In Devstream 153, we looked both to the past and the future for our Warframe updates -- reflecting and iterating on Update 29.10, and teasing what is to come in the Call of the Tempestarii Quest!

If you want to catch all of the details and shenanigans, including everything covered in our Q&A section, be sure to catch the full stream on our YouTube channel. For those looking for the recap, read on below!

Housekeeping:

- Our official Xbox Series X build is targeted for April 2021!

- Gift of the Lotus alerts are live for 24 hours after the stream! Don’t miss your chance at a Forma and Aura Forma.

- Hop into Easter with returning seasonal content on March 31 on all platforms: the Lepus Headgear, Easter Color Picker, and Spring Step Ephemera!

- We are working towards a simultaneous release of Update 30 in April! For our Console Tenno, you can read an update (including download sizes per platform) in our “In Dev” thread!

- As a reminder: we are keeping our studio closed until September 2021 at the earliest. Meaning, yes, TennoCon 2021 is digital. Full details to come.

Warframe’s 8 Year Anniversary

Warframe is celebrating 8 years! Join in the festivities with the return of our Dex anniversary items via Alerts. To ring in 8 incredible years, players who log in during our Anniversary celebrations will also receive the Dex Rhino Skin on login! More details to come.

Update 30: Call of the Tempestarii

Sevagoth and his Quest

We’ve talked at length about Sevagoth, but we still have more to share prior to his release in April 2021! First of all, here is a look at his alt helmet:

Secondly, we have his Prex Card to showcase! In this update, we are trying a new acquisition for this card: in lieu of investing narrative work into a Leverian, we are making it acquirable from his Quest itself!

The Call of the Tempestarii will be a shorter quest with a mysterious vessel. This will be one of our first lore-heavy quests featuring Railjack -- in it, we will introduce you to Vala:

Mirage Deluxe

Mirage’s Deluxe skin is coming along nicely, to the point where it should be ready to release with Update 30! We might also be able to squeeze in a Deluxe Animation set as well, but no promises.

If you missed it, this Deluxe skin started as a community concept by Cleo Naturin!

The New Railjack Retrospective

The Devs chatted about a few popular feedback notes from our recent PC update. Iteration is always an ongoing, complicated process, so here’s a look at some of our internal conversations and plans for the future.

”Core” Warframe and Railjack

With Corpus Railjack, we saw the first versions of Railjack gameplay leading into core Warframe missions: Defense, Orphix Venom, Exterminate, and Volatile (new mode!).

Scott explained that the requirements for all squadmates to enter the “on-ground” portion of the mission was tied to AI spawning limitations. With that said, we are very much aware of the requests for more mission diversity in these nodes, and we are working to include more core Warframe game types into the Railjack ecosystem!

Reb specifically mentioned Assassination is something you can expect with Corpus Liches.

Liches as Crew Members

We can confirm that Liches being eligible for “On-Call” status is in the works!

Another key feedback item about Liches was the ability to give them roles other than Defender. Geoff said the animation team is doing work to support any extra responsibilities you want to give them -- because Liches are so large, they require some custom tweaks before we can teach them any new skills.

Rewards

Rewards is an ongoing discussion for Warframe as a whole, but it definitely is relevant for Railjack as well! Since our roll-out of “The New Railjack” is still ongoing, we hope to add more interesting rewards with the introduction of Void Storms, and Corpus Liches as well.

Battle Mods

We changed Battle Mods with Update 29.10, and usage stats show how this impacted player selection following this update. Looking at the stats below, the team mentioned it is perhaps a sign that some of the other Battle Mods need a tweak to bring them closer to the level of Seeker Volley.

Gunnery Rank 10 and Gameplay Notes

Gunnery Rank 10 has received a lot of feedback for having a downside to its auto-aim. There’s always room to re-evaluate, but currently we feel like the perk of Rank 9 helps to off-set the extra heat accretion. With that said, we are open to revisiting this down the road!

The team also discussed the relationship between the Forward Artillery and Pilots, and the feedback of letting Pilots use the Artillery without having to change stations. This conversation covered a few options: letting Crew Members use the Forward Artillery, and/or making Pilot-assigned Crew Members not move the ship when the Player is in Forward Artillery. At this time, there is no concrete plan for iteration, but it is an ongoing conversation point, especially for Solo players.

Scott also mentioned the option of allowing per-station Weapon selection, instead of having the Dorsal and Ventral turrets share the same equipment.

Plexus Affinity

Players have noticed that since the Plexus has entered the Affinity equation when Piloting or Gunning, there is a new way Affinity is distributed. While Squad kills are still shared, personal kills are absorbed by the Plexus. This is currently not something we are looking at changing.

Railjack Host

The ability to choose to be host of your Railjack missions is no longer available -- hosting and matchmaking in general is a complicated system and at this time we do not have concrete details on whether that option is planned to return.

Other Tidbits

We had feedback on making the boss fight in the Deadlock Protocol a little less difficult. That change went out in Update 29.10, and we saw marked results!

Other Misc. Notes:

- Load times have been cut in half on PS5 due to finding a memory allocation bug!
- Operators could see more of a role in future lore expansions of Warframe.
- Scarlet Spear could make a return, but most likely would need some tweaks before it does!

Thanks for reading! Have a lovely weekend, Tenno.