Warframe Empyrean: Kuva Lich Changes Update 27.1.0 Patch Notes

The Kuva Lich system is going through some changes in Warframe. Update 27.1.0 is filled with notes related to the Kuva Liches, and most of them are very welcome indeed. Larvlings will now give you an indicator about the weapon that Kuva Lich will have, so you can decide not to kill it if you have no interest in that particular piece of equipment. 

Liches that survive a Parazon blade will also no longer kill you, removing a very annoying part of trying to deal with them. Instead, they laugh at you and leave, which is far more in line with the original premise of the enemy, and a welcome change.

You can use Valence Fusion to combine similar Kuva weapons, increase their stats to a predetermined cap. Once again, extremely welcome news that gives more value to duplicate weapons, and combined with the changes to Kuva Larvlings, gives you the chance to make the most of your Kuva Lich hunting.

There are a whole host of other changes and fixes, being deployed as well, so be sure to read through the full notes to keep up to date on the state of the game.

Warframe Empyrean: Kuva Lich Changes Update 27.1.0

2020 Kuva-vision

The birth of the very first Kuva Lich came just over 3 months ago (October 31 2019)! A copious amount of Additions, Changes, and Fixes have been made in these 3 months; each one of them touching the surface of feedback, but not fully reaching all the way into the depths. Today, that changes! 

If you watched Devstream #136, the 2019 Player Survey showed us that out of the 27,000+ responses, the Kuva Lich system was the 2019 addition that was enjoyed the least. Many players voiced that the Kuva Lich system got progressively less fun the more time and energy was devoted to it. While finding the line between repetition and progress is one Warframe has struggled with since it’s first day, Liches highlighted some issues we aim to address while walking that line.  

Let’s get to the meaty changes shall we? 

1. The Kuva Larvling Who Lived
Starting from the very beginning of Kuva Lich conception brings us to Kuva Larvlings. Kuva Larvlings will now play a key role in determining your future relationship with your Kuva Lich.

• A downed Kuva Larvling will now display an icon of the Kuva weapon that it’s birthed Kuva Lich will possess!
  • This allows players to decide upfront if they want to pursue that weapon by finishing the downed Kuva Larvling, or to ignore and attempt another Lich. The Kuva Larvling will be in this downed state for a max of 30 seconds before it perishes. 

As an added benefit to completing the mission even if you choose NOT to kill the Kuva Larvling, a downed Kuva Larvling will grant 100 Kuva on End of Mission.

2. Breaking Your Back for Knowledge
The first time my Kuva Lich cracked my back like celery I knew I’d have to settle the score. But, over time- and 100 back-cracks and deaths later- Parazon Requiem Attempts started to feel overly negative. To alleviate some of that back pain, we’ve prioritized knowledge over chiropractic methods: 

• Your Kuva Lich will no longer kill you when you fail a Requiem guess, nor will they attempt to break your back. The Parazon stabbing animation will play but the UI will show whether it was a success or failure. Upon receiving a Requiem fail, your Kuva Lich will laugh at you and leave, leaving your back and dignity intact!  

3. Valence FUSION
First introduced in 26.0.6, Valence Transfer, now re titled Valence Fusion for clarity, was designed to address owning duplicate Kuva weapons with different unique innate damage bonuses. Giving you the ability to replace a Kuva weapons innate damage bonus (plus investments like Forma, Focus Lens etc) with one from another Kuva weapon was a good start, but we can push this even further!

• Valence Fusion now also boosts your Kuva weapons innate damage bonus. Examples:
  • Your Kuva Kohm with 25% damage can be fed into your 40% weapon, to make it 44%
  • Your Kuva Kohm with 40% damage can be fed into your 25% weapon, to make it 44%
  • Your Kuva Kohm with 25% damage can be fed into your 44% weapon, to make it 48.4%

Your Kuva weapon duplicates now offer a gradual progression towards a “perfect” Kuva weapon, which would reflect a 60% damage value, if you choose to pursue this path.

We’re also looking at other places we could potentially use this mechanic (Railjack, etc)!

As you can see, we’ve cracked a few eggs to make this omelette! We look forward to your feedback on these Kuva Lich changes!

