The Arsenal Divide: Changes & Follow Ups

[Aldain]

Hot take from me, Critical Chance should never have gone past 100% in the first place.

But I do agree on working on the stances and animations, some of them have dead stops in either swings or in movement for no real reason.

[_Kiro]

The fact Melee is still getting nerfed instead of bringing Primaries and Secondaries to the same level just makes every single one of these posts pointless to read no matter the content they have. I don't even wanna think what's gonna be of people who bother using Hammers, 2 H Swords or any slower weapon with the changes to Berserker, good luck if you even bother playing after all these changes hit.

Berserker will basically be dead and people will just move to Primed Fury, the nerfs to mods are pointless and will do nothing in the long run but the fact you're making the game's combat even more uncomfortable instead of, for example, adding a cap to Attack Speed to prevent animation break just shows that your methods for game balancing never seem to progress.

But anyway... I seem to be one of those that also doesn't learn, this kind of thing has been happening for years and I still pop up on the forums to say my piece while believing it'll never amount to anything.

[Balegrim]

All these on-kill arcanes look boring as hell. 

Should make buffs happen on crit/status application. Much more fun IMHO and reliable to keep up. 

[Zaebin]

Honestly, I think some of the animations of melee attacks are unnecessarily long and have a pointless end of the animation (i. e. the Stalking Fan combo when you slash horizontally and you just hold the scythe behind your back for a short time or the forward windmill combo on the ninkondi that ends in an animation where your warframe literally just puts the weapon away). When was the last time someone took a look at warframe's basic animations? If you're running with single or dual pistols, the one in your right hand that you hold up seems to be oddly balanced (like a chicken's head) almost not moving at all. The melee slam attack looks so stiff while going down. Finisher animations are slow af.

[DealerOfAbsolutes]

If Base Damage mods like Serration are going to be made obsolete by the new arcanes, maybe Serration and its kin should be made into the gun equivalent of aura/stance mods?

Frees up a slot and gives 14 extra capacity from the start to work with? Even more incentive for new players to rank them up to max as soon as possible.

Would make guns way less tedious to level.

[Meshugganah]

On-kill effects don't sound too useful if you have trouble killing anything in the first place, otherwise a kill with any weapon/ability should count or the effects trigger on staus/crit

My suggestion for primary/secondary arcanes/mods:
-consecutive hits on the same target deal 10% more damage until it caps out at +300% (useful for automatic weapons)

-if the target is above a health cap (60% maybe) hits deal +200% damage (decreasing by 40% for each hit below the health cap) (useful for slow, powerful weapons)

 

[Tenc-w]

I know you have said that it would be too hard to go through and update all gun stats individually and with all these new mods, they have conditions like on kill which if you don't have your damage stacks up for each mod we are still left in the same place as before.

This is just a idea so not sure how it would work out but wouldn't it be easier to just increase mod capacity from 60 to 80? (like all kuva weapons), add 4 new mod slots on all primary and secondary weapons and move helpful mods like reload speed to the Exilus slot that was originally shown before Exilus release.

That would open up so many weapons to new build types while adding mods that are usually left out of builds.

[wirecard]

On 2021-06-22 at 8:02 PM, [DE]Rebecca said:

Note that for consistency the Vitus Essence will also disappear after 5 minutes if not picked like Steel Essence as previously announced. Heads up! 

this will bring the most of so said arsenal divide after some new meta quickly settled i guess.

[_Akasha]

On 2021-06-25 at 12:30 AM, Alavaris said:

First off, thank you DE for actually reading the feedback to the coming changes. Moving the mods to the arbitration store seems a good start, putting them in both the arbitration and steel path stores would be even better. It doesn't hurt anything if we can choose which one to farm. Even though very few issues have been addressed yet, it makes me feel cautiously optimistic that the rest of the issues won't go unnoticed either before the update comes out. 

I still agree with the majority here that the new mods will not solve the problem, and the whole on-kill mechanic problem has been explained here often enough, so i'll just hope you guys really test these things a few more times, on different guns, and without any bonuses just like a normal player would have to use them. 

One thing that I don't see mentioned a lot since the announcement is the changes to glaives. There's not many of us glaive users to begin with, but that doesn't mean our favorite weapons should become useless just because the majority is focusing on other areas. Please give these changes a thorough testing as well. And do so on the steel path. Yes, glaives have a bit more base damage than for example swords. But while throwing the glaive, you have nothing left to defend yourself up close, so you need to not just partially hit, but kill the enemies before they reach you. Making this process slower by increasing the heavy attack speed while also doing less damage will make these weapons unusable against high level enemies. And as someone said before, why do all glaives have to suffer just because the glaive prime with its slash proc is a bit too convenient? I have literally never seen anyone else in a mission use the same glaive as me. I doubt weapons like the orvius are overused. And I've also never experienced any "accidental" throw when I was trying to do a normal melee hit. But even if that happened, it would still hit the enemy right in front of me, no harm done. Imo, that doesn't justify turning a weapon that has a nice flow between hitting, charging and throwing into a clunky, slow weapon that won't be much fun to use. 

