It’s not mutually exclusive. The system should support both casuals AND veterans. Wanting numerically upgraded gear after 1800 hours is excessive. The crafting systems are harmful to both casual and non-casual players.
You also don’t want some rare resource only on damnation/maelstrom missions otherwise people that have the skill level and comfort to play on malice (apparently the most played difficulty) will farm on difficulties they really shouldn’t. The highest difficulty should give no extra benefit to resource collection and have a high fail rate for people who really want a challenge. Like Cataclysm from VT2.
I am playing darktide to play the builds I want inside darktide, builds that require specific setups.
Would you be up for it if brining back the number of players meant you couldn’t get better gear after 1800 hours?
Long term excessive grind is better served by cosmetics, borders, weapon skins, etc.
If we decide “winning” is a 380 base with perfect stats and 2 T4 perjs and blessings of specific types on a specific mark… I have better odds at the casino.
[quote=“brosgw, post:2359, topic:79281”]
The system should support both casuals AND veterans. Wanting numerically upgraded gear after 1800 hours is excessive. The crafting systems are harmful to both casual and non-casual players.
[/quote] This is a prime example of a strawman argument.You base your argument on my listed playtime. The issue here, is you’re just looking at what Steam says, and that doesn’t show how much I played. I could have just left the game on without playing it for a long time.
Cataclysm was a difficulty that people rarely played… Probably because it had no rewards than what a lower difficulty already gave you. If you’re trying to have a min-maxed weapon for malice, you might be missing the mark. Malice is the difficulty where you can safely use any weapon. You keep shifting your stance, sometimes aiming to please casual players and other times targeting hardcore gamers. It seems like you’re unsure which direction to commit to.
That is descriptive of a hardcore gamer, not a casual one. So, if I am understanding you, you’re trying to advocate the allegedly vocal majority of a minority set of players.
I actually picked up most of my gear way before hitting 1800 hours. I’ve been rocking the same Purgatus Staff since a month after the beta, the same sword for over a year, and my Voidstrike Staff is about six months old. I just mess around with other stuff when I feel like it. You’re assuming I spent all that time actively playing, and that I only got my gear right at the 1800-hour mark. You’re setting this random benchmark without offering any of your own stats—not that it matters to me, because like you said, you’d ditch your whole setup for a “better” system. It seems like you’re just pushing for changes that benefit you, not the whole DT community by suggesting that the harder difficulties have no reward or incentive. It would appear that you don’t value achievement at all.
That’s your definition of what a win is. For me, if I can find a weapon with 75% on two main stats and >70% on the two others, that’s fine. Don’t care about the dump stat. And if I can get one perk I like and one blessing I like, I can modify the other two to synergize with it. This approach has led to a lot of theorycrafting that I’ve enjoyed. I’ve discovered quite a bit with this method instead of just trying to force what I want and discarding it because it isn’t what I want.
I’m starting to think your approach to playing this game is beyond niche and requires something that is impossible from the start and that’s what you’re really complaining about - which is fine, I just don’t think there’s any satisfying you outside of meeting every single one of your demands.
Casual and Hardcore has such a broad meaning as in to what context.
Casual in time or what they do in missions or how much thought into builds etc
i.e. could mean
Casual in time = Don’t play often
Casual in gameplay = Minimal risks, play from distance, stay with team
Casual in builds = Picking skill nodes and weapons to be effective. Not thinking too much about optimisation.
Hardcore in time = Play regularly
Hardcore in gameplay = Full esports sweat. Most kills, most kills on elite, high risk and high reward. Equivalent of chasing green circles in VT2.
Hardcore in builds = Picking skill nodes to be in most synergy with right weapons, right perks/blessings to minimise breakpoints and maybe specialise against certain enemy types. Full optimisation.
It is generally true you can complete T5 missions with grey weapons. However part of enjoyment is experimenting with new builds ideas to overcome mission repetition. You can’t change the maps, but sure is fun to try new methods of running them.
But in order to try new things easy to swap out skill nodes, but obtaining weapon with desired perks and blessings different story.
This is 90% of the reason I fizzled out of DT. For all the things I want to fiddle with and experiment on, making the gear for it is simply too tedious.
When the YouTube CCs for your game start their vids with “Today we’re looking at this and such, but I couldn’t get the gear in time for the vid”, there’s something there…
Between that and the (still) repetitive maps/objectives, the gameplay got from amazing to stale reaaal quick.
In the context of the conversation, this person is a hardcore player in builds; the need to have every stat, perk and blessing to be 100% exactly the desired result, while on the same coin saying that the game sucks because they can’t roll a perfect roll. Anything less than perfect isn’t good enough, in spite of the marginal difference that the stats actually make up in the grand scheme of the game, concerning modifiers of a weapon. At the same time, appealing to “the casual players” who want to play at malice difficulty. I can’t imagine why someone would want a hardcore build for a casual game difficulty; it’s overkill. They still haven’t specified what breakpoints they’re seeking at what difficulty of what mob by what weapons.
