Forced Into Solo Play – But Solo Play Is Impossible

[Xylia]

RE:Enot83:

 

I could live with reduced mods and materials, as long as you didn't screw with the chances to drop materials.

 

What I mean is some materials are a bit ridiculous to get already (attempting to get a Control Module off of anything other than Hyena for example).

 

The chances to get materials should be left alone, but in all non-rare materials, you could get reduced materials, sure. maybe -30% or something. Instead of getting 120 nano spores, you get 80 instead. Instead of 24 rubedo, maybe that particular mob only dropped 16.

 

You can still make some progress, without spending revives or barely surviving missions if you're having trouble trying to get a weapon.

 

Some of these are just a little too hard to get for newbie players. If a newbie player wants a new Warframe, they are pretty much FORCED to go kill J3-Golem and Hyena at the very least.

[Xylia]

Gallium comes from Mars and Uranus, and just like every other rare material, the best place to farm it is at the boss of said planets. You can make a weapon for specifically dealing with the Infected by the third planet, and at the least you only need to fight Mercury's boss(Vor) for Morphics(Dual Heat).

 

Yeah, I did the entirety of Mars and never saw 1 Gallium.

 

Got 80% of the way through Uranus and finally my first Gallium dropped. That one, I had to use on a Potato.

 

lol.

 

And Dual Heat? They are "OK" for Infested but they are kinda meh. I see a lot of people bringing Heavies (Scindo, etc) and spamming Jump Attacks with Cold Mods.

 

Either that, or a Boar/Strun. Take your pick.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Xylia

[Sada_no_Fujin]

....Why did you spend 400 and not get the grand masters pack?

I'm not going to be rash and say its yo i'm going to be civil and say it is probably your gear. Honestly i don't think warframe takes any extreme amount of skill to be good at. Its sort of like a 3rd person RPG. you get better gear, you rank up, poof. your better.

[Xylia]

Also for solo.....

 

I hate trying to level melee weapons in solo.

 

I remember trying to max out my Skana before selling it.

 

I'd do entire maps using nothing but the Skana in Mercury and I'd come out of it with something stupid like 1800 xp or something.

 

That'll only take 20+ more missions to do. Ugh.

[Xylia]

....Why did you spend 400 and not get the grand masters pack?

I'm not going to be rash and say its yo i'm going to be civil and say it is probably your gear. Honestly i don't think warframe takes any extreme amount of skill to be good at. Its sort of like a 3rd person RPG. you get better gear, you rank up, poof. your better.

 

Most of the focus of the game is on the Mods System.

 

Other than buying Mod Packs.... there's no "Get Powerful Quick" ticket. You can buy yourself a Rhino, a Hek, a Gorgon, etc and you won't be very uber at all until THE important mods you need, drop. And even THEN, you have to Rank the mods up, too! This takes MORE mods and/or mod cores along with credits (most of which you probably blew on new weapons ASAP).

 

It took me until I had Lv30 Excalibur and Lv10 Rhino before my first Redirection dropped.

 

Yup, that's right. I didn't get Redirection until at least 20 hours into the game. Without the rarer mods like Multishot, Streamline, Flow, Continuity, etc, your Warframe experience will be subpar.

 

Mods are THAT important.

 

I think they are TOO important, IMO.

 

Low Mods = You're an absolute wimp and your equipment level means nothing if you don't have the mods to fill those slots with. This means newbies are throwing junk like crit+ because that's all they have on them at the time (read another thread about a guy who thinks weapon levels are useless for this same reason).

 

I think a lot of these uber people are forgetting what the first few weeks of a new player's life are like, OR, they did it before the new mod system went live. They don't seem to remember/realize that when you first start the game, you are an absolute wimp who keels over the moment anything touches you once you get past Mercury.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Xylia

[Sada_no_Fujin]

Also for solo.....

 

I hate trying to level melee weapons in solo.

 

I remember trying to max out my Skana before selling it.

Made it to rank 14 with it myself. Never bothering with it again. No patience for the beginning gear. I find however i mostly solo, and i only use melee weapons.

[Sada_no_Fujin]

Most of the focus of the game is on the Mods System.

 

Other than buying Mod Packs.... there's no "Get Powerful Quick" ticket. You can buy yourself a Rhino, a Hek, a Gorgon, etc and you won't be very uber at all until THE important mods you need, drop. And even THEN, you have to Rank the mods up, too! This takes MORE mods and/or mod cores along with credits (most of which you probably blew on new weapons ASAP).

