Survival Balancing

[Mxysptlik]

I think survival needs more than just a tweak of numbers regarding drop rate or amount of air restored. Survival needs a 2.0 rework to incorporate changes to its base structure. Above all, survival needs to be removed from the realm of RNG forever and made completely about skill. No more random drops in spawn rates or PLS drop rates, no more Lotus giving up on supplying life support beacons. Survival needs to be until you die and don't respawn, or until you feel you have to extract. Survival and defense both also need a boost to rewards. As you go up in time, you should be receiving more and more rewards at each stage. There's currently no real reason to stay longer than the first C rotation unless you're dealing with limited void keys. Staying for a second rotation should yield a second reward for each stage of the reward cycle, so if you stay for 40 mins you should get 2 random rewards for the C rotation. Difficulty should be reflective of that, but every player should want to work together to actually survive for as long as possible, to maximise rewards. Only then will we really feel the pressure to survive

 

^THIS^ is what I think of when I play any other game title and choose "Survival". Currently, it's boring, tedious, potentially unrewarding (RNG), and risky (disconnect=lose everything). NONE of these features make me want to play any survival mission, and it's hard to have fun when you don't even want to play the game.

[Kalvorax]

I think survival needs more than just a tweak of numbers regarding drop rate or amount of air restored. Survival needs a 2.0 rework to incorporate changes to its base structure. Above all, survival needs to be removed from the realm of RNG forever and made completely about skill. No more random drops in spawn rates or PLS drop rates, no more Lotus giving up on supplying life support beacons. Survival needs to be until you die and don't respawn, or until you feel you have to extract. Survival and defense both also need a boost to rewards. As you go up in time, you should be receiving more and more rewards at each stage. There's currently no real reason to stay longer than the first C rotation unless you're dealing with limited void keys. Staying for a second rotation should yield a second reward for each stage of the reward cycle, so if you stay for 40 mins you should get 2 random rewards for the C rotation. Difficulty should be reflective of that, but every player should want to work together to actually survive for as long as possible, to maximise rewards. Only then will we really feel the pressure to survive

+9001 to this :D

[BlackCoMerc]

What we need to ask is this: Does anyone - anyone at all - really ENJOY the Life Support mechanic? Not support it, or deal with it, or make their peace with it. Do they really, truly ENJOY it?

 

I dont. And I dont know anyone else who does. 

 

In my opinion, endless missions are breaking the game. They lead to a situation where a portion of the fan base - and dev team - want to balance everything round endless, level 80 enemies. So they do. And they absolutely trivialize everything on the star map for that weapon or frame in the doing of this. See the new Valkyr for more on this.

 

In my opinion, we need Survival missions that still use the every 5 minute rotation, with extraction available after the first 5 minutes. After this, things change:

 

-Elite units (Hyena, Bailiff, Eximus Bombard) is regularly mixed in any time after 8 muinutes, with frequency increasing slightly from there.

 

-A mini boss spawns every ten minutes

 

-An Elite Squad AND a mini boss spawn at 20 minutes.

 

-A Final Boss spawns at 40 minutes

 

After 40 minutes the mission ends.

 

The compensation for no longer getting Rotation rewards:

 

-Mini bosses ALWAYS drop rewards

 

-Final Bosses ALWAYS drop rewards

 

-Elite units have a higher than normal chance of dropping rewards

 

-Boss rewards DO NOT count as rotation rewards. Boss rewards are IN ADDITION TO rotation rewards, because boss fights are optional. Players can always extract instead of fighting.

 

Why do this:

 

-It feels better. Players get to COMPLETE a mission, as opposed to running away in the end

 

-It increases immersion. If enemies have units we CANNOT beat, why do they not just bring them out immediately?

 

-It makes the mission more FUN. Right now a goodly number of players HAVE to WAIT 40 minutes to see a challenge. Adding in Elites and Mini bosses changes this for the better (see the much loved Proxy War Survival threads for more on this). 

