New Players Need Informed About The Stalker

[Zoike]

maybe they should make a rank limit/minimum

[Tempera]

I was a new player at first, shocking right, and my reaction to the stalker was more like this: "holy crap, I died but that was awesome!".

The lack of complaining from new players speaks for itself so don't act like you're representing them or something.

I was a new player at one point, too. Gasp!

 

And man, it's almost like I chat with new players to Warframe semi-regularly so I can keep up with the new player experience. But that'd be silly. Then I'd have just plain no idea about how new players to Warframe feel.

[Rhorge]

I was a new player at one point, too. Gasp!

 

And man, it's almost like I chat with new players to Warframe semi-regularly so I can keep up with the new player experience. But that'd be silly. Then I'd have just plain no idea about how new players to Warframe feel.

Well the abundance of "Stalker is unfair" threads made by new players totally supports that. Every new player I talked to liked the stalker and the fact that he destroyed them.

Edited August 17, 2013 by Rhorge

[Icymountain]

The stalker is fine as he is, though could use a little buff for higher level players. First time I met him I actually almost killed him, but got careless and got hit by his slash dash. With clever use of cover he IS beatable with low level gear

[ValhaHazred]

The stalker is fine as he is, though could use a little buff for higher level players. First time I met him I actually almost killed him, but got careless and got hit by his slash dash. With clever use of cover he IS beatable with low level gear

Absolutely true. I recently killed him in solo with a rank 3 nova and a rank 10 flux. Granted, I went running for the best cover I could find the moment the lights started flickering, but still.

[Agent_of_Change]

What stalker?

[Sgaterboy]

What stalker?

 

I think they're talking about another game.

[RedlineRonin]

More like "he's that element X that makes a newbie roll their eyes and go 'well, that's stupid/cheap/lame'" when they die in 2 seconds flat because they had no warning that he will OMG ROFLSTOMP YOU when he appears in low level missions.

 Be

Seriously, go play any other game (MMORPG, Online RPG, whatever) and tell me how many times you're fighting Level 10 mobs and suddenly, something that's Lv45 appears out of nowhere, and kills you in 2 seconds without giving you a chance to even hurt it?

 

That just doesn't happen in games, nor should it.

But that only happens once, then you know. Next time he shows up, you look around and maybe you kill him but you at least realize you can fight him. Then you kill him and get some of the best bps in the game and you are pumped and all is right with the world.

Pumped.

[Operator_Error]

THe Stalker in the Anonymous of WarFrame: Expect him.

[Nagisawa]

Man, Stalker scared the hell out of me that first time! It was so exciting and unexpected!

If anything there needs to be more mysterious random encounters.

And after the first time, he became tedious and annoying.

[Icymountain]

And after the first time, he became tedious and annoying.

To you. Not to others. Up to now i personally still love how he randomly shows up. 

[KoshLovesYou]

That's just it, after he kills his intended target, he vanishes.

He doesn't continue to impede the mission.

He's that element X that keeps you on your toes. 

 

AKA: He's there to make sure once you reach the point where you don't use a revive, you end up using a revive, more often than not...unless you can get up on something taller than him, apparently.

 

 

 

Seriously, go play any other game (MMORPG, Online RPG, whatever) and tell me how many times you're fighting Level 10 mobs and suddenly, something that's Lv45 appears out of nowhere, and kills you in 2 seconds without giving you a chance to even hurt it?

 

That just doesn't happen in games, nor should it.

 

Well, consider this:

 

-He only shows up after you've defeated at least one boss.

-He only shows up after you're on planets of a certain level.

 

Once you reach that stage, you've been in the game for a good while. And ideally, you'll ask in public chat "WTF was that". Ideally, other players will point you to community resources, get you talking, which introduces you to clan stuff, which encourages you to play long, buy stuff, etc.

 

He's a hook to get people socializing, a mystery that needs to be answered. How good is he at actually DOING that, though? Well...

[Xylia]

-He only shows up after you've defeated at least one boss.

 

The first boss that he can show up after is Jackal, and that is a ~Lv10 mission. At least I ASSUME Captain Vor doesn't count. Assume. Can't say for sure.

