Why Forma is Bad (And How to Fix It?)

[Koboldion]

I haven't played Warframe in a while, but the recent announcements to changes of some of the basic foundations of Warframe have gotten me excited. Melee, heat procs vs armour, re-balancing of weapons, etc have all indicated to me that Digital Extremes is recognizing some of the underlying issues with the game, but that got me thinking of the biggest thing that made me quit in the first place.

Forma. Such as staple of Warframe, and yet one of the most questionable game design decisions in my opinion. Every time a something major changes, there is a collective sigh of exasperation or sometimes open outcry about polarities and Forma, DE having to compensate everyone with what is a band-aid solution to what is a problem nobody seems to talk about. It has become such as staple I don't think people notice it anymore.

Here's a question: Why is it when you want to improve a weapon you like, you have to stop using it for a while. Look, I get the concept: You forma it, and then you bring it back up as if its a new weapon, killing a bunch of weaker mobs along the way, etc. However, the reality is that you lose most of what you like about the weapon if you use the spy mission method, or you don't get to use the weapon at all as you leech exp. In other words, you have to drop everything you're doing to level a weapon, and you might not even get to use it in the first place. You probably have to dedicate an hour or so of not playing to gain a whopping 6 points of mod capacity.

My suggested solution? Reverse the process. Instead of levelling the weapon again from 0 after the forma, you use the affinity you gain from using the weapon is used to 'buy' a polarity slot with a forma. I think this would benefit both players and DE (yes financially, they are a company) and would make all our lives a lot easier.

Players:

• Weapons can be levelled passively
  • Can do other content while improving the weapon/frame
• Less 'dedicated time' required for each weapon, making variety less costly on time
• New updates can be adapted to quicker

DE:

• Increased demand for forma.
  • Forma packs are valued more, possibly more purchases of those.
• Less need to compensate players when introducing a major change
• Effects of an update can be tested quicker
• Eases player progression better.

What I propose: (Note: All these numbers are hypothetical. I'm not a professional game designer, and they have not been tested in any way.)

1. Once the weapon/frame hits level 30, it continues to gain affinity. This is displayed at the end of the mission, but not during. However, more affinity is required each time to increase to the next rank.
   • Maximum 6 bonus ranks, with 1.5x affinity, 2x affinity, 3x affinity, 3.5x affinity, 3.7x affinity, 4x affinity
2. Once it hits a new rank, the weapon unlocks and empty star and the option to rank up/polarize is highlighted in the arsenal, and the 'actions' pulses and turns gold.
   • No affinity is gained until the new rank is 'purchased'.
3. Forma is used to purchase a new rank, upon which it unlocks a polarity slot and the star is filled, indicating a new rank. This polarity slot can be changed at any time with additional forma, without the need to get additional affinity.
4. Repeat step 1 to 3. At rank 6, instead of adding an additional slot, all slots can be changed without forma. The idea behind this is at that point, any additional required forma is kinda ridiculous. 

Notes:

• Weapons and frames with existing polarities cannot change their base polarity slots without ranking up until they reach rank 6.
• The reason for the jumps in affinity needed is because higher level missions drop a lot more affinity, so the time taken wouldn't be as long.
• This also means that dedicated levelling of a weapon is harder, though this may encourage playing at higher levels.
  • This could also work to DEs advantage, promoting affinity boosters.

 

Edited October 19, 2019 by Koboldion
Formatting issues

[Steel_Rook]

I blame Call of Duty. That series' "prestige rank" has been plaguing gaming for years now, and I kind of wish it would stop. The only reason that was ever a thing even there was to give appearance of progression where there is none. Weapon resets in Warframe are a pain in the ass only mostly mitigated by increasing your MR, and I genuinely don't see the point of it.

 

3 hours ago, Koboldion said:

My suggested solution? Reverse the process. Instead of levelling the weapon again from 0 after the forma, you use the affinity you gain from using the weapon is used to 'buy' a polarity slot with a forma. I think this would benefit both players and DE (yes financially, they are a company) and would make all our lives a lot easier.

Let me see if I'm reading you right. You apply a forma to a mod slot, but that mod slot is not actually polarised. The polarity is there but not active. You have to play through 30 Ranks of affinity for the item before the polarity actually activates, at which point you can apply another one. If that's what you're suggesting, then I'm ABSOLUTELY in favour of it. I'd very much prefer this system of constant albeit gradual progression over the current yo-yo of constantly losing mods as I apply forma.

[Hobie-wan]

9 hours ago, Koboldion said:

 

Here's a question: Why is it when you want to improve a weapon you like, you have to stop using it for a while. Look, I get the concept: You forma it, and then you bring it back up as if its a new weapon, killing a bunch of weaker mobs along the way, etc. However, the reality is that you lose most of what you like about the weapon if you use the spy mission method, or you don't get to use the weapon at all as you leech exp. In other words, you have to drop everything you're doing to level a weapon, and you might not even get to use it in the first place. You probably have to dedicate an hour or so of not playing to gain a whopping 6 points of mod capacity.

Just to address this point, if you've raised your rank to at least somewhere in the 15-20 range, you have a good chunk of your points immediately available after a forma is applied. If you're putting a forma on something, you will surely have a potato on it and have been enjoying the game enough to level up a fair number of items. So realistically, you should have at least 30 points available to you after applying a forma. That should be good enough to start leveling it back up a good way into the solar system if not one of the usual spots if you insist on doing the meta.

If you're resorting to using the spy method to level up a weapon passively, why did you even forma it? I only do that on weapons that don't gel with me and I intend to dump once I get to 30.

[Tiltskillet]

7 hours ago, Steel_Rook said:

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

My suggested solution? Reverse the process. Instead of levelling the weapon again from 0 after the forma, you use the affinity you gain from using the weapon is used to 'buy' a polarity slot with a forma. I think this would benefit both players and DE (yes financially, they are a company) and would make all our lives a lot easier.

