Proposed Starchart Changes [Megathread]

[Grimlar]

First up. DE you have sometimes surprised me, pleasantly, with your design decisions. Having said that, there are also times I have wanted to hit my head on the wall repeatedly over some things. To your credit, you often do change the less popular decisions. But this takes time and damages the reputation/playerbase of the game. Players once gone, tend to be gone for a long time if not permanently.

 

Whilst it is too early yet to tell if the plans for the starchart fall into the good change or bad change category. (After all, we know very little.) I must admit I dont like what I am hearing. As such I urge you to consider your plans carefully and before they become set in stone, run the details past some players you trust first, even if its just the design council/guilds you sometimes play with.

 

Beyond that, I would like to make a few comments.

 

1) As a solo/friend only player, the ghost town problem doesnt concern me, nor am I part of the solution.

Nothing DE does will make me want to play with other people. (No, not even raids or PVP, just the opposite in fact.) So restricting my range of choices just makes me more likely to stop playing.

 

And before anyone jumps in with "its a group based game," no, its a group oriented, solo friendly game. And despite the recent addition of raids I still believe that to be true. Besides, I have more than paid my way and feel as entitled as anyone to voice an opinion.

 

2) I have already achieved some of the goals I have set for myself. Restricting my choice so that I cannot work on the rest of them, possibly for long periods of time will again, simply encourage me to stop playing.

 

3) I dont see the ghost town problem as a major issue, at least partly because just about all of the missions are/were soloable, even the bosses. (And Im hardly a particularly good player.)

 

4) Lets be honest though, this problem is mostly self inflicted. The game seems to start the mission pretty much immediately and adds any players it finds, this is great if you have lots of people playing in every system on every node, but it is impossible to guarantee that will always be true over the lifetime of a game. When you have a sales push, lots of new players turn up in the lower level missions, when the game gets older, more players reach the later stages and dont play the earlier missions. Happens to every mmo.

 

The only way to get round it is to advertise where players are needed, let them decide to join in or not, (its their time after all,) and possibly reward them for joining in.

 

So, how about having a matchmaking system that, when a public player selects a planet to pick a mission to play, highlights those locations that have missions that have just started or are just about to start and have empty slots. Then, like the current alert/nightmare mission selection options the player can choose to join an existing group or start a new group. Offer a small bonus for joining groups that have taken a while to find enough players. Offer some credits, a fusion core etc of suitable quality to go with the length of delay/level. (Obviously if a group is found and the group decides to kick one of the players to make the delay longer, then the bonus is cancelled for everyone so as to prevent abuse.)

 

In other words, give the game/players time and information to find groups they are willing to join.

5) In my opinion its almost never a good idea to try and force players to do what you want them to do. Its clumsy, irritating and generally not conducive to fun. (Year of quality... yes?) Especially if you can encourage them to choose for themselves whatever it is that you want them to do. Call it a bribe if you want, but you already know players will respond to alerts that offer money, cores and other relatively trivial items. There are options.

 

6) Perhaps part of the problem is that there arent enough alerts to focus players attention. So, why not have at least one alert on every planet? Why arent some of these alerts repeatable, at least a few times? Why not sometimes have a planetwide bounty, 100 bonus credits (or 10 plastids etc) for every grineer lancer killed on Mercury. (Up to a daily limit.) Bonus to the drop rate of neurodes on Earth for the weekend, 50% extra, double? Im sure it would work. There are lots of options to spread the boost to resources so it doesnt have to flood the economy.

 

It would even help low level players progress, reducing the grind. Rarer resources only available in later systems, mods, cores, keys, credits and so on, new players will probably need just about everything. It may not tempt MR 15+ players back to mercury/venus too often, but it probably will tempt the mid rank players back.

 

7) Lets look at the grind too while we are at it. Why do players grind specific mission locations, because that is either the best, or the only way for them to get those things. So the obvious thing is to make sure that drop rates are roughly the same everywhere and there are multiple locations to collect stuff.

So, a) encourage players to move to a different planet, why not give them a small bonus to the drop rates in the first mission at a different location, maybe a larger one for a different planet. (You could add a small penalty to the drop rate if they stay in one location for too long if you needed to.)

b) In addition to the specific boss room location, why not have a teleport device/trap spawn occasionally on any mission in the system which gives the player the option, (provided they are careful enough to avoid the trap,) to visit the boss tile from their current mission and return to finish the mission after dealing with the boss. (Possibly have the boss summon tougher troops and send them through the portal to try and defeat the tenno and/or bring them back to the boss.)

