Let's talk about conclave.

[VenomousValentine]

I just gotta say Im happy to see people are open to discussing my ideas and conclave as a whole. I see so many people calling for the outright deletion and abandonment of what would be my favorite game mode very often and it gets discouraging.

[AlmightyPancake]

4 minutes ago, VenomousValentine said:

I just gotta say Im happy to see people are open to discussing my ideas and conclave as a whole. I see so many people calling for the outright deletion and abandonment of what would be my favorite game mode very often and it gets discouraging.

As much as I'll say that conclave is bad at the moment, and how I don't think DE wants to put in any effort to fix it, I'll never call for them to delete it. It does have its own place in Warframe, and I respect anybody who puts in as much effort into it as some of you do.

[Stormdragon]

57 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

I actually agree with you here. I would honestly love to see conclave become a bigger, more balanced part of Warframe with high player engagement and some decent exclusive rewards. But the problem is that I don't see putting in any effort to make it better because they see it as a high investment low reward process.

DE already stablished a base for it years ago, they would just have to work on it again and add stuff like a weapon rebalance (they aren't short of feedback on it, still nothing has been done since PvE weapon changes made around the release of PoE started destroying a finely tuned balance), Match/Server browser (RNG matchmaking can be good enough for PvE, not for PvP), a way to force people out of RC after some point and/or a better tier system (with some way to encourage climbing into the highest tiers while also rewarding people in the lowest ones). 

Those 3 things are probably a lot less effort and resource investment than developing Lunaro, the unreleased "Stalker Mode" or the upcoming "warframe kart".

57 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

Ok, this is pretty fair. I haven't interacted much with the dedicated conclave community, so I might have mistaken them for some of the toxicity I've seen in conclave. Sorry about that. Although it still holds that PvP games are more likely to develop toxic communities than PvE ones.

As someone who has been in different competitive communities (a bit more about it later in this post) i totally disagree, specially if you're basing your experience on the fame of communities like LoL, DotA, CoD, Fortnite, etc. 

57 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

This is mostly true. I'm sure that someone experienced in other PvP shooter games would have an easier time coming to conclave than someone jumping into competitive shooter games cold.

Most of my PvP experience -prior to warframe- comes from fighting games, mostly Tekken for over a decade; a bit of RTS games (Starcraft, AoE, Supreme Commander, etc) and ~20 years playing both, Basketball and Rugby (not sure if you want to count those too since it's competition but not in videogames, so will still leave it there). So jumping into conclave when i started playing it wasn't easy since RC wasn't a thing, there were many more good players back when DE worked on pvp and advertised it (and many of them have moved on to other games seeing DE's lack of attention to the mode) and i wasn't used to shooter's mechanics.

And while playing wf i've tried some other games like a few from the Quake series (mostly champions), and if something i've found consistently in all of the communities i've been is that people at the top encourages those in the bottom to become stronger opponents and promote a healthy environment while most of the toxicity comes from people at the bottom who wants to reach the top somehow but without putting the effort it requires, which usually gets them filtered out quickly or a behavior change.

And i don't care if it gets seen as controversial, but this is also consistent with that part of the warframe PvE comunity that's constantly being toxic towards PvP and calling for conclave to be turned into a generic tactical shooter (or basically anything that isn't warframe) or removed while asking us, those who enjoy warframe's PvP even with its flaws, to "go play something else".

Edited February 1, 2020 by Stormdragon

[AlmightyPancake]

5 minutes ago, Stormdragon said:

DE already stablished a base for it years ago, they would just have to work on it again and add stuff like a weapon rebalance (they aren't short of feedback on it, still nothing has been done since PvE weapon changes made around the release of PoE started destroying a finely tuned balance), Match/Server browser (RNG matchmaking can be good enough for PvE, not for PvP), a way to force people out of RC after some point and/or a better tier system (with some way to encourage climbing into the highest tiers while also rewarding people in the lowest ones). 

Those 3 things are probably a lot less effort and resource investment than developing Lunaro, the unreleased "Stalker Mode" or the upcoming "warframe kart".

I'm sure that it wouldn't be too much more effort to get it going in the right direction, but atm I think DE isn't going to put the effort in to conclave and focus on their other projects. I don't agree with that approach, but I guess that's just the way the cookie crumbles.

8 minutes ago, Stormdragon said:

As someone who has been in different competitive communities (a bit more about it later in this post) i totally disagree, specially if you're basing your experience on the fame of communities like LoL, DotA, CoD, Fortnite, etc. 

I personally have mostly experience in LoL to be fair, but almost every other competitive game I've heard of has had a problem with toxic players. Which games have you played that aren't like that? I'm curious. I also agree that people are more likely to be toxic in lower ranks or if they're newer to the game.