 

I whole heatedly agree with this. Ive been sad about this as well. I fell in love with the galive prime from my first acquisition of it over 6 years ago. Not many people use them and at times, they can get buffs but they always, always, always end up getting nerfed back down to the point literally no one uses them and I really hope we can leave them in the place they were at.

[TheLexiConArtist]

3 hours ago, Aldain said:

Hot take from me, Critical Chance should never have gone past 100% in the first place.

I can't agree. The way we have it here is almost as tame as super-critting can get (for results as compared to a mutable initial crit-damage variable) and is probably being grossly overestimated, especially by DE with the 'oh no red crit' justification for reducing Blood Rush.

Unless my equation is buggered, an orange crit will never quite reach 2x the value of a yellow crit, and a first-tier red will never reach 1.5x the value of that orange crit. Rising and falling within the >=yellow range is consistent and fairly moderate unless you're jumping multiple tiers at once.

It's not like we exponentiate off the modded crit damage. That would make supercrits far more problematic.
That considered, the bigger loss of nerfing Blood Rush isn't the reduction in red/orange crit reliability, but the lower end weapons that won't yellow-crit reliably.

[GREF_TM]

1 hour ago, _Akasha said:

end up getting nerfed back down to the point literally no one uses them

Heavy attack builds are almost untouched (small attack rate reduction between longer startup and berserker), and forced procs are untouched, too. Glaives (well, glaive prime) will remain being top tier, no need to worry, unless there will be an another followup with more melee nerfs.

[master_of_destiny]

12 hours ago, .Khaos. said:

Arbitrations are lot more punishing than Steel Path though, you only have 1 life and the revive mechanic when playing in a team is too convoluted for most people to care to actually do it.

Steel Path is actually approachable with the current state of the game, I've seen many "newbies" get straight into it after completing their normal Star Chart, since Arbitrations are useless for the reason mentioned above, and do endless survivals in the Void.

So why not just have the Galvanized mods drop from Steel Path as well, so you progressively get stronger while progressing through the Steel Path Star Chart.
You know, to actually add incentive to unlock good farming spots in SP. Incentive that did exist at first, but then you initially killed with Incursions. Now all people have as a reward from completing Steel Path planets is Steel Essence, a useless and finite reward, since you can easily get it infinitely elsewhere, all you need to do is to get an Incursion to a survival and have it unlocked forever, never to worry about it again, or get carried/taxied by another player and have it unlocked as well.

 

Bottom line is that making Galvanized mods drop from Steel Path would've created more incentive for players to actually farm and unlock Steel Path, but you've gone tone-deaf and chosen the easy way out and listening to the screeching feedback of the snowflake players who don't want to grind more than an hour or two a day in a game that is all about grinding.

 

Let's talk about this....because while I can see your frustration I don't agree with it entirely.

 

Arbitrations start at a high level (60-80).  They scale off of the current enemy level system.  The mission changes once per hour, it's nutty random, and if you die your team needs to carry burdens until you can be resurrected.  In a full team of four you'll be required to have a 2-2-1 burden load, as a minimum burden to each individual players.  Said burdens steal health and energy....but once used you can get all of this back.  The reward drops are whatever that mission would be...so often are 99.9% random garbage resources and 0.1% vitus essence.  The only catch is that arbitrations also have a per segment reward, so you've proportionately also got the chance o earn thousands upon thousands of endo...assuming that's your thing.

 

Now, Steel Path is standard levels+100.  It doubles resource drop chance, and mod drop chance.  This part is laughable (200% of 1 in 10,000 drops is still 1 in 5,000), but the less laughable part is the +250% health, shields, and armor.  This means that the Steel Path is not a "player choice" game mode.  It's a game mode where you largely have to be kitted for the current meta.  Your special rewards are either 3 steel essence per a 5 mission daily selection, or two essence dropped on the death if a acolyte.  Acolytes have the tendency to spawn wherever they feel like, whenever they feel like.  Is a spy mission it's about once every 5 minutes...so 24 essence per hour is the best possible drop rate.  Other rewards are a literal joke, because they default to regular star chart pools.  That is to say a level 30-40 mission rewards better than a 120 mission in Steel Path.  On a positive note you can die to your heart's content, as long as you either get a standard resurrection or use one of your 4-6 resurrections.

 

 

Now....why is the Arbitrations better then?  Consistency and cost of rewards.  

Let me elaborate from where I stand.  If I want to earn an umbral forma blue print I need to get 150 steel essence between each offering.  That's 150/3 or 50 missions that I have to run.  Theoretically I could improve this with acolyte spawn drops....but a 2 minute capture mission won't even have the chance to spawn an acolyte.  This means that just to get the unique stuff from Steel Path I need to grind the snot out of it...and forego any of the other weekly rewards.  I will also, after the update, have to grind steel essence to buy arcance unlockers.  If they are surprisingly cheap, and aren't another thing that requires a forma and 24 hours of construction, they might only be an annoyance. 

