. But I like the idea! Just needs some fleshing out.

So in both these cases, please note, this is still early days. This is a 'proof of concept' obviously, but suggestions like these will certainly help towards what we would need to look at.