[How to take GOTL from 'Meh' to 'Amazing' (IMHO)]

How to take ‘Guides of the Lotus’ from Meh to Amazing

 

1)      Open Guides sign ups as an in-game ability on a daily basis to MR20+ players
By doing this, ranked players, who likely have accomplished nearly everything in the game can opt-in on a daily basis to pick up and help newer players. It also leaves the door open to not have to be a guide every day, so players can still just enjoy the game based on helpful/not they are feeling on that particular day.
 

2)      Have separated sections of the Guides program on the daily opt-in for both prospective guides and players. In this way, prospective guides can ‘sign up’ for the thing they most want to do that day or even the things they are best at and can offer the most helpful advice in
For Example:
Help with (X) Mission type
Help me with (X) story mission
Help me farm a frame
Help me farm resources
Help me beat a boss
Help me solve Lua challenges
Help me hunt an Eidolon
Help me hunt an Orb on Valis
 

3)      Limit the requesting of a Guide to players MR14 and under. Why not MR19 (when MR20 is the cutoff to become a guide)? Because that gives MR15-19 players time to explore, level and upgrade new weapons and warframes that, up until this point, they’ve only just leveled. Consider that MR15-19 zone the ‘Learning how to be pro’ zone. Honestly, it’s really the sweet spot for most players; which is to say the spot in their development where they enjoy the game the most.
 

4)      Assuming this direction is taken, players seeking a guide should be able to look and see what guides have currently signed on to do for that day. Maybe with a green check mark or, better yet, a numerical value showing how many guides are available for that purpose. While folks who’ve opted-in to be a guide for that day can see what’s got the least available guides in case they want to switch (which you should allow) or even select multiples.
 

5)      The reason this idea is to be an opt-in program on a daily basis is that it allows every player the opportunity to either help (or not) other, junior players. And it offers the chance at seeing the broader community as a whole. When the day resets, they’re off the hook and can go back to being Joe-the-plumber or Rhino-the-stomper and have no further association with the GOTL if they so desire.
 

6)      What if these opt-in guides misbehave? Easy, peasy: Use similar guidelines as what chat moderation is supposed to be with the final knockout being permanent disallowing of opt-in guide sign-ups for the offending guide. Also allow guides who’ve been accused the opportunity of defending themselves against accusations -> To this end, strongly suggest that every guide record their GOTL session so they can have video and audio evidence of their innocence for their own protection. (This isn’t outside of reason, as many, many PC gamers have the ability to easily record their gameplay and many more still have their own youtube channels they can post videos to).
 

7)      Thank all GOTL participants (both players and guides) in some fashion. I’d personally suggest finding a way that doesn’t leave out those who are currently too far advanced in MR to request a guide. Maybe by giving the guided an extra daily trade and the guide an ayatan statue? (Yes, I know that’s not a perfect suggestion, but it does balance out a little while not leaving anyone out; if you have better, even-handed reward suggestions, I say go for it)

 

NOTE: I'm well aware this idea may spawn some vitriol or derision and isn't, in itself, perfect (but, really, nothing is so...), but if everyone can agree on adjustments that make this idea better, by all means, post on. For those with derision or vitriol: (nothing from me but amused silence)

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

Just now, GinKenshin said:

*snip*
... what you think the game needs isn’t necessarily what DE thinks it needs 

I don't care what DE thinks it needs. 

I don't care what YOU think it needs.

What I do care about is hearing the same gripes from every public match, every player, every reddit, every streamer/youtuber all of the time. Which is what my suggestions are from and how they came into existence.

If the only thing that comes out of this is some of the more ridiculous portions of the grind being leveled out and a proper lobby system, I'm 100% good with that. Because take a moment, go play a game with a good lobby system, then come back and try telling me how Warframe's laughable lobby system doesn't suck rotten eggs and I'll hear you out.

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

2 minutes ago, dEjAvU5566 said:

Fortuna will have more grind, sorry op.

And fashion frame is one of the end games, sorry again op.

 

You should feel sorry for you and for anyone who starts the game out and walks away.

