Another set of Nemesis weapons, another "Refusing to stab Nemesis" thread

[Voltage]

Greetings. My feedback over the years has been the same. If a player refuses to stab their Nemesis (which is totally fine), everyone else in the squad should benefit Murmur progress besides the person refusing.

If you're going public, you're expecting to benefit from other players spawning and attempting their Nemesis Requiem combination. Other players expect the same from you. If you wish to reap the rewards from others but not give them the same, then others should be given rewarded progress while you refuse to attempt a combination.

The game directly encourages sharing Nemesis attempts, and refusing to stab robs other players of progress they would have otherwise earned from a cooperative teammate. A player has every right to choose how to engage with Nemeses, but a selfish choice shouldn't negatively affect other players' progression. That is all.

Previous topics on the issue:

I'll keep writing this thread every time it's relevant again. It's getting really old that this has not been addressed to have a reasonable solution.

[MobyTheDuck]

tfw you are the only one in the squad to stab the bungholio because everyone else "wants to keep it low level" or "wants to fill all three ciphers before trying once", expecting everyone but them to stab the lich.

The third worst kind of player in the game, under people that join public relics and leave if no one is running the one they want and "8x3" eidolon speedrunner toxic elitists.

[Fred_Avant_2019]

Personally I instastab for two reasons :

1. I get to know my combination faster.
2. Even if it ranks up, it's still a oneshot from my Kuva Hek's alt fire.

Why people do not instastab is beyond my understanding. I can only guess they've had incorrect knowledge shoved down onto them by mediocre popular content creators who adviced to do so. Literally nothing in-game tells you to NOT stab your lich. This sort of bad behavior has to be inherited somehow, it's completely unnatural.

 

[(PSN)slightconfuzzled]

I don't disagree with the general premise of what I just generally assume is asking for improvements. I do disagree a little with the framing of selfish actions though, because of game theory. Though you'd also generally have to come to certain common agreements as well. To quickly demonstrate though, you put 4 people into the situation. They all believe that a certain act, is what will benefit the group most, and a different act exists as a possibility, the one they consider most beneficial to themselves. It could be considered selfish, if they then pursue that option, with the belief they will benefit more and the others less so. However there is a bit of complexity, nuance, in the sense that, all 4 may want a certain act, not just for themselves, but for the others as well, to also choose that act for themselves. Then its not actually selfish. It could be considered that, if there is one of the four, that believes the other act, that will benefit all, is the selfless act, and they choose it, and the others choose the selfish act, but that would be perception, and not necessarily reflective or indicative of actual general gain, net gain, positive outcomes. 

This is important and relevant to Liches and Murmur progress stabbing, because for many faster completions are preferred. Then depending on how you are playing... Like if you are alone going into PUGs, their is an RNG element. Since their are many cases where holding off a stab can be faster for an individual, the perception of it being faster for the group or majority, only works, if the consequences of not stabbing across a broader pattern hold up as being accurate or true. Except its not. At least to my current bets understanding. To my best understanding there are two many variables to say definitively one way or another without disregarding certain elements that shouldn't be disregarded. Like as an example, you might go into a PUG, and its your very first mission after getting your Lich. Their appearance will be relatively least likely, but you might be grouped with 3 other players who have already done 2 or 3 missions... so their Lich is relatively likely to appear, and they may also already have their first Requiem known... Basically there is little to no incentive for them to not stab. Your progress is boosted considerably. That being said, if you load into 3 randoms who are also on their first mission... So thats a huge difference and variable to consider. Then if you revisit the earlier scenario but adjust it a little, in that one of the people not on their first mission, maybe their second or third, they do find out their Requiem in the mission, but their Lich appears... Some peoples perception is that they should stab anyway, for the benefit of the group... Sure, but is that actually accurate? 1. Their personal progress will likely be faster if they don't stab, find out the Requiem, then stab next opportunity. 2. That applies to all individuals, in that exact context. 3. Its not a 4 player game, people who they pair with in the next mission will benefit when they do eventually stab, improving their murmur progress. Maybe not the original 3, but 3 none the less. 4. If people are ever in the situation of 1. themselves, they will also benefit. Its easy to extract that therefore, despite the potential for seeming selfish, its not actually (well not including certain other variables which could potentially apply). 

