Are "Mastery Rank Tests" there to make players leave the game?

[(PSN)idsie]

1 hour ago, Genesix6 said:

Glaive and Redeemer have limited range + if the enemy is behind a poll you won't be able to hit, they're bit faster 

while exodia contagion is AoE, a bit slow, instead of limited range, you throw it in a arch, and usually depending on how high you are

Hence I'd rather use a Glaive. So much more fun than cheesing it. 

[nslay]

Well, coming from Diablo 3, the MR ranks appear to be more prestigious and indicative of skill than experience-based leveling schemes. Nobody looks at a level 70 or paragon level 3000 (also an experience-based scheme) Diablo 3 player and automatically thinks of the player as really good or skilled at Diablo 3 (more like having to much time!)! So my guess is that DE makes these tests somewhat difficult and also time gates them to inflate their perceived prestige by other players. Indeed, even if the tests have nothing to do with ordinary game play, they still require somewhat of a brain and a little skill as compared to grinding experience!

My advice? Practice the next MR test at least once per day (even if you're not close to the next MR!). Qualify for a tricky test only if you can pass the practice test 5 times in a row (5 is a "nice" number I picked, you pick the number). And NEVER look at youtube players. Looking at youtube players is like the guitar tutorial in this humorous ATHF clip!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFHSzuXADPA

I watched the MR 8 tests on youtube and tried to do those fancy fluid and continuous maneuvers without mistakes. I almost never passed the MR 8 practice test trying to do it like the fancy youtube Warframe players. Instead, I just became aware of the exact key sequence (as opposed to muscle memory) for bullet jump, walked up like one might a diving board, used landmarks to measure the jump and pressed the bullet jump key sequence. I never failed the practice test afterward! I passed MR 8 practice test in the most slow and lame way, but it worked. And I used Rhino... not even Zephyr (didn't know about Zephyr). It's the same with MR 9 test... the youtube Warframe players are flying over enemies, jumping all around, aim gliding, without anyone noticing. I just observed the marching patterns of the squads and hid on the top of pillars only jumping down when I knew it was safe (need to aim glide as you fall because they can hear you land otherwise, or just use Zephyr). So basically, never use youtube for MR tests is my last piece of advice...

That said, when trying to solo the Teralyst at low MR, all the high radiation/puncture damage weapons are MR 10 or higher (Opticor, for example, is MR 14). Being stuck in low MR really limits your options for solo Teralyst fighting! I was able to get all 4 joints solo with Lex Prime mod'd with crit and radiation damage though (but ran out of time killing the Teralyst itself!). So for all the prestige MR has, it is very annoying when trying to fight the Teralyst (even in groups) since most low MR weapons barely scratch the joints.

[Mr.SpookSpook]

They are here to purge the weak.

[CPT_deBauch]

13 hours ago, SgtHotPepper said:

It's true but i know that before even playing it. And im a pretty new to this game.

Warframe is a wikigame.

 

You know that some mods add a pourcentage multiplying a base pourcentage and others add a flat number ?

Do you know that some location are far more reliable to drop some stuff that others ?

Do you know that the damage outpout is no the reflection of the numbers in game but the mods combinations and much of these combos are not intuitive ?

Etc. ...

Warframe have layers and layers of complexity.

You can feel that this can be very hostile but personnaly i enjoy it.

It's the complexity of the game that make me stay because the animespaceninjajumpingepilepticeverywhere aspect make me first hesitate a lot.

 

Yeah DE can just add a help pop-up to every fonction but we barely see ours Warframes anymore 🙂

 

Another positive aspect is the community created by the need to search informations, to share tips and to communicate.

I played many others games and i think that the Warframe community are far much less toxic because players need each others. And many veterans enjoy helping newbies.

 

Or maybe im just a generation who played games that implies to read a 100 sheet manual before push the start button....

Well, I am of that generation of players who reads the actual F-86F Pilot's Manual (that's 273 pages IIRC) before playing the F-86 in DCS and actually enjoys it.
The difference is: things in F86 manual are logical and make sense, while things in Warframe mostly aren't/don't.

The first few days I played Warframe I had it running in one window and Google search (with 20-30 tabs) opened in another.
While learning the game this way could be done, and could be somewhat fun - this is bad game design. Good game design is when a player learns to play the game by playing the game (that doesn't necessarily means that the game should be simple or "lead a player by hand").

 

20 hours ago, so_many_watermelons said:

It's called using your eyeballs and/or exploring. You may not notice it immediately within your first couple of MRs, but you have to deal with Simaris eventually and if you can't be bothered to look through this brand new room to you when first walk into it, let alone simply looking to your right when you enter, that's on you. You don't have to google things to figure it out. It isn't some hidden mechanic, it's pretty clearly there.

