Weekend Events - Why So Rush? Why So Samey?

[matrixEXO]

I really don't like the weekend events since they promote rushing and speedy completion. The main culprit are both competitive prizes and the points needed to be earned to unlock prizes. Now, I don't disapprove of having some competitive spirit but these events just mean that people should chip in and help to promote a cause for the game's dire situation rather than a cause for competition and 'who can get the fastest time'.

 

As of that, I would like to see future events be more lenient. Anyone who decided to do a single event run should be offered it's complete rewards unless it's within certain clauses, such as if the event failed. Anyone who wants to get to the top of the leaderboard during the event does not get any extra goodies but just bragging rights because the leaderboards ARE locked after the event is over. Event completion rewards are supposed to be event completion rewards and will not change.

 

 

Additionally, the events now and the Formorian one are quite samey to any other old missions we have done. How samey? The Formorian one is basically a "Do a pseudo-Exterminate mission followed by a Mobile Defense mission" while the current Arid Fear is "Do 2 Alert missions to build a Key to finally be able to do a pseudo-Capture mission", though the current Arid Fear event is much better than the Formorian one. It doesn't pique my interest to really do it (apart from my completionist in me to get all the mods). I would like to see some interesting new mission outtakes during weekend events (because they are special, duh!). Additionally, it can be used as a testing ground for a new mission type or just to throw a bone at people to come back from the dead of boring stale missions that we have been doing for days and months now.

 

As an example (read it in the way of the Lotus):

 

 

The Grineer has discovered an ancient Earth weaponry of massive destruction. It is simply known as the Nuke. Grineer Galleons have been armed with the Nuke and are preparing to use it to wipe out all non-Grineer dominated planets. Your objective is to escort a Tenno engineer to the weapon, protect him while he neutralises the weapon from ever being usable and escort him out.

 

Be warned that we do not have many Tenno engineers. Each one is valuable and losing too many may cripple both this operation and our functional capabilities in the near future.

 

Translation of example:

The event mission has two objectives. The primary objective is to disarm enough Nukes that would render the Grineer operation impotent. A secondary objective is to protect the Tenno engineers throughout the whole mission. Note that even if we failed in securing many of the Tenno engineers to safety, as long as the primary objective is completed, the event will come out as a success, albeit some impact as well to the Tenno.

 

 

Through my example, you may ask "How different is this compared to how you describe the events that occurred before?" and the answer is simple: It's actually 2 mission types in one mission itself. By combining both Escort and Mobile Defense into one mission, it makes the game's mission type look better than it is to do the Escort and Mobile Defense missions separately in 2 missions (and boring as well).

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[crow-k]

Why so serious? 

 

 

So what you want is that if you show up, do one attempt and win, you get all of the awards? Am I mistaken in this?

Edited August 12, 2013 by crow-k

[Volt_Cruelerz]

Sling-Stone wasn't too bad because you could farm Xini and then go do it, though it definitely was rushing to and from the reactor.

 

This one was just all rushing.  ALL rushing.

 

I really like your idea though.  In terms of failure punishment, something along the lines of all clan research times, clan construction times, and foundry times increased by, say, 40%.  Makes sense that losing engineers would do that, could motivate clans to motivate their members, and isn't so absurd as 50% drop rates for a while.

Edited August 12, 2013 by Volt_Cruelerz

[Kohira]

The example is bad (I know it's just an example) because it involves escorting an npc. Rescue missions are horrible enough, I doubt that the AI of the engineers will be better when DE makes these events weekly.

Other than the example, I fully agree with all your suggestions. Going through a couple (or just one) hard missions that takes some time to complete (missions that could be scripted with random events) would be much better than rushing through 50 repetitive missions. Quality over quantity? That way people won't be forced into playing the entire weekend.

Good ideas, too bad DE will never improve this way. Grinding is all that they like to throw at us.

Edited August 12, 2013 by Kohira

[matrixEXO]

Why so serious? 

 

 

So what you want is that if you show up, do one attempt and win, you get all of the awards? Am I mistaken in this?

Rather than just do one attempt and win, the mission is actually to promote people to ENJOY the event more than "I.. must... finish... getting... XXX points... to... get... the... complete... rewards! *faints* ". The current design is basically a Zombie Players design concept to force people into being zombies. I want weekend events to be fun. You play the events because you want to get to enjoy something that is different from the norm. Apart from that, I also want people who dared compete against each other for the better "score" to only get bragging rights through leaderboard. Nothing gives a person or a clan a better bragging right than having his name on the first spot in the event leaderboard.

