Dead Eye Aura Values Make No Sense And Research Proves It

[Garuger]

Somewhere , somehow at some point there is going be a nerf to deal with it

Edited February 21, 2014 by Garuger

[(NSW)Omgwtfl9lbbl]

To clarify, I'm not mad over a mod being underpowered. I didn't even have any intentions to use Dead Eye to begin with, as I'm happy with the damage my Vectis outputs already, and would rather have something better for utility that my teammates can also benefit off of. Hell, I am of the personal opinion that mods need massive nerfs across the board, but that is a story for another time.

 

However, I'm worried that a seriously obvious design flaw which is easy to spot was overlooked. When I say that, I don't mean that the fact that Dead Eye sucks is some game breaking thing. Rather, I mean that this is something so simple and easy to spot that mere minutes of testing after going through the most basic train of thought possible ("Huh, I wonder if this mod is any useful") was able to make this apparent. And even before physically testing it... I mean, come on. Imagine you are going to design an aura to increase the damage for sniper rifles. Are you telling me that you wouldn't consider looking over A) if any other auras in the game provide a similar bonus, B) if so, if the bonus this new mod relevant in comparison, and C) if this new aura even up to par to begin with against other auras in general (5 mod points). In order for DE to design and release something like this, the only way I could imagine it happening is if they just blindly threw it out there. It says something about the core design process and how familiar the devs are with their own game. Who wants to play a game where you get the sense that the people making the game don't even play their own game? Because that's exactly the kind of feeling this gives off.

 

This isn't rocket science. This isn't something like releasing a brand new sort of weapon that doesn't have any kind of direct equivalent to compare off to (like the Castanas or the Phage), thus potentially releasing something weirdly OP or UP, or a warframe with really strange mechanics that may not work entirely properly (like Zephyr). Issues like those are understandable to a degree, and if they happened, I'd be like "whatever" and let it slide. For instance, while I thought that the Legendary cores were handled extremely poorly, I gave it a slide because it was a unique situation for DE. You had this mod you were testing out that gave a distinct advantage in return for providing what was for the most part a pretty terrible aura, and later realized it was out of line when people had already spent massive amounts of a valuable resource on it, and would require virtual compensation for potentially real goods (money). That's actually at least a tricky situation. This, however... this is an aura mod, with a really obvious direct competitor in Rifle Amp, an aura which I imagine is actually probably decently popular given the fact that 8/18 warframes come with V aura polarities by default and so isn't some obscure thing, and the only other V aura up until this point was Steel Charge, which until update 12 was absolutely useless in the eyes of most. There's nothing special when it comes to designing this.

 

The only reason I bother to post this is because it worries me. Warframe is a game with potential to go in a lot of directions, and even if I feel like the game is going down a design path that I feel I'm not a fan of, I'm okay with that. For instance, if DE pretty much just encourages the pure horde rush design instead of introducing more things like unique leaders or miniboss type things, I would probably quit, but still be happy with my time spent on a game I enjoyed. That's totally cool. I'm not the one designing the game, it's their labor of love. But this more akin to wondering where the heck has your QA gone, rather than what direction are you going. One could say that, given that this is a beta, we are the QA, but that really doesn't fly here. Not only is this glaringly obvious, but this is something that should have been noticed during any internal QA (you can't say DE does not have any kind of internal QA, because if they didn't... oh boy), and even before that, this should have been noticed during any kind of meeting over balance and design of this new mod they plan to push out.

 

This is sort of like, say, a smartphone company just blindly pushing out a phone with no regards to what other phones are on the market or how their product will actually fare against the competition. Because in the end, that's what releasing a new mod like an aura is - DE is releasing something new (Dead Eye) into well trodden territory (auras), and it has to be enticing enough for people to want it over the competition (other aura mods), because people only have a limited amount of room for one in any given build. You don't push out something clearly useless into an already well established field "just to see how it goes". Doing that is called wasting valuable development time that could instead be spent on something useful, and causes you to lose your customers trust in your competence. This isn't something that DE should need to "learn", this is the obvious and for a veteran company with as much history as DE has... yeah.