 

Just my two cents. Basically, to sum up: If every 20 minute fight was like the Proxy wars alerts, I wouldnt NEED or even want to go longer. That's hectic and fun enough I want a short break before the next 20 minutes.

[(PSN)CrackFoxLegend]

Everyone on this thread talking about it being too easy to survive, stay longer it's that simple. Survival is not just end game, it's at the beginning of the game as well where the new players are still trying to figure out how to play and often times struggling to do so. If anyone wants a challenge on any endless mission type then all they have to do is stay longer. You're lying to yourself if you think you will last forever, you will either be killed or run out of life support.

[--Q--uaint]

Everyone on this thread talking about it being too easy to survive, stay longer it's that simple. Survival is not just end game, it's at the beginning of the game as well where the new players are still trying to figure out how to play and often times struggling to do so. If anyone wants a challenge on any endless mission type then all they have to do is stay longer. You're lying to yourself if you think you will last forever, you will either be killed or run out of life support.

 

I'm sorry, but I don't want to play the game for an hour before it begins to truly challenge me.

[PookieNumnums]

Spawned enemies should teleport to the tile next to a player if they get left too far behind if that isn't already a thing

[Ry0uSh1n]

What we need to ask is this: Does anyone - anyone at all - really ENJOY the Life Support mechanic? Not support it, or deal with it, or make their peace with it. Do they really, truly ENJOY it?

 

I dont. And I dont know anyone else who does. 

 

In my opinion, endless missions are breaking the game. They lead to a situation where a portion of the fan base - and dev team - want to balance everything round endless, level 80 enemies. So they do. And they absolutely trivialize everything on the star map for that weapon or frame in the doing of this. See the new Valkyr for more on this.

 

In my opinion, we need Survival missions that still use the every 5 minute rotation, with extraction available after the first 5 minutes. After this, things change:

 

-Elite units (Hyena, Bailiff, Eximus Bombard) is regularly mixed in any time after 8 muinutes, with frequency increasing slightly from there.

 

-A mini boss spawns every ten minutes

 

-An Elite Squad AND a mini boss spawn at 20 minutes.

 

-A Final Boss spawns at 40 minutes

 

After 40 minutes the mission ends.

 

The compensation for no longer getting Rotation rewards:

 

-Mini bosses ALWAYS drop rewards

 

-Final Bosses ALWAYS drop rewards

 

-Elite units have a higher than normal chance of dropping rewards

 

-Boss rewards DO NOT count as rotation rewards. Boss rewards are IN ADDITION TO rotation rewards, because boss fights are optional. Players can always extract instead of fighting.

 

Why do this:

 

-It feels better. Players get to COMPLETE a mission, as opposed to running away in the end

 

-It increases immersion. If enemies have units we CANNOT beat, why do they not just bring them out immediately?

 

-It makes the mission more FUN. Right now a goodly number of players HAVE to WAIT 40 minutes to see a challenge. Adding in Elites and Mini bosses changes this for the better (see the much loved Proxy War Survival threads for more on this). 

 

Just my two cents. Basically, to sum up: If every 20 minute fight was like the Proxy wars alerts, I wouldnt NEED or even want to go longer. That's hectic and fun enough I want a short break before the next 20 minutes.

I for one would actually enjoy this. Id play this over and over and still not get bored. As is now 5 mins in any survival i start literally falling asleep.

[nms.]

Everyone on this thread talking about it being too easy to survive, stay longer it's that simple. Survival is not just end game, it's at the beginning of the game as well where the new players are still trying to figure out how to play and often times struggling to do so. If anyone wants a challenge on any endless mission type then all they have to do is stay longer. You're lying to yourself if you think you will last forever, you will either be killed or run out of life support.