 

It took me until I had Lv30 Excalibur and Lv10 Rhino before my first Redirection dropped.

 

Yup, that's right. I didn't get Redirection until at least 20 hours into the game. Without the rarer mods like Multishot, Streamline, Flow, Continuity, etc, your Warframe experience will be subpar.

 

Mods are THAT important.

 

I think they are TOO important, IMO.

 

Low Mods = You're an absolute wimp and your equipment level means nothing if you don't have the mods to fill those slots with. This means newbies are throwing junk like crit+ because that's all they have on them at the time (read another thread about a guy who thinks weapon levels are useless for this same reason).

You know, my first redirection didn't drop till my second week playing. I think my excal was rank 15 or so. After that they dropped by the dozen. Its rigged i say.

I guess you could buy the dragon mod packs. if your that kind of guy...

[Xylia]

Made it to rank 14 with it myself. Never bothering with it again. No patience for the beginning gear. I find however i mostly solo, and i only use melee weapons.

 

See, the thing is, the Dojo Weapons take Rank7+.

 

I don't really want to sell anything unless its Lv30 because Mastery is a limited resource and I don't want to waste potential Mastery points. So I ain't selling that Skana until it is 30.

 

I need to equip it and go into groups and just.... not use any melee and hope I run into some maniac with a Scindo or something and I can leech XP off of him.

[Xylia]

You know, my first redirection didn't drop till my second week playing. I think my excal was rank 15 or so. After that they dropped by the dozen. Its rigged i say.

I guess you could buy the dragon mod packs. if your that kind of guy...

 

I got my one-and-only Split Chamber a couple weeks ago, ~10 game hours ago.

 

I have 116 hours playtime according to Steam.

 

So.........yeah.

[Ghobe]

Xylia. I have 71 hours played(a decent chunk is probably idle too), I joined after update 7. If you're including me in your assessment of "these players don't get how hard it is for new players", you're including me in the wrong batch, bro. I've never gotten a split chamber xP

 

 

 

And Dual Heat? They are "OK" for Infested but they are kinda meh. I see a lot of people bringing Heavies (Scindo, etc) and spamming Jump Attacks with Cold Mods.

lol I foamed at the mouth the first time I did a charge attack on a pack of infected with it. I was expecting "oh I'll have to do it 2 or 3 times like the skana, but at least it's aoe" and then I did that charge attack and all that remained was blood and guts. I didn't even have Killing Blow back then either xP

 

As for leveling, Ruk(Tethys on Saturn) makes for decent exp runs(3.5-10k) up until your double digit levels when it really starts to slow down, but by that point you should have enough mod capacity to put over 100% total damage bonus on your weapon(Serration 2, Piercing 5 is a total of 15 capacity for +132% damage for example) and thus you can begin running the real exp makers, mobile defense missions. Though you'll still want to stick to the 20-30 range(Kappa on Sedna for example) where you should be able to turn 8-25k exp a run depending on your team's preference.

 

And although leveling the Skana sucks, remember, the sliding cut is an aoe ;)

Edited June 14, 2013 by Ghobe

[Xylia]

I wasn't grouping anyone in particular in anything, its just I hear that whole "Its easy!" thing coming from so many people, but yet people seem to forget how much it sucks to be a newbie, with no connections, trying to hack it out without some of the necessary mods to make things a lot smoother.

[Enot83]

RE:Enot83:

 

I could live with reduced mods and materials, as long as you didn't screw with the chances to drop materials.

 

What I mean is some materials are a bit ridiculous to get already (attempting to get a Control Module off of anything other than Hyena for example).

 

The chances to get materials should be left alone, but in all non-rare materials, you could get reduced materials, sure. maybe -30% or something. Instead of getting 120 nano spores, you get 80 instead. Instead of 24 rubedo, maybe that particular mob only dropped 16.

 

You can still make some progress, without spending revives or barely surviving missions if you're having trouble trying to get a weapon.

 

Some of these are just a little too hard to get for newbie players. If a newbie player wants a new Warframe, they are pretty much FORCED to go kill J3-Golem and Hyena at the very least.

If you're stating the Hyena in this would still be equal to his current state even with a lowered difficulty for the rest of the level, it would on the surface make sense that, drop rates should be similar.  However, if you are able to move through the level more easily due to the lowered difficulty, you will be able to reach and kill the boss more quickly.  Where the reduction for normal drops would be X, if the boss retained his same level of difficulty, then rather than a reduction by X value it could perhaps be reduced by X/2, the numbers are less important at this point of the discussion.  The point is, reducing difficulty should not allow you to do anything but unlock planets more quickly, and gaining any and all others things should be reduced so that even the most skilled player can not lower the difficulty setting and get more by playing on easy and just doing it quickly.  That is my point of the reduction, in addition to that it would make playing on easy difficulty serve one purpose of allowing those who struggle with the current setting a way to simply go through the game, but in no one gain more than they would on the current setting, otherwise, we're just making the game easier and potentially exploitable by those of us who find the current difficulty to already be too easy.

