Tenno Clock, Discussions Of The Community [Youtube] (Ep 89)

[Xenogelion]

Hey guys, so Episode 47 is out and can be found on the first post as well as here:

 

 

 

Edited September 9, 2014 by Xenogelion

[Sixty5]

Yey! I can watch this one!

Not a huge amount of feedback here, but I do have a fairly large topic in the works for rebalancing damage based frames.

Basically it almost boils down to passives.

For instance ember would gain 10% power damage for 10 seconds each time she damages an enemy. This would stack and refresh each time a power is cast.

Basically this means that given enough time ember can gain near infinite levels of damage if played right. It also helps to keep her as a high damage dealing frame all through the game, something that giving her utility would not.

Still got some stuff to work out on it, but it looks good.

Also nice to see letter on here.

Anyways until next time.

[Xenogelion]

But surely she could have a damage dealing effect that would have utility. So Nekros having terrify is pointless but if a Grineer or Corpus non-robot enemy get hit by flames surely they should run around screaming "I'm on fire, I'm on fire!"

[Sixty5]

But surely she could have a damage dealing effect that would have utility. So Nekros having terrify is pointless but if a Grineer or Corpus non-robot enemy get hit by flames surely they should run around screaming "I'm on fire, I'm on fire!"

True, but they do that already with fire procs, which seem to happen most of the time with fireball.

 

The whole idea is to turn ember into a monster in long games by giving her practically infinite power scaling. Also considering accelerant works off of power strength you get quite a bit of bang for your buck. 

Each 10% power strength with cause accellerant to give you an additional 25% (10% of 250%) damage on your flames, plus the 10% that you get on your powers. At 10 stacks (100% bonus power strength) combining Accellerant and a Power will result in 4 times the damage it normally would have.

And it only gets bigger from then on.

 

I'd also like to see fire blast replaced with that big AOE line of sight fire blast that Eximus units do, since fireblast as it is is rather terrible.

[Traeyze]

I think people are a bit harsh on Ember. Her Fireball move is currently pretty good, with gauranteed proc on hit and 50% on AOE or something, so it is basically a free stun with amazing speed and range. Then she has petrol throw that boosts her damage and etc though I personally think it is a flawed move.

I really like Sixty5's idea though I am not sure I like the idea of it being passive. I feel that an ability that is something akin to the human torch going flame on that gets a buff every time it is used and can stack for huge damage could be really interesting. Give it Valkyr levels of duration [like a minute or two] and you could see some pretty interesting stuff. As it is Fireball is a great move to use in and around WOF, so this would be a perfect way to further work in unity with those powers by making the spam practical. Wow, it could even increase the size of the fire moves as your aura increases, that would be cool.

Nekros could be a lot more interesting without any huge changes. If SFist was pure utility and did similar things to Banshees push wave except it was ranged but narrower that would be fine [it sort of does that now but not really]. That random thing for Terrify is a great idea, I'd totally support that. The Shadows could work the same way if they were invincible but drew like 1000% more aggro, and literally could be used as walking Decoy zombies. That would leave Nekros to go feel up dead bodies.

I guess in general I would like to see more unity with movesets. I like Vauban because his moves work together. Mirage needs to utilise all her moves to maximise output. Valkyr builds that focus on Hysteria still work really well with rip and warcry, etc.

Otherwise good stuff, it was a slow week in terms of the game though the dev was interesting.

[Sixty5]

The thing is it kinda has to act like a passive to really work.

What my goal is, is to make damage based casters (and pure damage abilities) viable right up through endgame.

Ember would need to keep those stacks up to be relevant, dropping them would drop her usefulness.

With the 10 second cast thing, playing ember becomes a lot more about proper energy management as well as avoiding damage/enemy cc.

A good ember would be completely unstoppable, burning through everything, a bad one would be only marginally better off.

Plus I think a unique passive for each frame might tie nicely into the focus system.

Hit level 30, unlock passive.

[Traeyze]

That's why I was suggesting a much longer timeframe, sort of like the precedent set with Valkyr and Hysteria. That said I do completely understand what you are saying and it is a good point.

Focus as a way to introduce passives would be a great idea. Maybe Rhino could have something where anytime he has full energy any orbs you pick up strengthen his IS. That would stop Stomp spam and make it possible, with correct setups, to be virtually immortal by the time you hit high gameplay as opposed to the soap bubble it currently represents, etc etc. That was a really arbitrary example on reflection.

