Energy 2.0: The Anti-4 To Win And A Bit Of Balancing

[TheAceOfSkulls]

[Apparently I need an anti-TL;DR too. I'm trying to find a system to work in a lot more casual usage of earlier powers, not eliminating the strength of the ultimate. The 4 To Win behavior I'm talking about in the title is the tendency players have to only use one of their powers and to horde energy purely for that power. I want to find a way to get people to experiment without directly nerfing what a lot of people discover and make use of first. The point of this isn't "Grr. People are just using power 4 on this game," but "How can we get them to use 1-3 more often while still enjoying 4?"]

 

I've been seeing a lot of people on the forums complaining about this a lot, and so I thought: Well, what could really be done to encourage people to use other powers?

 

I tried a number of different potential solutions to see if any of them could work out in my head, and eventually I just came to the conclusion that the way powers are set up right now, they don't encourage the fun gameplay I loved about Warframe.

 

I loved watching a Volt create their own version of a snowglobe around the terminal in a mobile capture mission. I love seeing Valkyr's fly through the air on a hook. I love watching an Excalibur superjump to a platform above that has some cover and unload on the enemies below him. I enjoy seeing a Saryn continually Molt away from a cluster of surrounding enemies and hitting them all with an explosive.

 

However, when you're using these frames, those early powers are really discouraged, as the ultimates (or next best thing) are usually so much more powerful, and you watch as your powers slowly become usable up to that point. Not to mention the fact that every player has probably felt the pain of accidentally losing their energy due to accidentally hitting the wrong button.

 

All of it just continually leads into this behavior players get of "save all your energy for the ultimate". But what if that wasn't the case?

 

I have two potential solutions to Energy 2.0, but both of them have one basic core idea: Your other 3 powers should not impact the final power.

 

Ultimates don't need nerfs, but they also should remain just as time consuming to attain on regular missions. These are useful for less experienced players to handle larger crowds without having to have too much knowledge under their belts about the game, and it would be detremental towards newer and less skilled players to focus on removing what Extra Credits would call a FOO (First Order Optimal) Strategy, or something that's easy to pull off and gives you reliable results. Instead we must focus on a system that teaches other strategies to players.

 

So the two systems I'm proposing are this:

 

1) Individual cooldown for abilities

 

or

 

2) Separate power bars that operate slightly differently from one another

 

Let's start with easier one:

 

Individual cooldowns

 

Every ability recharges on its own. Energy orbs, sapping, and recharging would all affect the speed of these cooldowns, and naturally they would be based off of the current energy cost of the abilities. Energy total would instead be calculated as recharge speed.

 

If done with a UI that made sure that players noticed when a power was ready without being obnoxious about it, it would get people to use those earlier level powers more often in their regular games. It would also cause people to be on the lookout for when a power would be a bit more suited to the situation. After all, you could use your Frost's 4 on that huge upcoming group of enemies, but it looks like the next room is a lot more open and could be a lot more populated, and this narrow corridor makes your 2nd power a little bit more appealing. In the current game, you would likely forgo using your powers at all and try to gun through it hoping to save that energy for an ult in that next room.

 

How would this work with Melee 2.0's channeling? Channelled hits could impact the recharge rates of each of these skills.

I'm torn between actually causing recharge of your skills and adding a bit of time (or slowing the timer temporarily) of a skill used immediately after a channeled strike.

 

The former would cause precombat evaluation similar to the current system on whether or not to just jump in with your weapons lasered up, where the risk/reward is "Do I think my melee will kill these guys before I need to use a skill".

 

Meanwhile adding that slowdown timer would allow for players who misjudged the crowd they let surround them to escape with their powers, but suffer the consequences of not thinking things through. It would not immediately cause you to feel like you're being penalized for channelling, and could even work at getting squishier frames to try using melee a bit more due to not instantly decreasing their potential firepower.

 

The big question though for this system is "How do you handle powers like Snowglobe, Iron Skin, or sustained powers?" and I don't really have an answer for that yet. You would need a cooldown that didn't nerf skills completely, but didn't buff them too much either. 

