Vivergate: Vent Radioactive Gas Y/n

[arsyadpower]

my excalibur is going back to collecting dust now.

[Lorche]

Since when was RJ a thing? IT HAS NEVER BEEN A THING... The fact people keep complaining about an ability that is NEVER used if ever due to how its only to be used in low tier levels is ridiculous. Even then 99.99% of players use RJ wrong by staying still instead of leaping through the air, and using it with perfected timing. RJ is as hard as Limbo to use, but must be strategically used in low levels. If anything we don't need RJ the only abilities needed are jump, dash, and blind they work for everything, and the jump still makes excalibur amazing! I defend the LoS nerf 100% It was a needed good in the world to enforce the PROPER way to play Excalibur versus the 99% doing it wrong.

 

Well, I guess I'm the only one who use RJ pre-U15, even though RB is what he really excel at. Or keep all ability polarities intact in all of my frames.

 

I'm no mix-maxer, and I use balanced build when running as Excal. 600+ hours on this game (this frame is my starter frame, and it was never sold to this time) I definitely learn to use the RJ (when I use it anyway, RB is more effective back then) with SJ ot while jumping, as it increase the javelin count and help counter ridiculously number of cover in some tileset. And I do remember I say that the damage type make this skill age faster than other frame's ult (oh, I guess you didn't check my latest edit on that one). After U15 hit, it didn't change my playstyle about Excal a bit. Basic run-gun with well-placed RB, SJ for gain elevation, SD for quick get-out-from-mob button, and RJ for its miniscule stun. I was not ult spammer in the first place. After this change? My playstyle still as same as it was in pre U15. But this whole mess still smell like a knee-jerk response to exploitation against massive grindwall that is Syndicates.

 

Try to think of this Excal change for the whole playerbase, not just for veteran players. New players only has frame skills and broken mods for them. Slowly, they will get essential mods and experince on how to use frames and maximize its potential. But until then, they only have frame skills (and weapon) with them. Just because you don't use RJ, doesn't meant everyone is. And there is no proper way to play a frame. Everyone has their own style. You think RJ are useless, I see RJ has it's own use.

Edited November 14, 2014 by Lorche

[ThePresident777]

TL;DR: People spam AOE kill abilities, because AOE killing is the most profitable action in this game. And people spam same abilities to achieve that because there is zero reason to weave in any other abilities. So perhaps instead of taking a radical populist stance like "AOE Room Clear is Bad, Period", you should design a game that encourages and rewards people for doing other things.

 

I agree with that.  But it does not go far enough.  What is this profit you speak of?  It's a number of things, but in the case of Viver it is rep points directly, and, untimately, it's affinity because that is what rep points are derived from.  You are essentially stating that people are engaging in a certain game play for Affintity.  We know why they want the affinity.  It's to trade for mod cards, for game play.  Mod cards are game play. 

 

DE felt that the Affinity rate was too high on Viver.  They reacted by nerfing the mission, the map, and the warframes used there.  They nuked it all to hell.  But, missions, maps, and Warframes are game play.  Affinity is not game play.  Affinity is a separate system under their direct control.  Affinity is Warframe's business model.  It's not game play at all, not in the least.  You can play the game just fine without a single affinity point.  You get a standard affinity rate for free and double rate for RL money via plat.  Affinity is strictly business.  It is not what people play the game for.  People play the game for game play.  Game play is the draw, the reason why you wouldn't mind paying money.  DE saw money gushing out of Viver and reacted by nuke nerfing the F*** out of the game play, the reason to even bother playing the game at all let alone paying money.  DE shot the patient in the face because it was bleeding money all over the place, rather than treating the patient's wounds.  Then they defend shooting the patient because of "homer's bird".  That's not how one practices medicine.  DE, you're doing it wrong.

Edited November 14, 2014 by ThePresident777

[(PSN)Crackle2012]

Thank you for taking the time out to deliver this message to us directly Steve!  It is much appreciated!!! 

 

BTW - LOL at the "Grandma on an icy road" comment, rofl wow.....

 

Looking forward to seeing EVERYTHING that is coming, and not just these quick insta fixes / revisions.  

 

In my mind, there is always a reason if you all touch/change something, whether it is 2 updates away, or a hotfix away, it becomes pretty apparent that  "Ohhh ok!! So that is why they changed "X" back in U10.5"... Because now they wanted it to work like THIS in 11.3!  etc etc....

 

I hope that garbage of a sentence above made sense.  

