Thermia Fracture Mixup - A "Burping" Challenge

[SmilingMad]

The only thing that worries me about this is the fact that currently there is only place where you can get the coolant canisters, and having to fly several hundred meters back and forth to get them from the Temple of Profit every time you want to close a fracture seems clumsy. Maybe Coolant Raknoids could roam near the fractures for easier access to coolant.

[Xolgys]

vor 14 Stunden schrieb dwqrf:

Feels like transforming a mobile defense into an excavation. Problem will be : how and where to find the extra coolant canister for newish players ? Also, i've encountered a lot of new players trying to complete this event, but without an archwing launcher, moving around and finding rift is really hard.

 

 

Maybe having some Coolant Raknoid spawn and stay around the rifts, passively, before the tenno arrives, could be simple and efficient solution.

the archwing issue is something ive read/noticed too and shouldnt be underestimated.

 

[JollyNova]

I had to do much of this solo, due to multiplayer connection issues, so even with the update it would still be slow and tedious for me. I’m a casual player, I don’t go for op builds or do crazy shenanigans. The thought of having to make it harder to get it over with faster just makes me anxious. Where would the extra canisters come from since one person can... lol, only carry one? The way it is now, you’d have to find a fissure you want, Mark it, and then make multiple canister trips and leave them there without plugging them in. I welcome the change of making it faster, but perhaps maybe not make it so hard for forced solo players.

(ANd by that I mean I only have one friend I can stay connected to, they have to be the host, and the ping and lag is pretty bad. Going public there’s an 80% chance of being disconnected and punted to square one. My internet is okay before anyone suggests I get off dial up, it’s considerably better than what most people have. )

[(PSN)ArcAvenger89]

15 hours ago, [DE]Bear said:

Greetings PC Tenno (and Console Tenno who will experience this later!)!

Operation: Buried Debts was introduced 14 days ago, and as part of its initial release, we have been considering changes to mix up the way Thermia Fractures are harvested. Thermia Fractures will be coming back on a roughly bi-weekly basis, but we wanted to add some changes that allow players to determine the challenge and rewards given because the simple root of all feedback about Fractures is: too long and boring.

The general plan is to allow players to spend additional Coolant Canisters to increase the difficulty of that Thermia Fracture, in return for faster completion. When a new Coolant Canister is added, the Fracture will “burp” and cause some interesting new effects, some examples of which are listed below:

• Molten Spider swarm (brand-new look and stats)!
• The next few enemies will be Eximus Units!
• Enemy damage output will increase!

When Thermia Fractures become systemic after the event ends, their role is to give you Diluted Thermia and bring a bit of activity to the Orb Vallis. 

As of the time of this post, the Thermia Fracture Mixup is in development, and we are looking to deploy this change when the technical aspects are solid. We do not want to rush this deployment as any quality problems would continue to negatively impact the limited remainder of the current event.

As with any of our planned changes, we would like to see your thoughts on this new addition to Operation: Buried Debts. Remember to keep your thoughts and feedback constructive, but let us know what you think, or perhaps what kind of “burps” you think would work!
 

Here is my idea on how you guys could make it faster while also letting people choose thier difficulty. You mention using more coolant will increase difficulty and speed up the process but you dont specfic exactly how(like does it shorten time?, hand out more thermia?, etc.). So here is just what happened to pop into my head as I read the post.

 

To start you could let people put up to 4 coolant canisters at once and the fight would get more difficult with new and stronger enimies like was mentioned in the post but here's where my idea kicks in, at the end you would be rewarded either with:

-one canister that would be filled based on the amount used like for example if you use 2 coolant you get 1 canister half full or if you use 4 you get a fully done canister 

OR

-each canister you use would be returned with 1 stage worth of progress meaning you still need to close 4 fractures but depending on how many coolant canister you use at once you could finish the 4 fractures with up to 4 coolant canisters done

 

Now just an extra idea as for how to deal with how long it take to close the fractures based on the current system. It would be cool if you guys used something like what hack and free the fortuna prisoners part of bounties does. As you know in those missions enimies drop data keys that help speed up the hacking and the mission overall. My idea is you could have slightly stronger units spawn throughout the fracture closing that drop a chemical/item that interacts with the coolant something like "coolant enhancer" and this could be pick up and delivered to the coolant so that it can speed up the fracture closure rate.