People don't want to last forever, that's the god damn point. They want to join, play 10-20 minutes of epic hard S#&$ and be done, or continue a tad longer with more insanity. Not wait 30+ minutes until it starts to get good for their 1245389 forma'd weapon and frame, then play for another 20/30 wasting out at least an hour in a single session half of which is picking their noses. Wasting 30 minutes only to be able to properly use the firepower we are given is lame and only creates boredom before that point.

Edited October 5, 2015 by nms64

[(PSN)xKAIOWAx]

Actually survival missions lost your sense , become  a super extermination camping mission,  life supports are uselles now, survival 2.0 is really necessary 

[starpursuer]

I just want things to drop. I don't want more keys.

 

EDIT: Read BlackCoMerc's post and fully hearted agree with it. Would make the survival actually fun to play. 

Edited October 6, 2015 by starpursuer

[taiiat]

Spawned enemies should teleport to the tile next to a player if they get left too far behind if that isn't already a thing

Enemies that get too far away will be put inactive and more Enemies will Spawn elsewhere. you're not running away from the Enemies either way.

[achromos]

Hmmm.....

My idea for survival would be to make it pretty much like an infinite mobile defense, but protecting your lives instead of the cache. Give it a 60m range of influence, and anyone outside it's range gets a timer for their personal LS unit that refills slowly when in range. Then when the air runs out you move on to the next cache. The amount of air in the cache decreases by 30 seconds each time (capped at 2minutes) and starts at 5 minutes 15seconds.

 

Yes.  This would be awesome.

[FrostSpecter]

Not sure about reducing the drop rate, theres already too much of a perception that Nekros is is a must-have for survivals...

 

Infact, had an idea;

 

Remove PLS entirely.

 

Instead of restoring a set amount of remaining time, using the LS capsule will simply prevent the mission from failing until the next one arrives.

 

When the next one arrives, players have a certain amount of time to activate it before mission failed.

 

This will require players to move at some point, will end those boring tunnel camps everyone only ever seems to do, and it removes the dependance on loot drops for the mission to continue, and it kills the noob trap of players just using the capsules as soon as they arrive without realising what it actually does.

 

This is the best idea that anyone has had for revamping Survival/making it properly frenetic while keeping it with the fun of killing massive waves of enemies.

[jinxeverything]

I will just leave this here:

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/541338-de-lets-talk-about-survival-for-bit-shall-we/#entry6081040

Edited October 8, 2015 by Prinny13

[-TSA-OptimusGrind]

Problem is u drop too many S#&$ in suv or can drop and u spend 20~60mins there this is too much!

 

and u need everytime a nekros whatever u camp or not!

[goatMissileAlpha]

I have said it in these forums time and again: no one - literally, NOT ONE PLAYER - actually LIKES or ENJOYS the life support mechanic. At best its tolerated, amidst constant grumbles about how we just want to run missions without babysitting numbers or coffins or extractors. Just once. 

 

And now not only has DE decided to keep it, they have doubled down on making it more rare and scarce. 

 

So much for fun.

 

I don't fit your description, so your theory is blown.

 

The problem with Survival isn't the life support frequency/drops.. its that there simply aren't enough enemies to truly contest things.

 

I believe the problem DE faces is one of conflicting requirements.. all game modes must be playable by all player levels with at least some chance of success.. so if you balance a mode for elite min-maxers.. you make it almost impossible for beginners to get through.. balance for beginners, its a yawn for the elite min-maxers.  

 

 

One thing that could be done would be to scale the amount of enemies based on an average of the experience of the team (judged on total kills on your account or something like that).  Get a highly experienced team together and you would really face the numbers.  This would work in the FPS environment because its a calc done at game start only, and simply sets up the correct mechanic for a given survival run.  And this mechanic could apply to a lot of the game modes.. 

 

Most folks don't take into account the variances in player skill level/gear level and how it affects these modes.. that little fact makes balancing all these modes truly complex and challenging.

Edited October 20, 2015 by goatMissileAlpha

[LazerusKI]

Those changes sound ok to me, its not that bad, i mean...we really had enough oxygen.

the most annoying thing is always waiting for the 20min tick...

