Making Stances More Immersive

[bejuizb]

Hey everyone,

 

I just wished to provide some feedback regarding the Stance system that was introduced with melee 2.0 and how it's affected my personal experience when it comes to melee combat in Warframe.

 

The concept of stances is definitely good. Allowing players to pick and choose from a collection of movesets with different intents is great and I feel like it helps broaden melee weapon diversity in the game, as certain players might favour a particular stance on a particular weapon over others. All in all, it's a great fundamental step in the right direction compared to the boring melee system of old.

 

And then comes my primary gripe with the system: The acquisition of said stances. Most of the time I've used a melee weapon in Warframe, I've spent more time searching for the stance than I spent playing with the weapon and getting it to maximum rank. I don't like rushing my weapon levels, so it's quite a lot of time invested into simply obtaining something crucial to the melee experience. Without stances, I find melee weapons to be usable of course, but they lack the flair and fun factor that the stances provide.

 

During its conception, this idea of making Stances mods that players had to acquire might have made some sense, but mostly because during the start of Melee 2.0's implementation, Warframe didn't have nearly as many "classes" of melee weapons. We currently have 42 stances, spread across 21, I repeat, 21 different melee weapon classes. What we've been experiencing for the latter half of 2015 is most of the newly released mods being tremendously rare drops, while also being the only stance mod for that particular weapon class. Most of my experience with melee 2.0, at least with melee weapons after the Venka, have been done without the stances because of the low chances of actually acquiring them without burning myself out from grinding.

 

This to me, is a big mistake and the community as a whole is losing out. Such a crucial part of Warframe's melee experience should not be locked away behind RNG and grinding, but should serve as a way for allowing players to enjoy the content. Without a stance, a melee weapon only has the generic E button mash. With stances, players can choose how they want to fight and execute combos, and simply putting it all behind RNG is doing no good for a system that's already struggling to compete with gunplay and powercreep, but I digress.

 

A Possible Solution

 

Please note: this most probably isn't an ideal solution but I'd like to use this idea as a springboard to promote discussion.

 

Allowing players to have stances pre-installed in their melee weapons upon acquisition would alleviate all the monotony and grind associated with that stance. While unranked, players only have access to the basic E spam combo, similar to if the weapon did not have a stance. As the player gained levels with their melee weapon, they would unlock more combos for that stance, with a full set of combos available around levels 20 to 25. This would encourage players to take the time to learn different combos while they are leveling the weapon and alllow a sense of progression when they actually do start noticing different potential moves they can execute as they get better at using the weapons. With weapon classes that have multiple stances, all tiers of combos would be unlocked at level checkpoints.

 

Let's assume a weapon has Stance A  that has combo x, y, and z, and Stance B that has combo p, q, and r. If a player reaches level 5 with a melee weapon, they could unlock both combo x in Stance A and combo p in Stance B. This might not be ideal, but I welcome any suggestions to improve my feedback.

 

With regards to how equipping different stances would work, I propose having a system similar to the animation set interface we have with Warframes, and allowing players to simply swap the stances in there. Warframes have their Agile and Noble Stances, and while they don't impact the gameplay for players, it does allow them to visually fit their vision of their frame. Having a similar system for melee stances would allow players to switch stances when they want to change up their playstyles. This would alleviate player fatigue from stance grinding, and allow the developers to successfully implement as many weapon classes and stances as they want, without having to dilute drop tables.

 

All constructive criticism is greatly appreciated. Please note, I only intend to provide feedback to improve player quality of life while using melee in Warframe and this to me is a fundamental issue.

Edited December 31, 2015 by BattleBrows

[AdunSaveMe]

Pick the stance with the highest damage combo, ignore the rest, never have to earn them.

 

Sounds a bit rubbish. Especially since, if I'm reading this right, you have to level up weapons to rank up the stance to use it on other weapons, which is worse than just having it as a mod.

[(PSN)MoRockaPDX]

Yup, always room for improvement. Not opposed to your proposal, or DE could increase drop rates for stances. Make them just a different drop percentage because of their use case.

