Melee is a form of combat system that utilizes edged or blunt weapons and close quarter attacks. Every attack causes the player to take a single step forward. However, if the player is crouched, non-combo melee attacks will not cause a step forward. Melee weapons can be equipped in the tertiary slot of the arsenal in Warframe.
Current melee weapons consist of a number of classes, in which each class of weapons has a unique set of attack animations, including normal, jump, slide, stealth attacks, finishers, combos, and blocking.
Basic Maneuvers[]
Melee can be switched to at any time by pressing the melee attack key (default E ), immediately holstering the currently equipped gun, and can instantly switch back to an equipped primary or secondary weapon with the fire button (default LMB ) or zoom (default RMB ). Going into melee mode (default holding F ) will unlock additional melee combat features such as manual Blocking.
All melee attacks can be executed by pressing or holding the melee input button.
Each melee weapon has a number of attributes, such as attack speed and damage. Each attribute can be altered by a variety of Melee Mods.
Normal Attack[]
Excalibur performing a basic melee combo.
E
The simplest form of melee attack. The action is achieved by simply pressing the melee attack key repeatedly, in which the animation pattern continues to loop until the player ceases the attack.
Common Attributes:
Damage: Damage done by each hit. Enhanced by damage mods such as Pressure Point.
Attack Speed: Speed of the attack animation. Enhanced by speed mods such as Fury.
Follow Through: When hit multiple targets in one strike, the part of damage remaining after each target. (excludes jump attacks and slide attacks)
Cleave Radius: A rough estimation of the size of the swing. May not be accurate due to individualized cleaving animations.
Slide Attack[]
Excalibur performing a slide attack.
Damage inflicted on enemies when performing a Spin attack.
Combo
While Sliding + Melee
Air variation:
Combo
While Air Sliding + Melee
Also known as a Spin Attack, Slide Attacks propels a Warframe forward while performing a spinning slash around them, dealing greater damage and hitting multiple enemies. For sparring weapons like the Kogake and Obex, slide attacks perform a double kick that targets only a single enemy, but ragdolls them away instead of only dealing damage. Slide Attacks can be performed on the ground to hit low-lying enemies, or in the air to hit tall enemies, potentially landing headshots.
Slide attack damage can be increased by the Pressure Point mod and all other elemental damage the player may have equipped on their weapon (e.g. Shocking Touch).
Aerial Attack[]
Excalibur performing an aerial combo.
Press the melee attack button while in mid-air to perform an aerial attack, or rapidly press to perform an aerial attack combo, regardless if a jump has already been made or not. The Warframe will automatically maintain Aim Glide for the rest of the air combo if Aim Glide was initiated at the time of starting the combo. This is useful for fighting airborne targets such as Ospreys.
Slam Attack[]
Excalibur performing a slam attack.
Damage inflicted on enemies by landing a Ground Slam attack near them.
Ground Slam attack hits all enemies around the point of impact within (Slam Radius)m.
Combo
In Air + Aim Downwards + Melee
Also known as a Leap or Jump Attack. While in mid-air, performing a melee attack while aiming downwards causes the Warframe to slam down at the point of the reticle, dealing damage and usually inflicting Stagger. Slam attacks are typically composed of a singular damage type (usually Impact). Check a weapon's page to see what its slam damage type is.
Players can utilize slam attacks to change direction or add momentum while in mid-air, effectively zip-lining themselves to the point of the reticle.
Players may also perform a heavy slam attack which benefits from the heavy attack combo multiplier and applies the Lifted status. Heavy slam attacks are typically composed of a singular damage type (usually Blast). Check a weapon's page to see what its heavy slam damage type is.
Slam attacks do 2x the damage of a normal attack (3x for heavy slam), but have Damage Falloff, linearly diminishing with distance from the point of impact to 50% (70% for heavy slam) at the edge of its radius.
Slam Attack Stats By Weapon Class[]
Exceptions exist to this chart. For example, Masseter has a normal slam radius of 10m and a heavy slam radius of 10m, despite Heavy Blades typically having a normal slam radius of 8m and a heavy slam radius of 9m.
Wall Attack[]
Combo
While Wall-Latching + Melee
While wall-latching a player may initiate a melee attack, causing the frame to drop off the wall facing the direction aimed, with a special melee attack animation. The attack will change depending on what melee weapon is used; most weapons will slash the air in front of them as they unlatch off the wall, while heavy weapons will swing the weapon beneath them, and sparring weapons will deal a forward punch.
Since Update 26.0 (2019-10-31), Wall Attack damage stat is not shown in the Arsenal.
Upon equipping a Stance Mod, up to three additional advanced Melee Combos will be unlocked, which are special chained attacks that enhance the melee abilities of the weapon. These combos can only be performed while wielding a melee weapon. The combination will vary depending on the melee weapon equipped and the Stance mod equipped.
Dodging or rolling while performing melee combos will immediately end the combo, canceling the current melee animation.
While in hand, melee weapons block incoming attacks within a [Blocking Value]° cone. Blocking is centered around the current point of aim.
Weapon Aim RMB
L2
Blocking is a defensive technique that negates both incoming damage and knockbacks in an angle in front of the Warframe.
Successful blocking can only be performed if enemies attack within the blocking angle cone of the player's melee weapon, which varies depending on the melee weapon type. For example, Dual Swords have a blocking angle of 60°, meaning any damage coming from 60° to the left or right of the reticle will be negated.
All melee weapons block 100% of incoming damage, with the exception of certain boss attacks and area-of-effect damage such as Bombard rockets, where blocking is only partially effective. However, it does not negate Status Effects, which can still damage through the block.
When a melee weapon is drawn by performing a melee attack while using a primary or secondary weapon, blocking is automatic assuming enemies are attacking within the blocking angle. However, if a melee weapon is manually switched to, or only a melee weapon is equipped in the Arsenal, blocking is manual and the block button must be held down to block.
Any time an attack is successfully blocked, 1 point will be added to the Combo Counter. Additionally, blocking an enemy melee attack has a chance to stagger them, briefly opening them up to melee front/back finishers. This stagger chance can be increased through mods like Parry.
Blocking completely negates the pull effect from Scorpion grappling hooks.
Blocking partially negates effects like Fire Blast from Sargas Ruk and Rippling Shockwave from certain Corpus units, preventing the knockdown effect, but the player will still be pushed back.
Certain enemies such as Fusion Moa require the player to either back up slightly or aim slightly upward in order to parry their attack up close.
Mods That Benefit From Blocking[]
Tactical Dodging[]
A tactical dodge or roll can be performed by rolling while blocking, allowing the player to shorten their roll distance while maintaining melee distance with enemies in combat.
Melee Combo is a power source that grows as the Tenno strikes or blocks with melee weapons, multiplying the damage of certain attacks. Heavy attacks consume the melee combo gauge, called the combo counter, for a burst of damage (from 1x to 12x). Certain Warframe abilities also benefit from melee combo, and they do not consume combo points, but they receive 1/4 of the added damage. Normal melee attacks are not affected by the combo multiplier, though combo scaling effects and mods can apply to all melee attacks. An inactive melee combo resets to zero after 5 seconds.
