My most serious gripes with The Sacrifice update: Exalted weapons / cosmetic prices / New UI

[Gregnoth]

Since I'm a wordy bastard I will add a TLDR section at the very bottom.

 

Dear DE,

I have to admit - The Sacrifice turned out to be one spectacular, touching and surprising quest and I

Spoiler

-MOMMY WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME-

loved it. Just like I love new Excal and the fact that we finally

Spoiler

-SERIOUSLY MOMMY, WHYYYYY?!-

know for sure where Warframes come from (as disturbing as it is).

 

There are a few "buts" though - some smaller, some Ember-quality (I mean, she does have a THICC bottom, doesn't she?). Points below, I'll list them in no particular order:

 

1.    EXCEPT FOR THIS ONE, IT GOES FIRST CAUSE IT REALLY PISSED ME OFF!

Ekhm.. Exalted weapons:

What. The. Flip?

Sorry but this one really feels cheap and has that used-car-salesman kind of vibe. Why are we required to spend more forma to make some of our favorite Warframes reach peak condition again? I get the added benefits of not needing a corresponding weapon type equipped and specifically modded and I'm fine with that, but adding more forma to the mix is not a solution. This would mean that some frames would need around 6-10 forma in total to be maxed. (I've seen some people claiming 13 for Titania, but this really feels like an overkill). You can't even rationalize this by thinking that you are modding a weapon, as - guess what - you can't use that exalted piece of goodness on any other character.

This really feels unfair, especially for someone who loves frames with Exalted abilities (all of them. Yes - even Wukong).

And you know who this will probably also feel unfair for? New players. They already have a hard time with the steep learning curve so to them sinking even 1-2 formas would be a tough sale. Not to mention 6-10... I can vouch for that - I was a new player not a year ago, and even though I accumulated a lot in the meantime this design decision still hurts like motherf(the other half of Sam L J's favorite catchphrase).

People did not complain about Venari too much, even though it's a similar affair, sure, but to be honestly most of the community probably thought this was a one-off. I mean, how often will we get pet frames?

Once again - feelsbadman and there a few solutions to remove this. You could put some more Madurai polarities in / make the weapons get 1 more polarity for every forma pumped into the frame / excellent one, but not mine: make the capacity infinite but make the ability cost more for with raising capacity.

 

2.    Prices on some new merch:

225 plat for a slightly reskinned old Nikana skin? 75 plat for operator cosmetics when the old ones cost 15 each? 500+ plat for the entire set, without the aforementioned operator cosmetics? I really don't know what to think about this - is this meant to be a plat sink? Is the market so saturated that some plat needs to be drained? In that case why not release more cosmetic options - even small ones - for a slightly higher price and not overprice those few 5 times over?

This can't be explained by the availability of easy ways to farm plat, as the newer players don't farm it from the game directly - they get it from other players, who in turn buy it from the store. Such being the case if there's too much plat on the market then it means that you are doing a wonderful job and that people give you money hand over fist - is that a reason to punish us for?

I don't mean to sound cheap (EVEN THOUGH I AM) but if this is only a taste of what's to come then Warframe might start bleeding players soon.

 

3.    New UI:

Finally something more technical. The New UI.

Let me begin with this: I do understand that this is only the beginning. I do like the new styles. I hate the new screens as a whole.

The reason? Very simple: Loss of information and loss of functionality. Let me give you a few examples:
o    Baro's merch screen is completely empty on the left side. Looks awkward.
o    All inventory / shop screens miss the name of the item and basic info (price, for instance). Inconvenient.
o    Where is my "Remember my logon details" checkbox? I've been looking forward to this as much as Tyl Regor looks forward to my live dissection. The anticipation… Oooooh… - this one I can understand as security reasons. Unfortunate, but acceptable, I suppose...
o    Can't choose the game type (Public / Friends Only / Invite Only / Solo) on a controller? Wait, what?
o    Can't insert the password on the controller ('X' doesn't seem to work)
o    Options don't react to mouse click when a controller is connected (although this might not be connected to the current update, I think this was an issue before… OR WAS IT?)

That's about all in regards to UI. I'm sure you will be working on this in the following weeks so I don't want to give you a hard time for this, after all this is a major change and it will require a Lua-full of work.

