Toxic Game promoting Toxic Gameplay

Warhammer 40,000: Darktide Gameplay Feedback
1

Been playing, have my own level 30 vet and a mid 20’s preacher. This game is just become toxic, the players and game play systems promote it.

  1. Ridiculous Pennances, like the Vet no Melee, Preacher speed runs and psyker boom to kill 3 elites. its causing people to play like complete idiots. Not only are the pennances a fair bit on the hard side, they promote people not playing as a team. Vet’s hiding and doing as little as possible and preachers running so far ahead and getting downed. (And before you say they are for pre-made groups etc, this is an online game, no one is going to do that really, expect the worst from the playerbase and plan accordingly)

  2. RNG on top of RNG on top of even more RNG. pls stop, its a lazy game design system and it always fails.

  3. The shops in game are another lazy design. Time gating stuff doesn’t create more demand, it creates disinterest. 1 hour between refreshes and you might find something worth picking up? heck no.

  4. The new crafting system isn’t thrilling me frankly, more RNG, just what we needed more of.

  5. Mission rewards. have some, incentivise playing and teamplay.

  6. Vote kick button is horribly abused.

  7. Difficulty jump from tier 3 to 4 is a bit harsh. most people stick in 1-3, why play any higher, theres no reward or incentive.

  8. Joining matches in progress … give us the option, if I want to do that then I will choose to., i don’t want to spend all that time loading to find myself with a complete wet noodle of a team to have to quit, load and retry, id rather see my pug team composition first rather than just be ported in.

  9. Mission randomness is lazy. ps I hate grimoires. how about the person who picks it up gets the corruption rather than the whole team, i avoid them, 500 credits isnt much incentive to pick them up.

  10. Contracts … just need relooking at, especially in conjuntion with RNG mission board.

  11. Complete lack of Fatshark interaction on here or steam forums. (Way to go! starting to remind me of activision and ea)

  12. Lack of scopes on rifles is irritating, its the 41st millennium, they have mastered how to make optics. PS where is the Long Las?!!?!? The closest is the Lucius and its sights are terribad. None of the Lasguns have the full auto option other than the recon? Most do, only a few don’t.

  13. Customisation of weapons. There is none. I’d like to choose sights, barrels etc beyond the paint job.

  14. Mission ratings and trust level need adjusting. having lowbies in tier 3 and 4 is just a loss waiting to happen.

  15. Thunderhamer is just weak. The combat knife outperforms it.

  16. Crafting mat drops are a bit ont he low side given how expensive the crafting system (ha!) is so far.

  17. Missions are a bit long, but thats not a deal breaker.

  18. When you eventually release them, Scoreboards, make them private. Game is toxic enough as it is.

10 Likes
2

I agree that the RNG maps and contract really need another pass through, I feel like there’s not enough missions in each zone on each difficulty available to make us feel like there’s 13 missions in 5 zones.

3

Tidat in sesame street, the word was toxic.

4

people much less fooling around in 4-5 diff

this is just hilarious, scoreboard is gone, toxicity stays. conclusion: scoreboard is toxic.
if it will be brought back as it was game will probably melt, sure.

btw i have 160 hours played in dt already and didn’t meet any toxicity people are talking about, just like in v2.

4 Likes
5

Sorry, but let us make one thing clear, game is not “toxic”.
It is ppl who are toxic and make the expierence seem as such to others.

6

While i’m willing to accept that you have one or two point most of your complaints seem to reflect more on the players and nopt the game. Toxic turds are a thing they have been and always will be a thing. No game will ever make them vanish. That said i’ve encountered exactly 1 turd thus far.

As for weapon complaints…its a new game they aren’t going to put in every possible 40k weapon hopefully they will have many more years to work on this game. As for scopes & long las maybe you should actually look at the weapons i think you will find weapons with nice scopes and a lasgun pattern which is basiaclly a long las.

7

Grimoires are the reason I don’t play random games. I don’t like that there is a random chance that the game will come with items that will allow other players to sabotage the run.

8

  1. I totally agree with the penances not being balanced in the slightest. And yes, whoever made the penances surely did not have teamplay in mind for the most part.

