Coherency is anti-teamwork and toxic

Coherency isn’t a buff for standing near teamworks but is funcitonally a penalty for not being near teammates.

From a normal standpoint, if you actually seriously played these games, the idea behind it makes no sense. Because you ask yourself When do players split up?

Anyone who seriously plays these games, isn’t a toxic person with a head full of toxic drivel, then the answer is that in the tide series, and in coop horde generally, players split up because of

  • a basic fundamental of horde games that you need to control territory so that you have space to fall back on, this is intuitive fundamental stuff at a high level of play that in many situations where the horde is coming in from multiple direction that you instantly get as much distance from your teammates as you can so that there’s a space between your backs that you control
  • a very desperate situation where it’s chaos and people are going down, hordes and elites are pushing and dragging players all over the place (and Fatshark have decided this is a moment to place a penalty upon players)
  • an act of intelligent teamwork, such as 3 players dealing with a difficult situaiton, maybe a boss, a player sees a chokepoint and a horde coming through it, and it’s a possible wipe if that horde comes through the chokepoint and so they go to try and plug that chokepoint (fatshark have decided to place a penalty on this player for doing an act of intelligent teamwork like this)
  • an act of self sacrifice, similar to above but more desperate
  • an intelligent spilt where the team splits in two

This idea of “coherency” makes no sense on any level. If you actually play games like this and appreciate these games it is a very difficult design decision to make sense of.

But if you think of something which has really nothing to do with these games, has nothing to do with the actual experience of playing these games, has nothing to do with how these games actually work, but you step into the toxic delusional fantasy world of someone who plays these games for a few hours, has no appreciation of them, has no idea how they work, is a toxic abusive control freak and got upset that other people didn’t do what they say, and goes on a forum and discusses how that “People are running ahead!” (they mean other players aren’t doing what they tell them to, they’re upset about their lack of control over other players), and if you imagine a situation as absurd that “game designers” actually took seriously toxic nonsense such as that from those who played the game for a few hours and was naturally just toxic and reported their toxic ideas of how everything is the fault of ohter players, and then tried to come up with a solution to toxic control freaks feeling upset that other people don’t stand next to them at all times, then you’d come up with something as asinine and toxic and anti-teamwork as “coherency”.

And it’s simply so insulting and infantilisng to put such a thing in your game, even if what it was trying to encouraged was actually “teamwork” instead of encouraging some sort of braindead corner camping type of “teamwork”; a grotesque imitation of actual intelligent teamplay, why would you ‘give a buff’ (introduce a penalty) for not hugging one another? Surely the very thing itself, if it were so superior, doesn’t need a buff, and if it were the wrong way to not play in such a way then you wouldn’t put a penalty on it. It’s this very strange obnoxious sort of Nudging attitude by Fatshark, there’s something very gross and obnoxious about such a design choice.

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It’s a theme choice as much as an incentive to work together and keeping situational awareness of your team. The players are the suicide squad sent in assured to die, all they can rely on is each other. The traitor guardsmen know very well how strong squad tactics can be a danger, so the forces of chaos will do everything they can to divide the players.

Darktide also seems to be faster at ambushing players who run off too far alone, compared to Vermintide 2. I’m enjoying the changes, but not all players are adapting quickly. They’ll come around, or they won’t.

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“run off too far alone” there it is. Doesn’t exist, completely irrelevant, the balance of the game shouldn’t be based around some neurotic idea of trying to nudge people to play in certain ways when there’s no actual thing of people “running off” beyond something that toxic people say on forums.

Should Darktide be taken seriously as a game?
Should Darktide take itself seriously?
If you put something like “coherency” in your game then you’re not taking your game seriously. You’re reducing the balance of your game to based around some weird paternalistic idea of trying to nudge players to play in certain ways (which they do already). You’re not basing your balance around the player and the enemy, instead you’re gutting the balance of your game just try and nudge new player behaviour as pandering to some toxic players.

