It also depends entirely on how you play. People who only hit the primary objectives and extract or medal farm on eradications will get very little to no credits. It’s all about exploring and hitting the shinies (gold beacons), friend doors and crate doors.
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Again, I’d like to bring up that SW Battlefront game.
Being able to unlock something faster by paying money is P2W. If you can grind it out lessens the blow, so to speak, but doesn’t change the definition. The fact this is a PVE game is another saving grace, but the P2W at the heart remains; it’s just sugar-coated.
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I like how immediate accusations are thrown around. Well done you! Yes, I do play the game, but I’m only lvl 30. Is there some “Level 100 Helldivers Club” I need to be part of to make my opinions on the game acceptable?
No, I don’t “farm” because it’s boring and a waste of my time - if I’ve got limited time to play games I’m going to perhaps play DT, perhaps HD, or perhaps play something else entirely. If I decide to play HD I don’t want to waste said time doing trivial missions looking for beacons or abusing the mechanics by Alt-F4 out of the game to get back in to farm medals / SC.
It’s actually an insane take that just because some farming method exists (and if it’s the one using Alt-F4 then it feels like an exploit) then a game is suddenly no longer P2W…
I feel comparing Helldivers 2 to SW Battlefront is at best not accurate and at worst a super bad faith argument.
On launch Battlefront was literally impossible to direct progression and even throwing money at the problem you only had a little bit of control. Every part of Battlefornt employed Lootboxes and every FOMO mechanic known to man.
The Star Card system was literally pay to win since they made MASSIVE changes to the classes in a PvP game. You had to buy crates and GAMBLE for progress. Not to mention star cards would have a better chance to drop from bought crates and literally cost 80 bucks a hero. This was a system that was so user hostile and so wrapped up in gambling that it caught the attention of GOVERNMENT ENTENTES.
Helldivers 2’s progress is not based on random loot boxes or gambling. You know what you are getting when you spend medals (which can’t be bought) or super credits (which can be earned in game). This also goes into how unlocking stratagems goes or ship upgrades. You can’t buy your way into it, the only thing you can spend money on is super credits.
I don’t farm super credits but i have about 1100 saved up for the next warbond. This is from both super credits that ive found and just from playing normally. I’ll admit ive put a fair amount of time into it (203 hours at the time of typing) but i still find it far less offensive to my time compared to Darktide even though money is not tied up in it.
I get that microtransations aren’t great but comparing a game where you can get something a little faster to a game where it was essentially a casino for children is a wild comparison.
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I used Battlefront as a very clear-cut example and (because the internet can be a weird place) I know if I used something less “bad” there’d be that one person going “oh that was absolutely fine”. 
You’re absolutely right that HD isn’t anywhere near Battlefront. My intent was to point out the principles of both are, at heart, the same. Tease the player with a gameplay component they can theoretically obtain by playing. Then sell a shortcut.
Doing all of the side content in a single match will earn you 10-20 SC, while a Warbond requires 1000 SC.
You get the majority of the SC back in the warbond by spending medals earned by completing objectives.
I typed this somewhere else, but: I got the Super Citizen Edition since I enjoyed Helldivers 1, and I have every Warbond and a lot of stuff from the Superstore, but I have never purchased any Super Credits, and I don’t have that many hours played:
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Fixed that for you 
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And a single match will be… what? On higher difficulties it’s 30-40m. That’s ~38h of game commitment to unlock a warbond without spending medals (full 1000 SC cost) OR ~27h with the extra SCs from the “previous” bond (assuming 700 SC cost). I’m taking some averages here - like 15SC on average per game and a 35m game.
Of course you can play lower difficulties or start farming which throws a wrench into the above theorycrafting, I admit.
The hour-commitment is doable, I’m not denying that. And yet, you can… pay, and opt out of the time commitment. Making it P2W by definition. And with more bonds being added, that time commitment becomes less attainable for anyone but the most dedicated of players.
PS. My total playtime is roughly half of yours, for context.
That’s flat out false unless I’ve missed something (if that’s the case please correct me). IIR you can get ~300SC back. But that’s not “the majority”, unless my math isn’t mathing, ~300 is less than 500, which is half of the required 1k per warbond.
I feel like I maybe need to give some context on why I so vehemently dislike what HD is doing. I used to play Call of Duty 2 back in the day with some lads from some forum I was part of, all those years ago and I think it was a really glorious time for MP gaming. You picked your gun and off you went to kill the other team. You could argue if the US, Russian, German or Brit weapons were better (async gameplay and all that) but at the end of the day no one had an advantage, and the only deciding factor was skill.
Left4Dead also doesn’t lock anything (if we’re looking at PvE games).
When Modern Warfare (was it 1 or 2…?) came around I was pissed. Because now you had to grind out and unlock what I felt should be available from the start. In a MP PvP game. For me it marked a sort of decline in MP gaming in general.
