Ahead of TennoCon 2025, I had the chance to speak with Warframe’s Megan Everett (Community Director & Live Ops) Zach McKone (Senior Community Manager) about a wide variety of topics. After all, this is ten years of TennoCon, and more than ten years of Warframe, and as someone who has been along for the whole ride, it’s very exciting to see this indie game really continue to thrive.This is my second time speaking to Megan Everett and my first with Zach McKone, but it’s clear that both of them have an unadulterated love of Warframe, the same that the fans have. We talked about some topics that are memes in the community (Dino-frame), and some more serious topics, like Loki, and raid bosses.It’s a very exciting time to be a Warframe fan, and while I’m disappointed I’m not in Canada this weekend for the event, I’m keeping up with goings-on just like everyone else is, because Warframe is definitely one of my favorite online games, and TennoCon is an event like no other.Warframe's Megan Everett and Zach McKone talk raid bosses, Loki, the new player experience, and more ahead of TennoCon 2025Q. It has been 10 years of TennoCon now. What would you say are your most memorable moments in its long and very colorful history so far?Zach: For me, I started at DE in 2020, which means my first TennoCon was virtual in 2021.And so I had never been to a convention before, and so I had to sort of experience what the community got to do for TennoCon, but online. So, for me, my most memorable TennoCon is 2023, when we first got to come back after TennoCon and experience what it's like to be in a room full of people that all love the same thing. It was like an electric feeling, I had never felt it before.And so being in the room for TennoLive, where we were revealing everything on stage, and everyone cheering, and getting hyped for the same thing, was incredibly memorable. That would be 2023 would be my most memorable one.Jason: I've only been to one, it was last year (2024), it was the last TennoCon. It's so much fun. It was so loud… and just so great.Zach: Well, last year was the first year that we actually opened up the entire ballroom and tried to get as many seats as possible. And… as a panelist myself, when I first saw that layout, I was like, uh oh. What did you do to me? Like, this is terrifying. But it was incredible for everyone to get the reaction on stage, working for months, and then getting an entire room full of people reacting. That was just awesome.Megan: My answer is 2017, Plains of Eidolon, doors open. Like, I still rewatch that VOD to hear the crowd's reaction if I need to feel something, you know? Yeah. And a first open world, and we got it right. So that was a relief.Q. So there hasn't really been any raid boss-type content in Warframe since, like, the Profit Taker or Exploiter Orb, from what we can remember. You know, the newer bosses, like the 1999 Tank or The Fragmented Ones, they're close, but they're not really raid bosses.Will we finally see something like Eidolons or Profit Taker in the Tau updates?Megan: Ooh, I think... I mean, as you saw, we have Old Peace later this year, and then the big Tau journey next year, 2026. So I think in terms of raid size, probably not. In terms of the enemy being large, maybe. The actual size of the enemy, maybe.When I hear raids, I think of, like, the trials that we had with, you know, the three missions linked back to back and things like that, and the absolute devastating moment that I had to do to tell people we were getting rid of those has burned me for the rest of my life.Hopefully, the future will bring us another raid boss for Warframe like the Profit Taker (Image via Digital Extremes)But yeah, I think it's really balancing out what is achievable bandwidth-wise, what it is we want to do content-wise, does it make sense? You know, there's always something you have to sacrifice for something else, depending on what development it takes to do that.So if we were going to explore something like that, does that mean we wouldn't be able to commit to doing a new Warframe or something like that? So you've got to weigh the pros and cons, because at the end of the day, I think we're a small studio. I know we've grown, which is great, but we're no big guys. We're still the underdogs, I feel like, trying to make it work.And we try to balance as best we can and keep new players in mind and try to entice people with either something shiny or something new. And yeah, I can't 100% answer that we won't have any similar mechanics to that in Tau, because that's still more of a next year thing. Old Peace is definitely more of a cinematic story experience than, I would say, it's a, you know… that raid level of things.But you know, we see the want, and we joke about the third orb spider, and it's just been sitting in that bathtub for years and years and years, and what are we ever going to do with it? You know, when the time is right, the time is right, and something will happen.Q. This one, there's a lot of debate regarding it. So if you guys are able to set the record straight, is the completion meter on operations real? Like, when your reward unlocks tied to the community progression, is it real?I can definitely understand the apprehension behind community