Dev Stream 82: Endless Relic missions feedback

[NekroArts]

Unlike Void Key, which has two grindings (farming for key and farming for parts), Relic has three grindings (farming for relic, farming for traces, farming for parts). The need to have a Radiant Relic + a group of the same relic has been deemed a must. Since there's so many relics finding a group with those necessities have become much harder.

Thing about the new upcoming endless is that you now have to spend a relic every 5 waves; that means if a player intends to go for 20 waves they'll have to: farm up 4 relics to use, farm up the void traces to make them radiant, and have to deal with players that may lie about what relic they'll be using.

[Tizodd]

1 minute ago, Raniu said:

The new system is better. The arguments for it are so obvious that there's no need to point them out.

I think people don't like changes. They liked the endless missions but they don't feel like doing them if there's no reward for the time spent. Even if what used to be the reward was not quality but a bunch of prime parts you could sell for ducats.

With the new endless fissure we're getting, we'll be able to farm more traces the longer we stay, guess people missed that part too.

That's all I guess.

"Better" is very subjective.  Personally, I prefer the old system because I feel it was better for the community.

The old system involved:

• going into recruiting chat
• assembling a group
• talking with one-another to decide what frames to bring
• discussing how long you'd stay
• talking during the mission about in-game stuff but often off-topic banter
• possibly making a friend (sometimes and enemy lol) after the run

The new system involves:

• queuing for mission
• rushing through mission
• hitting "Leave Group" after the run

So yeah the new system is faster, but I feel the old system was better for fostering new in-game relationships.  It was also fun helping newer players with endless void runs but now it's just not the same since everything is a rush to the end.

[(PSN)DesecratedFlame]

A few Benefits of Endless:

• more challenge
• place to try out your end game weapons (4 forma+)
• multiple items per relic for ducats
• multiple items per relic for reselling for plat on the player market
• opens up more variety for relics (e.g. survival, excavation, defense)
• less grind (i.e. don't have to farm for the relic, plus grind for traces, only to get one shot at an item)

[Raniu]

2 minutes ago, NekroArts said:

Unlike Void Key, which has two grindings (farming for key and farming for parts), Relic has three grindings (farming for relic, farming for traces, farming for parts).

But you can farm relics WHILE opening them. Same will be possible with endless fissures I believe.

2 minutes ago, NekroArts said:

The need to have a Radiant Relic + a group of the same relic has been deemed a must.

A must? Only if you're hardcore about being efficient and getting what you want ASAP.

[Chipputer]

4 minutes ago, NekroArts said:

have to deal with players that may lie about what relic they'll be using.

Because we never had people bail on their turn to share their key in the past, or anything.

[AlphaPHENIX]

Here is why I am not the happiest litte puppy/kitty I could be with the new system, only two words...Ducats farming.

I am just one of those guys that moustly doesn't care about Prime Warframe (infact I have none) and Prime Weapons (Only got Lex, Paris and Hikou) so whenever I get prime parts I A: Trade them for plat B: Pile them up and sell them for Ducats when Baro comes with stuff I am interested in, or can sell for plat.

Void Keys system - You could just get some T4 Interception keys from 20 waves in Draco or somewhere else, then go to Recruit chat and start the mission. You get a Prime Part more or less every wave, survive as long as you can and go back to Baro to sell them. Oh ya, you could also get multiple Prime Parts for the prize of one key and some skill!

Relics system - You can get prime parts you want more easily sure...if you can get the relics you need. Also unleass you are willing to sale rare parts, Ducat farming gets a bit more tedious.

[(PSN)BlitzKeir]

1 hour ago, Miserie said:

At the end of the day though, I don't fet why people are so worked up about it, you can get the part you want at a shorter amount of time considering the ease of access to the different relics of the game. And with this new mode, get more players doing it with you, all with the same relic and you'll probably get the part you wanted after a few runs even without using traces.

