The Stalker Is Getting Out Of Hand

[Tsukinoki]

The only 'warning' sign that I hate from the stalker that I get occasionally (though thankfully not all the time) is the red screen effect.

I've actually had it blind me so I couldn't see anything (It was an infested invasion and dark) and he killed me before I knew where he was or anything.

[Gigaus]

Currently, the Stalker has....

 

Dread [bow] which has a high proc chance for slash.

 

Despair [Knives] which fire faster than most fully auto weapons, and do about the same damage as a fully modded primary.

 

Hate [Melee] which is there abouts a one shot weapon.

 

Slash dash, which is a one shot kill attack, even with a fully modded rhino, and has a 50% chance of triggering on spawn, without his stand up animation.

 

Pull, to prevent us for going into cover.

 

Switch Teleport, Grineer Commander Style, in that it has no LoS requirement, and infinite range.

 

Dispel, which, bar Zenuka and the fabled Harvester, is the only one that has it in game. No longer staggers/has situational stagger.

 

And Super Absorb. This is not an exaggeration; it is literally super Absorb. It heals the Stalker back up to max HP, so he counts as having two lives now, has a fully modded range + damage, and he can move while using it, making it almost unavoidable. The last part is not a glitch.

 

Lastly, Shuriken, which is an auto lock attack; 100% unavoidable in the Stalker's case.

 

His HP, Armor, and Shields are always at max, and effectively has max ranked Fast Deflection on.

 

There is a 90% chance of dying to the Stalker should he appear. I won't brag, but I have confirmed he can be beaten 'legit'. By legit, I mean not glitching him out, not stacking 15+ penta charges at his target's feet, not body checking him with shotguns. I recently had a Stalker drop in on me on an invasion mission as a volt. With no support from my team mates [thanks for absolutely no help guys.], my chances of survival were slim, except I found a weakness; His Dispel A, does not stager you, or at least if you're running with Speed on it doesn't, and B, resets the time/cd on abilities, so abilities like Speed can be spammed. What I did was not skill, it was pure luck; I ran literally from one end of the map to the other with the Stalker on me, for a solid 5 some minutes. That I'll slightly brag on, but nee....I killed him twice using a Brakk with Radiation and Viral as it's elements; The Stalker's HP is weak to Viral [+75% damage], and his Armor is weak to Radiation [+75% damage]. His shields do NOT reduce Rad or Viral damage. It took two of my teammate dying for any of them to even pay attention, but by that time all the Grineer were dead, and we weren't rushing anymore.....Just as a side note; If one of your teammates has a stalker on him, don't be a loser and leave them behind. FFS, you're meant to work together, not run away like a chick in a horror movie.

 

All in all, while the Stalker is 'beatable', he is no longer a 'mini-boss'; He is superior to even the supposed end boss Laphtis, and should be considered a super boss at this point. He desperately needs a nerf, and no DE, we don't care if you think he's working as intended; we are your player base, this is the feedback forum, and the players have given their feedback in droves. Please FIX your mistake.

[Kamal965]

You do realize the Stalker scales with your loadout, right?

 

Yes. And my conclave rating is always from 1100 to 1500. He's usually level 30-45.

 

He still dies.

 

As it scales in proportion to your own gear, the "difficulty" should retain the same ratio. 

[Leuca]

 

Yes. And my conclave rating is always from 1100 to 1500. He's usually level 30-45.

 

He still dies.

 

As it scales in proportion to your own gear, the "difficulty" should retain the same ratio. 

There must be something not yet considered with his scaling code then. My most recent stalker was almost level 60 and proceeded to one-shot me after I managed to dodge his first two attacks. I was barely able to fire my weapon as the first thing I could see from him animation-wise was a slash-dash.

[(PSN)ariaandkia]

 

so, DE insist on continuously buffing the stalker and getting him new abilities. and i, as someone who's played for 700hrs, i reckon it's getting out of hand.

 

so as of update 11, he now spawns at lvl45 (so it should be about comparable to lvl90 from pre-U11), which means he does quite some damage. but he also have a few ability, it instantly teleport his victim to his melee range NO MATTER WHERE YOU ARE. he previously gets a dispell aoe which disable every power we have, now he gets this? is this what DE want the stalker to be? a random event that steals revives from players for no good reason? the stalker isnt a exciting mini-boss to encounter and fight anymore, he's simply a nuisance when the light flickers, ill just let him kill me and get it over with. my max damage max crit Soma couldnt get him below 75% health (was in solo), granted i was using Ember, who has 703 shield and 300 health(effective health of 2003 with guardian).

 

at the end of the day, the stalker should be fun, and this isnt it.

 

Currently, the Stalker has....

 

Dread [bow] which has a high proc chance for slash.

 

Despair [Knives] which fire faster than most fully auto weapons, and do about the same damage as a fully modded primary.

 

Hate [Melee] which is there abouts a one shot weapon.

 

Slash dash, which is a one shot kill attack, even with a fully modded rhino, and has a 50% chance of triggering on spawn, without his stand up animation.

 

Pull, to prevent us for going into cover.

 

Switch Teleport, Grineer Commander Style, in that it has no LoS requirement, and infinite range.

 

Dispel, which, bar Zenuka and the fabled Harvester, is the only one that has it in game. No longer staggers/has situational stagger.

 

And Super Absorb. This is not an exaggeration; it is literally super Absorb. It heals the Stalker back up to max HP, so he counts as having two lives now, has a fully modded range + damage, and he can move while using it, making it almost unavoidable. The last part is not a glitch.

