Game Difficulty: Keep It Real And *bring It* De

[epochofentropy]

There's a somewhat vocal presence that keeps asking for the game to be easier in some fashion. These usually focus around specific enemies, and the comment usually seems to revolve around "the enemy is doing something that I have to adapt differently to than just whacking away at it." I know the preceding statements are generalizations, but it's not hard to look out there and find these kinds of posts.

 

I wanted to get it out there to say that it's my personal opinion this game is too easy, especially when you've started to max out frames. Yes I know you can go solo late-level planets or try your hand at forming a group for high wave defense missions. Both of which get somewhat tedious after awhile, as the first eliminates the "multiplayer" aspect completely and the latter is just a high-risk grind.

 

Where's the real "we almost wiped" challenge for high level frames and that risk of failing? Where's the gameplay that requires a strategy more involved than run in to a pack of mobs and swing your swords around? Where's the real time strategy being hashed out over voice chat? (That barely anyone is using voice chat should be a sign)

 

 

What I want are zones that are truly hard to succeed in, where you'll need a L30+Orokin equipped frame/weapons and pre-formed group just to start, and even then you'll get your &#! handed to you until you learn new strategies.

 

These zones could drop rare Mods that are only available to equip in high-level frames and will be required to continue on to later parts in the zone. I want enemies in this zone that you MUST adapt to, enemies that have the power to force the players to change their battlefield configuration to overcome it. Bring some zones to the table that radiate a proper fear of failure, so that players have to bring their best game face to succeed. Make the high level rewards (eg: recipes/mods) in areas that are "off the path" and well guarded so players are enticed to clear and explore, as right now lockers drop nothing but more credits that aren't useful.

 

With the upcoming organizations for clans, good players will be able to (and want to) better organize around each other to tackle these zones.

 

 

 

DE I IMPLORE YOU: Please put the nerf bat in the closet start buffing the enemies, at least in one ONE zone. I challenge you guys to bring it and make a Nightmare zone that tests players' mettle. Make it seem impossible and we'll find out who can tough it. I have high hopes that Update 8 will do so, but I'm concerned that some vocal players will gut the challenge.

 

 

 

Overall Enemy Suggestions:

Grineer Rollers are fine

Ancient Disruptors are fine

Infested Runners are fine

Corpus MOA's knock backs are all fine (thanks for buffing the green ones)

Ancient Healers need a buff (maybe add shields and larger radius?)

Corpus Turrets need a buff (is anyone scared of these things? they're wired into ship power, why aren't they fearsome Tenno obliterators?)

Corpus Box heads need a buff (harder hitting rifles?)

Stalkers need a slight buff or better level matching

Grineer Heavy Gunners need a buff (they get stop shooting too easily)

Grineer Ballista DEFINITELY need a buff (for snipers they have the worst aim ever)

Grineer Napalm need a buff (less reload time?)

Infested Leapers need a buff (they just seem to wander around and gently pat people)

 

 

High level reward suggestions:

-- Reduction of stagger mod (possibly to your sentinel?)

-- "Enhanced" base abilities

-- Rarer Fusion Cores

-- Craftable weapons and helmets

-- High power mods with tradeoffs (ex: 200% more power strength but 75% less shield recharge)

-- Slotless rare graphics mods/skins to show off that you're skilled, not moneyed

 

[Ferghus]

What I want are zones that are truly hard to succeed in, where you'll need a L30+Orokin equipped frame/weapons and pre-formed group just to start, and even then you'll get your &#! handed to you until you learn new strategies.

 

These zones could drop rare Mods that are only available to equip in high-level frames and will be required to continue on to later parts in the zone.

Although I mostly agree with your sentiment of wanting to be challenged more, I'm not sure if creating a progressive gear treadmill is the best approach for it, especially with catalyst and reactor bps being as rare as they are in alerts. Warframe is largely a casual game, and many people would feel excluded and pressured into spending real money to compete in endgame. That being said, I'm sure DE will eventually deliver on a solid, balanced endgame concept; we just need to be patient.

[SolluxCaptorTA]

Epoch, as for the voice chat thing, do you have a clan? I'm a Warlord for Space Sharks Inc., and a lot of us use Raidcall to voice chat while playing. If you're interested, send me a message. We'd be glad to have you.

 

However, to address the problems I see with your post, it doesn't offer any specific strategies. First off, read this: http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/

 

That is how you can turn a group of Level 1 Kobolds into adventurer killers. I know, different game and genre, but still applies.

