The misconception of Enemy radar

[s2915202]

There are rumours among the Chinese Warframe players which claim that the aura “enemy radar” has the effect of increasing the spawn rate of enemy and speed of enemy during the survival mission.

We hope DE can give a clear answer on these question in order to end these nonsense rumours. 

Edited October 25, 2018 by s2915202

[Kyoresh]

this is no nonsense. try it for yourself and See how much more enemies you will see

[(XBOX)Danowat32]

Do you mean Enemy RADAR?

[TheGrimCorsair]

Yeah, nah, word of god already covered that awhile ago. It's a trick of your perception since the enemies are highlighted on radar you are aware of their existence when you otherwise wouldn't be.

[(PSN)SilentTakeo]

These rumors are false. Enemy Radar only allows you to see the enemies in a greater radius, it does not affect spawn rates at all. The misconception being that a larger area of effect correlates to forced usage of that area, which is completely untrue.

For instance, the Kavat mod that sends out a massive pulse and reveals enemy locations on your mini map perfectly exemplifies the concept. It only shows you what's already there.

End of.

[420-chan]

It's not about more enemies spawning, it's about putting the enemies in a detected "alert" state which makes them run toward you faster, allowing you to kill them faster and increasing spawn rate that way. I've never actually seen this tested though so I've no idea if it's true. 

Edited October 24, 2018 by 420-chan

[(PSN)xtharbadx]

This is well known technique used by survival endurance players, not a rumour.

Call it a design flaw if you will, but what happens is that there is a relation between spawn points, enemy awareness and enemy radar. The larger enemy radar radius you have, more enemies will be aware of your presence and run to you.

Try to boost it via frame and pet/sentinel mods and you can see the difference.

A better range will cover more spawn points, therefore more enemies will come.

[(XBOX)DShinShoryuken]

Interesting 

Always have these types of things pop up with TRUE/FALSE posts as well.

Does it reveal Spawns so they come for you or is it a trick of the mind since you can see the Spawn areas and their beeline to your area?

Only way to tell is to do the science. Bring a Frame (Ivara) with ALL the Enemy Radar mods. Do an hour Survival staying in one area. Then do one with no Enemy Radar mods, and see what they difference is. 

Would like to view this by one or more of the YouTubers out there to get their take and see how it differently for each one of them playing.

Gods, I enjoy this game and all it contains. So much and yet, people only do the least amount in it cuz they are reward happy.

Cheers

[DatDarkOne]

9 hours ago, (XB1)DShinShoryuken said:

Would like to view this by one or more of the YouTubers out there to get their take and see how it differently for each one of them playing.

Of the Youtubers, the only one I've ever seen or heard of mentioning this has been LifeOfRio.  

Of the way to test this, I think I will try that out this weekend.  Just to see what really happens.  

[Amhiel]

hace 16 minutos, DatDarkOne dijo:

Of the way to test this, I think I will try that out this weekend.  Just to see what really happens.

I'd love to see the results of this experiment, please post your paper here. I'm the kind of player in need of all the cheese I can get. 

[5H4DE]

I tried it out myself, it keeps enemies in an alerted state thus making them run to you instead of walking so you kill them faster, therefore speeding up spawns as well since they need to "resupply" enemy count.

[Leafcoin]

15 minutes ago, TheRealShade said:

I tried it out myself, it keeps enemies in an alerted state thus making them run to you instead of walking so you kill them faster, therefore speeding up spawns as well since they need to "resupply" enemy count.

But enemies are always in an alert state during Survival mission? You run in already guns blazing so they'll always be alerted and run straight to the position where the gunfire event originated.

I'll admit I like having enemy radar during survivals because I can see where the enemy is coming from and prepare and preaim. Results in quicker clears especially when they run in a long line and you bring punch-through weapons.

 

Edited October 25, 2018 by huhhWhat
clarified some junk near the end

[DatDarkOne]

33 minutes ago, Amhiel said:

I'd love to see the results of this experiment, please post your paper here. I'm the kind of player in need of all the cheese I can get. 

Well you're in luck.  I just did two missions just now for just under 10 minutes each.  There wasn't even a need to go longer as I noticed the difference fairly quickly.  

Using my standard Ivara build that doesn't have any radar mods other than her innate radar, I removed Animal Instinct from Helios Prime.  Geared with Rubico Prime, AkBolto Prime, and Skijati I went to MoT solo.  

Within the first 5 minutes I ended up using two life support towers and had to move around more than usual while staying in basically in the same room.  I thought this was lower than my usual experience.  

Second mission took the same setup as last time but with fully ranks Animal Instinct back on Helios Prime.  Was able to practically stand in one spot while enemies kept running to get in my area.  Didn't use one life support while staying the same amount of time as previously.  