 

The more people walk away, the more likely existing players are likely to walk away out of boredom or frustration. The more that happens, the more likely the game is to die. So, rather than having the opinion of 'Yeah, well, we like it the way it is, deal' you should probably take a step back and think about my suggestions. They're all valid, logical suggestions that would add real, lasting value and would only benefit us all in the long run.

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

2 minutes ago, Xico.xide said:

I wouldn't call that a good thing ._.

I support games I like because I know how much work goes into making them. I've helped on a few and, at one point, was working to get into digital design for films. It didn't work out for me (I'm not the artist I'd like to be), but it did give me a healthy appreciation for how much heart and soul gets poured into these things... and how easy it is to get derailed completely. Which I don't want to happen for this game or its developers.

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

13 minutes ago, Chewarette said:

You very well know that's utterly wrong.

*snip*

Except that it isn't as inaccurate as you think. A million concurrent? No. Nearly a million new or returning? Yes, without a doubt. And where did that end up from the dizzying height of over 127K concurrent at PoE release?

https://steamcharts.com/app/230410

There. It ended up right there. From Steam's Top 5 to below the bottom 30. Yeah. It really bites when someone actually does a little bit of digging to prove the facts, yeah?

 

EDIT: Steam Charts are updated hourly, at the moment it's after 1AM ET and Warframe sits at #8 on the running list (which communicates how well the game does after midnight, I suppose). Overall, for the last year, it's below rank 30 (but not by a terrible amount). It's not my responsibility to teach you how to use Steam charts. Nor is it the end-all-be-all of data points, just an interesting one to keep an eye on.

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

2 minutes ago, LupisV0lk said:

Whoa look out lads, we got a badass over here.

Is this what you're looking for?

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

FYI:

Fashion Frame isn't end-game. Reaching the point in the game where you can help other people reach your level is the only current end-game.

 

As for the emotional bit, I'm mostly an emotionally dead-inside person. I have to fake most of my feelings. If you're reading this, thinking it was an 'emotional' post, that's because you're projecting yourself onto me. Please stop.

If you don't agree, fine, you don't agree. But bashing my suggestions just goes to prove what many long-term players have had to say about the forums: It needs to be doused in gasoline and set on fire and a whole new forums built, minus the toxic whiners. <- Not sure I agree with this sentiment, but given your responses so far, I certainly understand where it comes from.

 

BTW: I've been around longer than any 10 of you combined and have spent more money than any 20 of you, so, feel free to cast aspersions if you wish, but I'm not going anywhere. :)

[Thoughts on upcoming Fortuna]

Dear DE,

 

Please listen. Please read. I love this game. I love you guys. I love Reb especially, because brunettes are super awesome (and Megan because us red-heads have to stick together)

 

More than a year ago now, I posted a not-so-nice gripe post, mostly about the plains. Everything I complained about was eventually patched (for the most part)...

 

BUT it wasn't in time. And you lost players you could've otherwise kept.

 

Don't make the same mistakes this time. PoE attracted nearly a million people to the game, nearly all of whom left within a week (two at the most). NOT because Warframe is a bad game(SPOILER ALERT: It's not a bad game, quite the opposite, it's an awesome game), but because the insane amount of nonsense built into it, such as improper skyboxes, insane amounts of grinding, obtuse Eidolon hunting methods (seriously obtuse), a Day/Night cycle that creates a toxic Eidolon hunting community (which still hasn't been fixed; best bet here would be a flat 60/60), random bugs and crashes, ridiculous draw distances, etc., etc.

What's worse is that, even when you didn't win the game awards for best long running game (or whatever it was called) you still didn't understand why you didn't have the votes: Because a lot of us who were going to vote for you, didn't. And we didn't because Reb made us all sound like shallow fools with her comment about how "...Fashion Frame is very important to our players..." and after all of these years, you still haven't registered in your brains that it isn't. The saying 'Fashion Frame is endgame' is a direct, extremely derogatory dig at your unwanted, unwelcomed and unappreciated obsession with visuals. Do we want content? Yes. But that content should be useful (for example: What is the purpose in having extra pieces of 'armor' if it doesn't actually add any armor value???). So, I'm going to reach into my personal settings menu, deep inside my brain, and turn down my 'Huge Jerk' setting all the way down (or as low as I can get it), long enough to offer some helpful suggestions that will not only make players happy, but will help attract and (more importantly) keep new players. I'm going for order of importance here, so bear with me:

1) A proper lobby system -> This cannot be stressed, said, reprinted, re-said and hammered on enough. The current 'lobby' nonsense is broken, non-sensical and mostly useless. If you'd like to know what a good lobby system looks like, there are 2 games I'd reference out of the gate: For P2P games (like wf ) look to PayDay2; or, if you'd prefer something that uses a more dedicated server system, Left4Dead 2. Both lobby systems have their advantages and disadvantages, but both of them do it very well. In PD2, the host picks the mission, can invite players, kick players, set Infamy (Mastery Rank) and/or Level requirements (such as equipped warframe level) for players wanting to join, set it for invite only, friends only, public, etc. The host can also enable/disable drop-in for both public and private matches and players can simply ready up when it's time to launch. I'll even take this suggestion a step further and note that, if players could tweak their loadouts so that weapons in specific loadouts could have specific mods JUST for that loadout - and even rearrange loadout order in their loadout menu - it would make it even better.

2) Learn the difference between a scalpel and a hammer -> There's an old saying "If the only tool in your toolbox is a hammer, everything looks like a nail".  But not everything is a nail. Sometimes what you need is a scalpel. There have been multiple occasions (a few of which I'll reference so you can gain some clarity) where you've swung the proverbial hammer only to come back within weeks or even days to tweak or fine tune (if you do anything at all after the initial swing) things that wouldn't have had to fine tune if you'd taken a little bit of time and thought it through a little better. Need some examples? Ember, Saryn, Volt, Gara and, pretty soon, maiming strike (via the 'Melee 3.0' you have planned, which, for the record, everyone in the community pretty much hates the idea of; this isn't Darksiders and your idea is super bad, please don't do it; don't swing that hammer). In the case of Maiming Strike, a simple nerf to the amount of damage a slide attack does while adding a slight buff to combo attacks will alter the meta. <- See what I did there? See how very slight changes make a HUGE difference? If you don't want Spin2Win to be the meta, fine, that's cool and I get it... but don't try to turn melee combat into bloody Darksiders/Legend of Zelda just because you overlooked the simple answer. Pretty please? With sugar on top? This game is way too hectic for that idea to work well and melee will be abandoned if you go that route. And that will be a sad day for us all. Not everything is a nail. Think it through, ask for feedback, do what you gotta do... as long as you stop swinging the bloody hammer.

3) Enough with the grind -> Seriously. Enough. I get that getting resources is just part of the game and that some resources/mods/arcanes being rarer than others is part of the attraction... But under absolutely NO circumstances are crazy amounts of insanely rare resources like Cetus Wisp called for. To build 1 amp part for a decent amp, it takes 20 wisps. 60 for the whole amp. Plus another 2? 5? to gild it to get the final stats. To put that into perspective, there are only 2 ways of reliably obtaining wisps: Farming runs (where, on average, you'll spend 10-15 minutes scouring the plains on your Archwing to net 4 wisps) or 10,000 standing (after achieveing MAXIMUM rank) from Quill Onnko to get ONE wisp, standing you can ONLY get from hunting Eidolons and getting cores. <- This becomes farming recursion hell because you need a good amp to hunt/farm ediolons in the first place, as the Mote amp is only slightly more useful than a toothpick. Lighten the load, man. There are numerous places in this game where you can lighten the load on players (but most especially newer players) so more fun can be had doing cool things like hunting Eidolons as opposed to mind-numbing and soul crushing amounts of grind. To put this into full perspective for you guys: Warframe is now the #1 most grindy game on the planet, yes, that's including WoW. That's not okay, folks. I only stuck through it during times when I'm saving money (so I can buy a house, or a new car, or a new PC if you're curious) and buying games where the bigger concentration is on fun and story rather than soul-rending amounts of grind simply wasn't within my budgetary means. Please stop. Pretty please? With butterfly-kisses?
** Need an idea for this one? I'm pretty sure I saw a post where some guy suggested adding a pool mechanism in the dojo that other clan members can pull from. In my mind, this means we could go to the dojo (that is, players like me who have 100+ cetus wisp they're never going to use because they've built everything under the sun twice) and donate resources that other players in the clan can simply withdraw from. <- This would also make building up decorations in dojos much easier as well, so I'm really digging this idea. It would give me somewhere to use all of the 672,000+ Rubedo I'm currently lugging around.

