Ability Spamming: Is It Really An Issue?

[AlphaHorseman]

The real issue here is that thoughts like this hide the deeper issue. 

 

wasted frame kit. 

 

certain abilities are really good at clearing a room. but rather than 1 ability on a frame being good at clearing a room (I.E. radial javalin or miasma) shouldn't one frame be good at clearing a room and have abilities to support that?

 

for instance. valkyr. first frame i recommend to anyone who likes to hit stuff. first ability gets u closer so u can hit stuff. second ability makes u hit stuff faster. 3rd ability stuns so u can hit stuff fancy. 4th ability hits stuff so u can heal. 

 

many frames have 1 move that shines at a job and other moves that arn't as good. those other moves get left in the dust for the sake of doing one job. spam frames arn't spam frames if the whole kit helps the job get done in a way that's fun and feels natural. 

Haha, couldn't have said it better myself.

 

Now, BEFORE DE thinks that this means whacking a power for the sake of the other powers, I'm of the mind that rather than hurting good abilities, we make other abilities better to ensure that an entire WarFrames kit can shine, rather than just one power. Thus, we can have many abilities that are good and can also synergize well together, or be useful alone.

[Moasiac]

The way this game is currently designed, gun-play is very weak in comparison to many other shooters. It feels like some of the recent changes the devs have made are trying to push a slower and more gun-centric play, but quite frankly, that's boring and not why I or many others play Warframe.

 

This isn't really the type of game where you trod room to room, taking cover and slowly advancing, dealing with enemies with unique behavior patterns that take thought and consideration to confront ala Dark Souls. Instead, I would liken this game to something more like Dynasty Warriors where you kill hundreds upon thousands of troops in your way, plowing through enemies on a powertrip.

Edited February 12, 2015 by Moasiac

[SIDESTRE4M]

I would say gunplay is quite strong.

 

Under most circumstances, they deal the most damage.

If you have a full team equipped for synergy, it may be different though.

[JayGideon1]

So what im hearing (and its about even) that some people see this as an issue because:

1. it makes things boring and trivial  (such as gun play and melee)

2. people who use all their abilities will be punished due to DE trying to stop the spammers.

3. it makes missions boring for other people

4. people advance too quickly

 

Those who do not see this as an issue have the following arguments:

1. No one is being forced to do anything and its wrong to try and force players to adhere to a certain play style (let spammers spam essentially)

2. they find other ways to have fun so the boring aspect is invalid

3. people look for the best way to do things and if ability spam was removed it would just go to something else

4. just because something is the most efficient does not mean it is most fun so most players won't do that

 

 

generally solid arguments on both side, but not enough to really sway me to move away from my previous point of view

Edited February 12, 2015 by JayGideon1

[GhostMelody]

If you're not spamming Desecrate as a Nekros, then people will complain about you, insult you, and generally be an A******.

Because Nekros is a farming utensil. Not much else.

Pure lies, only kids that lack the ability to see nekros' potential say that, he is a really strong frame that from since day one when we found out he cod be used to farm, you people Assumed that was the only thing he was good for;

Not his fear, because lowering armor and cause enemies to panic definitely isn't useful, defiantly not as useful as desecrate. And the new buff to shadows of the dead: bring back stronger versions of your previously killed enemies, definitely not as good as desecrate.

All I see in that comment is blind insight

Edited February 12, 2015 by GhostMelody

[Azamagon]

Ability spamming is a little hard for me to say wether it's a bad thing or not, as I like spamming my abilities AND using my weapons. It can be fun to play as a caster, not many games allows you to do that.

 

But what I personally dislike is that most powers are so incredibly lacking, while others are far too strong. Take a lesser example of this - Ash, the Warframe I think I have played the most:

Shuriken - Is cool, not all too bad and can be used while reloading/shooting. But it has ZERO utility.

Smoke Screen - Highly effective, regardless of any scenario, useful in ANY Ash-build.

