Sortie slowly becoming trivial

[Brahkest]

Idk about raising sortie levels. You can raise them to 500 as the norm, for example, and somehow, someway, someone's going to find a set up or there already exists one where players can cheese it. Having enemies hit harder and be more of the bullet sponges than they already are wouldn't solve the "challenge issue" I think. Because what would anyone be doing differently other than CC'ing longer, shooting things for longer, or bypassing enemy advantage for longer? If anything that sounds more tedious than challenging. 

Personally, I'd rather have more and varied multipliers or more complex missions. I mean, what's a sortie exterminate with I dunno, radiation hazard? Well, it's just a normal exterminate mission since you can avoid the radiation rather easily. What's the challenge? Make it lv 1000 or something and you're still doing the same mission, it's just it'll take longer (or it'll take the same amount of time because "insert instakill daggers here") and the enemies will just one shot you. I guess the challenge is not getting one shot? That seems more like tip toeing around a larger problem than addressing it. I can see the value in upping levels for the sake of harder enemies but I think the sortie system as a whole needs to be addressed. For casuals, yeah I can see sorties being tough. But if anyone's played long enough to have multiple set ups for missions, you can easily pick something that can completely derail the "challenge" set in sorties. And at some point, even casuals will get stronger and stronger builds.

I dunno how to exactly address sorties but I'd like to see variation (mission wise, objectives or conditions) at least. Even the toughest interceptions can be entirely locked down by limbo with a big enough bubble and I can't say the challenge is really there when the difference between shooting a statis'd enemy on different levels is the amount of time it takes.

Edited July 29, 2018 by Brahkest
grammar

[Rakosta_Kai]

31 minutes ago, Autongnosis said:

Well i just wished there was easier access to tougher enemies, like lv 150+, because currently my arsenal is geared towards that and i mostly don't have time to waste an hour on easy stuff before the enemies become interesting 😞

^This^ highlights what I think is the biggest issue Warframe has.

I think it's absence is the heart and soul behind the bulk of the calls for nerfs in this game to date and why the playerbase experiences so much division on what should be completely optional issues like weapon/frame choice.

I genuinely wish they would add a difficulty slider to the game because the functionality clearly already exists.

A optional difficulty slider and (optional) condition settings would encourage co-op play at a higher difficulty level, would reduce nerf calls for semi-outliers, and if implemented well would equitably reward players for the work they've put in thus far and the added difficulty they undertake in those missions..

[(PSN)JustJoshinEnt]

3 minutes ago, Padre_Akais said:

^This^ highlights what I think is the biggest issue Warframe has.

I think it's absence is the heart and soul behind the bulk of the calls for nerfs in this game to date and why the playerbase experiences so much division on what should be completely optional issues like weapon/frame choice.

I genuinely wish they would add a difficulty slider to the game because the functionality clearly already exists.

A optional difficulty slider and (optional) condition settings would encourage co-op play at a higher difficulty level, would reduce nerf calls for semi-outliers, and if implemented well would equitably reward players for the work they've put in thus far and the added difficulty they undertake in those missions..

Problem is...if I "slide" my difficulty to 100%, and you "slide" yours down to 40%, we both join a PUB, .... what happens?  Who shares whose settings?  That works in maybe an invite-only scenario, but that's not the best focus for DE.

Honestly, as has been mentioned here, the real question is:  What -is- "difficulty"?  

[Autongnosis]

il y a 4 minutes, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu a dit :

Problem is...if I "slide" my difficulty to 100%, and you "slide" yours down to 40%, we both join a PUB, .... what happens?  Who shares whose settings?  That works in maybe an invite-only scenario, but that's not the best focus for DE.

Honestly, as has been mentioned here, the real question is:  What -is- "difficulty"?  

Check Whitelight's review on that: 

 

Basically to avoid the 30+min video, which is admittedly very interesting I'll just paste the specific quite:

"[...] Warframe's idea of difficulty is just like every other MMO. Forget a well designed moveset, just bump up the level and chuck as many enemies at the player as the engine allows." 

That's very fitting.

[Autongnosis]

DOUBLE

Edited July 30, 2018 by Autongnosis

[Autongnosis]

AAAAAND TRIPLE!

 

(jeez...)

Edited July 30, 2018 by Autongnosis

[(PSN)JustJoshinEnt]

1 minute ago, Autongnosis said:

Check Whitelight's review on that: 

 

Basically to avoid the 30+min video, which is admittedly very interesting I'll just paste the specific quite:

"[...] Warframe's idea of difficulty is just like every other MMO. Forget a well designed moveset, just bump up the level and chuck as many enemies at the player as the engine allows." 

