The Problems With De And Why Warframe Has Such A (Comparatively) Small Community

[Jukantos]

It's unfortunate you chose League of a comparison as it obviously turned away the spotlight, so good on-point edit there.

 

There were some very interesting episodes from Extra Credits on the topic of monetization and i'm pretty much quoting them here, so ill give them the (extra) credit for what i'm about to say.

 

A negative spending Experience DOES NOT WORK! Warframe earns MASSIVE points over other Free2Play games for having an actually tradeable premium currency and then completely smashes that positive potential by blunting new players with the inventory limitations and Free2Wait mechanics that might as well be copy pasted directly from some mobile filth (See the Jim Sterling Video "FREE TO WAIT" for further reference).

 

It's incredibly sad new players are smashed with such a brick wall. And yes, it certainly turns off potential future customers. Even i was eventually repelled off the game when i first started it around update 10, i left for almost a year because i simply had to wait so damn long for my cronus to build and when it finally was finished i STILL couldnt stay more than 5 minutes in survival due to my lack of mods and knowledge of game mechanics getting me killed by bombards super easily.

 

I will directly quote Extra Credits here: "If a game feels like it's extorting you for money, stopping you unless you pay up, there will be that point when players turn around and walk away." "Spending money in a game should feel awesome. The Koreans got this down, in one game James helped to design they had an item called a moneybomb, which a player could buy with premium currency, throw down on the town square and it would drop a bunch of goodies that everyone ELSE could pick up, not the player themselves. Eventually other players joined in and the whole townsquare would turn into one giant party".

 

The same applies for cosmetics. It's awesome how many of them you can actually earn in-game yourself and how cheap they are to buy with (tradeable) platinum, but that in turn forces you to sell SOME of them at 49,99$ (prime accessories) and have all this waiting and inventory stuff in the game.

 

Warframe could attract a MUCH larger userbase without these NEGATIVE spending experiences (getting presented with a 3-day timer that you have to buy your way out of, or being told you cant grab your new frame that you WAITED SAID THREE DAYS FOR out of the foundry because you're missing the inventory space permission and have to pay up in platinum to be able to grab it)!

 

You have an awesome universe and game at your hands. But in all honesty, whoever designed your monetization model has completely failed and that is THE ONLY reason you ever had to deal with ghost towns, and less than a million players. I would be more than willing to drop 300 plat on each color set if it means the foundry and inventory limitations go away. You could probably legitimately tripple your playerbase if you got rid of these mechanics that just smell of "mobile gaming nonsense".

 

Sources: Extra Credits Episodes on Microtransactions:

 

 

Extra Credits: Doing Microtransactions Wrong and how it hurts Free2Play Games

 

 

Jim Sterling Jimquisition ("FREE TO WAIT") (please do not feel attacked for, your game is not a straight up waiting only game like Dungeon Keeper Mobile, but his remarks on why the foundry mechanic is bad do apply to Warframe)

 

[PR1D3]

TL;DR: DE needs to make massive changes to the game state itself to allow the game to grow.

 

EDIT: Focus less on the comparison and more on the message please. That the community cannot grow with how restricted it is towards newer players. The comparison is simply there to give context to how small the Waframe community is, and that clearly there are other issues that need to be addressed, within the core game itself.

 

So. Warframe. A free-to-play Steam game about Space Ninjas. If those past few sentences didn't make you moist yet, then you probably are either impossible to help or you've actually played Warframe and understand that it isn't that simple. The Warframe community is small. Compared to other free-to-play games, that is.

