What I think DE should focus on in 2020

[SolarDwagon]

So, I want to preface this by saying that many of the changes already done, and already planned for 2020 fit into this, and that makes me really happy. The changes to Tenebrous Ephemera acquisition, and the planned Lich changes are two great examples. But let's get on with the main points.
In 2020, I want to see DE come back to the existing systems in Warframe. Lets take a rest from new and shiny (except for all the quests and new open worlds already planned, I guess), and work on core and existing gameplay loops, especially with two principles in mind.
1) Connection.
I want to see different systems starting to link up. Currently the game has a high number of systems (Archwing, Railjack, Liches, just to name a few) that mostly progress themselves and nothing else, and can only be progressed by themselves. While this makes a lot of sense when introducing new systems, to give them time to test and refine, at this point I hesitate to call even Railjack new and untested. Warframe as a game needs to flow through all the different content much more smoothly, and feel more like an interconnected universe. I'd like to see lich progress be possible outside the dedicated lich missions, but at the same time liches having influence beyond "Haha I steal some resources that you get back anyway". I'd like to see railjack missions that take you to ground missions, or vice versa. In short, I want the game to stop being a bunch of systems and become a single experience.
2) Capped RNG
The new lich system is a great example of what I mean by this. RNG is great, but only to a point. The high of finding a perfect weapon is a powerful force, but in many places in Warframe this is easily outweighed by the toil of dozens of pointless weapons. Combining the two still allows for people to get lucky, and feel great about it, but allows the unlucky players to still work towards a goal. I want to see this in many more systems than just Liches, however. Perhaps a rank 3 Arcane can be traded at a Little Duck-esque vendor in Cetus for a higher rarity arcane, perhaps Rivens finally get stat fixing after a certain number of rerolls, bosses can have 5, 10 of a single part tradeable for a different part. RNG will still matter, but even the worst luck can get you exactly where you want eventually. Taking this philosophy across the game is not really going to affect profits, as time value will still keep prices for the tradeable items high, and still drive purchases, but it will prevent many of the player losses that I've known personally from being unable to get RNG-locked items with no end in sight. Putting an end on, that can be bypassed by RNG on the way, is going to make the game better, fairer, and most importantly, more fun.

We've had a great start so far, but there's a long way to go in revising these old systems. I believe DE can do it, otherwise I wouldn't be here, but lets take a (relative) break from new content release treadmill.

[peterc3]

8 hours ago, SolarDwagon said:

Lets take a rest from new and shiny

Is DE supposed to get more money out of existing players for content they've already done or draw in new players?

[Fallen77]

J... Can't you stop complaining ?

Edit : now that you've change the title, it's not obvious anymore that this comment is a joke sooo, here you go, it's a joke.

Edited February 4, 2020 by Fallen77

[DOOMPATRIOT]

I do think that DE returning to stuff they already have would be awesome, but sadly we all know what it is going to actually happen:

Simulacrum Update (why?!).

Skins.

NightWave3 (do you really care about it? Intermission gonna be Easier and will have the same rewards as this one).

Skins.

Insert New Frame (not actual content).

Skins.

(Maybe) New Kuva Lich Faction (yay more grind!)

Tennocon 2020 (get hyped for a cinematic quest that was teased 2 years ago?)

Skins.

NightWave 4 (New mods intensifies)

The New Quest (30 min quest).

Insert New Frame (again not content).

Skins.

(Super low chance) The Third Open world ( If 2 weren't enough).

Skins.

 

[SolarDwagon]

On 2020-02-04 at 5:15 AM, peterc3 said:

Is DE supposed to get more money out of existing players for content they've already done or draw in new players?

Connecting systems together so that the game flows better can do both. It's not a zero-sum game.

On 2020-02-04 at 7:05 AM, DOOMPATRIOT said:

I do think that DE returning to stuff they already have would be awesome, but sadly we all know what it is going to actually happen:

Simulacrum Update (why?!).

Skins.

NightWave3 (do you really care about it? Intermission gonna be Easier and will have the same rewards as this one).

Skins.

Insert New Frame (not actual content).

Skins.

(Maybe) New Kuva Lich Faction (yay more grind!)

Tennocon 2020 (get hyped for a cinematic quest that was teased 2 years ago?)

Skins.

NightWave 4 (New mods intensifies)

The New Quest (30 min quest).

