people use the scoreboard to be more toxic and claim they’re right in being toxic. some dude rageposting about their team sucks and they’re sure they were carrying before they went down just gets laughed at, they’ll either stop doing that or everyone else will identify them as toxic and coping hard.
the scoreboard makes them worse because they will claim the numbers support them and people pretend there’s a legitimate argument when they’re just hating. the scoreboard is bad. also if you have a recurring issue with people popping barrels on you, it maybe isn’t them being toxic.
So just ignore toxic people. A basic feature shouldn’t be withheld because some people will be mean on the internet. Especially a feature that they said they’d add.
Does the Helldiver’s 2 scoreboard make people toxic? Maybe it amplifies already toxic individuals, but they’re ridiculed by the community. The vast majority use it to just see how well they did or to see how well their friend did. Like how you can see your friend fired literally thousands of bullets but only hit 15.7% of them because he was having fun roleplaying a machine gunner suppressing the forest.
So, here’s the thing: A lot of the design changes they made going to DT from VT2 were actually direct responses to the feedback they got. When they first announced DT, they had a single page for it on the forum here and it filled up with every sort of random little personal complaint you can imagine. They’re probably still on here if you scroll back far enough to DEC2020 and pretty much all of 2021.
One of the biggest complaints was about the scoreboard and especially those evil green circles. And like it or not, FS listened and removed the feature. Even after launch and just up to a few months ago, just mentioning the word “scoreboard” would create a hotly-divided and contentious thread. One of the longest-running threads went for almost a year starting with the beta and was just an argument for and against the scoreboards. So in that scenario, it is no surprise to me that FS chose to not introduce a scoreboard to appease the against crowd but permitted the mod to appease the for crowd. It was the best course of action they had available to them.
Of course, the forums at least, don’t have nearly as many “against” folks as they used to. A post a few weeks back calling for the scoreboard mod to be banned fell flat and had almost no defenders backing OP up so I gather most of the “against” types were the casuals who have since moved on. Small surprise there.
Other complaints from VT2 that the devs addressed:
The full-book run meta resulted in taking the same path through maps each time. Clearly not a cata-level complaint. They made books spawn in “random” locations (more like artwork spawns but whatever).
The breakpoint system felt like being forced to do math homework. There were calls for some way to shake up the system such as enemy healths being randomized in a range, or individual strikes being randomized over a range, etc. They went with perhaps the least aggravating option and made the weapons’ damage stat variable. The lack of consistency in the other two options would have been infuriating, but it didn’t stop breakpoint calculating anyway, just made it a bit more of a pain which is what all the counter-points were arguing years ago.
Random lootboxes were a pain. Again, clearly not a cata-level complaint, as you could easily scrap unwanted weapons or items and use the materials to craft your own weapon that was just as good as anything you can get from a lootbox, but oh well. It was one of the biggest complaints so it’s no wonder they tried to make a system where you could choose which reward you wanted out of a selection, hence the Armoury.
There were more but these were some of the most frequent topics. It’s somewhat frustrating but some of their most controversial changes from VT2 were driven by player-feedback here on the forums. A real case of the squeaky wheel getting the grease, I’m afraid.
Yeah, but the grease they’re using is corroding the wheel. Sure, there were complaints on those things, but people didn’t ask for time locked random stores, an addition of 2-3 layers of RNG on items or the complete uselessness and lack of feedback of secondary objectives.
You can laud them for responding to complaints but the implementation leaves a lot to be desired.
Reasonable take. Now here is a mind experiment explaining the possible origin story.
People blame green circles and MVP status for rushers rushing ahead and “stealing kills”.
An often overseen factor is a lot of people having trouble cooperating with strangers in anonymous environments. Cooperation requires a lot of compromise. Compromising requires you relinquish your ego, yet for the thrill of our egos we play in the first place.
Scenario explaining most complaint threads:
The game is started by all four players being randomly slapped together, because what are friends and where can I buy them?
