"Play Solo!" Solution, or problem? Want to talk about this.

[MollAgdeduba]

Hi. Since ther's not too much left to do for me in game, i spent a lot of time here on the forum, and i have notice that more, and more problem have this as solution: "Play Solo".

Since wearframe is a "co-op game" evrything is supposed to be created around the "4 tenno team", but is the opposite. Nowdays play with more people have really a lot of more malus than play the game alone. DE, instead of aknowledge that something is wrong with the "online" and try to fix it, continue to boost the "solo mode", instead of making it a little bit difficult.

So i'm curious to know what you guys think is the problem of this "non working core mechanic of co-op".

Here what i think are the most critical point:

-) Community: i like to play online, but sometimes you find troll people, toxic people or noob people that don't want to cooperate for the mission. This is frustrating and is what could make you say "better go Solo". But this is also part of every online game and not only game, so is normal. Otherwise, those are a small minority and for every one of this you encounter a lot of nice people or at least neutral people. At the end i think this: if you play solo cause you don't like to match other people, you lost half of the funny.

-) Have the control: This is for me the major and stronger point for play solo: everytime you enter in a mission you should consider that other player have different objective than you, so maybe the mission could not work like you have planned. A guy maybe want to farm the map, another want to rush extraction, one is looking for exp farm, one just want to nuke everything, another is testing his new weapon, one want to reach rotation C another need just the rotation A and other one want just play 10 hours of survival while ther's a guy that want to stay afk. This is a roulette, but a lot of thing could be done to make your decision in online mission less relevant for other player. Since the decision of other player could heavily impact your game, of course you will be more interested in solo than online.

-) Hosting: Another relevant point is about the host. How many times you find people with insane ping? no matter if you have set the filter, sometimes it simply don't work and you find this people. Is horrible when you have to waith 5 seconds for a door to open, drop is not taken, weapons don't shot and everything is lag... Here i talk for myself: if is one mission or 2, i just aknowledge the fact and go on my road, but if you start to find one mission after the other with the burundi host, it start to be boring.

-) Bug: Ther are a lot of mission that go bug and they will not if played in solo mode. Since removing bug is difficult, especially the one related to online, maybe give the player a way to don't lose reward and exp before leaving an unplayable mission. Maybe /save in chat will add your current drop to inventory so you cna force the closing

-) Incentives to play solo some mission: I don't understand why some mission work better in solo than in 4 people (RJ is an example) play solo of course should be an option, but it also must be a little bit difficult cause you have to do not only your work, but also the one of the other 3 teammate. Since play solo will be easyer than play online, of course more people will use this mode. 

 

My conclusion: since the "solo mode" will be the only solution to avoid a lot of problem and trouble, more and more people will continue to play solo instead of online and this is a problem, cause the game should be an online co-op game and no an online solo game.

What you think tennoabout this?

 

[RazerXPrime]

No no no. Warframe is a solo game with coop options. Bit like Borderlands. Solo is not the problem. Matchmaking of the online aspect is. Specifically if you play with random people. When you play with friends or with your clan then none of these issues arise as well. Because working together is a lot more fun than everyone running around like a headless chicken.

[Kraethius]

Actually, Warframe is listed as a Single-player game on the Steam page and *not* as an online co-op game. I think the system is fine and gives you freedom to choose to play by youself (with the ability to pause, no less) when you feel like it. Trying to force the solo crowd to play in a squad would be a massive S#&$show.

[FRTE_Ret5o]

Its true that some missions are better if played alone. Plus since the adittion to crew intrinsic the solo option is way more popular.

At the same time some missions(defense, survival, any long run mission) becomes borring doing it solo.

Lets review those points you stated.

-comunity, true there may be trolls(depending on the level of toxicity just report them DE does a good job), but in general fellow tennos are doing their business and being nice.

-have the control. Welp thats where i think DE have found a solution, the recruiting chat. But your point still stands, since finding a group that wants to do something in particular takes some time.(afk there is a sistem that punishes afk in the game, no rewards, woud be interesting a votekick option for that, but at the same time "trolls" so its not an option)

-hosting. Oh boy, ping, i have a kinda bad ping, and i dont desire to be a host, normally i try for others to take the host. But sometimes its just imposible. And host migrations dont forget that. One of the points for solo.