progression/community events. Comes from being a wrestling fan, I guess (Image via Digital Extremes)Megan: Oh, my god. It is real. It's an absolute real thing. And I think I can understand why that's a question. and it is real.And in full transparency, we never want the player to fail. Like, that's on a good vibe. And maybe that's the wrong approach… um, we'll see. But at the end of the day, if we see that it's not… what, like… I think in terms of what the current operation is doing, I do think there is a lot of improvement that can be done in how that was set up in terms of what you can buy in that store to progress that meter.Like, there is a lot of feedback that we're seeing in terms of improvements we can, and learning things that we could do next time for that. Because this has really been kind of the first operation where there has been that mass kind of, like, panic of, like… “Oh, my God, we're not actually going to make it!” And I can understand why that feeling exists. So, I think there's definitely some things to take away from this one, as opposed to previous operations.But it is a real meter. At the end of the day, we don't want you to fail. So, if we were to see, you know, 24 hours left, and people realistically aren't going to make it, then we would step in, because we want you to have your candy. And if that is not the move, people will tell us, and we will make changes the next day.Q. One of the problems when it comes to live service games is not all players are going to like everything. Like, new elements, new game mechanics. Almost always there's different opinions on what the optimal way to do-over an event or a mechanic. If the community is split sort of 50-50, how do you guys distinguish on whether or not it's a, the community likes or dislikes something? The numbers don't lie, and they spell disaster for you, at Sacrifice (Image via Digital Extremes)Zach: I think for us, we get the privilege of looking at both feedback and stats. And being able to make stats-based decisions on things gives us the confidence that it's the right thing to do.I think we have to take risks with making the next update something interesting and fresh. And I always think that when Duviri was announced, people were, like, hesitantly excited. But now Duviri is a staple of Warframe.You can't talk about Warframe without it. It takes time for people to adjust to it. But that same quest, we also had to experiment with putting it at the start of the game.And we heard feedback and we saw stats. We decided to make the change to not make it at the start of the game. So, we definitely want to make sure that we listen to people's feedback and how they're feeling subjectively and balance that with the objective stats.How many people are playing these? Is no one interacting with this content? And then make the decisions from there.Obviously, we would never take something away from people for the half people that they liked it. But we want to make sure that the next step incorporates as many people as possible.Megan: Yeah. There's also that aspect of someone might not know they like something until it's presented to them. I think 1999 was a good example of that with just how abstract it was from the Warframe universe.In terms of, are people gonna like humanoid Warframes? Is that gonna piss people off? And it did. It did upset a few people… like, you've been so adamant that there's no human aspect to Warframes. Here we are, and suddenly there's humans. And it's like, that's fair.Like, we pushed that narrative so hard for years about, no, there's nothing under the suits, yada yada… and here we are. There's people walking everywhere.It's important to mix things up and try new stuff. At least they have the stats on what hits, and what doesn't (Image via Digital Extremes)So, I think what is inspirational about that: while some people might not love it, they're willing to kind of go on that adventure with us and see where we take it. We don't often get a… like, straight up, you know, hatred towards something.It's more like, “This isn't really my speed, but like, okay, DE, let's see what you're gonna do with it kind of thing.” Which is great. And we're never gonna please everyone with the content we put out.And that's something that is just a mutual understanding: that not every cup of tea is meant for everyone. So, some people don't drink it and they come back when we serve them new tea and see what we've been up to.Because we're always gonna be up to something. We always wanna try and experiment, right? 