(PC) Grendel & Masseter Feedback

[[DE]Danielle]

DEV NOTE:  Because so much is changing by design with THE OLD BLOOD, we want to be clear on how we’re handling your feedback. The majority of week 1-2 Hotfixes will speak to feedback. We want to combine feedback and stats together to iterate. To be a part of the feedback conversation please be constructive and clear (expand the spoilers below for a guide on how to write feedback), and most importantly, patient.

Spoiler

 

HOW TO WRITE FEEDBACK: 

1. Keep it simple
Write simple, directed points about the topic you feel strongly about. Remember to be constructive and to the point.

2. Back it up
Support your points with concrete points. X has better stats than Y. This ability is less useful when considering X. Provide in-game situational evidence or a solid foundation for your argument to rest upon.

3. Be polite

The best feedback occurs when two people discuss opposing viewpoints to find a constructive middle ground. Discussion is a natural part of feedback! Ensuring that it is polite and without personal attacks is key. We’re far less inclined to listen to feedback filled with personal attacks and rude speech. We are all trying our best!

The Forums can be an amazing tool when used correctly. We look forward to hearing your thoughts on Grendel, how to acquire him, and his signature weapon! 

 

There’s nothing wrong with first reactions - but relearning takes time. We are especially interested in feedback from players who have taken time to understand The Old Blood. Thank you! 

This thread will be used to house your feedback on the newest Warframe from The Old Blood: Update 26: GRENDEL and his Signature Weapon the MASSETER.  We will also be using this to collect your feedback on Grendel's acquiring method! 

Expand the spoilers below to read the full details about Grendel and his Masseter: 

NEW WARFRAME: GRENDEL'S ABILITIES

Spoiler

 

PASSIVE:
Each enemy consumed grants 50 bonus Armor.

FEAST:
Swallow an enemy whole and store it in Grendel’s gut. Not satisfied? Keep eating, but beware, each foe in Grendel’s belly slowly consumes Energy. Hold to vomit out stored enemies covering them in toxic bile.

NOURISH:
Consume the enemies in Grendel’s gut and nourish nearby squad members with a radial buff.

• Nourished Energy - Energy buff
• Nourished Armor -  Armor buff
• Nourished Strike -  Damage Multiplier buff

REGURGITATE:
Violently puke out a bile soaked enemy from Grendel’s gut, turning the unfortunate creature into a toxic projectile.

PULVERIZE:
Powered by feasting, Grendel curls into a ball and knocks over anyone in his path. Jumping slams Grendel into the ground and generates a damaging shockwave.

 

NEW WARFRAME: ACQUIRING GRENDEL 

Spoiler

 

Grendel can be earned for free through means based on the lore of his Leverian entry. Once you’ve listened, you’ll begin your hunt for Grendel by acquiring:

• Grendel Neuroptics Locator
• Grendel Chassis Locator
• Grendel Systems Locator

These Keys are found in Arbitrations and will expose hidden missions on the planet mentioned in his Leverian for you. Grendel helps those in need - and only those who are truly ‘empty’ will earn his pieces, guaranteed. 

 

NEW SIGNATURE WEAPON: MASSETER

Spoiler

Tear and chew through enemies with this unusual crankshaft-style greatsword. Grendel's signature weapon.

*When using Grendel with his signature Masseter, he will be immune from crowd-control procs while doing Heavy Attacks.

 

Need to report a bug? Visit the The Old Blood Bug Reporting Megathread.

[(PSN)Hopper_Orouk]

soo this is not really feedback, but i can't find the synergy between gauss and grendel anywhere here 

Edited October 31, 2019 by (PS4)Hopper_Orouk

[mrdanaris]

about the 3 missions unlocked by the keys 
I just tried archaeo is it normal that you cannot use your operator or gear in this mission 
or is this a bug?

[Arceus255]

The energy drain per second on Feast seems to increase over time. Is this intentional? It's not stated in the notes.

Having eaten just one enemy, the energy drain started very slow, but over time, became more than the listed number (i was using maximum efficiency/duration, and the drain became multiple energy per second)

[SilentMobius]

So given that you detail Grendel's aquisition here I'm going to put feedback on the mission here.