The normal standpoint is that if the players are better off together as a team then you need to give them a buff when they’re separated so that they can get back to their team.

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So you are not happy because teamwork is required, solo rushing isn’t encouraged enough and you have to have situational awareness where your teammates are. I personally don’t see the issue here, since it is a game mechanic that incentivises teamwork, rewards players for sticking together by giving them more than they get when they are split apart, as you are still getting your benefit mind you, just not your teammates.

They are also not balancing it around the coherency mechanic ironically enough, they are balancing around weapon loadouts. Especially in the later difficulties, they are expecting the classes to bring the various powerful weapons they can use, such as the Boltgun, Power Sword and so forth, to those missions so that they can actually defeat the enemies.

But yeah, if a player is to get a buff when they are split, you would not want to be together ever.

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The maps are designed with no return moments, it you jump down alone and run off…thanks for revive a fallen comrade for my achievement ticker. I main, well only play as zealot at the moment until things smooth out. Coherency is fundamentally built into the class almost to a debilitating point and their one ability sends you charging out of range of coherency. Most of what I’ve experienced was the guy in front charging ahead knows the map or gets to the first docile horde and waits for everyone. The real problem I’ve seen is a lack of concern for a rear guard because for some reason FS decided 4-5 spawn points every 20m was mandatory fun. So what happens is that the group gets spread out and the rear guard is dealing with that arse bomber or hound with multiple small horde clusters, the player up front keeps triggering spawns events. I do my best to stay close to at least one player because trappers and dogs have infuriating skills that required stagger or quicker trigger finger because you cant dodge it… don’t get me started on Abhor the Mutant unlock. I will now proudly wear that one for a while after all the rage inducing moments. Glares at the psyker in a different time zone

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While more thought could be put for coherency, I think your claims are exagerated and tainted with chaos energy (negative emotion) and not looking quite clearly at the whole picture.

Perhaps a change that would work best is for coherency to have a fall-off time, so that you keep the bonus for X seconds even after leaving your teammates’ vicinity.

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Coherency’s aura size could be greater and decremental over distance.
Greater area to allow a bit of leeway, but not too big as to allow that player from going away on his own and still benefitting from coherence boni.

Decremental to encourage to stay closer together without being absolutely penalizing to not be.

I see people complaining about being penalized for being alone ; I instead see it as not being rewarded.
It’s not that you lose something, you just don’t gain it.
Like playing a lottery, if you don’t win, you haven’t lost. You just haven’t won.

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No one is going to take you seriously when your post sounds like this bud.

Turn off the entitlement and the childish temper tantrum you just had over a video game mechanic is very unbecoming of someone who wants other people to listen to them.

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In my opinion auras aren’t necessarily a bad thing they existed in Vermintide 2 as well and did their thing. The main issue I have with auras currently is that your toughness regeneration is too heavily bound to staying together, which further decreases your survival chances once you inevitably get split up or are last man standing. In those situations the game basically makes you extra fragile and I do not find this to be a good thing. Passive toughness regenerations should be separate from other coherency buffs. Other than that I think they perfectly fine. Sure we can talk about incremental drop off, but that does not fundumentally invalidate their existence.

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I agree with you op, sometime you need to make a smart move than will put you far of your mates and you will get punish for that.
Sometime you need to split for thing to be better like kitting a monster away for protect the others and allow them to deal with the rest in “peace” and doing that you will get punish or wanted to lock some gunners on you and allow your mates to help in peace or advance etc you will get punish.

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If I may ask, in what way are you being ‘punished’ for splitting from the party?

You still regen toughness. You still have access to your class’s unique ability that is conferred to others by proximity. Your abilities in general still work as they work when next to your people. Your damage output is not lowered. Your health is not lowered. Your movement is not lowered.

You are not being punished, you are simply being rewarded for being in proximity. The only punishment is gameplay related in the form of things like getting caught by Trappers, swarmed by a horde or jumped by a Hound. Those are all to be expected obviously.