 

Me being angry with DE would probably involve tons of random and useless expletives getting thrown around, and a much less formatted post. I'll also tell you that I don't really get angry much. This is more like me, standing off to the side, shaking my head, and wondering what in the world could possibly have gone through your head to culminate in this release, like a kid that randomly decides to swallow his toy car. What? Why do that? That sort of feeling. I will admit frustration, because when I see something really illogical for no reason, it does grind my gears. On the other hand, if I can detect some semblance of reason or logic behind it, I'm typically okay with it. Heck, if someone came into this thread and stated a reasonable timeline of events that would culminate in this mod being released as it was, I would probably say okay if I felt that their argument and reasoning was compelling enough and wasn't obviously at odds with how the rest of their game is designed, and I would happily admit fault if it was good enough. I usually give a very large benefit of the doubt if I can see a little logic.

 

But Dead Eye strikes me as being poorly thought out in virtually every way possible. It's not too often that I come across situations like this in game design, as I can usually at least figure out at least some kind of rationale behind weird decisions and designs. Laziness and carelessness are not valid reasons, though; those are warning signs, and I cannot see any way in which Dead Eye could have been designed without coming into conflict with Rifle Amp, unless DE is admitting that those in charge of design and balance do not properly check these things out against each other.

 

One could say that they released Dead Eye as is as part of a change to make a general modification to other mods, such as Rifle Amp (namely, making it not affect sniper rifles, and perhaps tweaking its effects). In other words, as a test to see how it affects the playerbase and get some feedback off of that. I gave that a lot of thought before I wrote up my initial post (it was one of the first counterarguments I could think of), and to be honest, if I thought that was a valid line of thought, I would have scrapped my entire original post and gone on with my day. That's what I mean when I say I'm pretty lenient about stuff. But I don't think it is a valid line of thought. Releasing Dead Eye as it is, with the rest of the aura mods the way they are, will literally result in one single feedback - Dead Eye is useless. For the purpose of gathering feedback to use to make any kind of change to aura mods or mods in general, that is absolutely useless for obvious reason. The only way this would have been valid is if they simultaneously made changes to the rest of the auras so that we could actually see how these things fit against each other in a new state, and actually be capable of providing meaningful feedback. And DE is definitely capable of making pushy changes to use us as their guinea pigs - things like forced new UI with no method of reversion and minimal initial customization allowed, for example - and there's nothing wrong with doing that, as this is a beta. But that's obviously not the intent here.

 

TL;DR - Since I know I have a very bad tendency of rambling and going over indepth, I'll just restate this here: I'm okay with mods being out of balance, assuming that there is an intent to bring them to a balance. The major issue here, and what I am not okay with, is that they are apparently willing to release something that is clearly broken and unbalanced on first inspection and is easy to confirm in mere minutes, which implies a number of (bad) things about how they design and test things.

[LazyKnight]

This makes absolutely no sense, at all, no matter what you say. You can't even call this a mistake.

The more I think about this mod, the more I believe it should be changed to a critical chance aura for sniper rifles. Have it provide 50% more critical chance for a maxed-out dead eye aura, and because critical chance caps at 100% it could never be as overpowered as stacking pure damage.

 

If it was 50% critical chance and 4 people used the Dead eye aura, it would allow people to have 100% critical chance for a Vectis (if point strike was maxed).

Edited February 21, 2014 by LazyKnight

[(NSW)Omgwtfl9lbbl]

The more I think about this mod, the more I believe it should be change to a critical chance aura for sniper rifles. Have it provide 50% more critical chance for a maxed-out dead eye aura, and because critical chance caps at 100% it could never be as overpowered as stacking pure damage.

 

While I do kind of like that, I think the issue would probably be that it'd make snipers encroach over bow territory again, just as they used to. Bows are now -the- crit weapons, up there with other unique cases like the Synapse.

 

Game balance is definitely not an easy thing, and you're pretty much always going to tick off someone, somewhere, someway. It's pretty inevitable. This isn't so much about the state of the game's balance, though, but rather DE's designing and balancing process.

