master_of_destiny

Stopping for just a moment...do you remember when the developer streams used to just be a video with no rewards? I do. Do you remember that the engagement was from people deeply dedicated to the game, because the community was a very shallow pool? I do. Do you remember when this died? Let me give you a hint. DE generated a massive population increase...and had a backlog of content literally years old. They spent months tinkering with the open world...and all the while people had a bunch of content to explore. Veterans...were a thing...but the community that supported the game from kickstarter to sale to Leyou (sorry, whatever the poultry farmer in China was named) was largely left out as content droughts got longer. It's been years...and people have burned through the content. A few years ago DE started increasing engagement via partnering with Twitch to do give-aways...and get eyeballs on the developers. That's why they need to offer free stuff...because once you start paying people to watch it becomes a requirement going forward. Now...the developers "retreating" to discord is a joke. It's how we get garbage like the latest COD game, or the complete misfires of things like Prey, or still yet the shenanigans like No Man's Sky. It's people not wanting negative feedback..so cutting off all of it instead of employing human punching bags. I mean, customer satisfaction agents. I say that not as an insult, but because that's often how those people have described their job to me. To be clear...DE as a developer has a mixed track record in their response to negative feedback, but have been consistent to reward players. Considering that they desire positive feedback, then host dev streams which promise features that can take years to happen if ever they do, then a bit of bribery for a positive player response is probably not a bad use of resources. Let me qualify the above just a bit. Dev streams have shown us Parkour 2.0, and they've shown off frames. On the other hand you have the Ghoul Saw...which took a community backlash to get into the game after being told for months it was "almost done." We saw modular archwing, which was deep into development...and years later is still not in game. We also watched things like a third orb mother...which is chilling in a lake, as it has been since launch. I say that we learn nothing about the future of the game not in jest, but because the delivery of promised features is often a roll of the dice as to whether it's a goal or a fun idea... Finally, why complain? Because occasionally DE listens and fixes things. It's a pipe dream, but not unprecedented. If there's a possibility, then people will ask for it to be less...insulting. Please note that DE isn't stupid...so the decision to reward in this value is likely based upon math. With the recent release of content, it's likely that DE is betting on people being invested in seeing updates...so they're testing if worse rewards is a community acceptable practice. We provide feedback by either forum comments, or not engaging with the stream...and as per all the other people DE doesn't have the capability to see a difference between leeching and engagement. Of course, you could also suggest that some of these have rewarded an umbral forma for watching. 45 minutes of engagement for a thing that cost a bunch of steel essence and comes around every...10 weeks I think...or 45 minutes for half of a basic reward you can grind infinitely in 30 minutes. With that math established, this really seems like a bad reward.

OK....let me short this. If you are cracking open a window, and harvesting the rewards, then the stream is pointless. It's a cost gate to see if you'll buy twitch prime or amazon prime. Now, let me tackle rewards. Just give this a little bit of thought. I can solo the basic stuff with sun & moon in about 30 minutes...getting 10 pathos clamps, resources, and the ability points. That's twice as much reward, plus resources, plus experience, in less time than it'd take to watch DE tell me nothing about the future... Why complain? Well, because nothing is free. If you think your time has no value then I have nothing to say. 90 minutes for 10 pathos clamps, or 90 minutes for 30 clamps, experience, and resources is a no-brainer. If you just open the window it's a free reward...but DE is using you to inflate engagement numbers so you are the product being sold... It's pretty silly to not value yourself. Barring the rest of this...it's silly to think that DE gives anything away for free. They want your engagement time to support their whales...and they've given up on things that drive constant engagement. See: Nightwave devolving. They may not have the resources to do that sort of stuff....but they can give away a limitless virtual resource that literally cannot purchase anything in-game at the rates being awarded...which is why people feel insulted. You're welcome to think that's complaining...but imagine if DE gave away a free frame...and once you got it a message on the screen flashed and said you have no open slots, either sell a warframe or buy a slot to receive your gift. It'd be less useful, right? It'd be an insult, right? Well, that's why free frames now come with a slot...

You fail to see the big picture...but are on a reasonable path. Let me rectify that. Warframe is in a constant cycle of content-logins-drought-losses. That's what you always hear as a counter, and it isn't entirely wrong. That said, the longer and longer there are content droughts the less people come back immediately. This is how we've gotten to the current model of two large drops per year...with "echoes" style booster packs because they need people engaged again. To stop this DE introduced a variety of time gates. Think Sorties, Archon Hunts, and the current rewards for the circuit. That said, this started back with syndicate standing...so you can't call this magically new. The best part of all of this is that you are wrong (about feedback). I have asked plenty of people who quit what their breaking point was, and youtube is littered with former partners. Let me enlighten you...and hopefully DE. 1) My time is wasted. Having a 2% drop for something that requires 20 minutes of my time is insulting. 2) The content sucks. There are maybe 5-10 great weapons in any category...but hundreds to grind. Getting to MR20 is a pipe dream...(yes, that long ago) 3) Bugs. So many bugs. It's a AAA bugged game that never fixes more than the most critical stuff. 4) Double standards. Watch a dev stream. Identify that DE's representatives are forever making lewd and inappropriate comments...as defined by their own ToS. It isn't me being a prude, but I've seen people nearly get a huge ban because of the name of their pet...and it was less edgy than some of the crap on their streams...in a game about slicing people in half you can't even make certain references. Why do players come back then? DE has about 10 seconds of good game. That's not an insult, it's acknowledging that the 10 seconds it takes to mow down an army of mooks, parkour to another, and slice them into sashimi is a great loop. It makes this game. Unfortunately, 99% isn't that loop. Like opiates, that loop is so good it keeps people coming back despite all the bad. Thing is, rehab is a thing. People do get to their breaking point. People leave because DE is making their game more transparently time hungry while flogging microtransactions out the ears. That's all fair...but sometimes people leave because it doesn't feel good. A fair few of my friends left forever...because there are hundreds of alternatives. DE is in the midst of making fishing more core to their game than murdering Grineer by the bucket load...and that lack of focus is showing. That said, don't flog the steam chart numbers. It's a poorer argument that's easy to contrast with peaks brought on by content releases. I say that because I was where you are. The people who care stick around and talk about what can be done. Normies just log off forever. It'll only be a problem when whales disappear...and that'll only be a problem when you can't get a match...which DE has "fixed" with cross-platform...so a 20% drop across all platforms becomes a 320% increase in players by virtue of multiple platforms (yes, 80% of varying player counts isn't going to add up to this...but the math is close enough to demonstrate the point).