Are We Turning Into Spartans?

[LGear]

Trying to shoehorn the stereotypically historical conception of "Ninjas" unto Tennos and Warframes in my opinion is really pointless. They're not called "Space Ninja" for nothing, the "Space" is as much a part of the word as the "Ninja". It may sound pedantic, but think about it: do modern day soldiers have to wear bright, visible clothing and march shoulder to shoulder in battle between lines of musketmen just because that was the 1800's perception of what a "soldier" is? Do they also have to use gladius and shield just to fit the Roman description of a "warrior"?

 

Tenno are Space Ninja, but above all they are Tenno: they are supposed to be their own entity, their own concept. Since the beginning their lore has always painted them as superhuman soldiers augmented by mysterious forces, using highly advanced armor. They take inspiration from the warrior culture of old, sometimes to the point of being archaic and seemingly old fashioned, but that's pretty much the same as how someone not versed in the ways of actual ancient warriors and shinobi might do: emulate the old ways. But they're not so rigidly affixed to such concepts that they can't use more powerful arsenals of weaponry at their disposal, including guns and rocket launchers.

 

That we can have the freedom to play as either a gun-toting bullet hose that sprays firepower everywhere, or be a swordsman cutting down enemies with their blade, or be a mix of both, is a very good thing in gameplay. I'd rather not be stuck to the normal archetypes of what "Ninja" are supposed to be in relation to Tenno because they've never been strictly ninja in their portrayal or their lore.

[VoidWraith]

Sadly, despite DE's claim that this is a "space ninja" game, ALOT of the designs of the Warframe do not fit it. They are supposed to be mobile? Stealthy? And in most cases, lethal?

 

I'm sorry, but when I see Rhino, I don't see him as a ninja. Ninja's aren't supposed to be tanks....or beefy.... that's something I would see in an anime... or these types of games too apparently....

Saryn? The same thing, She is more of an assassin, if anything.

Banshee is probably on the level with Saryn, an assassin.

Ash has ninja-like abilities, but he sorta reminds me of a samurai with his shoulder pads/armor thing.

Vauban? An engineer/mechanic (actually a trap master) who resembles an old man.

Trinity.... reminds me of a swordswoman in a weird way.... even though she's a healer/support.

Oberon.... seriously? DE made a satyr and called it a paladin.... a paladin..... how is that a "space ninja"?

Hydroid is another one. They basically made him a "space pirate" instead of a "space ninja"....

Nekros, who is the necromancer..... I don't see that playing a "ninja" role besides things you see in animes......

Frost.... I'm sorry, despite how I like him, he reminds me of a mage with his trench coat....

Volt.... ehh... probably a well-dressed assassin? The coat tail on him reminds me a bit of assassin's creed....

 

Everybody else with this slim-ish design passes for a "ninja" I guess.... although some of them fit the "warrior" class instead....

 

The thing is... DE can only make/create Warframes that have that "ninja" feel/theme for so long before it gets tired and look like recycled rejects....

Hence the diversity.... The problem then falls onto what we can do as "space ninjas":

Parkour - really? it's not really that great... the flow of our parkour abilities isn't smooth. It's choppy a bit... There's no smooth flow to the movements when you're vaulting over, wallrunning (vertical or horizontal)... The wallflipping is ok, but you would think that because each Warframe is unique, they would have their own animations to a wallrun/wall-flip/etc..... Animations are recycled....

 

