Defense And Survival Need Love.

[Xylia]

So... in another thread, someone asked DE to bring back Viver and the DE (Killerkarpfen) responded by saying "Viver is outdated in every way, we're going to be making new tiles for those game mods (pp)".

 

Well... uh...

 

Survival and Defense modes are what is outdated, IMO.

 

It is one of the reasons why I never liked Defense back in the day. One, because everything was gated behind it at the time. Want a decent mod? DEFENSE! Then it became "Want Keys? DEFENSE!"

 

That isn't so much of a problem now, but it is still Defense/Interception/Survival for keys.

 

But anyways, it is either "Spam 4 to kill everything over and over again" or "Wait for something to come so you can kill it" all the while trying to defend a stupid piece of cardboard that goes down fast if anything goes wrong.

 

Survival, I still hate the whole gasping for air part. A lot of maps do not spawn enough mobs (or their chance to drop air is simply too low) to keep you supplied on air even with Lotus's "help", not to mention the ridiculously slow ramp-up, a 5-10 minute long "Sweet spot" where the spawns and enemy levels are good and then the ludicrous ramp-up and eximus spam afterward.

 

Both Defense and Survival are entirely out-dated and have never been fun in my eyes. Viver was kinda fun, but only because it allowed me to catch up by getting 12 weapons to Lv30 in a hurry to get myself a good 30% of a rank or so.

 

So, IMO... Defense and Survival itself need tweaks to make them interesting.

 

Survival: Make enemies drop air more often. How about make every enemy directly add 1% to the air meter when killed? That way we're not praying for the RNG to give us drops. Also, increasing the spawns a little and smoothing out the ramp up curve would be nice too. We shouldn't have to wait 15 minutes for the match to actually get interesting and then enjoy a 5-10 min "Sweet Spot" as I mentioned above, and then 25min+ is wall-to-wall eximus and heavy unit spam while the levels ramp up sharply (where enemies get 3x as strong as they were in 3-4 minutes). Oh, and cut the minutes between "waves" a bit too. Instead of 5 minutes, make it 3 minutes and adjust the level curve accordingly. Remember: Shorter Missions are Better in P2P multiplayer because of the multitude of connection issues that can arise. Nothing sucks worse than wasting 20, 30+ minutes of time because of a Host Migration or Disconnect.

 

Defense: #1, make the stupid objective more meatier and make it a bit more well-defended. Void Defense is a pretty decent example of Defense. You have the lasers for defense, the map is set up in such a way that you can use the pod and the walls next to the pod for a little cover while you Defend the objective. Meanwhile, the Asteroid Base Defense is just horrible. I refuse to do it. #2, Shorten the # of waves from 5 to 3 and adjust enemy curves accordingly. Again, shorter missions are better. #3, Add more objects to interact with in the map. The Void Lasers are such an awesome idea... but you never used them (or anything else like it) anywhere else. Why can't there be a Phobos Defense with grineer cannons or turrets set up around the map? Why can't some of the Grineer come in on skiffs that you can shoot down with these cannons when you see one approaching? etc etc etc.

[UnknownGunneryChief]

Well first of all, most of these things could already be in development - making models for vehicles/turrrets or entire new tilesets is time-consuming. Also, 3 waves per batch would be low - all we need is increased stability after host migrations and if after host migrations the squad isn't full, a player can join/be invited no matter the progress done.

[Fettikus]

i personaly never understood why you have to defend a pod against the Grineer INSIDE of a Grineer base. i think it would make more sense if you had to defend some kind of Orokin temple while Lotus tries to extract artifacts.

[Xylia]

Well first of all, most of these things could already be in development - making models for vehicles/turrrets or entire new tilesets is time-consuming. Also, 3 waves per batch would be low - all we need is increased stability after host migrations and if after host migrations the squad isn't full, a player can join/be invited no matter the progress done.

 

A year+ later, and we still don't have reliable host migration for Endless Missions, so something tells me that is not likely to happen anyday soon.

 

I'd rather we just shorten the missions so they don't feel like a boring slogfest for the first 20+ minutes of a mission. Why not speed it up so you get to the fun sooner?

