An Open Letter To De From Your Veterans (The megathread)

[General_Krull]

I was not being nitpicky - I was just providing an opinion/explaination on something that seemed to be a reoccuring theme in this topic. Why the hostility?

Not you specifically, but it has been reoccuring theme in this thread, people can't seem to argue the points so they argue the legitimacy of OP, which is stupid, his open letter was drafted by veterans, hence open letter from veterans AND the VERY FIRST PARAGRAPH OF OP EVEN SAYS IT'S NOT THE OPINION OF ALL VETERANS!!

 

I sort of expected finger pointing but was speechless at how concise and reasonable the OP was. +1 and I really hope this opens actually active communication channels between the playerbase and the devs.

Past mega threads mentioning the very same themes have not changed anything, why would this be an exception? So far there has been only empty statements not promising anything.

[BETAOPTICS]

I said fine, not good.

 

fine: in a satisfactory or pleasing manner; very well.

 

I think just that. I take no issue with those current systems. I think drop rates (outside of detron specifically, 1 too many layers of RNG) are great and RNG is a necessary part of a game like this. It inflates the time-sink, which is all were doing anyways. If you guys want to remove random drops, why not admit the whole game is a waste of time and go do something more productive with your lives. These mechanics are part of Warframe, and to change them would be to change the game. What your asking for isn't warframe at all, but a completely different game with the same theme.

This argument is as valid as anyone of the other side saying you should leave because of reasons. No, neither is right with that argumentation. You should never use the attitude " don't like it? Don't play it. " - I have seen many developers act like that, disrespecting their consumer base and guess where they are now. They are out of their jobs, that's where they are and I somehow suspect that is in DE's healthiest interest to do the same.

Sorry, again off topic but had to say this. I so hate these kind of arguments, they are dumb. This will be my last off topic comment and won't continue derailing this. Again, I'm sorry but it was too much to pass on.

[General_Nuisance]

Raised from slumber after the seventh cycle the battle, the weapons, the progression were all new and compelling. I delighted in the fight, the speed and in the deaths of our enemies. Loyally I followed the Lotus and obeyed her every command. Our purpose was noble, to retain balance, to maintain peace and to dance merrily with our enemies until they lay in bloody heaps across the slick decks.

 

And so, for many more cycles, it continued. We morphed between warframes and grew in skills, marveling at our own accomplishments - racing to the end for our enemies could not contain us. The Lotus was our guide, our leader, praising us for completion and bestowing new and shiny instruments of death. Go Loki! Go Rhino! Kill for the Lotus... Even though so many questions remained un-answered we were obedient

 

While major events occurred (and even partly because of them) a nagging doubt began to grow...

 

Why did we awaken? What was our purpose? Are we all that is left of the void's masters, the Orokin? What is the reason for balance being the goal? It seems to promote only suffering and an endless conflict with no resolution. The infested are not a choice but then neither are the broken Grineer or the psychotic Corpus... Who are we preserving balance for? On whose behalf do we fight?

 

If the fight was for our own joy then mine is gone. There is no hope, no reason to dive into un-ending conflict - the entire pursuit seems hollow. 

 

We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rats' feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar
    
Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion;
    
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us-if at all-not as lost
Violent souls, but only
 As the hollow men
The stuffed men.

[Vandoore]

Vandoore, if they add more content I am quite sure they will revamp the current content or add more. After all they did introduce new zones by taking moons, not just planets. I am quite sure more regions can be added to the current map or beyond the map, such as Orokin Void and Derelicts. Maybe we will see a Corpus mothership that will have 13 nodes because its just that big?

UMM 

-Yes, that is what happen when more content is added, they add more. Not really sure what you mean by revamping current content, unless you're talking about Jupiter and Earth which are just tileset changes with no real additions. It's just replacing the same scenery, nothing new is added.(content wise)

-Yes they did introduce new zones (void and OD), though at the moment it seems if only as a place to farm rare pieces of equipment(prime gear).

-Maybe, but it will just become another place to farm gear.

 

 

But that still doesn't answer my queries, You stated "little bumps and the detrongate", but then pass them straight off saying don't touch the system.

