My thoughts on Operation Plague Star

[Duckboy3825]

When DE teased Operation Plague star I was expecting a ton of new infested content with a whole new variety of infested enemy classes. I thought this "Hemocyte" was a new infested class. Isn't that what DE usually does with operations and events? But what we got was extremely underwhelming. Here's the "operation" in a nutshell:
 

1. Take a 1,700 meter hike and steal some of Vay Hek's goop juice.
2. Take a 2,000 meter hike all the way across the plains to get the juice extra goopy.
3. Take a 1,500 meter hike to escort a drone all the way across the plains that treads at 2 miles per hour.
4. The infested boil's allergies kick up and it sneezes all over your warframe.
5. The End, now hike all the way back to Cetus and do the process all over again.
6. Do it 20 times over to get rewards that are at least have decent.
7. Die from boredom.

The operation is not fun. It is essentially just running across the plains over and over again while completing the same bounties I've done since day 1 of the Plains of Eidolon update. Not to mention that there are several game-breaking bugs keeping players from participating in the event. There are no leader boards, profile stat placements, or endurance missions. No new content or anything, just an extra fancy and tedious alert.

I was expecting something so huge based on how much it was hyped. First the Lotus tells us there is a "living" asteroid heading towards Cetus. Fragmented chunks burn in the atmosphere above. Everyone begins speculating and discussing what it could possibly be. Rebecca posts a tweet of a Grineer commander reporting an anomaly detected in the atmosphere. Then we see the giant boil looming over the plains like a star. Extremely ominous and threatening looking. During the devstream they had a little animation showing the boil making landfall. Growling noises and silhouettes of mysterious creatures are reported by the Osterons from inside the boil. The boil then fills the air with bright red spores, inhibiting vision. If DE were to go through all this work for a simple time limited operation it has to be big, right? Doesn't seem so to me.

Edited November 16, 2017 by Duckboy3825

[Voltage]

What gets me more is how un-operation like this operation is. It would have made a lovely weekly update, but this is just sad:

This event has no scores, no importance, and no relevance besides the Mastery points.

[BansheePrime]

My one and only issue is that objectives are pretty much always in opposite corners of the map. I just "love" that. I feel like this event is mostly going to be used for some kinda plot expansion.

Edited November 16, 2017 by maj.death

[Ventura_Highway]

When I tried to archwing to make to travel across the plains faster, I dropped the toxin.

I mean I run volt always but christ this is a bit much.

[CrazyCatLad]

Same missions, same long distance hauls between Bounty phases, same disappointment.

[goggles2]

buggy mess 4 out of 5 runs end in bounty fail or crash

[CriticalFumble]

Could there at least be some variety in these?  Like have an assassination or capture target carry the toxin or the key to it?  Or maybe shoot the toxin into the boil with "borrowed" Grineer artillery?  Or at least somehow not have that escort mission every time. . .  Waiting to see on the summon boss aspect.  

It also highlights a problem with the Plains systems.  Namely, its hard to tell if the top rewards are good or not.  

I will say, adding the infested into the plains has made the area far more lively!

[BansheePrime]

9 minutes ago, Ventura_Highway said:

When I tried to archwing to make to travel across the plains faster, I dropped the toxin.

I mean I run volt always but christ this is a bit much.

Wormhole master race!

[Latiac]

Needs more explaining. like ALOT more.

Where does it mention anything about the Infested Catalyst? I must have missed it if it did.

It also needs to have less running about, really it's tiring.

I'll probably play for laughs with a few friends from my clan and grab the emblem, but the rewards aren't appealing, no Stratos emblem, no Sigil, no Leaderboards and No profile score either.

Not worth my time, it's just the same bounty over and over and over, atleast with things like Tactical alerts the tileset changed randomly and the enemies spawned randomly, but these guys don't, I grab the fallen drone, it's the exact same location, with the exact same group of enemies guarding it, I reach a certain distance and the EXACT same ships spawn in to try and attack me.

It's incredibly dull.

I may sound critical, but DE needs to understand and get things correct or improve things, it seems lazy, the way the boss spawn mechanics work, how it's a repainted bounty mission that doesn't even randomly change (Even slightly) like the normal bounties (which are STILL repetative) do.

I don't mind the Open world every so often, but in my eyes Warframes gameplay truly shines and lies within it's tilesets, which I still find myself enjoying and going back to despite PoE being out. Far more lively and changes.

I just hope DE don't ditch Tilesets completely...