 

4.   Bonus round -  /Spoiler/
/Spoiler/ mode gets a /spoiler/ debuff when /spoiler/ing back to our new Excalibur /spoiler/. Apparently this happens as clients only, from what I've read on the forums.

 

And that's about it. Hope that you will see this, DE, and that the community agrees with me at least a little. I've been trolling through the forums and I noticed a lot of people complaining about the above, so I just thought I would echo those concerns, frame them and submit here.

Don't get me wrong DE, you have been doing a fantastic job for the last 5 years. I just don't want this to end / change, so I had to give my proverbial 2 cents here.

All the best,
Ya boy,
Greggy

 

---TLDR:---
Ya boy, Greggy, has some issues to raise:
1.    Exalted weapons should NOT take this much additional forma. They are not additional gear that can be used by every frame but an extension of Warframes they belong to.
2.    Some new cosmetics (Nikana skin, Operator cosmetics) are disproportionally expensive. Their prices should be adjusted.
3.    New UI: Some empty-looking screens, lack of names and prices on items, no "Remember my logon details" checkbox, Game Mode type can't be set on a controller.
4.    /Spoiler/ /spoiler/ /spoiler/ /spoiler/, /spoiler/?

Edited June 17, 2018 by Gregnoth

[AlendasNaro]

Yeah the exalted weapons NOT having applied formas from Warframe is just not okay. Look DE we know you need money to keep making this game but this is not the right way to try a cash grab or something. Another gripe mostly friend of mine has is that. There isn't anything else to do. The quest was like about 10 minutes long. Which is okay because it was good. It gave you a reason to keep eye on this game as a sleeper game. Problem is. WHERE is the substance? We need more things to do. Veteran players (at least most of them) HAVE LEFT and moved on to other F2P games because there isn't anything to do in Warframe. There isn't anything challenging and rewarding. Sure we have ESO (Expert Sanctuary Onslaught)

However rewards there are basically something veterans just turn their backs to also how it was launched hurt the mode EVEN MORE. While you probably have fixed them and this is continually a beta game for PC players. PLEASE do not launch anything in that state. We need content that is challenging and rewarding. Preferably it can be some kind of upgrade (For PvE such as something that increases reload speed or something. It doesn't need to be big buff but considerable which you can adjust when you need to) but cosmetics aren't that bad although DO NOT DILUTE the drop table with those. They don't need to be tradeable either. If there was one thing (Don't get triggered) Destiny (not the 2nd) did correctly was giving loot at raids and how good content those where.

DE give your community a REASON to stay longer. The longevity of your game is suffering from this now. Yes you are pretty much constantly updating the game but those are fixes (Which yes are VERY important) but you can not deny that if you do not give your community a reason to stay longer it won't attract more people. The larger the friend base that plays Warframe more likely is for those who haven't may give it a try after all. Game is free (Although some of the things needs to be rethought should we make it better for the players. Such as weapon, warframe, archwing and weapons for them, sentinel and their weapons slots)

Edited June 16, 2018 by AlendasNaro

[peterc3]

4 hours ago, Gregnoth said:

1.    Exalted weapons should NOT take this much additional forma. They are not additional gear that can be used by every frame but an extension of Warframes they belong to.

Maybe people should have really thought about it before constantly whining that they needed to use a stat stick instead of making the exalted weapons fully moddable weapons. The die is cast. This is what they were asking for, nevermind what people thought they wanted.

4 hours ago, Gregnoth said:

2.    Some new cosmetics (Nikana skin, Operator cosmetics) are disproportionally expensive. Their prices should be adjusted.

They are cosmetics. If you don't feel they are worth what they are priced, don't buy them.

4 hours ago, Gregnoth said:

3.    New UI: Some empty-looking screens, lack of names and prices on items, no "Remember my logon details" checkbox, Game Mode type can't be set on a controller.

Not done, never said it was done and, as usual, will continue to be refined. There was never any plan to have a "remember me" feature, unless you saw devs say otherwise.

[-AoN-CanoLathra-]

4 minutes ago, peterc3 said:

There was never any plan to have a "remember me" feature, unless you saw devs say otherwise.

IIRC it was on the first spoiler Steve released of the new UI. I don't remember seeing it in any later images, though, so I think they scrapped it early on, probably to avoid providing an easy way to break the ToS (Only you can log in to your account, no one else).

