Can we take a look at the Archon Shard removal cost?

[MobyTheDuck]

Alternative title: "Please remove the removal cost."

50% bile to remove one shard is insanity. Not only its the most annoying Helminth resource, the feeding efficiency drop makes so you can feasibly remove one shard each 2 or 3 days.

We only get two per week, at most, yet it has a prohibitive cost to make you think twice before adding one and think thrice before removing it.

It stifles creativity, experimentation, and therefore, fun. Its like if mods had a credits/endo cost you had to pay any time you wanted to move or unequip them.
Instead of trying different builds, people just will minmax or copy whatever the meta is.

You added 5 reds and now wants one blue? 50% bile gone. Oh, you regretted getting that one blue and decided to replace it by one yellow? 50% more bile.
But now your bile efficiency is red, you can waste most of your resources to get 50% bile, farm a bunch of sentient cores and gems to put it back to green, or wait 2 days to recharge the efficiency.

[Birdframe_Prime]

This again? People? Search for like-minded threads, or you're all going to get merged and lost in the shuffle.

So, just to be clear:

1 hour ago, MobyTheDuck said:

it has a prohibitive cost to make you think twice before adding one and think thrice before removing it

This is entirely intentional.

The cost is in place to purposefully slow you down, make you grind, and do your dilligence.

It's absolutely supposed to make you think about, and plan, your Shard build before you install it. By the point that you have access to Shards, and enough of them to be 'creative', you know what these changes are going to do for your build, you can predict the result. You can be creative by theorising what the results will be and starting the build with more caution.

The way to prevent regrets is to think about things for longer before you just slap the resource on your frame and hope it works.

This isn't 'modding' the way you've been doing it for the entire game so far. This is, and I will go back to the idea that incepted this; a semi-permanent buff system that's independent of modding as a reward for going to higher level content.

You're asking for creativity?

Nah, you're asking for freedom from the consequences of the oopsie you made by not being creative enough.

[MobyTheDuck]

On 2023-10-07 at 4:43 AM, Birdframe_Prime said:

The cost is in place to purposefully slow you down, make you grind, and do your dilligence.

It's absolutely supposed to make you think about, and plan, your Shard build before you install it. By the point that you have access to Shards, and enough of them to be 'creative', you know what these changes are going to do for your build, you can predict the result. You can be creative by theorising what the results will be and starting the build with more caution.

What "diligence"?

Diligence being just copying stuff?
I can't "predict" anything otherwise I would be playing the lotto. I have to either assume how the stats work (additive? multiplicative? do they stack? do they change the base? how much of a difference will 15% strength do?) or look for people that already experimented with it.
I don't want to research for stuff I could be doing and having fun with it.

I can be "creative" and try a running kick build for fun. The game doesn't goes "hah, now pay up to change your build".

I can be "creative" with a "theorized" build, play a low level mission and see it sucks, then change it a bit for next run until I find the perfect spot.

On 2023-10-07 at 4:43 AM, Birdframe_Prime said:

This isn't 'modding' the way you've been doing it for the entire game so far. This is, and I will go back to the idea that incepted this; a semi-permanent buff system that's independent of modding as a reward for going to higher level content.

What. "Semi-permanent buff system"? That is literally EVERY slot system in the game.

We have shard slots. We have shard stuff we put in these slots. Putting shard stuff in these slots gives a semi-permanent buff.
We have arcane slots. We have arcane stuff we put in these slots. Putting arcane stuff in these slots gives a semi-permanent buff.
We have mods slots. We have mod stuff. Putting mod stuff in these slots gives a semi-permanent buff.

They are basically the same, at a different scale.

On 2023-10-07 at 4:43 AM, Birdframe_Prime said:

You're asking for creativity?

Nah, you're asking for freedom from the consequences of the oopsie you made by not being creative enough.

What do you mean, "not being creative"? How can I even BE creative knowing that if I have ONE regret will drain me half of my resource?

And consequences of what?

The consequence of deciding maybe 15% duration would be better than 15% strength?
The consequence of deciding to have fun for once and see what would happen with a certain combination?
The consequence of not watching people that have suffered through the system to find the "safe meta"?

That's it? That's all it is? I want to be creative and try something, but I can't otherwise I have to be punished for it? So its better to just copy whatever "works" instead of being "creative"?