*PS: It matters which order you Valence Fuse them in. The weapon that you START from, the one where you click “Actions”, is the one that will be kept with its investments.

*Clarification on ‘Abandoning Liches’: We have removed the prototype for this for now, because rather than not fixing the core loop and just letting a Lich be banished, we intend to focus on the core loop first. 

*Comment on Murmur hunting – There are some questions about Murmur hunting that are outside the scope of this hotfix, but we will be reviewing in the coming weeks once the above changes are settled in.

NEW KUVA WEAPONS

KUVA HIND (variant)
This powerful Grineer burst rifle has been retrofitted to add semi-automatic and automatic fire modes.

KUVA NUKOR (variant)
A highly-optimized Nukor that allows for the weapon’s microwave field to hit up to four additional targets.

KUVA BRAMMA (new)
This Grineer bow delivers vengeance in the form of cluster bomb-tipped arrows that can be detonated mid-air or on impact.

Converted Kuva Lich Changes
Converted Liches have been criticized for their lack of endurance and firepower. They don’t use their abilities, and leave a weak impression. 

• Increased Converted Kuva Lich minimum time to 2 minutes.
• Increased Converted Kuva Lich Damage Per Second with damage bonus upgrade 3x.
• Fixed Converted Kuva Liches not using their abilities.

General Kuva Lich Changes & Fixes:

• Doubled the chance of a Kuva Lich to have a Vengeful Ephemera from 10% to 20%!
• Known Requiem/attempts now also appear in your Parazon Upgrade screen!
• Changed all Kuva Thrall markers to consistently reflect the new icon brought in 27.0.11. This includes the minimap and when waypointing a Kuva Thrall.
• Kuva pickup/rewards are now displayed as the fancy banner UI, similar to Argon.
• Kuva Liches can no longer be Parazon stabbed as they are escaping. This resulted in invisible animations, and the UI unveiling if your Requiem Mod guess was correct but not registering it, thus not ranking up your Kuva Lich.
• Cleaned up visual metal chunks from the Kuva Liches Carapace (Iron Skin) ability.
• You can now search the Kuva Lich History Codex section by name, Kuva weapon, and Ephemera.
• Fixed Lich ‘Ruse’ clones displaying the default Excalibur Helmet on their shoulder instead of the same Warframe Helmet as their owner. 
• Fixed Nidus Helmet Armor not appearing grayscale on Kuva Liches.
• Fixed certain enemy types being allowed to be spawned as Kuva Thralls that shouldn’t be.
• Fixed cases of the Kuva Lich ping-ponging between locations when engaging its target.
• Fixed script error when changing resolution while in the Kuva Lich screen.

IVARA SKATHI SKIN
From the darkest forest, a striking new huntress takes aim. Also includes an alternative appearance for the Artemis Bow.

IVARA SKATHI COLLECTION
Take aim with this striking collection of Ivara Skathi items. Includes the Ivara Skathi Skin, Dali Ballistica Skin and the Thiazi Syandana.

New Warframe Augments (at max rank)
Garuda – Bloodletting Augment: Bloodforge
Garuda’s equipped weapon is reloaded up to 100%.

Baruuk – Lull Augment: Endless Lullaby
Performing a finisher on a sleeping enemy will retrigger Lull for 100% of the remaining duration. Passive: +50% Lull Duration.

Baruuk – Serene Storm Augment: Reactive Storm
Desert Wind is granted +35% Status Chance and changes its damage type to match enemy weaknesses.

Hildryn – Balefire Augment: Balefire Surge
Fully charged shots restore 250 Shields to Hildryn. Impact with Nullifier Shields will destroy them and restore 750 Shield.

CORBU SHAWZIN
Shape intricate melodies with this geometric Shawzin.

A note from our Sound Team: “We recorded many different real guitars to make this electric guitar Shawzin sound heavy.  The sounds are a result of blending these different guitar tones together. Each of the notes has a couple of different variations so when you play it, it will sound like a realistic electric guitar.”

General Additions:

• Drusus has a tale to tell! Visit the new Ivara Leverian to learn more and find her Prex card! You can find the Leverian in the Market or Codex when viewing Ivara!