Let me see if I'm reading you right. You apply a forma to a mod slot, but that mod slot is not actually polarised. The polarity is there but not active. You have to play through 30 Ranks of affinity for the item before the polarity actually activates, at which point you can apply another one. If that's what you're suggesting, then I'm ABSOLUTELY in favour of it. I'd very much prefer this system of constant albeit gradual progression over the current yo-yo of constantly losing mods as I apply forma.

I actually like the current system fine, but wouldn't have a huge objection to something like this.   It wouldn't really change much for me, since at my MR I don't need to try to cram  in mods that won't fit when I reset the level again.  I can totally see it being more convenient for other people though.

As a side note, I've always been surprised there's not a (mostly paid) way to forgo the re-leveling aspect entirely.

[Birdframe_Prime]

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

Why is it when you want to improve a weapon you like, you have to stop using it for a while.

Because it's now been made part of the player MR progression.

MR grants you starting Mod Points. As you progress through the game and level up, your items go from having to 'stop' using them (which I find odd as your idea for 'passive' levelling actually exists in the form of Shared Affinity; all of your gear gets a share of the Affinity generated by players in range of you) to the point where you can put on the basics of a build from the moment you unbox it.

When you've reached the (vastly over-rated) ranks of above 20, you have enough mod points that even a weapon with no polarities can slap on a Catalyst and have 40 mod points (enough for a Serration, a Supplemental like Point Strike or Vigilante Armaments and two of the Dual Stat elementals to give you a basic build) available to you right away.

So the grind actually has some payoff in terms of the Forma system. At MR 27, which is the current max, you get 54 for every bit of gear just for putting on a Catalyst or Reactor, with 64 for Melee and between 68 and 72 for Warframes due to Stance and Aura increases.

The struggle is real for newer players, but it gets to be less so as you progress, and the same is true for a few other systems too. Like Standing, you can get an extra 1000 per MR level, which doesn't seem like much until it gets to the point where if a new Augment is released, you can actually grind that out in only one or two missions, instead of two days, or three, because of the Standing cap making you wait for the reset. (Of course, sensible people will stock up on Medallions in order to bypass their Standing caps, but that's another part of the flexibility of the system.)

Having convenience be awarded to you as part of the progression through the rankings is literally what games always should do (rather than the Fallout 76 route of creating problems and selling you the convenience at a premium...) and so my point would be to just stick with it. It genuinely does get easier and easier as you go.

[Koboldion]

10 hours ago, Steel_Rook said:

Let me see if I'm reading you right. You apply a forma to a mod slot, but that mod slot is not actually polarised. The polarity is there but not active. You have to play through 30 Ranks of affinity for the item before the polarity actually activates, at which point you can apply another one. If that's what you're suggesting, then I'm ABSOLUTELY in favour of it. I'd very much prefer this system of constant albeit gradual progression over the current yo-yo of constantly losing mods as I apply forma.

That is actually a really good suggestion too, and might work better actually. What I was going with was you basically keep getting affinity after level 30 regardless of whether you have used forma or not, reach the affinity needed for the next stage, and then applying forma. In other words, the game will tell you when you can forma, which is also a lot more new player friendly. I really like your version too though.

3 hours ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

When you've reached the (vastly over-rated) ranks of above 20, you have enough mod points that even a weapon with no polarities can slap on a Catalyst and have 40 mod points (enough for a Serration, a Supplemental like Point Strike or Vigilante Armaments and two of the Dual Stat elementals to give you a basic build) available to you right away.

...

Having convenience be awarded to you as part of the progression through the rankings is literally what games always should do (rather than the Fallout 76 route of creating problems and selling you the convenience at a premium...) and so my point would be to just stick with it. It genuinely does get easier and easier as you go.

I get where you're coming from, but there are three things that tipped me off to this issue that still proves that it is at least annoying and is an innate issue.

1. Big WF Youtubers still complain about having to forma their favorite weapons when a new update drops that changes something about the core of the game. I only follow two, namely Brozime and Tac. Potato, but it's something that still comes up kinda often.
2. DE has to massively compensate players for the changes. A legendary core is kinda a big deal, and the fact that they have to do so says something about how faulty the system is.

Additionally, a majority of players don't hit MR 20 from my experience. To put bluntly, there are other things that they'd rather be doing. While it does get easier, it takes a lot before it stops being a complete chore that prevents you from playing the good parts of the game, relative to the average person. 

Regardless, I think there is one part of my suggested fix that veterans can probably appreciate more than new players.

14 hours ago, Koboldion said:

1. Forma is used to purchase a new rank, upon which it unlocks a polarity slot and the star is filled, indicating a new rank. This polarity slot can be changed at any time with additional forma, without the need to get additional affinity.
2. Repeat step 1 to 3. At rank 6, instead of adding an additional slot, all slots can be changed without forma. The idea behind this is at that point, any additional required forma is kinda ridiculous. 

 

 

[EinheriarJudith]

34 minutes ago, Koboldion said:

Regardless, I think there is one part of my suggested fix that veterans can probably appreciate more than new players.

i know i would.

[Birdframe_Prime]

4 minutes ago, Koboldion said:

Big WF Youtubers still complain about having to forma their favorite weapons when a new update drops that changes something about the core of the game.

I mean... In other news, Water is wet? WF Youtubers complain about anything that means they can't produce a video faster. Even when they're excited about something happening, they always find something to complain about. I'm not one of them and I still complain regularly about the game. Doesn't mean that it's not there for a reason and that the Devs aren't going to change it anytime soon because it's both a massive revenue stream and a way of specifically enforcing that players do not and cannot just pay for the best build and weapons; even though you can buy the weapon outright half the time, it isn't battle ready, meaning it's still pay-to-go-faster not pay-to-win.

8 minutes ago, Koboldion said:

DE has to massively compensate players for the changes.

This is only the second time DE have 'massively compensated' players. Yes a Core is a huge thing, but for anyone that's over the MR of around 25 it's not really going to have a use unless there's some new massively Endo-heavy mod to be released soon (I know that's what I'm holding on for...)

