[2020] Upcoming Xaku Changes: Round 2

It's been a little bit over a week since the first round of changes to Xaku went live on PC in Heart of Deimos: Update 29.1.0 (soon to come to consoles). Since then we’ve been keeping tabs on the usual feedback channels to read and review your takes on Xaku in their updated form. We have been pleased to see that generally these changes have been enjoyed thus far, and that we’ve taken a step in the right direction. But as many have expressed, and to which we have found ourselves agreeing, our work is not done yet on this Community Warframe!

So here we are with a second round of changes based on the most standout and widely discussed points we saw strewn across the feedback hubs. Whether it's iterating on Round 1 or offering new insight on Xaku’s abilities, we thank you for sharing!

Note that adjustments may be made between the posting of this Workshop and the launch of the changes listed below.

General Changes: 

• Xaku's "The Lost" ability description will now include descriptions of "Accuse", "Deny", and "Gaze" within it. 

The Lost updated description

Xata’s Whisper (Void Status Effect):

• Void damage’s Status Effect will now redirect projectiles to the body part it proc’d on.
  • How it will work: If you shoot at an enemy’s head with Xata’s Whisper enabled and proc, the bubble will redirect all projectiles to the head. If you shoot at the feet, it’ll be redirected to the feet, etc.! It is however possible that even if you proc on the head but then shoot at the lower part of the bubble it might hit the body on the way up to being redirected to the head. 
  • This is a game wide change to Void Status Effect! Now that we have a Warframe that can harness Void damage at the click of a button, it has brought much focus to and discussion around its Status Effect. For those of you who are unfamiliar, in its current state it creates a bullet attractor bubble that directs all projectiles to the center of the enemy’s torso regardless of where it procs. Since Xata’s Whisper applies Void damage to all of their weapons, it was increasingly noticeable to Xaku players that the bubble’s current redirecting position prevents any attempt at enemy headshots until its duration expires. This is one of the main reasons for this change. Headshot disruption ultimately limits your damage output by removing the opportunity for headshot multipliers while it is active. Now, you will be able to use your headshotting skills to greater benefit, while also having generally more options to focus projectiles where desired. Note that regardless of where the Status Effect occurs, it will continue to prevent enemies from being able to shoot at you without having their projectiles redirected back to the center of the bubble.

Grasp of Lohk:

• Re-casting will now steal weapons up to the max number of affected targets.
  • How it will work: You will be able to re-cast up to the max number of targets that you can steal from. In other words, you can add to the current batch of weapons. For example, if your max target is set to 6, and you have 3 weapons active, Grasp of Lohk can be re-cast to “top up” to the remaining 3 weapon allowance. Newly grabbed weapons from re-casts will have independent durations from the previous batch - similar to Protea’s Blaze Artillery.
  • We made re-casting available in Round 1 and set it up to replace the entire current active batch of weapons. Our original reasoning was that this allowed for a ‘fresh’ cast to be made if an undesirable pull occurred. But what makes far more sense is to follow the precedent set by Nekros’ Shadows of the Dead. So now you can maintain your current floating auto-cannon sidekicks and re-cast to refill or top up to the max on command. This will give far more control in maintaining the max number of active weapons you can have at once.
• Added HUD tracker for active weapons.
  • Following our re-cast change, we thought it would be quite helpful to know exactly how many weapons you have active so that you know how many more you can add on re-cast. Instead of counting them manually one by one as they float and shoot around, this is much easier on the eyes!

Grasp of Lohk HUD tracker

• Stolen weapons will no longer target invulnerable enemies.
  • Currently, Grasp of Lohk weapons will target enemies with grey health bars indicating that they are invulnerable. This clearly serves no purpose as their health cannot be damaged and ultimately takes focus away from more important targets. Not to mention that this is a poor use of the ability’s duration drain. As a result, we’ve removed invulnerable enemies as target candidates and stolen weapons will now redirect to vulnerable enemies within range.
• Note on Grasp of Lohk’s ‘Target Range’:
  • In Round 1, we made the distinction between Grasp of Lohk’s ‘Grab Range’ and ‘Target Range’. We then increased its ‘Grab Range’ and left ‘Target Range’ untouched due to “firing range experiments being a bit too wild for Round 1”. As we’ve continued testing, this has held true. In any instance where we’ve increased it, even slightly, we neared a state that we had already established was undesirable due to its encouragement of an ‘inactive’ way of playing (Ember’s “World on Fire” comes to mind before it was changed to “Inferno”). As a result, ‘Target Range’ will continue to remain untouched for this round.

