De, Do You Want Me To Grind, Or Don't You Want Me To Grind? Or Ripening Of Conceptional Contradiction In Wf

[Ska-boo]

Careful, very TL;DR wall of text.

 

So, there had been quite an amount of feedback concerning newly introduced units and game mechanics. The opinions differ, as usual, but I think, I won't be argued with, if I say that we all understand that these new units are "anti-grinding"

 

Pretty much all of their mechanics were aimed to disrupt high leveled abusers from easily farming certain nods, using same, known to everyone, stale patterns of "press [button name] to win". Tar-Moa might as well be named "Anti-Vauban Moa", it's pathing and agro mechanics prove to be aimed at screwing high-ground campers and Null Crewman was clearly designed with Viver and Cerberus in mind.

 

The implementation may be considered successful - it is no longer worth to autistically sit on Sechura for tens of waves in Solo mode just for XP and Single properly modded Mag or Ash can no longer ensure successful run of Corpus interception. They are still manageable, no doubt about it, but Vauban will have to actually start playing with both hands now and he will still take risk of dying or loosing the objective and Mag players may have to take off their sweaters, before starting Cerberus.

 

And this is all a good thing, really. Good games should not be played with one button. But that If you can abstract it from current WF meta. Because, let's look at it this way...

 

You didn't like that said Vauban played Sechura, as he did. But do think, that Vauban liked it? Do you imagine him, enjoying that process of spamming one skill and bombing infesteds with his Penta? I mean, what did he gain by it? - nothing. Sechura didn't yield any good reward at all - it couldn't be farmed for credits, because tax was always ridiculous, and DS defense rarely gave any worthy reward for wave completion. No rare resources on Pluto either. So it was all done just for XP/rep for syndicate. He didn't like the process, but he was forced into it by mechanics of the game, where you need to kill mobs, to level. You need to kill mobs to level weapon, then you need to Forma it and kill mobs again to level it back, than Forma again, then level again and again and again and again. Then repeat for other weapon. Same with syndicate standing: kill mobs to advance.

 

And it just so happened, that other missions are worthless for this purpose. Actually, most of planet missions are worthless for any purpose in current meta - they yield neither reward, nor XP, nor anything and now they also pose a threat of loosing. Like the unfortunate example of Rescue 2.0, in which you have put a noticeable effort to improve it, adding a stealth element and it would have been great... If this was made in the game which had stealth. Now the mission type is just a pain in the !, which noone plays, unless it is an alert with good reward. Just as pretty much any node. The low-tier planets are quite populated with newer player, mostly, but those players either permanently stay on Mercury, or finish a few planets and abandon the game, because the higher the planet, the more dead it is, up to the point, where you will fortunate just to not to have play whole Ceres solo and have at least 1-2 squadm8s in at least some of the missions. So, it's not worth it - it's too unrewarding and people just move though all the nodes, on which you have worked, to unlock the map and subside on the Dark Sectors, Void Towers and Derelicts and Several high level nodes, like Cerberus and Viver, with occasional raids on bosses and excavations on the lower planets for the sake of faster keys. Cause that's where the proper grind is done.

 

And now you are taking the grind away from me. Which is not so bad, I didn't like to grind.

 

But have you given me an alternative? Have you delivered renewed gameplay, which would be rewarding by itself? Nope, still same brainless mobs, coming in by thousands.

 

More tactical elements? Ability synergy to make fights more spectacular and fun? More intractable environment? Nah, nothing.

 

Have you lessened the amount of grind required of me to do, when taking the easy way of performing it from me?

 

And that's the most interesting part - not just you have not, you've increased it. You keep putting massive work into syndicate, adding new rewards high level reward, urging more players to join them and grind rep. You add completely useless mods to vaults with enormous drop chance, making me play 10 vault runs instead of one. You add more prime stuff, diluting drop tables even further, more mods ridiculously low drop chance, warframe that is hidden behind 3-layered grind wall. And I figure more is waiting where that came from - warframe is developing!