Like their are optimal ways to speed up the progress, like if you don't PUB, you do a premade coordinated team, that sticks together, and if they have excess of Oull and those Beacons that force spawn a Lich, and you carefully select certain missions. There are also absurd patterns, since some mission types are far more popular than others. You go public and choose Disruption but no other players are there. Why? Well because they are all in Exterminate and Capture. Your Lich spawns, do you stab it despite not knowing the Requiem and no one else being around to get the progress? Or do you not stab, find out the Requiem, do a Capture/Exterminate since your Lich is angry and will have a higher chance of showing up, and there will likely be 3 other players, then stab it, speed up your own progress, as well as boost 3 others... because you delayed your stab? 

To be more blunt, I think some people get a little bit too wrapped up in accusing others of selfish behaviour just because they have a strong inclination to doing something a certain way, they think is optimal, and they sort of attached/conflated that way as being the obvious best/selfless common sense way, when its a bit more complicated. 

Also for transparency sake, my maths isn't the best, I usually know a bit more about game theory (and maths does help with that), but since there are certain variables, (like the one I spoke about), that based on my understanding, unless you are talking about specific controlled scenarios, there isn't really an outright best way to tell people as far as "always stabbing" or "discretionary stabbing" as far as overall group net benefits/positives. More so that sometimes you may be blessed by RNG, or denied such blessings (the few example I gave, being some of a few other variables).

Personally, since I have excess Oull, that Judgement Beacon that force spawns the Lich, I actually enjoy Lich missions, and don't mind if they take longer, and I have killed over 200 Nemesis, and even when taking it slow, I do it fast, I pretty much always stab, when in public, (well if no one else is in the mission, and I learn a Requiem mid way, I sometimes don't stab in that specific occasion, then I'll do a popular mission after and stab), but even though thats what I do... I strongly encourage others to just do whatever they want/prefer including discretionary stabbing. Its not really selfish (just actually down the Lich or try to, so other peoples can spawn too). I mean, in an objective and neutral sense. Peoples perceptions, including your own, are something else. 

[Numerounius]

There is a reason behind it. If you are going around making all these posts then you are absolutely aware of it. And there are reasons behind it that goes beyond reaping benefits from lich spawning.

[(PSN)Sentiel]

Voltage is right. It is perfectly fine and understandable when you do not want to stab your nemesis but the rest of the team should still get their murmur progressed when the nemesis despawns.

[Voltage]

14 hours ago, Numerounius said:

There is a reason behind it. If you are going around making all these posts then you are absolutely aware of it. And there are reasons behind it that goes beyond reaping benefits from lich spawning.

Okay, would you mind outlining this stated reasoning in writing that extends far beyond what I'm bringing up? I'm only aware of the reasoning for why you get shared progress (which was originally a bug that they removed, but then reinstated in Update 27.2 in 2020):

"Requiem Murmurs from failing a Kuva Lich Parazon stab will now again be shared with the entire squad!

If we take a trip down memory lane, we’ll arrive at The Old Blood: Hotfix Hotfix 26.0.5 (2019-11-06), where we fixed all players receiving Kuva Lich Requiem Murmur progress whenever someone in the squad failed to kill their Kuva Lich. Our intentions to have the Kuva Lich tied exclusively to the respective player were genuine, but the feedback has shone light on what is a worthwhile feature for the Kuva Lich system given its pace towards success. We have bigger plans for Liches for connecting them to other Systems, but this change is the only one ready for Mainline!"

My feedback is rooted in identifying the issue that persists beyond this initial change. If you're going to encourage squad participation, it should never be annoying or a bad time for someone because of how you chose to interact with the system. 

I could suggest a more punishing solution to players who refuse to stab, but I feel like this is the most polite way to address my concerns.

