Bad idea. Aside from Darktide having devolved into a “melee first” game so it won’t improve the classeses siuation, it just making the whole ammo mess worse with two weapons to feed. And we would still be limited to the same builds. This is a classic “hey this is a cool idea” solution - sounds good but doesn’t actually fix the - or any - problem.
Fixing the ammo issue is really two simply fixes. One for everyone, one for veterans.
The everyone fix is simply STOP THE ELITE SPAM! Period. As long as these lazy developers idea of “increased difficulty” is the Timmy Power Gamer “throw more big mobs at the players” lot of issues will remain. Issues like ability spam brought on by cooldown reduction based on elite & specialist kills, excess ammo return (again based on elite/ specialist kills), an over-representation of specific weapons (that are good at killing elites/ specialists - sensing a pattern here), etc. Keep the number of these supposedly “rare” mobs limited and make them and the rest of the non-zombiefied mobs smarter (aka use basic infantry tactics*). That goes a long way to fixing a bunch of issues.
The veteran-specific fix is to not tie all our ammo return to two nodes on one side of the tree. Ammo return should be a core ability that returns a small amount per kill of a specific type to the veteran only. Taking the scavenger aura would just extend that (albiet in a likely reduced level) to the rest of the group. Viola, no more watching devs make fools of themselves trying to balance ammo levels around if the veteran has scavenger or not. Incidently it also makes the other two a bit more attractive because its no longer “do I give up ammo return entirely to get 5% extra damage/ speed” but “do I want to give my group more ranged endurance, extra damage on everything, or extra speed”.
Its kind of pitiful how many of this games problems came about in the same way. A mix of stubborn refusal to see and address issues and a playerbase that has quickly calcified into a “elite” and “filthy casuals” caste with only the former considered “worthy” of having its ideas entertained. I would say I hate the thought that all that money & time they are dumping into their “new studio-saving IP” is going to be wasted since the same issues will remain, but that would be lying. The faster this place burns the quicker someone with a bit more competence can get the license. Heck I would take EA at this point.
*This is Sweden. A place with mandatory military service. I dare you to tell me that not one staff member at FatShark served their requred time in the infantry and keep a straight face.
I think wanting to play the militarum vet primarily ranged is a fair request.
When someone plays the zealot ranged/melee 10/90 that’s acceptable but a vet 90/10 would destroy the game?
I disagree.
BUT I think available ammo is not the problem on most weapons. I agree with @alsozara that certain very powerful weapons shouldn’t be spammable. And that is my problem with OP‘s suggestion - I think being able to choose a revolver as tertiary would lead to serious balance issues.
I wouldn’t mind however if Auto guns and auto pistol would either get a larger ammo reserve or even better be included in the shock trooper talent.
Sadly Vermintide in some aspects, have a better ranged gameplay mechanism and also better ammo resupply options.
in matter of fact, DT do have many flawed aspects when it comes to ranged combat, inconsistent recoil patterns, suppression is still flawed or not even working (lacking any gradual build up), and blessings that lacks any meaning and so on.
I too agree, if we are going to add a secondary weapon, not every weapon should be allowed as secondary, or get stat nerfed as its secondary either ammo or performance etc.
You don’t expect AI being smarter than human players always looking for a way to bend the system? What are those “basic infantry tactics” ragers or maulers or crushers will use to present a higher difficulty to players?
Thats the annoying bit to us. But its the total number of them onscreen at once that breaks so many other abilities and drives the “must be good at killing carapace” weapon meta.
A developer once admited that they balanced around malice. So think how often elites etc appear there. Now compare that to higher difficulties - yeah a LOT more of them show up at once. Its that huge difference that is driving so many problems precisely because so much was balanced around a smaller number of them.
Wait around a corner? Wait until the gunners have the players attention then come up from behind? Spread out to hit from multiple directions instead of clumping up into a single group? Crusher swings and when the player dodges a rager hits them from behind. The basic “do not let this happen to you” lessons that get taught in self-defense, martial art, and unarmed combat classes.
Don’t see how that follows, surely the lower down the scaling sweet spot is the larger the magnitude of upscaling needed to make it more difficult, looks to me that the whole difficulty issue is a problem is because they are working with malice level threats, there are only so many of these mobs you can throw at a team before the game just falls apart.
a few ideas off the top of my head. just examples not suggestions.
Ragers - some adrenal boost that makes them live for a brief window after HP are depleted during which time they do huge damage and become uncontrollable and faster. makeing it very dangerous to “kill” a large amount at once.
Maulers could have smoke grenades to help them get into place or a charge ability , spawn in opposing directions .
Snipers could have a refraction field making them invisible to the guy being aimed at
there must be hundred or thousands of ways you could alter a monsters skills or rule set to offer a bigger challenge / increase need for team work
It’s not really military tactics though. Well, at least if we speak about times when melee combat was the main thing on the battlefield - then it was exactly about lumping together in a huge tight blob and pushing into enemy’s formations. With some flanking involved too sure - but AI does flanking strikes already too, you can see several waves coming at you from several directions.