What do I mean by cheap?  Well, 2 steel essence.  How do I come to this number?  Oh boy.  Let's assume that you only use about 10 primary and secondary weapons.  That's basically a joke...but we'll assume.  10 weapons+ 10 catalysts+ 10 exilus adapters+ 10 arcane unlockers+ about 6 forma per weapon (60 total) means that every single items you want to test for viability at high levels is a huge cost.

Why eve care about this?  Well, DE continues to bag on about player choice.  They have rivens "to make everything viable at higher levels," and I note that phrase because while DE hadn't actually done this it is still their stated goal.  Right now people go into the simulacrum, do a youtube video, and determine if a thing is valuable or is a mastery rank fodder weapon.  If you're about to dramatically increase that investment, I don't see why anyone would ever engage with any new content unless it's disproportionately strong...and DE's modus operandi is to release a thing underpowered and buff later.  For those with a pair of brain cells, that would mean virtually everything comes out dead on arrival.  By the time a riven buff happens, a minimum of 90 days later, nobody cares.  Hmmm....this is almost like DE forgot about how their content stream works...  You know, the release poor and release middling content, both ideas existing because they fear power creep more than anything else. 

 

 

So, why then am I actually happy about arbitrations bearing the mods?  Well, the investment.  I am clearly not happy with the rewards rate...but at the same time arbitrations do give you either endo or pull from a unique rewards pool.  If absolutely none of the drops from the game mode interests you, then you can get Rolling Guard, Power Donation, and Grendel locators from the store.  If I don't feel like the Steel Path grind I lose out on...umbral forma.  Of course, that seems to be a once every 10 weeks thing...and with only 3 umbral mods the thigs have little absolute need to exist (with current sentient content).  Heck, we aren't cheated on the cost of arcane unlocks then Steel Path will remain the least value highest bar grind in the game...because why the heck not?

 

 

Put into one paragraph, because people seem to be incapable of reason; Arbitrations may penalize death harder, but they are also demonstrably less of a mess when it comes to unfun tanky enemies.  I see why you'd think otherwise...but the facts don't bare out the emotional logic.  The death burdens are less of an annoyance than a level 120 enemy who claims difficulty only in the length of their health bar is infinitely less fun is a fast paced looter shooter, especially one with the tagline "ninjas play free."  This isn't a Gears of War style game, where hiding behind cover is expected.

[GREF_TM]

6 hours ago, Balegrim said:

Should make buffs happen on crit/status application.

Should've been way lower numbers per stack but more stacks total and gaining stacks on any hit, similar to arca scisco. Stack gain per hit scales with fire rate, with special calculations for charge weapons.

15 minutes ago, master_of_destiny said:

but they are also demonstrably less of a mess when it comes to unfun tanky enemies

A mission type full of enemies that effectively disable your warframe abilities in a game about warframes and their abilities  are somehow more "unfun" compared to enemies that allow you to play warframe like you'd normally do, but just don't explode on one-two hits? lol

Steel path already has far more consistent essense drops that arbitrations will have even with 6% drop chance. It would've been an objectively superior place to farm new mods, especially considering that arcanes will also drop there, which makes moving these mods to arbitrations a terrible change overall for any player who values their time and want only mods. You can be "happy" to waste far more time on farming all you want, but the fact remains.

[master_of_destiny]

19 minutes ago, GREF_TM said:

...

A mission type full of enemies that effectively disable your warframe abilities in a game about warframes and their abilities  are somehow more "unfun" compared to enemies that allow you to play warframe like you'd normally do, but just don't explode on one-two hits? lol

Steel path already has far more consistent essense drops that arbitrations will have even with 6% drop chance. It would've been an objectively superior place to farm new mods, especially considering that arcanes will also drop there, which makes moving these mods to arbitrations a terrible change overall for any player who values their time and want only mods. You can be "happy" to waste far more time on farming all you want, but the fact remains.

 

Shenanigans.  It's amazing that you could actually play these game modes, and suggest otherwise.

 

To the first part...are you even being rational here?  Let me frame this in another way...what enemies existed years before arbitration drones that did the same thing?  Let's see....Ancient Healers, Parasitic Eximus (not able to use powers by virtue of energy drains), Nullifiers, all three types of Scrambus, and to some extent shield lancers.  Hmmm.....seems like the goal at DE has been, for literal years, to stop warframe abilities.  

For reference I remember when these stupid enemies were put into the game.  Your thinking that arbitration drones are somehow new is the same myopic view as people who believe we're going to get more stuff in the dojo...beyond the once in a blue moon research and cosmetics.  Literal years of that system being neglected don't suddenly justify more attention, and the fractions of a second obstacle course runs were what drove DE to allow us to make our own.

As another aside, Arca Plasmor.  Maybe you forgot, but when arbitrations went live that was the weapon.  Infinite punch-through, good damage, and good coverage.  It absolutely nuked arbitration drones.  Now we have the Kuva Nukor and a litany of other AoE weapons that make short work of drones, if you're too lazy to simply aim at a target.

 

 

Let's talk about Vitus Essence....because you seem to not know how to do the math here.  Let's work through this....because you seem to actively not want to.

