The Second Stream Podcast: Mulling Melee, Clan comments, & other discussions!

[Monsterwithin]

6. Do you think Wraith items should be recolorable?

Does that also include vandal items as well, or only wraith?
Because personally if it's only wraith items, why not do vandal items the same?

[Bibliothekar]

13 hours ago, taiiat said:

3 - participation Rewards should require showing competence at the task presented, proving that you understand the features of it and can handle juggling what it wants you to.

but at the same time not requiring you be interested in diaper competitions. i've done my fair share of them, i know that they're not interesting for a lot of people.

Agreed. And, more importantly, participation rewards (especially if it's going to be a weapon) should be tied only to your personal performance, not your clan's. To get the blueprint for the weapon, you should show that you're able to handle 65+ extractions in one missions. Personal effort, not clan effort.

Getting the fully built weapon with slot and tater can stay a clan effort, but people shouldn't be locked out from getting the weapon in general, just because their clan is a bit slow when the event hits. Otherwise, we'll see clans kick even slightly inactive members left and right with every event announcement just so they can drop a tier and have a better chance at getting that participation reward.

(So, in conclusion, we'd have a reward for cumulative points, a reward for personal best, and a reward for clan effort, which could stay the sum of personal bests.)

Regarding competitive rewards, I'm not sure if I like the idea of research being tied to those. We'll have to see how it changes clan dynamics. But right now, I think a special cosmetic (like the skulls when the permanent leaderboards were removed) or a preview of new content before it drops for everyone (like the guy who got the Oberon Deluxe skin a week early because he had built 100 Oberons) might be a better idea.

10 hours ago, AXCrusnik said:

even if it makes a cool noise and makes things you hit dance

WABBAJACK!

[Zendadaist]

The trouble with tactical melee combat in a fast paced horde shooter is that it risks completely breaking the flow of the mission if you're scything through trash and then have to stop and go toe to toe in a deadly duel with a tactical melee mob, while the guy and his Soma next to you just mows through it like it was another mob. If the path of least resistance is vastly easier, it'll be all that is used. If meleeing become much more difficult and much slower than bullet hosing or ability spamming, then hardly anyone is going to melee.

Otherwise: fashionframe demands Wraith be recolourable! Participation rewards should be achivable for social and casual clan players (stuff like the ignis wraith). Actual clan vs clan competitive rewards should be a lot more challenging but not locking out mastery or anything with actual mechanical and play effects (trophies and bragging rights). Photobooth looks like a nice time-filler then you're waiting for that one teammate who takes 15mins to make a cup of coffee, meanwhile another teammate decides to go do a syndicate mission while waiting and the third has gone to walk the dog...

[Blakrana]

Whilst more purpose for Melee would be nice, the focus upon Quantity makes the notion of a 'tactical' approach problematic for two reasons. Firstly the melee system itself lacks the mechanical nuance for tactical combat, as it relies purely on timing of how often you press the same button with limited directional input. Secondly, in order for these 'melee based' enemies to be plausible obstacles they'd need some form of way to survive the ways we can blanket delete the battlefield, which standard practice at this point equates to 'invincible unless you do the very specific thing'. Understandably, this is far from a compelling addition to gameplay.

In order for there to be a tactical element to combat you need to support it mechanically...which with the focus on Quantity till something breaks on both sides of the Player v Enemy equation, isn't likely to happen any time soon. If you want tactical combat to be plausible, it will require mechanical revisions to make happen; something that has been met with a fair degree of reticence.

I'm not averse to having some more consideration to combat...but it will need more nuance than 'basically do this or it's unkillable'. That's not a tactical challenge, merely a nuisance that unsettles the flow with little reward to it. Tactical gameplay requires a strong foundation, else it's awkwardly tacked on.

Either event apologies for going on as always.

[Gr1mjaw]

Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

No, dont screw-up my melee, unless its done right, but i highly doubt that.

Edited March 7, 2017 by Gr1mjawT

[Bibliothekar]

1 hour ago, Zendadaist said:

The trouble with tactical melee combat in a fast paced horde shooter is that it risks completely breaking the flow of the mission if you're scything through trash and then have to stop and go toe to toe in a deadly duel with a tactical melee mob, while the guy and his Soma next to you just mows through it like it was another mob. If the path of least resistance is vastly easier, it'll be all that is used. If meleeing become much more difficult and much slower than bullet hosing or ability spamming, then hardly anyone is going to melee.

