Survival missions need significantly more enemies spawning

[Jax_Cavalera]

Running survival missions over the last few months, I've noticed a consistent pattern.. the gamemode should be called suffocation.. seriously! You kill everything in sight, raid every single breakable, crack open all life supports and by 16mins in (especially noticable solo on lower level missions such as Elara) you can run through 2+ rooms before finding a single enemy to kill and when you kill it.. it rarely drops life support so you wanna hope you're running as nekros or some other multi-drop rolling frame (hydroid, ivara, etc.)

Can we please get some serious levels of enemies spawning in so it feels like we're trying to survive from the onslaught of mobs defending their territory. I don't want to feel like my best weapons would be breathing apparatus when I'm this all powerful warframe armed to the teeth and ready to deal that damage. The oxygen should be there as a means to get out when you realise the mobs are too strong to kill fast enough to extract life support directly from them.. not there as the only real way to try last at all.

This isn't just something that happens running solo, it's happened in 2squads and even a 3squad.. it's more rare in a 4 squad though.

Survival isn't the only place either.. i've had to abort several exterminate, capture, spy etc missions because the enemies stop spawning in after the objective is complete and a few mins go by.. leaving a full team of 8 reactant loaded relics a few short of being cracked open, a real time waster.

In general more enemies.. specifically.. more enemies in survival... well I think i'm just repeating myself at this point so i'll leave it there.. +1 if you share this sentiment, share your painful experiences playing suffocation ... i mean survival below ^ ^

[GinKenshin]

tbh, E/SO feels like a better survival than survival >__> 

[Jax_Cavalera]

Yep that's kinda what prompted as well, been doing that and realised.. OMG this is what survival should have always been about!

[Chewarette]

Unfortunately, it seems that the vast majority of Warframe's playerbase enjoys missions where they don't have to kill anything.

I'm with you though, but I don't expect any change in this direction.

[den2k]

Dark Sectors Survivals are quite full of enemies. Most of the times you just have to find a good room near to many spawn points.

[RobWasHere]

9 minutes ago, den2k said:

Dark Sectors Survivals are quite full of enemies. Most of the times you just have to find a good room near to many spawn points.

Because infested. Grineer and Corpus spawn significally less frequent.

[Chara]

God, this. I've played this game for years and I very much enjoy solo, and survival solo is extremely dull and stupid due to the lack of masses to shred down. I've always wanted to be able to select a difficulty where 4-tenno worth of enemies spawn for solo players if they want, or something. Give me hordes!

[Creedybabe]

Completely agree with Jax. I've found myself falling short of reactant when running with less than 4 players in a endless Fissure mission (Surv, Excav, Def, Int, I won't even mention the others as there's a 99.1337% chance it's probably a crap game mode, COUGH.. defection COUGH..). 

I have also experienced survival missions devoid of enemies in the first 15-25 minutes. I know for certain that this topic is a very accurate depiction of "a day in a veteran tenno's life", the metaphor is quite literal (if you're a veteran, and believe there is sufficient enemies in a survival, then good for you, you're happy with the amount you get, I'm not lol). The spawn rates in "survival" are, imho, bad. Forcing the players to move around to find anything to kill was bad enough as some builds can be done stationary, you know..... Since you gotta farm a plethora materials, it's better to do it in comfort.... But to also have the rates be so damn low that even veterans on the highest level "survival" available are quite literally bored for the first 15-25 minutes kills the vibe, and fast (usually in 15-25 minutes lmfao..) In essence, mostly all endless missions have spawn rate and/or location problems in general.

As for dark sectors, I haven't noticed any comparative differences in the spawn rates at all (yes I've tested it several hundred times, no I didn't make a graph in case you ask). Not only that, but dark sectors are also only limited to infested. Even if the rates were higher, I wouldn't want to kill the same enemy type if I felt like a "somewhat questionably higher spawn rate survival".

Before anyone says "Oh if you're looking for a challenge then wear newbie gear on high tiered missions", my response to you is; if that were my objective I would've pursued that already. All I'm saying is quite a lot of vet players are frustrated with having to wait 15-25 minutes before actually feeling like there's even enemies in a "survival" mission, low or high tier, and in that, I support Jax in saying:

36 minutes ago, Jax_Cavalera said:

Running survival missions over the last few months, I've noticed a consistent pattern.. the gamemode should be called suffocation.. seriously!

Summarized version to spare people from reading wall of text (a.k.a derp mode for people who can't read well or don't want to read)
NOT ENOUGH ENEMIES/POOR SPAWN LOC ENEMIES IN "SURVIVAL" MISSIONS AND POSSIBLY ENDLESS FISSURES. 💩

[Autongnosis]

This has been a problem for ages... In a 4 man team the spawns are adequate to decent if you stick together, but become #*!%ed up as soon as even one tenno splits up. 

