Terridaks.

After seeing this thread about game balance, decided to post my own. The topics of difficulty, balance, and improved AI come up periodically in the WF discussion. I've dedicated a thread to it myself, as I too have been dreaming of a shift from grind-dependent to skill-dependent gameplay for years. However, I realize that in the current state of the game this is impossible. Changing the fundamentals of the game, like adding more complex AI or overhauling the parkour system would mean serious risks. If you change one system, you'd have to change all the others. It's much more convenient to layer on new ones. Core changes could ruin the game, which I agree with the vast majority of forum members. However, I do not agree that the game in its current form is the result of DE's directed efforts and conscious gamedesign decisions. More to the point, WF is a chronically sick game, and a cure risks killing it, as sickness has been part of its nature from the beginning. And no, I'm not calling to blame DE for this. I'd like to quote this response to a newbie's question about how to have fun in this game: And this is a very symptomatic situation that I've encountered more than once and more than twice while trying to sell WF to my friends. They didn't understand why should they play it after the prologue? We endlessly speed up the grind to skip the grind, but the whole game is one solid grind. So why play it? Intentional spoiling WF is a free-to-play cooperative PvE game. And for the free-to-play distribution model to work, you need microtransactions. For players to want to resort to microtransactions, the gameplay must be intentionally spoiled. In our case, the spoilage factor is the grind, which you have to go through in order to get equipment that is interesting to the player or to progress through the story. Grind implies routine, repetitive actions that the player should want to skip. And since the game is still afloat, it means that there are quite a few players who want to skip the grind and pay money for it. It's a necessary evil for a free-to-play PvE shooter. But can the pill be sweetened? Is it possible to make grind interesting? Yes, of course. It takes one key component of gamedesign: decision making. Unintentional spoilage Imbalance DE have never been good at balance. If in PvE it is still possible to be slippery, giving the result as the original goal, then in PvP everything is much more transparent. Remember the launch of Conclave 2.0 It received a lot of attention at the time, and players flooded into the previously unpopular mode. The imbalance of the first patches in such conditions is always expected. If in the case of weapons miscalculations can be understood, the situation with abilities resembled both a massacre and a circus. Wasn't it obvious to anyone that leaving AOE abilities with 1000 damage in a mode where all players have 300 EHP is a terrible idea? The same problems with misunderstanding abilities have always been inherent in PvE. Calculating that Rhino will run around in invulnerable Iron Skin indefinitely is not a difficult task either. And that's just one example. False decision making Do you ever get the feeling that despite such a greater variety of warframes, their archetypes and abilities, it's as if they're all the same? If the answer is yes, then you're not wrong. The fact is that in 90% of missions, your only goal is to deal as much damage as possible to the bullet sponges. Therefore, almost all warframes are designed to deal damage through direct ability damage or damage buffs. Survivability is needed to keep killing enemies, speed is needed to get to the right enemies faster, and control is needed to more easily group them for damage. You may ask, "Are there any other options?" And I'll say, "Yes, there are!" Lack of ability balance and dull enemy design prevent the creation of universal combat rules where the player's decisions actually matters. Reduce duration, reduce radius, standardize effects, add soft cooldowns. Imagine if instead of fighting a horde of bullet-sponges you encounter something like this: Enemies that can use ability to convert all stat effects to healing. Enemies that instantly teleport away, removing all status effects as soon as they take damage. Enemies that can redirect some of the damage they take in melee range explosion each 3 sec. Enemies capable of charging an extremely powerful strike, which can be canceled by either certain abilities or by knocking through a sufficient number of impact stat effects. Enemies that can inflict long-lasting debuffs, like canceling shield regeneration until it is destroyed. The list goes on for a very long time. This is a list of enemies that would create new niches. And if warframe abilities were balanced, players could say, "Hey, this warframe, even though it does low damage with abilities, is mega-useful because it has 2-3 abilities that can knock out one enemy's super-strong attack and prevent another enemy from teleporting. This warframe, on the other hand, will have a hard time against these enemies. To compensate for that, he needs this weapon and this gear." Currently, however, the abilities are so imbalanced that all the developers do is introduce enemies that simply prohibit you from using game mechanics. They're just trying to ban at least temporarily infinite control, damage-dealing abilities, status effects, etc. That said, a number of control mechanics are extremely counter-intuitive, and do not prevent enemies from using their abilities in any way. And I haven't even broached the subject of more utilitarian goals on missions yet. We already have a good example of stealth missions, where the player is given a fundamentally different goal. This approach could be expanded upon. By providing, for example, a gate that you have to sneak through, but it closes almost instantly as soon as the player is in range of the scanner. Warframes with abilities like "dash" or "teleportation" or "superspeed" or «invis» could sneak through, unblocking the passageway for their teammates. If there are no such warframes among the team members, you will have to go through a small segment of parkour with hacking. False builds A lot of people say they enjoy creating builds. However, this is only true for players with a lot of experience. Without mystics (which are long and difficult to farm, and among which 80% are junk), beginners have no real choice. They simply can't not use mods like Serration, they don't have access to gamechangers for a long time, of which there aren't many for the whole game. The vast majority of mods give a conditional +5% to stats per rank. I could go on for a long time, but there's little point. I think the basic message is clear. Don't think I'm a DE hater. I described an ideal situation, while they had to work in a crisis. And they did their job - they created a game that is played and profitable.