Insert New Frame (again not content).

Skins.

(Super low chance) The Third Open world ( If 2 weren't enough).

Skins.

 

And this is why I felt the need to post about it because.... well, you basically summed up 2019 there. I believe DE can do better, but they won't unless we make it clear we actually value old systems becoming more relevant and connected.

[(XBOX)Erudite Prime]

DE doesn't read General Discussion; put this in Feedback.

[(XBOX)Erudite Prime]

On 2020-02-03 at 8:15 AM, peterc3 said:

Is DE supposed to get more money out of existing players for content they've already done or draw in new players?

Maybe DE should prioritize making a polished, quality product instead of just profit. 

[SolarDwagon]

On 2020-02-06 at 10:13 PM, (XB1)Erudite Prime said:

Maybe DE should prioritize making a polished, quality product instead of just profit. 

I'd also add that polished products keep people around long enough for DE to pump out more plat cosmetics for invested players to keep getting. Different teams and all that. But if you start losing people at the core, the flashy additions stop mattering.

[Serafim_94]

Last time they "got back to the old systems" forums went on fire because "muh melee ruined".

What I'd like to see, theoretically, is revisit of damage and defence types. Railjack was a step in that direction, but so far it's an isolated experiment. I'm also not optymistic about how long such a revamp would actually take.

[Serafim_94]

1 час назад, SolarDwagon сказал:

I'd also add that polished products keep people around long enough for DE to pump out more plat cosmetics for invested players to keep getting. Different teams and all that. But if you start losing people at the core, the flashy additions stop mattering.

You have a founder icon. Looks like the game kept you around pretty damn long. And no game, ever, has infinite retention. Some time people will simply get bored.

[(PSN)STR8L8CED]

DE makes new content...fans scream to fix what we already have

 

DE tweaks old content...fans die of thirst from no content.

Its a balancing act. Hell its 2020 and im still waiting for them to get dedicated servers...and before the white knights say dedicated servers are expensive...DE is not hurting for money. 

[SolarDwagon]

On 2020-02-14 at 1:47 PM, Serafim_94 said:

You have a founder icon. Looks like the game kept you around pretty damn long. And no game, ever, has infinite retention. Some time people will simply get bored.

It has, but I find myself sitting out for longer and longer periods, and doing less. Part of that is life, part of it is the game. On top of that, I'd like to see the game get better because I like it.

And yes, it's a balancing act that they've kept on the shiny new thing side of the balance for far too long in my opinion.

[Goodwill]

2020, I want them to focus on cleaning up Railjack and making it what they intended it to be.

2021 though, I would love it if they fixed progression and reworked starchart and quest system in conjunction with Railjack.

It's hard to get people into Warframe when they have to clear half of the starchart before getting to anything relatively interesting.

[Serafim_94]

9 часов назад, SolarDwagon сказал:

It has, but I find myself sitting out for longer and longer periods, and doing less. Part of that is life, part of it is the game. On top of that, I'd like to see the game get better because I like it.

And yes, it's a balancing act that they've kept on the shiny new thing side of the balance for far too long in my opinion.

I've stopped playing Warframe 8 or 9 times. Back when POE launched, I actually ragequitted. For me it was never about continuous play - it's about returning to something new in half-a-year or so. Because no matter what they add or fix - it will get boring to me after some time spent with it. No matter how good (or bad) content is.

I'm not trying to discredit your opinion, but do consider simple fatigue as a factor. Taking breaks from the game makes it that much easier to enjoy. And it's something a lot of people on forums fail to account for.

[Teljaxx]

I definitely agree that they need to connect all these separate systems they have added. This is one of the main things that keeps me from playing anymore. I have gotten really tired of having most of my prior progress rendered moot by big new updates. Want to go to an open world area? Well, all those old resources you spent so much time collecting are useless there, so you have to start an entire new collection. Twice. Want to build a railjack? Once again, you have to go farming for a completely new set of resources. And this time, your old gear doesn't even matter all that much either, since its an entirely different game now. And after you spend all that time farming and building an awesome Railjack, you can't even bring it into any other missions.

Collecting new toys has pretty much always been the main point of the game. But collecting things is pointless if you don't have any reason to use them afterwards. And when each area of the game is so unconnected that you need an entirely different set of items for each one, it makes it hard to use any of it. Its like gathering a huge collection of tabletop miniatures, only to find that you have no one to play with. So they just sit there collecting dust, reminding you of how much time you wasted on them.