11 minutes ago, Stormdragon said:

And i don't care if it gets controversial, but this is also consistent with the warframe PvE comunity constantly being toxic towards PvP and calling for conclave to be turned into a generic tactical shooter (or basically anything that isn't warframe) or removed while asking us, those who enjoy warframe's PvP even with its flaws, to "go play something else".

I honestly don't like people who think like that. I play Warframe to make the most out of my builds and push frames and weapons as far as I can, but I don't think that people who don't play like that are playing wrong. If they're having fun that's all that matters, especially in a game like Warframe. If someone likes conclave, even with how frustrating it can be, then that's all that matters in my eyes. Let them play it and enjoy Warframe how they want to.

As much as I'm being pessimistic here, I do hope that conclave gets some love and attention soon, you guys deserve it.

[Tyreaus]

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

No wait, don't lynch me yet.

 

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

The truth is, I feel like nobody plays pvp, not because they dislike pvp, but because the pvp in this game is BAD.

These are mutually exclusive notions. If people wanted to play PvP but PvP was bad, you shouldn't have to worry about being lynched.

(Thankfully, it seems like you haven't had to worry thusfar 🙂 But that you're worried about that at all should be telling to the truth behind some other statements)

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

And by hiring a new devoted team to exclusively PVP ... it also wouldn't take time or effort away from the mainline devs.

Unfortunately, this is not how this would work. DE, like every company, has particular budgets for particular things. In DE's case, that would be development, including developer wages. A PvP team would have to take away from that budget somehow, either cutting into current budgets or cutting into future budget expansions, thereby cutting down on development funding meant for PvE. The two sides come from the same resource pool somewhere in the liquidity pipeline.

Moreover, "paying for itself" is difficult to quantify with PvP additions. Consider what PvE garnishes financially: prime access, cosmetics... the sorts of things a number of PvP players either would not care about (bright-arse colours don't exactly provide a tactical advantage) or would not be able to benefit from (making primed weapons more powerful upsets balance). So does it actually pay for itself? Considering the current financial schema comes from PvE-centric play, that's very, very difficult to quantify or even estimate.

EDIT: It's also likely not really that necessary to outsource. Many of the balance changes set in modern Conclave were done, if I recall right, by two, maybe three people. The problem lies in that they haven't been given the time to do that. Outsourcing doesn't fix that issue.

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

Problem 2: Lack of matchmaking.

This flat-out puts the cart before the horse. Matchmaking cannot happen without a decently-sized playerbase.

What can help is to figure out how to break up the monotony of being beaten by a higher-skilled player. Because that's what it is. Any PvP player who remotely enjoys it and knows there are OK rewards will get through a few deaths without quitting (because they're learning the game). Any such PvP player will also quit after spending an entire match being naught but target practice. That's why I've suggested bots in the past: it dissolves the monotony, at least in part.

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

I would say the best thing to do would be to have plenty of rewards that can be obtained in PVE, but are just about as easy to obtain in PVP within your skill level

 

3 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

A round gives a reasonable amount of currency given your performance,

This may be a controversial line of reasoning, but skill-based extrinsic rewards often cause more problems than they solve. The current setup shows the most simple and egregious consequence: if you're at the bottom of the ladder, you might as well quit and find a different game you dominate, because you'll get better standing for a similar time with less strain. That is fixable, but consider the psychology of an extrinsically motivated player: they get into a PvP game in search of their rewards and are frustrated because they're losing. Because of course they are, they're there for the rewards, not the gameplay. Said player is more likely to turn down one of two routes (path of least resistance: "getting good" isn't least resistance for an extrinsically motivated player): absurd toxicity, or alt + f4. Both of which commonly come with low opinions of the mode that they spread about like wildfire due to their frustrations.

And before you think that would be rare, consider the players Warframe attracts as a looter shooter filled with extrinsic rewards. The entire PvE side of the game is based on extrinsic rewards. Is it then any surprise that so many comments in the forums call for Conclave's dissolution and its rewards to be added to Nightwave?

The major incentive should be to play, not to win. Same end result—people play for the rewards—but without as much consternation tied to win or loss.

(Side-note: also consider the other half of skill-based rewards, i.e. how it'd work with the skilled players. How do you design a reward system that better rewards skilled players while also ensuring they don't just get it overnight? It defeats the purpose if its too easy for them to get. On the other hand, making it harder fixes that, but what do you think happens to the less-skilled players under that system? Hint: we have that right now.)

Edited February 1, 2020 by Tyreaus

[(XBOX)Shodian]

Personally, I think the way to get conclave going again is to limit how much power and movement that the player has, I think the way to do that is to make it a Grinder vs Corpus. Give them basic guns with no mods to it to balance it out.

