This is the opposite of helpful.
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Factually most people dont think it is fun, and games are meant to be fun.
If it is ever introduced, it should be the last thing on the list, as the current state of the game doesnt allow for this mechanic to be implemented in a fair way, and even then when all surrounding issues are fixed, it will still be a crappy way of increasing difficulty. Maybe they should put it in difficulties of 5 and above if there ever are any, that way the masochists have their way too.
Maybe add a level 6 where if you take fire damage your GPU explodes, i dont know i dont care, just leave our normie 1-4 alone, it was good before and nobody asked for it to be changed.
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Itās all very well to be dismissive, but Iām struggling to see coherent arguments against the chip in this thread or elsewhere. āIt isnāt funā isnāt really insightful criticism, and half the other complaints Iāve seen sound more like theyāre railing against enemies spawning right behind you (fair enough) then conflating that with health chip. All the hyperbole of ātoughness is uselessā certainly doesnāt help understand where the anti chip gang is coming from exactly. And everyone agrees the tutorial needs to match what happens in game but that isnāt realistically an argument one way or the other.
Also interesting I keep seeing people using heresy and damnation to defend why they donāt like health chip, but Iām getting this sense from a number of posters that confidently completing top difficulty maps while weāve had the game for like 2 weeks should be expected. I donāt know, I just wanna see the meta and such settle for top difficulties before we try to judge where they realistically stand. Itās also a struggle to tell if people think this is a difficulty issue or just a base mechanics issue. If the latter the people who keep making accusations about what difficulty others play need to stop, if itās just a bad mechanic period that should observable across more than just the top 2 difficulties. If it IS a difficulty issue for people, well where you want the difficulty to be is extremely subjective, and Iād argue if people are clearing damnation even 50% of the time currently when the game isnāt even fully released yetā¦ Iām not at all convinced chip damage is making the game ātoo hardā, at least relative to what Iād like from the highest possible difficulty.
We can argue all day about what does and doesnāt constitute āunavoidableā damage, but ultimately weāre just arguing what level of attrition we think is challenging and enjoyable, and since that is going to be deeply subjective a lot of people here could afford to chill out a bit and accept different view points are reasonable (please note this is directed to both sides of the argument). However all the emotive language and name calling from both sides is making it extremely hard to properly understand the arguments from both sides.
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I think we can all agree that the tutorial teaching you that health damage happens after your toughness is broken is pants on head.
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Yeah, first impressions matter a lot and the fact THE TUTORIAL tells you that you only take health damage after toughness runs out probably set a lot of people off after finding out it doesnāt.
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How is āitās not fun to deal withā not insightful? Weāre talking about a videogame that is ostensibly meant to be āfunā. Are you expecting a college essay from everyone with an opinion about the game? Itās good to have people state clearly why they dislike or like something, but sometimes they just like or dislike something in a way that isnāt immediately easy to explain.
And you missed the main gripe I and many others have with it, which is that melee chip completely neuters all of Zealot Preacherās low-health buff feats, his Martyrdom passive, and his Until Death passive. Dead feats are objectively bad balance and will always be.
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Sure, but if your primary argument is just that you personally donāt enjoy it but canāt articulate why you think it is bad, then probably chill with demanding it needs to be immediately rectified, since none of us have clear data on what % of players currently do or do not enjoy the chip damage element.
That argument is built on an awkward assumption and completely fails to recognise the slew of bugs that are far more consequential in killing that build. Firstly just because low health talents exists, that doesnāt mean youāre meant to stay at low health all the time. Thatās about as illogical as having a revive speed talent and assuming you are therefore meant to down your team mates with every explosive barrel you see in order to get use out of the bonus. āBut what if nobody goes down? Itās useless?ā Yes, thatās how insurance works. Zealot low health talents are there to help you do well in bad situations when they occur. Yes they are undertuned currently, I will probably post a Zealot feedback thread at some point with my own take on how to address those.
