[PC] Beasts of the Sanctuary: Sanctuary Onslaught Feedback Megathread

[More-L]

Idk how flexible the coding is for AI mechanics, but how about adding in some form of boss/mini-boss that Simaris spawns in? Imagine an eximus unit but with greatly increased health and size but it is entirely optional and provides a powerup of some sort (i.e Stops efficiency drain for 10 seconds, completely restores efficiency to 100, kills all enemies on the map granting efficiency for them) to make it feel more 'arcade-like'

Just make sure this unit does NOT have bs 1 shot mechanics, does NOT have immunity phases but DOES have a damage cap per bullet, is a slow-ish melee-type unit (with a guaranteed mag proc when it hits you and an aoe mag proc as an ability) and is immune to all frame powers. The reason for all these factors is that it is supposed to be an optional, challenging unit that can be avoided (if necessary) but will help if you take the time to kill it. Simaris could event taunt you when he spawns it such as "Lets see if your skill can defeat this enemy."

How about add these optional side-objectives to break the meta of kill the whole map in 1 ability?

• occasionally spawn in a series of pickups in random locations that (if all are collected within x time, increased spawns based on players in-game) grants a large amount of efficiency. These could replace the current efficiency spawns.
• Mark areas on the map (similar to interception) that can be captured to grant efficiency and/or a powerup
• Spawn in a random allied NPC to be defended for x time and grants a powerup
• Add meaningful power-ups, in whatever way possible. Always have 1 of these per rotation and have it activate when 1 minute or so is left until the conduit spawns.

Now obviously, this is probably asking for a lot, but adding in variety and 'fun' would make this an amazing gamemode. It is a simulation, the potential for odd things is endless, provided it doesn't interfere with Simaris' goal which is experimentation. But what better way to experiment, than to actually experiment 

[Lyravain]

Alright, here we go;

With every patch, dunno about thge others, but I've been getting WORSE bugs.

I've lost at least two full Khora sets due to Host Migrations.

So how about you fix the loss of EVERYTHING when the host migrates? At least this way, we MIGHT be able to actually KEEP some of our rewards?  Novel idea, I know.

To move on to host migrations; improve the stability for crying out loud. Every, single, freaking, time today; Host migrates on zone 3. After three times I'm halfway ready to get really creative with insults, held back only because I realize cussing you out won't fix anything. Might make me feel better.

Instead of 'fixing' the Focus gains (finally we get a good way to get Focus and you want to nerf it, do you even PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR COMMUNITY SOMETIMES?), devote all manpower into making sure we'll actually like this instead of turning into yet another Rathuum; farm until we get what we need, then never touch again. It's a waste of time, resources and energy.

I am sick and freaking TIRED of losing all progress because your servers have been lately less stable than a sociopath faced with a mob of stupidity.

[ZarakkiZenn]

I was getting ready to give up on focus before onslaught hit, got excited for a few days and now I'm ready to give up on focus once more. PUGs struggled enough as it was in later waves and many went down especially within the first 10s of jumping through a portal. The focus decrease is noticeable and, to make it worse, I now expect some gimmicky meta setup to emerge with, say, a frost spamming bubble while saryn debuffs while link trinity clears while rhino buffs, and we all know how much fun those organized setups are...

Scaling was more reasonable in onslaught than in regular game mode, to the point where most frames didn't necessarily die within 1.5s if they found themselves in the wrong spot, and most weapons were usable if modded correctly. Seems the game was designed up to level 50 and scaling itself was never revisited. Off the top of my head, I'd say you can't do both or all three: more health, more damage, more enemies, it becomes rather absurd rather quickly and leads to gimmicky non-gameplay type tactics.

[cursedmoon13]

Mode was really fun the first time I played it a few days ago, because I somehow managed to have the one run I played not have any bugs!

Today (first time I've really been able to play, b/c work), annoying Banshee first run, so I left after I got tired of sitting around, basically leeching (not devs' fault). Second run, Host migration Zone 3, kicks me out, no rewards; shelving this mode until at least THAT bug is fixed.