You have 5 drones spawned at any one time.  Imagine that you only killed a drone every 20 seconds, or three per minute.  Now assume you do a 60 minute mission.  Fantastic.  The likelihood of getting 180 vitus essence is 1-0.03¹⁸⁰.  The likelihood of no vitus essence is 1-0.97¹⁸⁰.  So we are clear that is 1-(7.6*10^-275) of 180 essence drops and 1-(0.004) of getting nothing.  That is to say, 4 in one thousand hour long runs will spawn no essence.  Note that this is only killing a drone ever 20 seconds....meaning each team member only kills a drone every 80 seconds.

Now, let's factor in the x3 vitus essence drop chances.  Remember, because I think most people miss it, THESE DROP AT 7% PER REWARD ROUND.  MORE THAN THE 6% DE IS BOOSTING THE RANDOM DROP RATE TO.  So, that's 1-0.93¹² to get none and 1-0.07¹² to get 36.  

Maybe the math escapes you.  Let's do some anecdotal results.  They are mine, but let's work through this.  I did a spy mission on steel path today, and one acolyte spawned and 8 minutes.  Another spawned at 14.5 minutes.  Hmmm....  You know, that potential reward is 3+2+2 or 7 steel essence in a 17 minute mission.  Thing is, that's only good if you include the daily mission reward of 3....and if you don't that means I can earn less than 12 drops an hour....or 24 steel essence.  Today I didn't earn a vitus essence drop, but did a survival against the infested for 40 minutes.  23 vitus essence added to the bank.  Note, in both cases I had no boosters.  Hmm....anecdotally the maximum 24 steel essence<33 vitus essence.  You'll also note that the 33 assumes no rewards drops, and under estimates the 11.5 actually earned per 20 minutes to only 10 for the last 20 minutes.  I might be wrong here, but 33>24....and this invalidates your point without all that messy statistics quoted above...because most people don't want a real statistical spread to determine the likelihood of getting more or less than any number...despite every run being a subset of potential outcomes and thus one number based upon random drops never actually providing a full picture.

 

 

But whatever.  You can keep screaming about how it's unfair.  In 40 minutes I earned more than enough for a new galvanized mod.  I also earned a single arcane (blade charger).  On top of that there were 7 endo drops....which are frustrating.  That said, several thousand endo were earned...and in the same time on Steel Path I might have been able to earn a few hundred endo if RNG was freakishly on my side.

You keep on screaming though.  Nothing quite like an argument that "looks" good because DE is doubling drop rates and that's a fact.  Of course, that's because the most expensive item in arbitrations is an ayatan (50 essence) versus steel path (150 essence for an umbral mod).  Hmmm....  It's almost like poking any deeper into the argument reveals that the math doesn't agree with feels.  But, nobody else here seems to want to do the math, only scream about the feels.  Yeah, don't care about your argument if it's not supported by fact somewhere....and "they're doubling it" is not a fact to support you.

[GREF_TM]

6 hours ago, master_of_destiny said:

what enemies existed years before arbitration drones that did the same thing?

To the extend even remotely close to what drones do - none. Nullifiers are frail and extremely easy to shut down, same with ancients.

And you conviniently ignored the question on how this is any better than just beefier enemies with no special (ability, status) resistances.

6 hours ago, master_of_destiny said:

because you seem to not know how to do the math here.

It's quite funny to me that someone who apparently is so good at math simultaneously lacks reading comprehension.

The point that flew over your head was pretty simple, but let's simplify it even further:

When you go into steel path to farm essence, you know for a fact that completing all the missions will give you 5 essence per mission + 2/4 extra if you wait for an acolyte (which you will do, since they now drop arcanes). Very consistent, little to no RNG involved, gives you a steady supply of essence per day, and as a result, it's a really straightforward farm - you see what you invest your time into, you have a clear goal to work towards, and you know +- how much time it will take you to get there.

When you into arbitrations to farm essence, however, all this flies out the window. The only consistency that remains is a pitiful end of mission reward that is basically nothing. Aside from that, you can only get random drops, so you never know how much time this farm will siphon out of you. You can get lucky and get results comparable to what steel path gives you guaranteed, or you can be like this guy

On 2021-06-26 at 2:04 AM, Ghost1598 said:

5 vitus essence for 40 min defense currently

what a complete joke, this is pathetic. You're literally scamming our time

and get completely screwed, and knowing the math behind it won't save you from that. 

If you actually think that this inconsistent mess is a better farm overall, the i'm starting to think you must be delusional, and there's no point to continue. 

6 hours ago, master_of_destiny said:

You can keep screaming

You can hear me screaming based on what i write on a text forum? Interesting. Sounds like time for you to visit a shrink - you know, talk about those voices you're hearing.

[zuraja]

7 hours ago, GREF_TM said:

A mission type full of enemies that effectively disable your warframe abilities in a game about warframes and their abilities  are somehow more "unfun" compared to enemies that allow you to play warframe like you'd normally do, but just don't explode on one-two hits? lol

Not to mention that the unfun tanky enemies really only exist in the armored factions.  Infested are still pretty squishy and Corpus still go down if you so much look in their direction while using a halfway decent toxin build.