I think Passive stuff would be a good way to add more fun and further differentiate frames, but if one frame had a passive while others don't that would be a concern, ergo with the current system it would still have to be an ability to be 'fair'.

[Sixty5]

I do have written in my notes "wave intermission time not counted" under embers thing.

Which solved my main issue with the timeframe of it.

Ember so far seems to be the biggest monster, but Saryn and Excal are looking pretty nasty too.

Slash dash deals 30% of a targets current health in damage, plus anything needed to bring it up to the current damage.

Radial Javelin deals 50% of a targets missing health in damage. Additional javelins hitting the same target add an additional 10%.

Press 1 to cripple an enemy at full health and press 4 to execute nearly anything.

Plus there is some nice synergy with well of life on there too.

And I am absolutely all for every frame unlocking a passive of some kind once they hit level 30, be it ability modifiers, stat boosts, mechanics or otherwise.

They would be a rather nice balancing factor.

Edited September 10, 2014 by Sixty5

[Xenogelion]

Hey guys, so Episode 48 is out and can be found on the first post as well as here:

 

[Sixty5]

Yay!

 

Anyways, continuing on from my last post here and in relation to the discussion in this episode I posted this topic last week

 

 

For a long time damage dealing frames have received the short end of the stick in regards to late game use. Their abilities scale into baby scratches and any buffs they receive give utility, which is fine, but for many it compromises what they are about.

Hence I've been playing the hell out of 3 of the Frames that really have fallen off in use, or only find use through roles that don't fit the rest of their kit. Specifically, I will be looking at Excalibur, Ember and Saryn.

(Note, these analyses were done before 14.6 and the recent discussions about Excalibur, so bear that in mind)

 

Excalibur

To start we need to look at the problems with his kit. Two of his abilities deal direct damage, one putting him into danger and the other taking half a year to cast for mediocre damage output. In addition another of his abilities only adds a small degree of mobility to his kit.

Historically I have always looked at Excal as a very mobile frame, indeed, I'd have put him at the top of the list for mobility. However with the release of Zephyr Excal has lost a lot of his usefulness in terms of mobility, since her first ability does a better job than his two mobility powers combined.

However, early game Excal is great, as his abilities are good teachers about how to react to situations, and help newer players pick up skills, hence compromising on this early game play is something that any balance changes should avoid.

 

So what Excalibur needs is the ability to dish out the damage later on, a bit more safety and a reason to use his mobility later on.

With that in mind I propose these changes.

(Any aspect not mentioned here can be assumed to stay the same)

 

Slash Dash:

Ability will initially deal 30% of the targets CURRENT health in direct damage, if this is less than the regular damage number, additional damage will be dealt up until this point.

Direct damage is not boosted by power strength and ignores 90% of an enemy's damage reduction.

In addition all other abilities can be cast whilst dashing without animation. Radial Blind and Javelin will not interrupt the dash, Super Jump however will.

 

Radial Blind: (Post U14.6)

Requires line of sight, though at a lower degree than in the 14.6 changes. Enemies will not block LOS. Blinded enemies will take 50% additional damage from his abilities.

 

Super Jump:

Now damages nearby enemies upon landing.

Deals 150/200/250/300 Blast Damage in a 3/4/4/5m radius upon landing. Additionally enemies hit with the blast will be knocked down.

This effect will occur regardless of the height reached by your jump.

In addition all other abilities can be cast whilst using Super Jump.

 

Radial Javelin:

Damage reduced to 750 per Javelin.

Javelins hitting targets will deal their regular damage , followed up by additional damage equal to 50% of the targets missing health in direct damage.

Targets struck with multiple javelins will take an additional 10% extra direct damage for each additional javelin, as well as the initial damage

Direct damage is not boosted by power strength and ignores 90% of an enemy's damage reduction.

Javelins gain 0.5/0.6/0.8/1m of Punch Through

Javelins will now target enemies in line of sight. If the number of javelins created is greater than the number of targets present, multiple will target each enemy prioritising enemies nearest to Excalibur.