Honestly, to me, balance was fine first time I played, so about late on launch day for the mode. Please stop tweaking balance until showstopping bugs are fixed. Please?

[SolVigilance]

22 minutes ago, Lyravain said:

Alright, here we go;

With every patch, dunno about thge others, but I've been getting WORSE bugs.

I've lost at least two full Khora sets due to Host Migrations.

So how about you fix the loss of EVERYTHING when the host migrates? At least this way, we MIGHT be able to actually KEEP some of our rewards?  Novel idea, I know.

To move on to host migrations; improve the stability for crying out loud. Every, single, freaking, time today; Host migrates on zone 3. After three times I'm halfway ready to get really creative with insults, held back only because I realize cussing you out won't fix anything. Might make me feel better.

Instead of 'fixing' the Focus gains (finally we get a good way to get Focus and you want to nerf it, do you even PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR COMMUNITY SOMETIMES?), devote all manpower into making sure we'll actually like this instead of turning into yet another Rathuum; farm until we get what we need, then never touch again. It's a waste of time, resources and energy.

I am sick and freaking TIRED of losing all progress because your servers have been lately less stable than a sociopath faced with a mob of stupidity.

This pretty much sums up exactly how I feel about Sanctuary Onslaught. The majority of my runs this morning have had our host drop around wave 7. That's like a slap in the face and you're expected to appreciate it.

[d4edalus]

22.18.7 brokes solo. according to the tile sets, you can not reach the zone 8 just because there is not enought ennemies - 

[JackieHeart]

I played onslaught since the release.. and i must say its way better now.. however because of the host migrations its sometimes impossible to get anything from it.. i lost whole khora set today alone because of that.. i'd love to see solution similar to the one implemented in void missions when we're disconnected from the game we can still get the items when we're back in our orbiters via inbox message. I think this could solve the problem with loosing the rewards as well as constant worrying about host migrations/game breaking bugs. 
 

[H00ver]

My feedback for Onslaught would be that I initially enjoyed it, but after having run it for as many days since release (bugs aside) it’s beginning to feel stale.

Whether elite or regular, most groups run 8 and out and most party members only equip melee and smash thru each level. 

There’s little reason to use a main hand or secondary weapon, very few abilities, just equip an atterax with maiming strike and you’re GTG. There’s also no strategy necessary to get thru 8 rounds, there’s only waves and waves of enemies dropping ammo you don’t need.

Once most players have Khora unlocked, I see little reason to run the tamer Onslaught, except to acquire some relics. Even so, (IMO) it’s more economical to run excavations or defense missions for those relics because beside relics, there’s credits and resources included in those runs that you can’t get from Onslaught.

I’d suggest maybe varying the rounds with random challenges like main hand only, secondary only, no abilities, etc. Also, abandon AABC and adopt a scaling reward system that encourages players to play as far and as long as they can.

[DiabolusUrsus]

17 minutes ago, H00ver said:

No abilities, etc. 

This only excludes specific 'Frames who can't survive without abilities. Let's not do that, please.

[----Fenrir----]

vor 17 Minuten schrieb H00ver:

Whether elite or regular, most groups run 8 and out

Given the stability issues, most people are probably happy to manage a whole rotation without either crashing or host migration^^ Not many people are willing to risk longer runs when the game might sent them into "host-migration-limbo" at any moment and that usually means losing all the rewards.

[Checht]

4 hours ago, LSG501 said:

No thanks, that will just push most players into using tanks which then basically turns onslaught into a melee/shooting mission.  We shouldn't be restricted in what we want to take to a mission.

That's the point. The current meta for Onslaught is skewed heavily towards dps nuke frames. There's no reason to choose tanks or CC frames over dps nukes. 

With zero revives, it will balance the meta such that it is important to have some tanks or CC in a team composition, so that they can revive squishier dps nukes (or keep you alive enough until you abuse Void mode for team revives). Dps nukes wouldn't go away, as they are still important to kill fast for efficiency, this balances the meta. 

I am assuming team play, of course. Solo play for ESO can retain the 4 revives. Regular Onslaught can also have the 4 revives. Only implement 0 revives for ESO team play as a true hardcore mode. 

