Warfarme/weapon Future Scaling?

[Emotitron]

This is more of a question than feedback.

 

How do the game makers intend to deal with future content? The big question being how do they plan to deal with the need to keep increasing the power of bosses/content as well as the power of warframes/weapons to follow it.

World of Warcraft deals with content progression exponentially it seems (stuff doubles in power every so many levels).

Games like Planetside offer rapid and semi-linear upgrades with caps (which are needed to keep older players from completely dominating). Planetside is already feeling the pain of this, as now all they can release are side-grades, and they are running out of interesting side-grades to offer.

 

Warframe seems to have two parallel leveling paths (oddly neither of which are actual player level). It is primarily centered around upgrading mods.

 

--

 

My question is, which scenerio is the most likely future for Warframe?

1. Level cap on warframes removed and more mod slots added?

2. No level caps and instead mods only can continue to be upgraded creating a dimishing return on trying to get warframes/weapons any stronger - new content will not be 'tougher' just different?

3. New stronger warframes/weapons released to take on new stronger content?

4. Introduce higher level mods that replace warframe/weapons mods with new much stronger versions?

 

It seems warframe is painting itself in a corner by creating an endless dungeoun crawl that doesn't scale in difficulty nor offer ever increasing rewards. Rather than a linear or exponential power growth with upgrades it seems to be creating a law of diminishing returns growth pattern.

I love the core of this game, but from a game theory perspective... it is kind of leaving me scratching my head.

[MetalGerbil]

there is no real reason to increase, simply add to the system.

 

i dont need to fight enemies with more HP or that hurt more. if they keep adding variety it will remain fresh. and they have mentioned something like difficulty lvls for missions. 

 

plus adding difficult as you put it isnt really adding.... difficult. o.O if you gave players double the power, then made enemies twice as hard. your kinda in the same place as before but with more content.

[Emotitron]

there is no real reason to increase, simply add to the system.

 

i dont need to fight enemies with more HP or that hurt more. if they keep adding variety it will remain fresh. and they have mentioned something like difficulty lvls for missions. 

 

plus adding difficult as you put it isnt really adding.... difficult. o.O if you gave players double the power, then made enemies twice as hard. your kinda in the same place as before but with more content.

 

Then all future warframes and weapons will be side grades only? And two weeks in I am playing with a nearly maxed out warframe/weapon combo. I don't see that being their plan as this is a sci-fi dungeon crawl (like a hybrid of ME3/Borderlands/Diablo). The only point of crawling is to collect the fat loot required to progress. There is no way they will provide content fast enough to keep players happy if there is no progression, some kind of grind is always needed - as well as progression. Killing the same boss over and over only ever makes sense if you are farming them for stuff to get you ready for the next bigger and badder boss.

And as silly as it sounds to double enemy power and then double your power... that is how dungeon crawls work. If the fat loot doesn't keep coming, then there is no progression... and without progression, there is no game.

That is how this game currently works, it just hits the ceiling very fast because it isn't set up to scale. What would the game have been like if Mercury and pluto were the same Difficulty?

[OoKeNnEtHoO]

I would love for them to focus more on enemy and boss creation more than anything else.

 

They should not be making bullet spongues

 

but rather enemy/bosses with unique invulnerabilities and vulnerabilities like the Jackal (It's main body is its vulnerability but you have to first destroy its legs to reveal it otherwise it is near invulnerable)

 

or the Ancients (the red eye at its leg is its vulnerability and it's tougher if you don't shoot it there).

 

Enemies with unique functions like the Fusion MOAs (actually somewhat of a bullet spongue but at least interesting), shockwave MOAs (stun requires you to jump), big &#! grineer metal balls (stun and annoy) and shield ospreys (shield enemies) are welcomed as well.

 

There is really no need for increase with level cap given the current content, however, if more bullet spongues enemies or bosses are added then the mod caps for items and mod levels will have to increase.

Edited May 7, 2013 by OoKeNnEtHoO

[Emotitron]

I would love for them to focus more on enemy and boss creation more than anything else.

 

They should not be making bullet spongues

 

but rather enemy/bosses with unique invulnerabilities and vulnerabilities like the Jackal (It's main body is its vulnerability but you have to first destroy its legs to reveal it otherwise it is near invulnerable)

 

or the Ancients (the red eye at its leg is its vulnerability and it's tougher if you don't shoot it there).

 

Enemies with unique functions like the Fusion MOAs (actually somewhat of a bullet spongue but at least interesting), shockwave MOAs (stun requires you to jump), big &#! grineer metal balls (stun and annoy) and shield ospreys (shield enemies) are welcomed as well.

