What are the biggest flaws of this game?

[TeaHands]

The flaw that most MMOs and a lot of RPGs focus on to keep you grinding forever, RNG. It turns video games into work or cause you to pay with real life money. It's nice when RNG is on your side, but goddamn when it's not sometimes it's just not worth it.

 

Also, the open worlds are extremely boring.

 

And, to pepper in a lil positivity because this thread will get down in the dumps. Hot damn I absolutely adore the weapons of this game. In terms of feel, sound, and visual design, most games just do not compare.

[Vaml77]

The big flaw of DE is not playing the game itself and changing the game without doing research on something...

An example is the rework of the eximus....every warframe is now useless against them! Another example is railjack 3.0. They did away with the original interface that gave the player the ability to configure the entire ship in just one screen. The cryophon "rework" that managed to destroy a weapon that was quite fun to use...(I'll open a parenthesis here to say that DE has a habit of thinking that when the community likes a weapon for some reason it goes there and destroys it, the cryophon was not a powerful weapon but a pleasant one to use and they changed it with the argument for it to have more "cinematic" effects in DE's view). Turns out they actually managed to destroy this weapon....And removing the ship's energy....one of the most questionable things DE has ever done and also sad!

And the lack of accurate dialogue with the community...they are always disclosing wrong or wrong things to the community.

That's why the game is becoming irrelevant....the impression I have is that DE does things without any planning and testing on the proposed changes.....this weakens the game's reputation in the community.

[(XBOX)Lord ChibiVR]

15 hours ago, (XBOX)GearsMatrix301 said:

Revenant.

first there’s the issue of how someone can look at the concept of an Eidolon frame and decide “you know what? That’s a stupid theme. People would much rather prefer a vampire over that”.

then there’s the fact that his abilities are some of the worst designed abilities in the game. His 4s the only thing that’s actually decent and no surprise it’s the only thing in his kit that’s actually Eidolon themed. Further exemplifying how much they wasted that Eidolon theme.

Shotgun status being absolute garbage. They fixed the bug with it only to then nerf all shotguns to only have the amount of Status chance they would’ve normally had when the bug was a thing. The status/projectile has done more to benefit non-shotgun weapons than shotguns themselves.

The fact that the Warframes themselves have become more of just pedestals for skins to DE. Where their cosmetic value has taken priority over their actual in game capabilities.

 

I'm starting to think you are just memeing at this point. Just because you personally dislike revenant, does not mean he is a major problem with the game. The fact that people use him and main him shows that he does indeed have a purpose you do not see. 

 

Also if you don't understand how his first three abilities are eidolon themed I would be happy to tell you.

Enthrall: similarly to how vomvalysts are pieces of the eidolon connected mentally, revenant has pieces of himself. He puts these fragments over 7 enemies, making them believe that they are revenant (makes sense because the fragments are directly above their skulls implying mind control), which is why they become his allies and are imbued with his power (think of it like amalgams but made from eidolons instead of regular sentients).

Mesmer skin: literally an eidolon shield, except weaker because enemies can't deal void damage so it has to deplete from normal damage to stay balanced.

Reave: vomvalyst dash, they use the same energy when they dash as well.

[Mover-NeRo]

Warframe is victim of its own success.
And by success I mean fast, mindless horde slaying.
New weapons / frame need to be faster , more efficient killing machines or they will be forgotten in Mastery folder.
And you cant really nerf things or many players will riot.

[(XBOX)GearsMatrix301]

5 hours ago, (XBOX)Upl0rdYT said:

I'm starting to think you are just memeing at this point. Just because you personally dislike revenant, does not mean he is a major problem with the game. The fact that people use him and main him shows that he does indeed have a purpose you do not see. 

 

Also if you don't understand how his first three abilities are eidolon themed I would be happy to tell you.

Enthrall: similarly to how vomvalysts are pieces of the eidolon connected mentally, revenant has pieces of himself. He puts these fragments over 7 enemies, making them believe that they are revenant (makes sense because the fragments are directly above their skulls implying mind control), which is why they become his allies and are imbued with his power (think of it like amalgams but made from eidolons instead of regular sentients).