[ValinorAtani]

Am 22.6.2021 um 20:02 schrieb [DE]Rebecca:

FAQ:

 

How many Vitus Essence will each Mod cost from Arbitration Honors?

20 Vitus Essence Each. If you'd like to wait until the Sisters of Parvos Update launches, it will increase the Vitus Essence drop rate from 3% to 6% from the Drones. Note that for consistency the Vitus Essence will also disappear after 5 minutes if not picked like Steel Essence as previously announced. Heads up! 

 

Ah Reb isnt it funny that the deaf ears of a special kinded developer to implement univac exactly the reason is why you had to put an 5 min despawn timer on ressources? Man this inconsistency of DE is hilarious. :D :D :D

With univac you wouldnt have this kind of problems that players seeking for a buffed pick up :D

[Graavarg]

A few last minute suggestions:

1. A new aura mod focused on guns with a "9" cost => giving the same additional mod space as Steel Charge (and Power Donation). If the focus is on buffing the use of guns we need a "third option" for keeping our "maxed" warframe builds. The two we have now is either a totally melee-focused aura (Steel Charge) or an aura reducing our ability strength (Power Donation). Power Donation can work well in teams, but mega-sucks in solo play and sucks in PUGs.
2. Make mag capacity mods into exilus mods. They don't actually increase damage as such, only "effective" DPS (like some other exilus mods).
3. Add a primary/secondary arcane or mod that (automagically) doubles reloading speed by using warframe energy (as long as there is energy to be used/sucked). Seems like something a Tenno should have when expecting intense gunfights. Or you could make this into the new "9"-space aura.
4. Off topic, but please remove the forced reload from Corinth Prime when using the secondary air burst fire without enough ammo left in the mag. It is super-duper-annoying to suddenly and surprisingly going into an unintended, fairly long reloading animation sequence. Just when you were trying to kill enemies, and were NOT trying to reload. Just make it "not shoot" instead. That will also be annoying, but at least it is my own fault.
5. ...and add more riven slots, please. I am in serious need of more riven slots.

[master_of_destiny]

6 hours ago, GREF_TM said:

To the extend even remotely close to what drones do - none. Nullifiers are frail and extremely easy to shut down, same with ancients.

And you conviniently ignored the question on how this is any better than just beefier enemies with no special (ability, status) resistances.

It's quite funny to me that someone who apparently is so good at math simultaneously lacks reading comprehension.

The point that flew over your head was pretty simple, but let's simplify it even further:

When you go into steel path to farm essence, you know for a fact that completing all the missions will give you 5 essence per mission + 2/4 extra if you wait for an acolyte (which you will do, since they now drop arcanes). Very consistent, little to no RNG involved, gives you a steady supply of essence per day, and as a result, it's a really straightforward farm - you see what you invest your time into, you have a clear goal to work towards, and you know +- how much time it will take you to get there.

When you into arbitrations to farm essence, however, all this flies out the window. The only consistency that remains is a pitiful end of mission reward that is basically nothing. Aside from that, you can only get random drops, so you never know how much time this farm will siphon out of you. You can get lucky and get results comparable to what steel path gives you guaranteed, or you can be like this guy

and get completely screwed, and knowing the math behind it won't save you from that. 

If you actually think that this inconsistent mess is a better farm overall, the i'm starting to think you must be delusional, and there's no point to continue. 

You can hear me screaming based on what i write on a text forum? Interesting. Sounds like time for you to visit a shrink - you know, talk about those voices you're hearing.

 

I am baffled.  I thought that things were relatively straight forward...but you then follow up by misquoting and selectively stripping out contextual arguments.  It's not amazing, so much as a bad faith actor trying to misinterpret things.  Let's answer some of your arguments...because there's only so much that I can offer you.

 

 

To the extend even remotely close to what drones do - none. Nullifiers are frail and extremely easy to shut down, same with ancients.

And you conviniently ignored the question on how this is any better than just beefier enemies with no special (ability, status) resistances.

I can't tell here whether you're intentionally being obtuse...or you genuinely don't play the game at anything resembling a high level here.  Let me assume neither, and explain.  An ancient healer creates a aura where all enemies in the local vicinity take no very minute amounts of damage.  Said effect is an invisible bubble.  The only difference between this and the effects of a drone are that for the first ~20 levels (remember, you start out at 60-80) you can brute force the damage and kill enemies near the ancient healer.  Of course, at the 20 minute mark (on a survival) the enemies are levelled up enough that this is idiotic, and the damage sponging nature make the two indistinguishable.

Of course, you have changed the argument here...and you seem to not realize it.  Your argument has now stopped being about the drone, and has decided that the ancient, nullifiers, and drones have different stats.  Funny that though...you seem to not actually have an argument.  Why say so?  Well, in about 30 seconds I can look up the base stats for all three of these enemy types

Ancient Healers (15) - 1576 effective health, 1576 health, 0 shields

Arbitration Shield Drone - 261.4 effective health,137.9 health, 123.5 shields

Nullifier Crewman (starts at level 15) - 210 effective health, 60 health, 150 shields (unaccounted for bubble) 

Hmmm....  The number state that the weakest enemy is the base nullifier crewman, but don't include any calculation for the shield bubble.  The strongest is the ancient...and that's by a wide margin.  I won't even begin to understand your metric of "beefier" without any metrics...because it's a facile argument.  What I hear is that you personally like them the least...which is fine.  Before you decide to make a mathematically provable argument though, you should really think it through.  Also, stop trying to argue in circles...because remember that the bonuses to all enemies on Steel Path are 100 extra levels, and a 250% increase in stats.  That means those same enemies are now STATISTICALLY a tankier setup than anything you could find in arbitrations.

