The Art Of Survival : A How To Guide

[Austerity]

A long time ago in a Solar System that seems far, far away…

 

There was a time last year, when I decided that I wanted to raise my KpM (Kills per Minute) to find the maximum I could achieve. I was able to hit around 80KpM and consistently maintain an average of around 60KpM (my apologies I never did the math to find the exact average). Using the method I developed, I was easily able to take #1 killer the first and second week of the kill Leader boards in January. Since there is no real reward for being #1 killer and the weekly boards are not archived (I believe DE dropped the ball on this one), I chose not to continue wasting time on maintaining #1. I did however, have fun in the friendly competition with other players when I was doing it.

 

In order to achieve the maximum KpM, I looked at the various game types as well as mob factions. Based on spawn rates, traversing through maps, times between levels, load times and so on, the obvious game choice to maximize efficiency and get the most kills was Survival. The obvious faction choice, because they don’t camp behind boxes, was Infested. Having once been told “Work smarter, not harder” and in an effort to achieve my personal best, I began deconstructing how air drops and how mobs spawn.

 

On most maps, I was easily able to solo survivals to 35min (2^nd Tower Key), however I rarely stayed beyond this, as damage begins to slowly decrease thus in turn decreasing KpM. (Note: I was after KpM, not trying to achieve the longest time in Survival Mode.) The exception to this was when I would get exceptional spawn rates or my favorite rooms (tiles) and I would stay to 55min (3^rd tower key)(see above screenshot of favorite tile).

 

I have shared this method with a handful of people and they have shared it with others. To the best of my knowledge it never made it to the forums. It has now been many, many months and it has been suggested to me recently by a friend (WrinkleDurf) that I have a responsibility to share my discoveries on the forums with the people. So here goes…

 

 

 

The Art of Survival

By Austerity

 

 Disclaimer: In order for this method to be successful, all players must agree to follow it. If one person is running off doing their own thing, it will break spawns and spawn times and the method will not work succesfully.

 

WARNING: Large Image

 

 

I know this is an old Screenshot, but unfortunately I have not taken the opportunity to do a long Survival recently. I will attempt to get this updated with a new one, soon. The Screenshot does however help to explain some of the principals I will discuss below.

 

The Basics

In every Survival mission there are environmental variables you can control and some you cannot. As Tenno, in order to insure the greatest chance of success, we want to control as many variables in our environment as possible. Things such as where mobs spawn, and where Air Capsules drop are controllable. Air Module drops from mobs cannot be controlled, but can be manipulated under certain circumstances.

 

Air Capsule Drops

In every survival mission there will be three consecutive rooms (tiles) that air (Life Support Capsules) from our dear Lotus drops in. Each of these three main rooms are connected by halls and may have additional halls and rooms connected to them. The Life support Capsules will only drop in the three main rooms.  Here is a simple diagram:

 

[spawn] – hall – [Room #1] – hall – [Room #2] – hall – [Room #3]

 

 

 

 

The exit will always be located through a closed door off Room #2. At minute 5 the door unlocks and the Tenno can proceed to exit when needed. Because of this, Room #2 is nearly always the preferred room for defending. It is worthy to note that all rooms may contain a minimum of 2 Life Support Capsule locations and a maximum of 3 locations.

 

When you are first learning this method it is easiest to use all Life Support Capsule in Room #1prior to the group proceeding to Room #2 (More advanced group tactics will be discussed later). While you are in Room #1 waiting to use Air Capsules, I highly suggest that you use that opportunity to decide who will be “it” (see Tagging Out section). After the Life Support Capsules have been used, STOP killing when you proceed to Room #2 (explination to follow in Mobs Spawn section).

 

When you get to Room #2, you will need to decide as a group which area you will choose to defend (see Choosing a Defense Location section). As a group you will want to try and conserve air as mobs spawns will be slow initially as they begin gradually catching up with the group. Air quality may drop to uncomfortable levels as low as 3-5% while you are waiting for Life Support Capsules. Do not leave Room #2. If you followed the directions in the Tagging Out sections, you should be able to hold out on Modules drops from enemy spawns.

