So, after months of work a big patch comes out.
Ogryn changes are nice, however other classes need the same treatment of bringing the extremes closer together.
Havoc exists because people you chose (who are the biggest sweats in the game) in your discord told you the game is easy.
So instead of looking at WHAT MAKES THE GAME EASY = several weapons+talents+blessings that have multiplicative interactions between them,
you pour god only knows how many thousands of workhours into creating a mode, where you are FORCED only to pick the most broken stuff.
I like to bring up Thunder Hammer -** THE quintessential anti heavy sh-t infantry weapon of the imperium, outside of explosives **
You turn a corner and there are 5 crushers - you activate the powerfield, charge a heavy attack, then charge enough stacks of thrust to reach a oneshot ⌠and 3 are dead as dueling sword wielding friend already killed them.
A one handed normal sword, which is better in mobility, attack speed, crit fishing, WEAKPOINT HITS, instant stagger button, arguably even cleave is better. IS ALSO better at dealing with super heavy enemies.
And when you saw this, the solution wasnt to look at the state of balance, you took the feedback âgame is easyâ and made a mode for dueling sword/knife.
And now again instead of looking at the objectively clear extremes of power you still continue to push havoc.
P.S. I know some people will come âbut I seen/did H40 with shovel no talents true solo ..etcetcâ
I dont care, we KNOW that overwhelming majority of builds use DS or Knife, and we also know why.
I do kinda have to agree. Havoc feels like an attempt to build a hardcore difficulty mode with âexclusivityâ rather than simplyâŚreining in players, and letting Auric be its thing.
The FS game plan seems to be to keep adding options for people, rather than morphing existing modes/difficulties into something else.
As long as the game only requires 2 people to start a match, and is available across 4 platforms, I donât think there will realistically ever be a problem with that approach.
Given that thereâs literally nobody on the Party Finder for Havoc right now on NA for any difficulty, the morning after a major release update, it feels like a pretty wasted use of Dev time.
Fatshark feels like theyâre obligated by contract to put out a new feature every X months, and theyâre just comping up with stuff to fulfill a goal without really planning how it integrates with the rest of the game or how interested the existing playerbase will be in it. Havoc, Mortis, etc donât feel like integrated continued expansions of the game, they feel like tacked-on gee-whiz features.
This mode exists mostly for sweats who want to think theyâre better than the majority of the playerbase.
Yes, itâs satisfying to beat the challenge of high Havocs with a good team, but I would rather main mission board get an expansion with new modifiers and mission types. The only reason I play it is because the game lacks content as it is.
OR⌠it exists for people who hunger for challenge. Contempt is a bad look.
It would be nice to get some of the Havoc modifiers mixed into Auric, could help bridge the gap for players who want to do Havoc but arenât quite ready for Havoc
Steamcharts is showing the average players online this morning as twice the last 30 day online average rate.
Sure, not peak play time, but higher than whatever peak we was there last week at any time.
If your new game mode with brand new features has literally 0 (zero, nada, none, a complete absence, etc) players in the party finder the day after an update, even at off-peak hours, itâs not bad faith to comment on that when Steamcharts is showing 8-9k people online.
Havoc gameplay changes are really fun. The changes to deranking are awful and put people off the mode entirely. Fatshark is trying to invent a âladder grindâ mentality in a game and playerbase that doesnât have any. Itâs not working.
a mode thats supposed to be the be all end all should be available 24/7
usually i take vacations solely to play darktide all day, with the result now recording some 10-12 auric maelstroms and 0 havoc matches from 11 am to 24am german time / eu servers.
what more can one do? 2am play sessions in different time zones with crappy latency ?
Itâs only fair these people get this treatment for steering the game into this direction.
I donât have any empathy for high level players that think the game should be balanced around their premades of good players where people optimize their builds.
The funny thing, I have 2.5k hours and I play as well if not better with certain loadouts than those content creators. But I actually consider the rest of playerbase, unlike them. My friends all stopped playing the game, because of changes made to appease this crowd.
Homeslice, thereâs more people on right now than there was at any peak time any day since DECEMBER.
So, pick your comparison to any point in 2025, thereâs more people on now and still nobody in the Party Finder for Havoc (or at least wasnt when I posted a bit ago, cant login to check now).
When I was in yesterday at peak time posting hereâŚthere a whoppingâŚtwo groups.
The core demographic wanted it to be harder, and from what Iâve seen it is, but also more interesting. Also lots of complaints about gunners severely limiting build variety for all but the sweatiest. FS addressed that too.
But no one asked for more punishing deranks, and it surely wasnât done to attract casualsâŚsame as all the other changes (adding twins, changing spawning, etc etc.)
Itâs a niche mode, but aside from the derank changes, it seems FS is doing right by its target audience.