Mesmer skin: literally an eidolon shield, except weaker because enemies can't deal void damage so it has to deplete from normal damage to stay balanced.

Reave: vomvalyst dash, they use the same energy when they dash as well.

Enemy grineer, corpus, and Infested units are not Sentients. The sentient Eidolons communicate with each other as they are the consciousness of a single entity. No Eidolon has the power to mind control it’s enemies. They’re not doing some special thing to have the Vomvalysts fight for them. They’re literally the same creature. And given that Revenants lore is that he was captured and corrupted by the Eidolon trying to fuse him into itself, effectively turning Revenant into a sentient (because only Sentients can become eidolons). It makes far more sense for Revenant to be able to summon Vomvalysts than for him to suddenly have the ability to mind control things. Because Eidolons do not have any form of mind control powers.

Enthralls only theme is vampire and is based off the vampires ability to enthrall people and command them to do their bidding.

Eidolon shields do not function on number of hits. They are effectively a regular health bar. Mesmer skin doesn’t come close to replicating the Eidolons shields.

Mesmer Skins only theme is vampire and is based off vampires ability to effectively hypnotize people and put them to sleep. Why such a concept was turned into a defense ability is beyond me.

Reave was originally a wall of smoke on release. They changed it due to it literally being a crappy looking 2D smoke wall. Also Eidolons do not have the ability to leech health from their enemies. Which is the function of Reave. Simply changing the visuals of the ability does not negate the thematic influence of the abilities function.

Reaves only theme is vampire and is based off their abilities to turn into smoke, and to drain people of their life force.

You yourself personally admitted that Revenant serves no function in a mission when he has squadmates as they can do anything he does far more effectively. Leaving your only argument for how Revenant to be considered good to be to only observe him in a vacuum with zero acknowledgment or comparisons to other frames. And hey with that mindset literally everything’s good. Stug is technically good as long as you ignore literally every other pistol in the game. Latrons technically good as long as you ignore literally every other primary weapon in the game. Zenistars good as long as you ignore literally every other melee weapon in the game.

[Skoomaseller]

lack of clarity when it comes to various things, example: how bane mods are calculated in damage, leading to players needing a wiki to find out more about it. imo, we shouldn't have to rely on a wiki to find out things like this. it should be in game. not to say that a game wiki is completely unnecessary of course

[Vortex]

The Forum

 

[(XBOX)Lord ChibiVR]

1 hour ago, (XBOX)GearsMatrix301 said:

Enemy grineer, corpus, and Infested units are not Sentients. The sentient Eidolons communicate with each other as they are the consciousness of a single entity. No Eidolon has the power to mind control it’s enemies. They’re not doing some special thing to have the Vomvalysts fight for them. They’re literally the same creature. And given that Revenants lore is that he was captured and corrupted by the Eidolon trying to fuse him into itself, effectively turning Revenant into a sentient (because only Sentients can become eidolons). It makes far more sense for Revenant to be able to summon Vomvalysts than for him to suddenly have the ability to mind control things. Because Eidolons do not have any form of mind control powers.

Enthralls only theme is vampire and is based off the vampires ability to enthrall people and command them to do their bidding.

Eidolon shields do not function on number of hits. They are effectively a regular health bar. Mesmer skin doesn’t come close to replicating the Eidolons shields.

Mesmer Skins only theme is vampire and is based off vampires ability to effectively hypnotize people and put them to sleep. Why such a concept was turned into a defense ability is beyond me.

Reave was originally a wall of smoke on release. They changed it due to it literally being a crappy looking 2D smoke wall. Also Eidolons do not have the ability to leech health from their enemies. Which is the function of Reave. Simply changing the visuals of the ability does not negate the thematic influence of the abilities function.

Reaves only theme is vampire and is based off their abilities to turn into smoke, and to drain people of their life force.

