Dead End - Weapon ( Warframe ) Graveyard Inevitable

[AdFinitum]

One of the core Warframe concepts is to release new weapons almost every week, with the ones that come with a major ( or prime ) release being the strongest in game at that time ( Bo Prime followed by Scindo Prime as an example that I validated ).

 

This inevitably leads to a situation with a huge amount of weapons ( 176+ as of now ) in game from which most are outdated, underpowered, unbalanced.

 

Those weapons wont be fixed. DE has made an indirect statement by buffing utterly underperforming weapons ( warframe abilities ) with syndicate mods instead of fixing / balancing them which most likely implies that those weapons ( warframe abilities ) will never get a rework / rebalance.

 

Much of this applies to warframes as well.

 

The sheer amount of weapons and warframes and the fact that more and more will be added will lead to a point ( which has already been reached, at the very least with regards to weapons ) where a development team consisting of a certain number of employees will not be able to maintain them anymore.

 

The sad thing of this is that there are so many weapons ( warframes ) that have a unique style, mechanic or handling but all of them are destined for the weapon ( warframe ) graveyard.

 

While there might be a way to get some of the most popular weapons brought up to date again ( for instance a monthly community vote for a weapon and a warframe that will get a retouch ) the graveyard for a majority and basically every weapon / warframe is inevitable with the current concept of an endless stream of new ( more powerful ) ones.

 

I dont know if there is something to discuss since this is not going to change because it is an essential concept of Warframe but I wanted to get the inevitable consequence of it straight.

 

Edit : This fact renders recurring discussions about balance almost pointless since it will be ( is ) impossible to balance all weapons / warframes against each other.

 

Summary : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_creep ( Thx to Hupf4 ^^ )

Edited November 25, 2014 by AdFinitum

[Hupf4]

Wf is a perfect example of power creep... so sad

[AdFinitum]

Wf is a perfect example of power creep... so sad

Oh right - I didnt know about this term. It perfectly summarizes my longish post ^^

[fatpig84]

Nukor and Tiberon are pretty recent things.

But no where that Op.

[Gr33hn]

Nukor and Tiberon are pretty recent things.

But no where that Op.

 

But they are better then Spectra and Burston, the old weapons with similar function.

[AdFinitum]

You may be right about a few recent individual weapons not surpassing all other weapons but my main point is that the sheer amount of weapons / warframes is / will be unmaintainable / unbalancable.

 

The Vivergate being a grand example of a combination of a few warframes which seemed overpowered in one specific setting while the overreactive nerf possibly would have nerfed them beyond all other warframes. It shows that DE wants and tries to keep a balance but wont be able to more and more time after time.

Edited November 25, 2014 by AdFinitum

[Guest]

This is probably the reason so many weapons disappear from the market, such as the Machete, the Gorgon, the Ether Daggers, the Boar... some of which seem to have been lost for good. It's rather sad.

[.Czern]

Yeah. It's a shame that you have to put several formas into old weapons just to make them viable at later star-chart missions.

Rebalancing them all would be a hard task, but without it we need more effort to use those fancy things with same efficiency as with newer stuff.

[sp33chle55]

There will always be weaker and stronger weapons. You never played an action rpg huh?

Its about working your way up to the strongest gear. There is no sense in balancing each weapon to be on par with every other. And i dont see a reason for trying to balance every item in the game. This should not include warframes. They should be in balance with each other.They are automatically separated by their abilities which favors one over the other in certain situations and that's fine.

Tl;dr i dont agree with you op, because above

[AdFinitum]

There will always be weaker and stronger weapons. You never played an action rpg huh?

Its about working your way up to the strongest gear. There is no sense in balancing each weapon to be on par with every other. And i dont see a reason for trying to balance every item in the game. This should not include warframes. They should be in balance with each other.They are automatically separated by their abilities which favors one over the other in certain situations and that's fine.

Tl;dr i dont agree with you op, because above

I only stated that every weapon in game will be outdated some day ( unlike action RPGs with a limited amount of weapons ). The only opinion I gave was that I think that it is sad that one day every weapon will be useless despite its unique attributes that we might have come to love. Im perfectly fine if someone doesnt care about every weapon inevitably becoming useless in the future.