Stealth - (I have discussed this in lengths with Kuhrasu, a fellow forum poster on this subject and me and him/her generally share the same idea) this is borderline, non-existent. You can reset alarms.... great.... But you have to clear the room, and possibly the next room, because the ship isn't sound-proof. A slight grunt and the entire room will notice your presence...really? you'd think a yell or a shout "Tenno!" or "Ah! Tenno Skuum!!!" or something to alert the others but no... it's "Erh.." (notice there's no exclamation mark, because sometimes the grunt is very low, but every single unit in the room heard it). "Stealth Attack" really? Why are we stealth attacking? We should be stealth killing/execution (I don't mind if we can't kill bosses but we should be able to kill anything that's not a boss). The execution or "Stealth Attack" involves some flashy moves like impaling, head splitting, neck snapping, throat slitting..... It's amazing that they can get up from that.... Finishers should also kill.... You're impaling them while they're on the floor, why aren't they dead? The same goes for the parry-counters... it shows you impaling them in a certain way, where they should've just died.... why aren't they dead? Even if enemies are alerted we should still be able to "Backstab" (Kuhrasu's idea) them as punishment for having their backs turned to us.... or at least give us an option for a takedown/knockdown when they're running from us. On another topic (basically melee was/is unrewarding, especially in the stealth department), why aren't there more routes/paths to take to go into the next map? DE did release SOME alternate paths, but we still have to go through a corridor (basically ONE door inorder to go into the next room... really?) just to get to the next map/portion/section of the mission. Why can't we travel through ventilation shafts? Heck every mission that isn't planetside, has involved us kicking out a grate and landing (as silently or ninja-like) into the mission. Even the planetside missions has us doing a nice flip onto the mission starting point....

 

Cover - I'll admit, if DE inputs this, it will slow down the pace of this game.... But at the moment, cover is a joke in this game... just hide behind something to avoid fire. I can dodge corpus fire just fine as long as I keep moving, but Grineer fire, they're like hitscans. It WILL hit regardless of movement... The only exceptions are the grenades (both factions) and Bombards, Napalms, Eviscerators and the Seekers's seeking/rolling grenades (ones you can roll, to detach it). The objects/terrain is also non-destructible which can be a good and bad thing.... good in that it makes for excellent cover.... bad in that some people tend to "turtle" there until it's safe to move onto the next spot....

 

Stamina - Stamina usage in this game is amazing... Running, Jumping, Falling (yes, if you have the dash/run key held, your stamina drains), Melee swings(stance mod's don't really help with the stamina drain since, if you are going full melee, you will be using up alot of stamina), Rolling, Blocking (Only when actually getting hit, once out of stamina it stops blocking, which makes you have to manually reblock), and Wallrunning. I don't mind the stamina drains, but if you want to be full melee, the amount of stamina drain is near impossible.... Since one would pick survivability mods over stamina mods any day. Stamina is static like Armor and doesn't scale with level like HP/Shield/Energy does.

 

The way the AI behaves and the programming of how "sound" really works ingame prevents stealth. They don't have that "investigate" behavior if they detect movement (while in cover/hiding but parts of you were clearly showing). It's an automatic detection. There's no way to "silence" that alerted enemy, besides Banshee.... but realistically we should all be able to do it, since DE should give us like a 0.7 second time limit to silence him before he alerts everyone else in the room. Running for the alarms should not alert every enemy in the room, until the alarm has actually been sounded or he makes a clear yell indication like "Tenno!" or something like that.....

 

All in all, I see us more like a mercenary group with special powers, instead of "space ninjas".... and even then, at least high end games have a stealth takedown or kill but Warframe being "space ninjas" can't do that.

We are getting shot at during melee/melee kills/finishers/counters, to take out that ONE target. I have never seen anyone use pure melee, and came out unscathed in higher level missions. It's more rewarding to just blow up the enemy group from the safety of my cover then run up to enemies to melee kill them. DE is afraid of inputting instant kills to finishers/stealth attacks/counters because they feel it's overpowered.... is it really, when you can shoot and kill someone ALOT faster instead of waiting for your melee kill (counter,finisher,stealth attack) animation to finish (no invulnerability during these animations) inorder to move onto the next one?

 

Melee 2.0 only gave us melee combos (stances) and channeling.... and even channeling is VERY lack-lustered....the channeling is basically the same swing animations except your're glowing from the energy feed into the melee weapon........the only satisfying thing is when you kill due to channeling, the enemy vaporizes/disintegrates into the air upon death.......

 

I've given up on this game being a "space ninja" themed game, with all the introduction of the Warframes (past,present,future), but the mechanics of stealth is severly lacking....... and quite frankly, a turn off.

 

EDIT: The stealth attack should also work on bosses actually, it shouldn't kill them like I suggested for any other unit, but it should at least hurt/critically wound the bosses.... 1/3 of their hp? 1/5? Up to DE (although they might not "listen" to this notion).

