How the behaviour of individuals can affect group play on missions and levels.

[2wentyThre3]

This will be a wall of text. I apologise for this in advance, but I will try to be as clear and concise as possible.
I do expect that some people will either not care for or will strongly disagree with this to point of argument, I am not here to argue, only question things from a player's standing. My own standing. I will start this by addressing directly what I perceive to be the issue, how I feel it affects our player base beyond myself, why I feel this is part of a larger issue and what I feel is a solution. By all means, please question my solution. But where my perspective and circumstance is ignored, I will only do the same in return as understanding how I see this as an individual is key to the points that I am making. Thanks for taking the time to read what I have to say in full and taking my perspective into account.

Me:
I am in my mid thirties, have played games my entire life, believe that gaming is a large part of who I am and have played online games since it was possible through IRC text based gaming and later found a love for party based, dungeon format online multiplayer games through games like Phantasy Star Online and World of Warcraft. I am obviously more than this, but these things I believe are what is relevant.

My ethos for online and group play:
Inclusion is key. No matter the skill level, no matter the age. Always communicate in a way everyone understands and only move forward as fast as your slowest moving person allows. Learn and play together.

The perceived problem and how it conflicts with my way of playing and why this is relevant to this forum:
We all like to play online games. We all like this game. But I feel a core part of the game is being homogenized and is being pushed through a play dough mould at the expense of community spirit and enjoyment of the game. Be it Defense missions, Excavation missions or to be honest all low level missions on the star chart, there is an issue with higher MR players, certain Aura's and abilities and exploitation of these things for the sake of convenience for that one player. That one player greatly affects gameplay and the experience for entire group.
My wording of this issue has previously been inflammatory, in game and previous posts, and I will refrain from wording things in that manner again as people have previously stalled on my sarcasm and missed the larger point I was trying to make. That was my error.

Example:
Player "A" is of mid to high MR, has access to most weapons, has a multiple forma'd Warframe, like Banshee for instance [and more than Banshee are capable of this], and has high potential for Aura'd damage and reach extended AoE.
And players B,C and D are either low MR or playing more niche tunneled Warframes, for either fun, necessity or learning purposes.

All players join a mission on one of the first planets on the star chart.

Players B,C and D are there to have fun, learn or need to be there to further progress in the game. One thing ties these players together and that is the want of playing the game in a party to fulfill the need of being in a situation that allows them to play together.

Player A on the other hand is there for the sake of being bored or need of farming resource "X". Player A has no interest in the other players of the group and is only using larger party numbers to spawn more enemies to AoE down to greater increase odds of resource "X" dropping. Or in the case of being bored, Player A wants to press a button and watch numbers fly around his or her screen, further fulfilling their need to feel like they have progressed or whatever motivation they have to do so.

Player A decimates any and all things in the immediate and distant area. Killing anything other Players had CC'd to combo through their Warframes core playstyle, Killing things within other's crosshairs, killing things other Players were making their way towards. Players B,C and D are now put into a position of minimal interaction. They are now placed into what some people have accurately dubbed "Waiting Simulator" where the waiting is for the mission to end.
Player A is having fun. Player A is doing everything they wanted. Players B, C and D however:

Player B thinks this is cool. Player B is getting what he or she considers free loot and a free ride. It's the first time they have ever seen anything like this as they are new to the game and Player B looks at Player A as part of Player B's new definition of what the meta game of Warframe can look like, and it looks like raw power as Player B has no end game perspective. Who knew Warframes could have so much power!?

Player C on the other hand had just waited 72 hours to pull their new Warframe off of the Foundry table. Player C is on a low level map to test their first ability and to get a feel for what the warframe does. They joined a group as they were unsure of their new Warframe and if they could handle it right. They joined a group in the hope, consciously or subconsciously of one of the other players playing the same Warframe and they can learn through osmosis. But Player A is killing everything. Player C is learning nothing and Player C starts to roll their eyes. He/She has seen this all before and really wished it wasn't happening now... Why is Player A even here? What a waste of time...

Player D came to relax and shoot a few things down. Maybe even talk to the group a little as he/she is aware that B and C are new[ish] players. Maybe wanted to help them out a little. Player D loves to hang out and wait for an opportunity to share what they know and be social. Make friends and build bridges. Player D gets a kick from helping out and likes to have time to flex their knowledge. Player D is actively annoyed. Player D is watching B and C try kill things and scramble round while Player A keeps spamming the same ability. Player D senses unrest in the group and in many cases watches other Players quit groups like this... Wait, there goes Player C now...