 

Possibly I am fine with that as well since this gives us new toys frequently.

Edited November 25, 2014 by AdFinitum

[Monolake]

Till they assign some one to actually work on balancing - no, it will remain poor. 

And it will go on and on and same problems with arise with new content too, not just old.. Look at some recent weapons, look at syndicate mods, look at archwing mods. Many of them are poorly balanced ( and some are just downright useless).

Edited November 25, 2014 by Monolake

[Qynchou]

I disagree. Rebalance isnt needed, weapons should be unique on release and everything will be fine.

 

Example: buzlok, the only weapon with homing projectiles.

 

Unique.

 

edit:

 

Forgot to mention, when it comes to melee weapons, youre right, the animation team will just be too small to keep releasing new stances with new animations.

Edited November 25, 2014 by Qynchou

[Dhrekr]

While there might be a way to get some of the most popular weapons brought up to date again ( for instance a monthly community vote for a weapon and a warframe that will get a retouch ) the graveyard for a majority and basically every weapon / warframe is inevitable with the current concept of an endless stream of new ( more powerful ) ones.

 

 

May I dare to say that you are not being very revolutionary?

 

DE keeps buffing old weapons. One month ago they buffed the stats of all Sniper rifles, for example - although Sniper rifles are still never seen in game, but imho it's because the sort of missions we play are not sniper-friendly. DE buffed the Heavy Melee weapons two weeks ago - and lo! I now from time to time see people with a Galatine or a Fragor in mission.

 

And equally the do revise obsolete Warframe abilities. Oberon's complete overhaul. Banshee's and Nyx's toggable fourth ability. Even small things like Saryn's decoy getting rid of all states that afflict you. They keep doing that.

 

What else can DE do?

 

Well, for example release weapon-specific mods that will enhance one specific completely out-dated weapon. That could make them interesting. And, while I agree that some Syndicate weapon mods are still underpowered and can't redeem the weapon, some actually are good. The Furis, for example, is still terrible even if you have lifesteal - but it is conceivable that someone will bring it along and use it when they need health. The augments for the Burston Prime and the Grinlock however make them viable weapons.

 

With this I don't mean that the issues you point out are unexistant, but rather that DE is aware and is already on the case.

 

I fear that if someone from DE opens your post, they will glimpse at it and say "oh, THIS again! As if we didn't know!" and go to the next thread in less than ten seconds. They know. It is clear that they know. They might be interested in specific suggestions.

[Qynchou]

DE, please take care with archwing weapons, the arsenal is very low and each new weapon can be unique and viable in its own way.

[AdFinitum]

@Dhrekr :

 

I dont think that there is a solution to the problem. An endless stream of stuff cannot be maintained by a static amount of employees and a staff cannot be increased endlessly. I dont even know if it is bad or not since that way we get new stuff frequently. Its just sad from a nostalgic point of view that at some point any very old weapon will become unusable. My suggestion you quoted might be a solution to that at least so that the most popular weapons can be retouched some day.

Edited November 25, 2014 by AdFinitum

[Dhrekr]

@Dhrekr :

 

I dont think that there is a solution to the problem. An endless stream of stuff cannot be maintained by a static amount of employees and a staff cannot be increased endlessly. I dont even know if it is bad or not since that way we get new stuff frequently. Its just sad from a nostalgic point of view that at some point any very old weapon will become unusable. My suggestion you quoted might be a solution to that at least.

Your suggestion being "exactly what they do now except that the community tells them what weapon/warframe to buff"?

 

I'm not being sarcastic. I'm sincerely struggling to understand in what your suggestion is any different from what they do today - aside from the chance that we might get to decide.

 

Also, consider this: not all weapons are meant to be late-game weapons. Some are weapons for beginners. Some for mid-game. Some for Mastery Rank 5 players. Some weapons have better options because DE wants players to want more and to be motivated to proceed. Most people will use the Skana and the Karak and the Furis, rank it to lv 30, and sell it. Most people will go through a series of mediocre weapons and then move on. Some weapons will only be used by players who use them because they are the best they can get and they don't cost much.