*EDIT: I'm not saying the grind needs to go away, just that some of the more overkill portions of it be toned down enough to not feel like your immortal soul is being squeezed out of your body Freddy Kreuger - A Nightmare on Elm Street style.

 

4) NO MORE FAVORITISM!!! -> For this one, sadly, I'm going to have to be a little insulting here, so hold your nose and prepare for the cold water: Most (not all, just most) of the current Warframe parnters are cancer. And I mean that almost literally. And, even if I'm 100% off the mark here (I'm not, in case anyone's curious, there's video proof all over youtube and twitch, it will take you 10 seconds to find folks like Mogammu being toxic, hateful, disgusting, real-life threatening people and far, far worse), the fact that we can't even use our Clan logos as our  Profile glyphs while people who behave like entitled brat-children get free advertising from you guys (and, apparently, free reign to be jerks whenever they want, up to and including getting others banned) is not OK. It's the furthest thing from OK, it's wholly unacceptable. Obey your own rules and put a stop to it. If you want proof, PM me and I'll send you the links, but I strongly suspect you've already seen it and yet these folks remain partners.... not cool, guys. Not. Cool.
* Personally, I don't think you should 'partner' with anyone, because you don't really need it. But most of the current partners should probably find their way to the underside of the barrel for a little while. Instead, maybe pick unknown streamers who play and do 'Weekly featured players'. Just don't pick me. I do stream, but I'm often way more concentrated on playing well than I am on being entertaining, so my stream is probably boring (a confession I know I shouldn't make, but there it is).

5) Fix game breaking glitches with better accuracy whenever possible. -> This one I'm going to try to be super fair on, because, for the most part, it's obvious that you DO try. Sometimes you're better at it than others, but there's still a pretty persistent bug where players randomly can't use abilities, transference, switch weapons or really anything else after being revived. It seems fairly random and the only way to reset this particular bug is to allow yourself to die off and respawn. If you're using a certain build out for a certain sentinel, this basically means you have to leave the game, since you'll probably never NOT get revived. Yeah. Super annoying. Again, in fairness, it's clear you do try (sometimes, really, really hard) and sometimes you do really, really well... but this particular one has been around for nearly a year now and still hounds us. 

 

6) Lay off the endless, pointless content filler -> At this point, I've alluded to and at least once, outright said it: Enough with the Syandanas, useless 'armor' and extra skins. They don't really add any tangible benefit to the game. The time you waste on this stuff could be better spent play testing new ideas, new warframes, abilities, mods, coding patches, fixing your broken netcode (which, by the way, communicates WAY more data than it needs to) and so on and so forth. We love new content... when it's actual content,  such as new missions, new stories, new weapons, new warframes... you know, the things that make this great game really great. But it's very obvious you spend a lot of time on stuff that doesn't really add anything to gameplay. You created Tennogen for a reason. Put it to use, take your cut of the profits and refocus your efforts on the places that really need it.

7) Do actual playtesting -> By this, I don't mean you and your 'partner' cronies (who, by the way, are all yes-men; I've watched enough of their streams and videos to know this to be true) and get some actual regular players (pick at random! or make a game/contest out if it if you can) to play-test new game builds and give feedback. If people who participate fail to give good feedback (or any at all) don't use them again and move on. But do some actual play-testing of your ideas with your actual community. The end-results of the release will be smoother and you'll have a better game and more appreciative community out of it. And you won't need to swing that hammer quite so often (maybe never again).

I'm sure others will think of things I haven't, but I tried to hit all of the major gripes in a single post. Outside of one particularly insulting bit, my 'Huge Jerk' slider remained turned down to the lowest setting I'm capable of this late at night.

In conclusion: I love this game, I love the work you've done. I love the fact you've risen from the underdog-ashes to become a F2P power house. It's great. But I love the game enough to want it to go from being great to truly awesome and, at 3126 hours (just logged through Steam, nevermind the pre-steam client), I think I'm pretty qualified to give some feedback and I'm well-versed enough in design and code that, if pressed, my feedback can be extremely useful (just gotta keep my jerk settings on low so people will listen, I guess). Rise above being just 'great'. Not because I asked you to, but because you've built something where you truly can. But only if you try.