1999 was crazy. We're going with a very different vibe with this TennoCon with straight up war and Tau and the very kind of themes of tragedy and humanity.And so, it's getting more, we're back into what is a familiar territory of sci-fi roots, as opposed to alien boy-bands and alive guitars. Like, you gotta switch it up to keep alive in this day and age.Q. There are several things (in Warframe) that can stop a new player from having fun. And some of this has been corrected in say, The Teacher in the next update to bring people to modding school, and the Junction system streamlining in the last update. Let's say that's two of the four horsemen of new player deterrents. What would you say are the other two big things that could be improved upon in the new player experience? Megan: I think one that always comes to our mind, obviously, when we're putting out new content is: how do we get a player there fast enough? You show them something shiny, they want to touch the shiny thing, but might take them a hot minute if they're a new player.I remain mediocre at best at modding, and probably always will be (Image via Digital Extremes)So, that's something that we're always trying to improve. And honestly, it's such a hard puzzle to solve because Warframe is a 12-year-old game that's very complex. To try to fast-track someone has to be done appropriately, which is what we tried to achieve with Isleweaver and the Junction changes and everything like that, giving them a bit more of a shortcut to 1999 without taking away too much of the game… as to where they'd be confused once they got to that spot in the game. It's very important that there is a level of teaching.So, that's kind of just like always needing to improve. And I don't think we'll ever have the answer to it, but it's something that we think about every single time we add anything into the game: “How do we get someone to it fast enough?” I think additionally to that for a new player experience, I would have to say modding is obviously a huge one. And we know that.Along the same vein of modding, I would probably say things like status effects and more of those nitty gritties. You know, if you're a meta player, you understand it. I'm not a meta player. I appreciate those who are and can do the math and they have it all figured out. It's impressive. And I'm like, good for you and cool. And if you find enjoyment in that, great.I play what I find is fun, which is why you see me playing the same three Warframes or whatever, because that's my vibe.We've made strides towards this with improvements to the UI and hints and stuff like that in terms of what this status effect does. How do I get this status effect? But again, because there's a lot going on, I think that could be improved.I don't know if it could be improved in such a large way, like the mod quest is turning out to be. But I think along the same line of it gets to a very complicated system, especially when you start adding enemy factions or whatever. What are their weaknesses? That to me is… you know, I've grown up a Pokemon player, so I'm always used to “Fire is good against grass”, the very obvious ones.But for Warframe, it gets a little confusing. Like as a new player, like you meet the Infested, the Corpus, the Grineer, you're like, what the helly? Like, I'm just gonna try, I'm gonna throw everything at it and see what works and what's effective.And maybe what's effective isn't shown very well, you know what I mean? I think there's room for improvement there, but I don't have the answer for it. But I think that could be something to tackle next.Could my loadout be better in Warframe? Almost certainly. (Image via Digital Extremes)I don't know, Zach, do you have any thoughts?Zach: Very similar to what you were saying about players having to do their homework with status effects and faction types. I think there's such a trend with games these days that people want that quick dopamine, let's say. And a great example of that is like League of Legends, you have to know a lot, you have to know how all the items work.And then Deadlock comes around and gives you a one-button build. And it auto-buys all your items. And I think for Warframe, we've made improvements to things like auto-modding. I think it would be interesting to see how far we can push that to let players play, not have to feel like they're stuck in progression because they don't know something.But (also) give them the skill ceiling room to go back and manually change everything to get that meta building if they want it. And I think that would cater to two different groups like a game like Deadlock is doing.You can pick Auto, or you can go in and you can change it on your own to achieve a better effect. So similar to Megan's answer, but a way to sort of let players quickly get into the shoot-em-up crazy stuff that we all love.Jason: I think as far as weaknesses go, because we've got all the cool scanning technology in Warframe. When I think about it, what immediately comes to my mind is scanning X amount of, say, Grineer, and then you'll have something pop up in your UI. It's like, hey, this isn't going to work. This gun type is not going to work.Megan: That is a very interesting idea. I think what we've definitely learned with Warframe is just how fast-paced players play Warframe and the speed at which they want to play it. They want to go, go, go.So it kind of goes back to what Zach was saying in terms of, is this all a one-button-press, here's the best build possible? I've seen people, as they're modding their weapons or whatever, they title their loadouts - Corpus, Grineer, Infestation. There's kind of versions of this, but again, it's not taught to you. Maybe there's more suggestivity that could be involved.Q. And so next is that the Operators are getting sort of a facelift, which feels like ages because, you know, time travel. And I know the spotlight's supposed to be on the operator for a change, but will the Drifter