Thomas comes into the team with rushing in mind. He’s a calloused hardcore veteran gamer and is used to being done in 15 mins tops. He’s seen it all, he’s done it all, he must feed the addiction. Just a quick high-adrenaline game to sooth his mood.
Ishmael comes into the team wanting to pick-up all the Plasteel. He is a mid-level player and knows all the hidden spots. He’s a good player for the most part, but he can’t clutch solo well.
Cindy really wants to play all ranged build. She is as methodical as possible. Also she’s a total noob and just reached level 30 with all green gear. For her the game is still magic and looking at the pretty assets is more important than dodging crusher overheads.
Ruth doesn’t care either way, but she only has 25 mins time before she needs to leave. She must pick up her kids. She’s already stressed because her boss chewed her out at work and she is a more experienced player, too.
There are several colliding interests as well as experience levels. As the four of them play, they nurgle each other off more and more.
→ The fast, experienced and time-limited players Thomas and Ruth both rush ahead. They wanna get done fast, so they trigger the objectives to avoid waiting. This triggers horde mode.
→ Ishmael is off some side-path right at the start, getting cut off from the others because gotta get that PLASTEEL. Neither Thomas nor Ruth pick it up, while Cindy doesn’t even know where it is located or what she can do with it.
→ Cindy is dead 4 mins in anyway, because she doesn’t know how to block-cancel mid attack or what a slide-dodge is.
The glorious disaster unfolds. Eventually Ishmael dies, because he gets netted by a trapper. Thomas and Rush push on to next event, but then get the unlucky double boss spawn with Pox-burster spam combo. Yadda yadda. Everyone dies and they get sent to the Game Over screen together.
Now what happens?
Everyone of the four has a negative experience and they project their Khorne-enhanced thoughts onto each other, seeing the mistakes of everyone else.
The facts shown on the scoreboard:
Thomas and Ruth have the most green circles, because they went ahead and logically killed the most.
Ishmael has only 3 green circles, specifically in the resources he gathered and least damage taken.
Cindy gets embarrassed completely. The scoreboard documents her merciless obliteration in wonderfully precise detail.
Thomas is filled with rage. Ruth is filled with stress. Ishmael is filled with crafting FOMO. Cindy is filled with envy.
Now as Ruth ragequits during the Game Over screen, causing an unresponsiveness that forces everyone else to wait on the scoreboard in misery. What do they say?
Thomas: “This is all your fault. You two couldn’t stick with the group and that’s why we all died. And especially you Cindy!”
→ He goes and makes the two threads “low-level scrubs ruin Auric missions, make joining for them impossible” and “need better votekick option”.
Ishmael: “If you weren’t chasing those green circles, Thomas, we could have gotten all the plasteel and still done it in time. You are an egotistic Kerillian player. Go back to VT2 you arrogant nerd!”
→ He goes and makes the infamous “Scoreboard green circles ruins game” and “rushers ruin game” threads.
Cindy: “I totes agree man, Thomas and Ruth are, like, suuuuch bumholes for rushing ahead, maaaaaan! He is playing that stupid Knife Zealot build, too. All people like that, like, totally do that, man! I hate them so much, it’s unreal!”
→ She goes and makes two threads, nr. 1 is “Nerf Knife Zealot” and nr. 2 is “Ragers are overpowered, pls nerf them too”.
Ruth as she logs off says to herself: “Another game ruined by people who have too much time on their hands. If I could host a custom lobby and pick my mission in peace, I could play the shorter Hab Dreyko map without having my day ruined!”
→ She goes and makes also two threads, nr. 1 “Mission board is garbage” and nr. 2 “Why still no solo play?”.
In truth there is not that much wrong with the game itself (obvios issues withstanding). But because the different playstyles collide and because losing due to lacking teamplay feels like the worst way to lose, you get this bitterness.
TL;DR: Scoreboard would have been fine. But some people use it as an outlet to project their frustrations onto it. But these frustrations are likely deeply rooted elsewhere.
this is just the “why matchmaking never works” explanation reskinned, that’s not how it goes. here’s how it goes:
Herp, Derp, Burp, and Chirp all get into a game.