- Bugs, i will just pass on that

-incentives, dont forget that silent kills gives a bonus to master points, and 5 times the regular points is no joke, plus kavat and boosters its insane(20 times the regular combining these 3)

I think that it woud be awsome if squad link worked. But with somthing extra for the work, not just a regular mission, it will enforce solo missions again. 

[Zimzala]

"Solution"

IME, it's only the very extroverted that seem to think playing a game must involve other people if it has the capability.

There is little to no content that requires a group.

Like others, I would like for there to be better matchmaking and whatnot, but it's not going to stop me playing.

[(PSN)Deeceem]

The actual answer people give when people whine about their team is: "Play solo OR premade/with people you know.". Co-op only works with people who want to co-operate. Playing public and then complaining is like willingly to buy something blindly followed by whining about what you got. In almost any game.

Warframe especially though because you don't have to learn the game or be good at it to succeed. In WoW (back in the day) for example you eventually have to learn your class at some point otherwise your dungeon groups fail most of the time because your gear, movement, healing, tanking, damage, aggro management, whatever sucks and as a result your group dies and you don't progress or you don't get that item or whatever else. Basically in many other co-op games you hit a wall eventually and have to "git gud". Meanwhile in Warframe I met people at MR22 who couldn't bullet jump to the Eidolon shard island and still can get carried anywhere. If you look at the outrage each time something slightly challenging (Vitrica boss) or something that requires certain investment (Helminth at MR15) is added you're not even surprised anymore.

Bugs and host migration are a different story. I had to go back to play RJ solo because me and a friend just encountered more mission-breaking issues than when we played solo (endless loading screen etc.). That ball lies entirely in DE's court.

[chaotea]

44 minutes ago, MollAgdeduba said:

My conclusion: since the "solo mode" will be the only solution to avoid a lot of problem and trouble, more and more people will continue to play solo instead of online and this is a problem, cause the game should be an online co-op game and no an online solo game.

What you think tennoabout this?

I think thats not really a conclusion.

Also, the game isnt an online coop game. Its a game with online coop or solo options. I mostly only play online, but i spent much of the first 3 years mostly only playing solo, cause my internet was so bad.

[Artekkor]

Its kinda both. In spy missions, for example, its a solution. A lot of players seem to absolutely suck at stealth and triggger everything. Ironically, they often play Lokis as well, so its double funny that they keep failing while i - the fatass Rhino - do things flawlessly 90% of the time.

But then again its also a problem. This is supposed to be a coop game, yet often playing solo is a more... Comfortable experience. You can play the mission at your own pace, slowly picking out targets, instead of watching some Saryn nuking the entire map and leaving your jobless. I don't know... Its not an issue that can solved easily without introducing mandatory coop aspects like special infected in Left 4 Dead that will 100% kill you unless someone saves you.

I mean... I wouldn't mind. But:
1) It would kill solo gameplay because what do we do with these guanrateed kill enemies then? And there's a decent solo gameplay base around here.
2) Something tells me people will not like that in general.

[RazerXPrime]

1 minute ago, Artekkor said:

Its kinda both. In spy missions, for example, its a solution. A lot of players seem to absolutely suck at stealth and triggger everything. Ironically, they often play Lokis as well, so its double funny that they keep failing while i - the fatass Rhino - do things flawlessly 90% of the time.

But then again its also a problem. This is supposed to be a coop game, yet often playing solo is a more... Comfortable experience. You can play the mission at your own pace, slowly picking out targets, instead of watching some Saryn nuking the entire map and leaving your jobless. I don't know... Its not an issue that can solved easily without introducing mandatory coop aspects like special infected in Left 4 Dead that will 100% kill you unless someone saves you.

I mean... I wouldn't mind. But:
1) It would kill solo gameplay because what do we do with these guanrateed kill enemies then? And there's a decent solo gameplay base around here.
2) Something tells me people will not like that in general.

I will tell you this. If warframe was a multiplayer only game I would have never started playing. And if they switch to multi only, then I stop playing right at that moment. Like hard stop.

[(PSN)shadowraith_666]

52 minutes ago, MollAgdeduba said:

Incentives to play solo some mission: I don't understand why some mission work better in solo than in 4 people (RJ is an example) play solo of course should be an option, but it also must be a little bit difficult cause you have to do not only your work, but also the one of the other 3 teammate. Since play solo will be easyer than play online, of course more people will use this mode. 

some missions like defence and definitely interception are best played with others, missions such as spy are best played solo.

