prime frames VS normal frame cost.

[SDGDen]

to preface this: this is an opinion piece that many players will probably hate me for, nevertheless i believe it may be good to discuss this.

 

i think we can all agree that prime frames are generally a straight upgrade, maybe some shieldgate fans dont like certain primes for their increased base shields but in general, they're straight upgrades.

this suggests they *should* be more expensive to build than the regular frame.

and that used to be the case. lets look at rhino prime vs normal rhino:


rhino - rhino prime
150 alloy plate - 150 alloy plate
2 morphics - 4 morphics
800 rubedo - 750 rubedo
600 plastids - 900 plastids
500 salvage - 0 salvage
150 polymer bundle - 150 polymer bundle
2 gallium - 0 gallium
1K ferrite - 1500 ferrite
0 orokin cells - 3 orokin cells
0 neural sensors - 2 neural sensors
0 control modules - 3 control modules

now of course, rhino may be a bit unfair since he's relatively early game, but the difference actually becomes bigger when we look at for example mirage vs her prime
 

mirage - mirage prime

1 argon - 2 argon
250 alloy plate -  26K alloy plate
3 orokin catalysts - 5 orokin catalysts
1 neurode - 5 neurodes
2500 ferrite - 18K ferrite
1050 polymer - 2.5K polymer
450 plastids - 0 plastids
1 gallium - 0 gallium
1 control module - 10 control module
250 circuits -  0 circuits
0 rubedo - 4.5K rubedo
0 salvage - 23K salvage
0 nitain - 2 nitain
0 morphics - 20 morphics
0 oxium - 350 oxium

as you can see, primes are more expensive than their normal counterpart. except here's where the issue comes in, lets now take baruuk, a much more modern frame. compared to base mirage and base rhino, baruuk is relatively "modern" and thus has much more strange components than base starchart materials:

baruuk:
1 orokin cell
3 sola toroids
3 vega toroids
3 calda toroids
150 hespazym alloy
5 synathid ecosynth analyzer
5 marquiste thyst
5 radiant zodian
10 tromyzon entroplasma
2850 alloy plate
3250 salvage
2500 ferrite

meanwhile, baruuk prime ONLY uses base starchart materials, and not even that many of them. ignoring common materials since they're easy he requires a mere 2 nitain, 2 argon, 5 gallium, 2 tellurium, 5 orokin cells and 8 neurodes.

ON TOP OF THAT

baruuk prime can be obtained as soon as you're able to do void fissures.

normal baruuk requires you to get to rank 5 with solaris united and then rank up vox solaris (unless you take the duviri route)

 

the reason for this is that prime frames have kept largely the same recipes that they had when the game launched, while modern frames require all sorts of new exotic resources (depending on what they launched with). the most recent frame that DIDNT have any non-"basegame" starchart items in their recipe was HARROW. and that's assuming kuva is counted as a starchart item (and even then, harrow prime is significantly easier to build than harrow)
 

and on top of all that, many regular frames are locked behind quests, some of which have MR requirements (for example the silver grove is MR5 locked). meanwhile, a newbie can just... go grab titania prime, maybe a friend trades it to them so they dont even have to grind for it. 

the biggest upgrade modern primes give is in their ease of aquisition, but should that really be the case?

 

in my opinion? no. no it shouldnt. primes *should* be the upgrade, either A: they should require the normal frame components to be built (on top of prime stuff) or B: the prime part blueprints should have the same resource requirements as the normal blueprint but in higher amounts. if base hildryn needs you to fight the profit taker, so should hildryn prime. 

 

[o0Despair0o]

2 minutes ago, SDGDen said:

this suggests they *should* be more expensive to build than the regular frame.

The argon RNG is more than enough.

It's not like they're isekai protagonist-levels of overpowered compared to their non-prime counterpart. Only difference is some mild increases to certain base stats and altered polarities.

 

And then one might argue about the platinum costs if we're talking trade.

[trst]

I don't see what the benefit would be even from a balancing perspective.

All resources, especially basic ones, become overly abundant to all players eventually so making Primes more expensive doesn't actually do anything other than making them slightly harder for new players to get. And making them require the base frame parts just tacks on an extra grind layer that's unnecessary since all players are going to want both copies in the first place due to both counting for mastery.

[PollexMessier]

Well. There are some potential lore related issue to making primes require certain materials that wouldn't have existed until after the Orokin were removed from power.

You do kindof have a point that prime frames should logically be more expensive tho.