  2. It really is lazy game design. I do get the feeling they had no time left to code something reasonable and just copypasted their RNG scripts.

  3. The exchange should offer one of each item you unlockes (in gray quality) with a rating based on your current level. As far as I care, everything else can be randomised. But at least a baseline of weaopons would be available at all times. When my Ogryn reached level 11 I had to check the shop for 12 hours until a Shield & Maul appeared.

  4. It would not be too much of RNG if list tiem 3 would be addressed properly

  5. Rewards would be nice. At least there’d be a reason to continue playing after hitting 30. Nothing outlandish, just a little actual reward, not a tiny bit of diamantine so I have to go grind and grind and grind for the so-called “crafting system”.

  6. I actually used it to hopefully get rid of a player who was actively sabotaging the mission. So I cannot say if it being abused or not.

  7. This! I played on 4 a few times and learned that I need to dodgee and block more and faster. That was my reward. After that I again saw no real reason to stay at that level or even try 5 because of missing rwards (in whichever shape or form).

  8. That sounds like a good idea. Yeesterday I joined a game with 2 players already down, the third player being netted by a trapper mere seconds after I join and me standing in a seea of flames surrounded by the horde with half a health bar. Guess how that played out.

  9. I don’t mind everyone having to cope with corruption. Maybe the player holding it should just have more of it. Right now it just seems to be too much corruption per grimoire. How about having a guaranteed green/blue/orange item for 1/2/3 grims and maybe a locked blessing reroll per scripture?

  10. They are as RNG as (what feels like) everything else in this game. And thus extremely annoying. I just try to ignore them. The stuff Melk offers seems to be worse than my equipment and I didn’t even farm stuff. Maybe I just got lucky.

  11. Well, they had thir sales. Probably exceeded or at least reached predictions for sales. So why bother anymoree if the monetary goal is already reached? Sure, throw in a “hotfix” every now and then to keep some players active who - with every passing hour of gameplay) - are more likely to spend even more money on aquilas.

  12. As a huge 40k fan since its inception I rummaged through my brain-library, my library and the internet and yes - the Lucus pattern is actually not meant as a sniper rifle but to pierce heavy-ish armor at close range. So why the veteran sharpshooter does not have access to a long-las is beyond me. But then again, they also give power weapons to people who are most likely not to return in this game.

  13. As somebody who values lore I can tell you the tech-priest would be less than happy. As a player, I can understand your desire, though. To me, it would be a nice to have-feature, yet not necessary.

  14. I agree the gap between when you can actually choose the next difficulty level could be a bit larger. I fell for that trap myself.

  15. And that is why my zealot uses a totally lore-accurate combat knife. Because basically everything is based on crits. A stat the Thunder Hammer does not even have.

  16. Completely agree. I will also assume we soon need more mats than ever. Oh the joy!

  17. I think they are just right. That’s very much personal preference.

  18. Never cared for scoreboards (if they existed or not). There will always be people better than me and I don’t think this is a competitive game.

Just my thoughts on your points. As always, everyone has their own opinion and that’s a good thing.

P.S.: Now I just ask myself why I even bothered writing. It’s not likee any Fatshark employee will read this topic.

1 Like
9

Not sure why you reply to mem as it seems you wanted to comment on the post. :slight_smile:
I expressed my disagreement with the principle in the topic.
I encountered maybe 3 assholes, in 180 hrs of play, so I was not referring to this community, if that is how you interpreted my response.

10

I now have 157 hours in game. 2 level 30’s.

Point 1 stands, just failed a heresy, 2 Zealots run off trying to do the whole 20 minute thing leaving me and the psyker to get shafted by 6 elites on our own. They need toning down somewhat. I’ve done most of the vet ones which were not so bad except the make every shot count, that was a nightmare.

Point 2. Nuff said.

Point 3, see point 2. rarely anything worth picking up. Why would I be interested in buying stuff way too low level to even consider upgrading?

Point 7 - Still think this applies after running quite a few heresy levels. I find it challenging to do sharpshooter stuff while melee adds completely ignore my team mates Infront and make a bee-line for me, the aggro system really needs explaining.

Point 8 remains infuriating.