Edited May 30, 2014 by VoidWraith

[UncommonUnicorn]

Spartans?

More like Adeptus Astartes/Adepta Sororitas if you ask me.

Anyhow, I play my Saryn like a Canoness Preceptor of the Order of Our Martyred Lady.

 

Stealth? Parkour?

Forget that, I wade into battle and block bulats with my face,

as I do so.

 

Let them know fear, for I am fear incarnate!

[VoidWraith]

Spartans?

More like Adeptus Astartes/Adepta Sororitas if you ask me.

Anyhow, I play my Saryn like a Canoness Preceptor of the Order of Our Martyred Lady.

 

Stealth? Parkour?

Forget that, I wade into battle and block bulats with my face,

as I do so.

 

Let them know fear, for I am fear incarnate!

 

When I read this, only this popped into my head:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75cVj4m2x0Q

 

You may be fine without stealth or a better parkour, but some don't mind having it there as an option.

[SableSonata]

Warframes routinely engage in combat. Have missions to outright kill everyone.

Wear heavy armour and use heavy weaponry.

 

Referring to them as Ninja is a marketing scheme and nothing else. Warframes have very, very little in common with actual ninja.

[UncommonUnicorn]

Says enough.

[Iotan]

It seems more and more as the game progresses we are turning more and more into Spartans from the Halo series rather than Warframes. Even some of the backstory is similar. Genetically enhanced / altered humans inside of a suit that are the strongest of any force out there, yet are few in numbers and we NEVER see the person inside the suit.

 

1. All sorts of non-ninjalike weaponry. It's understandable to a point; of course we aren't going to just stick to katana's, shurikens, and bows, this is of course the future and that simply won't cut it anymore. But several different types of explosive weaponry along with light machine guns? feels a bit off.

 

2.Armor.Ninja's don't wear armor. It makes noise and lowers mobility. On top of that, with enough armor we start looking more like Spartans and less like Warframes.

 

3. Stealth is still not rewarded or very viable with most frames. Don't get me wrong, unless stealth was really well rewarded, i'd still most likely blaze through missions blasting away at everything in my path. It just doesn't feel right considering we are supposed to be "space ninjas" and yet hardly anyone stealths; even in rescue 2.0, a mission type where stealth was pushed to be "necessary", we are able to rush on through as long as no one touches the alarm.

 

In conclusion, I would like some of these things to be worked on; more ninja-like weaponry and stealth to finally get a good overhauling. I would hate for the Tenno to turn into more generic "SPACE MUHREENS" instead of awesome space ninjas.

Spartans to me need large polearms and a shield, we have one of those, but we don't work in a coordinated unit which is the main thing that makes me shake my head when you describe tenno as spartans. 

However I think it best to say tenno are tenno, and leave it at that. Stealth could do with more bonuses the primary one being a quicker movement speed, at the moment the level would be over before you killed anyone if 3 stealthed and one didn't. This also comes down to the game needing some counter to the high DPS solo player who can walk through everything, and no I don't mean doors ;) I mean enemies (or groups) which require two people no matter your dps.

 

-edit

Just realised you were not talking about spartans but the other spartans! Curses :D

Edited May 30, 2014 by Iotan

[CY13ERPUNK]

warframes honestly have more in common with the space marines from 40k than we do "ninja"

 

the warframes were basically future space samurai

 

now we are future space ronin/pirates/mercs/assassins with incredible nano-magic-tech suits and gear that amplify our reality twisting abilities

 

DE calling us "ninja"s was a horrible move because they never really captalized on the idea/potential, thus now the term looks/sounds stupid/silly

[uppertiggy]

i have to say i would REALLY like to see stealth game play worked on alot to make it alot more viable and deadly as well as more fun at the same time, as for the use of swords and bows, even in this day and age both the bow and the sword are still very viable weapons,bows are used the military for verius puropses, either for attaching or getting a wire to a distant place quietly or to kill someone with little noise, a bow makes next to no noise what so ever and are still very deadly and can still go through your traditional kevlar vest. armour today are designed to not only protect yourself from bullets and knifes but also be light, easy to move in and make little noise.