[Spoiler][Crtical Analysis] Game Design Suggestions And The State Of The Game

[(PSN)Romulus93]

Recent DE design choices: 

 

1. Daily focus cap

2. Some focus passives considerably nerfed as per 18.0.5 notes

3. Mesa 4 ultimate changes due to Greedy Mag synergy

4. Greedy Mag nerf

5. Fusion core reward amount reduction for some missions as per update 18 patch notes

 

My suggested Design choices (just a few):

 

1. Remove focus daily cap

2. Re-evaluate focus experience gain

3. Make focus passives passive and suitably powerful and appropriate for what focus is intended to be

4. Remove syndicate daily cap

5. Reduce amount of fusion cores needed to level up mods but reduce power of some rare fusion cores

 

Overall assumption of DE's philosophy: Design choices based on further developing the game in the interest of the players with emphasis on appropriate nerfs and grind to maintain playerbase and platinum sales

 

Overall philosophy of my own: Design choices wholly devoted to further developing the game in the interest of the playerbase and Warframe as a whole. Community recognizes the sincerity and will support with sales of platinum and other packs.

 

Major criticisms of the current state of the game: DE appears to make design choices and changes in the interest of artificially creating a "grind". Statistics unknown of whether or not this fosters more platinum sales. What is known is that grind, coupled with RNG, and artificial longevity through daily caps is wholly unsupported from the community.

 

Final thoughts: I recommend DE place more emphasis on the players and the game. I have no doubt they are very passionate about Warframe and it very clearly shows yet there is another side,so to speak, that we don't see but feel. That side is the business side which seems to negatively impact Warframe and community moral and trust. DE's vision and pure intentions are jeopardized by unfavorable Nexon like choices. I would prefer they follow what they know to be true in their hearts. I spend a lot of time in this game. I give a sizable amount of support with my wallet. The vast majority of the community is like me. 

 

Final Solution: Recommend DE re-evaluate design choices both recent and in the future. 

 

 

Players would rather give money happily than give money grudgingly.

Edited December 9, 2015 by (PS4)Romulus93

[vasvaska]

My 3.8-ish стотинки(home country's currency):

1 and 2 design choices: it's in beta. Subject to major changes. Fact is that some people already have more focus than they should for and long term goal. Honestly, I have ONLY like 8k focus and I don't think that will make the game less interesting. In fact the opposite: I see it as a LONG TERM goal.

Change 3: Mesa's supposed nerf makes her more interesting than before. Now you Actually have to play... Wow... Imagine doing that.

Change 4: if you mean the LineOfSight, yeah I agree that sucks. If you mean the " I pull for myself" I'm kinda okay with that. Made press 4 to win frames ACTUALLY MOVE and play the game. On the other hand that augment is kinda! useless now. In short: mag needs a rework but this is a whole new discussion.

Can't say anything on 5 cause you have to be more specific.

Proposed changes of yours:

Change 1: IT SHOULD BE A LONG TIME GOAL. Daily caps are a bandaid, the focus should be something harder to get than just kills and affinity IMO.

Change 2: it's in beta and Steve said on Twitter that it's being worked on.

Change 3:Hopefully some improvement in the future. As I said, it's in beta.

Change 4: so you want to have everything I in less than a week? And by everything I do mean everything from all 6 syndicates.

Change 5: so... You mean make it easier (reduce cost) but make it harder (increase ammount==cost) ? Wat? Be more clear on that.

From what I read, you are to impatient.

I Find DE's choices okay-ish.

Alertium, daily caps, raid cooldowns are not meant for impatient people. They are intended to prevent doing everything there is to do in a matter of weeks.

Platinum is made for impatient people. The "get now" button. DE are great at providing actually free content to everyone. That luxury comes at the price of grind-times. You can easily choose: time+nerves or money. You do realize that if things were easy to get(no time walls, less grind, less if no RNG) people will mostly pay for lesser stuff like cosmetics. Not to mention that the ingame trading would be devastated because the people with platinum will buy it for cosmetics/slots/potatoes and not have more to go to the ones that can't spend real money for plat but have the time.

In short: high supply - low demand will actually discourage people that can't buy plat. If it wasn't for trading I wouldn't have lasted a year. And with me a lot of other players. Players that could have potentially spent thousands of plat that would have otherwise never be introduced to the economy.

Gawd, I'm tired and TypingUI(as in DUI). This is much longer that I thought I'd write. I'll end here.

[Endothermia]

I like this post. Sadly Business is business.

[(PSN)Romulus93]

My 3.8-ish стотинки(home country's currency):

1 and 2 design choices: it's in beta. Subject to major changes. Fact is that some people already have more focus than they should for and long term goal. Honestly, I have ONLY like 8k focus and I don't think that will make the game less interesting. In fact the opposite: I see it as a LONG TERM goal.

Change 3: Mesa's supposed nerf makes her more interesting than before. Now you Actually have to play... Wow... Imagine doing that.

Change 4: if you mean the LineOfSight, yeah I agree that sucks. If you mean the " I pull for myself" I'm kinda okay with that. Made press 4 to win frames ACTUALLY MOVE and play the game. On the other hand that augment is kinda! useless now. In short: mag needs a rework but this is a whole new discussion.

Can't say anything on 5 cause you have to be more specific.

Proposed changes of yours:

Change 1: IT SHOULD BE A LONG TIME GOAL. Daily caps are a bandaid, the focus should be something harder to get than just kills and affinity IMO.

Change 2: it's in beta and Steve said on Twitter that it's being worked on.

Change 3:Hopefully some improvement in the future. As I said, it's in beta.

Change 4: so you want to have everything I in less than a week? And by everything I do mean everything from all 6 syndicates.