 

Let's take a look: Warframe All-Time Peak of Players Online Simultaneously: 42,816

League of Legends Simultaneous Players EVERY DAY: 7.5 MILLION

 

That is a difference of about . . . 7.45 million. Now I know some of you are saying "That isn't fair!! League is the most popular multiplayer game in the world!!". But really, Warframe and League aren't that different! They are both free-to-play, multiplayer games which gather their funding through in game funding. And it isn't like Riot was some HUGE name when League came out, a few years ago, no one had ever heard of it. Kinda like Digital Extremes. But that is kinda where the similarities end. Both games gather money through in game content, the difference? League gathers it almost EXCLUSIVELY through skins for the characters. EVERYTHING ELSE can be acquired through in game action, without too much trouble! Warframe? Not so much. We not only have to buy or farm weapons/Warframes, we ALSO have to literally buy the INVENTORY space for them. And unless you would like to play Warframe with only 2 frames, you are forced to. But that's understandable right? You can buy stuff in all free to play games, that's how they get revenue! Besides, League has a competitive aspect which gains revenue as well!

 

Yes. That is true. But Warframe practically FORCES you to buy the game products, through inventory gimmicks and the INCREDIBLY long time to make and acquire materials and parts for the products you can obtain in-game. So why is Warframe so small? Yea it costs something but is that it? Well, the problem is how the game is introduced to new players. When they first start the game, THEY DON'T KNOW that all the weapons purchaseable with plat can also be obtained through other way. A new player might just see everything for plat, and immediately turn away, seeing this as "pay-to-win". Not to mention the INCREDIBLE jump in enemy levels, which is awful for new players, realizing they can't beat it unless they spend money or spend hours farming on incredibly slow lower level missions. 

 

All of these restrictions, for Forma, Warframes, Weapons, Mastery Rank restrictions, Clan restrictions, all for what cause? Profit. Which is fine! All companies want profit. BUT SOME PEOPLE DONT HAVE THAT MONEY. And those that don't will, for the most part, stop playing. Walk away. DE will not allow this game to grow due to the incredible skill and monetary gap in this game. And even after they buy weapons, to make them best outside of the star chart, they have to forma and RE-LEVEL the entire thing. Personally, I love farming for things (most of the time), it makes me feel like i'm working towards something! But . . . many people do not. And, to fix this for themselves what do they do? STOP PLAYING. We don't want that. And DE shouldn't either! Because it means less profit. DE would probably make better profit if they made the game more player friendly. I'm much more likely to spend money on something that works WITH ME instead of AGAINST, constantly trying to force purchases down my throat. 

 

What astounded me coming to Warframe from League, was the community. So accepting, welcoming, and kind (for the most part). Such is the case when you play a game that makes players COOPERATE and work together. It is beautiful. But small. So this is my plea. DE you try so hard to make players cooperate with each other . . . but why don't you focus on making the game cooperate with the players? There is a lot of change and improvement that needs to happen in Warframe. Starting with making it more acceptable and easy to slide into for new players. And less a money steal. 

 

Why should you listen to me? Maybe you shouldn't. But I have something that none of the DE staff ever will. I'm a player. This game is made for me and all the other players. And i have to work to get my voice heard, or changes implemented. Honestly, sometimes I wonder if some of the developers even play this game. Listen to the players DE. I have respect for those that make games like this, and especially Warframe . . . but maybe you should focus more on the thing that is most important in a game: fun. Not taking money or making purchases at every corner, or leveling and releveling a gun 4 times to make it usable, no. Fun. 

 

Just all my opinions of course. But I would like to remind you all of someone who knew that message, Satoru Iwata. He wanted to make games for the players, to ENJOY. To have FUN. And what do you know. He was president of one of the largest video game companies in the entire world. It isn't about your vision. Support the players, and they will support you. 

 

 

Ok, the comparison is pointless as it doesn't really help the game get any better by comparing numbers. Also comparing a game that is completely different and has a larger PvP competitive component. Screw what they are doing (cause honestly if we want to get into a 'whose a better company pissing contest' Riot would lose for a multitude of reasons with a trip to their forums to read complaints galore) DE only needs to concern themselves with their game and their company.

 

I have a problem with the entire post, mostly with the way it's written. It's so incoherent, badly organized, and really just all over the place. In the second paragraph you go from "game forces you to buy" to "new player experience". Then in the third you bring up money again, go into progression (I think), and then back to money. The last three are honestly pointless, with your paragraph on "fun" being ridiculous, so I'm not going to address them. I'm going to focus on the 2 after the comparison.

