Myths about Havoc

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
1

I seem to run again and again into total myths regarding Havoc, so i decided to debunk them. Im atm cleared for Havoc 27, but as a guy who plays maybe 10 hours a week, maybe isnt the most talented :), I have played a fair bit of Havocs to get there, so i experienced a fair amount of games.

1- “I play only Aurics, im not sweaty enough to play Havoc”
Poeple seem to have this weird notion that there is Aurics and Havoc40 and thats it. Havoc 40 is top of the top, and there is , like the name suggests, 40 levels in between.
My estimated difficulties, from experience playing them and in comparison to Auric/Auric Shock Troop Gauntlet:
1-15 Havoc - This is actually EASIER then normal Aurics. The way i see it, it is for you to get familiar with Havoc format.
15-20 Havoc - Here you get into comparable to Auric Shock Troop Gauntlet dfficulty and surpass it slightly
20-22 Havoc - i dont know if it was circumstential or not, but it seems that sowmwhere around these levels there is a spike in difficulty, both me with my friend and plenty of players seemed to get stuck there for some time.
22-26 Havoc - gradual ramp up, dont see anything to crazy.

2- “I dont want to get hassled about my loadout”

Nobody cares about your loadout in Havoc 1-26, i have never ever experienced a player commenting on my loadout. Only thing that matters is you clearance level, nobody will accept a clearance level 10 on Havoc 20. A title liek “Auric Exemplar” might help to jump over the first few levels, tough nowadays seems evenrbody cheat to get them judging by the insta quits on auric when sombody dies. So you must go slow, advance from level to level

3- “Party finder sucks, I dont want to wait 15 minutes for a game”
Making a party outside of prime time for you timezone can take a while, but in prime time should be under 5 minutes. I have never waited 15 minutes for a game. Also if you are a competent Auric player, you can do the first 12-15 levels with just 1 player, the rest with bots.
If you apply to other games, you will often get rejected for no reasons that you can think of (I sometimes get rejected from level 20 game when im cleared for 27 atm), its the way it is. You can alwys create yuor own party and just wait to gather the party. Imho party finder got a bad reputation becuase its something different and not automatic like quickplay.

4- Havoc players toxicity:
Most players at these levels are just neither specially friendly nor specially toxic. I would say ~10% are really toxic, and will talk crap, but you just block them for next time and move on. ~15% of players imho are really friendly, you can have a laugh with, they will try actively to help other players, looks whats happening to them, not race ahead.

5- “The game shouldnt be balanced around Havoc but around normal modes”
Havoc is a normal mode, like i alrdy described in point 1 , first levels are easier then normal mode. There is nothing demonic about Havoc, you can balance the game both for Havoc and Auric levels.

Overall for me, as a semi casuall (~10 hours a week), semi try hard, Havoc is pretty fun and i wish poeple would try it. Its got problems, but is imho a natural progrssion for poeple who really like the game and want something a bit harder, a ladder they can climb and improve, its pretty fun.

2

As someone who hovers around the same havoc levels as you do, this post is very true, especially regarding wait times. I’ve never understood the complaints over finding a match at lower havoc levels since like you mentioned, at peak hours there is always a lobby open around my clearance level. And on the off chance I have to put up my own party, it gets filled up pretty quickly!

3

This isn’t taking into consideration the complete and utter lack of Player agency, though. Havoc’s Difficulties aren’t something that you can just SELECT and play at will like you can with Adventure.

Ah, yes, because recognition that Havoc, specifically high Havocs, have an abundance of unique Modifiers that create artificial difficulty with things outside of Auric’s realm as well as perpetuating genuine balancing issues for the rest of the game, thus holding the game’s balancing hostage… is a myth.

I mean, generally speaking, a game should NEVER be balanced around its highest Difficulty, that’s just a given. But Havoc is ESPECIALLY problematic to balance the rest of Darktide around because of the inconsistencies. It’s just basic logic.

Stop spreading misinformation, Mr. Information doesn’t like it.

