Let's talk about Incentivisation

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
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Hello fellow Rejects, I’ve been thinking about this for a while and wanted to put pen to paper so I can get the community’s take on these thoughts as well as hunt for a mystical reply from StrawHat!

I’ll be honest, before we get into it, I want to discuss the WHYs and HOWs the game rewards us for playing it but I want to view it through the lens of the Party Finder feature. So I’ll be talking a lot about that.

First, let’s define incentivisation:

Incentivisation or incentivization is the practice of building incentives into an arrangement or system in order to motivate the actors within it. It is based on the idea that individuals within such systems can perform better not only when they are coerced but also when they are given rewards. Source: Wikipedia

Next, let’s talk about some potential incentives the game can put in front of a player:

  • cosmetic rewards
  • gear upgrades
  • currency
  • crafting materials

When looking at the implementation of the Party Finder, we see that FatShark did not include any incentives and, predictably, the community is not interacting with this feature at all. In fact, when you think about it, there’s a massive opportunity for Darktide to reward players for playing multiple missions together. Because we’re playing no-name randos, it could be interesting to have an affinity system to players on our friends list or something like that.

Anyways, I’m already getting into solutioning mode, that’s not what I’m here for. I think the greater question, what kind of incentives could help retain players longer? Certainly a mix of cosmetic rewards, daily missions (which include a streak for completing them every day).

What about story rewards? Personally, I don’t tend to listen to the voxcomms that come out. Why not reward players with these voxcomms in-game? Maybe with how the story relates to our characters… I know that’s a massive undertaking but from the little that I know about the background of the sector, there’s an interesting story to tell here.

So far, event incentives have been a massive failure. Our most recent event was named “Unrelenting Hordes” and requires us to… get books!!! With the usual Plasteel, Diamantine rewards.

Additionally, rewards have to be meaningful. The only time I select Quick Play is when I’m 100% undecided. The additional rewards just don’t matter to me at all. Why would I go to the party finder when I can solo queue and be paired with individuals who queued for something similar? What problem are we solving for? Is this a social issue? Let me be clear: the Mourningstar is NOT a social hub. It’s a bit weird to build a social feature on top of a game that has … no social features to speak of.

Anyways, I don’t have a proposed solution. Penances are nice but there are too many for them to be meaningful. I feel like the game is between a rock and a hard place when it comes to incentives, what do you all think?

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Could you clarify what the problem is that you are trying to use incentives to solve?

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You know what? I don’t have an answer to that.

I can only look at this from personal experience and, right now, Darktide is the most fun it has ever been for me. I even managed to get a friend to try it after 2 years and now, he won’t even play Space Marine 2 until he gets all classes/weapons leveled in Darktide.

I wish I could say the goal is “long term player retention” or “making it more fun to log in daily” but either of those things are really a problem for me right now.

I guess I just look at the Party Finder and wonder “Why?” and maybe “how can it be made better?”

I’m sorry, I really don’t have a good answer to your very good question

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Your response is reassuring. If people play to “make dockets go up” I would agree that this is not a great incentive. Playing for fun seems much healthier.

You are right about the LFG tool though. It’s slower than the mission terminal for no benefit over the mission terminal. I am hoping that if players are given more freedom to choose maps and modifiers the LFG tool will be part of that.

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I don’t need an incentive to use party finder, party finder just isn’t implemented correctly.

It should naturally be part of quickplay(as in click quickplay, you get put in a party based on your preferences, and then random a map if not an ongoing game).

I know a guy who stopped playing after 5 minutes of going back to darktide because it still incentivizes slidespam. So instead of trying to make up incentives to keep people playing(this isn’t going to make people go back to darktide), maybe they should remove stuff that turn people off, like the dumb rng that is still in the game(curios).

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You know what I really want for this game?

alex-nikiforov-loot-goblin

LOOT GOBLINS!

They could drop ammo and/or stims and/or currency, but drop they shall! And so too shall the rejects scramble for a taste of that sweet, sweet treasure :money_mouth_face:

I’ve enjoyed the other various in-game incentivisations like heretical skulls and the secret booby traps, why not one more? :slight_smile:

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goblin x
loot girl ✓

Some kind of representation of wyrmwood agents or civilian collaborators who run at first sight of trouble would be nice.

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Yeah they could be civilian looters but then idk why nurgle wouldn’t just eat them too

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Ok… ay…

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Here, have some Jam for your Goblins. :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

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if the Beast of Nurgle doesn’t become a loot piñata, we riot

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So you don’t need an incentive to use it, but you would use it if there was a proper incentive…

I know a guy that didn’t like one specific aspect of the game so we should stop improving on aspects that people find fun and instead focus on random things I decided were important

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Pls skip to 47:42
(Unfortunatly LOGICALLY nobody EVER wasted their time to cut this movie into memes.
NEITHER will I.)

The Intro is very cool IMO.

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gear upgrades how exactly? because when you look at some other threads, you have players complaining already about power creep. and upgrading underperforming weapons to the level of the better ones is more a question of general weapons balance.

dockets and materials is probably interesting for newer players, or for those who want to build mastery and optimal weapons. but whoever has already everything cares more about the gameplay than the “economy” of the game.

which leaves us with cosmetics (clothes, weapons, trinkets, frames and titles) as the reward that fits everyone regardless of status (regarding gear and mastery)

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for some time now, i’ve considered the serious issue that an increasing amount of gaming is focused on teaching people to play for “rewards” rather than enjoying the gameplay, to the point where people will play, frankly boring crap games because at the end of each round there’s a results screen with a prize and and a happy empowering jingle for getting it.

i don’t really know how to get people to self-check for this sort of obsessive compulsive behavior. Not like i can be hovering behind every person to slap them upside the head when they’re getting weird about it.

anyways, at some point you have to ask yourself if incentives are there to make you feel rewarded or to make you feel too engaged to “give up the loot” and find a better thing to do.

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Best Jakal take :heart_eyes:

When the game starts to feel like a job, or a checklist, or a chore, it’s time to self-check :purple_heart:

That said, imo we can have cake and eat it sometimes! I don’t mean to start an ideological discussion about how we enjoy our games in this poor thread :grin:

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honestly these type of games are meant to be played because of their gameplay, not because of their rewards. as the majority of players play the game because of the gameplay loop.
just like in other 4 players coop games usually.

i think not ironically speaking, the good incentivisation would be the one to have content and so on. because it is sadly lacking so far, but in a great spot after having removed the rng from crafting. Party Finder feature should have the ability to select any map and special condition you want. then it may be used very often perhaps imo.

cosmetics rewards would be cool behind hard/challenging content, some cosmetics that may somewhat show the skill of players. i’d rather to be like that.

active content
just like in any other games. sadly we are getting updates too way slowly.

more fun game modes would also help, something to have fun and with more variety.
along with new weapons (enhancing the gameplay) new maps, new enemies etc.

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how is Swagger able to slip through all those enemies?

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a “proper incentive” like what, and how does that compare to quickplay?

who finds slidespam fun? assuming there is no longer defensive/mobility(also a massive gap between classes that have low stamina regen delay and those who do not) reason for it?
it’s just as tedious as spamming leftclick on knife.

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The party finder not being used has nothing to do with incentives and everything to do with it’s abysmal implementation.

Real incentives would cause someone to actually enjoy the game. Modern gamers don’t want that, they want participation trophies and to watch numbers go up.