Defense Mission Discipline: The Right Tool for the Job

The recent event Digital Extremes implemented in Warframe this weekend seems like a success.  Whether I was duoing with my battle-wife as our Rhino/Frost pair, going solo as my newly re-finished Ash, or offering my services to Region chat to help finish off Artifact Defense missions; I rarely found myself failing at the event.

But I certainly did feel the strain from other people.

Bringing a Heat Dagger to a Snipetron Fight

There are so many weapons available to players in Warframe that it can be difficult to get a solid grasp of what you are supposed to do.  What is the difference between the Strun, Boar, and Hek?  How do I know if I should bring a Boltor over a Grakata?  What use is the Burston when compared top the Braton and Gorgon?  Why does everyone seem to always have a Paris or Dread for missions?

That last statement is important; we're going to have a birds-and-the-bees talk about it by the closing paragraph.

One of the biggest struggles is the "correct" use of weapons in Warframe.  Making sure to bring the appropriate weapon to the appropriate content isn't something a lot of people playing in Online games will really concern themselves with.  On a Raid or Spy mission there is no real concern beyond cutting a bloody swath through the enemy.  Your Tenno cell (what a group of players is called in the setting) gets to the objective and gets out.  You move on to the next mission.

Unless you're playing on an Endless Defense or Mobile Defense mission.  Then you need to be mindful of a few things.

Rectitude and Respect

A Tenno must be mindful of the other Tenno in their cell, when working together towards a goal.  The objective is the single most important thing you have in a mission, but your fellow Tenno are as much a means to completing the objective as you are.  You must Respect both of these factors in a Defense mission.  We're back to the basics of Bushido to best describe Defense Mission Discipline, as it helps put into perspective the problems and solutions at hand.

Using the right weapon in a Defense mission is important because it allows you to carry your own weight.  While certainly some weapons are enjoyable to use and other weapons have a pleasing aesthetic which matches your Warframe, the three other people in the mission with you will not appreciate it as much as they will appreciate a solid performance.  Carry your weight, and show your fellow Tenno Respect.

From Respect we must move on to Rectitude, and what it means to your arsenal.  In short, you must accept that you will have to play a certain role and be able to perform certain actions in a Defense mission.  You will be required to kill a great many foes with various strengths and weaknesses.  A Vulkar sniper rifle can kill a Corpus Shield Osprey with a single blow or cripple a Grineer Heavy Gunner, but so can a Latron or even a Braton with the application of a handful of bullets and the correct Mods.  These weapons can then be turned on a different foe without an impact on their time to kill (TTK).  This is where the idea of Rectitude comes in to play; to strike when it is right to strike.  And with the right tool for the right difficulty.

Difficulty?

Difficulty.  A Tier 1 Endless Defense mission is a cake-walk, as anything under level 15 can be mindlessly slaughtered without consideration to the threats they normally would hold at higher levels.  But reaching these higher levels in an Endless Defense mission is where the greater rewards and greater risks lay, and thus where teamwork and cooperation (the Respect towards your fellow Tenno) is required.

We will primarily be discussing the difficulty of Tier 3 encounters and the foes which you will face there, as this is where the most difficulty and misunderstanding of ones role comes in to play.  The easiest Tier 3 Endless Defense missions to complete to Wave 5 are Ceres-Casta and Ceres-Varro, while the highest is the infamous Pluto-Outer Terminus.  Casta and Varro start at level 25 and approach level 30 quickly, while Outer Terminus starts at level 39 and increases in difficulty.  Varro is the easier of the two Ceres Endless Defense missions, as it is located in the storage hold of a Grineer galleon; Casta is located in the infamously annoying asteroid cavern.

We'll start with levels, and work our way up.

