The intended inability to dodge melee attacks with ranged weapons

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide General Discussion
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I started this discussion on reddit but someone pointed out that FS read their forums more than reddit. I have no idea if that’s true or not but in any case, I thought this wouldn’t hurt to start the same conversation here too:

how does the community feel about the intended interdiction/inability to dodge melee attacks when holding a ranged weapon?

Sans titre

I can see where FS is coming from but to enforce such an arbitrary interdiction/inability to dodge seems to me like a very clumsy way to go about it (unless you’re wielding a very bulky or heavy weapon). If they don’t want people dodging with their ranged weapons out, they could drastically cut the efficient dodge count and/or dodge distance of ranged weapons, but prohibiting dodge w/ ranged weapons entirely? Isn’t that a bit counter productive to their professed goal to make range combat a more integral part of Darktide’s gameplay than it was in Vermintide’s ? Not only does it penalize ranged careers but it will also affect melee-focused players since it will make using ranged weapon in melee (and thus for melee-centric careers) even more dangerous.

Am I in the minority here for not being on board with this?

EDIT #1:

According to TwinkTheUnion from reddit:

TwinkTheUnicorn

The way that dodging works is by interrupting an enemy’s tracking of the player character. Once an enemy has started their attack animation, they will track the player even if the player strafes to the side. However, if the player dodges after the attack animation starts, the enemy will continue to target where the player was when they started the dodge.With that said, when a player has a ranged weapon in hand, dodging does not interrupt enemies’ tracking. You are still able to take the dodge action but if you are still within reach, the enemy will hit you. […]

If that is correct, this restriction is not nearly as bad as I initially thought/feared.

EDIT #2:

Some people’s experience in the BTC seem to contradict what I put in the first edit:

RangiNZ

A mate and I have been discussing this. It feels really bad and is frustrating and unfun. In his experience in the beta enemies would just slide forward and hit you even if you managed to get out of range while dodging with a ranged weapon. […]

Alas since, at the moment, there’s no definitive way to settle the debate as to how this interdiction/inability to dodge melee attacks with ranged weapons works or is implemented or “enforced”. I’ll refrain from editing the post from now on to avoid wild speculation unless we eventually get some clarification from FS if they ever stumble onto this post.

EDIT #3:

Aqshy [Community Manager]

I have an update on this, from the combat team:

Players can dodge melee attacks with their ranged weapons out, ranged weapons just have worse dodge in general. In the CBT we ran with a flag that enabled enemies to continue tracking if you wielded your ranged weapon. This flag has been removed as we’ve tuned through all dodges and dodge timings in general and in detail. We still discourage players from trying to dodge-dance melee enemies with ranged weapons, even if it’s possible on the pistols n stuff that are a bit more nimble.

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TBH, I don’t ever like being told what to do. I like to make my own choices. Now, that’s within reason… but still.

This feels like an attempt to control my playstyle and that kind of thing isn’t welcome. I can understand a few aspects, like teamplay encouragement, but punishing me for playing my way, that I really dislike. If I can slip a strike with a sword in my hand, I can do it with a carbine.

If I can bob and weave inside the horde as I gun them down, I shouldn’t have ‘reverse falloff’ where my laser just removes the poxwalker’s tattoos.

Give me tool and give me goals and let me play my way. Don’t nerf the tools or hit me harder if I don’t play your way.

Very, very strongly opposed to this aspect of what is otherwise a wonderful game.

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while playing and noticing this i wen’t and opened a post in the bug’s section because i couldn’t see this as intended, just to get informed that it was.

i don’t think i have to tell you how much im against this change, it just feels awful while playing

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I wanted to try close combat veteran with submachine gum basically shooting at melee range and dodging but it may not work…

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well they already made changes on the chainsword, based on feedback!

so theres hope for a compromise, right? right?
uff

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What’s the word on chain sword change? Since the beta or during?

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It still isn’t good seeing as it renders side-dodges utterly useless and many enemies such as maulers ignore back-dodges (here they seem to have a shockwave that can hit you on a back-dodge)/can still hit you even if you dodge a considerable distance back, the same way it was in VT2. They have many attacks where they step after you fast and far, meaning if tracking isn’t broken they can hit you a solid distance from your/their starting position.

