i think it would be interesting to introduce a freeze status effect. possible effects could include:
slowing down enemy movement speed
completely freezing enemies, rendering them unable to act
freeze damage
I’m not very familiar with Warhammer 40K lore, so I’m not sure if such an ability would fit into the existing classes or weapons. however, I believe adding this mechanic to the game could make combat more engaging.
Cool idea, I think replacing smite with a freeze ability would actually be pretty neat even. It would actually be balanced and fun if the CC had a windup time and slowed enemies a little at first, then intensifies and freezes em for a bit at the end of the duration (so the Psyker can stop smiting and actually start hitting stuff himself, too). Way less disruptive for teammates too
Psykers would definitely be able to use some sort of Ice Force Staff.
Another Status Effect that I’d also love to see implemented would be Radiation Damage.
Tech-Adept Archetype using a Radium Carbine to rapidly microwave Enemies until they start to writhe around in their own vomit and succumb to radiation poisoning. The Omnissiah would be most pleased.
A good example of how Freeze Damage should work is how it works in Deep Rock Galactic.
Picture this:
Crusher walking towards you? Unleash a torrent of Ice at him! He’s slowing down… he’s slowing down… and now he’s encased in Ice! Now swap to your Melee Weapon and take advantage of his Carapace being temporarily useless! Hurry, before he thaws out!
Chaff would Freeze almost instantly, but chonkier and tougher Enemies would take longer to Freeze. Freezing them would temporarily negate their Armour until they thaw out or are killed, whichever happens first.
Not directly, for the Vet, Zel and Ogryn there aren’t really any that would fit for them.
As for Psyker, there are Ice powers, but either they’re Space Wolf stuff (so in theory not available), or it’s Astropath stuff.
Astropath’s Voidfrost is something that I would like to see happen as a new branch for the Psyker, with a node that replace all player’s application toward Soulfire into Voidfrost effects, which would replace the damaging DoT into a buff+CC (Applying Brittleness and slowing the enemy).
Indeed, to me it seems like a perfect way to reintroduce a limited full brittleness debuff to the game in a way that makes sense, provided it’s balanced sufficiently.
As an example: every source of brittleness in the game can stay in line and still obey the 40% cap, but this new freeze ability would be the only way to give an enemy anything over that, up to the full 100% temporarily while at full cold stacks for a limited time.
To use an example source of this new effect: for a Psyker blitz I’d picture it as a purgatus cloud type visual with much shorter range and an actual, much lower cleave value (maybe let it cleave ~3-4 crushers) that would tick once every 0.8-1 second(s) in % stacks of something like 5+10+15+20+25+25. As the stacks build up, an enemy is slowed by a % depending on the number of stacks; when hitting an enemy with all of them, the enemy is fully frozen, they cannot move and are stripped of their armour for x seconds (say 2-3s). If the target is still alive at the end of the time window, all stacks drop off instantly, they break free of the CC and are then immune to further applications of the ability’s full brittleness and slow effects for y seconds (say ~5s+). For balance reasons also, I feel that if you stop applying the cold stacks to an enemy when they are between the current brittleness cap and the maximum from the blitz, then any brittleness% above the current cap should fall off rapidly (say in less than a second), otherwise the effect would be far too powerful; for the blitz to work as intended, the user should have to fully commit to debuffing a limited number of targets at a time, and not just be an easy way to bypass the current cap and apply say 70-80% brittleness in a large area for free for any length of time.
TL; DR: I really enjoy the concept and think it has it’s applications in the game, but it would need to be balanced very carefully.
As far as lore goes, there is certainly the stuff that is considered “mainstream Imperial” but there is, realistically, nothing that cannot be permitted in the lore either as an esoteric item specific to certain sectors of the Imperium (FFG had a bunch of things that tended to be found only in the Calixis sector or the Lathe Worlds, and FS could do stuff found only in the Moebian Domain if they liked, especially with the Moebian steel excuse), a found bit of archaeotech (sometimes even reproducible), or as something produced by a minor xenos race (of which there is likely at least one prominent one in the Fringe). As members of an Inquisitorial warband hosted on a Rogue Trader’s vessel there is nothing that is too exotic for us to have, but, sadly for our armoury’s scope, that seems to not be in the Devs’ plans.
Probably for the best, as it would be a nightmare for them to balance all the extremely powerful near-unique stuff with the low-tech shovels and stuff. Or maybe not as the meta picks are already the low-tech knife and dueling sword, lol.
The FFG RPGs have some funky grenades. No cryo-grenades but there are ones that lock things in place. A web grenade that explodes with ultra-sticky and strong chemical polymer web strands, and a crystal grenade that causes rapid-growth crystals to sprout all around the target (that also happen to be razor sharp, eww).