 

Lastly, Shuriken, which is an auto lock attack; 100% unavoidable in the Stalker's case.

 

His HP, Armor, and Shields are always at max, and effectively has max ranked Fast Deflection on.

 

There is a 90% chance of dying to the Stalker should he appear. I won't brag, but I have confirmed he can be beaten 'legit'. By legit, I mean not glitching him out, not stacking 15+ penta charges at his target's feet, not body checking him with shotguns. I recently had a Stalker drop in on me on an invasion mission as a volt. With no support from my team mates [thanks for absolutely no help guys.], my chances of survival were slim, except I found a weakness; His Dispel A, does not stager you, or at least if you're running with Speed on it doesn't, and B, resets the time/cd on abilities, so abilities like Speed can be spammed. What I did was not skill, it was pure luck; I ran literally from one end of the map to the other with the Stalker on me, for a solid 5 some minutes. That I'll slightly brag on, but nee....I killed him twice using a Brakk with Radiation and Viral as it's elements; The Stalker's HP is weak to Viral [+75% damage], and his Armor is weak to Radiation [+75% damage]. His shields do NOT reduce Rad or Viral damage. It took two of my teammate dying for any of them to even pay attention, but by that time all the Grineer were dead, and we weren't rushing anymore.....Just as a side note; If one of your teammates has a stalker on him, don't be a loser and leave them behind. FFS, you're meant to work together, not run away like a chick in a horror movie.

 

All in all, while the Stalker is 'beatable', he is no longer a 'mini-boss'; He is superior to even the supposed end boss Laphtis, and should be considered a super boss at this point. He desperately needs a nerf, and no DE, we don't care if you think he's working as intended; we are your player base, this is the feedback forum, and the players have given their feedback in droves. Please FIX your mistake.

 

 

I've fought the stalker yesterday on the PS4 (U11.5.8) and killed him (solo 4 times, had someone fire an arrow at him (or at least he was hit by an arrow) on the 5th which took out half his shields) rather easily.   Main thing that is dangerous is his slash dash.  If you don't dodge or somehow block it, you are screwed.  If you screw up on your dodges or blocks, you are screwed.  Now, I'm assuming he gets stronger in a later patch since I've never seen him do that super absorb thing where he can move around, but this past week (U11.?.? and U11.5.8) I've killed him around 20 times?  Even scanned him 6 times (he killed me once because life support completely died and it counted as his kill).

 

The version I fought had:

 

Dread, Despair, Hate

 

Dispel, Teleport (player to stalker), Slash Dash, Absorb.

 

He died fairly easily the fifth time since well...    He tried to kill me during the cicerno crisis event (PS4 got the event with 11.5.8) when I was working on my Loki (who had so little health that one hit would've killed him)

 

Needless to say, I stayed calmed, looked him in the eye and fought him face to face.   First four times were fairly easy.  I was doing survival runs and I was expecting him (I had like all the possible deathmarks in the game on me), so I waited for him before starting the survival, was on a map that had good terrain for a duel with the Stalker, taunted him a few times.  Then when he appeared, I dueled it out, doing rolls, blocks, etc.  (I still dodge instead of blocking his slash dash since I somehow doubt block works on that).  When he did the absorb, I countered with Blessing/Iron Skin/Hysteria.  (Too bad overheat got removed, ember was my favorite anti-stalker warframe.  Stack like 5-20 fire blasts, throw on overheat, throw on world on fire, start dodging and blocking until he dies (overheat would get dispelled but usually I could manage to take out his shields and do some health damage before).

 

I've found that the best way to fight the stalker is to not panic (which is NOT easy).  When I see him winding up for slash dash, I still sometimes panic.   And this is after a week of stalker farming.   I literally recorded a video of me fighting the stalker just so that I had something to use to learn his moves (My specialty in fighting isn't my reaction speed (I have almost no reflex or reaction speed) but my ability to learn moves of my enemies and "script" counters into my body).

 

Main issue I've noticed though is people that panic.  One player died because all we hear is "Stalker is after me" a few times and two of us who were stalker farming were like: which one are you?  No name, no waypoint, so we just chose the player that was actually running towards us (the ones who stated that we were Stalker farming and were telling everyone to group up if the stalker came). About 20 seconds later...   "Stalker is in the center of the room! HELP ME!"  By the time we got to the stalker, he was dead and stalker was leaving...  Because he panicked, ran, and the group had no idea who he was after until it was too late.  Another game, nobody panicked, stalker showed up, player kept the stalker busy while I healed and attacked the Stalker.  Stalker died.  Staying calm and collected saves lives.

 

I've seen this happen quite a few times, not exactly the same scenario, but similar.  

 

Second most important thing is situational awareness-something that most people don't seem to have (even I've screwed up on this a few times despite me always trying to be careful). I've almost killed the stalker with new gear (I had just started new weapons and wasn't expecting a stalker) and the player ran so he was between me and stalker, blocks my attack (stalker was like one hit from done), and gets me killed since the stalker threw his despair and they hit me).  If the other player had just chosen to slide when passing, then my shot wouldn't have been blocked.  I probably would have still died, but I would've taken the Stalker down with me.   If the other player had chosen a path that didn't lead the stalker to hit me with a stray despair, I would've lived.  Situational awareness saves lives.