 

Once Life Support Capsules have been used up in Room #1 and Room #2 and when Room #3 has reached it’s maximum capacity for Life Support Capsules, than the capsules will begin dropping back in Room #2. As the Capsules drop over time, the amount of capsules that will drop in Room #2 will depend on the number of drop locations. So if Room #2 has two drop locations, there will only appear one capsule. If the Room #2 has three drop locations, than there will appear two capsules. Essentially one capsule location will always remain “open.”

 

Once the drop locations that can be filled in Room #2 are filled, the Life Support Capsules begin to stack off map. At this point they will never drop in Room #1. Meaning if you are able to obtain enough Life Support Modules from mobs, you could possibly end up with an invisible stack of 6-7 unseen Life Support Capsules. Now when you use a Life Support Capsule, the invisible stack is reduced by one and you gain an instant replacement in Room #2 at the location that was previously “open.”

 

I have personally found that in using this method, most often one is forced to leave a Survival not due to lack of Oxygen, but due to Mobs becoming too tough to kill.

 

Mobs Spawns

Mobs will continue to spawn one room away from where they were killed, unless a Tenno occupies that space. If a Tenno occupies a mobs spawn point than the mob will (usually, not always) spawn in the next furthest room. So for example, if the team is in Room #2, but a single Tenno is standing in the hall to Room #3, then the mobs will not spawn in the hall, but will instead spawn in Room #3. In essence what this does is push the spawns further from the group. The further away the spawns, the greater the travel time to get to the group. The greater the travel time translates into a slower kill rate. The slower the kill rate the fewer the air modules from mobs, and the fewer the air modules the shorter the stay or worse, dead Tenno.

 

This is why, when heading from Room #1 to Room #2 we want to stop killing. All mobs that are killed will generally spawn one room away from Tenno and usually in this case it is in the halls off Room #1. This means further travel times for those mobs to find the Tenno in Room #2. If you stop killing, the mobs will give chase and Tenno can then kill them in Room #2 causing them to respawn just outside the room.

 

Again, we want to force the mobs to spawn as close as possible to where we want to defeat them. By forcing the mobs to spawn close, Tenno can eliminate them quicker and force quicker re-spawns. Quicker re-spawns generally means a faster kill rate and a faster kill rate means more air (IMPORTANT: see Tagging out). The easiest way to make sure mobs spawn on the map close to Tenno is by making sure doors are closed and everyone is in the same room.

 

 

Notice that the area I chose to occupy and defend was in the center of the room away from the three entrances to the room.

 

Tagging Out

The following theory is based on observable actions of Tenno within the environment and the reactions of the environment to the Tenno. It has been play tested in a group of two, however I do not hold any physical proof beyond that.

 

As in a child’s game of tag, where one person is “it.” When in a team enters a Survival mode game, a similar occurrence happens. One of the members of the Tenno team will be invisibly tagged and all their kills will offer up a greater number of Life Support Modules from eliminated enemies than the other Tenno in the party. Because of this it is incredibly important when first starting to kill, to find out who among the party is tagged “it.”

Example: We have a party of four people, a Frost, a Trinity, a Nekros, and a Rhino. They all join a T2 Survival. After loading in they begin confronting mobs as they move to Room #1.

 

“Not it” says Rhino

“Not it” says Frost

“it! nekros” says Nekros

 

Now the entire team knows that the Nekros is tagged and will need to do the majority of the killing to get the maximum amount of Life Support Modules. Nekros decides, because he only has a MK-1 Braton and wants to spam Desecrate, to tag out.

 

“tagging out” says Nekros.

 

He then proceeds to allow mobs to incapacitate him (place him in a bleed out stage). Once he is incapacitated the invisible tag will switch to one of the remaining players still on their feet.

 

Choosing a Defense Location

Tactically it is easier to defend against attackers on one Front, than it is to defend against attackers on Multiple Fronts. Because of this, when choosing a defense location in Survival, it is best to choose a location that forces mobs to funnel towards the group through a singular location. As an example see the Screenshot at the start of this post. All mobs, with the exception of the rare Leaper who jumps over the rail, are funneling towards Frost through one location. This means Frost neither has to defend behind nor on the sides, so all focus can be directed forward towards the one location where Frost’s enemies are funneling towards him.