This sort of argument by the feels, when the easily available statistics disagree, is why I refer to your comments as screaming.  You don't scream when you have a point.  You scream because you feel bad, and no rational explanation will offer you relief.

 

 

It's quite funny to me that someone who apparently is so good at math simultaneously lacks reading comprehension.

The point that flew over your head was pretty simple, but let's simplify it even further:

When you go into steel path to farm essence, you know for a fact that completing all the missions will give you 5 essence per mission + 2/4 extra if you wait for an acolyte (which you will do, since they now drop arcanes). Very consistent, little to no RNG involved, gives you a steady supply of essence per day, and as a result, it's a really straightforward farm - you see what you invest your time into, you have a clear goal to work towards, and you know +- how much time it will take you to get there.

When you into arbitrations to farm essence, however, all this flies out the window. The only consistency that remains is a pitiful end of mission reward that is basically nothing. Aside from that, you can only get random drops, so you never know how much time this farm will siphon out of you. You can get lucky and get results comparable to what steel path gives you guaranteed, or you can be like this guy

 

This is an argument borne out of stupidity.  Let me explain this one more time...because you seem to not get it.  I can separate my results from statistics, and I know the difference between a fact and a bad assumption.

The FACT here, that you refer to, is wrong.  It's demonstrably idiotic to assume, but let me explain.  The acolytes have spawn conditions.  One of them is the duration of the mission, and another is the level of completion for that mission.  I have regularly played both capture and exterminate missions where there was no acolyte spawn.  Yes, we managed to get the mission done and no magic extra spawn.  Now, the other half of this stupidity is arguing that you have 3+2n steel essence for every mission.  You don't have an infinite number of the daily missions.

I cannot believe that such a simple argument escapes you.  If I were in your shoes I'd have made the argument that by completing the daily missions I was guaranteed 15 steel essence, while if I played an hour long arbitration survival there was a 4 in 1000 chance of getting no drops at all.  Unfortunately, you made the much more disprovable argument that you could get a bunch more steel essence...again assuming magic and forgetting that the acolytes don't spawn frequently.

So....let me address the 4 in 1000 run argument now.  3 drone kills per minute is a joke.  If they stick around that long you've got other issues.  If we assume a more realistic doubling of that rate, your chances of getting no vitus essence to drop become 2 in 100000.  Ouch.  That of course is statistical probability...because the anecdotal response of someone who has played so many arbitrations that they've earned more than 600 vitus essence is a drop rate of about 20 units per 40 minutes of play.

Let me end by agreeing that the Steel Path has nothing rewarded in mission that you couldn't get in the standard version...because you state this.  In a survival mission you get all of the standard stuff, and a reward every 5 minutes from the arbitration specific drop table.  You then go on to say that arbitrations are better...and I cannot marry the two ideas.  Yay...after a single 40 minute mission I can have thousands of endo and purchase Rolling Guard (or a number of other mods).  After an hour of Steel Path at most I've earned a consistent 24 essence (assuming the acolytes spawned at 5 minute intervals).  I might even assume another 3-15 essence assuming that somehow I had instant loading and the daily missions were all randomly chosen to be infinite duration missions (though this is all a very bad assumption). 

What can I buy for 39 steel essence?  Relic packs, Kuva, a stance forma, pieces of the Bishamo armor, and the cheapest ephemera.  That's pretty silly.  So....with the changes acolytes will spawn more often and the drop rate of vitus essence doubles.  Let's give you an acolyte every 2.5 minutes.  Let's bump that 20 vitus per 40 minutes to 40.  48 steel essence versus 60 vitus essence.  I still can't afford anything new in the steel essence store, but now I can get 3 galvanized mods in the store.  I can buy the expensive ayatan sculpture (the most expensive single item), and have 10 vitus essence left over.  Hmmm....  Your accusation of me not reading your points seems to actually be me rejecting their false premises, and irrational inability to do basic cost-to-reward calulations.

 

 

and get completely screwed, and knowing the math behind it won't save you from that. 

If you actually think that this inconsistent mess is a better farm overall, the i'm starting to think you must be delusional, and there's no point to continue. 

 

I cannot tell if this is troll logic...you genuinely don't understand a statistical spread...or you missed my point addressing exactly this and stating that in 1000 runs you will have 4 with no vitus essence drops under stated assumptions.  There of course is a statistical chance that every drone drops vitus essence...but apparently the concept or RNG loot generation escapes you.