 

===

 

 

That being said, I'm assuming he gets harder.  So who knows.  U11/11.5.8 are doable with ease (about the same as any other starmap boss, U11 he was actually slightly easier than some bosses).  When we on the PS4 get the stalker buff, I'll try again and see if he is still doable with at least a reasonable effort.  

[NalkorRN]

 

 

 

 

 

I've fought the stalker yesterday on the PS4 (U11.5.8) and killed him (solo 4 times, had someone fire an arrow at him (or at least he was hit by an arrow) on the 5th which took out half his shields) rather easily.   Main thing that is dangerous is his slash dash.  If you don't dodge or somehow block it, you are screwed.  If you screw up on your dodges or blocks, you are screwed.  Now, I'm assuming he gets stronger in a later patch since I've never seen him do that super absorb thing where he can move around, but this past week (U11.?.? and U11.5.8) I've killed him around 20 times?  Even scanned him 6 times (he killed me once because life support completely died and it counted as his kill).

 

The version I fought had:

 

Dread, Despair, Hate

 

Dispel, Teleport (player to stalker), Slash Dash, Absorb.

 

He died fairly easily the fifth time since well...    He tried to kill me during the cicerno crisis event (PS4 got the event with 11.5.8) when I was working on my Loki (who had so little health that one hit would've killed him)

 

Needless to say, I stayed calmed, looked him in the eye and fought him face to face.   First four times were fairly easy.  I was doing survival runs and I was expecting him (I had like all the possible deathmarks in the game on me), so I waited for him before starting the survival, was on a map that had good terrain for a duel with the Stalker, taunted him a few times.  Then when he appeared, I dueled it out, doing rolls, blocks, etc.  (I still dodge instead of blocking his slash dash since I somehow doubt block works on that).  When he did the absorb, I countered with Blessing/Iron Skin/Hysteria.  (Too bad overheat got removed, ember was my favorite anti-stalker warframe.  Stack like 5-20 fire blasts, throw on overheat, throw on world on fire, start dodging and blocking until he dies (overheat would get dispelled but usually I could manage to take out his shields and do some health damage before).

 

I've found that the best way to fight the stalker is to not panic (which is NOT easy).  When I see him winding up for slash dash, I still sometimes panic.   And this is after a week of stalker farming.   I literally recorded a video of me fighting the stalker just so that I had something to use to learn his moves (My specialty in fighting isn't my reaction speed (I have almost no reflex or reaction speed) but my ability to learn moves of my enemies and "script" counters into my body).

 

Main issue I've noticed though is people that panic.  One player died because all we hear is "Stalker is after me" a few times and two of us who were stalker farming were like: which one are you?  No name, no waypoint, so we just chose the player that was actually running towards us (the ones who stated that we were Stalker farming and were telling everyone to group up if the stalker came). About 20 seconds later...   "Stalker is in the center of the room! HELP ME!"  By the time we got to the stalker, he was dead and stalker was leaving...  Because he panicked, ran, and the group had no idea who he was after until it was too late.  Another game, nobody panicked, stalker showed up, player kept the stalker busy while I healed and attacked the Stalker.  Stalker died.  Staying calm and collected saves lives.

 

I've seen this happen quite a few times, not exactly the same scenario, but similar.  

 

Second most important thing is situational awareness-something that most people don't seem to have (even I've screwed up on this a few times despite me always trying to be careful). I've almost killed the stalker with new gear (I had just started new weapons and wasn't expecting a stalker) and the player ran so he was between me and stalker, blocks my attack (stalker was like one hit from done), and gets me killed since the stalker threw his despair and they hit me).  If the other player had just chosen to slide when passing, then my shot wouldn't have been blocked.  I probably would have still died, but I would've taken the Stalker down with me.   If the other player had chosen a path that didn't lead the stalker to hit me with a stray despair, I would've lived.  Situational awareness saves lives.

 

===

 

 

That being said, I'm assuming he gets harder.  So who knows.  U11/11.5.8 are doable with ease (about the same as any other starmap boss, U11 he was actually slightly easier than some bosses).  When we on the PS4 get the stalker buff, I'll try again and see if he is still doable with at least a reasonable effort.  

 

Iron Skin has no duration, so if you still had it up after his Absorb went off, he'd dispel you and then follow up with despair/Dread/Hate attacks with virtually no weapon-switching. We never know when he's buffed or nerfed because he's almost never mentioned in patch notes, aside from when DE gets super @(*()$ vague.

 

The reason the PC players advise against rolling, blocking, and all that is because he'll either not let up and keep using near-aimbot levels of accuracy and getting free hits in, teleport to you and smask you around, or just use pull and then slap you with something nasty.

 

In fact, Blessing does next to nothing because he will dispel the invulnerability effect, same for Hysteria. He @(*()$ cheats. There's a video a page or two back showing someone take on the Stalker and lasting roughly 8-12 seconds because of his insane damage output.

[Klomster]

I don't like the stalker, he's just mean.

 

I've always had problems with the sucker, sure i am afraid of the sucker but try not to panic and prepares to dodge his first attack.

 

At times i live, but then he just runs up to me and smack me to pieces.

 

This is with every frame i've ever played, regardless of weapons, regardless of level.

Sure i'm no super grinder, i'm actually just at mastery 5 (now people will think, uhh, effing noob, but no, i don't spend 99% on my life on playing games, and i have a tendency to not switch my gear to much, resulting in not levelling new weapons and thus not getting much mastery.)

 

I'm more of a casual gamer, and likes me some warframe.