Edited November 16, 2017 by Latiac

[Anthraxicus]

This event seems like PoE in a nutshell. Bullet jump across endless open spaces.

 

Anyway, because I haven't bothered with PoE one bit so far, I don't have archwing, despite having the archwing, so I simply built a high efficiency/high range Nova and it seems faster than archwing itself. Plus, I get to keep the toxin.

[degrida]

I thought I was facing an infested sentient that requires my operator. I even grinded just to get more focus too.

[MakubeX]

I also thought it would look like how tyranids invade a planet but nope same old Plain with just a few infested here and there they could have add flying infested and titan class infested make them huge even a survival infested mission have much more enemies then what the plains provide. I thoug when I open the gate of cetus there would be a defending ostron at the gate trying to fight back the infestation.

Edited November 16, 2017 by MakubeX

[Brahkest]

I'm personally not exactly happy with getting augur message 3 times in a row out of 4 stages. I do greatly enjoy the rewards cuz I'm a forma junkie and zaw fan. But otherwise I wished the mission changed up or had a different objective once in awhile. The sad thing is I get really excited when the objectives are somewhat close together so I can get the mission over with faster and get another augur message lol

Otherwise it's just another bounty. 

[Kyronz]

All of the above are valid complaints, but the big one is...Why the HULL do we not have rational grouping for going out onto the plains? instead of this voodoo witchy stuff of drop, turn around 3 times and look for invite, drop, reinvite etc?

Edited November 16, 2017 by Kyronz

[Horaciozhao]

3 hours ago, Ventura_Highway said:

When I tried to archwing to make to travel across the plains faster, I dropped the toxin.

I mean I run volt always but christ this is a bit much.

Hmmm, I use archwing while carrying toxin too, it never dropped for me

Edited November 16, 2017 by Horaciozhao

[Spot.]

I'm holding up some hope that this is only just the first mission for the operation and that they have more planned to roll out as each day passes.

However, if what we've been given currently is all we're gonna get, I'm gonna be disappointed... but I'm gonna do it anyway. for the forma

Edited November 16, 2017 by Spot.

[Kyronz]

41 minutes ago, Spot. said:

I'm holding up some hope that this is only just the first mission for the operation and that they have more planned to roll out as each day passes.

However, if what we've been given currently is all we're gonna get, I'm gonna be disappointed... but I'm gonna do it anyway. for the forma

DE has not put out much effort in a long time, i suspect that what we see is what we get for now.   

Remember they dropped POE on a friday and took the weekend off.   I have worked for major software companies where doing something like that would be heresy.

[WindigoTG]

1 hour ago, Kyronz said:

Why the HULL do we not have rational grouping for going out onto the plains? instead of this voodoo witchy stuff of drop, turn around 3 times and look for invite, drop, reinvite etc?

I mean, whaaat?

[Kyronz]

4 minutes ago, WindigoTP said:

I mean, whaaat?

go play, it is a pita to actually wind up in the group you start with even if you wait to group in cetus.    it makes no sense, it follows no known rules other then one person must be solo  and in  plains and then invite.

Grouping in @$@#$$ plains is a nightmare.

do something DE folks not done in years, play as a registered loser.

Edited November 16, 2017 by Kyronz

[WindigoTG]

Just now, Kyronz said:

go play, it is a pita to actually wind up in the group you start with even if you wait to group in cetus.    it makes no sense, it follows no known rules other then one person must be solo  and in  plains and then invite.

Grouping in @$@#$$ plains is a nightmare.

We go in and out full squad without any problem.

 

The only nuance there is when you're returning to Cetus and going back to the Plains again, people shouldn't go out of Cetus untill host had finished to load in Cetus.

[Kyronz]

2 minutes ago, WindigoTP said:

We go in and out full squad without any problem.

 

The only nuance there is when you're returning to Cetus and going back to the Plains again, people shouldn't go out of Cetus untill host had finished to load in Cetus.

That is hardly a common experience, and i have been in game for over 5 hours today.

[Atekron]

and do not forget there's no leaderboard, highly disappointed

[Ventura_Highway]

10 hours ago, Horaciozhao said:

Hmmm, I use archwing while carrying toxin too, it never dropped for me

Perhaps it was blinking with Itzal.

I will see later.

[LemonDrizzle]

Frankly its just tedious imho did it once and regretted the time spent. The distance between objectives ...well the OP nailed it.

[White_Matter]

This operation is like carrot on a stick except that there is no carrot.