Now, in DT we have levels and talent unlocks (which is slightly less annoying for me than MW because DT is PvE)… or HD, with a blatant “hey, wanna skip the grind?” option. It’s got plenty of saving graces (it’s PvE, the grind isn’t as obscene as some other games, it’s not RNG based, etc.)… but the annoyance at its core is still there.
If anyone feels like comparing HD to Battlefront was too much, how about comparing it to some of Ubisofts recent AC games, where you can unlock boosters to skip “the grind”? Those are SP games, so I’m almost certain that’ll be used as as counter point, but it’s the same insidious tactic inside a game - insert a problem, then sell the solution. It seems no one really cares about these boosters… yet everyone can see them for what they are.
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To be honest, I’m not sure what we’re talking about or debating over here, but we appear to have opposing viewpoints on the matter, which is perfectly OK, and I always like reading/hearing thoughts from individuals that disagree with me.
I love Darktide btw:
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I have less hours, didn’t buy the deluxe edition and I have everything unlocked, with enough SC saved for the new warbond next week. Only about 10 hours less, but it’s still less. No eradication medal farming, no difficulty 2 SC farming. Just jumping on with friends mostly.
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Let’s be honest. DT combat is a masterpiece (with balance problems but that’s normal).
HD2, Arrowheads will pressure our wallet. I bet that the warbounds will always include a tool you will need to be effective against this new enemy that appeared with the siege of this planet, or this weapon will be too good (and will get a nerf at final) etc.
Yes they want our money…
I blame FS to not be able to deliver something valuable. HD2 brings new features periodically, price is about one DT set (a little less). Before I would have think that it is outrageous, but after DT and 20€ for one set, in a surprising way now the price of one warbound seems low…
Will I play regularly HD2? for now, I love the gameplay and want to test lot of things. Not sure I will switch to it and abandon DT, but until DT delivers something new… well HD2 is really welcomed.
And that’s not new penances, or even new free cosmetics, that will make me happy. Penances are just annoying, ad I have given up them after the change to block some outside of private sessions. So penances is now, since this, a big no.
Clothes… well recolors are a slap in our faces… So, I don’t even try to wear something that looks good…
DT could be the game with as many players as HD2 has actually… But DT has chosen to forbird casual players to play it, and instaured mechanics done for hardcore gamers. When you want to make money, you try to enlarge your public, not to reduce it. That’s something that Arrowheads has understood, and not DT. Prices are also a problem with DT. I could spend same amount of money I will in HD2, but as I get a lot less in DT, I think this is not worth the purchase. And so, I don’t buy anything. What is better for DT, earn 5 € from me and 3000 others players, or earn nothing but selling sets at 20 €? I guess they have chosen the second option, considering there will always be some buyers.
With this policy, they have lost lot of money that could have helped to deliver high quality content. Instead of that, we have a game that is slowly improving, and dying.
I guess penances rework is about cosmetics that don’t sell… or maybe I don’t know. But this is absolutely not what I waited for DT.
But let’s be honest also about HD2. Maybe when my skills will progress it would be better, but I feel that lot of stratagems are totally useless. Same for weapons.
For now, the best build I could find is energy shield + quasar canon and whatever you want around. However, I don’t see anybody using a jetpack against automatons at high difficulties.
And that’s maybe what will disappoint me in this game… if it is always a gameplay loop, it won’t work for me.
On this, DT has succeeded to please me with the skills tree.
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I won’t say never, but as things are, it’s doubtful because the warbonds only contain weapons, not stratagems.
For those who haven’t played the game, weapons are primarily used against trash mobs because stratagems are extremely powerful but have a cooldown/limited use.
The only broken weapon we had for a few weeks was the standard Breaker shotgun, which was unintentional and eventually fixed.
A business that depends on money needs money; more news at 11.
Darktide’s combat is an incredible masterpiece!
A typical motif among fanbases is that they adore their own game/movie and despise the competitors, yet you know you can enjoy both games, right?
Both Helldivers 2 and Darktide have strengths and weaknesses, Helldivers 2 is also not a tide/LFD type of game, but in terms of development, Arrowhead currently outperforms Fatshark.
That can be addressed with balance patches.
SPEAR just received several improvements, and Arrowhead is issuing patches at a steady rate.
EAT is my favorite anti-armor stratagem because of its quick cooldown and the fact that you get two with every drop.
I enjoy the jump pack because it lets you to hop up to places where bugs cannot reach and plant your turrets, but I’d def want to see some changes to how the stratagem works.
Unfortunately, I believe it is difficult to balance weapons and stratagems so that they perform successfully across all modifiers and difficulties.
How many weapons are useless in Darktide in Maestrom?
Like 95 percent of them?