That back room at Simaris' was the only place at the relay I didn't bother to go in.
I didn't even think there is "physical" representation of MRT in game, because the fact that the test is activated through the esc-menu and the look of the test itself made me think it's purely VR experience for player character. And that small tooltip thingie which 99.9% of players won't notice until being pointed to is where it is exactly to be used as an excuse for bad game design.

 

15 hours ago, rastaban75 said:

Mastery Rank tests are a rough equivalent of stage boss fights. In many games, in order to progress, you go through a boss which is usually some sort of fight/challenge that is supposedly there to test your abilities, your "build" and your thus far knowledge of the game and its mechanics. Sometimes these challenges force you to think in a way you haven't done before, too.

Am I fond of MR tests? Not really, but I don't hate them either and in a sense I'm glad that they exist to force us try different things outside of comfort zones. They are also in agreement with the vague lore type of thing in that we are "ninjas" and gain mastery and higher ranks through tests. In many martial art movies etc. the character often learns and "levels up" through different tasks set by a teacher/master, and in many cases these seem inane or irrelevant. I see a certain analogy here.

The 24-hour requirement is hated by lots of people, but the case is always that you immediately forget about it when you pass the test. The game doesn't punish you by not allowing you to get MR points, either. Your progression till the next rank is there.

This is true, but a boss fight is fun because it's a fight, jumping around some platforms with the perspective of being locked out of new content for 24 hrs (if you don't jump the way the devs want you to jump) - not so much.
I'm not against the test being there, it's just the test requiring you to do things you never did and never will be doing in actual game (I for one found out that my keybindings are poorly suited to complete MRT8, while being very comfortable in all other situations I encountered while playing the game), and also I don't understand why having 24 hrs cooldown on test failure.

[Methanoid]

mastery tests are just time gates like all new stuff added to the game since like junctions, daily standing limits, quest mastery requirements, etc etc.  In their original concept they were the only thing that gave mastery rank any relevance, the game was a lot more open at the beginning and we pretty much finished up in quick time so this is why we retain and aquire more time gates and always will to ensure content last a bit longer, moreso now that their development time increases because they have a fetish for making big boring static maps like every other game out there rather than enhancing their original lego map system that made them stand out from their competition...

[angias]

They could decrease the reset time to 1 hour instead of 24.

[Lutesque]

8 hours ago, (XB1)Skiller115 said:

Well go hop on the Anthem train but don't worry after EA suck your wallet dry you'll be back here complaining about a game you still play lol

I have no desire to play Anthem...

I never hopped on the "Warframe is better than destiny train" and im not going to hop on the "Anthem is better than Warframe". 

[FlusteredFerret]

13 hours ago, (XB1)Skiller115 said:

If you go to a relay you can go to Simaris you can practice the mastery tests before actually doing them so you don't have to wait 24 hours for it. MR 9 test was the hardest for me because I had no stealth frames at the time. I failed it a few times myself.

Yeah, I needed a few practice runs before I figured out a way through.

Ended up using my Orvius to take out the targets at range, before they spotted me. 

[WhiteMarker]

13 hours ago, CPT_deBauch said:

The thing is: mastery rank tests require you to do things that have nothing to do with being good at the game.

I mean... Mastery Rank Tests are part of the game. So being good at the tests means you are good at a part of the game.
There is that...
And you not using mechanics from the tests doesn't make the tests have nothing to do with actual gameplay.
Going by your first post, you don't like parcour or stealth. Does that mean, both things have nothing to do with the game? No, both things are a big part of the game. You just don't like these parts. That's all there is to it.

[(PSN)guzmantt1977]

14 hours ago, CPT_deBauch said:

I've found out about that too, but only after some googling and warframe-wiki reading. There is no information about this feature in game. There are lots of things in this game you can only know about if you googled for them specifically, which makes the game extremely hostile for new players.

Next time you are going to do the test, pay attention to the screen that comes up, instead of just rushing to confirm. It tells you each and every single time that you can practice at the relay.

Every. Single. Time. 

 

Just think. If you managed to miss that repeatedly, what other parts of the game have you skipped over? 

[angias]

il y a 21 minutes, (PS4)guzmantt1977 a dit :

 

Just think. If you managed to miss that repeatedly, what other parts of the game have you skipped over? 

Probably having completed the few first in the first try, assuming that mechanic aren't explained ingame and the fact that it was added fairly recently. (1 year or so)

 

The only test i have "praticed" for, was the operator one. Can't remember if i even failed that one.

The one i have failed repeatedly was the one with wall running where you had to shoot target to make the next platform apear, it was in parcours 1.0 before we could pratice those test.

 

....would be great if we get parcours 1.0 back.