[LazyKnight]

-Snipe-

Their option for this Aura are limited: If they change it to 20% more final damage using 4 of them would cause game breaking overpowered weapons(no joke it would cause crushing overkill). Adding more critical damage would also be an option, but it would only make damage more spikey, and it could also break if stacked like final damage bonus.

 

Their only safe options, other than critical chance, would be reload speed or punch effect, but I doubt that either of these effects would be worth using over energy siphon. 

 

Critical chance might overlap with bows, but it wouldn't cause blatant overpowered equipment. People would still have to sacrifice an aura slot on each party member's Warframe in order to reach a guaranteed 100% chance, like bows can get for one mod.

Edited February 21, 2014 by LazyKnight

[Anzuul]

Can someone here verify/test for me real fast if the Dead Eye aura works with the Miter? Prolly not but I want to know just incase. 

[Garuger]

Can someone here verify/test for me real fast if the Dead Eye aura works with the Miter? Prolly not but I want to know just incase. 

Lol under-powered weapon with under-powered AURA XD 

[Anzuul]

Lol under-powered weapon with under-powered AURA XD 

 

Hilarious.

 

Fun > Rest.

[HAYABU5A]

in light of the recent buff to bows and marksman rifles like the latron prime, the sniper rifles really needed this aura to give a big boost to dmg to make them viable again if they themselves wont get buffed 

 

even at +60% their  slow RoF wouldnt make them OP and afterall they should be the highest single shot damage by a large margin

[K-O.MOD2]

I think like this...

This MOD having wrong effect.
 

not increases base damage only sniper rifle.

If it increases headshot multipliers for all primary?

...Is it crazy effect??

[Banfaith]

I know it's been almost a month since somebody posted here, but I just now read through all of it when I saw the Dead Eye Mod pop up on alert. I was wondering if it might be worthwhile to consider making this mod a +silence, a -minus recoil, or a +accuracy.

As a silence bonus, it would lead towards stealthier gameplay with a team that is into that without requiring everyone to be using specifically silent sniper weapons.

As a -minus recoil, it could allow for a more all sniper group to be able to line up shots more quickly without upping the actual damage output.

+Accuracy, while not specifically a boon for the already uber-accurate sniper weapons, it would perhaps give the feel of a sinper on the team playing the role of spotter for the rest of the team, tigthening up their aim with the superior tactic.

 

Finally, I could even enjoy an aura that gives +zoom to continue to play with the spotter style mechanic.

 

Maybe not the best choices in the world, but hopefully not the game breaking damage numbers of large amounts of suck that are currently part of the mod.

[Riasiru]

As a silence bonus, it would lead towards stealthier gameplay with a team that is into that without requiring everyone to be using specifically silent sniper weapons.

As a -minus recoil, it could allow for a more all sniper group to be able to line up shots more quickly without upping the actual damage output.

+Accuracy, while not specifically a boon for the already uber-accurate sniper weapons, it would perhaps give the feel of a sniper on the team playing the role of spotter for the rest of the team, tightening up their aim with the superior tactic.

 

I'm going to stop you there and explain why all three of those things (As a sniper.) are irrelevant to snipers. First, silence. What does the mod name (Dead Eye if you forgot.) have to do with hearing things? No no, this would be the Dead Ear mod if it made things silent. Not that snipers even need silence half the time. With the ability to turn off alerts on missions, it's even less important. 

 

Recoil... Yeah... Recoil... I use the Vectis... Recoil, while a thing, doesn't matter. In the time it takes to reload, the recoil has settled and I'm already lined up on the next head. This doesn't help Sniper Rifles. This helps DMRs. The fact I typically don't look down the scope without a target in mind also makes it rather useless. The perspective change is more jarring than recoil, and once you've gotten over that recoil is a non-issue.

 

Accuracy is a terrible idea. Here is a terrifying thought. A swarm of people using Gorgon Wraith, Dead Eye, and Stabilizer. Their guns are now super accurate death lazers at all ranges. Who needs snipers when you can just bullet hose things from 100m away? If there is ever a +Accuracy mod, it should not be an Aura. It needs to be a rifle mod that you equip with stabilizer for any real effect. Two mod slots locked up, sacrificing DPS for range. It should not be an Aura where the only competing mods are a laughable damage buff provided by Rifle Amp. (It is laughable.) Also, that whole thing about not even being useful to snipers. 