 

 

So why these changes? To start it doesn't stop Excal from doing anything he is doing already. Initially I had planned to leave radial blind blank, since it was doing alight as it was, though after 14.6 and 14.6.1 it is assumed that the LOS change will be happening.

The biggest changes are to his first and final abilities, giving them both direct damage means that both will remain relevant right up into the endgame.

Slash dash dealing damage based on current health means that it works best as an initiation tool, encouraging the player to charge in with it to get as much damage in as possible. Subsequent strikes will deal less damage, so picking your targets becomes much more important.

Radial Javelin will now deal additional damage based on how weakened a target is. A single javelin for instance will always kill a target on 30% health of less, regardless of what level they are or how much armour they are wearing. The reduced damage on it was added to keep its base damage on about the same level as it is now. Additionally it becomes incredibly potent when facing smaller groups of enemies, as all Javelins will now target something.

The second big change is the freedom to use abilities at any point. Being able to hit blind while dashing means that you can freely charge in, knowing that any enemy who might want to shoot at you is now looking for a guide dog instead of firing their gin.

Finally the changes to super jump give Excal a tad more utility and encourages players to use it as an initiation tool.

 

Overall these changes have little impact on Excalibur earlygame, yet later on they mean that he can deal significant damage through his powers  and encourage greater use of his mobility while rewarding good timing of power use.

 

Saryn

Saryn is a rather interesting frame, she is poison/toxin theme, but her powers don't really gel together. She was good in the past, but that was because of the relative strength of her powers particularly Miasma.

The only consistent theme that she has is killing targets in unpleasant ways, hence my goal was to improve Saryns killpower in the late game, as well as making her abilities work together.

 

Venom:

Name changed to Contagion (Seriously)

Spores that are popped now create 2/4/6/8 additional spores.

Applying a new spore to a target will refresh the duration of all spores

Hitting a target with a spore will apply a Seeping Poison DOT that deals 0.25% damage per second for 4 seconds

 

Molt:

Hitting a target will apply a Seeping Poison DOT that deals 0.5% damage per second for 4 seconds

 

Contagion:

Name changed to Venom

While active all melee hits will return 5% of damage done as Health

Hitting a target will apply a Seeping Poison DOT that deals 0.25% damage per second for 4 seconds

 

Miasma:

Ability now is centred on Saryn, dealing damage in a radius around her.

Similar to how Banshee's Silence works

Hitting a target will apply a Seeping Poison DOT that deals 1% damage per second for 4 seconds

 

Unique Passive: Seeping Toxin

Hitting an enemy with damage from any ability will deal 1/2/1/4% (in order of respective ability) max health damage in 4 ticks over 4 seconds. Hitting an enemy with additional power damage will refresh the duration and stack the dot damage.

For venom this only applies on an enemy being hit with an additional spores

To explain, an enemy hit with miasma will start taking 1% of their health in damage each second for 4 seconds, on being hit with the next tick the duration will reset and the damage will increase to 2% per tick, on the third it will increase to 3% and so on.

A Miasma cast with no duration mods will deal 1/2/3/4/4/4/4% of a targets Health in additional direct damage totalling 22% of a targets health in additional damage extra damage if all 4 ticks hit an enemy.

Damage dealt is rounded down, if the DOT would be lower than 1hp it would deal no damage.

DOT is capped at 10% per tick.

 

Wow a unique passive!

What these changes aim to do is to give Saryn back some of her old face-melting power without making her overly oppressive at lower levels.

The changes to her first ability bring back a bit of its old nastiness while keeping it a tad more tame. The Passive damage it gets may well be a tad too high, though that shouldn't be too hard to rebalance.

The changes to her third ability are a bit more dramatic as they give her a tad more survivability with some innate lifesteal, it doesn't fit her theme as such but it makes her work better gameplay wise, again the passive damage would need a bit of a look

Miasma gets the brunt of the effect, without any mods it will deal at least 22% of a targets health. The passive also means that increasing the duration on Miasma has a real positive effect on the skill, letting it build up the DOT a bit more and allowing more focus on its stun effect as well.

Not really much more to say, I'd really like to be able to playtest these changes to see their actual effects in order to scale them correctly.

 

Ember

Ember is meant to be a frame that slings off constant fireballs and burns everything in her path to a fine ash. She doesn't do that at all. Her entire kit is based on damage, and yet as soon as she starts moving into the late game she simply lacks the damage that she needs to kill things, reducing her in effect to a poor-mans Nova or Banshee.

