The game currently has two side objectives: Collect 3 scriptures, and collect 2 grimoires. This feels a bit weak to me. The game could stand to have more. Here are a few extra ideas:
Locate a payload in the first 1/3 of a mission and carry it to the end: Good for Ogrin. Requires strong teamwork.
Finish the mission in less than 20 minutes: Speed runs can make a game challenging and interesting. Rushing through requires you to pass enemy hordes by that you wouldn’t normally pass by. Just don’t make the time limit too restricting.
Locate, release, and kill an optional boss: Maybe cultists are summoning a special kind of demonhost off the beaten path and if the players locate the ritual and stop it, the demonhost appears in a state that can be killed.
Auspex Scan 5 points: Give the auspex for the whole mission and have it direct them to all 5 points throughout the mission.
Tag Supply Crates for later retrieval: Explore the mission for supply crates and tag them for future teams. Another search mission like scrips and grims, but doesn’t take up an inventory space.
What other thoughts do others have for possible side objectives?
Speedrunning is the worst. There, I said it. I want to have fun playing the game and not having to be rushed.
In addition to the other suggestions, it’d be cool if you could rescue captured guardsmen throughout missions who would travel and fight with you (keeping them alive optional, since escort missions can also be the worst), or come up on stalemate fights that your fireteam helps turn the tide of. I think these would add more to the flavor of the Hive, as opposed to it seemingly being just you 4 running around with all these heretics and that’s it.
This is the biggest misconception with newer players. Rushing through doesn’t mean you pass enemies. IT MEANS YOU KILL THEM FAST.
Sure, there may be some instances where the team identifies you can skip enemies, mainly chaff. But if you can’t kill the big enemies, you don’t rush.
Having a well-equipped team and killing efficiently makes it FAST, it becomes a race to KILL FAST.
Running past enemies and leaving you team behind does a few things.
Splits up the team and causes them to now focus on other things like what you just pulled.
Your other points are interesting. I like the Payload and optional boss.
I would like when a boss ran through the wall during its spawn, that the room it came from wasn’t so clean, maybe it was busy feasting on corpses. Or the boss spawn would open up a short cut, or side path.
My only side objectives were similar to the payload, but the mission where you used the interrogator or servitor skull. it would be neat if you have to carry those to the OBJ, taking up a medkit/ammo/book slot. Only one person would pick it up in the beginning before the door could open, and they couldn’t drop it
After having played 150 hours of the game, I think I can confidently say I’m not a new player. I’ve speed run with friends plenty trying to crank out ‘complete 25 missions’ objectives. We leave tons of enemies behind. Sure, it’s important to kill fast when you need to, and there’s plenty of that. We’re not trying to pass every horde we come across, but if there’s a choice between closing the airlock door and staying back to kill the horde, we close the airlock door.
Your idea with the servitor skull is interesting. I admit, the speedrun secondary objective is a bit of a weak one and I could definitely see it being unpopular. It would just be really easy to implement and would add more variety.