But how long does this gameplay last? There’s only so many builds to try before you have nothing left. Then it’s just “repetitive maps/objectives.”
I’m baffled by the desire for shortcuts to achieve quick results, while also complaining that things become stale. Advocating for instant gratification often leads to boredom setting in just as quickly.
Just gonna tune in and say it’s crazy to say that 500+ hour players even bother with crafting anymore. Everyone I know doesn’t. They’ve got some weapons they consider usable and then the materials just stack up into the millions.
This isn’t like some super endgame grind that people actually engage with as a rule. I would be really really interested in learning what % of people actually doesn’t just straight up ignore the crafting system for the most part past 500 hours or so.
It’s wrong to characterize the current system as “giving long time players something to do” because those people just start actually ignoring the entire inventory system once their weps are sorta good enough
Like, does this look like a successful system to you? I’m sure most people here have even more despite not having perfect weps either, and the only reason I’m not gold capped is because I’ve been buying out the commissary because might aswell.
I’m inclined to say that if someone actually and genuinely keeps playing this game just to keep rolling the weapon gacha with its 0.01% odds to get a perfect plasmagun (or whatever) he might have severe gambling issues
FS have a creators program. Goal is free marketing.
A Darktide dedicated YouTuber starting out, lots of content potential. 1-2 months you can go through mission layout, cover options, spawn points and enemy types. 1-2 videos per week regular enough to get subscriber count up.
Afterwards time to showcase synergy of skill nodes with weapons, perks and blessings. LOTS of combinations. You want to ideal stat, and T4 not T3 perks/blessings. Very difficult to create one per week after you have drained content surrounding maps and enemy types. But way things are, probably one video per month, not enough to get subscriber count up.
Hence very few dedicated Darktide YouTubers. Even the regular ones switched to Helldivers 2.
You can make them part of beta testing or give physical merch. But very challenging in creating content for free marketing.
You might be going at this for a bit too long now. While your initial drive was impressive, you’re moving away from what your original intention was, I feel.
How long? It got repetitive as early as 50h, but then I began to diversify for myself. Got all the characters to a solid place (back then there was no shared resources, so that was part of the issue at hand, but that’s another point). Then I found challenges for myself. Then - solos (when the mod came out). Note something - I found ways to make the game entertaining for myself. Hence - my point: eventually, all I had left was to experiment and diversify, while waiting for the next patch and reading “We’re sowwy” letters…
Shortcuts and quick results? Instant gratification? Nonono, sir (or madam). You assume too quickly and border on strawmaning. The game actively prevented me from experiencing it in a way that would’ve deepened my enjoyment of it. It put a soft cap on “interest” and “fun” through tedium and boredom.
I can point out the fact that there are blessings I still don’t have, blessing combos still not possible etc etc, but that’s obvious and not the main drive of my complaint. This is - how many times can you run the same map with the same gear and the same talents before your basic pattern recognition starts pulling the proverbial parking break? I mean you, specifically.
Without engaging in the crafting side of DT, there’s only so much repetition before you have to diversify. And then the real pain of the wall sets in.
Simply put they don’t “need” optimum builds. A major feature of the game is builds. People like creation even if it isn’t optimal.
Example
Cities Skylines. Buildings are square/rectangle shape. Optimal way would be to build cross roads to maximise use of space and place public services that cover in sphere of effect without wasted overlap. The game inspires creativity even if isn’t optimal, makes it less repetitive… The game’s goal isn’t just only challenge. Other creative games are like Zoo, Theme park management etc
Hitman series. Very few maps but large. Fixed events to kill targets in optimal manner, shortest time and most stealth, all that already discovered. Yet some people decide cruel and unusual methods to dispatch them. Creative means it is fun and often with hilarious results.
Witcher 3. People already know the best decision paths for most rewards and path of least resistance. Creativity to see unsual results. You can play it again 3 times and find something new.
With enough creativity in possibilities it can overcome the repetition of the same playground.
Games would be pretty boring if you simply chose same methods every time.
We just choose less optimal methods, just because we can and want to see different results out of curiosity than being best.
Others have gone in this thread far longer, why not focus on them?
Starting to think your points are disingenuine; mocking FS for trying to fix what they can with the resources available as management provides?
What argument am I making for you? I was following your logic. Where do you find more additional entertainment after you’ve done what you set out to do once you instantly have the build you seek with the perfect numbers? It seems to me that your argument is more about the boredom, and not so much about the crafting. The crafting in this case would be a bandaid for the boredom that you describe of gameplay that gets bored and stale rather quickly.