 

In those you bring up financial, introduction, and progression. The money aspect has been brought up countless times now here in the forums, whether or not Warframe is Pay2Win. It's not. People want to throw this term around and they don't fully understand what it means and the conditions a game must have to be considered Pay2Win. Vor's Prize does help with the introduction ,and of course it could use a little bit of tweaking. Progression has always been on the board for things that need changed, in fact the progression and intro problem does go hand in hand a bit. I'm trying to find a particular forum post that gives a better solution on addressing the progression and acquisition of certain gear and information. I highly doubt player retention is due to market prices of items, it would mostly be due to the intro and progression. They probably wouldn't want to stick around if they are in the dark for too long. We need progression, we need to push early players into the relays to interact with the community. We have vets and Guides of the Lotus helping to encourage that player retention by showing them the ins and outs of the game. We have clans that go to the Mercury relay, picking up new players, and helping them. It's one of the reasons behind the creation of the Clan Concourse that DE is trying to put in the relays. Stuff like this is the reason why we have a good community, and DE should implement more stuff like this that empowers the players when they do stuff like that.

 

You need to give better information on how the game isn't "player friendly", it's an open term and could mean multiple things. With the little info that you give it looks like your "player friendly" is the mainstream definition of dumb down content, and parenting the player. At least that's what I think that's what you're trying to say as your post is a mess. As far as Warframe forcing you to purchase content, that's a bit misleading considering majority of the content is not locket behind a pay wall (except for most cosmetics, but they are freakin' cosmetics), nothing is preventing you from constructing items and holding them in the foundry until you can get slots for them, archwing slots are free so no barrier preventing you from that section of the game, trading is a thing, and the chance for daily login discount tokens along with the ones that give plat for free if you're super lucky.

 

Warframe has it's fair share of problems the thing is you don't make any, truly valid points and the post seems to go no where. I don't know what scope of growth you think is acceptable, but the game is growing. And you're comment on DE needs to listen to the community, I've heard that so much and so many times the people who say this reveal that they don't watch Livestreams, Prime Times, and read posts from Community Managers and Developers.

[Temfist]

To the OP, you make some interesting points, I think the only real relation between Warframe and LoL is that they are both competing for your time and money, and that they both don't know exactly what their audience wants. Warframe, to me, needs to focus more on some sort of meta game roles for it's Players as well as for how to deal with enemies and tactics, more of a fluid and balanced combat system, and rewarding skill based mechanics that encourage level interaction. Along with those things would have to come more interactive environments, meaning more of a reason to stop and react to whats actually around you once and a while rather then just steam rolling everything in your path etc.

(ie, miniboss rooms with a locked door during extermination missions and/or on the way to extraction that may require all players present in the game to beat, either due to high damage single target moves that are suicide to go up against without someone to revive you, or you need them to hack a console to lower the bosses shields because the boss is part of the ship, etc or maybe instead of doors that just require 2 players to open, have interactive puzzles during the level, like opening a door for someone else, so they can open the door for you, or having rooms that you need to approach with caution because of level hazards that "DO NOT drain "all" of your energy", but instead can heavily damage you, as well as have more enemies that punish you for running solo if you don't play smart/use specific strategies available through the environment to beat them, and more ways to help your friends to encourage groups to work together like Left4Dead, etc. That approach to teamwork, plus reworking Rhino to have moves that make enemies target him over his other allies, would make him no longer feel like a Scrublord. Applying this same meta role rework to other "tank" themed characters might just then create a desired team role and meta game function for every scenario, rather then just go to frames for certain mission types. Just Sayian.)

just one more example of this, would be to have Bombards and Napalms have weak points in their back, so that if your shooting that weak point (or performing an assassination thanks to handy dandy Excal's Blind, Ash teleport, or Loki Master race), you can cause their weapons to backfire/explode, thus promoting team work/stealth and flanking instead of getting requests to nerf hard enemies on the forums all the time. just an example.

