The Pendulum swings too hard - Early, Mid & Late game combat Mutation.

[Ronyn]

Sup yall.

I love me some warframe!

Now that i have said that lets get into feedback and attempts to improve it

The game plays too fundementally different from early, to mid, to late game.

I belive this is the cause of a lot of the often debated view points on common issues.

This is easily illistrated by two big issues that I will list below.

Warframe Uniqueness.

This is a very common topic around here.

Some will say that the frames need to feel more different from each other through stats and passives while some will say that the powers and looks are enough.

Some say powers should be switched to a cooldown sytem some say we just need better energy collection and retention.

I don't want to get too deep into what is the right or wrong way to solve that issue in this thread.

Instead I will point out something that will improve the situation using the existing tools and features of the game.

Specifically power usage.

Early game you barely get to use your powers.

You spend 90 percent of the level shooting and hacking.

The frames feel too similar.

Mid game you hit a sweet spot where everyones powers are coming into play.

Rhino has his iron skin up a lot so he feels tanky. Loki has his invisibility up often so he feels sneaky.

The frames feel unique.

Late game you have so much energy you can use your lvl 4 "ultimate" power so often its almost repeatedly.

Since every ultimate is some sort of AOE to various degrees of room of clearing power...

The frames feel too similar once again.

Solution.

We need to extend that "mid game" sweet spot feeling, where powers come into play often enough to differintiate the frames but not so often you can spam your lvl 4. The sweet spot needs to start almost right away and last forever.

btw-the frames being able to use their powers also ties into other important functions like the feasibility of stealth or caster builds.

Melee Effectiveness.

There is a lot of talk about expanding melee combat in various ways. Combos, moves, etc...

Again, I don't want to get too deep into what is the right or wrong way to solve that issue in this thread.

Instead I will point out something that will improve the situation using the existing tools and features of the game.

Specifcally damage output.

Early game the melee attacks are a nice supplement to gunplay.

When an enemy gets up close a solid sword swing comes in handy, when youre behind an enemy a good charge attack does great..etc.

Though there is simply no contest as to what is more effective at dispatching enemies overall.

Guns are by a large margin.

So players who want to focus on melee are out of luck.

Mid game the melee fans may have gotten lucky and found a few good melee damage mods for their frame.

So now the melee weapons do enough damage that you can focus on it but you will still need to time charge attacks or perfect the distance of slide attacks to take enemies out.

This is another sweet spot...or at least close to one depeding on the mods you have found.

By end game if you have farmed and equiped melee mods you can turn your swings into devestating blows that will one shot most foes.

NOW melee fans can truly enjoy themselves to some degree but it quickly devolves into easy mode since nothing more than mashing the button is required to kill most enemies.

And those who are too tough to insta kill can be stuck in perma stun from mashing the button.

btw-combos and sweet moves wont be very interesting if everything just dies from one hit anyway.

Solution.

The starting level of melee damage needs to be porportionally higher so that such an extreme focus on melee damage frame mods arent required to create a melee build.

Obviously adressing these two things wont solve every issue in the game.lol

But it would do a lot to send things in the right direction.

Thank you all for reading. :)

Edited January 15, 2013 by Ronyn

[Malachia]

You have some very good points my friend.

Your right about extending that sweet spot, but extending it needs to happen both ways.

What I mean is, you should feel that your using your abilities and that your frame is unique even early game, not just late.

In my opinion the crazy op aoe attacks on the 4th ability (or 1st ability for Excalibur :P lol) should be on a long cooldown, like 1-2 minutes. while the other abilities are energy dependant.

Personally, when playing Ember (not Excalibur, seriously that thing is batS#&$ crazy op) I feel that the passive regeneration I get from energy siphon is enough to make me feel im using my abilities to some extent.

Of course, thats only with Ember, and I havent really played any other frames.

Make everyone have energy regen like from energy siphon and make energy siphon give people more regen! (less than now)

POWER TO THE PEOPLE!

*bro fist*

[Ronyn]

Your right about extending that sweet spot, but extending it needs to happen both ways.