How is the current drop system adequate? really how?

you could probably convince me with a good enough argument, but you'd be going up against the fact that warframe has only RNG for content, and if taken away you have nothing much at all.

 

 

To parrot General_Krull  - RNG and grind are not content or gameplay....remove grind and rng from warframe you will run out of things to do in few hours

[Nkomo-Sama]

Raised from slumber after the seventh cycle the battle, the weapons, the progression were all new and compelling. I delighted in the fight, the speed and in the deaths of our enemies. Loyally I followed the Lotus and obeyed her every command. Our purpose was noble, to retain balance, to maintain peace and to dance merrily with our enemies until they lay in bloody heaps across the slick decks.

 

And so, for many more cycles, it continued. We morphed between warframes and grew in skills, marveling at our own accomplishments - racing to the end for our enemies could not contain us. The Lotus was our guide, our leader, praising us for completion and bestowing new and shiny instruments of death. Go Loki! Go Rhino! Kill for the Lotus... Even though so many questions remained un-answered we were obedient

 

While major events occurred (and even partly because of them) a nagging doubt began to grow...

 

Why did we awaken? What was our purpose? Are we all that is left of the void's masters, the Orokin? What is the reason for balance being the goal? It seems to promote only suffering and an endless conflict with no resolution. The infested are not a choice but then neither are the broken Grineer or the psychotic Corpus... Who are we preserving balance for? On whose behalf do we fight?

 

If the fight was for our own joy then mine is gone. There is no hope, no reason to dive into un-ending conflict - the entire pursuit seems hollow. 

 

We are the hollow men

We are the stuffed men

Leaning together

Headpiece filled with straw. Alas!

Our dried voices, when

We whisper together

Are quiet and meaningless

As wind in dry grass

Or rats' feet over broken glass

In our dry cellar

    

Shape without form, shade without colour,

Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

    

Those who have crossed

With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom

Remember us-if at all-not as lost

Violent souls, but only

 As the hollow men

The stuffed men.

Well that's ^ just awesome for so many different reasons...

[Kyria]

Not you specifically, but it has been reoccuring theme in this thread, people can't seem to argue the points so they argue the legitimacy of OP, which is stupid, his open letter was drafted by veterans, hence open letter from veterans AND the VERY FIRST PARAGRAPH OF OP EVEN SAYS IT'S NOT THE OPINION OF ALL VETERANS!!

 

Yes, I agree. Beyond the initial address and clarification that several felt was needed the points in the letters really ought to be the focus. To be fair though; that goes not only for the people hung up on the definition of "Veteran" and/or the title, but also for the "high-fivers" chit-chatting about how nay-sayers could not possibly have significant intelligence or experience in order to come to such a conclusion. I understand the consolidation of the letters makes it easier for the devs to read through, but it also makes it that much harder for us to address as participants. I would like to have a conversation about at least two of the letters posted, but not the starting post and also not in the "air of the superior" that managed to seep in at places.

 

(But might I suggest the OP link to all official letters for an easy read and exposure?)

[Raze4573]

By bumps I mean how odd the resource drops were in the future and the little glitches we had with broken drops.
By DETRONgate I mean how ridiculous the Harvester appearance chance is/was.

RNG and grind is a game mechanic, sorry but I think you should either accept it or move on. It exists in all online games in one form or another.
Throwing fits of rage how ITS NOT CONTENT WAH WAH WAH makes me wonder if this is your first online gaming experience...
RNG is just a name for randomness, for drop chance. Its been done. What else do you want to see in Warframe hm?
I actually want you to give an example, you clearly have an issue with a solution the developers so go ahead, whats your genius idea.
If its good, I will agree with you. If its crap, I'm going to point out "You know nothing Jon Snow" and hope you leave the decisions about game mechanics to the people responsible for the game mechanics.

And if your argument is "you will run out of things to do". How many items have you bought with plat and how many did you make by hand?
Not talking about you two specifically but I know a few people that go "I got nothing to do on Warframe" because they just dish out cash to get stuff.

Oh and by revamping I mean something like we got with J3 Golem being replaced with Alad V and how Vay Hek now drops Oberon while Volt has been moved to survival rewards. Stuff like that.