But also, gtfo. Don't give the devs any ideas when it comes to making the game even grindier than it already is.

[(PSN)slightconfuzzled]

I'm glad you mentioned this, because it actually reminds me of my own issues regarding this, and its this... if this is the future, and our Foundry could replicate things, then we should only ever need just one resource. So OP's point is moot, and my own point supersedes it, because actually, Rhino, Baruuk, Mirage, normal or Prime or otherwise, should only ever cost one resource, of anything, and further costs should be eliminated, because the Foundry should be futuristic enough just to make the resource again. Therefore whichever of a Warframe you create first should be the most expensive, with the Prime or normal being cheaper unless it requires a resource you have yet to collect. Not only that, but as time goes by, since many Warframe use the same materials and resources, many would be basically free. 

Also, you should be able to use the Foundry to make a bigger Foundry. Why are we creating the a head, chassis, systems etc, instead of the whole thing at once. You should be making the whole thing in one go. Also you shouldn't be allowed to have a regular version and a Prime at the same time, the Prime as the bigger of the two, should always vore/consume the smaller counterpart to grow bigger and stronger. 

Also Warframes health, shield, armour, energy totals should always be 1000 exactly, or rounded to the nearest hundred at the least. 

Another thing now that you mention it, that doesn't make a whole lot of sense is that... **continues for 2 hours**. 

I get what you mean though, but I don't think anyone would actually hate you for such opinions. Not seriously at least, its more likely to just get shrug reactions. Like, I like Profit Taker, but the idea that players should have to expend themselves more because someone thinks it makes "more sense" that way, in a sci fi future setting war ninja game is... Reminds me a bit of a player a few years ago, who thought Prime Warframes being rarer should be way harder to get. Imagine if Equionix Prime required as many Prime components as regular. Imagine Grendels missions, but they are set to Steel Path plus made harder in other ways, but you are still limited. Imagine of Chroma Prime required Prime parts of others too... Seems almost antagonistic. 

[BroDutt]

2 hours ago, SDGDen said:

in my opinion? no. no it shouldnt. primes *should* be the upgrade, either A: they should require the normal frame components to be built (on top of prime stuff) or B: the prime part blueprints should have the same resource requirements as the normal blueprint but in higher amounts. if base hildryn needs you to fight the profit taker, so should hildryn prime. 

Fissure is another GRIND RNG for some player. Compare to those material for normal WF that can be farm easily.

Trading Prime part require PLATINUM (vaulted or extremely Rare/Axi relic part), another cost that you forget.

[Hypernaut1]

I don't know about all that, but as a new player i felt like Prime frames should've used my regular mastered frame as part of crafting. I wanted to "upgrade" my favorite frame instead of replacing it. 

[Aruquae]

I think they tried to do that with Vauban, Nekros, and Trinity Prime, but it seems they backed away from that

Hmmm I wonder why…

[(PSN)robotwars7]

On 2023-11-27 at 6:15 AM, SDGDen said:

this is an opinion piece that many players will probably hate me for,

I wouldn't say "hate", but do you REALLY think people would want to go through the absolute agony of Toroid farming for Baruuk Prime: I can tell you now, nobody deserves that. having offered my services to new/returning players recently, I've ended up confronting the awful drop chances of resources that I can now take for Granted. safe to say it's been quite the wake up call for me, and I appreciate my stockpiles a lot more now.

your proposition is logical, but you go farm Toroids or whatever WITHOUT a Nekros like a newbie would, and you tell me if you think it's fun: even if it doesn't change your mind, it'll give you something to think about.

[0_The_F00l]

I get where OP is coming from , and i do feel it slightly makes players that have grinded for the original feel a bit ...  Slighted ?

Like how a younger sibling easily gets something you had to do multiple chores to get years ago (and the new thing is definitely much better).

But then again you also have the advantage of using said frame for that amount of time along with the memories that went with it.

So it isn't that unfair ,though it can make the experience a little bit bitter , 

back in my day you had to have keys and go through multiple towers and you couldn't even influence the kind of primes you got , we also had to go uphill both ways to and from school and sell arcanes for hundreds of plat.

[(PSN)Unstar]

On 2023-11-26 at 10:15 PM, SDGDen said:

i think we can all agree that prime frames are generally a straight upgrade, maybe some shieldgate fans dont like certain primes for their increased base shields but in general, they're straight upgrades.

Shield-gating mechanics were changed a month or two ago so that more base shields is an advantage for shield-gating as opposed to a disadvantage.