[VenomousValentine]

Just now, (XB1)Shodian said:

Personally, I think the way to get conclave going again is to limit how much power and movement that the player has, I think the way to do that is to make it a Grinder vs Corpus. Give them basic guns with no mods to it to balance it out.

Yeah but that's like... the bad solution.. The amazing mobility is WHAT sets warframe apart from other shooters.

[AlmightyPancake]

4 minutes ago, (XB1)Shodian said:

Personally, I think the way to get conclave going again is to limit how much power and movement that the player has, I think the way to do that is to make it a Grinder vs Corpus. Give them basic guns with no mods to it to balance it out.

That's basically any other shooter game then, just with a "warframe" skin on it. People wouldn't play "COD but Grineer" over COD, because the latter is putting the majority of its resources into that PvP game loop, whereas DE wouldn't be.

Balancing movement and how much power it gives a skilled player is all well and good, as long as doing so doesn't remove the unique Warframe aspect of conclave.

The mods are another story altogether though. I think my least favourite part of beginning to play conclave was the fact that I started with absolutely no mods, playing against veterans who had every mod. I understand that players should be rewarded for their investment with better ways to do things; it's common practise to do so. But being a noob getting his nose ground into the pavement just so that you can get a few mods so that you don't get your ass whooped so hard next time until you are the guy grinding noob noses into the pavement is honestly really exhausting, painful, and unsatisfying. I think giving newer conclave players a selection of mods they can use right from the start would ease that, even just a bit.

[Stormdragon]

13 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

I personally have mostly experience in LoL to be fair, but almost every other competitive game I've heard of has had a problem with toxic players. Which games have you played that aren't like that? I'm curious. I also agree that people are more likely to be toxic in lower ranks or if they're newer to the game.

Pointed it above but going a bit more into detail:

In online games and before i started playing warframe, i've been mostly on communities from other genres like fighting games (mainly Tekken and Soul Calibur), Strategy games (AoEII, Supreme Commander, Starcraft). 

After i decided to start playing PvP in warframe i've been on communities of games like Quake Champions or Toxikk (but briefly since warframe's parkour is unique and has spoiled me)

And out of the game i've been on Basketball and Rugby leagues for around 20 years (getting to be part of the team and winning against others are 2 different ways of competition in sports) and i have also been part of the community of a local TCG (Myths and Legends).

30 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

I honestly don't like people who think like that. I play Warframe to make the most out of my builds and push frames and weapons as far as I can, but I don't think that people who don't play like that are playing wrong. If they're having fun that's all that matters, especially in a game like Warframe.

Well, we all play games to have fun, and fun is subjective so i totally agree with your view. However, get ready to see a lot of what i mentioned above in any conclave related thread. Hell, you can even see some people bringing that up in some totally unrelated threads and some WF partners tend to take the lead in this behavior.

32 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

If someone likes conclave, even with how frustrating it can be, then that's all that matters in my eyes. Let them play it and enjoy Warframe how they want to.

Thank you very much for this, hopefully more people gets this mindset at some point instead of being blinded by the current "Rewardlust" (not sure how else to call it) that seems to be spread in the community and makes some people argue for the removal of content just for easy access to its rewards.

37 minutes ago, AlmightyPancake said:

As much as I'm being pessimistic here, I do hope that conclave gets some love and attention soon, you guys deserve it.

Don't worry, it's easy to get pessimistic when a highly vocal part of the community is against PvP and devs nothing to improve it or at least advertise that it exists.

With that out of the way, thank you very much for the good wishes.

[----Legacy----]

42 minutes ago, Tyreaus said:

Unfortunately, this is not how this would work. DE, like every company, has particular budgets for particular things. In DE's case, that would be development, including developer wages. A PvP team would have to take away from that budget somehow, either cutting into current budgets[...]

Seriously? There is budget to put an ad in Times Square and to make contests that exclude a huge part of the playerbase like sending a tenno to the space or giving away custom "Prime" gaming platforms in a giveaway that excluded a huge portion of the plauervase just for not being born in the right countries, but you believe there is no budget to hire 1 person to work on PvP balance (like @[DE]joebuck used to do) as a priority and doing PvE related stuff while PvP balance is doing good?

55 minutes ago, Tyreaus said:

[...]cutting into future budget expansions, thereby cutting down on development funding meant for PvE. The two sides come from the same resource pool somewhere in the liquidity pipeline

This is straight nonsense and relates more to PvE players always being content hungry than to lack of budget. If DE somehow managed to get 69000000 of employess you can be sure that PvE players would rage if 1 of them was dedicated to PvP because "it's slowing down the progress of PvE updates".

