Can true difficulty exist in a game like Warframe?

[KingBBQChicken]

Honestly this topic is unavoidable for anyone joining the warframe community. It seems like people have been begging for difficulty for several years, but every time major content is released, people haven't found it fun/challenging. Im sorry if this post derails from a reasonable discussion to a rant, but im genuinely curious.

I started playing this game on xbox around march of last year. I eventually got myself a pc and had to restart it from the beginning and let me just say, this game was actually very challenging. Believe it or not, going into either of the open worlds with your krakarak and your mk1 lato is challenging and quite enjoyable. I didnt have my comfort mods like healing return and i couldnt press 5 every time a Sanguine-Ancient-Bombard-bursa-prime-crewman-Eximus-Prime decided to join the mix. No arcane guardian, no health pizzas, no energy pizzas, nothing. So if I liked this so much then why not grab an unmodded lex and jump into a tridolon? Thats some fun and challenging difficulty right?

You all already know how this game works but let me explain to you from my perspective. Warframe takes a sort of rock paper scissors approach to damage. This isnt new and many other games have a similar system. You have Magic resist? I have Magic pen. You have armor? I have a .50 cal. You have rock? I have paper. The list goes on. Whats special about warframe's (and a small portion of other game's) damage system is a bit like this: you have Scissors? Oh but I have rock... and corrosive projection... and Arcanes... and the scissors are slash based.... and radiation... and vex armo- ok you get the point. What happens now is DE must implement things such as the wolf's absurd armor or the eidolon's untargetability just so they can have some inkling of challenge. When they dont, the entire community laughs at it as it eats 60 corrosive procs in 0.1 seconds.

Next ... is this games unique balance philosophy. Warframe was my first and only looter shooter so I cant compare it to any other games of its genre. Anyways, the balance philosophy in most other non pvp shooters is simple: you can be powerful, you just cant be TOO powerful. Warframe completely throws this out the window. And as much as we meme about it, its kinda true. Hey, grineer lancer #4534692 over there bothering you? Press a button to kill him. Ya know what , just wipe the entire map while your at it. Im not against this at all, Its actually one of my favorite playstyles in this game but.. it can prove to be problematic when new content comes out. 

• Arbitration, a game mode that was supposed to be elite just turned into catchmoon simulator 2019
• Exploiter might as well have been an energy drain sortie because bringing any ability dependent frame was utterly pointless
• The Wolf Shows up in your hydron and ingests enough lead to build the entirety of new York on the moon
• Wasn't around for raids so I wont even attempt to bash them
• I hope you dont like using your eyes because the guantalyst and hydrolysts make flahsbangs look like some kind of weak joke

And finally, this is a grind-based game. The other day I finally got Wise Razor while doing thermia fractures. I was using an Octavia who notably, dosent have much to offer in terms of survivability. I had already died 3 times and my team wanted to attempt one last fracture before extracting. I went to grab another coolant raknoid and CONVENIENTLY my stealth ends. Exploiter proceeds to one shot me before I can grab my archwing and escape. Thats the thing about warframe. When a challenge is present, It puts your potential rewards at risk and ... well you've seen all the threads complaining about host migrations in 1 hour kuva survivals. 

And so this brings me to the title. Can we actually have true difficulty in a game like warframe? And when I say true difficulty, I dont mean borderline invulnerability. It seems to me like every time it's been implemented its just doomed to join the rest as "meh, easily cheesable".

[YazMatazO]

Once you have enough of all the mesas and saryns, and whatnot, you can look at those less... hmm, 'meta' frames and build something that is more active than your regular press button, clear maps. *Gulp*, you then start having fun with the game... who knew. 

As far as difficulty goes, the game can actually be quite hard for newcomers. Not everybody watches youtube to get all the info in advance. Now, I am not saying that we don't need proper end game in WF, but considering how the community likes to react to changes in general, I think it will take either considerable effort on part of the developer, or no effort at all, in which case we never will get the fabled end game. On the other hand, there's the Wolf, who really isn't a very interactive guy to fight. It's actually good that in the same time the community is giving that constructive criticism freely.

But also consider something else--I make a party for toroid farm, and a guy sends me a whisper offering his Mesa to join. I ask him if he has any other frames available, he says it's not meta. He literally said my Hydroid is obsolete. This is what those easy push buttons skills do to people ^_^. You want an endgame that is viable for that guy?! I'd rather not.