 

This not only makes killing mobs faster and more efficient than running aimlessly about the map, but it also increases the rate the mobs spawn. Additionally it makes looting incredibly easy and with a Carrier Sentinel and Ammo Mutation all Frost needs to do is walk to the start of the ramp and near instantly he refills both Life Support and ammo.

 

Summary

Use all Life Support Capsules in Room #1. When the last Capsule is used, STOP KILLING mobs, and proceed as a group to Room #2. When you reach room #2, STAY PUT and especially STAY AWAY from DOORS. This may entail patiently waiting for 3-5min for mobs to catch up and find you. Kill whatever does enter the room through the doors, but ABSOLUTELY under NO CIRCUMSTANCES leave the room or enter the halls. Initially, mobs will trickle in and your air may drop to uncomfortable levels (3-5%). It is usually at around 10-15% life support that every Noob freaks out and runs to Room #3 to pop a Life Support Capsule. This is possibly the worst thing anyone can do for the team when using this method. As once a Air Capsule is used in Room #3, the order in which the capsules drop changes and you will no longer be able to solely stay in Room #2. Only use the Life Support Capsules that drop in Room #2. Leave when your team no longer has the capacity to kill enemies.

 

Advanced Tactics

The sooner everyone can get to Room #2 the faster you can control the mobs spawns and get them to your desired defensive position. This means it is most efficient to have the entire group move to Room #2 as quickly as possible at the start of the game. You will however need to send one party member to go back to Room #1 to use the Life Support Capsules that drop there. It is very important that whomever accepts this responsibility also kill as few as mobs as possible once they leave Room #2. Basically run back to Room #1 ignoring mobs, use all capsules, and run back to Room #2.  Remember the further you kill mobs from your defensive position the longer it will take them to find the team again. I recommend waiting till Life Support reaches around 40% unless, Room #1 had 3 capsule locations, than waiting till around 15% lifesupport will be ideal. The Runner needs to be able to use all capsules in Room #1 in one trip.

 

There are certain Warframe skills that I personally feel are incredibly sloppy and counterproductive to the team when using this method. Firstly Molecular Prime, because it goes through walls, slows mob progress (fast nova excused from this), and ultimately the mobs may die outside the room Tenno are defending thus pushing spawns further from group. If a mob dies in the hall while heading to Room #2 than it will respawn not in the hall, but one room away from the hall it was killed in. Also, Molecular Prime will spread loot throughout the room. This does not mean Nova is ineffective; in fact Antimatter drop is very effective for this method. Another Warframe skill to avoid if possible is Nyx’s Chaos. This may have a similar effect as Molecular Prime, pushing mob spawns away from Tenno and Room #2. Like Molecular Prime it also scatters loot and  slows the killing process. Other skills to avoid include Tornado and Tentacle Swarm which can also be very destructive to this method.

 

There are certain Warframe skills that I personally feel are incredibly useful and productive to the team when using this method. For example, when defending a single Front, Vortex can be used to block the front and entirely halt mob progress towards the group. Snow Globe is of course a very useful skill for Tower Survivals, blocking heavy fire and keeping Tenno on their feet.

 

If you are planning on staying a long time, it is a good idea to have an “Escape Pod.” Valkyr using Hysteria can make it to the exit so everyone receives their rewards, even when other Tenno cannot due to insanely high mob levels.

 

I’m sure I have other tips and tricks, but my brain is fried after writing this wall of text. I will try and update this as I think of other things that may be useful.

 

Whew. I hope some of my fellow Tenno find this information helpful.  Have fun and Enjoy!

 

EDIT: As requested by a Fellow Tenno, here is a rather long (16:19 min) video of an example of the strategy above. My apologies for the poor quality, I just threw it together on my Lunch break.

 

 

http://youtu.be/H4Ue95Gi_EI

 

 

Video Related Explinations (please read before or as you watch)

Due to time constraints today, I am unable to add a more thorough video guide full of descriptive texts, dialogue, etc. I did a quick recording and edit to seem the video together and cut out load time. In many aspects it’s a rather poor example, I didn’t equip for a Survival mission and was just using stuff I had on from yesterday when I was helping a friend farm for Delta to make a Hek Triangulator. I spent a fair amount of time goofing off in mission as well.