So obviously this one isn't perfect, so let's look at option number 2

 

Separate power bars

Let's explain how this would work:

1. There would be effectively be a "Mana pool" which powers 1, 2, and 3 used as well as channelling, and a "super meter" which 4 pulled from

2. The "Mana Pool" would regenerate naturally. This rate could be increased with Energy Siphon and would still fill up from orbs

3. The "Super Meter" however wouldn't move, instead acting like the current energy bar does

4. Channeled strikes and powers would also fill up the Super Meter (not at the rate of Energy Orbs, but still)

5. These power bars would be affected by the current mods to influence their lengths. In other words, your super meter wouldn't necessarily empty after one usage if you were modded right.

 

The advantage to this system is that it's a bit more similar to what Warframe currently is, while still encouraging energy use rather than hording it for the ultimate attacks.

 

In fact, using powers would help fill up a bit of the ultimate.

 

Natrually, damage dealt with powers would fill the Super Meter, but support and other skills would also feed into it. Powers like Iron Skin, Snow Globe, Decoy, and Molt would give back power based on the damage they absorbed, and so on.

 

This system however, to work right would require looking into energy costs of your abilities. With every frame getting their powers recharged, certain abilities would need to take a heavier toll than others, while some would need to be castable much quicker than they currently are. This one requires a lot of work on the current frames, and would require a lot more balancing so that frames wouldn't feel broken in either sense of that term.

 

The Elephant in the room: Recharge vs Reload

I'm willing to point out the biggest concern with this proposed new system, as it needs to be ironed out before I can ever reasonably expect DE to look into this: How do we want to balance gunplay with frames?

 

This balance has to be established to determine how quickly either energy systems would work at handing you powers. Should every player in a party use one of their powers every couple of rooms, or should it be similar to what it is now where every couple of rooms a single player uses one of their powers?

 

Should your fireball/psychic knives/freeze/etc be used in between volleys of your weapons, or whould that not encourage people to use their side arms when cornered?

 

Should powers keep pace with some of the more ridiculous modded weapons to make them viable in end game survival/defense, or should your gear be more important in those circumstances?

 

I really don't have an answer to this, as it's more up to DE and the community to determine what Warframe means to them when it comes to using your Frame, Guns, and Blades in conjunction, but I feel like this is a right step towards getting that a bit more balanced.

 

Thanks for reading all that. Any feedback or suggestions would be appreciated. In the mean time, have fun Tenno.

Edited January 8, 2015 by TheAceOfSkulls

[Cynaris]

What is this, Street Fighter? :P

[AlphaHorseman]

We tried cool downs in closed beta, that wasn't fun for anybody and it was exploited quickly.

 

For the energy bars thing, that sounds a bit too complicated to implement. Not to mention it limits the availability of all powers to a certain extent. Sometimes players might need that ult if they hop into a situation where the other 3 wouldn't do it. Limiting them to gun play shouldn't be how its decided, they should be able to use guns, melee, and powers at their discretion. Not all ultimates function the same, however, as each has its own drawbacks and benefits simply by design.

Edited January 7, 2015 by AlphaHorseman

[thekarubo]

Really wish people would stop suggesting cooldowns as a way to "fix" abilities.

There were cooldowns, they were bad.

[JohnProdman]

Abilities are half of the game and they don't need to be nerfed out of use. This is ridiculous.

 

No support. -1

[CY13ERPUNK]

im really all for removing the blue balls from the game completely

 

then all abilities recieve some form of cooldown (more for ults, prolly a lot less for other powers, even if its just .5 or 1 sec)

 

innate energy regen for all frames, could be different for each unique frame, just as max energy is currently different

 

additionally innate energy regen would only fill the reserve energy up to a certain point, ie 40-60% (this could also be different for each frame), the bottom line is that innate energy regen would be high enough to be able to use the #2/3 powers without buildup, but not enough to use the ULTs (not without mods at least)

 

lastly the #1 powers would not cost energy, but instead they would add energy to the reserves, thus this would encourage players to actually use more of their powers instead of just spamming ULTs nonstop (the buildup amount again would be another adjustable/differentiated stat) [some #1's would need to be adjusted to be balanced to be used more often in this fashion, as they have all been buffed previously to be 'worth' their previous energy costs]

 

of couse there would need to be some changes to a few mods [ie equilibrium, could actually be the mod to adjust max innate regen cap, ie regen to higher than 40-60, maybe 70-90, etc etc], energy siphon could be a % addition onto the frames base innate regen instead of a flat # (additionally these changes make the 'required' ES aura less dominant), and other new mods could be designed to deal with the new stats (ie cooldown reduction mods, etc, etc)