That's very fitting.

Y'all posted that 3 times, fyi >.>

Anyways, I'm absolutely fine with that being how Warframe does things.  I loved the old Dynasty Warriors-type games, but always felt they never had enough depth or lore or customization...Then I found Warframe.

I really don't see the issue people have with it.  As if somehow running into a room and hack'n'slashing your way through 100s of enemies like a ninja space-god isn't somehow "fun". 

Difficult?  Meh....it certainly does have challenges, at times and depending on the situation, but....one can't expect it to scale forever.  I find plenty of ENJOYMENT, however, and that, in a game, which is played for FUN, I think is much more important.


I mean, not to repeat the ol' response but...if people want enemies to be 'just harder to kill", they're welcome to remove some mods 😛

[Rakosta_Kai]

10 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

Problem is...if I "slide" my difficulty to 100%, and you "slide" yours down to 40%, we both join a PUB, .... what happens?  Who shares whose settings?  That works in maybe an invite-only scenario, but that's not the best focus for DE.

Works in any scenario actually...

Matchmaking would pair the player seeking +40% difficulty up with other players seeking the same thing. Likewise the level +100% seeker.

Not that difficult...Numerous games have done it for well over a decade now.

Heck, DE could set the missions up based on bronze, silver, gold, platinum, (and more) to denote mission difficulty and players could simply choose what tickles their fancy that day and offer a free slider and condition settings for recruited groups and everyone gets what they want.

The difference in number of members in a group adjusts mob count and spawn speed (iirc) so the well-prepared Tenno tends to view additional members as increased loot chance as it is anyway.

16 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

but that's not the best focus for DE.

What would you say that is exactly?

17 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

Honestly, as has been mentioned here, the real question is:  What -is- "difficulty"?

It really doesn't take playing the game terribly long to determine that DE's measure for difficulty is based around levels (modifiers for HP, Armor, and DMG/types), conditions, and enhancements.

I'm not interested in re-inventing the wheel... My personal outlook is that if a player wants to do that, they really need to find another game that fits their vision.

• It takes longer than implementing something that already obviously exists
• It's unpredictable and that's a big ask for an established playerbase...It's why companies typically fold new mechanics in new content first before introducing it to general gameplay.

Imposing brand new, untried, and unfamiliar systems in an existing game is a recipe for trouble long term. 

[(PSN)JustJoshinEnt]

3 minutes ago, Padre_Akais said:

Works in any scenario actually...

Matchmaking would pair the player seeking +40% difficulty up with other players seeking the same thing. Likewise the level +100% seeker.

Not that difficult...Numerous games have done it for well over a decade now.

Heck, DE could set the missions up based on bronze, silver, gold, platinum, (and more) to denote mission difficulty and players could simply choose what tickles their fancy that day and offer a free slider and condition settings for recruited groups and everyone gets what they want.

The difference in number of members in a group adjusts mob count and spawn speed (iirc) so the well-prepared Tenno tends to view additional members as increased loot chance as it is anyway.

What would you say that is exactly?

It really doesn't take playing the game terribly long to determine that DE's measure for difficulty is based around levels (modifiers for HP, Armor, and DMG/types), conditions, and enhancements.

I'm not interested in re-inventing the wheel... My personal outlook is that if a player wants to do that, they really need to find another game that fits their vision.

• It takes longer than implementing something that already obviously exists
• It's unpredictable and that's a big ask for an established playerbase...It's why companies typically fold new mechanics in new content first before introducing it to general gameplay.

Imposing brand new, untried, and unfamiliar systems in an existing game is a recipe for trouble long term. 

I agree they don't need to reinvent the wheel.  I was more saying that because I see alot of "DE should make things more difficult!" posts, ....but the posters never actually define what it is they're looking for.  It's like a kid just screaming "I'm hungry!" but then, no matter what you make them, they're never satisfied...it's easier if we just start by defining exactly what it is they want, and that makes the issue much easier to address (assuming there IS actually an issue, at all).

As for the slider, the thing is.....Hydron, for example...PUGs help to diversify who you end up with.  Someone like my gf who is still at MR9 and doesn't quite have a great loadout, might still luck out and get paired up with some higher-tier players who can know what they're doing and can help her with her lack of experience.  In a slider, you're now dividing that one node, Hydron, up into multiple instances, and the likelihood of diversification in those random squads now drops severely.   Not just that, but it adds to the server load.

