End Game Content Suggestion: Raids

[Draknus2009]

The following is an idea for a type of mission that requires a combination of high powered warframes and weapons as well as teamwork and communication. This would be targeted towards players who have played up to Mastery Rank 10 and up (equivalent to playing approx. 300+ hours).

 

The concept is simple. Have a long mission meant to be challenging for both individual player skill and team cooperation and communication.

 

The answer is far more complex however. I suggest this: a Clan Raid. To start, a clan would have to build a special Raid Key from one of the clan foundry rooms. (possibly one for each?) The Key itself would be restricted to players who have reached a certain Mastery Rank (10?).

 

Then comes the Raid itself. My thoughts are that it should be targeting one of two things: 1) a powerful Assassination Target or 2) Recovering powerful Artifacts (such as Mods or Weapons) that can only be found at the end of these Raids. However rewards are not the focus, only the lure.

 

Bosses: The Raid should possess several bosses. Not mini-bosses, but full fledged bosses. Also each boss should be more difficult than your standard boss. Not due to having massive amounts of Health or Shields though, but instead due to a gameplay mechanic that requires teamwork. For example: your facing a Corpus robot that appears to have infinite shielding. Upon some searching however your teammates find power cells that upon being destroyed allow the robot to be damaged. The power cells are split away from the fight, so you must split into separate teams in order to win the fight. One team takes out the power cell while the other team does damage to the robot when the shields go down. This process will be repeated a few times as new power cells will spawn and the away team must find them and destroy them so that the boss team can keep fighting.

 

This will require cooperation and time, as well as skill for both teams. The boss team will have to survive while waiting for the shields to go down, and the away team will need speed and parkour skills on their side in order to find the power cells. This is would only be one boss however, and each boss should require teamwork mechanics such as this.

 

In between bosses should be segments that challenge players in continuing. This could be as simple as surviving a room full of level 50 or 60 enemies for certain time frames. (basically pulling challenging high level versions of existing game modes into parts of the Raid to keep up that feeling of high intensity action with overpowered abilities and weapons). You could also add in running segments where players must use parkour skills and movement options in order to make through an area before it collapses, possibly while killing enemies on the way. You could also add other challenges such as mazes and puzzles that players need to solve. (You could also spice thing up with a little Archwing action)

 

After some segments like these and some bosses (I'm thinking 2-3 bosses sounds good) you would have one final boss. This enemy would be unlike any other in the game, requiring multiple stages in order to defeat. Like above, I'll give an example of what I believe a Raid boss would be like.

 

Raid Boss: Phase 1: Since I uses a Corpus boss above, I'll use one here as well. Say you have a Corpus Commander piloting some sort of Mech. In order to get to him your team had to split into two groups, each team located in a different position. The boss will move between these two locations. Whichever one he is not in at any given moment will instead possess a horde of enemies and pieces of an artifact attempting to come together. If the players with the artifact do not destroy enough of it within a time limit, then the boss will regenerate a chunk of health and/or will launch a powerful attack. He and the artifact will switch between locations periodically. Upon taking enough damage, phase 2 will be started.

 

Phase 2: The Corpus Mech will deploy into space and the team who was with him will deploy Archwings and go after him. While outside in space they will be attempting to damage weak spots on the boss in order to disable his attacks and flight. The inside team will be attempting to use grappling hooks in order to capture the Mech and pull it back into the battlefield. Upon Success, phase 3 starts.

 

Phase 3: The Archwing team stays outside, while the inside team fight the Mech. Both will have to deal with extra enemies spawning as well. Periodically the Mech will call out for large ships from the outside to fire upon the inside players. They will have to get under cover until the Archwing players take out the ships. Phase 4 starts when the Mech gets destroyed and the commander comes out. The Archwing players will come back in to the main battlefield at this time.

 

Phase 4: The Corpus commander creates a force field around him, preventing all damage. Players will have to manage both destroying enemy mobs and focusing fire on energy nodes powering the force field. During this time the commander will steal energy from the players to charge up attacks that players must watch out for. Once the force field is down the commander will send out an energy burst disabling the player's ranged weapons for the duration of his movement (except for thrown weapons), making melee and powers the only options. The commander will try to get to the opposite side of the room in order to set up another force field. If he succeeds then he regenerates all his health and players lose all their energy. They must then go through the force field part again. Once they get through it again he will have no more force fields to put up and focus on attacking the players. He will put up a Snow Globe that travels with him and attack normally. Players will have full access to all weapons and powers at this point, allowing them to wail on him in a satisfying manner. Upon the commander's death rewards will be given out in the form of either Raid-Only mods or weapons.

 

Other Ideas and Suggestions

1: While a Raid could work with 4 players it would make it all the more exciting and special if it was made for 6. While I do not know if this is possible with the game engine, I feel that it would make the experience all the more special.

 

2: Both for the purpose of providing a unique experience and having interesting but stable gameplay mechanics, a Raid's map should not be randomly generated. While RNG made maps could potentially work to make the experience feel different each time you play it, having one huge map that's the same every time would allow for planning in future expeditions, as well as a more stable map with less "invisible holes" that could appear. This may also allow for better connections between players and as such, a larger player count.

 

3: Another possible suggestion. Instead of making Raids a clan focused mission they could be Syndicate focused instead. Keys could accessed by getting to max Syndicate Rank and spending Favor. This would make it more difficult to justify a Mastery Rank cap though.

 

4: While mods from Syndicates tend to be focused on making previously under-used weapons and abilities more powerful, Raid mods might want to be focused on making currently powerful weapons even more powerful, truly rewarding the player for overcoming such a challenge. Or it could just be special weapons, that would be fine as well.

 

5: I highly believe Warframe's movement capability (like the parkour) should be taken full advantage of in a Raid. Requiring players to utilize it well and with skill in order to proceed. Currently I feel like Warframe's movement is under-utilized and this would provide a great way of taking advantage of it.

 

6: Design such a Raid to only be possible to beat with the best weapons and fully modded warframe builds. This should be hard. Make it hard.

 

Thank You, for taking your time to read my idea. I love this game so much and I only wish to see it continue to grow in the future.

                    -Draknus2009

[Cold_Arrow]

This sounds great! Very interesting.

 

Personally, i like the idea of a getting the key through syndicates a bit more,

but it should still be limited to a high mastery rank though, maybe rank 8?

[Draknus2009]

Yeah, rank 8 would also be good as by that point you have access to every weapon in the game (currently). Also the more I thought about it the more I thought it would be nice to have Syndicates give quests other than simple Alerts and this would be a nice solution.