 

 

The example is bad (I know it's just an example) because it involves escorting an npc. Rescue missions are horrible enough, I doubt that the AI of the engineers will be better when DE makes this events weekly.

Other than the example, I fully agree with all your suggestions. Going through a couple (or just one) hard missions that takes some time to complete (missions that could be scripted with random events) would be much better than rushing through 50 repetitive missions. Quality over quantity? That way people won't be forced into playing the entire weekend.

Good ideas, too bad DE will never improve this way. Grinding is all that they like to throw at us.

Heh, I know right? But if they successfully pull this off, they may as well just have asked themselves, "Why haven't we even worked on improving the AI all this time?" which can lead to better Rescue missions and better AI in general. In other words, a hurdle for DE to work with.

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[direcyphre]

You do get your reward for completion of this current event by merely participating. Rushing is obvious in the case of this event and any other because there isn't any purpose to farming the same level. Although everyone is welcome to solo the event just the same and you can do it at any speed you like. All events will be 'samey' to some people because it is still doing the same mission types more than once.

 

The problem with your idea is that it wouldn't really change the status quo. It would still be the same mission over and over again to achieve a special reward. The only difference is that the mission would be Rescue instead of Capture (which was changed up in this event with having to capture multiple targets in random locations, and they could escape).

[matrixEXO]

You do get your reward for completion of this current event by merely participating. Rushing is obvious in the case of this event and any other because there isn't any purpose to farming the same level. Although everyone is welcome to solo the event just the same and you can do it at any speed you like. All events will be 'samey' to some people because it is still doing the same mission types more than once.

 

The problem with your idea is that it wouldn't really change the status quo. It would still be the same mission over and over again to achieve a special reward. The only difference is that the mission would be Rescue instead of Capture (which was changed up in this event with having to capture multiple targets in random locations, and they could escape).

Oh? And what about having to do 2 Alert missions beforehand? I'd rather they use their brains to make us do only ONE mission and that mission be seemingly different from the norm. This Arid Fear event shows that Capture can be 'changed' but is that where they will put and end to the design? They should be improving on all their mission types. They should be thinking of the combinations that they can make in a single mission itself.

 

Ask yourself, would you prefer to play 3 missions just to be registered that you did the event or would you prefer to just play 1 mission and be registered already? I think we all can see how worse it becomes when you extrapolate it onto their "Get XXX minimum points to unlock all mods" design as well. We all know it's just doing a minimum of 34 missions total in a group of 4 to get all of it. But 34 missions of pure rushing and rushing because you want the rewards that should have just been given to you when you accomplished the event is a burner and the fact that you are doing 2 old-type missions just to do 1~4 pseudo-new mission type is a bit... tiresome.

 

Lastly, I want events to have their own spark. Arid Fear shows that events can have their own attractiveness above other standard mission types. Why stop there? Why not improve on it, shape it with the limitless potential of the mind(s because DE is not a one-man team).

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[HexCaliber]

I took one look at this event and promptly logged out for the weekend, again; I have no interest in rushing or being forced to run all the content grouped with random Muppet's. I group in warframe when I chose to play with friends, friends I know that chose to play in a likeminded way.

 

If I chose to play solo because they are not on, or because I only have half an hour to spend or know I will have to pause in the middle of a run I don't expect to be punished for doing so, in a game that claims it supports that play style, that is DE's claim not mine.

 

I do not expect an easier time when I am playing solo as that is my choice, its already harder running high level content solo, much harder in fact, which is fine by me. However, I do not expect to be punished for taking DE at their word. There really is no valid reason for the point’s difference awarded for a group run over a solo run, its already easier and quicker clearing these missions grouped and farming for key parts, without awarding 4 points for less individual effort than that required by the solo player doing the same mission.

 

  Reward should be based on the effort and risk, here warframe has it arse about face.

[direcyphre]

Requires slightly more effort by having to complete two other missions? Not seeing a huge deal there, since those other two missions are completely random types. Even defense came up multiple times in the cycle if that's your preference.