[Dauggie]

the only problem with multiplayer is expecting other players to play according to you. if you can get over that, nothing else is a issue

[STUVash]

il y a une heure, MollAgdeduba a dit :

Hi
[...]
So i'm curious to know what you guys think is the problem of this "non working core mechanic of co-op".
[...]

My conclusion: since the "solo mode" will be the only solution to avoid a lot of problem and trouble, more and more people will continue to play solo instead of online and this is a problem, cause the game should be an online co-op game and no an online solo game.

What you think tennoabout this?

 

Well all the points you stated are part of why one would go solo but I think the main reason would be to have a plan in motion and not just chaotic destruction.
I'm sure Tennos would enjoy squad greatly if every single squad member was needed for the mission.
Railjack can be like that if you gutter the defense equipment, someone had to protect the ship by moving it, someone has to repair it and someone has to do the objective, if the objective is a mobile defense one it could be bad for a player to just go back to the Railjack too.

Orphix mode restrains your equipment and strat so much that you need more players to have a higher firepower in total. Either to save time by spreading the Necramechs or to deal damage on one Orphix faster.

More often than not if you go squad especially with randoms, they will all have a plan of their own that might not align with what you came up with. If the whole squad planned beforehand it could be different, one could nuke, another would heal, another would crowd control and the last one could be assigned to lockdown key targets.
Either that or the whole squad could dumb down their builds as to make everyone useful again, like with Necramechs in Orphix mode, or they could get stupid builds just for the heck of it. 

Conclusion: Chaos is fun but in a game where we mod absolutely everything, it would be funnier if the squad modded together instead of individually as to see everyone's plan in action.

I play solo alot, I play with friends when possible and I play with randoms when joining fissures.

[maycne.sonahoz]

The way i see it, it's a "fake" co-op game, in that it has many cooperative features (4P matches, matchmaking, party/voice chat, clans, user waypoints...) but also many incentives to make players have opposite goals (experience/resource grind, optional objectives...).
Being so heavily oriented towards power fantasy also contributes to this, as there isn't much need to have players complement each others. Having a support/objective oriented teammate is usually unneeded, at best a bonus.

[(PSN)Unstar]

1 hour ago, MollAgdeduba said:

-) Community: i like to play online, but sometimes you find troll people, toxic people or noob people that don't want to cooperate for the mission. This is frustrating and is what could make you say "better go Solo". But this is also part of every online game and not only game, so is normal. Otherwise, those are a small minority and for every one of this you encounter a lot of nice people or at least neutral people. At the end i think this: if you play solo cause you don't like to match other people, you lost half of the funny.

Of all the Warframe I've played, maybe 1% of the games I've been in have jerks or trolls?  In those rare occurrences, the Ignore button is right there, so you don't have to listen to them for the rest of the mission, which will be over soon anyway.

As for noobs, this isn't a problem and people should just deal with it.  Everyone is new at some point, and Warframe is incredibly obtuse and doesn't onboard players to its mechanics or systems very well.  If players are new, don't avoid them; help them out.  If they need a tip or two, find a way to offer it in a compassionate, non-overbearing way.  Or you could always carry harder, which in my personal experience I've always found to be an enjoyable challenge, but to each their own.  Regardless, we all lift together!

1 hour ago, MollAgdeduba said:

-) Have the control: This is for me the major and stronger point for play solo: everytime you enter in a mission you should consider that other player have different objective than you, so maybe the mission could not work like you have planned. A guy maybe want to farm the map, another want to rush extraction, one is looking for exp farm, one just want to nuke everything, another is testing his new weapon, one want to reach rotation C another need just the rotation A and other one want just play 10 hours of survival while ther's a guy that want to stay afk. This is a roulette, but a lot of thing could be done to make your decision in online mission less relevant for other player. Since the decision of other player could heavily impact your game, of course you will be more interested in solo than online.