I wouldn't say they can still get into writing. And Gradivus was more of an anomaly. Take the same Tethra operation: Vay Hek threatens the entire system with a fleet of Fomorians, but only Tenno care about it for some reason. Meanwhile, the Corpus' reaction is "Brah, we don't care." I don't think all tenno obey Lotus. Moreover, according to the game lore, tenno don't obey Lotus at all, she only acts as a coordinator. I'm not talking about the moment when Lotus disappeared. Plus it would be weird if all tenno thought the same way - like we're some kind of ants. With that level of independence, surely there must be renegade groups that would look at things from a different angle. There might even be some who wanted to join the Corpus or the Grineer. In terms of history, it would be possible to get around that restriction. The Second Dream still seems like a DE mistake to me for many reasons. From the fact that it set the fashion for solo quests in co-op play, to the huge ludonarrative dissonance it caused. Think about it: the player commits 10 war crimes per mission, builds his space fortresses, makes deals worth millions of credits, and then goes on a quest where it turns out he's been an impulsive teenager with mommy issues the whole time.

Why aren't there any tenno-NPC? You know what I remember about Gradivus's Dilemma (besides the brutal grind)? How well the developers managed to use all the available lore to make it feel like the tenno are part of the Warframe universe. All sides of the War for Mars behaved quite reasonably in trying to get the Tenno on their side. Except for the fact that Alad was actually trying to get some tenno to sell other tenno for organs and torture Valkyr. At the time, many thought we were saving the tenno inside Valkyr. I.e. there was almost a tenno-NPC in the lore. The Second Dream was the turning point. I know a lot of people have warm feelings about this quest. Well, I didn't. It was a turning point for the game when we stopped being "one of the tenno" and became "the tenno". To this day, the only tenno NPC in the game is the now dead Rell. We don't know anything about the attitude of the rest of the tenno towards Duviri, the Entrati family, what they did during the Narmer invasion, etc The player character and his personality issues became the center of the Warframe universe. It's possible, of course, that this is part of the lore and all the tenno are actually one personality, just existing simultaneously in different versions.

If you don't like grind or fashion, quit the game and don't look back. Otherwise it will turn into a second job for you.

Well, the devs said it would be core warframe, but a little different. Older or more down-to-earth gameplay may well fit the description. But the most reasonable thing to expect, of course, is just another open world. I don't see a big problem with the hairstyles. Arthur is a cybersamurai inspired by Jetstream Sam, and Aoi is Asian. My only complaint is that they're being a little too pompous. But I guess that's just for the teaser.

