Review: Loki (Prime) [U32.1.4]

Loki is one of the original Warframes, available since the Closed Beta launched. Like his namesake, Loki's abilities are focused on trickery and deception rather than direct offence or defence. While still very usable, his few niches have become increasingly contested from other Warframes, many of whom offer much more than Loki does.

Acquisition

Loki's component blueprints drop from the Hyena Pack Assassination on Neptune. His main Blueprint is available from Market.

Loki Prime's blueprints drop from Void Relics as normal. He is currently Vaulted, so his Relics are not currently available. He will eventually return through Prime Resurgence.

Stats

Loki has quite low base Health and Shields, in exchange for very high base Sprint Speed and Energy, both of which are highly appreciated.

Loki Prime has increased Armour and Energy, the latter of which is again quite useful.

Abilities

Passive:

Loki has 10x Wall Latch duration, allowing him to cling to walls for up to 60 seconds.

Outside of specific Riven challenges, this Passive is basically worthless. In the current state of Warframe, Wall Latching does not confer any notable benefits outside of activating a few specific mods and Arcanes. Essentially nothing in the game benefits from being able to Wall Latch for longer than the base 6 seconds that all other Warframes can do anyway.

1: Decoy

Loki places a Decoy wherever he is aiming, up to 100m away and having 400 Shields and 200 Health. The Decoy will last until it is destroyed by enemies, or for 25 seconds (+Dur). The Decoy wields a weapon dealing effectively 0 damage, allowing it to draw enemy attention.

Decoy is often cited as one of the most useless abilities in the game. While being able to draw enemy attention away from a high priority target can be useful, that its Health does not scale at all means it gets instantly destroyed at higher levels. Other abilities that have scaling Health or cannot be killed (e.g. Saryn's Molt [2], Octavia's Resonator [2]) are far more effective and often provide additional benefits as well.

2: Invisibility

Loki becomes invisible for 12 seconds (+Dur).

Being invisible is often cited as one of the best survivability methods, as enemy AI does not effectively attack invisible targets, if at all. However, you need to be particularly aware of any AoE attacks, as you can still get hit while invisible. Loki has the longest lasting Duration-based invisibility besides that granted by Octavia's Metronome (3), which lasts 15 seconds (+Dur). However, Loki's is much more convenient, requiring just a single ability cast, where Octavia's requires crouching in rhythm with the Mandachord to use properly.

3: Switch Teleport

Loki switches place with the targeted ally or enemy, at a range of up to 75m (+Ran). If the switched target was an enemy, they will be briefly "confused" and will not attack for a short time.

Switch Teleport is another ability with only niche uses. Most notably, with high Range it can be used to switch with and speed up Drone traversal Bounties on the Plains of Eidolon. It can also be used in conjunction with Decoy to travel long distances faster, though that only works in open line-of-sight such as in the Open Worlds.

4: Radial Disarm

Loki releases a pulse of energy that permanently disarms most ranged enemies in a 20m radius (+Ran), dealing a miniscule amount of Impact damage (+Str) to certain enemy types. Most ranged units such as MOAs, and Grineer and Corpus infantry will be unable to use their ranged weapons, and be forced to rely only on melee attacks. Certain enemies such as bosses cannot be disarmed.

Radial Disarm is the second of Loki's useful abilities. There are a lot of enemies whose ranged attacks can be a threat, such as Grineer Bombards and Napalms for their very high burst damage and AoE. Being able to permanently remove these threats can be very helpful, allowing you to kill them at your own leisure or even straight up ignore them if killing is not necessary.

Radial Disarm's biggest flaw is that it only works on most ranged attacks and a few Sentient melee attacks. Most melee-only units (e.g. many of the Infested) are unaffected by the disarm effect. Additionally, it does not affect abilities such as the Scorpion/Ancient grappling hook or the Grineer heavy groundslam.

Augments

1: Deceptive Bond

Loki has two Augments for his (1). The first one, Deceptive Bond, originates from a Conclave-exclusive Augment that was adapted for regular play.

With Deceptive Bond, 50% of damage that Loki suffers is dealt to the Decoy instead, and vice versa. This scales with Strength, so at +100% Str, all damage dealt to Loki is dealt to the Decoy instead, and vice versa.

This Augment is basically useless because the Decoy is so weak. At higher levels, enemies will deal more than enough damage to instantly kill the Decoy, resulting in you dying to the second attack anyway. In return, any damage the Decoy takes will be dealt to you, even if you are invisible and not being directly attacked.