Personally, I think things are good as-is.  We have Nightmare modes, we have different mission types, and heck.....enemies do scale overtime.   Perhaps an "Enemies scale with Average MR of Team" might be cool, but then that'd just breed more toxicity on recruitment, I suppose.

Right now, we already have things the way they need to be.  We have a "slider" as it were...in that you can just hover on a node, see the enemy level, and choose to do it or not to.

The lack of a higher-level option is really the issue, but....I think it's just a matter, not of it not being on the road of Warframe's goals, but just that we haven't gotten there yet.  Tau is coming, PoV is coming, and I'm sure with those, there will be later map nodes, which also means higher starting levels for said nodes.

But yeah, personally, I'm not asking DE to change a darned thing, lol.  I'm happy the way it is.  I was just poking the discussion to try and get people to actually define what they're asking for, instead of just expecting DE to read their minds, lol.  I think one of the biggest issues this playerbase, or I suppose any game's playerbase, really has is they don't know what they're asking for.  This isn't aimed at you, really, just in general.  It's like me pointing to an empty lot and saying to a construction worker, "Make a building!" without understanding any of the tools he needs to do so.  Just expecting him to "figure it out".  And then judging him on his lack of ability to read my mind accurately.

That's all I really wanted to point out.

[Autongnosis]

il y a 29 minutes, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu a dit :

Y'all posted that 3 times, fyi >.>


I mean, not to repeat the ol' response but...if people want enemies to be 'just harder to kill", they're welcome to remove some mods 😛

Fml, or more specifically my stupid phone. 

As for the second part, it's nowhere near as satisfying, because this is an infinite ladder grinding game and having to go back and relinquish part of your progressio to have the enemies survive more than a mean look is not a solution tbh. That's why I'm a fan of releasing content with higher level cap. 

Even more so because weapons with basic builds (base damage and elemental mods and nothing else) are fully capable of smashing through most of the game's content. 

[(XBOX)motionROTATION]

1 hour ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

Since when did we play games JUST to get things?  When did playing the fun of the game itself, and the challenges therein, stop being a reward in its own right?

I think the mentality shift came shortly around the time of achievements and trophies for games. The gaming industry found that people like that “acknowledgment” factor and people are hooked on them. Now if someone plays an old game, the fun had to be significant because most players play it once and are done. Thus, withstanding in a game with a player base continually shifting is hard. 

/rant

[(PSN)robotwars7]

4 hours ago, angias said:

The only Idea that comme to me is raising sortie lvl.

and that will fix... exactly jack shish. all you'd do is make enemies take longer to kill, and make the same trivial missions take longer. that's just wasting people's time, and that's not gonna create a positive playerbase.

Sorties need to have modifiers and changes that force you to think outside the box a little, maybe some new rooms for spy vaults that can't be cheesed so easily, maybe introduce a no-revive mode to missions (if you go down, you die, no bleed-out phase) to encourage players to try tactics other than sponging bullets with tank frames. how about spontaneous invasions; you're trying to sabotage a Grineer Reactor, but the Corpus have showed up declaring an Invasion, and you have to fight off everybody?

there are ways of fixing Sorties, it'd just require a lot of dedicated brainstorming and ideas.

 

[RX-3DR]

28 minutes ago, Padre_Akais said:

It really doesn't take playing the game terribly long to determine that DE's measure for difficulty is based around levels (modifiers for HP, Armor, and DMG/types), conditions, and enhancements.

 I would say this is actually quite incorrect. This is only really present beyond a certain point in the game where they simply do not have the content available to create any useful increase in difficulty. Things such as Noxes and Bursas do not appear in low level missions on the Star Chart but do towards the later missions. There is also a change in the distribution of enemies as the level increases. While some are specific to the area, they are excluded from the starting half of the game. 

Simply put it, the levels constantly being dialed up is more of an effect from players rather than a creation by DE.

Edited July 29, 2018 by Flandyrll

[Kyronz]

What's this "becoming" nonsense, it has always been so.

[Rakosta_Kai]

33 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

Difficult?  Meh....it certainly does have challenges, at times and depending on the situation, but....one can't expect it to scale forever.  I find plenty of ENJOYMENT, however, and that, in a game, which is played for FUN, I think is much more important.


I mean, not to repeat the ol' response but...if people want enemies to be 'just harder to kill", they're welcome to remove some mods 😛

Here's the problem I see with your reasoning...