Teleport - Is good, but very limitted in use and FORCES you to use finishers if you wanna melee a target, even if you don't want to (unless it glitches, which it does often, thankfully). I want options, not forced choices. And how about some more incentive to use it, such as a brief, but powerful, boost to melee attackspeed? But that would bring synergy to his kit, so we can't get such nice things */sarcasm* >_>

Bladestorm - VERY powerful, so powerful that many people think: "Why do I need Shuriken and/or Teleport again?"

 

Ash is still one of the lesser problems when it comes to powerspammers though, because even if Bladestorm is generally the most efficient, there are several moments when it is NOT so favorable to press: A teammate is down, then #2 and #3 can be far more useful to make sure they don't bleed out. Press #4 AFTER, sure. Or when life support gets critical, using his #4 is then often a very stupid move to do. Shuriken allows you to do lots of stuff AT THE SAME TIME, so Shuriken is actually not useless.

So yeah, I like to use his kit as varied as possible, everything can have a use. But at the end of the day, Bladestorm is still his most efficient ability to use most of the time, sadly enough. At least his Smoke Screen is also useful.

 

So, I kind of like to spam abilities, but this:

 

4 spam is a side effect of poorly designed kits. 

^ that is a bigger problem than spamming in itself. I find the lack of VARIETY while spamming a bigger issue. That lack of variety + gunplay is kind of boring right now (far too few effective AND fun weapons) + melee is so unrewarding and clunky = People spam that almight ability over and over again... Oh yeah, and the Corrupted mods, they are also a huge part of this problem.

 

What I'd like:

* More useful and synergistic abilities, so we VARY our ability casts more.

* More fun gunplay (that thread is just some minor stuff, but it's a start)

* More rewarding and smooth melee play

* Then -maybe- the ability to spam abilities so frequently can be looked at. And that can be quite easily fixed, by, for example, changing the efficiency-formula so 75% does not equal to 300% actual efficiency bonus (bringing an ultimate's abilitycost down from 100 to 25 is 4x as efficienct, thus a 300% bonus), but rather just being 75% efficiency (meaning, bringing down an an ultimate's abilitycost down from 100 to 57 energy (100 / 1,75)).

That, and/or not allowing us to stack Corrupted mods with their regular counterparts (goes for weapons and warframe modding alike), with Corrupted mods then being rebalanced so they are always stronger than the regular counterpart, but still has its negative side-effect of course.

Edited February 12, 2015 by Azamagon

[Janzer]

I love ult spamming. Because what I wanted to play was a running simulator, where you run room to room and there are no enemies alive. Super fun.

[(PSN)theelix]

So i have been seeing a few of threads on spamming abilities as of late and the general argument being made is that these powerful abilities are trivializing content to the point where the game is far too easy. Now i am of the personal belief that ability spamming is not really a huge issue and better just left alone. Mainly for the reasons that no one is forcing users to spam and simply not playing that way seems rather easy to do and i rarely ever encounter ability spammers and it's usually on one of two nodes. However i am curious to see what other people think in a general way. Do you think this breaks the game or do you believe that this isn't a problem and still enjoy the game? Or even do you think that the real issue lies somewhere else in the game? Please use civility Tenno, no one likes hostility in a thread.

 

PS: to the mods, i am a little uncertain as to the proper location of this thread, but seeing as how it discusses abilities i thought it best to put it here, sorry in advance if i was mistaken.

The way I see it:

Frames are the real weapons, guns are just secondaries. 

that being said, I've never actually power spammed in my life. I hate the idea and it's abso-freaking-lutely boring being confined to just sitting there and building it's no fun. I currently have R9 Blind rage and R9 Narrow Minded on my Excalibur, making him the mobility frame. He's Zephyr's ground counterpart, basically. If we had a group like such, we'd absolutely rek everything, Zephyr raining hell and Excalibur basically teleporting 30m. 

Anyway... Back on topic... 

Ability spamming's issue lies with the majority's playstyle. 