It's very possible to have end game, but considering what systems WF uses - a blend of RPG and shooter mechanics, it will need to be just so. Just think about how potent Trin is in the realm of support characters in RPGs in general(they have shot themselves in the foot a little there). Additionally, not only will DE need to sweat for that, but also the players, too, because it is very likely that the regular push-button-clear-maps won't work in those scenarios. 

 

[Mainabi]

yes, give fights/bosses a more scripted feeling, imagine an mmorpg raidboss with bullethell

the exploiter is a good start, but having telegraphs (maybe normal with telegraphs while hardmode is invisible)

less bullS#&$ mechanics like invul with 1ms open timeframes, or ancients/grineer pully pully sticky face to floor mechanics, or ignore all warframe abilities.

 

the good thing about the exploiter was also the arena/size was big enough to have fun bulletjumping and moving around, having to fight anything in tight spaces isn't fun if you're getting stuck in any little corner and if you have to stay too long at the same spot.

[krc473]

14 minutes ago, KingBBQChicken said:

Can we actually have true difficulty in a game like warframe?

In a game like Warframe? Yes. Many games are like Warframe and have difficulty. Although, I have no idea what you consider ‘true difficulty’. I do not think what I would consider difficulty to work that well in Warframe. Most of the difficulty in Warframe is around lack of understanding/knowledge. Raids as an example: if you knew what you were doing, they were just as easy as a Mercury capture mission (just longer); if you didn’t, they were nightmarishly difficult. But that’s not difficulty, that is ‘learning curve’.

 

I don’t find any content in Warframe particularly challenging (played for years, MR26), but I won’t pretend that is the same for everyone. The way everything is set up just does not seem to allow genuine difficulty (in my opinion).

[Loza03]

Yes. Given some of DE's actions, I wouldn't even be surprised if this is part of their ideal. See: Wolf, Eidolons, Arbitrations, ESO, Nightmare Missions, Stalker... the list goes on. DE have been trying to add difficulty for donkeys years.

Problem is, they're trying to deal with two bits of technical debt at the same time. The broken enemy systems and broken damage systems. No - we aren't too powerful. Or, at least, we're not in theory. The problem is, damage, on both player and enemy sides, is borked. Enemies have ludicrous armour and damage scaling. Problem is, player power has gone up to deal with both, and most problematically the former. Since Corpus and Infested by and large don't have armour, their EHP scaling is pretty much what the game was initially intended to be. Then you got the Grineer with orders of magnitude more bulk. And since you have to balance around the highest common demominator lest there be a whole faction unfightable... players have gotten ways to deal with armour in terms of raw DPS over the years. Now, Corpus and Infested are worthless due to complete lack of survivability, as are any levels of Grineer below, like, 100.

Now, add on top that all enemies are vulnerable to all abilities, as opposed to some having even partial resistance to abilties - even on some kind of case-by-case basis where different enemies were resistant to different individual abilities, alongside AI that's gone unupdated for 6 years, you wind up with a very limited amount of combat situations. Those being - enemy rushes you and either fires off an ability (regardless of usefulness) or attacks. Maybe occasionally hides behind cover if they feel like it. There's no 'Oh S***' moments where you're put on the backpedal unless a nully comes up, because abilities are all-or-nothing. Either all abilities are godly, or all abilities are useless.

[Phatose]

Can true difficulty exist in a game with a business model like Warframe has, where broad accessibility is crucial to making money?  Only for the absolute worst players imaginable. 

Not really relevant though, since nobody actually wants actual difficulty.  What they want is the illusion of difficulty, to allow them to feel like they've earned their success, while still being easy enough that they personally can accomplish it.  Give a player actual difficulty, something that they personally can't accomplish?  Watch the playerbase raise hell. 

[Lost_Cartographer]

Warframe can have difficulty... but players tend not to like losing.  If they can beat it and people whine, those people need to git gud.  If they can't beat it and a fair number of people are whining, then it is not true difficulty, just cheap.