In teams with less than 4 tennos it's a farce... Barely anything spawns. Solo is even worse. 

[Creedybabe]

19 minutes ago, Autongnosis said:

This has been a problem for ages... In a 4 man team the spawns are adequate to decent if you stick together, but become #*!%ed up as soon as even one tenno splits up. 

In teams with less than 4 tennos it's a farce... Barely anything spawns. Solo is even worse. 

Off topic:
Better watch out with those symbols man, might get you a warning lmfao. 🤣 (Majority of text removed)
(warframe mentioned in image had 75 armor, and now has 225 base on normal version of it lololololllllllllll)

The pain of a warning is only temporary, but the satisfaction of a result will last an eternity.
 

Edited July 26, 2018 by Creedybabe

[den2k]

50 minutes ago, Creedybabe said:

As for dark sectors, I haven't noticed any comparative differences in the spawn rates at all (yes I've tested it several hundred times,

I did regularly 40 mintues DS survivals in solo for a while (farming  mutagen masses and relics) and I also used those as a benchmark for ease / efficiency between my former favourite gun (Sobek with ungodly riven) and my new favourite one (IgnisW with reasonable riven).

I usually ended up to 2000 kills in 40 minutes, so there were at least 50 spawn/minute. Note that I was using Rhino Prime so I had absolutely no large DPS powers. It seemed to me that enemies kept flowing quite steadily, especially in the first 15 minutes where my kill rate was about 70/s. Probably with a Saryn I would have felt the problem?

As for Corpus Survival I lately ended up in a couple of fissure survivals that were absolutely Hell on wheels, with a full squad though.

I have to say though that adding enemies would make things hard both for new players and for those leveling equipment, maybe horrible equipment like the Lanka (oh nice it does a freakton of damage to one/two enemies, let's hope the other 48 enemies won't notice). Yet as an experience player I wouldn't dislike higher enemy numbers to feed to my IgnisW or my new 5-Forma Amprex.

[Creedybabe]

31 minutes ago, den2k said:

I usually ended up to 2000 kills in 40 minutes, so there were at least 50 spawn/minute.

As for Corpus Survival I lately ended up in a couple of fissure survivals that were absolutely Hell on wheels, with a full squad though.

 I have to say though that adding enemies would make things hard both for new players and for those leveling equipment, maybe horrible equipment like the Lanka (oh nice it does a freakton of damage to one/two enemies, let's hope the other 48 enemies won't notice). Yet as an experience player I wouldn't dislike higher enemy numbers to feed to my IgnisW or my new 5-Forma Amprex.

50/minute is too slow.
Full squad isnt the prob.
Ye exactly, let the high numbers flow I say.

Duo team I average 260 to 300 kills a minute in ESO (5500 to 6000 kills in 22 mins), I just want that in normal missions lmao.

Edited July 26, 2018 by Creedybabe

[Jax_Cavalera]

@den2k

Maybe there needs to be a toggle when first starting up a survival to choose between suffocate (players that cannot handle the mobs and probably shouldn't be doing a survival in the first place if killing to survive is such a struggle) and then on the other side survival where the spawns are at such a level that you can get by without needing life support when running solo.

[den2k]

18 minutes ago, Creedybabe said:

Duo team I average 260 to 300 kills a minute in ESO (5500 to 6000 kills in 22 mins), I just want that in normal missions lmao.

My goodness... build? 😄

17 minutes ago, Jax_Cavalera said:

Maybe there needs to be a toggle when first starting up a survival to choose between suffocate (players that cannot handle the mobs and probably shouldn't be doing a survival in the first place if killing to survive is such a struggle) and then on the other side survival where the spawns are at such a level that you can get by without needing life support when running solo.

Toggles are good, yet adding a toggle to a mission start is heavy on the user experience. Adding a global option to the game can be a good idea except that the game is already prolific of options and many of them aren't that known.

An entirely optional (so that players who wish a tranquil experience can do so, and no one is forced to survive a perceived Hell to advance in the game) star-chart or groups of planets... that would be the coolest thing ever.

[Creedybabe]

1 minute ago, den2k said:

My goodness... build? 😄

Saryn efficient build for solo, roughly same kills little slower
Saryn + trin for duo is pretty good, heard of a few others tho but works for me

[den2k]

1 minute ago, Creedybabe said:

Saryn efficient build for solo, roughly same kills little slower
Saryn + trin for duo is pretty good, heard of a few others tho but works for me

Of course it was a Saryn... silly me to even ask.