While the proposed system is indeed an improvement over the old void system in many ways, this particular statement is untrue. The chances of an Intact relic rolling the rare part is 2.5%, which was the same rate as rare parts in the old system which is half the rate from the old system. At Radiant, the odds increase to 10%. I'm not great at math, but the average chance of at least one of four Intact relics rolling the rare reward must be somewhere just under 5%. With four Radiants, I believe the odds are about 32%. Meaning with four Radiants, on average, three runs are needed to get the desired part. With Intact relics... you should probably just wait until you can upgrade them.

I like the new system, but I understand the complaints leveraged at it. If you have hundreds of relics and can afford to burn through a bunch, it's great. But with relics mainly dropping on rots B and C, you're burning more relics than you're earning with this method. And only around 10% of them are going to be upgraded--maybe 25%, if you have a Smeeta and a stack booster for earning more traces.

The main advantage of endless fissures now, I think, is going to be the ability to earn more traces from a single mission. Let's be fair, it takes a few minutes sometimes. And with the time it takes to complete the objective, extract, restart the mission, probably wait for a new squad too... In endless fissures, you're probably shaving seconds off the trace earning rate. And you get a bigger challenge to boot. So there is that nice advantage.

The fact that your relics need to be upgraded beforehand is the only real limiting factor for this new system. If there were some way to upgrade your relics when re-selecting, and even use the traces you earned on the mission so far, then it'd be @(*()$ perfect. But that would be difficult for DE to implement, and could have a lot of unforeseen bugs, especially on consoles. PS4 version barely runs half the time as is.

Edited October 30, 2016 by (PS4)BlitzKeir
Whoops, wrong about old void rare rate.

[(PSN)DesecratedFlame]

5 minutes ago, Chipputer said:

Because we never had people bail on their turn to share their key in the past, or anything.

You know there was a better solution for that right?  All DE needed to do was create an option where you could create a key pool, and everyone had to submit their key before hand, and the keys would then belong to and be used by the group. That way, if you bailed, you lost your key anyway, and everyone else still got to use it. Even if someone bailed before using their key, it was still more rewarding for everyone involved when compared with the relic system.

[low1991]

17 minutes ago, Raniu said:

With the new endless fissure we're getting, we'll be able to farm more traces the longer we stay, guess people missed that part too.

I heard, you could enter without a relic equipped and still gain trace from fissures. How is new endless better than this method, in terms of efficiency & time:trace ratio, as well as risk?

 

[Raniu]

Just now, low1991 said:

I heard, you could enter without a relic equipped and still gain trace from fissures. How is new endless better than this method, in terms of efficiency & time:trace ratio, as well as risk?

Read again what you quoted. For clarity: you'll be earning MORE traces based on how long you stayed.

[NekroArts]

1 minute ago, Raniu said:

But you can farm relics WHILE opening them. Same will be possible with endless fissures I believe.

That holds true with Lilith and Meso but since Neo and Axi are the rarest, players tend to not use them until they make them radiant, hence the three grinding.

4 minutes ago, Raniu said:

A must? Only if you're hardcore about being efficient and getting what you want ASAP.

I know, nearly all the complaints of the relics I've seen in the forums has been about those "must."

1 minute ago, Chipputer said:

Because we never had people bail on their turn to share their key in the past, or anything.

That is so untrue, there was always someone that would bail and someone would complain in the forums about it.

[-N7-Leonhart]

11 minutes ago, AlphaPHENIX said:

Here is why I am not the happiest litte puppy/kitty I could be with the new system, only two words...Ducats farming.

I am just one of those guys that moustly doesn't care about Prime Warframe (infact I have none) and Prime Weapons (Only got Lex, Paris and Hikou) so whenever I get prime parts I A: Trade them for plat B: Pile them up and sell them for Ducats when Baro comes with stuff I am interested in, or can sell for plat.

Void Keys system - You could just get some T4 Interception keys from 20 waves in Draco or somewhere else, then go to Recruit chat and start the mission. You get a Prime Part more or less every wave, survive as long as you can and go back to Baro to sell them. Oh ya, you could also get multiple Prime Parts for the prize of one key and some skill!