The last time they changed anything really big like this, it was the modding system and they didn't so much 'compensate' players as 'reimburse' them, returning all the Forma that had been spent on the two specific slots that were being removed for that change.

The only other times that something like this happened were maybe a couple of Forma drops on the release of frame Reworks...

Also, they don't have to do this, it's a goodwill thing because while the majority of the community actually wanted the Melee changes, buffs and so on, there are a vocal few that don't, and the only way to please everyone... is by being generous with the gifts.

15 minutes ago, Koboldion said:

Additionally, a majority of players don't hit MR 20 from my experience.

From mine, though, everyone I've ever played the game with in a serious fashion, from my clans I've started or helped out in, or from the one I'm in now, has reached MR 20+ and only one of them is even complaining about not reaching MR 27 any time soon by choice because they won't level up K-Drives.

This game does have enough players that people like you and I can have incredibly different experiences with the game. So while you haven't seen many people get over MR 20, I've seen half a thousand or more. I play regularly with dozens that are higher than MR 20, and in the original clan I joined when I joined Warframe it was a genuine competition to be the first to max MR every time there was an update.

There was even a competition when MR 20 came out, with two clans, to see who could initiate a new member at MR1, and accelerate their account to the highest MR possible without exclusives. It was shown that you could, at the time, get to MR 18 in 19 days, with a little help from a clan. And now that the cap is MR 27 you can get to MR 22 or 23 without hitting any exclusive/vaulted/timed content to inhibit you.

So getting to where levelling weapons and the progression of MR has brought you to a point of convenience is, to me and those I've known, just a matter of course.

Sadly though, I genuinely see your idea for a fix as an over-complication where you end up bypassing the limitations imposed just... because you want to not be limited, as far as I can read into it.

A Vet certainly would not appreciate having a locked number of slots when they get a fresh weapon, having to unlock them in this manner with Forma turns it into just a Mobile game style of 'buy and insert gems to make your weapon more powerful' instead of 'everyone has to start off equal and everyone has to grind equally to improve'.

A person starting off having to spend 6 Forma or so just to have access to the full number of mod slots... that genuinely seems wrong to me.

And further than that, it leaves anyone with the time investment with that 'stockpile' problem that DE absolutely hate. They've tried again and again, throughout the history of the game to remove functions that allowed players to have an advantage just because they'd been playing longer and collected more. The Relic system was implemented because people used to stockpile Keys and whenever a new Prime came out the newer players had to grind keys, then use keys, while the older players would just use their existing keys and get the new content nearly instantly. Cetus and Fortuna released with completely new grinds and resources to ensure that all players started on a basic level footing and everyone progressed at the approximate same pace. When new systems are actually released, there's usually a new resource released along with them that the player has to grind, and that new resource is used for any new Warframe or Weapon that's released in the next half year to ensure players grind it up. Hell, one of the biggest player back-lash incidents in the game came because DE made assumptions about the Veteran side of the game having such abundant stock-piles of resources that they released the Hema with a base 5000 Mutagen Samples cost for Research, believing that the clans would always have somebody who had been farming the Derelicts for so long that they would have hundreds, if not thousands, of Mutagen Samples ready to just dump in. And, of course, ruined that launch for thousands of clans that didn't have those veterans, and for veterans that hadn't had any reason to go back to the Derelicts for Samples in about two years...

What I'm getting at there is that when new things are released, Forma is supposed to be needed to adapt to them. DE want you to all need the same amount of effort to try out any new thing on release. A grind cost is always required, according to them, and whether I agree with it or not, I can't see them ever agreeing to a system where, after putting in 6 Forma, suddenly you never need it on that weapon again.

They do like convenience things, when they make no real impact, such as the crippling depression that 'swap polarities' created as a function. Being able to, once you'd put a Forma on the weapon, change around where the Polarities were... Ye gods of RNG, the wailing and gnashing of teeth that came from players that had re-Forma'd their weapons or frames just so that the Polarities lined up in their preferred order... Those kind of conveniences, where you do spend less Forma, but only because spending Forma just to rearrange the order of the bits is silly, are common sense.

But never needing Forma again on a weapon after just six? No, I definitely don't see that happening.

And this, believe it or not, is coming from a player that has literally spent an entire week of play so far re-applying Forma on weapons to ensure that I can use the new 'weapon Exilus' slot easier when it arrives, and I would have gladly not have had to do it at all. Especially considering that there are many weapons that I've levelled once for Mastery and ignored... but the Exilus will allow me the small Utility functions that I need to improve those weapons juuuuuust enough to be better functional, and thus useful.

While I can see the use of it, from that perspective, I cannot see it ever happening, because from the Dev's point of view, everyone needs to have equal grind, every time. Even if the Veterans can do it quicker and with more convenience, they still have to do that grind.

[Koboldion]

28 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

A Vet certainly would not appreciate having a locked number of slots when they get a fresh weapon, having to unlock them in this manner with Forma turns it into just a Mobile game style of 'buy and insert gems to make your weapon more powerful' instead of 'everyone has to start off equal and everyone has to grind equally to improve'.

A person starting off having to spend 6 Forma or so just to have access to the full number of mod slots... that genuinely seems wrong to me.

...

What I'm getting at there is that when new things are released, Forma is supposed to be needed to adapt to them. DE want you to all need the same amount of effort to try out any new thing on release. A grind cost is always required, according to them, and whether I agree with it or not, I can't see them ever agreeing to a system where, after putting in 6 Forma, suddenly you never need it on that weapon again.

I get your other points, but I think you might've misunderstood me there. You still have the same number of mod slots, and you still need forma. You just don't need to specifically allocate time to just ranking up weapons to polarise, which is what annoys me. I put it at 6 because I don't think I've heard of anyone who formas one thing more than 6 times unless it is to change an existing polarity.