 

Firstly, I started by showing the the Eternal’s build I am currently using, so that when I am blocking shots while firing Ignis or avoiding knockdowns, viewers will understand how. While it has been suggest by some in the community that the Eternal’s build is a melee only build, having been using it, I clearly know better. For weapon switching I use mouse wheel up for guns and mouse wheel down for fast swtich to melee. Makes cycling far less clumsy than using “F” key in my opinion.

 

After starting the alarm, you will notice I pass mobs to get to first room, I then begin checking halls for the door to find Room #2. Being Colorblind I can’t always distinguish the colors around doors so often I have to actually walk up to them to see if they will open. The second door I check leads me to Room #2, where I find the Exit door and mark it. Mark is merely for the video viewers. I already know this is a horrible room for defending as there isn’t really a funnel area. I head back to Room #1. This room is also a rather horrible room for defending as the best location I found was in a corner where you have two defensive fronts. I globed and screenshot for posting later. I mess around while killing time waiting for Life Support to decrease so I can pop capsule and head to Room #2.

 

When I get to Room #2, In an attempt to show what I have explained previously, I start by trying out one location in the “empty doorway.” Having already worked out mob spawns and such, I’m about 95% positive mobs will never spawn through that door. The bad: there is a line of sight issue with this area causing mobs to immediately camp upon entering from the far hall. This is especially bad as I want mobs to rush me. If you find a location is not working, move. I move to a secondary location. This location allows me to avoid line of sight meaning mobs will come look for me, however it does give mobs the advantage as they have cover and can easily shoot down on you from behind it.(At around 6:50min there is a fun spot when reflex guard activates as an Ancient tries to slap me and he kills himself from the reflection damage. :D lol)

 

You’ll notice that I never proceed to Room #3, there is a brief moment when it is necessary for me to jump into the hall to Room #3 to grab the air that’s on the ground, but following my own guidelines I try and keep from killing anything and head right back into Room #2. Unfortunately I was getting neither the mob spawns I wanted nor the air drops I needed for a long stay, but in truth not every Tower will be the Ideal perfect run. Sometimes you are going to need to problem solve in the mission for instance Mobs were hanging at the door of Room #1.

 

While in Room #2 you will notice I am forced to wait out the Life Support Capsule drop and as explained above you will see my air drop to “uncomfortable” levels (near 0%). Partly this is due to the fact that Room #3 has three Life Support Capsule locations. I can know this fact even without entering Room #3, because it takes three capsule drops before Life Support begins showing up in my room on the fourth drop. Due to low mob count and low module drops I wasn’t exactly able to get a stack of Capsules going off map, but I was able to wait it out long enough to show how when one air capsule is used, the next spawns in immediately in the same room. You will also be able to see how the locations of Capsules alternate between the two drop locations in the room.

 

Other things of note: When in room #1 I set off trap which starts lasers. Ideally you want to destroy these lasers as they will kill mobs that spawn in when you are not present in a room. This means annoying air drops scattered around the map.

 

Thanks for watching. I will try and get together a more shining example of gameplay as time permits (Hopefully this weekend).

 

HAVE FUN!

Edited June 13, 2014 by Austerity

[Tragixx]

Posting in hope that the OP will see this.

 

As already stated, this forum post is getting some pretty decent attention on http://www.reddit.com/r/warframe Specifically, it's currently #9 in terms of hotness, with 104 upvotes and 94% approval rating, if you care to know.

 

THAT BEING SAID, many points you brought up have been changed/invalidated from U14, and the community would greatly benefit from these changes being reflected in your guide.

 

The two biggest changes are:

1- Air canister staking, and the probability theory that comes with the stacking 'feature' now being removed.

2- Extraction rooms are no longer blocked off

Edited July 24, 2014 by Tragixx

[buriburi]

1) Removed the locked door to extraction, as it only limits the available spawn locations within the first 5 minutes.

2) Increased the number of small dead end rooms (caps) which can generate in place of red locked doors, providing more spawn locations for enemies.

3) Added some new small cap tiles for Asteroid, Settlement, Outpost and Galleon tilesets.