 

Now there are players, who say game should be challenging, and it should! There are folks saying it should be so challenging, that you must not know the outcome of the fight, before finishing it, even when bringing your top end stuff. And it is also a great thing to have in game! But, m8s, like hell I'm going to grind that Scindo prime part, if not just I will need to perform 100 runs for it to drop, but also won't know the outcome of every attempt. The has been people getting buttmad from RNG as it is and leaving the game because they could get stuff they wanted in certain amount of runs. What do you think will happen, when for every successful run that hasn't yielded wanted reward there will be 10 failed runs?

 

Now the Corpus with this new unit has become better! Really, a step in right direction for a gameplay. I have one-two admonition, but they are just details. Not so happy about Moas, but they are too almost an improvement. And I'm almost sure new Grineer and Corrupted units are incoming, and they too, may be an improvement.

 

But for gameplay, not for game as whole. Because as long as my progression is tied to meaningless grind, I want it to be as fast as possible. I want to be challenged, but not on every step, while having seemingly infinite amount of them before me.

 

So if you want me to pass your challenge, then bring it on, but give me a corresponding reward. Make me grind thousands of XP reputation, but don't tie it to killing mindless mobs, give me those thousands for completion of 1-2 really hard missions. Give mobs more tools like Null sphere, to resist me, give them new AI, reduce their number, but make every single one of them a challenge in itself. Make every mission borderline impossible, but let me chose the reward for it.

 

Turn solo runs into madness, but give me 4 times the reward I would have gotten, if accomplished it in full squad.

 

Let me chose to odds, and progress according to skill and not patience. Tie my advancement to challenge, rather than amount of repetitions, or don't change it at all. Because if I need to do something 100 times, I want every instance of it to be as easy and fast as possible. Because if I still have to make it 100 times, while wiping sweat with towel after every run, just for some symbolic progress in video game, I'm not gonna do this. And I'm sure many others won't as well.

 

Or will they?

Let's hear

Edited December 17, 2014 by Ska-boo

[lama_music]

the only thing i could read is....  

 

 

 

Or will they?

Let's hear

[BoomyGordo]

..disrupt high leveled abusers..

 

how exactly is using warframe powers to farm a certain node abusing it?

 

please explain this, so many people cry out that players are abusing it when they are just grinding out syndicate standing and affinity yet never explain how exactly it is abuse.

[Rexlars]

You said "very TL;DR wall of text" so I assumed you would have provided a TL;DR.

[vaugahn]

Actually, they lessened the amount of grind required for syndicates by quite a lot. You can easily rank one up through casual play now, no grind required (except for maybe a prime part sacrifice).

 

And I think you kind of answered your own question. Grind runs are quite easy to do, but you can't "autistically sit on Sechura for tens of waves in Solo mode just for XP and Single properly modded Mag or Ash can no longer ensure successful run of Corpus interception."

 

So yeah, DE wants you to play the damn game, not just afk and press a number key occasionally.

[Archistopheles]

And that's the most interesting part - not just you have not, you've increased it. You keep putting massive work into syndicate, adding new rewards high level reward, urging more players to join them and grind rep. You add completely useless mods to vaults with enormous drop chance, making me play 10 vault runs instead of one. You add more prime stuff, diluting drop tables even further, more mods ridiculously low drop chance, warframe that is hidden behind 3-layered grind wall. And I figure more is waiting where that came from - warframe is developing!

I tried to make this point back when the void was brand new. I tried to make it again when Ember and Mag prime were released, and we could figuratively see the drop table become more diluted. I tried to make this point when T4 was introduced. I will try to make this point when the next slew of void drops are released, and the next wave of players complain that the drop rate is abhorrent.

If it wasn't for the art & animation department, I would've left this game long ago.

[Aspari]

Actually, they lessened the amount of grind required for syndicates by quite a lot. You can easily rank one up through casual play now, no grind required (except for maybe a prime part sacrifice).

 

And I think you kind of answered your own question. Grind runs are quite easy to do, but you can't "autistically sit on Sechura for tens of waves in Solo mode just for XP and Single properly modded Mag or Ash can no longer ensure successful run of Corpus interception."

 

So yeah, DE wants you to play the damn game, not just afk and press a number key occasionally.