Jukantos, on 16 Jul 2015 - 03:02 AM, said:

It's incredibly sad new players are smashed with such a brick wall. And yes, it certainly turns off potential future customers. Even i was eventually repelled off the game when i first started it around update 10, i left for almost a year because i simply had to wait so damn long for my cronus to build and when it finally was finished i STILL couldnt stay more than 5 minutes in survival due to my lack of mods and knowledge of game mechanics getting me killed by bombards super easily.

I will directly quote Extra Credits here: "If a game feels like it's extorting you for money, stopping you unless you pay up, there will be that point when players turn around and walk away." "Spending money in a game should feel awesome. The Koreans got this down, in one game James helped to design they had an item called a moneybomb, which a player could buy with premium currency, throw down on the town square and it would drop a bunch of goodies that everyone ELSE could pick up, not the player themselves. Eventually other players joined in and the whole townsquare would turn into one giant party".

The same applies for cosmetics. It's awesome how many of them you can actually earn in-game yourself and how cheap they are to buy with (tradeable) platinum, but that in turn forces you to sell SOME of them at 49,99$ (prime accessories) and have all this waiting and inventory stuff in the game.

Warframe could attract a MUCH larger userbase without these NEGATIVE spending experiences (getting presented with a 3-day timer that you have to buy your way out of, or being told you cant grab your new frame that you WAITED SAID THREE DAYS FOR out of the foundry because you're missing the inventory space permission and have to pay up in platinum to be able to grab it)!

You have an awesome universe and game at your hands. But in all honesty, whoever designed your monetization model has completely failed and that is THE ONLY reason you ever had to deal with ghost towns, and less than a million players. I would be more than willing to drop 300 plat on each color set if it means the foundry and inventory limitations go away. You could probably legitimately tripple your playerbase if you got rid of these mechanics that just smell of "mobile gaming nonse.

I really agree with a lot of what your saying. I do feel the main problem Warframe has for player retention is not so much the arbitrary wait times (though I agree they are not helping), as much as it is the overall lack of accessibility. Whether it's due to presentation of mechanics at the beginning, the level design feeling like a confusing mess when you aren't familiar with parkour or otherwise, the way the game throws you into combat when there is no clear methods on whats effective when your a new player, and the shop being the eyesore in your ship that it is etc. There are quite a few things in the initial presentation that probably put people off, and that said, it's way better then it used to be.

I admit arbitrary wait times are a mobile game tactic, and usually are in place in those kinds of games because building things is the main mechanic, and is competitive by nature, since if you pay money you can get better, faster then those who do not. It encourages a "Whale" mentality for those who want to compete. Warframe's current market feeds off players with a desire to "collect". The problem is, that if you don't pay, the game punishes for wanting to collect by preventing you from having a collection of the things you've earned. Now, with the trading system, you can overcome that limit to a degree by using your plat on slots, but then you won't be collecting cosmetics anytime soon.

I think that is fine, too an extent, but honestly, I don't see why DE hasn't made it so that you get a free weapon slot with each Mastery Rank or 2 and a new warframe slot per 3-4, and allowed you too "sell excess weapon and frame slots for platinum" if you don't use them. This, too me, would increase new player retention levels substantially and give them something to work for. They wouldn't need to sell "EVERYTHING" they have built and leveled up just to get higher Mastery Rank, and they could feel like they are being rewarded more for trying new things etc. I think certain things you buy from the market should be be exchangeable for other things in the same regard. Building AK/Dual handguns shouldn't even require you to use 2 weapon slots, you should be able to use the one in your foundry if the timer says it's done building. I'd also like a system where you can trade in level 30 weapons for a new specific ones (even if they have to still pay a cost for obtaining the new gun), skipping the build time, as a way to encourage players to collect while also giving them a clear progression path when it comes to what guns they should use next. I also think it'd be better if the enemy faction weapons were exclusively dropped by enemies of that faction via parts and blueprint (IE, you could get the Hind and the parts to build the Hind by getting lucky when killing Grineer Lancers. Thus you now have an incentive to keep killing them, and if you get extra Hind's after you've already level'd one up to 30, you can sell the blueprint collection for 5 plat, or trade it in for the full price of the gun in credits, etc.)