 

 

 

-He only shows up after you're on planets of a certain level.

 

FALSE!

 

I've been killed by the Stalker on Mercury, as recently as 9.5.2.

 

And knowing/not knowing what Stalker is doesn't make it OK for him to show up and one-shot you because you were in a low-level frame. That crap is just ridiculous and it gets old and tiring, fast.

Edited August 18, 2013 by Xylia

[ForgemasterHD]

Considering the Stalker bottomfeeds like none other, I've taken to warning lower-leveled players in my game about his possibility of appearing. Not too much of a Fear factor nerf, in fact, I think it makes it more tense. This is just me though.

[Nagisawa]

Actually, I saw Stalker long before I killed Jackal.  He started to show up after I killed the second Grin boss, I think.

[Xylia]

The first time I saw Stalker...

 

I heard about him a few times, I knew basically what he was...

 

He appeared, and I Iron Skin'd as soon as I saw him (this was right after the 80% reduction nerf) and he killed me in 5 seconds WITH Iron Skin up.

 

I was like "yeah, that was f---ing ridiculous." Because I was like Lv15 Rhino at the time and I had, what, 400 shields? ooo.

 

I was in a Solo game, and I was on Venus at the time. So yeah, that was nice.

 

If there's anything I royally hate in games, is cheap unfair bullsh-- where you're pitted against an enemy you have pretty much zero chance of winning against, and then dying for real when you had no real way of avoiding it.

 

In RPGs, the "HopelessBossFight" is OK; you're scripted to "die" but the game doesn't end and you don't receive any penalties for dying because it was supposed to happen that way.

 

But when a game throws an impossible obstacle at you that WILL murder you in 2-5 seconds, AND makes you suffer all the normal penalties for death, then it is a "that was lame." thing, where I just roll my eyes in response.

 

I honestly can't understand why people think it is awesome when something that is almost 100% impossible to kill pops, instakills you and despawns leaving you with 1 less revive. You find that fun? What are you, masochists?

[KoshLovesYou]

 

FALSE!

 

I've been killed by the Stalker on Mercury, as recently as 9.5.2.

 

And knowing/not knowing what Stalker is doesn't make it OK for him to show up and one-shot you because you were in a low-level frame. That crap is just ridiculous and it gets old and tiring, fast.

 

Pretty sure that's a bug rather than him working as intended. He's "supposed" to crop up when you're fighting 20-30 level range characters to start.

 

A system for checking how many revives a character has (not spawning if they only have one), as well as checking when he last spawned (I've had him hit me up 3 missions in a row, still no unique kunai drop to boot, 7+ Dread BPs) on a player, would help with that.

 

Honestly? I think he's there to eat Revives and keep new players talking, MAYBE even spice up the missions and put the pressure on teamwork vs lone wolfing. That's the design goal.

 

Still pretty damn questionable methods to do it, though. "Eating Revives" as a goal is underscored by the fact that you often can't be saved by team mates if you're downed, which sadly shoots the "co-op emphasis" focus a bit in the foot.

[Mampara]

I solo like 99% but I can see where you're coming from.

[TheHeraldXII]

Guys, guys, you know you can just run, right? As in, what I did after my first encounter with the Stalker was leg it every time he popped up. I considered him to legitimately be my reckoning and did everything I could to avoid him. I solo'd every planet up to Ceres before I even considered fighting him and I honestly think that trying to avoid the Stalker while still completing the mission was fun.

If you find something you don't think you can kill, don't keep trying to kill it, find other ways to circumvent the challenge. It's that kind of random element that actually makes you change up how you complete the mission that keeps you on your toes. If you keep trying to fight the guy that kicks your can around town, you're not going to get anywhere.

 

P.S, for the people that want the Stalker to scale up for experienced players, if you play higher level missions you get higher level Stalker. I recently fought a level 86 Stalker on a Ceres alert.