 

---End of reply to previous user.---

 

The reason the mod's original function is so hilarious is because the person who made it didn't think about interplay at all. Please don't make the same mistake. Look at competing mods. Try to consider any unintentional repercussions. (Like Gorgon Wraith death lasers.) And try to balance so that the meta game isn't one sided. Last thing you want is to make Soma even more crit capable... Oh god. Forget the Gorgon death laser. The freaking Soma death lasers!!

 

PS. Why are bows so great, anyway? They're just sniper rifles with draw time, travel time, and projectile physics... Seems a lot to account for under pressure. Not to mention you sacrifice a lot of damage potential just for handling. Reload time, fire rate, arrow mutation, crit chance, crit multiplier. You only have room for serration and two more mods after all that. Split Chamber is more or less a double damage mod, so that's good... And then... Yeah... And this all relies on you hitting the enemy's head... No matter how it is moving... While your arrow has travel time... Is there a mod for luck? You need a mod for luck. Or, you know... Could just stick an explosion on the arrow and forget about damage. Why not use the Orgris, then? It explodes EVERY TIME. It also has a charge time. So yeah... It's kind of like a bow. (I just compared bows to a rocket launcher. You may hate me now.)

 

PSS. Lowest ammo pool in the game, best mutation mod ever. Rifles usually need to max out the rank and use up 8mp for theirs. (Gorgon especially... Maybe even a Scavenger Aura on top of that for the Gorgon.) Sniper rifles can comfortably do with only the unranked version. No, really. It is hilariously difficult to run out of ammo. The ammo efficiency of one and done is awesome.

[_Kireek_]

I agree with K-O.MOD2 - "Dead Eye", to me, sounds like it should either increase accuracy, or reward accuracy (such as increased weakspot damage).

[Methanoid]

their "fix" will probably just make snipers exempt from rifle amp, giving this other aura a so called use.

[BakaBlue]

The Headshot/Weakspot multiplier sounds nice. While bows and snipers served similar areas for a while, bows have apparently now the crit-superiority. Why not specialize the snipers as well? For me snipers are best at scoring Weakspot/Head-shots reliably at medium-long ranges, the low RoF and magazine size (if even present (Vectis)) ensure (to a certain degree) that even ridiculous damage per hit values wont be too OP. This wouldn't help the pace difference between the game and snipers, but would make them a valuable tool to quickly take out heavies before they can pose a threat. Im not sure if this should be an aura or if it would be better to make that a Sniper-Mod. 

 

Maybe the whole Idea of a Sniper-Exclusive Aura should be scrapped until snipers are more frequently used e.g. "fixed". With them being out of pace, not doing something that something else can do better, a Aura benefical only to snipers seems odd considering auras apply to the whole team. I mean its rare to see snipers in teams, so of what use is a Sniper-Aura?   

 

Riasiru: I support your point of view about bows, and i also consider the lanka a bow. It has charge time and traveltime (although minimal) two things that i consider fatal for sniping. The chargetime makes you miss opportunities, the Traveltime makes you miss shots. The only "Bow" i actually like is the Ogris, even if it misses there is a decent chance it will slam into a wall or the ground and still damage something.

[Erelas]

Maybe the whole Idea of a Sniper-Exclusive Aura should be scrapped until snipers are more frequently used e.g. "fixed". With them being out of pace, not doing something that something else can do better, a Aura benefical only to snipers seems odd considering auras apply to the whole team. I mean its rare to see snipers in teams, so of what use is a Sniper-Aura?   

 

Umm...this is a statement which I have a flat out "NOPE" for.  I was just having fun in an Interception mission the other day with my Vectis, leveling it up after a forma was put in it.  2/3 other people in the mission also had sniper rifles as well.  It's not as if no one is using them, they just choose the missions/maps they want to use them on.  Situational of course, but so are auras most of the time, I switch them out now and then dependent on the frame mode I'm using or mission I go into.  

