Nightwave Bad. Alert Good.

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

DE?! You're killing me, guys! C'mon! 

Back when you said you would rework Alerts so that players wouldn't miss stuff that wasn't on while they're asleep, a grindy battle pass starred by an ASMR Twitch streamer and backed by lore that no one cares about IS THE LAST THING I HAD IN MIND! 

But NoOoOoO, everytime I try and voice an opinion that differs from the everyday hivemind, I get hit with "You're not forced to do it" or "You don't have to hit every mission to reach Level 30". As a player with 6000 hours under my belt, I'm very disappointed with the changes that Nora has brought to the Alert system. And let me explain exactly what's going on.

---

What They Actually Did Right This Time

Irony aside, there are a FEW things that DE did with Battle Pass Season 2 that tops Battle Pass Season 1 significantly.

 - 'With Clanmates / Friends' Act requirements have been removed completely

I'm glad DE did this, because I've been playing all of my missions solo since the closed beta, and I don't want to deal with host migrations or incompotent players RUINING my playstyle. Also, since this game will be screwing my solo clan over anyway once Emperyean Railroads comes along, I figured this makes up for it only slightly.

- Ayatan Socket requirement for Acts lowered from 5 to 3

I don't know whose idea it was to make Amber Stars a requirement for 90% of the Ayatans, and then just have missions spawn only Cyan Stars, and then instead of remedying the way you acquire Stars, you just add a blueprint for Amber Stars utilizing the Cyan Stars and then locking it behind an elite gamemode that requires all starchart nodes to be unlocked, but I would like to meet that person and shake their hand with the business end of my Jat Kittag. 

- Hmm... There was something I was supossed to put here, but I forgot it.

Let's move on to what Nightwave can work on.

 

What They Need to Do 

In an attempt to make it so that people didn't get FOMO from missing alerts that had stuff they actually wanted, they created grindy weeklies that in turn created more FOMO than there already was.

Here's my rough sketch for a proper Nightwave:

A 30,000 standing limit means you can only rank up a maximum 3 times a day. But overflow standing gets added to the number when it resets. In this version, the Acts will always be there until the Series is over, but can be done whenever you want without restraint. 

Something I forgot to mention in this sketch is that each completed Act yields a certain about of Nightwave Creds, depending on its level. For example, completing Murder I would get you 100 creds, while Murder II could get you 200 creds. Leveling up grants you with both (Current Level x 10) Creds AND the associated reward. No more Creds as rewards. No more FOMO. Everyone goes home happy.

Oh, and when you reach Max Rank, you're allowed to Prestige the Battle Pass Awards, and get exclusive ones. Archwing Rivens, Ephemeras, New Color Palettes, Warframe Rivens? Possibilities are endless!

---

Analyzing The Wolf of Saturn Six

It's bad enough that some rare items have a chance to drop from a certain enemy. But when rare items have a chance to drop from an enemy that only has a chance of arriving in your missions, you get El Lobo de Saturno Seis.

The Wolf Sledge was mediocre at best, with a Mjonir-like special ability, but it was so rare that at the beginning of Act One, it went for about 1500-2000 plat a set. That's insane! As McGamerCz said in his review of the Hammer, NO WEAPON IN THIS GAME is worth that much money! But when you have two clashing probabilities, the rarity of a weapon goes insane. 

And then after Act I reached its conclusion, out of nowhere, the Wolf gets his own boss battle! 

Now, this was an amazing idea. SO amazing, in fact, that they NOT ONLY DIDN'T MAKE THIS A THING IN THE FIRST PLACE, BUT SAVED IT FOR LAST! 

I hear he's coming back though, so that's cool too, I guess. Maybe we could make his boss fight a recurring event, like Plague Star. And fighting him gives you Standing towards the first season of Nightwave, allowing you to get things that you missed out on.

---

Other Things

Earlier on, I made a concept of Nightwave-inspired Alerts called Nightspots, 5 daily alerts that would grant you Battle Pass standing when completed. If those end up making it in a Series in the near future, I won't post a GIF in any of my forum replies for a whole month. And trust me, that's hard to do.

Also, Nora is too much of a yes-girl. I get that she's a big fan of the Tenno but calling my "petting my 2-year-old Kubrow before putting it back in stasis" serious crud? That's a bit much. I feel like for immserion, it would be better if her voicelines changed depending on the difficulty/reward of our completed act.

