Quickplay Discussion

Can we get a discussion going about the quickplay system and ways to improve it? Haven’t seen any threads about it for some time now, and I’d hate for fatshark to think that just because people stopped complaining and are living with it means it’s a good system.

Carrot, or whip?

Outside of deeds and hunting for specific challenges (like completing all the maps for all the careers), mostly everyone is playing QP because of the added loot bonus. But in which direction does this go, do you see it as an added bonus to queing QP? Or is it rather a deterrent from playing non-QP games?

Does anyone actually feel rewarded for playing QP and getting that bonus loot chance? Or is it more that people feel punished or that they’re missing out if theyre not playing QP?

Maybe compare it to World of Warcraft and the experience bonus you get when you haven’t played in a while. In this game, when you’ve been away/offline/whatever for long enough, you get bonus experience for the next X amount of experience earned based on the time you were away. That seems like a nice bonus, right? That’s because it’s intention is somewhat cleverly masked. They first incorporated a similar mechanic to this, where they gave you less experience for playing through content if you had played for a long time without taking a break. This was to make speed leveling harder, but it wasn’t exactly well-received by the community. So instead, they did this fantastically clever thing where they nerfed experience gain all across the board, and instead gave you bonus experience for being away for some time, effectively accomplishing the same thing, but instead of feeling punished for playing a lot, you just felt like you recieved something nice when you returned instead.

They took their punishment, and cleverly disguised it as a reward.

What other game do I know of that tries to implement this system, but just makes the experience awful instead? Oh yeah, it’s this one.

I don’t play QP because of that fantastic feeling I get when I see the quickplay bonus get added to the bar at the end of a mission, I play it because if I don’t play QP and see the bar being halfway short to an emperors vault because of the QP-bonus being greyed out, I’m gonna feel like I was cheated for playing the map I wanted. That’s not a reward, that’s just straight up garbage.

Why should I get less rewards for playing a specific map that I wanted to play? It’s the exact opposite from Vermintide 1, where you had contracts from the board incentivising playing a specific map, but it wasn’t like it removed one of the dice from ranalds bones if I wanted to play another map anyways. I felt rewarded for playing what they wanted me to play, but I sure as hell didn’t feel cheated on because I wanted to play a quick black powder or whatever instead.

But it’s not actual punishment, you’re just getting on average a little less loot, it’s not the end of the world you entitled brat”. It’s not even the fact that I’m somehow getting less loot for playing specific maps that triggers me the most, it’s the fact that they flaunt it in your face every time you play a map without QP. “Well would you look at that, you were just a little short of the next loot tier, guess what would have pushed the bar over the edge? That’s right, the quickplay bonus sitting there all greyed out and lonely. Do you feel bad yet??”

The entire loot system is designed in a way to be as addicting as possible with the way it resembles loot boxes, the way you watch the pretty animations of the boxes and the bar exploding when you reach a new tier. That’s my biggest problem with it. I have more than enough reds by now, I don’t shed any tears over a “lost” emperors vault. But the system is literally designed to make me want that bar filled all the way, and it’s very much in the same way designed to make me feel bad when I don’t get all the “bonuses” that I should, thereby incentivising me to go play QP.


And to top it all of, their weighted algorithm for the QP map selection is the straw that breaks the camels back. Why would you rig your system to send people off to maps that they have lower completion rates for? Where and how is this fun for the player? So I just queued up for my 4th QP blightreaper in a row, and because of how boring I find the map, I’m gonna keep abandoning/jumping into the water at the start after completing it once for the day. But that just makes it more likely that I’ll get it again?!? So it’s basically, get a map of the AIs choosing, sit through this map (doesn’t matter that you had it thrice already today, bless RNG), and if you don’t sit through it, the AI is gonna cram it down your throat until you do!

Maybe I should start intentionally losing on the maps that I do enjoy so I’ll get to play them more often?