That's exactly what I'm counting on. Stating that 1999 will be something more than a content island like Duviri further fires the imagination. Although, years with DE have taught me not to inflate expectations too much. At least we already have a confirmed course for veteran warframe personification.

I hardly ever look at the game these days. However, news about 1999 brings my attention back to Warframe every now and then. The more I learn about the update, the more I like what I see. Theories, artwork, and fanfics from 2013-2016 come to mind, when players were having heated debates about the nature of tenno. I won't hide, I supported the losing side - those who thought warframes were suits or shells for mutated humans. My headcanon was a theory of my own composition that the tenno had awakened as a "tabula rasa": no memory, no gender. By putting on warframes, they were trying on the physiology and remnants of protowarframes personalities. Now, of course, this assumption seems absurd and impractical. At the very least, it would require more in-depth work with the lore and personality of each warframe. This is something fans have been doing for a long time. They came up with a "people's canon" and ascribed certain character traits to each warframe. For DE, however, this was clearly not a priority.... Until the annonce of the 1999 update. Yeah, protoframes aren't warframes in the usual sense, but it's nice to see even a loophole like that. And doubly nice that for once the game is taking a more down-to-earth tone. Maybe this time we won't even have another drama about growing up or abusive relationships.

Do I understand correctly that by calling them "suits of armor", we are getting closer to rehumanizing them?

I can't agree with that. The people of Mars called Inaros, not his operator. Gauss was Saint of Altra, not his operator. And so on. Natural armor is a phrase that does not mean literal "suit of armor". The body cannot exist without this "armor".

No. That's why my skin is not armor.

If you need clarification, here it is: "defensive covering for the body especially : covering (as of metal) used in combat". Anything that can be taken off/on and serves as protection (especialy in combat) is armor. No, warframes do not function as "suits of armor". I might as well argue that a military drone is armor because it protects its operator.

There is no evidence that most people think warframes are specifically suits. Instead, there is only evidence that commoners see warframes as gods of war in their own right.

They use them as teleportation points. It's a weird teleportation, and yet the tennos aren't physically in the warframe at the moment of piloting. I'm referring to the same War Within quest. Particularly the moment when the Queen tries to get into the operator's head.

First, the DEs themselves claim that this site is a compilation of actual lore to refresh your memory. Secondly it immediately breaks the fourth wall by mentioning the game in the next post: "These files reveal details of events before and during the game, tread carefully Tenno!". Based on this alone, we can assert that the character on whose behalf the narrative is told is a hero-resonator (a character who speaks from the author's position). More to the point, this character is just a device: "It is Albrecht Entrati whom this device serves. It is Albrecht Entrati who has instructed us to locate the chosen Operator." It records reports in dry, protocolized language. It would be irrational for him to use any ambiguity. As for the characters, listing them is important because they are the characters we come in contact with. How do we know someone thinks warframes are costumes if no one talks about it? Without that element, you're making the same mistake as conspiracy theorists who claim that if some scientific theory isn't true, it automatically means magic exists. We have Leverian, we have Inaros' quest where warframes are described as demigods in their own right, without any suspicion of costumes.

The problem is that the wording the DEs give directly misleads players about the nature of the game character. And it's not a play on words, no. The DEs themselves invented this substitution of words to cover up the retcon. "Who in the game's universe knows they're remotely controlled by children with void powers?": Captain Vor, Lotus, Queens, Ballas, Quills, Palladino. Possibly Teshin, Arbiters of Hexis and Nora. These are just the ones I remembered immediately. Now who claims tenno wear warframes as costumes?

But not "suits of armor".

Mutation =/= armor. You can't take off or put on the mutation. The infestation irreversibly changes your body to the core. "As Operators need not put themselves into physical danger while piloting a frame." - which literally means that operators control the drones from a distance. The meaning of military vehicle cannot be used here. The phrase "suit of armor" directly contradicts this. Idk: "Mirage's sleight of hand complements her might. Her dazzled foes take heavy damage. Doppelgangers, lasers, and traps are elements of her stagecraft." I hope so. I remember DE didn't change the old description of the tenno from the official web page for a long time after the Second Dream. Tenno were also described there as costume wearers, which was outright misinformation.