59 minutes ago, Blakrana said:

In order for there to be a tactical element to combat you need to support it mechanically...which with the focus on Quantity till something breaks on both sides of the Player v Enemy equation, isn't likely to happen any time soon. If you want tactical combat to be plausible, it will require mechanical revisions to make happen; something that has been met with a fair degree of reticence.

Agreed. The only time I could see that kind of enemy right now would be in melee-only sorties, as an added level of difficulty. Otherwise they'd be like

[Geraaltix]

1. Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

I chose Other.

This was brought up in the context of melee combos and their use in the game. I think they're clunky and inconsistent in their current form. It's very hard to learn from one weapon to another due to varying weapon speeds, animations, and so on. This is the problem. If you ignore this problem and just throw enemies in that require combos to kill them, you're going to alienate players like me who are not willing to learn the system in its current inconsistent form. Please don't do this.

Let me be more clear so you can understand: Adding complications to an already CLUNKY and INCONSISTENT system is a REALLY BAD IDEA. PLEASE DON'T DO THIS.

Melee combos need, at the very minimal, an indication of when to hit the next key in a combo. Players need some kind of stepping stone into learning these combos consistently before you throw a bunch of enemies in that will only end up frustrating a large amount of players. If you're unwilling to do any of this, then just drop the entire thing, please.

 

[Gendalph]

So, about first question - "special enemies".

Guys, do you realize that you have a first-person horde-mowing shooter? There are hordes of enemies. Hordes. There is no time to deal with every single enemy, you either kill anything that moves, fast, or die.

So the only way for you to add "tactical" enemies without ruining endless missions is to make them mini-bosses with fixed spawn mechanics. Like Bursas or Prosecutors. Same goes for special infested mentioned a few devstreams ago.

 

As for new weapons - personally I enjoy the feeling of mowing stuff down. I like Scindo and Galatine, like how they feel, like their effects. But then I decided to check out Machetes after NeightrixPrime showed the Gazal Machete on YouTube. And you know what? It feels interesting.

New weapons may have interesting mechanics and all, but they must be viable without all of their quirks, otherwise nobody would use them.

[Fifilona]

"Tactical Melee Combat" 

So I don't like the ideas I heard in the podcast at all. But what I was thinking when I heard this phrase was more like "Extra things to do in Melee to make it more badass looking" and I think that approach would be way better than "Make the enemies frustrating to kill"

So my ideas were more like:

An enemy that is very resistant to ranged/ability damage but weak to melee damage thus encouraging you to go into melee against them. They could have melee weak points on their bodies, if you hit them with melee you get extra damage. Maybe if you hit them all before they die you get a special animated finisher!

Another idea I don't know what its called but you know like in some games were they put you into a slowed down badass mode and you have to press a certain button in time in order to do a special badass move on the enemy or else you can't kill it? Something like that but in warframe it could be directional instead of different keys. Like press E within the circle that appeared before the time runs out for a series of special super badass attacks! 

Those kinds of tactics, ones that make the game not only more challenging but also more fun and make my warframe look more badass would be cool.

Edited March 7, 2017 by Fifilona

[BongoSkaggs]

Quote

1. Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

Other. Definitely.

There is absolutely no place in the game for "enemies who require more tactical melee combat" until we are given the tools to use melee combat tactically in the first place.

Bloody near every "option" we are given for melee sucks. Most stances, especially the older ones, are awful due to their combos being pointlessly inefficient & having very little in the way of theme or flow. Hell, Stance combos are also really obnoxious to use due to all the variable timings involved with the pauses and holds. Channeling is a trap option that only serves to confuse newbies into using crappy builds. Charge attacks are slow and impotent. Blocking doesn't do enough to protect us against anything remotely difficult. Slide attacks aren't particularly worthwhile without Maiming Strike. Ground Slams are similarly meh for the vast majority of weapons. And Counter-Attacks are so difficult to use consistently as to be nearly impossible.

Quote

2. What interests you *most* about new melee weapons?

Another instant Other. Cool mechanics without viable stats are worthless. Witness all the gimmick weapons we've seen over the years that have no place in the game due to their utterly rotten stats: Mutalist Quanta, Paracyst, Buzlok, Glaxion, Mutalist Cernos, Miter, Panthera, Original Flavor Simulor, Azima, etc.

Weapons need to have some combination of stats, style, and mechanics in order to be good. Focusing on just one aspect is a recipe for failure.

[Bibliothekar]

1 hour ago, Fifilona said:

An enemy that is very resistant to ranged/ability damage but weak to melee damage thus encouraging you to go into melee against them.

So, a Warden.