[Xylia]

Guys, guys, you know you can just run, right? As in, what I did after my first encounter with the Stalker was leg it every time he popped up. I considered him to legitimately be my reckoning and did everything I could to avoid him. I solo'd every planet up to Ceres before I even considered fighting him and I honestly think that trying to avoid the Stalker while still completing the mission was fun.

If you find something you don't think you can kill, don't keep trying to kill it, find other ways to circumvent the challenge. It's that kind of random element that actually makes you change up how you complete the mission that keeps you on your toes. If you keep trying to fight the guy that kicks your can around town, you're not going to get anywhere.

 

P.S, for the people that want the Stalker to scale up for experienced players, if you play higher level missions you get higher level Stalker. I recently fought a level 86 Stalker on a Ceres alert.

 

Yeah, uh huh.

 

If you're a newbie who got his first Jackal Kill, you probably have in the neighborhood of 300 shields and 300 health, IF you got a Redirection.

 

I'm doing a New Account Test to test out my Getting Started guide, right? I'm almost to Tolstoj and I've not seen a Redirection yet, though I do have a Rank2 Vitality.

 

I've got 160 Shields and 250 Health or thereabouts.

 

If a Stalker popped right now, he would nearly one-shot me with 1 Dread Arrow. It'd probably about 2 or 3 of his Despairs to kill me.

 

Given that a lot of these levels are somewhat dark (especially those stupid Galleons) it can be hard to SEE him and where he's spawning, and if he does Slash Dash and gets anywhere near you........you are dead. Period. No ifs, ands, or buts about it.

 

Not to mention... you're running into rooms with a death machine chasing after you.... you think the local enemies are going to just ignore you because there's a Stalker? Uh, hello? No, they're not. They're going to be shooting at you too. How long do you think those 160 Shields are gonna last with everything shooting at you?

 

You better pray you weren't on a Rescue, Spy, or Sabotage Mission, or you'll find yourself either having to backtrack or try to escort someone out.... with a Stalker chasing you, or having to destroy mining machines/reactor cores while Stalker is chasing you.

[TheHeraldXII]

Xyl, I appreciate the thought, but seriously, this is how I played through EVERY Stalker encounter from Venus to Ceres, solo, in order of difficulty. You can run away from him, at least long enough to get away from enemies or put them up as a barrier between you and him. Not to mention this is what I did the last few times he popped out at me while I was recently levelling up my Vauban. I get that his Slash Dash can one hit you but it's hard for him to get a chance while you're making haste in whichever direction he's not in. Also from that experience, having less than 300 health and shield, no, his arrows won't one-hit you.

This isn't something I'm recommending based on theory, but on practice. New players; this is exactly how I deal with the Stalker. I run, I run like a maniac and hope he doesn't catch me. It's possible, even kinda easy. In fact, it's a commonly complained about issue that you can run through entire missions ignoring the enemies.

[Nagisawa]

The only reason I got a Stalker kill, was because I hid and let the Corpus respawns take him.  They got him down to about 25% when I popped up and and shot him a few times with my Paris.

 

But if he corners me alone?  I fail the mission.  Even with a 500/500 max level Excal, I get three shotted by his weapons.  I just haven't gotten the damage mods, nor do I get the Catalysts for any of my weapons.

[Lumireaver]

Easy way: Introduce him to the lore proper.

 

We kill a boss a few times, Lotus mentions that there might be some retaliation for it (duh).

 

Then you start hearing mentions about a Tenno working for the Corpus/Grineer.

 

And only when you've heard both and can connect the dots, does the Stalker show up the first time.

 

Way too much exposition.

 

Flickering lights and ominous whispers are enough introduction.

[Nagisawa]

Stalker is a griefer and a troll.

[Casardis]

Stalker attacked my squad of 3 people two weeks ago. One of them was a new player, and we were on Terminus (his very first mission). That was quite the experience for him since he didn't know anything about the Stalker and much about the game either.

 

The only problem is that he was targetting me... bad idea from his part. =\

 

All in all, I like how they keep secretive about it for now, and it will probably remain that way for the most part. I don't think an exposure to the new players as obvious as some descriptions here will be beneficial to the effect he gives at first.