Simply giving Ember utility in the same way that Oberon did would turn her from a blazing inferno to an oil lamp, useful, but not nearly as much fun.

With that in mind Fire Blast is a rather outdated skill, it worked alright back in the days of overheat when ember could sit in her ring of fire sponging damage and burning everything to death with her 2, 3 and 4 all up at once.

Really what Ember needs is a rework of her third skill and the ability to do a lot more damage later on.

 

Fire Blast:

Replace that lame ring of fire with the massive blast that Eximus Units get.

New Fire Blast:

Cost: 75 Energy

Creates an expanding wall of fire that damages and knocks down any enemy in its path.

Deals 100/150/200/300 Fire damage in a 10/13/17/20m Radius. Wall expands out at 4m/s

Power is boosted by Strength and Range mods.

 

Unique Passive:

Intense Flames

Damaging an enemy with an ability grants Ember 10% additional power damage for 10 seconds. This effect can be stacked and has its duration refreshed any time Ember casts a power.

This effect can only be applied once per cast of a power.

The timer for this passive shown on the bottom right of your screen, just above the other stats, and is paused during the intermissions of Defence and Interception missions.

 

Unique passive number two!

Changing Fire Blast to what the Eximus Units use gives Ember some much needed CC, without compromising what she does.

The real change comes with her new passive mechanics. Allowing Ember to stack up power damage means that she scales extremely well in long games, and is able to stay relevant as a source of damage.

With her passive, Ember play would become a lot about energy management in order to keep her stacks up.

 

Anyways, that is all I have for now, feel free to ask any questions that you have and all feedback is welcome.

Cheers 

 

 

Quoting it saves me having to re-describe it, but I like the way these changes would buff things.

 

 

With the prime access thing it is just picky people. Originally the complaint that you couldn't get the Misa prime without the top tier, was pretty valid, hence the exclusives pack, and that was fair.

 

As to the apollodronus thing, I blame it on people being terrible. If you are having trouble getting swamped with maxed weapons in the first 5 minutes, then I'd say the problem lies with them.

Hell I was running it fairly recently leveling up my Excal, Lat Wraith and Spectra, none of which were higher than rank 5 at the start, I had no problem with keeping my killspeed up, and that was with a full party too.

 

Anyways, great episode as always.

[Traeyze]

Inclined to agree re Prime packs, the whole point of tiered rewards is to urge investment. Individual items would indeed make it a glorified market, which is contrary to the point. I figure if they are still bothering with Prime Access it denotes that it is still an important revenue stream for them, so why mess with that needlessly.

Appollodorus is an odd one. I have noted that the spawn rate is pretty hectic compared to a few of the other survival maps but frankly speaking that is half the reason it is a good map for grinding. Just before I ran a setup of average level 5 to 10 stuff with one other person for half an hour. I was a Mirage though, so magic happens when you are a Mirage. Frankly I see no reason to change it, if anything has changed at all.

Regarding some of the frames...

 

I dig the idea Sixty5 has for Excal, the idea of percentage damage is interesting. Proper tracking on Jav is a must, especially if they improve LOS. The other ideas to have Slash and Jav scale to melee damage and count or melee attacks [so that you get the bonus on blind enemies] introduce a couple of concerns: it would have the same problem that Valkyr hysteria builds had that you essentially gimp yourself by not equipping the best weapon [and the metagame squad would quickly identify that] and ultimately this would only push the damage wall problem back a little, as ultimately it is still not giving him scaling output, just significantly[?] increasing his damage cap.

But I really like the idea of percentage based damage and the reasonable scaling that allows. Frankly, it would help him stand out mechanically and be a good training wheel for new players because you don't need damage mods to keep him competent/useful.

Saryn definitely needs an ability to stack poison procs to stay useful. Then it would be a matter of running up to heavy goons, spamming a bunch of moves and building up a huge stack to bleed them out. This suits molt and her role as a pseudotank, because you can spam her melee and stack them procs then jump away to let the venom kill them, etc. Travelling cloud is a long time coming IMO, the nuke mechanic was always silly, especially as it didn't linger.