Now we also have Player E. And player E was not used in this example mainly as I have never been in Player E's shoes, well that and parties only allow 4 members... Player E just doesn't seem to care for or against. They don't see an issue or a benefit. And seriously, more power to Player E. But sadly I have spoken to a fair few Player E's that feel it's okay to tell Players A B C and D that whatever parts of of how they feel are wrong. And sadly some Player E's further that by saying that Players A B C and D should become more like Player E. What these select Player E's don't get sadly is that we can't help what kind of Player we are.
With that said... I, if you haven't worked it out yet, I am Players B C and D or at least have been at different points of my Warframe journey. Hell, I have been Players B C and D in multiple MMO's and other online games.

And the issue is, as a person I can understand the motivations of Player A and wish to some extent I could be like like Player E. But ultimately I reside as a Player D and will never be able to embrace those motivations. The world is full of personalities and these are but a few and I'm guessing even if I used all the letters in the English alphabet I wouldn't have enough labels.
But further to all this, even if I can't get a real feeling for their motivations, I can feel the direct impact of their behaviour - specifically Player A's in this case. Asking for the locking out of abilities, aura's etc. in group play at certain levels would be too convoluted, I get that. But there could be an easier solution [I say easier, it seems easier from my perspective].

A possible solution:
Okay so I have very specific feelings and questions being a Player D. And many A's and E's tell me I should actively seek parties in chat and in Discord servers. And I get that. But then comes the question of why should anyone's behaviour be doctored to such an amount? Why should I have to spend time not playing the game through other media ultimately trying to play the game? Why should Player A not have to do the same? Why is it okay to essentially be antisocial within a social session by making everyone else play "Waiting Simulator" but the person who wants to be social and joins groups to be social is trumped by the person being antisocial?
Player A's motivations are somewhat selfish as for the most part it involves them seeing numbers and personal testing OR grinding for material that they themselves need. They don't care how, they just need to be efficient, and the best way is to kill more things and to get more things, is to join larger parties to initiate the maximum spawn rates of enemies. I don't hate the Player, I disagree with them to a degree but my focus is the structure of the game.

Why not have a group option under the current "Solo" "Public" "Friends Only" and "Invite Only" that assists in removing Player A from B C and D's groups and allows them to carry on and ultimately helps Player A out to maximum effect? Why not have a "Solo Challenge Mode" or something where the map will have a spawn rate equal to a maxed out party, and will follow the parameters of that current map nodes levels and loot? That way Player A can farm or test numbers under real play circumstances and be rewarded for success and it not be as plain or sterile as using The Simulacrum.

I mean this of course is just a thought from my end as ultimately I want to play with people that want active and social groups. I saw the degradation in World of Warcraft where over geared fools would pull trains of enemies in dungeons as a DPS role and then blame others for their shortfall when it would cause group wipes... In the long run I must have spent literal days having to deal with idiots like that. In Phantasy Star Online people would do silly things like that and other players would collect the dead Players weapon and money and could have a legitimate form of negotiation on how things would play out after that, forcing social interaction for the benefit of a group. I mean these examples aren't this game, but what I'm saying is that there bad and good ways of doing things, but any way that makes people be social in an online game is a good way. Giving Player A more options allows all other Players of a higher chance to meet people like them without spending exorbitant amounts of time or 3rd party applications to do so. Currently any discussion mounted with Player A is typically met with animosity, a lack of caring or understanding, or in so many words "I'm doing this because I can and people do it to me when I don't like it so that makes it okay. What goes around comes around."... I personally think we can do better.

I've been Astronomicon and I thank you for your time ❤️

Edited June 4, 2018 by Astronomicon.

[TwoWolves]

I can't believe I'm the first person replying to this. Really? Me?? The irony is killing me...

Anyhoo...I get what your saying. Higher MR characters cause the game algorithms to scale up the enemies' strength, so that Player A who is at MR 30 causes all these weakling grineer to suddenly be tanks. I have often been Player A--I love Nezha, I love using his fire shield ability, then sliding through knots of enemies with my dex dakras. I have specialized in anti-infestation, so I can be extremely lethal to large groups of enemies. 