Players can have different objectives, but I've hardly ever seen this be an issue.  The only common issue is that players want to stay in an endless mission for different amounts of time, and even then, I find this only happens in a minority of missions.  If you want to stay in a mission for 20 minutes or 5 rotations or whatever, it's pretty easy to put a group together in Recruiting chat.  For situations other than that, matchmaking just works.  In my experience, that is, on PS4.  Maybe the PC community is more chaotic?  But given that y'all actually have keyboards to reliably communicate, I would have guessed it would be more organized...

2 hours ago, MollAgdeduba said:

-) Hosting: Another relevant point is about the host. How many times you find people with insane ping? no matter if you have set the filter, sometimes it simply don't work and you find this people. Is horrible when you have to waith 5 seconds for a door to open, drop is not taken, weapons don't shot and everything is lag... Here i talk for myself: if is one mission or 2, i just aknowledge the fact and go on my road, but if you start to find one mission after the other with the burundi host, it start to be boring.

This is probably what you mean when you say "filter", but just in case: there's a setting in Options that allows you to set a maximum ping, and I found that lowering it to 100 or 200 helps greatly.  But if you've done that and are still having issues, that sounds like a bug you should report in the Bugs section.

2 hours ago, MollAgdeduba said:

-) Incentives to play solo some mission: I don't understand why some mission work better in solo than in 4 people (RJ is an example) play solo of course should be an option, but it also must be a little bit difficult cause you have to do not only your work, but also the one of the other 3 teammate. Since play solo will be easyer than play online, of course more people will use this mode. 

In my opinion, I've never found a mission that works better solo.  I'm curious what it is about Railjack that makes you think it's better solo?  In my experience I haven't had problems playing with other players.

 

There's nothing wrong with playing solo, and if people want to play solo I think that's a perfectly valid choice.  But for me, Warframe is a co-op game.  The only time that I start a mission solo is in the rare circumstance that I think my goals in the mission would conflict with those of others, which I can count on one hand:

• I want to scan a Simaris target before someone accidentally kills it
• I want to mine/fish/conservation in an open world

Aside from that, I'm always playing co-op, and the vast majority of the time I haven't experienced any problems.  Most players in missions on PS4 want to finish the mission successfully, and we all work together to get that done.

[PublikDomain]

3 hours ago, Kraethius said:

Actually, Warframe is listed as a Single-player game on the Steam page and *not* as an online co-op game.

That reads more like "someone picked the wrong category" than anything else... Warframe is an online multiplayer co-op game and I don't really see how anyone could think otherwise? While the game can be played solo, playing in public with other players is the default.

Edit: Like, here's what introduced me to Warframe at a GDC talk over 8 years ago:

It was their first slide.

[RazerXPrime]

1 hour ago, PublikDomain said:

That reads more like "someone picked the wrong category" than anything else... Warframe is an online multiplayer co-op game and I don't really see how anyone could think otherwise? While the game can be played solo, playing in public with other players is the default.

Edit: Like, here's what introduced me to Warframe at a GDC talk over 8 years ago:

It was their first slide.

Well it's a slight misterpretation on yours and their side. There's single player coop games and multiplayer coop games. Since coop is a feature on top of the other experience. In this case Warframe is a single player game with coop features.

They just put multiplayer in this slide to sell the game, because at the time everything had to be multiplayer to sell it.

 

Steam lists this game as single player. Epic games lists it as coop, but Epic is a bunch of retards that don't understand anything.

Let me know how many of the main quest story missions you were able to play with multiple people. Or you know, check the more recent Sevagoth quest. Launch that with matchmaking/friends/clan whatever. Try. We'll talk after that.

[PublikDomain]

8 minutes ago, RazerXPrime said:

In this case Warframe is a single player game with coop features.

This is such a bizarre way to view the game...

9 minutes ago, RazerXPrime said:

Let me know how many of the main quest story missions you were able to play with multiple people.

And let me know how much time you spend doing main quest story missions. They make up maybe a dozen hours max over thousands of hours of playtime? The primary thing you do in Warframe is play the repeatable missions - which are by default co-op multiplayer. Multiplayer missions, multiplayer hubs, networked chat, player-to-player trading... It's multiplayer just about everywhere by default. Turning that off and playing solo is the exception, not the other way around.

[RazerXPrime]

1 minute ago, PublikDomain said:

This is such a bizarre way to view the game...