Relics system - You can get prime parts you want more easily sure...if you can get the relics you need. Also unleass you are willing to sale rare parts, Ducat farming gets a bit more tedious.

And why would you need the old type of ducats farming? Sure, you would get more junk, but also that junk was worth a lot less ducats.

Besides, you didn't exactly got the prime parts faster. In a survival, at most 1 in 2 rewards were prime parts, so it was one every 10 minutes at best. The only thing we had before is that you got more parts per key (only for endless missions). But the Relics are so damn easy to get, that I always get 10 times more than I use without even trying too hard to get them.

Edited October 30, 2016 by -BM-Leonhart

[(PSN)BlitzKeir]

2 minutes ago, low1991 said:

I heard, you could enter without a relic equipped and still gain trace from fissures. How is new endless better than this method, in terms of efficiency & time:trace ratio, as well as risk?

I answered this question a couple posts above. It's slightly faster. Very slightly, in most cases, but with the added benefit of more challenge. If you're into that.

[(PSN)DesecratedFlame]

2 minutes ago, (PS4)BlitzKeir said:

If there were some way to upgrade your relics when re-selecting, and even use the traces you earned on the mission so far, then it'd be @(*()$ perfect.

They could just make it so that an initial relic lasts as many rotations as the upgrades on it, then they could make it so that staying after rotation C makes a relic automatically radiant. So if you are a rotation after the first C, choosing an intact relic automatically makes it radiant as long as you stay.

[(PSN)BlitzKeir]

1 minute ago, Raniu said:

Read again what you quoted. For clarity: you'll be earning MORE traces based on how long you stayed.

I think you may be reading into Steve's comment on the subject. You earn traces when you crack open a relic. I see no reason to assume endless fissures will have any special mechanics regarding traces. Most likely, you will simply have to collect 10 reactant again, and receive another roll of 6-30 traces. As I said before, in theory, it should be slightly faster than non-endless missions. In survival, at least. Defense is not practical for traces, for obvious reasons.

[(PSN)DesecratedFlame]

4 minutes ago, (PS4)BlitzKeir said:

As I said before, in theory, it should be slightly faster than non-endless missions. In survival, at least.

Not really. Enemies take longer to kill the longer you go. Even if the first few waves shave off some time, subsequent waves will take longer. In the long run, it will be less efficient.

[Miserie]

Holy balls, I switch to another thread and now it has 100+ views o.o 

But all in all, I'm starting to see more of the reasonings of both sides, and perhaps an improvement to upgrade relics in the game would be great as said somewhere above (mobile version sucks)

[(PSN)BlitzKeir]

Just now, (PS4)DesecratedFlame said:

Not really. Enemies take longer to kill the longer you go. Even if the first few waves shave off some time, subsequent waves will take longer. In the long run, it will be less efficient.

Perhaps. It depends on the level of the mission. Lv40 corrupted enemies are the equivalent of lv60 or so. If your S#&$ isn't heavily min/maxed, or you're still learning, then it won't be as productive as exterminate/capture. But for players with 'endgame' gear, the first two C rotations shouldn't be difficult. Obviously having a Nekros around in non-endless nullifies the whole argument, you can have 10 reactant in about 30 seconds on any mission. But outside of that, trace earning should be slightly faster in survival for highly min/maxed players. Which is what we're most concerned about, I assume. The biggest benefit should naturally shift to the more challenging game types as a player progresses. But again, this is all hypothetical. I may be completely wrong. We'll find out in a few days.

[Mak_Gohae]

36 minutes ago, (PS4)DesecratedFlame said:

A few Benefits of Endless:

• more challenge
• place to try out your end game weapons (4 forma+)
• multiple items per relic for ducats
• multiple items per relic for reselling for plat on the player market
• opens up more variety for relics (e.g. survival, excavation, defense)
• less grind (i.e. don't have to farm for the relic, plus grind for traces, only to get one shot at an item)

1 item per relic stays. You need to load up a relic every 5 waves.

I think people are happy about this cause now they can complain about going 25 waves and not getting the stuff they want.