You yourself personally admitted that Revenant serves no function in a mission when he has squadmates as they can do anything he does far more effectively. Leaving your only argument for how Revenant to be considered good to be to only observe him in a vacuum with zero acknowledgment or comparisons to other frames. And hey with that mindset literally everything’s good. Stug is technically good as long as you ignore literally every other pistol in the game. Latrons technically good as long as you ignore literally every other primary weapon in the game. Zenistars good as long as you ignore literally every other melee weapon in the game.

You literally said it yourself, the eidolon corrupted revenant into an eidolon, and revenant corrupts enemies into eidolon thralls so  according to the lore itself, you don't have to be part of the original sentient to become an eidolon, you only need to become imbued with it's energy and its fragments which is exactly what revenant does in enthrall (the sentient fragment above the enemies and the eidolon energy they release on death).

Mesmer skin works differently to avoid being a copy of iron skin and to give the 100% damage reduction that the eidolon shields have, only more balanced.

Reave is the vomvalyst thing, yes it leeches shields, but then again, nidus is the infested frame and his "infested attacks" also have mechanics not used by the regular enemies like energy regen or the tether thing.

I never said revenant is useless in a team. Mesmer skin still preforms well in a team, and thralls are supposed to be easily replaced. I also literally have pointed out that you can mind control a thrall via helminth to avoid you from killing it. 

Please stop hating a frame you refuse to use in the first place, especially considering that everyone says that revenant is MUCH better than Caliban, who is literally mid tier, so if revenant is as bad as you say he is, people would be saying Caliban is better.

[(XBOX)GearsMatrix301]

17 minutes ago, (XBOX)Upl0rdYT said:

You literally said it yourself, the eidolon corrupted revenant into an eidolon, and revenant corrupts enemies into eidolon thralls so  according to the lore itself, you don't have to be part of the original sentient to become an eidolon, you only need to become imbued with it's energy and its fragments which is exactly what revenant does in enthrall (the sentient fragment above the enemies and the eidolon energy they release on death).

Mesmer skin works differently to avoid being a copy of iron skin and to give the 100% damage reduction that the eidolon shields have, only more balanced.

Reave is the vomvalyst thing, yes it leeches shields, but then again, nidus is the infested frame and his "infested attacks" also have mechanics not used by the regular enemies like energy regen or the tether thing.

I never said revenant is useless in a team. Mesmer skin still preforms well in a team, and thralls are supposed to be easily replaced. I also literally have pointed out that you can mind control a thrall via helminth to avoid you from killing it. 

Please stop hating a frame you refuse to use in the first place, especially considering that everyone says that revenant is MUCH better than Caliban, who is literally mid tier, so if revenant is as bad as you say he is, people would be saying Caliban is better.

Revenant isn’t corrupting enemies. He’s mind controlling them. If he was actually corrupting them them being turned into allies wouldn’t be on a timer. They would be permanent minions. Revenant was corrupted from the Eidolon literally trying to fuse Revenant into its body much like how the Teralyst turned a big tree into its new arm. The Eidolon didn’t just wibble its fingers, sprinkle some magic dust and suddenly have control of Revenant. It was thousands of years of Revenant being corrupted until he was one with the Eidolon.

That’s not an excuse for Mesmer skin. You can’t claim it’s a valid representation of the Eidolons shields and then admit it functions absolutely nothing like the Eidolons shields. Thus meaning that Mesmer Skin is not a valid representation of the Eidolons shields.

So you admit flat out that Reave does not represent Eidolons. Just because it looks like an Eidolon attack does not mean it’s mechanics aren’t blatantly vampire themed instead of Eidolon themed.

Nidus is infested themed in the idea that he grows and spreads. Which is something the infested do lorewise. Nothing in Revenants backstory nor what we know about the Sentients and sentient eidolons even remotely justify a vampire theme being shoved into Revenants kit.

You 100% said he was useless. Stop denying it. It’ll save me the time of digging through the thread where you said it.

I have never seen a single person say that Revenant is better than Caliban. No, I’ve seen you say Rev is better than Caliban and only you say it. And you are not everyone. If you have to lie to make arguments in favor of a frame that just speaks volumes on how bad the frame actually is.