You're still spending the same amount of forma. You just get the affinity before you forma, and you don't have to stop playing the rest of the game to get the affinity to forma. Maybe I got the wording a little unclear, I'm still new to this.

28 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

From mine, though, everyone I've ever played the game with in a serious fashion, from my clans I've started or helped out in, or from the one I'm in now, has reached MR 20+ and only one of them is even complaining about not reaching MR 27 any time soon by choice because they won't level up K-Drives.

I guess there's the difference between our experiences. I only know one or maybe two people who play Warframe seriously, because for everyone else they have other things they consider more important/enjoyable. I, for one, would rather grind out combos in a fighting game, as abhorrent as that may sound to you. 

But yeah, that is food for thought.

Edited October 20, 2019 by Koboldion
Misunderstood a statement

[Steel_Rook]

11 hours ago, Koboldion said:

That is actually a really good suggestion too, and might work better actually. What I was going with was you basically keep getting affinity after level 30 regardless of whether you have used forma or not, reach the affinity needed for the next stage, and then applying forma. In other words, the game will tell you when you can forma, which is also a lot more new player friendly. I really like your version too though.

Yeah, seems like we were coming at the same idea from different directions 🙂 I picked my approach simply because it's thematically similar to the current system, which is to say "you polarise a slot and THEN rank up the weapon" but there's nothing intrinsically superior to it. Either way, I'm in agreement that some way to re-Forma items without re-levelling them would be nice. I tend to prefer constant albeit gradual progression over the current yo-yo of performance. Sure, going from a fully Ranked-up weapon to a brand new one you just got will still show a performance dip, but that's simply because you're starting on a new progression path. That progression path will then not have loss of progression in it moving forward past that point.

 

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

I guess there's the difference between our experiences. I only know one or maybe two people who play Warframe seriously, because for everyone else they have other things they consider more important/enjoyable. I, for one, would rather grind out combos in a fighting game, as abhorrent as that may sound to you. 

Anyone who plays the game long enough will eventually gravitate to at least MR20, simply because you can get there purely through what's on the Market for Credits. In my experience, however (and this seems to be backed up by metrics whenever those are shared), that's a fairly small portion of any MMO community. The vast majority of players don't stick with the same game for more than a few weeks or a few months (not counting the ones who don't stick for a few hours), with actual veterans being a minority. This is why the majority of Live Services build their business around the new player experience and "time savers" microtransactions - because their business model is built on churn more so than retention. The jury's still out on whether that's sustainable now that everything is a Live Service demanding all of your time, as that could go either way in either increasing or decreasing player retention.

The problem with using personal anecdotes, though, is that they're very heavily coloured by one's own circumstances. Drawing opinions from the forums is always fraught with danger as the forum community is very far from a vertical slice of the larger playerbase. A high percentage of forum posters tend to be veterans, they tend to be outspoken and they generally tend to be disgruntled since criticism and suggestions for improvements are among the most powerful motivators to post in the first place. Veterans also often tend to surround themselves with other veterans simply because their non-veteran friends/clanmates/acquaintances tend to drop out over time, self-filtering those groups. That's not to say anyone is specifically wrong, but rather that personal anecdotes are worth a consideration but aren't conclusive evidence.

[WhiteMarker]

12 hours ago, Koboldion said:

DE has to massively compensate players for the changes. A legendary core is kinda a big deal, and the fact that they have to do so says something about how faulty the system is.

I don't want to talk anything else, because I'm to lazy to read right now.
But DE doesn't have to do anything. DE WANTS do compensate players. By no means they ever have to do something like that.
For example Overwatch changes characters constantly. If you payed a huge amount of money for fashion for a strong character, and if said character gets nerfed, you won't see any compensation.
So really, the compensation doesn't tell us anything about a system. It just tells us something about DE and their way of doing things.

[Birdframe_Prime]

12 hours ago, Koboldion said:

You just don't need to specifically allocate time to just ranking up weapons to polarise, which is what annoys me.

It annoys you because it's a limitation. An intentional one.

In the current one you have to get the affinity before the Forma, the difference is that Forma isn't the limitation on your play, it's the Mod Points which are based on the Affinity gain. You don't have to 'stop playing the game', in fact you're encouraged to do it with under-levelled weapons because of how Affinity Gain works in a team. If anything, you're actively encouraged to use only that under-levelled and under-geared weapon because 75% of shared Affinity goes to your weapons, which is supposed to split evenly, except if you only equip one weapon it all goes to that one weapon. Outside of that, even just putting a Serration on your gun, which you can do at just MR 7, allows nearly every single weapon in the game to at least attempt the Star Chart level content and make kills. So while you may struggle, it's not impossible to play and gain Affinity for that weapon as you go.

This concept you're pushing, that you have to stop playing with that weapon after a Forma, isn't the problem you're trying to solve by changing Forma.

What you want isn't a change to the Forma system, it's a change to the Mod Points system. You want to be able to have full mod points after a Forma, and that's not how this is supposed to work at all. It's an intentional limitation on us to make sure that only after you've put in the grind to raise your MR do you have access to Mod Points while the weapon is Rank 0. If the weapon is Rank 0, you shouldn't, at base, be able to modify it at all. Forma does reset the weapon to Rank 0, so I can see how you're blaming Forma for it, but it's that essential point that isn't going to change; Rank 0 is a base weapon, only by grinding up your overall Player MR can you offset the base Rank 0 weapon's mod points being naturally 0.

What you're chafing at is something that's supposed to chafe. It's no different than... oh, I don't know, the most recent Trine game, where you only have access to the Wizard's full arsenal of conjured objects and can only conjure the full three at once for puzzle solving after you're about 80% through the game. Going back to finish up missing collections is easy because of that, but until you get to that point you are intentionally limited by the game.

So, no matter what change you propose to the Forma system, DE are still going to put in a function that means you can't access a full build if the weapon is Rank 0 until you reach MR 30.