Basically, we went back to the old system where more waves should reward you better. People are going to try to cut the grind.

[LAWD]

So from devatream 82, we saw Rebecca, play from almost halfway through a mission,  and this screen pops up with the relics to choose with a pretty short countdown (considering host). 

I see this working well for interception and sense mission types, however survival may need you to activate it like one of those life support capsules. Otherwise capture would be insanity.

It would be much better if you loaded up the number of relics you wanted with its respective rewards. It would prolly also give space to attaining new mods?

[motorfirebox]

1 hour ago, EDYinnit said:

75% fewer drops, actually. 25% of drops per relic - one per customer. Exponentially less than 25% of drops per relic compared to Sabotage and Endless keys. Brief stints in trade chat have seen things being bought/sold that I wouldn't have even bothered trying before, which is implicitly a higher price than 'unsellable'.

Simple logic says that four keys at a 2.5% nonexclusive drop rate giving 0-4 desirable results can't balance with four relics with an exclusive drop giving 0-1 results unless the refined relic drop rate (multiplicative with any notable increase in acquisition of relics) is at least a solid four times better than that of keys, and more besides when accounting for those jam-packed Rotation C Endless rare-drops.

Plenty of time spent in trade chat tells me that prices have remained basically the same. There was a short spike when the relic system first came out, due to uncertainty, but after that prices went back down. If there were a problem with supply, you'd see massive increases in prices, and recent items (Vauban Prime, etc) would remain at high prices for much longer. Instead, because supply is flat and possibly even increased, things aren't particularly more expensive than they used to be.

The part you're not accounting for is the part where it's much, much easier to farm for any one specific part. That means you don't have to spend fifty runs full of junk you don't need; I find, on average, that I can get what I'm after within about ten runs. And getting the right relic isn't particularly more difficult than getting the right key used to be—the drop table for a given node is limited, there are only about six relics per rotation at any given location. So I'm spending the same amount of time farming relics/keys, but I'm spending fewer relics/keys to get the part I want.

1 hour ago, EDYinnit said:

Your citation there doesn't support much - "ducat supplies are back to normal" because they were changed/increased because lowered acquisition rates of the parts used. That was the solution. Between reducing Baro prices and increasing ducat valuation, they just settled on using the latter to compensate the shift.

The ducat economy is a bit tricky to valuate, because the value of the currency gets adjusted at both the income end and the expenditure end. However, the simple fact is that you can look at any given relic and decide immediately whether or not you should burn it for potential ducats or expend time and resources to try to get rare drops out of it. Under the key system, the value of a given key could fluctuate wildly from patch to patch, as the drop tables for various missions changed. That T1 Exterminate key might not have anything you want this week, but the temptation to run it for ducat fodder was reduced by the potential that next week's patch might put something you want into the T1E drop table. Prime junk (ducats) were more likely to be the result of farming for something you wanted than from expending keys for the sole purpose of grinding ducats.

That doesn't happen anymore. Regardless of changes in item ducat cost and the value of ducats that you can get from trading in prime junk, there's no more uncertainty about the whether or not a given relic is worth running for prime junk. The ability to get ducat-tradeable junk has been basically completely stabilized, which makes it much easier to farm ducats regardless of DE's currency adjustments.

[DeMonkey]

56 minutes ago, Chipputer said:

Couple that with this insatiable desire to fill their pockets with stuff that they have literally no use for at all times of the day and you have what amounts to the other side of the argument.

Is that a bad thing though?

Dragons lived to pillage and kill followed by more pillaging, they then stored all the useless gold and slept.

They didn't have to, but I can damn well bet you they enjoyed it (if they were real of course).

But if the Dragon gets its store of gold in one pillage then what is it to do? It's only been having fun for 10 minutes and already it's got everything it needs.

Not trying to start a big argument , based on your wording you think pretty poorly of that argument so I wanted to try and give you a fitting analogy.

That is how I feel personally, the game is fun and the void is still there, I can still pillage and kill but it's not as rewarding for me as other games are. I've already filled my gold vault here as it were.

