The Second Stream Podcast: Episode 2

[[DE]Drew]

Tenno, 

We're back with another recording of The Second Stream Podcast! We're joined by some great guests to discuss Devstream #79. Topics include: Fusion/Endo, Shield Gating, Nullifiers, Trials, Umbra, and more. Join the conversation by voicing your opinion in this thread and in the accompanying polls!

Special thanks to all of our guests: AGGP, @AM-Bunny,  @H3dsh0t, @iamiFlynn, @MDRLOz , and @TGDM!

Google Music:
https://play.google.com/music/m/Djhgl3lrwh65ewn6anxgonnhlfe?t=The_Second_Stream_Episode_2-The_Second_Stream

Also available now on iTunes!
 

[Cyborg-Rox]

1: Even though I gathered a hefty supply of Endo from dissolving thousands of duplicate mods, I could still imagine wanting some bonus boosts here and there. Not really sure how unique these decorations will be though, so can't accurately estimate how much of them I will be keeping.

2: I'm all for this. Dying in a single hit is not at all fair most of the times it happens, and having a chance to retreat or change your tactics before taking any health damage would be a good addition.

3: I believe only players in medium-large dedicated clans even stand a chance of learning to properly do Trials. Joining random parties from Recruiting chat is absolutely excruciating, and that really puts a damper on the amount of people who actually manage Trials.

4: In general, I'd like Trials to be more doable with completely random people, and without such a need for voice communication. That alone will open up Trials for a bigger part of the community to appreciate and to be challenged. I personally gave up on Trials after completing LoR two times with a full squad of known friends using Teamspeak. I'm the only one really playing anymore...

5: I've found searching for and scanning plants to be surprisingly interesting. I never did the Cicero Crisis myself, so I'm also glad this mechanic has been re-implemented in a way, and I'm glad more planets have been given a bit more depth with plant life. Would love if Earth Sabotage could play a bigger part in it too though...

6: Umbra is obviously not just another 'Prime'. Steve said long ago that Umbra is "not what everyone is expecting", and being the focus of the third cinematic quest, that pretty much confirms that it has something to do with a new mechanic.

Edited August 23, 2016 by Cyborg-Rox

[Shadow8600]

Good to see it's back, thought maybe there wouldn't be one with all the Silver Grove stuff going on. Really enjoying these. Also are there any plans in getting the podcast on Spotify? 

Edited August 23, 2016 by Shadow8600

[TGDM]

10 minutes ago, Cyborg-Rox said:

In general, I'd like Trials to be more doable with completely random people, and without the need for voice communication.

That alone will open up Trials for a bigger part of the community to appreciate and to be challenged.

Me myself gave up on Trials after completing LoR two times with a full squad of known friends using Teamspeak. I'm the only one really playing anymore...

Wellllll..... If you're on PC there's a group striving to make this more of a reality! You can check out their recruitment thread here on the forums:

 

[AM-Bunny]

Thanks for having me on! I've never done anything like this so I was pretty nervous; my shyness was getting the better of me. Still, had a lot of fun!

[Eldnacpeek]

Regarding this entire Umbra situation, I really don't think it matters what it ends up becoming in the end. Excalibur Umbra is exactly what the first word states; Excalibur. It was stated that they don't want to make him another reskin; the problem is that's exactly what he is and always will be. Whatever plans the developers have for "unique mechanics" and/or "systemic depth" are irrelevant, the fact is he and any other [possible] Umbra frames following will always be reskins no matter the desire to make them something more.

Edited August 23, 2016 by LazerSkink

[Stormdragon]

6) expectations about Umbra:

That it stops being pushed back and delayed 

Seriously, it has been over a year (14 months) and all we have gotten in this matter is a bunch of delays and "stop asking" 

Visually, I'm expecting Excalibur to look exactly as the Chinese Umbra Prime, but with removable scarf and loincloth in case it doesn't fit the player's taste. A similar aesthetics would be cool for every Umbra frame if there get to be more. 

Gameplay wise, I mostly don't care, I'd prefer a durability and mobility increase (in Excalibur case. buff the prime's energy pool to make him better as a "spam to win frame" and make both into upgrades from normal frame and sidegrades to each other) or whatever, this was just an example as long as the wait finally ends.