Because I haven’t really seen that many screaming bells or righteous stands lately, because those maps usually go better than the rest. That also sounds like good design, making players get to play less on the maps they do well on. For what? Making them less likely to receive loot because they would be winning more often if they got to play those maps? Thereby letting them acquire veteran items faster than you’d like? I really see no other reasonable argument to be made for it.

I realise as I’m writing this that I’m probably coming off as pretty salty and bitter, but that’s because there’s really no need for the system to be this way. I very much love playing vermintide, both the first one and now the second, but seeing these reverse QoL-changes just boggle the mind with how they sour the entire experience.


So, what can be done about it?

Well, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that Fatshark isn’t just gonna go ahead and remove this system, no matter how silly it is, because that would negate time and energy spent on implementing it or whatever.

But there could be at least some QoL changes to make it feel less shitty, even if you don’t want to fix the entire system.

  • Make it an option to remove the post-match loot bar entirely. The box/vault you get is determined before the whole flashy animation anyways, just let me skip ranald stopping the bar just before the next loot tier like a sadistic prick and just put the chest in my inventory right away, whichever it may be. This would at least reduce the frustration.

  • Let me put a couple vetoes up for maps that I genuinely don’t want to touch when I’m queuing for QP. I would again rather you ditch the entire system, but at least letting me put a veto on whatever map I just ran twice in a row would help, because I don’t trust your supposed negative weighting system in the slightest.

I’m sure there are other suggestions and ways to improve the system if we are going to have to continually suffer through its existence, so please share any and all feedback and improvements you might think of to make it more bearable.

All right, thanks for reading, and I hope that anyone from Fatshark who reads this knows that the critique comes from a love for the game, and you wont ban me from being overly salty or whatever.

TL;DR: Please just remove QP and all of its suffering from this game, or at least do something about it.

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HOLY BATMAN CHEESECAKES

this is a huge wall of text

imo: i like quickplay, but i don’t like playing repeated maps

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Quickplay DOES work as a system if you’re levelling characters and attempting to get your first couple of reds, as pushing the reward bar to the next tier does feel rewarding when you get your first couple of reds.

Once you’ve got everyone to level 30, and have a set of trinkets and weapons that you’ve rerolled to suit - then QP XP reward becomes irrelevant and is as you described - so to have a proper look at QP I think we need to understand QP is only a complete pain when it is part of the end-game content.

Replaying maps you have failed at when you’re At Recruit or Veteran might be a good way of getting players to develop newer techniques for dealing with problems on those maps, and the QP bonus is not an issue for people doing less-than-legend difficulties as they’re not really gunning for red-lootz anyhow.

The rotation of maps is an issue for people at higher difficulties really, although playing the same thing over and over is irritating. I maintain it would still be a good thing to have the buttons to vote for the next map at the end of a successful QP run, like in VT1.

In the OP @Fattigkussen you have highlighted why QP is a thing in the first place - running Horn of Magnus, Screaming Bell or Righteous Stand over and over and over because it’s the only thing people are hosting because the runs go smoother and are shorter and give a better chance of loot is just as brain-numbingly boring. Before Quest and Contracts in VT1 it was infuriatingly hard to get any map other than HoM because it was the sure-fire way to get a smooth run with better loot. If I didn’t get repeated maps so often, or I got to vote at the end of a run for the next map, I think QP irritation might virtually go away.

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Good summation of the problem, thank you.

I would like a map-voting system like in a lot of multiplayer games. You start quickplay and you get presented with three buttons: each one for a different random map. The majority vote of the team chooses the map. In case of a split vote, it is a random choice between the two.

You could even combine this mechanic with the end of the map, where you get the choices “Map1”, “Map2”, “Return to Keep”. This would feel pretty nice, as you get the most gameplay out of your time by playing maps back-to-back.

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I’m fine with parts of quick play, mainly how it incentivizes playing random maps and playing with others. If the system wasn’t there players would probably start running the shortest maps, fort/halescourge, for the most efficient chests.

