The Power of Scions (Gears 4 - Gears 5)

Gears 5
#1

Hello everyone! :smiley:

I have a question that has been on my mind for quite a while now and I wanted to share it with you, because maybe one of you will have the answer.

In Gears of War 4, the Scions had the same power as the Kantus in previous Gears, that is, the ability to reanimate/regenerate their allies. I thought it was really interesting that the developers put this gameplay element back for the Locust camp.

Unfortunately, I found that in Gears 5 the Scions no longer had this possibility. Why did you remove it? It was very cool I think! I thought the Scions were much more threatening with it as well.

Do any of you have the answer to this question please?

Thank you in advance!
(Sorry if my English isn’t very good, I’m French!)

5 Likes
#2

Good question, the scion ability was cool. Short answer, I think it’s to do with tc;s inability to commit to something, always turning coat to the wind/most loud players and following easy route to what they think people want in gameplay.

4 Likes
#3

I don’t remember but I think I or someone else had asked this during one of the dev streams and I think the answer was them forgetting about it or something.

#4

Because they thought people would much prefer to kill this new enemy called a Leech

5 Likes
#5

If this is true then…It’s honestly disappointing. The Kantus chant/scream had lore and meaning behind its name, It was a very cool character and my favorite locust. So simply forgetting perks about the designs you created is just…lazy quite honestly lol.

1 Like
#6

Should bring the scion empowerment ability back

#7

I’m not 100% but I’m sure T.C. will bring the ability back in a newer OP or the next gears installment

#8

Nothing against you but this mentality of “they’ll get it right the next game” needs to die.
The community needs to hammer TC into doing better and really challenge them.
If they can’t get this stuff correct right now, what makes you think they’ll get it right in the future?

4 Likes
#9

Just another one of their many poor design choices, nothing more. It made no sense whatsoever to remove it.

#10

I don’t think it revived down swarm units, but it seemed to make them do more damage or be more resistant.
Wasn’t it only the buzzkillers that did it in Horde?
I miss the sound they made.

1 Like
#11

Why is no one mentioning Bastions replacing Scions as the “buffer” type enemies? I’m almost certain that’s the sole reason why they did it.

#12

Because they dont buff only really shield them from damage. The scion buff is more of a damage and health/defense increase if I remember correctly maybe just a health buff if not.

If they did do it because of bastions that’s just a huge step back as bastions are more annoying than threatening compared to the scions scream ability.

#13

I meant more that having both Bastions and healing Scions at once would be way too infuriating to fight. Like you said, Bastions are already irritating to deal with, so I can’t imagine fighting a Scion that’s healing and buffing other enemies and having invincible shields while doing it.

I still would like to see the ability return though, either with the Scions or some other enemy. I know Buzzkill Scions have a similar ability on The Line, so I hope they toy around with that kind of thing more. But it doesn’t seem very likely.

1 Like
#14

Who knows? These first few OPs have been nothing but learning lessons for T.C. and we still have quite a few more to go. Gears 5 come the end of its lifespan could be the best gears yet but for right now T.C. needs to pick up the pace.

1 Like
#15

Thank you for your answers! I find the debate interesting. I don’t think they will put this element back for a future operation. Maybe in the next Gears? I’ve discussed it with a friend, he’s thinking of an oversight, but it seems unlikely!

#16

Overall I think we’ve lost a lot of diversity in horde. Grenadiers don’t have grenades and the elites only have flashes. The scions no longer roar and we’ve lost the battle medic of the kantus. Boom shields are gone and flame grenadier, hilariously feast or famine as they were are gone too.

Remember in gears 3 when you had to call out a former swarm? Remember retro charging through a horde? Or one shotting (the weapon one shot!) a mauler through his shield? Annoying as these enemies were… I find myself missing them. Getting a down and seeing that white ominous glow meant “hey we should find the kantus unless we want an ink from out of nowhere”

I get it. Half of this stuff is gone due to lore reasons… but when it comes to horde I think we need to just forget the lore and embrace the idea of playing a diversified experience. Look at payday 2. A simple first person shooter at its core. But there’s a huge amount of customization in builds and weapons, with enemies that have their own brand of terror and it is GREAT! I think we need to embrace these things to keep people coming back to try and do more. Because once I see DB’s come out: I understand exactly what I’m about to get, and it’s not gonna be that exciting. The DB’s are fine, but we need more, I feel.

2 Likes
#17

The Scion war chant was actually seen in the gameplay reveal for Escape.

What sucked about the war chant was that it made enemies do more damage, and it made them highly resistant to damage. It was probably removed because that would make Escape and Horde ridiculously difficult with any Mutators enabled. Imagine playing on Master difficulty, like many players do, except Scions permanently turn all enemies around them into even spongier damage bombs. That would have massively changed the meta and turned every fight into more of a slog.

I hope the war chant returns. But I hope it has a different effect in Gears 6.

Possible effects:

  • drones gain speed increases and become more erratic in their movement. Instead of roadie running, they run like the Bolters from Gears 2.

  • all downed drones are revived, and all drones are healed for 20% of their max health.

  • drones gain a small damage resistance, but they also grow a sense of self-preservation. Instead of charging, they seek cover more effectively, and blind fire more. (not a fan of this one, but it would make sense and balance itself better than RAGE ENEMIES HIT HARDER ALWAYS CHARGE REEEEE)

  • monsters (Pouncers/Snatchers/Carriers) gain a speed increase for their attack animations (but not their movement speed).

There are definitely more ideas that could be explored. Hopefully TC picks something that amplifies the lore, but also makes for fun and tense gameplay.

1 Like
#18

Yeah I was disappointed when I found out this was left out. I remember seeing the first Scion in the Campaign and going S*** need to take it out quick only to find the near by drones dont receive any helth boost or at least become more agressive. I just left it at ok its not in the game anymore so there must be a reason but I wouldn’t be surprised if they just forgot and now its too late to fix it. Would make Horde a little more interesting if they had this ability.

#19

There’s a few oddities/oversights like this in Gears 5 as a whole.

The Mulcher(Heavy) Scion for example. In the Campaign, it has the same armor as the Mulcher Scion in 4s Campaign, but for some reason in Horde and Escape the Mulcher Scion decides to flex those chest muscles and not wear the helmet-looking thing.

Or in the Escape map builder, the picture shown for a Warden is the ‘old’ art from the E3 2018 trailer with some crystals growing out of the head(and an even uglier face, believe it or not), but in gameplay it’s clearly the accurate/current model of the Warden.
Likewise, the map builder claims Stumps would try to explode if they take too much damage but the only time it causes explosion damage to anything nearby is if the kill shot is to its actual proper head.

I’m sure I could find more if I looked closely enough. But it’s not just the Scion Drone powerup that went missing or is inconsistent, basically. Also reminds me Octus claimed the Scions still did that but I’ve never seen them do it once in any of the PvE modes nor Campaign.