[2019] Arbitrations Revisited

Hail Tenno.

Your path has led here. Prove yourself.

Arbitrations have existed in Warframe for just over 6 months - these endgame mission variations put new twists on our tried-and-true mission formula, offering players a level of challenge they cannot find anywhere else in the game. Now that we have had time to observe how these missions fare in players’ hands, we have prepared some tweaks meant to address common complaints with the mode.

The most polarizing of these issues is Arbitrations’ lack of revives. Adding real consequences to death was somewhat of a new sensation in Warframe, and while we would like to retain some of that tension, the fact of the matter is that being dead is not fun. Permadeath also caused issues with host migration, since a dead host may be inclined to leave early, potentially throwing squadmates into disarray. Therefore, we will be implementing a new system where dead players can be revived - but your squadmates will have to earn it.

When these changes go live next week on PC (and consoles in the near future), the rules of Arbitration death will be a little different: players are still killed with no bleedout timer, but a revive tower will be placed at the player’s spot of death. If any squadmate is awaiting revive, the Arbitration drones will begin dropping unique pickups known as a “Resurgence Burden”. These pickups function similar to Index points (otherwise known as “Financial Stress”), debuffing the players who carry them. 

In order to revive a player, 5 of these Resurgence Burdens must be taken to their tower simultaneously. These 5 pickups can be delivered by one or multiple squadmates, but cannot be “dropped off” at the tower - it’s all or nothing!

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We hope that this system bridges the gap between players who crave hardcore consequences, and those who were put off by the prospect of permadeath. Since this shifts the mission balance in favor of players, we plan to compensate by making enemies scale at the rate they do in other mission (instead of the reduced rate of scaling that Arbitrations have now).

Finally, we wanted to give players who have already mastered Arbitrations a reason to come back. Therefore, we will be adding a new reward mentioned long ago - Archgun Rivens will be available for purchase using Vitus Essence! Expect a few new cosmetic rewards as well.

Thanks everyone for reading - we hope you look forward to revamped Arbitrations. 

You are on the verge of a new truth. May this help your journey.