A Veteran and Business Analyst's Report on the State of Warframe.

[Kefirno]

Quests are trash. In most of them writing is cringy as hell and trying to shoehorn Warframes into some character's sad story feels forced, especially when every character and faction in the game were about to have some warframe related to them. Warframes don't need stories.

Raids were trash. FIVE CC FRAMES AND TWO TRINITIES SPAM ONE BUTTON NONSTOP WHILE LOKI IS RUNNING AROUND BECAUSE HE HAS THE BIGGEST ENERGY POOL, SO EPIC. And then one person's poor connection ruins everything.

Asking for cheap riven rerolls and stat locking while also mentioning power creep in the same post makes me wonder if it's a joke. Bloated market prices, necessary kuva grind, heavy RNG and abundance of absolute garbage rivens is what makes rivens remotely tolerable and stops them from breaking the game beyond repair.

[Sloan441]

10 hours ago, RWBY-WhiteRose said:

Just goes to show that they don't listen even though the problems are blatantly laid out in front of them.

They do, but they're under no obligation to acknowledge player feedback or even act on it.

DE has their own roadmap and is perfectly aware of player input. How they use it, however, is something else again--and probably heavily influenced by the biz side of things, which isn't something they're going to reveal to the world at large. 

1 hour ago, Shalath said:

 ...the analysis of a player who wants the game changed to suit what they want without ant real understanding of how F2P games make money.

This was pretty much my take on the whole thing. It's also fairly typical of player input. Nothing intrinsically wrong with it, but it's blind to a lot of the realities of running the game as business. 

[JujuHex]

Now, before we get into this, I feel it’s important to let you know the position I take in this, for lack of a better term, Response, as well as why my opinion here should matter at all. 

I started Warframe 6 Years ago, reaching MR26, and other than having to stop playing for some amount of time, have never Quit or Uninstalled. I'm the kind of person that doesn't say goodbye and have nothing to get out of my system; yet I stick around helping and advising players still left in the game. I have 0 hours on Steam because I am a 1st Party Loyalist and get punished for it by not having access to the Steam exclusive fashion, yet I have over 3000 hours in Missions. 

I am also a Professional Astronaut, starting in 2012, with over 300 days in the International Space Station and over 40 hours of EVA. It is literally my job to go out to space and defend the Earth from scientific ignorance and possible alien threats, which qualifies me as an expert Tenno...

 

Jokes aside...

Never state your real life proffession as a qualification of sorts to legitimize your opinions, it will only result in the total opposite. Just by seeing the replies here, I think you learned that already.

I give you a hug, send you my best wishes and mean no ill intent. Perhaps we'll see you again on greener pastures.
Swazdo-lah!

[DoomFruit]

2 hours ago, Kefirno said:

Quests are trash. In most of them writing is cringy as hell and trying to shoehorn Warframes into some character's sad story feels forced, especially when every character and faction in the game were about to have some warframe related to them. Warframes don't need stories.

Raids were trash. FIVE CC FRAMES AND TWO TRINITIES SPAM ONE BUTTON NONSTOP WHILE LOKI IS RUNNING AROUND BECAUSE HE HAS THE BIGGEST ENERGY POOL, SO EPIC. And then one person's poor connection ruins everything.

Frames might not need stories, and the writing style might not agree with everyone, but quests did serve to fluff out the lore and provide backstory. That alone makes them worth playing for me.

Also, with regards to raids, that looks like the mindless way of just completing them so that you can get your reward. The real fun came in working out and testing speedrun strategies. There were leaderboards for completion time, and they existed for a reason.

[DeadVoid118]

7 hours ago, 5p33dy_01 said:

so in essence, you do in fact agree that it is all about the grind, BUT you would RATHER not grind.
you cant say something is not and is the same thing, in the same sentence.
e.g saying its not a grind but then going on to say how you dont like the grind. (maybe just because you feel like you want to say something)

I never said it wasn't a grind? I'm saying I don't play the game for the grind, and I don't think most people do either. The grind exists, but it's not the sole purpose of the game. It's not about the grind, but there is a grind.

7 hours ago, 5p33dy_01 said:

that is bad language, also contradictory and creates confusion.
no offense, its better if you just dont say anything, than put yourself in this kind of situation.
you just lose all credibility, and make yourself look like you just want to talk for the sake of talking.

It's not bad language, you're just misinterpreting my words. It's in no way contradictory, and wasn't confusing to myself.