Talking about being "creative" though, remember arcanes?
They were also "a semi-permanent buff system that's independent of modding as a reward for going to higher level content." (Trials, then Eidolons)
Remember when we had to be "creative" with them? Remember how everyone just used the same 3 or 4 arcanes because every other was a waste or worthless?

Remember when you had to put them in your syandana and helmet? Permanently? So you had to think about the frame it would use AND your fashion beforehand?
Then much later they added an item to remove said arcanes at a high resource cost (100k syndicate standing)?
Remember how they changed so the arcane remover had infinite uses?
Remember how they reworked the entire arcane system to work more like mods?

Its the same timeline. I just want them to make it end faster.

[Birdframe_Prime]

4 hours ago, MobyTheDuck said:

What "diligence"?

Diligence being just copying stuff?

If you don't have the creativity to do any theory-crafting beyond just copying stuff?

Then this thread is really, really set up on false pretenses...

[MobyTheDuck]

1 hour ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

If you don't have the creativity to do any theory-crafting beyond just copying stuff?

Then this thread is really, really set up on false pretenses...

You seriously ignored everything I wrote and got only that as a "gotcha"?

Just tell me, how I can be creative based on assumptions of a mechanic I never used nor know how it works, without looking at what other players did? What is YOUR "theory-crafting"? Give me an example of a system with the same behavior.

Also, you mentioned "This is entirely intentional.", which made me think, what do think it means "intentional" on this game? And please don't say its "whatever the devs say it is", because let me tell you something, if you played as much as I did, you would know what most of the current mechanics were not intentional.

If we were playing the "intentional" Warframe, we would still be walking around with a stamina system. Primes would be just reskins. Companions would be useless.

Just think about how many systems were "intended" and got replaced or reworked. Stamina, movement, Railjack, Archwing, several frames, focus. Hell, we are getting a companion update in a few days that will completely change the way they work, companions that years ago you had to purchase and use items almost daily to keep them in top shape, otherwise they would be LITERALLY deleted.

Yes, you can ignore everything I said if you want and grasp at straws on some insane argument. Again, all I want is to be able to remove a shard without having to pay a cost.

This wouldn't make them more common or more powerful. You still would need to play Kahl and Archons to get shards. You still would need to get lucky to get a Tauforged. You still can only get two per week. You would still need to properly build and mod your frames. Shards would still be complements to your build.

The system would literally be the same. The only thing that would change is ONE resource/time sink.

[Voltage]

On 10/7/2023 at 3:43 AM, Birdframe_Prime said:

This again? People? Search for like-minded threads, or you're all going to get merged and lost in the shuffle.

So, just to be clear:

This is entirely intentional.

The cost is in place to purposefully slow you down, make you grind, and do your dilligence.

It's absolutely supposed to make you think about, and plan, your Shard build before you install it. By the point that you have access to Shards, and enough of them to be 'creative', you know what these changes are going to do for your build, you can predict the result. You can be creative by theorising what the results will be and starting the build with more caution.

The way to prevent regrets is to think about things for longer before you just slap the resource on your frame and hope it works.

This isn't 'modding' the way you've been doing it for the entire game so far. This is, and I will go back to the idea that incepted this; a semi-permanent buff system that's independent of modding as a reward for going to higher level content.

You're asking for creativity?

Nah, you're asking for freedom from the consequences of the oopsie you made by not being creative enough.

Archon Shard removal cost is Arcane Distillers all over again. Having any cost above 0% is quite frankly stupid, and there's precedence to support that. 

Archon Shards are just mods, just like Arcanes. That's how they are treated. Archon Shards are fundamentally 5 Arcane Helmet slots if we really want to give a fair comparison.

Edited October 8, 2023 by Voltage

[(XBOX)K1jker]

Yeah it's ridiculous, lost over 100k cryotic over it, and more.. and that by only testing *some* stuff, not all.

Hope they do a refund when they change it tbh, getting punished for experimenting is never a good thing. 

I suggested to change which category is being consumed every 24 hours, so that there's no waiting longer than a day.

But of course I wouldn't mind if the cost gets removed entirely. 

Edited October 9, 2023 by (XBOX)K1jker

[Birdframe_Prime]

18 hours ago, MobyTheDuck said:

You seriously ignored everything I wrote and got only that as a "gotcha"?