Was looking at the lore notes in the Operator Report, and came across the following sentence in "1_Operator.txt": The TENNO piloted WARFRAMES, suits of sophisticated battle armor. Again! Why the armor/suit? Warframes are not armor in any sense. Here's the definition of armor: defensive covering for the body. Warframes are drones, biomachines, anything, but armor/suits. Operators don't "wear" drones. You can invoke the unreliable narrator effect. But who in the game's universe believes, and directly says, that warframes are armor?

Well, Alad calls them crustaceans.

Thanks for your reaction, glad you enjoyed it. I can answer some of the questions that have arisen. Desiccation consumes 12% of current health, not max health, which makes it a little safer to use. So, Inaros with 1000 hp will spend 120 hp, while Inaros with 500 hp will already only spend 60 points. "What's more of an issue is the preservation/resurrection of Devour's biggest flaw" - I know, I know, it's more of a compromise than a complete solution. Still, in most cases, if allies can't stop killing enemies, they don't need healing. If emergency help is still needed, finishing off one of the many blinded enemies is much easier, faster, and more effective than standing in the animation of devouring one particular enemy. Yes, you're right, I mistyped. I meant puncture status effect:

Okay, looks like I should explain my position on Inaros's rework. In short, it seems to me that the devs were trying to keep up with the theme rather than the gameplay, resulting in a warframe with a set of functionaly overlapping and not very usable abilities. Let's start with the passive ability Undying: due to the lack of scaling, it only performs well at low levels, where there's nothing to die from. Some might argue that at higher levels, allies can resurrect Inaros by killing targets he shoots his beam at. However, in practice, if allies are that close to bleeding Inaros, the vast majority of the time he is resurrected in the standard way. I suggest adding scaling from both Inaros' health pool and abilities at once. I don't like Inaros' second current passive ability, as it only combines with his Desiccation out of his entire ability set. I, on the other hand, suggest a passive ability that directly synergizes with his self-resurrection in the most natural way possible. The Sand Shadows will contribute directly to the resurrection of their master. 3 of Inaros' 4 abilities grant healing. 3 of Inaros's 4 abilities grant control. 4 of Inaros' 4 abilities deal damage over time. 3 of Inaros' 4 abilities temporarily incapacitate him in some way. I feel it is necessary to diversify his ability set by focusing a bit more on two aspects of his character: helping allies and health manipulation. Desiccation's essence hasn't changed as much as it may seem. First of all, this ability now uses up health to restore even more health. Using it idly, however, can be detrimental to Inaros. I don't see the need for a true damage, nor do I see the need for a dot. The status effect of piercing, on the other hand, works well in combination with Inaros' other abilities, as well as with finishers. It is also the first time that the image of the king-defender is touched upon here. Inaros sacrifices part of his health to allow his allies to heal in battle. The disadvantages and inconveniences of Devour have been described many times before and without me. So I will concentrate on the "new" ability. Scarab Swarm is great as an auxiliary close combat tool: it gives a handy armor buff to allies, while at the same time reducing the defense of enemies. Unlike most other warframe abilities, the Swarm benefits from the crit multypliers, including piercing stat effect, allowing it to deal even more damage over time. Maintaining this ability is key to successful resurrection in the event of a critical failure. Sandstorm in the current version requires a huge energy expenditure, slows down, blocks the use of abilities and weapons, giving in return only awkward control and not the highest periodic damage. I didn't change that much. Self-evident changes: moderate energy consumption and more comfortable control. Of the innovations, defensive-ish mechanic that makes enemies miss targets inside Sandstorm, and a high-risk, high-reward game. Now at low health, the damage of the ability more than justifies the cost. And Inaros gets two tools at once to control his hp. The current Scarab Swarm penalizes a player for using it's active part. Hitting enemies with scarabs? Stand still for a few seconds, sacrificing health. The Celestial Mandate, on the other hand, offers Inaros to once again play a game of high risk and high reward. The player will have to constantly feed on enemies to maintain invulnerability.