Edited April 26, 2018 by Checht

[low1991]

Why not, make onslaught mission a map-scale area control (like those from PoE?, but maybe like 4 to 7x bar length?).

Killing enemies increase the control of the area. Control reduce as the amount of enemies counts (not including summons) in the map.

[H00ver]

My feedback isn’t 

31 minutes ago, ----Fenrir---- said:

Given the stability issues, most people are probably happy to manage a whole rotation without either crashing or host migration^^ Not many people are willing to risk longer runs when the game might sent them into "host-migration-limbo" at any moment and that usually means losing all the rewards.

My feedback ignores “current state” because they’re going to fix it, I’m looking down the road. I want a reason to go back in there, and if there’s no incentive put in to go past 8 rounds, then they may as well cap it there.

Going 10, 15, 20 rounds should be a viable option with rewards more in line with the effort it’ll take to do it, be that Riven mods, Arcanes, boosters, whatever.

Basically I’m asking the devs to look at Onslaught beyond the here and now because the concept is cool, but as it stands right now it feels like a mini grind for a couple of weapons and a frame that many players may not revisit 6 months from now.

How many players run the missions that have Gara’s parts anymore?

[Zedasfogueiras]

I dont like elite onslaught because:

1-AOE and nuking meta, that makes all the rest useless

2-rewards dont scale, and there is endo on elite mode (the players that run the elite mode may have 99 problems but endo aint one!)

3-rewards arent that nice over all

What would fix it for me:

1-remove effiency and make it more like "how far can you go without dying and how many kills can you get in the process" 

2-make the final score convert into kuva (this would give us a reason to kill as much as possible and it could scale if done right!)

3-add cool bosses every 8th zone (that drop exclusive rare zaw parts!)

4-stop reseting our energy after every zone (a cold start makes many frames way too weak in later stages)

5-LET ME PLAY IT SOLO AND REACH STAGE 8 WITHOUT HAVING TO USE MEMESTRIKE!!!!! I want to use my braton prime :'(

 

 

[LSG501]

1 hour ago, Checht said:

That's the point. The current meta for Onslaught is skewed heavily towards dps nuke frames. There's no reason to choose tanks or CC frames over dps nukes. 

With zero revives, it will balance the meta such that it is important to have some tanks or CC in a team composition, so that they can revive squishier dps nukes (or keep you alive enough until you abuse Void mode for team revives). Dps nukes wouldn't go away, as they are still important to kill fast for efficiency, this balances the meta. 

I am assuming team play, of course. Solo play for ESO can retain the 4 revives. Regular Onslaught can also have the 4 revives. Only implement 0 revives for ESO team play as a true hardcore mode. 

Still don't see a reason for it.  There's been plenty of times where I've been in missions where all of us or all but one of us have been taken down at the exact same time due to 'bad judgement' etc.  If we're all spread over the map, which on some maps is needed due to the spawns, then you may not get revived. 

Adding artificial mechanics to make things 'hardcore' is not the way to make things 'harder'.

[Ijaa-Aden]

From my ESO's last hotfix experience :

- Still losing everything except Focus when host leaves (byebye Braton Vandal), worst is when you try to leave, die and get thrown in next room while host leaves.

- On certain tiles enemies die faster than they spawn, making the Efficiency hard to sustain

- Harder it gets, still the same rewards / drop chances.

 

Before improving gameplay, fix the host disconnection issue, PLEASE. This will avoid Pedleks (that look like jerks and have crappy faces) to leave on wave 7 because they don't like how you play. Or bored/at their limit hosts that leaves and make you lose all your rewards.

Either get the efficiency back as it was OR remove it completely : We want to see how far we can get (or how high we can be on the scoreboard), not specifically how fast we can kill things but how long we can withstand pressure under fire.

And for all Endless missions : Please make something for the drops. It's rather annoying to fight against hi level enemies, gather thousands of cryotics, defend a pod for many waves, survive for hours and still get 5000 credits or Vitality for our effort. Make it so Rare drops get more chances the longer we stay and Common drop get less chances to pop.