And let me know how much time you spend doing main quest story missions. They make up maybe a dozen hours max over thousands of hours of playtime? The primary thing you do in Warframe is play the repeatable missions - which are by default co-op multiplayer. Multiplayer missions, multiplayer hubs, networked chat, player-to-player trading... It's multiplayer just about everywhere by default. Turning that off and playing solo is the exception, not the other way around.

Well that's your opinion

[Wolfdoggie]

I generally like to play Public for everything cuz I love Tennos but the game will force me to solo in certain situations

Some that I can think of off the top of my meow:

Spy Missions: Having one player hold the power to completely destroy all progress is why I hate these missions and have always thought they needed reworked to be more hotjoin friendly somehow. So I'm forced to solo since I can't hold 3 hands at once from opposite sides of the map.

Open World Maps for misc gathering and Nightwave stuff: If I'm not host I'm constantly at risk of being disconnected by migration and losing NW progress and probably items too. They've tried to fix item loss but it still happens. So I always do these solo. 

Syndicate Missions: A lot of the time I simply don't care to collect medallians, especially if NW is forcing me to do 10 of them. I have to do them solo otherwise I'm waiting at a door that needs 2 people to open for exactly 11 and 1/2 years. 

Simaris Scans: These targets die from the wind generated by the bullet/melee weapon before the bullet/melee weapon physically touches them and Simaris often points them out too late. Solo is a must.

Onslaught: If I only want to do 1-2 waves for something since no one can join beyond that~ I often thought there should be a way to hotjoin endless missions in a way it would match you with others wanting to go longer than 1 wave. Sure there's LFG chat for that, but lol... LFG chat is a mess and always has been, plus I'm impatient. 

Railjack: Immensely buggy in public O_O haven't tried since most recent update though.

[PublikDomain]

20 minutes ago, RazerXPrime said:

Well that's your opinion

An "opinion" backed up by DE themselves?

Spoiler

Slides from 2013's GDC calling it a co-op game, which you've seen...

Presentations from 2018's GDC where Rebecca calls it a co-op game...

 

"It's free to play, it's co-op..."

From the PS store:

"Online play required"...

The ESRB rating includes "Users Interact"...

From the Microsoft store:

Online Multiplayer (2-4), Online co-op (2-4)...

From EGS:

Co-op, "third-person co-op"...

You need an internet connection to play...

And the same on Steam:

You go to the Steam Store and look at Massively Multiplayer, and there's Warframe under What's Popular. Add the Multiplayer tag and it's still there.

Warframe is primarily a multiplayer co-op game lol, idk how you'd ever conclude otherwise.

35 minutes ago, RazerXPrime said:

Epic games lists it as coop, but Epic is a bunch of retards that don't understand anything.

And I forgot to mention, but you do realize that DE sets up their storefront, not Epic or Sony or Microsoft? Epic ain't setting up DE's market pages lol.

[Spectre-8]

Playing Warframe is optional at the end of the day 🤣

[RazerXPrime]

8 minutes ago, PublikDomain said:

An "opinion" backed up by DE themselves?

8 years ago. You play 8 years ago. I play now. You want to believe this is a multiplayer game go right ahead. I'm not stopping you.

[PublikDomain]

Just now, RazerXPrime said:

8 years ago. You play 8 years ago. I play now. You want to believe this is a multiplayer game go right ahead. I'm not stopping you.

"Warframe isn't a multiplayer game", sure...

[Fl_3]

When I started Warframe I played public, which just lead to people who had played longer than me with better gear than me finishing the missions before I'd even found my way to the objective. I was advised by someone in region chat to try the game in solo if I wanted to see all the content for myself at my own speed without other people beating me to it.

So I did.

Now. here I am, MR 30, all the frames, weapons, companions. you name it, I have it. Map cleared both regular and in Steel Path, 2-3 hours survivals, excavations, disruptions played, Prodman runs, Eidolons, Orb Mothers. all the bosses and mini-bosses beaten, again regular and steel path where applicable. Railjack cleared, half of it solo before the command intrinsic and the other half solo with AI crew.

Everything in this game cleared, beaten solo.

Would someone like to show the content that requires multiple players to complete? Because I seem to have missed it.

If this game was as multi player orientated as some people seem to think then surely there would be something in it that actually required more than one person to beat it.

[Circle_of_Psi]

I mean I have no friends, so..

 

Rip me I guess