[mycroft_]

The biggest flaw of the game is the understaffed programming department. Less than 10% of DE staff are programmers. They're constantly saying they don't have enough manpower to work on longstanding issues. This creates 99% of the other problems with the game...there's always a backlog of work for them, and they can simply never catch up, because DE won't support their programmers properly.

[(XBOX)Lord ChibiVR]

16 minutes ago, (XBOX)GearsMatrix301 said:

Revenant isn’t corrupting enemies. He’s mind controlling them. If he was actually corrupting them them being turned into allies wouldn’t be on a timer. They would be permanent minions. Revenant was corrupted from the Eidolon literally trying to fuse Revenant into its body much like how the Teralyst turned a big tree into its new arm. The Eidolon didn’t just wibble its fingers, sprinkle some magic dust and suddenly have control of Revenant. It was thousands of years of Revenant being corrupted until he was one with the Eidolon.

That’s not an excuse for Mesmer skin. You can’t claim it’s a valid representation of the Eidolons shields and then admit it functions absolutely nothing like the Eidolons shields. Thus meaning that Mesmer Skin is not a valid representation of the Eidolons shields.

So you admit flat out that Reave does not represent Eidolons. Just because it looks like an Eidolon attack does not mean it’s mechanics aren’t blatantly vampire themed instead of Eidolon themed.

Nidus is infested themed in the idea that he grows and spreads. Which is something the infested do lorewise. Nothing in Revenants backstory nor what we know about the Sentients and sentient eidolons even remotely justify a vampire theme being shoved into Revenants kit.

You 100% said he was useless. Stop denying it. It’ll save me the time of digging through the thread where you said it.

I have never seen a single person say that Revenant is better than Caliban. No, I’ve seen you say Rev is better than Caliban and only you say it. And you are not everyone. If you have to lie to make arguments in favor of a frame that just speaks volumes on how bad the frame actually is.

I've literally have seen people ask revenant vs Caliban in region with everyone saying to get revenant. That's not just me.

I never said that revenant was useless in squads, I said thralls weren't needed in squads, but his shield still works.

His Mesmer skin is based off an eidolon shield, both block 100% of damage. Revenant has charges because enemies can't use the void.

Xaku void-corrupts enemies, they become uncorrupted, the argument that it has to be permanent is invalid because none of those types of abilities are permanent.

I know Reave used to suck visually, that's been something de does until this day.

Nidus's cord, larva, and virulence are not anything regular infested do. His buffing abilities are not something infested do either, and his maggots are the only attack done by infested enemies. 

Frames have been known to have secondary themes. Revenant being a vampire isn't the only one. Look at Khora having spiderlike mechanics, zephyr being windframe and bird frame, Chroma the elemental master and a dragon etc.

 

[TheArmchairThinker]

On 2022-08-04 at 5:24 AM, Silligoose said:

Too much homogenization

This stems from having many competitive choices where they're equally good that nothing is standing out, that's why other games tend to make flaws on purpose like armor strip/bypass or healing being exclusive to support role and we're way past that time

On 2022-08-04 at 5:24 AM, Silligoose said:

Lack of balance towards lategame

And where is the late game though? Not at level 3000 SP Zariman for sure

On 2022-08-04 at 5:24 AM, Silligoose said:

Too much player coddling.

I find it fine, Warframe finds its niche as a forgiving game with abilities to nullify any threat than trying hard to be "challenging" or "difficult"

And waiting for "play soulframe if you want challenge" reply in the future

On 2022-08-04 at 5:24 AM, Silligoose said:

Too many overpowered options given to players that bypasses the majority of the game's mechanics

That ship has sailed

[(PSN)GEN-Son_17]

The BIGGEST flaw in this game is this all-over-the-place community. With years of continuous high production output, Warframe has gathered the widest and weirdest collection of players in gaming, IMO. The result is the most insane amounts of contradictions I've ever seen regarding one game. And...the devs actually try to listen and accommodate this crazy @$$ group! Lol!!