 

To re-iterate, I am very optimistic and curious to see what you guys have up your sleeve as far as future content whether it be far off, or next wednesday!

 

Thanks again DE_Steve!

[ClockworkSpectre]

I see people saying cooldowns are a good idea, they are not.  It would only serve to slow the pace of the game down as people wait for timers to tick down before moving on.   I think the game originally had them but was removed for these reasons(very early closed beta? I started playing half way through closed beta and they weren't there.). 

 

Now, as for line of sight, I have said it before and will say it again, Line of Sight does not belong in this game.   The game does not appear to be designed with Line of Sight in mind, most of the tile sets make abilities based on Line of Sight not viable there are to many obstructions.  To make LoS acceptable you would have the ability ignore light cover and enemy bodies.  An easier solution is to just reduce the base range of some abilities or Nerf the Overextended mod. 

 

I just have a really bad feeling DE is going to go WAY overboard with this LoS thing.  Honestly it doesn't even make sense for some abilities.

Edited November 14, 2014 by ClockworkSpectre

[SlapClown]

I could think of a good Excalibur fix

 

radial blind    >>>  bring back old no line of sight and also hard cap range  max of 25m 

Radial Javelin>>> hard cap range  25m aoe no line of sight 

[SteelWingAngel]

I love the admission of having screwed up.  I don't mind the odd strange decision if I can at least retain trust in the devs.

[ryte2byte]

If there is ever a cooldown added to abilities, I'm out. I'm here to play a shooter, not a bad MMORPG.

[Mcl_Blue]

This fall, starting with Excalibur, we’ve begun to take a hard look at these ‘X-Ray AOE’ abilities and wonder if we can bring more elements of skill back in.

(...)

With abilities, again, things are not staying as they are currently - as I said above *until we have a cohesive set of changes*

I don't like this omen. I'll stick around to see what happens, maybe I'll even be proven wrong and the new changes turn out to be awesome, like they were with Frost and Nova, but I just wanna say that, right now, I don't like this omen.

 

The fact alone that you guys recognized this was a mistake was already a big plus, and shows me that I can still trust you guys, and believe me when I tell you, that is a big @(*()$ deal to me. So now, just please prove to me that I am wrong in not liking this omen.

[TrickyBoomBoom]

Thanks Steve. My Faith is restored. I love this game. Forgive me for being passionate as I forgive you for screwing up. If we all work together we can make Warframe something really incredible. What has come out of this is a realization of the depth of passion we all have for this game.

[fadeinlight]

I'm not going to touch the whole "press 4 to win" issue, other than to say I don't really think it was the problem in this case.

 

When it comes to Viver--I never understood why there needed to be an Corpus Interception mission on Eris.  Why not just eliminate it entirely?  Turn it into a defense mission instead as a short-term fix.

 

Cerberus is an excellent challenge--there's no spot on the level where you can effectively cover two towers with one warframes' abilities, and the openness of it means that you have to constantly be moving or get mowed-down by Corpus fire.

 

If you absolutely must have an interception mission on Viver, then you're going to need to use a bigger map.  The whole problem with Viver was that you could protect two towers from one spot.  That doesn't make a good Interception mission at high levels--it makes an "all you can eat sushi" sign to Homers.

 

If you want to do something entirely different, then why not do something like this:  take the Hive mode native to Eris and make an Interception variant of it.  Players could destroy hives, then defend them as the Infested try to repair them like ants repairing their nests.  These hives could be said to be sending chemical messages to other colonies of Infested.  Or perhaps this:  players could destroy three hives in order to drop a force field (similar to what we see on rescue missions) on a fourth one which is sending messenger spores.  Once the fourth one is destroyed, the round ends, cleanup commences and finishes, then the next round is voted on.

 

It's encouraging to have an opportunity to play a game where the developers are wise enough to listen to the community, yet discerning enough to filter out the BS.  Thanks for listening, and I hope this makes it past the filter.

Edited November 14, 2014 by fadeinlight

[ZephyrPhantom]

While I understand people shouldn't just be mindlessly mashing 4, this buisness about messing with frames is just silly in my opinion - it's been established from the start that the core problem here is the reputation costs and how players adjusted to gain it as quickly as possible, a natural cause-and-effect reaction. I'm glad Viver and co. are getting reworked and reviewed, but the frames should've been left alone to begin with - abilities that didn't rely on LoS was never a real issue until now, and it probably still won't be as long as the core problems are addressed. I feel it would be best if Mag, Excal, and Trinity were put back to the way they were before this whole Viver mess started, and focus on simply nerfing Viver itself. Is decreasing enemy spawns that hard?