 

Something I could see being done for this is:

Grineer

 

Tactics. Tactics tactics tactics. Why are advanced space marines so dumb? Have Grineer Commanders rallying the troops just around the corner, pop his head out and teleport you into a death trap. Have Heavy Gunners lie in ambush, then catch you in deadly crossfire. A trio of Napalmers who lay a triangle of fire around you. Shield Lancers walking in phalanx formation, forming an impenetrable wall of death.

 

Beyond that, at later levels, what about Elite units? Not any tougher than regular units, but smarter, faster, and harder hitting. An Elite Lancer who uses the Braton instead, dashing behind you and opening fire from an unexpected direction. The Elite Ballista who can crawl on walls, staying out of reach and popping deadly headshots. Elite Troopers who play dead to let you get close, then open up with a full clip of full auto shotgun fire. Elite Flameblades who appear a foot above you, mid swing at your face.

 

Corpus

 

Since you mentioned turrets being plugged into the ships core, why not let Moas do that? Have energy pylons that a Moa can plug into to get extra powerful shields (twice that of Shield Osprey bonus) and fire faster and more powerfully. And with the new Fusion Moas, let them fight close up till they lose shields, then flee and start popping off Drones like crazy while avoiding direct combat. And maybe Mine Ospreys try to lay mines directly on you, just to screw with you.

 

In addition, where are ANY Corpus Elites or Heavies? The Fusions were a step in the right direction, but not enough. Get a Tremble Moa, who has an aura that slows you down, a stomp attack twice as strong as a Shockwave Moa, and a deadly kick. The new Corpus melee unit. In addition, the Railgun Quad. Built like the Hyena or Jackal and mounting 2-4 railguns on its back. Tough, fast, and capable of a good rate of fire with one of the deadliest weapons in game.

 

Infested

 

...

 

I don't have much here. Infested don't make much sense having more than a Zerg rush as there plan of attack, and with some buffs the units should be fine. This could probably be easier mode, since the enemies are rock f*** stupid.

[epochofentropy]

Although I mostly agree with your sentiment of wanting to be challenged more, I'm not sure if creating a progressive gear treadmill is the best approach for it, especially with catalyst and reactor bps being as rare as they are in alerts. Warframe is largely a casual game, and many people would feel excluded and pressured into spending real money to compete in endgame. That being said, I'm sure DE will eventually deliver on a solid, balanced endgame concept; we just need to be patient.

 

I can agree that the "treadmill" of gear may not be the best way, but even if there were NO additional rewards for said zone, I'd still want to have it and play it. The current end-level planets are a too easy, and it seems it would be a trivial task for DE to even just update the difficulty to always be 5 and enemy level to 65+ just to give players a solid challenge.

[Slaskia]

What is 'easy' (or 'hard') is very subjective on the individual level and for different reasons.  For me, the game is about right, challenge wise (though I would like to have some form of control over how hard things are: see my thread here for my ideas https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/40240-my-idea-on-how-a-difficulty-setting-would-work/), but I recognize other's may find it harder (to the point of keyboard tossing) or easier (to the point of boredom) than me, so I do try to keep that in mind.

[epochofentropy]

Epoch, as for the voice chat thing, do you have a clan? I'm a Warlord for Space Sharks Inc., and a lot of us use Raidcall to voice chat while playing. If you're interested, send me a message. We'd be glad to have you.

 

However, to address the problems I see with your post, it doesn't offer any specific strategies. First off, read this: http://www.tuckerskobolds.com/

 

....

 

Tactics. Tactics tactics tactics. Why are advanced space marines so dumb? 

 

I agree in substance with your reply, but as a programmer myself I know that coding in and testing new AI is a very time intensive thing to do. The alternate I was suggesting was more about upping the current enemy levels and numbers to a near impossible rate, which would significantly increase the challenge with little effort on DE's part.

 

Your suggestions though are better in the long run, would increase the challenge as well as increasing the fun, and I would definitely like to see AI like that implemented in time.

[Quetzhal]

The way I see it, there are two forms of difficulty. There is mistake-oriented difficulty, where making one small (sometimes unavoidable) mistake leads you to die. Then there is tactical difficulty, where the difficulty comes less in the fact that it's easy to die and more in the fact that you need to think tactically in order to overcome the opponent (or be slowly overwhelmed). I vastly prefer the latter to the former, which isn't to say the former is at all bad. I mean, Mario is mistake-oriented and it's pretty popular. But I don't think it fits Warframe.