The second biggest flaw is the lack of a solution that can deal with people with poor internet connections. ~95% of the bugs are pub based with players who have bad internet. I'm six years in and I'm not sure if I've experienced over five concerning bugs or even ten slightly noticeable ones when I play solo or with friends. It's always pub play.

The third is on the players again: not realizing that they very poorly claim that the game isn't doing enough...except they forget that they've clocked in 1000's of hours playing it. If you've put that much time in, then DE has done more than enough.

[Domztheone1]

On 2022-08-03 at 6:33 PM, (XBOX)elementXGHILLIE said:

Yeah MR lock isnt used for things that actually need it but the burston prime is Mr 13 locked.

Mr just has no real relevance because people can make a new account and farm to Mr 20 within a couple months of starting warframe.

I've met Mr20s who didnt know how to mod correctly like I'm talking not ranking/using serration bad.

Ill also add that I'm 740 days logged in but I'm struggling to got past Mr 22 because I spend most of my time forming the stuff I like. Instead of burning through Mr fodder. 

I"m still using serration > .>

 

[Rage_Inducer]

AoE meta is a good contender.
Content islands are irritating.

My biggest issue with this game is the introduction to it.
It does an absolutely horrible job of explaining just how vital modding is to your gear or explaining how and why you'd upgrade mods.

Then you go a bit further into the system, find that any weapon you can get will suck even if you buy it with plat and the whole market will come across as yet another scummy F2P game's attempts to get your cash... And that's just one of the ways this game scares off newcomers.
This is worse than anything else because people won't even get a taste of the AoE meta or get even close to being irritated by having to farm some more specific-to-islandium.

[(XBOX)elementXGHILLIE]

1 hour ago, Domztheone1 said:

I"m still using serration > .>

 

As you should for most cases. I'm talking about players who dont know that damage and multishot are basic to most builds. These players also know nothing of how to build in general.

[Silligoose]

7 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

This stems from having many competitive choices where they're equally good that nothing is standing out, that's why other games tend to make flaws on purpose like armor strip/bypass or healing being exclusive to support role and we're way past that time

It comes down to the balance of choices pertaining to mechanics of a category, as well as both the upper levels of performance attainable and levels of performance required, when comparing global choices to specialized choices, within content.

As an example, in many games it is fine for any class to be able to heal, be it via various items or generic spells, but the healer class remains valuable as long as the healing provided is superior to a marked degree AND has practical value within the content: If characters have 400+ HP, while potions and generic healing spells can heal 100 HP, but the healer class can heal 200 HP, the healer class retains value as they can not only heal better within their specialization, but their healing prowess will not be lost in many cases due to the higher performance having a marked effect. Contrast this to generic options having the ability to heal 180HP and healers being able to heal 200HP and a lot of the healer's value is lost, because they are only 10% better than the generic option. Likewise, if characters only have 120 HP, much of the healer's value is lost, since a lot of the potential healing performance serves no purpose. If enemies oneshot characters, the healer's healing doesn't have value and if enemies only do 10 damage per minute combined, the healer again won't have much value. All these factors need to remain balanced in order for the healer class to have value.

In Warframe, global options in many categories, including healing, cc, damage, durability, outperform specialized options, perform close enough to specialized options, or perform  good enough in context of encouraged content, for the specializations to not actually have a lot of value eg Mirage's extra damage capability doesn't have much value deeper into lategame approaching endgame setups, because players can oneshot most enemies in encouraged content with any frame. Single-target weapons' superior sustained damage on single targets don't have much value, since players can oneshot enemies with a burst AoE weapon. 

 

7 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

And where is the late game though? Not at level 3000 SP Zariman for sure

I'd say late game is entered into around the point when one finishes base Star Chart and gains access to Sorties, Arbi's, SP etc and associated power both encountered and available from that point. Others may argue it starting a little earlier than that, perhaps later than that.

No, it doesn't start at lvl 3000 SP Zariman - You'd best be wary of your tendency to take others' points within posts out of context. Go back to your thread and provide the proof of your claims pertaining to our conversation, there.