Herp specifically chose to play this map because it’s hi-int damnation and they’re chasing circles. they have the scoreboard mod and a bunch of “legit” mods that a lot of people think at cheating but got approved anyways so Herp insists that’s how the game is supposed to be played. they have a zealot that’s built to whatever the highest meta is and no chill
Derp chose to play this map because it’s hi-int damnation and they’re used to it and they don’t want to play one of the five vent purge maps. they also have the scoreboard and maybe a couple QOL mods but don’t use mods to change the gameplay. they’re probably an ogryn with a kickback, know the meta and want to enjoy a good win.
Burp Quickplayed into the map because quickplay gives a bonus to plasteel to it matters less if their team forgets to grab mats. they don’t have the scoreboard mod because they don’t want to use mod and may think they’re all cheats. they’re probably a vet and either spam plasma or run around with an autogun headshotting at range.
Chirp did not see what map they picked. they just unlocked damnation and want to try it out, and have no idea mods exist. they’re a psyker and are playing whatever they think is fun currently.
Herp, Derp, and Burp run ahead while Chirp is kinda wandering around the spawn area
→ Herp and Derp keep going, while Burp doubles back to make sure Chirp doesn’t get jumped and Herp’s speed bonus leaves Derp behind. seconds later herp runs back to Derp with a bunch of mobs chasing them because he’s chasing circles and poxwalkers just slow you down while wasting most of your attacks recorded damage.
→ Burp and Chirp catch up and help Derp while Herp runs off again, picking off elites and running back whenever the mobs get too heavy for them to dump the trash off on their team and use them to better target elites for circles.
→ Chirp goes down almost constantly, they’re not used to damnation, they’re a gun spyker and out of ammo and don’t know how to defend well. Burp goes down a lot, they can handle damnation but they’re constantly wading through Herp and Derp’s excess chaff spawns because Burp is slowed down trying to save Chirp all the time and the enemies end up clogging the paths Herp and Derp ran through.
→ Derp struggles along, not going down but constantly on the verge of getting overwhelmed because their team is not helping.
→ Herp is doin’ great, herp’s taking up all the ammo pickups, dodging enemies, picking off all the elites and generally “winning”. Derp manages to get through the mission objective with Burp’s help while herp runs around killing any specials and elites and teabagging chirp until Burp picks them up and they extract.
after the match Herp insults Burp and Chirp for being bad players and wishes Derp better luck next time. Derp is upset because the run sucked for them, but sees the scoreboard and agrees it couldn’t have been Herp’s problem (even if they did steal all the ammo), Burp is raging because Herp’s at fault and Chirp is thinking about going to helldivers instead.
Herp goes onto discord after the match talks about how bad psyker players are and wants them to make a mod that blocks people with non-meta builds from games. they screenshot their scoreboard and brag about how they did all the work that game and say Derp, Burp, and Chirp should play a different game so the GOOD players can enjoy themselves
Derp goes onto the forums salty and gets into one of the 150 arguments about locks, and maybe comments how the scoreboard is fine because it lets you tell who’s contributing to the match. Burp complains people need to pay better attention to teammate’s ammo levels because they see “a lot of good players wasting ammo topping off”
Burp goes onto the forums and posts ragethread #98,420 either blaming players rushing ahead or fatshark not “Fixing this game” they probably also call all mods cheating because after playing long enough they can tell when someone has the scoreboard and enemy warning modes and is using them to chase circles instead of helping.
Chirp is in the helldivers or DRG discord saying how bad darktide players all are, and will keep doing that until the next update when this all happens again.
two players had a terrible time and one had a bad one because of one player having the scoreboard and using it to enable a terrible way of playing the game. this crap happens daily in darktide.
Yeah… right.