 

SO i was thinking.

For those that like a fight but expect to come out on top if they don't eff up, nothing really should be done. Make sure high level dudes aren't immortal and keep the enemies many and damaging, but comparably low health so we keep the fast moving ninja theme.

I'm fine if a gunline shoots me down (well, i'll be angry for dying, but comparably fine with it) i expect that to happen at times.

 

But one match i played me and my friend met lvl "50" grineer. And they were just bullet sponges.

We used up all our ammo in our lvl 30 maxed out weapons with max dmg mods (with catalysts, reactors you name it). ALL AMMO.

We were down to hitting them with our swords, which did no dmg either.

 

The second an enemy in this game gets bullet spongey, i just start hating the game.

This is warframe, fast ninja action. Not wow grind for an hour to kill an enemy and then move to the next.

 

Sure, bosses can be a bit spongey, they are bosses after all.

 

But the stalker? He's an event.

I think his great speed should be his greatest ally.

I've never taken down the stalker solo. And only occasionally in teams.

 

So i got an idea. We get the normal players and balance everything to them.

 

Then, people who want to we can get an option ingame that says "i want a challenge".

What this does is make every enemies level 200, boosts their speed with 150% and multiplies their damage with the players frames level.

A bonus to all values mentioned above is added by the same number as their mastery level.

 

Then you will have a balanced challenge.

The normal people will fight normal opposition which will pose a danger if not thinking straight or not using the frames correctly. And the min maxers will get a reasonably challenging difficulty based on their "skill".

Oh, and the "I want a challenge" option is irreversable, because you saif you wanted a challenge, no going back. There can be a warning so people don't agree to it when just fiddling about.

 

Coz i dunno, i've never got how i run around in an high level void run, trying to help but the enemies are just to spongey.

When the others seems to just fine blast through anything with ease.

 

What is their secret? I have maxed out damage mods on my guns as well? And hit most of my attacks. I usually have around 70% accuracy or better so it can't be that i cannot shoot straight?

Do they have 3 damage mods? Can you even get more raw damage mods than one?

 

It seems a bit silly that you need several maxed out damage mods to be able to fight the regular enemies.

Not to mention whacked out bosses or the stalker.

 

Coz you can't skip the raw damage mod. It's stupid, and not all players do even have it.

Imagine being new and not getting it out of bad drops?

Their gun will be useless! And i'd like to have the option of kitting out my gun with only fun mods and not be forced to give up 3 slots for raw damage, elemental 1 and elemental 2. Just to get some damage at all out of the gun.

Apparently you need nightmare mod and corrupted mod that adds damage as well to even stand a chance.

 

I think i got out of hand with my ranting, and lost the topic somewhere.

Perhaps this post belongs somewhere else.

Regardless, this game is out of hand in some areas. And in some totally laughably easy.

 

When i run around and feel that yup, these lvl 25 enemies are a fitting foe when sitting on lvl 60 weapons and frames is not righ. Something is wrong and it is not me.

[(PSN)ariaandkia]

Iron Skin has no duration, so if you still had it up after his Absorb went off, he'd dispel you and then follow up with despair/Dread/Hate attacks with virtually no weapon-switching. We never know when he's buffed or nerfed because he's almost never mentioned in patch notes, aside from when DE gets super @(*()$ vague.

 

The reason the PC players advise against rolling, blocking, and all that is because he'll either not let up and keep using near-aimbot levels of accuracy and getting free hits in, teleport to you and smask you around, or just use pull and then slap you with something nasty.

 

In fact, Blessing does next to nothing because he will dispel the invulnerability effect, same for Hysteria. He @(*()$ cheats. There's a video a page or two back showing someone take on the Stalker and lasting roughly 8-12 seconds because of his insane damage output.

Did I ever say that you were planning to still have it after his absorb went off, lol.   You literally are only using it to protect against his absorb.   He is fairly easy with a party though (at least on the PS4 version (11.5.8).

 

Have someone like rhino be the target, have a trinity in the party, have a nova in the party, have a Loki in the party.  Nova and Trinity stay out of the way.  Loki disarms any firearms users to force them to melee and uses decoy to try to push the enemies towards the stalker and the rhino (yes, the rhino is going to have very limited movement.   Now, Nova needs to do Antimatter Drop THEN Molecular Prime. and the Prime has to hit before the Drop lands.   And this has to be timed fairly well or the Rhino will probably die.  The Trinity's main deal is to keep the Rhino alive by using blessing to stall for time.  A few of Stalker's attacks (in U11.5.8) have small telegraphing-generally barely enough to get iron skin off depending on the distance (the stalker uses his skill first then debuffs in 11.5.8) and then blessing would put the Rhino's health back to normal after and force the stalker to use dispel.  At least in our version, dispel forces the stalker to pause for a brief moment (not even a second really).  Anyways, the idea is that you use the prime explosions and the drop explosions combined to do a lot of damage to the stalker since at least in our version, powers can still damage the stalker even if he is immune to secondary effects.

 

As I said though, that is in our version.  Your version stalker sounds buffed up and I look forward to fighting him just to see how buffed he is.

[DragoXXVIII]

pc stalker is in short broke for solo play

 

 

party play if ...and that a big IF the party pays attention  you have a slim to ok chance of winning provided he dosen't  just  kill off everyone that attempts to help you like he dose now on pc....so party mentality is now" lol just suck it up an pay the respawn" while everyone just runs ahead nukeing the run

[MortalSword]

Here is my feedback for what it is worth.