[Creedybabe]

Just did a short survival and noticed the enemies dropping off around this time, we were still insta killing and were only at 50% life support actively running around etc etc. Upon exploring, I found a speedrun room and found there were a high number of enemies behind the locked door that had been there for a while as my enemy radar had picked them up when I was on another floor. So I went to go find them and sure enough there were about 20 enemies locked inside the speedrun room basically destroying the spawn cap. This was on void survival fissure "Mot" 40-45. Only averaged about 55 to 60 kills per minute like this.

Edited July 26, 2018 by Creedybabe

[Jax_Cavalera]

 

23 minutes ago, den2k said:

My goodness... build? 😄

Toggles are good, yet adding a toggle to a mission start is heavy on the user experience. Adding a global option to the game can be a good idea except that the game is already prolific of options and many of them aren't that known.

An entirely optional (so that players who wish a tranquil experience can do so, and no one is forced to survive a perceived Hell to advance in the game) star-chart or groups of planets... that would be the coolest thing ever.

yeah can be done with ember, equinox,  few others probably (re: heavy kill counts) just did an experiment then with @Creedybabe and was interesting being i brought a low level mirage along and was still able to use her ability to buff for the 1 shot on all mobs right to the end when we were suffocated out of the mission.

When I picture surviving, a gentle slumber isn't quite what comes to mind, I picture having to use every single option at my disposal just to stay alive. If I were trying to survive in a warzone, I wouldn't be running and gunning out of cover away from the team going from location to location. I'd be in a bunker / trench holding the fort surviving till help can arrive or as long as possible.

Interestingly enough, right now we have a focus on doing the exact opposite to the above and then labeled the gamemode as survival.. but then instead of it being a frantic struggle to fend off the enemies, it's a struggle to sniff a few breaths of oxygen.

[den2k]

12 minutes ago, Creedybabe said:

enough there were about 20 enemies locked inside the speedrun room basically destroying the spawn cap

Spawning and pathfinding are absymal, even in Onslaught enemies often spawn in 3-4 per group and you must actively find them. What an onslaught...

Spawn cap actually made me think that maybe there aren't enough enemies to allow for low hw requirements - one thing that they are increasing for the future. I remember when I installed the "Adrenaline Oblivion" mod on my TESIV: Oblivion that the framerate dropped horrendously.

[(PSN)Tenchi145]

6 hours ago, Autongnosis said:

This has been a problem for ages... In a 4 man team the spawns are adequate to decent if you stick together, but become #*!%ed up as soon as even one tenno splits up. 

In teams with less than 4 tennos it's a farce... Barely anything spawns. Solo is even worse. 

This is my entire problem with pubs with inexperienced players.  I loaded into a Titan, Saturn Fissure.  and one guy loaded in as 1 random, a clanmate, and I were actually doing a good job in this nice small room with good spawn points.  He immediately struck out on his own and went to the complete opposite side of the map and destroyed the spawn rates for our group. eventually we had no choice but to go after him and after getting into the same room as him and starting finding our rhythm again he again strikes off telling us to stop stealing his kills. We barely made it to 10 reactant because of this behavior.  Then after we had stayed for 20 mins we decided to leave finally and he complained because his secondary(which he hadn't been using) wasn't leveled any. I wouldn't have known because I put him on ignore.

[Jax_Cavalera]

@(PS4)Tenchi145 That sounds like a pretty common scenario and whilst I agree it was an admirable effort by DE to try force players to stick together as a group, the lack of education around how affiinity leveling works makes the mob agro system trash spawns even more so than they normally are.

At the best of times, you gotta stay close by in a room near connecting ones that have "spawn cages" on them so the feed is strong, but if you cannot find a good spot to do this, your left with one option of running around the entire map.

As soon as you do that, the chances someone gets left behind in a room crippling spawn rates increases significantly. Run a pub with a player that doesn't get how affinity works and you can bet they'll be trying to get all the kills alone, probably on the opposite end of the map to where extraction and the rest of the team are mostly hanging out.

There are a few mechanics that need to be adjusted if we want to really see improvement, because you're right just buffing spawn rates won't fix the underlying problem.

1. Mobs need to stop going agro to the weakest player in a squad as preference - Even Agro unless using a decoy type ability
2. Even when using a decoy type ability it should only affect mobs within proximity of the ability range. No drawing agro with abilities outside their ability range
3. Enemies need to continue spawning in even if you are stationary, their level is more than welcome to increase more aggressively  but the whole spawn rate dropping off by bunkering down to survive by taking cover as a squad and playing with a little tactic vs run and gun should not be punished. Not all frames work the same way so forcing the same play style on them ruins the experience of feeling like we are surviving. Camping increases mob difficulty faster but does not decrease spawn rates.
4. Increase spawn rates in general.