[KIREEK]

I think they don't stab because they believe it is better to stab later when they know the requiems, i don't blame them when you're 1st introduced to the system, it's new and you don't know that the order of the requiems is important. As such players will try stabbing the sister/lich and will realize that it will likely level up just from trying to guess the right order.

You also earn the "requiem exp" thingy by trying to fight the lish/sister so eventually you will realize that stabing from the get go is the best and most efficient way to get things going.

Best we can do is try and help the players with these concerns, but overall there is no need to be upset at someone not stabbing, it's a learning experience.

[Numerounius]

26 minutes ago, Voltage said:

Okay, would you mind outlining this stated reasoning in writing that extends far beyond what I'm bringing up?

Public is by far and away the most popular matchmaking mode to play Warframe. I'm not going to turn it off simply because I want to do an optimal lich strategy.

 

[Voltage]

3 hours ago, Numerounius said:

Public is by far and away the most popular matchmaking mode to play Warframe. I'm not going to turn it off simply because I want to do an optimal lich strategy.

You have yet to provide this "reasoning" DE has for why it functions this way.

I'm in the same boat as you by the way. My feedback is to preserve public matchmaking with a slight tweak towards other players. Not stabbing wouldn't change for those players whatsoever.

[Fred_Avant_2019]

Le 16/05/2024 à 21:28, Voltage a dit :

You have yet to provide this "reasoning" DE has for why it functions this way.

I'm in the same boat as you by the way. My feedback is to preserve public matchmaking with a slight tweak towards other players. Not stabbing wouldn't change for those players whatsoever.

"Simple" fix :

Everytime the lich regenerates, give other players 1/3 of what the amount the lich is meant to give in total (because if I recall right, you can down the lich three times before it will forcibly leave). If the lich is stabbed, every player gets the initially intended amount of progress (so the person who stabs gets it all in one go and other players get the progress either in one go (if instastabbed) or progressively (but everyone should get the same sum of progress points in the end)).

Doing so will encourage players to instastab their own lich, but also encourage players to obliterate other players' liches.

[Zakkhar]

On 2024-05-16 at 6:01 PM, Numerounius said:

Public is by far and away the most popular matchmaking mode to play Warframe. I'm not going to turn it off simply because I want to do an optimal lich strategy.

So you essentially want all the benefits with zero responsibility?

Edited May 21 by Zakkhar

[(PSN)rexis12]

It's almost as if tying this 'Nemesis' system to a long boring grind of the Murmur system and the Annoyance system of the Lich, in addition to the RNG aspect of the Requiems, has actually de-incentives teamwork due to you having to:

1. Waste time to refill the annoyance bar just for an Increase chance to get the Lich to show up again. 

2. Waste a slot and increase the level while not having the required Requiem slot to test, made especially worse when Liches can spawn at 0 annoyance level and screw you over that way in terms of testing out the Requiem orders. 

 

At this point the fact that Liches used to kill you should've been kept if only so that players can give an actual excuse at the moment, instead of having to explain that the overall system of the Lich System is actively detrimental to a teammates own Nemesis, meaning that you could get S#&$ out of luck with your bad RNG while the r est of the squad could magically get all three in one go. 

[CrownOfShadows]

I don't really like this solution tbh, because it doesn't solve the issue of people not stabbing, which immediately divides the team as far as goals go. This is the single reason that I tend to solo this experience.

I absolutely agree with the basic problem though.

[Caerith]

The bigger problem is that people are too eager to shoot liches.  If you want what's best for everyone, you gotta let them stay mad and convert more thralls so everyone gets more murmurs.  In order of worst to best:

1. Downing your lich right away (no thralls) and forcing them to retreat (no murmurs).
2. Stabbing your lich right away (no thralls, some murmurs).
3. Letting your lich convert a bunch of thralls, then downing your lich and forcing them to retreat (some murmurs, and you can repeat this on the next node).
4. Letting your lich convert a bunch of thralls, then stabbing your lich (most murmurs in any single mission). 

Someone refusing to stab is the least of the problems in public lich missions.