[Koboldion]

7 hours ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

What you want isn't a change to the Forma system, it's a change to the Mod Points system. You want to be able to have full mod points after a Forma, and that's not how this is supposed to work at all. 

I'm not sure where that's coming from, can you clarify? What I'm suggesting is still polarising one slot at a time, in fact in total it takes more affinity to totally Max out a weapon. I'm honestly confused as to where this is coming from. 

7 hours ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

In the current one you have to get the affinity before the Forma, the difference is that Forma isn't the limitation on your play, it's the Mod Points which are based on the Affinity gain. You don't have to 'stop playing the game', in fact you're encouraged to do it with under-levelled weapons because of how Affinity Gain works in a team. If anything, you're actively encouraged to use only that under-levelled and under-geared weapon because 75% of shared Affinity goes to your weapons, which is supposed to split evenly, except if you only equip one weapon it all goes to that one weapon. Outside of that, even just putting a Serration on your gun, which you can do at just MR 7, allows nearly every single weapon in the game to at least attempt the Star Chart level content and make kills. So while you may struggle, it's not impossible to play and gain Affinity for that weapon as you go.

I think that's another miscommunication on my part. By 'essentially stop playing the game' I mean you have to drop whatever you were doing just to level that piece of gear, which is what you're suggesting. By no means is your opinion wrong, but in my opinion, a game shouldn't be forcing you to go do repetitive content that isn't engaging for something that is necessary for some of the higher-level content. In most other RPGs, the exp grind can simultaneously be grinding for gear, currency, etc. In WF, grinding exp is almost always just grinding exp, unless you're using akkad for levelling. Bringing just that weapon with a team means you're either in a lower level mission, which means it's nothing you haven't seen before and the gain is slow, or you're getting carried and you to next to nothing. 

On other words, you either have to go play in some other part of the star chart that has no other purpose to you and exp grind slowly, or you do little more than buff whoever is nuking the map to level quickly but, well, basically not play the game. 

When I throw Forma on a weapon, it's because I like using it in the content I usually enjoy. What Forma does is it takes it right out of that, and you normally have to do it several times for a high-level build. I don't mind having to throw Forma at gear, as in the resource is fine. What I do mind is having to spend several hours of doing arbitrary dull chores just to get it back to a usable state for the content that is actually meaningful and somewhat engaging. 

9 hours ago, WhiteMarker said:

But DE doesn't have to do anything. DE WANTS do compensate players. By no means they ever have to do something like that.

That's true, DE is a darling ❤️

[Birdframe_Prime]

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

I'm not sure where that's coming from, can you clarify? What I'm suggesting is still polarising one slot at a time, in fact in total it takes more affinity to totally Max out a weapon. I'm honestly confused as to where this is coming from.

Because, and I'm not saying this to be obtuse, what your whole problem seems to be is that after a Forma, you don't have any mod points, so you can't put a build on. Forma isn't the issue there, it's that DE dictates that rank 0 weapons have 0 mod points.

What you're asking for, in fact, is something DE actually have hidden in the game files (for the last five years) and haven't released; Omega Forma. This item polarises without actually resetting the rank of the weapon to 0. The very fact that they tested it, and tested it enough that it's still hidden in the files to this day, without ever implementing it, is more than enough evidence (for me) that they do not want a situation where you don't reset your weapon to 0 after a polarisation.

As long as you are not MR 30, you will not get the full mod points after a Forma, not because that's what Forma does, but because that's what the rule of unranked weapons and warframes is. 

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

On other words, you either have to go play in some other part of the star chart that has no other purpose to you and exp grind slowly, or you do little more than buff whoever is nuking the map to level quickly but, well, basically not play the game. 

How is it not? If the mission is lower level you can be playing it for a reason, such as farming resources with a team (because enemy level does not affect resource drop), and if you're spending the mission buffing other players, then you are in no way 'not playing the game' because you're contributing to the mission.

Far from that, going to Hydron and standing in a corner while other people kill things really is stopping playing the game. So, no, you don't have to stop playing the game, you can still play the game. It is not playing it with an OP optimally built weapon, but it is still playing the game.

The mentality that just because your weapon is underpowered and you're not getting kills somehow means you're not actively playing is... just defeatist in my eyes.

So you can't go to the particular mission you want to play with it? Do you not have other things in the game to accomplish? Absolutely nothing else? Not even helping a team member farm up parts for a frame by running the boss fight a few times? Are you seriously telling me you've got no reason whatsoever to play any other content than something that you're not even willing to attempt without fully ranked and maxed-out gear?

Because if I wanted to level a weapon without 'stopping playing' I can find a dozen things to do that an unranked weapon can attempt that further aspects of the game I want to achieve. Even if, at the time, all that boils down to is picking up a clan member and being a run-buddy through a few missions they need.

Again, I have literally spent the time since the announcement of the 'weapon exilus slot', or 'pexilus' I think it is, putting Forma on my Primary Weapons (and I'll be moving on to Secondaries now that I'm done), all of them barring the standard versions that have a Prime/Vandal/Wraith/Prisma upgrade, and to do that I have still farmed Prime Parts for Baro, I have still farmed Kuva for my Rivens, I have still farmed Arbitrations for Vitus Essence (because I'm heavily guessing that it's Vitus Essence that will be required to get the 'keys' for Grendel's parts). Heck, I've even spent a couple of hours helping my clan leader film footage for the background of his upcoming videos. (Yes, go watch Xenogelion's Frame Cast stream with Michel Postma, or if you can't catch it, watch the Frame Cast highlights on Youtube. Mostly because I want you to watch his stuff, but the Highlights are where that background footage will be used).

Kuva Siphons are only level 30, a simple Serration can let most weapons take on those, even if you need to swap to another for the more 'difficult' parts, and going with a team to support them is not a waste of time, as your weapon is earning Shared Affinity the entire time. Enough runs of those to get you a couple of rolls on a Riven is enough to fully level a weapon, and you'll be gaining Capacity as you go anyway, so you'll be able to add mods back in between missions.