 

There is really no need for increase with level cap given the current content, however, if more bullet spongues enemies or bosses are added then the mod caps for items and mod levels will have to increase.

 

I'm all for them throwing up some fun new content on a regular basis, but I don't think what you are suggesting is viable for a game - especially not one that starts out completely as a dungeon crawl/loot farm. Adding new critters along the way is what keeps the farming fresh, but in the end no game maker can make content faster than people can play it. All games of this type end up requiring farming in order to prep for the next bosses. If you can think of a successful game where there was no progression, or where progression completely stopped and players remained interested, I would be interested to know how that worked. No game I have ever played has worked that way (except PvP, in which case the players use one another as content).

It isn't even a question as to whether or not they will keep scaling really, the question is how are they going to get there from where they are now? They have built a pretty firm cap into the game as it is. They are going to have to tear something apart and rebuild it in order for the game to grow.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Emotitron

[OoKeNnEtHoO]

I'm all for them throwing up some fun new content on a regular basis, but I don't think what you are suggesting is viable for a game - especially not one that starts out completely as a dungeon crawl/loot farm. Adding new critters along the way is what keeps the farming fresh, but in the end no game maker can make content faster than people can play it. All games of this type end up requiring farming in order to prep for the next bosses. If you can think of a successful game where there was no progression, or where progression completely stopped and players remained interested, I would be interested to know how that worked. No game I have ever played has worked that way (except PvP, in which case the players use one another as content).

It isn't even a question as to whether or not they will keep scaling really, the question is how are they going to get there from where they are now? They have built a pretty firm cap into the game as it is. They are going to have to tear something apart and rebuild it in order for the game to grow.

 

I'm not really trying to say that player progression or the extension to player progression will not add to any game.

 

The current system in the game allows for player progression through:

 

1. Mastery Rank Level

 

2. Item (Warframe, Weapons, Sentinels) level

 

The first 1 is pretty much pointless as of now since past level 4, you get nothing but bragging rights so it is not part of my discussion.

 

The second 1 is very much related to the mod capacity and as such the number and level of mods within each item.

 

This directly translates to higher stats (hp, shields, dmg, speed, power, fire rate, etc) and is very much similar to the leveling of stats/player progression in other RPGs.

 

It is intuitive that these higher stats is to allow for you to handle enemies better but given the current enemy selection, we can see that the only difference between most Bosses (eg. Captain Vor) and normal enemies (eg. Grineer Flameblade) is nothing other than their stats (hp, shields, dmg, speed, power, fire rate, etc)

 

Now, why would you need higher stats on your character or weapons?

 

It would likely be due to the developer only focusing on adding in more bullet spongues  where the difference in difficulty soles comes from their higher stats (hp, shields, dmg, speed, power, fire rate, etc).

 

The developer will thus need to allow the player to get higher stats past the current caps (via raising mod caps and items levels) as well to allow them to be able to handle the new bullet spongues.

 

Eventually, the players will hit another cap (the raised cap/extended player progression) and the same situation repeats itself infinitely.

 

There is thus no need to increase the current player or rather item progression in terms of caps, since the effort and time used to do this could be better else spent on designing more unique enemies, which are not killed simply by having higher stats than them.

 

In addition, not all games require leveling systems which increases stats.

 

It is mostly in MMORPGs (almost all since they usually aren't really deep in terms of story) or RPGs (not all, mostly is due to story) in general which tend to make use of the stat leveling system.

Edited May 7, 2013 by OoKeNnEtHoO

[Gibblemung]

Only truly lazy developers just add 'more numbers' instead of content.

DE doesn't strike me as that type of developer. New missions, new enemies with different combinations of abilities, new maps... all of these will add to the game.

 

Also, the game isn't a 'loot farm.' It's a dungeon crawl. The difference is subtle, but there. The first focuses only on the result, while the second focuses on spending time with friends exploring, testing, and enjoying.

 

For further discussion from the perspective of developers, I suggest the following videos:

Extra Credits: Power Creep http://youtu.be/Bxszx60ZwGw

Extra Credits: Balancing for Skill. http://youtu.be/EitZRLt2G3w

[OoKeNnEtHoO]

For further discussion from the perspective of developers, I suggest the following videos:

Extra Credits: Power Creep http://youtu.be/Bxszx60ZwGw

Extra Credits: Balancing for Skill. http://youtu.be/EitZRLt2G3w

These are very good videos.

