End of "Chains of Harrow" was Frustrating and Upsetting

[(PSN)Unstar]

I loved the Harrow quest.  Loved it so much.  That is, until the final fight.  In that last 20 minutes, my excitement and joy just melted into frustration.  It left an awful taste in my mouth.

I'm going to paint a picture.  There I am, at the end of this really intriguing quest, as my Operator.  I'm excited to see what happens next, excited to reach the conclusion of this great story.  Suddenly, there are 4 Red Veil agents after me; some of them have guns, some of them have swords.  I do the only thing I know how to do: I shoot the closest one with my laser.  Eventually he dies from it.  The second sword agent reaches me and delivers a flurry of attacks before I can react, killing me.  The screen transitions and I watch myself float in the water for 5 seconds.  I reappear somewhere new and struggle to get my bearings.  Now something in the middle of the room is shooting a barrage of projectiles at me, so I have that to deal with as well.

Over the next 20 minutes, I will struggle to figure out how to kill this seemingly endless stream of agents with my Operator's abilities while protecting my frail health bar.  To the best of my knowledge, I used everything I could: hand laser, invisibility, force punch, quick dash.  But during that 20 minute period, I will experience that abrupt, jarring transition — being quickly killed, watching myself float in the water for 5 seconds, then reappearing somewhere new — roughly 3 times a minute.  During that 20 minute period I will gradually feel more and more powerless.  I will gradually feel more and more frustrated.  I will gradually lose touch with the smile that previously adorned my face.

Even as I break the final chain, I don't feel any sense of victory or triumph.  There was no victory here; I didn't discover any tricks to do better, didn't figure out the key to solving this puzzle.  All I did was endure being killed and resurrected endlessly until my meager powers had finally killed the last of my aggressors.  And all that I feel is the hollow relief that I don't have to have this experience anymore.

If pressed to describe that experience in a word, it would be 'miserable'.

This experience made me wonder if there are some secret moves or techniques to playing as the Operator that I don't know about; it's sort of where Occam's Razor leads me, because I am guessing you didn't intentionally lead your players into a fight you thought they would be entirely unprepared to handle.  And if these secrets exist, I'm frustrated that I was never taught them before I needed them.  If they do exist, I never figured them out.

And if they don't exist, I'm frustrated that I wasn't eased into Operator combat.  Before this boss fight, I don't recall even a single situation where I had to defeat even one enemy as the Operator.  I have defeated Kuva Guardians with the help of my Operator, but the Operator only comes out for a quick one-two punch before slipping back into the Warframe to finish the job.  Sustained Operator combat?  That was new to me. Please don't make me learn new mechanics by having boss fights repeatedly kill me.  It's not fun.

I want to give everyone at DE the benefit of the doubt here.  You make this game, and all of the content in it, with the intent of creating enjoyable experiences for players.  I don't think that this quest was intentionally designed to be a frustrating experience that sapped the fun out of my play session.

It's with that in mind — the fact that the developers and the players are on the same team and after the same goals — that I share this experience.  I want to pass along that if fun was your intent, it didn't work out that way.  I hope my single user story can somehow help direct future development in a more positive direction.

Thanks for making an overall great game, and thanks for listening.

[Zanchak]

This is written so well. I think the ending made a lot of people feel this way lol

[WhiteMarker]

21 minutes ago, (PS4)Unstar said:

If pressed to describe that experience in a word, it would be 'miserable'.

If DE plays their cards right in the future, then this experience is great.
What did the quest show us? An Tenno went insane and became strong as hell. We remaint sane and are kind of weak. Now we have to figure out how to become stronger without losing our mind.
Now we have to wait and hope, DE figures out a way to write us a nice way to become more powerful.

[StinkyPygmy]

It really just further highlighted all the problems with Operators that need fixing. Especially now that they are becoming more and more relevant in the rest of the game and not just for grabbing kuva.

That being said, I didn't have quite the same experience you did. It didn't really upset me, it just wasn't very fun. Took me a few tries and I got the hang of it. Its just tedious hiding behind pillars at the right moment and running around kiting enemies till your energy restores.

Edited July 25, 2017 by StinkyPygmy

[AtoKitsune]

I didn't die once. A lot of people had way more trouble than I experienced, and I have no idea why.

Edit: This doesn't mean it wasn't a poor design choice, it just seems weird that everyone hated it THAT much. In Plains of Eidolon we apparently will get better options for combat as Operators, anyway.

Edited July 25, 2017 by AtoKitsune

[Fiftycentis]

i think that i died less than 5 times, the only problem was the red veil with the long sword that used an attack similar to harrow 1, the others gave me no problems

still... i didn't like that fight so much, it was annoying and in some way pointless

[(PSN)DAVE-WF]

Meh, it wasn't frustrating for me - just kite and kill was what I did, although I did die once. More frustrating for me was Second dream, where I couldnt steal the specter because the queen bugged out and didnt shoot the laser - i had to repeat the last part 3 times to finally finish the quest lol. The thing with CoH for me is that... it was way to short. Great story - no doubt - i really wish it was longer, if it was it'd be 2nd best quest after Second Dream for me.

[(XBOX)Demon Intellect]

The only thing that pissed me off about the ending fight was when I died the game thought it would be hilarious to spawn me right on top the sword guy. Repeatedly. I'd spawn in before I could move it was back to the fetal position I went.

[DMDoom]

I figured out the technique to kill them easily enough, when they parry, either force punch to knock 'em down and hit 'em while they're down, or phase out, get behind them, and get 'im before they can start their parrying. Still died a painful amount of times, and while I was frustrated, I'd describe the boss fight as 'tedious' more than anything. My guess is they were having an off day figuring out how to end the mission, but yeah, it was a chore. 

[Lutesque]

12 minutes ago, DMDoom said:

. My guess is they were having an off day figuring out how to end the mission, 

Nope.... They simply balanced this Quest Around players who already had fully Kitted Operators....

And that would be fine except the Focus Grind sucks..... So why did they Do This ? 🤔