 

Just the other night, friend and I were doing T1 Defense, while leveling lowbie crap for the most part. We were doing 25 waves for two chances at a prime piece (which of course did not drop...).

 

Waves 1-20 are easy-peasy, pretty much no challenge at all. A complete borefest. /yawn, more wimps. Then finally 21-23 it gets good and 23-25 was spamming too much crap too fast for the lowbie gear we had on.

 

It just takes too long to get to the "good stuff"... a mission shouldn't be "80% yawn 15% yay and 5% OMG!". Reducing it down to 3min/3waves would make the "yay" come sooner while reducing the chances of something bad happening ruining your day, and if something bad DID happen, then you didn't lose as much playtime as you would have otherwise. In a Survival, what was 20min would then be 12 minutes. If a disconnect happens, 12min loss would be far more preferable over a 20 minute one.

[Donnell]

I agree mostly. Defence is fairly difficult since mobs attack from too many sides and at range. From what I mostly see, using "pug"s, there is no real team work to make it worth playing. Running about in circles killing stuff while letting a snow globe do the protection bit.

I have been thinking of ways to change these two missions using current assets.

 

Defence:

Remodel the maps to support a more "tower defence" style game play. Several lanes (from one direction) with the pod to defend at the back.

At certain points, have turrets which attack approaching mobs but need to be protected and powered: using the excavation power-cell system. At the end of every 5 waves, Lotus sends larger power-cells which can perhaps boost the starting turrets or activate the inactive ones nearby to cover a different 'lane' or reinforce the back defences.

This gives players a points of focus; keeping players together so they can do actual team work (hopefully). At the end of the current wave system, I feel players are always uncertain about the gamble: to go another 5 waves. With this tower defence style, you know you're in a strong team because the turrets are still holding. If Tenno have been pushed back too far, it becomes clear that extraction is best.

 

Survival:

How about the Tenno be the ones that take the life support!: The opposing faction must force out the Tenno or they suffocate. As they attack the Tenno, the covert op dude can look for supplies.

Lotus sends life support modules every 5 mins to suck the life out of the enemy ship but doesn't need to be defended. (perhaps taints their supply rather than steals it?). *The modules need to be reached for the rewards.. can't have you camping forever eh? :p*

Taking away the clock from survival should make things a bit more fun; until the more heavy units come. To combat this, Tenno should think about elements they should bring to survive against stronger enemies instead of hoping the drops are good.

 

The only survival map that really gets played, to my knowledge, is "Apollodorus" in Mercury and the Void. Both for farming mods or leveling weapons because of the amount of mobs to kill.

[RyouichiKitsune]

I agree mostly. Defence is fairly difficult since mobs attack from too many sides and at range. From what I mostly see, using "pug"s, there is no real team work to make it worth playing. Running about in circles killing stuff while letting a snow globe do the protection bit.

I have been thinking of ways to change these two missions using current assets.

 

Defence:

Remodel the maps to support a more "tower defence" style game play. Several lanes (from one direction) with the pod to defend at the back.

At certain points, have turrets which attack approaching mobs but need to be protected and powered: using the excavation power-cell system. At the end of every 5 waves, Lotus sends larger power-cells which can perhaps boost the starting turrets or activate the inactive ones nearby to cover a different 'lane' or reinforce the back defences.

This gives players a points of focus; keeping players together so they can do actual team work (hopefully). At the end of the current wave system, I feel players are always uncertain about the gamble: to go another 5 waves. With this tower defence style, you know you're in a strong team because the turrets are still holding. If Tenno have been pushed back too far, it becomes clear that extraction is best.

 

Survival:

How about the Tenno be the ones that take the life support!: The opposing faction must force out the Tenno or they suffocate. As they attack the Tenno, the covert op dude can look for supplies.

Lotus sends life support modules every 5 mins to suck the life out of the enemy ship but doesn't need to be defended. (perhaps taints their supply rather than steals it?). *The modules need to be reached for the rewards.. can't have you camping forever eh? :p*

Taking away the clock from survival should make things a bit more fun; until the more heavy units come. To combat this, Tenno should think about elements they should bring to survive against stronger enemies instead of hoping the drops are good.