 

The other main thing I would love to see DE do is to finally peel back all the layers of overpowered stuff they have added over the past six years, and try to actually properly balance this game for once. The other main reason I don't play anymore is because the game is just plain boring. I am usually willing to put up with a lot of peripheral problems, like long grinds, if the gameplay is good enough. But Warframe's gameplay is not good enough anymore. At this point, because of how powerful players can become, and how simple the enemies are, doing missions is about as interesting as playing an idle/clicker game. So what's the point?

But, Unfortunately, I know this will never happen. It would take way too long, and they don't have the dev resources to do both this and keep new stuff coming. And, the attempts they have made at this already have been met with idiotic outrage. Mostly from people who desperately cling to their boring "power fantasy" ideals because they don't realize that overcoming true challenges is what really makes you feel powerful. Which is more powerful? A kid burning ants with a magnifying glass? Or a kid killing a giant with nothing but a sling? And, which would you rather play as?

 

On 2020-02-14 at 1:47 AM, (PS4)STR8L8CED said:

DE makes new content...fans scream to fix what we already have

 

DE tweaks old content...fans die of thirst from no content.

Its a balancing act. Hell its 2020 and im still waiting for them to get dedicated servers...and before the white knights say dedicated servers are expensive...DE is not hurting for money. 

This is one of the biggest problems inherent in this "live service" development model. They have to constantly add new stuff, and maintain the old, or the game dies. But, the more new stuff they add, the more old stuff there is that needs fixing. Eventually, it gets to the point were the Devs simply don't have the resources to keep doing both at the same time. So they have to choose one as their main focus, and the other goes on bare minimum life support. This can easily kill the game if they don't handle it right.

Warframe passed the point of overload a while ago, and DE seems to have chosen to both make even bigger, and therefore slower, updates, while mostly ignoring the old parts. So we're getting less new stuff, and the old is withering away. Doesn't seem sustainable to me.

[SolarDwagon]

On 2020-02-16 at 5:09 AM, Teljaxx said:

I definitely agree that they need to connect all these separate systems they have added. This is one of the main things that keeps me from playing anymore. I have gotten really tired of having most of my prior progress rendered moot by big new updates. Want to go to an open world area? Well, all those old resources you spent so much time collecting are useless there, so you have to start an entire new collection. Twice. Want to build a railjack? Once again, you have to go farming for a completely new set of resources. And this time, your old gear doesn't even matter all that much either, since its an entirely different game now. And after you spend all that time farming and building an awesome Railjack, you can't even bring it into any other missions.

Collecting new toys has pretty much always been the main point of the game. But collecting things is pointless if you don't have any reason to use them afterwards. And when each area of the game is so unconnected that you need an entirely different set of items for each one, it makes it hard to use any of it. Its like gathering a huge collection of tabletop miniatures, only to find that you have no one to play with. So they just sit there collecting dust, reminding you of how much time you wasted on them.

 

The other main thing I would love to see DE do is to finally peel back all the layers of overpowered stuff they have added over the past six years, and try to actually properly balance this game for once. The other main reason I don't play anymore is because the game is just plain boring. I am usually willing to put up with a lot of peripheral problems, like long grinds, if the gameplay is good enough. But Warframe's gameplay is not good enough anymore. At this point, because of how powerful players can become, and how simple the enemies are, doing missions is about as interesting as playing an idle/clicker game. So what's the point?

But, Unfortunately, I know this will never happen. It would take way too long, and they don't have the dev resources to do both this and keep new stuff coming. And, the attempts they have made at this already have been met with idiotic outrage. Mostly from people who desperately cling to their boring "power fantasy" ideals because they don't realize that overcoming true challenges is what really makes you feel powerful. Which is more powerful? A kid burning ants with a magnifying glass? Or a kid killing a giant with nothing but a sling? And, which would you rather play as?

 

This is one of the biggest problems inherent in this "live service" development model. They have to constantly add new stuff, and maintain the old, or the game dies. But, the more new stuff they add, the more old stuff there is that needs fixing. Eventually, it gets to the point were the Devs simply don't have the resources to keep doing both at the same time. So they have to choose one as their main focus, and the other goes on bare minimum life support. This can easily kill the game if they don't handle it right.