Pls, keep in mind that, the longer the wait, the higher the expectations get, and this only leads to a higher level of disappointment.

 ^{And finally allow us non-founders to get an upgrade for poster boy, my personal favorite frame}

Edited August 23, 2016 by -----LegioN-----

[Zoracraft]

Noticed you didn't put a question down regarding nullifiers. Afraid to see what the results would be, perhaps?

 

EDIT: Or, like I've suggested in other threads, you could actually use Rebecca's newfound love of fact checking on Scott's blanket statement of "without nullifiers, the corpus would be too easy", instead of just using it to pick on your playerbase for some strange reason (seriously, what provoked that, Rebecca?). Take nullies out of the game for a week or two, check if the corpus suddenly become easymode as Scott claims, and, if he was wrong and the corpus become actually fun to fight again, make him apologize for using an argument that's been (heh) nullified countless times before him even making that statement (Shows how much he looks at the forums).

Seriously, your last devstream did a lot of damage to your community appeal. Maybe, just maybe, you should actually care about earning it back.

Or not. The choice is yours, of course, and you'll make bucketloads regardless. Just thought you would care.

Edited August 23, 2016 by Zoracraft
An alternative

[Rawthgar]

#5 I do not mind the plant scanning with the exception of the one that requires the most (V-Moss) is the hardest to see/find.

[Roboplus]

1 hour ago, AM-Bunny said:

Thanks for having me on! I've never done anything like this so I was pretty nervous; my shyness was getting the better of me. Still, had a lot of fun!

Any chance you'll be doing a write up of what was discussed?

Or is that too meta?

[SilentCircle]

6. I completely agree with what someone on the stream said. I really don't want yet another variant of the same frame.

Do we really need three frames that just look slightly different.

Edited August 23, 2016 by SilentCircle

[AM-Bunny]

Just now, Roboplus said:

Any chance you'll be doing a write up of what was discussed?

Or is that too meta?

Probably not, just because - as far as I recall - there wasn't really any official announcements or conclusions during the podcast.

It was just all of us giving our own thoughts on different topics, and our opinions on those things are no more or less important than anyone else's.

[Shadow8600]

When Rob was talking about how Corpus are the weakest enemy type without Nullifiers, I couldn't disagree more. They are by far the most damaging, and dangerous group. Worse at high levels as well. One shot weapons, Bursas, Combas, Leech Ospreys, and Sapping Ospreys are bad enough, adding Nullifiers that severely reduce map mobility, and completely remove everything from your frame, is making a tough situation even worse. They are not rare, sometimes there's more of them than regular Crewmen or Moas.

One recommendation, bring community people or content creators who have an opposite view of each other. Like political debates, 2 on each side, 2 pro and 2 con. On topics with such polarizing views it is highly warranted in the spirit of fairness. 

Edited August 24, 2016 by Shadow8600

[ClatterHD3]

Q3. It is mostly dependent on various factors like, i dont usually do trials because its confusing to remember everything and the team you have is not noob-friendly. The trial also requires you to havr a squad who actually know what theyre soing and everyone always ask for something like MR20 "pro" player required. What does the mr has to do with it?

Q4. This is kinda obvious. Its gotta be like a very small majority because when u can do a nightmare jordas (if there is one) u know u finished the game. Mostly high mr players focus on doing raids while low mr does all the grind and grind and grind to get to a lvl to be applicable enough to do a trial. And the mojority right now is not that highly lvled.

Q5. Ah, more scanning. Greeaaaattt. Like, im running through these missions and now i want to extract. The missions were already somewhat difficult because i was doing them solo (why would anyone stop for me so i scan a flower?) And now i have to run through the whole place again just so i can find all the flowers and scan them and it turns out, they werent enough. Why would anyone want to stop and scan something in a high paced game? You arw not invulnerable doing it and u still can die while doing it. Its kinda like u brought back hasten coil and now im trying to find it so i can get the buff.

GG EZ.