Now, Warframe can have proper difficulty with its borked damage (though that should really be reigned in considerably) but a large part of Warframe's difficulty problem is in ability spam.  Hard to challenge the player when with the press of a button they can virtually disable all enemy AI.  If we had to rely near solely on blue orbs to power our abilities, things would be a lot less spammy than they are now, and we would probably think level 60 is tough simply because there will always be a gap where the enemy can at least get in a few pot shots.  Anymore, I think DE is desperately trying to counter ability spam by resorting to any means besides resorting to cool downs.  And well, between you and me, I'd rather be able to use a CC every 30 seconds on the exploiter orb's hell spawn than never at all.

I mean, infinite scaling at the end of the day is intended to beat the player, that's just common sense.  I'm not sure what the point of going hours into an endless is anymore except cheap radiant relics, but that's the point of endless scaling, so armor values exploding isn't really an issue.  Health will get to a similar point anyway, just much, much later.  But raw scaling overall is too severe to be practical.  The range of firepower we have, need, and have to deal with is so extreme in its variance it's virtually impossible to balance around statistics. because what's designed to be killed in two dozen rounds from the Braton Prime will be minced several times over with a single shot from some other weapons and vaporize everything in the 5m surrounding the target on top of that.  Meanwhile, some frames can't take two shots from a target that spews lead at 1000rpm, while another frame will eat 400x that amount and ask for more.

So at best, if DE doesn't want to touch energy income or ability spam directly, and they can't just up and overhaul the statistical side of the game overnight, they'll have to explore pseudo power/damage immunities in enemies.  Preferably it wouldn't be a all-or-nothing deal and they'd get clever, like Grineer actually wearing armor we could plink off that protects them from some ability types and AoE damage, requiring direct hits to expose their health to actual damage.  However, this kind of approach and giving AI abilities and complex AI to make use of those abilities can quickly bog down weaker machines, especially in a horde shooter.  They'd have to reduce overall enemy presence and increase individual staying power to justify more complicated enemy forms... which also isn't an overnight process.

I do not envy their position right now.

Edited May 1, 2019 by Lost_Cartographer

[bibmobello]

Now arbiter difficulty scales normally. Watch how many level 26+ die before 50 minutes during survivals.

They should only add an option to start from higher level.

Edited May 1, 2019 by bibmobello

[jfhsanseiIII]

2 hours ago, Jun-Mai said:

yes, give fights/bosses a more scripted feeling, imagine an mmorpg raidboss with bullethell

the exploiter is a good start, but having telegraphs (maybe normal with telegraphs while hardmode is invisible)

less bullS#&$ mechanics like invul with 1ms open timeframes, or ancients/grineer pully pully sticky face to floor mechanics, or ignore all warframe abilities.

 

the good thing about the exploiter was also the arena/size was big enough to have fun bulletjumping and moving around, having to fight anything in tight spaces isn't fun if you're getting stuck in any little corner and if you have to stay too long at the same spot.

I’ve been suggesting this for ages.  DE just needs to look at MMO’s that've had popular raids and look at the kinds of mechanics involved in them, and tailor them to Warframe and their audience.  The ones they put out before were convoluted and genuinely unfun (totally my opinion and I’m not berating you if you loved them) for people. 

Give raids that:

-have fun bosses to fight that require some mechanics that require players to pay attention and follow along.  Doing a series of puzzles while everyone else fights sucks.  Shooting up a boss while trying to avoid missile strikes and an AoE weapon is fun.  

-create rewards that can only be obtained in the raid but are desirable by everyone and not just min makers.  

-make certain builds necessary for the fight. You have to have a certain amount of armor, cold, or heat bonus.  

-make additional raids require items, equipment, etc necessary for future raids.

 

These are just some some elements that can help players feel like they’re progressing through the game and not just doing the next step in farming.  Also to keep the game vibrant they need to make ALL farmable resources relevant all of the time.   

[XenMaster]

Yes, if it revamp every system including AI.

[Lutesque]

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

Believe it or not, going into either of the open worlds with your krakarak and your mk1 lato is challenging and quite enjoyable. I didnt have my comfort mods like healing return and i couldnt press 5 every time a Sanguine-Ancient-Bombard-bursa-prime-crewman-Eximus-Prime decided to join the mix. No arcane guardian, no health pizzas, no energy pizzas, nothing. So if I liked this so much then why not grab an unmodded lex and jump into a tridolon? Thats some fun and challenging difficulty right?