 

This also has a great impact on events like the moa one, and all of this needs to be taken into consideration.  Since as stated before, you could simply do some of the easier missions more often till you improve your skill and mods/weapons/warframe etc before proceeding when you find that you current equipment and skill have slowed your progression.

 

The way I see it is you are asking the game to be changed to accommodate a struggle among a none majority, (I would love to have some good figures on how much of the player base truly can not complete the game, even with proper modding and weapon use etc), that you can already do by a change of mindset and expectation by going back and playing more on the easier levels to improve yourself.  As such, there should be absolutely no impact on those who do not find the game to be difficult by any of these changes or give any edge other than the unlocking of planets.

 

The mindset I speak of, in which a player goes back to lower level areas to work on their skills should always reward the player better than opting for an easier time.

 

 

I wasn't grouping anyone in particular in anything, its just I hear that whole "Its easy!" thing coming from so many people, but yet people seem to forget how much it sucks to be a newbie, with no connections, trying to hack it out without some of the necessary mods to make things a lot smoother.

I found the game to be easy and intuitive when I began and was in this situation of no connections, it took some farming in the right areas, and the game has gotten easier to get things since that change.

 

Now I think I've been clear that I don't want to make it unnecessarily hard for those who are more casual or none "hard core" etc, but there should be no adverse affect for making an accommodation to make the game easier.  Otherwise the game will be diminished in quality rather than enhanced.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Enot83

[Xylia]

If you're stating the Hyena in this would still be equal to his current state even with a lowered difficulty for the rest of the level, it would on the surface make sense that, drop rates should be similar.  However, if you are able to move through the level more easily due to the lowered difficulty, you will be able to reach and kill the boss more quickly.  Where the reduction for normal drops would be X, if the boss retained his same level of difficulty, then rather than a reduction by X value it could perhaps be reduced by X/2, the numbers are less important at this point of the discussion.  The point is, reducing difficulty should not allow you to do anything but unlock planets more quickly, and gaining any and all others things should be reduced so that even the most skilled player can not lower the difficulty setting and get more by playing on easy and just doing it quickly.  That is my point of the reduction, in addition to that it would make playing on easy difficulty serve one purpose of allowing those who struggle with the current setting a way to simply go through the game, but in no one gain more than they would on the current setting, otherwise, we're just making the game easier and potentially exploitable by those of us who find the current difficulty to already be too easy.

 

Or, we could scale the Solo Difficulty by the Mod Collection Rating.

 

First, we'd have to modify the Mod Collection Score to be smarter. It doesn't appear to be very smart (it counts mods and ranks, but I can't really see any actual formula). It sound build a list of "Must-Have" mods to actually succeed at solo. Things like Redirection, Warframe Powers on Rank3, etc.

 

That, and it sound count Warframes.

 

IMO, if you only have 1 Warframe, Hyena and J3 should drop the Control Module and Neural Sensor 100% on the first drop only (kinda like the Cronus Blueprint).

 

This guarantees that a player can make the Warframe of their choice without having to farm for hours and hours and hours. Anybody who does any Research is going to want Rhino for their soloing needs, right? Because he is just an awesome soloist.

 

My point is.... J3 Golem and Hyena both are.... not very good Solo-Friendly bosses, ESPECIALLY J3. His Poison Clouds are absolutely wicked and newbie players aren't likely going to have the type of skill to not only survive up to him but also kill him if they ever want to build their first Warframe.

 

But you are pretty much forced to go kill him if you ever want to see a Neural Sensor anytime soon.

 

This is, of course, another reason why Control Modules and Neural Sensors should be sold for credits, too. 50k creds a piece even. That way, newbies could get their Rhino BPs, farm up the creds, and build him without having to worry about Hyena and J3.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Xylia

[Ghobe]

I wasn't grouping anyone in particular in anything, its just I hear that whole "Its easy!" thing coming from so many people, but yet people seem to forget how much it sucks to be a newbie, with no connections, trying to hack it out without some of the necessary mods to make things a lot smoother.