[motorfirebox]

1 hour ago, (XB1)Shodian said:

Personally, I think the way to get conclave going again is to limit how much power and movement that the player has, I think the way to do that is to make it a Grinder vs Corpus. Give them basic guns with no mods to it to balance it out.

The reduced mobility in conclave is a big part of why I'm not very interested in it. I wouldn't be super interested in it regardless, because I'm not much for PvP, but the main reason I haven't sat down and ground out the rewards anyway (just for the sake of completionism) is, I hate how hampered and slow I feel in Conclave.

[VenomousValentine]

3 minutes ago, motorfirebox said:

The reduced mobility in conclave is a big part of why I'm not very interested in it. I wouldn't be super interested in it regardless, because I'm not much for PvP, but the main reason I haven't sat down and ground out the rewards anyway (just for the sake of completionism) is, I hate how hampered and slow I feel in Conclave.

there.. isn't a reduction to mobility?...

[Aadi880]

19 minutes ago, VenomousValentine said:

there.. isn't a reduction to mobility?...

I don't think there is a reduction in mobility, but the movement feels clunky at times, when compared to PvE modes. I don't use mobility mods in PvE, but PvE's mobility feels less clunky than Conclave. Idk if that some placebo s*** or what, but I do feel something different in movement.

It just doesn't feel right.

[Sevek7]

6 hours ago, VenomousValentine said:

No wait, don't lynch me yet.

Look, a lot of people seem to think conclave doesn't fit in this game. And frankly I think that's absurd, because with the amount of mobility and skill that one can pull off in this game, it adds a whole new element to the shooter genre that 99.9% of pvp shooters do not have. 

The truth is, I feel like nobody plays pvp, not because they dislike pvp, but because the pvp in this game is BAD.

Before we go further let's look at why I think pvp should be at least a minor focus of DE.

Reason 1: A new crowd of players to appeal to.
Plenty of people do NOT like PVE shooters. This is a LARGE swathe of people alienated by warframe that could be pulled in. Do you know how many destiny players I've met that said "I'd switch to warframe if it had pvp" They didn't even know it had pvp because of how under represented it is. Not that that would matter because it's a S#&$show in it's current state.

Reason 2: A more engaging gameplay loop.
One advantage PVP games has over PVE games is that they don't get stale very easy because of the human element. The challenge is not in code, but in overcoming another player, and every person has a different level of skill and can play completely differently. You have to adapt, and that by it's own right is enough to keep a lot of people enthralled for hundreds of hours. Look at TF2. TF2 has had barely any noteworthy updates for nearly a DECADE and yet it still has a respectable playerbase. (not to say the game doesnt have it's own problem.) But my point is, with a more engaging gameplay option it would prevent burnout from a lot of players and keep them engaged even when the updates aren't quite rolling out consistently. Obviously this doesn't apply to everyone, but it would apply to a LOT of people.

Ultimately those are the biggest two reasons I have for why pvp would be suitable for this game if it were just moderately maintained, and pvp doesn't require a lot of maintenance. Occasional number tweaks, implementation of the new frames and weapons as they come out, and maybe some seasonal rewards or events every now and again. Once the baseline is established, it's really low maintenance. But pvp in it's current state has too many problems to accomplish either of those.

So lets address the problems.

Problem 1: Lack of updates, balance, and maintenance.
that's an easy one. DE isn't a small company anymore. Yeah nobody there has experience or qualifications dealing with a pvp based setting. But the thing is, DE could easily hire a conclave team. And if they did it right, it would easily pay for itself with the new players it would not only pull in, but retain. And by hiring a new devoted team to exclusively PVP, not only would those interested in pvp be getting higher quality updates, it also wouldn't take time or effort away from the mainline devs. PVP players win, Mainline PVE players win, Devs win, everyone happy.
As far of lack of updates go, conclave got its biggest update in years recently. Wanna know what they did? They... Removed ember and vauban. Wowee.
In fact, the most recently released frame you CAN play in conclave is khora. After that came revenant. Wanna know how long ago revenant came out?
AUGUST 23d, 2018
SEVEN warframes have come out since then, all of them unusable in pvp. Because it's completely been abandoned by DE. 

Problem 2: Lack of matchmaking.
I know this is the second point, but it may be MORE important than the first.
Raise your hand if you decided one day "I'm going to try out conclave", queued up, and either didn't find a match, or got matched against people who exclusively play conclave, eviscerated you, and swung around your own entrails like a lasso. And then you probably vowed to never play again after that.
It's a huge problem. Not everyone likes to get kicked in the teeth the first time they try something. Some do, but you're a minority. 
Any pvp game with such a high skill ceiling like warframe NEEDS a matchmaking rating so you are ensured to be matched against players of your skill level at least the majority of the time. and I know what you're gonna say, you're gonna say "but what about smurfs" and well, you have a point. A really small point, but a point. But here's another reason warframe fits pretty well with pvp. A smurf would have to make a new account, get the gear they prefer, and then level up their MMR(matchmaking rating) on their smurf. Which will happen, as is inevitable in any pvp game, HOWEVER it's rare in most pvp games, and due to the nature of warframes grind, I feel would be even rarer here than in games like overwatch or rainbow six.