Buffing stats promote mistake-oriented difficulty. Stunlocks do much the same. I don't like either of these, as they take control away from the player - which doesn't mean I want the game to be easy. I think it's fine to have some of this in the game, because quick reflexes are important in a fight where you're playing as a space ninja - but I don't want difficulty to be solely based on it. That kind of thing shouldn't happen all that often. More difficulty should rely on thinking around the enemy AI, finding out ways to defeat each enemy, that sort of thing. Like if there was an enemy that had shields that couldn't really realistically be taken down unless you draw them into a freezer-type room, which debuffs them just enough for you to kill them - but you need to be smart about how you do it because your shields are halved while you're in there, too. That kind of thing.

[epochofentropy]

What is 'easy' (or 'hard') is very subjective on the individual level and for different reasons.  For me, the game is about right, challenge wise (though I would like to have some form of control over how hard things are: see my thread here for my ideas https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/40240-my-idea-on-how-a-difficulty-setting-would-work/), but I recognize other's may find it harder (to the point of keyboard tossing) or easier (to the point of boredom) than me, so I do try to keep that in mind.

 

I understand that completely, but the entire first segment of the game is there in varying degrees of difficulty based on player skill and equipment.

 

I want an end segment that not everyone will be able to complete with the understand that it's OK they can't. So many games nowadays seem to be designed so anyone can beat them - I think this does a disservice to a certain segment of gamers.

[Necrio]

Needs more complex enemies instead of bigger numbers.

 

Also rollers need to stun less and damage more.

[TinyLesbianRobot]

The way I see it, there are two forms of difficulty. There is mistake-oriented difficulty, where making one small (sometimes unavoidable) mistake leads you to die. Then there is tactical difficulty, where the difficulty comes less in the fact that it's easy to die and more in the fact that you need to think tactically in order to overcome the opponent (or be slowly overwhelmed). I vastly prefer the latter to the former, which isn't to say the former is at all bad. I mean, Mario is mistake-oriented and it's pretty popular. But I don't think it fits Warframe.

Buffing stats promote mistake-oriented difficulty. Stunlocks do much the same. I don't like either of these, as they take control away from the player - which doesn't mean I want the game to be easy. I think it's fine to have some of this in the game, because quick reflexes are important in a fight where you're playing as a space ninja - but I don't want difficulty to be solely based on it. That kind of thing shouldn't happen all that often. More difficulty should rely on thinking around the enemy AI, finding out ways to defeat each enemy, that sort of thing. Like if there was an enemy that had shields that couldn't really realistically be taken down unless you draw them into a freezer-type room, which debuffs them just enough for you to kill them - but you need to be smart about how you do it because your shields are halved while you're in there, too. That kind of thing.

I was going to state exactly why I object to the idea of making the game universally more difficult, but this sums it up nicely.

Whenever I've asked for a nerf or a rebalance, it's because of this exact issue.  I love enemies that force me to adjust my tactics, such as Shock and Fusion Moas, but I hate enemies that arbitrarily punish the player for not being able to see through walls, like the Disrupter Ancient, or punish the player for not having an aimbot, like the Grineer Roller.  There's a difference between 'challenging' and 'cheap', and as it stands, a number of Warframe's enemies fall into the 'cheap' category.

I'm all for increasing the difficulty, as long as the difficulty increase stems from an increase in challenge, rather than an increase in cheapness.

[SolluxCaptorTA]

DE, please develop an ultra advanced combat AI that's fun to play against but still challenging without needing ludicrous stats to pose a threat.

 

We sound so entitled right now. But, DE, I have confidence you can do it, or at least make Warframe even better than it is now. I (don't actually) know (but assume) it's much harder to develop more advanced AI tactics than it is to increase HP or damage for enemies, but I think it would make the game truly special, instead of just shooting stabbing and running. (Except for Infested. Keep them dumb as rocks, so we have somebody we can outsmart and mess with.)

[MoonicusMaximus]

Something that has always irked me is how unimpressive Grineer special units are. Heavy Gunners take far too long to acquire Tenno as targets, and their Gorgon spin-up and tracking is atrociously slow. And this is BEFORE you hit it with an ice modded weapon and freeze it. Heavy Gunners, Bombardiers and Flamers are all this way; they do not attack with enough speed and power to be a threat to Tenno as a special unit should.

