I'm sure we all remember when Topaz shards were utterly overpowered only to be nerfed so hard as to be all but abandoned outside secondary crit chance. Since then DE have said they follow the same rules Calibans lethal progeny ability, this howerver is incorrect and Topaz shards appear to be even more limited. They in fact seem to obey the following 2 rules.

• Overshields cannot be generated.
• Shields cannot be generated during ANY kind of recharge delay.

The second point is important because any recharge delay includes the brief one every time you'r hit, even if you still have shields and haven't shield gated. The result is that Topaz shards cannot generate any shields while under fire.

This in my opinion is likely an oversight as it renders them utterly useless since their only potential utility is when you're not in combat yet still able to kill enemies with a blast, a situation not only incredibly rare but also one where shields regenerate on their own anyway.

So I've mostly been playing on Haz 3, I could swing Haz 4 and even did the EDDs with a friend but Haz 3 was my comfort zone. Then I got around to doing the haz 5 unlock assignment, I wanted to do it solo because it felt right and my initation was graced with swarmageddon and duck and cover hazards, plus a surprise bulk in the kill 3 dreadnoughts mission.

Afterwards I did a few missions on Haz 4 and it just feels... cozy. is this how it happens? Am I inevitably going to become one of those crazy dwarves who plays on Haz 5+ and still considers the game too relaxed? In Karls name is this my fate!?

So before I start here's my build for reference:

Review
So overall I think Jade is a cool concept, having a 'biblically accurate' angel warframe is a nice change from another speedster frame or whatever cali...something is meant to be. I know some people find the whole, well if you played the quest you know; thing a bit uncomfortable but in retrospect its a pretty masterful move by DE because a biblically accurate angel should be unsettling. Onto the review:

• Lights Judgement:
  This is a pretty great ability, it effectively acts like blood altar but without requiring an enemy and with extra synergy with other parts of her kit. It does suffer a bit from the same issue as Trinitys 'well of life' in that despite being an objectively good ability its a bit overshadowed by the rest of her kit.

• Symphony of Mercy:
  This is basically a 3rd aura, and honestly outright unbalanced compared to other support frames but it is fun. I like to use the strength buff before casting my 4 for the free boost and then maintain damage to buff my own glory weapon, occasionally switching to the shield buff to quickly recharge if I'm taking a lot of damage. Its worth noting that this scales with affinity range so it can benefit from PoE consumables and the Vazarin focus school. I also suspect the % shield regen could make for an interesting tanking method when combined with primed redirection but I haven't tried that yet.

• Ophanim Eyes:
  Another strong one and Jades subsume the defense strip is not only good but also stacks addatively with corrosive projection allowing you to speed up armor strip by about a second. The ability also has slow but most enemies die before it can make a difference (The abilities own damage is not worth mentioning). On Jade only this can also revive allies but it really doesn't come up much.

• Glory on High:
  Mandatory if you want to look like an awesome angel instead of a pile of wet towels this ability is also fortunately pretty damn strong. The drain isn't crazy and the weapon is also strong in its own right, 30-50% damage reduction is also icing on the cake; combined with aerodynamic and aviator you can hit abnout 75% damage reduction in this state.

Glory:
Once again here's my build for reference:

Easily one of the stronger exalted weapons right now being somewhere beteen dex pixia and peace makers in terms of raw damage output while being easier to use than both. It can handily take down level 200 steel path grineer without any armor strip, and with range and sufficient enemy density it can maintain her 2 forever all by itself, particularly in steel path. It can also synergize with her 1 for a massive room nuke but honestly thats overkill.

If you want more single target damage simply swap fulmination for pistol elementalist to roughly double its damage output.

Conclusion
Overall Jade is a really strong frame who's fun to use with a kit where every ability has its place and feels worth using... yet its feels vaguely dissapointing. Despite being good it doesn't really feel like Jades kit. Particularly with her 2 and 4 it feels more like DE took all the things they should have done to rework, Hildryn, Equinox and Titania and combined them all together to make a new frame instead.

Overall I'm happy with jade but I think I would have been happier if Hildryn had a 4 that felt this good, if Equinox wasn't saddled with awkward limitations and uncapped energy drains, and if Titania (while still strong) just had a little more usability and synergy in her kit.

These screenshots are both from the exact same drillevator ride in todays deep dive. Needless to say we had a good time.

While there have been no statistical changes to the weapon the ice trails it leaves behind (just the default ones not the new overclock) seem to deal more cold damage than they used to as I've noticed them freezing enemies a lot more often.

Perhaps a tweak that was made while they were looking at it for the purpose of the new overclock?

E.g. I like the Cinta because its super pretty and has an interesting firing mechanic even if its not the strongest.

I'm not sure where Cliff went but since I'm doing the deep dive I figured I may as well upload this (Missing your weekly post cliff!)

I know they're pretty much the worst companions in the game but I really love my helminth charger, glad I can run around with four of them now.

So its 25 ammo to instant freeze a praetorian with a 1.5s charge time... Except I can freeze a praetorian in the same time and with about half the ammo just using the regular cryo cannon fire. Am I missing something or is this overclock somewhat lacking in a use case?

Tried to make this thing using only materials available at the start of the game: wood, stone, dirt, sand, iron and gel. Its got a full crafting setup, space for a hellivator and storage room. It also deliberately doesn't count as housing so NPCs won't barge in but I can still set my spawn.