Yeah, I like running the easy, low-level infestation survival runs for a half hour or more because I can just for the credits, or the components, or the XP, or the fact that I built a Nezha that is so powerful that it can go toe-to-toe with most bosses without ever losing any of my actual shield just because I could and everyone wanted to hate on Nezha. However, that being said, I always try to either A) go off on my own so I'm not in the same tile as the other lower-MR players (my Nezha is only a 7, so it's not a big deal, though he's probably the equivalent of a 10 or 15) and leave a trail of corpses and blood in my wake. Or, B) I will pick off the outliers in the larger areas (the cannon room in Grineer ships comes to mind) and occasionally slide into the fray where there are lower MR players to clean up and take some pressure off them.

I think another solution to this problem would be better communication. Seriously. The chat box is tiny and easily ignored because it's in the left corner. Any typesetter or graphic artist will tell you that the eyes naturally move from the top left of the screen to the bottom right. So the bottom left corner really isn't even on the radar when you're too busy trying to blast your way through five eximuses that just spawned in front of you, guns blazing. If they want the chat to be more prominent for communication during these missions, they need to change the chat box color so it's not white (red would do in-mission) to attract the eye, and when a player is tagged in-mission, it should have a flashing icon elsewhere in the UI so that you know to look at the chatbox. 

A huge problem in-mission is the fact that you cannot easily access the chat box on the fly. You have to hit the Esc key (or O on the PS4) to bring up the menu, then hit T (or L2) to talk. Very awkward. If there was a way to simply click on the player's name on the side of the screen to bring up options like Highlight (the player's silhouette is highlighted no matter how far away), mute, kick (if you're the host), or Ping. Ping would be the most important I think. With one click, you could cause another player to see an alert pop up with your name on it, possibly with a short message or even making the chatbox itself flash a few times.

Now, on the flip side of that coin, players do need to learn to adapt. Yeah, there's always going to be the occasional player who comes in, uses a power, and everything in the entire tile dies. Five times. When I know that I am way out of my league, I'll take occasional shots and try to kill some stuff, but I know I'm not going to last, so I just go off on my own looting and killing, and getting a tile or two away from the God of War player usually scales down the enemies a bit (or at least thins them out so they're not coming at you in a constant barrage). If you're testing a frame in a group, and it's overpowered, you know that you're going to have to stick close to those power players to survive and clean up the left overs. If you want to test the frame for real, you go solo in a defense or survival mission. Test complete.

Lastly, I'm one of those ubiquitous players that turns up in the most surprising places ("What the hell are you doing on Pluto?? You're only MR 7!" "Uh, I won free tickets for the Lynyrd Skynyrd concert...?"). If you see TwoWolves in your group, and you want me in a specific area, get my attention, chat at me (when this ban is lifted lol) and tell me, hey, we need you over by this area using your firewalk ability. Boom. I got your back. If you have to come up and swat me with your sword to get my attention do so.

Use the loading screen time to talk to your group members. Work the logistics out ahead of time.

Unfortunately, DE may take our advice and change things up, but there's nothing you can do about bad players who refuse to be a team player other than abort the mission and block them or go off on your own and loot-loot-loot.

[Etrionas]

Hey,

I couldn't agree more, and I am one of the players that can nerf anything and everything. I think one of the largest problems is that there really isn't a better way to do it. Its a game designed for fun but it seems to run like a farm where you take your basket and pick apples.

Make 'farming' part of playing with people is the key.

I have made this suggestion elsewhere but I would say that the fix is this:

-Have a 'Join Open Squad' Button in the top right of the Navigation window,
-Give an 8.4% xp (totalling 25.2% for a full squad) boost for non friends and an 11.10% xp (totalling 33% for a full squad) boost for friends to play together,
-Make 'Challenge Rewards' repeatable with a reshuffle button (with a timer on it) that allows you to get a new one (for instance if you need melee kills but have no melee weapon)

Now yeah you might get a bad opinion of this because you see high MR players as the problem but if the affinity and resource gain from completing challenge rewards exceeds the affinity gain from nuking everything then its a win win and everybody can have fun.

I hope that helps.

[Zinkaiser]

the only thing I hate is when two guys in survival missions each go into their own separate path killing the spawn rates and oxygen levels while the other 2 hang out in one spot drink tea while afk.

[KilluaWalker]

This is pretty interesting and I think one of the downfalls of the warframe design and community. 

For end game players efficiency is everything, speaking for myself I don't play warframe for it's gameplay anymore, I play to have something to do while I skill in runescape. So like in runescape I want the most efficient way to farm period. 

Another way to look at it like you mentioned above some players will view it as a strict boon, they get items they are farming for faster. I think the majority of mr16+ think all players want efficiency. The finish line has become more important then actually running the race. 