Edited January 31, 2019 by angias

[angias]

il y a 15 minutes, angias a dit :

Probably having completed the few first in the first try, assuming that mechanic aren't explained ingame and the fact that it was added fairly recently. (1 year or so) (also talking about the pratice hint)

 

The only test i have "praticed" for, was the operator one. Can't remember if i even failed that one.

The one i have failed repeatedly was the one with wall running where you had to shoot target to make the next platform apear, it was in parcours 1.0 before we could pratice those test.

 

....would be great if we get parcours 1.0 back.

 

[(XBOX)Knight Raime]

Yes.

[(XBOX)zThulsaDoomz]

Remember, we're laughing at you, not with you....

[NamelessWF]

Personally, I think Mastery tests are good. I started playing bout a month ago or so, and forcing myself to do mastery test practices until I could clear them definitely helped me improve - I got better at stealth, I got better at manuvering with jumping, etc.

[CPT_deBauch]

18 minutes ago, (XB1)Thy Divinity said:

Remember, we're laughing at you, not with you....

In Russian there's a saying: "Cмех без причины - признак дурачины". It seems quite fitting in your case (and the others like you).

[(PSN)guzmantt1977]

3 minutes ago, CPT_deBauch said:

In Russian there's a saying: "Cмех без причины - признак дурачины". It seems quite fitting in your case (and the others like you).

What's the saying for when we have a reason? 

[Thaelyn2]

16 hours ago, CPT_deBauch said:

I'm not crying (and I didn't cry "nerf" anywhere), I'm genuinely curious about what the devs want to achieve with this gameplay element. I fail to see anything positive about it so far.

 

The devs intent seems pretty clear to me. Mastery tests are there to force you to learn the systems of the game and to encourage you to master the tools the game gives you. There may be tools the game gives you that you don’t enjoy using, but it’s still better (IMO) for the game to ask you to learn to use the tools at your disposal than to ignore them alongside you. 

[EmberStar]

19 hours ago, MagPrime said:

It's part of the progression system.  It's also supposed to test what you've learned about the game and push you to learn more.

The problem is that many of the tests are stupid, arbitrary, poorly designed, and "teach" you to overcome a test that has *NOTHING* to do with anything you'll ever encounter in actual gameplay.  (I.e, they force you to check the wiki and look up the best build for cheesing them and trivializing the idiotic "test.")  The newest, highest rank tests are especially egregious.  The "movement" test between Rank 22 and 23 forces you to "capture" a bunch of rapidly moving objectives.  The targets are completely static, not even changing facing to indicate which direction they're going to move next at a corner.  Limbo trivializes the Grineer hall trash (except for the Manics, which can pounce you even inside the rift.)  But you still basically have to do it over and over until you memorize their movement pattern.  In an environment with no landmarks or good points of reference.  The best part is, this test has NOTHING to do with ANYTHING you'll encounter anywhere else in the game.  There isn't a single mission type that works like this.  NOT.  ONE.

[Joe_Barbarian]

9 hours ago, CPT_deBauch said:

Well, I am of that generation of players who reads the actual F-86F Pilot's Manual (that's 273 pages IIRC) before playing the F-86 in DCS and actually enjoys it.
The difference is: things in F86 manual are logical and make sense, while things in Warframe mostly aren't/don't.

 

9 hours ago, CPT_deBauch said:

That back room at Simaris' was the only place at the relay I didn't bother to go in.

So ... you'd read 273 pages of a manual but you didn't want to go check out a room in the relay ... right ...

[(PSN)Elvenbane]

3 hours ago, EmberStar said:

There isn't a single mission type that works like this.  NOT.  ONE.

I'm pretty sure those targets you chase use the same "AI" as the sortie defense operative. 🙂

[(NSW)Evilpricetag]

13 hours ago, (PS4)idsie said:

Be a good boy and use a glaive, a lot more fun. Or the redeemer. Any frame is a stealth frame of you don't get seen

Except Khora, Vaneri will instantly fail the spy Mastery tests. 

[rune_me]

The Mastery Rank tests teaches you the most important thing you need to learn about Warframe: that no matter how difficult or frustrating something can seem, with the right build and setup there's nothing in the game that can't be easily cheesed.

[(XBOX)SilverSurferGuy]

Then you have not mastered the lesson little grasshopper -.- 

[(NSW)ForTheGhostsWithin]

I think the problem of MR tests is the lack of explanation. They are not teaching anything, just throw a test on you. Of cource you can practice anytime you want, but still think it needs something like a lesson before tests, like in real life tests. Just showing a text description of procedure might help much. Or just put a link to the wiki.

Saying "git gud" and laughing at someone will never make the community better. I always do it in Dark Souls community because of tradition, but Warframe is not Dark Souls.