How I would improve Havoc

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Gameplay Feedback
1

Decided to write out some of my thoughts on havoc.

Deranking System

It is my opinion that end of week derank to the lowest rank you have completed is too steep of a punishment for players who cannot or do not play that week. From what the playerbase originally thought the system would be, is if you did not play for 1 week, your rank would decrease by 1. I propose this is what the weekly derank is changed into.

Havoc chances before demotion should be increased from 3 to 5. This is an idea I have borrowed from Reginald because I agree with it. As it currently stands, it feels like build variety is hampered by the 3 chances. The demotion system is a good concept, but to increase build variety in havoc, ultimately 3 chances is not sufficient, whereas 5 would be ideal.

Hordes

If havoc is to be expanded above current cap of 40, timed hordes should return for it. Currently, the most optimal way to clear havoc, is to go very slowly, and exhaust horde and boss spawns, which is not particularly interesting from a mechanical standpoint. I enjoy the density of hordes in havoc, and they do not, in my opinion, need to be increased.

Here is how i would implement timed hordes.

For every 2 ranks above 40, there should be a set time between hordes, obeying the entity cap and implemented in a way where specialist spawning is not interrupted by the spawning of a new horde.
Starting at 40, the timer should be set at 10 minutes, decreasing by 60 seconds every other havoc rank, capping at 5 mins between a timed horde. This horde should not be included inside the allocated horde count in a sector.

Specialist Spawns

From my experience, and the experience of others, havoc seems to overly prioritize elites over spawning specialists, to the point where in an identical timed mission, on the same map, you would have around 100 specialists less than on a I-II-V-E-G Auric Maelstrom true duo.

For a game mode that is supposed to be the hardest content available, I believe that that specialist spawns are far too low. In a perfect world, you should see at least 100 more specialists than in a 3veg. A relatively easy fix would be reducing the time between coordinated strikes/surges.

Boss Walls

As high mobility weapons are significantly stronger in havoc than all over weapons, boss walls could provide mechanical complexity that is not simply running through the map. This would also clamp down on speedrunning and taxiing to current cap of 40.

Ammo Reduction

As it stands, some weapons are punished in havoc too much. Weapons like the Bolter, infantry autoguns, twin linked heavy stubbers etc. The cause of this is the 75% ammo pickup reduction, this hampers viable builds too heavily, and could use a reduction to around 50% less ammunition from pickups.

Thank you.

9 Likes
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Heavy agree on all points especially ammo. It railroads builds into high efficiency cleave picks, basically being plasma, flamer and purgatus. This is terrible.

I’d also add:

  • The option to quickplay into predetermined havoc ranges (1-10, 11-20 etc)
  • Ability to freely host any havoc rank up to the highest one you’ve completed without demotion. Demotions only applying to your current highest rank
3 Likes
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deranking like that makes no sense and from what they teased before the update i don’t even think they intended it to be like this, when you get demansionated if you were clearance level 35 one week, you can’t get lower than 34 the next week, it would make no sense

the ammo deparment also exposed how the power creep affected the psyker class, staves were balanced at launch with the intention to penalize their unlimited avialability of ranged attacks, and look at what we are at now

i’m not even bringing my main (vet) on havoc, with its power swords in this sorry state its just useless compared to the other classes

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The second part of this statement confounds me to the point I feel I must say something (yes on the ‘down with the deranking’ system though, all for that).

But…vets not being good in havoc? They are like, one of the quint essential pieces! Survivelist alone enables the Zealots to completely ignore ammo pick ups, allowing the Veteran to hoover up all the reduced ammo on the map. And thus insures their high impact weaponry always primed for melting any monstrosity or long range target that needs melting. They like, serve THEIR role and are the only one that can (long range high priority target clean up), at the speed and efficiency that is required, on top of spamming knock downs and golden HP to the team at a constant rate.

They are like, insanely important, I had a 40 run just this past weekend where we had 2 vets and 2 zealots, cleanest run I’ve had in a good few weeks. One had the Plasmagun, the other a Boltpistol, and it made everything quite a bit of a breeze with all the shouting between our respective classes, and various forms of suppression as they shot down specials at range to keep the guns down until our choruses got there.

This isn’t to say Psyker isn’t great, but their main draw is pretty much entirely locked in Inferno Staff being given Blaze Away because reasons. A Flamer can do that same job to very good effect, along with a few immolation/frag grenades here and there, and with a Vet that’s quite the viable strat as well. Though ‘1 Vet, 1 Psyker and 2 Zealots’ is the main bread and butter for Aura reasons (team wide CDR bot with a bubble is still very nice), but Vets are still absolutely an essential piece of that puzzle, quite happily standing toe to toe with everyone else and serving their squad exactly the way they are needed.

They are very much the exact opposite of useless, near essential.