[EDeN153]

Sounds a bit rubbish. Especially since, if I'm reading this right, you have to level up weapons to rank up the stance to use it on other weapons, which is worse than just having it as a mod.

Ahh! I have to actually use the weapon in order to make it stronger! What is the world coming to?

[AdunSaveMe]

Ahh! I have to actually use the weapon in order to make it stronger! What is the world coming to?

Way to completely miss my point.

[EDeN153]

Way to completely miss my point.

Could you clarify then, to clear up any miscommunication.

[AdunSaveMe]

Could you clarify then, to clear up any miscommunication.

Having stances as swappable mods with their own separate rank (consistent with other mods that increase power) is superior to having a stance tied to a single weapon, which forces you to use a weapon you don't enjoy using and will never use again once you have that stance.

 

Better?

[bejuizb]

Having stances as swappable mods with their own separate rank (consistent with other mods that increase power) is superior to having a stance tied to a single weapon, which forces you to use a weapon you don't enjoy using and will never use again once you have that stance.

 

Better?

You don't have to do anything of that sort though.

 

Once you get a weapon, you have all the possible stances available for it. Depending on your weapon's rank, you have access to stronger combos. If you use a different weapon, you still have the stances. You don't lose anything.

[EDeN153]

I've discussed this topic with the op a few times before, and I'm almost 100% certain that he means every stance is available to each corresponding weapon of that class, not just specific weapons of a class.

[Magneu]

I'd personally love to be able to swap stances in mission; would essentially give each weapon upwards of eight or nine different combos to use.

 

Granted, there would have to be serious requirements to obtain said stances. But I would prefer that to grinding and hoping against hope you get the mod you want, or shelling out lots of plat.

[manub]

Frankly stance drop rate has never been my issue

It's annoying I agree but still not that bad (except for one or two of them: revenant, dervish...)

My biggest problem with the system is that except if you go pure melee vs infested or by giving yourself a challenge vs other factions nobody really can use them

the transition between melee & range combat is too clunky to switch fast & smoothly. That's my biggest concern. Most players I know don't even try & use the basic unequipped melee attack when they need it

the fact that we can't use the combos if not in sword alone mode never made sense to me. If I had one change to ask for it would only be to do away partially with this switch melee/range system, with combos available when range weapon equipped without multiplier & sword alone mode with better (even slightly OP) bonuses/multiplier.

that way the basic melee would become more fun & those going sword alone would be rewarded & more viable for higher content stuff

[bejuizb]

Frankly stance drop rate has never been my issue

It's annoying I agree but still not that bad (except for one or two of them: revenant, dervish...)

My biggest problem with the system is that except if you go pure melee vs infested or by giving yourself a challenge vs other factions nobody really can use them

the transition between melee & range combat is too clunky to switch fast & smoothly. That's my biggest concern. Most players I know don't even try & use the basic unequipped melee attack when they need it

the fact that we can't use the combos if not in sword alone mode never made sense to me. If I had one change to ask for it would only be to do away partially with this switch melee/range system, with combos available when range weapon equipped without multiplier & sword alone mode with better (even slightly OP) bonuses/multiplier.

that way the basic melee would become more fun & those going sword alone would be rewarded & more viable for higher content stuff

That's one of the problems of RNG. I still haven't gotten most of the stances since the Venka got released. From speaking to people, it's pure luck whether you get the stance or not, and that to me isn't a fun mechanic.

 

What you bring up is definitely an interesting point. I agree that melee and ranged combat and switching between them especially, can be very clunky and non beneficial.

[bejuizb]

I'd personally love to be able to swap stances in mission; would essentially give each weapon upwards of eight or nine different combos to use.

 

Granted, there would have to be serious requirements to obtain said stances. But I would prefer that to grinding and hoping against hope you get the mod you want, or shelling out lots of plat.

I can definitely see the appeal in being able to swap stances on the fly. In my head, I was seeing the stances as potentially being the three stance system that players have in Mortal Kombat X, where you pick a stance prior to a mission and stick with it till the end. Do you have any ideas on what these requirements could be?