[(XBOX)Skode]

Enemy spawns still way too sparse on certain tiles - survival beyond 20 mins on the new sealad tileset for example is a real struggle. I feel less like a frantic struggle for survival and more like a lonely isolated tenno there lol

[PnOyLeeT]

i like it sometimes there the occasional "where they at moment"

just need to wait for that 10 minutes or so tick to come forth..

[JuanDeages]

I don't fit your description, so your theory is blown.

 

The problem with Survival isn't the life support frequency/drops.. its that there simply aren't enough enemies to truly contest things.

 

I believe the problem DE faces is one of conflicting requirements.. all game modes must be playable by all player levels with at least some chance of success.. so if you balance a mode for elite min-maxers.. you make it almost impossible for beginners to get through.. balance for beginners, its a yawn for the elite min-maxers.  

 

 

One thing that could be done would be to scale the amount of enemies based on an average of the experience of the team (judged on total kills on your account or something like that).  Get a highly experienced team together and you would really face the numbers.  This would work in the FPS environment because its a calc done at game start only, and simply sets up the correct mechanic for a given survival run.  And this mechanic could apply to a lot of the game modes.. 

 

Most folks don't take into account the variances in player skill level/gear level and how it affects these modes.. that little fact makes balancing all these modes truly complex and challenging.

Well, tbh, there should be content for the "elite min-maxer" as you call it, just as there should be content for the beginner to have the chance to become an "elite min-maxer." T4s should not be content a beginner can do without getting backpacked through it, and there is nothing wrong with that. On the flip side, I shouldn't go to Mercury with a Soma Prime and a Lex Prime and expect a challenge. And player skill and time played are not the same thing. I could have a billion kills and be completely awful, or have a few thousand and have a strong grasp of the game.

[Jaaazz]

I just want a tower style survival/exterminate mission where you have to clear a floor in order to proceed to next one. It would be endless mission with no side objectives (or maybe some optional ones for fun), nothing to defend and nothing to collect just mass slaughter.

 

Current survival missions are okay I guess up to 40min max then it gets boring. These changes won't make 'em any more interesting.

This sounds like a good material for a new type of game mode :D Pls DE think about that idea,sounds like fun, especially if its an endless type, where enemies just get ultimately stronger, get some new defensive gear (like those manned Gatling turrets).

[(PSN)rippedj]

I think a mini boss added to deffense mission's or survival mission's would add a twist.maybe the mini boss could drop resources or mods even more air.

[rao_94]

I just want a tower style survival/exterminate mission where you have to clear a floor in order to proceed to next one. It would be endless mission with no side objectives (or maybe some optional ones for fun), nothing to defend and nothing to collect just mass slaughter.

 

Current survival missions are okay I guess up to 40min max then it gets boring. These changes won't make 'em any more interesting.

+1 to this idea ....love it !!

and btw i feel the changes the op posted would make survival more challenging but i face problems in survivals almmost every run where sometimes there are no enemy spawn for as long as 30 secs and sometimes they just keep swarming into the room 

not sure if its intended but would like a balance between them :)

Edited November 30, 2015 by rao_94

[Terrornaut]

Survival might be my favorite mode, because it lets me do my favorite thing in warframe: fly around and kill things enmasse while having enough room to be creative or super focused without having to deal with excessive loading and whatnot.

 

If survival had a few super pods pop up that could be destroyed by enemies, that might also add a sense of urgency and really add to the 'lets move fast and stick together to keep going.'

[--Q--uaint]

I had an amusing thought just now: combine the ideas of Life Support being entirely objective-based and minibosses.

 

Survival would make sure that there is always one miniboss in the level, and each miniboss would fill your LS meter when killed. When you can't kill the miniboss fast enough, you lose. This would discourage camping, since you would want to go find the miniboss to kill it and not lose, but would also encourage sticking together.