Point 9 and 10 - Lack of player agency is annoying, and fast becoming a deal breaker.

Point 11 - other than telling everyone we’re too stupid to know what we want, pretty much silence and zero engagement from community teams.

Point 12 - I still want the option of better scopes. so, you know, I can actually aim properly at distant targets, you know, remove them before they get into a position to threaten my team. Silly I know.

Point 14 - still annoys me.

Point 16 - yeah, discouraging people from exploring the crafting system due to costs is still an issue.

New Point - Whats up with your servers on Heresy and above? stuttering, frame drops and lag.

TL:DR
Lack of player agency is detrimental to my experience, community engagement being zero other than being told we’re too stupid to know what we want and the reliance on RNG. Just disheartening gameplay. Most successful games have an element of RNG, its a necessary component, but entire games built on it just become boring and die.

Addendum: the tactic of having people log in hourly to check the shop to increase numbers - real scummy tactics, things id expect from EA or Activision (You know, COD guys? For not wanting to be COD you’ve sure picked up on a few of their bad habits).

11

You may have discovered a new word. Noice!

I love the thunder hammer personally, whachu talkin’ bout willis!

have them in hubs (beats dead horse)

The game is mechanically demanding which can cause players to snap at each other. Keep playing, it sounds like you’re having fun.

I hear ya. The quickplay does warn you that you may jump into a match in process. Which is OK.

When I select a specific one, on the other hand, I want to start it fresh. Just give us the option.

12

Most of your points is devs being incompetent and releasing half-baked unifinished product in Early-Access state where game needed MINIMUM 1-2 years more in development. Terrible management, terrible devepment cycle and tons of dropped/gaveup ideas and promises like less RNG and weapons customization, where clearly they struggled with releasing BARE MINIMUM to call it functional game.

And this:

Is result of first part I mentioned. Only such predatory RNG design can prolong life of a game that has absolutely ZERO content, barely enough to keep most playing till level 30. The horrible RNG is classic mobile-gaming way to keep people at least logging in, even if not playing.

Why? Becasue on upper management/infestors meetings the numbers will look good. And more microtransactions becasue people that are vulnerable to RNG gotcha-machine tactic and the same people nulnerable of buying cosmetics just to feel short shot of dopamine in game that has no content.

Let’s face it: It’s half a game it should have been after V2 lessions/development and 1 year delay

13

I disagree with this. V2 only has one thing of truly terrible RNG (red drops) and despite having a large lack of overall content, it tended to maintain a fairly stable playerbase over time. Not a big one, sure, but stable.

You don’t need a lot of content for people to be interested, it just has to be good content. But man the content isn’t great either. Most of my friends (and myself) either barely touch the game or don’t touch it at all anymore. Mostly because of the RNG items, with a dash of “Penance design is garbage.”

I’m just happy a release is popular enough for people to call Fatshark out directly on both of these problems, as awful challenges was a big problem in VT2 as well.

14

At start RNG in V2 was bad becasue there was no crafting reds, so many people even when playing hundreds of hours couldn’t get their fav weapons to drop. But at least they had way way more perfect weapons overall in way way less time than in Darktide, even if they were getting duplicates which was why V2 gear progression RNG sucked at start. And yes, at start V2 had also little content but had 15 classes to play vs 4 here with shared resources and gear (tinkets, amulets) + there was a reward (albeit not perfect lootboxes) for running highest difficulty (Legend) and secondary objectvies (tomes + grims). Becasue playing game better actually increased your chances of getting better gear. Plus we had basic functions like… choose map and difficulty, duh.

So in V2 tons of people also dropped the game (me too) becasue of RNG, but definitely after longer time than Darktide, because of rewarding gameplay (even with issues), player agenda (me increasing my chances of bestgear) and much more classes kept game going better. Plus they added converting dusts which also made whole gameplay loop of play higher difficulty->get better reward->get item you need->profit or get item you don’t need->salvage->get dust->craft item you need. And I had basic function of rerolling perks and traits whenever I wanted to whatever I wanted… Again, missing in Darktide (stupid Refine 2 steps back from V2).