Let me use the small words here...so we can agree to a premise.  If loot drops due to an RNG mechanic then it will drop on a statistical spread.  That is to say with something as simple as ten flips of the coin your average number will be 5 heads and 5 tails.  Of course, my one run of 10 flips could be 10 tails, yours could be 10 heads, and this is the beauty of a statistical roll.

Now that the training wheels are taken off, the roll in question is a 97% fail roll and a 3% success roll.  Given enough instances, an anecdotal instance will exist where 10 rolls of that 97% failure will produce 10 successes.  THIS IS WHY I HIGHLIGHT MY EXPERIENCE AS ANECDOTAL, DESPITE BEING A SUBSTANTIAL SIZE (50+ runs).  An anecdotal situation consisting of one run means absolutely nothing when the drop percentages are low...and the person citing the anecdote has not even cited how many drones died.  Remember, their AI sucks...so if that long form defense only spawned a couple of dozen drones they had very little chance to earn any.

This is another reason I believe you are screaming.  It's citing a single edge case, then applying that logic to everything.  I don't see you doing the same for Steel Path... where I can boot into a mission without a daily bonus, and not have any acolyte spawn.  That can literally be hours of speed running a mission, and ZERO essence will be earned.  Where is the citation of that anecdotal result?

 

 

 

You can hear me screaming based on what i write on a text forum? Interesting. Sounds like time for you to visit a shrink - you know, talk about those voices you're hearing.

 

Funny.  You say this...and it's an ad hominem attack.  Your final argument is to attack me personally, because you've got nothing else to argue from the point of facts.  This is the definition of screaming, rather than rationally responding and supporting your conclusions with facts.  

You know what, let me do the thinking for you since you seem incapable.  If I were in your shoes, and delivered the same arguments, I'd have gone down three argument paths.  The first would be that my anecdotal results were not valid because they could not be verified.  I'd then have done a statistical model, and argued that the rewards for Steel Path could be consistently counted upon.  I'd have followed this up with the statement that the Steel Path having the galvanized mods in its reward table would have made it like arbitrations, but better because the rewards were not heavily weighted towards giving up endo.

Of course, that's a different reality.  In this one all I have to do is quote facts, and strip your argument of teeth by simple logic.  That's the problem with quoting a single experience...it's a joke when a single run is statistically insignificant.  For the record, this is why DE choses to run RNG based loot.  It's devisive, and leads to taxable player trade and platinum purchases as an intermediary.  Platinum that DE gets real world money for, and cannot be converted out of their platform.  As long as there are haves....the statistically lucky spread...and have nots...the people who cannot get a 10% drop chance item in 20 rolls...there will always be grinders and payers. 

Congrats, you should finally realize it now.  This entire argument can be condensed into DE spreading out rewards to lengthen engagement times...or more likely offer grinders the chance to sell power to whales for platinum.  The only difference now is that by using arbitrations and steel path they could generate more transactions...because payers now have to get people to grind for them on two mission types. I support this because earning 21 of each arbitration arcane is already going to earn you an insane amount of vitus essence.  Why not pay out the grinders for doing this?  Of course, the counter argument seems to be the feels...because I haven't seen anyone show me the likelihood of any outcome...let alone a statistical spread showing me the average vitus essence reward for a corresponding amount of time in the steel path is lower.  Heck, I haven't even seen anyone show the steel path to be genuinely rewarding, beyond it being the single source for umbral forma....which means that it's only as useful as a two year old trio of mods.  Ouch.

Of course, the steel path will soon be hiding arcane unlockers in its reward pool...so another grind on grind, on top of a construction wait item.  Yay...

[DhatZ]

Arbitrations have been stagnating with no improvements since the revives got added. Here are 4 at once proposals for arbitrations : 

Rework as a kuva siphon type alert, 3 options for endurance where any of these has the best vitus per time due to spawn density. Only one endurance completable per hour and frame and gun bonuses are common to all 3.

Add 4 short versions which also reset every hour but they dont give any or low guaranteed vitus on completion and have less enemies per time including drones, but noticeably higher levels. These would be modified short modes where in addition to normal objective it needs a full extermination and it forces several more eximus units than normal.

Make vitus from drones guaranteed and also raise the rotation bonus and item prices my a big multiple as to not invalidate hoarders in existing economy.

This way the completion of 3 endless rotations should exceed vitus earnable by doing all 4 short missions and doing a long endurance needs to be more rewarding use of time in a proper squad than doing the short alerts.

[TheLexiConArtist]

1 hour ago, master_of_destiny said:

I am baffled.  I thought that things were relatively straight forward...

Is anything ever straightforward with you, though? I know I'm a bit overly verbose at times myself, but you take the cake.