When you are not being crippled by a mechanic, it is not a punishment. Being out of coherency is not gutting you or crippling you. Being split from your party for whatever reason, such as needing to cover various objectives, holding off different avenues of attack or even just maximising the effectiveness of your own abilities, such as the Sharpshooter’s Feat for extra damage when far away from the enemy, is just a player’s own choice if they consider it to be more efficient on the matter at hand.

I honestly cannot in any way comprehend how it is punishing outside of the notion that a player wants to either A) be so hyper optimal they play it more like an Olympic Sport or B) they simply want an excuse to run off alone and be able to gain all the benefits of your teammates still. It’s not a punishment unless it somehow negatively lowers your ability to fight in such a manner where the game becomes incredibly difficult to the point where it actively pushes you towards failure. Just because you don’t have a buff on when you are doing a mechanic in a video game does not mean you are being debuffed. You are being rewarded for doing a mechanic in a video game.

To give you another way of looking at it, would you consider not completing secondary objectives a punishment? After all, you don’t have to complete them to finish the mission, you don’t have to pick up the Grimoires for example, but you get more XP and Money for your troubles. Is that a punishment or a reward?

Much like you can ask yourself if on a theoretical level you didn’t have enemies that require you to have help if caught, aka the Trapper or the Hound, can you beat the level without other players there? The answer is, yes. Yes you can. It is not exactly difficult either in that you just have a lot of enemies to kill, but it’s not like your health doesn’t regen or your ammo doesn’t return without other players there.

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Skill issue, mad cuz bad, etc.
Squad coherency buff applies if there is only 2 players, or if there is 4 players. Only the “lone wolf” is punished for being a stupid player.
Running to a buddy to save your sorry ass after your toughness breaks is great incentive to stay near your teammates.
You are having a temper tantrum over something very inconsequential because as you said players are naturally going to stick together.

Any horde shooter should live by the phrase: Fight Together or Die Alone. In fact, thats one of the loading screen flavor texts in vermintide.
You are a gibbering manchild that is complaining about something that effectively creates a better cooperative experience overall because you cant go and solo the sniper with a dagger.
You play elf, dont you hot pain.
BUT OH WAIT, YOU STILL CAN.
Nothing happens to you if you walk away from your teammates, your damage is not debuffed, your health is not reduced, you are not slower, you have created a problem out of the stray thoughts in your mind.
They are nothing.

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The only thing toxic here is your post and your ego. Chill out.

Coherency is a nice mechanic that rewards teams that work together and that’s a wonderful thing.

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Tell that to every person who goes off on their own, dies, then gets huffy because nobody was with them to bail them out.

In VT2 I once had a BoP/AnF Zealot (at the peak of that build’s strength) have a cry and throw away a grim because he was left alone to handle a single horde wave. Some people can survive on their own in these games. Most can’t.

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While the author of the thread did put it rather bluntly. I do agree with him. In my three hours of playing Darktide I had a mission where all three of my team members got wiped out. I was the last man standing. Just like Vermintide 2. My instincts of kiting the enemy around while slowly making it to my allies in order to revive them, kicked in. Since they weren’t up yet. I did what was natural and worked to thin the horde out as best as I could.

However, since there’s a bigger emphasis on ranged enemies in this game. I found myself struggling against them. Since its: 1) Harder to line shots up while being fired at and getting staggered 2) There’s no ability to lean out of cover so you can’t hide behind cover in order to line shots 3) It’s very easy to get overwhelmed by ranged units.

I don’t find it very fair to get punished for being the last man standing, trying to salvage a run.

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As someone who put waaaaay too many hours in Vermintide 2 Catacyslm (Damnation equivalent in Darktide) over last 4 years I agree with it (mostly) after 40 hours of playing early-beta. So here is the thing for those that are maybe new:

  1. This is basically Vermintide 2. No matter what mental gymnastics you go through: it’s like 80/85% Vermintide 2. The same tactics that worked there work here.