What I mean is, you should feel that your using your abilities and that your frame is unique even early game, not just late.

yes that is what I meant.

hmm..maybe i need to make that more clear up there. :)

Edited January 15, 2013 by Ronyn

[Sealgaire]

So in my rambling post I created when the melee damage mods were accidentally deleted from the game (I'm relieved to an embarrasing degree they were given back) I talked a bit about this. Since that thread was quickly locked I'll just repost it here so my panick fueled thoughts don't go to waste.

Before the most recent patch that buffed shields again and lowered enemy damage across the board (as I'm assuming the case is considering how easy the game is again), this build was a complete blast to play on hard missions. I actually had to use the sliding and dodging mechanics to stay alive and in general stay hyper mobile and block sight lines while closing. It was frantic and exhilarating and by far the most fun I've had with the game. He can take down everything but the boss quickly, but he had to as staying under fire for even a couple seconds would have killed him. This was the perfect level of difficulty for me and was hugely rewarding. Enemies did alot of damage but could (and had to be) be killed quickly, making you actually feel like a badass space ninja. Now I can just either lazily run around the level whacking on guys until they fall over then moving to the next or mow them down with a gun.

I think the key to late game challenge isn't making enemies bullet sponges but increasing their damage and accuracy enough that you have to learn how to take them down quickly and efficiently with powers, combos, and maneuvers like the slide and dodge. If a difficulty level existed in the game that required mastery of all it's systems, really focused cooperation between diverse warframes and powerful well developed warframes and weapons, I think it would go a really long way towards extending the life of the game.

Edited January 15, 2013 by Sealgaire

[Ronyn]

I actually had to use the sliding and dodging mechanics to stay alive and in general stay hyper mobile and block sight lines while closing. It was frantic and exhilarating and by far the most fun I've had with the game. He can take down everything but the boss quickly, but he had to as staying under fire for even a couple seconds would have killed him. This was the perfect level of difficulty for me and was hugely rewarding. Enemies did alot of damage but could (and had to be) be killed quickly, making you actually feel like a badass space ninja.

I feel ya!

That is the kind of feeling that should be possible earlier on and continue throughout the experiance.

I think the key to late game challenge isn't making enemies bullet sponges but increasing their damage and accuracy enough that you have to learn how to take them down quickly and efficiently with powers, combos, and maneuvers like the slide and dodge. If a difficulty level existed in the game that required mastery of all it's systems, really focused cooperation between diverse warframes and powerful well developed warframes and weapons, I think it would go a really long way towards extending the life of the game.

Thats how I like to play as well.

I think the truth in this is balanced with the idea of perfered build,

If I build myself for damage I should feel close to death but capable of quick killing.

If I build myself for resiliance then I should be able to take hits but I cant expect to mow down the hordes.

Edited January 15, 2013 by Ronyn

[Sealgaire]

I feel ya!

That is the kind of feeling that should be possible earlier on and continue throughout the experiance.

Thats how I like to play as well.

I think the truth in this is balanced with the idea of perfered build,

If I build myself for damage I should feel close to death but capable of quick killing.

If I build myself for resiliance then I should be able to take hits but I cant expect to mow down the hordes.

Yea, I guess I should have allowed room in my example for tanky frames that don't deal as much damage but can take more punishment. I'm personally more of a high risk high reward type of guy though.

[Ronyn]

Yea, I guess I should have allowed room in my example for tanky frames that don't deal as much damage but can take more punishment. I'm personally more of a high risk high reward type of guy though.

I play that way a lot.

As i get new frames Ive found myself building them to play very differently from each other.

I like to play to the inherent strengths of the power set but I really enjoy how I am able to decide so much about my character through weapon selections, mods and the energy system letting me choose which powers to rely on.

Its rare to have this much freedom in a class system.

I feel like if Warframe got that sweet spot earlier and kept it throughout we would have more enjoyment out of the existing systems.

new ones may be required, I know I have ideas, but until we get the existing stuff right I would be hesitant to actually implement anything new.

Edited January 16, 2013 by Ronyn

[XAN3MK]

Power duration mods on fully upgraded Rhino. Press that "2" all day, every day.

[Vahnkiljoy]

If abilities didn't cost so much and energy orbs so far and few between drops sometimes i'd agree with the skills being used a lot, now though I just forget I have them on my volt since shooting his 1 at the target I WANT to hit and watching it hit something else next to it.