First a summary: Did you think about solo scaling at all here?

I get it, it's 100% RNG free once you have earned the resource, so the mission should be hard, something that takes multiple attempts, refine your approach, sometimes lose due to dumb luck. I understand the intent and have no issue with that. I can see the lack of operator mode and no access to consumable gear resulting in a team needing to bring a Trinity. On the Excavation and defence a Frost/Gara/Limbo maybe a Mesa. (Are mods removed or is there some global debuff? Either way) abilities and energy are limited.

I get it.

I completed the Survival solo with Khora, but it was by the skin of my Teeth, burning through 4 (all) revives, by the end I was running for my life grabbing life support and maybing picking a couple of straglers off with my melee (because even my good ranged weapons were doing nothing). It was frustrating but acceptable.

I failed the Excavation with Gara, just not enough energy to protect anything, so I switched to Limbo... I could protect the Excavators for maybe 2 Energy Cells worth. Near the end I was just running to the next as fast as I could and getting the 20 cryotic from zero cells, relying on the travel time of the murder squad to tick down the default excavator energy. I didn't complete a single excavator. It was no fun at all, but I had comitted to the idea so I wanted to see it through. And I got it after... quite some time.

Then Defense... I mean I don't think there is any way to do this solo, at all, not enough energy to defend to give time to take out the enemies (slowly due to a lack of power)

So, I'm not saying the mission should be easier, especially not for a team and I applaud the limitiations in an attempt to get people to think about tactics, and I applaud the lack of RNG, I would be happy for this to take a long time (And it did because vitus drops outside of a team are virtually non existant so you're looking at 10x more work solo by some comparisons). But "tactics" in this case is 99%:"What teammates do you need?" which is just a huge problem for the solo player, they simply cannot cover that many bases without some give somewhere.

I'd also like to stress that Grendel is not even "end game" content, it's just another Warframe, which is no slight to it, but it boils down to a small amount of lateral utility and a block of MR, (the primary progress metric of the game) It should not be locked behind a team.

Edited November 1, 2019 by SilentMobius

[Ramflare]

I'm all for difficulty but these Grendel missions are undoubtedly the wrong solution. No mods alone is pretty bad but Hildryn's passive doesn't work and there's no hint of these weird changes in-game. Solo highlights issues survival has always had, life support just runs out with 5 minutes left and you can't kill anything. It should definitely be hard to solo but I'm fairly certain it's much closer to impossible at the moment. I'll have to try again with a squad but at the moment it's some sort of frustrating snoozefest that I don't care for. Needs to be toned down just a smidge.

Edited November 1, 2019 by Ramflare

[vaarnaaarne]

Having done the Survival thing solo (boy was that a surprise to load in and realize all my stuff was disabled), I'd figure that each of these could use halving the duration it takes. It's a slog to do a full rotation basically naked.

And yea, giving a warning pop-up that tells you get one shot at the part per locator bought (just to clarify, it goes away on failure too? I beat it so I don't know about if it's just in case of success) and your stuff will be disabled would be rather prudent. More than anything because of the need for a ticket to ride, you need some details because 25 Vitus isn't just pocket change for most people.

Edited November 1, 2019 by vaarnaaarne

[selimsrm]

These missions feels like being brand new player and getting taxied to Pluto.

[NightBlitz]

DE. Need I remind you that not everyone likes to, or is capable of playing with others?

Honestly? you're taking too many things away from the player. 1 of them? sure, 2 maybe? 3? the extreme upper limit/ 4+? way too many restrictions. not fun at all

 

[Zalanore]

Not giving you mods / operator / gear isn't a "creative" way you farm Grendel. It is however:
A) Not what we were promised (I was really looking forward to a good puzzle)
B) Not enjoyable at all
C) Not hard, just really freaking annoying
D) A massive chore
E) Make you weaker than an MR0 player?

Honestly between the obnoxiousness of the Grendel farm and the color pallets being locked in a bundle full of stuff that I don't want (why am I forced to buy the new mods to get color pallets instead of being allowed to farm those mods?) this update comes across as DE just trying to force me to give them more money. Which I don't mind spending money on Warframe, but I do mind being manipulated into it.