 

Would I prefer to only play one mission in an Event? The whole purpose here is to continue playing, not do one special mission. If an event consisted of one mission, it wouldn't really be an event. It wouldn't encourage cooperation, it wouldn't encourage continuing to play. I understand you hate grinding, but the purpose of an event is to get everyone together. To encourage people to join clans or find groups and cooperate within the community, while still giving you the option to solo. Those who continue playing get rewarded with special mods, which gives people incentive to continue. I personally had no issue grouping up with a few people in my guild briefly. I hit my 100 points and I still have 23 keys left to help others in the guild later.

 

Let me put it another way: No matter what the event is, you will do the same mission over and over again. Even if slightly modified like the Capture in this, and defense in the last, you will do the same mission regardless of how inventive or original the concept is. It will always be 'Samey' because once you've played through all the planets in the game, everything is the same. This is especially true of anyone who has played over 100 hours of it. Obviously people want more variety, but after so long it doesn't really matter what they add or how they go about it because the game has already become tedious to some people.

[matrixEXO]

Requires slightly more effort by having to complete two other missions? Not seeing a huge deal there, since those other two missions are completely random types. Even defense came up multiple times in the cycle if that's your preference.

 

Would I prefer to only play one mission in an Event? The whole purpose here is to continue playing, not do one special mission. If an event consisted of one mission, it wouldn't really be an event. It wouldn't encourage cooperation, it wouldn't encourage continuing to play. I understand you hate grinding, but the purpose of an event is to get everyone together. To encourage people to join clans or find groups and cooperate within the community, while still giving you the option to solo. Those who continue playing get rewarded with special mods, which gives people incentive to continue. I personally had no issue grouping up with a few people in my guild briefly. I hit my 100 points and I still have 23 keys left to help others in the guild later.

 

Let me put it another way: No matter what the event is, you will do the same mission over and over again. Even if slightly modified like the Capture in this, and defense in the last, you will do the same mission regardless of how inventive or original the concept is. It will always be 'Samey' because once you've played through all the planets in the game, everything is the same. This is especially true of anyone who has played over 100 hours of it. Obviously people want more variety, but after so long it doesn't really matter what they add or how they go about it because the game has already become tedious to some people.

Encouragement does not need something to show that running on Solo means any different than running in a group. Except for the number of people present in the same map and boss level (which is actually not really something I bother too much). The reason for this is because the game is not built for Co-op actually. If you were here since CBT time, you should know that Co-op and Clan wasn't something they tried to promote but are now only moving into promoting. But the way they are doing it... like the initial release of the clan Dojo up to before the scaling of resources, the current designs of events. It all seems forced. It seems as if they want to push a person into playing Co-op or kicking the other Solo players in the butt. I get that they want the community to develop "together" but if that was their goal, they should have started from Day 1.

 

Grinding is fine and all since ALL games require some sort of grind system but no matter how random the mission tiles are or the mission itself are. Apart from that, how else to make an event be more unique? Toss us a special mission type. Have you seen the mission type I suggested? In one mission, it's basically an Escort and Mobile Defense mission combined. When you think about playing it, even if you know how it seemingly is in general design concept, you get the sense that it would 'feels' different from how the other missions are. That's the feeling I get from the Arid Fear Capture mission when I tried Co-op, something not being shown to me when I initially Soloed it.

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[direcyphre]

Having to do fewer missions to achieve higher numbers is encouraged by way of grouping. Though for some this may not be immediately apparent if they've been running solo all along. This game was built for cooperative play, there really no question about it. Problem arises that everyone tries to run Online public games and has bad experiences with random individuals, rather than joining a guild to find a proper group to run with. Enemy AI is a whole other topic and unfortunately not an issue that can somehow be solved.

 

As I explained, your idea is nothing more than yet another variant of an existing mission type, much like the current event. I'm not sure how much of this event you played, but the capture target in this can slow you down, turn invisible, and run away entirely in a very short period of time. While you may say it's just another capture mission, it is an original variation of pre-existing scripts in this game. Adding or combining slight variations in those types obviously do not make them feel original or different from other missions, because you clearly haven't seen it in the other events. At the end of the day, the core mechanics remain the same and doing it more than once people consider 'grinding'.

[matrixEXO]

Having to do fewer missions to achieve higher numbers is encouraged by way of grouping. Though for some this may not be immediately apparent if they've been running solo all along. This game was built for cooperative play, there really no question about it. Problem arises that everyone tries to run Online public games and has bad experiences with random individuals, rather than joining a guild to find a proper group to run with. Enemy AI is a whole other topic and unfortunately not an issue that can somehow be solved.

