The silver grove quest is poorly designed

[MothKing]

What makes Warframe a good game in my opinion, is how solid the game play loop is. One might argue that it is repetitive but if its entertaining and rewarding for the players then the repetitiveness should be no issue.

My issue is with the quest "The silver Grove" is its mechanically very poorly designed. The plant collecting is tedious , going in and out of the same map in an attempt to find a rare plant is not fun. 
Frustrating: The player has to look up what planet and tile set the plants grow at. They need to know when they are able to get it, because some plants can only be obtained during night or day mode. They also need to know where to look for the plants. 
There are a lot of things in the game that the player must look at the Wiki for more information, but at the end of the day those things where still fun.

Here are a couple of ways that I think would make the quest better. 
1. have a map that is guaranteed to have enough materials to make the potion. For the potions that take multiple maps, make them step wise. 
2. If the map wont have the materials because its not night/ day time, tell the player to try again later. 
3. I feel like having an arrow pointing toward the plant would make things easier, but too simple. A better way would be to have a detector that would go up or down depending on how close you are to the plant. You could even have a timer on how long the plant is available to harvest, then if the player fails or succeeds then they move on to the next plant until they have what they need.

With these changes , you still get the exploration sense that the quest is trying to give. I think right now the only thing the quest accomplishes is the lore of the consortium its associated with.

I understand that no one is forcing anyone to play this quest , but the lack of thought that went into this quest is just mind boggling. And , to some this quest might be a fun exploratory thing. But most players have already seen these maps hundred of times if not thousands. Just look at another quest type with no combat, the "spy". These work because there is already a stealth mechanic in the game, and rewards players for not being caught.

Even with being able to see nearby plants by scoping with the scanner, the quest still ends up being too tedious.

Just think to yourself honestly, if the game had more quests like "the silver Grove" would the game be better? If the answer is no, then why is it even in the game? 
I only say this because I know you guys are capable of more than this. This quest might not be important in the grand scheme of things and I am sure there are other things that the team is working on, but I hope you can find the time to make it at least a little less tedious.

[(XBOX)Solargeo]

its about forcing people to not just zoom through stuff. forcing people to actually LOOK. Also i don't mind more quests like the grove. or the Anthem. And Lore wise it IS wort of important

[MothKing]

Im just asking if it can be better done :3, I know some people like it the way it is. If the map was new I would be more in agreement with you. But the tile set has been seen so many times, so it just ends up being load in look in a couple of rooms, abort. Re- do until you find the rare plant.

For the ones that are more common , you could feasibly get them while doing other events. that is if you know where to get them and having gone on the wiki to know where. which is not a bad thing in itself since a lot of things in the game get learned through the wiki, which is usually better than hand holding.

Just comparatively with other quests, this one seemed a bit unimaginative in the game mechanics department.

But everyone will have types of quests that they like more, so you cant please everyone.

I just think if they looked over it again they could probably make it better,  but would it be worth their time.

If most people are fine with it prob not, but if a lot of people agree that the quest is lackluster then something should probably be done to make it a little more interesting. other than the lore thing you mentioned.

 

[Duality52]

The Glast Gambit is the worst offender of being poorly designed, as repeated confusing & frustrating Index matches (the point margin) after a strong start. Add on to how painful to farm for Nidus compared to quests that reward you the parts of the quest frame (SG for Titania, Sands of Inaros for Inaros).

3 hours ago, MothKing said:

Im just asking if it can be better done :3, I know some people like it the way it is. If the map was new I would be more in agreement with you. But the tile set has been seen so many times, so it just ends up being load in look in a couple of rooms, abort. Re- do until you find the rare plant.

The "rare" plants spawn in the same exact spots (except Earth) in the same tilesets, so they're not that difficult to spot with the use of your scanners (Codex/Synthesis). Not only that, the Synthesis scanner can net you double scans.

The Silver Grove also gives you a reason to explore tilesets you usually breeze through and who knows, you might find random treasure like Ayatan or even Rare/Reinforced crates.

[Siilk]

 

The idea behind the Silver Grove is solid. Teaching players about collecting plants and where they are while rewarding them with lore, new items and ultimately a new frame. Sounds great but the execution is quite poor. While mechanics themselves are ok and the repetitive acquisition of plants can be forgiven given warframe's grindy nature, the(unfortunately usual) lack of directions given is hugely detrimental to player's progress. Yes, I understand the idea that vague hints players are given are "supposed" to be a riddle players will have to figure out. But it is way too obscure, even for someone who knows what he is supposed to do.

Warframe is a ultra fast-paced action game with focus on PvE horde combat and pretty much nothing else, expecting warframe players to enjoy dealing with vague riddles rather than be frustrated with them is naive at best. Especially so given not only all the plants and their locations are described in the wiki, but the quest solution itself can be found there as well in a form of an easy to follow step by step guide. Game essentially forces players to go and read the wiki page to know what to do. It could've been more obvious only if the only quest hint provided to players would've been a direct link to a wiki page.

Same effect should be achieved by providing similar information in-game, either through quest narration or through codex article Lotus will recommend you to consult after the initial hint was given by the Loka contact. I do not have high hopes for this to be implemented however as 5 years into development warframe still lacks any kind of meaningful in-game descriptions for anything. Which, given the number and complexity of warframe's mechanics, is completely unforgivable.