[General_Krull]

By bumps I mean how odd the resource drops were in the future and the little glitches we had with broken drops.

By DETRONgate I mean how ridiculous the Harvester appearance chance is/was.

RNG and grind is a game mechanic, sorry but I think you should either accept it or move on. It exists in all online games in one form or another.

Throwing fits of rage how ITS NOT CONTENT WAH WAH WAH makes me wonder if this is your first online gaming experience...

RNG is just a name for randomness, for drop chance. Its been done. What else do you want to see in Warframe hm?

I actually want you to give an example, you clearly have an issue with a solution the developers so go ahead, whats your genius idea.

If its good, I will agree with you. If its crap, I'm going to point out "You know nothing Jon Snow" and hope you leave the decisions about game mechanics to the people responsible for the game mechanics.

And if your argument is "you will run out of things to do". How many items have you bought with plat and how many did you make by hand?

Not talking about you two specifically but I know a few people that go "I got nothing to do on Warframe" because they just dish out cash to get stuff.

Oh and by revamping I mean something like we got with J3 Golem being replaced with Alad V and how Vay Hek now drops Oberon while Volt has been moved to survival rewards. Stuff like that.

I haven't bought a single weapon with platinum and I only bought Nekros, only weapons I'm missing are detron and glaive prime. And yes I already feel like I'm running out of things to do because rng and grind are not content no matter what you say. They are shallow timesinks. 

 

As for replacement for rng? Token system or pseudo rng like what some people have suggested, with token system you would have a clear goal to work towards instead of hope you get the key you need and then hope you get the part you need. And pseudo rng it would increase chance of getting the item you haven't got yet while lowering the chance of getting items you already have, I know you will say these are stupid ideas without even thinking about it because I dared to say the game you like has flaws.

 

Nobody wanted J3-Golem gone, or infested for that matter, DE said Lephantis would replace him on jupiter, instead we get grindception. And Volt is in rng limbo with banshee and vauban, good luck trying to get any of them now. Also Trinity is on phobs now with all miter parts and gremlins so yeah.

I don't understand how you people can defend rng as a good mechanic, it's obviously not added for player enjoyment.

[Methanoid]

I don't understand how you people can defend rng as a good mechanic, it's obviously not added for player enjoyment.

 

imho its a "cant think of anything better" or "this is the quickest solution" type affair.

[JokerVictor]

+1 OP, well said, covers all the bases quite nicely.  Don't let the low post count fool you, I've been around here for quite awhile, and I wholeheartedly agree with your points.

 

The RNG with bonus RNG on top of RNG is absolutely infuriating.  I still don't have the Paris Prime, and I've been trying to get that damn thing for months.  In that time I've only gotten 5 capture keys... RNG #1 is a fail.  None of those 5 runs have produced a single paris prime part... RNG #2 is a fail. 

 

The removal of this system, or at a minimum the addition of a ticket system alongside it, combined with the addition of a new faction (designed to be endgame only) would silence most of the frustration.  We need a glorious valhalla-like battleground to take all of our OP toys to to fight a constant stream of mini-boss style enemies with challenging AI.  Proper battlegrounds would be cool too, but I'm assuming the engine wouldn't handle that very well.

[Methanoid]

after several months i at last aquired a bronco prime reciever having got the other parts much faster, of course im now at the stage where i know 95% of the prime weapons are pure grade S#&$, so im not even going to bother building the bronco, hell i dont even need the mastery and i certainly dont need underperforming weapons just to pointlessly grind up mastery which i dont need.

 

theres a few other prime stuff i dont have and tbh now i dont even want, their not "rewards" for your time/effort like in other games or mmo's where you achieve something "epic", instead we recieve something "weak", only fanboys defend them by saying their collector items, unique or eyecandy.  tbh thats not good enough.

 

only prime items im actually quite happy with is the orthos prime and to a much lesser degree the boar prime, the rest is just garbage and a waste of our time.

 

wrap all of the above in this insane rng is just beyond madness.