Agreed here.

 

However, I DO feel like they increased something. I feel like they increased the amount of gambling. I'd rather grind than gamble.

[Playford]

So yeah, DE wants you to play the damn game, not just afk and press a number key occasionally.

That's kinda his point I think, the fastest way to progress is to be afk and press a number key occasionally. But then they take that away and provide no alternative.

[Ska-boo]

how exactly is using warframe powers to farm a certain node abusing it?

 

please explain this, so many people cry out that players are abusing it when they are just grinding out syndicate standing and affinity yet never explain how exactly it is abuse.

Oxford dictionary:

"To Abuse - Make excessive and habitable use of"

 

It's just so happened, that this word got such a meaning. Good players, utilizing certain mechanical aspects of the game and achieving results easier, than expected by developers get to be called abusers. Or simple spammers get called thus sometimes too. I think it started from MOBAs, where players, discovering such ways could screw the gaming experience of their opponents in the worst possible way. And thus they started to call them "abusers" instead of "very advanced players"

[Ska-boo]

That's kinda his point I think, the fastest way to progress is to be afk and press a number key occasionally. But then they take that away and provide no alternative.

Pretty much. Thanks, m8

 

 

 

 

To the point of syndicates, I must add that I never initiated in any of them, because of the very nature of the feature, so it may be the weakest point of my reasoning. I don't know how are they now, relatively to what they were, but they didn't rework the very idea - grind rep by killing mobs to gain stuff. That's why I never joined, even after Viver-inspired changes.

Edited December 9, 2014 by Ska-boo

[FREQ1989]

Good post with good points. There has been so much elimination to "normal" grinding techniques, but with them essentially taking them out and providing no alternative, has ruined the core gameplay by providing no reward at all. Hopefully we can get enough positive feedback and constructive criticism that this problem can be addressed. Good post. +1

[democrator]

 

You didn't like that said Vauban played Sechura, as he did. But do think, that Vauban liked it? Do you imagine him, enjoying that process of spamming one skill and bombing infesteds with his Penta? I mean, what did he gain by it? - nothing. Sechura didn't yield any good reward at all - it couldn't be farmed for credits, because tax was always ridiculous, and DS defense rarely gave any worthy reward for wave completion. No rare resources on Pluto either. So it was all done just for XP/rep for syndicate. He didn't like the process, but he was forced into it by mechanics of the game, where you need to kill mobs, to level. You need to kill mobs to level weapon, then you need to Forma it and kill mobs again to level it back, than Forma again, then level again and again and again and again. Then repeat for other weapon. Same with syndicate standing: kill mobs to advance.

 

This is not an issue with Sechura only. Even Orokin Derelict Mission don't give decent rewards. ODS is hard once you reach 30 mins mark but the rewards are one uncommon core. A rare reward is one R5 core (Are you kidding me?). Come on, we need better rewards to actually do these missions (rather than just farming for xp). 

[Wurdyburd]

I had to rewrite this a few times, so sorry if my thought process doesn't seem as clear.

 

DE's entire development focus is to keep us struggling along as much as possible, so that we lust after shiny weapons dangled from the other end of a very wide, very deep gorge of rng. We play to get those items to alleviate the strain of playing, which is good for DE because we end up spending more time, and possibly more money.

We seek such items to avoid being frustrated, or think about leaving the game, when it's this practise of using a carrot on a stick that's making us frustrated in the first place.

 

And so, whenever a new grinding technique is developed or discovered, DE is quick to swoop in and take it from us, so that we can spend time playing the game instead of pressing 4. Faced with no choice but to play the actual game itself, we are dismayed to find that the game is relatively empty. Most systems that lead us to this game, such as the abilities, the parkour, and stealth, haven't been improved, and in many ways, have become progressively less prominent. New enemy abilities such as nullify prevent rushing and use of abilities and more focus on gameplay itself, which we find has been reduced to nothing more than the constant practise of filling enemies with lead. Stealth is nothing more than rushing to kill all enemies before they can hit the alarm, and parkour leaves us as easy targets on the wall.