 

The Stalker is a fantastic concept, I love the way his "visits" are initiated. He instills a strong sense of foreboding, and really triggers an adrenaline pump. This is exactly how his attacks should feel, I applaud the level of tension and anticipation his appearance creates,

 

The actual encounter is frustrating and a monumental buzzkill. I've been attacked by him around five times since the major tweaks of the last week or two and each time I've been insta-gibbed/one-shotted once I was able to see him. I'm often either in a Rhino or Vauban, both with Reactors and significant Shield/Health boosts (over 1k shields on Rhino). For me it hasn't even been a matter of not doing enough damage, it has been a matter of not having an opportunity to interact with him before I was murdered. I'm happy to chalk the first appearance or two to inexperience, but I've tried multiple methods of movement to maximize the chance of facing him and allowing my team to support, I have not however used the "crate trick" because I consider it an exploit/cheat and it lessens the experience for me. 

 

A few broad points about the encounter as it stands.

 

1. Non-interactive encounters lessen the player's enjoyment. 

 

- When the player is targeted and cannot interact and have the opportunity to both overcome and enjoy the challenge, it is no longer a feature that is enhancing the experience but detracting from it. 

 

 

2. Stalker's ability to counter all Tenno powers is non-interactive and counter intuitive.

 

- The combination of the Stalker's high DPS and ability to counter most powers leads to a non-interactive and counter intuitive situation where the Tenno (player) has most options stripped and all but the most elite/experienced players are forced to use awkward movement to avoid being insta-gibbed/one-shotted and just hope the rest of your team A) Knows what to do and B) Does so in sufficient time to save you. 

 

- Players using powers effectively to overcome challenges is the foundation of good gameplay, and Warframe's gameplay in particular.. Why does this encounter nullify that? Why are all of my abilities nullified/dispelled? This goes against what the rest of the game establishes.

 

 

3. High risk for no reward makes little sense and also detracts from the gameplay experience.

 

- I've helped kill other player's Stalker spawns before. The first time I saw the Stalker killed he dropped the Dread Blueprint. Since then he has never dropped anything other than Slash Dash. This is a buzzkill. All the excitement of overcoming the encounter is spent when you finish the mission and there is no reward for it. Players are used to Common/Uncommon/Rare tables and come to expect that, but when the Stalker is slain he should drop something, I'd much rather have a stack of the common Blueprint than nothing. 

 

 

Most people would agree that complaints alone solve nothing, so I will follow my above issues with some suggestions. While I am not an industry professional, I have played thousands of hours of various games and I'm pretty familiar with the systems and experiences that have motivated my friends and myself. With that I humbly offer the following insights...

 

 

The Stalker encounter is very close to being a fantastic and unique gaming experience. As mentioned above his initial arrival always incites some level of excitement and anticipation. This is a great thing, and in order to maintain the quality of that experience for most players the encounter must be balanced differently. Personally I think the flavor lends itself very well to the Stalker featuring high DPS. The real issue lies in his ability to negate most Warframe abilities continuously. I'm certainly not proposing that the Stalker should be vulnerable to the various crowd control effects that would make the experience much less special and much more mundane. Clearly the concept of the Stalker hanging in Vauban's Bastille is not very intimidating and somewhat less dignified than he deserves! I do think the way he interacts with the player could be tweaked. The Stalker dispelling all abilities once, upon his initial assault makes a great deal of sense flavor wise and presents options to the player being attacked. While thinking on the subject I thought the idea of the Stalker draining HP while he is in proximity would be exciting as well. 

 

Allow me to paint a different Stalker experience...

 

- You begin to receive the Stalker's taunts, and your adrenaline starts to pump. On the third taunt the Stalker appears before you, and all active powers are dispelled. He initiates with the Slash Dash, which you either manage to dodge or withstand via an ability like Rhino's Iron Skin. Someone lays down an AoE CC effect, let's say Vauban's Bastille. The Stalker taunts again and continues his assault unphased, using his various weapons to great effect.. At this point you notice your health is draining, slowly at first but increasingly more through the fight. Your squad converges and begins to counter attack the Stalker with you, offering support abilities like healing or damage buffs. The battle seems to be swinging your way when suddenly the Stalker begins a power similar to Nyx's Absorb sphere. Somewhat familiar with the nature of the power your team backs off until it dissipates, After the sphere bursts the Stalker  disappears and taunts the players. Suddenly he reappears in front of the targeted player and attacks again. After being reduced to 10% HP the Stalker puts up another shield and assumes the meditation pose and disappears, this time for good. The player have survived his onslaught! On the ground where the Stalker was seconds before now glows a pink orb with the blueprint (or component) for one of his weapons. 

 

 

Now the picture I've tried to paint above is not that far from the current experience, the main differences being that the Stalker no longer spams Dispel, but neither does he care about most AoE effects either. The players are able to use beneficial buffs but the longer the fight goes the more risk is involved as the target's health is draining away. Upon his defeat the players will receive an award, even if it is just another of the "common" blueprint/component for one of his weapons. This would lead to a much more enjoyable and challenging experience than the Stalker currently offers, which for most players is generally run around in circles until your team kills him for you or you die, if they don't just bug him out that is. While fighting the Stalker may become routine for advanced players, it can still be a rewarding encounter and still have an element of excitement, particularly if aspects like the life drain scaled based on Conclave level. The biggest thing I want to stress here is that the targeted player should not feel like a helpless victim, particularly if they aren't in their "best" loadout. Getting caught while leveling a weapon would increase the difficulty, but being able to fallback on the power of a warframe like Rhino would give you a fighting chance, and the reverse true as well. Getting caught on your low rank Ember will make for a scary encounter but the power of your trusty optimized Soma can offer the offensive edge you need to survive on your relatively weak frame. 

