Duviri on a more positive note

[Veridian]

After every major update the doom and gloom squad rush in to claim their share. Labeling it as a failure, the end etc, etc...

That's how content gets abandoned by the devs. (Just gonna mention that RJ got the same hate back in the day and a recient servey showed that it's the content most people want to see more of).

So let's try to keep things if not positive at least on a more neutral note. That said, here's my take so far:

 

The world - beautiful, music is great and the mood changes make it feel different. I'd argue that one big mistake in any open world is flight, because it devalues the world itself, but on the other hand riding everywhere would have gotten old real fast. My personal oppinion is that's what failed Fortuna the most.

The story - It's the drifter's story, I liked it and it explained the drifter and how Duviri came to be. If the new player gets shoved into TNW after leaving duviri the story would make a lot more sence for a new player. 

The undercroft - great idea, a lot of fun, especially once you start snowballing. The randomizing is a nice touch that gets me out of the monotony of 1shotting everything with an immortal frame.

Bounties - I was never a big fan of bounties, but at least they are unique, fun and so far nothing (undercroft aside) has required me to sit at a spot and wait out a timer. (we'll see how long this feeling lasts, probably not long, but that's the nature of everything that involves repetition)

Combat - It's exactly what I expected, might be me, but it feels better than what we've seen from the devs about a month back. More impactful and if enemies gang up on you (esp on SP) it might be GG. 

Decrees - a very nice touch, makes long runs actually feel worth doing.

Horse - It's a horse!

Cosmetics - the new drifter suits are sick, but the new deluxe skins aren't really my thing.

 

That said, all of this isn't without it's issues, but not as major as the rage train make them out to be (obvious dislike for drifter gameplay aside)

World - add some randomly occuring events to the world (40 sec rule?) and some more NPCs (esp in cities and towns), make it feel a bit more alive

Undercroft - Add a few more modes, nothing's preventing Void Cascade from being a thing there and would it really be so bad to have a capture here and there?
SP Undercroft - randomized gear should instead throw a potato and 2-3 random forma with unlocked arcane/exilus on the weapon so you can make the build.
This would do for vets what it's doing for new players. A random weapon with the most basic of mod layouts doing 30 damage per hit isn't going to get anyone excited, but if at least we had the freedom to build it ourselves we might discover we actually enjoy it and invest in it.

Combat - make block usable at any time, maybe add some ability variety, since as of now all we have are a heal and invisibilty. 

New player experience - I find it weird that the main focus (drifter as he is in Duviri) will never be used outside of it. It also doesn't mention modding at all, not even a glance at the modding UI.

 

On my end, I'm overall enjoying this update and with a few tweaks it could be really amazing. There are obviously some bugs and stability issues, but anyone who's been playing any online game that gets major content releases shouldn't find this as a major surprise.

 

[Slayer-.]

I'm enjoying it so far, regardless of what the doom & gloom squad says, I'm still in the quest I think lol but enjoying it so far.

[Genitive]

25 minutes ago, Veridian said:

World - add some randomly occuring events to the world (40 sec rule?) and some more NPCs (esp in cities and towns), make it feel a bit more alive

 

There are.

 

25 minutes ago, Veridian said:

Combat - make block usable at any time,

Yes, definitely.

 

26 minutes ago, Veridian said:

It also doesn't mention modding at all, not even a glance at the modding UI.

You can see mods when you choose your equipment, but you can't customise it. Not a problem if you start with Duviri, but when we have access to mods in the orbiter, we should be also able to swap mods from the Duviri level.

[Veridian]

12 minutes ago, Genitive said:

There are.

 

Yes, definitely.

 

You can see mods when you choose your equipment, but you can't customise it. Not a problem if you start with Duviri, but when we have access to mods in the orbiter, we should be also able to swap mods from the Duviri level.

Guess I must have missed those events, but I don't recall anything about modding during the quest, which is the new player experience. 

[0bsi]

World
The world is GORGEOUS!  and the music is great.  The new style for the houses and such but with some of the Zariman look is a nice blend of new and familiar.  It's a great place to be.  I will probably choose to visit during certain moods though, so I can appreciate it when it's looking nicest. (PURPLE TREES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D )

Horses
I'm pretty fussy when it comes to horse animations in games (nothing can live up to RDR2), and I was very pleasantly surprised at just how fluid they move!  The take off and landing is very smooth and the instant summoning and dismissal is really handy.  Makes traversing the land both fast and stylish!  Cannot wait to unlock these in the other open worlds!

The bounties and side quests
I love that some are nice and short, and different things to do - although the marker to the next part can disappear if you go off exploring which I hope they fix.  I've only found a couple of side quest things so far, but that was a nice addition to stumble across them like that without markers.

Combat
I was not a fan going in, after seeing the gameplay teaser, and the first training section had me cursing and complaining it was going to be slow and boring.  But after playing enough to get some decrees to make it less painful, I actually don't mind it.  The decrees also give you a reason to open chests and look for things to do.  I mean, I still prefer warframe combat, but it's not as bad as it seemed at the beginning.

