Companions, those little cats, dogs, robots, and weird creatures that run around beside you in Warframe, are getting a rework. “It’s about time,” I hear you cry. And truthfully, you are not wrong. Companions have been extremely useful for a long time in Warframe, acting as important mod carriers, adding nuance to builds, and bringing vital functions of their own to the party. Plus, when you play solo a lot, it’s nice to have something in the mission with you.
Warframe Companion rework details
The objectives of the rework
According to some detailed notes from Digital Extremes, the rework has three main purposes.
- Help with high-level viability by making pets immortal.
- Introduce more interactive Mods to expand gameplay options. There are no details on this just yet, as testing and balancing is still on-going.
- Changes to existing companion mods to work better within the new system.
Immortal Pets are the new hotness
From October 18, which is when the Abyss of Dagath update releases, our companions will no longer die. Being aware of the specific level of annoyance that a companion dying can bring and how strict a metagame has been established around them, our pets will simply no longer die. Instead, when they reach zero health, they will become Incapacitated. This will last for 60 seconds and can be shortened with mods. Once that time reaches zero, the pet will automatically revive and can do that as many times as it needs to with no cap.
Now, there are some individual nuances to that rule, depending on the companion.
- Kavats, Kubrows, Moas, and Predasites will collapse on the ground and can be, optionally, manually revived to get them back into action quicker.
- Sentinels cannot be manually revived, but they will fly along with you in a damaged state while performing their automatic self-revive.
- Vulpaphylas have their usual tricks instead, where they morph into a Sentinel-like state for a short period and then recover.
- Khora’s Venari still uses its usual behavior of temporarily disappearing if defeated, but you can override its time-out by spending energy to cast her Venari Ability.
New Pet Stats
All pets are getting something of a stats rework. The TLDR is that this is designed to make them 50% tougher. That’s right, not only will pets not die, but they should get down a lot less in the new system.
Revised Kubrow Stats:
- Huras Kubrow: 560 Health (from 150), 490 Shield (from 125), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Raksa Kubrow: 750 Health (from 200), 390 Shield (from 100), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Sahasa Kubrow: 940 Health (from 250), 290 Shield (from 75), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Sunika Kubrow: 830 Health (from 220), 350 Shield (from 90), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Chesa Kubrow: 940 Health (from 250), 290 Shield (from 75), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Helminth Charger: 710 Health (from 190), 330 Shield (from 85), 200 Armor (from 50)
Revised Predasite Stats:
- Predasite (all types): 710 Health (from 190), 350 Shield (from 90), 200 Armor (from 50)
Revised Vulpaphyla Stats:
- Vulpaphyla (all types) 680 Health (from 180), 370 Shield (from 95), 200 Armor (from 50)
Revised Moa Stats:
- Moa: 350 Health (from 100), 350 Shield (from 100), 350 Armor (from 100)
- Moa base stats can be modified further by their components and via gilding
Revised Kavat Stats:
- Adarza Kavat: 310 Health (from 80), 270 Shield (from 70), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Smeeta Kavat: 390 Health (from 100), 230 Shield (from 60), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Vasca Kavat: 310 Health (from 80), 270 Shield (from 70), 200 Armor (from 50)
- Venari: 900 Health (from 300), 350 Armor (from 350)
- Venari Prime: 1050 Health (from 350), 450 Armor (from 450)
Revised Hound Stats:
- Adlet Hound: 350 Health (from 100), 450 Shield (from 150), 350 Armor (from 100)
- Garmr Hound: 350 Health (from 100), 350 Shield (from 100), 450 Armor (from 150)
- Raiju Hound: 450 Health (from 150), 350 Shield (from 100), 350 Armor (from 100)
- Hound base stats can be modified further by their components and via gilding
Revised Sentinel Stats:
- Carrier: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Carrier Prime: 650 Health (400), 200 Shield (from 100), 150 Armor (from 150)
- Dethcube: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Dethcube Prime: 600 Health (from 300), 200 Shield (from 100), 150 Armor (from 150)
- Diriga: 700 Health (from 350), 150 Shield (from 50), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Djinn: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Helios: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Helios Prime: 700 Health (from 250), 200 Shield (from 100), 100 Armor (from 100)
- Nautilus: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Oxylus: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Shade: 600 Health (from 350), 130 Shield (from 50), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Shade Prime: 700 Health (from 350), 200 Shield (from 100), 100 Armor (from 100)
- Prisma Shade: 600 Health (from 300), 130 Shield (from 50), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Taxon: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Wyrm: 560 Health (from 200), 250 Shield (from 100), 80 Armor (from 50)
- Wyrm Prime: 450 health (from 225), 600 Shield (from 300), 150 Armor (from 150)
Pet Healing Changes
An interesting piece of information that was revealed is that the Link Health mod had an invisible healing mechanic. Your companions would gain some of the healing that your Warframes benefitted from. This system was quite obtuse and never explained in great detail. There was also an issue where Pets were apparently using the same mechanics that mission objectives used, leading to a mishmash of healing mechanics and a lack of clarity. As such, all that stuff is just gone now.