So my question to you is this: How is 'going to another part of the star chart' something that has no purpose for you, how is that 'stopping playing the game' when there are dozens of purposes there to be taken advantage of? Worse than that, when somebody is a dedicated damage frame, nuking the entire map anyway, by your definition how would your weapon be actually contributing at that point anyway? If somebody is going to do that, by your point, you're not going to be 'playing the game' even if you had a max ranked, multi-polarised weapon, because you'd still be either just buffing them or chasing down the things they miss.

It makes no sense to me that this is such a problem for you.

But... then again, I guess I have been here longer than a lot of players (not all, but a lot) and there now seems to be a reason for that...

[Koboldion]

37 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

How is it not? If the mission is lower level you can be playing it for a reason, such as farming resources with a team (because enemy level does not affect resource drop), and if you're spending the mission buffing other players, then you are in no way 'not playing the game' because you're contributing to the mission.

...

Far from that, going to Hydron and standing in a corner while other people kill things really is stopping playing the game. So, no, you don't have to stop playing the game, you can still play the game. It is not playing it with an OP optimally built weapon, but it is still playing the game.

...

So my question to you is this: How is 'going to another part of the star chart' something that has no purpose for you, how is that 'stopping playing the game' when there are dozens of purposes there to be taken advantage of? Worse than that, when somebody is a dedicated damage frame, nuking the entire map anyway, by your definition how would your weapon be actually contributing at that point anyway? If somebody is going to do that, by your point, you're not going to be 'playing the game' even if you had a max ranked, multi-polarised weapon, because you'd still be either just buffing them or chasing down the things they miss.

It makes no sense to me that this is such a problem for you.

I guess there is a difference in what I consider 'playing the game'. Buffing in WF from my experience is just pressing one button occasionally and sometimes running around. Same for nuking, same for EV, etc. To me, it's becomes just about watching a bunch of numbers go up. I can't tie something emotional to it like Pokemon or a character in, say, D&D, nor do I feel like I'm improving myself, like in a fighting game. The weapons themselves, specifically the accurate and precise weapons are what I find rewarding, because then I have an excuse to actively engage with the movement system, try for trickshots, etc. That's kinda why the melee 3.0 got me interested again. I originally planned just to play a pilot for railjack, but the new melee system suggested some more engaging and technical gameplay (out of all the things, I was most hyped about dodge-cancelling animations.)

I suppose therein lies why I hate the forma grind. It takes me out of the most engaging core gameplay loop for me. Contributing is one thing, but actually doing something I enjoy is another.

37 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

Because, and I'm not saying this to be obtuse, what your whole problem seems to be is that after a Forma, you don't have any mod points, so you can't put a build on. Forma isn't the issue there, it's that DE dictates that rank 0 weapons have 0 mod points.

What you're asking for, in fact, is something DE actually have hidden in the game files (for the last five years) and haven't released; Omega Forma. This item polarises without actually resetting the rank of the weapon to 0. The very fact that they tested it, and tested it enough that it's still hidden in the files to this day, without ever implementing it, is more than enough evidence (for me) that they do not want a situation where you don't reset your weapon to 0 after a polarisation.

I guess, yeah that sums it up. Question about Omega Forma though, did it have an affinity cost?

38 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

So you can't go to the particular mission you want to play with it? Do you not have other things in the game to accomplish? Absolutely nothing else? Not even helping a team member farm up parts for a frame by running the boss fight a few times? Are you seriously telling me you've got no reason whatsoever to play any other content than something that you're not even willing to attempt without fully ranked and maxed-out gear?

Nothing really worthwhile, no. I don't really have anyone who needs frame parts, and if they did, I would bring along a weapon which I feel like can actually help them with if they're having trouble. The other thing is if I try to level it up that way, I'd basically be locked out of using the weapon for content that I want to do for one or two months. As you can imagine, this isn't very pleasant when this is your favorite weapon.

Edited October 21, 2019 by Koboldion

[Birdframe_Prime]

1 hour ago, Koboldion said:

I guess, yeah that sums it up. Question about Omega Forma though, did it have an affinity cost?

 

No, none, actually. That's kind of the point of Omega Forma, it was a super Forma that did not reset the Rank to zero, and so you didn't have to level it back up again.

But as I said, the problem that you're going to have to get over is that DE specifically don't want you to have access to all your mod points for an Unranked weapon, which is why no matter how much cost you put in a Rank 0 weapon (whether caused by a Forma or anything else) will not have a complete set of Mod Points until you're MR 30.

1 hour ago, Koboldion said:

The other thing is if I try to level it up that way, I'd basically be locked out of using the weapon for content that I want to do for one or two months.

Two months? I just said that I've been doing Forma application in a dedicated fashion for the last two weeks and have gone through every major Primary weapon (except repeats) from Acceltra to Zarr. I have not been sitting in Hydron all that time, I have been playing the game, getting Kuva, playing Arbitrations and helping my Clan Leader record footage, and in that time I have applied around fifty to sixty Forma with multiple weapons needing four or more Forma to hit the builds I wanted.

I have a full time job and play only for a few hours each day, and have even had time to complete Trine 4 in that time as well. (Find the Corgi, it's cute.)

What are you doing with your methodology that is slowing you down? If you were to assume I have a booster, for example (because I have one), that only gains affinity at twice the rate, so with that in mind, four weeks of play would be enough to apply 50+ Forma. And would likely have net me double the rewards too, because I'm still going to be doing the other content regardless.

Two months? You're genuinely exaggerating for effect now.

[DariusMcSwag]

On 2019-10-19 at 8:30 AM, Steel_Rook said:

Let me see if I'm reading you right. You apply a forma to a mod slot, but that mod slot is not actually polarised. The polarity is there but not active. You have to play through 30 Ranks of affinity for the item before the polarity actually activates, at which point you can apply another one. If that's what you're suggesting, then I'm ABSOLUTELY in favour of it. I'd very much prefer this system of constant albeit gradual progression over the current yo-yo of constantly losing mods as I apply forma.