I did. Because I'm not changing your mind here. What? You think that anyone on the Forums ever actually says 'Oh, you're right, I guess I was making a fuss over nothing?' And would you?

These aren't my opinions. They're just what's happening.

You aren't going to 'speed up the process' here.

As much as people compare them to the Arcanes and the Arcane Distillers. Arcane Distillers only came about because DE put in no method of removing Arcanes in the first place.

DE have put in a method for removing these. They're going to call it done and move on for another four years.

I'm not saying that everything that's intentional from DE is good and great and we should all praise DE. I'm tired, jaded and know that DE have reached the point where they believe they're past the mistakes they made in the original game, and the progress through it to current day. They think that what they've done is enough, and prove this with every year they go on without updating much, much older content that needs much, much more attention than Archon Shard costs.

Come back in two or three if they do it early and necro the thread to laugh at me if you'd like.

[MobyTheDuck]

54 minutes ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

I did. Because I'm not changing your mind here. What? You think that anyone on the Forums ever actually says 'Oh, you're right, I guess I was making a fuss over nothing?' And would you?

These aren't my opinions. They're just what's happening.

Fair enough, I guess. I honestly was trying to understand your point of view, but like you said, I guess you are just jaded.

Players gotta voice their opinion and feedback though. With Reb and Pablo at the wheel we are getting changes that were LONG asked, compared to the decade with Steve.

Maybe if more people talked about the systems you think deserve change, we would get them eventually. Remember when they unveiled the IPS changes that would ship with Khora and the feedback was so overwhelmingly negative that they shelved the entire thing?

[quxier]

On 2023-10-07 at 9:43 AM, Birdframe_Prime said:

You're asking for creativity?

Nah, you're asking for freedom from the consequences of the oopsie you made by not being creative enough.

Experimenting makes creative process much smoother. Sure, you can do spreadsheets, write all those stuff. However that's "harder". You may not know everything nor internet may not have it. What I'm doing when I want to experiment? I just change things. I got -1.4 range melee Riven (with 0.35 range). I thought to myself: "how can I make it work?". Primed reach were obvious answer so I wanted something less obvious. I've picked Kullero's ability and it worked (afair). I've found some mod set with lifted explosion. I've put it in and I've tried in mission. It was bad. I had Naramon on, so I've tried dashing. Works fine in missions (finishers). All of those without cost. If I have to pay for every thing I would just NOT do it. I like Kullervo's Helminth ability. I've tried probably 1/2 of frames. I've done my research for potential candidates but lots of thing had to be tested. However cost of infusing abilities makes my tests very slow.

Removing those costs are obvious ways but we can do both (keep cost & aid experimenting). Let's us just use Simulacrum for that purpose (borrow mods/Archons, temporally infuse Helminth abilities without cost etc).

[(PSN)Joylesstuna]

You can do a lot of fun stuff with the shards and the costs only stifle enjoyment. Agree with looking at removal cost.

Edited October 9, 2023 by (PSN)Joylesstuna

[Qriist]

No.

[Voltage]

8 hours ago, Birdframe_Prime said:

As much as people compare them to the Arcanes and the Arcane Distillers. Arcane Distillers only came about because DE put in no method of removing Arcanes in the first place.

And Arcane Distillers got removed because it was silly to have Arcanes have a cost for removal. There was nothing stopping DE from importing the functionality of Distillers into Arcane slots, yet they didn't, because they are aware that the limitation is silly. 

It's especially egregious when Archon Shard bonuses are locked to every config for the Warframe it's installed on when this issue has already been addressed within Helminth for subsumed abilities per config. 

The cost is especially steep when you compare removing a 10% strength bonus from a Crimson Shard to the cost of infusing Roar. Sure, these aren't apples to apples in terms of bonus effect, but the nature of installing an effective mod has always put the cost in a reasonable fashion. Asking players 50% bile per Shard is asinine and achieves nothing positive for the experience. It only shoehorns players further into taking meta choices like Casting Speed and ignoring experimentation with breakpoints and other builds, especially with the config issue I outlined above.

Edited October 10, 2023 by Voltage

[Qriist]

50 minutes ago, Voltage said:

And Arcane Distillers got removed because it was silly to have Arcanes have a cost for removal.

I wasn't around for Arcane Distillers. At that time, were Arcanes "consumable" in the same way Archon Shards currently are? That is, did using a particular Arcane remove it from the inventory, making it unable to be equipped on other frames until the Distiller was used?