Technically.... yes. But this is obviously difficulty done wrong which is why most players can't be bothered to Intentionally Hamstring themselves with S#&$ty gear just to make it take longer to kill tanky enemies...

Its pretty obvious just from playing that you're not suppose to be Running around with MK-1 Weapons. And Modless Warframes...

But for any Dark Souls trie hards out there you are more than welcome to go for it.... you only prove how much Free Time you have not how difficult the game is.

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

 When they dont, the entire community laughs at it as it eats 60 corrosive procs in 0.1 seconds.

Tigris Prime for the win !!!

Okay you know what really bugs me ? Its this.

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

You all already know how this game works but let me explain to you from my perspective. Warframe takes a sort of rock paper scissors approach to damage. This isnt new and many other games have a similar system. You have Magic resist? I have Magic pen. You have armor? I have a .50 cal. You have rock? I have paper. The list goes on

Why does Everysingle RPG do this ? So Far war frame is biggest offender of this "Use This Element" against this specific enemy type bull S#&$ . And wow.... this is a whole lot of Complexity for absolutely Zero depth...

Literally theres no choice to make her...  you simply swapout the different damage type based on what you plan on doing the most damage to... and theres always only one correct choice.... its so Annoying.

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

Next ... is this games unique balance philosophy. Warframe was my first and only looter shooter so I cant compare it to any other games of its genre.

Me too....

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

Thats the thing about warframe. When a challenge is present, It puts your potential rewards at risk and ... well you've seen all the threads complaining about host migrations in 1 hour kuva survivals. 

But thats not a challenge though.... getting one shotted is just bull S#&$ lazy design and I've seen many developers make this mistake during the Dark souls hype train.... including From Software themselves when they made Dark Douls II and III .

3 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

And so this brings me to the title. Can we actually have true difficulty in a game like warframe? 

I mean... In theory yes.... you can just remove all the RPG Trappings make more distinct enemy types build the level design around the game play mechanics and viola... you have a challenging game. Obviously thats not going to happen.... never have I ever known something like this happen in any game. 

 

[stormy505]

I find it hilarious how the hardest part of warframe is trying to understand the extremely garbage instructions or dealing with peer to peer connections and host migrations. no god roll riven will save you from host migration.

[--DSP--Jetstream]

Never, the playerbase didnt like losing even a bit and moan loudly everytime a semblance of difficulty exist. Game certainly attract the worst kind of players in video games.

5 hours ago, Phatose said:

Can true difficulty exist in a game with a business model like Warframe has, where broad accessibility is crucial to making money?  Only for the absolute worst players imaginable. 

Not really relevant though, since nobody actually wants actual difficulty.  What they want is the illusion of difficulty, to allow them to feel like they've earned their success, while still being easy enough that they personally can accomplish it.  Give a player actual difficulty, something that they personally can't accomplish?  Watch the playerbase raise hell. 

This guy know whats up.

[Kontrollo]

Can true difficulty exist here? Yes and no.

There are still a few niches in this game that offer true difficulty, but they're all things you can do on the side.

• Archwing: imagine facing enemies as high as Sorties, you'd have a really bad day
• Conclave, Lunaro, Frame Fighter:  because (in theory at least) you're on equal footing with your enemies
• Dojo Parkour rooms: can be as easy or as difficult as you or your clan mates want them to be
• Forumframe: actually the true PvP for most people around here
  • Bonus: Fighting the forum software/editor
• Fashionframe/Decorating etc: no way to truly win this one, and whether it's difficult depends on how you look at it, I guess
• Getting a good deal in trade chat

 

The main part of the game however has these insane scalings and offers so many ways to sidestep our opponents that the only way to make an interesting encounter for a broad part of the playerbase is to take certain parts out of the equation, or create some truly obnoxious win conditions. Exploiter is the best example for the former. Everything else can only be difficult for a narrow band in the spectrum, depending on where you are in your progression (or to lesser degree: understanding of the game systems).

Personally, I think that's ok if done "right", e.g. I think Arbitration Drones aren't the greatest design ever, but they get the job done. SO/ESO on the other hand falls into the latter category.

Side note: It's telling that these two endgame modes aren't really part of the game anymore. They're offered with an excuse by some Syndicates instead.