I would be ok with this too, as long as we could see the newly added 30 ranks to our weapon.

For example: You rank up a weapon to rank 30, install a forma, and watch the weapon rank up from 30 to 60. SO instead of seeing "Rank 30 - 1 forma" you would see "Rank 60"

Theoretically, a weapon should be Rank 60 in both usage and stats if you forma it once. This would help make progression in Warframe a more concrete thing.

[Steel_Rook]

Erm... Sure. That's not what I intended but I see no real downside to it. It's really just a matter of display, anyway. As I said, Forma seems to have been tailored after the old Call of Duty "prestige rank" mechanic, so displaying items as 5-30 or V-30 or 30(5) comes with the package. Displaying the weapon as 300 instead would be fine for me, although it might induce some added mental math trying to figure how close to needing a new forma a Rank 133 weapon is (120 + 13, incidentally). I tend to find the current iteration a bit easier to use, but my only argument here is personal anecdote.

[Koboldion]

6 hours ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

I have a full time job and play only for a few hours each day, and have even had time to complete Trine 4 in that time as well. (Find the Corgi, it's cute.) 

I play a few hours per week. 

[Birdframe_Prime]

11 hours ago, Koboldion said:

I play a few hours per week. 

Well? In a few hours in this game I levelled a Warframe in standard SO to 30, which is more affinity than a weapon and took about 20 minutes, I took a Glaxion Vandal (of all the joke weapons) to an Arbitration to level it up , again only about twenty minutes or less, and I still got in a full roll at one of my Rivens with short-run missions like Exterminate and Capture, again only about ten minutes at most per mission. And I play Zephyr, not some kill frame. If you play for a couple of hours a week, then make the most of those hours. It's a logical way to think of the matter.

There are huge amounts of things to do in Warframe, you don't need more than a few hours a week to get any of it done, DE have deliberately reduced the average time of missions down so that 20 minutes is considered the most you need by the vast majority of the players. I'm one of the weird ones nowadays for being able to spend a couple of hours in high-end missions.

Short times are encouraged, and short times will level up your weapons quickly if you actively play them with that weapon instead of dropping it because it's not optimally modded.

[Koboldion]

21 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

I took a Glaxion Vandal (of all the joke weapons) to an Arbitration to level it up , again only about twenty minutes or less, and I still got in a full roll at one of my Rivens with short-run missions like Exterminate and Capture, again only about ten minutes at most per mission. And I play Zephyr, not some kill frame. If you play for a couple of hours a week, then make the most of those hours. It's a logical way to think of the matter.

Out of curiosity, was this solo or in a team? Also what region are you in?

In my experience, I actually enjoyed levelling warframes, but leveling weapons were dull because I was locked to missions lvl 20-30 or so if I wanted to get stuff done solo with them (which is basically what I had to do a majority of the time. Finding a squad was pretty rare for me.) Maybe I was missing something, or something changed while I was gone, I don't really know, but if the weapon leveling grind can be done in 20 minutes per forma then I might have to rethink my approach.

Still think reforma-ing previously formaed slots shouldn't require re-leveling though. I'm sure they can just add some sort of array, or an extra dimension to an existing one for that.

[Koboldion]

On 2019-10-20 at 6:58 AM, Hobie-wan said:

Just to address this point, if you've raised your rank to at least somewhere in the 15-20 range, you have a good chunk of your points immediately available after a forma is applied. If you're putting a forma on something, you will surely have a potato on it and have been enjoying the game enough to level up a fair number of items. So realistically, you should have at least 30 points available to you after applying a forma. That should be good enough to start leveling it back up a good way into the solar system if not one of the usual spots if you insist on doing the meta.

If you're resorting to using the spy method to level up a weapon passively, why did you even forma it? I only do that on weapons that don't gel with me and I intend to dump once I get to 30.

Just realized this was a thing I didn't address.

I responded earlier to a different question with the reply of speed: Most of the star chart isn't that interesting to me, and oftentimes this takes (from my experience) a month or two. Maybe it's because arbitrations weren't a thing yet, I don't really know what they are right now, perhaps they're an answer to my prayers.

I guess this may also be influenced by one of my unpopular opinions: WFs core gameplay loop is dull. Once again, opinion, but taking to the rest of the star chart means that the already lacking technical aspects of WF becomes irrelevant: you're so tanky that your movement doesn't matter, you effectively have as many chances as you want to aim, defense objectives aren't going to die unless you make a really bad decision.

I'm starting to wonder if what I'm looking for has come in the form of arbitrations (is it something like a mid-level mission where there's some technical element that is challenging regardless of your gear?), but I was thinking that if there was so many people getting annoyed at re-forma-ing, it's easier to implement that and easier to maintain in the long term than creating a specific new mission type or node to make it engaging.

(Background, I quit around when SO and Fortuna was introduced)

[Birdframe_Prime]

7 hours ago, Koboldion said:

Out of curiosity, was this solo or in a team? Also what region are you in?

Both Solo and in a team, and I'm over in the UK, so Northern Europe. If you're levelling a weapon out of dedicated levelling spots like Hydron, there are a few very quick ways to do it, but the one I'd recommend if you're Solo is to move one node over from Hydron to Kappa, the Spy. Take any frame, it doesn't really matter in this case, unless you're levelling a melee (in which case, take a stealth frame and use Stealth Finishers on everything that isn't Alert, you get the Stealth bonus for up to 500% Affinity if you chain in Stealth Kills, and you can pick and choose your targets so you don't accidentally kill an Aware enemy and reset your Stealth Affinity boost).