I think the "its easy" attitude comes from 2 things. 1) the bosses are all pretty simple and straight forward and 2) there isn't really a brick wall in the game that allows for players to shine if they are actually good at the game. The players calling the game easy, are probably in the same boat I am...nothing in this game has challenged me too hard in solo and the multiplayer has been an absolute joke to the point that I don't even need to know the boss' mechanics to bring it down(Lech Kril, though I do now, point remains).

 

 

EDIT: Post came in as I posted mine xP

This is, of course, another reason why Control Modules and Neural Sensors should be sold for credits, too. 50k creds a piece even. That way, newbies could get their Rhino BPs, farm up the creds, and build him without having to worry about Hyena and J3.

I think the better solution would be to increase chances to drop rare materials outside of boss battles. Something similar to what I posted here for example.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Ghobe

[Xylia]

Your suggestion needs work. Without killing a boss, your drop rates are worse than current drop rates in your average non-rushed mission (assuming ~150 kills).

 

The idea has potential, but it needs work.

Edited June 14, 2013 by Xylia

[Ghobe]

Your suggestion needs work. Without killing a boss, your drop rates are worse than current drop rates in your average non-rushed mission (assuming ~150 kills).

 

The idea has potential, but it needs work.

Numbers can always be tweaked, it's more about the mechanic.

[SlyBoots]

I do have mods with ice/electrical as I too have found anything to slow down/freeze the foes is crucial.  

 

I WANT to use my Volt (30) Gorgon (just hit 30 - so this may get swapped) Lex (28) and Furax (27).

 

let's break it down:

 

don't ever use electrical damage mods against infested, you have to use fire damage mods (regular damage and armor piercing damage should be on every weapon, even ranking your freeze damage mod is better than the addition of electrical damage against infested).

http://warframe.wikia.com/wiki/Charger

http://warframe.wikia.com/wiki/Runner

don't use armor ignoring/blunt (single target) melee weapons (fists, daggers and staffs, hammer - hammer can work though due to big area of effect) against infested, use multi-target, slashing weapons (dual/heavy swords, axes, scythes and polearms).

http://warframe.wikia.com/wiki/Weapon_Types

don't use sniping weapons against the infested swarm (except dread bow), use shotguns or something with a reasonable fire rate.

 

volt against infested is very much possible but you gotta have reliable weapons + mods - heck - you can probably make the lex work more or less (if your aim is good and you have enough fire damage to one-shot the regular mobs...) even the fang daggers can be made to work against infested but for furax i just don't see a way (maaaaaybe with loki/ash and liberal use of the jump attack or some pro-blocking skills). check the wiki as a broad orientation about your enemies' vulnerabilities and resistances - mod accordingly.

 

if you insist on using furax and lex, simply fight grineer and corpus.

Edited June 14, 2013 by SlyBoots

[fatpig84]

Infested use melee.

Don't even waste your bullets unless it is toxic ancients or there are like a sh1ton of ancients coming.

[Saint_Tan]

@ Varo_Sanumai

 

$99.99 Founder (Master Level)

$199.99 Trinity Platinum Pack (3 Rare Mods and Platinum)

$79.99 (discounted) Twain Platinum Pack (Daily reward popped up a 20% off – so I caved in).

Grand Total (to date): $379.97

 

Hence: “Near $400”

 

Yes, that is an embarrassing amount of money to spend on a “free” game (especially in this economy…) However, I was happy to pay it (and a little drunk when that 20% off popped up!) not to mention the hours of enjoyment this game has provided me (us).  So I guess I will rationalize it by saying:

 

If you are reading this post, then you are most likely a fan/player of the Warframe, and my contribution has been put into the pot to help DE make us a better game – hence WE ALL WIN (on my dime)!  Yea!

 

BTW – thanks to everyone else who has donated even a dollar to help promote this game!  As I player (not a developer) I do appreciate it!

 

@All

 

I understand the replies about my choices of warframes and load outs.  I will have to adjust.  I just hate that this game may be suffering from the Street Fighter Syndrome:

 

If your best (or only) bet to beat the game is with Ryo or Ken, they why even make the other 30+ characters? 

 

And if I start an online game with the hopes/dependency that others will join in soon, then I’m gonna take my (whimsical) preferred load out verses the “I’m in here alone” load out.  Problem is, there is no way to know what the player rate will be before hand. 

 

So again, scaling to the current player count would be nice.  Not saying I want to cheese this game and make it too easy for others who don’t require this.  But I also don’t want to go down in flames every time I’m left to go it alone on Pluto.