 

Now what can you do as a developer if there's no good way to offer difficulty anymore? It's rather simple, really. You just make it about time spent instead.

Edited May 1, 2019 by Kontrollo
trade chat is true difficulty

[SneakyErvin]

10 hours ago, Phatose said:

Can true difficulty exist in a game with a business model like Warframe has, where broad accessibility is crucial to making money?  Only for the absolute worst players imaginable. 

Not really relevant though, since nobody actually wants actual difficulty.  What they want is the illusion of difficulty, to allow them to feel like they've earned their success, while still being easy enough that they personally can accomplish it.  Give a player actual difficulty, something that they personally can't accomplish?  Watch the playerbase raise hell. 

Not really true, Path of Exile does just fine with challenging gameplay and it is a F2P game aswell with roughly the same amount of players. It doesnt have to be accessible to the majority in order to make money if you have enough content for all of the game to feel worthwhile, which WF and PoE both have.

WF has gone a bit out of hand though and a system wide change to damage would be needed to actually make interesting challenging content. Trash mobs should still be trash mobs and die easily even after a damage rework, however the game would at that point have the option to introduce more elite units that actually pose a threat and take some time to kill.

I wouldnt be opposed to a future of the game where we get mini-bosses, champions or elite packs spawning throughout the missions in order to put some strain on us players. Sure a game wide drop change would also be needed to make the challenges worthwhile.

[FlusteredFerret]

11 hours ago, KingBBQChicken said:

Honestly this topic is unavoidable for anyone joining the warframe community. It seems like people have been begging for difficulty for several years, but every time major content is released, people haven't found it fun/challenging. Im sorry if this post derails from a reasonable discussion to a rant, but im genuinely curious.

I started playing this game on xbox around march of last year. I eventually got myself a pc and had to restart it from the beginning and let me just say, this game was actually very challenging. Believe it or not, going into either of the open worlds with your krakarak and your mk1 lato is challenging and quite enjoyable. I didnt have my comfort mods like healing return and i couldnt press 5 every time a Sanguine-Ancient-Bombard-bursa-prime-crewman-Eximus-Prime decided to join the mix. No arcane guardian, no health pizzas, no energy pizzas, nothing. So if I liked this so much then why not grab an unmodded lex and jump into a tridolon? Thats some fun and challenging difficulty right?

You all already know how this game works but let me explain to you from my perspective. Warframe takes a sort of rock paper scissors approach to damage. This isnt new and many other games have a similar system. You have Magic resist? I have Magic pen. You have armor? I have a .50 cal. You have rock? I have paper. The list goes on. Whats special about warframe's (and a small portion of other game's) damage system is a bit like this: you have Scissors? Oh but I have rock... and corrosive projection... and Arcanes... and the scissors are slash based.... and radiation... and vex armo- ok you get the point. What happens now is DE must implement things such as the wolf's absurd armor or the eidolon's untargetability just so they can have some inkling of challenge. When they dont, the entire community laughs at it as it eats 60 corrosive procs in 0.1 seconds.

Next ... is this games unique balance philosophy. Warframe was my first and only looter shooter so I cant compare it to any other games of its genre. Anyways, the balance philosophy in most other non pvp shooters is simple: you can be powerful, you just cant be TOO powerful. Warframe completely throws this out the window. And as much as we meme about it, its kinda true. Hey, grineer lancer #4534692 over there bothering you? Press a button to kill him. Ya know what , just wipe the entire map while your at it. Im not against this at all, Its actually one of my favorite playstyles in this game but.. it can prove to be problematic when new content comes out. 

• Arbitration, a game mode that was supposed to be elite just turned into catchmoon simulator 2019
• Exploiter might as well have been an energy drain sortie because bringing any ability dependent frame was utterly pointless
• The Wolf Shows up in your hydron and ingests enough lead to build the entirety of new York on the moon
• Wasn't around for raids so I wont even attempt to bash them
• I hope you dont like using your eyes because the guantalyst and hydrolysts make flahsbangs look like some kind of weak joke

And finally, this is a grind-based game. The other day I finally got Wise Razor while doing thermia fractures. I was using an Octavia who notably, dosent have much to offer in terms of survivability. I had already died 3 times and my team wanted to attempt one last fracture before extracting. I went to grab another coolant raknoid and CONVENIENTLY my stealth ends. Exploiter proceeds to one shot me before I can grab my archwing and escape. Thats the thing about warframe. When a challenge is present, It puts your potential rewards at risk and ... well you've seen all the threads complaining about host migrations in 1 hour kuva survivals. 