 

I think the special units shouldn't be affected by freeze mods, and should acquire their targets and being attacking at a much faster rate.

 

Alternatively, nearly everything in Warframe is just so easy to shoot. Stock Grineer, Corpus and Infested units do not move quickly, making them incredibly easy targets. Really, the only target that challenges my abilities to aim and predict paths is the Grineer Roller, which I am a big fan of because of the fact that it's probably the only unit in the game that I have a chance of missing when I shoot at it. Something as simple as enemy units being more actively difficult to hit would increase the challenge and would put more purpose on precision weapons.

[epochofentropy]

Buffing stats promote mistake-oriented difficulty. Stunlocks do much the same. I don't like either of these, as they take control away from the player - which doesn't mean I want the game to be easy.

 

I agree with your sentiment in substance, but want to put it out there that think that the "stunlocks" in this game are implemented OK.

 

Do I like losing control over my character? Definitely not. So, I change my tactics to avoid this happening and now rarely get tromped by a group of Chargers or MOA's any more. I know the risk of death is high in these cases so avoid it like the plague. In the off chance it does happen it's my fault for letting them get close enough, not the design of the enemy.

[Necrio]

Let's take a look at some games with fair difficulty and incorporate features from them. Like Dark Souls and Monster Hunter.

[Loswaith]

This is the thing I dont get about the difficulity issue.  The mod system gives players the ability to make it as hard or easy (to a point) as they want.  Tone down your shield and health mods, tone down the weapon damage mods and the game immediatly gets harder or more challenging (sure the AI doesn't improve but thats a different kettle of fish).  You realy dont need to have all your 60 mod points used.

 

How much more of a challenge would the latter stages be if you have only base shields/health for your warframe or no damage mods at all on your weapons (now if this was too easy i could understand the issue), or if you didnt catalyst/reactor your gear.  It realy is in your own control.

 

Keep in mind Tenno are meant to be powerful, They are meant to be "One tenno able to take on an entire ship of enemies".

 

At the end of the day if you are going to use all 60 mod points for everything on the more powerful weapons and frames, of course it will be easier.

 

Note Im not saying that there shouldnt be the option for higher difficulities so it is hard for maxed out frames, but that will likely come in time.  Till then its on you to set the challenge level.

 

There is also the point of we dont want DE not balancing stuff for all builds just for the sake of it being harder too.

[epochofentropy]

Something that has always irked me is how unimpressive Grineer special units are....  this is BEFORE you hit it with an ice modded weapon and freeze it.

 

I think the special units shouldn't be affected by freeze mods...

 

... put more purpose on precision weapons.

 

Shot in the dark: You like the Latron a lot too? ;)

[MJ12]

I agree with your sentiment in substance, but want to put it out there that think that the "stunlocks" in this game are implemented OK.

 

Do I like losing control over my character? Definitely not. So, I change my tactics to avoid this happening and now rarely get tromped by a group of Chargers or MOA's any more. I know the risk of death is high in these cases so avoid it like the plague. In the off chance it does happen it's my fault for letting them get close enough, not the design of the enemy.

 

That's not okay, or even tolerable implementation.

 

People seem to be forgetting that the sole reason for game difficulty existing is not to make you lose. It's to make you think you can lose. Ideally you'd beat the game 100% of the time and always feel like you're an inch away from losing. Challenge is important solely in how it contributes to the fun factor of the game and adds tension.

 

This means most games make it relatively easy to get into bad situations while giving you tools and the ability to get out of bad situations. Take Crysis for an example. The enemies would stop shooting at you for a bit whenever you got to low health (but were extremely accurate and did high damage), so you spent a lot of the game on Delta (the hardest difficulty) seeing your health bar flashing as you desperately scrambled to recover from the situation. Devil May Cry has parries and dodges that provide invulnerability frames and negate stuns or staggers, which makes up for the fact that being hit twice can be death on the hardest difficulty levels. Modern Warfare gives you very quickly regenerating health but enemies spawn in huge numbers, love using grenades, and whittle away your health very quickly.

 

Etc etc.

 

In Warframe the difficulty curve is exactly the opposite. Either you're facerolling everything or you make a single mistake and get into a bad situation with no way to make it better. This is bad difficulty.

