Remove the lockout timer from Mastery Tests

[Jabberdragon]

Let's be real here - the only reason there's a 24 hour lockout on Mastery Rank tests is to be exploitative of players' time.  No other mission in the game locks you out for any real amount of time, and Mastery Rank is only truly important for unlocking weapons and increasing the amount of standing you can farm in a day.  It's understandable that DE wants to prevent you from blowing through all the content in their game, but the speedbump of a Mastery Rank test is either insignificant because you complete the test and that's it, or immensely inconvenient when you fail it (or it bugs out on you) because you just have to wait a day to try again.

In the time that I've played Warframe, nothing has really made me more frustrated than when a Mastery Rank test bugs out.  It's something that happens with every mission from time to time, but Mastery Rank tests are unique in that if you fail it, you have to wait 24 hours to attempt it again.  It has happened three times to me on three different tests, and it is something that immediately makes me log out of the game.

I typically only have limited windows to play Warframe because I have a full-time job, like many people.  When it comes to Mastery Rank tests, they are something I want to do immediately so I can unlock more opportunities - more weapons to use, more Focus to grind, more Standing to earn.  In every way, increasing Mastery Rank makes your gameplay experience better (to the point that I think it's kind of badly designed to tie so much other progress to such a useless statistic) but getting locked out for 24 hours does nothing but hurt the game.

Edited June 11, 2019 by Jabberdragon

[peterc3]

It's not like you lose any XP gained in the interim. It's the main time gate for the game. How do you call it a useless statistic, if you want to increase it so badly?

[Jabberdragon]

Because the only point of it is to measure how many times you've been to Hydron.  It artificially gates your progression by making you do things that aren't directly conducive to increasing your power, standing, or game enjoyment.

In order to get more standing with factions you have to increase your mastery rank.  To increase your mastery rank you have to level up warframes, weapons, and companions you probably won't ever use.  You are essentially just throwing your time away because the game demands you do it, not because it actually progresses you directly.

[ArchangelusAlpharius]

Lets be honest, after MR 16, MR becomes effectively cosmetic. With the exception of assisting in forma grinding, the only other important thing MR affects is standing cap, and is one more day short 1k really going to affect you terribly? Yeah, it's a nasty feeling to fail due to bullS#&$, but lets be honest here, if it affects you to the point of ragequitting for the day, you are taking the game far too seriously.

[peterc3]

10 minutes ago, Jabberdragon said:

Because the only point of it is to measure how many times you've been to Hydron.

Try other nodes. You might find the rest of the game a lot more fun even at lower MR. You won't level that much slower, either.

DE puts time and money into new frames, new weapons, new game modes. You, having paid nothing to play the game, are heavily encouraged to try everything, in hopes of you spending money.

[Jabberdragon]

1 minute ago, peterc3 said:

Try other nodes. You might find the rest of the game a lot more fun even at lower MR. You won't level that much slower, either.

DE puts time and money into new frames, new weapons, new game modes. You, having paid nothing to play the game, are heavily encouraged to try everything, in hopes of you spending money.

I'm sorry, is your argument "Abuse my time and artificially gate my progression because DE wants my money?"  Are you actively shilling for skinner boxes or do you just do it by accident?  Is the pay good or is it more about that gross sense of satisfaction knowing you did your part to support a struggling third world developer who isn't the #1 money earner on Steam?

I have also put more than a non-zero amount in this game and when a timer locks you out with the hopes of getting you to spend more money, I'm actually less likely to spend money.

[peterc3]

21 minutes ago, Jabberdragon said:

I'm sorry, is your argument "Abuse my time and artificially gate my progression because DE wants my money?"  Are you actively shilling for skinner boxes or do you just do it by accident?  Is the pay good or is it more about that gross sense of satisfaction knowing you did your part to support a struggling third world developer who isn't the #1 money earner on Steam?

I have also put more than a non-zero amount in this game and when a timer locks you out with the hopes of getting you to spend more money, I'm actually less likely to spend money.

If you know of a position in the company where I can be paid to find threads like this, by all means let me know the details.

In this context, what would a "natural" progression gate look like? I'm actively telling you how this free game operates. It is completely irrelevant that you have paid money. That doesn't change the fact nobody has to to play the entirety of the game. You can't spend money to increase your MR. It's up to you to pass the test, whether you've spend money or not.