That last bit about credibility and 'like I want to talk for the sake of talking' is uncalled for. I attempted to clarify my first statement with my second, but apparently you didn't understand and decided to imply I'm just here to see my own thoughts in writing. I am most certainly not, and your last statement is entirely an opinion that I wholeheartedly disagree with.

[Rhalick0]

2 hours ago, Kefirno said:

Quests are trash. In most of them writing is cringy as hell and trying to shoehorn Warframes into some character's sad story feels forced, especially when every character and faction in the game were about to have some warframe related to them. Warframes don't need stories.

Raids were trash. FIVE CC FRAMES AND TWO TRINITIES SPAM ONE BUTTON NONSTOP WHILE LOKI IS RUNNING AROUND BECAUSE HE HAS THE BIGGEST ENERGY POOL, SO EPIC. And then one person's poor connection ruins everything.

Asking for cheap riven rerolls and stat locking while also mentioning power creep in the same post makes me wonder if it's a joke. Bloated market prices, necessary kuva grind, heavy RNG and abundance of absolute garbage rivens is what makes rivens remotely tolerable and stops them from breaking the game beyond repair.

This game.just run around with a weapon with eyes closed while spamming whatever ability you got.

[5p33dy_01]

9 minutes ago, Keylan118 said:

I never said it wasn't a grind? I'm saying I don't play the game for the grind, and I don't think most people do either. The grind exists, but it's not the sole purpose of the game. It's not about the grind, but there is a grind.

It's not bad language, you're just misinterpreting my words. It's in no way contradictory, and wasn't confusing to myself.

That last bit about credibility and 'like I want to talk for the sake of talking' is uncalled for. I attempted to clarify my first statement with my second, but apparently you didn't understand and decided to imply I'm just here to see my own thoughts in writing. I am most certainly not, and your last statement is entirely an opinion that I wholeheartedly disagree with.

ok, please accept my apologies.

maybe try being a little more specific. that's all i was aiming for.

i sort of knew what you meant from the start, but i would rather not assume.
besides, it is a little funny to see peoples reactions/responses, when you make it out as if you don't have a clue what they're talking about.

[WhiteMarker]

3 hours ago, Kimimoto said:

Have you ever once thought the game used to be for these players, and it's now changed for players like you?

Not even once. I play since forever, since the Founders program (don't know the exact year anymore). I enjoy playing since then.

Fact is, people always leave games. And that's fine. That's only natural...

[DeadVoid118]

1 hour ago, Sloan441 said:

They do, but they're under no obligation to acknowledge player feedback or even act on it.

DE has their own roadmap and is perfectly aware of player input. How they use it, however, is something else again--and probably heavily influenced by the biz side of things, which isn't something they're going to reveal to the world at large. 

This was pretty much my take on the whole thing. It's also fairly typical of player input. Nothing intrinsically wrong with it, but it's blind to a lot of the realities of running the game as business. 

Eh, the assumption that most of their unpopular decisions (or just some decisions in general) have to do with business may or may not be true. However, if they are business-based decisions I would wonder if it's actually necessary for the business. Additionally, I wonder how detailed that roadmap actually is. They are by no means stretching their resources (well, they might be with how much effort they're putting into new content compared to how it used to be, despite everything still being broken, unbalanced, and buggy) and they need to create proper 'sinks' for platinum (as in, things regularly bought for platinum that ISN'T trading between players) to prevent too much platinum from entering circulation (rather than releasing new things that are bought once for platinum and then the 'sink' is ineffective). I'm not sure how they would do this with fashionframe, but maybe a special consumable appearance thing that makes someone obnoxiously sparkly/golden/shiny. It'd also be nice if they had a team to go over old stuff as regularly as new stuff comes out (and maybe make that team in charge of QoL updates as well). These are just my ideas though, and I'm no businessman nor have any idea how DE works internally (hopefully it's not as messy as Warframe has been through the years).

Just as a side thought, I wonder what would happen if DE suddenly made everything 'free' (by making platinum easily acquired via some sort of farm maybe?) and going on a system similar to Patreon. I doubt it would be economically viable, but it would be interesting to see (not that it should happen).

[Kimimoto]

9 hours ago, WhiteMarker said:

That's only natural...

If they're naturally leaving the game, which they're not. The design choices over the past 2-3 years have pushed them away. Just like me, I want to play the game it's one of my favorites, but I can't stomach logging on for the daily and logging off. How #*!%ing sad has this game become?