1: Savior Decoy

Upon Loki suffering damage that would normally kill him, Savior Decoy will cause an active Decoy to switch places with him, taking the damage in his stead. Decoy casting speed is also increased by 50%.

A well placed Savior Decoy can be a nice safety net against dying, although since Loki can be almost permanently invisible, dying should not even be a consideration in most situations. Additionally, since the Decoy draws aggro on its own, Savior Decoy may end up pulling you into a group of enemies anyway if your Decoy placement was not very careful. You could potentially use it as a way to quickly snap back to a previous location, but that's a pretty niche use.

2: Hushed Invisibility

Hushed Invisibility causes all weapon attacks made while Invisibility is active to be considered Silent.

Hushed Invis is a nice Augment for keeping enemy awareness down, as loud weapon attacks can alert enemies even if the attacker is invisible. It's not the most impactful Augment, but if you have spare mod slots, it's not a bad choice.

3: Safeguard Switch

Safeguard Switch has two effects based on who gets switched. Switching with an enemy will give Loki invincibility for 3 seconds (+Dur), while switching with an ally will give them invincibility for 6 seconds (+Dur). Switching will remove Status procs from Loki, as well as any switched ally.

Any effect that grants invulnerability is immediately worth consideration. Used appropriately, Safeguard Switch can grant Loki or an ally total invulnerability so long as Loki still has Energy. Though incredibly tedious to maintain, this can be an effective extra survivability method even into extremely high levels.

4: Irradiating Disarm

Any enemies hit by Radial Disarm are also affected with a Radiation-proc-like effect that enables friendly fire, however it is not an actual Radiation proc. This effect lasts for 9s (+Dur).

Irradiating Disarm causes enemies to fight amongst one another, like with regular Radiation procs or Nyx's Chaos (3). Combined with Radial Disarm's default effect of disarming most ranged enemies, this can completely non-lethally disable enemies for a good amount of time.

Builds

None of Loki's base abilities make notable use of Strength, so unless you have used Helminth to infuse a new Strength-using Ability, it can be treated as a dump stat. Duration is important for longer-lasting Invisibility (2), allowing for less frequent recasts and periods of vulnerability. Range is extremely useful for Radial Disarm (4), as well as for Switch Teleport (3). It is very possible to get decent amounts of both, the balance between the two really coming down to intended role and personal preference.

Looking at Augments, I'd ignore both Savior Decoy (1) and Deceptive Bond (1). Hushed Invisibility (2) is nice if you have the spare mod slot, but not strictly necessary. Safeguard Switch (3) gives Switch Teleport a reliable, if rather tedious, source of invulnerability. Irradiating Disarm (4) makes Radial Disarm significantly more disruptive, and in my opinion is the best Augment of the lot.

For survivability, once you have good Energy economy, you should only really be considering Rolling Guard and Shield-gating. Loki does not have the base stats to be taking multiple hits, and with on-demand invisibility, should never even be exposed outside of the brief times when invis expires. Shield-gating and Rolling Guard's 3 second invulnerability should be more than enough time to refresh invis and escape danger. Managed well, you could very much forgo both and just find safe spots to recast Invisibility in.

Arcane Energise is always worth a mention as one of several ways to significantly improve Energy economy, allowing for much greater use of Abilities. Arcane Trickery can be used as an Energy-free method of invisibility, though it is not consistent and Loki does not have ways of forcibly opening enemies up to finishers without Helminth. Arcane Guardian can be used as a survivability buffer, though ideally Loki shouldn't be getting attacked anyway. Molt Efficiency can be a nice way of slightly increasing Duration. Weapon-boosting Arcanes that don't require getting damaged, such as Velocity, Momentum, Precision for your preferred weapons are useful.

Loki (Prime) has a - polarity in the Aura slot. Loki natively has one of each D and V polarities, while Loki Prime has one additional of each D and - polarities.

For the Aura slot, Energy Siphon is a great early-game option. Early-game Energy economy is quite poor, so having the passive Energy-regen-over-time is quite beneficial. With the right balance of Efficiency and Duration, it is technically possible to have permanent Invis uptime just from Energy Siphon's Energy-regen, however the stat requirement is very high. The equation to do so is as follows:

For instance, if your Efficiency is 130% thanks to Streamline, the minimum Duration you will need is (100 - 50 x 1.3) / 7.2 = 486%, which is not currently achievable. However, if your Efficiency is 175% from Streamline + Rank 4 Fleeting Expertise, you only need 174% Duration, which even with Fleeting Expertise's negative Duration, is very achievable.