If this is happening a lot... you might want to check that everything on your end of the connection is perfect.

[(PSN)chibitonka]

1 hour ago, Jabberdragon said:

Because the only point of it is to measure how many times you've been to Hydron.  It artificially gates your progression by making you do things that aren't directly conducive to increasing your power, standing, or game enjoyment.

In order to get more standing with factions you have to increase your mastery rank.  To increase your mastery rank you have to level up warframes, weapons, and companions you probably won't ever use.  You are essentially just throwing your time away because the game demands you do it, not because it actually progresses you directly.

only schnooks/idiots use hydron for leveling. Rest do it passively cause they would rather play the game and not hear a grineer death cry for the thousanth time in a hour or be confined to such limited bland gameplay. Or they say screw it take the stuff they're leveling and kuva survival cause it actually pays out more than just affinity. Or eso if just weapons need leveling. 

Mastery tests need to be more difficult.

Odd considering it increases your base mod space for all gear, trade counts per day, standing cap for all syndicates and lets you use more weapons. 

Gear you won't ever use... funny since the few players that are worth mentioning collect and use them. 

Egads time gating in a free to play game.

[Jabberdragon]

I'd also like to point out that after Mastery Rank 15 or so, you have absolutely nothing to unlock through Mastery Rank but standing caps - and you need a LOT of standing with a lot of people.  You'll be farming standing forever until the game dies of heat death along with the rest of the universe.  If you say "Oh you only get 1,000 more standing cap per day" like that isn't essentially the only content left in the game after a certain point, you're a fool.

Also, the difference between MR15 and say MR20 isn't 1,000 standing, it's 5,000 standing.  MR25 is 10,000 standing.  If every time you try a test between 15 and 20 it bugs out and you have a 24 hour lockout timer, that's 5 days of your time just gone.  It's bad.  It's bad design.  It's exploitative of the player's time.

[(PSN)abbacephas]

1 minute ago, Jabberdragon said:

It's exploitative of the player's time.

Right, because video games, in general, aren't a waste of time in the first place.

[Jabberdragon]

1 hour ago, (PS4)abbacephas said:

Right, because video games, in general, aren't a waste of time in the first place.

Just because they're optional doesn't mean they can't further be abusive.

[(PSN)abbacephas]

4 minutes ago, Jabberdragon said:

Just because they're optional doesn't mean they can't further be abusive.

Games are time sinks which are meant to be entertaining. If you feel exploited or abused by a free to play game, then perhaps you should rethink playing it. MR gating is a mechanism DE has chosen to implement to prevent players from blowing through content. If you have a problem with it, then it is your problem to deal with. This is clearly not the game for you if you get your knickers in a twist over such a triviality. 

Move on. Play something else.

[(PSN)chibitonka]

8 hours ago, (NSW)IronElemental said:

Just want to react to this out of your mostly unfriendly looking post.

You're viewing stuff a bit too black/white i think. Not everyone is actually gonna keep and use/forma all their variants of braton mk1, regular, prime, every type of early shotguns, lato, aklato, whatever.

A lot of stuff really is just mastery fodder. Especially if an item has a prime or mk1 version. In your view, the only people worth mentioning are the people buying a ton of warframeslots and weaponslots to be able to keep the old nonsense once the prime version is in their inventory? I sure as hell sold my old little loki once i got his prime. I got ember prime before the regular. Still farmed the regular to lvl to 30 and sell.

I'm quite sure i'm not the only one doing that. Together with all the other unmentionables? In this view, are you even worth mentioning yourself?

normals and mk1s aren't considered variants. 

any sane person knows you don't keep the mk and normals when there's vandal, wraiths, prisma, primes and so on. The fact this even has to be said hurts x:

[Eclipse2024Qc]

It annoys me too, I hate the timers before trying to get past rank 9, being spotted by the damn grineer makes me sick, I'm sick of it. I would like us to remove the timer completely because I'm tired of waiting for those damn 24 hours for nothing.

I'm STUCK AT MR 8 !

Edited January 23, 2021 by Roswell5151Qc

[TheMostFrench]

Keep doing the practice. If you can do the practice but fail the real test, you're tense and not ready. Isn't that how real tests work? If you failed a university exam they could make you resit a whole years worth of content and pay for it twice, because failure proves you don't understand what you're doing.

[Andromaliuz]

I can't believe people defend this garbage.