[Bizzaro21]

-the idea of Endo artifacts itself is good, but i totally wont keep all of them, sell half and keep half

-yes, shields should stop one shots

-my restriction with trials is finding a team, nobody does them anymore

-i think everyone should have an equal shot at trials, but IMO trials themselves are a fail, because, they are a one-trick-pony, once we figure how its done its a cakewalk

-i liked the hunt for plants, but vestan moss was a pain to get

-why cant we vote for "umbra is a new warframe with similar theme but different kit&stats" ? that`s what i thought umbra is...

[protomanex14]

I really do not want to see Umbra as another line of Warframes... If you want to bring Excalibur Umbra I'm totally fine for that, seeing as we can no longer get Excalibur Prime. That being said I would rather not see Umbra variants of Warframes.

Umbra was only hyped due to the exclusiveness of not being able to get Excalibur Prime. There is no other reason for the Umbra hype. I would understand lore, faction, and/or mechanics that we can associate with Umbra, but a new set of frames...  Naw

[Askannon]

Well regarding trials:

I have played them (all) to an extent but for me they aren't something I would like to play, since I'm not a person who wants to rely on other players in terms of even being able to play the mission (a reason why I don't like to play defense and excavation (especially in sorties)). In other words: a solo player.

 I don't mind it being challenging. But it being restrictive (even though it's part of the design) is something that drives me away from trials (and sorties) and probably others as well.

Why not working on a solo trial that is challenging but not impossible with most frames (maybe even as introduction to trials)?

[Roboplus]

1) If they were made out of Alloy Plates or something else I have excess of and nothing to use on I'd be delighted to do both. As it stands I'd rather just hold on to the Endo.

2) I'm not against it. But if it's the only solution to shields then no, that's not enough. That creates no difference in shield function between a Mag and a Valkyr. With all the sources available now to regenerate health, shields need to do something more than just recharge.

3) Realistically, yes. Technically, no.

4) 50%. That's about where it was in City of Heroes. Even the lowest population servers had nightly, public, raid groups that regularly secured wins.
High-end players can wreck them (and their reward is speed), low-end players can pull out a win with planning and coordination. And all objectives are clear, concise, and every phase can be explained in a sentence or two at most. The difficulty comes in execution, not in understanding what to do or where to go.
Also, sets of 3 or so separate, procedurally generated conditions would go a long way to revealing boredom for those who have it on farm. Something like:

• Automated Defenses/Experimental Shielding/Advanced Notification and
• Nightwatch Team Inbound/Infestation Outbreak/Stalker & Acolyte Attack but
• Syndicate Backup/Air Dropped Supplies/Void Surge (Periodic Energy Boost)

5) If the plants can be used for something to craft and use in missions, even after you're done farming mods. Maybe act as a replacement for a material in Team Restore deployables. Otherwise it's just more fluff.

6) None.

[Syln]

Titania's quest brings back an old mechanic with scanning plants. Are you happy to see it return?

to further my answer about this question : i would love to see a scanning focused type of mission with new stealth mechanic as we play as our tenno not a warframe :3 (facility infiltration for instance)

as it was i found it a little boring and frustrating (earth day and night cycle + pace breaking gameplay)

[thegamer118]

For Umbra honestly i believe it depends on the lore, if they happen to be a sorta big and deep make them have their own sets of abilities and everything, make their abilities reflect how important or how deep or what they represent

[HalfDarkShadow]

Ah been excitingly waiting all week for this! Thanks again @[DE]Drew, @[DE]Rebecca, and anyone else involved to get this all together!

Anyways, regarding Trails and introducing their mechanics in other parts of the game we actually do sort of have that with Grineer Hijack missions, so I was a bit surprised it wasn't mentioned.

It was also really cool to see some newer faces this episode like @AM-Bunny! It's awesome to see other community members outside of Youtube and/or Twitch c;  Definitely hope to see him again in a future episode!
#forumrepresent

Edited August 24, 2016 by HalfDarkShadow

[RengiSama]

1.You guy's do very well on these streams, however I'd like to know how community Youtubers are selected to speak and give their opinion, and their fans opinion. 
2. I personally have never finished a raid, due to; connection, confusion, etc but I've been a player for about 3 years now. I consider myself a veteran, but putting those mechanics in new mission types, or even every day missions would help a lot.