[Voltage]

23 hours ago, Qriist said:

I wasn't around for Arcane Distillers. At that time, were Arcanes "consumable" in the same way Archon Shards currently are? That is, did using a particular Arcane remove it from the inventory, making it unable to be equipped on other frames until the Distiller was used?

Not only that, but your Arcane was attached to a specific Warframe's Helmet or a general Syandana.

Edited October 11, 2023 by Voltage

[MobyTheDuck]

12 hours ago, Qriist said:

I wasn't around for Arcane Distillers. At that time, were Arcanes "consumable" in the same way Archon Shards currently are? That is, did using a particular Arcane remove it from the inventory, making it unable to be equipped on other frames until the Distiller was used?

Arcanes were rewards from the old trials, you could get only 3 per week, but they had fewer levels and you could equip two of the same.

They were trying to expand the retired "Arcane Helmet" system, so you had to install the Arcane on your Syandana and Helmet. Not only that was permanent (for a while), you also had to keep in mind your fashion and which frame would get the arcane.

Way later, they added a single use remover for 100k (later 50k, I think) syndicate points. Later, they made the remover infinite use as they were preparing to rework the Arcane system, which is what we got now, where they act like mods.

[Tiltskillet]

I'd love it if the cost were removed entirely.  But on the assumption that DE wants to keep this as some sort of resource sink, I'll say what I always do:  Most of what's punishing about it is it's all Bile.  Make it a spread of 3 secretions, based on the distributions we already have for ability injection.  It can even be a larger total resource sink than it is now and still allow more flexibility.

Other QoLs I'd suggest that don't remove resource cost (not necessarily all of these together):

Allow us to clear all the shards for some reasonable cost. (Or create a new consumable reward that does this.)

Allow keeping the color but changing the affix on a shard for 0 cost.

Allow switching an installed shard with the tau version for 0 cost.

 

On 2023-10-06 at 10:58 PM, MobyTheDuck said:

You added 5 reds and now wants one blue? 50% bile gone. Oh, you regretted getting that one blue and decided to replace it by one yellow? 50% more bile.

"You want to replace the yellow with a tau yellow you were so excited to get?  Sorry, that's still 50% Bile!"

[Birdframe_Prime]

23 hours ago, MobyTheDuck said:

Fair enough, I guess. I honestly was trying to understand your point of view, but like you said, I guess you are just jaded.

Players gotta voice their opinion and feedback though.

That I am, with reason, though.

There are some topics that simply don't get any traction regardless of the amount of player feedback. The only thing that matters to things like this is either the much-more public feedback that happens from content creators simultaneously all commenting on the same issue, or the more functional feedback of players actually using things. Or not.

For example, a really good example, Chroma's Spectral Scream. DE saw that it was the, and I mean the, number 1 removed ability with Helminth. So what was their answer? It wasn't to buff the ability, that's for sure. They did buff Chroma by allowing him to change elements within mission, but they could just as easily put that cycle onto Elemental Ward instead (as in, put the elemental change onto the elemental reliant ability), and instead they wanted people to stop taking off Spectral Scream and so they put the elemental cycle onto there.

Until DE functionally change how Spectral Scream deals its minor damage and applies its effects, the only reason to not remove it for Helminth is if you want that cycling in mission, now, where before there wasn't any reason at all.

DE have these things that they put in, and rather than make a change that players are actually asking for, they wait until their internal stats show that there's a problem and then they change something tangentially related to make the problem go away.

So all we're likely to get in the future, if anything, with this problem is something like 'lowered the unit cost of resources that generate Bile'. 

[Fred_Avant_2019]

Probably had to move some shards about 15 times already, still not making a dent in my resources, though that probably comes from the fact I've had a bad habit of spamming Railjack. Still got about a million pustrels dormant in my inventory, but those aren't accessible anymore since 2021. I still wait for Infested Proxima and their reintroduction.

 

The cost is probably a huge deal when you still have stuff to farm for in this game, but so is the Helminth system in general.

Wether the cost stays or goes doesn't really matter to me, but I'm more likely to understand why people would want to see it go. Or at least lowered.

[Tiltskillet]

2 minutes ago, Fred_Avant_2019 said:

Still got about a million pustrels dormant in my inventory, but those aren't accessible anymore since 2021.