[Alenn_Tax]

#3: Participation Reward: (i.e. personnal weapon BP)

I think it should be easy to obtain. It should be something you get for participating in the event, regardless of your performance in said event. I also think it shouldn't be tied to your clan's participation in the event at all. Instead of the current goal (260 points for a ghost clan), I think it should haven been something along the lines of: "Extract 20 (or 25, or whatever the threshold for C to spawn is) survivors, alone, in the easiest mission." Something that proves you understood the mechanics of the event, but doesn't requires a specific loadout, only a little bit of skill.

#4: Competitive Reward: (i.e. Overcharged weapon)

I'm both okay and not okay with the current requirement. 400 point for each players' personnal best on hard is fine by me, however ... It should scale with you clan participation, instead of assuming 100% clan members will participate (and a full clan rooster). What I mean is: at the end of the event, you take a look at the number of clan members with an event score ≠ 0 (we assume clan members with a score of 0 didn't participate in the event at all), you multiply that by 400, and bam, you got your clan's goal for the competitive reward.

Edit: Also: that's assuming the scoring system doesn't derps itself: My personnal best, (in a PU team), is 100 or 101 evacs. Yet, somehow, my personnal best score is only 384. :'(

#not numbered: Cooperative Reward: (i.e. Clantech research)

Not asked about, but while I'm at it: Numbers aside -I think top 10% in each tier is too low- an alternative in my mind would have been something like that: (numbers for explanation's sake only)

• At the start of the event, the research automaticaly open to contributions in every clan.
• The research only requires one thing, say 100 000 ... let's call them "Ingis shard" (scaling with clan size as usual)
• Ingnis shards drop in, and only in, (and only during) the event's missions, by stacks of 10 in easy, 20 in medium and 30 in hard.
• However, if multiple members of a same clan are in the mission together, they each get a bonus to the number of Ignis shard in a stack: *1.5 for two players, *2 for three, *2.5 for four. (so a full team of 4 members of the same clan would get ten times (4 players * 2.5 bonus) more shards than a solo player)
• At the end of the event, clans that have fully funded the research have it researched instantly. Clans that didn't have it cancelled. (and hidden from the research menu.)
• All Shard remaining in the players' inventory after the event are destroyed.

#6: Wraith weapons:

How about this: Yes, but only partially. All wraith weapons are red and black, right ? What if you couldn't recolor the red & black parts, but you could change the accents and energy colors ?

Edited March 7, 2017 by Alenn_Tax

[Fleetwing]

If weapon swap speed in Warframe was as quick as it was in DMC: Devil May Cry, then I'd be all for more tactical melee enemies. Like, say, a mob that had had 50% damage resistance to melee, but carried a shield that deflected gunshots, which only lowered when it was stunned by a melee attack. That's cool. That requires me to act like a space ninja; drop the gun, slash with the sword, raise the gun, blam, headshot. It encourages combo play without invalidating all other forms of attack; 50% damage reduction means I might just decide "ah, what the heck" and murder it with a sword anyway.

But the current weapon swap speed in Warframe limits the tactical options, locking players into one weapon at a time. 

Digression: one of my favorite action movies to come out this last year was John Wick. Everyone should see it. Take the kids. It's fun. Keanu Reeves trained for months to be able to switch from melee to sidearm to assault weapon and back in fractions of seconds. Point: Why should a 50-year-old Canadian be faster than a technologically-advanced space ninja? Part of what makes John Wick engaging is the same thing that makes DMC fun to play: the ability to switch almost instantly between weapons, thereby increasing the number of possible combination moves, increasing the coolness factor.

Point being: I'm all for tactical weapon swaps to take down specialized enemies. It makes sense that after years of being slaughtered by Tenno, our rivals would advance and attempt to match our melee skill. But not at the current weapon swap speed. As it stands now, any kind of tactical system would be much more likely to simply slow down combat and frustrate players. 

[Fari]

Recolorable wraiths would be a dream.

I've always loved the patterns more than other weapons, but the colors are the absolute worst thing I can imagine. Some weapons can just use a skin to bypass 'em, but then you just lose the cool pattern for something worse just to have colors.

Also for melee I definitely prefer mechanics, stuff like Boltace that give move speed for example. Bonuses while not using stance>bonuses while using stance. Including quick melee things, I like melee but don't really use stances ever, so.

[Bibliothekar]

56 minutes ago, Alenn_Tax said:

Edit: Also: that's assuming the scoring system doesn't derps itself: My personnal best, (in a PU team), is 100 or 101 evacs. Yet, somehow, my personnal best score is only 384. :'(

Lost defectors subtract points, so you if you lost 4 guys and rescued 100, that means 400-16 points.