By this same logic, I think Guns need to have varying sell prices based on their difficulty to obtain/build, and or MR requirement, so that getting duplicates while farming can help you earn credits faster, etc.

While I'm on leveling weapons to 30 to trade them in, I feel like Forma should not "reset" the level of the item you use it on, as that is generally just unappealing to everyone. Instead, just have the Forma'd Polarization slot become unusable until the weapon gains a set amount of affinity to unlock it again. This would allow you to put multiple Forma on a weapon at once, but each Forma further divides the EXP distribution, so using heavily Forma'd weapons makes it harder to level up your other weapons. Also, I think DE needs to consider adding unarmed Combat for the Warframes, so that if you don't choose to take a melee weapon with you, your not completely punished in CQC.

That said, I also think DE is focusing too much on trying to improve the end game. While I think it's a nice motivation to make the end game look more appealing by adding new "archwing parts" and "High level pre-req's for new Warframes being released" etc, we already have PvP and Raids now, and they are not overly popular for what I feel are a lot of the same reasons the game is. I mean, look at "Destiny", a game that practically wishes it had what Warframe does in many regards, but then again, a game that is so simple and incredibly well articulated in terms of FPS mechanics, that anyone can pick it up and play it for hours. Now, Destiny doesn't have much in terms of content, but people still enjoy playing it because it feels so good mechanically that it's fun regardless, super accessible to those who don't even excel at FPS games. I hate how short it was, and I lost a lot of faith in Bungie's ability to keep their word etc, after all the broken promises, but I can't deny that I still had fun with it.

Warframe, for a lot of new players, is just not that fun. I think this has a lot too do with just a few of my prior ideas, as well as overall presentation, but whats unfortunate is that I don't see DE focusing on that part of the game. While I do think things like Parkour 2.0 will help game feel exponentially improved, it needs to be paired with proper level design and good enemy placement and challenges for it to mean anything to the player (otherwise it will just feel like a gimmick), and I don't know if DE is planning on changing how the tile sets work anytime soon.

I dunno, there are so many "little" things I think would make Warframe "feel" better to the player, but DE is not a big company and are already working hard just to keep up with their commitments of making "new" content. As long as they focus on "Quality over Quantity" I have confidence in them. I think the best we can do as a community is tell them what is working, what isn't working, and why we feel that is, and if you have suggestions on how they can do it differently, put it into a well articulated format that they can take the time out of their schedule to try and read I guess.

TL;DR, I feel DE is working their hardest to make the game better, and while there are many, many little things they could change to improve the game in terms of accessibility, I feel we need to focus on making sure that what they come out with from here on out is working and improving the game experience for new players, rather then making the game feel less and less friendly to newbies.

Edited July 16, 2015 by Temphis

[LightstealKnight]

IMHO, You failed to identify the problem.

Many people try Warframe but quit.
The problem is player retention.

 

You claim that it is the lack of F2P elements but I have a lot of friends that have lots of Platinum in Warframe and have never spent a penny.

 

Player retention can be boiled down to 3 reasons that players leave.

1.  Steep learning curve - Although League of Legends (the game you used for comparison) is difficult to master, it is quite easy to learn.  Warframe has such a bad tutorial, confusing UI, and so many hidden features with no introductory tutorial to them, and no clear objective or progression.  A few of my friends left the game because of this.

 

2.  Fun is not the Goal - Unless you like the CCG element, or the RNG based farming, Warframe is unappealing.  I've had friends try it and tell me that it feels like a job.  A cooperative job.  There is little story-driven content, and collecting all of the Warframes, weapons, and gear is a skinner-box approach to gaming.  The fun mechanics is really the only thing that makes the farming fun, but repeating the same 8 mission types gets old for many people quite quickly.  Also, there is a lack of end-game content.  All of that RNG farming would make sense if there was end-game content to use it on.  But all of that end-game content is just another RNG farming experience.