Different attacks award varying amounts of combo points, depending on their strength and number of hits. The combo reset period is affected by combo duration, and combo consumption from heavy attacks is affected by Heavy Attack Efficiency.
Heavy Attack[]
An example of a heavy attack. Notice entire combo counter is spent.
Base damage of the weapon's Heavy Attack. Damage is increased by Combo Multiplier, but consumes Combo Count.
Damage inflicted with a Heavy Slam. Damage is increased by Combo Multiplier, but consumes Combo Count.
Additional damage inflicted in the radius of a Heavy Slam attack. Damage is increased by Combo Multiplier, but consumes Combo Count.
Heavy Slam attacks hit all enemies around the point of impact within this distance.
Middle Mouse MMB
R3
Tapping the MMB or holding the attack button while melee is equipped will perform a Heavy Attack. When tapping the MMB in mid-air, a Heavy Slam Attack is executed which, unlike the light version, does not have radial damage falloff. Heavy slam attacks also Lift enemies airborne, keeping them suspended for longer at higher combo multipliers. Both kinds of heavy attacks deal increased damage depending on the combo multiplier, and they consume all or part of the combo counter in the process.
Heavy attacks can be performed without a combo counter, albeit with diminished effect.
Heavy Attack Damage[]
Heavy attacks and heavy slam attacks use fixed base damage multipliers compared to normal attacks. These multipliers depend on the weapon type. Furthermore, the radial damage of heavy slams uses another multiplier. This can be seen by comparing the values shown under the Heavy Attack section in the Arsenal to the total normal attack damage. The following table lists the possible values.
On top of the fixed multiplier, the damage is further multiplied by the current combo multiplier. For example, a heavy attack with a Staff with normal (modded) attack damage of 400, when at a 3x combo multiplier, will deal 400 × 5 × 3 = 6,000 damage on hit, in exchange for the combo counter being reduced down to zero (if no Melee Combo Efficiency mods are equipped).
Combo Efficiency does not decrease the combo multiplier of a heavy attack.
Wind Up[]
Time a Heavy Attack must charge up before it activates.
Weapons have varying Wind-up times between activating a heavy attack and the actual attack being performed. For example, Skana has a wind-up time of 0.6s, meaning the actual heavy attack will be performed 0.6s after tapping the MMB . Increasing melee attack speed does not reduce the wind-up time; rather, it reduces the interval between heavy attacks. During this brief period, the player is free to move and maneuver with the exception of performing any other melee attack. Being knocked down will cancel the charge. While winding-up, the combo counter decay is paused. Performing a heavy attack is possible when the combo counter is zero, and connecting with a heavy attack does not add to the combo counter.
There is no cap to Wind Up. Even if numbers stop changing in the arsenal after adding multiple Wind Up mods, this is due to diminishing returns and the game's number rounding system. This can be proven with an FPS animation test.
Recall the art of Tennokai. You occasionally have opportunities to perform faster Heavy Attacks with no cost to your Combo Counter.
Certain mods have the ability to invoke Tennokai. With Tennokai enabled, melee hits have a 15% chance of flashing a sword icon on the reticle for 2 seconds; performing a Heavy Attack or Heavy Slam during this flash increases its Wind Up Speed and does not consume Combo Counter.
Triggering Tennokai requires directly striking an enemy. With the exception of Gunblades, striking multiple enemies from a single hit and multi-strike attacks do not count as hits. The energy waves created from Excalibur's Exalted Blade, and Baruuk's Serene Storm can not proc Tennokai. Despite being able to equip the mods, Titania's Diwata is unable to proc Tennokai, due to Archmelee lacking heavy attacks.
The wind up speed of Tennokai attacks is not affected by wind up speed bonuses from other sources.
The first Tennokai Mod Mentor's Legacy is awarded from the Whispers in the Walls quest. The other Tennokai Mods are awarded from Rotation C of Alchemy missions or purchasing the Essential Tennokai Mod Bundle from the Market for 100 Platinum; the bundle only appears after installing the Melee Upgrade Segment obtained from the Whispers in the Walls quest.
Depending on the type of melee weapon, both light attacks and especially heavy attacks can deal different effects to enemies, such as applying Knockdown, Ragdoll, Stagger, or Liftedstatus. Surviving enemies that are struck by heavy attacks from Heavy Blades for example, will have a guaranteed Lifted proc applied to them. However, not all melee weapons grant Lifted status on heavy attack hits.
Lifted status suspends enemies in mid-air in a ragdolled state for a short period of time, allowing players to briefly "juggle" them in a melee combo. Besides heavy attacks, Lifted status can also be applied to enemies by performing Heavy Slam Attacks with nearly any melee weapon, lifting all enemies within that weapon's ground slam radius. The higher the combo multiplier at the time of a heavy attack or heavy slam attack, the longer enemies can stay suspended. Unlike standard status effects however, status duration bonuses do not extend the lifted duration.
Range[]
Melee attacks hit enemies within this distance. Some Stances offer more Range using throws or lunges.
Each melee weapon has a Range statistic associated with it that displays the weapon's reach in meters. The hitbox of melee weapons are obround in shape, with the Range stat representing the length of the hitbox and a hidden Sweep Radius stat representing its width.[citation needed][1] The Sweep Radius of most melees is 0.25 meters.
Modifies the amount of damage dealt in a single strike each time an additional enemy is hit after the first.
Each melee weapon has a Follow Through statistic associated with it that tells what proportion of damage is dealt to successive targets in a single strike. In general, if a single strike hits multiple targets, the amount of damage each target will receive will be:
Proportion of weapon damage = FT(n - 1)
Where n is the order of when an enemy is hit, and FT is the amount of follow-through for the weapon.
For example, Skana has a follow through stat of 0.6 (FT = 0.6). If a single strike of Skana hits three targets, the first target to be hit (n = 1) will be dealt 0.6(1 - 1) = 100% of the total damage, the second to be hit (n = 2) will be dealt 0.6(2 - 1) = 60% of the total damage, and the third (n = 3) will be dealt 0.6(3 - 1) = 36% of the total damage.
The total damage dealt with a given follow through stat for a sample of enemy group sizes are as such:
For example, against a group of 3 enemes, the Skana would deal 1 + 0.6 + 0.36 = 1.96 = 196% of the base damage in total, which can be calculated with the closed-form formula as .
In general, as the number of enemies grows (i.e. n approaches ), the damage approaches if the follow through is one; otherwise, the term approaches zero and therefore the damage approaches . For example, against theoretically infinite enemies, the Skana's damage would approach an upper bound of times the base damage (250%).
te)
0.4
1.00
1.40
1.56
1.65
1.66
1.66
0.5
1.00
1.50
1.75
1.94
1.99
2.00
0.6
1.00
1.60
1.96
2.31
2.48
2.5
0.7
1.00
1.70
2.19
2.77
3.24
3.33
0.8
1.00
1.80
2.44
3.36
4.46
5.00
0.9
1.00
1.90
2.71
4.09
6.51
10
1.0
1.00
2.00
3.00
5.00
10.0
∞ (infinite)
As of Update 26.0 (2019-10-31), this stat is shown in the arsenal whereas previously it was hidden despite it existing before since {{ver|1|}
As of Update 26.0 (2019-10-31), this stat is shown in the arsenal whereas previously it was hidden despite it existing before since Update 13.0 (2014-04-09).