  2. Staying together close all the time is actually in many situations just stupid.

  3. The best example is classic scenario from V2: horde + boss. Usually 2 players do boss, 2 do horde and they go as far away from each other as possible so both have room to fall back and manouver/kite when necessery. The other one Patrol + Boss. Same but usually 1 player kites boss, 3 do Patrol. Or you have horde + patrol + boss or horde + a lot of specials/elites + boss etc. etc. Generally If you stay together one bomber/grenadier (in V2 it was gas rat or ratling) can end whole team. Two/Three such specials and staying together close just wiped the team.

In many cases it’s good to split up. It’s better to split up.

I think it’s too late to change that core mechanic but the radius of it should be much much bigger or it should not have radius but worked based on how many teammates are alive, no matter the distance.

Sometimes I think (I am almost sure) Fatshark dev team never plays their games past level 2 difficulty…

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The range should be bigger, notably so, but I don’t see a reason exactly why remove a unique mechanic that rewards and incentivises teamwork over lone wolfing. As was already mentioned by other people, it is only detrimental to the only one by themselves. We also have to consider the fact that we are in a beta, even if people like to think that because this is one leading up to the release that it just means a fancy word for Early Access, in truth, it is very much a beta, we are getting a slow rollout of mechanics and missions so they can get testing and data on portions of the game so they can fix those prior to release.

The reality as that the two games put emphasis on a different thing and the environments are vastly different in their style. If the only thing you use to define the two games is that you swing your weapon around a group coming for you and fend off an Elite, then yeah, I do agree with you. However, if you actually look into how these two games differ, there is a massive difference.

Let’s start with the biggest I already sorta mentioned, focus. VT focuses 90% into melee with its enemies and the way players are intended to tackle situations. Going 100% Ranged in VT is not basically possible unless you somehow manage to nick every ammo drop on the map and/or get lucky with the sheer amount of drops there are, but usually there is simply too many enemies coming at you that the melee weapon comes out either way, which is not 100% necessary in DT. There is a bigger emphasis put on Ranged Enemies in DT than VT ever had. The only basic ranged enemies we got in VT were the Ungor Raiders, the rest were various Elites that could engage you from range and while abundant in the later difficulties were never nearly as abundant as the Traitor Guardsmen for example are, on top of the Ranged Elites.

The next thing, and this is the part I find most amusing how people keep forgetting about it in a way, is the team comp. In VT, you only had so many combinations you could have in a run because you couldn’t have 2 Ironbreakers or 2 Mercenaries. In this one you can have anywhere between 1-4 Veterans, Psykers, Ogryns and/or Zealots in a party with vastly different weapon loadouts that change the way the mission is going to end up being tackled, or completely blundered.

Which brings to the last part you mentioned, even if it was more a snappy comment, the balancing in the game. The game is outright balanced around the weapons brought and not around the classes themselves as they were in VT. Odds are they do indeed play all the way to difficulty 5, but with free access to the whole range of weapons at the highest ratings so that they can coordinate their equipment prior to the match. This is not a luxury in DT, in any shape or form.

It makes a huge difference if your team has the weapons necessary to tackle the horde armoured enemies, or have the ability to take out basic enemies with a single hit or swing. Unlike in VT, we can’t craft yet, the shop is 100% random and timegated, we can’t in any way choose what equipment we are going to be getting or even knowing if we get any from missions, etc. etc.

So yeah, these two games are totally different from one another on several levels, ranging from the basic stuff, aka focus on mixed enemies rather that heavily skewed to one type (melee), to the unrefined gameplay related things because of it still being in the beta without access to all the features which makes planning and coordinating incredibly difficult.

Again, I need to reiterate what I said in my earlier comment. It is not a punishment when you are not being crippled. It is a reward if doing X thing gives you a benefit. Saying you are being punished by not doing a Secondary Objective because you are not getting the additional experience and money it gives you would be the same as saying that not getting the coherency bonuses from your teammates would be identical to this issue.