 

3.  High Buy-in price - Once you actually learn the game, you will quickly realize how far behind you are all of the early members.
Forget about ever getting an Excalibur Prime, Event mods, all those alerts and potatoes that you missed over the years, arcane helmets, retired gear... etc.
Not to mention starting your mod collection, and leveling them all up, took so much cash, resources, and time to collect fusion cores.
Possible solutions to this might be a specter mechanic, allowing older players to allow newer players to take control of their specters so they can jump into the game and not worry about modding right off the bat.

 

 

There is actually a strong 4th reason that players leave the game, and that is it's unusual aesthetic that most vet players love and find charming.

Players need to be slowly brought into this weird aesthetic.  That ugly Vor and Grineer that we see at the beginning throw new players off.  The strange appearance of the Warframe and the early tilesets are unappealing to new players.  You need to slowly lower your audience into the rabbit-hole of weirdness.  I love the way that the engine looks and all of that unique aesthetic, but it does take getting used to.

 

And of course the bugs, crashes, P2P hosting, grouping options, horrible trade system... etc all make newer players, that are used to better QoL options, uneasy.

 

 

*** My Frustration ***

 

I have spent a lot of time finding new players in Warframe, and helping them get into the game.  I helped them to power level a bit, so they could get over that initial hump.  I have introduced them to vault runs, syndicates, relays, void missions, Derelict missions, lephantis ... etc.  I have answered all their questions and given them some prime parts, and helped them to farm their first new frame.  I helped them farm plastids.... plastids!!!
After doing all of these redundant runs with them, they lose interest, leave the game, and all of the time I have spent helping them to build their account goes to waste.
My help, in essence, helps these new players overcome reasons 1 and 3, but they leave the game because of 2.  This is something that I cannot help them with.

[RavenCorella]

Perhaps limiting certain planet unlocks to mastery ranks would create that sense of end game that Warframe needs.

 

 

Per se, MR 1-5 unlocks planets up to Jupiter, 5-10 goes up to Ceres, 10 to 15 unlock the void, 1 level = 1 tier of a tower, and well, after 15 you'd get Phobos, Europa and Eris.

On top of that, players lower than the said rank won't be able to be invited in  locked mission. No more taxi. 

That will prevent players from getting overpowered weapons like Boltor prime or any other void equipment at mastery ranks 4 just because they had experienced friends. It will also force them to begin with low-power weapons up until they get access to resources to build better ones. 

 

If you bare with me, I will try to explain why and what would that accomplish. 

 

1.Balance in games.

If a person doesn't have a badass weapon in a low planet like Jupiter, they won't be able to one hit-kill everything, thus make the game by far more challenging. Currently, a lot of players have high-placed clan mates or friends that get them to high missions the moment they finish Vor's Prize, and I see people with primed gear that should be somewhat exclusive at Mastery rank 5 or even below. How can you not expect them to get bored if they have the best gear in the first week?

 

2.Give another purpose to mastery ranks.

 At the moment, the system works like this: 

You kill a boss - you unlock a new planet.

Now, that may seem like a good idea at first, but the issue goes back to #1. People get taxi to higher planets and unlock all the planets at the very beginning. 

Reaching a higher level mastery rank to unlock a new planet would be better in my opinion, mainly because Mastery ranks require weapons/warframes, those warframes require resources, which in the end can be found on the planets newly unlocked by mastery ranks. That could create a balanced chain that loops infinitely. 

[Temfist]

Perhaps limiting certain planet unlocks to mastery ranks would create that sense of end game that Warframe needs.

 

 

Per se, MR 1-5 unlocks planets up to Jupiter, 5-10 goes up to Ceres, 10 to 15 unlock the void, 1 level = 1 tier of a tower, and well, after 15 you'd get Phobos, Europa and Eris.

On top of that, players lower than the said rank won't be able to be invited in  locked mission. No more taxi. 

