The New Systems Introduced with TWW

[NyxCrab]

WARNING: IF YOU HAVEN'T COMPLETED TWW YET LEAVE THE THREAD AS THERE WILL BE SPOILERS

 

So with the release of TWW, we got 2 new systems: Transference and Riven. Both systems are fairly unique and can be cool, but atm there's issues plaguing both of them, and today I wanted to talk about it.

TRANSFERENCE:

Spoiler

On paper the Operators seem like they'd be fun and interesting to play. Choosing to temporarily move from our fast and maneuverable warframes into our slow but high damaging Operators would be awesome, but in practice that's not how it is at all 

ISSUES WITH THEM:

• 100 health and very low armor, so they die extremely quickly in most content
• Upon "dying" you lose all your energy, all buffs currently on you are dispelled, and 10% (i think) of your Maximum health is permanently reduced until the operator gets a kill without dying before returning to your warframe. Your operator can die during the animation they go through to return to your warframe though.
• Their beam does not deal a whole lot of damage outside of low tier missions, so if you accidentally take control of your operator and die it can be really hard to get your health back.
• The operator runs out of energy extremely quickly. For a slow and squishy character with limited mobility, they rely on their Blink and invisibility to get around safely, but they drain energy through everything they do outside of walking/jogging, and once they're out of energy you're a sitting duck.
• They also take fall damage, which isn't that big of deal but it's something I noticed when I missed a blink once.

Now DE is almost definitely working on something to fix a lot of these issues already, but it's still important to mention them. Operators have the potential to be fun to play through in missions, but again they're extremely weak atm.

WAYS TO FIX THIS:

• Let Operators scale off of your currently equipped mods similar to how exalted weapons scale off of weapon mods: They have base stats and stuff, but the mods on your warframe improve this. It doesn't have to be anything crazy, it could be 225 health and shields, 100 armor, .9 movement speed, and 150 energy, but then it scales off of: health, shield, armor, movement speed, energy, and efficiency mods OR give Operators their own modding section, but they share mods with Warframes. This way should NOT have the same problem Sentinels have with conflicting mods and should be able to be shared between warframes and operators because Transference or whatever.
• Their beam either scales similarly to one of the two ways above, or scale with enemy level similar to specters so even in extreme situations with enemies being level 2000 or higher, operators can still deal reliable damage.
• Make Focus have synergy with the Operators. This is something that seems like it'd be obvious, but DE either didn't have the time to implement this or forgot about it while trying to get TWW out. There's plenty of ways to go about this, but I'm going to just mention easy and most likely obvious ways to do this because I'm not keen enough to come up with anything better.

                 1. Madurai: Increase Beam Damage and give it multishot so it can hit multiple enemies
                 2. Vazarin: Knocking down enemies heals nearby allies and gives you damage resistance
                 3. Naramon: Blinking into/through enemies applies a slash proc
                 4. Zenurik: Increased energy pool and improved efficiency on beam, knockdown, invis, and blink.
                 5. Unairu: Improved Health, armor, shields, and knockdown resistance.

Obviously those are just examples and can easily be changed to better things, but my point still stands that synergy with Focus is important for Operator gameplay. Also, whatever buff the Operator gets should be determined by whatever your active focus currently is, and maybe the buffs could improve with how much stuff you have leveled in focus idk.

RIVEN:

Spoiler

Again, Riven sounds like a really interesting system. Randomly generated mods that give buffs to random weapons? Now maybe it's just because I played a ton of Borderlands but the system itself doesn't sound half bad. It can create a lot of variety in builds and supposedly acts as a way to buff old weapons. However, the system itself is really flawed and does need improvements.

ISSUES:

• The randomness of the system is perhaps TOO random. From the challenges needed to unlock them, as they range from "get finishers without dying" to things like "complete a capture mission in 3 minutes solo with the hobbled key without taking damage, using abilties, or killing anyone and the enemies have to be at least level 100". Obviously that last one is an exaggeration but it perfectly encapsulates how the randomness of the system can either make challenges that are really easy or just part of a frames playstyle like Inaros, to ones that are an exercise in frustration.
• Speaking of randomness, the stats of the mods and the weapons it applies to are also completely bonkers. There's pictures out there of a mod that increases the zoom on the Stinger, which is a Sentinel weapon on which Zoom doesn't affect at all. Okay so Zoom does affect Sentinels, thanks @Arcadiace. Instead, take a look at the Riven mod I own. Unless I'm wrong, the ammo part refers to ammo in reserve, which sentinels have infinite of. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there's a picture of a mod for the Tonkor of all weapons that not only improves the damage of it but the multishot as well. DE said this system is supposed to make older weapons more viable, but all it really does is give either mods that won't improve old and outdated weapons at all or gives even more power creep to weapons that don't need them. 
• The 15 mod cap. The mods themselves are pretty rare, so the cap isn't really that much of an issue. But the issue comes in with that because of the mod limit a lot of players are only going to want mods for the best weapons and trash the rest of them. This does not apply to everyone obviously, but there will be those players no matter what.