I don't think there is a healthy solution for this myself other then the community changing. I will, when I run  a lith or meso fissure and I see someone mr6 or lower I will usually (Not always I can be selfish to :P) ask if they would like me to mass kill so it goes by faster. I understand almost no one does this. 

if you segregate player based on mr you are only furthering the "1/2 the game Is played in the wikia" mentality, because new players may find it harder to make bonds with older players that allows the new player to have a bank of knowledge at their disposal. 

It also would perpetuate this elitist culture around veteren players and new players. I tend to so this the most with people who are between mr8 and mr16 ( but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen with higher mr's) where because new players aren't as efficient, they are treated like trash.

I don't have a fix for this but I thought I'd throw my 2 sense in here as a "veteren" player (me 24 900h in game 2000h steam) and hope it will help to Develop a your fixes 🙂

 

 

[TwoWolves]

I don't understand what the problem is with the game engine that proper scaling can't be coded in. Trion Worlds' Defiance and Defiance 2050, Skyforge, and ESO all have scaling built into the code so that higher level players get grouped with higher level players when running missions. This is especially true (or supposed to be--it's currently broken beyond belief) for Defiance, in which I have sank an inordinate amount of time into.

Why does DE not use scaling in groups? There's already a bit of code in there to join random players together for public missions; why can't that bit of code be refined to have instructions in it like thus:

<complicated bit of code>

IF incoming player is NOT within x of averaged MRs of group, THEN kick player to a group whose MR is all within 3 of each other.

<more complicated bits of code>

This would solve a huge amount of the problem so long as there was still the option to join with higher MR groups--when you want to. But otherwise, the baseline would be that the scaling would keep all selected players within a 3 MR rating of each other. No more MR 3 and MR 25, unless those players specifically create a group together just like normal by inviting specific members. This would affect nothing but the scaling, so there would be no noticeable difference other than that you are now matched with players within 3 MR ranks of your own unless you invite specific members to group together and go on missions with, just like you can normally. This would also keep the enemies from scaling up when an MR 60 shows up, making them damned near unkillable for the lower-end player. You don't get scored on how many hits you get on an opponent, you get scored on whether you killed them or not.

One way that Defiance overcame this was awarding xp bonuses for kill-assists and defensive-kills. This could easily be incorporated into the Warframe structure (it's just one more statistic to add to the results screen), and such kills could be as little as five or ten percent of the amount of xp awarded for an actual kill. Or does Warframe already take this into account and I'm just not noticing?

Lastly, this forced averaging of MRs for groups could even have a coded EITHER/OR statement built into it so that if for whatever reason, there's no players available for a session that are within 3 ranks of your MR, it would either give you the option to play with higher MR players (thus temporarily removing the restriction for that mission) or wait for players (like normal).

Edited June 7, 2018 by TwoWolves
Typo

[Etrionas]

@TwoWolves I think scaling would be bad, it would divide the community and that's not what we want to do.

[tprx]

On 2018-06-05 at 10:46 AM, TwoWolves said:

I think another solution to this problem would be better communication.

I think you can activate your headphones/mike from the options menu. I did hear players talking to their friends once in pubs. That's when I discovered the option - and went and removed it from my game. It broke my concentration (it came as a surprise and I wasn't used to follow conversations lol!). I heard there's also a Discord channel for Warframe, though I never tried it.

[TwoWolves]

1 hour ago, Etrionas said:

@TwoWolves I think scaling would be bad, it would divide the community and that's not what we want to do.

It could be made optional with a toggle in the settings. Scaling already occurs--if higher MR players show up, guess what? That Ancient Healer you were fighting just got a new lease on life and is he pissed. That's what scaling, in theory, prevents from happening. And if it's optional, as I described in my op above, everyone is happy. The only debate left, at that point, would be the debates over which is better. However, I understand what you're saying could happen in theory as a result, but I honestly don't think that would happen beyond a few outliers who are diehard traditionalists. 

53 minutes ago, tprx said:

I think you can activate your headphones/mike from the options menu. I did hear players talking to their friends once in pubs. That's when I discovered the option - and went and removed it from my game. It broke my concentration (it came as a surprise and I wasn't used to follow conversations lol!). I heard there's also a Discord channel for Warframe, though I never tried it.

Yeah, it's startling to hear voices jump in. I think with the new option to use a keyboard, more people will turn to the chat box and hopefully use the loading screen time to get the baseline logistics down, i.e., I'll go left, you go right. Typing in a chat box is a lot easier on a keyboard than with a controller.