 

basically i would like the system to be structured so that ULTs are not the only abilities [or at least the majority] seen used

 

i would like to make ability use more tactical and rewarding, vs being just the standard go-to function nonstop (that for many frames eventually falls off and becomes useless with some CC)

 

making the #1 abilities build energy instead of costing keeps these abilities useful no matter the lvl, as they serve multiple purposes, #2/3 abilities still have to hold their own, and now ULTs can be understandably powerful, since access to them will not be quite as easy as before (ppl would still be able to mod their frames to have easier access to their ults more often, but the mods required would be choice/compromise)

Edited January 8, 2015 by CY13ERPUNK

[TheAceOfSkulls]

We tried cool downs in closed beta, that wasn't fun for anybody and it was exploited quickly.

 

For the energy bars thing, that sounds a bit too complicated to implement. Not to mention it limits the availability of all powers to a certain extent. Sometimes players might need that ult if they hop into a situation where the other 3 wouldn't do it. Limiting them to gun play shouldn't be how its decided, they should be able to use guns, melee, and powers at their discretion. Not all ultimates function the same, however, as each has its own drawbacks and benefits simply by design.

I got in during the open beta, so I missed that. Sorry for the repeat suggestion.

 

As for limiting the availability of powers, does the current system do that a bit more harshly? If you don't have Siphon on, you're stuck at 50 energy until you get an orb, which if you're stuck in a team that's moving fast and not stopping for crates or lockers, it's hard to get enough for an ultimate built up.

 

I wanted to try to see if there was a way to grant the first 3 powers a bit more availability without stealing energy from the ultimate. In fact, I wanted to see if you couldn't try to build up towards that ulimate without limiting towards gunplay, which is where I feel the current system is at.

[xkillo32]

Abilities are half of the game and they don't need to be nerfed out of use. This is ridiculous.

 

No support. -1

no downvote button for some reason

Edited January 8, 2015 by xkillo32

[Anatolius]

What about how syndicate cool downs work? It's not too slow in my opinion and is always ready when I need it the most.

Just because something didn't work before doesn't mean it can't work now

[TheAceOfSkulls]

Abilities are half of the game and they don't need to be nerfed out of use. This is ridiculous.

 

No support. -1

 

I'm actually suggesting a system to get newer players to use abilities a bit more often by trying to encourage usage of the first 3 by making them interfere less with the fourth.

 

I'd love to use a poison blade with my Saryn, but the current system demands that I save up 75 energy when with 25 more I could use one of my most powerful abilities.

 

I'm trying to see if there's a way to develop a system that keeps ability use throughout a level without removing gunplay, which is what my last point about the current flaw to this suggested system is about

[AlphaHorseman]

I got in during the open beta, so I missed that. Sorry for the repeat suggestion.

 

As for limiting the availability of powers, does the current system do that a bit more harshly? If you don't have Siphon on, you're stuck at 50 energy until you get an orb, which if you're stuck in a team that's moving fast and not stopping for crates or lockers, it's hard to get enough for an ultimate built up.

 

I wanted to try to see if there was a way to grant the first 3 powers a bit more availability without stealing energy from the ultimate. In fact, I wanted to see if you couldn't try to build up towards that ulimate without limiting towards gunplay, which is where I feel the current system is at.

Wait, where are we stuck at 50? And enemies do drop energy orbs, lockers too, or you can just throw out an energy restore pack. There are multiple avenues to restore energy in the current system, actually. Maybe not as concrete as Energy Siphon, but they are there. So, without cool downs or bars, the system limits you on the available energy you have at hand, of which can be gained through various means, and lost through power use.

[Anatolius]

I got in during the open beta, so I missed that. Sorry for the repeat suggestion.

As for limiting the availability of powers, does the current system do that a bit more harshly? If you don't have Siphon on, you're stuck at 50 energy until you get an orb, which if you're stuck in a team that's moving fast and not stopping for crates or lockers, it's hard to get enough for an ultimate built up.

I wanted to try to see if there was a way to grant the first 3 powers a bit more availability without stealing energy from the ultimate. In fact, I wanted to see if you couldn't try to build up towards that ulimate without limiting towards gunplay, which is where I feel the current system is at.