[Xepthrichros]

On 2019-05-29 at 5:15 PM, Sicarius_Avindar said:

I am also a Professional Business Analyst, starting in 2014. It is literally my job to look at stuff like this and pick out the Shortcomings, as well as, if they are not obvious already, come up with Solutions. I regret it, but I also used this knowledge and experience to become a rather successful Riven Trader.
 

Based on the content of your post, I think many of us can do your job. I've seen someone or other, and also myself, point out some of the issues you did. At times, better articulated, and more in-depth than you did. Your post sounds like your top 10 list of things you hate, not some "professional take" or whatever you are trying to market your whining post as.

Plus you are wrong about power creep. 

... You had one job.

[TheSkunkyMonk]

On 2019-05-29 at 10:15 AM, Sicarius_Avindar said:

 

Now, before we get into this

Not a very good analyst from the looks of it, each decision has a cost both development wise and to the profit margins. Sadly most decisions are made to support greater profits and that is what is wrong with the game at the moment. To many decisions being made to increase profits instead of increasing player enjoyment. Btw you want to fix rivens for the majority instead of the trader, Make the riven for the weapon we use to unlock it, that simple change would bring so much more enjoyment, but would also hit plat sales no doubt so once again poor decision for enjoyment, good decision for profit.

 

Games trash now anyway, I came back to have a peek after Nightwave and they are still hell bent on increasing the grind to 11+ so see yall later had fun for a while but now all I see is grindy stress FOMO mentality. Lol kind of amazing they got rid of alerts because of people moaning about missing out but then they bring in a new system that does exactly the same.

Someone send me a message if we ever do get alerts back might have another look, but damage is probably already done now as that is all I see 11+, 11+ 11+ everything new 11+

Edited May 31, 2019 by TheSkunkyMonk

[Hyohakusha]

So if I parrot the complaints of other people and put my personal gripes into a box and boldface it, I too can become a "business analyst"?

[(XBOX)GearsMatrix301]

I think somewhere around making this list you forgot Warframe is a free to play game.

[Xycelium]

On 2019-05-29 at 5:15 AM, Sicarius_Avindar said:

Aesthetics

One of the major problems with Warframe’s Fashion, is frankly, it only really comes in Four Flavours. Strange Tenno, Strange and Shiny Orokin, Bulbous Grineer and the rare piece of Sleek Corpus, but there’s nothing normal. Nothing out of the expected norms, nothing Normal, it’s just ABC or D, with the rarity of say Limbo Deluxe.

Nyx Deluxe was frankly a welcome addition Aesthetically, because it was a good design and it was Normal. There’s so little Variety in Warframe’s Aesthetic anymore that isn’t purely based on Colour.
Also, Capes. Can we get some actual Capes? Please? Or actual Scarves? Plz thx

There is so much wrong here.

"only really comes in four flavors" - Forgets Infested, already existing TennoGen series like Mithra/Blade of the Lotus, Syndicates, Sentient; it doesn't take very long to find this stuff. But I guess since the other things exist more, that means they automatically cancel out the existence of these other items, right? Looks like some laziness on your part.

"but there's nothing normal" - Yes, like if anything is normal in Warframe? Did you forget the art style of the game you're playing (or used to play)? Almost everything in this game is a greater allusion or complex references to something already existing, and most designs in the game reflect that by being intricate and 'not normal'. If you were truly a "veteran", you would probably noticed this by now.

"Nyx Deluxe was a frankly welcome addition... was a good design and it was Normal." - I thought Nyx Deluxe would fit into the imaginary category of "Strange Tenno", how is that skin normal?

"There's so literally variety in Warframe's Aesthetic" - If you simply everything down to a small range of 4 things, sure, it can seem that way. But this is wrong due to the multitude of TennoGen skins and faction designs that are available.

"Can we get some actual Capes?" - Repala Syandana, and if you want an actual scarf, just play Excalibur Umbra or figure out how to rig a functional scarf for every Warframe instead of just telling DE to grant your wishes.

Also please don't copy and paste your black text onto the forum post, it's a bane to all of the Dark Mode users.

[Sohaya-]

17 hours ago, Shalath said:

I don't think much of this analysis. Padding content is bad? It is better than not padding which leaves players with nothing to do, therefore not logging in and spending money. A market would stabilize costs? Yes, the -1 bids would stabilise the to the floor. The whole thing reads like somebody who doesn't understand hoe developing a game works and more like the analysis of a player who wants the game changed to suit what they want without ant real understanding of how F2P games make money.

Padding content lasts for roughly 1 day before becoming irrelevant again.

[Sohaya-]

57 minutes ago, (XB1)GearsMatrix301 said:

I think somewhere around making this list you forgot Warframe is a free to play game.