 

Maybe even an ‘on the fly’ scale, that would acknowledge: Hmm…this guy just had to use 2 revives inside of 60 seconds, maybe we should drop the enemy intensity a bit.

 

Anyway, I am still totally enjoying the ride of playing the levels, so maybe I will just dodge Pluto and above for now.  Though I don’t have mad skills, I’d like to think I’m not a total lame-o on FPS or 3^rd person either.  Guess I just hit my skill ceiling on this for the moment…

[DemonicKnight786]

I actually like the difficulty O.O

[Ghobe]

I understand the replies about my choices of warframes and load outs.  I will have to adjust.  I just hate that this game may be suffering from the Street Fighter Syndrome:

 

If your best (or only) bet to beat the game is with Ryo or Ken, they why even make the other 30+ characters?

That analogy would only be correct if you were choosing one weapon and only using that weapon, but you're not. A better analogy would be to a game along the lines of MvC where you choose a team of 3 to fight, and even there, you want certain strengths to be covered by various picks(for example, you wouldn't want 3 guys that are all good at aerial combat but aren't that great at ground/range/launch/bounce type mechanics). Your choices aren't bad on the individual level, they just all have the same strength as well as the same weakness, and that weakness is currently murdering you. You can use all the weapons in the game, just make sure your load-out covers the basic weaknesses on the overall, every weapon doesn't need to cover them all.

[lycheeranger]

When dealing with infested I usually grab a heavy melee with fire mods then just jump around hitting e

That jump smash is a life saver against mobs and with the right mods is a hella nice cc tool

[Countess_Hapmuhr]

This is a real issue. I am surprised at the amount of ignorant posts in reply to this thread, mostly stating 'Oh it's easy for me.' Yea? Post a video or gtfo. Eitherway, learn that varying people have varying playstyles.

But meanwhile, since they have not addressed it, let's see if my way of playing helps you.

Get Energy Siphon.

Get your 100 point skill.

Get Ghost on your Sentinel.

 

 

#1) Get to high ground with a something in front of you, Infested have issues climbing up things.

 

#2) Wait for power to recharge till over 100.

 

#3) Shoot at mobs that you see running away or in a distance, to get their attention.

 

#4) Jump out of the spot, get them all nice and close.

 

#5) 100 point skill.

 

#6) Profit.

 

#7) Go to next map, cloak will allow you to find a nice place to repeat the process.

 

 

 

Now this only works with warframes with AOE 100 point skills that do over 1000 damage, it's a process that gets boring quickly but it gets the job done. Usually I use it when someone decides to leave everything to me (eg, leave game). Just ...if you run into something with more than 1000hp, be prepared to have at least 200 energy.

 

 

 

Still, I agree. Scaling needs to be there. I rermember my first fight on Terminus, I ran out of bullets so quickly.

 

 

Why even play the game if you're going to keep cheesing it like this? The harder and more rewarding way is to learn who your enemies are and gear up according to that. The only time you can equip a "set and forget" loadout is when you've got team members backing you up and that's because they're packing what you aren't. (and vice versa)

 

The problem that I'm seeing with newbies is that they're trying to progress too quickly without properly leveling their gear first. I wouldn't set my foot on Pluto without good leveled gear on my own, because I know that place is a death-trap in that case. Single player is harder, because you're lacking people to revive you, so that's one major disadvantage right there. So rather than making the game into easy mode faceroll academy, I would recommend that players educate themselves using the wiki and tooltips for weapons.

[yiN_]

The levels are clearly NOT set to scale the difficulty to the number of players currently in game

Agreed, It's too easy when you are with friends.

Edited June 14, 2013 by yiN_

[Estred]

I back what many other have said. Examine what your faction is weak against.

 

Grineer: Armor Pen

Corpus: Electric

Infested: Fire

 

Also many melees offer X3 damage to Light-Infested (Charger/Leaper/Runner). Your Gorgon is more an Elite/Boss muncher. I can solo Eris on my level 5 Warframe (Nyx) with only Chaos and Mind Control each at rank 2. I used a level 8 Paris with Armor Pen and level 2 Serration. A level 10 Kunai modded for 40% Hornet Strike and Convulsion. A Cold-Modded Fang with Fury of all things... I still beat the mission. I had to be careful. I had to gauge my fights. I had to run from Chargers for hallways on end while I picked them off.

 

I don't think the game is too hard, I think you are using an improper load out for your mission. This is why it's good to have multiple weapons that you use, or mod out your weakness. Add Fire-Damage to your Gorgon and it will fair better against Infested, though still poorly against Trash.