 

Last thing I agree with the idea that there should be a bounty or misson so you can group up easily with people who want to close fractures especially going forward when the event keeps comes around again and again since not everybody might have need to play it as much as the first time they do. The bounty could show up only when needed(like the cetus ghoul purge bounties) and could act like the Cetus Eidilons bounties, where they aren't so much a specfic mission set by the system but instead a way to group up fast with people trying to do the same thing as you at that moment.

[M4T2E]

vor 11 Stunden schrieb Voltage:

Not everything has to have solo players in mind. If solo players are always a concern, then multiplayer content will always be too easy. If you want to solo and be insanely efficient, you could still do so. Zenistar + Frost + Itzal seems like a good combo to start with. The tools are available, and being solo means you acquire the added difficulty of not having 3 helpers.

This game is mostly for 1-4 players so it should allways have in mind to work for all possible group sizes.
If it's too easy, why not going on with uncommon frames, weak gear and let away some of the "must have" mods, just to increase the difficulty!? The tools are available!

[Rawbeard]

2 hours ago, slotschii said:

wrong they're the only thing DE is interested in...

that was before all the gating of and removal of alerts.

[limernest]

The main reason why people complain that thermia fracture sealing is too long and boring is because there is currently no way for players who are skilled/ better geared/ better coordinated/ better informed to speed progress up.

This was a problem that I thought the devs had solved going from POE to Orb Vallis bounties. Some of the longer POE bounty stages involve standing there waiting for a timer to run down like for the mobile defense or capture the camp stages, and to a smaller extent the drone escort stages. No matter how well you do, the bounty stage is going to take a fixed amount of time to end. On the other hand, most Orb Vallis bounty stages actively reward better players with faster completion times. Exterminate and "collect credits to assassinate", drone hacking etc. all end faster if the players kill stuff quickly. Spy ends quickly if people know the vaults beforehand. Cache ends quickly if players know the right spots to search etc. As players play the bounty stages again and again, they learn how to complete these challenges quickly and efficiently as they progress.

Not so for thermia fracture sealing, which is basically 4 mobile defense stages in a row, each taking 4-5 minutes fixed, and with the datamass spawning in one remote corner of the map. Even with archwing it gets boring really quickly.

While the current suggestions are interesting I suggest the following redesign of the mission to make it more streamlined/ rewarding:

1. Coolant raknoids will spawn on top or near fissures. Killing them will cause them to drop the coolant canister, which can be immediately placed on the fracture. (This cuts out having to run back and forth from the Temple of Profit everytime.)

2. Enemies will spawn as per normal, and the closure will progress as per normal, players will have to defend the canister as per normal.

3. Every time a certain number of enemies are killed (maybe 10-20) a coolant raknoid will spawn and attack the canister. Killing it will cause an additional coolant cell to spawn, bringing the cell to the current fracture will consume the cell and add a flat 10% to the completion meter, similar to a power cell in excavation. (This incentivizes players to actively seek out and kill enemies that spawn instead of waiting for the timer to run out. This also rewards players who are able to defeat enemies quickly with more canisters which can be used either to speed up the current fracture or to use on other fissures, again cutting out the need to run back and forth from the Temple. This should alleviate solo player concerns.)

4. Once the progress is done, the canister is consumed and players get 1 diluted thermia. (I personally feel having to do the same task 4 times to get what amounts to a boss mission key a bit too tedious.)

I hope these suggestions help. DE, if you are planning to make this biweekly like the ghouls you have to make it way faster and way less tedious if you want to avoid burning players out on this event. The double drops during the fractures is really nice and if it's recurring that would be great as well.

[xRufus7x]

16 hours ago, kyori said:

So for solo players, they will have to go all the way back(perhaps) to get another coolant canister, while having the danger of the present one being busted by enemies while the players are away?