[Ojimaru]

Mod Name: Shield Flux Moderator

Rarity: Common

Polarity: Vazarin

Base Cost: 4

Ranks: 10

Effect: Incoming damage that would deal more than (75% to 25%) of Maximum Shields will deal that much instead.

---

As pointed out during the podcast, "tanky" 'Frames that utilise Vitality and Steel Fibre for survivability do so at the cost of an extra Mod slot (even if we're disregarding the Capacity cost of both Mods). So why not introduce a Mod that will increase the survivability of Warframes that have high base shields, but low health and/or armour? While it's nothing more than a boring copy of Steel Fibre, it will gate large one-hit-kill damage while letting repeated smaller attacks, either by sheer enemy numbers or by rapid-fire weapons like the Gorgon or Supra, to remain as significant threats.

[Chroia]

1. When the new Endo "Artifacts/Treasures" are release, do you think you'll mostly trade them or keep them?

> Probably a bit of both - trade some, keep some.

Probably keep 1 of each type(?) for collectionism, then dupes are open for trade.
But selling maxed mods is more efficient, so eh, prob won't happen either.

2. Do you like the core concept of Shields helping to negate 1-shot kills on your Warframe?

> I'm not sure - not enough information.

There are 2 issues at hand here -
1) No matter how much shields you have, if you're relying solely on shields, a Bleed/Toxin proc will kill you.
2) (QT/Rage+)Life Strike, Winds of Fury, Hexis/Loka procs, Inaros' passive give you huge survivability through "regenerating" health.
Shield regeneration does not - and cannot - compete, since it doesn't regen while you're taking damage (and it has the recharge delay to boot).
I mean, I've literally run complete S1 and S2 exterminates tank-and-spank with just an R6 Vitality frame and a mostly-maxed Furis - no CC no deaths.

Even beyond that, shield gates are of limited utility in Warframe, due to enemy levels and enemy density increasing in tandem (in anything that isn't Exterminate or a stealth-spree mission).
Yes, they'll save you from a roughly-equal-level sniper, but they'll have minimal effect in content higher than that (and less the higher the enemies go).

3. Trials Q1: Are trials restrictive to entry for most players?

Define 'restrictive to entry'?
The keys are in the market. If you know they're there and can craft them you can enter.

But. (Disclaimer - All the following relates to LoR. I've not done JV past farming the injectorbits when it first launched.)
* There's a huge burden of knowledge to starting.
I've been playing TERA for literally the last few days. Not even a week.
Did my first half-dozen high-to-max level dungeons today, blind. With the exception of a single phase on a single boss, I could pick out pretty much everything that needed to be done/avoided through previous experience or on-screen prompts.

Warframe, while completely not an MMORPG, doesn't have that.

* It takes a fairly specialized composition (for non-experienced and/or geared players) to do well.
In most cases - read: Not Loki, Nyx or argueably Nova, this means fairly expensive mods and builds.
Between that and the burden of knowledge...

On the other hand, those frames do offer a cheap role to get your foot in the door.

* If you don't have friends to run it with, putting together a PUG takes longer than the actual run.

 

tl;dr - as Roboplus put it:

16 hours ago, Roboplus said:

3) Realistically, yes. Technically, no.

voted >  Not sure / No opinion on this topic because I'm uncertain what you're actually asking.

4. Trials Q2: What percentage of the player base do you think Trials should be geared towards?

> No opinion on this topic.

Depends what raids are intended to be. And that's up to you guys, not me.

5. Titania's quest brings back an old mechanic with scanning plants. Are you happy to see it return?

> No, I'm not really interested in scanning plants.

* Clashes horribly with the pace, unless you're playing stealth to begin with.
* Scanner doesn't have enough penetration, and a limited range - which makes acquiring new spawns difficult (*coughFrostleafcough*). Getting a vantage can mean you don't see stuff highlighted anyway. And, ofc, the angle of attack on that goddamn Moss. -_-
* Takes too long to do, imo, though ymmv on that one.
And last, but far from least:
* forces insanity-inducing levels of weapon switching, unless you go thrown melee or melee finishers.

All that said, I'm glad to see DE coming back to old mechanics ([size=2]*cough*[/size]), I just don't like this specific one.