[-InV-igo95862]

1). Other (post an explanation below).

 

I have doubts in DE game design. "Tactical melee" probably means more invulnerability, cheap one shots, bullet sponges...

If you look at games like Dark Souls or For Honor, any damage can be dodged or blocked testing your reflexes and knowledge. In warframe most of the damage you take cannot be avoided unless you spam CC or abilities which is not skillful in any matter..

[-InV-igo95862]

1). Other (post an explanation below).

 

I have doubts in DE game design. "Tactical melee" probably means more invulnerability, cheap one shots, bullet sponges...

If you look at games like Dark Souls or For Honor, any damage can be dodged or blocked testing your reflexes and knowledge. In warframe most of the damage you take cannot be avoided unless you spam CC or abilities which is not skillful in any matter..

[taiiat]

14 hours ago, Bibliothekar said:

Agreed.

you might not be actually - the premise i'm setting is that 'participation' goals should still require full understanding of concepts and proving you can juggle the tasks asked of you - which for this Event as an example, the High Score requirement to get the Blueprint for yourself as a one person Ghost Clan wouldn't be the 325 originally, nor the 65 after.
but rather probably somewhere in the area of 170-200. as in that context a moderately extensive Mission is the only way to test understanding of the concepts.

 

i also didn't say anything about Clan Co-Op things, which in that regard they are appropriate - to make Clans actually.... act like one, but for those wanting to 'lone wolf' things, still being possible of completing such things, just having to have a stronger understanding to do so.

realistically 'participation' probably shouldn't be Clan involved - but not for the reasons Players complain about - but rather because setting a bar high enough that requires a single Player to fully understand concepts and prove it, isn't diddly for a (Ghost) Clan with even just 10% activity. so they should be separated to function better.
all Players tested on understanding of concepts, and extras on top of that for Clans.

[Sasquatchias]

I personally am against adding in enemies that require more "tactical" melee combat until we actually get said tactics in the first place.

As of right now melee is currently in a state where the best option tends to be to constantly spam a single combo, Parrying / Deflecting is an entirely unreliable mechanic based on RNG instead of actual skill, the combo system is needlessly annoying due to being forced to use flow-breaking inputs, and every melee enemy in the game is poorly designed to actually be fought melee-wise that the most tactical thing anyone can do is dodge highly telegraphed attacks and hit them while they're recovering.

Until Melee itself has more depth and work put into I don't think we need to add unnecessary difficulty to the mix.

[AwesmePersn]

Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

I would like there to be a different melee combo system. A two button combo system would be much better than our current one button system in my opinion.

Edit: Weapon Swap. It will help diversify our weapon usage to change more frequently. Will also indirectly buff snipers too . . . No reason not to have it instant really . . .

What interests you *most* about new melee weapons?

I do like new mechanics, but if they are worthless mechanics or locked behind prohibitive costs, I tend to look at those weapons in a negative light. Ex: All the melee weapons that take 10 mutagen mass, Sibear, or (not a melee) the infamous Hema.

In your opinion, how difficult should the participation reward(s) be to obtain in Clan events?

If the participation reward includes being given the weapon, then I believe it would be acceptable to have it somewhat easy to obtain. If its just a blueprint, it should be trivial to get.

In your opinion, how difficult should the competitive reward(s) be to obtain in Clan events?

If the "competitive reward" is a weapon with a potato and slot, then I believe it should be an easier reward. The cosmetics if anything should be moderately difficult to obtain. I do not believe that any rewards, except trophies, should be difficult to obtain, including research. Reason being is that DE has botched difficulty repeatedly so anything they consider difficult will be nigh impossible without a maxed clan. 50% participation is unrealistic when it comes to large clans, especially if there is new players who cannot tackle the event content yet. I think 5~30% participation is more accurate for most clans, particularly the larger clans.

How much time do you think you'll spend using the "photo booth" feature?

I'll definitely try it out. Once I see it, I can determine how much I'll use it.

Do you think Wraith items should be recolorable?

I think all cosmetics and weapons should be color-able. Even if I liked the look of the Harkonar Wraith armor, I currently will never use it unless I'm intentionally trying to make an edge lord load out. Which isn't something I'm really big on. I actually like the look of the Vulkar Wraith and Karak Wraith for example, but I can't color them without getting desert tactics (a skin I don't really like) or getting the conclave Karak skin (which does look nice, but conclave isn't something I have time for now).

Speaking about special weapons, I'd really like some new Vandal and Prisma weapons . . .