If everyone ability spammed, it'd be a problem to no one. 

To me, it's only a problem if they're preventing me from having any fun at all, and that's pretty difficult. Not Limbo doesn't rain on my parade, he just annoys my eyes with bad Cataclysm builds that last .55 seconds. 

Hydroid, though, is another story... 

[ThePredicament]

The best skills in the game can't/doesn't have to be spammed.

 

All these damage skill spams only become trash clearing at later levels, in early level anything can blow over tons of enemies with ease (Read:Ignis+Firestorm). Damage skills, ultimately become consequential. Skills like Accelerant, Radial Blind, Chaos don't have to be spammed and won't be affected much by nerfing efficiency.

 

With that said, some skills do need to be reworked so they aren't eclipsed by ults.

[MechaKnight]

The best skills in the game can't/doesn't have to be spammed.

 

All these damage skill spams only become trash clearing at later levels, in early level anything can blow over tons of enemies with ease (Read:Ignis+Firestorm). Damage skills, ultimately become consequential. Skills like Accelerant, Radial Blind, Chaos don't have to be spammed and won't be affected much by nerfing efficiency.

 

With that said, some skills do need to be reworked so they aren't eclipsed by ults.

Late level is more balanced for ultimate abilities compared to early level, but it doesn't solve the problem of this ability still being the best one to use in all scenarios.

 

What can fix this with a buff balance, with priority on making limited and complex abilities more significant than radial infinite target abilities with multiple effects applied instantly. What if the other abilities were more useful than the nuke in raw numbers, so you prefer to use them over the radial spam in more difficult situations? The abilities would be scaled to be appropriately powerful for their limited scope, resulting in an overall buff and increase to variety.

 

This is the first step to making more abilities useful. Old-fashioned nuke spamming is still untouched and just as feasible. The next step is to reward players for playing with balance, dedication, effort, and knowledge. It is good to reward players who play with variety, are good teammates, and try their best. How to we do this?

 

We do this with a difficulty selection system.

 

The idea is to scale up the challenge inside the mission as well as scale up the rewards. Your non-nuke abilities have already been buffed before this point. For taking on a higher difficulty, players are encouraged to use their full kit, because each ability is now significant and unique enough to consider using on an even basis. Nuke spamming will not be as popular here because your other abilities are stronger than your nukes to reward the difficulty behind casting them. The end result is nuke gameplay can still be had in easy mode, and balanced gameplay can be had in more challenging modes for better rewards. Everyone gets to play the way they want, players feel rewarded for using all of their abilities, and players who learned and mastered the game now have a purpose to use all of their kit to max effect, instead of being forced to spam one ability for an hour, because it's the only effective way to play.

Edited February 12, 2015 by MechaKnight

[VentiGlondi]

Rep farming is one thing.

Being unable to play pubs without a Saryn just blasting everything to shreds is another.

 

"Don't like it don't use it" was never a good argument and never will. I never liked it and I never used it, yet it ruins my experience.

[HunRii]

I'm used to spamming my 3 ability.  Not my ultimate.  Does that make me bad?

[MechaKnight]

I'm used to spamming my 3 ability.  Not my ultimate.  Does that make me bad?

It can, or it can make the warframe's kit bad. In the case of Nekros, his Desecrate forces him into a looting slave role for the team--people wouldn't like you if you didn't play that way on Nekros. If you're Nyx, Chaos is exponentially more effective than Mind Control because it hits infinite targets in a huge radius. Either way, as bad as the ability system is I can't accuse players for what DE has allowed us to do with our abilities, and how bad the incentive is to choose some abilities in the kit. If it's your best option, you're going to spam it. If that's your best option all the time, you won't use anything else.

Edited February 13, 2015 by MechaKnight

[RealPandemonium]

Ability spam is bad for the game because if DE balances the game around it then all other options will become worthless and the game will devolve into a broken mess where everything is too hard to do without THE BEST BUILD.