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if it worked for you its fine, whatever works works, from my pov i had better runs when vets weren’t in my team, i’d trade away a class that has been reduced to a nerfed survivalist and voice of command for a pickaxe ogryn, a second chorus zealot or a smyker

as far as level 40s are concerned, i finished one with most suboptimal teams, my worst being with 2 shield ogryns and one melee psyker with the new 2handed sword, a good chorus zealot is enough to overshadow any shout vet yellow thougness wise

and a shrieker with infernus overshadow all the damage a vet could do by just doing all the damage himself for free

and the chorus zealot is just as good as a vet when it comes to watching his back and to silence gunners with his bolter

i don’t play my main (vet) because the low avialability of ammos makes him useless (compared to those who don’t need), and because it feels dumb to suffer from ammo deficency to do my damage when i can just shriek my way out of my weekly assignment

6

As far as I’m concerned, I will not launch it anymore after I lost my hard grinded lvl 25 to a rank 1.
I don’t have a lot of free time to play and this is just sickening they allow these bugs to remain in their game.
Zero respect for their player base.

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Havoc is quite an interesting thing, but it is clearly not up to the idea of developers ‘only the toughest will take 40’, and not up to it, because players are locked on metovyh builds that allow you to play safely in random (reliability = victory).
About the rank reset - quite adequate, you can’t get up to 40 back - you don’t deserve it.
The number of attempts - quite adequate, 3 norms for randoms in a pack, if the group has at least 1 friend or a person in the voice then enough 1 attempt.

Here is what should be changed first of all - it is a reward for level 40, I’m already starting to think where the limit of plastic, for me it is ridiculous and ill-conceived reward. For the strongest to give resources to improve weapons - do not understand how the game works.

Ammo crate - still should restore 100%, 75% penalty to regular ammo packs is fine, but the crate should be so valuable and give the team a boost.

Giving ogryn something more team based so they are wanted as much as Zealots with Chorus, or Psyker with Buble.

Reward for 20 weeks: THIS. JUST. NOTHING. Not even a one-piece suit, but a tag that you can’t see during a match…

Oddly enough I’d add more bosses, but slashed in health from AM so that guaranteed 1 goes out with the horde.
And yes, more and more specialists.

If someone gets disconnected - a bot doesn’t appear in his place, we’re playing hard mode after all

Giving the opportunity to send a help signal, previously mentioned this, but I’ll say it again:
1 time per mission you can send a help signal to the base, if the group is vacated, the signal appears not only in the group finnder, but also a separate tab on the mission board, where only these requests will be displayed. It is only available for 5 minutes, can join a person of any Havoc level, but not less than 15 from the current lobby level (if 40, minimum 25)., the situation is desperate and any help will be welcome.
Well, and of course you can add some kind of achievement for such ‘Angels-savers’, of course with stages to stimulate to come to the rescue, but among other things in the credit will go only victorious. Let’s take for example 100 victories, and give some kind of frame, for more Sharks can not be generous.

8

Havoc needs to be removed and completely remade from scratch, removing any and all similarities to the Weaves game mode in Vermintide 2.

While there are a few people who might actually like the mode, the VAST majority of people took one look at it and left the game.

It divides the players ingame, which is a huge problem that should have been noticed and prevented immediately. But beyond that, its just more of the same tired gameplay loops, with the added nuisance of there being no quickplay. And its also a ridiculously overcomplicated ranking system.

There are so many issues with this mode that I personally will not be happy with a small patch for Havoc. I won’t be happy until the entire thing has been stripped out and reworked into a FUN game mode for ALL players.

2 Likes
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Generally the best update for Havoc is to make the Chaos Wastelands, which most people have been asking for

1 Like
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Yeah, feel it’s entirely an experience thing then really. I’ve had the exact opposite experience, two weekends ago I literally couldn’t clear a Havoc for almost an entire evening/almost swore off the idea entirely like most have before me due to the sheer number of Psykers running around. They’d walk in, get two filling up the lobbies I was in, they’d die repeatedly, and their wave clear would thusly vanish and the havoc would be lost. Meanwhile trading those Psykers out for Vets has lead to nothing but positive experiences.

Even the runs I’ve had with 1 Psyker usually results in that Psyker being downed repeatedly and needing to be healed to keep damage up, with there only being 1 exception in which I got True Survivor from that game.

I feel at the end of the day it’s just the mentality that really caries it, as soon as you have a vet on your team, at least in all the games I’ve played, it’s pretty much a given that ‘every single ammo drop goes to him’, with only a rare few exceptions when the ammo’s across the map from them and it’s better not to back track. This usually results in the veteran doing rather fine for themselves, while allowing me and the other Zealot to utilize our power weapons (Flamer/Boltgun) relatively freely still, which feels rather nice for all involved.

Where as without the vet, literally every other class is required to go melee and can do nothing else the entire time, as your starting ammo will be gone 1/4 of the way through the mission and you’ll never have nothing but a maybe a mag on your person the rest of the match. I’ve tried to do a few matches with that kind of set up, they’ve always failed.

Even had a good few scream psykers, every match with one I’ve also failed, due to aforementioned squish and their sudden lack of existence (be it due to instant 50 yard retreats or death) immediately causing overwhelm and team wipe.

I feel the main difference is likely the ‘skill floor’ for a vet (thanks to shout and everyone ‘giving them everything’ since they need it) is vastly lower. Bring a Vet along and you pull the team up with golden HP and knocking everything away for spacing on a constant basis. Bring a Psyker along, and unless you play perfectly/have a Vet standing next to you to keep you up, you drop like a lead weight and drag the team down with you.

I’m glad you’ve been playing all the exceptions to this ‘rule’ though, I hope someday to experience them myself :sweat_smile: .

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Bosswalls are never a cool idea

1 Like
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