Because without a scoreboard, nobody would care about anyone’s performance at all. Nobody would have a single competitive fiber in their body…
I guess people only suck, if there are “toxic” statistics to show it, and taking the statistics away, fixes all problems.
for them it sadly does. thats what generation “participation trophy” got us.
strangely being a coop game seems to suggest an instant apology for slacking, when in fact its even more imperative to contribute your best as to not be a drain on the team.
i’d be ashamed of myself to be considered dead weight in something i actually love spending my time at.
personally i enjoy me a scoreboard as cherry on top a good round, see if my build is paying off and in all those hundreds of matches i didn’t need said board to call out the handful of active saboteurs.
matter of fact i didn’t wait for the end to ask if he was trolling on purpose.
another fact remains that i enjoy an additional gratification, totally honest about it, if i was having a particularly good performance, team game or not.
also i respect great performance from others and let it inspire/motivate me.
never lost a match because of someone dealing “more damage”, if anything it made my job easier and the screen less crowded.
what did cost rounds though were underachievers slacking or simply being unfit to contribute.
some situations are just uncarryable, yet those in question dont like to feel bad when they’re performing badly.
and it ain’t “just a game”, its the most valuable time of the day where one can enjoy himself after having sold a huge part already to some “energy drain”, so people rightfully expect equal contribution to a favorite pass time.
Then just let the scoreboard display your personal stats, not the others, if you are so worried about the toxicity. Though as a side note, if people can not handle some random wannabe criticizing their stats, I’d say they have bigger problems, and shouldn’t be spending their time playing this game.
I think players should at least be able to see their own stats if they wanted to.
Insecure people project their behavior into the games, trying to compensate irl lacking of power and confidence and stuff like scoreboard prevent them from escapism. Scoreboard is a great tool to expose such hysteroids.
I’ve seen much more toxicity in games without scoreboards, where mediocre players were shitting on others cause they know themselves can’t be exposed due to no tool for that.
And so they aren’t interested in cooperative teamplay, the want to ego jerk and flex, but the same time not to have a tool that rly can be a measure of performance.
Just make it toggable, people who don’t want to see scoreboard will not.
“Toxicity” in this game is all projection from toxic people. That’s my simple take.
In 580 hours I’ve seen less than 5 people be deliberate jerks in game, and I can’t remember any of the details of those situations, because they were not very bad.
People complaining about toxicity all the time probably need to look in the mirror and ask themselves if they are the ones contributing, at least in part, to creating a toxic environment
Theoretically it’s already like that, just flipped. I.e. go get the scoreboard mod if you really need it. Personally I found the mod “meh” at best, given how it throws points around for weird things, like blocking or picking up plasteel, or penalizes the use of medicae stations.
Someone suggesting disabling ALL the scoreboard mod’s options and installing “Ovenproof” mod on top of that. This one doesn’t do any silly points tracking, just raw stats, and I found this one a lot better.
Ultimately while people can argue who did more boss damage, it’s kind of pointless. If you can’t tell who did “better” then the skill levels were likely close enough. Otherwise you can tell who keeps on getting killed / getting down / holding back and requires assistance without the help of a scoreboard.
The mod toggling is one complaint I’ve seen around, and I don’t understand one bit. It’s not like Fatshark releases patches every day, nor is re-enabling mods difficult (just fire that BAT once and you’re done).
The mod update thing - sure, SOMETIMES. Most of the mods don’t require a mod update on every patch. And, again, it’s not like Fatshark release a lot of patches to begin with. If anything I feel like the community would appreciate a faster working pace on that front…
Then perhaps it was even your own suggestion which I’ve originally followed…? In any case, that’s an excellent mod vs the base scoreboard one.
I play since beta, so for me even that one click action become a chore. Add here some reinstalls, cause game accidentaly can run like ass after some patch and for some magic reason reinstall helps.
I don’t want to and don’t understand why i should go through this ritual over and over again just to have a basic feature in my game. Like i use mostly QoL mods for which there is no excuse why devs can’t add them, but somehow they are happy to rise cosmetics prices.
Like what’s next? Brightness slider will be a mod?
In any case, that’s an excellent mod vs the base scoreboard one. 