Edited January 20, 2014 by Methanoid

[H0PE]

Hi guys,

 

Did you receive any official reply from DE staff since the open letter (either personaly or via forum or whatever)?

 

Just wondering what is DE's response, if any...

Edited January 20, 2014 by H0PE

[General_Krull]

Hi guys,

 

Did you receive any official reply from DE staff since the open letter (either personaly or via forum or whatever)?

 

Just wondering what is DE's response, if any...

There was a reply few pages back but it offered nothing new and was basically empty words promising nothing.

[H0PE]

There was a reply few pages back but it offered nothing new and was basically empty words promising nothing.

 

Ok thanks!

Just as I expected unfortunately.

*sadface*

[Althix]

There was a reply few pages back but it offered nothing new and was basically empty words promising nothing.

what would you expect?

 

there is no communication between developer and player base except for monologue.

Edited January 20, 2014 by Althix

[H0PE]

what would you expect?

 

there is no communication between developer and player base except for monologue.

 

But <most of the companies> state that bug report, feedback on forum is a very important part for them in development -especially for a beta game-

 

So one should and could expect some feedback from them on the forum, that is the first (primary) communication panel for a game, or you don't agree?

[General_Krull]

But <most of the companies> state that bug report, feedback on forum is a very important part for them in development -especially for a beta game-

 

So one should and could expect some feedback from them on the forum, that is the first (primary) communication panel for a game, or you don't agree?

Last I heard DE Steve blocked all PMs and mostly posts on reddit. MAke of that what you will.

[Kyria]

I don't understand how you people can defend rng as a good mechanic, it's obviously not added for player enjoyment.

 

 

To shed some light on what I am thinking I will elaborate:

 

Wouldn't it all even out in the long run, you think? It is surely not fun for you, or any other long-time player, currently farming for the Detron. I don't think anyone is claiming it is; of course not! But if you started playing the game today, while levelling your weapons and frames, over the next 300 gaming hours would you not accumulate most, if not all, parts for most items gradually? Or be entertained with what was there until you did? If the Harvester had been there from the start - would you not have obtained your Detron over that time by casual play? I suspect the current situation is due to there only being an odd, few items left to desire and work towards for a lot of Tenno. Everything else is "been there, done that". Currently new content is added to old content and a new weapon will have to be farmed in old missions. Or new missions will reward old content. My train of thought is that if the base pool of items is large enough and the world expansive enough DE will be able to steadily add to it at a pace where the player simply will not run out of items or content to be entertained by and thus the rng drop will be less punishing. That is the ideal and aspiring goal, I assume. If the numbers are tuned right one should be able to, with reasonable time and reasonable grind, gradually find one's self in possession of the appropriate gear. And in that light the current conundrum is a temporary situation only experienced by the certain players. I am thinking that the end result we all want is coming - it just sadly is not present at the moment and you/we are the beta testers (I do apologize for pulling that card!) that are paying the price during the wait. I'm not attempting to make justifications - these are merely some of the thoughts I have made thus far and I do not find it to be too unreasonable of a perception.

 

But I digress.

I do recognize that it is an issue at present and the future promise of the rng being adequately hidden in a vast pool of items and content where the math is spot on and the gods of probability are reliable seems too unlikely, and does nothing to ease the current frustration shared by many. And so I ask (to all that have an opinion on the matter): Do you feel the rng can ever be tweaked to be right? Are you in support of a token-system, for instance? (Instead of or in addition to rng drops?) How would you see the drop system reworked?

Edited January 20, 2014 by Kyria

[General_Krull]

To shed some light on what I am thinking I will elaborate:

 