I’m however quite unhappy with the QP map selection algorithm. As you mention, it allows for repeats and uses weights based on map completions. Pretty sure it’ll be a problem whenever new maps are released, since it’ll lean towards those new low completion maps.

They should have used a Fisher-Yates shuffle for map selection, or done a similar fix and disallowed maps from repeating within a short range (i.e. no map repeats until like ~6 maps later). There is a mod to fix this, but mod approval waves are now nonexistent and the modded realm has its downsides. This means the modding scene is mostly dead (because why make mods no one will use), but that’s its own topic.

I’d like to know their rationale for this map selection design, as it seems poor. Too many downsides for not enough upsides imo, but perhaps they have a specific reason for using it.

I’d be fine without map vetos if the maps were closer together in length/difficulty. Boss maps got dice, so that’s fine, but some maps take a good bit longer or seem more difficult. I’d personally veto both of the new DLC maps in a heartbeat.

I’d be very happy if I could skip the chest animation. To me it’s just a waste of time, just take me to the scoreboard (that is still possible to miss completely). I’m either alt-tabbed or not looking at my computer screen anyway.

But I disagree with the other point. To be addicting, the game has to actually reward you. Cosmetic chest hats are effectively nonexistent and are largely just minor variants (and only tied to XP chests anyway). Reds are largely duplicates, with far too much jewelry. Also no extreme RNG protection exists, so you could be screwed anyway.

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The idea behind quickplay works and is a good one. It incentivies people to not just play one map all the time (v1, horn of magnus). But the way it does it is bad.
Your idea of mapvote sounds decent. Another idea would be to do it similiar like v1. Each day/week (either for a full week or just a day) you can complete the weekly and/or daily quests only on specific maps. Those maps would be the same for everyone. Its not like quests force you to play any different from a normal run. So there wouldnt be any competition to do things differently.

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Qp on it self is nice. And I think getting this extra half a bar for not being prepared for the maps is nice or because you filled an empty Spott in an runn Ing Team.

But their Algorithm Makes people hate some of their besten mapps. (Honestly if i got one pit/blightreaver/or skittergate a day i’d See them as the fantastic,Huge and open maps they are . But dooing one of them 3 times in a row deminishes their popularity. Yet it seems like it was month Ago i played empire/or against the grain.

Yet trying too Farm reds choosing mapps seems
An non Option.
Too get the Border vor/Rekrut Veteran for bardin wich ist the only Char i played in the last 200 runns .
I needet too chose 4 maps manually because i lvld too 600 HP before challanges where there

So in maybe an 50 attemted runns doing champ+ i got brachsenbrücke for example 2 times and failed the First one . So getting the "do all maps on x dificulty with a class " cosmetics might take you about 1.5 months of Casual play on Qp
And win all runs you play
That is really not the ideal way i hope.

As a side Note. If you are not completly and I mean litteraly decked Out on loot or dont Care for reds.not playing Qp
Ist an non Option. Exept you wanna powerrun skittergate and hope for ranalds. Yet again if you wanna run one map 8x a day you might as well play Qp.

I have about 15 deeds on Rekrut/Veteran

And they are completly Useless. Exept for the challanges for Borders. But when i dropped the Rekrut ones they where harder than champ,gave me a rek Generals and no Qp Bonus so i could get 2x better loot and if it was for the dificulty
Move closer towards champ,legend
If i ignored any deeds i dropp.

Atritiob deeds are bs btw not gonna doo a deed for a General+peasant-merchant chest if i can now churn Out emp chest on every run with a Boss. Books Need too be included in These.

PS.
If you dont have a mate too joine and then que up for Qp have fun joining some guy from down under with 300ms. If you dropp Out of a game or the host dcs you dont get Qp Bonus on rejoin. And the automatic reconnect never workers for me eiter. If the host dced you just dropp the run and if you dc you still automaticly Restart the map alone with bots and with Out Qp so you have too wait 2 extra loadIng Screens and an introduction before you can attemted too reconnect manually too your Team just getting 50% bar less now

Personally, I don’t have a problem with the Bonus. It is just that, a slight bonus for not knowing what to expect. Never have I felt “cheated” by it. That one chest tier it may or may not grant doesn’t affect the chances of Reds (or others) that much, but it’s nice to have.