[Checht]

Just now, LSG501 said:

Still don't see a reason for it.  There's been plenty of times where I've been in missions where all of us or all but one of us have been taken down at the exact same time due to 'bad judgement' etc.  If we're all spread over the map, which on some maps is needed due to the spawns, then you may not get revived. 

Adding artificial mechanics to make things 'hardcore' is not the way to make things 'harder'.

If you make mistakes or bad judgements, you die. That's the essence of a game. Where's the fun when you cannot fail? 

This is not artificial, this is the basic concept of a game. If you run out of health in Megaman, you die. What happened to "game over" in games? 

[Ijaa-Aden]

il y a 2 minutes, Checht a dit :

If you make mistakes or bad judgements, you die. That's the essence of a game. Where's the fun when you cannot fail? 

This is not artificial, this is the basic concept of a game. If you run out of health in Megaman, you die. What happened to "game over" in games? 

What happened to "Continues" in games ?

[Checht]

6 minutes ago, Ijaa-Aden said:

What happened to "Continues" in games ?

4 continues is too many, especially when teammates can revive you. Let Elite mode be a true hardcore mode. Grinders can grind the heck out of the regular onslaught for all I care. Besides, "continues" usually do not let you continue from where you left off, it's starting back at some check point. 

Edited April 26, 2018 by Checht

[AeneasofTroy]

Sanctuary Onslaught: Expectations, Reactions, and Ideas

This is just a personal statement of what I hoped for, how I feel, and where I think this gamemode--or possibly a future gamemode could go. I will say things that people will disagree with me for, but I have no intention of speaking for other players or other player experiences. I've seen in this thread numerous good ideas, some of which I wish I thought of and would want to include here, but I didn't think of them so I'm not. The majority of this post was written between Hotfixes 12.18.6 and 12.18.7, my play experience of Onslaught during that time and prior was primarily in Elite mode in squads with friends and with random other players.


Expectations

From the first stream I caught demoing what would become Onslaught, I assumed it would be a form of time trial with enemy kills adding to a timer--kinda like a horrible love child of Rathuum and the Index. Enemies would scale with each “level” (determined by kill number perhaps?) and eventually the kill rate of the squad would taper off and the timer would run out. As it was referred to as a replacement for Dark Sectors, I thought perhaps different planets would have certain enemy factions assigned to their Dark Sectors and be assigned difficulty reward zones (sort of like how different levels of Spy missions are sorted). Anyway the core of what I was expecting was a fast paced hoard murder mission type, kinda like an exterminate but all of the enemies are shoved in your face and angry from the start.


Reactions

It wouldn’t be a reactions section if I didn’t make a comment on the bugs and crashes, however the diligent hotfixing has been drastically reducing their presence. I’ll personally point towards Transference and Host Migrations for fumigation as I’ve still been encountering a lot of significant issues there in 12.18.7.

Token comment on the presence of bugs aside, Onslaught is interesting. It’s murder mayhem (to a degree) without the loot. That being said, despite the entertainment satisfaction of mass murder (most of the time), the rewards don’t have the same satisfaction as they do in the missions*. The issue with the murder mayhem premise which can be summarized in a shot call my friend made in voice at the start of a round of “Sonar please”. On some tiles the enemies end up spawning far from the players with lower density due to the larger space which require the players to hunt them down, making it difficult for players to keep up efficiency with trying to find where enemies are as efficiency deteriorates because the kill rate slowed. This issue is being addressed in hotfixes (see ya drudges) but please continue to bear it in mind if you intend on keeping the gamemode as is.

The rewards themselves… I’ve managed to get three of the four Khora pieces and two of the weapon parts by time of writing. The radiant relics and focus gains are good core rewards for Elite. I’m not a fan of the low drop chance on the weapon pieces but unlike the Imperator Vandal grind, Onslaught isn’t going to appear for a weekend every few months. I think it suits well as a passive reward after picking up your daily focus cap and some radiant relics, but I’m not scrabbling at anything I can to gain MR so my opinion is fairly laid back on this.