 

I built a Karak and I used it and I had fun when I was mastery rank 5. Then I sold it and I bought the Soma. Do I want the Karak to be as viable as the Soma or the Boltor Prime? No. In my mind the Karak is a weapon for intermediate players, and it is great when you build it, and then you outgrow it.

 

 

You clearly have the perspective of a player who has outgrown most weapons. Yes, from your point of view (and mine as well) most weapons are too weak to be considered.

 

So I'm actually happy that DE releases new weapons that are strong enough for me to take to some difficult mission and enjoy. Praise the Opticor, for it is much much better than the Furis and I don't regret the time when I used a Furis.

[Rorgal_Sina]

All I wish is for DE to make every weapon worth using. That's it.

 

There are many easy ways to buff weapons. DE is pretty slow on that. In fact, too slow.

[VocalMagic]

I believe that OP wishes to convey how there are weapons with unique mechanics that do not carry from the tier they are meant for- such as begining, mid-game, high-level, and end-game- through the tiers that come after it.
I get the feeling that they wish to convey that the unique mechanic is lost once you advance.

Barring unique mods for unique weapons that don't quite make it to end-game, the only way to make a weapon with a unique mechanic carry on to tiers after the one it's meant for... Is to make a new, more powerful, weapon, with the same mechanic. An MK-2, so to speak.


I also feel like they wish to convey more, but I am lost on those points.

[bejuizb]

What the OP's trying to say is this: Power creep is killing the game's guns. And I for one agree wholeheartedly. I got laughed at a while ago for using a Gram. The big daddy of Greatswords in this game. Why? Because it wouldn't do enough DPS and all the other nonsensical gibberish this game's tryhards spew out. I know that he's being daft, but it did make me think. No one uses the Furis, the Lex, the original Viper, the Paris, and even if they do, they just rank them up for mastery fodder and sell them. Why? Old mechanics, and lesser effectiveness in the battlefield. Newer weapons will always get more attention sadly, that's how humans are, but it does sadden me sometimes when I feel extremely old school for using a Lex, Gorgon and Gram in combat, while all the new kids are running around with their 1mil deeps Boltor Primes and Rocket Rhino Primes. 

 

/rant

Edited November 25, 2014 by bejuizb

[SHOCKED]

Many logical fallacies in OP.

[ErickJatobA]

SOON™, Warframe might have more guns than, I don't know, borderlands '-'

[Noabettiet]

If mastery rank was structured right, with each weapon assigned with the right mastery rank, that wouldn't had to be that much of a problem.

But the hell with it, i don't really care anymore.

[UFOLoche]

There are a ton of weapons in the game, and I feel a lot of the old ones are still perfectly fine weapons.  Maybe not some of the melee weapons(And I do think the Gram could use a small buff to be put on the level of the Galatine), but a lot of the other ones are fine.

[JakeRobber]

What game has this kind of balance with 200+ weapons?  The fact that so many easily acquired weapons, weapons that are acquired from the market via blueprints, are receiving buffs is more balancing than I personally think is needed.  Clan-tech and primes should outperform those weapons.  More effort should equal better rewards.

 

What I'm trying to say is that the balancing effort should mainly focus on making hard to obtain weapons more viable.  

 

And let's be honest, they do update weapon and frame stats pretty consistently.  You don't even have to go back a month in the patch notes to see that this is true.  The Syndicate mods do help the cause as well.  This seems like weird timing to have this complaint, as we haven't seen a new non-archwing weapon in almost 3 weeks now, and the heavy weapon boost and syndicate mod introduction are both pretty recent.

[sp33chle55]

Its not killing the guns. They are just becoming beginners weapons. You're just being nostalgic. Mastery rank 17 people need weapons for their wave 60+ runs and those will never be rank 2 weapons. Just because you are too far into the game for those weapons doesn't render them obsolete. Thats just not right.

There have to be weapons for each state of the game. Period. And warframe is doing it well.

Balancing every weapon in the game to do slightly the same performance would completely destroy progression. And why should i get other gear if its all basically the same just other features. Doesnt make sense to me.

Edited November 25, 2014 by sp33chle55