I personally enjoy Vermintide 2. Played it more than V1, and with about 1000+ hours in the game, I think I can echo that some problems exist. Hookrats dragging you through the ground, Maulers, if I have the correct name for the fellows with armor on their head but not their body, hitting you when you stand behind them, etc.
These are errors or little unintended borks in the code can be handled, or gotten used to. Poked fun at or remembered in a ‘Oh my god that actually happened’ way.
What I really, really don’t like, is part of the way Fatshark has handled things. For example, if you recall the ‘skating’ enemies? At some point, that was actually fixed. Enemies no longer skated, tracking you 10+ feet away to home in on you in a single, janky motion.
But, people complained that made the game easier. And no doubt it did. Because you could actually dodge past their attacks when you hit the ‘dodge’ button, and they would continue their swing until the animation was complete. Then, Fatshark decided to reintroduce these ‘skating’ attacks, by causing the enemies to lock on, and extended the animation in a long and horrible-looking fashion, unless you dodge during a particular ‘window’ in the attack, with the timing growing more precise the higher the difficulty. By itself, the fix is not a problem. That they kept the immersion-breaking slide in, is.
In Darktide, please do not do this. Come up with actual tailored combat animations, a spring attack, or throwing their weapon at you if you are out of range, or something. Just not a repeat of the buggy skating animation.
I’m sure we all remember the roadmap. I hope Fatshark does not make that same mistake of putting down features that they cannot reasonably achieve. Have it be a pleasant surprise, if you must. People love excellent features that are released and working, even if you didn’t tell them beforehand you were going to do it. Base what you put out on what you have an active route for, instead of vague planning.
Sanctioned Mods. If you are going to keep allowing Mods in Darktide, please do not repeat what has been done in V2, with initial waves of sanctioning mods, and then a complete and total silence with no sign or further mods being even looked at for Sanctioning.
Have someone do a once-per month short workshop, like you did with the Brettonian Longsword. Have them go through a few new mods, and explain/show why they are suitable or not. Give us feedback, interaction. SHOW something being done, instead of just telling us ‘things are progressing’.
My last thing is, please, please, PLEASE, do not forget the improvements you made in the last game that were well-received. V1 had the Bounty-Board, which people liked for the ability to get the things they wanted, without relying completely on random chance.
In V2, people had many Veteran-quality items with excessive duplicates, but perhaps not the weapon-type they wanted. Red-Dust from salvaging those was put in, and that allows both emptying the limited inventory of excess Reds, as well as improving weapons to Veteran-quality for the ability scores, if not the Skins.
Don’t forget what WORKED. Do not start entirely fresh, deciding not to take note of the past. Take the good improvements from previous games and KEEP them in the new one, in some incarnation.
As I’ve said, I do genuinely enjoy the game. I apply for betas, even if I’ve not always been accepted. I love the atmosphere Fatshark has created in the Warhammer Fantasy universe, and I hope they can do the same for 40k.
EDIT;
And it completely skipped my mind.
Version Control. You’ve got to do something about that, where developers are working with months-old code and bugs that get reintroduced into newer versions because of it. You remember when the players and Devs were playing two separate versions of the game, because there was an entire SYSTEM that wasn’t working for the players, but was for the developers.
I don’t exactly know how you can fix a disconnect that massive, but please find a way.