The launch of Warframe's first major 8 player content was an exciting time for all of us here at Digital Extremes. Trials were made to be difficult, cooperative encounters that would call upon every Tenno to perform a role that was critical to the Mission's success.

Watching Tenno from all over the globe race to complete Warframe's first step into endgame content was thrilling for everyone. Whomever came out on top would have some pretty cool bragging rights in addition to a lot of insight into how successful we were in our goal of making the The Law of Retribution an intensely cooperative experience.

After a bit of problem solving the first squad to successfully clear the The Law of Retribution did so in just over 55 minutes, and we certainly couldn't resist getting the inside scoop from the victors to find out more about their time spent hunting Vay Hek.

Let's get to know the team:

Mraah: I'm Mraah, and I've been playing this game for a year or so on and off. I think I'm the lowest Mastery Rank here but they let me come with them. I like long walks on the beach…

-laughter-

Flare_Eyes: I'm Flare_Eyes. I'm been playing the game for a very long time now and…I like puppies. I think that's it.

Celestics: Hey, I'm Celestics, I've been playing for about a year and a half. I speedrun Warframe, and I'm actually a moderator of the speedrunning channel for this game on Speedrun.com. I like killing bosses fast.

GoldDeoxys: I'm GoldDeoxys, people usually just call me Gold or Goldie. I've been playing for about 11 months, usually every day on Twitch.

LancelotGray: I'm Lance, playing Warframe here from Singapore. I've been playing Warframe ever since the Breeding Grounds event. I found Flare_Eyes's Stream and now here I am with the group!

StarfishSr: My name is Starfish, and I just play this game for fun! I've been playing for over a year, and these guys invited me to play with them.

Tcooc: Hello! I'm TC, I've been playing since Update 7. I play Trinity because she's immortal.

Orro99: My name is Orro99. I've been playing for 2 years, and was playing a lot of first person shooter games before Warframe. I found Flare's stream after taking a break of 4 of months and decided to come back.

How long have you all been playing together?

Flare_Eyes: I'm not too sure, actually!

Celestics: I don't remember either…

Mraah: I know I didn't really play with any of them before the Trial. We've been hanging out in the stream together but we didn't play until it happened.

Celestics: I think all I remember is the first time I went to Flare's stream and the majority of it was farming for bacons.

-everyone laughs-

Flare_Eyes: The Vay Hek frequency beacons, yeah. I've known Orro99 for quite a while now. Since April?

Orro99: April of last year, I knew Flare from a little before then.

Lancelotgray: Since July of last year for me!

Flare_Eyes: Some of us have been playing together for quite some time. Others, we've been hanging out but not playing with one another as much.

Were one of you designated squad leader for the Trial?

All: Celestics!

-everyone laughs-

Celestics: Yeah, I hosted the mission. I also might have taken too much control. TC and I carried the raid for communication.

Tcooc: About the Trial…the best moment was the first stage. I was holding the battery and we had no idea what to do, and the battery was running out of stability. I just face planted myself into the injector and somehow it was vulnerable and we blew it up. That was how we figured out the first strange. Also, I died.

(Disclaimer: Mature Language, a very brief audio drop, and many helpless Grineer slain)

Can you tell us your squad composition and what influenced your choices?

Celestics: So our first run when the Trial first came out I think we had five Loki Primes, Nyx Prime, Trinity, and Ash. We got to the third stage but failed because of a glitch that prevented any doors from opening.

The second time we went with three Loki Primes, Valkyr, Ash, Trinity, Nyx and Nova. That went very well, and we used that group to finish first. We decided on Loki Prime because Invisibility is kinda overpowered, and the Disarm would prevent the lv 80s from killing us fast. That was our mindset.

Mraah: Ash ended up working really well because you can Smokescreen the bomb carrier.

Celestics: It worked out amazing well until we figured out the bomb kills you when you shoot at it. -laughs- That was pretty funny.

What did you find the most difficult part of the Trial was?

Mraah: I base that off of how much time we spent on each part, so I'd say the third part is definitely the hardest. Figuring out what to do with the bomb, how to do it with each door. How to get it out alive without being killed by all the enemies around us.

Flare_Eyes: I think the second Trial is the hardest for me, in terms of getting the team coordinated. Where you need to step on the platform and everyone gets electrocuted. There are moments where someone's down and there's only one more person that needs to step on a platform. We just have to watch him die and then next thing you know everyone's dead.

GoldDeoxys: I think the third part was the hardest, although I crashed loading between the first and the second. It took a while because we didn't know what to do.

LancelotGray: There's very little information or details on what to do for the first time doing the Trial. The second part of the Trial is definitely the hardest, with Scorpions pulling you away from the pad.

StarfishSr: I think I have to agree with Flare, the second one is the hardest part. Standing still and being a giant target for the enemy is not fun at all. Hard, but we managed!

Tcooc: I agree. Standing still while there's Scorpions and Bombards attacking you was pretty terrible.

Orro99: The hardest was the second Trial. We had a delay getting on the pad because we were waiting for someone to get on. We have been working to improve on that part for each run.

Celestics: I think regarding the hardest part the second was the hardest overall, but the first part is also really difficult. You need the gear investment and a lot of energy for the bomb. That one really has way more in terms of an investment than the other two phases.

Now you guys said earlier you had a pretty hilarious mishap with the bomb…do you have any other memorable moments from the Trial?

Celestics: So the first time we did it, everyone was on a pad. I was going to be the eighth pad but then somebody went down. There were seven seconds to go and we decided to just yolo it. I hacked the console, jumped to the pad, and stood on it with about a second to spare and everyone cheered. That was pretty good.