Edited November 14, 2014 by ZephyrPhantom

[birdei]

the problem with big maps like Cerberus is the share exp range.

also if the developers admit that it was a mistake, why not revert the frame changes and just make viver unavilable for the time being. That way people that enjoy using excal/trinity/mag can keep on enjoying till a real fix is found.

Edited November 14, 2014 by birdei

[Avalona]

Some of you guys need to remove that rank 10 narrow minded mod out of you already.

 

One post does not solve anything, not until the rollback has been made and promise made to never nerf with stupid reason again.

 

I bet you''ll be satisfied if you're given one forma BP alert in exchange for Rhino stomp being limited by LoS....

[AetherKBS]

Our ‘press 4 to win’ ultimates are metered primarily by the supply of energy. Finding an energy loophole means that Homer’s drinking bird can play the game for you. That is not team synergy. That is just broken.

 

This fall, starting with Excalibur, we’ve begun to take a hard look at these ‘X-Ray AOE’ abilities and wonder if we can bring more elements of skill back in. That’s the short answer to ‘why the hell is DE messing with us’. Homer’s drinking bird should not play the game for you.

 

Ok, so this is a legit question: Given that it is just as easy or easier to do massive sums of damage with weapons as it is to do so with Warframe abilites, if you make all Warframe abilites Line of Sight/Line of Effect, why shouldn't I just use a gun that is "OP"?

 

I mean, given

(1) how LOS/LOE calculations would break in a game like this (all the computation and network resources and hiccups -- even if your code was flawless) and

(2) how often mobs would just avoid it (sheer volume of cover available, any lag making people appear to be place they aren't -- tying back to hiccups mentioned above, how quickly all the mobs can move, the fact that player vision and frame vision aren't the same making it awkward to target especially with true LOS but even somewhat with LOE, etc.), or

(3) you just die every time you pop around the corner to use an ability,

it seems that it would devolve to be easier just to use guns pretty quickly. 

 

Besides: Wouldn't the obvious evolution of this be to use loadouts like Rage, Quick Thinking, Equilibrium, Steel Fiber, Vitality, Redirection, Fast Deflection, Flow, or even better/worse focus exclusively on super defensive powers like Iron Skin and Hysteria builds and then ignore all the squishy offensive frames entirely? Then you'd have to nerf that next. Then something else would come up. And another thing... And eventually the only thing left in the game would be ... well... nothing interesting.

 

Now, having said all that, I AGREE that the game should be more involved than sitting a drinking bird down at your keyboard. But LOS/LOE seems like a poor way to implement that. Perhaps rework some of the frames so the abilities are more utilitarian (buff, debuff, heals, etc) and less destructive so that we have to synergize our frame abilities with the weapons? Mirage and Limbo are good examples actually. Hall of Mirrors is directly based off of weapon used obviously, and a Rift Walking Limbo is probably going to want a beefy weapon to kill things with before banishing that angry dude in the corner after all. Granted neither of those are Xray AOE ults, but still, the idea is basically that reworking the frames to be better at withstanding hits and/or amping their weapons seems much better than just tossing LOS/LOE crap willy nilly to me... Side note, I may have to legitimately uninstall this game now and I'm sad to say that. I can't do "normal shooters" because of my vision problems.  :/

 

If you wanted to clone COD/Battlefield/etc I wish you would have told me that before I gave you any money, because seriously there are too many games like that already. The awkward mix of options to play with by using both abilities and weapons made the game worthwhile, but if the abilites are going to be neutered... this game has little else going for it.

[Horonelius]

I still think adding a sort of punch-through to skills utilizing the LoS would help remedy the "targets standing 5 meters in front of me are not being affected by my skills" issue.

 

The way I always figured LoS checking in games worked was that a line was drawn from the player to a target and if it didn't pass through any objects then the effect would be applied to the target.

Naturally the issue here is "Where on the player is the origin of this line?", and "Where on the target is the destination?" Two people can have their heads sticking out above cover and, if the lines being drawn between center of mass, obviously the cover is in the way.

 

Theoretically this could be remedied by setting up multiple checks between different body parts, so if a toe is sticking out, the target is still considered "visible".

...What was the topic of this thread again?

 

In any case, there is no reason that magnetism should be affected by walls. Have you ever put magnets on two sides of, I don't know, a countertop or a door or even a thick piece of paper? Remember how they were still attracted to each other despite the obstacle? You do? Good.