Exceptions[]
Finishers[]
Excalibur executing a Stealth Attack with Dual Swords.
Finisher attacks have custom animations and deal a very high percentage of the equipped melee weapon's total damage. Players performing finishers are immune to any kind of damage for the duration of the animation.
The three types of finishers are:
Ground Finisher, on knockdowned targets
Stealth Attack, on unalerted enemies
Front- / Back-Finisher, under specific effects
Tips[]
For players wanting to specialize in melee combat, remapping the equipped melee attack key to LMB can make performing attacks and melee combos easier and more instinctive.
There is also an option which allows the Fire button to be used when the melee is drawn using the default melee key. Players can immediately return to their other weapons by pressing the Aim/Block button, which will not block, but rather bring up the previously equipped Primary or Secondary.
While doing heavy attacks, the moment the swing does damage, immediately pressing the melee key will execute another heavy attack, this can be repeated. Connecting a second heavy attack immediately after the first will retain the current combo counter, only draining it after the second heavy strike has been swung.
Bugs[]
Successfully blocking an attack while rolling can make a player unable to attack with their melee weapon. This is usually accompanied by a slight change in camera perspective where the camera is positioned slightly down while facing upwards. This bug can be resolved by performing a roll or dodge again.
Tapping the melee key slightly before landing causes the player to slide across the ground with minimal friction for a brief period.
On some weapons, the Heavy Slam does have radial damage falloff. An example being the Cyath Machete Zaw.
Ivara's Prowl, Loki's Invisibility, Ash's Smoke Screen and Banshee's Silence will now muffle Melee weapon impact and dismemberment sounds (for player audio).
Improved the responsiveness of holding the Melee Attack input to perform a throw for Melee weapons with ranged attacks (ex: Sigma & Octantis). Pressing and holding the Melee attack input now throws after one swing instead of two.
As a result of this change, it is now easier to activate Tennokai with Glaives in the window it is available. Prior to this change, the second swing could prevent you from hitting Tennokai before the timer ran out.
This also fixes multiple issues with thrown weapons and Tennokai:
Fixed Wolf Sledge not benefitting from Heavy Attack Wind Up Speed Mods or Tennokai’s Wind Up Speed bonus.
Fixed instances where the Wolf Sledge’s Tennokai Heavy Attack would not complete (the animation would halt halfway-through and leave players stuck mid swing until they Melee attacked again).
Fixed an issue where throwing a Glaive manually (ie. by releasing the Melee attack input instead of auto-throwing) would consume and waste Tennokai unnecessarily.
Fixed being unable to Auto-Melee as Chroma while Spectral Scream is active.
Fixed an issue where Auto-Melee wouldn’t work while on a Zipline.
Fixed being able to equip Tennokai Mods onto Sentinel weapons such as Deconstructor, Batoten, Lacerten or Akaten (since they do not benefit from them and take up valuable Mod slots).
If you had Tennokai Mods equipped to your Sentinel’s Weapon, they have been automatically unequipped.
Fixed an unintentional weaponless Ground Slam Attack occurring after using the “Context Action” binding while airborne and looking down.
Fixed a case where spamming Ground Slams could leave players with the inability to jump.
Prior to Dante Unbound, Melee Ground Slam Attacks were distributed between two damage instances - they appeared in the Arsenal UI (includes the stats window when hovering over equipment as well as the Upgrade screen) as follows:
Slam Attack: Damage inflicted on an enemy by hitting them directly with a Ground Slam Attack.
Note: We’ll refer to this stat as “Slam Direct Hits” moving forward in this section of the patch notes to avoid confusion between all the terms. This term denotes that the damage instance came from the direct Melee hit on an enemy while performing your Ground Slam - effectively Goomba Stomping them, if you will.
Damage on Slam Direct Hits was scaleable with Mods.
Slam Radial Damage: Additional damage inflicted to all enemies in the radius of a Ground Slam attack.
Other than a few specific Mods (Seismic Wave, etc.), Slam Radial Damage was locked at a flat value and did not scale with Mods.
What’s Changed:
1 - Ground Slam Attacks are now entirely Radial Damage
Ground Slam Attacks now only have one instance of damage: Slam Radial Damage! It is now the whole sum of the damage dealt by Ground Slam Attacks instead of being “additional”.
What this means is that Slam Direct Hits are no more. All the damage done by a Ground Slam Attack is now purely Radial.
With this change, it's worth noting that we have also maintained the Damage Falloff on Slam Attacks, where damage diminishes the further an enemy is from the point of impact, but with some changes:
Previously: Damage could fall off to ~0% at the edge of the impact radius.
Now: Damage will only ever go as low as 50% (of total damage) at the edge of the impact radius for normal Slam Attacks, and 70% for Heavy Slam Attacks.
2 - Ground Slam Attack’s Radial Damage now scales with Mods
Since Slam Attacks are now purely Radial Damage, we’ve made its damage scaleable with Mods, when previously it wasn’t. This effectively buffs Ground Slam Attacks since you can now directly increase its damage and apply Weapon Status (inherited from Mods), which ultimately improves its scalability for late game content.
It’s worth noting that all of the above changes only apply to AERIAL/JUMP Ground Slam Attacks (In air + Aim Downwards + Melee) and AERIAL/JUMP Heavy Ground Slam Attacks (In air + Aim Downwards + Heavy Melee). They do not affect Slam Attacks that are part of Stance Combos. For example, Slam attacks during combos deal flat damage amounts and do not scale with Mods. We currently do not have plans to change this.
3. Added a 2x Multiplier to its Radial Damage
Slam Direct Hits had a 2x-3x multiplier (depending on Weapon Class) to account for the fact that it was actually quite difficult to land them, so the multiplier helped in making those rare instances feel impactful.
Since Slam Direct Hits are no more, we have accounted for its removal by applying a 2x multiplier to Slam Attack’s Radial Damage across all Weapon classes. For the reasons listed directly above (Radial Damage now scalable with Mods) and for the sake of balance, the 2x (3x for Heavy Slam Attacks) multiplier on Radial Damage maintains the damage output without going overboard.
How The Changes Appear in the Arsenal:
Melee Ground Slam Attacks now has only one core stat in the Arsenal: SLAM ATTACK. The number listed beside indicates its Radial Damage.
You’ll notice that with all of the above changes, some Melee weapons’ Slam Attack Damage has changed. Previously “Slam Attack” in the UI informed of “Slam Direct Hits”, which for some Melee weapon types (ex: Polearm, Sword, Two-Handed Nikanas, etc.), had a 3x multiplier applied. Now, since “Slam Attack” in the UI indicates Radial Damage and has had a 2x multiplier applied across all Melee types, the damage for those weapons may differ.