Large energy restores exist. And yes people use them. They are pretty cheap to make too Edited January 8, 2015 by Anatolius

[TheAceOfSkulls]

im really all for removing the blue balls from the game completely

 

then all abilities recieve some form of cooldown (more for ults, prolly a lot less for other powers, even if its just .5 or 1 sec)

 

innate energy regen for all frames, could be different for each unique frame, just as max energy is currently different

 

additionally innate energy regen would only fill the reserve energy up to a certain point, ie 40-60% (this could also be different for each frame), the bottom line is that innate energy regen would be high enough to be able to use the #2/3 powers without buildup, but not enough to use the ULTs (not without mods at least)

 

lastly the #1 powers would not cost energy, but instead they would add energy to the reserves, thus this would encourage players to actually use more of their powers instead of just spamming ULTs nonstop (the buildup amount again would be another adjustable/differentiated stat) [some #1's would need to be adjusted to be balanced to be used more often in this fashion, as they have all been buffed previously to be 'worth' their previous energy costs]

 

I actually kind of like these suggestions a lot, though I share concern that certain #1 powers could be a little overpowered to be used without energy.

 

The innate energy regen cap could help leave gunplay very viable, but I'm still not 100% on having the ULT on the same system. My concern is that it could still cause energy hording on longer missions with more enemies (like Invasion).

 

Still, this could get players to use their powers more on quicker missions, and lead to people willing to experiment in them rather than simply rushing.

[Zakharon]

Please stop trying to ruin this game

[Jeigo]

im really all for removing the blue balls from the game completely

 

then all abilities recieve some form of cooldown (more for ults, prolly a lot less for other powers, even if its just .5 or 1 sec)

 

innate energy regen for all frames, could be different for each unique frame, just as max energy is currently different

 

additionally innate energy regen would only fill the reserve energy up to a certain point, ie 40-60% (this could also be different for each frame), the bottom line is that innate energy regen would be high enough to be able to use the #2/3 powers without buildup, but not enough to use the ULTs (not without mods at least)

 

lastly the #1 powers would not cost energy, but instead they would add energy to the reserves, thus this would encourage players to actually use more of their powers instead of just spamming ULTs nonstop (the buildup amount again would be another adjustable/differentiated stat) [some #1's would need to be adjusted to be balanced to be used more often in this fashion, as they have all been buffed previously to be 'worth' their previous energy costs]

 

of couse there would need to be some changes to a few mods [ie equilibrium, could actually be the mod to adjust max innate regen cap, ie regen to higher than 40-60, maybe 70-90, etc etc], energy siphon could be a % addition onto the frames base innate regen instead of a flat # (additionally these changes make the 'required' ES aura less dominant), and other new mods could be designed to deal with the new stats (ie cooldown reduction mods, etc, etc)

 

basically i would like the system to be structured so that ULTs are not the only abilities [or at least the majority] seen used

 

i would like to make ability use more tactical and rewarding, vs being just the standard go-to function nonstop (that for many frames eventually falls off and becomes useless with some CC)

 

making the #1 abilities build energy instead of costing keeps these abilities useful no matter the lvl, as they serve multiple purposes, #2/3 abilities still have to hold their own, and now ULTs can be understandably powerful, since access to them will not be quite as easy as before (ppl would still be able to mod their frames to have easier access to their ults more often, but the mods required would be choice/compromise)

#1 abilites that do not require a target (i.e. slash dash) would allow 1 wf to build up energy all the time while another cannot. I really like this premise but I think that keeping the first ability free is already enough and doesn't suffer from the aforementioned issue.

[(PSN)Ninja_Reaper_916]

How bout simply making first 3 abilitys actually good? With exception of obvious frames whose main ability are there 2nd or 3rd :)

[OniDax]

I'm actually suggesting a system to get newer players to use abilities a bit more often by trying to encourage usage of the first 3 by making them interfere less with the fourth.

 

I'd love to use a poison blade with my Saryn, but the current system demands that I save up 75 energy when with 25 more I could use one of my most powerful abilities.

 

I'm trying to see if there's a way to develop a system that keeps ability use throughout a level without removing gunplay, which is what my last point about the current flaw to this suggested system is about

 

What if the first three powers work like normal, and the fourth power works like the syndicate powers? In this case, using any of the first three abilities will increase the counter for the fourth. When that is full, the player can then use the fourth ability. The fourth ability can even be buffed a little to offset this. This way, the player has to use any of his first three abilities repeatedly to activate the fourth ability. Along with this, all first powers should be buffed and some should be reordered. For example, Excalibur's Super Jump isn't directly useful for combat, so it should be the first or second power, slash dash should be the next power, then radial blind, then radial javelin. Similar reordering could take place for other frames' abilities.