Just trying to give a reasonable counterpoint.

[Chipputer]

5 minutes ago, DeMonkey said:

Is that a bad thing though?

Dragons lived to pillage and kill followed by more pillaging, they then stored all the useless gold and slept.

They didn't have to, but I can damn well bet you they enjoyed it (if they were real of course).

But if the Dragon gets its store of gold in one pillage then what is it to do? It's only been having fun for 10 minutes and already it's got everything it needs.

Not trying to start a big argument , based on your wording you think pretty poorly of that argument so I wanted to try and give you a fitting analogy.

That is how I feel personally, the game is fun and the void is still there, I can still pillage and kill but it's not as rewarding for me as other games are. I've already filled my gold vault here as it were.

Just trying to give a reasonable counterpoint.

If it already has everything it needs then everything else it's gathering is purely due to greed. Greed is a negative attribute-- taking more than one needs, particularly in a multiplayer game that has trading, can lead to inflation of the economy, which can lead to bad pricing, unfriendly barriers to entry, and can lead to the developer tailoring costs around those that have taken far more than they need (SEE: adjusting cryotic costs, ducat costs, oxium costs, etc).

That analogy is bad.

[(PSN)BlitzKeir]

3 minutes ago, DeMonkey said:

Is that a bad thing though?

Dragons lived to pillage and kill followed by more pillaging, they then stored all the useless gold and slept.

They didn't have to, but I can damn well bet you they enjoyed it (if they were real of course).

But if the Dragon gets its store of gold in one pillage then what is it to do? It's only been having fun for 10 minutes and already it's got everything it needs.

Not trying to start a big argument , based on your wording you think pretty poorly of that argument so I wanted to try and give you a fitting analogy.

That is how I feel personally, the game is fun and the void is still there, I can still pillage and kill but it's not as rewarding for me as other games are. I've already filled my gold vault here as it were.

Just trying to give a reasonable counterpoint.

While it's true reward factor is visceral to an extent, and it's important to be conscious of what you naturally enjoy and why, "I like it" isn't a very good counterargument argument in a debate about balancing mechanics; at least, not by itself.

If I may, I can offer a very solid counterargument...

1 hour ago, Chipputer said:

"It's not endless if I don't get more than one reward per relic," is the most common phrasing of it. They don't like the 1:1 system because it requires them to put more effort into their prime part hunting. No matter how many times you point out that endless missions then reward extra relics, that doesn't matter. 

The problem is it's not 1:1. As I said before, you're burning through more relics than you're earning, and the value of the relics themselves is not universal. It's closer to 0.2:1. Add on top of that the need to farm traces to upgrade them, and you're looking at a time investment many times greater than the old void system for a single run. This is a detail overlooked on both sides of the argument. With the ability to burn through more relics in endless, every rotation cycle you're losing slightly more ground than before because rot A doesn't drop Neo/Axi relics. If rot A contained more than just Lith/Meso, then this argument would evaporate. Traces are still an issue, but that would evaporate too if you could upgrade a relic during 'half-time'.

[Chipputer]

1 minute ago, (PS4)BlitzKeir said:

The problem is it's not 1:1

How isn't it 1:1?

1 relic to 1 reward. If you run with 3 other people, sure, it's 4 relics for 1 reward, that way, but you're still inputting 1 and receiving 1. Void Traces are only a thing for people looking for specific rewards and I have always acknowledged that it's a pretty janky, time consuming system, but it's there to help skew your rewards in your favor. Yes, it could use some tweaks, but that's another topic entirely.

3 minutes ago, (PS4)BlitzKeir said:

rot A doesn't drop Neo/Axi relics. If rot A contained more than just Lith/Meso

It entirely depends on where you're farming. If you're farming on a high level interception map then you're getting Neo/Neo/Axi/Axi. High level defenses offer similar rewards, but with many more other items mixed in.

This will come down to tactically choosing when and where to farm if you want a replacement relic for the one you spent. That's it.