[Gregnoth]

4 hours ago, peterc3 said:

Maybe people should have really thought about it before constantly whining that they needed to use a stat stick instead of making the exalted weapons fully moddable weapons. The die is cast. This is what they were asking for, nevermind what people thought they wanted.

Well, I've never asked for this - neither did many other people. This change has completely blindsided much of the community and I'm not the 1st one to voice similar concerns - in fact people have been doing so ever since this was announced earlier this month (or was it late last month? I can no longer recall).

In any case, as stated in my full post - I see no reason why we should (depending on interpretation): either pour more forma into a Warframe with Exalted ability (if we consider the Exalted skill a part of Warframe) or forma a weapon that only 1 Warframe can ever use (if we consider the Exalted skill a weapon).

 

4 hours ago, peterc3 said:

They are cosmetics. If you don't feel they are worth what they are priced, don't buy them.

I won't, don't worry - it's just the items I mentioned are disproportionally overpriced. I can understand an increase of 200%, but 500% is a bit much, eh?

If I was sure this was a one-off, I wouldn't even say anything. I'm just worried this will set a trend and I will not leave this without a comment.

 

4 hours ago, peterc3 said:

Not done, never said it was done and, as usual, will continue to be refined. There was never any plan to have a "remember me" feature, unless you saw devs say otherwise.

As mentioned in the full post - yeah, I know that this is work in progress. I also know that certain are simply broken or incredibly inconvenient at this time. And I don't even mean when using a controller - that's a different story altogether. As with the above point - I will not leave this go unnoticed, hence this topic.

 

In general: I am not whining about this update as a whole. I like it - I love the lore, like the quest and the overall ambience, but I can also see some things - all listed above - that really worry me as a player invested in this title's future. I've already sunk 1,6k hours in this and frankly - I would like to sink even more, but not if the new game mechanics and cosmetic items becoming unrelenting plat sinks.

Who knows, maybe this is just a one-time anomaly. If such is the case I will gladly accept this bump and proceed as if nothing happened.

Edited June 16, 2018 by Gregnoth

[True_Naeblis]

5 hours ago, AlendasNaro said:

Yeah the exalted weapons NOT having applied formas from Warframe is just not okay. Look DE we know you need money to keep making this game but this is not the right way to try a cash grab or something. Another gripe mostly friend of mine has is that. There isn't anything else to do. The quest was like about 10 minutes long. Which is okay because it was good. It gave you a reason to keep eye on this game as a sleeper game. Problem is. WHERE is the substance? We need more things to do. Veteran players (at least most of them) HAVE LEFT and moved on to other F2P games because there isn't anything to do in Warframe. There isn't anything challenging and rewarding. Sure we have ESO (Expert Sanctuary Onslaught)

However rewards there are basically something veterans just turn their backs to also how it was launched hurt the mode EVEN MORE. While you probably have fixed them and this is continually a beta game for PC players. PLEASE do not launch anything in that state. We need content that is challenging and rewarding. Preferably it can be some kind of upgrade (For PvE such as something that increases reload speed or something. It doesn't need to be big buff but considerable which you can adjust when you need to) but cosmetics aren't that bad although DO NOT DILUTE the drop table with those. They don't need to be tradeable either. If there was one thing (Don't get triggered) Destiny (not the 2nd) did correctly was giving loot at raids and how good content those where.

DE give your community a REASON to stay longer. The longevity of your game is suffering from this now. Yes you are pretty much constantly updating the game but those are fixes (Which yes are VERY important) but you can not deny that if you do not give your community a reason to stay longer it won't attract more people. The larger the friend base that plays Warframe more likely is for those who haven't may give it a try after all. Game is free (Although some of the things needs to be rethought should we make it better for the players. Such as weapon, warframe, archwing and weapons for them, sentinel and their weapons slots)

What's the point in them continually pumping out new content if it's broken? There are major, major issues with Eidolon fights that haven't been addressed even though they've been brought up in detail for months or more. They simply scrapped raids in their entirety rather than focusing on getting them right before releasing new content. Cetus has bugs galore and they're on to Venus for more grind and more bugs to send our way. How is that rewarding? How is that good for player retention, vets or otherwise?