It should not be a thing. They can penalise dodging by reducing the distance on ranged weapons or giving repeat dodges diminishing returns like in VT2 (wasn’t sure if this was the case with DT in the beta, didn’t feel like it), but having it work one way with melee weapons and then not with ranged weapons is not at all intuitive or fun, and it runs totally contrary to the idea DT is supposed to have a more even balance of ranged to melee than VT2.

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100% agree, not to mention that the time to kill, and swapping speed, are also lower on ranged.

V2 had powerful ranged builds its true, but its not like range careers didn’t sacrifice anything for it,

in darktide i felt i had to make a whole lot more sacrifice to have good ranged capabilities compared to the melee oriented counterparts, and didn’t get much out of it because the enemies i was supposed to engage (enemy range and specials) punish you just as much as the melee enemies do.

while the sharpshooter has talents to help with that, it felt more like: “here’s a talent that lets you do your job barely” opposed to “here a talent that adds to your capabilities!”

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I didn’t know this was intended behaviour during the beta. I figured I was just messing up my dodges.

Please get rid of this restriction. It feels horrible.

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I can’t disagree. I even made this post where I talk about a perk to get around the issue not so long ago. Now that I think of it we shouldn’t have to deal with mechanics that are a specially developed issues to be forced into the gameplay loop.

  • Why don’t ranged kills restore tougness? Why is ranged combat not sustainable when it’s supposed to be equal parts to melee?

  • Why is toughness dependent on coherency with other players? Stacking player with unbearable mechanics isn’t going to cut it when there are so many elites and specials with high collateral damage.

  • Why is AI deadly accurate and doesn’t have a greater miss chance when you’re close to cover when there is no cover system in the game?

  • Why is there an artifical pause to stop you from continuing to fire as you raise your gun from the hip to aim it?

  • Why are we penalized when trying to dodge melee attacks with a ranged weapon equipped?

  • Why can’t we reload and sprint at the same time? I can reload my gun while sliding and doing a 360 in the same time.

Did you know that most of FPS games do never implement things I just listed there? That’s because these concepts fundamentaly negative for the game and the players. None of the concepts work out in the long run. Well, we now have seen that it didn’t work out in Darktide as well so we can get rid of them and hopefully completely scrap them. How bad does a “game mechanic” have to be when such a big part of the playerbase wishes that the feature was never in the game in the first place? The game is so fun and then on the other hand is held back by so many poorly designed system nobody asked for.

I don’t believe that implementing a mechanic just to make impact on the gameplay and on how the players has to interact with the game is a great idea. It’s actually the other way around. All these artificial restrictions don’t bring any more fun or depth to the table but instead cripple the creative thinking and the decision making of the players.

It took 3 days. Three days of beta for there to be a strong melee meta established. It feels as if there were so many systems put in place to restrict you from using ranged weapons that you simply want to limit yourself to bursting down the elites and then jumping back straight to melee as if this was the 80/20 Vermintide had (where you’re most effective in melee and only in times of need switch to ranged for a second or two).

Yes, a lot of us picked the veteran class to play with guns but it just isn’t worthwhile. It is only a matter of time before the difficulty 4 and 5 are completely flooded with ogryns and zealots by players trying to force themselves into the narrow “anti-ranged” meta where you have to slide/charge in to the fight to always be in melee range of your enemies.

I wish that on the 17th of November I’m going to wake up to a list of patchnotes where all the trivial and restrictive mechanics that dumb down the gameplay choices are completely gotten rid of. No tweaks or tuning down. Just imagine waking up to this.

Good morning rejects!
It’s about time you got back to work. Here is a list of many changes that were made in reaction to your feedback and the statistics that we tracked.

Lets talk about guns shall we? This is a Warhammer horde shooter we are talking about so let’s get down to business shall we? The first major change to ranged combat is that you no longer are penalized for dodging with your ranged weapon. We heard your feedback and that it restricted your gameplay options and severly limited the potential of autopistols and shotguns (who were much often used as sniper rifles in the beta).

You can now reload as you run to keep up your tempo and not stay behind your friends who prefer a more “hands on” approach of combat. If you can slide and reload then you should definitely be able to run and reload either.