Fun fact, if you pick up a container as your frame and then switch to your operator and pick up another one you can use your operator to deposit one and then bring your frame to you and they will be holding another one. Obviously it would slow down getting to the fissures because you can't use kdrives or archwings in operator mode but it is an option if not an ideal one.

[(PSN)Elvenbane]

50 minutes ago, limernest said:

<snip>

This is the best suggestion I've read so far that is pretty compatible with the current fractures...I'd be ok with this.

That said, I don't believe this will ever truly be engaging no matter how much you can speed it up or how varied you make the spawns. It's basically still standing around obliterating stuff that randomly warps in around you.

Personally I'd like to see things turned around, we have enough stand and wait content. Have the Corpus harvesting the fractures. Give them bunkers, big stationary gun turrets, patrolling spiders, etc. You clear the mining operation and drop the canister to immediately close the fissure...anything that doesn't involve a timer...

Why are the Corpus attacking us anyway? Isn't closing these good even if they aren't financially motivated to do it themselves...why do they want to stop us?

* I also liked the map marker suggestion for active fractures to minimize aimless flying...

[tarfeef101]

Some thoughts on the ideas tossed around:
 

1. Not just making the fractures more difficult, but rewarding those who are "better" or "trying harder" with faster completion or better rewards is essential. This sounds like a step in that direction, so that's very nice.
2. Yes, for new and old players, WPs, a bit of fire on your big map, or anything to make finding fractures easier would be nice. Finding them doesn't require skill, just time. That's not fun
3. No, getting an archwing isn't hard. Nor is it a problem if it is. This isn't time limited. It is a recurring event. That's like saying all baro items should be 20 ducats so new players can get his stuff. They can wait til they progress to the point where farming fissures is realistic for em. And they can wait to zip around the map (which honestly the k-drives make pretty fast anyways, and getting an AW isn't much work) with their AW of choice til they get that quest. Honestly, situations like this where people feel that getting some gear that might be locked behind some start chart and/or quest progression would be useful or even essential is good. I see so many players who don't bother going through their star chart, doing their quests, trying to get new frames to adapt to different situations (or even just cause they could be fun). The bigger push we can give them to do more, not less, is good. Because apparently, even though I never had that issue, there isn't enough of a push for people to actually go through the progression in the game. Most people who aren't vets have maybe a couple frames, don't actively try to get through the star chart at all, and ignore quests. Which is basically the opposite of what they should do at the beginning.

[Kimimoto]

On 2019-03-21 at 3:28 PM, [DE]Bear said:

As with any of our planned changes, we would like to see your thoughts on this new addition to Operation: Buried Debts.

What's the point of Thermia past getting the event rewards? Thermia Vendor? Why would anyone ever come back and do this event on a bi-weekly basis? The ghouls are dreaded because past the first few runs you don't really get anything, and those are bounties. At least they give relics and such. 

Basically I'm not looking forward to ANOTHER bi-weekly "tHe gHoUls ArE BacK!", which means nothing to anyone. This would be an excellent way to introduce some content sustainability to the Orb Vallis.

Past the initial grind, there's nothing to do. That's the problem with both open world areas and a big reason why they're not worth the 10 month development investment. 

[bluefish177]

As a user that has already spent over 50 hours farming diluted thermia I feel like I have more diluted thermia then I could ever use. I also feel like if the time it took to get such thermia were reduced it would be a swift kick to those who have ground out the thermia for future used. I see no future use in farming any more thermia as there is currently no use beyond exploiter orb, and after many runs of exploiter orb, I have enough toroids to max rank rank vox 54 times and I still have plenty of thermia left (over 100).

Unless there is introduced other uses for thermia there is no need for more farming and thus the time should remain the same as over time the number of thermia individuals will get is staggering if they casually farm it. Such as the amount of any item in the game that has limited uses, such as articula from bosses. I have more articula then I can fit on my entire ship yet there is nothing to do with the extras. Or other objects such as Vitus essence, I have over 70 essence just sitting waiting for a use. I have already purchased everything from the shop and any more essence earned is just currently either a waste or used for decorations that I can't use as my ship is full.