Railjack Changes & Fixes:

• Omni tool is now available as a Gear item in your Inventory (Archwing Quest completion required)! This allows you to place the Omni tool in your preferred Gear spot for quick access!
  • If you forget to equip the Omni tool in your Gear upon entering a Railjack mission it will still be given to you for the mission.
• Increased maximum power for Zekti Predator Avionic to 80%, from 72%
  • This Avionic was slightly under-performing its cheaper Vidar equivalent.
• ‘Show Equipped’ will now show ranked Avionics that are equipped even when ‘Show Ranked’ is disabled.
• Hijacked Crewships now start the reactor meltdown sequence when they reach zero health.
• Ordnance weapon icons now become translucent while in cooldown, and will reflect a timer icon to better indicate it’s current cooldown state.
• Changed Railjack Engine Component rating stats from Kilometers Per Hour to Meters Per Second to be consistent in the equipped stats.
• Fixed Railjack Speed stat showing a higher number than your in-game movement speed.
  • This fix needs some explanation. First of all, a bit of trivia, Railjack operates at a different scale than the rest of Warframe. Perhaps some of you have seen space-time breaking down in the form of truly enormous cats… The Speed that was being shown in the drydock in your ship Stats was in the wrong scale and gave numbers that were inaccurate.  This also caused the bonus given by your engine, displayed in kilometers-per-hour, to be wrong: an engine might say that it gave an extra 30km per hour, but give far far more than that in the Stats if you did the math to convert.  This has been fixed so that: 1) your Stats now show the correct Speed for Railjack’s world scale, and, 2) your engines are rated in meters per second which matches up to the Stats.  While it may look like your ship’s Speed stat in the drydock has gone down significantly, please try flying around in missions and see how your ship handles. This only fixes how the UI reports the numbers in your Stats. No change to how fast your ship actually moves is intended, and if your ship doesn’t fly at the meters-per-second shown in the Stats then it should be carefully measured and reported as a bug.
• Fixed the Railjack Forward Artillery not damaging Crewships past their engines. You should find that the Forward Artillery hits harder and your shot isn’t wasted on just destroying the Crewship engines! 
• Fixed Crewships not recovering after becoming disabled by your Railjack guns.
• Fixed Railjack Host being able to use Navigation before the mission is complete and Clients inability to use Navigation at all when launched from the Dry Dock.
  • For clarification, the correct functionality is Host and Client can use Railjack Navigation after mission complete and neither can use Navigation before mission complete.
• Fixed enemy Captains spawning in the “Asteroid Base Commander” POI and Commanders spawning in the “Kill the Galleon Captain” POI.
• Fixed Galvarc Missile Launcher not functioning for Clients.
• Fixed Fiery Phoenix not becoming disabled when Flux Energy reaches 0.
• Fixed full ranked Flow Burn not being upgraded further when placed into a max rank Grid.
• Fixed Battle Avionics remaining disabled for Clients after Railjack is repaired from Critical Breach.
• Fixed Dome Charges being consumed when a Client enters the Forward Artillery, regardless of actually firing the BFG.
• Fixed issue where Clients would see Forward Artillery reload multiple times while waiting for Host to put Dome Charges in the weapon.
• Fixed Clients not seeing Shatter Burst Battle Avionic explosion FX.
• Fixed Clients not seeing the missile created by Shatter Burst/Void Hole.
• Fixed being left out in space if you were aboard a Crewship when it despawns due to mission completion. 
• Fixed cases of losing the Railjack Forge UI if you attempted to activate it while sliding.
• Fixed Railjack Ammunition and supplies that were spent during a mission not saving at the end of mission.
• Fixed losing custom Railjack Skin/Colors if a Host migration occurred and you were the last remaining player. 
• Fixed Railjack Avionic/Salvage pickups sometimes not showing distance markers.
• Fixed the camera breaking when Warping to another player while in the Archwing Slingshot.
• Fixed Tactical Menu Chase Camera to better reflect the view of the player’s camera.
• Fixed Dry Dock creating a blocking volume in a room that is built below it.
• Fixed issues with selecting Veil/Saturn Proxima nodes when using the controller.
• Fixed cooldown bar on Railjack Ordnance burst-fire weapons emptying and not start filling until after the laser’s done firing, instead of when you initially fire.
• Fixed Railjack Tactical Avionics cooldown tooltip information not applying Intrinsic cooldown reductions from Tactical Response and Swift Tactics.
• Fixed Void Cloak cooldown timer not updating when viewing in the Tactical Menu.
• Fixed Upgraded Avionics not showing their proper description and stats, such as being Ranked vs Unranked.