 

<3 you guys. <3 you too, Reb.

 

Peace out, my Ninjas.

[DoJo Upgrade Suggestion]

+1

[I've been silent long enough]

I was in on the first (or perhaps the second) closed Beta and have been pretty silent until now. But it's time to get some stuff off of my chest. Plains of Eidolon is so unforgivably awful; so completely and utterly BAD, I am almost convinced the only thing the devs at DE could do to make it up to us is public harakiri... almost convinced. Almost.

To be clear: I did not purchase a 'Founders pack' because the idea of exclusive content you could never earn and no one else would ever, ever, ever have was so completely asinine and reprehensible, I honestly thought it would be the reason Warframe failed. And, while I was wrong on that count, I don't regret it. If you have founders content, you are an elitist jerk for supporting such ridiculous garbage. That being said, let's examine why 'Plains' sucks so much d*** it breathes spunk instead of air:

1) The rewards scaling is utter garbage. What do I mean by that? Read on.

- Each mission - even the really low level missions - have 3 parts. Not a huge issue on its own, but they are so far apart (and a few even have time limits, it seems) so, without an Archwing launcher, the grind becomes extra grindy and an enormous hassle. But, keep reading, it gets worse.

- Each sub-mission - even low levels - spawn an inordinate amount of enemies, most often dropping in new enemies right on top of you, dealing you damage in the process. While this is annoying in the daylight, there is so little ambient lighting on the plains at night, what is annoying during the day becomes nearly impossible to manage during a night cycle.

- Enemy spawns don't scale well to solo play; so, if you're by yourself, your best bet for crowd control would be Lenz except...

- Enemies often don't drop enough ammo when killed. Sometimes, they drop none at all. And the ammo refill points? Those aren't at every Grineer location, so you're likely to completely run out way too fast.

- Archwings - almost a necessity - get taken out in a single hit. The enemies and turrets that do this damage spawn faster than your archwing drops in, so any advantage you might've had is rudely stripped away in the most frustrating way possible.

- Archwing weapons/abilities - many of which would be an enormously helpful boon - aren't allowed and none of the archwing abilities have been re-tooled for this new use case. Consequently, your archwing abilities are mostly useless. Even Itzal, which is, by most accounts, the best archwing.

- In addition to having to worry about enemies, Grineer ships strafe you with gunfire from the air. Remember that Archwing of yours whose weapons and abilities would be helpful, if it hadn't been nerfed into useless oblivion? Don't expect it to help here at all. Not even a little bit. In fact, the only weapon I've found that's helpful is a pimped out AKStilletto Prime... but I'm damn sure not everyone has that and even more sure not everyone who does is using the mods I am or has forma'd enough times to use aforementioned mods. So most of you are screwed. With no lube.

* Last, but finally not least, if you manage to power your way through all of this endless sh*t, you are rewarded with 2 things: a very, very small amount of standing when compared to the effort it takes to get it and a random reward from the reward tree. (Seriously, it's much, much easier to level a Syndicate than to make any progress with the Ostron; the Syndicates just scale better)

The problem is, that reward tree? Yeah... Let's talk about that, shall we? One of the early rewards in the bronze tier is a Pressure Point mod. You know that mod you use to increase your melee damage? The most prolific mod in the entire game? That one that drops from every 3rd enemy you kill in every other tileset? That one mod we all have collected thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands of? Yessiree bob, that mod is a reward for all of your hard work, should you get randomly crapped on and given a bronze tier reward. And the Gold Tier for the same mission? 2x Morphics. You read right: 2x Morphics. Another has 2x Gallium. At this point, most of us who've been playing this game for a while know where to get morphics and, even without boosts, can run out of any random map on, say, Mars, with any where between 4 and 10 morphics. But Morphics being a tier reward isn't the problem. The problem is that it's a Gold Tier, you only get 2 and the amount of horseS#&amp;&#036; you have to wade through to get it. In the interim, Gara chassis is a silver tier and, inspite of having done that particular mission almost 20 times now, I've never once gotten anything in the silver tier. This same amount of utter garbage is repeated tier after tier, regardless of mission. At least with relic drops, there are ways to increase your chances of getting the reward tiers you want. There is no way to do any such thing for plains rewards. You get what you get and, most often, what you get is S#&amp;&#036;. Like 2000 Credits. Seriously, you can easily get more credits by sticking your finger up your bum and spinning on it. The whole rewards tree? It's a slap in the face.

