Less "x Is Too Op", More "how Can We Make This Game Balanced So X Doesn't Seem As Op"

[Cerokhol]

Ok, when I started this I did not expect it to end up as this huge wall of text so please forgive me

 

                                                                                                                                                                              

 

There have been a lot of threads about whether or not to nerf Nova. This thread is NOT about that, but rather a different way to look at the balance of the warframes and the game in general.

 

Looking around forums, I see threads about "Nerf X cause it kills everything too easily", "Rushers/Explorers are ruining this game", "This game is TOO easy. Someone else figure out how to make it harder."

 

All of these can actually talk about balance but it usually gets buried behind 5 pages of opposing viewpoints yelling at each other.

 

I think instead of just whining about whats OP/UP/easy/hard/ruining our lives right this very second and we take a step back and look at what we have and look to what opportunities this could bring in the future to balance things differently.

 

Warframes

 

First off, instead of balancing warframes right now based on whats already out or based on how hard it is to clear a room right now, we should balance warframes so that they FEEL right. There should be synergy and no skill should feel absolutely out of place.

 

This doesn't mean that I should argue that radial disarm is bad on Loki because the enemies hurt MORE when you take away their guns. That's not really a problem with radial disarm so much as the enemies.

 

I am more thinking along the lines of the old Rhino Stomp and Radial Blast. The two skills were too similar in his skill set. We should look at the roles we want the suit to play and look at how the skills could work in that role, not at how well they are actually implemented in clearing rooms.

 

When the warframes FEEL right we can add new stuff to the ever changing repertoire of enemies. We should feel like bad &#! ninjas when clearing out the lancers or the moas or the chargers. But we need more enemies that cause us to slow down and back up. 

 

Enemies

 

Imagine you are in an Infested mission mowing down wave after waver of chargers, runners, and leapers when all of a sudden you get knocked down by an ancient from behind. You don't just hop up and start mowing through all the small stuff again. We all actually know that an Ancient Disruptor  is a BIG threat if we ignore it because we lose all our energy and our shields in one go. Or a Toxic Ancient we know not to run up and give it a big hug with our Kogake.

 

This is because ancients more than any other enemy type disrupt the flow of the game. They make us change the pace of how we are playing. Heavy Grineer can knock us down then shoot us, but they usually get shot long before we get in range to get knocked down. And Railgun Moas can stun lock people to death but that's a little harder to deal with after it has started because it usually happens before anyone notices the Railgun Moas.

 

Once we have our warframes balanced to so their kits feel right, we can add in more enemies that disrupt the flow. Maybe we add an Infested that shoots some type of projectile that acts as ice damage and slows down the player, or a Grineer that clears debuffs like venom or sonar or Mprime.

 

The idea is to come up with a challenging enemy that would catch you off guard as you started getting into your rhythm playing against that faction. They should makes themselves a threat to either a specific play style, like the Toxic Ancient is pretty anti-melee, or a threat to everyone, just like how an Ancient Disruptor is everyone's best friend.

 

Bosses

 

Now that we covered warframes and their enemies, we should also look at the balance of bosses. Bosses should not be a bullet sponge and should not just be a scaled up version of another enemy. Each boss should have a distinctive feel to how they play, and should have a mechanic that is neat or interesting.

 

Jackal is the first example that was different. But the fight was just repetitive and is actually easier to just hit him through his shield and kill him normally if you have enough damage.

 

Vor is the next step up. You fight him, then there is a change in mechanics. This is where we see different phases. First he's just a pretty normal baddie. Then he starts shooting Teslas everywhere and if they stick on you they really hurt. And finally we have his beam that is a simple line of sight mechanic. 

 

Now for the first boss in the game this is great. The only problem with this whole fight, is that you spend half of it just waiting around while he regens his shield and it makes you lose all sense of urgency.

 

There are two ways to solve this. We could either, simply remove the invincibility and just reset his shield to full, or we could add those new enemies we just talked about. Changing the flow of the game while he regens gives the sense of urgency that we have to deal with these annoying enemies before we have to fight them and the boss at the same time. Right now the lancers he releases are just mocking us as they die in two seconds and the next two minutes are us watching an old guy hide in a bubble.

 

Honestly Krill is probably the best boss so far. He has a simple mechanic but its a challenge. He gets his invincibility, but we aren't just standing around sipping tea and eating crumpets. We are taking it away from him.

 

I can only hope the Golem boss is even better than we have seen so far, but I think we really need nice arenas for all the bosses so that we can do more interesting things with the bosses.

 

Levels

 

Now the last part. We have all these great mobility skills, Speed, Super Jump, Teleport, Swap Teleport, Wormhole, Bounce, but our levels are not designed for them so they feel lack luster most of the time. This is NOT to say they are bad in any way, just that they don't get the attention they deserve.