If there were introduced other uses for thermia such as a thermia shop, then a change could be implemented to please those that have already invested a larger # of hours farming for such thermia. All thermia farmed before the proposed change should be renamed into a special variant of thermia that has 2 or 3 times the purchasing power of all thermia farmed after the change. 

 

 

 

[--RV--ThaPear]

Please add a "Thermos Fracture" bounty so that we can do public thermia fractures. 

[Basalto]

On 2019-03-22 at 2:17 AM, Ely.I said:

If you feel insulted it's your problem not mine. If you think i was advocating for not making anything accessible you're wrong, read again what I said, I'm advocating for content to be a scale of natural progression, let players figure out what they need to make things easier or efficient for themselves because the tools are already provided in game. In short for you to understand saying that not everything needs to be accessible doesn't mean that everything shouldn't be accessible, these are not mutually exclusive, correlation doesn't mean causation etc. Don't reply to me again with strawmans.

I don't think archwing launchers are a bad idea AT ALL, and I doubt DE though about them randomly when they were released basically at the same time as the first large open map, this is not a coincidence. You don't have a single argument on why it's bad, so I assume your point is that you don't like them. Too bad for you, I don't really care.

Solo players are already handicapped on other aspects of the game, I'm mainly a solo player and I accept this, because the game is meant to be played in groups, I accept these disadvantages and move on, because it was me who choose to play solo mostly. I suggest doing the same, move on. On a side note you CAN carry two canisters at once as solo player, I won't feed you and let you figure how to yourself. 

I agree with your last point and only your last point, spawning coolant spiders is a good idea, this doesn't mean the other ideas proposed by bear are bad at all. Again one doesn't exclude the other.

There's no "feeling insulted" here. You actually went ahead and made a condescending remark on someone's intelligence simply because they didn't agree with your point of view, which was hardly anything, to start with. Don't play victim when you're the one who started it. And no, I was not claiming you were absolutely against accessibility of any sort, just that it's immensely stupid to deny players something they met within the first hours of playing, right on the second planet (or even the first one, if you count having to travel the Plains with archwing, but having no launcher). New players should have access to the content they need to do missions properly in the first planets. Starting a game and already feeling like you're way behind even in the beginner places is absolutely not an indicator of a good new player experience, and I say that as someone who had to craft that launcher garbage after going back, because for some reason my orbiter has such things, but I myself don't. It doesn't make sense and it's not even named as some sort of "gravitational upgrade" to make archwing work on non-zero-gravity environments. Your "too bad" and "I don't care" attitude once again remind me of why I stopped coming to this place; meeting people like you is quite detrimental to the discussions that a forum should provide, and instead people can be greeted by a childish attitude that resembles that of an angsty teenager.

The game is meant to be played in groups, yet the very design of the game allows the player to become a one man army and also encourages players to rush around, ignoring teammates and having everyone do their own thing in some sort of hybrid group solo, where it's almost as if you were playing solo, but have people you can yell at or get yelled by. The idea that the game is meant to be played in groups hardly feels true. I'd say it's meant to be played with an individualist mentality, independent of solo or group play. Hell, that's why people play Rhino and don't roar, or Mesa and don't use shooting gallery; they usually don't care about even buffing their team. And unfortunately your condescending side note won't work; someone else already mentioned how in the thread, and it's one of the most absurd and illogical things I've seen in this game. It's not something to be figured out, unless the player is actively exploiting the game's bugged mechanics, of which there are more than enough.

[Darkvramp]

On 2019-03-22 at 4:41 AM, Xydeth said:

the archwing issue is something ive read/noticed too and shouldnt be underestimated.

 

make the coolant heavy, so that you need to use a kdrive to transport it... people would hate it but its a solution to this......

it would also add an additional element, where you need to escort the coolant to the location, creating small roles, easily understood tactics, and facilitate the creation of new enemies that chase you on the roads.

[Deshiel]

Please include thermia themed ephemera as a possible reward

[Hiiamwilliam]

The biggest problem I had with this event was the random spawn of fractures. Sometimes, fractures spawn at the side of a road, which means Coildrives frequently appear, shooting with those already high damage canons, and now they're gonna do even more damage? Other times, dropships fail to deliver enemies close to the fracture, which means there's hardly anyone to shoot while waiting for the timer. And not considering when the closest one spawns more than 1600 m away.