But now that you can scale Slam Attack Damage with Mods, those differences can be easily recouped and then some.
We’ve also added a Slam Radius stat to the tooltip to better inform players in-game: “Ground Slam attack hits all enemies around the point of impact within X meters.”
It’s worth noting that the Slam Radius for each Weapon class has been untouched.
Melee Finisher Improvements
Melee Finishers have been updated to standardize Finisher eligibility across enemies and weapons. Previously, if an enemy did not have a finisher animation prepared for a certain weapon type, then players would not be able to perform that specific Finisher on them. We have added default animations for all weapon types to prevent this restriction, meaning all enemies* should now be eligible for every type of finisher.
Also added a new VFX to showcase when an enemy is open to Finishers. You will still need to get into proper position to execute the finisher with this VFX active!
This includes finisher openings created by Warframe abilities (ex: Inaros Desiccation) and Ground Finishers.
*Flying enemies (Corpus Ospreys, The Anatomizer, etc.) are still ineligible for Melee Finishers with this change.
Added new unique Mercy Finishers to the Hollow Vein, Severed Warden, The Anatomizer, Lumbering Fragment, and Shuffling Fragment enemies! Each with their own custom animations to really stick it to the Murmur in style.
The context action to perform a Finisher on the airborn Murmur enemies (The Anatomizer and The Severed Warden) are not anchored to their bodies and will instead appear on the HUD when you are within radius of them. This is an experimental approach into finding ways to include Finishers on other airborne enemies in the future.
Auto-Melee Fixes
Fixed getting locked auto-meleeing (even without input) after interacting with items and other actions while melee attacking. Notably:
Interacting with Golden Hand Tributes
Selecting Duviri Decree
Entering Sanctuary Onslaught portal
Selecting Endless Void Fissure reward
Opening Gear Wheel
Using Transference
Interacting with turrets in Railjack
Known issue: We are aware that this issue can occur from the Stay/Leave screen in the Circuit.
Fixed Auto-Meleeing in a certain location in the “Awaken the Sleeper” stage of the Whispers in the Walls Quest causing an interaction to be skipped.
Melee will now be disabled when in this area to prevent key moments from being skipped.
Fixed getting locked auto-meleeing after holding the ability menu open and auto-meleeing simultaneously while using a controller.
Fixed getting locked auto-meeling after opening the pause menu/chat window while holding the Melee attack button.
Fixed Auto-melee persisting after exiting a Railjack turret / pilot seat if melee input was held upon entering it.
TOP FIXES
Fixed being able to Heavy Attack mid-air. Now mid-air Heavy Attacks will perform a Heavy Ground Slam as intended.
Fixed being unable to perform a Melee Ground Slam if started while in Transference.
Fixed Disclipline’s Merit’s “Opportunities [for Tennokai] occur every 4 melee hits” not counting all the hits from an Exalted Melee Weapon and standard Melee Weapon when equipped on both.
Fixed Melee Heavy Slide Attacks not functioning with various mechanics, including but not limited to Tennokai, Heavy Attack Decrees (ex: Salted Wound), etc.
Fixed an issue where if you had any Heavy Attack Efficiency and your Combo Duration was zero, you would immediately get all of your Initial Combo back instead of it regenerating overtime.
Fixed an issue where using Melee attack to switch from Operator to Warframe and then immediately using Transference could leave you with an invisible Operator.
Fixed Operator getting stuck infinitely Void Blasting after switching from Warframe to Operator while auto-meleeing.
We are aware of and investigating other issues related to Auto-Melee that we’re hoping to fix for Dante Unbound.
Fixed Kullervo’s Wrathful Advance ability not activating Tennokai.
Fixed being able to gain Melee Combo by unconventional means if your Melee Combo Duration was negative. Indirectly also fixed Heavy Attacks not consuming from Combo Counter when Melee Combo Duration was negative.
Fixed being unable to swap Polarities on a Melee weapon if you do not own the Tennokai Segment.
Fixed the Exilus Slot appearing for Melee weapons in the Upgrade screen even if you don’t own the Tennokai Segment.
Fixed Mod Slots overlapping in the Zaw Gild screen if the Tennokai Segment isn’t installed.
With the launch of Auto Melee in Abyss of Dagath, we mentioned that we were working on a “Perfect Heavy Attack” system for Whispers in the Walls, and it is officially here!
Recall the ancient art of Tennokai with new Tennokai Mods for your Melee Weapons. Tennokai is a long-lost melee art form, allowing Tenno to make the most out of their Heavy Attacks. With Tennokai enabled on your Melee weapon, you will have a 15% chance for a symbol to appear while performing a melee attack. If you perform a Heavy Attack while the symbol is active on your reticle, it will trigger a Tennokai Heavy Attack, which has a faster wind-up speed and does not consume any combo counter.
With this new Tennokai system, there are a variety of Mods that allow you to further customize the frequency and effects of these Tennokai attacks.
HOW TO ENABLE TENNOKAI:
You can enable Tennokai for your Melee Weapon by equipping any of the new Tennokai Mods onto it. Tennokai Mods can be equipped in your build as normal, or in the new Melee Exilus Slot that is unlocked via the Melee Upgrade Segment acquired upon completion of the Whispers in the Walls Quest.
TENNOKAI MODS
These Mods can be earned from Rotation C of the new Alchemy game mode (Cambire, Deimos) or purchased via the Market in the Essential Tennokai Mod Bundle*.
*The Market purchase option is not available to players until they have installed the Melee Upgrade Segment (rewarded from completing the Whispers in the Walls Quest).
Discipline’s Merit
Enables Tennokai. Opportunities occur every 4 melee hits instead of at random.
Dreamer’s Wrath
Enables Tennokai. Increases opportunity chance by 50% and Heavy Attack critical damage by 32%.
Master’s Edge
Enables Tennokai. Increases Tennokai damage by 60%.
Condition’s Perfection
Enables Tennokai. Increases status chance by +100% on Tennokai Attacks.
Opportunity’s Reach
Enables Tennokai. Increases opportunity window to 4.0s and melee range by 3m for Tennokai attacks.
Tenno will also receive a basic Tennokai Mod in their Inbox upon completion of The Whispers in the Walls Quest:
Mentor’s Legacy*
Enables Tennokai.
*This mod is not tradeable as it is a Quest reward!
MELEE UPGRADE SEGMENT
Upon completion of the Whispers in the Walls Quest, players will receive a new Melee Upgrade Segment via their in-game Inbox. Installing it will further expand your Melee Arsenal with two new upgrade options:
Melee Exilus Slots
Fuse an Exilus Weapon Adapter into your Melee weapon to unlock the new Melee Exilus Slot. Players will be able to equip the new Tennokai Mods into this slot, as well as the following newly Exilus-compatible Mods:
Parry
Dispatch Overdrive
Focused Defense
Guardian Derision
Electromagnetic Shielding
Whirlwind
Melee Arcane Slot
In these new Arcane Slots, players will be able to equip new Melee Arcanes, which have also been released with this update. Players can earn Melee Arcane Adapters via the Wares & Shiny Treasures Vendor in the Cavia Syndicate, Netracells, or by purchasing them in the Market for Platinum*.