Problem 3: Lack of Incentive.
Now, this is probably the least important point, but it's still an important point none the less. There is barely any REASON to play pvp besides the fun of it. And news flash, most people don't have fun with it. So there is NO reason to play in its current state.
I would say the best thing to do would be to have plenty of rewards that can be obtained in PVE, but are just about as easy to obtain in PVP within your skill level, and just as needed for pvp. A ten minute round of PVP could give say, 250k credits (comparable to index), 1000 endo (comparable to arbitration), an added bundle of random resources, but a small amount (comparable to 20 or so minutes of farming.)
Or perhaps better, would be to make a shop system like with vitus essence. A round gives a reasonable amount of currency given your performance, Not so much difference so if you do bad you don't feel like it wasn't worth it, but also enough of a difference that skill is rewarded. Maybe a difference of double the currency between the worst player in the match and the best.
Rewards I would suggest available from this shop being things like endo, credits, kuva, every resource, some cosmetics that are attainable elsewhere (such as syndicate syandanas) universal medallions for syndicates, Certain mods that can be obtained elsewhere, conclave exclusive mods that can only be obtained here, etc.
With this system, conclave would not need standing, let alone a daily standing limit. Make rewards minimal so PVE is still the best way to farm these resources unless you are exceptionally skilled, but not so minimal that you feel like you aren't getting your times worth.

Bonus Suggestion: Ranked.
This is where some people may get alienated, but note this isn't super important at all compared to everything else I've said, and should only be implemented well after the rework gets established, if at all.
BUT, People who play pvp like to get good. And people who get good, like to know and show they're good. Ranked is the traditional way to do this. A ranked season could be say six months, give slightly extra pvp currency, and depending on your rank at the end of the season, an exclusive syandana/weapon skin, and bonus currency.
Again, not necessary, but something a lot of people would probably like to see.

I'm really glad that you're providing good ideas for improving conclave, it's a great game-mode that deserves to be updated regularly. I honestly tried to maintain a healthy skepticism when looking over your suggestions to provide critique, but I actually agree with each and every one! Keep up these good ideas!

[Lightel03]

I`m quite supportive of a Conclave rework, there is no reason not to make a better PvP or PvEvP mode in Warframe. It could finally bring a stream of renewable content to Warframe, if done right of course.

But Conclave is the last thing that DE wants to focus on at the moment, as much as it will be good for the game, there is just no way that they will focus on Conclave, at least not until they are done with everything they need to get done with Empyrean, New War, Duviri. And even then, when that time comes, it`s quite plausible that they will keep ignoring this kind of Conclave feedback and move on to bigger things.

When it comes to forums like these, where everyone gets to write any post at any moment about any topic, and there is a minimal chance that the Devs will at least see the post, you need to care for your feedback, not just throw it onto the board without thought or consideration whether if it can be possibly taken inspiration from.

The Conclave section is dead, I`m sure no DE employee ever even looked at it since 2016 or even further past, you did well to post this in the general section. You got the place right, but not the time. I much rather see people come up with ideas to nudge DE into a better direction on the things they are working on currently, than see good posts being wasted, without even having a chance of being discussed.

As for another "but", even when the time is right, this Conclave rework will need to have a huge support by players. Only just now we got DE to listen to Railjack and Lich feedback, and that was because of the content creators challenging DE`s image as good developers. They won`t listen to anything regarding Conclave unless it becomes a huge point of tension within the community.

And what I mean by that, is to turn Conclave suggestions into memes. Trust me, DE won`t have another choice other than to embrace the memes, that`s just who they are.

[Okami_Amaterasu]

The lack of updates it's Conclaves biggest problem right now (If you've played a match recently you probably know about the dual sword/telos boltace stuff going on).

This was a great read, maybe someday DE will notice.

[Tyreaus]

6 hours ago, ----Legacy---- said:

Seriously? There is budget to put an ad in Times Square and to make contests that exclude a huge part of the playerbase like sending a tenno to the space or giving away custom "Prime" gaming platforms in a giveaway that excluded a huge portion of the plauervase just for not being born in the right countries, but you believe there is no budget to hire 1 person to work on PvP balance (like @[DE]joebuck used to do) as a priority and doing PvE related stuff while PvP balance is doing good?

