Please overhaul interception fissures - people routinely not getting 10 traces.

[Kryogeneva]

Please overhaul interception fissures - people routinely not getting 10 traces.

The timing between fissure spawns, especially on "low level" tilesets, can sometimes (often) not be enough to get 10 traces before the round completes.
The mission levels where this is the biggest problem are low MR - meaning the new players would not expect to have to sacrifice a tower or 2 to ensure they get enough traces.
This is especially true for late-joiners from matchmaking.

Please fix. Traces should never be a thing players have to worry overmuch about getting enough of. Only that they DO get enough for playing even remotely decently. 

[(PSN)Frost_Nephilim]

Talked about this a min ago, is rather suckish

[Numerounius]

Heck this goes for numerous other fissure gamemodes:

Defense has this problem if you clear waves too fast.

Exterminate if you have later joiners and kill everything too fast.

Disruption could also have this same problem, in fact there is even a bug that completely stops spawns

Interception if you hold all the points like you are supposed to and kill everything within one second of seeing it.

[JimmuTanno88]

Also capture if you load in later than the host has already speedran to extraction, sometimes the reactant doesn't spawn and people won't get off the point to let new joiners get any.

Excavation too, cant count the number of times ive had to say to people not to power up the second excavator before everyone gets 10 reactant, because its counter-intuitive af to how the game teaches you to do those missions.

now that I think of it fissures in general could stand for a look-at by DE 🤔

[(XBOX)Big Roy 324]

Weigh this against railjack that often has me getting ten before the main objective.  

[Quest]

+1, I don't even try to do interception fissures anymore, they always lead to disappointment.

[Graavarg]

1 hour ago, XHADgaming said:

Defense has this problem if you clear waves too fast.

Exterminate if you have later joiners and kill everything too fast.

Exactly.

The problem is not low level missions, but dumb players killing all "normal" enemies too quickly, which means that there are not any enemies left that can be corrupted.

On some defense maps this is further exacerbated by dumb players running into the spawn points looking for enemies, stopping spawns from happening.

And I use "dumb" not as in lacking IQ, but as in lacking basic knowledge about the mission they are trying to conclude.

 

Repetitio Mater Studiorum Est:

- Corrupted enemies drop reactants (basically works as every n:th corrupted enemy killed drops a reactant).

- "Normal" enemies close to void fissures will become corrupted (in addition to the corrupted enemies appearing from the void fissure).

- Void fissures will sort of play tag with one player but also "jump" to objectives.

- Void fissures are attracted to nearby existing enemies (creating more corrupted enemies, which increases the amount of reactants that drops).

 

So to successfully play a void fissure you basically need to know only two things:

1. DON'T KILL uncorrupted enemies (unless you really have to).

2. STICK TOGETHER (if possible), so that everyone gets the reactants.

 

Of course, this is generally NOT what you see in void fissures with randoms. Instead the players compete with killing all enemies as quickly as possible and then run off in different directions (which means that the void fissures spawn will follow only one, and the other will not get any void fissures, no corrupted enemies and no reactants).

 

There are a select few missions where the enemy spawn really is too low (a certain interception on Earth comes to mind), but generally the problem is the players (including their warframe selection), not the mission or the spawn rate.

The really real problem is that reactant drops are not persistent for players joining missions "later", often making it impossible to even collect 10 reactants. That is sucky design and something DE should be ashamed of.

[Tiltskillet]

45 minutes ago, Graavarg said:

There are a select few missions where the enemy spawn really is too low (a certain interception on Earth comes to mind), but generally the problem is the players (including their warframe selection), not the mission or the spawn rate.

I absolutely agree that players can self-regulate and take care of most of these problems most of the time.  But even so, it only takes one un-self-regulated player playing in a perfectly conventional manner to ruin the mission for the other three.  Which is faulty design if it's addressable by the studio.    Yes, players should take individual responsibility, but DE, as the designer, referee, and gamemaster, has to take creative responsibility.

 

50 minutes ago, Graavarg said:

The really real problem is that reactant drops are not persistent for players joining missions "later", often making it impossible to even collect 10 reactants. That is sucky design and something DE should be ashamed of.

This is true for most or all drops though, isn't it?  If so, it might imply a constraint of the engine and/or the client-server model, so maybe not a simple thing to work around.  But whatever the reason, they should be able to address it largely through spawn mechanics.