 

The only survival map that really gets played, to my knowledge, is "Apollodorus" in Mercury and the Void. Both for farming mods or leveling weapons because of the amount of mobs to kill.

ill throw my own interjection on this

no...(THIS IS ALL SPECULATED) the spawns are about the same. the drop rate is about the same. BUT. HERES THE KICKER

the exp gain in this game is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO muffed up. seriously?

a lvl 1 grinner...yeilds id safely say 60 affinity..takes 3 shots with a @(*()$ LEVEL 1 SKANA OR LATO...they are EASY to take down with 0% effort. ANY weapon. ANY LEVEL. is good to grind them on BECAUSE their so easy. ...so back to the BS exp thing

a lvl 1 grinner...easy to take down..60 affinity without barely pressing a f'in button

 

a lvl 40 grinner? BRING THE BIG CALIBUR WEAPONS. BOMBS. 4 FRAMES ULTING. LVL 30 DRAGON NIKATA. LVL 30 BOLTOR PRIMES, AND YOU /MIGHT/ get its health HALFWAY down. and for how much exp?.........92? seriously? ONLY 92 AFFINITY?

so let me get this straight.....74 clips of a bolter prime to get 1 AFFINITY of 92 exp in maybe 30 seconds...something i can find HIGHER OF in containers with affinity balls?

 

OR...i could go to Apollodorus and kill 17 light/heavy grinner giving 60 exp each with out even pressing the left click 17 times?

 

lemme just do some math here...60x17=1020. in NOT EVEN half the time.

so thats why i go to Apollodorus...the affinity in the game is just NOT ramped at all  even on @(*()$ pluto

 

the only better place to get exp imo is viver because of obvious reasons...but if they fix that. then void t1 survival. why? those big gunners give 600 exp...and they dont take much to take down on t1

its more rewarding to kill weaker then it is to kill stronger

:I i did all this math WAY BACK WHEN it was in update 10...............they havnt changed a damn thing

a lvl 40? it should give 8x the affinity of a lvl 1 dont ya think?

......this is war farm...... less farming in farmville

but yeah thats my take on it. no offense to you though donnell..just wanted to share my personal reaosn why i went to Apollodorus. instead of say a pluto survival.

also 10/10 agreed idea...i alwyas wondered why were defending something. IN THE WORST POSSIBLE PLACE. all the open space? seriously? why would you defend something in OPEN SPACE....its a camp mission. throw it in the corner like a L4D survival map :I

Edited November 18, 2014 by RyouichiKitsune

[lianjifei]

I'll always welcome new game modes.

Sounds like give a end to endless mission is needed for some Idae a got, so that's what i came up with:

 

Change it to a digging mission, so we are protecting the a number digging machines to dig some huge artifacts, takes 10 mins at least.

Enemies buff every 10% of the progress.

If the digging machines got destroyed it will slow down the progress until lotus send a replace one.

Speed matters the reward.

 

Just saying, welcome to give more opinions on this(or not).

[vats3]

Il have to admit OP has a few good ideas for survival, if you got alittle per kill it would slightly lower the need for nekros, but I have to say, defense and survival are the only places I really have fun, I like the never ending waves, the mindless killing, honestly what I really want is just more places to mindlessly kill till I cant kill anymore 

 

also

I'll always welcome new game modes.

Sounds like give a end to endless mission is needed for some Idae a got, so that's what i came up with:

 

Change it to a digging mission, so we are protecting the a number digging machines to dig some huge artifacts, takes 10 mins at least.

Enemies buff every 10% of the progress.

If the digging machines got destroyed it will slow down the progress until lotus send a replace one.

Speed matters the reward.

 

Just saying, welcome to give more opinions on this(or not).

isnt this... just a copy of the mode they just added? 

Edited November 19, 2014 by vats3

[Repligon]

<...>

 

Defence:

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Survival:

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I'm not a fan of a tower defence but it's something I would like to play.

 

Survival in this form will actually make sence.