[Ronyn]

Power duration mods on fully upgraded Rhino. Press that "2" all day, every day.

yes too strong at that point.

Practically invulnerable all day.

Bet hey, I guess that reminds us of how different it is than playing another frame. lol

If abilities didn't cost so much and energy orbs so far and few between drops sometimes i'd agree with the skills being used a lot, now though I just forget I have them on my volt since shooting his 1 at the target I WANT to hit and watching it hit something else next to it.

Which is why I say they need to fix it...

Edited January 16, 2013 by Ronyn

[Ronyn]

I wonder how DE feels about the way the game changes as it goes

[TeamWorkTom]

I think the key to late game challenge isn't making enemies bullet sponges but increasing their damage and accuracy enough that you have to learn how to take them down quickly and efficiently with powers, combos, and maneuvers like the slide and dodge. If a difficulty level existed in the game that required mastery of all it's systems, really focused cooperation between diverse warframes and powerful well developed warframes and weapons, I think it would go a really long way towards extending the life of the game.

I think the key would be to just add more enimies really. Making each enimy do more damage creates problems towards making melee 100% useless. By increasing the number of enimies able to attack you at once you are left with the situation you were talking about before. You have to make decisions on when to use melee and how to attack the group, or you would save your AoE abilities for these situations.

I hate to bring up other games but this game to me feels similar to say Diablo 2. In the sense that it is an action RPG but with better control similar to Devil May Cry or Darksiders. But the difference between this and DMC or DS is that you don't have telegraphed attacks and that is where the similarity to D2 comes in. Bosses have telegraphed attacks while trash monsters have very little in the way of telegraphed attacks. In D2 the way you usually died wasn't because you sat there wacking on one guy too long, but was because there were so many people attacking or surrounding you at once. (yes you could be one shotted but again you could dodge most attacks that would one shot you)

So to me the solution would be to increase enemy density vrs enemy strength which would allow you to feel like a bad &#! but even bad &#!' die when overwhealmed.

Edited January 16, 2013 by TeamWorkTom

[sambarpowder]

Not very far to the late game, been playing less than a week and I'm spamming overload.

[Tacoman]

I think it would just be better if abilities only utilised cooldowns.

I've been playing with my friends and the current problem is that as Volt, I speed through the level and end up killing a lot more stuff and collecting the energy before anyone else does, so I get to speed and overload more often. But then my friends aren't enjoying it because they can't get energy to do anything useful.

[Sealgaire]

The simple solution to that would be to make energy orbs shareable. Cooldowns were tried and abandoned. Do a search for the reasons why.

[Kaiku]

The most fun I've had was when I just started with my new Excalibur, but equipped him with a lvl 25 bronco and went to do lvl 10 or 15 missions. It felt awesome to run from cover to cover, trying to get behind enemies and then kill them in one or two hits.

It was satisfying to kill them that quickly, and also know that if I didn't move fast and manage to land the hits, I would've been the one in pieces.

What I feel about the powers:

Now using one power affects to all the others powers since all the powers use energy from the same pool. This, at least how it affects to myself, makes one save energy for only for the most useful or powerful power. This makes the other powers mostly unused and feel useless. Also it mostly prevents use of combos, which is silly, since some of the skills are meant to be used together. Or atleast they'd be the more useful, but alone they're useless.

That's why I propose that every power had their own energy pools.

Then you wouldn't have to worry about not being able use your other skills if you use one.

Make each of the powers energy pools maximum size about the size their power costs, otherwise it results in spamming of low cost powers.

If a power costs 50 energy, it has an energy pool of 50 or 60.

When you use that power, you can then use your other powers too, but have to still collect energy to use it again.

And if you want to use another power after that one, which could cost 15 energy for example, you can do that. But also only once, since the enrgy pool size for that power is only 15 or 20.

This means you can use low cost powers often, but can't spam them, you have to get more energy first.

This also means that you can still use your most powerfull power and the other skills after. Or low cost ones first and then the big one.

Simple.

Edited January 17, 2013 by Kaiku

[Ronyn]

Some of the energy costs have been lowered and this has helped the frames seem more like themselves earlier into the game.