[(PSN)haphazardlynamed]

4 hours ago, Tiltskillet said:

I absolutely agree that players can self-regulate and take care of most of these problems most of the time.  But even so, it only takes one un-self-regulated player playing in a perfectly conventional manner to ruin the mission for the other three.  Which is faulty design if it's addressable by the studio.    Yes, players should take individual responsibility, but DE, as the designer, referee, and gamemaster, has to take creative responsibility.

 

I believe it is bad game design, that in order to be successful with fissures you have to intentionally go against the Mission Objective.

players should not have to "self regulate" (ie -throw the objective).

Fissures ought to be rethought. ditch the reactant farming mechanic and instead make them tie directly to completing objectives.

?I suppose there's the argument that Reactant pickup was once intended to deter AFK/Leeching? but there's already a motion-based general AFK system, just use that and maybe make it more aggressive in the specific case of fissures?

 

Consider other instances of players Not Playing the Objective:

the Old Oxium Farm, where you'd down a corpus capture target but instead of completing the mission you'd sit around and farm the drones.

Clearly that was frowned upon, yet we pretty much do the same thing in Fissures to farm Reactant.

Fissures should not have this double standard where Not Playing Objective is required here, but considered an Exploit in the rest of the starchart.

[Tiltskillet]

22 minutes ago, (PSN)haphazardlynamed said:

I believe it is bad game design, that in order to be successful with fissures you have to intentionally go against the Mission Objective.

players should not have to "self regulate" (ie -throw the objective).

We're agreeing, right?

[Lutesque]

I don't even bother.... Would rather not open that Relic at all than to suffer this Game Mode....¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Stafelund]

23 hours ago, Kryogeneva said:

The mission levels where this is the biggest problem are low MR - meaning the new players would not expect to have to sacrifice a tower or 2 to ensure they get enough traces.

Funnily this also happens with high MR players I've played with. I'll leave one tower alone, and one or two of them will attempt to capture the tower. It came at a point where no one at all got 10/10 reactants so everyone just quit

[Graavarg]

23 hours ago, Tiltskillet said:

I absolutely agree that players can self-regulate and take care of most of these problems most of the time.  But even so, it only takes one un-self-regulated player playing in a perfectly conventional manner to ruin the mission for the other three.  Which is faulty design if it's addressable by the studio.    Yes, players should take individual responsibility, but DE, as the designer, referee, and gamemaster, has to take creative responsibility.

I don't agree. I also don't feel any urge to defend DE and the interception design.

The way I look at it you are personally responsible for making the choice (and taking the risk) to play with three unknown players. As we all know, that can result in a mission on a scale from "fantastic" to "catastrophic". But the reason a mission goes up in flames is the result of risk you decided to take, and the vector is an idiot squad member. But blaming DE for not making sure that we all are cuddled with a nice, safe and satisfying experience is not an answer to anything. All that results in is a "fake game", where the design and the bar is adapted to some low common denominator so that all players can feel that they succeed, even if they suck. Though in the above case it is another player and your decision that sucks, not you as a player.

It is true that this "cuddling" is an ongoing trend in computer gaming, but it is driven by short term economic goals, and in my view it is as destructive as it is fake. It's aim is only and solely to lure a player in and keep them on the hook for a awhile, but never to give them any real challenges to overcome or to keep them playing the game for a long time. Just imagine playing a version of the Solitaire that cheats "for your enjoyment" so that you always wins. Can you imagine anyone even remotely sane playing that for hours, days, weeks and months, and in the case of Warframe we are actually talking about years.

So the short version would be that we are all personally responsible for taking the risk with three random players, and DE should not make the game less challenging since that will kill Warframe faster than anything (except maybe implementing P2W).

23 hours ago, Tiltskillet said:

This is true for most or all drops though, isn't it?  If so, it might imply a constraint of the engine and/or the client-server model, so maybe not a simple thing to work around.  But whatever the reason, they should be able to address it largely through spawn mechanics.

In my opinion you are mixing up "drops" with "rewards". It is a mathematical truth that you have a smaller chance to get a certain drop (any drop) if you join late and only play for half the time. But this is different from the game selecting a mission (instance) for you that makes it impossible for you to achieve the mission reward, which in a void fissure is the mechanism allowing you to select a part or blueprint from cracked relic(s).

That really is bad design, it simply shouldn't happen. If dropped reactants were persistent for all joining players (you can only join before the first reward anyway) you could still end up with too little time to collect the 10 reactants before the rotation ends, but that would be ok. To be honest I am not even sure that they are not persistent, it could be that the dropped reactants are there but just doesn't show up as marked (since sometimes I pick up one reactant marker and suddenly jumps to 10).