 

As I explained, your idea is nothing more than yet another variant of an existing mission type, much like the current event. I'm not sure how much of this event you played, but the capture target in this can slow you down, turn invisible, and run away entirely in a very short period of time. While you may say it's just another capture mission, it is an original variation of pre-existing scripts in this game. Adding or combining slight variations in those types obviously do not make them feel original or different from other missions, because you clearly haven't seen it in the other events. At the end of the day, the core mechanics remain the same and doing it more than once people consider 'grinding'.

Sigh. I think you ought to see the changelog since the start of the game. If you actually noticed how far we have gone through and how long it took the game developers before they started pushing for Co-op, then you would only agree with me. You can say what you want but I have been here longer than the first weekend event, the Fusion MOA event. I know vaguely how long it took them before they started pushing for Co-op. Until you were actually in my shoe, which is impossible, you won't be able to actually see what they have been doing before the start for the Co-op push. BTW, Co-op was never really aggressively implied upon until the Dojo. Co-op was there for people who wanted to run a mission with others, nothing more and nothing less. There weren't any rewards when you ran Co-op back then.

 

How is combining 2 mission types into 1 a variant? It's called GATTAI. Ok, I'm dropping my lame jokes but in all seriousness, apart from completely new design iterations, a capture-the-flag game will always be a capture-the-flag game, yes? Then, change the flag to be a designated spot and it becomes king-of-the-hill, no? I don't see any reason to remove the idea of variants in the game just because they are of the same root. Variation is there to spice things up, variant is there to put a twist into the standard design of a mode. Otherwise, we would all be having Deathmatch games since Quake and no Team Deathmatch would ever exist at all. Also, I never said it's still a Capture mission, I called it a pseudo-Capture mission.

 

As for slowing you down, turning invisible and running away entirely, it's your fault for not using the radar. It's there for a reason. At times, I split from my group to chase other targets since I know that they can handle it. At times, I use the radar to find out where he is once he's invisible then put hot lead into him because he still can be harmed by both ranged and melee weapons. I never had a successful escape from the target cause I'm always in the room when he wants to get into the escape pod, with him locking himself to his own doom. Question is, are you THAT slow that you can't catch up to them? Or are you the type who prefer to clear the whole room first (aka OCD)?

 

Not really, grinding is when you have to do a specific mission/objective/monster over and over and over again. As long as you reach more than 1~2 hrs doing the same bloody mission or objective or monster over and over again, it's grind. Doing the same mission 3 times over is not a grind. Doing it 20 times over is. So, stop over-exaggerating the scenario and look at it properly.

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[cataclysm2]

They way i see it, weekend alerts are to promote co-operation and getting people together to play the game with each other. In light of this, the spy drone event was really quite rubbish - random blobs floating around that were so easy to 1 shot but not only that, it coerced you into running missions solo (ie, against the intention of the game to group up and play together with others) because whoever popped the spy drone was the only person to get any recognition of it and lastly, it was rubbish because the spy drones posed no challenge whatsoever -- they just sat there and did nothing.

 

On the flip side, I liked participating in the sling-stone event and found it was really quite fun tbh. I played it quite a bit more than just needing however many points it was for the reward. You had to get the corrupters, form a group yourself by interacting with people either from the chat channels or from your clan, deciding who takes what type of corrupter then go do a variation on a mob def gametype, which i quite like anyway. There was also some varying degree's of difficulty because u could farm corruptors on somewhere low level like Io or something or go do it on xini. The fomorian ships also had a big range of mob-levels meaning that new players could participate on the ships in Mercury and veterans of T3's could also find an appropriate ship in pluto or whatever to attack. 

 

I've got to say, this arid fear event really bored the S#&$ out of me very fast and it is because, as others have said, it was a pure rush fest. You rushed the alerts 1 shotting everything (if u could even be bothered to press the trigger), made the key, went to corpus void and continued to rush and 1 shot everything. It's only one leg up from the spy drone event in that the more people you went to the corpus void with, the more dudes there were to kill and therefore acquisition of points was faster and so that was the only part that promoted grouping.

 

Without question, DE are experimenting with these weekend alerts. Some hit and some miss. Your enjoyment of the events obviously varies since u like/dislike different things in this game to me.

Edited August 12, 2013 by cataclysm2

[MeteorKing]

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/93851-screenshot-most-glitched-up-game-ever/#entry1051000

 

Name one game, other than warframe, that has bi-monthly events.