get some love in Warframe in 2026? Because I still remember the Pedro Pascal Drifter from the Duviri trailer. In-game it kind of looks Oblivion-esque in comparison. Megan: Saw that face the other day because it's part of our graphics for TennoCon. You see him again, I'm like, oh God. Who is that guy?We are focusing on operators first, definitely, for The Old Peace this year. Unsure what to commit to for Tau necessarily. I think the R&D that has gone into the operators will definitely serve us in the future when and if we do a Drifter overhaul, because it is such a stark change.Not gonna lie, my Operator in Warframe needs the touch-up. Pretty excited for that change (Image via Digital Extremes)I accidentally played the demo the other day with my current operator and I was like, oh my God, who is this ugly child? No offense. It's 10-year-old tech, okay? Life has changed.But I think what's really important is that — and this is something that we will obviously talk about on the Devstreams that come up for this — this is going to be an overhaul of the character that you have loved for 10 years. So we have to do it respectfully because people have attached themselves to this persona of an operator and literally make original character art and things like that of their operator.And they're like, this is me. So we are essentially taking away your face as an operator for 10 years and giving you a new one that you're going to have to essentially respect.We did essentially ask the community, if we did an operator remaster in that way, is that something that you would be okay with? And it wasn't overwhelmingly yes. Obviously there were some that were like, no, I love my little guy.And that's fair. And so we're deciding to obviously move forward with it. And we need to make sure that when it happens, that happens right and the people are aware. And we just need to kind of see the reaction of it and what happens after that before we kind of decide to do it again, essentially for Drifter and put the work into doing that.Because it is a lot of work. We've made a lot of faces for these characters and it'll take some time to definitely do it. But it's not out of the cards. It's just, I would feel more comfortable committing to that once we've seen how the operator remaster goes.Q. Loki is in kind of a tough spot right now. He used to be one of my mains back in the day. And now I feel like a very edgy sort of hipster when I run him in public squads. Because he's no longer really the best at anything. Ash has better invis, Oraxia can do the wall-latch Riven challenges, and many do what Loki does, but better. When will there be justice for Loki mains in Warframe?Megan: Oh, justice for Loki! It's so funny you say that because I was having a conversation the other day about how for Loki — again, we're going back to, we're talking about trials again! — I was having a conversation about Trials, and I was like, my Loki loadout is for Trials so that he does Radial Disarm or whatever.And that's what I used to do — I was like, “I'll bring Loki!” whenever anyone did a Trial, like “I got you.” That was my role.Frankly, stealth has never been my strong suit. But Loki mains deserve justice (Image via Digital Extremes)Anyways. I cannot give confirmation that there will be a Loki rework. But - as you saw yesterday - we are doing an Oberon rework. And that really stems from the community's… loud voice we’ll say… in terms of “Give Oberon justice!”So… if the want is there enough to warrant the work, then we will do it. You know, Valkyr was requested, and we kind of - right time, right place - decided to go ahead with that one.And then the Oberon crowd came out and said, “Hey, hold on a second. What about the goat guy?” Excited to give them and let them know that's coming.But, you know, if there is such a desire for that, we have an ongoing list for sure. You know, there's not an empty list at all of requested reworks, but if the desire is there and the time is right, it can be done.Q. Since we’re running out of time, my contractually obligated question: Dino-frame in Warframe when?Just think, Tenno. We could have something like Transformers' Volcanicus! Make your voices heard! (Image via Backflip Studios)Megan: Oh, my god. What have we done? Oh, Reddit. What a great place.I will say never say never. I always say never say never. But I think…. realistically, if you want a T-Rex warframe, you might want to scrap that idea from your brain.I think if we were ever to do something, you know, closely related to a dinosaur, it's not going to be a, you know, Stegosaurus Warframe or whatever. Like, it's always got to be warframe-ified in some sort of way.So the themes of a dinosaur could be adopted at one point. Who knows. But I cannot, I will not confirm a dinosaur frame in this interview, contractually.Zach: When we do a warframe 5 BC, we'll make sure to throw a Dino-frame in there.Megan: Prehistoric warframe. Oh, Lord.Check out our other Warframe guides and featuresAll new Warframe Augment mods in the Isleweaver updateAll new Arcanes in Warframe Techrot Encore, and how to get themWarframe: How to get Thalys (the new Incarnon weapon)All Warframes in release order (and their Primes)Warframe Antivirus and Potency Mods, explained