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Warframe's Abyss of Dagath update is a long-awaited content patch that will bring major revisions to the game systems and balance. Releasing on October 18, 2023, it will introduce a sweeping series of adjustments and reworks to several in-game mechanics and progression avenues, as well as quality-of-life features. These range from major things such as Hydroid rework to more minuscule changes like extra Nightwave challenges.
The total number of reworks are too many to list here, as they cover all areas of gameplay. The main idea of this patch seems to be to iron out gameplay kinks and address progress roadbumps, such as the tedious focus xp grind.
The following changes, however, impact the game in a major way. This article explains more.
Five major ways Warframe is changing with the Abyss of Dagath patch
1) Shield gating rework
The changes to how shields works in update 27.2 completely alters Warframe gameplay in higher levels. Many Warframes who were previously considered squishy have now become survivable regardless of enemy level.
Essentially, shields grant one-shot protection by giving you invulnerability frames when they are fully depleted. Using this mechanic efficiently is called shield-gating. Before the Abyss of Dagath rework, the invulnerability period used to depend on two conditions: whether your shields had regenerated fully prior to depletion or partially.
A full shield-gate would grant you 1.33 seconds of invulnerability, while partially regenerated ones would only grant 0.33 seconds.
This led to the widespread use of the Decaying Dragon Key item to artificially deflate your maximum shields value so you could regenerate it completely much easier and, thus, cheese the mechanic.
The Abyss of Dagath will make the system much more complex. The amount of shield-gate invulnerability you gain will now depend on the actual number of shields you have. However, players who prefer the old system can return to it by using the new Catalyzing Shields mod.
2) Companion rework
Anyone following the Devstreams or this year's TennoCon will have known the companion rework to be the most advertised feature in the Abyss of Dagath patch. While it leaves some room for criticism, the rework in question does address the two main issues with companion gameplay.
Companions now handle death differently. Instead of simply being downed at zero health like Warframes, they enter a temporary state of incapacitation. Animal companions such as Kavats can be manually revived as before, while robotic ones like sentinels are incapacitated immediately and start self-repairing.
Regardless of their type, all companions will now come back to life after a minute. You can expediate their recovery through several methods that do not make you deviate much from regular Warframe gameplay.
Furthermore, a series of 'Bond' mods now make Warframes and companions work in tandem to gain favourable results, such as deploying companion clones or making specific targets drop extra loot. You can read more about the rework in this detailed breakdown.
3) Universal enemy radar (among other accessibility features)
The community demand for a 'universal vacuum' to yoink stray loot off the floor remains an unfulfilled dream, but your Warframes will now gain stronger peripheral senses with universal enemy radar.
Enemy radar is your ability to see enemies on the minimap, ignoring line of sight restrictions such as walls. Previously, you would need to use an enemy radar mod to get this information, usually delegated to the companion-exclusive Animal Instinct mod. Now, these mods will add to a baseline 30 meter enemy radar.
This will especially come in handy for the Index game mode, where you would previously need to sacrifice the exilus slot on your Warframe to track enemy spawns.
On top of enemy radar, a host of similar accessibility options will offer easier visibility of vital information on screen, including:
- Contour highlights for enemies and allies
- Ease of life map annotations for conservation targets
- Readable buffs and debuffs on the pause screen
4) Auto-melee
A Warframe mobile port for both iOS and Android is on the cards with a 2024 release, with pre-registration for iOS beginning since TennoCon 2023. Some ease-of-access changes seem to have targeted better handling and controls on a touchscreen environment.
All of these features will also be available for PC and console versions of the game. A friendlier auto-aim rework has not been pitched by the developers yet, but an auto-melee system stands to have the biggest effect for all of the Warframe ports.
Instead of having to mash the melee key, you can now simply hold it for similar results. While the place for melee in the meta remains the same, this feature makes high attack-speed light attack spam playstyles much more viable.
In relation to this, the developers have also teased a new 'Perfect heavy attack' system to be released with the Whispers in the Walls update this year.
5) Easier Archon Hunts
While beginner Tenno benefit from a number of early-game ease-of-life adjustments, veterans should have it easier with a critical component of end-game progress: Archon Hunts.
Accessible after beating the New War questline, Archons are the primary source for build-defining Archon Shards. A mechanic called damage attenuation, earlier pioneered by Kuva Liches, also affect Archons and make them highly durable targets.
While it makes sense for an endgame raid boss to be tanky, the application of damage attenuation turned the process into a slogfest if you deviated outside of a limited pool of meta weaponry. Simply put, the numbers on this mechanic post-Abyss of Dagath will be more lenient towards a larger variety of builds.
A further change that expedites Archon Shard collection is a few quality-of-life additions to weekly Kahl missions, or 'Break Narmer' missions accessible from Kahl's Garrison. Kahl now moves easier and gains enemy and loot radar, can pick up bonus Stocks on the map, and gains access to a more diverse arsenal including Ogris, Ignis, and Grinlok.