This is straight nonsense and relates more to PvE players always being content hungry than to lack of budget. If DE somehow managed to get 69000000 of employess you can be sure that PvE players would rage if 1 of them was dedicated to PvP because "it's slowing down the progress of PvE updates".

I did not say there was no budget for those things. I said that it affects PvE development, either currently (by taking PvE developers away to work on PvP) or in the future (by assigning developers who could work on PvE to work on PvP instead). To be clear: that puts no quantifier whatsoever on that amount. It may be minuscule. It likely is. But it is erroneous to say it has no effect whatsoever, which is how I interpreted OP's point.

In short: any developer working on PvP could be working on PvE.

And, as I said to expand on that point, that's an investment on something without (currently) verifiable returns. Advertising _{(as dumb as that is in the modern era; see also political attack ads)} has verifiable returns. That includes things like their space program and the custom gaming platforms.

On the other hand, if letting a couple PvP-liking employees work on PvP happens to increase their PvE productivity—see, for example, Google's probably-mythological 20% rule—then it stops being "burning cash" and starts being an investment with verifiable returns. Had I the time this morning to do more research on that, that is the line of reasoning I would much sooner present. Especially because quality content is a mixture of time and creativity and a lack of passion slaughters the latter. Does it still take away resources from PvE? Sure, temporarily. But that could return in spades.

But if telling DE that it's "straight nonsense" that they can't devote one guy to PvP is the way you want to make demands, and insisting that you can keep all your apples in one basket while having some left over for another basket, knock yourself out.

Edited February 1, 2020 by Tyreaus

[DrivaMain]

9 hours ago, Stormdragon said:

I've seen a lot more toxicity in PvE than in PvP and that's despite the "cooperative" nature of PvE missions. 

PvP players just want other players to get good in order to have fun matches with equal people while respecting our enemies and even helping them so they keep coming back and getting stronger every time they do. With that out of the way, most (if not all) of the toxicity i've seen in conclave comes from PvE players who don't care about the mode but want the rewards without any effort or improvement.

Are you sure about that? Have you seen Overwatch’s competitive match chat and LoL? Reading them is disgusting. I believe the toxic PvE part you are saying is probably come Raid Missions, where that mode means “No mistake on the slightest or lose”.

All PvP games are subject to high level of toxicity because of Rank and K/D pressure. Even if you rework Conclave the “friendly” state will only last for a brief moment after that it will be a toxic wasteland.

I am on the “Just Remove The Game Mode” side. Warframe’s content pace and  quality on release is bad enough (Liches and Railjack on initial release). Devoting resources to Conclave only makes content pace slower because it divided the company’s focus.

The likely scenario is DE probably will still abandon Conclave and pull the plug eventually because it will only draw a lot of toxicity and it only ruins the game’s reputation and community for being “one of the nicest in the gaming world”.

 

[Sevek7]

40 minutes ago, DrivaMain said:

Are you sure about that? Have you seen Overwatch’s competitive match chat and LoL? Reading them is disgusting. I believe the toxic PvE part you are saying is probably come Raid Missions, where that mode means “No mistake on the slightest or lose”.

All PvP games are subject to high level of toxicity because of Rank and K/D pressure. Even if you rework Conclave the “friendly” state will only last for a brief moment after that it will be a toxic wasteland.

I am on the “Just Remove The Game Mode” side. Warframe’s content pace and  quality on release is bad enough (Liches and Railjack on initial release). Devoting resources to Conclave only makes content pace slower because it divided the company’s focus.

The likely scenario is DE probably will still abandon Conclave and pull the plug eventually because it will only draw a lot of toxicity and it only ruins the game’s reputation and community for being “one of the nicest in the gaming world”.

 

I understand your point of view here, Warframe's content pace has slowed due to focus on gigantic PvE updates in recent years. Players will blow through it in record times, and then we're back to the "content drought" complaints, so the developers feel stressed to push the next thing as fast as possible before they lose their playerbase. This state also clearly leads to rushed updates with a lack of polish. 

It certainly seems logical that if they devote people to PvP stuff, the pace will slow even more, and big updates will be even slower, with less polish. This may be correct, but let's consider the following: Typically, in these types of games, PvP is what people do when they have finished all the PvE stuff. (This is likely because PvP is the only way to really test your skills [Beating braindead AI while the player has 100% invulnerability and the ability to crowd control the AI and deal damage based on % of max health is not really a challenge after all], and every encounter is always different, always giving something new and something to learn - unlike PvE.) Therefore, a healthy PvP scene will take the pressure off due to far less complaints about "content drought." So, when PvE updates are released, they will no longer need to be rushed, which will also prevent the need for several months of fixes - time that could then be spent on working on the next thing instead. Warframe is of course primarily a PvE game, but PvP should exist for those who want it, and for the dedicated players who finish the PvE content faster than anticipated. 