Warframe passed the point of overload a while ago, and DE seems to have chosen to both make even bigger, and therefore slower, updates, while mostly ignoring the old parts. So we're getting less new stuff, and the old is withering away. Doesn't seem sustainable to me.

The balance issues is definitely a hard one for DE to deal with, as we've seen how reluctant people are to take even small obstacles in their stride recently with things like the lich failure mechanics. Which were a bad idea, but not (specifically) because they killed you.
Personally I think the biggest stumbling block is that most power boosts in warframe have been multiplicative in nature, and that makes the range of power levels massively wide. I think I worked out that an optimised suqad can put out 3-4 magnitudes more DPS than a non-optimised squad, which makes creating appropriate challenges that don't force you into very specific frame combinations... basically impossible. See eidolon meta for an example.
The live service situation is definitely an issue, but I think many players would be happy with new ways to play the same content as being new content in itself. I certainly hope so, since that would give DE much more leeway.

[(XBOX)EPOSSTYLE]

Hugo Martin a doom developer explained warframes problem. Its enemy engagement, since it's so thin, any content designed around it fizzles out because it's so one note.

You need cannon fodder foes 

Intermediate foes 

Foes that dont totally negate my powers.

Vocal enemy taunts (not in faction language or options for both would be better).

Enemy squads in challenging configurations.

All enemies should be like chess pieces when dropped in the battle. Currently the modus operandi is shoot and take subpar cover, bullet sponge or invincibility.

Once the formula is nailed down any content there after will be enjoyed instead of race to the end and wait.

DE the world has witnessed monster hunter your bosses need a serious revival. Before that there was lost planet (what generation was that?) And you present lephantis...lol.

 

[SolarDwagon]

20 hours ago, (XB1)EPOSSTYLE said:

Hugo Martin a doom developer explained warframes problem. Its enemy engagement, since it's so thin, any content designed around it fizzles out because it's so one note.

You need cannon fodder foes 

Intermediate foes 

Foes that dont totally negate my powers.

Vocal enemy taunts (not in faction language or options for both would be better).

Enemy squads in challenging configurations.

All enemies should be like chess pieces when dropped in the battle. Currently the modus operandi is shoot and take subpar cover, bullet sponge or invincibility.

Once the formula is nailed down any content there after will be enjoyed instead of race to the end and wait.

DE the world has witnessed monster hunter your bosses need a serious revival. Before that there was lost planet (what generation was that?) And you present lephantis...lol.

 

It would certainly be interesting to give warframe enemies Deus Ex-like AI, might make punchthrough a bit TOO strong a stat compared to now but interesting at the least.

[Teljaxx]

On 2020-02-24 at 5:01 PM, SolarDwagon said:

The balance issues is definitely a hard one for DE to deal with, as we've seen how reluctant people are to take even small obstacles in their stride recently with things like the lich failure mechanics. Which were a bad idea, but not (specifically) because they killed you.
Personally I think the biggest stumbling block is that most power boosts in warframe have been multiplicative in nature, and that makes the range of power levels massively wide. I think I worked out that an optimised suqad can put out 3-4 magnitudes more DPS than a non-optimised squad, which makes creating appropriate challenges that don't force you into very specific frame combinations... basically impossible. See eidolon meta for an example.
The live service situation is definitely an issue, but I think many players would be happy with new ways to play the same content as being new content in itself. I certainly hope so, since that would give DE much more leeway.

The way that Liches killed you if you failed was a problem, but definitely not the biggest one the system has. The real issue is that the entire "challenge" of defeating a Lich comes from multiple layers of RNG, and has nothing to do with skill. You just roll dice until they game decides you can win. That isn't fun, or engaging, and it isn't even a real challenge, because guaranteed failure isn't challenging.

The fact that Warframe has never had a standard linear leveling system has made proper balance really hard to measure. There is no easy way to gauge exactly how powerful each individual player is. An insurmountable challenge for one player may be a complete non-issue for another. But why exactly? There are so many different factors that affect how powerful a player is that narrowing it down is really hard. Their specific gear, specific mods, how many forma they have used, if they have potatoes on everything, what quests they have done, etc. It makes it nearly impossible to figure out what level enemies are the proper strength for your current equipment. So the best option is usually to just take your best stuff into every mission and overpower everything all the time. But that's boring.