There should also be sub bosses/tougher eximus who have a chance to appear in any mission, not too frequently and never more than once per mission, drop some useful loot, including for example, a piece (perhaps the rarer piece,) of the warframe that the boss of the system drops, weapon blueprints, (perhaps even some of the weapons that have been taken out of general circulation, or rare mod cards, core packs, anything that would feel like a good reward for a very hard fight.)

 

8) Is breaking the starmap and restricting player choice really the best / easiest choice? Seems like a lot of work that is quite likely to annoy the playerbase. I believe there are other options, based on existing systems that will improve the situation and would be less controversial, and take less effort to implement. Alerts 2.0, Mini Events 2.0, Matchmaking 2.0. (Or whatever version we are on now.) These could benefit everyone.

 

Its got to be worth looking at the alternatives. Please don't do a Firefall and keep changing core systems all the time. Nothing is ever perfect. What you have isnt broken, it just needs a few improvements.

[Hypernaut1]

Alerts were the most exciting regular missions anyway. I see no issue with this. It makes sense. I've rarely played an alert that didn't have players, and I rarely see people on star chart besides a select few farm missions or early missions

As much as many of you cry "player choice!", I'm sure DE had the metrics that show that a majority of players actually barely ever exercised this "player choice" but played the same few familiar nodes. You guys are losing nothing. You're not going to quit because you can't rarely at random play a spy mission.

Edited May 10, 2015 by Hypernaut1

[Ferdynan]

Steve was just having fun Imo (he was a little lit too I think, that's why I condem drinking, smoking and drug use). We all agree that the star chart needs a rework so let DE do their thing then we try it and give them informed and constructive criticism (only very few of us sadly) and they'll hear us and balance it or change it. People are overreacting, they are not EA or Blizzard. Edit:Grmmar.

Edited May 10, 2015 by Ferdynan

[-dicht.ThanksFrost-]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuJ2BpHPYu8&feature=youtu.be

[Demon-King-Lamb]

The difference is that it involves money, a large as hell playerbase, possibly Nexus Mods (SkyUI is supposedly becoming a paid mod), and things that SHOULD be free, becoming just the opposite of that.

I can't even bother to think about Bethesda and Valve right now.

I hate suits.

 

Just so you know. Bethesda shut down the Paid Modding on Steam. According to EULA Copy Right Laws. Making profit off of some one elses work is a crime and against the law. PC mods for Skyrim will always be free. You can donate money to modder's on Nexus Forums. They Just can't sell Mods.

 

With that said. Taking away from the star chart won't really make a big difference. Nearly all the nodes are just the same thing but with different tile sets. It also increase the availability for pugs when searching for random squads.

 

And as for me. I only play on like 5 other nodes anyway. Just resource grinding. There isn't a story to play along with so. All there really is to the star chart is Resource grind.

[Pendragon1951]

While we are at it I'd like to address something else which I think is very important. I have never thought of myself as a stick in the mud and I love humor and funny things as much as anyone, but when those antics are at the expense of someone else I believe that is wrong. It seems lately every Dev Live stream it becomes the Sheldon and Steve doing stupid things show. It took all of my patience this last stream to finish the stream. I really admire Rebecca for her patience and professionalism in trying to moderate an informed stream despite their stupid childish antics and to be honest in my humble opinion they owe her a public apology for their un-professional actions on the stream. People can be funny and silly but not when someone is trying to talk. Just my thoughts.

[(PSN)Drakiza]

I'm going to reserve my opinion until I have more information.

[Alphafox]

Alerts were the most exciting regular missions anyway. I see no issue with this. It makes sense. I've rarely played an alert that didn't have players, and I rarely see people on star chart besides a select few farm missions or early missions

As much as many of you cry "player choice!", I'm sure DE had the metrics that show that a majority of players actually barely ever exercised this "player choice" but played the same few familiar nodes. You guys are losing nothing. You're not going to quit because you can't rarely at random play a spy mission.

You seem to miss the main reason people do alets. The freaking rewards. Is it hard to understand that people prefer certain maps because the reward/time ratio is better? A kid could understand something that a Dev can't.

[H3RRD0KT0R]

One mission type node per tileset, so they all feel unique, and rewards/drops spread more homogeneously through them, that's the kind of change I'd like to see, no additional RNG.