Change 5: so... You mean make it easier (reduce cost) but make it harder (increase ammount==cost) ? Wat? Be more clear on that.

From what I read, you are to impatient.

I Find DE's choices okay-ish.

Alertium, daily caps, raid cooldowns are not meant for impatient people. They are intended to prevent doing everything there is to do in a matter of weeks.

Platinum is made for impatient people. The "get now" button. DE are great at providing actually free content to everyone. That luxury comes at the price of grind-times. You can easily choose: time+nerves or money. You do realize that if things were easy to get(no time walls, less grind, less if no RNG) people will mostly pay for lesser stuff like cosmetics. Not to mention that the ingame trading would be devastated because the people with platinum will buy it for cosmetics/slots/potatoes and not have more to go to the ones that can't spend real money for plat but have the time.

In short: high supply - low demand will actually discourage people that can't buy plat. If it wasn't for trading I wouldn't have lasted a year. And with me a lot of other players. Players that could have potentially spent thousands of plat that would have otherwise never be introduced to the economy.

Gawd, I'm tired and TypingUI(as in DUI). This is much longer that I thought I'd write. I'll end here.

It's not impatience that drives the general rng/grind dislike but the player choice of play being taken away. 

 

I gawked at the quickly introduced cap because there was no way in hell that I'd reach 75k in a day and that they took that choice away from me anyways. It's the principle. 

 

Let people grind at their own pace. My love for the game keeps me playing but I want to grind with a purpose. I grind until I reach the cap then I become discouraged and feel like my time is wasted. What's the point in playing if there are no accomplishments to be had?

 

I don't want to take any choice from the player on how they want to play. People want a sense of worthiness for their time. I and many others love the game so much that we want to put in more time and play but we want to make sure there are still rewards. What reward is there when we've reached the cap?

 

The game turns sour when you no longer receive any accomplishments for your gameplay.

Edited December 9, 2015 by (PS4)Romulus93

[(PSN)Romulus93]

Would you rather grind 100 min. for X or grind 20 min. for Y chance at X?

[(PSN)RocketPunch1221]

> Platinum is made for impatient people. The "get now" button...

No, platinum are there so the guys that developed the game can feed their children.

[(PSN)Romulus93]

> Platinum is made for impatient people. The "get now" button...

No, platinum are there so the guys that developed the game can feed their children.

It's not up to the players to worry about that.

[MumblesMcphatty]

It's not up to the players to worry about that.

Just because you're clearly selfish and entitled doesn't mean we all are. Don't make claims on behalf of the entire playerbase when your views are so blatantly myopic.

[Volinus7]

"Analysis" ? Where?

Crucial part of this business is to keep optimal amount of players on servers at all time.

[Vali]

It's not up to the players to worry about that.

 

I almost thought this topic had some value to it, sadly this comment above states otherwise.

 

We can't expect a game with complete freedom of choice since its completely free to play with constant updates. Warframe already has one of the best free to play designs I've ever experienced, unlike most MMOs which have a hefty paywall which locks so much content.

 

You're being too greedy with your opinion, we already have it better than most MMOs, why ask for more?

[(XBOX)Grihaly]

The Focus caps don't affect me, because I don't care about it, nor do I use it.

[Hypernaut1]

the focus and rep cap are there for people that game the system to earn 75k with minimal effort.

 

They cant stop players gaining 75k rep in one mission, but they can stop those players from maxing the tree in few hours or flooding the market with easily earned syndicate weapons/mods. Sure they could go back in and try to limit stealth gain, accumulated gain, and a whole host of other systems to not make XP exploitable or they could just easily make a cap and worry about more important things, while not hindering people that do enjoy hitting the cap in 20 minutes or playing "normally".  

 

What some of you salty people don't realise is that the cap is there so they DONT have to mess too heavily with XP mechanics because of exploiters. They dont want to have to nerf stealth gains for the average player just because a few Lokis can game the system and easily stealth an entire level. They dont want to make gaining affinity MORE difficult to accumulate because a few min/maxer know how to turn a 30k XP run into a 100k run.

Edited December 30, 2015 by Hypernaut1

[(PSN)Romulus93]

I almost thought this topic had some value to it, sadly this comment above states otherwise.

 

We can't expect a game with complete freedom of choice since its completely free to play with constant updates. Warframe already has one of the best free to play designs I've ever experienced, unlike most MMOs which have a hefty paywall which locks so much content.

 

You're being too greedy with your opinion, we already have it better than most MMOs, why ask for more?

Perfection is never a goal to be reached but a goal to strive for. This game is good but it's far from great and there are some things that drag it down. There exists a sweet spot between the grind and enjoyability. Warframe hasn't reached that spot according to other threads and people across the forums. The dissent is on what, if anything, can be done to improve and there is always space for improvement.

the focus and rep cap are there for people that game the system to earn 75k with minimal effort.

 

They cant stop players gaining 75k rep in one mission, but they can stop those players from maxing the tree in few hours or flooding the market with easily earned syndicate weapons/mods. Sure they could go back in and try to limit stealth gain, accumulated gain, and a whole host of other systems to not make XP exploitable or they could just easily make a cap and worry about more important things, while not hindering people that do enjoy hitting the cap in 20 minutes or playing "normally".  

 

What some of you salty people don't realise is that the cap is there so they DONT have to mess too heavily with XP mechanics because of exploiters. They dont want to have to nerf stealth gains for the average player just because a few Lokis can game the system and easily stealth an entire level. They dont want to make gaining affinity MORE difficult to accumulate because a few min/maxer know how to turn a 30k XP run into a 100k run.

Why limit the players that want to spend a few hours to max everything? I sure as hell can't do that nor have the time but I'm not going to put a limit on those that want to.