But honestly you can put all that aside, because Martyrdom just doesnāt work nearly how its description says currently. If it did, and Iām stacking health curious, I am entirely unconvinced that staying at a relatively high stack count of Martyrdom would be unreasonable. Youād be down 90 health out of probably way over 300 to achieve max stacks, plus you have your free down every 90s with the ability to heal from that. Any attempt to draw Zealotās ālow health buildā into this discussion feels like a truly long bow while the myriad of other issues around it completely dwarf the effect hp chip has by comparison.
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The good points were all made earlier this thread at around post 130 or so.
Anyway, since you clearly want them all summarized, here is a summary:
ā Chip Damage clearly wasnāt the intended first design, as it plays the toughness break sound and visual effect on taking chip damage. Furthermore the tutorial makes it clear as there is no chip damage in it
ā Chip Damage makes you drop mission items immediately, even though you have toughness and should be able to shrug it off
ā Chip Damage means getting stunned, despite having toughness and it affects all the melee classes worse, it feels outright clunky
ā Chip Damage invalidates the entire Zealot schtick and yes, if you check his penances he clearly is meant to be played low-health high-toughness
ā Chip Damage invalidates several penance challenges that were designed around not having your toughness broken
ā Chip Damage invalidates the need for toughness to begin with, you will just eat all that damage anyway so why bother gearing for toughness?
ā Chip Damage gets you killed very cheaply. Difficulty is good, but artificial cheap difficulty is bad and will be perceived negatively
ā It is a contrived and stupid change that was made in the last content patch before the servers went down and it needs to go
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Yes, actually, if you want significant value out of that talent, ie you donāt want it to be a dead slot, it does. Players are logically going to adjust their playstyle to get as much value out of their talents as possible. Come on now. Vermintide 2ās careers are practically built upon this assumption.
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While chip damage felt bad at first, the only real kicker is hurting zealotās free death. If zealot also had a talent choice āMelee attacks donāt deal chip damage when health is below x%ā (5, 10, 20, or whatever balances it) I feel like it would be a reasonable compromise, make it compete with other valuable talents.
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Also affects anyone trying to take a shot and getting touched by the weakest mob resulting in missing. Forces the player to resolve ALL background enemies before engaging ranged, severely changing gameplay loops.
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Iām going to agree with all of this and also throw in that, even Cataclysm in VT2 relied heavily on their own form of toughness. Temp HP. Imagine if the game let you take permanent health damage through your temp HP bar. Between lapses in concentration, bugs on enemies not playing sounds or warnings of impending attacks, or simply lag to the server, some attacks are unavoidable.
Hell, Iāve gotten the sound warning, dodged correctly, and been hit. Iāve seen dogs pounce where I was before dodging, turn 90 degrees and instantly snap on top of me. Lag is very real in Darktide and is probably the biggest reason by itself why toughness needs to be a shield, not armor. Some people will be hit more than others explicitly because of dedicated servers and slightly bad implementation of them. The 360 no-woof dog pounces are just humorous examples of the problems lag can seemingly cause.
And donāt forget, we have 2 forms of chip damage now. Health damage through toughness that punishes the loser the more they are struggling, and corruption bleedthrough from infested enemies. We definitely shouldnāt have both. And Iām actually fine with corruption bleedthrough. Itās thematic, makes sense, and I like corruption a lot more than just flat health reductions, especially its interaction with the wound system. So having a second form of bleedthrough is actually redundant and not conducive to a good gameplay experience.
To people who like bleedthrough, remember this. The game is going to be balanced around bleedthrough, or a lack thereof. Not having it isnāt somehow going to make the game magically easier. Itās just, simply, going to make the game less stupid. All else is negotiable, bleedthrough needs to go because itās not a fun mechanic and has major gameplay problems associated with it.
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Despite my better judgement I actually have read the vast, vast majority of this thread, I stand by saying the arguments against it are scattershot, barely coherent.
