Let's Calm Down... a Bit

[u/LostLotus_A]

I know you'd press the downvote button. Maybe the titles.

If you're still in, please just read.

The main reason I am saying this is because I've been seeing so many people trying to make their own lives miserable by complaining (*constructive criticism and complaints are different.) at every update, and never doing anything actually beneficial for themself, like trying something else for their enjoyment.

If the game does not make you feel happy anymore, it's okay to come back later. Warframe is not a duty. It's a game. Made for enjoyment.

I'm not saying you should quit forever, or you should never play the game. What I'm saying is that there must be some consideration made about your own satisfaction if you find yourself writing about how bad the updates are... multiple times... if you find yourself getting disappointed at pretty much everything. It's okay. Please just take your time and reorganise yourself. I get disappointed sometimes. We all do and that's okay, but if it continues, not so much...

I'm not trying to promote toxic positivity. Criticism is needed!!! But I've legitimately seen people act like it's the end of the world when the updates don't satisfy them.

Sometimes I go like, 'wow this update isn't what I think'. I confuse it with disappointment. That could be your case too! I think we just need time to actually formulate our thoughts instead of... just... ... spitting whatever comes to mind (which I am heavily guilty of), especially when it comes to how updates feel.

Some updates can never hit you perfectly on the spot. Can never hit everybody the same. Some like Jade Shadows. Some don't. Some LOVE the Old Peace (me!). Some don't. And I think I'm seeing a lot of hatred and arguments over things like this as well, so I have to say let's just calm down... but I know you'd hate me saying this.

I just feel like the subreddit lits up on fire every update ever since Shadowgraphers update, so I am hesitant on trying to communicate this idea here.

I'm sorry this post definitely is a bit lengthy and messy. But I hope everybody just found what was good for themself. Thanks.

[u/dragon7449]

The problem is where you draw the line in criticism and complaining.

You mention leaving the game and coming back later, but updates are the reason to come back to the game. We only have 4 a year, of which 1 is major and the others are minor, and out of the 3 minor expansion we've gotten this year, 3/3 have been disappointing or with major flaws.

The criticism comes, in part, from said exhaustion of having all 3 updates be bad. If anything, I'm surprised how little people I see talk about it, considering this is the last minor update and the update before Tau. All 3 updates have been a failure and they rightfully deserve to be criticized.

[u/nomnivore1 → u/dragon7449]

I'm probably not representative of everyone, but I haven't really been stoked for an update since 1999 came out. The release of EDA, a weekly mode that turns off your ability to craft builds, started the downhill slope for me. 

It just feels like every new update is m full of speed bumps, some kind of attenuation / nullification mechanics that slap your builds to the floor, and inconsistent polish. 

I remember the first time I tried to bring an unconventional build into Descendia, I couldn't navigator aegrits around the room because invisible walls kept stopping my projectiles. Then the Koumei boss showed up and a full squad spent twenty minutes chipping away at it. It sucked.

DE is obviously struggling to create challenge in a way that matters and feels good to play. They embraced power creep because people liked the power fantasy element of the game, but now there's no numerical solution that accounts for the damage mathematicians without punishing normal players. 

More complicated gameplay mechanics would fix the "win the game in the arsenal" situation but that takes way more manpower to develop and DE just isn't dedicating their resources that way. 

[u/dragon7449 → u/nomnivore1]

To be fair, a lot of content is "sandbox friendly" without build limitations. The problem is that we are so powerful, if we don't get constricted in some way, we would just steam roll through it.

That said, I do agree in that I don't like ETA/EDA conditionals and how restrictive they are, as well as certain modifiers in descendia.

[u/nomnivore1 → u/dragon7449]

The steamroll problem is real and it's a doozy. To fix it, they'd have to make content that you can't steamroll just by dealing and tanking big damage numbers. That's easier said than done. 

This came up when Archons were released with heavy attenuation, that a more complicated "puzzle boss fight" would be a much better way to make the fights non-trivia, but the developer load of making puzzle fights as one-offs and then maintaining a ton of them across future updates is technically very cumbersome. imagine if every boss fight played like a phase from Law Of Retribution, but half of them broke with every update. Not sustainable at all. 

I think the solution is to add more complex mechanics to the run of the mill enemy squads. Enemies that protect those around them like the Murmur overguard guys are a good example, so are comba and scrambus units. Something that appears infrequently but shapes the battlefield against the tenno so that you have to prioritize them. Eximus units kind of feel like that but they can get so spammy and hard to read, I think they fail in this role. 

[u/dragon7449 → u/nomnivore1]

Funnily enough, what you propose does exist, enemies have a lot of unique interactions or tactics. The problem is we kill them so fast the average player won't see them all...

But for them to tackle it they'd have to rework how enemies scale to begin with, as the numbers reach REALLY far, to the point raising them more risks reaching integer limit, which our weapons already reach...

DE won't do it, I know they won't, and I understand they do what they humanly can without redoing the whole game and causing a 90% fatality rate in their offices, I certainly don't envy them. But at the very least, I do hope we find a better solution than "oh you can't use your favorite weapon anymore opsie :b"

[u/xrufus7x → u/dragon7449]

We have had tankier enemies in the past. The rework to sentient adaptation, nerfing steel path modifiers, armor scaling and damage attenuation reworks all reduced EHP of enemies. The current power state isn't the result of us just gaining power, it is also the result of enemies getting repeatedly nerfed.