As you progress further into the game however, Energy becomes much less of an issue. There are many stronger methods of gaining Energy, such as building and using Energy Restores, unlocking the Zenurik Focus Tree, and acquiring Arcanes, 

If Energy is not an issue, the other default good - polarity mods are Corrosive Projection, Energy/Loot Radar, and Sprint Boost. CP makes armoured enemies slightly less tough, ER/LR provide significant extra situational awareness, and SB gives a small Sprint Speed increase. For other polarity Auras, Power Donation could be considered as a support Aura if you haven't Helminth subsumed any Abilities that use Strength. If you have, Growing Power is of course better. Other Auras such as Combat Discipline and Brief Respite are also worth consideration.

Basic 0-Forma

Standard build using just relatively easy-to-acquire mods. This setup has reasonable Invisibility duration as well as a decently disruptive Radial Disarm. Vitality offers a bit of survivability at lower levels but does not scale very well. 

Primed 0-Forma:

This setup just upgrades Continuity and Flow to their Primed versions, nothing special otherwise.

Efficient 0-Forma:

This setup has enough Efficiency and Duration to permanently sustain Invisibility just on Energy Siphon. Note that Narrow Minded and Primed Continuity do not need to be at max Rank to do this, which can save you a lot of Credits and Endo.

Overextended has taken the place of Stretch, as Loki's default kit does not care for Strength and the additional Range is appreciated for Radial Disarm.

Range 0-Forma:

This setup instead goes heavy in Range for maximum Radial Disarm effect. It will disarm enemies in an enormous range, and still has enough Duration for Irradiating Disarm and Invisibility to last a reasonable time.

Duration 1-Forma:

Finally, this build installs a - polarity for some extra capacity. This build goes hard into Duration for the longest lasting Invisibility. If you have the Energy economy to support it, you are probably better off with a bit more Range so that Radial Disarm is more effective.

My Builds

First build is an ordinary high-Duration build for longer Invis. Since Loki's base kit gets essentially no benefit from Strength, Overextended for usable Range for Radial Disarm is perfectly fine. 

While Vitality + Arcane Guardian isn't necessary, I like having that safety buffer. Rolling Guard would be a much more useful option overall.

This alternate version goes much heavier into Range for a more effective Radial Disarm, while still retaining good Duration for decent Invis.

Roles

Loki fulfils two main roles well - invisibility and enemy disruption. Invis from Invisibility (2) is a purely selfish method of survivability, but it is extremely effective as Warframe's enemy AI is very simplistic. Radial Disarm (4) acts as an effective Debuff against a number of enemies whose primary threat comes from their weapons (e.g. Grineer Bombards and Napalms), and when Augmented also provides a degree of CC.

Augmented Switch Teleport (3) can be used as a very specific Support Ability, however its utility is purely defensive and has quite low duration.

Combat Use and Summary

The core of Loki's gameplay is to ensure Invisibility (2) is active at all times. Radial Disarm (4), especially when Augmented, can be very useful to weaken and distract enemies, ideal for mission types not requiring kills to progress such as Interception and Mobile Defence. Augmented Switch Teleport (3) can be used for total invulnerability, though as Loki should be invisible all the time anyway it is more useful for making allies invulnerable. Decoy (1) is practically useless besides being a Switch Teleport anchor for long distance travel.

Since his kit does not assist directly in killing, Loki is most useful in mission types not requiring kills to progress. His long-lasting invis can be useful for stealth missions such as Spy, though once you have learnt the Spy Vaults, there are better Warframes to be using (e.g. Wukong and Titania are much faster and more agile, Ivara is even more forgiving). Radial Disarm, especially when Augmented, can make purely defensive missions such as Mobile Defence and Interception much easier, although the same can be said for proper CC Frames as well (e.g. Vauban and Nyx).

Overall, Loki feels like he has a very dated Ability kit. Two of his four Abilities are niche at best, one of which (Decoy) is often cited as among the worst Abilities in the game. His other two Abilities, while useful, are often considered powercrept or otherwise outclassed by other Frames. Barring his unique uses with Switch Teleport, I think that pretty much everything Loki does is better done by other Warframes.

Weapon Combinations

Loki doesn't have any unique or notable interactions with specific weapons or weapon types.