 

As for Radial Javelin getting nerfed, originally, the the javelins originated at Excalibur and then flow towards enemies, getting stuck on any obstacles that they hit. Then they spawned on top of them, hitting them instantly, and now they spawn on top of them only if they could have gotten to them in the first place.

 

Trinity is..no.

Edited November 14, 2014 by Horonelius

[Arlayn]

my excalibur is going back to collecting dust now.

My Excalibur will be proving to the entire community they were using him wrong from the start...

[Neocyberman]

Steve, quick question.

 

What is excaliburs intended role. What place does he fill?

 

Also do you intend syndicates to be endgame for warframe? In what way will endgame expand?

[Avalona]

Abilities to kill things through wall and never limited by obstacle should be maintained in Warframe forever. We're passionate about how we instagib the enemies and nuke them back to stone age in single keystroke because it's fun. We love to have fun seeing the screen flooded with EXP number popup when we wipe a room (and then some), we love to have fun stacking damage on an unfortunate enemies who happened to be near us just to see how high it can get, and we love to have fun experiment multiple way of decapitation on some more unfortunate mobs we happen to come across. This is a kind of fun Warframe has to offer, and Warframe only. It is a niche of Warframe.

 

We don't want realism in the game. We play the game for its core element that is called absurdity. We want to fly around in space, we want to blow things up for no reason, we want to be a hero, that's why we want to play game because we want fun. We don't experience such fun watching movies, because we're not the one controlling the elements there, we're an observer, and therefore not as fun as gaming.

 

Again, we never want realism in any game. If we want our glorious tenno-purge to be limited by walls, obstacles, and waist-high railings, we'd play Call of Duty instead. Even then, we'd still find a way to have fun, and look what happened, instead of fighting with rifles, we tossed knives around instead, because it's more fun that way.

 

Why would everyone so obsessed with using C4 to launch a tank at terminal velocity sky-high instead of using rockets in order to destroy a fighter jet in Battlefield? Because it's more fun that way, same as to why we'd rather parachuted out of a jet in order to knife (and C4) strategic bomber instead of using missiles to shoot it down.

 

Now then, was such method of flinging a 68-ton M1-Abrams battle tank across a building block just to flatten that camper over at that window ever considered an "exploit"? No one will ever play Battlefield again if such physics has been removed.

 

You're removing the only fun we had in Warframe by giving the abilities the Line-of-Sight BS.

 

What's that, DE? you want Warframe to have realism? Oh, please, tell me, how is the "we're remnants of old civilisation superweapon in a form of human wielding the power of antimatter, now entering a ship belonging to a faction of genetically-modified human clones, killing with a lightning gun on steroid that somehow jump between targets, while crossing over to multiverse with our dimensional power, at the same time being assisted by a stomp that stopped time, and being given speedforce power by a jolt from our comrades who can control electrical current, while wielding a pogostick-shaped mining laser that somehow shoot laser cubes that float in mid-air, with enemies around us dropping to an alien gun that shoot a glob of gas that inflict cold damage, shaped like an alien phallus, and also having a bow that shoot horizontal-bladed arrow that cut things vertically, also our friend over there can magically split into 4 bodies created by light that carry a gun that shoot rockets that shoot rockets that split into rockets" a realism in any way?

 

Last time, we don't want realism in a game ever. If we want to play a 5-hours shift forklift job at a dock like in Shenmue we would live our lives instead, and that sucks.

 

I seriously hope that DE is aware they're killing the only fun Warframe has to offer by adding LoS.

[AstraTen_Vtuber]

It is nice to hear that the change for Excalibur, MAG and Trinity is a temporarily emergency action for the problem on Viver.

 

But Steve, it is clearly that players go to Viver to farm reputation due to the unreasonable setting of the reputation requirements.

 

To stop this issue, it is better to either change the reputation need for each level/item or just simply build up more reputation quest or missions give out fixed reputation (MUST BE A REASONABLE VALUE) for stopping players to go Viver for farming reputation. So players will not stick to Viver for everything(exp, resources, credits, mods, reputation)

[Arlayn]

Well, I guess I'm the only one who use RJ pre-U15, even though RB is what he really excel at. Or keep all ability polarities intact in all of my frames.