[Necrio]

This is the thing I dont get about the difficulity issue.  The mod system gives players the ability to make it as hard or easy (to a point) as they want.  Tone down your shield and health mods, tone down the weapon damage mods and the game immediatly gets harder or more challenging (sure the AI doesn't improve but thats a different kettle of fish).  You realy dont need to have all your 60 mod points used.

 

How much more of a challenge would the latter stages be if you have only base shields/health for your warframe or no damage mods at all on your weapons (now if this was too easy i could understand the issue), or if you didnt catalyst/reactor your gear.  It realy is in your own control.

 

Keep in mind Tenno are meant to be powerful, They are meant to be "One tenno able to take on an entire ship of enemies".

 

At the end of the day if you are going to use all 60 mod points for everything on the more powerful weapons and frames, of course it will be easier.

 

Note Im not saying that there shouldnt be the option for higher difficulities so it is hard for maxed out frames, but that will likely come in time.  Till then its on you to set the challenge level.

 

There is also the point of we dont want DE not balancing stuff for all builds just for the sake of it being harder too.

Those challenge are derived from numbers. The enemies don't actually get harder aside from taking longer to kill and taking shorter time to kill you, but whatever strategy works at lv1 works at lv whatever.

 

And they're all mostly bullet sponges that are not really satisfying to kill anyways.

[SolluxCaptorTA]

Super-Elites.

Because I hate you all.

 

Grineer Macross Missile Massacre Marine

 

High HP, shields, and armor. Dual wields cluster rocket launchers, each fires ten rockets every five seconds. Fires in big bursts (20 rockets every five seconds) against one player, half bursts every 2.5 seconds against two, and one rocket per half second against three of four targets. Each rocket deals 50 damage, allowing it to deal a OHK against any unmodded frame (and a lot of fully modded frames too, barring perhaps tanks) or provide constant and dangerous fire (50 damage every half second) against groups.

 

​Corpus Quantum Quad Quarterer

 

High shields and mobility. A Corpus Quad mech with lots of thin razor sharp wires coming out the back. It has three attacks-Stomp Fury, where it unleashes four stomps in quick succession that knock everyone away; Lunge, where it dashes a small distance forward and uses its wires to decimate the person in front of it (200+ damage at least); and Whirlwind, where it spins its wires in a massive circle (100+ damage in a wide AoE). Moves around speedily, stomping then retreating as needed to let its shields return, then dashing out and tearing a single unit apart or inflicting massive damage to all around.

 

Infected Creeping Camo Craw

 

Crazy high HP. This is a small unit, looking a lot like the small pods of Infestation that blanket Infested maps. It sends out small Infestors, about the size of a Latcher, that can either Infect another area (5+ meters away from any other ICCC) or latch onto a player. Once latched on, it can only be removed by another playing shooting/stabbing it off, or by using an explosive barrel to kill it. It drains 6 HP per minute (1 every 10 seconds) when attached, ignoring armor and shields, and with NO damage indicator. A player who has one attached will be the target of others, each one multiplying damage by 6 per minute. (2=36 a minute/1 per 1.666... seconds, 3=216 a minute/about 4 per second) The difficulty arises from the fact that they are small and hard to kill, and if left unslain, they multiply.

 

Edit: Starting a new thread about this kind of unit. Figure it's appropiate here, but also deserves its own place for new SE ideas.

Link: https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/40311-super-elites/

Edited May 6, 2013 by SolluxCaptorTA

[neKroMancer]

We need more varieties and depth in combat. Buffing stat is a temporary solution until DE able to pump out enough mechanics to fill the gap in the game. We all want to see AI that force us to adjust our tactic, not just bullet sponge or Nervos (half size of a roller with almost permastun ability, good god they took it out for rebalance).

Three factions that we currently have is not quite 'there' yet. Grineer and Corpus are still relatively more fun to play that the Infest. I don't see the Infest as a well-designed faction and have been vocal about it whenever the opportunity arise. They can be managed with simple tactic, not really challenging.

However, DE already stated that there will probably be a difficulty slider in future update/patch to cater hardcore gamer. I think it's the best solution for this game since all players can access all content regardless of skill. Only selected few will be able to stand against hardmode AI.

Skynet RULEs.

[epochofentropy]

Super-Elites.

Because I hate you all.

 

 

haha, that's the correct mindset IMHO: A Nightmare zone of heavy hitting difficult to kill enemies that are equally (or better) equipped to kill you.

[epochofentropy]

That's not okay, or even tolerable implementation.

