Currently working my way through the mid-30s of Havoc and boy, does it feel a lot like the mid 20s. Normally I’d wait till I hit 40 before writing something like this but I’ve had this draft sitting here for over a dozen levels and my opinion has yet to change much. In addition, my opinion aligns with a lot of other folks who have gotten to level 40, and have achieved notable accolades, an example:
I also created a similar post at around level 23, mainly wishing that Havoc mode was something else: Imagining A Better Havoc Mode (Come Cope With Me)
But the focus of this feedback is to try and suggest a way to make havoc closer to the intent of the developers, as gleaned through the Havoc Q&A post:Introduction to Havoc Q&A - Dev Blog
And specifically this quote:
With Havoc our intent is for players to adapt to the Havoc Assignment at hand by selecting the correct character, talents, weapons, blessing and curios to best take on the challenge.
The problem here is that this intent doesn’t reflect reality. The only people playing and completing Havoc are either on teams so good they don’t need to adapt, or else are relying on the meta to bridge the gap here. You effectively created 40 puzzle boxes that are solved with the same key, or by breaking them open with a hammer. Not everyone can afford a hammer, Fatshark, not in this economy!
Let me start with some simple feedback, and later I’ve got an idea I’d like to float for fixing this fundamental design flaw.
Firstly, I think all the “Hidden” modifiers should be visible. Reworks aside, this should happen regardless, as it gives a greater appreciation for what each level does, even if it’s just a vague “Elites have more health” or “Operators have less toughness”, we should be able to see not just what the new level adds, but have a list tucked away on the UI somewhere we can open to see each collective modifier active for that level. This is design 101 stuff and it boggles why this isn’t the case.
Secondly, get rid of the demotion mechanic altogether. If you want players to adapt, they need to fail, and they need to be able to experiment. It’s plenty grindy without it I assure you, dump that mechanic in the bin where it belongs.
Thirdly, whenever you complete a mission of equal or greater Assignment Level, you should get 1 level-up regardless of if you’re the host or not. You can keep the “Weekly Clearance Level” level-skip thing if you want, but the choice between “Slowly leveling at a risk” and “Skipping the grind risk free by waiting a week” is not a meaningful one, it’s weird and dumb. Weird and dumb, Fatshark!
Big Brain Idea: Really wrinkling over here, stand back.
I would like to suggest a shift to Havoc that would force people to use different solutions to solve different assignments.
To start, I think all these Hidden modifiers should be squashed to levels 1, 10, 20, 30 and 40, so that level 30 is as hard as level 39, 20 as hard as 29, etc. And yes, we favor the harder mods, so this would just increase the difficulty across the board. Some things might need tweakin’ numbers wise (Shooters are stealing the show right now), but this flattening of the curve into step-ups is important for the next step so stay with me, we’re just setting a baseline difficulty here.
Next, the levels between these difficulty spikes (Excluding the spikes themselves) should have absolutely GAME CHANGING mission modifiers. Get all these wimpy mods outta here, send 'em to Maelstroms where they belong. We want mods that feel like a swift kick to the tires, some real gut-punchers, a couple of bone breakers, literal jumper-cables on the nips, so on and so forth, you get it.
Well, maybe “we” don’t all want that, but modifiers that require adaption would align with the design intent and the current ones simply don’t require anything. Here are some mods I think we should consider instead. Feel free to suggest replacements if you hate 'em.
1.) Specialist Strike Teams: 4 of the 9 modifiers would restrict what operators can be brought. I.E. All vets, All Psykers, All Zealots and All Ogryns. This would force people who main a certain class to have competency with all operators, and it would encourage additional coordination to ensure that your teams’ builds are complementary and cover all the major threat-vectors.
2.) The Malaise: Combat Abilities have limited charges/No Longer Recharge. You kinda shot yourselves in the foot balance wise giving out CDR like candy, and now we’ve got a meta to squash. For at least 1 of the 10 levels per cycle, you gotta deal with not having infinite access to your “Press F to not die” solutions and have to come up with something else. This would force adaption like no other, and require folks to respec their builds to minimize CA/CDR nodes, because they’re now effectively dead (or dying).
3.) Firing Line: Brutal Shooters. You made shooters scary, good job! Now you can tune them back down a bit for 9/10 levels so the melee mooks stop being jealous. But every nerf you make to bullet bros in base-havoc you compensate them for in this modifier. Every shooter is effectively a gunner, and every gunner is effectively an armored sweatshop spittin’ out nonstop molten lead at discounted ‘What-are-child-labor-laws?’ prices. Shooter spawn like salmon and every patrol is reapers, good luck! This is where the current meta can have its home.
4.) Munitions Shortage: No Ranged weapons, more stimms and grenades, maybe. No guns, no staves, just melee. This is one of those “Fun” modifiers, in the sense it’s goal is just to have a different play-experience, and not necessarily grind your face to bone. I mean, it ain’t easy, but you’ve got your CAs you’ll be fine. Still requires building around “Dead” ranged nodes in your trees. We can add enhanced blitz up to level 20 and remove or reduce the extra stimms and grenades for the 30+ versions. This can also be where you have your “Themed” missions.
5.) Munitions Surplus: Only Ranged Weapons, infinite/extra ammo. Dukane says we gotta deplete our ammo stores or else the Militarum won’t send us as much next time. Another fun one. Still requires building around “Dead” melee nodes in your trees. Early assignments can have infinite ammo, 30+ just removes the less-ammo-per-ammo-box debuff currently in play. This can also be where you have your “Themed” missions.
6.) Rigged to Blow: You’ve got a timer, when it hits zero, the whole level floods with GAS. Passivity is a common trait in competent squads, why rush ahead when you can let the enemies come to your killzone instead? This flips the script and gives something for those speedfreaks to play with. The “soft” punishment of a slow death by gas (As opposed to instant failure) provides a nice buffer zone, mainly for the sake of developers so they don’t have to precisely time out levels. And yes, this timer does get shorter as levels progress, making 30+ guaranteed to be a gas!
And what of Level 40? Not only should it be harder baseline, but I think its extra modifiers should be randomized week after week. Hell, why not throw “Scab Melee Only” into the pool as well, the tough-nuts LOVE Scab Melee Only. This would also provide perfect grounds for giving out an actually good reward for completing one a week (hint hint)
Progression wise, completing any mission above or equal to your current clearance increases your overall level by 1, allowing you to skip certain levels if you wish by playing higher ones but you can no longer skip the line by playing one match and waiting a week. However, in order to gain permanent access to level 40, you need to have completed all the prior levels at least once. Completing an auric maelstrom lets you skip the first 20. If this is still too tough, we could only require all the levels between 30 and 40 to be completed.
In addition, you would now be able to select lower level assignments, if you so desire. Hoping to find a party with someone of that level just to replay it might make sense for current Havoc, since all the levels equally suck, but if we’re going to make each assignment its own thing, replayability is a must!
Also, players in the “Pregame” lobby should have access to Brunts and Hadrons, and a way to hotswap operators, in case they need to fully respec their builds. It’s easier to coordinate when everyone has all the info in front of them.