I know, I know. DE will definitely have to make a pretty wide spread of player skills at each rank. And I'm guessing the split will only be 3-4 ranks. But they have an advantage that a lot of other PvP-oriented games don't have, namely a gigantic audience that isn't that hard to target. I remember the flood of players when conclave 2.0 first opened. People were playing and trying new things even despite the huge holes in the balance.

I still can't figure out what happens if the ability is used on an enemy without armor. The whole point of the Hydroid is that he expends energy to deal increased damage with armor removal. The contradictory point of your ability is that Inaros gets a penalty for him or his allies killing an enemy before the swarm removes all armor. That is, he gets a penalty for doing something well. The opposite mechanic would be much more logical - that Scarab Armor is returned in full if an enemy is killed before all of their armor is removed. Well, or the earlier you kill, the more armor is returned.

I've played Conclave, and I can say that on the one hand the developers did a good job adjusting abilities for PvP. A good question is why no one from the DE thought it was a bad idea to give warframes with basic health abilities that can kill players in one use in the first place? It really messed up the launch of conclave 2.0 back in the day. Overall the PvP in warframe is pretty well balanced and fun to play with friends, especially if you're at about the same skill level. And this is where we come to the problem that DE never solved. It's the clash between veterans and newbies. The problem is that newbies entering PvP are immediately wiped out without being able to do anything, which causes them a legitimate sense of helplessness and frustration. They don't understand how abilities work, and they can't understand at what point a casual game about "shoot in that direction and everyone will die" began to require them to be extremely skilled at parkour and aiming. And while the motto "git good" is a natural part of any PvP, if it takes dozens if not hundreds of hours of practice and thousands of fruitless deaths to start enjoying the game, players simply start looking for more accessible sources of enjoyment. And I remind you that fun is what we play games for. In other words: just add ranked matchmaking so players can compete against their peers. At first glance, it might seem that this counterintuitive solution would finally do away with Conclave, as matchmaking would become much harder to find. But you have no idea how many players go in, try it out, die 15 times a match, and never think about Warframe PvP again. I've met 6 of them in a week alone, even though I don't play at the most crowded times. If you keep even a third of these people, the conclave will become a much more populated place. As with any game, you need to give players two things: clear game rules and development horizons achievable within a reasonable time frame. The second task will be handled by the rating system. To solve the first problem, I would suggest introducing a training mode, where players could test weapons and abilities on combat specters. This is the required minimum. I would also reconsider the conclave affinity and syndicate rep system. Killing an enemy for a player who has spent the entire game just dying is a task many times more difficult than killing any boss on the Steel Path.

Since no one is commenting on my rework, I'll comment on someone else's. In any case, the one that seemed to me the most adequate. I'm fine with your resurrection passive. I don't think it even needs a cd, since you're essentially offering a natural toolkit to enhance the current ability, which is a good thing. Once you get to a certain level of enemies, Inaros can still run into self-resurrection problems. This is especially justified given how risky a position his new ability puts him in. Yep, nuke Devour. The new ability gives me conflicting feelings. On the one hand, it's great that you've thought to add damage reduction along with aggro, but on the other hand, if anyone needs this mechanic, it's warframes like Rhino or Nix. Unlike those two, Inaros doesn't directly benefit from enemies focusing on him. Sandbagging enemies has never been a big problem - enemies are facing the player 90% of the time. Also, the ability suffers from the same disease as many other reworks on this forum - it suffers from a lack of brevity. How many tasks does it accomplish? Let's count: damage debuff, control, heal, minion summoning. Four tasks for one button is a lot. Sandstorm rework is ok. Your Scarab Swarm could be a direct ability improvement, though it's not entirely clear what happens if you infect an enemy without armor? And why does the ability reward the player for not killing an enemy for as long as possible, while leaving Inaros himself in a more vulnerable position?