[RealPandemonium]

Skills like Accelerant, Radial Blind, Chaos don't have to be spammed and won't be affected much by nerfing efficiency.

RB is arguable but Chaos and especially Accelerant have efficiency as their lifeblood.  

 

EIther way, efficiency and power accessibility aren't bad things; poorly designed immortality and radial abilities are.

[Ajreil]

Warframe is a progression and loot-driven game. Players strive to unlock everything, to have every weapon and warframe they can get their hands on, reach mastery rank 18 and honestly "Press 4 to win" methods are the fastest path there is.

 

Players in Warframe are basically given two choices. The first choice is to have fun and solve all of your problems with stealth, guns and whatever they want. The second option is to reduce the game to its most mind-numming level and power your way to the end game.

 

Since this is a game that encourages players to reach the end game, I don't think the problem here is that players have the option to use radials to win the game. The problem is that players feel they must use them in order to reach the end game by the end of the decade.

[MechaKnight]

-snip-

It doesn't help the situation that void trader and short term events intensify the rush. If you don't move fast in the system a lot of exclusives go down the drain.

[Forgotten_Aeon]

Frequent and liberal useage of abilities is not a problem, and should never be made difficult to do. Removing energy restores or efficiency mods is just a blanket solution that will mean guns are your only real solid way to play, and abilities will be relegated to the "Oh S#&$" section. It will kill options we have as players (and a myriad abilities already currently scale terribly). If someone wants to play with abilities foremost and guns as their secondary, that SHOULD be a viable method. Given Volt's description when picking your first frame, which mentions gunplay as a secondary priority, this was/is intended to be an option.

 

The problem isn't that abilities can be cast too frequently, or that energy requirements can be rendered meaningless (which I love, by the way)- It's that, as already stated multiple times, some frames have abilities that completely eclipse their kits to the point of it being stupid to not just use that single ability as much as possible. As MechaKnight said, a reworking of abilities to balance out a frame's utilities/damage across their entire kit is what has to be done to fix it, and make the game a lot more enjoyable. I would personally assume it would end up being a considerable buff to frames as abilities are given clearer roles, their scaling subsequently altered for the better.

[ThePresident777]

Ability spamming isn't an issue at all.  What is an issue is:

1)  some people do not enjoy ability spam.

2)  those people do not have their own sandbox such that they do not have to tolerate ability spam

3)  some people can't stop themselves from trying to shove their play style down everybody else's throat.  They act as if the entire world is their sandbox and tough luck for those who don't like it.

 

Warframe was never meant to be any one faction's sandbox.  It was supposed to be a multi-faceted game from the start.  A lot of people seem to not be aware of that or lost sight of it.

 

Proof:

Warframe: Developer Q&A , Answer to Question 4:

The core is the 4 guys against a massive army.  And, generally speaking, they are devastating. The core is not something like in Gears of War where the one on one is something a bit more balanced.  One Space Ninja against a whole ship of Grineer is the idea.  But, that needs to be balanced by boss battles, and by like desperate scenarios.  But, generally speaking, the whole idea of it, even an old ninja (right?) is that the untrained militia get devastated by a single one.

[MechaKnight]

 

Ability spamming isn't an issue at all.  What is an issue is:

1)  some people do not enjoy ability spam.

2)  those people do not have their own sandbox such that they do not have to tolerate ability spam

3)  some people can't stop themselves from trying to shove their play style down everybody else's throat.  They act as if the entire world is their sandbox and tough luck for those who don't like it.

 

Warframe was never meant to be any one faction's sandbox.  It was supposed to be a multi-faceted game from the start.  A lot of people seem to not be aware of that or lost sight of it.

 

1) Some people do not enjoy ability spam, some do. That's fine. However the problem is not abilities, but which abilities, and how much more often? Why? For Excalibur, it's Radial Javelin. He casts it more than twice as much as his other three abilities combined. He does this because it does better damage to more targets compared to Slash Dash, blinds more targets easier than Radial Blind while dealing damage, and supersedes Super Jump by providing better local and area defense while providing damage.