But that is beside the point, which is that because the game selects a squad/mission for you you should be given the same chance as the other players to collect 10 reactants, so they should exist on the map both as drops and markers. In the same places they dropped for the other players.

[Graavarg]

19 hours ago, (PSN)haphazardlynamed said:

I believe it is bad game design, that in order to be successful with fissures you have to intentionally go against the Mission Objective.

players should not have to "self regulate" (ie -throw the objective).

Isn't the main objective with void fissure missions to crack relics for the reward(s)?

And if so, shouldn't you play so that you maximize the chance to achieve that objective?

Even if it means actually taking manual control over your triggerfinger...?

[(PSN)Frost_Nephilim]

On 2022-03-09 at 5:00 PM, Graavarg said:

Isn't the main objective with void fissure missions to crack relics for the reward(s)?

And if so, shouldn't you play so that you maximize the chance to achieve that objective?

Even if it means actually taking manual control over your triggerfinger...?

I believe the argument being made is that the game is punnishing you for what the majority of players come to do in warframe, kill a bunch of stuff

Its like having a racing game and if you go too fast, you have to restart

Or playing call of duty where if you get 3 kills without dying, you have to restart

 

It defeats the purpose of what people come to play your game for. Getting a lot of kills is what people are legit trying to do when they hop on warframe, especially when theyre playing endurance missions like survival. Just make the game feel clunky with the random pauses. 

Main objective is to enjoy the game, and this feature runs risk of stopping that enjoyment, in a way thats near out of your control, for little to no good reason. Aka, no way to gave fun with it. Its not a challenge, nor is it a reward, its just there.

I was told it may be an anti afk neasure, which if true, it should be changed to random garaunteed drops along the map, similar to that focus booster pick up that randomly spawns in for a limited amount of time. This way you dont kill the fun out fun out if the blue, and people still get their reactant

[Graavarg]

9 hours ago, (PSN)Frost_Nephilim said:

I believe the argument being made is that the game is punnishing you for what the majority of players come to do in warframe, kill a bunch of stuff

Its like having a racing game and if you go too fast, you have to restart

...

It defeats the purpose of what people come to play your game for. Getting a lot of kills is what people are legit trying to do when they hop on warframe, especially when theyre playing endurance missions like survival. Just make the game feel clunky with the random pauses. 

Main objective is to enjoy the game, and this feature runs risk of stopping that enjoyment, in a way thats near out of your control, for little to no good reason. Aka, no way to gave fun with it. Its not a challenge, nor is it a reward, its just there.

I was told it may be an anti afk neasure, which if true, it should be changed to random garaunteed drops along the map, similar to that focus booster pick up that randomly spawns in for a limited amount of time. This way you dont kill the fun out fun out if the blue, and people still get their reactant

There are lots of missions available for players that are only interested in "kills". But the suggestion that that should be the start and the end of Warframe is sort of braindead. I'll rephrase: it is not "sort of braindead", it is "braindead", pure and simple. A sprawling game like Warframe needs a lot of diversity, and consequently diversity is one of Warframe's greatest strengths.

The racing allegory is pretty apt though, but maybe not the way you put it. A racing game where all you due is press the throttle 100% from start to finish is not only extremely boring, it is bad design. You have to adapt your speed to course and to what your opponents do. So too in Warframe. In most racing games that I've played keeping the throttle pressed to the floor continuously is a recipe for disaster. So is blindly killing everything that moves in select Warframe missions.

It is not an AFK measure, all it takes is knowing how the game works and what to do and being able to do it. A player that cannot think, cannot plan for longer than 3 seconds, will not learn and refuse to adapt to mission parameters is not a very good player, regardless of DPS and builds copied from Youtube. And then claiming that the atual problem is with DE's design is... well... let's say "the epitome of hubris".

It is true that there is a learning curve involved with Void fissure missions, and how they work (and how to behave) is something all new players have to learn. But I've guided tens and tens of them, and so far every single one of them have understood how void fissures work once you explain it. It really isn't rocket science.

And as to "the game punishing players", I would say that if you change it slightly to "void fissures punishes stupidity" you would be spot on. Because Warframe is generally pretty forgiving and even if you play as an idiot you can still get away with it with good enough gear (and with the help from other Tenno in the squad). But not so in Void fissures, where one player's stupidity instead has the potential to punish the whole squad.