7 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

find it fine, Warframe finds its niche as a forgiving game with abilities to nullify any threat than trying hard to be "challenging" or "difficult"

And waiting for "play soulframe if you want challenge" reply in the future

The coddling ties in with lack of balance and homogenization. A lot of the game's depth is lost deeper into lategame as a result.

8 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

That ship has sailed

The ship can be steered, provided capable leadership and crew.

[(XBOX)Lord ChibiVR]

I got another flaw: augument warframes, aka warframes with auguments that are mandatory for (or compete with) the abilities of said Warframe. A couple examples would be ash and equinox who both have 2 auguments that are mandatory for abilities, and auguments that compete with those auguments.

These auguments will intentionally sabotage you for trying to (a) fix the flawed abilities and (b) using the other auguments instead of the "mandatory" auguments needed to make abilities practical.

[MqToasty]

Like many others here, I would say Warframe's biggest flaw / weakness is its poor onboarding, minimal tutorials and progression speedbumps.  While not the only way for games to design progression, one of the most lauded is the Metroidvania system.  In a Metroidvania game, players start out with a small set of abilities, and are presented with a set of challenges that encourage them to practice using these abilities.  Along the way, the player may meet challenges that they simply cannot overcome with the current set of abilities, but these are not showstoppers as they can just move on.  Eventually, the player gains a powerup granting an additional ability, and are immediately given a chance to overcome a puzzle with the new ability.  They can now go back to the place they could not get past, and use the new ability to progress.  And so the cycle repeats.

Perhaps Warframe has been around for too long and grown into too massive a monster, or perhaps there is another reason for its woes.  But new players are almost immediately tossed into the deep end and overwhelmed by options, with very little guidance.  As they progress and new systems are introduced, many are just used once or twice and then abandoned for long stretches.  So unless the new player really enjoys some early part of the game, they're bound to be turned off eventually when a new grind or speedbump comes up that may just end up going nowhere.

[TheArmchairThinker]

17 hours ago, Silligoose said:

It comes down to the balance of choices pertaining to mechanics of a category, as well as both the upper levels of performance attainable and levels of performance required, when comparing global choices to specialized choices, within content

With our health being low enough that recently added molt vigor capable of healing 150 health in one skill cast, I don't think things will change anytime soon and I believe this is the choice DE made, allowing you to be a one man army instead of relying on someone else for having superior aspect

17 hours ago, Silligoose said:

I'd say late game is entered into around the point when one finishes base Star Chart and gains access to Sorties, Arbi's, SP etc and associated power both encountered and available from that point. Others may argue it starting a little earlier than that, perhaps later than that

Honestly, I find the "late game" is more of buzzword to separate the grind into phases. You grind to reach "late game" for what? The same grind except this time the chase is "late game gears" where things eventually become easy and it's back to the cycle of grinding power to access late game to get gears that make the late game easy.

Warframe isn't on that model where you grind grind power to get more power. Arcane is more to convenience and new gear isn't a must have to play and I'm not shoved with grind just to play the newest content and I find it great

18 hours ago, Silligoose said:

The coddling ties in with lack of balance and homogenization. A lot of the game's depth is lost deeper into lategame as a result.

And what depth we're talking about?

18 hours ago, Silligoose said:

The ship can be steered, provided capable leadership and crew

With any hint of nerf leading to a meltdown? Try steering it without any thread about "spitting on player investment" or any kind of crap this community can throw

[(PSN)Frost_Nephilim]

On 2022-08-03 at 8:25 PM, shut said:

there are occasionally large gaps that you have to bullet jump over lmao

Foreal tho... bullet jumping be all they hear when parkour is said...

[Venus-Venera]

Gerade eben schrieb (PSN)Frost_Nephilim:

Foreal tho... bullet jumping be all they hear when parkour is said...

especially with new mele weapon it is really good. the range is great.

[(PSN)Frost_Nephilim]

37 minutes ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

Honestly, I find the "late game" is more of buzzword to separate the grind into phases. You grind to reach "late game" for what? The same grind except this time the chase is "late game gears" where things eventually become easy and it's back to the cycle of grinding power to access late game to get gears that make the late game easy

Its much better than having 0 sense of progression like it is right now... just feel like youre there... 