GoldDeoxys: Probably trying to figure out the doors. No one really knew where we were supposed to go next, and at that point we thought we were supposed to fight Vay Hek standing on the towers. It was pretty funny watching everyone try to jump on those things.

Flare_Eyes: It gets pretty chaotic.

MrAah: The third part gave me a headache…

Flare_Eyes: Don't forget double Grustrag 3! The surprise with the G3 was pretty awesome.

Celestics: So one of us was targeted by the G3, so the G3 came in during the Mission to attack us. But then a second G3 came in because it happened during the second Trial. -laughs-

I think assassins were unintentionally enabled on launch, so we did have some assassins showing up to make things more difficult.

-everyone laughs-

Mraah: That was fun.

Orro99: A memorable moment is when we found a rare container and we all dropped everything and rushed to scan the container.

Celestics: Oh yeah that was great too!

What would you guys like to see from future Trials?

Mrahh: I've thought a lot about this. The main thing I want to see is a harder Trial. While this one was pretty challenging at first, once you get to know everything it becomes trivial. The main thing I want to see is a nice multistage boss fight to go through.

Vay Hek, once you figure out the doors, you just shoot him a couple times and he dies. I want boss mechanics that really make you have to think.

Flare_Eyes: If Archwing is possible it would be really great to see a boss fight that lets players split up. When I first heard of the J3 Golem I thought it would be so cool if you had four players on the outside and the other four players on the inside. That would be awesome.

GoldDeoxys: I'd like to see a better way to communicate. If you can't talk like this on TeamSpeak or Raidcall it can be really difficult, so I'd like to see a shortcut key in the chat to make some type of voice announcement or marker. That would be really helpful.

Flare_Eyes: I'd like to add to that actually. It would be nice to show which waypoint belongs to which player. It's kind of confusing to have so many waypoints, especially with eight players.

Celestics: It would be cool to color point the waypoints.

StarfishSr: I have to agree with Flare, having a mixed Mission with Archwing would be nice. A split up team would be best -- one four man party goes somewhere and the other one does something else. It'd be nice!

Celestics: I'll +1 to that. It would be nice to see the teams split up and have to coordinate while they're locked off in different rooms. That would be limited on the communicate part, but it would bring something new to the gameplay.

Lancelotgray: I want to see where there's a stage like Spy 2.0 for the whole team to go through the Mission without triggering the alarm.

LancelotGray: Oh! Also a parkour stage.

GoldDeoxys: Definitely Archwing.

Tcooc: Personally, I really like the combat in Warframe. But the thing about the Trial is you don't really need to kill anyone for most of it. I think the number of enemies in the Trial was great, but in the future I would like to see Mission types that have me killing thousands and thousands of enemies. That's Warframe in a nutshell.

Orro99: I'd like a Trial that can change and not be one static level. Maybe have a maze that can change each time you run the Trial.

Do you guys think the Law of Retribution was a good start to 8-player content?

Mraah: Absolutely. It's funny because a couple weeks before the Trials were announced I was thinking what I would really want from Warframe and I said I really wanted a raid in Warframe. And then it came out and I was just… -fangirl scream-

Flare_Eyes: Yeah I agree, the Trial is really fun. Especially if you have a party to go with.

Lancelotgray: It was really a good start! It was so much fun!

Golddeoxys: I like the Trials. I didn't used to play online games, at least not usually. Before Warframe I was never really into them. I never had much exposure to Trials before launch but I really like them. It's definitely a nice challenge. You can't just go into it like it's another Mission type.

Are we going to see this particular Squad be the first to clear future Trials?

Mraah: I'm hoping so!

Flare_Eyes: We're probably going to try again, yes.

Orro99: We will try!

Mraah: Right now we've been doing a Trial every nice since release.

Celestics: I kinda skipped homework to be in the raid…

-everyone laughs-

Celestics: Yeah I pulled an all-nighter because I wanted to have fun in the Trial. It ended up taking five hours.

Mraah: We were up till around 5-6 in the morning going at it.

Any advice for Tenno looking to start the Trial with a fresh Squad?

Mraah: Communication is the biggest thing I can say. It's next to impossible to do without actually being able to communicate. We can tell you because the first time we tried we were typing the whole time, and it's hard to run around to not be shot at by 80+ enemies while trying to type or look in the bottom left for chat.

Lancelotgray: Communication is key.

Flare_Eyes: For me, it's gear. Bring some energy restores for the bomb.

GoldDeoxys: You definitely need to have the right gear to survive. You can't just go in there with a bunch of MK1 Braton's and expect to survive and contribute to the team.

Celestics: Definitely a group with a communication aspect. Number one is designate a leader. If you don't have a leader then you get a lot of conflicting ideas. That's a must-have. Number two is you have to have a plan. If you just decide to wing it and go in it doesn't work out so well. The Trial is late-game content, so you can't expect to just run in there without having the experience.

How is it said…half the war is won before the battle even starts, right?

Orro99: Have one person that can be the leader, and bring some ciphers for the many hack consoles.

Flare_Eyes: Yeah I agree. Bring restores, ciphers. You definitely need restores.

GoldDeoxys: I don't know that you actually need ciphers. If you're fast enough at hacking you don't need any, but you'll absolutely need some restores because the bomb's going to take away your energy really fast.

A tremendous 'thank you' goes out to Celestics, Orro99, Flare_Eyes, LancelotGray, StarfishSr, tcooc, MrAah, GoldDeoxys, and every other Tenno who worked hard to clear Warframe's very first endgame experience. The feedback you've provided has been invaluable in pushing everyone here at Digital Extremes to ensure our future Trials continue to challenge Tenno in ways previously unimagined.

And to all Tenno looking for a greater challenge from Vay Hek's Trials -- stay tuned.