Companions will no longer gain Health when your Warframe does, and the restrictions of the following abilities and features, as they apply to granting Health, Shields, or Damage Resistance to companions, have been removed. That’s right, you can now just actively heal your pets with the below mechanics.
- Warding Halo
- Blessing
- Immolation
- Blood Altar
- Splinter Storm
- Intrepid Stand
- Eclipse
- Discharge
- Desolate Hands
- Penance
- Thurible
- Mend & Maim
- Sancti Magistar
- Protective Sling
Changes to existing mods
Below are all the listed changes to existing mods from the Dev Workshop 34 Pre-Patch notes.
Sentinel Survivability Mod Changes:
- Calculated Redirection changed from max 275% Shields to max 250% Shields
- Enhanced Vitality changed from max 220% Health to max 250% Health
- Metal Fiber changed from max 110% Armor to max 250% Armor
- Regen has been changed significantly. Because your Sentinels no longer die after reaching zero Health, Regen instead reduces the Incapacitation time of your Sentinel by 20 seconds and provides 6 seconds of Invulnerability after reviving.
- Primed Regen provides a greater benefit: Incapacitation time is reduced by 35 seconds and provides 6 seconds of Invulnerability after reviving.
- Sacrifice still allows your Sentinel to revive you automatically; however, the Sentinel now goes into Incapacitation instead of being destroyed. Adds 15 seconds to your Sentinel’s Incapacitation time.
- Repair Kit has been changed from providing your Sentinel with 6 Health per second to 18 Health per second.
Companion Survivability Mod Changes:
- Link Health has been renamed to Linked Vitality, and changed from max 165% of your Warframe’s Health shared with Companion, to max 125% shared Health.
- Link Shields has been renamed to Linked Redirection, and changed from max 110% of your Warframe’s Shield shared with Companion, to max 125% shared Shield.
- Link Armor has been renamed to Linked Fiber, and changed from max 110% of your Warframe’s Armor shared with Companion, to max 125% shared Armor.
- Medi-Pet Kit has been changed from providing your Companion with 6 Health per second and 72% Bleedout Reduction, to providing 12 Health per second and reducing Incapacitation time by 15 seconds.
- Accelerated Deflection (+90% Shield Recharge) has been changed from being only equipped on Sentinels, to the Robotic category, which means it is now also compatible with Hounds and Moas. Additionally, it also provides -45% Shield Recharge Delay.
Other Companion Mod Changes:
- Djinn’s “Reawaken” has been changed. Now it will reduce Djinn’s Incapacitation time by 6 seconds for each Energy Orb you pick up. Djinn will also revive with 300 points of Overshield for each collected Orb.
- Pack Leader has been changed. Instead of healing your Companion by 36% of melee damage inflicted, it now restores 50 Health per melee hit. Excess healing becomes Overguard instead, with a maximum of 600 Overguard.
- Primed Pack Leader increases Pack Leader effect to 92 Health restored per hit, and increases Overguard cap to 1100.
- Sentinel Sanctuary and Companion Shelter Mods have been improved. The shield globe, while the player is performing a Revive, has been increased from 600 Health to 1800 Health.
- Self Destruct has been altered and renamed. Formerly this would cause Sentinels to cause 600 Blast damage in an 18-meter radius on death. This is now renamed to Knock Out Blast and causes 600 Blast damage in an 18-meter radius on Incapacitation.
- Loyal Companion has been replaced entirely. Formerly it provided a 90% Bleedout-Link so that your Companion had a longer period of time where it could be revived. Since pet death is no longer a factor: Loyal Companion causes your pet to taunt enemies and draw fire to itself for 30 seconds if your Warframe falls below 35% Health. There is a 60-second cooldown between activations.
- (Parazon) Hard Reset: Changed from instantly reviving your pet if you achieved 3 Mercy Kills within 40 seconds, to reducing your pet’s Incapacitation time by 10 seconds on each Mercy Kill.
- Fired Up has been both improved and simplified. Previously this would require that your Sentinel has been shooting continuously for some period of time, and then added a Heat damage multiplier. This has been changed so that the Sentinel gains a 5% bonus Heat damage on every weapon hit up to 100%. The bonus resets after 5 seconds without the Sentinel getting a hit
- Spare Parts: Replaced completely. Previously Spare Parts would cause Sentinels to drop rare materials on death. This has been replaced by Salvage Scanner, which causes your Sentinel to mark enemies for 5 seconds, choosing a new target every 15 seconds. Killing the marked enemy causes them to drop extra loot.