And so this brings me to the title. Can we actually have true difficulty in a game like warframe? And when I say true difficulty, I dont mean borderline invulnerability. It seems to me like every time it's been implemented its just doomed to join the rest as "meh, easily cheesable".

DE are aware of this and are trying to figure out a way of creating content that is challenging for veterans with inventories full of cheese gear, that won't screw up other aspects of the game.

The way the game has been designed means this is a can of worms that will need careful sorting through.

I guess they will let us know on a dev stream when they manage this.

 

Edited May 1, 2019 by FlusteredFerret

[Szuna]

Difficulity is subjective because without good gear you have hard time to face challenges. Same goes on the skill level how you parkour, move, use your frames and weapons. Everyone is different and see the game differently. Another major fact the game is made for wider community and this means the majority just want to have fun in the game and enjoy their free time. Some want harder some want easier but everyone mostly just want their own fun. If they turn the game into a dark soul esque game then they can redesign the whole game and they can change the horde shooter title. Each enemy in this game capable to kill you on a certain level or if you not play the game. 

They tested the weakspot system, which meant to be a little bit more challenge for the players but this kind of artifical hardiness is not good for the game. If you need 10 min to kill a single non boss enemy because you can hit only a specific part then you pretty much die if a group of them come for you.

There are challenges in the game but every player different and the basic solution is to make content with higher starting levels but the current scalings and weapon systems just not able to cater those whom want hardcore challenges. The game designed differently and they cannot really make rewards for it aswell because there is nothing beyond what we have currently. They could make accessory rewards or rewards which boost stats or just different weapon-frame skins but they are not capable to do this otherwise they could have done this long ago.

I personally would like to see more enemies like Wolfie but I know it is a trash design and if you haven't maxed gear and frames with maxed mods then you will feel challenging. Jackal and Sargas Ruk also bosses which have immunity periods but most games use this formula. The other way to go is much higher stats without immunity periods but then they became bullet sponges.

Basically the improved AI could mean some challenge if you not wish pvp in your game. An improved AI with better tactical/strategical sense but then we are again at the point where the game not exist anymore as horde shooter. They need to try baalnce this out but they cannot really go beyond on what they supposed to do with it because that just screw the future casual players whom find their content actual fun.

[Test-995]

Remove everything but excalibur and braton, and now warframe has proper balance.

[(PSN)Limorkil]

When I first started playing Warframe I found the level of challenge was about right.  Yes, you are an op badass against single targets but missions can get tough fast.  

All this difficulty melts away in groups though.  This is why I prefer solo.  In a group the challenge is getting to do anything interesting before someone with more experience and better gear clears the map.  I feel like I am being carried all the time, and I hate that.  

As a solo game Warframe has almost perfect difficulty, at least for me.  Take thermia fractures.  The first time I tried one I failed, so I adjusted my build and tried again.  Failed a few more times.  Then I got one but failed to get the next.  Eventually I could do 4 at once with relative ease.   They were never easy.  I like that feeling where something seems impossible but it gets much easier with practice, and it’s more practice than gear although there is a sort of strategy element to gear choice.  

Thats my experience solo at least.  I am sure there are others who find it no challenge at all.

But I agree with the op that group play is mostly easy and I can’t see that changing except through changes no one likes or bs artificial difficulty.  

[Softballbryan]

11 hours ago, Phatose said:

Can true difficulty exist in a game with a business model like Warframe has, where broad accessibility is crucial to making money?  Only for the absolute worst players imaginable. 

Not really relevant though, since nobody actually wants actual difficulty.  What they want is the illusion of difficulty, to allow them to feel like they've earned their success, while still being easy enough that they personally can accomplish it.  Give a player actual difficulty, something that they personally can't accomplish?  Watch the playerbase raise hell. 