Fortunately, most maps have diversity through auric modifiers, and I have all toons at 30 that I can keep myself occupied through the diversity of weapons and kits at my disposal based on what I am feeling like playing. I hardly have any blessings for my veteran or my Ogryn, but I still enjoy playing them and the maps therein. My main is Psyker, I naturally have more blessings on that, but I don’t use half of them. If I get a weapon in my lap with a unique blessing I might try it out with some combos, but that’s it. I play because I enjoy the challenge of the aurics, not to play the crafting minigame.
That’s subject to taste. I have enough weapons and kits through my time playing that whatever playstyle I feel like satisfying, the aurics provide enough diversity, that the half life of repetitive maps is much longer than doing static missions with no modifiers.
I still don’t see how much more satisfaction, fulfillment and diversity can be found when you can easily get what you desire because of getting what you want when you want it. It seems like a bandaid to a much larger problem; keeping the audience engaged. It seems to me the issue here is not so much the crafting system but the lack of content flowing at a satisfactory rate for some of the playerbase.
So, you don’t need the best roll? So why change it if a 370 is all you need for the desired modifier setup as the complaint was made by a forum poster earlier who wanted to have 380.
Goalposts are being moved so much that it’s hard to keep track of a coherent complaint other than “Crafting sucks, gimmie what I want now.”
I did. They made their point. We discussed. We moved on. Some outstanding posters have suggested some of the most controversial points, which turned into a splendid discussion. This… ain’t it, anymore. You’ve been going back and forth, spinning in circles at this point.
Oh, I am (and was) quite genuinely unimpressed with that particular effort, the way it was handled, the results and the conversation surrounding it. And it should be mocked, every time it’s done in the industry. Every. Time. Without fail.
Well, this one, for starters:
I literally made a direct correlation between the crafting system not only adding to, but failing to address mounting boredom.
And the idea that I seek instant gratification, when I specifically mentioned buildcrafting, in response to
You assume I’m looking to game the system to… do… what?
You know how people repeat that you can do T5s with greys? I did that back in April 2023, to make that point (and I was bored)…
Let me make this clear once more, since we’re spinning wheels: For all of it’s gameplay strengths, there’s little to no backbone to this game, and what should be major gameplay elements are rendered to mere tedium and boring casino mechanics.
Perfect numbers are irrelevant in a system that affords me so little control over any of the numbers. Another point I didn’t mention, that…
Good on you. I’m legitimately glad that you can enjoy the game and that you’ve found a way to ignore what’s a major point of contention in it.
I couldn’t.
Here’s a legit question - if you don’t care for the crafting and can ignore it at will, and here we are, standing behind a thorough change, what is it that you’re aiming to bridge a compromise over? What fun is there in it for you, that you have to present a case for consideration? What do you and those like you standing to lose, really?
If anything, you’ll get to enjoy the game at least the same amount, if not more…
What is this endeavor about?!
Read the above paragraph, with this additional note:
What I wrote is clearly still up there. You interpretation of it is welcome and impressive, in a way, but quite obviously far from the point.
The content is already in the game. It is simply gatekept behind the RNG. You can’t test builds or experiment with the weapons at your disposal. People are asking to finally get access to said content.
At this point, people just want any kind of control over their equipment. Some would be ok with the basic blessing and perk freedom, others want total control so they can start min-maxing and reach breakpoints. And please, just let them have it. A system that has a defining end-goal for players to work towards is far more enganging than “good luck and now feth off”.
All those words aren’t going to get away from the fact that this game’s system is an objective downgrade to Vermintide 2’s, which was already terrible.
Logical question I would ask is it a breakpoint issue. i.e. Just a tiny bit more damage makes difference from 3 hit to 2 hit to certain enemy type
You should ask him why 380 is a must
If you want a stat increase with same weapon, perk, blessings, skill nodes all same, just extra 10 stat. The intention is to make it stronger and maintain same method of playstyle.
If you want flexibility to interchange perks/blessings the intention is creativity to specialise against certain enemy type and change your playstyle. Something different right?
The problem is having to over commit playtime to achieve that. Reasonable time is subjective, experience shows isn’t exactly a day, it isn’t months either. It sits somewhere between and it is obviously a problem otherwise this thread wouldn’t be so massive.
Yet even FS acknowledge themselves it is a problem. They are saying it themselves. It isn’t by accident they haven’t closed this thread. It was intentional, they prune tangent posts to keep it neat and keep it going. Any other topic would of been closed already.
It’s so annoying that I can’t just requisition a Weapon with fixed base stats and then just slap my preferred Blessings and Perks onto it without any fear of Locks… if I could, I’d have so many more cool builds!
For every new Weapon that drops my first thought shouldn’t have to be “Gee, I can’t wait to spend 48 hours rolling over and over again until I can find a decent one!”