6. What are your expectations for Umbra?

Again, depends what you're asking.

I expect that it was shoe-horned into the game for Warframe China's founders.
I expect that there was outcry from (some of) the global community. Between that and 'not wasting resources', I expect that it (like the Zhuge and Spira) will be ported to the global build.
I expect - since DE hasn't included Warhammer-esque Warframe patterns (seriously, read those.),
(heck, even the Wraith, Vandal, Prisma and synd weapons that exist are their own thing, as opposed to being presented as variants.) -
that Worldbuilding is going to have to find a way to make them fit where there isn't a place for them. Which I doubt can be done gracefully, even before looking at how things like the Void, Relics, Nullifiers (Scrambus, Combas, Bursas), Gate Crash and so on have - or rather, should have - already impacted Warframe's timeline and world-building coherency.
(I was actually going to exclude the narrative, but the Focus-related Operator manifestation not to mention the ocassionally asinine or straight-up idiotic quips from the Operator to... whom, exactly?) may have harmed that as well.)
Back on topic, I expect that Excal Umbra will be a statistical upgrade to Excal, probably beneath Excal Prime, probably not a sidegrade, and in no way unique beyond that... in which case he's nothing but a glorified skin. Which - if that's the case - is what he should be released as, rather than a "full-fledged" but fundamentally hollow (Ha. Ha.) 'unique' frame.

-----
Tangent: When the Void was the end-all of farming, Primes' unique twist was nicely beneficial when running non-endless missions (particularly without maxed eff).
With Relics (and the reward structure) moving most of the farm game out of the void, they're down to bling and stats.
(And 'Deluxe' skins nix even the bling.)

That, combined with the lack-of-immediacy of needing to farm new relics before I can start on the new PA gear, has rather diminished my fervor for going out and getting them.
-----

tl;dr - voted
> A skin. With frame attached.
It's not what I want, but it's what I expect.

Not to say that it can't be the start of a whole new something.
If that's a new mechanic, I don't know enough to say anything.
If it's initial launch of UmbraFrames™, and all it is is a reskin of existing (non-Prime) frames... what's the point?
(On the other hand, if they are actual frames with a unique twist... they straight-up compete with Primes. Which DE is selling.)

Edited August 24, 2016 by Chroia
[/s]. Woops.

[(PSN)chaos-SD]

Question 1: What I hope for in a new stage of collectibles in Warframe is a set that does not end.  I'll be a bit disappointed when I have cleared all the cephalon fragments as it would be nice if the collecting could continue, seeing fragments and pulling out my scanner wondering what I could unlock, and enjoy that the system's perpetuation.  Of course not all things can do this, there often has to be a conclusion, but in a game like Warframe where there are so few conclusions, hunting for treasures or extending a collection should join that endless rank.  I imagine different tiers of treasures and discussing with my friends some of the highest tiers, most difficult to find objects, comparing which we have and how many, how we even manage to out do one another in different numbers and sets, and the stories of how some may have been stumbled across.

Question 5: I'm jumping to this question because it fits after what I wrote above.  This obviously being my own opinion, I find it very odd when some would make the statement "That's not Warframe" as if this game that continues to reshape and evolve should remain a single way, or form of play.  If Warframe was only pure murder then it likely would not have persisted this long.  Design, and fashion, killing or controlling or both, support or sneaking, exploration or discovery, all of these aspects feel like they are at the core of the game, and while some may not feel entirely fulfilled all the time they certainly do belong and should expand.

Question 3: Trials/Raids are meant to be end game.  Obviously they need some work, I do like the concept of transferring some raid mechanics into regular play.  Rewards/arcanes need some refinement as the game has progressed, possibly even a seasonal reward pool, but this seems like something that will likely be some time from now

Question 6: Umbra likely does have some kind of unfortunate excess hype behind it.  Still, I likely wouldn't be shocked if the majority of the community was happy with a skin with some improved stats, basically a juxtaposition to Primes...though, with all of the comments from dev streams about making Umbra something unique I can't help but wonder if there is something more there.  Possibly something as simple as weapons or a frame with a unique Umbra element?  We'll see when you guys show it to us and I don't doubt that it will be great, one way or another.