Heart of Deimost: Inconsistent, but in the right direction.

[Loza03]

For me, Heart of Deimos has proved... confusing. In many ways, it's some of the best the Open World has reached. In just as many others, not so much. Almost everything in the Open World is excellent, making progress in a direction I think the game could genuinely benefit from, but just as much, I think many suffer from critical flaws that weigh down that progress.

Necramechs: Whilst I'm just on the cusp of constructing my own, my experience piloting the Necramechs in the quest and found in the wild has been an extremely positive one. Whilst there's some potential modding issues I've heard of (minimal means of healing, mod capacity and cost for 12 slots), that much at least is well within capacity to solve. Plus, I've heard that the payoff for these Soft MR-14 behemoths is quite extensive. However, actually acquiring them in the 'intended' method is not so joyful. It could be, however (well, minus the RNG mining/pillar farming, but that's and inevitability of a game like this I suppose). Specifically, the process of fighting the Necramechs.

Quite frankly, the basis of the Necramechs is good. Whilst they do have several of the less enjoyable RPG means of increasing boss duration (Status immunity, damage reduction etcetera), this is more than offset by the fact the padding is of a genuinely well-constructed, kinetic battle of aim, evasion, and baiting out attacks. With, of course, two exceptions - the slow attack, and the storm shroud. The former is relatively small, but significant - the attack does not have a proper visual indicator. The one used does not show the full size of the attack (particularly vertically) and depending on the surface, may not appear in the first place. Considering the potency of such an attack on the experience of a fight which is otherwise focused on mobility, which is something that Warframe has struggled with of late (having mobility but not needing it). The latter, however, has twofold problems. The first is that, unlike the other RPG-styled mechanics which extend an otherwise engaging battle so it lasts a meaningful amount of time,  the storm shroud removes the engaging aspects. The Necramech fight otherwise rewards aim and evasion. However, since the Storm shroud reflects the damage onto you, dodging is meaningless, and attacking the weakpoints is pointless. Not helped by how rapidly the ability can be re-activated, meaning that, even when you do drop the shield, it can be re-applied and negate your hard work in a matter of seconds. The other problem is how utterly opaque it is to learn. The ability activates almost immediately, and there's no indication whatsoever of how it works - only that the mech is now glowing blue, your attacks aren't working, and you're dead. Shooting off the arms, at least, gives visual feedback both from the visible damage 

 

Conservation: A particularly prickly subject, but one I don't personally have a lot to say on. I'm fond of Conservation, and to be honest, I'm extremely happy to see that all five animal types introduced can spawn in the wild. This was the best part of Conservation in PoE, and I'm glad to see it make a full implementation here. However, aside from the fact that this is probably the buggiest - or at least, the most noticeably buggy - part of the update with animals spawning inside of the terrain and such, I believe that the spawn rates of the animals are deeply unbalanced - particularly the avachea. From research I have done, it would appear that there are three locations where the birds can spawn, which they seemingly share with the pets which have numerous other spawn locations. In short, this makes the insect and bird animals dramatically harder to find than any other species, which makes hunting for them a miserable experience.

 

The World: In all honesty? The level design of the Heart of Deimos is excellent. Both surface and underground There is not only plenty of room to maneuver, but plenty of need. Infested spawn up, down and all around, and there is no shortage of both vertical space and obstacles impeding your progress, meaning that skill and/or good use of mobility powers is encouraged (which, as I stated earlier, is something Warframe has struggled with of late). Enemy design also helps with this. Ironically, whilst Fortuna and to a lesser extent PoE struggled with zerg-rushing enemies that all just walk right into your blender (making the large, open spaces somewhat pointless), the most zerg-like faction offers enemies that add variation to encounters. Jugulus, for example, being stationary, long-ranged targets that force the player to leave positions of power to deal with them or pack good long-ranged, single-target weaponry, Saxum encouraging good aim (or again, high powered precision weapons) and the Carnis offering 'air support' due to their ability to crawl on walls. However, whilst it looks gorgeous(?), the visual design makes distinguishing between terrain, enemy, conservation target and mining spot harder than necessary.

Moreover, about half of the world is critically underutilised - the underground. You can only access the underground in a single bounty, which has a single set of objectives, both of which set you in a single room each. This renders the procedural nature of the underground irrelevant - the space between hurried through as quickly as possible because it has no inherent purpose. A pity given that, in the introductory quest, we travel through large sections of the underground and its many inner chambers.

 

 

Personally, as simply reporting on the problems is only so helpful, I would like to offer suggestions on solutions.

For Necramechs, increasing the visibility of the slow effect would solve most of its issues in that department. For the invulnerability - remove the damage reflection. That part is totally unnecessary. I would also prefer that the invincibility be removed as well, but if it is to remain, then better communication about how it works early in the travels through Deimos is essential.

For Conservation, more spawns locations for the other animals would be ideal - I'm aware that better indicators are in the works which solves that part of the problem. And, of course, fixing the bugs would be appreciated but that's just rubbing salt in the wound.

For the World, I'd personally rework the underground and make it a sub-section to the open world as a whole. Always available (or unlocked at a certain level of game/Deimos progression) to be roamed at ones pleasure, rather than having to go through the process of detoxifying the tunnels and being guided straight to the vault. Instead, both vaults and toxic caverns are littered throughout a winding, twisting maze of dead ends as large as the rest of the world that changes each time it is entered. Entering a vault triggers the Necramech fight, and doing so in different vaults results in each tier of rewards (if that's realisable, of course). Perhaps re-using the existing bounty as an introductory mini-quest (perhaps where the Necramech fight tutorial takes place). This also opens possibility for further expansion down the line without cluttering the surface - new fish, new conservation targets, even new bounties and their rewards could take place in the procedural depths.

 

In so many words - Heart of Deimos is flawed. Deeply and sincerely. But what those flaws mar is some genuinely grade-A content. Heart of Deimos is a genuine move in the right direction despite its stumbling blocks, and I dearly hope to see its improvements carried forwards.

[mrpyro12345678]

I'd like for people to see this.

[Luciole77]

The main problem is conservation...its something very artificial thing and many bugs with strange locations or unattainable captures. Its just like fortuna....

 

I think the animals should be loose on the map roaming freely ... deimos has some flexibility compared to fortuna because we can observe some of them freely on the map like vulpas / fleece / predators. Fortuna could also change that ... let the animals appear naturally.