Why nerfing things isn't necessary.

[Pooroldude]

1 minute ago, (XB1)ECCHO SIERRA said:

Uh  this is demonstrably false. I would propose that not only can melee compete with any gun you want to throw down, but that it is probably the strongest category of weapon in the game.

 

Your melee have no power in eso and tri-eido, now fight!

[(XBOX)ECCHO SIERRA]

2 minutes ago, Pooroldude said:

Your melee have no power in eso and tri-eido, now fight!

*insert long, dramatic, passive aggressive reply*

 

Kidding of course, I mean ya got me for those activities,

[Orgoon]

1 hour ago, seprent said:

wouldn't shot guns also fit in there they have a pretty simple point an click interface 

though i guess you can aim those since the tigris can someone hit something from pretty far away same for the Corinth wont do much damage but hey you can hit it 

even after the change to the trigis family to try to stop it from being a pseudo sniper it still does it do some degree of effectiveness  

I think that only Zarr's barrage would count, as its spread is really wide.

[seprent]

5 minutes ago, Orgoon said:

I think that only Zarr's barrage would count, as its spread is really wide.

id say that is a mortar and warrants a double check on what firing mode your on so you dont blow yourself up yeah with fire storm you can cover a good chunk of ground if you do the as i call counter mortaring because cannon modes got some range for the flak mode yeah its definitely a if its like point blank use it shot gun since it only travels so far and then just stops existing personally i just blew my self up too much so i kept it in cannon mode

[Orgoon]

5 minutes ago, seprent said:

id say that is a mortar and warrants a double check on what firing mode your on so you dont blow yourself up yeah with fire storm you can cover a good chunk of ground if you do the as i call counter mortaring because cannon modes got some range for the flak mode yeah its definitely a if its like point blank use it shot gun since it only travels so far and then just stops existing personally i just blew my self up too much so i kept it in cannon mode

I have 2 tricks that I use with Zarr:

1. By default I use it in barrage mode, switch to cannon only when needed and switch right back to barrage.
2. I remapped alt fire to right mouse wheel movement, so I only have to slightly move my index finger to change fire modes. If my mouse wheel couldn't move right or left, I guess I'd map it to one of my thumb buttons.

[SenorClipClop]

11 hours ago, (PS4)Echo_X said:

The failure is that people are being driven to exploit. That there are parts of the game that have a massive, arbitrary grind, and that grind is considered significantly more valuable then enjoyment of gameplay. Now I love grinding as much as the next person who would be drawn to this kind of game. But not to the degree that it literally drives you to want to find ways to just go idle and let the game play it's self. 

That's not really a viable reason to justify a protest of nerfs. Sure some players would play whatever they want in a mission whose rare drops were statistically likely after just a few runs. But a huge amount of players would still run cheesy builds and those "meta" strats others dislike, whether that grind was estimated at 3 or 30 or 300 runs. Enough people still want the game to play itself that anything which makes that happen gets some attention from DE, regardless of how many or few times a mission is run.

In games, items tend to get nerfed when they are, in comparison to the rest of the game, too strong. I like how in all of your post, not once to you defend your example OP item by claiming that it isn't too strong compared to the rest of the game. Instead, you seem to be trying to excuse its OP nature (which I infer you acknowledge) by citing other problems you deem the game to have. It's as though you're saying that one problematic feature should remain to counteract another problematic feature. Wouldn't it then be better for everyone to remove both problems: nerf your example OP thing and also fix the issue you deem the game to have? In your example, it'd just make more sense to nerf Meme Strike and boost rare drops, than to keep both things as is. That way we'd get our goodies faster have more build diversity by not being "forced" to run meta setups to grind for lucrative loot.

[(PSN)robotwars7]

nerfing, whilst not something we enjoy, is required, otherwise certain things become blatantly overpowered and exploited to the point where it can affect other people's enjoyment of the game. case in point was old Ember, Miragulor Combo, pre-rework Mesa and Saryn just to name a few. thankfully DE aren't so quick to nerf things these days, and are willing to let more powerful things slide these days. in the past, mods like Maiming Strike and Condition overload would have been unthinkable, but now we have more reason for it (newer, slightly tougher enemies, more build variation). as long as one thing isn't objectively better than another thing in every possible, conceivable scenario, then it's fine.

 

 

[peterc3]

14 hours ago, (PS4)Echo_X said:

If you listen to those who beg for nerf after nerf

Going to go out on a limb here and state unequivocally that DE has never nerfed anything because people asked for it to be nerfed. 

[Midrib]

[Seele]

The OP is absolutely correct in one regard. The problem with Atterax and Maiming Strike are not that they are too powerful. Prior to this most recent Acolyte incursion, Maiming Strike was quite rare, but Atteraxes were not rare in the slightest. And while Atterax is strong and people who use it religiously often get top damage and kill scores, other melee weapons can perform similarly or better. So neither the weapon nor the mod is overpowered.

But, they should be adjusted all the same. As the OP said,

Quote

The failure is that people are being driven to exploit.

Precisely! The failure is not that this "strategy" exists, but that it is made desirable.