*The Market purchase option is not available to players until the completion of the Whispers in the Walls Quest.
Melee Arcanes and Zaw Arcanes
Like Kitguns, Zaws will offer both a slot for Zaw Arcanes and Melee Arcanes (once Melee Arcanes are unlocked). Zaw Arcanes cannot be used in Melee Arcane Slots, and vice versa.
TOP FIXES
Fixed Auto Melee persisting if the first melee of a mission is a Warframe ability (Kullervo’s Wrathful Advance, etc.)
Fixed using Auto Melee while entering a Cutscene resulting in being locked in a perma-melee state with no input required.
Fixed block combos not working seamlessly with auto-melee.
Fixed Parazon getting equipped in hand after Mercy-killing an Eximus enemy while auto-meleeing.
Fixed endlessly Melee attacking in Duviri as Drifter if the “Melee with Fire Weapon Input” toggle is enabled.
Fixed a bug where auto-melee was preventing players from throwing throwable objects, such as Thermia Canisters, with their Melee equipped.
GENERAL FIXES
Fixed Heavy Attack charge up animation not respecting “Camera Tracks Melee Target” setting while the player is stationary.
Fixed rare cases where you could trigger Auto Melee while on the Kaithe.
Fixed an issue where lightly tapping the melee input to swap from Sirocco to Melee as Drifter would not actually perform a melee swing, resulting in players being unable to quick fire for a short period of time.
Adding an Auto Melee button has been a frequently requested topic over the years as a way to mitigate repeated button presses. Your days of spamming E are over with the new Auto-Melee functionality! Here’s how it works:
With Auto Melee, players can trigger melee swings through the familiar repeated melee inputs, or they can simply hold the melee input button to repeatedly swing their melee weapon for as long as that input is held. Combos can be executed while auto-meleeing by simply adding the required inputs -- i.e. to start Slide Attacking, simply start sliding while holding the Melee Input, etc.
In short, the Warframe melee that you know isn’t changing - the only difference is that instead of needing to press your E hundreds of times, you only need to press (and hold!) it once.
Our goal is not to alter the main way you play Warframe melee if you prefer the precision of individual inputs - auto-meleeing is an additional way to play the game. This mechanic has been released as a permanent functionality of the Melee system, as we’ve designed this so that both individual input and auto-melee can co-exist without issue.
Since Auto-Melee is removing a lot of the active element of meleeing, we are working on an addition to this system called “Perfect Heavy Attacks” that aim to release with Whispers in the Walls.
Exclusions to Auto Melee
Due to the mechanics of Auto Melee mirroring that of thrown melee weapons, the following weapons will not have Auto Meleeing enabled for them:
Fixed some melee weapons (ex: Nikana with Blind Justice) not chain attacking while blocking in melee-only mode.
Fixed your character rotating rapidly in the Pause Menu if it was opened while you are toggled into Blocking or you are facing enemies that cause you to automatically Block.
Fixed cases of some Melee weapons being unable to chain attacks while blocking in exclusive Melee mode.
Fixed for Melee elemental FX not showing up when loading into a level.
Fixed crash when certain enemies attempt to melee attack.
Fixed being unable to use manual blocking while in melee-only mode, or use aim+attack melee combos, unless you are also using the ‘Hold to Aim Weapon’ in the Accessibility options.
We reverted back to its original functionality where melee could toggle into blocking mode when ‘Hold to Aim Weapon’ was disabled.
Fixed inability to block with your Exalted Melee weapon if your normal Melee weapon has a Melee Combo built up and you’re in exclusively Melee mode (no other weapons).
Fixed a cosmetic issue where being downed while only carrying Melee weapons would leave them looking holstered when somebody revived you.
Fixed improper Melee sounds when hitting Sentients.
Fixed incorrect positioning of Sugatras on numerous Melee weapons.
Update 29.10 (2021-03-19)
For those Tenno who don’t tune into Devstreams, we are actively reviewing the divide between Melee and Primary weapons in terms of power and lethality. A lot of Tenno have made cases that ‘Primary weapons just can’t compete with Melee’, and we agree. We are planning on doing a full detailed review of this and giving players a detailed workshop on what’s on our minds. That will come in the next few weeks.
However, we have one single change in this Update to Melee. The majority of all guaranteed enemy staggers on Melee hits have been removed. A few remain in neutral, forward block and neutral block combos. What this change does in practice is effectively removes the infinite Crowd Control melee attacking provided. The Crowd Control potential stacked with the scaling Damage potential was an area we could immediately change to give players a chance to try out this single tweak in the context of the current game.
This change is rather small in a practical sense, and after you’ve played missions with the change, please let us know what you think.
Other Melee Changes:
Reduced the forward movement of the Warfan Heavy Attack.
Reflection Mod changed from “Damage reflected during Channeled blocking” to:
Fixed an issue with several one-handed Melee weapons not functioning (as an accidental result of the Glaive changes). Weapons included: most Machetes, Plasma Sword, Destreza and Destreza Prime, Sheev, and Scoliac.
Fixed ability to keep your Melee Combo for Gunblade Heavy Attacks by timing a Transference activation at the right time. Gunblade Heavy Attacks will now expel Melee Combo as intended.
Melee Heavy Attacks are no longer able to be triggered by holding 'E', they again live exclusively on Alt-Fire.
The loss of Melee Combo Counter feedback due to spamming Melee drove the vast amounts of requests for Melee Heavy Attack to not be holding ‘E’. A toggle for Melee Heavy Attacks is not in the cards, thus Melee Heavy Attacks are now essentially brought back to its original mechanic of having to use Alt-Fire.
While most of our previous Hotfixes have focused on base functionality and bug fixes of Melee: Phase 2, this Hotfix takes a stab at some balancing in the wake of all the changes. This Hotfix also adjusts some Stances based on feedback.
UI: Split ‘HEAVY ATTACK’ Stats into their own category to better organize the various stats associated with all Melee Weapons.
‘Hold Melee’ will now perform heavy attack like it did before Phase 2.
Removed Combo Hit Multiplier with Glaive's hit damage. Only explosive damage will use the Combo Multiplier.
Mod Changes
The Critical Chance game has largely allowed Blood Rush to shine for active melee players, and with the ‘Steel’ series of Mods applying at the Base Critical Chance level, it’s led to players feeling they are obsolete. We are significantly buffing these Mods to give players a different option for Critical Chance builds. We want to give a more upfront Critical Chance and hard-hitting Heavy Attacks to builds that don’t rely on maintaining a high combo multiplier.
True Steel increased from 60% to 120% Critical Chance (x2 for Heavy Attack) at Max Rank.
Sacrificial Steel increased from 88% to 220% Crit Chance (x2 for Heavy Attack) at Max Rank.
Stance & Weapon Changes
Crimson Dervish:
Fixed Crimson Dervish not having its sliding heavy attack hooked up.
