Plains Bonus Objectives

[(PSN)sister-hawk]

Most of the new(ish) bonus objectives for Plains of Eidolon bounties are fine, but there's a couple of them that need to be adjusted. The two in particular are the "Defend the Area" where you have to maintain control by continuously killing enemies, and the Assassinate objective, specifically the part where you must kill enemies to draw out the commander.

Now this isn't me complaining that the bonus objectives are too hard and need to be made easier. I have no trouble killing enough enemies with enough speed to keep the control level above 50%. What I do struggle with is finding enough enemies to keep the control level above 50%. I played a bounty last night where I arrived at the zone, in which the only enemy was a single turret, which I killed, and then watched as the control level dropped like a brick with not a single enemy in sight, before a drop ship finally spawned in the distance and very casually strolled over to me. But by that point it was too late and the control level had already dipped below 50%. This is not my failing as a player. The spawn rate of enemies is entirely out of my hands. I have no control over it, so it doesn't feel very good to have a bonus taken away from me when the game is basically trolling. This bounty objective has always been a problem, but instances of failed bounties due to enemies not spawning was always somewhat rare. But losing the bonus now is not so uncommon.

As for the assassinate bonus objective, i.e. killing 15 enemies to draw out the commander in under a minute, that suffers from essentially the same problem. I have no trouble killing 15 enemies in one minute. I can kill 15 enemies in 10 seconds. But I can't kill 15 enemies if they don't exist. I've seen this bonus fail simply because the game didn't spawn me 15 enemies to kill before the minute was up. Once again, I have no control over that, I shouldn't be losing a bonus because of it.

The latter I think has a relatively simple fix: just increase the time in which to draw out the commander from 1:00 to either 1:30 or 2:00. Of course it would be better to fix the spawning of enemies in the first place, but I assume that's a more complex problem to solve. The former example I think is much more troublesome. Again, fixing the enemy spawn rate would be ideal, but it's also not always a problem. Sometimes it's raining cloned men, sometimes I get to sit all alone and contemplate life while I fail the bounty. And the control area is so massive that sometimes, even when enemies do spawn, they do so on the other side of a mountain and I have no idea they are there until I've already lost the bonus. I'm not sure what quick and dirty patch could be applied, but it needs something. Not even lowering the control requirement would work, because it doesn't address the root cause.

There is one more bonus objective that I would like to give my feedback on, but which is not quite as problematic as the other two: capture. This one was absolutely called by the community before it was ever pushed to the live game. You get to the area, run around looking for the commander, ignoring everyone else, and your Kavat jumps on a lancer and rips his jugular out. Bonus lost. Or, sometimes I just freaking forget and pop the first guy I see. Oops. I know, that's my fault, but it's just so damn counter intuitive to not kill enemies. Warframe is not that strategic, I'm sorry to have to say. It's a horde shooter. We have been trained to lay waste to our enemies as quickly and efficiently as possible. It hurts me to take my finger off the trigger when there's a heavy gunner trying to shove her grattler up by hind end. There's also the fact that when you're playing one of the squishier frames in a tier 5 bounty, simply leaving enemies alive while you run around looking for the commander is not an option, because one shield lancer will put a slash proc on you so phat you gotta do a double take at your health bar. Ok I get it, "be stealthy" or whatever. Scope the commander out before you rush in. Sure that's a solution, but I just don't think it's a good design in the first place. That's my opinion, anyway.

[Hobie-wan]

I wonder if there's  a spawn difference between the current versions between PC and console, or just PC versus console itself. I did a control the area portion of a bounty last night and there were plenty of enemies to keep it above 90% the whole time. This was in the upper right camp with the cave below the main structure.

[Duality52]

39 minutes ago, (PS4)sister-hawk said:

As for the assassinate bonus objective, i.e. killing 15 enemies to draw out the commander in under a minute, that suffers from essentially the same problem. I have no trouble killing 15 enemies in one minute. I can kill 15 enemies in 10 seconds. But I can't kill 15 enemies if they don't exist. I've seen this bonus fail simply because the game didn't spawn me 15 enemies to kill before the minute was up

That bonus objective is a lot worse, since the bonus demands you to draw out and kill the target all within one minute.

The Capture Target bonus needs some tweaks (capture the target without killing anyone), as most people won't have a decent Operator to down and capture the target. It's oddly punishing to people with decent kitted Companions that can kill Bounty 5 Tusk Grineer (40-60). If a Seeker throws a Latcher and it latches on you, that oddly count against you too.

Finally, the Ghoul bounties are missing bonus objectives too. Kinda a shame, as that could've help with some Nitain Extracts and Journal Fragments if people needs them.

[CinderSail]

deleted

Edited January 13, 2020 by SailingSilky
deleted

[Hobie-wan]

17 hours ago, SailingSilky said:

The capture target without killing any other enemies bonus needs to be changed. Your pets and sentinels can kill enemies without you wanting them to. If it's night time, the vomvalyst enemies can kill the greineer and you can't do anything about that. If you play as Nezha, your Warding Halo ability damages enemies that stand near you and you can't disable the ability without jumping into a lake. It should be changed to "capture the target in x amount of time" or something.

I agree for sure there. Unless you head out with a stealth frame and no companion, it's pretty unlikely to get this one done. I can't imagine anyone doing this on the plains for a 1 in 10 (or whatever) chance they'll get the target only bonus on a stage of a bounty.

[Myaurico]

"Defend the Area" is still broken sometimes spawn of enemy have cd and it literally goes to 40% and failed bonus even if most of time it 90%+
and for solo its much harder...

Edited December 3, 2019 by Myaurico