4) Restructured the Derelict Survival procedural level so it has more small tiles between the main areas.  There are still three larger main areas which have life support capsule spawnpoints.  The large root room no longer spawns on the main path between the spawn and extraction, only on a side branch.

5) The 'stacking' bug was fixed, capsules don't spawn instantly on activating a capsule if the level is full.

6) The first room's capsule spawns are no longer switched off after one use.  Since the first room is reused, each level may now have 2-3 more simultaneous capsules active before it reaches capacity.  Originally the level structure was a little different, disabling spawns was intended to keep players closer to extraction after moving on from the first room.

 

1) Extraction room has bad spawns: I mean its only one room (best case with 2 lockers attached to it ) and the room to extraction can have spawns and spawns from rooms attached to it and so on...

 

I guess it would be smart to build rooms attached to it with lockers rooms attached to it (much more spawns from extraction).

 

2) lot of players are split and copter through the map, with enemy sense or radar or sonar, it will be the same problem. coptering to the spawns spam ability or whatever. they will spawn to far away, when the player copter back.

 

4) depending on the size its possible that infested are getting stuck. If they spawn 1 more room away they will be much slower till they reach the player. Speed them up when they are far away from a player would be a solution.

 

My Questions:

 

-What about less RNG? Green drops are too random... I would suggest to get rid of greens: 

 

Basically you only get blue spawns: Kill X Enemies get a blue. For another blue kill Y times X enemies. And so on... 

 

-What about the need for Nekros on long runs? If DE would get rid of greens the nekros problem would be solved.

,

___

 

My Opinion: 

 

Without restricting player movement spawning will always be a problem. With coptering you need like 2-3 sec tops to cross one tile. Adding hacking console or slowing them down in a non-anoying way would be a solution.

[DFliyerz]

My good man, what is your build for the Ignis? I was only recently inspired by you to use it against factions other than the Infested, and would love to know what your builds for Corrupted, Grineer, and Corpus are!

[smithf]

Just a comment: the problem could boil down to the awkward I-can't-spawn-in-your-sight-cos-it-will-be-ugly spawn system.

 

It is a problem that has been around for a long time which has improved somewhat (recently by connecting prev red doors to "deadends" which can serve as spawn points), but not solved at the fundamental level.

[Jufrow]

All I do is pug unfortunately. GL getting randoms to follow any kind of advice or tactics ;p Although is the tagging out portion based on any kind of empirical evidence? It might make sense. Sometimes the LS drops seem heavily rng based and I can never figure out why.

 

Good read though. Every player should read so they suck less in survival :)

[Flying_Scorpion]

This is a REALLY good guide. Thank you for writing this. If anyone here wants to try this out in game, feel free to send me a pm and/or friend request

[Discount_Stepbro]

Amazing stuff, the "layout" stuff alone  helps out a bunch, managed to go from 15 to 25min void t1 survivals with this :>

 

 

I know, I know, "t1 lolscrubl2p" etc but hey, I'm really new to the game and I'm pretty much only playing solo.

Cheers man :p

Edited August 2, 2014 by Wonkywaffle

[Psiloc1n]

yeah

[Nira]

Terrific read, very educating.

 

I'm curious, is the "tagged player" mechanic still observable? I'ma keep a look out for it now.

[Filas312]

If you've read page two you'd notice that one of the devs has destroyed this theory.

[x3ternalx]

I have tested this on T1S and T2S. Just because I have plenty of spare keys for them. Most of the advice still works great but I'd give my inputs as well. Oh and I run my survivals solo, this is impt to note.

 

I never noticed about the mechanics on 3 main rooms, and the extraction point branching from the second room. This is very useful knowledge. In the void, there is always a room in between the main rooms. So they're actually pretty near.

 

Because of the update in U14, this strategy does not work anymore because air support will now also appear in Room 1. In theory the strategy will still work, but I doubt it is possible to stay in room 2 until all the slots in both rooms 1 and 3 are full. However, the core of this strategy actually remains the same, which is:
 

 - Stay in the same room for as long as possible

 

By keeping your kills in the same room, enemies will spawn closer, is a better idea than running all over the map as spawns will be everywhere. Now of course I'm just restating known facts. But how does this apply with the new mechanics?