 

I'm no mix-maxer, and I use balanced build when running as Excal. 600+ hours on this game (this frame is my starter frame, and it was never sold to this time) I definitely learn to use the RJ (when I use it anyway, RB is more effective back then) with SJ ot while jumping, as it increase the javelin count and help counter ridiculously number of cover in some tileset. And I do remember I say that the damage type make this skill age faster than other frame's ult (oh, I guess you didn't check my latest edit on that one). After U15 hit, it didn't change my playstyle about Excal a bit. Basic run-gun with well-placed RB, SJ for gain elevation, SD for quick get-out-from-mob button, and RJ for its miniscule stun. I was not ult spammer in the first place. After this change? My playstyle still as same as it was in pre U15. But this whole mess still smell like a knee-jerk response to exploitation against massive grindwall that is Syndicates.

 

Try to think of this Excal change for the whole playerbase, not just for veteran players. New players only has frame skills and broken mods for them. Slowly, they will get essential mods and experince on how to use frames and maximize its potential. But until then, they only have frame skills (and weapon) with them. Just because you don't use RJ, doesn't meant everyone is. And there is no proper way to play a frame. Everyone has their own style. You think RJ are useless, I see RJ has it's own use.

I do use it rarely, and it can be used by new players quite easily. Now that all abilities are usable they can simply super jump, and RJ, or with how weak enemies are on Mercury you can literally use RJ the wrong way, and it still be ok till you reach Venus. Which by then thanks to the infested mission they will have two new swords cronus, and the flame thing. They could have also bought a new Braton, or built some other gun. They would also come to realize how useful slash dash is. I remember back when I played CB all I used was slash dash, and super jump. Radial Blind seemed silly, and I kept dying from using RJ waaaay back then when I first started.

[-Noximilien-]

Nice to hear an admittance to messing up the (until recently) least used frame and posterboy of your game. There's a reason why he was being used, and it died with this nerf. Kinda sad because I like seeing rarely used frames!

 

 

The people have spoken quite loudly about the nerfs and I'm glad you noticed us. Seriously. Still getting that PWE vibe and it's spooky. Anyway, the best solution is to just remove the bloody node from the game and restore most (not all, some adjustments can be useful) of the functionality of the nerfed skills. I am perfectly fine with energy vamp needing LoS. But mag's shield polarize...it's magnetics. Unless the universe's polarity laws have gone absolutely haywire, that's screwed up down to a scientific level.

 

 

And of course people are always going to find some sort of method to break the game. And you all are right to squash any extreme cases of exploit. But I'm honestly worried about the longevity of the game before it turns into a generic third-person shooter after how these quickly thought up and poorly implemented nerfs are set in place. The players genuinely felt absolutely betrayed by the merciless swing of that nerf bat. I know I did. I mean for real: I've taken to flat out buying all the new toys that comes out as soon as they've been released. I honestly couldn't justify paying for the new archwing stuff after the blunt strike of the nerfin'!

 

 

Which brings me to this: Players. This is the kinda stuff that makes a playerbase feel unwanted or unloved, and I don't need to spell out what that means. A thought out and planned adjustment on skills is perfect(eg, Trinity's healing burst)! Turning Excaliber into a glorified paperweight because of a single node? That's too harsh. Making the most useful skill on Mag not even hit herself due to LoS? Limbo's doublestacking and Trinity's vamp nerfs are perfectly fine, they're still VERY playable. But the nerfs are just too much on mag and excalibro. (But I gotta admit that mind control buff was the best thing yet. Thank you DE~)

 

 

All in all, it's eggshells for now. I love your game, your style, the worlds you've made. But you make it hard to keep the love, y'know? For a game that proudly states 'It listens to the community' it doesn't feel like that's true sometimes.

[Kaiser_Suoh]

Ehm, about Archwing efficiency (Repel cost 100 of energy).

 

Its needed a new efficiency mod?

Edited November 14, 2014 by Kaiser_Suoh

[Arlayn]

Nice to hear an admittance to messing up the (until recently) least used frame and posterboy of your game. There's a reason why he was being used, and it died with this nerf. Kinda sad because I like seeing rarely used frames!

guessing your not a fan of timed slide, forward flip, RJ, or Super Jump then RJ. The two correct ways to use this ability. There is also simply waiting for enemies to come out. They eventually do poke their heads out. Also its homing it never misses. Veteran players like myself still prefer playing Excalibur over the rest of the warframes... Still one of the best survival frames in the game when it comes to things like Operation Gate Crash.

 

edit: or Jupiter

Edited November 14, 2014 by Arlayn

[GrayWolfCoder]

This'll probably not be noticed and get burried by all the other comments, but thank you, Steve. Thank you, to all of the devs. It is comforting to me to see that you are listening and recognize and own up to mistakes you make. Keep up the good work guys, and keep us in the loop on the discussion as much as you can.