2) Pointless map. Seriously, the map is completely and utterly useless. In every other game where a map this size or larger is present the player can mark out points of interest, waypoints and such. Much better games even go so far as allowing players to permanently mark discovered points of interest; be it statues, caves, mines, towns and other helpful tidbits so you don't have to remember where the holy hell everything is. You know, LIKE A REAL LIFE MAP. But can you do any such thing in Plains? Nope. Go F*** yourself. Better remember where absolutely everything is and be able to find it in complete and utter darkness. Can't do that? Well, too bad, cupcake. Enjoy that giant middle finger DE is giving you.

3) Artificially scaled skybox. Don't understand? Okay, let's say you drop in your archwing and try to fly as high as the highest point on the map from the lowest point. Try it and watch what happens. You will be forced down at a steady rate until you're just barely above the ground. This is unbelievably stupid and, given how ludcriously easy it is for the enemies to take your archwing out of commission, feels like it's been done to guarantee all you do is run around on foot. Why even bother giving the option for using an archwing if it's going to be nerfed, limited and forced to the ground at every turn? It's literally pointless. Were you hoping to get high enough to be able to survey the terrain, maybe spot something like a cave for mining or a good lake for fishing? F*** you, buddy; back to the ground with you, you silly plebe. DE has no love for your or your logical, free-thinking self. This is DE telling you to get bent; get stuffed, swallow a choad or any other creative and disgusting way you can think of them telling you to get f*cked.

4) Performance. HOLY. F*CKING. DOGSH*T. PERFORMANCE ON THE PLAINS IS SUCH &amp;#&#33;. To give you an idea, I'm running an 8c/16t CPU clocked at 4GHz, 32GB DDR4 @ 3200MHz, a 960 Pro NVMe and a GTX 1080Ti clocked at nearly 2GHz. There isn't a game in existence that tanks my PC's performance like Plains of Eidolon. The market at Cetus is the worst, by far, but I halfway expect that given how many player avatars show up there. But it doesn't seem to matter what settings I tweak or tune down, I go to the plains or to Cetus and I can watch my framerates drag to a crawl for no apparent reason. Every other performance monster game (Crysis 3, ARK: Survival Evolved, Battlefield, etc.) runs as smooth as butter, most often over 90fps. But not on the plains. On a good day, I can expect 30-40. Every other day, all I get is hitching and other random bullsh*t at random bullsh*t intervals. Fan-f*cking-tastic. You might think something is wrong with my system (you're wrong; I do this for a living; it's definitely the game) but no other game, application or even level on Warframe (with the only exception being the relays; performance while at the relay has always been trash though) has this issue.

5) Lotus. Lotus has always been that helpful space-mommy figure for players. Little hints, bits of story, words of encouragement or just a little chatter; all of which just served to fill the void and paint Lotus as that helpful, watchful eye. Sometimes even as a loving space-mommy to our warrior child avatars. But not on the plains. Oh, No, Goodsir or Madam! No, here, Lotus is the most annoying little twat I've ever heard in my life. I really, truly don't need this silly c*nt interrupting what precious little peace and quiet I have with random, stupid missions that reward me with absolutely diddly for my trouble while I'm just trying to grind out some fishing or mine some gems/ore... and then *@##&#036;ing at me and admonishing me when I don't go out on said random missions that are more hassle than reward. See point #1: Reward scaling sucks monkey balls. So Lotus griping at me about random missions with even less reward? It makes me want to stab that *@##&#036; right in her annoying face. Which sucks because I used to really like the Lotus. I like Lotus enough that it kind of freaked me out when she disappeared for a little while in a certain story mission. But on the plains? I'd kill that @#&amp;* myself if it would shut her yammering up. Fix my space-mommy, DE. Make her less of an annoying twat on the plains. I don't like being annoyed with space-mommy. Maybe give me a way of turning off the random mission BS.