 

There are a couple of levels where it is worth the time to set up these skills, but most rooms are too small to even bother with them. We need more rooms that can get traversed multiple ways and they should reward using mobility skills instead of making it seem like the easiest thing to do is leave Super Jump off of Excalibur for a Rush.

 

TL;DR: Before complaining about whats not balanced now, look to see if there is a more creative solution to balancing the game later on. Such as new enemies, or stages.

[Stefe]

Thank you for spacing out your thoughts. Now, to read them.

[Hobo42]

I currently don't have the time to read what you posted, I gave you +1 for at least having a more big picture mentality that I usually see on these threads.

 

People need to realize just how difficult it is to balance a game, especially one that is still growing continuously.

DE is obviously working hard on balancing, they mention something about it in almost every livestream.

 

Edit: Typos.

Edited August 22, 2013 by Hobo42

[Arlayn]

No balance any time soon... were going to need all the OP Novas we can get for this impossible event...

[Cerokhol]

No balance any time soon... were going to need all the OP Novas we can get for this impossible event...

This isn't about whether or not Nova is OP.

 

 

It is about a different way to look at balance in general.

[Baysick]

O man! You're on my boat, I've been telling my squadmates about this whole, don't just say they are "OP". Leave constructive criticism about why and how it should be balanced. this leads to a higher quality forum discussion than "OMFG TOO OP! NERF PLEASE!!!!!"

[Grilleds]

90% of the reason why this game is imbalanced is the armor system. Which will be fixed. Once it is fixed, there will still be major balance issues between the frames, but it will be more clear on how to fix them.

[Eisvogel]

Take a look at this:

https://forums.warframe.com/index.php?/topic/92326-we-need-endgame-and-a-challenge-what-do-we-expect-for-warframes-future/

 

 

Also, a main problem of the game... is not only that the enemies are lame (even the disruptor... i mean, come on.... when was the last time you were disrupted? because i would have to say around a month or more.... and prolly because i stopped to chat :P).... but also that abilities are not a tactical option of limited use, but rather a spam free fest to rape anything and everything

[way2faded]

DE listens to the whiny noobs far too much, almost every aspect of this game is entirely too easy.

They have easily halved the life of this game by making it too easy. Many of their bugs they do not fix fast enough and most are exploited.

a majority of the pug players I play with have sentinels that can handle 90% of this game. As time goes on pkayers get better and stronger, yet all I see are changes that make the game easier and easier.

Nightmare mode is a joke....where the hell is the challenge at.

[Aspari]

DE listens to the whiny noobs far too much, 

Completely false. DE only listens to the players who given sensible feedback.

 

where the hell is the challenge at.

No one was ever promised a challenge when they signed up to play Warframe. 

 

They have easily halved the life of this game by making it too easy. 

The difficulty has less to do with the game's lifespan than actually having fun things to do. Warframe lacking fun content to keep players wanting to come back is what makes people get burned out. If there were a ton more fun and rewarding things to do in Warframe nobody would give a damn about the difficulty except maybe those people who should be playing Simon instead of Warframe.

[Cerokhol]

 

The difficulty has less to do with the game's lifespan than actually having fun things to do. Warframe lacking fun content to keep players wanting to come back is what makes people get burned out. If there were a ton more fun and rewarding things to do in Warframe nobody would give a damn about the difficulty except maybe those people who should be playing Simon instead of Warframe.

 

 

Honestly I think it is less about the lack of content and more about the fact that there is very little change in the flow of the game.  Look at the stalker. He was a very small addition, but he completely changes the flow of the game when he shows up.

 

The game has content. I has kept people here for thousands of hours. The problem is that all the content feels the same because there is no difference in the pacing.

 

also: Please keep the insults out. It really is not helpful to insult anyone at all and only takes away from an otherwise great point

Edited August 22, 2013 by Cerokhol

[A1CZERO]

They need to add something the enemies have or can do to counter unstoppable 4s(bastille/snow globe) or change something to disallow 4 spam and the ability to keep such things on 24/7.

Edited August 22, 2013 by A1CZERO

[Cerokhol]

They need to add something the enemies have or can do to counter unstoppable 4s(basstille/snow globe) or change something to disallow 4 spam and the ability to keep such things on 24/7.

 

Well that would be the idea of a pace changing enemy. Since Nova is the hot topic of the day(week/month), you could have an enemy that would wipe the Mprime Debuff off of nearby allies. This would discourage Nova from spamming 4, since she would be using so much energy just to have an enemy clear it off just as fast.

 

This would counter Nova but still leave other 4's viable in that situation, while other enemies would work as counters to other frames.