 

As a parting comment I know that balancing encounters like this is difficult. I want to commend DE on a really unique encounter concept that still gets my blood pumping, I just offer these thoughts in the hope that it will be an encounter I can overcome in the future and not feel victimized by every occurrence. 

 

- MortalSword

Edit 1: added "not" to the phrase "targeted player should not feel like a helpless victim"
 

Edited January 26, 2014 by MortalSword

[DragoXXVIII]

agreed his dispell needs to be dispelled

 

and his 6-7 abilitys need to be brought back to 4 like other warframes

Edited January 25, 2014 by DragoXXVIII

[(PSN)ariaandkia]

I definitely think that developers need to stop adjusting games for end game players and consider in new players.  I see this quite often in online games.  It starts off fairly balanced, then as players hit end game, the developers make the game harder and harder to the point that new players struggle to pick up the game.

 

I like the idea of enemies being scaled to say average party strength or have it scaled based on highest player strength within the party or number of players in the party or some combination of such.  However, scaling enemy strength based on the strongest players in the entire game...  Is silly.  Logically, it really makes no sense for gameplay reasons.

 

We should, instead of having the game be harder for new players, have more end-game content, have enemies that scale to the party's strength, and have challenge missions.

 

As has been suggested, we could have some sort of "True Tenno" Mode where enemies are stronger but give say higher drop rates.

[Rapxtor]

Here is my feedback for what it is worth.

 

The Stalker is a fantastic concept, I love the way his "visits" are initiated. He instills a strong sense of foreboding, and really triggers an adrenaline pump. This is exactly how his attacks should feel, I applaud the level of tension and anticipation his appearance creates,

 

The actual encounter is frustrating and a monumental buzzkill. I've been attacked by him around five times since the major tweaks of the last week or two and each time I've been insta-gibbed/one-shotted once I was able to see him. I'm often either in a Rhino or Vauban, both with Reactors and significant Shield/Health boosts (over 1k shields on Rhino). For me it hasn't even been a matter of not doing enough damage, it has been a matter of not having an opportunity to interact with him before I was murdered. I'm happy to chalk the first appearance or two to inexperience, but I've tried multiple methods of movement to maximize the chance of facing him and allowing my team to support, I have not however used the "crate trick" because I consider it an exploit/cheat and it lessens the experience for me. 

 

A few broad points about the encounter as it stands.

 

1. Non-interactive encounters lessen the player's enjoyment. 

 

- When the player is targeted and cannot interact and have the opportunity to both overcome and enjoy the challenge, it is no longer a feature that is enhancing the experience but detracting from it. 

 

 

2. Stalker's ability to counter all Tenno powers is non-interactive and counter intuitive.

 

- The combination of the Stalker's high DPS and ability to counter most powers leads to a non-interactive and counter intuitive situation where the Tenno (player) has most options stripped and all but the most elite/experienced players are forced to use awkward movement to avoid being insta-gibbed/one-shotted and just hope the rest of your team A) Knows what to do and B) Does so in sufficient time to save you. 

 

- Players using powers effectively to overcome challenges is the foundation of good gameplay, and Warframe's gameplay in particular.. Why does this encounter nullify that? Why are all of my abilities nullified/dispelled? This goes against what the rest of the game establishes.

 

 

3. High risk for no reward makes little sense and also detracts from the gameplay experience.

 

- I've helped kill other player's Stalker spawns before. The first time I saw the Stalker killed he dropped the Dread Blueprint. Since then he has never dropped anything other than Slash Dash. This is a buzzkill. All the excitement of overcoming the encounter is spent when you finish the mission and there is no reward for it. Players are used to Common/Uncommon/Rare tables and come to expect that, but when the Stalker is slain he should drop something, I'd much rather have a stack of the common Blueprint than nothing. 

 

 

Most people would agree that complaints alone solve nothing, so I will follow my above issues with some suggestions. While I am not an industry professional, I have played thousands of hours of various games and I'm pretty familiar with the systems and experiences that have motivated my friends and myself. With that I humbly offer the following insights...

 

 

The Stalker encounter is very close to being a fantastic and unique gaming experience. As mentioned above his initial arrival always incites some level of excitement and anticipation. This is a great thing, and in order to maintain the quality of that experience for most players the encounter must be balanced differently. Personally I think the flavor lends itself very well to the Stalker featuring high DPS. The real issue lies in his ability to negate most Warframe abilities continuously. I'm certainly not proposing that the Stalker should be vulnerable to the various crowd control effects that would make the experience much less special and much more mundane. Clearly the concept of the Stalker hanging in Vauban's Bastille is not very intimidating and somewhat less dignified than he deserves! I do think the way he interacts with the player could be tweaked. The Stalker dispelling all abilities once, upon his initial assault makes a great deal of sense flavor wise and presents options to the player being attacked. While thinking on the subject I thought the idea of the Stalker draining HP while he is in proximity would be exciting as well. 

 

Allow me to paint a different Stalker experience...