I do enjoy the fact it’s less build specific than the Adaro Sleepquinox for decent focus gains, although now with the enemy scaling fix I’ve yet to hit focus cap again**, but I play casual. I’ve ran with different frames and weapons and not felt that I needed to adhere to a specific build to get results (Looks at Eidolon hunts and all of the Lankas). Yes, Onslaught still heavily favors some frames over others, frames that rely on abilities and QT for survival struggle as it takes them time to build up enough energy to be viable each round, especially considering which buffs/debuffs get cleared between rounds***.The choice to put radiant relics on the elite version instead of just Neos and Axi relics is also quite a pleasant choice, thank you to whoever at DE thought of that.


Ideas

*My current suspicion for the drop in satisfaction with rewards is that it’s partly a Pavlov’s Dog issue. Players are so used to hearing “Look at what our Tenno Operative has just discovered” and that schwing/ding noise when they receive a round reward during survival and then at the end either a Lotus message of “Good work here today” or the end of mission music. There is currently no notice toward a round reward and Simaris is berating the player at the end of an Onslaught run. An elite run getting 4 radiant relics should feel successful and I don’t think bloating the rewards screen is the only way to increase player satisfaction here. Now that I said that though, I’m going to get yelled at by anyone who’s bothered to read this far.

**The Focus system, a returning point of annoyance and frustration. During this last weekend was the first time I was able to reliably hit focus cap for several days straight by doing a fun thing, I was able to progress a lot of nodes for the first time in weeks. But I have Eidolon and Greater lenses as I’ve been looking for months on how to make my life easier on the focus grind. The convergence orb buff at the start of round 2 onwards is a nice idea… but it still feels stilted. Players have to regain energy at the start of every round and enemies are still spawning in as well. An idea would be to keep the convergence buff through a round--maybe on the off rounds as it’s version of a reward.

***Alright I’ll point out another strangeness of Onslaught that I’ve been testing. Does the conduit clear buffs? No, no it doesn’t. I’ve so far seen Zenurik’s energy dash buff, Arcane buffs, and Octavia’s Inspiration all consistently carry through the portal duration. The arcane buffs are less a concern as their duration usually run out by the time the portal animation finishes but they still carry through. Ability buffs are cleared as abilities are temporarily disabled (except for one time where I bugged out Mesa when my Transference broke… bug report pending recreation), energy pool is reset to mission start levels, ammo quantity and magazine stays as was in prior round, health is the same as the prior round, debuffs continue through. At the surface it reads as “new zone, fresh start” mechanic but it’s not. I would be fine with either a full refresh (health, ammo, energy, etc) or just allow energy to carry over if health and ammo are carrying over; consistency is appreciated.

Directing an idea toward Dark Sectors is that they could be similar to sorties in that they are more difficult mission nodes with changing restrictions, but with a less glamorous pool of rewards (maybe an opportunity to add in another non quest warframe here) than the actual sortie, allowing newer players to more organically understand what a sortie is when they come to it. I joined Warframe post-armistice so the clan involvement with them is stories of Ye Olde Days to me and so I don’t know how great or how horrible it actually was for players or how it would scale now with the size of the playerbase.

[Ijaa-Aden]

il y a 17 minutes, Checht a dit :

4 continues is too many, especially when teammates can revive you. Let Elite mode be a true hardcore mode. Grinders can grind the heck out of the regular onslaught for all I care. Besides, "continues" usually do not let you continue from where you left off, it's starting back at some check point. 

Problem is that it would lock some rewards to hardcore players only (even though even casual players can reach the 8th tile without much difficulty). And let's be honest, hardcore players aren't the majority among the playerbase.

Though, sending you back to the previous multiple of 8's tile when everybody's dead could be a way to "continue".

[Checht]

43 minutes ago, Ijaa-Aden said:

Problem is that it would lock some rewards to hardcore players only (even though even casual players can reach the 8th tile without much difficulty). And let's be honest, hardcore players aren't the majority among the playerbase.

Though, sending you back to the previous multiple of 8's tile when everybody's dead could be a way to "continue".