From what I understand, this mod doesn't max out to 20% with +5 for it's level like it's suppose to though.  Not sure why it hasn't be done yet, should be equivalent of the Rifle Amp but specifically for sniper weapons.

[Axterix13]

From what I understand, this mod doesn't max out to 20% with +5 for it's level like it's suppose to though.  Not sure why it hasn't be done yet, should be equivalent of the Rifle Amp but specifically for sniper weapons.

Nah.  It should be scrapped.  And then Rifle Amp renamed to "Primary Amp" and tweak to also work on shotguns.  Auras should benefit the team, and making auras for the types of primaries is just too specific, too limited.

 

Alternately, if they really want to go that route, they need to add two more (shotguns and bows), and then tweak Rifle Amp to be for rifles.  And then change all of them so that they provide two levels of benefits: One amount for their weapon type, and a lower value the other primaries.

 

But personally, I say just have the one amp for primaries and be done with it.  After all, if all weapon types are "balanced" in terms of stats, the bonuses provided should be the same if the intent is actually to benefit the team.  Which means having ones for specific primaries only hurts us all, since we'd benefit less as a team.  And if they aren't balanced, they should not be relying on mods, and especially not team focused mods, to compensate.  They should fix the actual weapons themselves.

 

Note though that I wouldn't mind seeing Dead Eye do something like provide bonus damage on head shots.  That would benefit accurate weapons, like Sniper Rifles, but wouldn't be exclusive to them.

Edited March 20, 2014 by Axterix13

[LGear]

Kinda agree on OP's point actually: I've always found it strange how Dead Eye, a mod that works specifically for Sniper Rifles, provides less bonus damage than Rifle Amp, which affects Rifles, Shotguns and Sniper Rifles. Normally you'd expect that the specialized mod provides a higher amount of bonuses, like how Redirection provides more shield boost than Vigor, etc.

 

It basically makes Dead Eye extremely pointless: why limit yourself to getting lower bonus damage just for your Sniper Rifle, when you can equip Rifle Amp and get yourself more damage for 3 weapon classes?

 

Either buff Dead Eye to provide greater bonus damage for Snipers, or change it entirely.

[Erelas]

Nah.  It should be scrapped.  And then Rifle Amp renamed to "Primary Amp" and tweak to also work on shotguns.  Auras should benefit the team, and making auras for the types of primaries is just too specific, too limited.

 

Alternately, if they really want to go that route, they need to add two more (shotguns and bows), and then tweak Rifle Amp to be for rifles.  And then change all of them so that they provide two levels of benefits: One amount for their weapon type, and a lower value the other primaries.

 

But personally, I say just have the one amp for primaries and be done with it.  After all, if all weapon types are "balanced" in terms of stats, the bonuses provided should be the same if the intent is actually to benefit the team.  Which means having ones for specific primaries only hurts us all, since we'd benefit less as a team.  And if they aren't balanced, they should not be relying on mods, and especially not team focused mods, to compensate.  They should fix the actual weapons themselves.

 

Note though that I wouldn't mind seeing Dead Eye do something like provide bonus damage on head shots.  That would benefit accurate weapons, like Sniper Rifles, but wouldn't be exclusive to them.

I like your thoughts, some good ideas there; however, there's a bit of flaw in that it's only inclusive to team based aura building and not those just soloing.  Snipers (in real world and in games) tend to be more solo, out there, and unconcerned with the team other than to support from afar with the skill they have.  That is, sniping.  In this case, I love that DE specifies auras to individual tastes, I don't mind that they are automatically applied to the group b/c it increases the chance of aiding someone else, but that's not the primary intent here.  

I do like the head-shot bonus idea!  It gives a very real means to benefiting snipers solo or otherwise.  However, the flat rate increase of dmg if it is to stay the way it is needs to be solely for snipers, rifle amp being solely for rifles, etc.  As of now rifle amp effects other weapons slightly and shouldn't.  I like uniqueness and specificity.  It adds character to a game and too many games make things universal and easier than they should be, I've seen too many games fail that way because players get bored of easily ground out content, the older players get annoyed with seeing the new folks come in and easily gain what they once worked hard for.  (E.g. Prime blueprints being available to everyone now)  Keeping a point of stability via differentiation and solo benefit gives a game spunk, I and many others want to continue to see that in Warframe.