 

Finally, the presence of power creep in this game is so prominent it's not even funny. Older weapons are always weaker because DE continuously releases new weapons that are more powerful, which we scramble to get due to the game's difficulty in the higher levels. Then DE every so subtly improves the difficulty of the game, either through buffing enemies or nerfing frames, weapons, and powers, so that when they grace us with another weapon, we're just as quick to scramble for it as the last one, that we've already ranked and sold off.

 

TL;DR: DE's business thrives off forcing us to grind for as long as possible, believing we are dedicated to the game enough to take their S#&$, and all of their sale- and play- data for the past two years has been more than enough to prove that they can continue doing so indefinitely without any problems.

Edited December 9, 2014 by Wurdyburd

[Ska-boo]

DE's entire development focus is to keep us struggling along as much as possible, so that we lust after shiny weapons dangled from the other end of a very wide, very deep gorge of rng. We play to get those items to alleviate the strain of playing, which is good for DE because we end up spending more time, and possibly more money.

This is correct with every game, but their new development here don't actually help their cause in this matter. Think of it this way: most grind friendly missions are endless missions. Abusing powers does not really fasten your progress, but rather makes it easier. If defence you can fasten, by spamming Negative MP, survivals are tied to the timer deadly - no way to fasten ticking of those 30 minutes, you need to stay there. And interception rep grind actually included deliberate stalling of the waves' accomplishment by leaving one point to mobs, so that wave would last loner and more mobs could be spawned and farmed.

 

So, while it is indeed in their best interest to make me waste as much time as possible, they just chose to make me waste more efforts during the same amount of time. As I said, the missions became harder, but are still manageable. I doubt everyone will now start to bail after 5 waves of Sechura or after one round of Cerberus. Rather they will try harder, fail occasionally, get mad, get frustrated, some will quit playing or just start to run out of revives regularly, which will end their gaming sessions sooner than usually.

 

 

Faced with no choice but to play the actual game itself, we are dismayed to find that the game is relatively empty. Most systems that lead us to this game, such as the abilities, the parkour, and stealth, haven't been improved, and in many ways, have become progressively less prominent. New enemy abilities such as nullify prevent rushing and use of abilities and more focus on gameplay itself, which we find has been reduced to nothing more than the constant practise of filling enemies with lead. Stealth is nothing more than rushing to kill all enemies before they can hit the alarm, and parkour leaves us as easy targets on the wall

Yes, indeed, that has been said many times - the gameplay needs massive tweaks. I'm just not sure if they fully understand how raw the game looks for someone, who've played it long enough, but I know they intend some work on it for sure. There have been talks about Spy 2.0 (I hope it will not be same as rescue) and, I think, they have promised too look at parkour and stealth after NY. All in all, I believe they mean good for the game and want to make it a proper creation, rather than just a hat-trading donation vein.

 

 

This is not an issue with Sechura only. Even Orokin Derelict Mission don't give decent rewards. ODS is hard once you reach 30 mins mark but the rewards are one uncommon core. A rare reward is one R5 core (Are you kidding me?). Come on, we need better rewards to actually do these missions (rather than just farming for xp). 

Yeah, I haven't found a single reason for myself to play OD, except for ext. for Vault runs and Lephantis, for Nekros. Again - shame. The map design is quite nicely done there, but if anyone gets there, he won't appreciate it, as he will be too busy rushing to that Vault to mitigate the fact that he will have to repeat that game 19023480238420948 times in a row, to get what he want for vault.

 

 

 

Thx, m8

[Wurdyburd]

This is correct with every game, but their new development here don't actually help their cause in this matter. Think of it this way: most grind friendly missions are endless missions. Abusing powers does not really fasten your progress, but rather makes it easier. If defence you can fasten, by spamming Negative MP, survivals are tied to the timer deadly - no way to fasten ticking of those 30 minutes, you need to stay there. And interception rep grind actually included deliberate stalling of the waves' accomplishment by leaving one point to mobs, so that wave would last loner and more mobs could be spawned and farmed.