Drifter
The voice lines when riding the horse can get a bit annoying, especially after being used to playing as a silent character for so long - it would be nice to have an option to turn off the horse-related voicelines after the quest (much like how you can turn off Operator comments in missions)

Undercroft
I haven't yet played these on their own, only as part of the open world bounty things, and I don't mind them (It is a novel change to have to work with gear you normally wouldn't use, and not nuke things instantly) - but I do feel that they are a bit jarring to be running about as Drifter then walk through a portal and become a Warframe and do completely different stuff with no real story-reason why, and then go back to being Drifter again.  I wish there was a bit more seamless transition between that.

[Felsagger]

1. The horse is an outstanding device and companion. It works in many ways. Bowing while riding the horse is a win. Flying and bowing while riding this beast is a win too. 

2. The melee library of the tenno increased dramatically. That is a great plus. 

3. The fishing device and lots of quality of life little things like these are a plus. That was outstanding. 

4. PARRY IS A MOST at any given time. If DE wants to block and parry let us use it at any given time, please by all means. That's an extra layer of game play for the Warframe and the Tenno/ Drifter. 

5. The arrangements of powers of the Tenno was FANTASTICALLY good. This is a good positive. 

[Genitive]

27 minutes ago, Veridian said:

Guess I must have missed those events, but I don't recall anything about modding during the quest, which is the new player experience. 

Random events trigger when you choose the Duviri Experience section and you have to travel on the ground, they don't seem to trigger when you're flying.

Regarding mods, I just meant that you can see the mods and change loadouts if you own the equipment provided, but you can't swap mods while in Duviri, which is a shame.

[(PSN)robotwars7]

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

The world

the map is great, just a shame we can't explore it freely with no bounty objective nagging us, and from my experience, failing one locks you into Duviri with no way out, so you have to leave and forfeit any rewards you have: all we need is a straight-up free-roam, that's it. resource gathering will be way more convenient that way.

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

The story

this was also pretty good, some of the character are fun and there was even a couple genuine LOL moments;

Spoiler

First was at the beginning when Drifter is sentenced to death by impalement then suddenly a Meteor appears, and the guy sentencing is like "Death by.. meteor? erm, yes, METEOR! HAHAHA" *gets crushed*. 

Second was hearing Lodun (Anger Spiral NPC going off on one), I'm English so I appreciate the posh-but-angry queen's English he speaks.

Third was when Teshin's Pet (I called mine Lua, it's based on your alignment) killed the imposter. I swear to god that was a reference to the killer bunny from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and I love it.

 

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

The undercroft

it's a decent area, though at this point I've had my fill of ethereal arenas: ESO, Void Angel's Boss Fight, now this... we also have actual planets you know DE! the random gear isn't really a problem for me even on SP because I have all the frames and nearly all weapons (save the new ones) and I've invested across the board rather than just one or two frames/weapons: granted, this is because I've played and grinded for years, but at least now that effort is paying off even more, as whatever gear I pick isn't leaving me at a total disadvantage, and at least one of my weapons or the warframe itself will carry me and the squad through the Circuit pretty easily.

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

Bounties

I wouldn't mind so much if they weren't forced in order to access Duviri, but they are also a bit long.. 6 stages, when the hardest bounties on other maps are 5 stages. technically it's 7 if you count the Orowyrm fight. thankfully we have Lone Story mode which streamlines the process somewhat, but there isn't really a *quick* way to do Drifter combat, which is gonna bite people in the long run once the charm wears off; at some point, if you haven't already, you will reach a point where you say/think "just let me kill the damn Wyrm already!"

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

Combat

probably the only real miss here for me: the lock-on is janky and while it works for one or two enemies, it's unhelpful when dealing with the rather common 6v1 situation with the Dax, all locking on does is make it so I can't see the Dax that will kill me. I can't blame the game entirely, some of it is also a skill issue in my case, but I wasn't expecting to have to effectively master yet another melee system with parry mechanics. I think it could be a bit more forgiving, larger parry window and being able to cancel moves by blocking would go a LONG way for me: also, buff the sirocco for the love of the void. at the very elast up the reload speed, it should NOT take that long for a person with functional hands to reload a pistol that doesn't even need a magazine... 

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

Decrees

some of them are ok, like double crit damage, damage boost after reload etc, but most of them are meh or absolutely useless; they also don't scale into Steel Path, or address any of the issues with melee (a decree for increased parry window or attack speed would go a long way). very few of them actually affect overall DPS, and lord knows you need all the damage you can get as Drifter, especially on Steel Path Duviri where enemies are level 40 and can easily kill you before you get a chance to heal. (also, the cooldown on that is a bit long IMO)

3 hours ago, Veridian said:

Horse - It's a horse!

ackshually, it's called a Kaithe* 🤓

 

[TeaHands]

I'm here for the positivity!