4

neither in h40 nobody cares about your loadout, cause people play for the challenge, but i guess you don’t see that, since you play below h30 range

but there is obviously people that want to grind for the rank, which is one of the issues with havoc, the demotion system forcing majority of players going with loadouts that make it easy

and that’s why they will use meta loadouts and deny other people loadouts
when in reality, any loadout works if you really want and you are good with it, especially in a full team squad.

not always but sometimes havoc is lacking of players, so many people would actually just accept anyone regardless anyway, because everyone just wants to play and experience the “final” challenge.

and so there is very less people declining because otherwise they would wait a while to find players. but then there is people like fuplaayz and others with the inspect mod for example, that would rather wait hours til they find someone with chorus and purgatus

5

Lol. I kept getting rejected with my Chorus, even on missions below my own rank

6

prob you are capping/larping just to prove me wrong for no reason
but even so, statistically my point stands still, it is statistics

and also… there is the fact that (noob) people think high true level = skill
so if you have a low true level… they going reject you for that too, you never thought about it?
you know there can be multiple reasons, right? :thinking:

for the records,
[ true level / rank doesn’t indicate any actual skill ]

7

Also, you get bumped to clearance level 16 if you finish a maelstorm.

8

Sure but i was nowhere talking about that, i was talking about difficulty generally. If i dont feel like playing at my best, sure you cna play Aurics, or as I do, join other parties,play lower Havocs helping other poeple advance.

I dont find that convincing. The general problems are same here and here, regardless of modifiers, at least at my level. Uncanny strike was a problem in both modes. The fact that you rarely get to interact with Crushers , because they get deleted by blitzes, is the same (and the problem of waves of them to counteract it).

Do be so sure about being right , reality doesnt like it.

9

Ah didnt know that, nice.

10

Havoc’s modifiers make it a very different meta, particularly at high Havoc levels, than the “normal” game, and this has impacts when Fatshark attempts to address it.

Pysker’s Bubble Shield for example got nerfed as a result of Havoc performance where the differences in the Toughness mechanic and high prevalance of Gunners made the Shield dramatically and consistently more capable and useful than anyone would ever find it playing Auric.

11

You must also remember people like me who uses the inspect mod and waits hours til they find someone without chorus and purgatus

12

Thats a fair example. MAybe im partially wrong about this, tough i still think big part of gameplay and problems is same.

13

i rather wait 30 min than fail 5 times in a row, and i dont want to sweat blood cuz u play your shitty build

14

the “weird notion”, thanks to the ladder system, is rather seeing dudes permastuck at below-40 like a sign “want to but cant”

as for the rest, no bragging rights and no final challenge below 40 either, so why bother?

you play since beta a couple hours a day, all thats left to “enjoy” is to go above and beyond.

that can be beating dudes at the killfeed in auric maelstrom or doing hav40 with stuff people feel weak to bring.

you climbed mt everest a couple dozen times, you dont bother with molehills.

one thing though about havoc

that aint the issue, neither got their voices (they remain mute pixels) nor do i bother with the chat.

the issue is dealing with them in the first place rather than picking 40 and hit play.

every other mode its totally irrelevant whos there or if theres anyone at all, you start in the hangar and “play”

if havoc was like that id play it daily, this way i rather renew my eartag every season to shut up any arguments and be done :man_shrugging:

15

“Yes, Inquisitor, there is the META Heretic. Right there…”

16

i guess you really need the 50 plasteel from winning easily

sweating blood is the most fun this game can be

17

do your own party and dont cry if u dont get invited, problem solved

18

Because its fun lol? You know its just a game, and i dont know about you, but most of my frineds wouldnt be very impressed if i told them i got very good at a video game.

Who thinks like that lol. “Want but cant”??? I mean its a video game, so im not good enough yet to play havoc 40, who cares lol. As long as im having fun and im slowly advancing… I would say in fact, im the happier one, because i still got a goal and the journey is all the fun. I would imagine part of the fun evaporates once you reach that final difficulty level.

19

Thats your perosonal approach, for many of us the social aspect is somehow important. And muting the voice chat imho degrades the game, as you cant coordinate and miss the fun chats you can have with the ~15% frinedly poeple.

20

Interestingly, a large number of people on the forum take this game more seriously than their jobs, if they actually have jobs, that is
They have completely forgotten the simple concept of enjoying a game