 

To address, though:

• Nullifiers were an emergency mechanic thrown in to quick-fix out of control abilities like all those non-LOS, mapwide nukes and crowd controls. Mag's old Shield Polarise for example.
  They should not exist in their current state now that these things have (largely) been addressed because they are binary influences - they do so much all packed into one unit there is no dynamic gameplay, it's YES/NO. A 'priority target' taken to the un-engaging extreme.
• Comba/Scrambus units are sane. Aptly to their distinguishing feature, they don't wear all the 'Hats' like normal Nullifiers do. The player can make educated decision on their priority based on what the specific subtype removes, and that they're also only an 'offensive' nullification - they cleanse and disable you, they don't passively protect everything around them as well.
• Ancients - I don't know why you're calling out Healers and not Disruptors. I suppose you're comparing the 'plot armour' from Arbi drones with the damage soak. 90% reduction and soaking status procs (this is important). Although it's still lose-lose for the player, they do have the option of trading 90% healer soak for their 75%-resistance by subbing in Radiation to proc. They can just brute force damage procs so high they'll kill the Healer (although this would be easier if the Healers weren't bugged to heal instead of soak damage on-hit). They can use certain abilities to deal with the auras. There are options.
  Disruptors are anti-power (damage and duration both reduced), but not anti-everything. The mix of Ancients is what Nullifiers should be limited to (but in less replaceable numbers) - units stacking their effects so you prioritise which ones are bothering you the most.
• Parasitic Eximi don't even register on the same level. They are a minor nuisance (or you might be Lavos). They're probably even less problematic in Sortie strongholds now that they roll their base loot drops - Eximi tables have no orbs, so players weren't noticing it's not just the drain that crippled them, but the fact they had almost no generation to compensate either. You have time to cast before you tick down. Active buffs stay active, active debuffs stay active.
• Shield Lancers are only able to be a nuisance because some bright spark at DE forgot to let Punch Through punch through.

 

Comparing all that to Arbi Drones, we have something between Nullifiers and a defensive-variant Scrambus. They don't quite wear every hat the design abomination of Nullifiers do as they can't also run up to do the offensive nullification effects (disable, purge) and don't have weaponry, but they offer unmitigated plot armour to everything they touch, and do so in a flying unit that's a pain to hit (when it's not hiding completely out of sight) making it often feel like the frustration of fighting the Ancient Healer bug when you can't not hit its allies and aren't one-shotting.

The problem is.. you the player cannot operate around Perfect Defensive Null as easily as Perfect Offensive Null. You can avoid those Scrambus pulses without killing them then use abilities from afar, but there's nothing you can do about the Arbi drone sitting there but attack it directly. You can still less-effectually use abilities to assault Disruptor-protected infested, but you're doing nothing but wasting energy if it's an Arbi drone.

And because that Perfect Defensive Null is also Perfect Guard against non-ability damage as well, your options are reduced to barest basics. You can't rely on anything but a self-buffing Frame - because you can't afford to have drones prevent crucial offensive damage/control that will let you not get dead. Yet, even when you've chosen a frame that won't be hamstrung by the Drones, you're still exclusively obligated to prioritise them because you do 0 to anything else. It's as binary as a Nullifier even with fewer hats.

[DarknessNightshade]

I'm genuinely curious as to why DE insists on putting these mods behind arbitrations, this requires the entire star chart to have been completed, the same with the steel path suggested in the last thread, which means you have to complete the entire star chart *without* the mods that are meant to help bridge the gap between gunplay and melee.

Now, you can argue the base game doesn't really need any touching up regarding Melee vs Guns, because Rivens and other powerful mods exist (Corrupted mods with 165% base damage modifiers, etc) to make them pretty serviceable in the base star chart, and the upcoming CO and Kuva Nukor nerfs are going to somewhat level the balance out, but even with these nerfs there is no suggested alternatives by DE for CO for primary/secondary weapons, so I feel like Melee still has the advantage there in how much damage you can get out of them.

I've suggested several mods in the last thread that would perhaps help fill in the gap in the regular star chart, so I really wanna know if DE are going to clarify whether this is strictly to address the divide in Steel Path (where melee primer builds run rampant) rather than just the entire game.

I have saved up and farmed the required Vitus Essence already waiting for the update to drop, and I can't wait to test out whether these mods will blend well with my existing builds.

Also, seeing as Kuva Hek was teased during a livestream, I want to know if mods such as Scattered Justice will work with it, and if these new kuva weapons are going to drop with Sisters of Parvos or in a future update.

[DarknessNightshade]

Also, just to follow up, I made a spreadsheet with the updated values for the mods you've changed with this announcement, and a few things stuck out:

- Galvanised Chamber has the same maximum Multishot of +230% as Galvanised Diffusion, even though Chamber costs two more capacity, and takes more stacks to get up to max.

- Galvanised Shot ends up with a maximum of +200% Status Chance compared to Aptitude and Savvy with +160% thanks to the extra stack Shot has, despite all being the same capacity.

- Galvanised Acceleration has a maximum +90% Projectile Speed/Beam Length, which is equal to Vile Acceleration (without having to had get kills for the stacks), though it being a Corrupted Mod has -15% base damage, which isn't a huge increase, compared to the buffs the other Galvanised mods have seen (Galvanised Hell being an upgrade from 120% up to 260%).

[Screaming_Quails]

Why are they not just buffing guns. They fall off by the time you get to War Within, they are worse, full stop.

[DarkSaint_Exile]

Is there a way that you could buff Blunderbuss and Laser Sight, or consider adding Primed and/or Galvanized versions of the mods for shotguns. I feel alot of shotguns are held back by a lack of crit chance mods.