Optimizations:

• Optimizations for the Kuva Fortress tileset. This includes cleaning up wasteful materials, abusive lighting, volumetrics, overdrawn meshes and much more. More optimizations to come!
  •  
• Made micro-optimizations to a script used in Survival missions.
• Improved performance of the Railjack cannons.
• Improved performance when using the Imperator Vandal in Railjack.
• Optimized runtime lighting in an Earth cave tile.
• Optimized real time lighting in the Jupiter Gas City Index tileset.
• Optimized the Omni tool to fix a hitch when equipping it.
• Made micro-optimizations to a script used for controlling doors. 
• Made some micro-optimizations to HUD performance, especially on Railjack.
• Made a micro-optimization to UI performance, including while piloting the Railjack.
• Made a micro-optimization Railjack POI once sub-objectives have been completed.
• Made a micro-optimization to a script that handles fire breaking out on a Railjack.
• Made a micro-optimization to Chroma’s Effigy ability.
• Made a micro-optimization to a script used to animate the Dual Kamas.

Changes:

• 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. 
• NPCs now have about a second of delay before being able to perceive other players or NPCs that come out of invisibility, regardless of alert state. Previously, combat-state enemies would near instantly retarget in such cases. Seen in:
• Removed Riven Mods from the Codex Mod section.
  • There were a few issues present here: 1) the Codex Mod section not display all of your Rivens Mods, and, 2) the Riven Mods that it did show would point their acquisition to Cephalon Simaris, which only applies to Companion Weapon Rivens. Considering the extensive amount of Rivens possible, this option in the Codex does not function properly, as it would need to look up unique information.
• All Gas City, Sanctuary Onslaught, and Elite Sanctuary Onslaught Captura Scenes can now be sold for 3500 Credits for those that have duplicates!
• A fully charged throw of the Orvius will now activate its unique enemy suspension mechanic. 
• Restored the original default Energy colors of the Limbo Limina Skin and Nekros Irkalla Skin to match its original artist intentions. 

Fixes:

• Fixed inability to invite people to a squad if your Matchmaking was set to Solo before joining a Public squad via Invite.
• Fixed a script error and loss of functionality when viewing Archwing weapons without having the Archwing Quest complete.
• Fixed Garuda charging her Dread Heart at full strength from any amount of Energy regen.
  • This ability now charges at a reduced rate if you are at 0 Energy and incoming regeneration isn’t enough to keep with how much Energy the ability wants to drain.
• Fixed Mirage’s Hall of Mirror clones not shooting the last round in your magazine.
• Fixed Mirage’s Hall of Mirror clones not animating properly for double/wall jumps.
• Fixed Index enemies not attacking Gara’s Mass Vitrify wall.
• Fixed damage done by Oberon’s Hallowed Ground during The Index will dramatically increase if the player is in Operator mode.
• Fixed Glaive lifespan timers not functioning correctly for the Host.
• Fixed Ivara Navigator not pausing some lifespan timers for projectiles, allowing the projectile to die of old age while you’re still controlling it.
• Fixed Follow-Through stat changing when the Sigma & Octantis and Cobra & Crane are equipped with a Stance Mod. 
• Fixed the Sanctuary Sentinel Mod and Companion Shelter Mod leaving an invulnerable shield lingering forever for the Host if used in a No-Shield Nightmare mission.
• Fixed projectile explosion & embed damage not properly using Status Chance upgrades.
• Fixed some cases of the ‘Deploy Resource Extractor’ button losing functionality.
• Fixed cases of invulnerable Corpus Turrets.
• Fixed K-Drives spawning ridiculously far away after being left on top of water in Orb Vallis.
• Fixed Wisp’s Agile animation not idling properly when the Shedu is equipped.
• Fixed Blade and Whip weapons clipping into Wisp when she runs.
• Fixed being able to revive in the ceiling in part of the Grineer Fortress.
• Fixed being able to get behind the first Data-Conduit in Sanctuary Onslaught.
• Fixed Power Menu UI remaining open when entering a Data-Conduit in Sanctuary Onslaught when using a controller. 
• Fixed Orb Vallis/Plains of Eidolon objective markers moving around when in Archwing.
• Fixed Companion Weapon Riven Mods not displaying under the ‘Mods’ tab in Cephalon Simaris’ Offerings.
• Fixed Nightwave multi-rank up past 30 displaying incorrect tier numbers and prestige status on the rank up popups.
• Fixed performance issues with Kela De Thaym’s Rollers.
• Fixed performance issues with the Ballistica projectile trail FX over long distances.
• Fixed an issue where the Defense target’s head would float above the cryopod in Defense missions, exposing it to the many dangers of the environment and also the dangers of not having your head connected to your body.
• Fixed maggots potentially being created out of bounds when spawned by the death of a Brood Mother.
• Fixed animation issues with the Grineer Flameblade causing its second and third attacks in its attack combo to miss its target.
• Fixed Lephantis sometimes not immediately dying after all three heads have been destroyed.
• Fixed being able to see outside the level from the gate in Cetus.
• Fixed Fast Traveling to Fisher Hai-luk teleporting the player midair.
• Fixed Ivara’s Artemis Bow arrows not reflecting chosen colors when stuck into objects/enemies. 
• Fixed fully default Look Links not applying to your Warframe. 
• Fixes toward Look Link colors not applying properly to Kubrows/Kavats/Venari.
• Fixed Look Link diorama for Venari appearing squashed and having a normal Kavat tail.
• Fixed overwhelming Elemental FX on Titania when she is given an Elemental buff. 
• Fixed positional audio not working for stereo/headphone outputs (i.e. a sound playing on the left side of your view would be heard equally in both headphones).
• Fixed in-game voice chat not functioning properly (would not play back any audio).
• Fixed the voice input/output device toggle in the settings screen not having any effect the first time you tried to change it.
• Fixed Pet Companions struggling to path ziplines. As reported here:
• Fixed having to click through Market items that only require one step to purchase (Relic Packs, etc), instead of displaying the quantity confirmation UI right away.
• Fixed ability to escape the Grineer Settlement tileset level bounds via Nezha’s Blazing Chakram.
• Fixed missing door frames in the Grineer Settlement Sabotage Tileset.
• Fixed missing minimap in part of the Grineer Shipyard.
• Fixed a teleport volume in part of the Grineer Sealab that was larger than it should be.
• Fixed a hole in part of the Grineer Sealab.
• Fixed a rock that was missing collision in the Plains of Eidolon.
• Fixed a rock clipping into a vent on the Corpus outpost.
• Fixed extra music loop playing when selecting Little Duck’s Exotic Goods.
• Fixed Simulacrum Ammo pickup playing the ‘Shield recharge’ sound.
• Fixed inaccurate Archwing quest tutorial text.
• Fixed several potential script errors caused by Warframe abilities.
• Fixed a script error that could break various Drone escort missions (including Plague Star).
• Fixed a script error when changing loadouts while in Fortuna.
• Fixed a script error that could break an bounty stage if the objective was destroyed right at the last moment.
• Fixed a script error for Clients when changing Arch-Guns in the Arsenal in Simulacrum while another Arch-Gun is already equipped.
• Fixed possible script error that could occur if you aborted a mission right as a missile locked onto your archwing.
• Fixed script error that could occur if you joined a mission while the host was running a K-Drive race.
• Fixed a script error when your Sentinel activates the Revenge Precept.
• Fixed a script error when your Kubrow activates the Stalk Precept.
• Fixed a script error related to a ragdolled enemy in Orb Vallis.
• Fixed numerous script errors when casting certain Warframe abilities.
• Fixed a script error related to Nidus’ Undying Passive.
• Fixed some inaccurate LOC text.