[AlendasNaro]

2 minutes ago, True_Naeblis said:

What's the point in them continually pumping out new content if it's broken? There are major, major issues with Eidolon fights that haven't been addressed even though they've been brought up in detail for months or more. They simply scrapped raids in their entirety rather than focusing on getting them right before releasing new content. Cetus has bugs galore and they're on to Venus for more grind and more bugs to send our way. How is that rewarding? How is that good for player retention, vets or otherwise?

True. After thinking a while. I think DE is facing a difficult situation of how to balance making new content and fixing the old to point where there shouldn't be any new major bugs. As long as community continues reporting them and DE does get to fixing them game should head to better way.

[marelooke]

1 hour ago, -AoN-CanoLathra- said:

IIRC it was on the first spoiler Steve released of the new UI. I don't remember seeing it in any later images, though, so I think they scrapped it early on, probably to avoid providing an easy way to break the ToS (Only you can log in to your account, no one else).

It's just an extremely bad idea from a security PoV, so I am not surprised it got scrapped. Whoever is in charge of security at DE would have veto'd it the second (s)he saw it.

[peterc3]

1 hour ago, True_Naeblis said:

They simply scrapped raids in their entirety rather than focusing on getting them right before releasing new content.

Heads up for Trials players. You are in the extreme minority. Focusing on getting them right was 1) an infinite manpower hole given its impact on other content and other content's impact on it and 2) lacked the engagement to justify evolving them rather than disabling them entirely. If they were really worth saving, they would have been saved. They didn't take such an extreme measure without reasons, to deny that there were real problems is to show your ignorance.

1 hour ago, True_Naeblis said:

There are major, major issues with Eidolon fights that haven't been addressed even though they've been brought up in detail for months or more.

Then you know the place in the code and any other places that might cause the issue? You know what related or unrelated systems might cause or exacerbate the bugs? Please show DE how little they know and how much you know, then.

1 hour ago, True_Naeblis said:

How is that rewarding? How is that good for player retention, vets or otherwise?

New content is king. To say otherwise is to deny the closest to objective reality there is. Demonstrate it is bad for player retention.

[marelooke]

27 minutes ago, peterc3 said:

New content is king. To say otherwise is to deny the closest to objective reality there is. Demonstrate it is bad for player retention.

If you don't keep your old content viable, or even just functional people that enjoy said content will just leave. Some of them might check back hoping for fixes, some (most?) players will just leave forever. I would think that would be obvious.

We all came to this game for the "old" content (aka the stuff that was there when we started), if the new stuff is good, that's nice, if it's not, we don't really care all that much because the old stuff is still good. If, however, you break the stuff that got us into the game to begin with and the new stuff isn't engaging to us...then what do you expect?

What this "old content" is will differ from player to player, depending on when they started and what kind of gameplay they preferred, I'd imagine.

Edited June 16, 2018 by marelooke

[peterc3]

2 minutes ago, marelooke said:

some (most?) players will just leave forever. I would think that would be obvious.

It isn't, to the point where I'd ask you to actually back it up with numbers, maybe another game where this was demonstrated to be true. Anecdotes are not persuasive in the face of player data that DE has.

4 minutes ago, marelooke said:

We all came to this game for the "old" content (aka the stuff that was there when we started), if the new stuff is good, that's nice, if it's not, we don't really care all that much because the old stuff is still good. If, however, you break the stuff that got us into the game to begin with and the new stuff isn't engaging to us...then what do you expect?

Then they should just stop developing the game, get rid of any plans they have for the future, layoff most of their staff. This is a quick way to destroy a game.

[marelooke]

27 minutes ago, peterc3 said:

It isn't, to the point where I'd ask you to actually back it up with numbers, maybe another game where this was demonstrated to be true. Anecdotes are not persuasive in the face of player data that DE has.

I base my argument on typical human behaviour, so if you have a counter-argument not based on numbers you have just as much access to as me (aka: none at all) then I'd love to hear it.

27 minutes ago, peterc3 said:

Then they should just stop developing the game, get rid of any plans they have for the future, layoff most of their staff. This is a quick way to destroy a game.

Right, it's going to be this kind of "argument" not sure if it's worth bothering with.

Edited June 16, 2018 by marelooke

[Gregnoth]

2 hours ago, AlendasNaro said:

True. After thinking a while. I think DE is facing a difficult situation of how to balance making new content and fixing the old to point where there shouldn't be any new major bugs. As long as community continues reporting them and DE does get to fixing them game should head to better way.