WAYS TO IMPROVE:

• Tone down the severity of/change the challenges. For some reason the challenges to unlock the card have an obsession with the hobbled key and soloing endless missions, which is alright in theory but it can get crazy annoying, especially ones like the "scan 3 simiaris targets while using the hobbled key without using abilities or the simiaris trap with enemies at a minimum level of 30". Instead, it should be something that actually challenges people more similar to the "get 3 headshots while aimgliding", though maybe slightly easier based on player feedback.
• Similar to the above, the weapon it chooses and what stats it gives should be based on what weapon you put it on and possibly what the challenge was. If I put my riven mod on my braton prime to do the challenge, I should NOT get the mod for my Dethcube, but rather for my Braton Prime. The stats themselves could still be randomized, but at least then I wouldn't do the challenge with a bow and then get a mod for my Tonkor. On top of that, the stats should be based on what the weapon has. The braton prime has a below average 10% crit chance, so I could get a mod that improves crit chance and damage but lowers status chance. Instead of getting +50% puncture damage on a weapon that doesn't have any puncture damage whatsoever. Again, the system most likely won't be this accurate, and there still has to be a sense of randomness, but these are just examples.
• 15 mod cap doesn't really need a change, but it could be increased or abolished entirely to stop things like the above mentioned "trashing mods for weapons that aren't top tier", but that issue will exist no matter what.

Now I know my suggestions for the Riven system are probably really crappy, but I only have one Riven mod so most of what I'm saying is based on other people's experience. Maybe once I get more Riven's I'll come back and improve this.

There's still a lot I could've added, but I'm slightly distracted and need to mess with the systems more, but hopefully you guys will understand what I mean and offer your own criticism to my improve my pretty mediocre suggestions. And hopefully DE sees this and is either already working on buffs for the systems or use this to help them improve it. 

Edited November 13, 2016 by NyxCrab
Fixed some misinformation

[Nazzami]

[Tesseract7777]

Good quality feedback on the new systems, well done. I am sure we will all have more suggestions to fix them as time goes on, but this is a good start. 

[Arcadiace]

I agree entirely on every aspect mentioned. My personal gripe would be the scaling cost for re-rolling Riven mods. 

 

On a side note, Zoom does affect Sentinel weapons. It increases the range it acquires targets with their precepts.

Edited November 13, 2016 by Arcadiace

[NecromancerX69]

[XIceBladeX]

4 minutes ago, Arcadiace said:

On a side note, Zoom does affect Sentinel weapons. It increases the range it acquires targets with their precepts.

So would the +zoom in% mods make your sentinel's range larger or smaller?
Or should I ask, which one will make my sentinel acquire more targets, increased zoom % or decreased zoom %?

[SaurusRex]

15 minutes ago, NyxCrab said:

Upon "dying" you lose all your energy and 10% (i think) of your Maximum health is permanently reduced until the operator gets a kill without dying before returning to your warframe. Your operator can die during the animation they go through to return to your warframe though.

WHAT?!

I didn't even notice that. Holy hell. That muscle memory on pressing 5 (not holding it) is going to be suicidal in sorties. Oh and hey you lose your buffs too. So instead of getting your focus going, you'll be dead in the water with lower health, your buffs gone, and no energy to recast them. Yep, surprise!

[Omnijack]

Clear, concise, and concrete criticism as well as sensible solution suggestions? You deserve credit for the sake of an admirable post alone!

That aside, I definitely agree with the points you are making. Especially about the operator. They look so cool, but they're almost completely pointless.

Edited November 13, 2016 by Omnijack

[Arcadiace]

28 minutes ago, XIceBladeX said:

So would the +zoom in% mods make your sentinel's range larger or smaller?
Or should I ask, which one will make my sentinel acquire more targets, increased zoom % or decreased zoom %?

Increases the range as a +% of the Sentinel's equipped precept. Dethcube's Swift Deth (30m) plus Eagle Eye (+40% Zoom) is 42m targeting range.

[NyxCrab]

51 minutes ago, Arcadiace said:

I agree entirely on every aspect mentioned. My personal gripe would be the scaling cost for re-rolling Riven mods. 

 

On a side note, Zoom does affect Sentinel weapons. It increases the range it acquires targets with their precepts.

It does? Huh, TIL. I'll go edit that in.

[TaylorsContraction]

I especially agree with the following:

15 mod cap doesn't really need a change, but it could be increased or abolished entirely to stop things like the above mentioned "trashing mods for weapons that aren't top tier", but that issue will exist no matter what.

[Xzorn]

There's a whole other layer of play that can be attained with the operators.

They touched base on this with the Kuva farm but I'd really like to see scaling damage and other purpose to swap in and out during normal game play.

A noticeable difference in performance between a player who stays in their frame and one who swaps in and out would be ideal.

-You seem to loose buffs whether or not you die which is a big hindrance to this concept.