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Darktide gang, rise up!
Full agreement. Darktide has something incredibly unique, a good even spread of high-octane survival, melee and ranged combat. Few other games compare. When I play Dragon’s Dogma 2 in comparison, DD2 is a snoozefest. Fun, but it doesn’t give me that kick.
Darktide gives me the kick that few other games do. Only Dota 2 has a chance to compare.
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I started leveling up Fighter yesterday, and holy heck! They are so much fun!
Parrying everything from Cyclop’s butt attack to Dragon’s and using the shield thingy to break your fall, you can stay perched on top of bosses indefinitely.
This class is extremely broken!
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I talk about weapons and also boosts. The dagger is incredible against robots and is a good sidearm even against bugs.
There are weapons that make a difference in every warbound… And even if you can use the default weapon, it lacks the power that other weapons can give you.
By example, the grenade pistol is a game changer with a demolition suit on a map where you have to destroy terminids holes.
And as the policy is more “nerf everything that could be powerful”… this will lead to see every warbound something that could justify you pay for it (even if you can avoid to pay by doing missions and choosing wisely how to spend medals).
I don’t complain about that. This is just what I think. And I prefer to see new content like that than the current DT situation.
Except that using an energy weapon on a robot is a good idea and using a ballistic one on bugs is also wise.
But in robotnam, every robot can kill you… and so trash mobs are also a problem that you have to address. By example the sickle is not bad against them. And where do you find the sickle and dagger? in the last warbound.
indeed
When I say lot of them, this is the early stratagems. But I feel that it is not a good idea.
Who takes a machine gun (the normal) at high difficulty? I prefer a quasar canon cause you can deal with any enemy with it.
But, this limit the gaming experience as you tend to come back to the same weapons / tools missions after missions.
Would say 10% of them and 10% are OP actually…
problem is that people tend to use what is broken and as FS needs 4 to 6 months to react, when the nerf comes they feel it as unjustified.
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Agreed, my biggest pet-peeve about Darktide is that bad weapons have been bad forever now.
In a game with so many variables and weapons/marks as Darktide, you need to do balance patches often to shake up the “meta” and that’s coming from someone that plays pretty bad builds if we talk about meta:
× VIIa Recon/PS, Support, Veteran
× Knife/XIV Revolver, Melee, Veteran
× Agri Shottie/Knife, Semi Melee, Veteran
× Purgatus/Deimos/Dome, Psyker
× Power Maul/Achlys/Bull Rush, Ogryn
I’m trying to showcase that HD has a non-trivial time commitment requirement if one wants to get the bonds without spending money. I wasn’t arguing anything specific you said and more using that as a jumping off point.
I do disagree with what you wrote about getting the “majority” of the SC back from a bond by spending medals.
I’ve only gotten DT last Christmas and have a “mere” 168h… like 1/10th of that! 
I think it’s worth pointing out how there’s been a sort of shift in gaming/pricing/monetization. It used to be that you paid X, and got the full game. That was it. Perhaps the game then offered some kind of map pack or DLC for Y as an extra, you paid that once.
And we moved from that to being OK with games with built-in MX shops, somehow. I’d much rather have the game priced accordingly so that the sale of the game “pays” for some future expansions (for MP games it prevents splitting the playerbase) with an up-front expectation that deployment ceases after some time (rather than some expectation that things will be developed in perpetuity). I guess I’m just old-school like that…
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We agreed to disagree.
Getting 300 SC back for each warbond is extremely generous to me, and it is a greater return than many other games’ battlepasses provide.
The only other battlepass system I’ve had personal experience with is Red Dead Online (RiP), which returned all gold, but that game is deader than dead and controlled by modders who destroy the game for everyone else.
You’ll get there! 
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“Generous”, sure, perhaps? 
“Majority”, no. 
I kind of doubt it. I don’t have those kinds of numbers even on the digital equivalent to crack-cocaine which is Factorio. 
*checks own Steam profile*
Actually, my longest “playtime” game is… Elite: Dangerous. OK, I take that back. I probably DID play that for well over 1k hours, given that I’ve got 400h on Steam AND I already played that game before it got released onto Steam…
But in retrospect that’s a game you can “play in the background” while doing something else, so…
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Your comparisons for HD2 are all off-base.
You can’t pay to “skip the grind” because you have to have medals to acquire anything from the warbonds. You can’t buy medals.
There’s purchasable kit in the rotating shop, and realistically that’s about it. You can argue that’s p2w since they’ve got actual stats and they’re not simply cosmetic, but it’s nowhere close; It gives you some kit to round out your gear without needing to “grind” to get to something specific.
They’ve effectively required folks to commit time in order to access equipment. You can’t buy your way out of playing the game. If you’re not into that type of thing, I get it. Not everyone’s down for a live service game… but it’s a live service game.
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