[xMarvin732]

Gamebreaking bugs arriving on a big update and bugs existing for years not being fixed.

[Silligoose]

5 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

With our health being low enough that recently added molt vigor capable of healing 150 health in one skill cast, I don't think things will change anytime soon and I believe this is the choice DE made, allowing you to be a one man army instead of relying on someone else for having superior aspect

It does not appear as though they are looking to move away from the degree of homogenization they are currently enabling, not in healing and not in the vast majority of other mechanics. I believe the degree to which they are doing it, is too great, as we end up with extremely similar playstyles, regardless of frame choices, when it comes to meta's within those frame choices.

5 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

Honestly, I find the "late game" is more of buzzword to separate the grind into phases. You grind to reach "late game" for what? The same grind except this time the chase is "late game gears" where things eventually become easy and it's back to the cycle of grinding power to access late game to get gears that make the late game easy.

Warframe isn't on that model where you grind grind power to get more power. Arcane is more to convenience and new gear isn't a must have to play and I'm not shoved with grind just to play the newest content and I find it great

Late game is simply a description of progress in a game, like early-game, mid-game and, if applicable, endgame.

As for why players look to reach late game in games they like... well, because they like the game, they like the world, they like the systems. They want to continue past midgame, the point at which they are more or less comfortable with the different mechanics, systems, characters, world etc, and want to experience the challenge that usually is presented at lategame in a game. Usually, the lategame in a game is the point where almost all mechanics, gear, classes etc are unlocked. Further progression usually just means increasing the stats/attributes of said asset, maybe with some special lategame exclusive items/abilities etc. Generally speaking, lategame presents a challenge in which the use of the various mechanics in conjunction with one another becomes important for further progression at the same proficiency - failing to make use of various systems in conjuciton with one another means slower progression in a mission, or even failure.

Consider a racing game: early on the races usually pretty easy, with cars being slower and tracks being pretty simple. Players accelerate, brake as they come to a corner and turn - even if one goes off the track, one may still win in the early races There is a lot of leeway for mistakes and inefficiency. As one progresses, the cars become faster, the tracks become more intricate and opponents become less forgiving. The hardest levels generally require a lot more skill and use of the systems available to win, including correct racing lines, proper turning techniques, proper passing techniques etc. It keeps players interested.

If Warframe was racing game, early-to-midgame would see players racing in a damn good game, unlocking better cars, unlocking tougher tracks, unlocking different tyres suited for different conditions, unlocking faster and varied opponents, developing their skills... then as players get to endgame, unlock the fastest cars to take on the toughest opponents, the game places safety bumpers all over the track and programs opponents not to race, but to just stay behind the player, so players can win by pressing drive and not really paying attention to silly mechanics such as "steering" or "braking" - those mechanics aren't for endgame, apparently.

This is where Warframe's lategame and endgame content is lacking and alienates players: DE coddles players too much, giving them power that isn't really challenged, negating the need to really use various mechanics in conjunction with one another, so instead of the deeper lategame requiring more harmonious use of mechanics than what was required earlier in progression, the gameplay degrades to more simplistic play. Some like this, but most find it boring: They are expecting lategame and endgame, to challenge them, to challenge the power they've accumulated, to challenge the skill they've acquired, to be a climactic experience they've been working towards. DE not providing this in a balanced  way, is a failure on DE's part.

6 hours ago, TheArmchairThinker said:

And what depth we're talking about?

Making use of the variety in offensive and defensive options in conjunction with one another efficiently, in order to progress, which has a very real effect on play, performance and outcome. Choosing the right damage type for the right enemies in a mission. Choosing which enemy to target first due to the benefit it would have. Choosing the right times to use a specific ability. Choosing where to move, how to move, in a quick encounter. Things like that. Deeper into lategame many of those choices and their timing don't really matter as much as they used to in early- to midgame, when our power wasn't quite as overwhelming as it is at deeper levels of lategame.