[Side note: I suspect the recent updates involving huge amounts of grind and rng are a result of attempting to artificially prolong the lifetime of content, staving off the "content drought" calls for long enough to bring the next thing. This is something that would be totally unnecessary with a healthy PvP system in the game.]

Finally, a general statement about games: Successful developers create games that cater to as many audiences as possible. DE have added all sorts of interesting things that have drawn in various crowds. Personally, I care very little about the pet breeding, fishing, mining, music making with Octavia and Shawzin, etc... But I understand that a successful game needs to branch out to attract these other types of players. Let's try to keep the same attitude towards PvP players - we should attract them too! If we all want a successful game, we should all want this, PvE players included. 

As for the reputation, the skeptic inside me thinks that warframe's community has this "nicest community" reputation precisely because the PvE is so extremely easy. In the vast majority of public matches, nobody even speaks to each other (because there's no need to coordinate with each other). I'm sure that if I counted up data on insults received per hour playing warframe it would be extremely low. However, if I counted insults received per messages received, I am certain that I have a better ratio in other games.

 

[Stormdragon]

1 hour ago, DrivaMain said:

Are you sure about that? Have you seen Overwatch’s competitive match chat and LoL? Reading them is disgusting.

Didn't play overwatch for long (gave it a try for a couple of months and didn't like it) and LoL never sparked any interest on me despite giving it a try with friends for a lot longer than i'd like to accept. Still you can see some of the communities i've been part of in one of my posts above. 

However, those games share a couple of things such as being team based PvP and having a big competitive scene, which added to how toxicity says a lot about the maturity levels of people, i wouldn't be surprised if competitive matchmaking on both games was filled by people with low tolerance to frustration and unable to see their own mistakes expecting to win 100% of their matches. People with these traits can get easily toxic even when playing solo games, but if you also add a will to reach the e-sport scene "in order to make a living out of playing [X]" and dependence on cooperation to win then that people is bound to face a lot more situations that release their frustration in the shape of toxicity.

I could probably go a lot longer on the entire toxicity topic but i guess to leave it there with a TLDR: Toxicity comes mostly from lack of maturity and frustration. Toxic people will be toxic in any environment, even when totally alone.

2 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

I believe the toxic PvE part you are saying is probably come Raid Missions, where that mode means “No mistake on the slightest or lose”.

Nop, you can see people getting toxic in normal missions even for minor things such as having a player (or group) that wants to take the mission slowly to explore and/or loot when they just wanted to get things done asap (or backwards); when a limbo joins the squad; when a Nova slows down enemies in certain missioks or speeds them up in some others; etc, i guess you can see the point.

The reason why toxicity isn't as much of an issue in PvE is how a single player can normally be enough to make up for the mistakes of the other 3/4 of the squad and how failing a mission (a frustrating situation that can get people to release toxicity^{read reply above}) can be a bigger challenge than completing them.

2 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

All PvP games are subject to high level of toxicity because of Rank and K/D pressure.

Once again that "pressure" just shows a lack of maturity. Does my rank define me as a player? No, and even less in warframe where PvP ranks are based on the syndicate system instead of results, so players don't get deranked despite how bad one can do in a match. Does a huge KD make anyone a better player? No, there are plenty of ways to farm KD ratio such as stomping on newbies but leaving as soon as someone who can give you a run for your money joins, this is even more noticeable in wf where players can decide to stay in the new player pool endlessly in order to never face the people out of it.

2 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

Even if you rework Conclave the “friendly” state will only last for a brief moment after that it will be a toxic wasteland.

Why you people love slippery slopes so much. Things can obviously get heated in competitions, the important thing is to be able to let that heat in the match/yard/etc and remain friendly out of it. That's what makes a community after all since its members have gathered around a common interest.

I think it's important to draw a line between someone "who makes [X]" and someone "who is part of [X]'s community". The former can just do the thing and never get involved with other people around it when not doing it (think of people who just plays warframe but never discusses about it anywhere) while the latter can stop doing [X] but still be in touch with it (like old players who aren't playing but stay up to date in mechanics and keep giving advice to new people through discord, forums, etc).

3 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

I am on the “Just Remove The Game Mode” side. 

I think that arbitrarily removing content for no real reason is bad for the game as a whole, no matter how much i dislike it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

3 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

Warframe’s content pace and quality on release is bad enough (Liches and Railjack on initial release).

Agree, and it's an issue older than Liches tbh. It probably relates to DE's plans being too big to be done in a reasonable time with such a small studio.

3 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

Devoting resources to Conclave only makes content pace slower because it divided the company’s focus.