 

- You begin to receive the Stalker's taunts, and your adrenaline starts to pump. On the third taunt the Stalker appears before you, and all active powers are dispelled. He initiates with the Slash Dash, which you either manage to dodge or withstand via an ability like Rhino's Iron Skin. Someone lays down an AoE CC effect, let's say Vauban's Bastille. The Stalker taunts again and continues his assault unphased, using his various weapons to great effect.. At this point you notice your health is draining, slowly at first but increasingly more through the fight. Your squad converges and begins to counter attack the Stalker with you, offering support abilities like healing or damage buffs. The battle seems to be swinging your way when suddenly the Stalker begins a power similar to Nyx's Absorb sphere. Somewhat familiar with the nature of the power your team backs off until it dissipates, After the sphere bursts the Stalker  disappears and taunts the players. Suddenly he reappears in front of the targeted player and attacks again. After being reduced to 10% HP the Stalker puts up another shield and assumes the meditation pose and disappears, this time for good. The player have survived his onslaught! On the ground where the Stalker was seconds before now glows a pink orb with the blueprint (or component) for one of his weapons. 

 

 

Now the picture I've tried to paint above is not that far from the current experience, the main differences being that the Stalker no longer spams Dispel, but neither does he care about most AoE effects either. The players are able to use beneficial buffs but the longer the fight goes the more risk is involved as the target's health is draining away. Upon his defeat the players will receive an award, even if it is just another of the "common" blueprint/component for one of his weapons. This would lead to a much more enjoyable and challenging experience than the Stalker currently offers, which for most players is generally run around in circles until your team kills him for you or you die, if they don't just bug him out that is. While fighting the Stalker may become routine for advanced players, it can still be a rewarding encounter and still have an element of excitement, particularly if aspects like the life drain scaled based on Conclave level. The biggest thing I want to stress here is that the targeted player should feel like a helpless victim, particularly if they aren't in their "best" loadout. Getting caught while leveling a weapon would increase the difficulty, but being able to fallback on the power of a warframe like Rhino would give you a fighting chance, and the reverse true as well. Getting caught on your low rank Ember will make for a scary encounter but the power of your trusty optimized Soma can offer the offensive edge you need to survive on your relatively weak frame. 

 

As a parting comment I know that balancing encounters like this is difficult. I want to commend DE on a really unique encounter concept that still gets my blood pumping, I just offer these thoughts in the hope that it will be an encounter I can overcome in the future and not feel victimized by every occurrence. 

 

- MortalSword

 

 

You have a point, but look at stalker was foe in you have to rely only in your ability dodge and weapons, and unlike some other user stated, stalker does switch weapons, almost automatic, but switch, using the range was advantage is also way to give you precious seconds, like is mean to be this way, was example only, if you are at 5m meters il attack you with despair but at 10m il use dread, if you stay static you il get slash dashed or he il switch teleport to you and use hate.

 

Having all of this in mind, the only thing is, with weapons fully modded you il kill him more quickly, with weapons at average damage, you il take long to kill him but its also option, i only dont recommend without mods, bc that way, its very dificult to drop is shields bc of the instant refill and reach is health.

 

Im uploading a video at this time that if you dont mind looking at other playing, you should take a look and create your own way to face him without using any ability, and I even lost my awereness for a moment and falled in the hole, or if you prefer, keep what i said in mind, and next time you face him, discover by yourself how can you easly use is attacks against him, there are still people who try ability against him, wich by this time is a waste since it was never mean to be like that by DE.

[Hadronox]

The stalker is unpredictable and inconsistent.

 

 

> He 2-shotted my forma'ed Rhino (with 3k effective health) in a blink of an eye, without using Slash and Dash. I believe he was lvl 60 or higher (?).

 

> He 1-shotted my Nova while leveling her up. His GFX effects started, I ran to my team mates then *poof* I died. I did not even get a chance to see him at all.

 

> I've met him 3 times since, while in a party doing invasions, and killed him every time. In fact he looked easy and died fast. He was about lvl 26 or 28 I think. He spawned on someone else.

 

 

The problem is this inconsistency and unpredictability of both his spawn level and the use of his skills. I think most people that keep saying he is easy have been lucky so far with either a low spawn level and/or him not using his OP skills/weapons to 1-shot or 2-shot them.

 

 

Worst of all is that despite his really low chance of spawning in the first place, he often does not drop anything except a lousy Slash and Dash mod.

 

 

So many layers of RNG to overcome ...

Edited January 26, 2014 by Hadronox

[Kickboxing_Banana]

Get Boar Prime, I don't even have to shoot one clip at him and he is dead. Damn noobs learn to play.

Edited January 26, 2014 by GalliumGD

[aavvdkdk]

Stalker is fine atm. He is far from broken and let me remind you: Warframe is a coop game with 4 players. Why does it surprise you that you can't solo him? (Which you actually still can) I like being challenged and the Stalker is one of the few challenging things in this game.  

[(PSN)Lord_Gremlin]

1. Revives cost platinum. Most people would never buy them, but some will.

2. Nobody will buy 800 platinum gear pack if there is an actual chance to get this gear for free. People are buying Stalker pack on PS4 exactly because he's broken. I passed, but many bought it on sale for 400.

[Leuca]

Stalker is fine atm. He is far from broken and let me remind you: Warframe is a coop game with 4 players. Why does it surprise you that you can't solo him? (Which you actually still can) I like being challenged and the Stalker is one of the few challenging things in this game.  