Status Quo isnāt a real argument. Visual and audio issues can be rectified, that does nothing to show the mechanic is bad, just that other parts of the game havenāt been fixed to match yet.
Melee hits have literally always staggered you in Tide games, itās never been unreasonable before, it still isnāt.
Again, debatable that is a bad thing. In VT2 if you got hit while carrying an explosive barrel objective it would light its fuse. Doesnāt seem worse here.
This is a little odd since everywhere else I see people complaining that penances encourage terrible gameplay. Now here it is being used to defend the intended way to play a class. Do I need to elaborate further why that isnāt convincing? Also see my other comment regarding broken Martyrdom. Unreasonable to link low health build not working exclusively to chip damage currently.
Penances are a mess regardless. They need another pass. I donāt think theyāre relevant to whether or not melee chip is a good gameplay mechanic.
Very debatable. Itās literally damage reduction if not empty and completely blocks ranged attacks. Itās extremely far from invalidated when it can make the difference between taking 5 damage or 50 damage from a hit. I will be waiting to see how the meta settles before judging the worth of toughness curios.
This is a just a your mileage may vary case really. You have people in here saying they donāt find it artificial and feels like a good part of the challenge for higher difficulties. Again FS is hopefully gathering wider data. Fair to say you donāt enjoy how it adds to the challenge, also fair to say you do enjoy it.
Thatās not even an argument anymore, youāre just saying you donāt like it. Lots of mechanics in games are contrived, but the complexity of melee combat in Tide games is what has kept me playing. Yes if it stays it should be explained well in the tutorial, then it wonāt feel nearly as contrived.
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Iāve said this before and Iāll say it again, VT2 Zealot is the worst designed class Iāve ever seen and itās not close. Again, I agree the low health feats are undertuned. I disagree that means youāre meant to play the whole game at low health, or that making it reasonable to do so would be healthy for the game or good class design. Anyway thatās really very aside from the main points, do can we please not get too lost on that tangent? The more relevant part is how Martyrdom doesnāt even stack correctly and the attack speed on low health feat clearly hasnāt been updated to match DT.
Iām going to focus on this thing, specifically. My argument will be slightly hyperbolic, but bear with it. I am making a point.
Before World of Warcraft, MMOs were seen as very grindy, massive time sinks. Now, World of Warcraft is seen as the very grindy, massive time sink.
FPS games used to have healthbars, occasionally armor on top. Now theyāre mostly shields that regenerate, sometimes shields with health bars underneath.
Left 4 dead used to just be straight health, any damage was bad. You also had infinite shoving, limited ammo except on your bad pistol, more limited resources yada yada.
A lot of these features, these designs, these goals, have been removed from games or otherwise changed to remove or lesson the problems with them.
To say that āMelee hits have literally always staggered in these games,ā isnāt a good argument. It is an appeal to tradition. If game design was handled this way, then weād all still be playing games that looked like quake, or doom, or Warcraft 1. No one would be attempting to iterate on designs, try to fix things that were problematic. Weād be stuck in the past.
The only difference, here, now, is that this is the first time Fatshark has shown us, the players, what the game would be like with temp HP operating as a rechargeable shield instead of something farmed. Itās something innate, always useful, always powerful, but with the game designed around it. And most people think the design is better for it.
To put it another way, how many people have actively complained about friendly fire not being in Darktide at the moment? How hard is the game when compared to VT2? Iād argue that DT is the vastly harder game despite a lack of FF. Having FF in it would actually make the game worse and a hell of a lot harder. Yet very few, if any, people are actively asking for it. Iterating on the design, removing things that are staples of the genre, often is the path forward.
And hereās the crazy thing. You can still have a really hard game without them. Melee stagger isnāt necessary. Bleedthrough isnāt necessary. Friendly Fire isnāt necessary. Yes, I know weāre mostly talking about 1 or 2 things, but I can say with certainty that the zealot talent for melee attacks not staggering you is a godsend when using weapons like the Eviscerator, and I would happily take it just to enjoy melee combat in Vermintide 2 if they decided to add this system to that game.