I think that having a general direction of where to go to find them would be much more helpful to begin with. And by general direction I mean, Corpus bases. We could capture those to have a limited supply of Coolant Canisters (instead of always having to go to the Temple of Profit). This could even generate fractures specifically for a bounty.

Assuming that now we can more reliably find them. I still think that having more enemies, Eximus or spiders may not help much: of course we would have to be more careful, but we probably have enough firepower to dispatch those new enemies, and thus nothing game changing was added. Everyone dies in a few seconds and we wait for a timer. However, if you guys raise the difficulty so much that it becomes a hassle, I might not even want to try, because it's not fun to keep dying. Back to square one.

Considering this situation, I think the most impactful "burp" would be to move the fracture to somewhere close, not abruptly, after a while. Show a very clear sign that the current spot will close and we'll need to reallocate the canister to the new spot in order to finish the extraction. Hint where the new spot is. Restarting the extraction process would trigger a side effect: the fracture is recent and will randomly create high damage fire pillars in a given radius. Hint that fire pillars will be created, like the laser pillars from Gantulyst, don't make them like Ember's World on Fire (no one needs to be instakilled in Vallis). This way we would have to be constantly on guard to not get caught by a predictable, momentaneous mission tied event, valuing our movement abilities while still doing the main mission itself (defend the canister).

On top of that, if you really want to put more enemies, go ahead - I'm trying to say that we don't need more of them to have a fun, engaging experience. 

[Xolgys]

vor 10 Stunden schrieb Darkvramp:

make the coolant heavy, so that you need to use a kdrive to transport it... people would hate it but its a solution to this......

it would also add an additional element, where you need to escort the coolant to the location, creating small roles, easily understood tactics, and facilitate the creation of new enemies that chase you on the roads.

its not a solution, it makes the situation worse which is hardly ever a solution.

[Loza03]

6 hours ago, Hiiamwilliam said:

The biggest problem I had with this event was the random spawn of fractures. Sometimes, fractures spawn at the side of a road, which means Coildrives frequently appear, shooting with those already high damage canons, and now they're gonna do even more damage? Other times, dropships fail to deliver enemies close to the fracture, which means there's hardly anyone to shoot while waiting for the timer. And not considering when the closest one spawns more than 1600 m away.

I think that having a general direction of where to go to find them would be much more helpful to begin with. And by general direction I mean, Corpus bases. We could capture those to have a limited supply of Coolant Canisters (instead of always having to go to the Temple of Profit). This could even generate fractures specifically for a bounty.

Assuming that now we can more reliably find them. I still think that having more enemies, Eximus or spiders may not help much: of course we would have to be more careful, but we probably have enough firepower to dispatch those new enemies, and thus nothing game changing was added. Everyone dies in a few seconds and we wait for a timer. However, if you guys raise the difficulty so much that it becomes a hassle, I might not even want to try, because it's not fun to keep dying. Back to square one.

Considering this situation, I think the most impactful "burp" would be to move the fracture to somewhere close, not abruptly, after a while. Show a very clear sign that the current spot will close and we'll need to reallocate the canister to the new spot in order to finish the extraction. Hint where the new spot is. Restarting the extraction process would trigger a side effect: the fracture is recent and will randomly create high damage fire pillars in a given radius. Hint that fire pillars will be created, like the laser pillars from Gantulyst, don't make them like Ember's World on Fire (no one needs to be instakilled in Vallis). This way we would have to be constantly on guard to not get caught by a predictable, momentaneous mission tied event, valuing our movement abilities while still doing the main mission itself (defend the canister).

On top of that, if you really want to put more enemies, go ahead - I'm trying to say that we don't need more of them to have a fun, engaging experience. 