Levels, Effective Levels, and Potatos

My Rhino is Rank 30 and has a Potato in it; an Orokin Catalyst which doubles the Mod Capacity of my Warframe.  Without a Potato, we can consider my Rhino to be able to perform as a Level 30 Warframe, with maximum Mod Capacity.  With a Potato, we can consider my Rhino to be able to perform as a level 60 Warframe, with maximum Mod Capacity.  But mine does not currently have the max Mod Capacity in use; it is only using 50 of the 60 Mod Capacity available.  The same applies to weapons, with the issue being further muddled with the application of Forma and Polarizing Mod slots.

This can act as a good indication of how well-prepared you are for an encounter and how well you can handle certain difficulties of Defense missions.  The same applies to weapons; more Mod Capacity allows higher-rank Serration or Point Blank Mods.  Higher-rank damage mods gain greater effect from Speed Trigger and Shotgun Spazz, as well as elemental damage Mods.

My high-level Redirection and Vitality combined with Iron Skin help to buy a great deal of time when wielding my Fragor to crowd-control Ancients, as an example.  Even in Wave 30+ or dealing with level 60 foes, the crowd-control of a fast-swinging Fragor with North Wind and Shocking Touch can lock anything down indefinitely.  It may not deal massive amounts of damage, but it serves to allow my fellow Tenno to safely dispatch the wave.

We'll Always Have Paris (and other Dreadful Puns)

A great many Tenno I encounter doing Defense missions make use of a Paris or Dread as their primary weapon, without understanding how they work or their place in the Tenno arsenal.  Bows are difficult weapons to use due to a combination of required skill and required mods.  Elemental effects will remove the ability to send a corpse flying in most cases, forcing a high Serration Mod and Piercing Hit.  As we briefly looked at, Serration acts as an aspect of your weapons strength and level as much as the functional rank which is displayed in-game.  A Rank 30 Hek without Mods installed can deal fair damage, but with Point Blank will deal 90% more.  Almost doubling the output of a weapon for 9 Mod Capacity.  9 levels, in essence.

Landing an arrow in a target requires leading and precision.  Endless Defense missions are not the environment for careful, precise shots.  Using a bow requires a solid grasp of damage values and high-rank Mods to perform against increasingly difficult foes; high-level Endless Defense missions are not the environment where someone should experiment with weapons they haven't put the effort into Modding correctly or completely.

Next Up?

Now that we're done with the bow-rant (I'm sure I'll see some grief for it too!), what comes next?

I don't have the experience in extremely high-level Endless Defense missions which TCPI has, as an example.  But we can go over the application of certain weapons and practices in various maps which can benefit a player.  Better understanding the behavior of Grineer in the asteroid cavern compared to the Grineer galleon, or the effect of establishing threat on Infected and herding them along specific kill corridors.

And a better view of what Warframes can fill which roles, and why you shouldn't rush into a crowd to use Mag Crush.

Grappling Hooks: What Might We See?

Flying Around at the Speed of Sound

Let's get one thing out of the way before we continue; it's a Grappling Hook.  There will be statements saying "Grapple Hook" and "Grapnel Hook" and various other instances of the English language eating away at itself.  A Grapnel is used in water, and a Grapple Hook simply incorrect English ("A wrestle mat" vs. "A wrestling mat").

Also all the video links in this post will (or should!) open a new window in your browser.  Be sure to check the volume settings when they come up, as these are from the era of bombastic industrial metal tracks as background music.  What once was Sonic Mayhem and Front Line Assembly has turned into a cluster of wub-wubs and bass drops.

Now that we have that out of the way; holy shit Grappling Hook.

Ropes, Wires, Hooks, and Utility Belts

The very concept of a Grappling Hook is fantastic, especially in a game such as Warframe.  Attaching yourself to something and zipping around the map is one of the dreams which many first-person shooter  and third-person shooter players have.  We can blame it on Bionic Commando and The Legend of Zelda.

But what kind of Grappling Hook will we get?  And in what form will it interact with the physics of Warframe?