For dailies, she'd give you a "Great work, Tenno" type compliment. Kinda like the ones Spacemom gave us before she went to get some cigarettes. (God, I miss her)

For weeklies, she'd give you one of the standard ones she gives currently.

For elites, she either hollers and hoots like her favorite football team scored a winner goal, or she'd pull up a few metaphors and similes before congratulating us on our work.

Ahem.

"The Sun isn't the only star shinin' on a bright, new Origin System, Dreamers. Thanks to your contributions, I can rest easy knowing that you'll rise to the task like the luminous, godly figure you are, before setting over the horizon, waitin' to see what's next. Here's to you, Dreamers. You're MY star."

Y... You get the idea.

---

So, that's my spiel. If you read through this entire thing, _{w... why?! what are you doing?!?}

But for real. Thanks for reading.

 

 

Spoiler

Conspiracy: What if Nora is an enemy of the Tenno, and she's trying to make us grind for unnecessary material goods in order to distract us from the oncoming New War that's about to start and ravage the entire solar system? What if she is an agent of chaos, demotivating the Tenno by burning them out long enough for the Sentients to come and rain fire on us? Think about it, she's connected to the radio. She'd be able to hear the transmissions that went on in the New War trailer. She'd hint to us that something horrible is coming. But she isn't.

Because she wants her Dreamers to encounter a nightware... and never wake up again. 

 

Edited July 12, 2019 by D20

[TARINunit9]

Your "Here are all the acts required for the entire season" idea is something they're going to deliberately avoid. They want to avoid two things: you missing out on look because some alert you wanted popped up at 5am, and you not logging in for three weeks because you finished all the challenges already. Weeklies are by design, no matter how much you hate them

Edited July 12, 2019 by TARINunit9

[(XBOX)YoungGunn82]

Also imo: Alerts should have never been removed. Only reworked to work alongside NW. No different than Kuva survival working alongside Kuva floods and siphons. 

It is possible for them to work together to give players more choice. 

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

5 minutes ago, TARINunit9 said:

Your "Here are all the acts required for the entire season" idea is something they're going to deliberately avoid. They want to avoid two things: you missing out on look because some alert you wanted popped up at 5am, and you not logging in for three weeks because you finished all the challenges already. Weeklies are by design, no matter how much you hate them

By the time Emperyean comes out, there should be enough content that Tenno won't NEED Nightwave acts to feel like they can do something.

Unless they incorporate Railjack into Nightwave, and if they do, SO HELP ME-

 

 

Edited July 12, 2019 by D20
Removing cleaned posts

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

1 minute ago, (XB1)RDeschain82 said:

Also imo: Alerts should have never been removed. Only reworked to work alongside NW. No different than Kuva survival working alongside Kuva floods and siphons. 

It is possible for them to work together to give players more choice. 

Which is exactly where Nightspots come in. To give players an alternate method for achieving standing. 

[LascarCapable]

Thread cleaned from a few unconstructive answers.

[BombtailsTheFox]

17 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

But when rare items have a chance to drop from an enemy that only has a chance of arriving in your missions, you get El Lobo de Saturno Seis.

Is that spanish? What about "Il Lupo di Saturno Sei" (which is italian)?

Jokes aside, this has a good point.

19 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

In an attempt to make it so that people didn't get FOMO from missing alerts that had stuff they actually wanted, they created grindy weeklies that in turn created more FOMO than there already was.

Here's my rough sketch for a proper Nightwave:

A 30,000 standing limit means you can only rank up a maximum 3 times a day. But overflow standing gets added to the number when it resets. In this version, the Acts will always be there until the Series is over, but can be done whenever you want without restraint. 

Something I forgot to mention in this sketch is that each completed Act yields a certain about of Nightwave Creds, depending on its level. For example, completing Murder I would get you 100 creds, while Murder II could get you 200 creds. Leveling up grants you with both (Current Level x 10) Creds AND the associated reward. No more Creds as rewards. No more FOMO. Everyone goes home happy.

Oh, and when you reach Max Rank, you're allowed to Prestige the Battle Pass Awards, and get exclusive ones. Archwing Rivens, Ephemeras, New Color Palettes, Warframe Rivens? Possibilities are endless!

That might be interesting... Although i can't picture the idea of Warframe Rivens. Like, what stats would be implemented as negative or positive? Would it have negative energy/health/armor/shield/sprint speed parts?

 

21 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

Other Things

Earlier on, I made a concept of Nightwave-inspired Alerts called Nightspots, 5 daily alerts that would grant you Battle Pass standing when completed. If those end up making it in a Series in the near future, I won't post a GIF in any of my forum replies for a whole month. And trust me, that's hard to do.