To be clear there are a lot of amazing things in this update.

• The melee changes are amazing
• The Warframe reworks are very fun
• The weapon exilus slot is fantastic
• The additional slots for builds is a dream come true

But none of those are additional content that make me want to come back and play Warframe again. I haven't tried Kuva Litches yet, and I'm really hoping they're fun, but after an infuriating mission getting 1 Grendel part I'm so aggravated with this update that I'm leaving to go play Remnant from the Ashes new update instead.

Edited November 1, 2019 by Zalanore
Fixed confusing wording

[Zalanore]

My clan was discussing this and came up with a fantastic idea:

Something in the mission (finding a hidden item, killing a specific enemy, completing a side objective, completing 1 excavator / defense wave with no damage / complete a kuva siphon style survival tower, etc.) would reward players with 1 (or 1 per equipment) random mod. This would make your builds constantly changing and a bit wild and unpredictable, but actually be interesting and different. Just an idea, but it's a starting point for discussion on how these missions could be improved.

Edited November 1, 2019 by Zalanore
Fixed Typo - Got it right this time

[Zalanore]

Well I suck at Forums apparently. LOL

[averysmallbanana]

Love the mission idea. I actually had to think about what equipment to bring for a change.

There should definitely be something in-game that explains that the restrictions are intentional though because not everyone watches devstreams for hints.

[TKDancer]

my issues with grendel are:

-> the armor removal over time value is too low at base, considering the energy cost to feast on multiple enemies, the time it takes to fully armor stripe should be way shorter considering we have frames that can provide widespread armor stripping instantly, base of 10% seems like a much better value

->  pulverize controls seem to be really wonky, being a katamari ball is fun, but i wish the controls were tighter

-> the toxic dmg on some of his abilities should instead be corrosive, i mean its his belly, shouldnt it be corrosive stomach acid instead of toxins? add in some decent status chance and he has a decent source of corrosive procs via skills to deal with non-eatable enemies



 

Edited November 1, 2019 by TKDancer

[Subteram]

The unlock missions were FANTASTIC. The challenge and ability to complete all missions in one day was super rewarding. I love this direct path to get a Warframe rather than drop RNG.

[Subteram]

43 minutes ago, vaarnaaarne said:

Having done the Survival thing solo (boy was that a surprise to load in and realize all my stuff was disabled), I'd figure that each of these could use halving the duration it takes. It's a slog to do a full rotation basically naked.

And yea, giving a warning pop-up that tells you get one shot at the part per locator bought (just to clarify, it goes away on failure too? I beat it so I don't know about if it's just in case of success) and your stuff will be disabled would be rather prudent. More than anything because of the need for a ticket to ride, you need some details because 25 Vitus isn't just pocket change for most people.

Locators are not consumed on failure.

[Martyr5000]

22 minutes ago, NightBlitz said:

DE. Need I remind you that not everyone likes to, or is capable of playing with others?

Honestly? you're taking too many things away from the player. 1 of them? sure, 2 maybe? 3? the extreme upper limit/ 4+? way too many restrictions. not fun at all

 

Yeah, I like a challenge. I attempt everything on the max difficulty for that very reason. Handicapping and taking away literally everything to play a skeleton running away by the skin of your teeth. I speak for myself but I don't find that entertaining at all. In order to make something challenging you shouldn't have to revert people back to new player status to make it difficult. I didn't and don't like the way it is setup. I also am generally a solo player unless RL friends are available. Can only imagine the carnage that would happen to just random new players trying these.

[CerebrateJoe]

In regards to how Grendel is acquired, what the hell?!  This is a common, non-prime regular everyday warframe.  I've got a stressful job and I come home looking forward to playing Warframe and having a good time, then you throw this at me?  I'll try to be constructive.

First and foremost THIS IS NOT FUN.  I want to really emphasis that.  I played tons of arbitration because I really enjoyed the challenge.  Part of why I find arbitration entertaining is because I find myself using tactics and thinking differently than when I play a survival against level 20 enemies.  You don't really need to worry about bringing one weapon for armor and one for flesh when you're dealing with those common opponents.  It really encouraged me to try new things and tweak my mods like crazy.  That brings me to point 2.