Increased the damage and combo-point value of Crimson Dervish's Neutral (Twisting Flurry) and Forward+Block (Coiling Impale) combos
Gun Blade:
Added a free movement shooting attack to the first move in the Forward Combo for High Noon (Vagabond Blitz) and Bullet Dance (Magnum Mamba).
The Heavy Attack shot is no longer free movement (the wind up remains free movement).
High Noon
Neutral Combo (Desperado Zeal) is now Tactical Forward Combo (Final Showdown), and vice versa.
Switched the order of the two Tactical Forward attacks and increased the forward distance of the first attack
Bullet Dance
Moved the first attack of the Neutral Combo (Samba Slash) to the end of the combo chain.
Bullet Dance - Neutral Combo (Samba Slash) is now Neutral Block (Automatic Rhumba) and vice versa.
Rapier: Vulpine Mask
Swapped the order of the first two attacks in the Neutral Combo (Assailant Guise).
Nunchaku Stance: Atlantis Vulcan
Decreased the forward movement of the first attack in the Tactical Forward Combo (Blazing Vortex) and increased it in the second.
Wize Razor
Second attack in Forward Combo (Cut Thrice) is now free movement
The last attack in the Neutral Combo (Threshing Grain) is now the first attack, damage multipliers and combo points adjusted accordingly
The last attack in the Tactical Forward Combo (Calling Thunder) is now the first attack with increased gap closing movement, damage multipliers and combo points adjusted accordingly.
Dark Split Sword Heavy Blade
Increased Critical Chance from 10% to 15%
Increased Puncture Damage from 68 to 78
Zenistar
Combo Multiplier applied to disc recall explosion.
Fixes
Fixed Blood Rush / Weeping Wounds resetting when using a normal attack on Gunblades.
Fixed Exodia Valor considering every target to be Lifted whether they actually are or not.
Melee has evolved again with a focus on TECHNIQUE - Stance/Combo reworks, the return of Equipped Melee, and MUCH more.
THE GAMEPLAY
1. The Return of Equipped Melee and Manual Blocking!
Holding the weapon swap button will equip melee fully again, and the aim button will manually block when in this mode. Holding the Weapon Swap button while Exalted Melee is in play will also lock you into Exalted Melee mode! (Don’t worry, Auto Blocking is still a thing!)
Blocking will now prevent 100% of damage, with a blocking angle that is dependent on the melee weapon equipped. All successful Blocks will also add to the new Combo Counter!
2. Dodge Cancelling and Tactical Dodging
Dodge Cancel - Allows a player to activate a dodge any time during a melee attack to end the combo immediately and dodge out of the way.
Tactical Dodging - Dodging while blocking now performs this Tactical Dodge, keeping the distance short, and allowing you to remain within melee range. This is an effort to not break the flow of combat after cancelling out of an attack, but also if you need to make a quick escape!
THE COMBOS
3. Stance Changes, Combos and You!
Forward Combo (Forward + Melee) - This allows you to attack without initially interrupting movement with the first 1-3 swings (depending on the weapon Stance). The last attack in the sequence will loop seamlessly into the first, so that you can keep a level of mobility while attacking.
Forward Tactical Combo (Forward + Block/Aim + Melee) - This move is usually a distance-closing opener, bringing you closer to the enemy and getting you within range to continue a harder-hitting string of attacks. The beginning or end of this combo can have a slam effect, allowing you to control the enemy, and during the mid-point of the combo, attacks will be large and sweeping, allowing multiple enemies to be hit.
Neutral Combo (Melee button only) - Hard hitting, movement-free attacks to allow a player to destroy their target. The last attack can either have a knockdown effect, or throw them into the air and hold them there, if one set of strikes does not finish the job.
Neutral Tactical Combo (Block/Aim + Melee) - First hit will likely be a longer thrust or throw of a weapon to increase range. Further attacks will be hard-hitting, and will often finish in a ragdoll effect or a Lifting Attack, as opposed to a knockdown or stagger. Lifting attacks are detailed in Section 7 of this workshop.
Air Combo (Melee while Jumping) - Perform a combo in the air without sacrificing movement.
Hover Air Combo (Back + Melee while Jumping) - Holds the player in place while the combo completes, and overrides the slam attack angle to keep the action going!
4. Smoother Combo Transitions
This allows for last-second decisions on combo changes to occur immediately after the first attack has finished. No more waiting for a combo attack animation to end before you can start spamming the attack button again! Embrace the fluidity!
5. Combo Counter Rework
Rather than just providing flat bonuses to damage, the Combo Counter will now also act as an expendable resource for new heavy hitting combat: HEAVY ATTACKS!
This counter will be increased in a more granular and rapid way, and can be built by using melee attacks, blocking damage, radial damage from Slam Attacks and hits from a thrown weapon (such as the Glaive).
In addition, the ‘heaviness’ of an attack will have a measured difference on the amount of Combo Counter it increases. As a general rule, lighter, swift attacks will give lower additions to the Combo Counter than slower, heavy attacks will.
Combo Duration is now displayed as a bar underneath your Combo Counter!
THE TOOLS
6. Changes to Slam Attacks
The ragdoll effect of the Slam Attack is being removed (with some weapon-specific exceptions *cough*JatKittag*cough*), however it is being replaced with an effect that will push enemies back or knock them down, giving the player some breathing room, and setting the enemy units up for follow-up attacks.
Also, all Melee weapons have received an updated Slam FX - come on and SLAM (attack), and welcome to the jam!
7. Goodbye Channeling, Hello Heavy Attacks and Lifting!
Channeling will be saying its final farewells in the Melee Rework: Phase 2 update, and instead is being replaced with a new form of Heavy Attack, as well as a new Lifted status effect. As we said before, Channeling Mods will also be changed to support this new system, as well as providing a larger pool of utility to choose from in your builds.
Heavy Attacks (Alt-Fire for Melee) - Heavy attacks can now occur at any time, simply by pressing the Alt-fire button while you have melee equipped or in your hand. This costs all of your Combo Counter (affected by Mods), so make sure you lay down the hurt! If you don’t have any Combo Counter active, you will use a Heavy Attack, but it will not benefit from any damage bonus from the Combo Counter.
Heavy Slam Attacks (Jump + Alt-Fire for Melee) - This new Slam Attack will create a new effect on targets, known as the LIFTED STATUS. When a target is Lifted, it is held suspended in the air, allowing a player to follow up on attacks while the target is held helplessly aloft. Again, if you do not have any Combo Counter active, this will act as a Heavy Slam attack without a damage bonus, and minimal Lifting Status.
But what about the Channeling FX you ask? Prime Armor Channeling FX will now appear when the Combo Counter reaches 2!
8. Weapon Stats, Mastery Limits and General Melee Changes
Mastery Rank - Weapons have been reviewed to make sure their function and power are aligned with an appropriate Mastery Rank, similar to passes made on Primary and Secondary weapons.
Base Damage - Since the Combo Multiplier will apply to Heavy Attacks only, the base damage of all melee weapons has significantly increased.