Time is an even more precious resource. 

[Sohaya-]

13 hours ago, WhiteMarker said:

Not even once. I play since forever, since the Founders program (don't know the exact year anymore). I enjoy playing since then.

Fact is, people always leave games. And that's fine. That's only natural...

If you enjoy the game as-is, good for you.

I personally can't really stomach DE.

[Sohaya-]

And for those of you being nitpicky about the business part, I agree it was unnecessary. I helped OP out a bit with the post, and I was the one who asked him to focus mainly on the gameplay issues he saw and not the business part. It's my fault, I guess. And I've been in contact with the OP and he does see some issues with his own points, so please stop criticising his professionalism.

[Sohaya-]

10 hours ago, Keylan118 said:

Eh, the assumption that most of their unpopular decisions (or just some decisions in general) have to do with business may or may not be true. However, if they are business-based decisions I would wonder if it's actually necessary for the business. Additionally, I wonder how detailed that roadmap actually is. They are by no means stretching their resources (well, they might be with how much effort they're putting into new content compared to how it used to be, despite everything still being broken, unbalanced, and buggy) and they need to create proper 'sinks' for platinum (as in, things regularly bought for platinum that ISN'T trading between players) to prevent too much platinum from entering circulation (rather than releasing new things that are bought once for platinum and then the 'sink' is ineffective). I'm not sure how they would do this with fashionframe, but maybe a special consumable appearance thing that makes someone obnoxiously sparkly/golden/shiny. It'd also be nice if they had a team to go over old stuff as regularly as new stuff comes out (and maybe make that team in charge of QoL updates as well). These are just my ideas though, and I'm no businessman nor have any idea how DE works internally (hopefully it's not as messy as Warframe has been through the years).

Just as a side thought, I wonder what would happen if DE suddenly made everything 'free' (by making platinum easily acquired via some sort of farm maybe?) and going on a system similar to Patreon. I doubt it would be economically viable, but it would be interesting to see (not that it should happen).

It's mostly true. Their model's mostly focused around new players, which is why they focus more on new content than they do on improving older content, which they should be able to do simultaneously even as an indie company.

[ARAMN]

On 2019-05-29 at 5:27 AM, WhiteMarker said:

Sorry, but not sorry to say this: Who cares?
What makes your opinion on the game more valid than anyone else's opinion? You could be lying about your profession. There is no reason at all to mention your job.

who cares?

seems you do since you posted with such comments and keep it clean most would do as well myself included an occupation like that is within the higher tier on Quality Assurance. something DE is very well lacking off.

[WhiteMarker]

2 minutes ago, ARAMN said:

an occupation like that is within the higher tier on Quality Assurance. 

Sure thing...
And he promised a proper analysis and didn't deliver. Seems like he is really bad at his job. And he didn't add anything new to the table. He just reposted the same opinions other people already posted.
So again, why stating his occupation, if he doesn't do, what he said he will do? If he did something like that in his actual job, he would get fired for that.

2 hours ago, RWBY-WhiteRose said:

If you enjoy the game as-is, good for you.

I personally can't really stomach DE.

While I don't really understand that hate, it is always fine to have your opinion.
I was just defending myself. This one guy said, that me liking the game was a problem. That my mindset was responsible for the current situation of the game.

[Xepthrichros]

5 hours ago, RWBY-WhiteRose said:

And for those of you being nitpicky about the business part, I agree it was unnecessary. I helped OP out a bit with the post, and I was the one who asked him to focus mainly on the gameplay issues he saw and not the business part. It's my fault, I guess. And I've been in contact with the OP and he does see some issues with his own points, so please stop criticising his professionalism.

He needed help for something like this?

Yeah, all the more reason to doubt his "professionalism" 

[(NSW)Evilpricetag]

On 2019-05-29 at 6:32 AM, (XB1)R3d P01nt said:

It can also be farmed from Ghoul events and as the third cache in Void/Reactor Sabotage and Lua/Kuva exterminates.  It's also a potential drop from the Wolf of Saturn Six.

My fastest cache run on speed Loki made the average drop rate of Nitain this way was about 1 every 5 hours. Volt might be slightly faster. 

[Sloan441]

9 hours ago, RWBY-WhiteRose said:

 ...so please stop criticising his professionalism.

What professionalism? He's a guy on the internet. Like all of us here. We don't know him.

The fact he's trying to sell himself so hard is a tell--and not an encouraging one. 

He doesn't like DE or the game. Fine. It's time to move on.