 

For a solo player:

 

The core strategy remains the same 'Stay in the same room as long as possible'. How you wish to achieve this is up to your discretion though. 

I tried this just now on T2S with a Perma Invi Loki build with enemy sense, 5 Forma Amprex, and a Dual Zoren for mobility. I exited past the 25 mins mark, but I had at least 3-4 air drops out there, I just wasn't paying attention to my air. So I would've lasted longer but in all honesty I doubt I'd hit the 40 min mark.

 

At the start, I stayed in Room 1, used all the air drops in there and only gunned for Room 2 when my air reached uncomfortable levels. IIRC I stayed past the 10 min mark with only Room 1. In room 2, same thing I stayed as long as possible. The air drops in Room 3 did become full and Lotus started to drop air in Room 2. However I was below 10% already and I knew I can't wait for that drop to appear.

 

But here's what I did, I gunned for Room 3, stayed invisible, used all 3 capsules, and RETURNED to Room 2 without killing any enemies. In theory I thought as long as I didn't kill any enemies, they would still want to go to Room 2. So despite seeing plenty of enemies grouped together in Room 3, I ignored them. Though they did spot me when I had to recast Invisibilty. But what awaited me in Room 2 was a long wait (pun intended) for mobs to appear in Room 2. I lost more than 10% just to see the first enemy enter the room. Needless to say, it wasn't long til I have to return to Room 1. Back in Room 1, there were a big group of enemies, so I happily cleared them. What I noticed was, I did not have the trickling effect I got when returning to Room 2 from Room 3.

 

So my current hypothesis is this, if you enter a room and there are a lot of enemies, you can 'activate' that room. From current known mechanics, we already know that enemies would want to spawn next to the room they were killed in. So if you kill a large number of them quickly in the new room, you would have 'forced' enemies to spawn next to that room. 

 

I.e. to say, if you are running solo, and when you enter a new room and you see plenty of enemies to be killed, you can consider killing them all and then base yourself in that room after that.

 

The reason why I ran a enemy sense and DZ build is because I want to maintain my KPM. The main rooms are can be pretty large and I don't find it viable to stay in one defense location, especially during the early stages when enemies go down very fast. Enemy sense will tell me where the enemies are and I will copter around.

 

However, in a squad things are different, not that I tested it myself:

 

Now with the same central strategy 'staying in a room for as long as possible'. In a squad, you can probably try going to Room 2 asap. And STAY THERE INDEFINITELY. However, appoint a runner to go to Rooms 1 and 3 accordingly. Assuming a squad of 4, 3 people will be maintaining the KPM within Room 2, so enemies will still favour spawning in the rooms adjacent to Room 2. As long as the runner does their best to not kill any enemies along the way. So by and large, in a squad, the strategy does not differ much. And in a squad, it is much easier to maintain a high KPM than solo. So in theory this could bring you to 40 mins.

 

Pardon the long post, but I hope to revive the discussion as I really want to uds better the Survival mechanics.

Edited September 24, 2014 by x3ternalx

[x3ternalx]

 

Hi it's me again. So apparently I did make it to 40 mins solo with my build. Actually its my first time surviving to 40. But by then my Amprex is really slowing down in kills and ammo consumption is really hard to keep up. Got to try something else if I want to solo T3S and T4S.

 

Anyways I tried my own advice. The moment when I enter the next room, I start first by killing some enemies before I rush for that air support, hoping to 'activate' that room.

 

Strictly speaking hitting 40 mins on a solo T2S is not an impressive feat I know. But usually I've only gotten 25 mins at best. After reading this guide, I tried it and lasted 25 mins with still air drops around. Tried it again 1 more time and I've hit that 40. So I hope these information can help fellow Tenno

[Racter]

Not sure if this is a bug or intended, but a little info to add. Currently, enemies will turn and head back to an air capsule activated in Room 1 or 3. They will also frequently derp around not doing anything in between rooms. Your best bet (as air man) is to kill any mobs standing still doing nothing in between rooms. You also must hide, out of LOS, at least ~20M (best guess based on a sizable chunk of experience) before your invis runs out, and not emerge until it has been recast. You cannot radial disarm, reinvis, and go on about your business, as the enemies go full derp and stand around. You can lead them back to your room with non-silent weapons aimed at the ceiling/wall while invisible.