Once they added crafting of red items + dust conversion, many people like me returned and soak full thousands of hours in game, becasue now not only there was content and rewards for gameplay but also now red rarity item duplicates were used to craft finally perfect weapons that you actually wanted to use.

Obviously V2 system became much better after updates but current Darktide system is way way way worse than what V2 had before red crafting added as in Darktide you have:

  1. No player agency. No matter what you play, how good, what difficulty- you have no influence on your gear
  2. No reward for playing the game. It’s all RNG store.
  3. No Crafting items I want and need, no salvaging items I don’t want/need. There is ZERO crafting+gameplay loop
  4. No way to work your way to perfect items in anyway. It’s all full RNG. A guy playing 4x times less than you on Diff 1-2 can get perfect item and you playing 10x more and on Diff 5 may never see it since that’s how RNG (probability) works. That suck ass, major.

So yeah, V2 wasn’t perfect, had simillar but not as bad issues at release with RNG but got better with time.

So you would think they learnt what made V2 system better from bad start it had. And that they would at least start from point where V2 ended, right? And only improve upon it.

Nope, we got even worse. End of story.

1 Like
15

Step 1. Add game mechanic that is suppose to force more hand holding and team play.
Step 2. Add penances that are anti team play.
Step 3. Profit?

Edit: I am starting to think that there were two separate teams working on this game, and those teams were not communicating with each other.

1 Like
16

Please let me add in to this thread, so I don’t create a new one on the same topic.
And disclaimer, I’m speaking to the Fatshark person collecting feedback (I hope there is someone doing that), not arguing with anyone posting here on forum.

I am very sore about penances, as they promote very bad practices that are counterproductive and pose danger to whole strike team, therefore I find them straight toxic. In the process I have learned to hate my strike team colleagues, that they can unconsciously destroy all my efforts by playing the game normally and according to its rules and its flow.

I love the game, I have loved last 95% of playing it. Loved the leveling, loved gearing up, even liked the weekly grind for special, percious weapons. Now the only endgame activity I have is to focus on penances and I am truly ASHAMED to persue them with people in my team, knowing that I’m playing against the flow of the game and playing bad on purpose, risking everyone’s time and flawing enjoyment. I want solo games to be implemented just to hand tie myself and do these abberations of achievements without betraying 3 innocent pub players. I won’t be playing solo after completing penances.

Please let me play well for reward. I can play long, knowing that every good action and successfully finished mission brings me closer to the reward.
In comparison, lets see Chaos Wastes penances from V2. I have played and played my best, on any difficulty I was able to that day, tried my hardest to win while using all my tricks so I could eventually get the reward, and every game has put me closer to the achievement.
When I received it I felt I have earned it.
In Darktide I feel like a scum, either cheesing the mechanics or cheesing my team. There’s nothing to be proud of.

17

Basically this, also games like Hunt: Showdown and really made me appreciate the “balance thru lack of options approach”, you can give good weapons bad sights to make them more unwieldy, make low ammo count to limit their burst potential and lethality and so on.
Usually, full customization of weapons leads to huge balance issues where the players will do anything in their power to alleviate the downside of a weapon ending up with devs making most weapon designs becoming streamlined and samey.

18

But then again, Hunt and Darktide are basically on two opposite ends of the spectrum and what works for a slow and careful hardcore PVP game like Hunt will probably not be applicable or even relevant to a fast paced horde PVE game like Darktide.

19

ofc they are not the same and it was just me expressing my fondness for it.
And while Darktide is indeed not intended for PvP and is more fast-paced, I do think there is more enjoyment in weapon identity over effectiveness. I would refer to the Monster Hunter games for that, where the different weapon classes have a lot of persona and identity to them thru the strong suits and shortcomings they come with, tho too a PvE games.

All this is of course a matter of preference.

20

Hunt doesn’t have random rolls every time you get some weapon and random properites and random blessings.

If all weapons in Darktide would be fixed weapons with fixed stats so you basically take them as trade off X for Y like in other games then I would agree.

But not when every single weapon stat/feature is randomized. It just doesn’t work in that way and it doesn’t compare to Huntdown or any other shooter with fixed loadout options to choose from.