 

2) The way the game allows us to encounter random players with different preferences makes it so nobody has a personal sandbox, and therefore all participating players have the right to share their opinion and act as they wish.

 

3) We're not talking about the world for now, just Warframe. All players are welcome to share their opinion. Clearly the game is not balanced to suit everyone, so this balance has to be found.

 

As to that quote you like to copy/paste around everywhere, try to understand what it means.

 

Warframe: Developer Q&A , Answer to Question 4:

The core is the 4 guys against a massive army.  And, generally speaking, they are devastating. The core is not something like in Gears of War where the one on one is something a bit more balanced.  One Space Ninja against a whole ship of Grineer is the idea.  But, that needs to be balanced by boss battles, and by like desperate scenarios.  But, generally speaking, the whole idea of it, even an old ninja (right?) is that the untrained militia get devastated by a single one.

 

The core of the game will not change even if weapons, abilities, or ability comparisons and limitations change. While we are expected to kill more enemies than a more limited one-on-one skirmish, there is still balance to talk about. Your post only speaks of players against enemies, but does not talk about players within themselves.

 

Radial multi-purpose abilities can outshine entire kits to the point where there is no purpose in using other abilities in the same kit. One Space Ninja should not be denying the three other space ninjas in the same squad the chance to have the same fun. Ability spam is just a gameplay tool. The actual problem is how they work in social play and within ability kits.

[AlphaHorseman]

 

Ability spamming isn't an issue at all.  What is an issue is:

1)  some people do not enjoy ability spam.

2)  those people do not have their own sandbox such that they do not have to tolerate ability spam

3)  some people can't stop themselves from trying to shove their play style down everybody else's throat.  They act as if the entire world is their sandbox and tough luck for those who don't like it.

 

Warframe was never meant to be any one faction's sandbox.  It was supposed to be a multi-faceted game from the start.  A lot of people seem to not be aware of that or lost sight of it.

 

Proof:

 

 

Finally, someone gets it. +1

 

If you want to help the other powers become more appealing, actually help the other powers be more appealing by buffing them up and giving them multi-functionality and more purpose. Thus, the entirety of a WarFrames kit can be seen as very useful, rather than just one power. Hurting one power just hurts peoples play styles and enjoyment, whatever "Balance" is assumed is because players do not like the power one power has, for the simple reason that it is a good power. Make other powers better, make them stronger, make them multifaceted, and voila, you have a more fulfilling WarFrame kit that players can view as more useful.

[vaugahn]

Finally, someone gets it. +1

 

If you want to help the other powers become more appealing, actually help the other powers be more appealing by buffing them up and giving them multi-functionality and more purpose. Thus, the entirety of a WarFrames kit can be seen as very useful, rather than just one power. Hurting one power just hurts peoples play styles and enjoyment, whatever "Balance" is assumed is because players do not like the power one power has, for the simple reason that it is a good power. Make other powers better, make them stronger, make them multifaceted, and voila, you have a more fulfilling WarFrame kit that players can view as more useful.

 

That is not an acceptable solution, and you know that.

[AlphaHorseman]

That is not an acceptable solution, and you know that.

It is not an acceptable solution in your opinion, in my opinion it can be. Not buff everything, not to the point where they're balanced around radial abilities. If a power is good, meaning that it has multifaceted mechanics, can scale through CC/Utility, then it's mechanically and objectively good. I mean giving powers that don't have these characteristics, multi-functionality and CC/Utility to help with scale ability. I did not say to the degree of other powers, I simply said to make other powers objectively good and multifaceted. That doesn't mean they become "op" or whatever whiny term people want to use, it means the powers are able to scale, they are mechanically good and sound throughout content.