Also, Nora is too much of a yes-girl. I get that she's a big fan of the Tenno but calling my "petting my 2-year-old Kubrow before putting it back in stasis" serious crud? That's a bit much. I feel like for immserion, it would be better if her voicelines changed depending on the difficulty/reward of our completed act.

For dailies, she'd give you a "Great work, Tenno" type compliment. Kinda like the ones Spacemom gave us before she went to get some cigarettes. (God, I miss her)

For weeklies, she'd give you one of the standard ones she gives currently.

For elites, she either hollers and hoots like her favorite football team scored a winner goal, or she'd pull up a few metaphors and similes before congratulating us on our work.

Ahem.

"The Sun isn't the only star shinin' on a bright, new Origin System, Dreamers. Thanks to your contributions, I can rest easy knowing that you'll rise to the task like the luminous, godly figure you are, before setting over the horizon, waitin' to see what's next. Here's to you, Dreamers. You're MY star."

Y... You get the idea.

Idk, it might work?

 

22 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

The Wolf Sledge was mediocre at best, with a Mjonir-like special ability, but it was so rare that at the beginning of Act One, it went for about 1500-2000 plat a set. That's insane! As McGamerCz said in his review of the Hammer, NO WEAPON IN THIS GAME is worth that much money! But when you have two clashing probabilities, the rarity of a weapon goes insane. 

And then after Act I reached its conclusion, out of nowhere, the Wolf gets his own boss battle! 

Now, this was an amazing idea. SO amazing, in fact, that they NOT ONLY DIDN'T MAKE THIS A THING IN THE FIRST PLACE, BUT SAVED IT FOR LAST! 

I hear he's coming back though, so that's cool too, I guess. Maybe we could make his boss fight a recurring event, like Plague Star. And fighting him gives you Standing towards the first season of Nightwave, allowing you to get things that you missed out on.

Interesting.

[(PSN)boilerhogbc]

Plays a coop game solo.  Thats all I need to see to write it off.  You obviously dont like the community of warframe or helping new players(which you were at one point).

Getting rid of the friends/clanmate requirement was a bad idea, again since this is a coop game.  Anyone can recruit, add a friend for the 30 minutes of missions you have to do then remove them as a friend after.  Easy.  Let me guess, you have a clan of 1 as well, right?

 

[rand0mname]

Ermm, what a mind screw. It looks like a parody, but half of the points you rise are good, and some of the solutions are interesting, but you know that DE do not read GD, and yet after some editing this could be a nice addition to feedback forums, but it is so over the top!

And yes, I read it all.

Have you forgotten to do a special thing today? To keep your accents shiny, Tenno?

Edited July 12, 2019 by rand0mname

[LascarCapable]

1 minute ago, (PS4)boilerhogbc said:

Plays a coop game solo.  Thats all I need to see to write it off.  You obviously dont like the community of warframe or helping new players(which you were at one point).

Let's not start to assume things against people you don't agree with, please.

[JackHargreav]

This whole thing is a mess. Really hard to read.

28 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

Oh, and when you reach Max Rank, you're allowed to Prestige the Battle Pass Awards, and get exclusive ones. Archwing Rivens, Ephemeras, New Color Palettes, Warframe Rivens? Possibilities are endless!

This one is definitely a really bad idea.

28 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

And then after Act I reached its conclusion, out of nowhere, the Wolf gets his own boss battle! 

No one said you have to buy it. And also It was kinda expected that there would be some easier way to get the weapon.

28 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

In an attempt to make it so that people didn't get FOMO from missing alerts that had stuff they actually wanted, they created grindy weeklies that in turn created more FOMO than there already was.

I don't know how they are grindy. Most of them easy do one mission and get the standing type of tasks. On the top of that you can go back and complete the previous tasks so they made sure you can get the standing even if you missed out a week.

Edited July 12, 2019 by JackHargreav

[(PSN)boilerhogbc]

30 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

and I don't want to deal with host migrations or incompotent players RUINING my playstyle.

 

4 minutes ago, D20 said:

Let's not start to assume things against people you don't agree with, please.

He literally said there are two large/common reasons why he doesnt play with others.  What else do you need?

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

1 minute ago, (PS4)boilerhogbc said:

He literally said there are two large/common reasons why he doesnt play with others.  What else do you need?