Exactly the case - they need to make new content to both: attract new players and retain the old ones. Such being the case there simply is not enough time to fix every old bug.

Unfortunate, but such is life...

 

2 hours ago, marelooke said:

It's just an extremely bad idea from a security PoV, so I am not surprised it got scrapped. Whoever is in charge of security at DE would have veto'd it the second (s)he saw it.

Hm, I guess you are right. I wanted to counter this with "WoW remembers you" only to remind myself that WoW has several other security measures that allow it to do so... Crap, I was really looking forward to not having to type in my password every singe time...

[uxx0]

The only thing I have to add to your complaints:

Spoiler

The quest was supposed to put an end to the trilogy. Instead we get a massive cliffhanger. Obviously it's a great creative lifeline for DE, since they can now expand the playable world to the Tau system. But it still doesn't feel like a conclusion.

 

20 hours ago, Gregnoth said:

Exactly the case - they need to make new content to both: attract new players and retain the old ones.

Gonna quote Steve from the Noclip documentary here:

Quote

One of the big parts of my job, which is, 'How much time are we gonna burn on a new player and how much time are we gonna give to that thousand hour player?'

 

21 hours ago, peterc3 said:

Heads up for Trials players. You are in the extreme minority. Focusing on getting them right was 1) an infinite manpower hole given its impact on other content and other content's impact on it and 2) lacked the engagement to justify evolving them rather than disabling them entirely. If they were really worth saving, they would have been saved. They didn't take such an extreme measure without reasons, to deny that there were real problems is to show your ignorance.

Then you know the place in the code and any other places that might cause the issue? You know what related or unrelated systems might cause or exacerbate the bugs? Please show DE how little they know and how much you know, then.

New content is king. To say otherwise is to deny the closest to objective reality there is. Demonstrate it is bad for player retention.

Honestly, the more I read your posts the more I'm convinced it's bait. Very good bait.

[(PSN)MJ-Cena7]

On 2018-06-16 at 5:21 PM, Gregnoth said:

225 plat for a slightly reskinned old Nikana skin? 75 plat for operator cosmetics when the old ones cost 15 each? 500+ plat for the entire set, without the aforementioned operator cosmetics? I really don't know what to think about this - is this meant to be a plat sink? Is the market so saturated that some plat needs to be drained? In that case why not release more cosmetic options - even small ones - for a slightly higher price and not overprice those few 5 times over?

totally agreed very steep increase in price for no reason that dax skin only ruins the option of buying the bundle and those operator cosmetics are just a cash grab 

also i recall buying hunhows gift for 695pl when update lunched for the exclusive armor and then its price dropped to 516 

[Klokwerkaos]

On 2018-06-16 at 10:21 AM, Gregnoth said:

1.    Exalted weapons should NOT take this much additional forma. They are not additional gear that can be used by every frame but an extension of Warframes they belong to.
2.    Some new cosmetics (Nikana skin, Operator cosmetics) are disproportionally expensive. Their prices should be adjusted.
3.    New UI: Some empty-looking screens, lack of names and prices on items, no "Remember my logon details" checkbox, Game Mode type can't be set on a controller.
4.    /Spoiler/ /spoiler/ /spoiler/ /spoiler/, /spoiler/?

1) meh, not a big deal.  I feel like it's fine.  I see why the gripe, but forma are so common I don't see why the big gripe.  I have other fish to fry with DE that are much bigger issues.

2) absolutely accurate, this is dumb pricing.  Beyond the fact that they are ugly, i would still collect them if they weren't stupidly overpriced.  I have the plat to afford them and just no.

3) the new UI is a hot mess, I have a ton of gripes here, from things being illegible, to less information being readily available on screen(direct downgrade), to screens not matching up consistently in game when you PAID PLAT for custom themes... this is a huge mess and DE should feel bad and fix it asap.  Whoever designed this UI needs to take some UX classes because it's absolute sh*t and I hope they read this and feel bad about it and never make these mistakes again.  This is seriously amateur work and I'm annoyed I PAID PLAT for something that's half done AND is a direct downgrade in many ways.

4) this is a bug as far as I can tell, and since I don't like excal anyway, umbra or not, i really don't care, but it is worth prioritizing a fix for the people that enjoy the frame.