Edited January 8, 2015 by AntoineFlemming

[Anatolius]

Please stop trying to ruin this game

You know what ruins the game? Going into a mission where a nova or excalibur puts down an energy plate and spams their ultimate

And you can't lean back on the "this is a co op game" argument because if you cant tell that's not cooperation that is tolerance as you sit there and do nothing for about 30 minutes.

Not everyone likes just soaking up experience without doing anything to get it. You can't stop the grind but at least I'll have a little fun while doing it

[dmkrodan]

I've been seeing a lot of people on the forums complaining about this a lot, and so I thought: Well, what could really be done to encourage people to use other powers?

 

I tried a number of different potential solutions to see if any of them could work out in my head, and eventually I just came to the conclusion that the way powers are set up right now, they don't encourage the fun gameplay I loved about Warframe.

 

I loved watching a Volt create their own version of a snowglobe around the terminal in a mobile capture mission. I love seeing Valkyr's fly through the air on a hook. I love watching an Excalibur superjump to a platform above that has some cover and unload on the enemies below him. I enjoy seeing a Saryn continually Molt away from a cluster of surrounding enemies and hitting them all with an explosive.

 

However, when you're using these frames, those early powers are really discouraged, as the ultimates (or next best thing) are usually so much more powerful, and you watch as your powers slowly become usable up to that point. Not to mention the fact that every player has probably felt the pain of accidentally losing their energy due to accidentally hitting the wrong button.

 

All of it just continually leads into this behavior players get of "save all your energy for the ultimate". But what if that wasn't the case?

 

I have two potential solutions to Energy 2.0, but both of them have one basic core idea: Your other 3 powers should not impact the final power.

 

Ultimates don't need nerfs, but they also should remain just as time consuming to attain on regular missions. These are useful for less experienced players to handle larger crowds without having to have too much knowledge under their belts about the game, and it would be detremental towards newer and less skilled players to focus on removing what Extra Credits would call a FOO (First Order Optimal) Strategy, or something that's easy to pull off and gives you reliable results. Instead we must focus on a system that teaches other strategies to players.

 

So the two systems I'm proposing are this:

 

1) Individual cooldown for abilities

 

or

 

2) Separate power bars that operate slightly differently from one another

 

Let's start with easier one:

 

Individual cooldowns

 

Every ability recharges on its own. Energy orbs, sapping, and recharging would all affect the speed of these cooldowns, and naturally they would be based off of the current energy cost of the abilities. Energy total would instead be calculated as recharge speed.

 

If done with a UI that made sure that players noticed when a power was ready without being obnoxious about it, it would get people to use those earlier level powers more often in their regular games. It would also cause people to be on the lookout for when a power would be a bit more suited to the situation. After all, you could use your Frost's 4 on that huge upcoming group of enemies, but it looks like the next room is a lot more open and could be a lot more populated, and this narrow corridor makes your 2nd power a little bit more appealing. In the current game, you would likely forgo using your powers at all and try to gun through it hoping to save that energy for an ult in that next room.

 

How would this work with Melee 2.0's channeling? Channelled hits could impact the recharge rates of each of these skills.

I'm torn between actually causing recharge of your skills and adding a bit of time (or slowing the timer temporarily) of a skill used immediately after a channeled strike.

 

The former would cause precombat evaluation similar to the current system on whether or not to just jump in with your weapons lasered up, where the risk/reward is "Do I think my melee will kill these guys before I need to use a skill".

 

Meanwhile adding that slowdown timer would allow for players who misjudged the crowd they let surround them to escape with their powers, but suffer the consequences of not thinking things through. It would not immediately cause you to feel like you're being penalized for channelling, and could even work at getting squishier frames to try using melee a bit more due to not instantly decreasing their potential firepower.

 

The big question though for this system is "How do you handle powers like Snowglobe, Iron Skin, or sustained powers?" and I don't really have an answer for that yet. You would need a cooldown that didn't nerf skills completely, but didn't buff them too much either. 