Considering that Ember already has a way to buff her attack via Petrol Throw [which is what my current build is centred on, running into the middle of a group of enemies then tossing petrol before launching a fire blast] the idea of a passive buff and stacking certainly works. After grinding up a vanilla Ember recently [i had the Prime but just got the vanilla for mastery] I found that Fire Blast is just a mechanically flawed move, the DOT it should have while active just doesn't seem to work properly, to the point that it really may as well just be a wave that pushes stuff away because enemies in the Blast funnel will still attack you while almost completely disregarding the flames, eliminating the point of having them inside it in the first place. The damage wall is obviously a huge issue as well, and a passive buff seems a good idea but as I've noted previously that would require a mechanical change to the system and I don't see that anytime soon.

[Calayne]

Cause loz asked for this some time back.

[MDRLOz]

AHAHAHAHHA Awesome. 

 

Thanks Calayne ^^. So many Kubro'sicles. 

[Calayne]

AHAHAHAHHA Awesome. 

 

Thanks Calayne ^^. So many Kubro'sicles. 

 

New Archwing Map incoming: Kubrow Graveyards. 

 

DUN DUN DUN DUNDUN!

[Sixty5]

Well now lots of stuff to talk about.

Firstly, I was watching this on my phone as opposed to listening to it while playing and the fact that you weren't coptering was really grating at me.

I am a copterholic, and unless I have some other form of mobility I will shy away from non copter weapons, on that note, it isn't that DE have made weapons as good as the Zorens, more that the attack speed balance of melee 2.0 leveled stuff out.

On a side note, I recently discovered that I can chain 3-4 spins with my Glaive prime, which is amazing.

Really I don't think it has too much bearing on parkour use, as addicted to coptering as I am, i will wallrun and jump alot, combining them with my copters and slides. There is a reason I don't feel the need for rush on my frost.

Point is, coptering is like the boltor prime, using it gives you a big advantage, and it is fairly easy to pick up, but if you have the skills and will there are better options out there that will do better.

Second point with 10 rank mods. I've had my serration and hornet strike sitting at rank 9 for.a very long time now, and in that period I have maxed a new redirection, a narrow minded and a blind rage. Right now I could max them both if I wanted to, but in all honesty I feel no need to do so.

Maxed blind rage is my new favourite toy by the way.

As for the last topic (complaint thread) much of it comes down to personal preference and opinion. In alot of those cases my response would be to deal with it, but that is just me and how I operate. A few points were valid however, like needing more frequent balance changes. I am all for that, the meta is getting rather stale.

Oh right ammo balancing.

The launcher changes were a good start, but I'd still like to see more done. Especially with the amount of ammo you pick up with certain weapons, 20 shots go a lit further in a Lat Prime than they do in a Gorgon or Supra.

Anyways good episode as always, tropic thunder is an excellent movie.

Also shoutout to my phone for not deleting 80% of this reply when I fat fingered a button that would take me away from this Page.

[Xenogelion]

Hey guys, so Episode 49 is out and can be found on the first post as well as here:

 

[Sixty5]

Oh yeah one more thing I wanted to say.

How is solo survival broken? I'd say it is one of the best things in this game as a test of skill. There is a mix of killspeed, spawn management, resource monitoring and survivability that you don't get anywhere else.

Defending the pod by yourself for any length if time is a pain, but solo survival is a very doable challenge

Case and point, I managed 20 minutes of T3 Survival solo with an extinguished key equipped, on a Banshee no less. And that was my first attempt at it.

All the pro rhinos and valkyrs should be able to do at least 30.

[MDRLOz]

Well I know Pre-T4 I used to get to T3 defence wave 24ish with frost. However it took forever and I had to use 1-2 energy restores per wave. It did not feel like I was supposed to be doing that. 

 

Survival I think varies massively when playing solo and it based on your random luck of what tiles you get.  Sometimes I have played solo and got wave after wave of mobs and other times I struggle to reach 15 min before the support runs out. Very hit and miss. 

[Xenogelion]

Hey guys, so Episode 50 is out and can be found on the first post as well as here:

 

 

Additionally people may ask why the same person has won the PS4 plat giveaway twice in a row, well it helps if more than one person votes ;).

 

TO VIENNA! (Conference Trip.)

 

Edit: ARGH!!! why you no work BB code???