It is a bonus, not mandatory. I wouldn’t start pinning the problems that are more related to lack of freedom to pick our weaponry as we want and lack of fine tuning the Game Director for a better balance in missions than on the benefit gained from basic teamwork.

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I haven’t read the entirety of your post, but a certain point struck me as needing addressing since I sincerely believe it’s incorrect:

In my many hours of playing Vermintide 2 I’ve never seen this so called behavior, lone wolfing as you will, being performed in Cataclysm. Running ahead from the team is a good way to get killed. People usually stick in pairs when splitting up. Or, if crap hits the fan, they move out as three uniformly pushing to rescue an ally who’s been pinned down by a Blightstormer’s tornado, Pack Rat, or Leech. Indeed, coordinating as a team is one of the most critical skills people naturally learn and get good at as they progressively pass through the difficulty tiers. By the time they reach the highest difficulty, people usually have a firm understanding of how to coordinate with a team. Just as individual skill is developed through practice so too is teamplay.

As the author of the thread put it bluntly, it just feels like Fatshark’s heavy handed approach at forcing players to play the way Fatshark wants. Instead of letting players organically work together through skillful cooperation.

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I have go agree the way coherence is now is not great. Anyone saying “Your not punished your just not getting bonuses” is being completely disingenuous. The buffs are so core to survivability in this game that not having them is a punishment. There are plenty of types of teamwork that are ruined by the proximity requirement when its that close.

  • The Ogrin and Preacher both have abilities that will launch them out of range of the ranged characters.
  • The ranged characters can’t stay back and provide long ranged fire support to the melee without debilitating everyone’s buffs and toughness regen. Considering this game is more ranged heavy then VT2 I think this is backwards.
  • You have to stay grouped up so your team is more vulnerable to area attacks.
  • you cant do any kind of enemy splitting or kiting.

I have been left behind regularly handling a pack at the rear of the group while the front guys just run ahead without ever even checking if its all clear. If anything rushing ahead is worse on this game as it has ever been. I have mostly been chalking it up to new players on a new game, but losing the the coherence makes it worse also.

Coherence as is it just incentivizes people staying on top of each other at all times. Not teamwork.

Also it would help if there were some clear indicator that shows how many team mates coherence you are in range of if coherence is going to be a thing.

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And this part right here is what struck here for how clear it is in its lack of consideration for the wider audience.

Not everyone plays on Cataclysm, and teamwork is just as important as it is on that tier on lower difficulties. The average player probably never touches anything beyond level 4, and at that point the difficulty is already notable for, as I said, the average person. This is where the lone wolfing likes to take place when you have a rather notable amount of individuals that hop in to that level since they can’t do Level 5s for XYZ reason but aren’t challenged enough by that level, or are there just to grind, so they try to rush through those missions as fast as they can, as such, lone wolfing.

Losing a player at such a level can easily end a run. Most of the time that player is lost because they are purposefully splitting off from the party to do just that, lone wolf.

I cannot see this at all when I play the game. The benefit I am gaining from coherency as a Veteran Sharpshooter is not notable, nor have I seen it when the people I play with play their chosen class and break coherency. There is this strange notion people have that you are forced into it, like your whole run depends if you remain in perfect coherency through the whole mission as if you’ll just drop dead if you even once break coherency. This is quite blatantly false, and I honestly can’t put my finger on why people think that, beyond the obvious, which is it isn’t making the numbers you want go up or down on the OptimalBuild.xlsx file.

Not ONCE have I failed a run because of coherency. I have only failed a run because people got split up for XYZ reason, got overwhelmed and taken out one by one, just like one does in VT. The mixture of unfortunate circumstances, such as getting Trapped, Hounded and then gunned down so that you can’t get to your allies in time. No different from when you get Ratling Gunned, Gassed, Snatched and Assassin leaped nigh instantly.

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