I'm sorry that my jokes and sarcasm didn't translate well through my writing. I was only utilizing two of my three brain cells while writing this mess. 

[sleepychewbacca]

8 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

I'm sorry that my jokes and sarcasm didn't translate well through my writing. I was only utilizing two of my three brain cells while writing this mess. 

That's too much. I can only utilise a maximum of 0.3 brain cells when using GD. The remaining 1.7 goes into making angery 'reeeeeeeee' noises and typing furiously on my keyboard. 

Please understand. 

[IntheCoconut]

There is some potential here, and some interesting ideas too. I like the idea of "evolving" challenges but I personally don't like the idea that you could just repeat them over and over in one week. I think it would work better still as weeklies, but after completing one challenge, next week it would appear again but be more difficult or with modifiers like in your example. You could get standing by only focusing on stage 1 missions each week because they are easy and less time consuming and offer a more passive approach. Or, you could intentionally evolve only certain missions each week in an attempt to ramp up its difficulty because it will reward more standing. Both get you to the same result, just different approaches depending on how you like to play.

 

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

Just now, IntheCoconut said:

There is some potential here, and some interesting ideas too. I like the idea of "evolving" challenges but I personally don't like the idea that you could just repeat them over and over in one week. I think it would work better still as weeklies, but after completing one challenge, next week it would appear again but be more difficult or with modifiers like in your example. You could get standing by only focusing on stage 1 missions each week because they are easy and less time consuming and offer a more passive approach. Or, you could intentionally evolve only certain missions each week in an attempt to ramp up its difficulty because it will reward more standing. Both get you to the same result, just different approaches depending on how you like to play.

 

That's actually a very good idea. While thinking of the evolving challenges, I forgot to mention that each one would get evolved a maximum of 5 times (After completing Murder V, you'd be locked out of the act type until you decide to Prestige), but your idea is a lot more fluid and makes sense within the confines of current Nightwave.

[stormy505]

I don't think Fomo is that bad anymore and it's definitely a lot more reasonable then alerts were. Like they introduced a catch up mechanic that lets you redo challenges from a previous week. And you can miss four weeks entirely assuming that we only get 10 which I'm a little doubtful.

Week to week challenges probably isn't going to change since NW makes players come back daily. As much as I want to do all of nw in a day, I wouldn't play warframe for probably months untill a content drop.

[(PSN)abbacephas]

19 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

I'm sorry that my jokes and sarcasm didn't translate well through my writing. I was only utilizing two of my three brain cells while writing this mess. 

Self-deprecation? I expect more from you, Bling.

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

21 minutes ago, JackHargreav said:

This one is definitely a really bad idea.

Those were just some examples. Forgive my recklessness. I'd be caught dead before giving Warframes their own rivens.

21 minutes ago, JackHargreav said:

No one said you have to buy it. And also It was kinda expected that there would be some easier way to get the weapon.

The least DE could have done was to allow the boss fight to occur on Episode 5, but instead they had all the episodes conclude and then spit in the face of people who bought it by giving players an easier method. And the "no one said you had to buy it" is exactly one of the points I was parodying in the very beginning of this mess of a thread.

2 minutes ago, stormy505 said:

I don't think Fomo is that bad anymore and it's definitely a lot more reasonable then alerts were. Like they introduced a catch up mechanic that lets you redo challenges from a previous week. And you can miss four weeks entirely assuming that we only get 10 which I'm a little doubtful.

Week to week challenges probably isn't going to change since NW makes players come back daily. As much as I want to do all of nw in a day, I wouldn't play warframe for probably months untill a content drop.

Yeah, Series 2 just started so I guess I'll wait and see what this catch-up mechanic has to offer.

 

[(XBOX)Hyperion Rexx]

You know what I'm getting most tired of with Nightwave?   The constant mega length posts from people complaining about Nightwave.  Especially if they are from players who are (or should) be able to do everything with ease given their oft quoted length of play time.

And new players complaining that they can't do everything?   Well, sorry but not sorry.  Name me a game that a new player can walk into and be able to access everything in the game straight away?   Can't?   Didn't think so. 

Nightwave is not perfect and absolutely no one says it is, including de.  It can still be made better.  But it is obviously a tool designed to keep players logging in if not every day then at least 2-3 days a week.  That is not a big ask from a game developer.

Finally, although there is clearly a number of vocal players who outright despise nw and long for a return to those 10k credit/200 oxium/5k ferrite etc rewards, from my own experience of running a very active clan with 1k members, they are actually a minority and most people quite enjoy it. 