Edited March 8, 2017 by AwesmePersn

[Punchedface]

1. Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

 

Considering that the enemy 'challenge' in regular missions involve spawning a ton of enemies that has 3000 damage bullets or enemies that douse players with high damage slash, heat, and/or magnetic procs or enemies that spawn giant toxic gas clouds that cover an entire room or enemies with invincibility frames that very rarely show their weakpoints or literally spawning 6 or more enemies that spam stagger/knockdown/hooks/radial knockdown that knocks you down for 5 seconds and pull you everywhere (notably into all enemies stated before this) or enemies that disable powers and drain energy in a femtosecond or enemies that disable any movement that's faster than limbless turtle or magical ninja rockets that can chase you through any obstacle that isn't a giant wall, pretty much any combination of the above...

 

No. Don't even bother. Might be cool as a concept in a passing thought, but fighting a 'super cool, challenging, fun, unique melee enemy' while in a giant gas cloud, surrounded by twenty enemies that deal unavoidable damage, effectively prevent ability casting, spam undodgeable knockdowns and stagger, and cripple movement isn't exactly fun nor tactical nor interesting.

 

Literally the only way to implement it is to temporarily disable regular enemy spawns and spawn this new enemy after everything's dead, but hey this is a horde game, right?

[ensignvidiot]

1. Don't touch my Melee

 

2. Stances. I care little about diversity in weapons now, because I generally only get to use 1 of 2 different combo branches. I really wish all Rare Stances had a Forward+E or E+RMB, as that's generally all I use. It's rare I ever use any other branches, and I intentionally avoid grip types that dont have those two types of branches (or whose branches aren't very viable)

 

3. The participation reward should be easy enough to earn with an hour or two of play  over 2 days from 25% of the ACTIVE MEMBERS (as in logged on within two weeks)

 

4. The competitive reward should be difficult to obtain and require planning and tactics and 3 hours of gameplay over 2 days from 75% of the ACTIVE MEMBERS of a clan.

 

5. Maybe a few times. Im more interested in making music with bard frame 

[Quanlain]

About recolorable wraith (and maybe vandal and others)

I think that they should have their theme, more like a destinct style. Like this new greneer shoulder pad with axe sticking out of it, not just a color locked version of what we have already. 

If it would be really different, not harkonar, but completely new, i wouldn't mind it having locked color. But now, harkonar wraith is kinda locking the whole themstics to black-darkblue-red colors. It could at least have red colour unlocked, like graxx series, so you could just recolor the it from red into different colors. That already would be nice. 

 

And i'm also rooting for cool and interesting mechanics on new melee, as long as it is not a complete trash stat-wise.

[SilentCynic]

1. Would you like an enemy or enemies who require more tactical melee combat?

Honestly? No, not in this game. "tactical melee combat" works great in For Honour, because of the limited and strategic engagements. Warframe is not a strategic or tactical shooter - Warframe is essentially a dungeon crawler, and while slightly more intricate enemies definitely have a place in this game, "tactical" combat does not. Would it be cool if that wasn't the case? Absolutely, but Warframe has very clearly opted for quantity over quality when it comes to enemy design, and trying to make some opponents more complex will either be frustrating or barely noticable.

The only way to effectively incorporate something like this is a complete redesign of the enemies we face, which, while it would be wonderful, will never happen.

3 & 4. In your opinion, how difficult should the participation/competitive reward(s) be to obtain in Clan events?

While I'm of the opinion that clan rewards shouldn't necessarily be handed out on a platter, DE needs to discover how Clans function in its own game, and no, that does not mean looking at special Clans that staff might be in. Many of the goals set are simply out of practical reach, especially for Moon Clans.

Between the Pacifism Defect event and the Hema research, DE has demonstrated a complete and utter lack of any kind of knowledge of how Clans operate in Warframe, both in terms of active members and participation by said members. One would have imagined that the Hema fiasco would provide information on participation rates, showcasing how many players donated how much, and whatnot.

Ultimately, I think that this comes down to the decision makers at DE being woefully unfamiliar with the rapidly-growing project they've made. I applaud Steve for actually taking the time to play from the ground up, but his pace is glacial.

[Bibliothekar]

6 hours ago, taiiat said:

you might not be actually [...] but rather probably somewhere in the area of 170-200. as in that context a moderately extensive Mission is the only way to test understanding of the concepts.

I still am, I just took the 65 DE set for solo clans when readjusting the numbers.

6 hours ago, taiiat said:

i also didn't say anything about Clan Co-Op things

No, sorry if you understood it that way, that's just where I hooked in with my own thoughts.