The goat man, the paladin - Oberon!
Release date: 2013-12-19
Passive: Creatures of nature rejuvenate in Oberon’s presence, causing all Companions to receive +25% Health, Shield and Armor links. Oberon’s own Companion also receives 1 instant revive per mission.
Smite - Focuses deadly energy within a target and then projects it outwards, damaging both the target and surrounding enemies.
Hallowed Ground - Sanctifies the ground before Oberon with righteous fire, inflicting damage to any enemy that stands in the flames.
Renewal - Healing waves of energy flow outward from Oberon to his allies, regenerating health over time.
Reckoning - Quickly lifts enemies into the air and then hurls them down with conviction. Enemies who succumb to this power have a chance to spawn a Health Sphere.
Acquisition: Main blueprint can be purchased from the Market. Component blueprints are obtained from Earth Proxima (Neuroptics & Systems) and Saturn Proxima (Chassis) Points of Interest in Empyrean missions.
Oberon suffers from a mild case of an identity crisis which I feel impacts his kit negatively. I get that DE was going for an Oath of the Ancients vibe with him, but I think he would be better off being either a pure paladin or a druid frame, rather than this weird amalgamation of both.
Smite is OK as far as first abilities go, doing %HP based damage means it always stays relevant. It does kinda have this weird issue of becoming worse with more power strength, as it’s damage gets divided between all the orbs it spawns.
Hallowed Ground is a soft CC ability that also gives you and anyone else standing on it status immunity. Standing part being very relevant, if you decide to do anything that even slightly lifts your feet from the ground, no more status immunity for you! Make the status immunity linger a bit after stepping off the ground and this ability would become much less clunky.
Renewal, oh my! TL;DR just play Wisp, her 1 does everything this ability does but better and for free. This ability is so old not only does it have a constant channeling cost, it also has the audacity to cost you more for every target affected! Do either one, not both! Honestly in 99% of cases, subsuming Gloom will not only offer you and your team far more healing, but also cost you way less energy to do so. Terrible ability.
Reckoning is almost good, all this ability needs is not being restricted to only armor stripping enemies on Hallowed Ground, it doesn’t have enough range to warrant having such a steep requirement.
Oberon will always hold a special place for me. As someone not happy with state of public Eidolon hunts, he gave me the ability to solo (all three!). Shards were finally obtainable :)
Cheers to the GOAT!!!
I remember back when you kinda just stumbled upon the Oberon parts. It wasn’t that long ago was it?
Yeah, he used to drop off of Eximus units so you would swim in his parts, they were like a little piggy bank of credits in your inventory you could crack if you ever ran out. Moving him to Railjack was a huge mistake, before at least he was easy to get for new players, now by the time you can get him you have absolutely no use for his kit at all. At least he is also available from normal Circuit rewards.
Shoulda moved Harrow to Railjack. Probably woulda made his parts easier to get. (Except the chassis of course)
There’s no point in the Harrow Chassis spawning the way it does, you have 3946 of them by the time you get the rest of his parts (if you ever bother to get them)
Id rather run railack than do kuva spy, Idk about the rest of the community.
I’ve seen the argument before that Oberon should be a starting frame alongside the other three. I love this idea. 4 squad members, four starting frames. It also means there’s immediately a solid support option for players that want it. Keeping Oberon with the eximus units would also keep his obtainability on par with the other starter frames.
TL;DR: Put Oberon back with the eximus drops, put Harrow in Railjack to keep his parts tied around the same time you get his blueprint, and make Oberon one of the frames available in Awakening/Duviri Paradox
I’ve also always wondered why they don’t just put the starter frames in the Tenno Lab. If they’re the three (or four if they were to make Oberon a starter) frames everyone has access to at the start, wouldn’t they be the ones Clans knew the most about? I feel like Wukong makes more sense as a drop for Lech Krill, and The Seargent could take Banshee, and Zephyr could become the Eximus drops. Then they can move Excalibur, Mag, and Oberon into the Tenno Lab alongside Volt.
I know I’m overthinking this, but I think this is how I would have done it. Of course it’s not that simple since all these frames have had various forms of obtainability throughout their lifespan, and they’ve all changed different times, but DE has recently been simplifying a lot of older mechanics to be more consistent (ie: mod stats) so perhaps this is a next step