 

For people who are too lazy or have no time to watch them:

 

Power Creep has to do with the balancing between old content and new content introduced at a later time.

 

Essentially, developers have to make sure not to make old content which the players have spent lots of effort and time (and have become very attched to) useless in terms of absolute power when compared with new content.

 

In other words, using an example, your frost prime (new content) should not be absolutely more powerful than your frost (old content) but rather more powerful or less powerful under different circumstance, thereby not rendering frost (old content) useless.

 

 

Skill-Balancing has to do with giving new players viable ways (weapons, skills, etc) to play with the old players.

 

It is more an issue in PVP games and it's very much related to the learning curve.

 

New players who find that they have absolutely no viable ways to compete against old players (who have more understanding of the maps and skills) will very likely quit since they are almost always going to lose.

 

Using an example, though Warframe is a PVE coop game, the Starter Frames (Excalibur, Loki, Mag/Volt) should not be useless compared to other frames as this will allow new players a way to play with old players without worrying about their frames not being good enough.

 

At the same time, there is also the issue of not making new players too reliant on the easy to use starter content. If the developer makes it too difficult for the new players to lose their crutch, they will eventually be bored and quit.

 

Using an example, if the acquisition of new frames is too difficult/"impossible" resulting in players having to rely on their starter frames, they will eventually get bored of them and quit or if the starter frames are just too good for the new players (in terms of absolute power) to give up over newer frames, the same result will happen.

 

Thankfully, we can see that DE has managed to avoid these 2 problems very well.

Edited May 7, 2013 by OoKeNnEtHoO

[Emotitron]

Only truly lazy developers just add 'more numbers' instead of content.

DE doesn't strike me as that type of developer. New missions, new enemies with different combinations of abilities, new maps... all of these will add to the game.

Also, the game isn't a 'loot farm.' It's a dungeon crawl. The difference is subtle, but there. The first focuses only on the result, while the second focuses on spending time with friends exploring, testing, and enjoying.

For further discussion from the perspective of developers, I suggest the following videos:

Extra Credits: Power Creep http://youtu.be/Bxszx60ZwGw

Extra Credits: Balancing for Skill. http://youtu.be/EitZRLt2G3w

While great videos ( I always like this guys stuff) not sure they apply so much to this type of game. This game is more like a shooter version of Diablo where power creep isn't a problem - it is a core component of the game. These videos are more the problems a Planetside 2 is currently struggling with. The power creep thing is something you have to counter in creative ways in dungeon crawlers (like how WoW deals with it) if you develop interesting content and you don't want it getting left behind to collect dust. The usual answer for that is just to make different difficulty levels for the same content.

It is both a loot farm and a dungeon crawl. If instead we all entered the game with Potatoed lvl 30 warframes and all mods available to us, and were told 'go have fun shooting stuff with your friends', this game would be dead in the water. Let's be honest, we are having fun with friends LOOT FARMING. The content is NOT that good yet, it is the same mobs over and over in the same environments over and over. It is a fun grind, but it is a grind. The loot and crafting does matter. There is no dungeon crawl I have ever played where there wasn't fat loot driving me to see what is around the next corner.

If they are planning on taking this a different direction, wonderful... but what exists now is very much a 'farm for better gear so you can take on tougher missions'. Farming for the various frames as side-grades works for a while, but how do you keep the side-grades going after a year of this? At some point progression has to return. This entire game from the first moment you log in is about improving your warframe/weapons and progressing through bosses. The second you hit the end of that line you are left asking 'now what'. Sure you can start another frame or another weapon, and go repeat the process of farming through the old content you did already... but eventually you come back to "now what". If they offer a MUCH larger variety of mods I could see some legs coming from that.

I agree that the ONLY way to keep players interested when weapons/warframes become maxed out is for really challenging/entertaining new missions to constantly be coming on line - and REALLY compelling side-grades. But even then you always need something to be crawling FOR and some new challenge you are gearing up for. That is the entire premise of games like this one is it not? If you are progressing constantly into more and more challenging content (even if it is heroic, and nightmare versions of previous content) that will introduce power creep. And it exists now here in Warframe beta. If I run a friend through levels with my 60 mod Rhino/Gorgon, my friend is going to be little more than a spectator of the carnage. His stock unmodded Bratton is going to be doing 1 damage while I am critting for 1000. Power creep already exists and is a core part of the design.

TL;DR Game already is a scaling loot farm - it just ends abruptly. Any good crawler needs to be a chain of upgrading to prepare for the next harder mission. How are they planning to address this is the question.

Edited May 7, 2013 by Emotitron