While it's true that every free online game demands some element of grinding or otherwise wasting time, other games tend to diversify the game, and provide game modes that are fun to play rather than a grind. It's a kind of reward after having made your way through all the quests and upgraded your equipment so much; sure you can still be rewarded by finding rare loot, but you're significantly less fixated on finding the newest, best equipment, and more so on just having fun.

 

I suppose my argument here is that in Warframe, those efficiency methods exist because grinding is all there is here. Whereas some other mmorpgs might introduce game-modes that have creative team-play and strategy, Warframe boils down to simply finding the easiest way to do something, in the least time possible. Which is rather the philosophy of old-time arcade machines, and games with high-scores and leaderboards, except in Warframe we're not competing against each other, we're literally fighting the game itself. Similar to how enemy players might change their strategy in pvp-oriented games, Warframe changes  every time the devs 'fix' it, and so we as players, fighting the game, find the best way to beat the game, at it's own game. 

As long as this pattern persists, Warframe's development cycle will be a constant state of shutting down the player base just to maintain the contest.

 

So, while it is indeed in their best interest to make me waste as much time as possible, they just chose to make me waste more efforts during the same amount of time. As I said, the missions became harder, but are still manageable. I doubt everyone will now start to bail after 5 waves of Sechura or after one round of Cerberus. Rather they will try harder, fail occasionally, get mad, get frustrated, some will quit playing or just start to run out of revives regularly, which will end their gaming sessions sooner than usually.

The issue is that most players here don't waste time out of choice, because the game is fun, but instead waste their time as an investment to make their equipment better. Players who have nothing else to level rarely play the game unless something new is released, because the gameplay is stale and unrewarding, not just in terms of equipment and loot reward, but in terms of entertainment.

 

Missions becoming more difficult isn't the problem, it's that it's effectively pointless, and the time-drain starts to hit home after only a couple of missions once all your grinding has been done.

The game, post-grind, turns into a childish game, like hopscotch, even in survival and defense. There's no goal, nobody gets anywhere doing it, everyone simply stops playing their mission when they feel like it, and it turns into a process rather than something that challenges any of your skills.

Everyone uses a combination of frames, using certain weapons, sitting in a single tile in a certain corner, and even without 'press 4 to win', you shoot enemies as they enter view instead of chasing them, press a combination of abilities depending on your frame every set number of seconds, and repeat. 

 

As long as Warframe is a game devoted to grinding and efficiency of numbers, nobody's going to get the fun, rewarding gameplay that they think lies at the end of that road mined with grind, rng, and inappropriately scaling enemy difficulty.

Edited December 9, 2014 by Wurdyburd

[Marthrym]

I tried to make this point back when the void was brand new. I tried to make it again when Ember and Mag prime were released, and we could figuratively see the drop table become more diluted. I tried to make this point when T4 was introduced. I will try to make this point when the next slew of void drops are released, and the next wave of players complain that the drop rate is abhorrent.

If it wasn't for the art & animation department, I would've left this game long ago.

I know the feeling...

[Ska-boo]

While it's true that every free online game demands some element of grinding or otherwise wasting time, other games tend to diversify the game, and provide game modes that are fun to play rather than a grind. It's a kind of reward after having made your way through all the quests and upgraded your equipment so much; sure you can still be rewarded by finding rare loot, but you're significantly less fixated on finding the newest, best equipment, and more so on just having fun.

 

I suppose my argument here is that in Warframe, those efficiency methods exist because grinding is all there is here. Whereas some other mmorpgs might introduce game-modes that have creative team-play and strategy, Warframe boils down to simply finding the easiest way to do something, in the least time possible. Which is rather the philosophy of old-time arcade machines, and games with high-scores and leaderboards, except in Warframe we're not competing against each other, we're literally fighting the game itself. Similar to how enemy players might change their strategy in pvp-oriented games, Warframe changes  every time the devs 'fix' it, and so we as players, fighting the game, find the best way to beat the game, at it's own game. 

As long as this pattern persists, Warframe's development cycle will be a constant state of shutting down the player base just to maintain the contest.