No, really. I think melee stagger is actively holding back VT2 now that Iāve seen a 'Tide game without it. The game would be less frustrating. It would arguably also be easier but, you know, you can always change the balance elsewhere. Iām not looking to nerf the game, Iām looking to make the game simply less full of frustrating design decisions.
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To add to that it also interrupts stamina recharge just long enough to be noticeable.
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This was a beta forum as of some hours ago, so I donāt know what youāre expecting people to do here except post about things they like and things they want to be changed.
Either way this discussion is now meaningless until the release comes out and we see if Fatshark has addressed the topic in any way. See you at release!
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And yet itās one of the most powerful classes with insanely strong builds? Perhaps your subjective take on an established and balanced system isnāt grounds for completely revamping a class designed around a wholly different mechanism that we were not testing out.
It is in fact ALWAYS damage reduction, which is the issue most have pointed.
Here is where I want to point out a very clear issue that players claiming high skill are missing, VT2 full health, you could drop from full in just a few hits. The same time scale applies to darktide, you take a hit to drop your toughness, and then another to drop your health. All the toughness + no chip system in reality is doing is actually limiting our potential temp health compared to VT2, where we could sit on 1 HP but have a whole health bar of temporary health, which barely ticked away.
I do not know why the pro-chip players in this thread overlook and insist that it will be a constant shield, when at the mentioned difficulties, it is only giving you a pre capped temp health above your overall health, with methods to maintain it
I also want to add that it is very disappointing to see most of the pro-chip players behaving so rudely.
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lmao you have NO idea. Any dissenting opinion about how clunky this gameās mechanics are is met with zealous condescension. Itās wild.
For sure. No issues with criticism, or even simply expressin you donāt like something. Just a bit sick of some it the vitriol flying about but Iāll admit itās pretty pointless to bemoan that. At least when hatred of a mechanic is paired with more detailed breakdown thereās more room for discussion. But the discussion has moved back towards discussing specifically how the system interacts with other mechanics and thatās great. Where Iām at with it currently is Iād still like to wait and see a bit how it all feels when other bugs get fixed and hopefully enemy AI and spawns are smoothed out more.
I think youāve misunderstood me here. I was a Saltz main and from playing since pre release till very recently, my view is that VT2 Zealot is disgustingly strong, all reward no risk despite the initial appearance of the class mechanics. We could go into a long argument about VT2 Zealot and the pros and cons of its design, but perhaps better suited for a Zealot specific thread? As said before I might post a Zealot specific feedback thread, so perhaps we could continue this there at some point. Might be a bit pointless so close to release though, very curious to see what changes with full release.
Iām not sure Iāve done this? I have pointed out elsewhere that the potential for very high toughness regen is definitely present, as well as high toughness DR at least on Zealot. Currently chip damage ensures every melee attack you take punishes you, even if youāre not being hit consecutively very often. As I said earlier, I think therefore how you feel about it will rely heavily on how much attrition you feel is too much. Personally I currently donāt mind feeling like Iām punished for every melee attack I eat. Itās tense and forces me to play more cautiously and more attentively. I can understand the other perspective that that is too much attrition, but I really would like to see how it feels when other aspects of the game are smoothed out. One things Iād agree is too much is it pausing stam regen as pointed out by @zaygr. Even if that does kinda make sense, thatās where it is getting a little needlessly punishing for my tastes.
Is this pointed at me? Can you point out where Iāve been rude? Itās certainly not my intention. I could certainly counter by pointing out I could collate a large collection of anti chip players being very rude to both other players and the devs without offering much constructive, and certainly not always as a response to pro chip players being condescending. However that would really just degrade the quality of this thread further going down a he said she said rabbit hole. I enjoy arguing mechanics in a civil fashion. So Iām happy to be called out if I contribute to escalating hostility.
@Taranok thanks for the detailed post about melee hit stun. Iāll read through it thoroughly and respond a little later.
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