[x_Soulframe_x]

Goddamit DE, don't shove your tilesets down our throats If I wanted to play a different mission then I would. If you want us to stop spamming missions then spread the rewards out evenly. I am not wasting hours upon hours of my life trying to get an item. 

 

Doing this gets DE more money because the RNG walls are now about 20 times stronger, thus making the player base spend money on the game to get weapons they want.

[Urlan]

I think that is the main problem with the star chart as far as people actually doing missions, there is no reward to do every mission more than once. The proper solution would be to create suitable rewards to have a reason to do them. Remember, reducing mission choice who not make more people have to interact together unless they also took away our matchmaking options. For instance, in the current system, if I want I can go private or friends only. I may go out of my way to help other players or I may not; but if there is no choice in the matter, the only choice is to stop.

[--.B.--HARDCOREDAVE-]

They didn't try though. That's the problem. Instead of doing something like removing half of the nodes and improving rewards on many of the rest, so people can still choose the missions they want to play while bringing the community closer together, they just threw it all out.

Honestly, this is somewhat common for DE: if something's broken instead of taking smaller, slower, more calculated steps to fix it they just jump way to the other end of the spectrum and break it in a different way.

Yes so much THIS^ why can't they just take more calculated steps that will not cause a public outrage with something as drastic as this.

[gunsmoke77]

I'm not a spacing and paragraphs person so doesn't matter to me just had to state what I needed about the proposed changes when you have so many though and ideas you want to expound upon you just have to let it all out sometimes.

See you have the grammar tenno's on your case i think most on here read with there eyes closed haha

intresting post op 

[--.B.--HARDCOREDAVE-]

See you have the grammar tenno's on your case i think most on here read with there eyes closed haha

intresting post op 

Yep haha well I got used to them already as long as I'm fighting for this cause doesn't matter to me if I get flamed.

[TheBrsrkr]

I'm going to reserve my opinion until I have more information.

[Snorkenhaufer]

"It sounded like if this was on a - the concern would be that you are no longer able to do something when you want to do it at any time. If you take that choice away entirely - to do it when you want, are we creating more problems than we are solving?"

"I don't think we are."

 

This is where I move from "wait and see" to "oh dear god no".

[.ERO.]

They are saving the graveyard that is the star chart, not removing choice.

[gunsmoke77]

whats all this Removing player choice 300 to 20 i,m reading about ? 

[DoctuhDrew]

cool changes really glad i just spent 50$ on this game FML

[--.B.--HARDCOREDAVE-]

They are saving the graveyard that is the star chart, not removing choice.

Well then they should just implement better incentives and reward systems as incentives to player to join squads in the nodes rather than removing choice from player of what nodes or game modes they want. There are some solo players that want to do their own thing on certain tilesets that they want your taking away that choice from them as well? As already stated in this thread there are a lot of better alternate solutions than creating an artificial immersive RNG based mission selector that removes players choice DE even stated so themselves "that it will remove some player choice and compensate it with crafting" so RNG replacing GRINDING at least with FARMING you know and have a hold or control of the time you can achieve your personal goals even with the current system there is enough RNG already. So I suggest for those people that haven't gotten every single thing yet from the star chart such as boss sigils frames, hunter weapons that spawn on certain invasion tile sets and missions, arch wing missions and even resources STOCK up already and prepare for the worst. I personally have farmed everything already on the star chart and have completed all nodes so for me it won't be a problem but do you see me giving up on this issue? NO cause I want to be able to choose what mission or gameplay I do and I don't want to be crafting keys to access areas that I already have access to that in itself is very $&*&*#(%& idea.

[--.B.--HARDCOREDAVE-]

@Gunsmoke this

 

New Starchart

• Hoping to appear in U17

• 300 nodes are being condensed to 20 nodes

• There may be time-based instances, such as Vor appearing temporarily, dropping different things each time

• Similar to Alerts, but hopefully not something that punishes players for sleeping

• There will be some removal of player choice - you will no longer be able to select whichever mission type you want, whenever you want; hopefully this will be better for the game overall

• Re-viewing player made quests again and designing the starchart so that these will be able to fit into it; hopefully this will be the answer to players that resent the removal of choice

 