You are basically saying that DE should do nothing to address this issue because you aren't inconvenienced by it...Even though DE addressing the issue does nothing to impact either you personally or the segments of gameplay that interest you.

To be fair, you aren't entirely wrong about players modding themselves into trivializing content—But the crux of this discussion has nothing to do with that in this case.

They aren't saying, "Everything needs to be nerfed because I am too powerful and the game is boring because of that.".

The OP is asking for a reliable suite of more challenging content as opposed to once a day content or mopping smallfry for 30-45 minutes just to enjoy 10-20 minutes of doable content before having to rinse and repeat.

That's a reasonable request that's been echoed by many for years now.

4 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

I agree they don't need to reinvent the wheel.  I was more saying that because I see alot of "DE should make things more difficult!" posts, ....but the posters never actually define what it is they're looking for.  It's like a kid just screaming "I'm hungry!" but then, no matter what you make them, they're never satisfied...it's easier if we just start by defining exactly what it is they want, and that makes the issue much easier to address (assuming there IS actually an issue, at all).

The reason why you see so many of those posts is because the standard content isn't commensurate with every players power or skill level...We are talking about carrots DE dangled to players to keep them playing that outright trivialize content for those accomplished players.

...That's not the player's fault.

7 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

As for the slider, the thing is.....Hydron, for example...PUGs help to diversify who you end up with.  Someone like my gf who is still at MR9 and doesn't quite have a great loadout, might still luck out and get paired up with some higher-tier players who can know what they're doing and can help her with her lack of experience.  In a slider, you're now dividing that one node, Hydron, up into multiple instances, and the likelihood of diversification in those random squads now drops severely.   Not just that, but it adds to the server load.

So?

7 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

Personally, I think things are good as-is.  We have Nightmare modes, we have different mission types, and heck.....enemies do scale overtime.   Perhaps an "Enemies scale with Average MR of Team" might be cool, but then that'd just breed more toxicity on recruitment, I suppose.

Truthfully, it's not about you, as you have admitted, you are good.

As to toxicity, I could just as easily argue it would create less... Why? Because players would gravitate to their comfort zones for difficulty and those toxic folks would wind up being grouped with the real hardcore players and eventually get shunned for being toxic from content they actually want to take part in.

This was one of the strongest checks on player behavior in groups for years in Online Games.

12 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

The lack of a higher-level option is really the issue, but....I think it's just a matter, not of it not being on the road of Warframe's goals, but just that we haven't gotten there yet.  Tau is coming, PoV is coming, and I'm sure with those, there will be later map nodes, which also means higher starting levels for said nodes.

Which is what people are asking for in this thread... No offense intended here, Your comments can be read like you are being contrary just for the sake of being contrary.

I don't know if that's the intent but it could certainly be viewed with that lens.

15 minutes ago, (PS4)Taishin_Ishu said:

But yeah, personally, I'm not asking DE to change a darned thing, lol.  I'm happy the way it is.  I was just poking the discussion to try and get people to actually define what they're asking for, instead of just expecting DE to read their minds, lol.  I think one of the biggest issues this playerbase, or I suppose any game's playerbase, really has is they don't know what they're asking for.  This isn't aimed at you, really, just in general.  It's like me pointing to an empty lot and saying to a construction worker, "Make a building!" without understanding any of the tools he needs to do so.  Just expecting him to "figure it out".  And then judging him on his lack of ability to read my mind accurately.

That's all I really wanted to point out.

OP's post was pretty explicit on this point. So was @Autongnosis's and I felt I made my point pretty clear (and blessedly short today) as well.

I understand where you are coming from and don't think anyone is asking for the way you play to be altered though.  

[GPrime96]

I think the only thing Sorties need without making the enemies Bullet Sponges like at lvl 150 - 200 would be giving them the T4 Void damage. That damage makes reaching lvl 100 in Mot a lot harder than Reaching 100 in Sorties. But after fighting lvl 200 - 250+ enemies in Ani, Void or Lower than that, I'm not sure if that's going to be enough since there's missions that's easy enough for Teammates to blaze through.

[Rakosta_Kai]

11 minutes ago, Flandyrll said:

Simply put it, the levels constantly being dialed up is more of an effect from players rather than a creation by DE.

Yes, because players design mods, effects, damage, and design the weapons/frames they are applied to. /s

You are welcome to your opinion but it's important to remember that every answer in a "chicken or egg" argument is both right and wrong. 