6) The new focus trees. Holy Jesus, these suck so bad, I could replace them with a Hoover vacuum cleaner and get better use of my time. First, you have to find 'The Quills'. Okay, fine. Let's go find them... except, unless you're willing to read the wiki, good-f*cking-luck. FYI, it's in a fairly well hidden spot inside Cetus, to the right of the gate entrance to the plains. Not that it matters because, even after you get the amp thing he gives you, you have to kill Eidolons to really get anything worth mentioning. Okay, fine. Let's spend all of our refunded points from the old skill trees building up the new one and go test them out... except nothing has really changed and the new abilities don't seem to be terribly useful or helpful in any meaningful way. What about your amp? How do you use that? No idea. No direction given by the game, no manual to speak of. F***. Me. Paint me into a giant frowny face, as I am not happy with this. Not even a little. It may be that the way the new trees worked is very poorly explained... but I couldn't find any kind of in-game manual that explains this. 'Back to the wiki' thought I. Yeah, you know what? About that...I'm sick and @(*()&#036; tired of having to Alt+Tab out of my goddamned game to read the mother@(*()&#036; wikia every time these asshats change some S#&amp;&#036;. 'Read the changelog' other 'veteran' players say. Yeah, tried that too. Clear as osmium mud. So if that's your answer, F*** you too. So here's a helpful hint, DE: WHEN YOU CHANGE CORE MECHANICS, FIND A WAY TO COMMUNICATE THE ENTIRE WAY EVERYTHING IS SUPPOSED TO WORK IN-GAME. NO MORE HUNTING THE @(*()&#036; WIKIA, NO MORE TRYING TO DECIPHER CRYPTIC CHANGELOG NOTES. ENOUGH ALREADY. STOP BEING OBTUSE ASSHATS. If you're going to change things in the attempt of making them better, fine. Please feel free to do so. But make goddamned sure everyone knows what the bloody hell is going on.

7) Archwing. On the plains, Archwing eats &amp;#&#33;, face first, no spoon and while said &amp;#&#33; is having explosive diarrhea. I know I've touched on this before, but good Christ, is it completely awful. Whoever thought this implementation of Archwing was either fun or a good idea should be strung up by their genitals and savagely beaten with foam rubber baseball bats until they're so swollen and bruised they resemble a cluster of purple grapes. Death would a release compared to this travesty. Don't take it away; it was the most exciting part of the plains, the idea of dropping in your archwing and strafing baddies with something like an imperator or grattler and having better survivability than with just a squishy warframe alone - that's a fantastic idea. What we have now? It's so frustrating, it's so bad, I'm worried it might give me cancer. Fix it. Pretty please. With sugar and a cherry on top. I'm sure at least one player here would donate their cherry if they thought it would help. Added note: Even after the patch, my archwing launchers are still disposable. Though, now, my archwing launcher blueprint isn't. What was that supposed to fix? Things are worse now! AAAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!

8) Failed missions. By themselves, failed missions aren't the full issue. The full issue is that there seriously needs to be a re-work of the way that missions can be completed on the plains without having to return to dreaded Cetus just to failed missions can be repeated. Put up some kind of Kiosk near the door so if we fail a mission, we can replay it without the incredibly ridiculous drawback of having to leave the plains, wade through random avatars, talk to the doofus, get reassigned the mission, wade back through the sea of avatars and back out of the door with those crazy load times all while PC performance is tanked to ghoulish levels. If archwings didn't suck so much monkey nuts, this would be less of a problem. Still a problem, just considerably less.

TL;DR: Warframe has always been very grindy. But, especially over the last year or so, it's been a type of grind where the rewards, more often than not, are equal to the amount of garbage you have to swallow to get them. But on the plains? Nope. Just endless amounts of frustrating grind with so little reward, so little payout it's not even worth playing. It's just frustrating for the purpose of being frustrating. And, after reading what other players have wrote - many of whom haven't been around as long as some of us - it's clear to me I'm not the only one who sees this. So, note to DE: If we wanted to be frustrated for the sake of frustration by a video game, we'd go play Dark Souls. This isn't Dark Souls. So knock it the F*** off.