Ah ha, players like you are probably the reason DE made this cost Bile. :P

[(PSN)jaggerwanderer]

20 minutes ago, Fred_Avant_2019 said:

Probably had to move some shards about 15 times already, still not making a dent in my resources, though that probably comes from the fact I've had a bad habit of spamming Railjack. Still got about a million pustrels dormant in my inventory, but those aren't accessible anymore since 2021. I still wait for Infested Proxima and their reintroduction.

 

The cost is probably a huge deal when you still have stuff to farm for in this game, but so is the Helminth system in general.

Wether the cost stays or goes doesn't really matter to me, but I'm more likely to understand why people would want to see it go. Or at least lowered.

Mostly this really. Those that complain about the Bile cost seems to be MR11 or so. In the mid range of Mastery Rank. A point in a person's warframe career where everything is needed but not enough time to gather it all. Like needing Forma to craft weapons instead of using it to polarize mod slots.

[MobyTheDuck]

5 hours ago, (PSN)jaggerwanderer said:

Mostly this really. Those that complain about the Bile cost seems to be MR11 or so. In the mid range of Mastery Rank. A point in a person's warframe career where everything is needed but not enough time to gather it all. Like needing Forma to craft weapons instead of using it to polarize mod slots.

No, not really.

Spoiler

I can refill the bile more than a thousand times if I wanted to. The cost isn't the main point, its barrier of just swapping A for B.

Like Arcane Distillers, it has no business existing and won't change the system. Removable Arcanes didn't made them more common.

The cost is nothing more than a time/cost annoyance that doesn't improves anything and can be easily removed without causing any damage.

Its not asking to build forma more often, its not asking to make Helminth skill changes free, its not even asking for something that will affect DE's finances since anything related to shards and Helminth resources are untradable and not being sold on the market.

Its all about changing one cost to 0.

[Tiltskillet]

5 hours ago, (PSN)jaggerwanderer said:

Mostly this really. Those that complain about the Bile cost seems to be MR11 or so. In the mid range of Mastery Rank. A point in a person's warframe career where everything is needed but not enough time to gather it all. Like needing Forma to craft weapons instead of using it to polarize mod slots.

Yeah, that definitely describes Voltage.

[Qriist]

2 hours ago, MobyTheDuck said:

The cost is nothing more than a time/cost annoyance that doesn't improves anything and can be easily removed without causing any damage.

Resource sinks are an incentive to play certain content you might not otherwise. From a game designer perspective they are quite important.

From my own personal aesthetic point of view, I really like how the (fairly insignificant) cost adds to the feeling of meaningful permanence in our gear choices - something that only the act of polarization touches on. After all, we're literally shoving alien tech -that we weren't designed around - straight into our bodies. There should be a cost.

 

8 hours ago, Fred_Avant_2019 said:

Probably had to move some shards about 15 times already, still not making a dent in my resources, though that probably comes from the fact I've had a bad habit of spamming Railjack.

Seriously, this guy gets it.

Railjack nets you multiple Bile resources passively while you farm many other items at once. Do Void Storms to crack relics every now and again and you'll be good to go.

[Fred_Avant_2019]

Il y a 1 heure, Qriist a dit :

Railjack nets you multiple Bile resources passively while you farm many other items at once. Do Void Storms to crack relics every now and again and you'll be good to go.

Ticor Plates 270k (These are what replaced my million Pustrels)
Cryotic 51k
Isos 20k

Those three are all resources you get in excess by just blowing stuff up RJ. On top of that, Voidstorms will also bring about parts of the Epitaph that you can trade for, whole ass Radiant Relics, and the cherry on top is that with a premade that knows what to do, grineer skirmishes can be completed within the span of 3 minutes, sometimes even as fast as a minute and a half. I understand some people despise the gamemode, but it's some of the most efficient ones out there when you need a little bit of everything.

 

And well, it's not even just Bile that RJ is good at filling :

2M Titanium and Carbides for Oxydes.
Nearly 1M Cubic Diodes, 100k Asterite and over 7k Nullstones for Calx.
13k Komms, 1k Aucrux Capacitors for Synthetics.

 

Biotics are taken care of by Itzal spamming 3 in Deimos.
Pheromones are all resources you can acquire doing stuff against the infested faction usually.

 

That being said I do play an excessive and unhealthy amount, so I can understand why people don't have as many resources to burn.