 

Edit:  Also a lot of this

Without question, DE are experimenting with these weekend alerts. Some hit and some miss. Your enjoyment of the events obviously varies since u like/dislike different things in this game to me.

Edited August 12, 2013 by MeteorKing

[matrixEXO]

They way i see it, weekend alerts are to promote co-operation and getting people together to play the game with each other. In light of this, the spy drone event was really quite rubbish - random blobs floating around that were so easy to 1 shot but not only that, it coerced you into running missions solo (ie, against the intention of the game to group up and play together with others) because whoever popped the spy drone was the only person to get any recognition of it and lastly, it was rubbish because the spy drones posed no challenge whatsoever -- they just sat there and did nothing.

 

On the flip side, I liked participating in the sling-stone event and found it was really quite fun tbh. I played it quite a bit more than just needing however many points it was for the reward. You had to get the corrupters, form a group yourself by interacting with people either from the chat channels or from your clan, deciding who takes what type of corrupter then go do a variation on a mob def gametype, which i quite like anyway. 

 

Without question, DE are experimenting with these weekend alerts. Some hit and some miss. Your enjoyment of the events obviously varies since u like/dislike different things in this game to me.

Indeed. I enjoy something I can spend my time on without having the hassle to rush through because there are only 3 days to complete the event or that I must play in a group to get the full benefit of the mission, because F*** Solo-play...

 

I want the leisure to play without being restricted too harshly. The events does this by either having it too short a duration or having a point earning system where playing in the group means more points than Solo, every time. I didn't mind the Spy Drones but I still felt the game was quite the same as it was since there were no new iterations. Except, Spy Drone events were still restricting me because of the duration and point earned.

 

Apart from that, I want to see something new. Sling-Stone has Datamasses as Corruptors being equipped in our Inventory slots for up to 3 Corruptors at one time while Arid Fear has the capture target/s armed with Spectra, flash bombs (for stealth),and a nearby escape pod point to run to (if it is at all nearby them because some are close to 2~3 tiles away).

 

 

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/93851-screenshot-most-glitched-up-game-ever/#entry1051000

 

Name one game, other than warframe, that has bi-monthly events.

Personally, I advocate quality over quantity. Because with the lack of quality comes the lack of innovation. Polish the whole design then send it out. If people wanted quantity, there are games like CoD that does it, every single year. And the quality of it? Still using Quake engine as a base for the upcoming CoD: Ghosts.

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[MeteorKing]

Personally, I advocate quality over quantity. Because with the lack of quality comes the lack of innovation. Polish the whole design then send it out. If people wanted quantity, there are games like CoD that does it, every single year. And the quality of it? Still using Quake engine as a base for the upcoming CoD: Ghosts.

Sadly, the masses do not agree with you.  This should be easy to see through the popularity of CoD as well as the amount of "MOAR" posts in these forums.

[matrixEXO]

Sadly, the masses do not agree with you.  This should be easy to see through the popularity of CoD as well as the amount of "MOAR" posts in these forums.

Which is why I said personally. If DE were to say that they want to brush the game up so they will not do any more updates except fixing bugs and balancing certain weapons, can the public do anything? Apart from rioting and sounding like children. Leaving for 3 months then coming back when they updated the game with really impressive quality improvement may make them re-think their ideas though. Only if it were done right.

 

Problem with people is that they think DE is a company with a thousand people working on this game. Which is obviously not.

Edited August 12, 2013 by matrixEXO

[MeteorKing]

Which is why I said personally. If DE were to say that they want to brush the game up so they will not do any more updates except fixing bugs and balancing certain weapons, can the public do anything? Apart from rioting and sounding like children. Leaving for 3 months then coming back when they updated the game with really impressive quality improvement may make them re-think their ideas though. Only if it were done right.

 

Problem with people is that they think DE is a company with a thousand people working on this game. Which is obviously not.

I wish everyone were as understanding as you.  I also wish that I had enough money to personally fund DE so that they wouldn't care about appeasing the masses as much as they would about making the game how it should be.

[matrixEXO]

I wish everyone were as understanding as you.  I also wish that I had enough money to personally fund DE so that they wouldn't care about appeasing the masses as much as they would about making the game how it should be.

Unfortunately, how the game should be and how DE directs it may differ. You know, personal perspective on things. I too wish I could fund DE so they can actually focus on creating quality content and not bother about the masses too.