All you do is kill enemies as much as you can between the Spy Vaults, complete the Spy Vaults, if the alarms sound in the main mission that's absolutely fine and just means more enemies to kill. Any weapon can kill level 30-40 enemies, although if you're struggling take a frame that can buff weapon damage, like Chroma, Mirage, Nezha or Rhino, and do it that way. With the combination of almost limitless spawning enemies and the Spy Vault bursts of Affinity, it'll take you a few runs without a booster for a Primary/Secondary, but it's something you can easily Solo, do at your own pace, and will get you from 0-30 in only one evening's play at the longest. If you actually do have a Booster, and do have the Naramon Focus School, and need to level a Melee weapon, the Stealth route will actually level your weapon in a single run, as long as you don't set off alarms or break your kill streak on Unaware enemies too often.

I say you can take any frame because all Grineer Spy Vaults can be completed without a Stealth Frame, even the high level one on Kappa is absolutely easy if you learn the routes.

There are, of course, the standard other things to think about. Hushed Invisibility Loki will allow you to kill enemies without alerting them too quickly and to complete the Spy Vaults with even more ease. But beyond that, the key is to use the weapon itself. As long as you kill an enemy with it, your weapon gets half your Affinity from that enemy, as long as it's the only weapon you have equipped, your weapon gets 75% of the Affinity from things your allies kill. Using these two things to your advantage, and exploiting frames that let a weapon perform way above its pay-grade if you need to, you should be able to level a weapon up in pretty much any level 30+ mission type in a single evening's play time. 

But if all else actually fails? If you're really struggling without your favourite weapon? Take it to Hydron with friends. Take only it, let your friends kill things, 15 waves to 20 at the most (10 if you have a booster), and you will have that weapon levelled. It's fast, repeatable, and if you don't have players you can take with you, you will always, always, always find public people on Hydron levelling things. Most public players will only stay for 10 waves, for some reason, but they will be a fast 10 waves, easy to complete, and you get huge gains from it.

6 hours ago, Koboldion said:

I'm starting to wonder if what I'm looking for has come in the form of arbitrations

If you're farming Grendel when he releases, you may find out. Apparently to get the keys to the missions that drop his parts (with one part guaranteed per key), you have to play Arbitrations.

Try them out, see if you like them ^^

[-Kittens-]

On 2019-10-19 at 4:19 AM, Koboldion said:

I haven't played Warframe in a while, but the recent announcements to changes of some of the basic foundations of Warframe have gotten me excited. Melee, heat procs vs armour, re-balancing of weapons, etc have all indicated to me that Digital Extremes is recognizing some of the underlying issues with the game, but that got me thinking of the biggest thing that made me quit in the first place.

Forma. Such as staple of Warframe, and yet one of the most questionable game design decisions in my opinion. Every time a something major changes, there is a collective sigh of exasperation or sometimes open outcry about polarities and Forma, DE having to compensate everyone with what is a band-aid solution to what is a problem nobody seems to talk about. It has become such as staple I don't think people notice it anymore.

Here's a question: Why is it when you want to improve a weapon you like, you have to stop using it for a while. Look, I get the concept: You forma it, and then you bring it back up as if its a new weapon, killing a bunch of weaker mobs along the way, etc. However, the reality is that you lose most of what you like about the weapon if you use the spy mission method, or you don't get to use the weapon at all as you leech exp. In other words, you have to drop everything you're doing to level a weapon, and you might not even get to use it in the first place. You probably have to dedicate an hour or so of not playing to gain a whopping 6 points of mod capacity.

My suggested solution? Reverse the process. Instead of levelling the weapon again from 0 after the forma, you use the affinity you gain from using the weapon is used to 'buy' a polarity slot with a forma. I think this would benefit both players and DE (yes financially, they are a company) and would make all our lives a lot easier.

Players:

• Weapons can be levelled passively
  • Can do other content while improving the weapon/frame
• Less 'dedicated time' required for each weapon, making variety less costly on time
• New updates can be adapted to quicker

DE:

• Increased demand for forma.
  • Forma packs are valued more, possibly more purchases of those.
• Less need to compensate players when introducing a major change
• Effects of an update can be tested quicker
• Eases player progression better.

What I propose: (Note: All these numbers are hypothetical. I'm not a professional game designer, and they have not been tested in any way.)

1. Once the weapon/frame hits level 30, it continues to gain affinity. This is displayed at the end of the mission, but not during. However, more affinity is required each time to increase to the next rank.
   • Maximum 6 bonus ranks, with 1.5x affinity, 2x affinity, 3x affinity, 3.5x affinity, 3.7x affinity, 4x affinity
2. Once it hits a new rank, the weapon unlocks and empty star and the option to rank up/polarize is highlighted in the arsenal, and the 'actions' pulses and turns gold.
   • No affinity is gained until the new rank is 'purchased'.
3. Forma is used to purchase a new rank, upon which it unlocks a polarity slot and the star is filled, indicating a new rank. This polarity slot can be changed at any time with additional forma, without the need to get additional affinity.
4. Repeat step 1 to 3. At rank 6, instead of adding an additional slot, all slots can be changed without forma. The idea behind this is at that point, any additional required forma is kinda ridiculous. 

Notes:

• Weapons and frames with existing polarities cannot change their base polarity slots without ranking up until they reach rank 6.
• The reason for the jumps in affinity needed is because higher level missions drop a lot more affinity, so the time taken wouldn't be as long.
• This also means that dedicated levelling of a weapon is harder, though this may encourage playing at higher levels.
  • This could also work to DEs advantage, promoting affinity boosters.

 

 

None of your premise tracks; and without a booster it takes about 25 minutes to level a weapon.

 

It's real real simple. If you like something, you invest time and energy in it.

[Hobie-wan]

10 hours ago, Koboldion said:

I guess this may also be influenced by one of my unpopular opinions: WFs core gameplay loop is dull.

It has already been brought up many times in this thread that it shouldn't take you long to relevel something if you just want to 'get it done'. An hour or less if you're using a meta location, a few hours if you aren't.

But really, if you don't like the core loop of shoot/slash/burn/freeze enemies and get new loot and power it up to see how well you can dispatch more enemies and get more loot, then it sounds like the game just isn't for you.