More to point 3, consider when you bunker down in a trench, building or whatever, you give the enemies few choices but to.. bring in a battering ram, bigger guns, anti-tank like defenses, artillery, etc.

It makes a lot of sense that when you do this type of thing, the enemies will grow strong faster as they can re-group with tougher units..It also makes sense that their spawn rate will increase dramatically as they rush in to try get you. When you're not moving, they know exactly where you are so they don't have to waste resources sending units off randomly around a map.. they can pinpoint all resources right at you.

From a player perspective, when we bunker down, we're taking cover so it shows we are here for the long haul, we're ready for a serious fight, we don't plan to just throw in the towel easily.

Edited July 26, 2018 by Jax_Cavalera
post became glitched and prevented adding more lines

[ViroMelchior]

I yell at teams in survival regularly to stay grouped up.  Because when you split into 2 to 4 groups, there's almost always a wave where someone is on the "wrong" side of the map (the side that the corrupted enemies don't spawn in enough numbers at), and doesn't get 10 reactant.  Same thing happens when you have smaller groups as well.

I don't enjoy having to run around the map constantly just to get any random reactants that dropped 450m away from me because my team keeps running in random (different) directions.

I'm in the camp that would be perfectly happy sitting in one spot all mission and getting free rewards without fighting.  But that *is* boring.  But it is better than running around constantly under threat of not getting to open my relic because of spread out groups or bad drop rates.

And you can't extract unless someone agrees with you.  I've been stuck in 40 minute defenses where I had to do the chicken-run constantly the whole time instead of being able to camp a room as a team "because that's boring".  My counterargument is running/sliding/jumping/shooting nonstop for 40 minutes is what leads to carpal tunnel when you have to do that every mission.

 

-----

Please fix Survival Fissures so that (pick 1):

More (slightly weaker - so you can go same duration) enemies spawn, so getting 10 reactant is easy as long as you aren't AFK.
Drop rate per kill is improved across the board
If any player loots reactant, everyone gets it, so we don't have to run around ridiculously.  AND improve drop rates on lower player count missions.
Or, if nothing else, allow players to extract themselves, like on Defense/Interception missions, so they can find a group that is willing to cooperate (even if boring).
 

[Jax_Cavalera]

It's the nature of any game when they provide an objective, the players will identify the most efficient means to obtain that objective then rinse and repeat till achieved or satisfied. In the case of Warframe, the objective for end game has always been the same thing.. collect X or get Y from a more difficult grind... but still a grind. So inevitably when players figure out that .. turns out the most efficient way to do this is kill enemies, they realised that the rate of killing mobs had to be reduced in order to extend the lifespan of content they released.

This in turn is really a solid contributing factor as to why we now play suffocation instead of survival.

If DE want to fix end game, they need to consider other ways of doing so like allowing players with a given level of experience at playing the game to create :

Above being just one example I know of since it was something I cooked up targeting that kind of problem a while back.

In terms of survival having a limitation on mob spawn rates, perhaps DE would be more motivated to give us what we wanted if they could change the way they continue to provide new content as a one hit wonder single goal that directly ties in with some form of grinding exclusively. And even if they don't, the spawn rates right now are too low for anything short of a 4squad and even then agro breaks a 4 squad if they split up across the map.

I agree with the general point being made, spawn rates alone won't fix the issue, mob agro mechanics need to be adjusted as well so players splitting up don't ruin the experience and if running in a Public session, you should be able to extract out from the mission any time you want the same as players can in POE.

(unrelated but hosts should be able to bail without dragging the squad along.. it should instead host migrate in POE and any other endless type Public mission as well)

Edited July 27, 2018 by Jax_Cavalera
UI glitched preventing completion of my post

[Helljack84]

As pointed out before, enemy count and spawn rate are decent, especially during fissures where enemies can spawn pretty much anywhere.

Maybe give more incentive for grouping up in the first place? More/stronger enemies are the most obvious solution, but we've got plenty of examples for random missions, why not spice things up a little? We already got things like random missions, mini bosses and kuva survival, there should be plenty of ways to improve things aside from moar bodies.

[Jax_Cavalera]

See I'd beg to disagree @Helljack84 on the basis that i've ran 2 Solo attempts at the current Tactical Alert Mission 3 and am running out of oxygen well before the 20min mark without life support.. Using all the life supports only when I absolutely had to, I was choked out at 19:20 so that's pretty close but still.. not enough and that's the problem, it's pathetic. I'm 1 - 3 shotting everything  including the Proxies right up to the point of suffocation but there's nothing to kill. To put it bluntly, the gamemode is broken.

Edited July 28, 2018 by Jax_Cavalera