So obviously this one isn't perfect, so let's look at option number 2

 

Separate power bars

Let's explain how this would work:

1. There would be effectively be a "Mana pool" which powers 1, 2, and 3 used as well as channelling, and a "super meter" which 4 pulled from

2. The "Mana Pool" would regenerate naturally. This rate could be increased with Energy Siphon and would still fill up from orbs

3. The "Super Meter" however wouldn't move, instead acting like the current energy bar does

4. Channeled strikes and powers would also fill up the Super Meter (not at the rate of Energy Orbs, but still)

5. These power bars would be affected by the current mods to influence their lengths. In other words, your super meter wouldn't necessarily empty after one usage if you were modded right.

 

The advantage to this system is that it's a bit more similar to what Warframe currently is, while still encouraging energy use rather than hording it for the ultimate attacks.

 

In fact, using powers would help fill up a bit of the ultimate.

 

Natrually, damage dealt with powers would fill the Super Meter, but support and other skills would also feed into it. Powers like Iron Skin, Snow Globe, Decoy, and Molt would give back power based on the damage they absorbed, and so on.

 

This system however, to work right would require looking into energy costs of your abilities. With every frame getting their powers recharged, certain abilities would need to take a heavier toll than others, while some would need to be castable much quicker than they currently are. This one requires a lot of work on the current frames, and would require a lot more balancing so that frames wouldn't feel broken in either sense of that term.

 

The Elephant in the room: Recharge vs Reload

I'm willing to point out the biggest concern with this proposed new system, as it needs to be ironed out before I can ever reasonably expect DE to look into this: How do we want to balance gunplay with frames?

 

This balance has to be established to determine how quickly either energy systems would work at handing you powers. Should every player in a party use one of their powers every couple of rooms, or should it be similar to what it is now where every couple of rooms a single player uses one of their powers?

 

Should your fireball/psychic knives/freeze/etc be used in between volleys of your weapons, or whould that not encourage people to use their side arms when cornered?

 

Should powers keep pace with some of the more ridiculous modded weapons to make them viable in end game survival/defense, or should your gear be more important in those circumstances?

 

I really don't have an answer to this, as it's more up to DE and the community to determine what Warframe means to them when it comes to using your Frame, Guns, and Blades in conjunction, but I feel like this is a right step towards getting that a bit more balanced.

 

Thanks for reading all that. Any feedback or suggestions would be appreciated. In the mean time, have fun Tenno.

 

The whole stance you have about enjoying watching people be creative with their powers is one of the main reasons I enjoy Zephyr so much. Her Turbulence skill is a situational but handy defensive measure, and Tornado is extremely situational, and strictly a semi reliable crowd control option, meaning you would have to be crazy not to use her for her mobility. She is one of the few frames that I am always conflicted on how I want to build because she has such a nice mix of skills that its extremely difficult for me to ever sacrifice a single one. The only one that comes close to the "not usable" bin to me is the second one, and I still use that one consistently as well, because its an amazing tool to have to land faster without leaving yourself prone to a melee animation. She is by far one of my favorite frames, and honestly, because of frames like her, you would not see an effective way for the "press 4 to win" issue addressed. She is extremely well made, I would argue that she has some of the most thought put into her skills. She lacks an insta-kill skill, but her presence on the map is still a large one in capable hands. By design she kills the whole concept of "press 4". And that's the answer. The frames would have to be designed that way. If frames with wide reaching mass kill capabilities are made, you will be most assured that people with the mindset to farm will find a way to use it in a group, or solo even. By making frames that are fun and interesting to utilize beyond farming, and by extension actually making the game fun and interesting to explore, so as to have that drive to want to do something besides farming, we would see less people abusing the ultimate skill. Otherwise for the sake of farming and getting things done, I do not see a problem with it. Warframe asks for large quantities of both time and money- and regardless of whether or not you choose to spend your money on it, spending time on it means you have less time to do other things. Time and Money are exceptionally important to alot of people, so people will find ways to reduce how much they waste. Simply, if it bothers you that someone wants to play a reckoning Oberon, do not play with them. choose someone else. quality over quantity right? (as in, its harder to teach a herd to act like you than it is to find some monkeys that will play monkey see monkey do.)

 

TL:DR if the game was consistently interesting, people would play with more than just farming efficiency in mind. 