That’s my observation in general on this forum. I think a lot more people complain about how difficult or unfair something is versus players looking for a challenge. Some of it has to do with the fear of missing out, some of it is lack of patience, and some is probably due to an improper perspective of Warframe and their real life. I feel there is difficulty in the game now, especially for new and mid level players. Probably a lot for established players too if they use all the frames and put some restrictions on themselves.... but I’ve heard many times players saying they shouldn’t have to change their load outs/builds for DE’s game design. I understand their position but I personally like to be challenged and fail every once in a while, not all the time, but sometimes. DE is in a tough spot... look at changes to Arby’s, and all the crying about the drones sucking, not being difficult, just annoying.... when I do public Arby’s, it’s rare for people to last past 30minutes... I would think that’s there plenty of challenge for them to try and get to 60 minutes... some of y’all reading this are gonna say 60 minutes is a breeze.... have you done that with most Warframes? I haven’t.... and most of y’all haven’t either... but you’re gonna tell me it’s boring not challenging... we may view difficulty differently....DE is in a tough spot

[Softballbryan]

7 minutes ago, (PS4)Limorkil said:

When I first started playing Warframe I found the level of challenge was about right.  Yes, you are an op badass against single targets but missions can get tough fast.  

All this difficulty melts away in groups though.  This is why I prefer solo.  In a group the challenge is getting to do anything interesting before someone with more experience and better gear clears the map.  I feel like I am being carried all the time, and I hate that.  

As a solo game Warframe has almost perfect difficulty, at least for me.  Take thermia fractures.  The first time I tried one I failed, so I adjusted my build and tried again.  Failed a few more times.  Then I got one but failed to get the next.  Eventually I could do 4 at once with relative ease.   They were never easy.  I like that feeling where something seems impossible but it gets much easier with practice, and it’s more practice than gear although there is a sort of strategy element to gear choice.  

Thats my experience solo at least.  I am sure there are others who find it no challenge at all.

But I agree with the op that group play is mostly easy and I can’t see that changing except through changes no one likes or bs artificial difficulty.  

I agree... solo is how I started this game... groups made it a breeze later... it’s the quickest way to add challenge for myself.

[Teljaxx]

Warframe can be challenging. You just have to make it that way yourself. Doing something like bringing an unmodded weapon into an endgame fight is pretty challenging. You also don't have to bring your god roll rivens to a Lith relic mission. The problem, though, is that being challenged means that you aren't grinding efficiently. And inefficient grinding in an extremely grindy game like this is a very bad thing. If there is a chance that you will waste your time by failing your mission and losing your rewards, then you will do everything you can to avoid that. Even simply making a mission go slightly faster by making yourself more powerful is invaluable when you have to do it hundreds of times in a row.

And when it comes to actual, intentional, developer created challenge, DE has basically made that impossible. Challenge in games mostly comes from specific limits imposed on the players, and the Devs designing the game around them. But over time, DE has slowly removed most of the limitations we ever had, and by extension, removed most of the challenge from the game. Along with the massive potential difference in power between any two players, especially old vs new, and it is basically impossible to balance anything properly.

Not to mention the self defeating challenge/reward loop that the game is built around. DE creates a new challenge that requires you to have the very best gear to stand a chance. You beat the challenge and get the rewards from it. These rewards make you more powerful, so the challenge is no longer challenging. And because of this, next time they add a challenge to the game, it has to be even greater than before. And so do the rewards. This is the problem with unchecked powercreep, and the "always buff, never nerf" mentality DE has adopted. No challenge can ever be permanently challenging if the players are constantly becoming more powerful.

Though, honestly, since DE's idea of a challenge seems to simply be that it takes longer, I am kind of glad that there isn't that much challenge to this game. Sure, massive bullet sponges and hour long endless missions can be hard, but they also aren't fun.

[Zimzala]

Warframe is power fanatsy.

IMO, if you want 'true difficulty' a video game is simply not the place to look for it.

Try playing the stock market if you really want a challenge.

Video games are for getting a dopamine hit when RL does not deliver, IMO.

[Pooroldude]

True difficulty is doing new codex quests/events without looking at patch notes.

Also, what is true difficulty? What sort of mythical creature is it? What characteristics does it have?

Edited May 1, 2019 by Pooroldude

[(PSN)drpunk-yo]

No, cos there's a reason we don't run around with empty mod slots on everything.