The Classic Grappling Hook

The original hook used in Ye Olden Days of FPS gaming, this is the one which paved the way for all others.  The properties of the Classic Grappling Hook are simple:

• Attach to a physical object
• Retain/inherit full inertia
• Pivot in a spherical area

As this video demonstrates (from the original Quake using one of the first three-dimensional examples of the Grappling Hook) the effect of the hook in spatial movement is substantial.  The implimentation of such a function in a game removes the Z-axis limitations which a majority of players are comfortable with.  As illustrated in this sequence of events, the player doesn't even reach the floor as they traverse a corner.  The location in question is a perfect choke and a prime location to gib a target with a shotgun blast, a railgun shot, or simply send them off-course with a direct or indirect rocket impact.

Removing the requirement for a player to be grounded for most of the match and moving through very specific zones of a hallway removed the expected locations which enemy players could reliably focus their aim.  Applying the same effect to enemy line-of-sight in Warframe (guards rarely look at the ceiling) is a fantastic way to create a faster method of stealth play which many players would feel more comfortable using.

The Physics Grappling Hook

Differing from the Classic Grappling Hook, this hook has properties which allowed it to be used for different methods of travel beyond slingshotting across a map:

• Attach to a physical object
• Retain/inherit limited inertia
• Reel the user towards the attachment point
• Decrease power of third function as user inertia changes

As we can see in this video, limited inertia and the various changes in the function of the hook offer a smoother and more natural functions.  If we were to compare the two hooks thus far (the Physics and the Classic), the Classic Hook would be a static iron bar which possesses no collision and swings the user along a pivot; the Physics Hook is a rope which quickly tugs the user towards the attachment point as it reels in and then slows the reeling process as time passes.

The Physics Hook does a great deal to open the possibilities for use, with limitations against exploiting.  The gravity- and inertia-controlled functions of the Physics Hook on the user ensure that objects in the world are still barriers, and that the user cannot ignore collision with surfaces while attempting to traverse the terrain.

The Inertia Grappling Hook

Anyone familiar with the Lithium Mod from the days of Quake 2 will understand the function of the Inertia Grappling Hook.  Another good title for this hook is the Zipline Hook, due to the function which inertia does not exibit as the user moves:

• Attach to a physical object
• Reset inertia
• Propel the user towards the attachment point
• Continue to propel the user towards the attachment point along a straight line

As a very loud video from Quake 2 helps illustrate, the Inertia Hook has no solid connection between the user and the attachment point.  The function of the Inertia Hook is to instead allow either brief periods of acceleration, or inter-spaced periods of acceleration and free fall   The method used to move with the Lithium Mod hook was to "skip" through the air by briefly attaching to a point and propelling yourself towards it, only to detach and sail through the air.  Repeating this allowed the user to continue to sail through the air, often while gaining momentum.

This is by far the hardest Grappling Hook cited thus far to balance around, and can cause numerous technical issues.  Desync from the host/server, exploiting movement speed to pass through objects, and out-ranging all but hitscan attacks are just some of the risks with implementing the Inertia Hook.

The Ninja Rope

We've saved the best for last, and it may be the best-known Grappling Hook from two completely different games:

• Attach to a physical object
• Inherit inertia
• Set maximum distance which user can move from attachment point
• Align user along maximum distance from attachment point when attempting to exceed maximum distance from attachment point

Explaining the Ninja Rope is hard. It involves Pi. Videos are the only way to really allow a user to better understand the effects, so instead of illustrating the various uses of the Ninja Rope we will look at where it has been best used.

Unreal Tournament: 2004 used a Ninja Rope as a Mutator (effectively a Mod), and the effect was profound.  As can be seen in the video, the ultra-balanced Facing Worlds Capture The Flag map was rendered a joke in the face of such a tool.

Worms Armageddon has one of the more memorable modern-gaming instances of the Ninja Rope.  Some of the things which you can do with it blow my mind even today.

Garry's Mod has a good implementation of the Ninja Rope as well, with a very Spider-Man feel to the controls.

Warframes Grappling Hook

So what will we get?  From the brief demo which Digital Extremes gave us, I'm not so sure we're going to see any of the above.  The closest example to take from above would be the Inertia Hook, without the ability to inherit inertia or disengage the hook before reaching the attachment point.  It is one of the simplest hooks to add, and ensures the hook isn't sued to exploit movement and trivialize Void content.