 

Indeed. And the most significant danger it pose to the game isn't even in the fact, that one day everyone may get enough of it, but that someday there will be nothing left to grind. DE cannot keep creating new content eternally and by the time they stop, there better be some gameplay worth playing just for the sake of playing, otherwise the game will go dead in no time.

[Liminal]

Until much of the game stops feeling so grindy, players will keep looking for the easiest way to farm xp/resources/reputation/etc.

I don't remember the last time I played WF "just because".

[RPrimed]

There will always be a viver

 

 

most of the problems he talks about have been fixed but the message still remains

[Chiwwy1]

Been noticing this problem too. I would love the challenging enemies if I was guaranteed so much more, but right now it is "Do mission crapload of times to possibly get what you need and you may get cheapshotted by something in a blind spot around you causing you to fail or it lands on a defense object that takes good amounts of damage even when you try to shoot it away". That is personally more tedious than it needs to be. I personally like the enemies being easier at times since I knew I would have to do a mission over and over and over and over (you get the point) which still makes the grind noticeable but somewhat less annoying. There will need to be a fundamental change soon because adding new (possibly cheap difficulty) enemies to the void missions just to get a chance at maybe getting the part you want will cause more to leave.

[Ska-boo]

Until much of the game stops feeling so grindy, players will keep looking for the easiest way to farm xp/resources/reputation/etc.

I don't remember the last time I played WF "just because".

I know that feeling. I often just end up logging in and hanging on chat, admiring the view from the ship's front window, sit like that for a while and then find it that I cannot be arsed to do any mission at all. Because why? It all turns into grind for the sake of grind. Like I grind now to get stronger to grind more effectively later so that I could then become top grinder and farm with the speed of light while putting zero efforts (which is now becoming impossible, so no reason to even start on that path).

 

 

There will need to be a fundamental change soon because adding new (possibly cheap difficulty) enemies to the void missions just to get a chance at maybe getting the part you want will cause more to leave.

My sentiment exactly. I hope they're not going to do so simultaneously with new Prime Access. Because introducing new "nullifier" + diluting drop tables even further, while adding more stuff with 0.00001% drop chance will just be a last drop.

[Davoodoo]

how exactly is using warframe powers to farm a certain node abusing it?

 

please explain this, so many people cry out that players are abusing it when they are just grinding out syndicate standing and affinity yet never explain how exactly it is abuse.

Ill explain, de put a limiter on how much you can use your abilities, its called energy

It was already far stretched by efficiency cap, but it can also be completely bypassed using evamp.

 

And no matter what circumstances bypassing game mechanic is exploit.

Most of exploits in history of gaming were allowed by poor design and theres a reason why "clever use of game mechanics" is synonymous with exploit.

Whether company admits defeat in design and just fixes that flaw or bans everyone using it is up to them.

Edited December 11, 2014 by Davoodoo

[Liminal]

^ There's a difference between exploit and abuse.

Spamming AMD all day long is abuse, but it's not an exploit. Energy restores and Energy Vamp can be abused, sure, but as long as they do their job and nothing else (restoring X energy), they are not exploits.

[Davoodoo]

^ There's a difference between exploit and abuse.

Spamming AMD all day long is abuse, but it's not an exploit. Energy restores and Energy Vamp can be abused, sure, but as long as they do their job and nothing else (restoring X energy), they are not exploits.

Yes spam is abuse, its poor mechanic imo and imo cc/dr/hysteria spam breaks difficulty, however we can objectively say that exca spamming 4, mag spamming 2 and rhino spamming 3 doesnt break any other game mechanic.

 

Evamp however pushed it further and broken game mechanic designed to limit spam.

 

There is difference and i pointed it out.

Edited December 11, 2014 by Davoodoo

[Liminal]

Yes spam is abuse, its poor mechanic imo but we can all objectively say that its not breaking any other game mechanics.

 

Evamp however pushed it further and broken game mechanic designed to limit spam.

 

There is difference and i pointed it out.

But the functionality to break the spam limit (energy reserves) is implemented in the game. Energy vampire and all other "spam-enablers" are simply doing their job. It's restoring players energy by the amount it says it does.

It's not an exploit, it's just a poorly balanced game element.