That will prevent players from getting overpowered weapons like Boltor prime or any other void equipment at mastery ranks 4 just because they had experienced friends. It will also force them to begin with low-power weapons up until they get access to resources to build better ones. 

 

If you bare with me, I will try to explain why and what would that accomplish. 

 

1.Balance in games.

If a person doesn't have a badass weapon in a low planet like Jupiter, they won't be able to one hit-kill everything, thus make the game by far more challenging. Currently, a lot of players have high-placed clan mates or friends that get them to high missions the moment they finish Vor's Prize, and I see people with primed gear that should be somewhat exclusive at Mastery rank 5 or even below. How can you not expect them to get bored if they have the best gear in the first week?

 

2.Give another purpose to mastery ranks.

 At the moment, the system works like this: 

You kill a boss - you unlock a new planet.

Now, that may seem like a good idea at first, but the issue goes back to #1. People get taxi to higher planets and unlock all the planets at the very beginning. 

Reaching a higher level mastery rank to unlock a new planet would be better in my opinion, mainly because Mastery ranks require weapons/warframes, those warframes require resources, which in the end can be found on the planets newly unlocked by mastery ranks. That could create a balanced chain that loops infinitely. 

hmmmm. I'm not sure how I feel about locking off stages by MR, I think locking off the rewards by MR makes more sense. Higher MR means better drops? well now MR is starting to sound pretty good. That said, all within reason of course, but I think that could certainly contribute too getting players to stick to their own level a little more, while not completely disabling friends from helping each other without incentive.

 

onto killing bosses to gain access to new levels however, I think that killing the boss of a planet should be the last thing you do, sort of the reward for completing everything else, ideally. I think the boss stage should become unlocked after you have already completed all of the other stages within a system, and playing on a level you don't have unlocked, doesn't unlock it for you. you have to beat them sequentially is what I'm suggesting. The original star chart actually had a sequential order to it, and to an extent the new one does too, but the new one is less linear, and allows you to skip a lot of stages. While the old one did have side missions branching off, they were endless objectives only, and felt like a bonus mission in the system. The new star charts sort of lack that visual design element, and just feel like a cluttered mess of levels, which I'll admit, is very unappealing to feel like a completionist about, especially when there is no reward for clearing a whole system to my knowledge. Having the boss level be the reward would just make sense to me.

 

That said, I know how hard/annoying it can be to clear a system when no one wants to help, which is why I feel like Warframe has too many random locations in each system. I think systems should have 1 of each objective type, and a series of extermination missions of increasing difficulty inbetween. In an ideal setting, each extermination after the last would offer something the others didn't, as an incentive to do them again, like certain "rare" enemy variants or set mini-bosses with dialogue that build up the hype for fighting the boss at the end of the system, each with unique drops and/or better drop chances for rare mods. This is something Warframe can't do quite now, not without a huge overhaul of the market place and how weapons are obtained and made, but maybe one day, DE can clean up a lot of the mess that currently makes a lot of the stages in a system redundant other then the fact that they all use the same tileset anyway.

Edited July 16, 2015 by Temphis

[owendawgx]

*** My Frustration ***

 

I have spent a lot of time finding new players in Warframe, and helping them get into the game.  I helped them to power level a bit, so they could get over that initial hump.  I have introduced them to vault runs, syndicates, relays, void missions, Derelict missions, lephantis ... etc.  I have answered all their questions and given them some prime parts, and helped them to farm their first new frame.  I helped them farm plastids.... plastids!!!

After doing all of these redundant runs with them, they lose interest, leave the game, and all of the time I have spent helping them to build their account goes to waste.

My help, in essence, helps these new players overcome reasons 1 and 3, but they leave the game because of 2.  This is something that I cannot help them with.

This. I remember when i started playing this game and had to farm plastids on Saturn. Good times, good times. Because I was being rewarded with what i was working towards! Sadly . . .  that doesn't really seem to be the overall theme with the rest of the game, because of as you said) the atrocious whims of RNGeesus.