[MagpieFirefly]

What about giving a segmented meter based on affinity like Syndicate weapons? Have one bar that builds up as you gain affinity. Abilities that cost 25 energy cost 2/8, abilities that have really low costs maybe 1/8, ones that cost 50 would cost half, etc. Then energy efficiency could be bar charge rate, and increasing energy cap could give extra bars. That way you would have to use your gun once and awhile, and you're rewarded for doing it. Rate of gain could be tweaked over time.

[7grims]

This kinda treads no longer make much sense to me.

In a way, yes, there is an overpower-fullness in the game, but, there is also the game getting to stages that it is so hard, you cant go without spamming 4 or any other.

 

I've died several times, in places like draco ceres and T4 def, only because I though "I'm use my gun for a wile" big mistake, the enemies bleed you out in 3 seconds.

 

And so what if there is spam?

For me the game as become 10x more fun since I can use my powers more, and we share xp within the team, and yet the enemies still find ways to kill us.

 

 

To end, think of what DE is also doing:

- increasing enemy difficulty (nulifiers, corrupted bombard), do you really want more nerfs when they are bringing more of these?

- then there is the excalibur rework, they nerfed RB that never killed or damaged enemies, but buffed RJ to make insane damage.

Edited January 8, 2015 by 7grims

[TheAceOfSkulls]

This kinda treads no longer make much sense to me.

In a way, yes, there is an overpower-fullness in the game, but, there is also the game getting to stages that it is so hard, you cant go without spamming 4 or any other.

 

I've died several times, in places like draco ceres and T4 def, only because I though "I'm use my gun for a wile" big mistake, the enemies bleed you out in 3 seconds.

 

And so what that there's spam?

For me the game as become 10x more fun since I can use my powers more, and we share xp within the team, and yet the enemies still find ways to kill you.

 

 

To end, think of what DE is also doing:

- increasing enemy difficulty (nulifiers, corrupted bombard), do you really want more nerfs?

- then there is the excalibur rework, they nerfed RB that never killed or damaged enemies, but buffed RJ to make insane damage.

 

The point of the thread isn't to nerf this strategy, it's to encourage people to develop other strategies by introducing them to the other abilities in a way that doesn't sabatoge what appears in the early game to be the win button.

 

When you get more people to use those 1 through 3 powers, you get those fun moments where you see things you haven't seen before when playing with others. This in turn reduces the monotany of a grind and keeps things fun for longer.

 

That's what I'm aiming for, not stopping people's fun but rather showing them more ways to have it.

[Jeigo]

This kinda treads no longer make much sense to me.

In a way, yes, there is an overpower-fullness in the game, but, there is also the game getting to stages that it is so hard, you cant go without spamming 4 or any other.

 

I've died several times, in places like draco ceres and T4 def, only because I though "I'm use my gun for a wile" big mistake, the enemies bleed you out in 3 seconds.

 

And so what if there is spam?

For me the game as become 10x more fun since I can use my powers more, and we share xp within the team, and yet the enemies still find ways to kill us.

 

 

To end, think of what DE is also doing:

- increasing enemy difficulty (nulifiers, corrupted bombard), do you really want more nerfs when they are bringing more of these?

- then there is the excalibur rework, they nerfed RB that never killed or damaged enemies, but buffed RJ to make insane damage.

But is DE buffing the enemies in reponse to power spam or is power spam happening because DE buffed the enemies? The former seems more likely as ulti spam has been here before nullifiers and eximus and all that. Hek, the game was so easy in open beta(imo) and people still played how they do now for the most part.

What doesn't make sense is why DE introduced such powerful ways to virtually have infinite energy such as cheap restores and fleeting expertise (and perhaps even a primed streamline soon) yet have clearly taken a stance against power spam or 'press 4 to win buttons'. Lack of foresight created the problem and now they are reinventing the wheel to try and and solve it. Trinity and her long list of tweaks wholeheartedly embodies this.

[420degreequicksopeswag]

We tried cool downs in closed beta, that wasn't fun for anybody and it was exploited quickly.

 

Really wish people would stop suggesting cooldowns as a way to "fix" abilities.

There were cooldowns, they were bad.

 

How did cooldowns fail?

 

Don't tell me people sat in a room, waiting for "4" to recharge...

[Jeigo]

How did cooldowns fail?

 

Don't tell me people sat in a room, waiting for "4" to recharge...

YES, haha.