There's no reward that is exclusive only to Elite Sanctuary Onslaught other than the peculiar mod, which is a pretty much useless item. Grinders wouldn't really be locked out of anything. If DE wants to introduce a hardcore content, please do not half-ass it and go all the way. 

Edit: Just realised the Vandal parts are exclusive to Elite mode. If grinders want them, DE please move them to the regular mode then. 

Edited April 26, 2018 by Checht

[Ktro]

My constructive feedback is as follows

1. Give reward every round

2. Start focus booster from round 1

3. Increase focus gain a bit more (60s instead of 45s). This is the only proper way to earn focus which itself is a broken system and now scaling down enemy level is bummer

4. Dilute pool with maybe arcanes, kuva which will diverge the gameplay options and reduce burnout

 

 

Things done right

1. Khora parts distribution as u need people to buy khora with plat acting as currency gain and plat sink

2. Lato vandal should be rare as all things should not be easily available and showd player determination to get them by playing. Fyi can u make the 2% to a more reasonable but still rare 4% chance

 

[FreeWilliam]

I think it's important to realize that many of us are playing this game for different reasons and shooting for different experiences.  I'm excited about sanctuary because it allows for the creation of games/environments/etc. that don't cater to some universal cluster of metas.  I hope this mode starts expanding and adding team events, target shooting contests,  races (Parkour 2.0 races and melee races through the thickest masses of Grineer we can find that force us to use everything from Handspring to Channeling), and whatever other crazy stuff they can come up with.

I'm historically sort of an alt-aholic with most games (I have to try all the things, level all the classes, etc.), but in Warframe I'm in the subset that gets a cathartic joy out of melee and enjoy when we're forced to start mixing things up and playing the stance dance...so it's a constant quest to find things that you can't one-shot but don't cheat. I don't mind the challenge and being nudged into equipping speed holster to add in some gunplay, but I really don't like switching out of my stance because I lose all my dance moves.

(yeah, also super picky about stances.  I love to flow around the battlefield, not get locked into place.  Clashing Forest before any of the current Polearm stances, etc.)

From that perspective, Onslaught has been partially satisfying.  I LOVE how quickly we can ramp up the challenge, that's awesome.

I don't love the fact that the rush for affinity is nudging me towards some cheesey tactics (I really want my Atlas and Zephyr builds to do better than my Saryn in this mode).  Simaris disabling abilities seemed to help a little bit, but I'm wondering if there's a diminishing returns approach there.

I think the lore supports the idea of multiple game modes that don't have to be tuned so generically.  Warframe's a game that allows us to play to the extremes we enjoy...I've seen some hilariously fast volts, stunning fashion frames, expertly masterful limbos, and so much more in this game. 

Most of the rest is growing pains and I get that, I also am VERY cool with this mode not containing many (or any) 'must have' items.  I'm hoping it's more about letting us cater to the fun factor while Simaris uses us as angry bitcoin miners. :)

 

 

[LSG501]

1 hour ago, Checht said:

If you make mistakes or bad judgements, you die. That's the essence of a game. Where's the fun when you cannot fail? 

This is not artificial, this is the basic concept of a game. If you run out of health in Megaman, you die. What happened to "game over" in games? 

No the basic concept of the game INCLUDES 4 revives.... taking it out just to punish mistakes/bad luck, not to mention lag/bugs, is artificially making something harder for no reason.  It's been a while since I played megaman but don't you also lose all your loot if you die so if you don't want to be revived then just quit after you die, simple job done, because clearly based on below you don't need the rewards etc.

 

24 minutes ago, Checht said:

There's no reward that is exclusive only to Elite Sanctuary Onslaught other than the peculiar mod, which is a pretty much useless item. Grinders wouldn't really be locked out of anything. If DE wants to introduce a hardcore content, please do not half-ass it and go all the way. 

Edit: Just realised the Vandal parts are exclusive to Elite mode. If grinders want them, DE please move them to the regular mode then. 

So... you're basically saying DE should take the only reason to go to onslaught out of onslaught... just to make it 'harder'.... so why would 'hardcore' players bother with onslaught, and don't say focus because these same 'hardcore' players have likely focus farmed to max it out already.

Edited April 26, 2018 by LSG501