Edited September 30, 2014 by Xenogelion

[Sixty5]

The easiest way to do the clan downsizing is to have it require you be below the requisite number of players, and then have it take a week.

Gets rid of a lot of event exploits, and takes long enough to make it painful.

 

Prime access accessories is no problem for me, the exclusives pack is all we really need.

 

T4 is supposed to be hard, any one who says it should be easier doesn't really get what T4 is meant to be.

They say you need top tier gear in there, but I prefer to see it as the justification of said high level gear. Plus I've never had any problems just jumping into a random group, beyond what is typical when encountering pubs.

My advice in general is "Git Gud" 

 

As for the Supra, I wouldn't say that you'd need an overheat bar. IMO an ammo count would work just as well as a heat bar, plus it would give more information AND would require less work.

Upon further thought into the topic, I'm not convinced fire rate buffing regen rate would be a great idea, though with it also increasing the overheat time might make it work a bit better, that line of thinking just came from thinking of how capacitors work =P.

Also, I'd probably lower the ammo regen rate during the overheat time, or maybe even stop it altogether. There'd have to be a penalty for letting it overheat.

Anyways, if anyone is interested here is the topic https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/315411-petition-to-give-the-supra-infinite-ammo/

 

Anyways, great episode as always, until next time

[Xenogelion]

Hey guys, so Episode 51 is out and can be found on the first post as well as here:

 

 

Edit: If the BB code worked that is!

Edited October 6, 2014 by Xenogelion

[Mattac0n]

I think, on Steve's noncommittal answer on endgame, DE hasn't reached a consensus on what endgame is yet. Steve is dodging the question to (I hope) shelter the team from community burn if their implementation turns out to be wholly different from what's discussed in a prior livestream. Endgame itself is a massive question that the team literally doesn't have the time format to answer in a satisfactory way, and the dodging is another show of the flaw of relying on limited devstreams to discuss such important topics. Personally to me the best way for them to answer this is in a long-format official forum post, or even using Community Hot Topics as the proper platform for discussing endgame, instead of trying to distill it in what is basically a time-crunched press conference and Q&A stream. We have to remember too that the developers themselves can get caught up in the hype as well and end up slipping things that may not even be ready for discussion yet (or worse, are never guaranteed [such as saying "2014 is they year of endgame"]).
Edit: Having re-watched the video, I also think now that their inability to reach consensus on endgame is a huge flaw of the team's "art first, gameplay second" design philosophy, especially given the lead designer is hugely art-focused. On the other hand, you had a great point about the playerbase- who's actually continuing playing the game, and are *those* players the ones leveraging complaints about lack of endgame? I'm hoping that the playerbase isn't stagnating (which tends to intensify the sourness of a community in the end). Datamining the playerbase (especially focusing on average player retention) would hugely help DE in this respect.

 

On the aside, even though there's no "true" endgame yet, I'm still enjoying Warframe as it comes. Despite the former, and despite the uber-hiccups in U14 (and the disasters in U13), I do believe Warframe has progressed massively in terms of content and variety.

 

Edit: If the BB code worked that is!

Nope, it's not working. :S

Edited October 6, 2014 by Mattac0n

[MDRLOz]

Well I am not allowed to post the stuff from design council from back in February but they made out back then that the first three "endgame" projects were fairly well outlined in their eyes. However what they think is in endgame is not what everyone will agree is endgame.

 

I don't want to rant to much now (though I could...). I think I shall bide my time till December/January. Give DE these last few months to pull a rabbit out of the hat.

 

However seeing as how Archwing seem to be dragging its heels on release. I don't think we are going to get update 16 ( what ever it is) before the end of the year. I really felt we were going to get a proper "Archwing really really soon" thin on the last livestream. It was a month ago they showed the working Dev test of it. I know it was no where near complete but it was very functional (minus gun vanishing).

 

I will have to look up the Devstream from the start of the year. The community was very toxic and you could feel the sombre mood of the stream. They have done some great things this year, however endgame is still lacking.

 

 On the other hand, you had a great point about the playerbase- who's actually continuing playing the game, and are *those* players the ones leveraging complaints about lack of endgame? I'm hoping that the playerbase isn't stagnating (which tends to intensify the sourness of a community in the end). Datamining the playerbase (especially focusing on average player retention) would hugely help DE in this respect.

