Isn't balancing this game actually pretty easy with Bastions method?

[Impulse_Nine]

So I'm probably one of like five or six people in the world who hated the game "Bastion", but I will credit it with one genuinely good idea- allowing the player to nerf himself or buff enemies in the name of greater rewards from the greater challenge.

I don't really keep up with the WF forums- has this been suggested as the solution to WF's difficulty problem? Was there a coherent reason it would be a terrible idea in practice?

 

When I say nerf self / buff enemies I'm being intentionally vauge. Everything from alternative Dragon Keys that nerf you but give 25% extra (xp/kuva/whatever), to mods for frames and weapons that block the slot / nerf the item- but provide a bonus that even late game players would be interested in getting.

I mean Warframe has Kuva- a resource that you can virtually always usefully use more of, even at the endgame. That in itself is surely half the solution to this problem?

This way power fantasists can keep things as they are, but people like me and the friend I play this with (who really enjoyed the modless* Grendel parts missions) also have the opportunity to be rewarded for giving ourselves the challenge we need to stay stimulated.

Surely there is room in this game for both kinds of people, maybe not in the same matches, but still in the same game? Surely?

 

*I realise those missions did actually allow a very select few augment mods, we did use them, it was still hard, and was the most fun we have had playing this game in literally years! 😄

[dwqrf]

There is couple of missions "like that" which come to my mind while you say that. It's not really the same, but is still a sort of "greater risk for greater rewards" kind of scenario. Namely the Kuva Survival (Taveuni) and the Thermia Fractures (Orb Vallis).

In the first, you can (and should) convert a life support tower into a kuva harvester, that you need to defend, which will give less life support after it's finished, but will grant kuva. It's a nice tradeoff, If you have enough spare life support to "gamble" with it. Generally, even without a Nekros, you can clearly chain the kuva harvesters without being concerned by the time, but if you stay a while, well, at some point you might have to reconsider your strategy.

For the Thermia Fracture, you can put inside the rift between 1 and 4 canisters of thermia, allowing the squad to make the run quicker, but definitely more dangerous. Same here, every player has to be careful about not trying to take a bigger bite than they can, as it can be really easy to get surprised by the damage output of a full army. But doing less than a 4 canister fracture makes the run maybe safe, but really long.

I think DE tries really hard to infuse this kind of missions in the game, but with the OPness we can have, most of the "hardest" challenges you can set become quickly cheesable and the "greater rewards" is the only thing to aim for, making any other run "a loss of time".

I just remembered Scarlet Spear. That was kind of the same too : stay a short time, you get "barely enough" for your time played, stay long, it becomes harder but give "decent" rewards. Thus the need to cheese it as much as possible, as the "best" drop we can have is only "decent" in the eyes of the tryharders. It's all a matter of perspective.

[AlphaPHENIX]

While I want to agree with this (as a fan of Transistor),  ^ dwqrf ^ explained pretty well why similiar things haven't really worked so far.

I also want to say I am up for more unmodded missions, like the ones for Grendel... but I think some people might sent assassins after me if I did.

[Impulse_Nine]

Yes the problems in the past revolve around the fact that the Tenno are staggeringly powerful. That's why it's that that needs to change for the challenge to return (for those who want that)- but I maintain, that can be done- selectively too!

11 minutes ago, AlphaPHENIX said:

While I want to agree with this (as a fan of Transistor),  ^ dwqrf ^ explained pretty well why similiar things haven't really worked so far.

I also want to say I am up for more unmodded missions, like the ones for Grendel... but I think some people might sent assassins after me if I did.

Absolutely with you on more unmodded missions. Can you believe me and my friend were actually calling out targets like nullifiers to each other for the Grendel defense? We weren't doing it for the cinematics either, we really needed to split / focus our firepower with coordination! Loved every bit of it.

[lukinu_u]

The big issue is warframe always allow some alternatives to reduce difficulty in a way that unfun gameplay become the most efficient way to farm, which is the reason balance is important in this kind of game.
Sure, right know you can do all of the game content with gears you like in a reasonable amount of time, and getting more power isn't really necessary in most of situation because you can't really do more than OS every enemy, speed run captures faster, staying alive "stronger" in survival missions, etc... But when it come to higher level stuff like Eidolons, the recent Scarlet Spear, etc... this additionnal strength matter and let you finish the mission faster, which provide more farming efficiency.

With your solution, you would be able to increase the rewards at the cost of more difficulty, which provide content to challenge our min-maxed builds BUT you will also be encouraged to use the objectively strongest gears in the game to increase the difficulty as much as possible and get more efficient farm.

So, the system would be interesting to provide challenge and fun to all levels of players, but it still require a big balancing pass to the game in order to keep variety in playstyles without harming too much players who goes instead the "meta" as long as they mod their gears smartly.

[(PSN)guzmantt1977]

2 hours ago, Impulse_Nine said:

So I'm probably one of like five or six people in the world who hated the game "Bastion"

 

[Impulse_Nine]

2 hours ago, lukinu_u said:

So, the system would be interesting to provide challenge and fun to all levels of players, but it still require a big balancing pass to the game in order to keep variety in playstyles without harming too much players who goes instead the "meta" as long as they mod their gears smartly.

Yes, and that certainly would be difficult- but I thought there was consensus that there is already a huge need for a balancing pass between mods and enemies as it is.

The other game I spend my time with, Killing Floor 2, also has mutually exclusive upgrades- but for example, one such tradeoff is between +30% dmg or +100% clip size. Compare this to Serration and Magasine Warp at +165% dmg or +30% clip. It's not even a competition, whereas in Killing Floor I still umm and err over that one (sustained DPS vs ammo economy, which is a much bigger deal when you only have a knife for a melee weapon and also have to buy ammunition with money you would otherwise use on better guns).