[(PSN)Absoluteboxer]

the game needs a more difficult mode in which you have to use more "real skill" ducking and covering, agro etc. Even at high levels you can pretty much jump around and spam attacks without thinking or worrying about defense.  I know there are nightmare modes but those rewards most are already obtained by vets. 

Also the game could use more complicated stylstyle  weekly (or better monthly) raids with higher exclusive rewards.  

Monthly raids would be nice( that you cpuld only do once so you dont farm it like you do with plague star).  The time frame also make it easier to organize with friends.  By having it able to be done ONLY ONCE a month (12 different raids in the year as well) it makes it hard for the elites to "crack the code".    This type of restriction would make taped and live stream twitch an invaluable too. As it would be the only way to share info on it.

[(XBOX)GearsMatrix301]

3 hours ago, Pizzarugi said:

Nothing is impossible if you have the right weapons and/or warframe. If you provide some examples of near-impossible combinations, I could provide some solutions. 😛

Energy reduction Ambulas

melee only on Kela de thaym

 

[shabudua]

I play more for fun than for rewards. When I want a more challenging game, I empty my warframe of all mods and equip an extinguished dragon key. Then I see how far I can go. For me, this makes missions challenging but possible somewhere in the level 25-35 range, depending on the mission and frame.

A difficulty slider could work roughly the same way — crank it up, and it simply makes ME weaker, by reducing health, shields, armor, energy, and overall damage by a percentage. Then the lower level missions suddenly become challenging again.

Another option would be to let me equip bleeding, decaying, and exinguished dragon keys all at the same time.

Edited July 30, 2018 by shabudua
Forgot energy

[(PSN)thowed]

All they would have to do is make the first two spy missions and the third Ambulas or Kela everyday.  Run these with randoms and your failure rate will be higher than completion lol.

[(PSN)teacup775]

Do them solo. More interesting that way.

[GPrime96]

11 minutes ago, (XB1)GearsMatrix301 said:

melee only on Kela de thaym

Hysteria and Chromatic Blade cheese.

[KIREEK]

Completing sorties is 1 thing, doing them is another and the vast majority of players still can't do sorties, even the regular mission is still being done in a very barebones way, no way they are ready, they might be MR25, but if you're like me, it's what you do that counts, not what you claim to do.

Harder challenges can somehow be created on your own and they only matter if you remove a reward from it, for example certain mssions are hard in a pub, like radiation mobile defense sorties, you can repeat the mission over and over, players don't do it because there is no reward to it, i mean there is, but most players can't see it.

And so players don't want harder challenges because there are plenty already, what they want is harder with rewards, sorties already atracts way to many players unsuitable for sorties, harder only means more players that will tag along for the sake of it, because what matters is completing the mission and that will happen eventually, someone will eventually carry the MR25 player that still uses the front door on a rescue, that waypoints an already minimap marked objective like a terminal, that brings an elemental weapon to an elemental enhacement sortie because he forgot to read the sortie condition, these are mere examples of players that along the staircase climbing are still falling several steps, so doing a sortie is something they can only claim.

Is it trivial at some point? yes, but you need to obey certain preparation rules otherwise you will suffer difficulties, for players with like 85% completion rate, quits and fails mean pretty much nothing, but for players aiming for much higher and since sorties are a daily thing, perfection must be achieved at all times, with any group of randoms and that is hard to maintain and is even harder to achieve advanced gameplay, this is the gameplay you do when the mission basics and goals are pretty much solidified, but you also buff your allies, kill enemies, open crates, CC enemies, waypoint that statue you saw on the corner of your eye, paying attention to rare crates, making the mission go faster with less players going down, that is advanced gameplay, obviously far from the grasp of the majority.

[RX-3DR]

29 minutes ago, Padre_Akais said:

Yes, because players design mods, effects, damage, and design the weapons/frames they are applied to. /s

You are welcome to your opinion but it's important to remember that every answer in a "chicken or egg" argument is both right and wrong. 

Now you're just misinterpreting my point. To pose the question simply, why must levels continue to scale beyond 100? Why not nerf players' potential?

You're also on a useless point by saying your own statement is as pointless as mine. I am pointing out that DE does have a wider scale of difficulty beyond what you stated and that the reason why we are at the point where we are where there are so few options left to raise difficulty leans towards the players rather than a direct decision DE made. You see it from your perspective when you view the scale from beyond where it most of it ends.

Edited July 29, 2018 by Flandyrll