I disagree, back when updates were released on a faster pace and had better quality than now (as pointed by yourself) DE also had people actually doing stuff for PvP unlike now when updates have become slower. PvP maintenance is also a lot less demanding than PvE's where people keeps demanding new content constantly, usually a couple of weeks after a big update.

3 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

The likely scenario is DE probably will still abandon Conclave and pull the plug eventually because it will only draw a lot of toxicity and it only ruins the game’s reputation and community for being “one of the nicest in the gaming world”.

"One of the nicest gaming communities in the world" is so nice that refuses to accept people who enjoys the game in a different way to it and asks the devs to remove the part of the game we enjoy in their attempt to make us play something else. That's far from nice and makes it look more like a sugarcoated toxic hivemind.

[Loxyen]

7 hours ago, DrivaMain said:

because it will only draw a lot of toxicity and it only ruins the game’s reputation and community for being “one of the nicest in the gaming world”.

That train had missed the station a couple years ago... 

I'm playing this game constantly since release and can say so much, that with the reduction of competition the toxicity grew in Warframe. Not only player vs player drama, but also towards the devs.

A noticeable big amount of the rising toxicity is literally caused by spoiled gluttony akin content greed that forces DE to push the updates faster and faster with less time to think things through or balance and fix stuff properly as Warframe gets bigger and much more versatile... That kinda causes a vicious cycle imho. 

Ppl sitting on op stuff and crave for a challenge, DE gives new bullet sponge boss or new boss with extra kill requirements, or tries to slow down the grind for top tier stats with rng and the mass is in turmoil while demanding MOAR CONTENT yet again. 

Kinda understandable that Steve called Warframe that monstrosity they had to feed.

Edited February 2, 2020 by Loxyen

[Loxyen]

17 hours ago, AlmightyPancake said:

So constantly bullet jumping and rolling around is the only way to stay relatively safe.

I know the misunderstandings are cleared by now, but I just wanted to add that video here on that matter... 

 

Yes with Warframe's unique movement its rather hard to shoot someone who is utilizing said movement quite versatile and efficient.

However you can be very successful with a decent common-pvp-shooter skill set aswell. It'll just need some 'getting into' learning time to get used to the mostly used movement pattern and paths. (even if you don't use them and just shoot at them) 

Over the years we used to have quite a bunch of dudes by now, who were barely moving, but instead very efficient at shooting based on their shooter experience. They could (literally) stand their ground quite good.

Imho if DE manages to attract more pvp players of other games, we won't only get the pvp infants as new players. Rather a decent mix up.

[VenomousValentine]

40 minutes ago, Loxyen said:

I know the misunderstandings are cleared by now, but I just wanted to add that video here on that matter... 

 

Yes with Warframe's unique movement its rather hard to shoot someone who is utilizing said movement quite versatile and efficient.

However you can be very successful with a decent common-pvp-shooter skill set aswell. It'll just need some 'getting into' learning time to get used to the mostly used movement pattern and paths. (even if you don't use them and just shoot at them) 

Over the years we used to have quite a bunch of dudes by now, who were barely moving, but instead very efficient at shooting based on their shooter experience. They could (literally) stand their ground quite good.

Imho if DE manages to attract more pvp players of other games, we won't only get the pvp infants as new players. Rather a decent mix up.

This is hilariously awkward to watch.

[VenomousValentine]

I just want to say some people have told me matchmaking in a dead gamemode is "putting the cart before the horse" but it's a pretty important cart, and if you don't have the cart you may as well not even have the horse.

If PVP is reworked without a proper matchmaking system, it doesnt matter how good the gameplay is, a large number of people will not want to play it as a result of them getting matched against people of vastly different skill level. The ultimate balance tool in any pvp game is first and foremost matchmaking. Even more important than the weapons and skills.

[(PSN)Black-Cat-Jinx]

It's underrepresented because it's literally the worst pvp I've ever seen in my life. 

This isn't just because PVP is objectively a bad thing, which it is, it's just, the worst, at being something that isn't good to begin with. I would all together be more interested in a system where your goal is to complete objectives. Some of your objectives if you complete them first cause a setback to other teams objectives. The team that completes the objectives first wins. 

Wargame scenarios don't just involve running around shooting at each other. That's literally only target practice and is by far the least relevant of anything you would be doing in a wargame scenario. It's mostly about completing the objectives you have in the time allowed. That's a kind of competition i could get into where the goal isn't who can donkypunch someone dead fastest, but rather how good you personally are at doing what needs to be done. 

Standard shooter pvp of one player shooting another is derivative, and a little pathetic. While people will talk about "tactics" it's mostly just "rush and maybe they'll miss more shots than we do".

No one should feel pride at managing to keep a crosshair on another target in a videogame. It's entirely superior to have competitive be about completing objectives rather than specifically having one player shooting at another.