I play precious little of QP anyway, but I do think repeating maps and the rotation is problematic. So I think that setting up a “buffer” of maybe five maps, so that none of the last five maps can be replayed would make things more comfortable for everyone. No repeating of the same maps, not even close to each other, and on a decent-length night (~2.5-3 hrs) you even wouldn’t get any doubles. The size of five would be a third of the current map rotation, so there’s still plenty of choices for the next map.

I don’t think giving players the ability to exclude any map from the rotation would be a good idea. In the worst cases, that could exclude four (if vote is for one) or even eight (if vote is for two) maps from the rotation. The former is almost a third of the maps removed completely, the second is over half. And the chances that the players’ wants line up (at least fully) isn’t that high, especially with randoms, so likely some maps that you like are on another’s exclusion list for one reason or another.

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Good replies, nice to see some suggestions being thrown out.

I can understand the reasoning for QP at a fundamental level, I was there for the launch of vermintide 1, and like you say there was Horn of Magnus, Horn of Magnus, and then some more Horn of Magnus.

It’s more the execution that needs to be looked at then, because the algorithm isn’t at all cutting it right now.

I like both the idea of some kind of voting system like in the first, and/or also having a prolonged buffer system like @Yzneftamz suggested, just little changes like these would go a long way of reducing the frustration involved.

I still hold fast on the QP-bonus being a punishment more than a reward, but at least if they improved the system overall it wouldn’t feel so in-your-face.

@Fatshark_Hedge do you know if any changes are in store for QP? If not, please consider any of the suggestions in this thread because it’s definitely needed. Thanks.

The purpose of quickplay is to add an incentive for people to play through random maps, rather than selecting the quickest ones to maximise farm potential of picking the quickest map to run through. It’s also a way to get people to meet other people, other Vermintide 2 players. This is a coop game and we wanted to add an incentive people cooping with other people playing.

What we determine to be the biggest pitfall currently with QP is, as many noted above, the way in which maps are selected, and we’re currently in the process of reworking the QP map selection behaviour.

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I like to play every map I QP as a rule, most of my friends do not, which is frustrating as I know that when I’m playing with them I’ll get “Both DLC maps/War camp/Althel Yenlui” or similar much more frequently as they always abandon it, which means I’m abandoning it, which I believe raises the chance we’ll get it again.

The thing I find really frustrating is that when I play in PUG’s I get all the maps they complain about not getting… which seems to suggest to me they are in a trap/loop of their own creation.

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Personally, I would like a veto system for QP up to a certain level of maps. I almost always get Bogenhafen maps when I use QP, and it gets old very quick. If I could veto up to 3 maps (The Pit, The Blightreaper, and Athel Yenuli) but still be joining a random map it would be perfect. I personally think this is the only real change needed for QP at the moment.

I disagree with a veto system at this stage. With the few maps we have now and the relatively small pool of players searching at any one time, I think the ability to veto maps would completely destroy the search times for games and all but kill quickplay as a gamemode.

I’ve personally never had an issue finding players, and am not sure it would really be an issue. On top of that, limiting the amount of vetoes as I mentioned would avoid that issue for the most part.

Well I’m glad that your region has enough players, but I played for a couple of hours yesterday and had multiple games where nobody joined. If people here start vetoing matches, I might as well become one of those wierdos who only plays with bots. And honestly I’d rather quit the game than do that.

Remove blightreaper and the pit from quickplay.

That is all.

Thank you.

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I don’t mind them, but they’re literally all I ever get when I quickplay. They need to fix the algorithm that decides what maps get selected, because it’s out of control.

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