Stealth Still Suffering From Many Issues

[Shamse]

It seems that Warframe is restricting the stealth aspect to certain Frames, which doesn't make much sense considering the game markets ALL the frames as space ninjas, but whatever.

 

However, even if it wasn't, there is a fundamental problem that's ruining this games stealth aspect, and it's the same problem that ruins many other stealth games- the enemy AI is too unpredictable.

 

There are times where you swear you could do the Carlton in front of their faces and they wouldn't notice you. Then there are times where there's 30 feet of crap between you and the enemy and then "THEY'VE SPOTTED YOU, GET READY FOR A FIGHT!" I might be exaggerating, but the enemy AI makes almost no god damn sense sometimes!

 

The first problem is the movement. Trying to understand where the enemy is going can be a total gamble. They're moving in your direction, but then they snap 150 degrees to the right to walk into the wall. There are even times when you're following behind them to grab a stealth kill, and before you see that "E" float behind them, they start rotating at 500rpm back in your direction, and you know it's too late. 

 

The easiest way to fix these issues are to create set paths for the enemies to follow. Create fixed patterns for certain rooms to have, that way you always know a trick or two to use. Now, don't make every enemy follow that path, then it'd just get boring. Instead, have multiple fixed paths that the enemy can transition into, and have an RNG mix each enemy a patrol route out of the predetermined lines. This way, every play session has a different pattern to face, but can still be deduced.

 

As for the snapping movements, create animations for things like turning around or transitioning through patrol routes. Make them slow and still subject to stealth kills, that way if you're too close, it's not too late to take him down without anyone noticing. 

 

Another problem with stealth atm is the lack of options you have, and the risk of each of these options- all you can do is wait on an enemy to make distance between him and an ally so that his death goes unnoticed. If an enemy is killed too close to another, they instantly know where you are (god knows HOW), and everyone is alerted and the alarms are rung and, "THEY SPOTTED YOU, GET READY FOR A FIGHT!"-- If you manage to kill someone without anyone noticing but someone finds their body, the enemies immediately get SONAR HEARING and will spot you from across the map, and considering how many mobs there usually are in a room, that basically means "THEY SPOTTED YOU, GET READY FOR--" yeah, its a problem. Topple with with the fact that if one enemy sees you, all the mobs in the room immediately kno-- "THEY SPOTTED YOU, GE--"

 

What we need is some sort of distraction mechanic, or something to lure the enemy out of the pack. Perhaps hitting things in the room, or shooting a gun somewhere and have the mobs rush to that location. Waiting on the opportune moment to strike cannot be the only option we have, that is dull, repetitive, and even will cause players to get risky just to speed things up.

 

Also, the way enemies are alerted of your presence needs to be drastically simmered down, to the point where once an  enemy sees you, they won't trigger the alarm, but rather rush to take you out, or check if it was just their eyes. You joked about doing the metal gear solid thing with the "?" appearing above their heads- that's a GREAT idea, MGS has always been known for it's stealth mechanics! You could even perhaps add in some dialogue of enemies muttering to themselves of what they just saw, things like "Did you see that...?" or "Woah, what the...?". And do away with the super-agro you get from having enemies see a body. Instead, give only that enemy an increased awareness, and make him go from enemy to enemy to spread it. That way, you can take out those who know too much ;)

 

So their you have it, my thoughts on how stealth can be improved. I know, it's long, and there's no way for me to TL;DR it, so just skip the post if you dont wanna read the whole thing. I do very much hope the dev's get something out of this, I am NOT a game designer, I'm NOT a games journalist, I just have a passion for critiquing game design, and I'd love to improve this game for the masses. 

 

Thank you, and please post your thoughts :)

 

 

 

[Zhoyzu]

if you had caught todays livestream you would have heard them state they are still working on stealth.

[Shamse]

Wow. Now that I read this, I kinda drabbled off topic for the last 3 paragraphs ._.

 

Screw my ADD...

[Shamse]

if you had caught todays livestream you would have heard them state they are still working on stealth.

 

Please read the whole post before you post, I very much know they are working on Stealth, and they stated that they're working on giving the Alarm system a way to undo itself. This post goes much further than that.