The Lost: Accuse

• We are following through with our proposed idea from Round 1 and have made Accuse re-castable!
  • How it will work: The same way Grasp of Lohk will be set up in Round 2! You will be able to re-cast up to the max number of targets that can be affected/corrupted. For example, if your max target is set to 10, and you have 5 active, Accuse can be re-cast to “top up” to the remaining 5 corrupted crew allowance. Enemies corrupted from re-cast will have independent durations from the previous batch.
  • Currently, Accuse cannot be re-cast until the duration expires or all affected enemies are killed. Which means that often you find yourself locked into a corrupted crew that is inefficient due to dwindling numbers, poor initial cast, etc. For those reasons and more, this was a highly requested change that we are happy to make happen!
• Added HUD tracker for active "Accused" enemies
  • This'll look familiar because we added this for Grasp of Lohk and explained above, but just so that we have intent clear here with Accuse as well! We thought it would be quite helpful to know exactly how many "Accused" enemies you have active so that you know how many more you can add on re-cast. Instead of counting them manually one by one as they run around, this is much easier on the eyes!

Accuse HUD tracker

The Lost: Gaze

• Increased base radius from 8m to 12m.
  • Increasing the base radius range on “Gazed” enemies was highly requested since its defense reduction applies to enemies while they are within the affected area. As we noted in Round 1, we evaluated Gaze and how it performs with established builds that maximized its effects. Increasing the base radius range hits the spot between improving the ability’s effectiveness and managing what is already established as powerful with focused builds. Essentially, more space for more enemies to have their defenses stripped without tipping the scales dramatically on is an already well performing ability when used strategically.

The Lost: Deny

• Increased Deny’s beam width and base range (25m to 40m).
  • Straightforward change to help you target and damage more enemies. More bang for your beam!
• Deny can now be cast while moving.
  • Currently, Deny’s casting animation locks Xaku in place. While we did increase the casting speed in Round 1, it just simply was not enough to fulfill the parkour freedom you’ve become well familiar with in Warframe. Removing the lock brings back the ninja fantasy while also making the most of the synergy between Deny and Grasp of Lohk that we added in Round 1. As we said in our first Xaku Dev Workshop, “more firepower… faster”, but this time we really mean it!

The Vast Untime:

The changes we made to The Vast Untime in Round 1 have been very well received and we echo your sentiment that it is in a good spot in its current state. With that said, no further changes are planned for this round. Go forth and Untime Vastly!

Known Xaku bugs planned for fixes:

It is likely that the following fixes will be released across multiple hotfixes/updates as we make progress on them independently of one another. More fixes are sure to come as well!

• Fixing enemies affected by Accuse not triggering “On hit”, “On Status Effect”, or “On Headshot” effects from weapons and mods.
• Fixing Xaku’s Grasp of Lohk ability targeting phantom enemies in the Ambulas boss fight.
• Fixing weapons that shoot bolts or projectiles (Boltor, Stahlta, Paris, Zhuge, etc.) not targeting/damaging enemies under the influence of The Lost: Accuse, as reported here.
• Fixing the HUD timer icon for Xata’s Whisper in the top right corner ticking down regardless of The Vast Untime being active. This was only a visual bug, and did not actually affect the ‘time freezing’ synergy with The Vast Untime and Xaku’s other abilities, as reported here.
• Fixed certain Grasp of Lohk Primary weapons (bows for example) appearing as the Void entity orbs that you’d see when cast on Melee enemies, instead of a copy of the weapon.

When?

We plan on releasing all of these changes in a future update on PC. For our Console Tenno, you will be receiving Round 1 in the upcoming Cert build and Round 2 changes will come in the next that follows.

Thanks!

12:28 edit: Adding clarification notes to Void Damage, UI and General changes
2:20 edit: Added The Lost ability description

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