Edited February 13, 2015 by AlphaHorseman

[RealPandemonium]

It is not an acceptable solution in your opinion, in my opinion it can be. Not buff everything, not to the point where they're balanced around radial abilities. If a power is good, meaning that it has multifaceted mechanics, can scale through CC/Utility, then it's mechanically and objectively good. I mean giving powers that don't have these characteristics, multi-functionality and CC/Utiltiy to help with scale ability. I did not say to the degree of other powers, I simply said to make other powers objectively good and multifaceted. That doesn't mean they become "op" or whatever whiny term people want to use, it means the powers are able to scale, they are mechanically good and sound throughout content.

I think the problem with the two of you is that he is advocating for a numbers cull and for the most gameplay-reducing ablities to be changed, while you are advocating for all abilities to become worth using and satisfying to use while also saying that it's ok to use the poorly designed abilities as a bandaid in the meantime.  You both basically want the same thing, but are too upset at each other's immediate solutions to agree.

 

For example, when I proposed a Frost revision in another thread you applauded it, and I don't think vaughan would be opposed to it either.

 

Here is that post:

 

Agreed on the band-aids.  Many of these augments should just be part of the powers because they are not overpowered while also allowing the ability to truly function as intended.

 

If i were to revise Frost I would:

 

1. Freeze behaves like Ember Fireball but with slighly smaller radius.  AOE has 50% chance to have the same freeze effect as the main projectile instead of just dealing pathetic damage and cold proc.  Enemies that unfreeze are inflicted with cold proc.  

 

2. Ice Wave impedance added into the ability; only one trail can exist at a time.  Allow the augment to boost this to unlimited simultaneous trails.

 

3. Make Snow Globe actually use Frost's armor instead of just gaining a pittance of extra HP from it.

 

4. Cause Avalanche to spawn large boulders of ice and snow that have a big AOE and explode into smaller ones on contact with enemies and terrain that spread out to hit more enemies (you know how the animation makes it look like actual snow and ice is hitting the enemies?  Something like that.)  Direct hits from the big boulders and their explosions do big damage (substantially bigger than the current base damage) and freeze enemies similar to how the old, bugged Avalanche did.  Boulder fragments inflict cold proc and do less damage (probably around what it does now.)  I'm not sure how we would aim the ability, though the targeting mechanics of Tornado and Tentacle swarm could be a good start.  

 

Does this sound like a good direction to take design in to you?

 

Can the two of you agree on something like this as a design paradigm?

Edited February 13, 2015 by RealPandemonium

[AlphaHorseman]

I think the problem with the two of you is that he is advocating for a numbers cull and for the most gameplay-reducing ablities to be changed, while you are advocating for all abilities to become worth using and satisfying to use while also saying that it's ok to use the poorly designed abilities as a bandaid in the meantime.  You both basically want the same thing, but are too upset at each other's immediate solutions to agree.

 

For example, when I proposed a Frost revision in another thread you applauded it, and I don't think vaughan would be opposed to it either.

 

Here is that post:

 

 

Can the two of you agree on something like this as a design paradigm?

Hold up, these ultimates are not poorly designed, they perform exactly how they should, as DE has made them. They are poorly designed in your opinion, but they complete their functions (most of the time). Radial Javelin functions as intended, and it does it's job well (in mid-tier and lower-tier content, damage falls off later on). Molecular Prime functions as intended, every ult functions as intended by design, they are designed as they are. It is their uses that people have disagreements with. Of course the functionality of some of them could be helped along to scale with content, but that's another issue.

 

1. I like the freeze, it actually works and can scale, I like it.

 

2. Ice Wave, maybe just giving it knock back is a better route, since it helps with his kit as an AoE defender/lockdown frame. I wouldn't mind the augment staying, so long as a knock back mechanic is made innately in, or the augment is made innately into the power and the knock back be the augment.

 

3. That actually sound like a great idea, as it helps with his globes scale ability and makes the armor very useful and more appealing to players to use.

 

4. Yeah, that sounds like it can actually help the scale ability of the power.