Wouldn't it all even out in the long run, you think? It is surely not fun for you, or any other long-time player, currently farming for the Detron. I don't think anyone is claiming it is; of course not! But if you started playing the game today, while levelling your weapons and frames, over the next 300 gaming hours would you not accumulate most, if not all, parts for most items gradually? Or be entertained with what was there until you did? If the Harvester had been there from the start - would you not have obtained your Detron over that time by casual play? I suspect the current situation is due to there only being an odd, few items left to desire and work towards for a lot of Tenno. Everything else is "been there, done that". Currently new content is added to old content and a new weapon will have to be farmed in old missions. Or new missions will reward old content. My train of thought is that if the base pool of items is large enough and the world expansive enough DE will be able to steadily add to it at a pace where the player simply will not run out of items or content to be entertained by and thus the rng drop will be less punishing. That is the ideal and aspiring goal, I assume. If the numbers are tuned right one should be able to, with reasonable time and reasonable grind, gradually find one's self in possession of the appropriate gear. And in that light the current conundrum is a temporary situation only experienced by the certain players. I am thinking that the end result we all want is coming - it just sadly is not present at the moment and you/we are the beta testers (I do apologize for pulling that card!) that are paying the price during the wait. I'm not attempting to make justifications - these are merely some of the thoughts I have made thus far and I do not find it to be too unreasonable of a perception.

 

But I digress.

I do recognize that it is an issue at present and the future promise of the rng being adequately hidden in a vast pool of items and content where the math is spot on and the gods of probability are reliable seems too unlikely, and does nothing to ease the current frustration shared by many. And so I ask (to all that have an opinion on the matter): Do you feel the rng can ever be tweaked to be right? Are you, in support of a token-system, for instance? (Instead of or in addition to rng drops?) How would you see the drop system reworked?

But your example doesn't really work because Harvester is high level content, so is Stalker and t3 void. And new players suffer even more from rng than old guard because they need to get the mandatory mods that are a pain to get. Is it any wonder only a few of the people who test this game stay? You can't build a game on rng and grind, other games have something else in addition and alternative ways of getting items.

 

I think Token system would be best, as it offers a clear goal to work towards or like I said in previous post, rng that increases the chances of getting the item you haven't got yet while decreasing the items you have had multiple of. But even that presents problems because there are items you need multiple of (forma). But rng can not work as it is now, especially if they keep adding new things to void and derelicts.

 

And even then, why base your game around something nobody really likes? At best people tolerate rng, I find it hard to believe someone actually enjoys it.

[LukeAura]

To shed some light on what I am thinking I will elaborate:

 

Wouldn't it all even out in the long run, you think? It is surely not fun for you, or any other long-time player, currently farming for the Detron. I don't think anyone is claiming it is; of course not! But if you started playing the game today, while levelling your weapons and frames, over the next 300 gaming hours would you not accumulate most, if not all, parts for most items gradually? Or be entertained with what was there until you did? If the Harvester had been there from the start - would you not have obtained your Detron over that time by casual play? I suspect the current situation is due to there only being an odd, few items left to desire and work towards for a lot of Tenno. Everything else is "been there, done that". Currently new content is added to old content and a new weapon will have to be farmed in old missions. Or new missions will reward old content. My train of thought is that if the base pool of items is large enough and the world expansive enough DE will be able to steadily add to it at a pace where the player simply will not run out of items or content to be entertained by and thus the rng drop will be less punishing. That is the ideal and aspiring goal, I assume. If the numbers are tuned right one should be able to, with reasonable time and reasonable grind, gradually find one's self in possession of the appropriate gear. And in that light the current conundrum is a temporary situation only experienced by the certain players. I am thinking that the end result we all want is coming - it just sadly is not present at the moment and you/we are the beta testers (I do apologize for pulling that card!) that are paying the price during the wait. I'm not attempting to make justifications - these are merely some of the thoughts I have made thus far and I do not find it to be too unreasonable of a perception.

I'd agree with you for the stalker. But not Harvey. Stalker will stalk you if you want to play anything more than about 33% of the games content. Basically he is a mandatory encounter you will encounter at least once because of this. A lot of content is locked behind a stalker mark giving boss. Nothing is locked behind siding with the grineer in invasion.

Harvester will harvestate at you if you want to play a very small subsection of a subsection of content. New players over time will eventually get many blueprints of Hate/Dread/Despair(The weapons, not the emotions!...Hopefully.) naturally as they play, because boss runs offer benefits to being played, thus making Stalker marks accrue on the side of actual objective and player goals. The only objective to siding with the grineer that isn't balanced compared to siding corpus is the chance of getting harvester, it's not natural it's deliberate. 