The stalker is a perfect example of broken mechanics, due to erratic scaling mechanics (unexplainable huge level differences between two different spawns with no significant change in conclave) and consistent violation of the rules the game establishes for you from the beginning.

 

He needs some degree of consistency, and mechanics/animations that players can read/properly respond to.

[Tsukinoki]

Stalker is fine atm. He is far from broken and let me remind you: Warframe is a coop game with 4 players. Why does it surprise you that you can't solo him? (Which you actually still can) I like being challenged and the Stalker is one of the few challenging things in this game.  

He is not fine at all.

Since he can spawn solo (which he can) he needs to be consistently beatable solo.

Since he can spawn when your frame is level 5 he needs to scale to your equipment.  I've leveled a frame and had him attack me while I was frame level 6 and weapons were level 20, 23, and 19 (Primary, Seconday, and melee respectively) and he was level 60.  I stood no chance at all against him as he one-shot me before I could do anything.  That shows that his scaling is utterly broken.

Further he violates basic game rules: No weapon swapping animation the majority of the time, no limit to the number of abilities he can cast without pause (I've been ragdollled by his pull for around a full minute because his AI glitched and only used pull before he finally attacked me and killed me), he can ignore any frame ability, he doesn't require LOS for any of his abilities and they go beyond the limit of 50 meters that all other abilities have.

That is pretty much the definition of broken in warframe.

He is very far from fine.  Unless you expect people to never level gear and only have R30 god tier equipment on in every single mission (and never use shade) just because he can appear and steal a revive randomly.

Further he takes some builds and makes them  more dangerous to use.  You want a max duration modded Loki?  Well hopefully you dont cast invis the second he sends his first message (which has happened to me) because he will spawn and stagger you with dispel before you invisibility can end, meaning he'll get off a 1 shot kill on you with absolutely no way to defend against it.

He's utterly broken and needs a complete re-work.

And small thing: he is NOT a challenge.  He is a cheap revive stealer that ignores in game mechancis just because he can.  A challenge is something that can be beaten by the average player and falls within the bounds of the rules of the game he appears in.  He is neither.

I would be fine with him as he is IF you could 100% control when you faught him.  As you cant he needs to have his scaling fixed and become beatable by the average player in whatever gear they have equipped.

[TargetDummy]

He said hello to me few minutes ago, and 1 shot killed my Mag prime through 1.1k shields. Yeap, that's some BS.

[ast00]

Looks like I'm also bumping it.

[Virtus_Dei_Est]

 

really, if you found the stalker hard, well, i dont know what you are doing wrong...

 

sometimes when you cant defeat an enemy face to face, there is something called strategy, is great!

 

also, yes, stalker is supposed to be almost unbeatable (is not the case but for some looks like it), dont know where did you get the idea that you should be able to defeat him with any gear like someone else stated before me.

 

carry at least a good leveled / potatoed / formaed weapon always with you in case the monster appears, and learn how to defeat him.

Edited January 26, 2014 by omega_phoenix

[Shyvorix]

 

 

really, if you found the stalker hard, well, i dont know what you are doing wrong...

 

sometimes when you cant defeat an enemy face to face, there is something called strategy, is great!

 

also, yes, stalker is supposed to be almost unbeatable (is not the case but for some looks like it), dont know where did you get the idea that you should be able to defeat him with any gear like someone else stated before me.

 

carry at least a good leveled / potatoed / formaed weapon always with you in case the monster appears, and learn how to defeat him.

How about this.

How about you go rhino fully loaded and have a lvl 50 stalker spawn and just slash dash you once to death. Or just put an arrow in your butt.

Then we'll see.

[Virtus_Dei_Est]

How about this.

How about you go rhino fully loaded and have a lvl 50 stalker spawn and just slash dash you once to death. Or just put an arrow in your butt.

Then we'll see.

 

Emm, no, we wont.

 

I farmed all the weapons of the stalker (just to let you know i know the drill, i killed him yesterday with my excalibur BTW), you know he used to have hitscan weapons right? and you are complaining because he uses a bow and kunais?

 

I wont post anymore here, i hate people who gets in a rage post to defend mechanics of the game,but i would like to check (seems impossible as i dont have acces to that data), but for me the ones complaining about difficulty of the stalker are new players, those who where here since the begining knows tha the stalker is "aww S***" moments maker, not a loot bag.

 

we can discuss about balance in every other aspect of the game, but the stalker, should be as cheap as he could get, is the reaper of the game.

 

also, please, STOP SHOOTING HIM WHEN HE START "MEDITATING" (NYX'S ABSORB STANCE).

 

is hilarious to see groups of tenno shooting at him from 2 meters away, and whining because they died after the power wave.

 

LEARN THE WAYS OF THE ENEMY.

 

bye!

[TargetDummy]

carry at least a good leveled / potatoed / formaed weapon always with you in case the monster appears, and learn how to defeat him.

Sure-sure... Getting 1 shot killed through over 1k shields is my frame being bad modded. Not a single boss in this game can deal such damage in 1 hit.

 

 

I farmed all the weapons of the stalker (just to let you know i know the drill, i killed him yesterday with my excalibur BTW), you know he used to have hitscan weapons right? and you are complaining because he uses a bow and kunais?

Yeah, you "farmed" him long-long time ago. Just like I did. How long has he come to you? Try to face him now, when you are death marked. Your memoirs and forum-theory are nothing against what Stalker has become.

Edited January 26, 2014 by TargetDummy