With any luck, we will see one of the more utility belt-like functions of the Grappling Hook in Warframe.  Upon reaching the attachment point of the Grappling Hook, the user is anchored in place and is unable to move until they manually disengage the Grappling Hook.  Be it through the use of the action key, jumping, or automatically after a brief period of time.

But just seeing a Grappling Hook in Warframe will be enough for me.  However it ends up working, the game will be made all-the-better for its inclusion.

Livestream 8: Artifact System

Delicious Information

The latest livestream finished this afternoon with enough new information and juicy teasers to keep people on their toes.  Discussion of the Mission Architect System (I'm personally calling it MAS), working on Alert levels for stealth gameplay, and the new content coming down the pipe in the form of a new faction to face is amazing to fantasize about.

But then there's Artifacts.

The Artifact Cherry

It was a rite of passage for me to get my first Artifact in Warframe.  Seeing an alert show up somewhere that I had previously unlocked and seeing the big question mark reward next to a credit bonus was exciting.  The question of what I would get, and the possibilities such rewards entailed were amazing.  It was an engaging thing which I felt immersed me further into the game, since I could get rewards from doing more than just running the same mission over and over again.

Admittedly I got Sniper Scavenger from the alert.  Not the worst thing, but it got me to check the Warframe Wiki to see what else I could get and piqued my interest in learning more about the game as it stood back in Closed Beta.

The Rework

So now we get the teaser statement from Digital Extremes in Livestream 8 talking about a rework of the Artifact System, and the conjecture is endless.  They briefly mentioned turning them into Mods, using some of our already precious 10 Mod slots and 30 or 60 Mod capacity to give us even more options.  It's a fine idea, but I think Digital Extremes could go a bit further.

Forma!

We have a lot of uses for Forma currently, and it very much should be understood what Forma does.  Platinum in Warframe is essentially how the developers can feed themselves.  As a very serious analogy, every single dollar spent on Platinum or Founders Packs is another dollar they can use to pay the rent on their office, the mortgages of their houses, and the bill for their groceries.  No hyperbole, they live and die by how well Warframe performs and how well they can balance the needs of players with what can be bought and what cannot.

Forma is a rare reward from various activities in the game, but can easily be bought with Platinum.  It is already used in a great many forms (upgrading gear with custom Polarities and Dojo building), and certainly isn't begging for another application.  But we could certainly get away with including it in the Artifact System.

As a Warframe has options to slot an Orokin Reactor for more Mod capacity and Forma can be used to Polarize existing Mod slots, it could be expanded to allow for Artifact slots.

Numbers are all conjecture.  Would a frame start with an Artifact slot?  Would they need to apply Forma to unlock one?  Would you need to only apply a single Forma, or more to unlock one?  What about more Artifact slots?

In a perfect world, I would like to see a blend of concepts:

• A default Artifact slot enabled on all Warframes, immediately after being purchased, crafted, or earned.
• Artifacts have a Rating of their own, working with the current rarity scale they possess.  Rare would be three, Uncommon would be two, and Common would be one.
• Warframes would have an Artifact capacity, similar to the Mod capacity they currently possess.
• Forma could be used to unlock additional Artifact slots.
• Forma could also be used to boost the max Artifact capacity.  Using an Orokin Reactor would be an acceptable alternative, since they are used for a smaller pool of gear than Orokin Catalysts.

This also allows Artifacts to be combined together, through their own system of drops (unlikely and unwieldy) or through the use of Cores (but not specific Mods) and other Artifacts.

The major downside I can see with this is the complication it would add to Warframe.  Without a proper tutorial it would be a risky addition to make, since many new players would be lost as-to how the process works.

Expect a one-sided fanboy post soon about the Grapple Hook, as well as a look at the upcoming Weekend Alert.

And a long-winded discussion of Warframe Lore, and why MAS is going to kick ass.