 

I do am enjoying the game, when I find the time to play, but it makes me think that when players even start thinking about "the health of the community" and "are we stagnating" its a bad sign. If everything was awesome we would not even take the time to consider such things.

[Sixty5]

I feel you are being a bit harsh with the whole endgame thing.

I know that we only have 1 out of 3 of the big endgame things, which is a tad dissapointing.

However on the other hand there is so much more that we have gotten/are going to get.

To start, T4 missions are great content. They are interesting (corrupted Vor encounter) and challenging (higher level enemies etc)

In addition the game has a better degree of difficulty all round, Eximus units and the changes they have received definitely turned up the challenge meter on long runs.

We also have two new endless game modes in Interception and Excavation, these also help to justify high level gear.

Another note I'd like to add is the Frequency of events, and their complexity.

Oxium hunt, Tethras Doom, Breedibg Grounds, Cryotic Front, Gate Crash, and all the other smaller ones in between. We are getting new stuff to do basically every 3 weeks, keeping the game fresh.

Adding to all this we have Archwing. Something that promises to add an entirely new dimension to gameplay. I'm still mostly in the dark about what it actually does since I'm too lazy to go watch tge VODs but the hype is real.

The question dodging seems to come from the fact that endgame is hard to define for Warframe.

In other games I refer to it as the point where I have the gear I want, at a level that I can crush things in the most enjoyable way right up to the end of the story.

Or as the point where you have consumed all of the content in the game.

However, both definitions are problematic as 1, warframe isn't campaign based, and 2, making content to be consumed after the rest of the content has been consumed is just shifting the horizon.

Many here want endgame as sonething to do once they hit max mastery and have nothing more to grind out, but fundamentally that is the wrong mindset.

It turns things into a "what do I have to do next" setup.

Anyways, I feel precariously close to rambling so I will finish with this:

How can you have endgame in a game with no end?

[MDRLOz]

Oh I cut that post short for time. Normally I would point out the great stuff we have gotten this year (e.g. Melee system, Liset, Quest system, Tier 4, 2 new bosses, Dark sectors, 4 new awesome tile sets, a pile of events, cool Uis, awesome new sound system).

 

However I would still sat dark sectors is 95% finished so we have had probably 1.1 out of three (0.95 from dark sectors and 0.15 from quest system and name dropping a few for proxy war). However DE has used the defence in the past of multiple teams working on things so development in all things is continuing. So some of those awesome things should have just coem out anyway and should not detract from "endgame" modes.

 

Also I may not have a perfect answer for "What is endgame?" however I was fully happy to just accept DES 3 endgame projects and wait on those. Focus sounds great and proxy war should be compelling. I cant wait for both of them. However neither have developed that far.

 

As for possibilities of endgame. Have I explained my Heroic boss mode to you? Use same bosses but scale them to the nth degree. Bosses on release will be over-tuned one shotting monsters and DE can slowly bring them down in power if needed. DE would need to stick to their guns on this. The reward? All cosmetic. Something like the tactical alerts emblem that upgrades the more you manage.These should be very hard and only conceive doing them when you have everything maxed and the best team setup. Its a similar style to WoWs challenge mode dungeons. Those are time trials (hard to do in warframe) that are tuned to a note so they are a hard challenge however they have multiple reward levels.  

 

DE said they would be adding in harder repeat versions of the quest but have not seen heads not tails of that.

 

I am not one of these people that would say we need "raid" encounters. That is just silly. However group quests would be a good idea with challenges. Only kill X mobs or Complete quest line only taking 1000 total damage. Challenge is the key, and I mean more than just shooting stronger mobs. I mean challenge that is only achieve able once you have reached the pinnacle of the game.

 

However DE worries such content will be "out of reach" for new players. However they seem to ignore the fact that players try and aspire to do or reach something. SO many new players I play with find fun at first and then a couple of days in will turn around and say... "So what am I doing all this for? What am I trying to reach?".  There needs to be some content that low level players cannot do at first but that they have to unlock or power up to be able to participate. Not a great example but I remember leveling up in WoW and using an addon for dungeon maps I would look ahead at all the higher level dungeons I wanted to reach. I would read the bosses names and plan routes through them. It spurred me on to reach them. I want to see it all.

Edited October 7, 2014 by MDRLOz