Base Range - Along with damage, range has also been increased to make sure you get the most chop for your buck. While base range is being increased, Range Mods are going to have a different calculation applied to them. This is detailed in Section 9.
Mod and Arcane Channeling Functionality - As mentioned above, any Mods or Arcanes with functionality tied to Channeling have had their stats altered to increase Lifted Status, Heavy Attack damage and Combo Counter modifiers.
Every Melee weapon that was originally a single Elemental damage type has been converted to Physical + Element, allowing for more Status reliability as well (Silva and Aegis excluded given Flame Blade).
Range increased for kick attacks from 1.5 to 2m (Except for Sparring weapons which is increased to 2.5m).
Combo Duration increased from 3 to 5 seconds.
9. Mod Rebalancing / Functionality
All Channeling Mods - have been changed to the Melee Parent type to bring them in line with Melee Phase 2 changes
Amalgam Organ Shatter - Description changed from Charge Attacks to Heavy Attacks.
Blood Rush - Will now scale differently, using a stacking multiplier based on the Combo Counter, raising 60% per Combo Counter tier (something much easier to achieve in Phase 2).
Condition Overload - Now uses a stacking multiplier based on how many Status Effects are on the target at 120% damage per Status.
During this whole Melee rebalance, Condition Overload remained a persistent outlier. Since launch, it has had an unintended stacking mechanic, that nothing else uses in the game: it grew exponentially, making it too volatile to balance. We know there’s nothing worse than ‘how can you call this unintended’, so let’s explain the history: initially it did the stacking on final damage, which, as you know from previous changes, we have been trying to move away from. This is because this type of stacking makes for very hard to control damage progression, and tends to be very confusing as to which damage, Melee/Proc etc, applies where. This new version of the mod makes Condition Overload’s damage multiplication become equal to Pressure Point when the enemy has 1 Status applied, better than Primed Pressure Point at 2 Statuses applied, and from there it just grows and grows. Even though the maximum potential damage is lower now, we think it is still an extremely powerful Mod in its latest iteration.
The new ‘Lifted’ Status also counts for Condition Overload calculation. Revised Stances and the new Heavy Attack give reliable ways of applying Status to enemies, which greatly increases the reliability of Condition Overload
Corrupt Charge - Adds a large amount to the Combo Counter, but significantly reduces the time it takes for the Combo Counter to drain.
Covert Lethality - is remaining as a Dagger Mod for now with +16 Initial Combo and 100% Finisher damage, pending later review. (Note: This has changed from what was laid out in the recent Dev Workshop)
Dispatch Overdrive - Increases player movement on a Heavy Attack hit.
Enduring Affliction - Increases the Status Chance on enemies suffering from the Lifted Status.
Enduring Strike - Increases the Combo Counter chance when hitting Lifted enemies.
Focus Energy - Add Electrical damage to an attack, as well as increasing Combo Counter generation.
Focused Defense - Adds an additional 20 degrees to a weapons blocking angle.
Gladiator Mod Set - Adds a multiplier with the Combo Counter up to 60% for the whole set.
Guardian Derision - Will add more to the Combo Counter for blocking hits. (Note: The Taunt mechanic is still in place.)
Killing Blow - Increases Heavy Attack damage and decreases the ‘wind-up’ time for Heavy Attacks
Life Strike - Heavy Attacks will now regenerate Health.
Maiming Strike - Changes from an additive buff to a stacking buff, but base functionality increased 150%.
Reach / Primed Reach - Will now increase range in a way that has been normalized. In the previous incarnation, long-range weapons were getting too much of a benefit, while short-range weapons were barely seeing any increase at all.
Reflex Coil - Increased Combo Point Efficiency when using Heavy Attacks.
Reflex Guard - +100% Combo Count Chance while Blocking.
Spring-Loaded Blade - Will now provide a maximum of 2 additional stacks of Melee Range.
True Punishment - Add 40% Critical Chance, but reduces the chance to add to the Combo Counter by -10%
Weeping Wounds - Increases Status chance in a Stacking Multiplier, 40% per combo tier.
This update will also see some changes to the following Weapon, Arcane and Focus School buffs:
Zenurik - Inner Might - Has been changed to provide 60% Combo Efficiency, instead of Channeling Efficiency.
Synoid Heliocor, Furax Wraith and Fragor Prime - All receive bonus initial Combo Count to offset the boosted Channeling Damage they had previously.
Exodia Triumph Arcanes - Have been changed to +50% chance to increase the Combo Counter on hit.
Exodia Valor Arcanes - Have been changed to +200% chance to increase Combo Count when hitting Lifted Enemies.
Exodia Brave Arcanes - Now grants +5 Energy Generation when killing an Enemy with a Heavy Attack. This can stack up to 3 times.
10. Exalted Weapons
All melee-based Exalted Weapons have received the Phase 2 functionality treatment, gaining access to the combo changes. For those of you who may have missed it, Wukong’s Exalted Iron Staff has already had this functionality implemented (with the exception of the new Heavy Attacks and changes to the Slam Attacks).
11. The Screens: Arsenal Changes
In Update 26, this screen is being reorganized to include Loadouts, Companions and Vehicles in tabs, while also giving more information about a weapon when selected: https://gfycat.com/serpentinearidalligator
As you can see, new stats for Heavy Attacks and Heavy Slam have been added, with channeling statistics removed.
THE TECHNICAL BITS
12. Aim Assist
Aim assist can be a help or a hindrance depending on what type of attack you wish to perform. While the current system either applies to all or none (on or off), the new system will have more intelligence on aim assist on a per-attack basis. As a general rule under the new system, Aim Assist will be disabled for almost all attacks in the Forward and Tactical Forward Combos, and enabled for most of the Neutral and Tactical Neutral Combo attacks. Of course if you don’t wish to use aim assist at all, you can disable it from the settings menu as normal.
13. Sticky Fingers when Equipping Melee!
Another common issue in user feedback was the unequipping of Gear Items (like the Codex Scanner), or dropping the ‘football’ (usually a pickup for Mobile Defense or Sabotage Missions) when equipping melee or using a melee attack. This has now been changed so that you will no longer drop items or unequip Gear Items when either equipping melee or using a Melee Attack!
Changed the Glaive recall to be done with Melee instead of Melee Channel so its consistent again (Channel being a toggle-only messed up this function).
Fixed cases of performing a Melee ground slam at an extreme horizontal angle if you move your mouse downwards while pressing Melee.
Fixed an error where, after Dual-Wielding gun and Glaive, throwing the Glaive in the "normal" Melee only mode could result in a turbo throw that is only supposed to apply for Dual-Wield.
Fixed a movement hitch that happened if you tried to sprint right after a Melee ground slam.
Upon picking up a Datamass, a Melee to gun swap will automatically equip your Secondary weapon instead of your Primary weapon, which would make you drop the Datamass.
Pressing F when in Melee mode now switches you back to your "other" weapon. For example, if your Primary weapon is equipped when you trigger a Melee attack, you will return to your Primary weapon when you aim or fire. If you instead press F while in Melee mode, you will now equip your Secondary weapon.