I disagree. Whilst it does make it more irritating to find them (perhaps some kind of radar or indicator of location), Thermia Spawn locations are one of the best parts of the event to me since there's far more places to fight on. Orb Vallis, for how large and how many bases there are, has almost nowhere where missions are available. I'd wager it has fewer than Plains of Eidolon, which is crazy. There was also way more variety in terrain in combat areas. All of the bases and most of the locations you fight in for bounties are flat. PoE actually had hills and high ground for you and the enemies.

Thermia Fractures actually take me to different locations that have different terrain. Valleys that limit the direction enemies come in, areas by roads that increase enemy spawns. Different fracture spawns actually have different tactics associated with them. If the actual process were more interesting (which, hopefully, this update will provide), they'd honestly be the best activity on the Vallis in my opinion. If I have to go to Central Maintainance one more time I'm going to scream.

[Darkvramp]

7 hours ago, Xydeth said:

its not a solution, it makes the situation worse which is hardly ever a solution.

no, it's a solution it doesn't make the situation worse, it adds to the experience by adding to the gameplay, everyone gets a kdrive, not everyone has an archwing. like I said, People will hate it, like you do.

 

[Vomitous]

On 2019-03-21 at 4:12 PM, BlindStalker said:

Just curious, how will this work solo? Or is it not even planned with solo approach in mind?

I mostly ran the thermia fractures solo or with friends (off-meta frame picks if solo), so I'm just curious if solo will exist? And if so, how much the difficulty scaling will be to force a certain setup? Or will there be considerations for other ways to play instead of conventional? Speeding it up will be optional? Just curious.

The writing for 'Solo mode' has been on the wall since they launched Plains and did away with pausing, then added 'group' bosses that are ridiculously inefficient to solo.

[Xolgys]

vor 2 Stunden schrieb Darkvramp:

no, it's a solution it doesn't make the situation worse, it adds to the experience by adding to the gameplay, everyone gets a kdrive, not everyone has an arching. like I said, People will hate it, like you do.

 

so, tediously driving through the plains searching for them rifts is improvement to u ? u will require at least twice the time to do them rifts and thats if u ignore the fact that searching is much more annoying. it adds to the experience, yes, something very negative.

[TARINunit9]

On 2019-03-21 at 12:37 PM, Rawbeard said:

those are not a thing DE is interested in, sorry.

The rest of the forums would tell me that new players are the ONLY thing DE is interested in

[Darkvramp]

2 hours ago, Xydeth said:

so, tediously driving through the plains searching for them rifts is improvement to u ? u will require at least twice the time to do them rifts and thats if u ignore the fact that searching is much more annoying. it adds to the experience, yes, something very negative.

not if they upped the reward thermia at the end, so you spend more time on the plains but get rewarded with possibly a new mod set from the  new enemies, it makes kdrives a focus and makes you want to go grind them for once rather than have them be this arbitrary thing that "happens" to be in the game, and it changes the loop, which to be honest, im all for any change in the current loop, cuz that loop is dull AF

[Hiiamwilliam]

9 hours ago, Loza03 said:

I disagree. Whilst it does make it more irritating to find them (perhaps some kind of radar or indicator of location), Thermia Spawn locations are one of the best parts of the event to me since there's far more places to fight on.

I didn't mean to restrict fractures spawnpoints exclusively to bases. I meant we could capture them to allow a fracture-specific bounty, which would spawn fractures in varied places (precisely considering varied terrain) at 600, 800 m away from the captured base - but being a bounty, they would be properly waypointed. In this case, it's good that we don't have many bases, because then each base benefits from a wide range of terrain to spawn fractures.

And while this would help fixing the random spawn problem, it would also give a use to those bases in an interesting, optional way. The fact that there are less bases than PoE is not a problem. The problem is that none of them offer anything interesting gameplay wise that justifies their existence.

I disagree that different fractures have different tactics. The most generic and simplistic tactic to any fracture has only two requirements:

1) Canister's health must not reach zero and

2) You must not fail the mission due to being out of revives.

If you sucessfully apply this tactic, you'll notice that "variety of terrain" doesn't affect the result, it still has the same straightforward approach.

That's why I suggested something that reacts mechanically different. That's how it gets interesting to me. Adding more enemies and more damage will make things more difficult yes but will it make things less boring? I don't think so.