~Tenno out

Edited March 21, 2014 by Erelas

[Axterix13]

I like your thoughts, some good ideas there; however, there's a bit of flaw in that it's only inclusive to team based aura building and not those just soloing.  Snipers (in real world and in games) tend to be more solo, out there, and unconcerned with the team other than to support from afar with the skill they have.  That is, sniping.  In this case, I love that DE specifies auras to individual tastes, I don't mind that they are automatically applied to the group b/c it increases the chance of aiding someone else, but that's not the primary intent here.  

I do like the head-shot bonus idea!  It gives a very real means to benefiting snipers solo or otherwise.  However, the flat rate increase of dmg if it is to stay the way it is needs to be solely for snipers, rifle amp being solely for rifles, etc.  As of now rifle amp effects other weapons slightly and shouldn't.  I like uniqueness and specificity.  It adds character to a game and too many games make things universal and easier than they should be, I've seen too many games fail that way because players get bored of easily ground out content, the older players get annoyed with seeing the new folks come in and easily gain what they once worked hard for.  (E.g. Prime blueprints being available to everyone now)  Keeping a point of stability via differentiation and solo benefit gives a game spunk, I and many others want to continue to see that in Warframe.

~Tenno out

The thing is, we have things that benefit "you".  That is what regular mods are for.  If a Sniper rifle only mod existed (like bows have Thunderbolt), then that would be fine.  But auras are to benefit the team.  They should not be very narrow things, like auras limited to just Sniper Rifles, Bows, or Shotguns  Not unless they also provide at least some bonus to the other weapon types.

 

That snipers are solitary types doesn't matter.  Solo, they'll still benefit from a basic Primary Amp.  On a team, they'll potentially benefit from multiple instances of it.

 

As is, it doesn't add character to the game.  Instead, it encourages players to think only of themselves.  And again, that is not what the aura slot is for.

Edited March 21, 2014 by Axterix13

[BakaBlue]

Erelas, the point i was trying to make was that such specific auras seem pointless, they affect the whole team, everyone should benefit at least a little. For example as rhino i dont really notice energy siphon since i dont really use any skills most of the time, but its still nice, not necessary but nice. Now imagine we have 4 different primary auras, you play as a premade 4 person team and everyone has different favorite weapons(one assault rifle, one shotgun, one sniper and a bow). Right now they could take rifle amp and 3 out of 4 would benefit from it (poor boomstick lover), they could take something else (ES or so) but with 3 to 4 rifle amps the bonus is pretty damn sweet. Now the same scenario with your specific auras: everyone has to take their respective aura, none of the others benefits from it. Or they agree on one aura, now only one person gets a buff for 4 persons using auras. in the end they will resort to using energy siphon or something else, but not the primary auras. 

Its not giving the game depth, by adding that it will actually make it more shallow for team play. And solo? well i dont see any depth increase in having to switch between 4 auras when 1 would be sufficient.

 

Agreed, snipers aren't dead, sometimes they can be a common choice, and i made my point wrong in the last post, drifted off the point.

In fact axterix has said all that what i would have tried to say by now, just in better english.

[Keltik0ne]

It's just bad design, something you should realise the every DE product contains plenty of.

 

The trick is to look for the fun bits in a DE game, they generally have a few (except their Star Trek game, that thing is a steaming pile of shovelware and no mistake).

[Kyte]

Reviving this topic in light of today's Dead Eye alert and the fact it's still a completely useless aura.

[MechaTails]

Thanks for bumping this topic.

 

So what's the latest news on this? Is the OP dead from an aneurysm yet? Inquiring minds want to know rofl

Edited May 23, 2014 by DarkTails

[HAYABU5A]

Reviving this topic in light of today's Dead Eye alert and the fact it's still a completely useless aura.

lol i also got another one from the same alert and thought the exact same thing 

this mod is just a waste/joke atm but maybe there are plans for sniper rifles in the pipeline