We've established by now that whip-spinning is not too strong, numerically, yet it is still immensely popular and highly controversial. Why is that? Because it's lazy. Many dedicated Atterax users go so far as to use a macro to simplify their spin attacks and ensure that the dreadfully slow normal attacks never happen by mistake. Atterax is good enough to get the job done with a single finger and no thought or other input whatsoever. That's the problem with it.

For such a gameplay option to exist, it ought to be weaker than the options which require more manual or mental skill of the player. Warframe, it seems, does not subscribe to this philosophy, and so Atterax, Ignis Wraith, and Amprex continue to be among the most popular weapons of the hundreds available, and map-nuke capable Warframes like Saryn and Equinox dominate the meta.

Were DE to improve skill-based gameplay (read: firearms), which is already a perfectly acceptable way to play, we would reach yet another upset in balance, one through which the game has suffered before. There was a time when Boltor Prime was all that mattered, there were no stance mods, and your melee weapon and Warframe were mostly aesthetic choices (though Trinity and Rhino were still preferred for being actually invincible).

The OP's argument is that this lazy way to play is attractive because most of Warframe's content is too tedious and mindlessly grindy. There is substance to that. But you may just lack mental resilience. There's a chance you just don't like the game, because I'll let you in on a secret: whatever it is for which you're farming, with your Atterax? A weapon, a Warframe, focus, mods, what have you. It's not going to change the way the game plays out. Warframe is Warframe. There's no secret garden at the end where there's no grind anymore. 

An elegant solution to the problem is to do the exact opposite of what you've been doing, OP. The game is mindless. So why use a mindless weapon? Break out a sniper rifle. Get some rivens and Forma up a 'bad' weapon (you'll find most of them are quite good!) Engage and challenge yourself a little. It makes the experience a lot more interesting. It's how I've made it through five years.

[(PSN)Mahd2_7]

On 2018-08-11 at 10:26 AM, 4thBro said:

I didn't really read... Do people say Maiming is OP or something?

 

There is nothing OP about any melee whatsoever. How can anybody say anything melee has a chance against guns? You can run whatever melee you want - you will lose in damage to ANY gun less than 5 Dispo.

Even though I don't melee the Zenistar is one if the best weapons in the game. However I'd rather have my Zarr + Pox combo than any other melee besides the Zenistar 

[ChromaUmbra]

Nerfing and buffing will always be necessary in games like this to keep a variety of playstyles viable.  It's really only a problem when something gets over-nerfed or over-buffed, as doing either of those things usually results in a game becoming even less balanced and less fun.

[ConzyFTW]

On 2018-08-12 at 2:58 AM, (XB1)ECCHO SIERRA said:

Uh  this is demonstrably false. I would propose that not only can melee compete with any gun you want to throw down, but that it is probably the strongest category of weapon in the game.

 

Ever tried a kohm with 100%? Yeah... it takes a hot dump on any melee or gun.

[ConzyFTW]

On 2018-08-12 at 2:58 AM, (XB1)ECCHO SIERRA said:

Uh  this is demonstrably false. I would propose that not only can melee compete with any gun you want to throw down, but that it is probably the strongest category of weapon in the game.

 

Ever tried a kohm with 100%? Yeah... it takes a hot dump on any melee or gun.

[(PSN)de_sch0sch]

Am 11.8.2018 um 11:45 schrieb Zeclem:

... there are a lot of melees with the range enough to cover half of a room in a single swipe ...

That's the real problem here. How can you speak of melee when hitting something at 20+ meter range.

[Zeclem]

2 minutes ago, (PS4)de_sch0sch said:

That's the real problem here. How can you speak of melee when hitting something at 20+ meter range.

de thinks the same way appearently since they said they're gonna nerf the reach mods(and buff the base range of melees, so maybe)

[GPrime96]

11 hours ago, ChromaUmbra said:

It's really only a problem when something gets over-nerfed or over-buffed, as doing either of those things usually results in a game becoming even less balanced and less fun.

Like for example, Saryn and Chroma. Saryn in her 3.0 form could spread her spores on a enemy, spread them, and go AFK. I’ve seen players do that in ESO. While Chroma got nerfed because of the Eidolons and instead of him fixing his damage with Elementals, his Calculations got completely changed which made a severe decrease to Chroma’s damage and Tankiness. Over buffs and Over nerfs can change how something performs and it makes something Broken or not worth using.

[(XBOX)ECCHO SIERRA]

6 hours ago, ConzyFTW said:

Ever tried a kohm with 100%? Yeah... it takes a hot dump on any melee or gun.

I tested my zaw against a friend's kohm, in the simulacrum. He had a riven with multishot, status, neg something irrelevant. It was roughly equal with my zaw against level 145 corrupted heavy gunners.

Besides, your argument is one specific gun with one specific type of build. That's cherry picking, and against lower level enemies (star chart) both a decent melee build and a decent kohm are going to basically one hit everything so I don't see much of a difference, let alone enough for you to say it takes a "hot dump" on everything else.

[(XBOX)HAPPYHapyJ0YJoy]

On 2018-08-11 at 5:16 AM, (PS4)Echo_X said:

It is better to fix that which underperforms, then to break that which shines.