[Kyria]

But your example doesn't really work because Harvester is high level content, so is Stalker and t3 void. And new players suffer even more from rng than old guard because they need to get the mandatory mods that are a pain to get. Is it any wonder only a few of the people who test this game stay? You can't build a game on rng and grind, other games have something else in addition and alternative ways of getting items.

 

Ok. I give up. Have fun being right. :)

[H0PE]

Last I heard DE Steve blocked all PMs and mostly posts on reddit. MAke of that what you will.

 

 

Thats okay, he shouldn't and couldn't handle the insane amount of PMs he probably receives, and that is not his work.

However there supposed to be a group, like DERebecca who is browsing forums, taking notes or hopefully better sollution, create tickets for bugs and stuff in their software they suppose to use in every day work (as 99.9% of the companies doing it nowadays). Then they should have meetings and discussions and THEN we should see some results of those discussions communicated to us via forum posts.

That is what I would do, if I would work in DE and care about my product.

[S5alad]

That's absolute non sense. You don't need to play even 10 hours to see the issues this game has.

Duuuuuuude that's wicked.  You're right.  However those of us that have put in 200x the 10 hours you mentioned, likely have a more comprehensive understanding of the full scope of the game with all its greatness and flaws.  That does not invalidate your feedback, or anyone else's, it's just that we're hoping that when the players who've supported this game the MOST, via game play hours, are banding together to express focused feedback, that it will send a message to DE.  Anyone can log in for 5 hours and start complaining, but when those of us that have been tolerant for 13+ Mastery levels, and especially those of us who once had faith enough to invest money into this game start, it's a stronger complaint.

[f3llyn]

Duuuuuuude that's wicked.  You're right.  However those of us that have put in 200x the 10 hours you mentioned, likely have a more comprehensive understanding of the full scope of the game with all its greatness and flaws.  That does not invalidate your feedback, or anyone else's, it's just that we're hoping that when the players who've supported this game the MOST, via game play hours, are banding together to express focused feedback, that it will send a message to DE.  Anyone can log in for 5 hours and start complaining, but when those of us that have been tolerant for 13+ Mastery levels, and especially those of us who once had faith enough to invest money into this game start, it's a stronger complaint.

 

If you say so then it must be true. I've never heard of anyone being wrong on the internet.

 

I'll also add that a lot of my other posts on the topic were removed for some reason with no explanation given so I'll say it kindly again, I'm done with that particular conversation.

Edited January 20, 2014 by f3llyn

[Raze4573]

Token system is a moot point, you'd still grind bosses to get tokens.
This is my last reply in this topic, not because I forfeit, I simply have better things to do than argue with someone who will not agree to see other choices because RNG IS EVIL OMFG.
The thing is simple, you either accept it and keep playing, waiting something new will pop up or you leave, thinking you can find a better game with better mechanics.

I honestly dont get the hate for grinding...its everywhere, its not something new and misunderstood.
Its been around since MMO's began their existance. Is it perfect? Far from it, it can be annoying and time consuming but so will the other solution.
Tokens? 435547568 Sargas Ruk kills to obtain Elite Tenno Token to redeem a weapon.
DE -will- add more content, thats a sure thing. Will we like all of it? Hell no. Will we get quality stuff that makes the game enjoyable? Hell yes.

Today I claimed 13 new weapons from the foundry and you know what? I will enjoy grinding them up to 30 because I like seeing progress.

Yes, those that put in money into the game, like founders or even people that buy a lot of plat can feel that they paid for something not as good as promised.
But please remember its beta, even for a while now, but I'd rather endure a year of beta testing and grinding and RNG and other supposedly EVUL! solutions just to one day check my launcher and see "Retail".
All in all, Warframe is a stunning game and the wincing, cringing and patient waiting IS worth it.

The randomized drop are an incentive to keep playing so one day we can see a CTF mode, a Warframe MOBA style team deathmatch, more mission types, new zones etc etc.

Sure feedback is good but when it becomes like this, do you honestly think the devs that spend time doing this for us, so we can have a F2P game, are happy that we whine and cry about something that works and they keep tinkering with?

Sorry for long and unorganized post.