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

Just now, (PS4)abbacephas said:

Self-deprecation? I expect more from you, Bling.

I have failed you, Ceph. Please accept my apologies.

2 minutes ago, (XB1)Hyperion Rexx said:

You know what I'm getting most tired of with Nightwave?   The constant mega length posts from people complaining about Nightwave.

YES! This is a meta-complaint about the meta-complaints! Someone finally gets it!

2 minutes ago, (XB1)Hyperion Rexx said:

Name me a game that a new player can walk into and be able to access everything in the game straight away?

...Tetris?

[KnossosTNC]

*Reads thread title*

*Sigh* Time for another axe...

*Actually reads the thread*

Hmm. Actually interesting proposals. Except for the Nightspots part. That sounds like the return of the RNG snooze-and-lose nonsense to me. I'd prefer that stays dead and buried.

Also, I can't really sympathise with the "grindy" complaints any more when I could have done all but one of this week's Weeklies and Elites in one of my daily Long Session (90 to 150 minutes each). The one I couldn't do, I probably could have done passively, if I wasn't role-playing as Switzerland to the Relay Syndicates.

But other than that, interesting proposals. Probably belongs in Feedback, though.

*Puts the axe back in the closet*

Edited July 12, 2019 by KnossosTNC

[Synpai]

54 minutes ago, (PS4)LeBlingKing69 said:

DE?! You're killing me, guys! C'mon! 

Back when you said you would rework Alerts so that players wouldn't miss stuff that wasn't on while they're asleep, a grindy battle pass starred by an ASMR Twitch streamer and backed by lore that no one cares about IS THE LAST THING I HAD IN MIND! 

But NoOoOoO, everytime I try and voice an opinion that differs from the everyday hivemind, I get hit with "You're not forced to do it" or "You don't have to hit every mission to reach Level 30". As a player with 6000 hours under my belt, I'm very disappointed with the changes that Nora has brought to the Alert system. And let me explain exactly what's going on.

This part almost turned me off of the post, it came across incredibly distasteful.
You're being ironic and joking, but write as if people don't know you and will take what you say literally.

There were really good ideas apart of this thread, that may not be taken seriously or read due to the initial reaction people may get.

 

[(PSN)LeBlingKing]

1 minute ago, Synpai said:

There were really good ideas apart of this thread, that may not be taken seriously or read due to the initial reaction people may get.

I'm testing you guys' faith. To see so many replies about my good ideas means you had no choice but to dig through my god-awful satire.

Never judge books by their cover, Tenno! /s

---

I'll do better next time, I promise.

[trst]

So why did you post this is GD? Your best hope of a dev actually reading this is reposting it in feedback or a mod moving it there for you.

 

As far as your feedback goes I have to start with saying FOMO isn't an issue with the catch up mechanics now. The most anyone can miss out on is daily acts which amount to a measly 70k~ standing over the total 435k~ standing possible over 10 weeks. Which is only missed out on if one is unable to get on every 2-3 days. And acts that someone is unable to complete due to not having the resources, standing, or general progress to complete has the entire season to reach that point and begin using the catch up to finish.

 

With everything else though; evolving challenges sound neat but I doubt basic (do this x times) ones will arouse much interest considering how annoyed players got with the strings of "kill 150 enemies with x element", it may just as well backfire and make it look like more of a grind because you know that you'll just continue grinding out the same number all season. But all that being said having a bonus for completing an entire chain of these does sound like a nice incentive for them regardless if they're perceived as an extra grind.

Maybe instead have evolving challenges work more like TF2's pass system where there are tasks that are "Do x OR y" with task "y" being more difficult but faster. So with your example having it be "Kill 150 enemies OR kill 50 enemies with finishers".

Having every challenge available from the start however will probably never happen. NW is meant to keep players actively playing and letting players spend a couple hours pounding it all out and only returning once near the end is working actively against that.

Also having Nightspots as dailies that give extra standing would go against reducing FOMO. since dailies by design have the shortest time window making them more important to ranking up puts more stress on getting on every day instead of right now where it's the stress of getting on every 2-3 days. And giving them a 2-3 day time window like current dailies meaning having 10-15 extra tasks piles up, potentially putting even more stress on those who don't have the time to complete all of these and their weeklies.

 

All in all some neat ideas but there are some core (if unfortunate) meta aspects of Nightwave that may never get changed like trying to keep players active and (although not mentioned here) preventing stockpiling.