First of all, I had one of the most genuine gut laughs when I got the decree that ups your fire rate after every shot, pure fire rate bliss.

Duviri? Gorgeous.

Music? Gorgeous.

Undercroft? Gorgeous.

Quest Givers? Gorgeous.

Me? I look tight as hell.

I really enjoyed the story, I loved how they tied in The New War to Duviri. The monologues from my edge lord Drifter hit that campy sweet spot.

I haven't gotten to play more since beating the story but I'm chompin' at the bits for more of jumping between Duviri and Undercroft.

I like Drifter combat, the lock-on is janky but I don't really need it.

The Dax being a part of the Undercroft was needed, I love their design and gameplay with both Drifter and Warframe.

They brought in the damn herding mini game from Twilight Princess, surprisingly easier thankfully.

Teshin was great, I'm glad we finally have both Space Mom and Dad back, they just are separated and live in different planes of reality. It's fine, that means we get 2 Tennobaums each year now, right?

I like how they're handling Steelpath, if you want to run it, you most likely will need to own the randomized equipment to buff it. It feels like it's an incentive to own and mod every weapon/frame that I can. It's also nice we can level up the items if they appear in Duviri.

Overall, this is turning into one of my favorite updates so far. I must be the target audience because I've been deeply enjoying what the New Heads are putting out.

I just have 1 big question from my fellow Tenno. How do I rename my Kaithe?

[Slayer-.]

Just finished the Quest not one bug in sight, very impressed so far.

Lovin how the horse feels so smooth, fighting with the Operator is so fluid and smooth as well.

It just feels so fluid on my old PC, I looked up the date I built this i5 computer and the same operating system I installed after building it has been running on this computer since the year 2013 non stop.

Edit: To add 
In the Quest I used the frame I started the game with originally which was Mag and used the Lex, Boltor and Kronen.

[Veridian]

47 minutes ago, TeaHands said:

I just have 1 big question from my fellow Tenno. How do I rename my Kaithe?

You unlock it as an intrinsic.

 

1 hour ago, (PSN)robotwars7 said:

probably the only real miss here for me: the lock-on is janky and while it works for one or two enemies, it's unhelpful when dealing with the rather common 6v1 situation with the Dax, all locking on does is make it so I can't see the Dax that will kill me. 

I'll be honest, I've ignored lock on in any game that offered it unless some further mechanic was behind it. Maybe that's why I'm not too bothered with the combat.

 

I myself am wondering if SP and reg Duviri have different rewards (circuit aside)

[KernelWizard]

I don't know man, I'm a relatively new player and wasn't expecting anything (didn't watch any of the trailers either to be more surprised/ excited when the real thing come), and I still do not like a some of the stuffs, especially the Undercroft portions. The flying horses were damn awesome though, although I can't seem to name mine for some reason. 

 

Edit: Oh damn it's an intrinsic huh. Gotta wait a while then. 

[TeaHands]

10 minutes ago, Veridian said:

You unlock it as an intrinsic.

Ohhhhhh thank you lol. I didn't bother looking at him, I saw I could get more options for weapons and jumped at that intrinsic.

[ReddyDisco]

The only thing that bugs me about the update are the bugs, circuit breaking after 3rd round, random crashes.  

[Veridian]

38 minutes ago, TeaHands said:

Ohhhhhh thank you lol. I didn't bother looking at him, I saw I could get more options for weapons and jumped at that intrinsic.

Did the same, would make SP circuit easier and it gives access to the arcane from the vendor and I always max any arcanes DE add, useless or not, so that's gonna make it easier on me.

Honestly, will upgrade horse last probably.

[(PSN)robotwars7]

10 hours ago, Veridian said:

I myself am wondering if SP and reg Duviri have different rewards (circuit aside)

can confirm after my latest session they do: you get +5 Steel Essence and +15 Pathos clamps, compared to 10 pathos clamps on normal.

honestly though, considering the amount of additional effort required (much tougher drifter combat, added mechanics to the Orowyrm fight, etc.) it's arguably a lot faster to just farm normal mode. in the time it takes to do 1 SP Orowyrm bounty, you could probably do 2 normal ones. up to you of course, but me personally, i'm sticklng to Normal mode for wyrms and Steel Path for The Circuit. I might do SP Orowyrms once I have most/all of the Drifter Intrinsics under my belt.

 

[Veridian]

16 minutes ago, (PSN)robotwars7 said:

can confirm after my latest session they do: you get +5 Steel Essence and +15 Pathos clamps, compared to 10 pathos clamps on normal.

honestly though, considering the amount of additional effort required (much tougher drifter combat, added mechanics to the Orowyrm fight, etc.) it's arguably a lot faster to just farm normal mode. in the time it takes to do 1 SP Orowyrm bounty, you could probably do 2 normal ones. up to you of course, but me personally, i'm sticklng to Normal mode for wyrms and Steel Path for The Circuit. I might do SP Orowyrms once I have most/all of the Drifter Intrinsics under my belt.

 

Thanks for the advice. I might do the same.