 

Re:tagging. I have had a feeling this was a thing but have remained unsure. It seems to alternate every so often automatically, (certainly not every 10s, and if you re-read the dev's post he was pretty clearly not referring to kill to air tagging but AI targeting) but can be difficult to push through the intermediary times when it's not on a killing frame. As far as where to set up, there are four rooms that can be much, much better than sitting in room two if you build your comp to take advantage of them and are lucky enough to get one of them to hole up in. One of them has two diagonal hallways with a circle in the center, inside the circle is a room. Typically in ODS/Non survival void missions, the doors are locked, and you must ascend the sides and take the elevator to the center. In Survival, the doors are just open. This is without a doubt the single best room to camp in the entire game. Both of the adjoining room's doors are completely blocked by walls, grenades cannot be thrown in, and many/most/all legitimate CC frames can lock down all enemies with no/little risk to the team. The second room is shown in the TennO's video earlier in the thread, but is inferior for three reasons;size, random interior enemy spawns, and the adjoining rooms are 99% of the time one of the awful air rooms (again, as seen in the TennO video). The third room is the 3 story room with the "secret" room you have to copter twice to unlock. The room that you unlock is amazing, there is only one point of entry, there are 4 potential spawn rooms adjacent to your team, and it is typically adjacent to an air room WITH a side entry/exit option for your Loki to make air runs from as well as occasionally being an air room itself. The final room is the canal room with two death orbs in the water under the bridge. One side of the canal has a door that leads to the rest of the map, the other has a bunch of lockers in it. You want the locker side. One point of entry, very easy to lock down, very safe to setup in for kills, up to 3 adjoining rooms for spawns, occasionally (maybe not any longer, but prior to T4 being released very often) an air room. The only reason this room isn't perfect is that it can be very difficult to get past/over the mobs in the tunnel to go get air.

 

If going for less than 40M, your comp and load outs really don't matter at all. If going for an hour or maybe just a little more, two players need to be geared/skilled accordingly. If going for longer than that (especially much longer, you do want to make the leaderboards, don't you? =), you need 4x corrosive with huge damage weapons (read: bows, explosives, and/or Brakks) and one of a few specific comps. You can drag a 30M team to an hour, or an hour team to 2 hours, but it's like trying to hammer a nail with a shovel. It'll work, but no one will be very happy with the results. A specialized comp makes it much, much easier. Our 2hr21m run was a walk in the park other than Vortex and unused ammo drops eating everyone's FPS. Which brings me to my final point, when going past an hour using a Vauban, it is highly recommended to bring 1 fast firing weapon per person with an ammo mutation to eat all the ammo drops up. It may be a bug, but they currently seem to last 5-10M. After they evaporate, there is a massive jump in frame rate, then it slowly drops back into the weeds, then goes back up. While my PC isn't at all high end (I-5, 560Ti 8GB) even my squad mates with I-7s, 7 or 8 series, 16+GB were playing slideshowframe with the Vauban comps. Not at all enjoyable.

 

Sorry for the wall of text, just thought I'd add some more info from a sizable chunk of personal experience in (specifically Void) survivals.

[osheroth]

Yes this is great, now if only it wasn't just you and that other veteran player in a group of 4  trying it out...

[x3ternalx]

@Racter. From what I uds, your approach is to use one of the connecting rooms instead of the main rooms to base yourself in? That does sound interesting as the main rooms are quite big. I don't know how this will work in Solo runs but I may test it out some time. And yes, I too also noticed that enemies are just randomly walking around in other rooms.

 

If I were to add one more tip for squads, it would be to have both good cc weapons (Amprex tops my personal list) and also single high damage weapons (Paris Prime tops my list, and in some sense the Paris has a 'straight' cc). How well you you start your run, also determines how far you can go. At the start when enemies are still squishy, use CC weapons to clear them out as fast as possible. As time passes, these CC weapons will begin to lose out in damage and then high damage weapons will take over.