Shines versus underperforms? Loading that much?

The problem with stuff "shining" is the exact same as stuff underperforming; it invalidates the options below it for those who wish to be effective.

When you have 5% overperforming and 5% underperforming it's a lot quicker, easier and more cost effective to lower 5% and raise 5%, requiring you to work on 10% of your assets, than it is to raise 95%, requiring you to, you know, work on 95% of your assets. That second option wastes a lot of man hours (and thus money), which in turn uses up a lot of throughput and reduces a company's ability to release more content or lower the rate at which content can be released.

You deal with outliers. If a nail sticks up you hammer it down, you don't raise the floor to meet it.

I've dealt with a company once that tried and "all buffs, no nerfs" approach to balance once. It ended in a broken game where very little got done, with assets in a never-ending loop of buffing passes as inevitably new outliers formed, creating new norms which requires all other existing content to be raised (again) to meet it. In other words; it doesn't work. Nerfing is a necessary tool.

[(XBOX)ECCHO SIERRA]

1 hour ago, (XB1)HAPPYHapyJ0YJoy said:

Shines versus underperforms? Loading that much?

The problem with stuff "shining" is the exact same as stuff underperforming; it invalidates the options below it for those who wish to be effective.

When you have 5% overperforming and 5% underperforming it's a lot quicker, easier and more cost effective to lower 5% and raise 5%, requiring you to work on 10% of your assets, than it is to raise 95%, requiring you to, you know, work on 95% of your assets. That second option wastes a lot of man hours (and thus money), which in turn uses up a lot of throughput and reduces a company's ability to release more content or lower the rate at which content can be released.

You deal with outliers. If a nail sticks up you hammer it down, you don't raise the floor to meet it.

I've dealt with a company once that tried and "all buffs, no nerfs" approach to balance once. It ended in a broken game where very little got done, with assets in a never-ending loop of buffing passes as inevitably new outliers formed, creating new norms which requires all other existing content to be raised (again) to meet it. In other words; it doesn't work. Nerfing is a necessary tool.

I would argue we have enough "effective" weapons that we don't have anything resembling a "nail sticking out of the floor".

[TARINunit9]

On 2018-08-11 at 2:16 AM, (PS4)Echo_X said:

The failure isn't that there is an exploit. The failure is that people are being driven to exploit. That there are parts of the game that have a massive, arbitrary grind, and that grind is considered significantly more valuable then enjoyment of gameplay. Now I love grinding as much as the next person who would be drawn to this kind of game. But not to the degree that it literally drives you to want to find ways to just go idle and let the game play it's self. 

That people are exploiting the game is not something you can fix with nerfing, because no matter what you nerf, people will always find something else to exploit, and if you nerf everything over and over while chasing down exploits and metas, pretty soon you have an unplayable game...

Blaming the devs for not pulling off the impossible, eh?

"There will always be a loot cave" is a commonly misunderstood phrase. The phrase is commonly misinterpreted as "there will always be a part of the game that is statistically be the best, so you can't blame the players for flocking to it, and the devs need to stop nerfing it." What it ACTUALLY means is "human beings are naturally lazy greedy whiny sniveling cretins, and when you mock them for being lazy and greedy for flocking to the loot cave you're being a toxic elitist"

Now I'm not calling you a toxic elitist, Echo. I think that both meanings are too extreme to really capture the essence of what a loot cave really is. But you do need to understand that first part to understand why this next quote of yours is fallacious:

On 2018-08-11 at 2:16 AM, (PS4)Echo_X said:

You have to fix what is driving people to exploit the game.

The thing driving people to exploit the game is human nature itself. You can balance everything perfectly, make every mod viable, make every weapon balanced impeccably, and people will still reach for the exploits. Human beings really ARE lazy and greedy creatures (in part, we are also proud and altruistic creatures) so it is only natural that we will ALWAYS exploit, will ALWAYS gravitate to more reward for less effort.

Sometimes this needs to be embraced. I think Maiming Strike and Galatine Prime represent a horrible symptom of power creep in the game's weapon balance, but the devs see them as healthy conclusions to a progression tree. Sometimes this needs to NOT be embraced, and the exploit nerfed into the dirt for the good of both the game and the humans using it

[Vox_Preliator]

7 minutes ago, TARINunit9 said:

The thing driving people to exploit the game is human nature itself. You can balance everything perfectly, make every mod viable, make every weapon balanced impeccably, and people will still reach for the exploits. Human beings really ARE lazy and greedy creatures (in part, we are also proud and altruistic creatures) so it is only natural that we will ALWAYS exploit, will ALWAYS gravitate to more reward for less effort.

Can we just have this paragraph displayed at the top of the forums in giant neon letters at all times?

Edited August 13, 2018 by Vox_Preliator

[Twentyside]

On 2018-08-11 at 4:31 AM, YUNoJump said:

Just gonna leave this here, people have been making the exact same argument as you since Warframe's launch and even before then, there's a reason nobody has ever actually used your method.

Thanks for linking this, made for a nice read.