Another issue is that real challenge doesn't really mesh with a loot based game like this. For things to be properly challenging, there has to be a decent chance of failure. And failure means missing out on loot. That isn't good in a game based entirely around collecting loot. Stacking low drop rates with low success rates is just going to frustrate everyone. The optimal way to play a game like this is to do the easiest missions you can with the most powerful gear you have, because then it goes faster, and you can't ever fail. So, even if they do add challenging gameplay, most people will still avoid it whenever possible.

Pretty much all of this games problems come from the fact that DE never really had any kind of cohesive plan for the future. They just kind of threw together whatever crazy ideas they had and hoped for the best. This created a lot of problems, most of which were minor at first. But DE ignored them then, and now they have become much bigger and harder to fix. For example: The huge mastery rank based weapon re-balance they did last year. If they had actually bothered to plan that out from the beginning, it wouldn't have taken them several months to go back and fix it all retroactively. And there are plenty of other things like that they they may never be able to fix. Partially because it would mean rebuilding huge parts of the game, and partially because every time they try, way too many angry people show up to complain about their precious "power fantasy shooter" getting ruined by proper balance.

[Teljaxx]

21 hours ago, (XB1)EPOSSTYLE said:

Hugo Martin a doom developer explained warframes problem. Its enemy engagement, since it's so thin, any content designed around it fizzles out because it's so one note.

You need cannon fodder foes 

Intermediate foes 

Foes that dont totally negate my powers.

Vocal enemy taunts (not in faction language or options for both would be better).

Enemy squads in challenging configurations.

All enemies should be like chess pieces when dropped in the battle. Currently the modus operandi is shoot and take subpar cover, bullet sponge or invincibility.

Once the formula is nailed down any content there after will be enjoyed instead of race to the end and wait.

DE the world has witnessed monster hunter your bosses need a serious revival. Before that there was lost planet (what generation was that?) And you present lephantis...lol.

 

I agree: Warframe's enemy design is terrible. It doesn't matter how many cool new weapons or Frames they add to play with, if all you get to use them against is the equivalent of a cardboard cutout in a shooting gallery.

There is basically no variation between units. Whats the difference between a normal crewman, elite crewman, sniper crewman, or dera crewman? They have different guns, but what effect does that have on how you engage them? Even fighting big enemies like Bombards doesn't really require any different tactics compared to the little guys. They just take a little longer to kill.

None of them offer any interesting counterplay opportunities. Hitting the nuke or invincibility button for everything is not good gameplay. And it doesn't matter how many cool abilities they may have if you can simply obliterate them before they even get a chance to use them.

The only challenge they do offer is more annoying than fun, because it usually comes from removing mechanics, instead of presenting new options. Nullifiers and Scrambus/Comba stop your abilities, Ancient Healers stop your damage, heavy Grineer stop your movement, etc. If they didn't simply completely remove these options, and instead forced you to use your abilities in new ways, it would be much better.

But, even if the enemies were actually well designed, it still wouldn't really matter. The random spawns completely remove any ability for DE to actually set up interesting encounters. They can't put specific combinations of enemies in specific locations to make interesting and varied fights, the way Doom does. In Warframe, or any other game with random spawns, whenever you run into a combination of enemies that is actually interesting to fight, its purely thanks to luck. Its basically good game design by accident, which is something DE has relied upon for far too long.

[Redfeather75]

Hire a dedicated team to fix and only fix content.

It's part of the new player experience initiative.

[SolarDwagon]

On 2020-02-26 at 3:16 PM, Redfeather75 said:

Hire a dedicated team to fix and only fix content.

It's part of the new player experience initiative.

The problem with that approach is that if they're not integrated extremely well with the new content creators, you end up with fixing old content then new content comes out that was based on the old "broken" content and it makes it even more obvious how badly meshed it is. I think their strategy of having feature teams is good, but I think they need to spend a lot more time revisitng stuff.

Which, hey, they're actually doing in the next mainline. I feel oddly prescient right now, even though it's not *exactly* what I asked for.

[Fire2box]

On 2020-02-03 at 8:15 AM, peterc3 said:

Is DE supposed to get more money out of existing players for content they've already done or draw in new players?

They get most of their money from plat sales and new prime bundles AFIK. 

[Serafim_94]

Well bois. Here comes the "older content" polish. Some interesting stuff actually.