Fixed a case where you could be left in an UNARMED state after using a non-Melee Exalted weapon (like Hildryn's Balefire) and went back to Melee when you had no other weapons in your loadout, having gone Melee only to that mission.
Fixed the Operator's Vazarin Guardian Shell not manifesting the charged Void Blast shield.
Fixed an issue where auto-blocking could cancel the charged/heavy Melee attacks.
Implemented fixes toward briefly being unable to Melee after an Aerial Attack, which breaks the flow of battle.
Fixed being able to Quick Melee when you equip an Archgun with either a Primary or Secondary equipped before that.
Fixed the Melee-only Parry becoming a toggle that you can't release until you attack for Clients.
Fixes towards the Wise Razor Stance giving unintended extreme velocity. Comical yes, but clearly an oversight of gravity!
Fixed the Melee combo menu not updating with the proper button inputs to use Melee when using a controller.
Fixed missing Melee Channeling binding callout in the Advanced Melee screen of the Codex when using a controller.
Fixed a number of Melee attacks that could leave weapon trails active after the attack is finished.
Fixed losing your crouch position when initiating a Melee to gun swap while crouching.
Manual blocking/parry has been added when players wield only a Melee weapon in a mission (i.e NO Secondary or Primary equipped). This is possible because in this specific state, the keybindings are free to allow this manual blocking. We do not plan on adding it to any other state yet. The default keybind for this is RMB/Right Mouse Button, as it was in the past.
Controller Changes & Fixes
Melee Channeling can no longer be rebound on Controller due to it completely breaking Melee 2.99997 changes. We apologize for the discomfort this may cause for those who have built their controllers comfortably around a different binding. You can't make an omelette without cracking some eggs!
Fixed a widespread issue where players using Controllers could no longer Aim after the Melee 2.99997 changes. This affected numerous mechanics like Aim Gliding, Melee Channeling, etc.
We’ll be continuing to monitor controller issues as they arise! If you’re still having issues, restoring your Controller bindings to ‘Default’ will help in the meantime. Please let us know of further issues!
Fixed an issue where attempting to reload your Primary/Secondary while in Melee mode would not transition you back to your gun.
Tenno - your favorite melee weapon probably feels a little different today. Today we bring you Phase 1 of 2019’s melee upgrade - we hope you love all the gorgeous new visual effects, streamlined combat, and high fidelity hit reactions! Here's what you can expect:
Let The Gun & Blade Flow
Swap between your gun and melee at the press of a button, no holstering required! Combos can be executed and resumed between movement and more. Blocking is now automatic in melee mode when aiming at an attacking enemy. Your stance combos may have changed, check out the Stance interface!
Death From Above
A Tenno is a master of aerial tactics - now you can better target enemies on the ground with deadly and responsive aimed ground slams.
Effects Upgrades
We've done a complete overall of all Melee Effects! Hit animations, elemental effects and slam attacks: making melee look as good as it feels!
More to Come
Fundamentally, we aim to upgrade Melee. This is Phase 1.
No one knows the power of their Arsenal better than the Tenno - your adaptability and skill with the blade will be tested, and as we continue these changes, we rely on your feedback!
Our Mainline update notes will summarize the information from within the Workshop, plus denote additional information
1) Uninterrupted Combat - firearm to equipped melee (and vice versa) states are instant.
Bonus 1.a) Combo Resume.
2) Ground Slams are more controllable, cleaner, and simpler.
All melee weapons have had their ground-slam ranges increased and new FX added:
Glaive slam range increased to 5m
Warfan slam range increased to 5m
Dagger slam range increased to 5m
Dual dagger slam range increased to 6m
Claw weapon slam range increased to 6m
Gunblade slam range increased to 5m
Nunchaku slam range increased to 6m
Sword and Shield slam range increased to 7m
Single Sword slam range increased to 7m
Blade Whip slam range increased to 7m
Rapier slams increased to 6m
Dual Sword slam range increased to 8m
Tonfa slam range increased to 8m
Machete slam range increased to 7m
Nikana slam range increased to 6m
Hammer slam range increased to 9m
Staff slam range increased to 6m
Polearm slam range adjusted to 7m
Scythe slam range increased to 8m
Heavy Blade slam range increased to 8m
Fists weapon slam range increased to 8m
Sparring weapon slam range increased to 7m
3) Visual FX
2019 style!
A full Visual FX pass has been done for Phase 1! Because this is Phase 1, it 'means all the unique weapons will have new generic FX for a little while (Jat Kittag etc.) until we can get through them all and make new clean variants'.
New and cleaner FX have been created with the idea of beautifully short, highly detailed lifespans. Not infinite - meaning the 'Constant Weapon Trail' option will be removed as a result of this change (at least for Phase 1, we really do think it looks better removed).
4) Keybinds!
Notable Keybind changes:
BLOCKING
Blocking with a melee weapon is no longer keybound, it is automatic when facing enemies who are dealing damage to you in melee mode. Your Reticle determines all!
CHANNELING
Channeling is now a toggle set to your alt-fire button when in melee mode.
Your 'F' button (if using default key bindings) now exclusively swaps between Primary and Secondary weapons with a tap.
Your left mouse button is gun fire, always, instantly.
Your right mouse button is now aim, always, instantly.
OPTIONS:
We are adding a toggle to preserve one aspect of the older melee system. You will be able to toggle an option, allowing you to continue melee attacks with the left mouse button once in melee mode.
Additional Information and Changes
Updated Reticles: Melee mode has received its own reticle!
Archwing: Arch-Melee & Archgun now also use the 'instant swap' behaviour.
Dual Wield (i.e Glaive & Single Secondary) is still supported!
Exalted weapons will also benefit from the uninterrupted swaps! Be aware that Energy will still drain, even when swapping between weapons!
AI hit reacts are getting updated! Enemies will have a more visceral/realistic response to the various hits you dish out.
With Melee Blocking now automatic, the Blocking angle has been reduced to 45 degrees.
If using no custom Energy color, the weapon will inherit the colors of the Elemental FX (or base trails if no elements are present). This unifies all colors (swing FX, trails, hit FX, etc).
Pressure Point.
Kogake and 
Obex, slide attacks perform a double kick that targets only a single enemy, but ragdolls them away instead of only dealing damage. Slide Attacks can be performed on the ground to hit low-lying enemies, or in the air to hit tall enemies, potentially landing headshots.
Stagger. Slam attacks are typically composed of a singular damage type (usually 
Impact). Check a weapon's page to see what its slam damage type is. 
Lifted status. Heavy slam attacks are typically composed of a singular damage type (usually 
Blast). Check a weapon's page to see what its heavy slam damage type is.
Masseter has a normal slam radius of 10m and a heavy slam radius of 10m, despite Heavy Blades typically having a normal slam radius of 8m and a heavy slam radius of 9m.
Flux Rifle lasers and Scorch flamethrowers, as well as non-continuous weapons like 
Gorgon bullets and Butcher cleavers.