[Racter]

Correct Eternal. I have found connecting rooms to be far superior in terms of spawns. In regards to weapons, we bring a cc frame and high damage weapons. Basically go in with 1-2 DPS, 1-2 CC, 1-2 support frames. Nekros and Banshee never DPS, Nova AMD bombs all game and Loki helps/gets air/disarms as required. Vauban DPSs in Vauban comp, Nyx is pretty much the only killer in our Nyx comp, etc

[Hamsta]

I've soloed  40 minutes T1S, T2S, T3S, and T4S solo with a half baked Loki (no potato) + 5 forma Amprex.
It's not that difficult. Since all the mobs head towards you when Solo allowing for a ton of air drops.

 

x3ternalx, I'd recommend you aim for the head. Body shots become prohibitively counterproductive once you start hitting ~35+ minutes while headshots remain quite effective.
 

My Amprex has very little trouble taking down Heavy Grineers even at 40 minutes though any longer and the armor stacking forces me to bail out. 

I also run both Rifle Scavanger + Rifle Ammo Mutation when Soloing 40 minutes of void. (Easier to ratio energy than risk my instant kill weapon running out of ammo.)

Edited October 2, 2014 by Hamsta

[[DE]Whirrrrr]

Re:tagging. I have had a feeling this was a thing but have remained unsure. It seems to alternate every so often automatically, (certainly not every 10s, and if you re-read the dev's post he was pretty clearly not referring to kill to air tagging but AI targeting)

 

My post referred to the OP's suspicion that only specific players are targeted by enemies.  Switching targets every 10 seconds helps to keep enemies moving through the level and makes sure no one player gets all the enemies piling on them.  There is no 'tagging' of players in any other form, and life support drop rates don't change for individual players.  There would be no advantage to such a life support tagging system, only player confusion!

Edited October 6, 2014 by Whirrrrr

[Seanjuju]

I've had enough of nekros and tiptoeing around spawn mechanics. Its time this mode got fixed.

[Noble_Cactus]

I don't mind spawn mechanics if they're implemented well. Heck, the core of Suicidal or HoE Killing Floor is making sure you balance the spawns on either side of your team so you don't get overwhelmed. But I do agree that Survival needs a heavy rework. Reworking Nekros is something I fully support as well, but that's for another thread.

Edited October 7, 2014 by Noble_Cactus

[ntyd1s]

That's how I hate Survival missions, waves after waves of grinding like clockwork around the flawed line-of-sight spawn system, no time for a breather nor enjoyment, along with RNG on every spawn and drop which can determine your fate. Replacement with Excavation can't be too soon. >_>

Edited October 7, 2014 by ntyd1s

[Llyssa]

interesting.

[(PSN)renosis]

Maybe OP should edit the original post to include the note that Warframe Staff Member Whirrrrr said about the life support tagging thing won't have any effect and how such a system will just confuse newer players. 

[Vivicector]

From my own experience, the best place in terms of spawn numbers and killing speed is a room as small as possible with as many open connections as possible. Rooms where capsules appear are usually big. AoEs don't hit everything, CC too, Nekros is running from one corner to another... No good. So, if there is a good spot out in between, why not use it? Our party was farming Pathogen rounds and leveling our gear on Saturn. The main halls were terribad.One - that bugged room, where you can't pick anything up. Another - a big room with a lot of stairs. Too much space and height. The third was good, but had all the doors closed, so there were actually 1-2 spawns active. We decided to quit on minute 10, since we disliked the map. But then... I have mentioned, that the room between rooms 3 and 2 was pretty good... 4 spawns (2 small rooms, 2 big So, we stayed there for like 40-50 minutes with leveling gear, never touching a capsule. Nekros' desecrate could hit the whole room, just as well as Banshee's Sonar and Quake. We left only when our low-level gear stopped killing things, leaving with 100% air and a ton of unpicked lifesupport drops on the ground, as well as stationary capsules.

 

Basically, the rules that helped us a lot in Survival progression are:

1) Kill enemies in the same room you are.

2) Don't run around the rooms.

3) Choose room with enough spawns (+/- 4) and preferably - small, with some cover.

4) Try not to use lifesupport from rooms other then yours for as long as possible.

 

The question I have is: do lifesupport capsules still stuck in an overflow buffer? I see they don't reappear immediately. But will they reapperar faster then normal (like, used lifesupport, then it disappeared, then its ghosty form appeared)?