I can't say that the amount of enemies increased for the map overall, but they did run to my location more with radar.  Without radar I did notice more enemies randomly walking around instead of coming to my immediate location.  

My take one this is that if it's that noticeable only 4 minutes into the missions, than it would could effect you longer term in the mission.

10 hours ago, 420-chan said:

It's not about more enemies spawning, it's about putting the enemies in a detected "alert" state which makes them run toward you faster, allowing you to kill them faster and increasing spawn rate that way. I've never actually seen this tested though so I've no idea if it's true. 

This was the effect almost exactly as it happened.  Of course others are free to do more tests at longer times and different missions maps to see if this still holds true.  

Edited October 25, 2018 by DatDarkOne

[5H4DE]

Just now, huhhWhat said:

But enemies are always in an alert state during Survival mission? You run in already guns blazing so they'll always be alerted. And they run to the last position of previously killed enemies.

I'll admit I like having enemy radar during survivals because I can see where the enemy is coming from and prepare and preaim.

 

That' the thing, they are alerted but they are not running towards you all the time, enemies that happen to be too far will just walk around, don't know what the deal is but the wider the area you detect them the wider the area they keep rushing to you from. Right now without any kind of radar, enemies that get too far from you at spawn seem to stop caring about you.

[DatDarkOne]

2 minutes ago, TheRealShade said:

Right now without any kind of radar, enemies that get too far from you at spawn seem to stop caring about you.

Yes, that's what I saw also with the enemies while in Prowl.  It was almost like they weren't alerted at all.  Notice I said almost because I still couldn't get stealth kills without using sleep first.  

[5H4DE]

2 hours ago, DatDarkOne said:

Yes, that's what I saw also with the enemies while in Prowl.  It was almost like they weren't alerted at all.  Notice I said almost because I still couldn't get stealth kills without using sleep first.  

Exactly, they know you're around but can't be bothered to also care that you are around unless you pop right into their face, somehow Radar changes that.

[Aazhyd]

Does this effect only happen in survival?

[-AiLuoLi-]

Video or didn't happen. There aren't any hard evidence till this date.

There's also the fact that if you use Ivara + navigator to spy on them, enemies still run towards you WITH or WITHOUT enemy radar. 

[Lost_Cartographer]

The idea is that the game attempts to optimize resources.  "Out of sight, out of mind."  If you suddenly put 40 guys on the radar, the engine has to make them do what the player expects them to do, even if before it was only managing the 15-20 that were in LoS.

But that's just a theory... a game theory.  All we really have to go on is anecdotal evidence, which tends to bias towards what One wishes to believe (placebo effect!) because being wrong on the internet and actually learning something is shameful.

[zombiedeadhead]

People think becuase they can see more enemies, that there are more enemies, and that the thing thats making them visible, is making them spawn.

[xLUONG]

Would be cool if someone did some extensive testing.
Being used to looking at the minimap every so often in other games, Enemy Radar is my most used aura.
But I have also noticed that I rarely have issues with feeding my frame when I do solo survivals. Atleast up to the 1 hour mark.
I always use the same spots on the different tiles and when playing frames without Enemy Radar/Sense I do struggle with life support and often need to use a capsule long before what I'm usually comfortable with.

So I'll keep using Enemy Radar thinking it gives me an added bonus, until someone proves me wrong 😄

Edited October 25, 2018 by xLUONG

[raian78]

Would make sense game wise, active radar would normally alert whoever you ping with it.

[[DE]Momaw]

9 hours ago, DatDarkOne said:

Yes, that's what I saw also with the enemies while in Prowl.  It was almost like they weren't alerted at all.  Notice I said almost because I still couldn't get stealth kills without using sleep first.  

I'm not sure it's a valid test of "enemies cant seem to find me!" if you're permanently invisible. 

[DatDarkOne]

29 minutes ago, Momaw said:

I'm not sure it's a valid test of "enemies cant seem to find me!" if you're permanently invisible. 

That was the point of the test. To see how differently the enemies behaved or rushed the player while invisible with and without enemy radar equipped.  

[Chappie]

5 hours ago, Aazhyd said:

Does this effect only happen in survival?

On the surface it appears yes.   

On low level exterminate runs with a max range radar build seems to help (at least before the recent mainline).   However, exterminate has another odd feature where the NPC's also race to the end.   But again, on the surface it seems to help.   

On defense, it seems to make the rounds go slightly quicker.   I usually press tab after each 5 rounds and check the time.  On maps with bigger areas, it again, seems to slightly help (maybe 30sec-1min per 5 rounds savings).   May not seem like much but it adds up to basically run 10 missions get 1 free in effect.

Interception....not sure since there is another mechanic where the NPC's pick a certain node and just hammer it.   Thus it is hard to figure out unless we would have all 4 people with max enemy radar to see.  However, in this case...the enemies being S#&$ty AI is actually a good thing =P.