Dante is the newest Warframe and part of the superb Dante Unbound update. Powerful new arrivals are often celebrated, but that doesn’t seem to be the case with Dante. Let me explain why some Warframe players want Dante to be nerfed and why it probably won’t happen.
Who is Dante in Warframe?
Just so we’re all on the same page, Dante is the latest arrival to the game’s 55+ strong roster of Warframes. While Warframe is no stranger to characters with magical abilities, Dante is arguably the most ‘wizard-like’ frame of them all.
Dante is also a ‘Nuker,’ meaning he can instantly obliterate crowds of enemies. He’s not the only frame who can do this; Saryn and Equinox, for example, can delete swathes of bad guys in the blink of an eye.
Why are players upset about Dante?
Dante can be built to deal tremendous damage. The gameplay loop is also extremely simple: He can cast his Dark Verse ability twice, followed by Final Verse, to wipe out rooms of enemies.
Dante can also use his Light Verse to grant himself and allies thousands of points worth of Overguard. Overguard is a great defensive buffer that grants immunity to Crowd Control effects. With this combination, Dante can dish out damage with the best DPS Warframes in the game without worrying about instantly dying in tougher content.
There’s a lot of discourse on the official Warframe subreddit, with many players begging for nerfs. After all, there’s at least one Dante in every activity, which is a problem, right?
Will Dante be nerfed in Warframe?
It’s hard to say if Dante will be nerfed, but I doubt it will happen. The Warframe is new, and you see him everywhere because everyone wants to try him. It’s also exciting to have a new arrival be this strong right out of the box, and he’s not too difficult to acquire. I’ve seen some players argue that he ruins the regular Starchart as he feels overpowered there, but you could say that about several Warframes, in my opinion.
The big counter to these calls for nerfs is we already have Warframes that are arguably stronger than Dante. Players don’t use them.
Take Octavia, for example. With my Octavia build, I can delete enemies with infinite scaling abilities that improve based on my opponent’s strength. Dante may have a decent survivability tool, but Octavia can go completely invisible and give tremendous buffs to her team for good measure.
Dante is strong, but if Warframes like Octavia/Octavia Prime can escape the Nerf hammer, Dante is safe for now.
We’ve seen several Warframes released over the years with weak kits. These frames sometimes recover with balance patches, but it’s hard to get excited about a sub-par Warframe that can’t keep up with better frames you already own.
If we start seeing full teams of Dante in every activity, then maybe the concerns are valid. Until then, I recommend Tenno enjoy a superb and fun addition to the roster. Dante can also be built with basic Mods as part of a cheap setup that doesn’t cost Forma, so there’s no excuse not to take him for a spin.