We fixed the bug which made all players stop firing their weapon as they aimed in and out with their guns. This was definitely not a poorly implemented system to make players think that the gunplay is clunky and not responsive instead of being quick and fluid. Definitelly not :slight_smile: .

Ranged kills now restore toughness just like melee kills do since you’re even more prone to being fired upon when not hidden inside of a poxwalker swarm. Now everyone can stay in the fight longer no matter if they expose themselves to more ranged fire or melee attacks. No longer do you have to lose your height advantage and a good angle on the enemy as you chase around your teammates to restore your toughness.

We have also taken into the account that height sliders rendered many covers put on the maps completely useless. This is why we are introducing a new system that will drastically decrease AI’s accuracy as it tries to pick you off when you’re behind the cover. Veteran sharpshooters can now function as they’re supposed to on the heresy difficulty.

Finally we are happy to announce that ranged weapons can be fitted with a flashlight and also at the same time a special action such as a bayonet charge or special ammunition. It’s better when your weapon is fun and practical at the same time than it being one or the other.

This is for our part one of our ranged combat mechanics overhaul or as we like to call it. Expect more changes as we go through more of your feedback and see how you react to the changes. On to the next subject of …

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Poor thing. You should’ve kept your distance with your shotgun/autopistol :confused: . You’re getting in the way of other players claving the horde so please do not pick the short range guns or use them exclusively to supress the enemies like the rest of us. /s

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At some point I’m going to try for combat-shotgun-only, zero-damage doomguy runs and there’s nothing anyone can do to stop me.

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honestly, V2 already had quite a big chunk of ranged combat, sure the normal gameplay loop isnt focused on it, but careers like BH or Hagstalker have easily a higher split of ranged, vet sharpshooter was quite similar in that regard just with added drawbacks

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It was actually, weirdly, easier to be ranged in 1. I ran Saltpyre with brace of pistols and ammo hoarder, learned where the ammo always spawned, and got there first. I had about 70 shots per pickup, and ran rupture so as to get linear AOE out of them. I could usually take most of a horde while it trickled in.

But overall, I really agree with Spazz’s take above.

That said, a lot of things in Verm have been a weird… well, gamey I mean… since real melee combat is so complicated as to be almost impossible to model. If you take judo for a month, you’ll learn a move, the counter, the counter to the counter, how to counter the counter’s counter, all that again x3, how to follow up on each of those if they work…

Overall Vermintide kept it simple enough to do as a game but not so simple you got bored too fast.

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I didnt have any problems dodging a horde featuring some elites with a revolver that constantly needed to reload, so i am not exactly sure what the thread is about.

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You most likely kept distance. “Dodge” is intended to break lockon, and it’s not the only weird little punishment for ranged.

Also, dodges feels very short compared to Vermintide.

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So that’s why the carapace armour guys can still hit me even though visually I dodged .

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I am against it as this takes away from skill when it comes to celling. In V2 it’s part of the skill to pull out range in middle of horde, shoot special, dodge melee while reload, shoot another one, switch to melee → go back to dance. The fact that you can dodge for 1 extra sequence of being attacked while aiming is part of V2 skill celling and make for one of best “plays” you can pull off.

This change doesn’t also make sense. As someone who was in military and was training with assault rifle/handgun I see absolutely no reason to not be able to dodge melee attacks with range weapon. One of the manouvers we learnt was to exactly “dodge” into prone/side step position when enemy has knife to be able to shoot them.

I get you wouldn’t be able to dodge with rocket launchers or machine guns but this is a video game.

I don’t like FS to restrict my gameplay like that.

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I had one game where a plague ogryn decided to focus on me, and despite my dodging I was getting hit because I’d forgotten this behaviour. So a squishy veteran trying to keep away from the Very Big Smashy Hulking Pusball is punished; my reaction was apparently to be the krieg meme, pull my shovel and charge in.
My beef is it’s incredibly ‘gamey’ in a ‘you have to play it this way’ rather than a 'Well you didn’t see that enemy in that dark corner, so yes you get shot’.

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Damn right! :+1:
Let me be able to play like the Doom Slayer:

running & gunning in melee range, dodging and blasting melee combatants to pieces!

At least episodically… :pleading_face:

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