I like to use my stuff.  I've fully leveled my operator and arcwing gun for a reason.  I've collected rare mods I didn't really 'get' in case I find a neat use later on or I have an 'ah-ha!' moment and see something old, but in a brand-new way.  Taking away my stuff isn't 'raising the challenge' its telling me my investment didn't matter.  Its breaking my toys and telling me not to care.

I'm fine with challenge, but why do this for a common warframe?  It just feels like punishment.  I know you don't mean it that way.  I really hope you'll change this.

[(XBOX)GearsMatrix301]

2 hours ago, Arceus255 said:

The energy drain per second on Feast seems to increase over time. Is this intentional? It's not stated in the notes.

Having eaten just one enemy, the energy drain started very slow, but over time, became more than the listed number (i was using maximum efficiency/duration, and the drain became multiple energy per second)

That is intentional.

[PsiWarp]

Going to reserve this post for future feedback, you can bet I'll be researching him thoroughly.

Preliminary feedback (rank 30, 2 Forma in):

1. Feast's energy drain per second per enemy ramps up quickly. Investing in Rage/Hunter Adrenaline, Ability Efficiency, and (Primed) Flow seems like a requirement if you enjoy hosting a lot of enemies in your gut party.
2. Nourish's UI icons need to be more visible, as in emphasized in a space away from the Ability Icons where the duration timers are covering the icons.
   • If the cycle selection must be kept, I would suggest a UI element above the Ability Icons (a cycle wheel) that causes the specific Nourished buff to light up when the enemy type is alive in Grendel's stomach. Smart cycling only allows the player to jump between available Nourished buffs when the button is held down.
3. Regurgitate is quite straightforward. I like that there is a bit of scaling damage built in.
4. Pulverize. I love rolling around as a ball, dealing decent damage and knocking away enemies as I trample over them. But, since enemies in Grendel's gut also take the high damage if I use jump and land (or fall down due to some steep elevation change in my path), they get killed surprisingly quickly with Feast's armor removal per second, leaving me a short time to enjoy ball form.
   • Perhaps damage from Pulverize is dealt in full once Grendel exits his ball form? So that I can enjoy rolling and bouncing as a ball freely without my stomach contents dying too quickly.

Edited November 1, 2019 by PsiWarp

[SSI_Seraph]

- Most of the powers are ok if the drain was adjusted except the 4.

Its controls are extremely annoying as soon as you're not in the ideal "plains, rolling down a hill" scenario and the effect is also lackluster for such a hindrance.

- The 1 drains a bit too much per enemy as soon as you want to keep more than 3-4 in.His whole gameplay loop would much more anjoyable if the drain was more frogiving when playing around with 8 enemies in your belly.

- Nourish bugs out and doesn't allow you to consume past a certain point sometimes.

- the enemy detection on feast is extremely wonky.

- Cycling nourish buffs should be easier.

Will provide more feedback over the next few days.

Edited November 2, 2019 by SSI_Seraph

[Drachnyn]

So personally the missions are the least fun i ever had in this game ever. They dont introduce anything new, no new build choices, no new enemies or enemy combinations. They just take away all mods and that's it. Yes they make it harder, but honestly the modding system is a huge amount of what makes the game enjoyable.

The old halloween alerts were fun because while they restricted your health they still let you use mods, which led to interesting build options. But this doesnt do that, we just have less options with no bonus. This is worse than being new player because back than i just dealt with lvl 5 enemies when i had no mods.

[zuraja]

The hit detection on Regurgitate seems awful.  I've seen it straight up pass through enemies without hitting them on quite a few occasions.

[Zexicon]

I really like Grendel's kit as a whole . However,

Nourish in it's current form is very difficult to swap between the buffs, it's difficult for me to tell the difference between the icons and the duration timer covers up most of the icon

I'd like it if nourish would apply all applicable buffs instead of having to swap between the 3 and recasting 

[N64Gamefreak]

I can't remember hating anything in this game as much as I hated the Grendel missions.