 

People seem to be forgetting that the sole reason for game difficulty existing is not to make you lose. It's to make you think you can lose. Ideally you'd beat the game 100% of the time and always feel like you're an inch away from losing. Challenge is important solely in how it contributes to the fun factor of the game and adds tension.

 

No no, I want to be able to lose; and spectacularly to boot. Seriously.

 

The games you illustrated are exactly what I think is wrong with so many modern games; they tone it down so everyone can beat it. It's my opinion that unless the game is mostly story driven, not everyone should be able to "beat" a game. (You can't really "win" Warframe, but you may try)

 

For example, Quake III is one of my all time favorite games. After unlocking Nightmare mode I pushed through and and had successfully overcome it. Can everyone with a mouse and keyboard do that? Most likely not, as that tier of the game is brutal. Is everyone who played Quake III going to want to try it and are they somehow "missing out" for not being able to? Definitely not, which is why I advocate a separate zone for those of us that don't want the blips on the map handed to us on a platter.

[MJ12]

No no, I want to be able to lose; and spectacularly to boot. Seriously.

 

The games you illustrated are exactly what I think is wrong with so many modern games; they tone it down so everyone can beat it. It's my opinion that unless the game is mostly story driven, not everyone should be able to "beat" a game. (You can't really "win" Warframe, but you may try)

 

For example, Quake III is one of my all time favorite games. After unlocking Nightmare mode I pushed through and and had successfully overcome it. Can everyone with a mouse and keyboard do that? Most likely not, as that tier of the game is brutal. Is everyone who played Quake III going to want to try it and are they somehow "missing out" for not being able to? Definitely not, which is why I advocate a separate zone for those of us that don't want the blips on the map handed to us on a platter.

 

No, you think you want to be able to lose. Hypothetically, assume you have a game where the enemy has autoaim infinite penetration instant kill railguns and can instantly acquire you the moment you spawn. According to you, this would be your GOTY for all years because you would lose spectacularly. For some reason I doubt it'd be your favorite game. Because fundamentally you can't win. Nobody plays games they can't win. Even if the game is punishingly hard, it has to be demonstrably winnable for that player so they keep playing. People don't play games to lose. Acting like you somehow do either means you're going into this with the wrong assumptions (you like games where you can lose because it makes you feel like you can lose, which is what I said) or you're a masochist (And thus not a major segment of the audience).

 

And Quake III is a very interesting example because not only was it a MP-primary game where the bots were largely there for training, but it was made by id software which post-Q3 largely decided that games like it were really, really niche and created Doom 3 and Rage, both of which were increasingly 'casual'. Also, Bayonetta, DMC, etc are 'what is wrong with so many modern games'? Really?

 

Being extremely fair to their players even on the hardest difficulty levels which are extremely hard is a bad thing now?

[SolluxCaptorTA]

Okay, but what Epoch is saying is that it should be so hard at the extreme levels that  not everyone can win. Only the best.

 

The difficulty slider would be good, so that way everyone can have their own personal level.

Edited May 6, 2013 by SolluxCaptorTA

[MJ12]

Okay, but what Epoch is saying is that it should be so hard at the extreme levels that  not everyone can win. Only the best.

 

The difficulty slider would be good, so that way everyone can have their own personal level.

 

I'm talking about two things:

 

1. How stunlocks in this game are bad difficulty

 

2. How Warframe's difficulty is bad in general. Epoch is going off on a tangent about how games like Devil May Cry coddle their players (whaaa?)

 

The first ties into the second, which is basically "a difficult game should be difficult because things keep going wrong and you have to scramble to fix them", rather than "if one thing goes wrong you lose". Even ridiculously hard bullet hell shmups give you multiple lives and continues (and you can always dodge every shot due to your generally tiny hitbox), for example, which means that instead of dying in one hit being 'if one thing goes wrong you lose the game and have to restart the level' it's just constant tension because one mistake will get you killed. But being killed in and of itself is a fairly minor setback.

 

Whereas in Warframe, what happens is that you faceroll things without difficulty once, then because you can't see behind you/through walls/predict spawns an Ancient Disruptor/group of Grinders comes along and stuns you and you die. Difficulties like that where you can't survive mistakes are both frustrating and create a strict difficulty ceiling, because if you can die (and dying is serious) by making a mistake like that, the game has to be balanced so you very rarely make such mistakes, i.e. enemies are super-forgiving.