I will repeatedly emphasize this part "There will be some removal of player choice - you will no longer be able to select whichever mission type you want, whenever you want; hopefully this will be better for the game overall"  and for all those white knights defending this idea even this part "Re-viewing player made quests again and designing the starchart so that these will be able to fit into it; hopefully this will be the answer to players that resent the removal of choice." clearly DE is admitting that they are "REMOVING PLAYER CHOICE" and trying to remedy it by creating another CRAFTING or even more GRIND systems because who know what resources those new keys might need (ARGON? ) which can be found in what time sensitive void missions that appear randomly? Even if its not some rare resource needed to build and access key to access a certain mission type why the heck would I even want "ANOTHER CRAFTING SYSTEM" to add to this games already GRIND intensive crafting systems when with the current STARCHART 2.0 we already have access to everything think about that for a second and see if all the justifications DE is doing for this new systems outweigh the costs it will entail for what less dead nodes? and more player playing together. While effectively reducing or removing EFFICIENT farming methods while CONSTANTLY introducing new things and aspects that require absurd amounts of resources and that are grind intesive? I fear for the new players I feel sorry for them especially for those that will farm for (CHROMA with all the parts needed to be farmed from bosses that will now be RNG and Time sensitive based) and also for the resource farmers as if neural sensors weren't rare enough already as it is. If you don't believe that DE is continually adding more GRIND/FARM intensive items then what about AKJAGARA, PANTHERA and those other WEAPONCEPTIONS and let's not even start with ARCHWING weapons and gear.

Edited May 10, 2015 by HARDCORE_DAVE

[ThePresident777]

New Starchart

• Hoping to appear in U17

• 300 nodes are being condensed to 20 nodes

• There may be time-based instances, such as Vor appearing temporarily, dropping different things each time

• Similar to Alerts, but hopefully not something that punishes players for sleeping

• There will be some removal of player choice - you will no longer be able to select whichever mission type you want, whenever you want; hopefully this will be better for the game overall

• Re-viewing player made quests again and designing the starchart so that these will be able to fit into it; hopefully this will be the answer to players that resent the removal of choice

(Notes thanks to AM-Bunny: https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/454266-devstream-52-overview/)

In light of what was said in Devstream #52, the Star Chart Manifesto now reads like orders to the borg from Simaris.

Random nodes a'la Nightmare Mode (which no one plays after they get the mods because the game play is random); to do list a'la Simaris; and resource grinding plus foundry waiting a'la Law of Retribution for the 5-20 minutes of the fun you really want. Grind 9000. Choice 1/9000.

DE created this problem by making 300 unrewarding nodes and 20 rewarding nodes. Now they're pitching this Trojan Nerf Horse as the solution to our complaints when it's really just stripping the veneer of the problem they created. It's more of the same problem, not a solution at all.

The solution is equally rewarding nodes and a node filter, not RNGesus 9000.

Random fun gets replaced by reliable fun. Some days will not be Warframe days because the fun will not be available on that day. Then people will get hooked on something else they can depend on for fun and move on.

EDIT: And how are we supposed to match make for the misisons we really want when they are keyed missions? That's another long unresolved problem that's about to get worse.

Edited May 10, 2015 by ThePresident777

[(PSN)flyersfan314]

We do not know exactly what this proposal entails. I think I will enjoy the game more if I am encouraged to play on other maps. My hope if that resources and enemies are juggled as well as what missions are available to play. This would make it so if I am farming for a specific resource I won't be doing the same mission over and over.

I think it will be a positive step if resources and mods were not locked on a specific planet or tower level. Instead of farming being repetitive and monotonous it could have a little bit more variety. My worse fear is like everyone else's, I do not want more grind especially with the recent gold core nerf.

I am just going to keep an open mind and enjoy this game for as long as I can. I encourage everyone to try and do the same.

[-Kryptic]

R.I.P Warframe. If this change happens, I am leaving Warframe.

I have supported most of DE's ideas, but this is absolute garbage. They already made the star chart worse by adding the carousel, and now this will top off the dirt in the grave.

[--.B.--HARDCOREDAVE-]

R.I.P Warframe. If this change happens, I am leaving Warframe.

I have supported most of DE's ideas, but this is absolute garbage. They already made the star chart worse by adding the carousel, and now this will top off the dirt in the grave.

^This is the reason why I am repeatedly warning DE of the aftermath of this I will continue to fight even if no one supports or believes me I won't give up as long as there is a chance to avoid a community fallout of this magnitude. I wouldn't even bring this topic into light if the CONCERN wasn't this grave.