WoM Beta and current live version problems and theory craft

This topic should be locked. It’s not that OP is wrong on everything, but the hostile attitude doesn’t belong here.

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You’re taking it the wrong way. I’m saying “you’re acting in a way that is embarrassing to yourself and not conducive to a good community”. Learn to operate within that community, there’s no need to lose control of your anger like this. You’re not coming off as tough, just kind of petulant.

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I just wanted to add some points to your feedback.

I personally think you made a great point with the 2 different Gear Sets, I would prefer them to overlap more or be the same.

I disagree on many of your angry emotional criticisms, for example I disagree that reskinning and adding assets is something negative. I personally enjoy the added variety. Of course new levels are better but this adds new pathways, atmosphere and replay value to the already existing ones. Also I enjoyed the short games.

I personally disagree on the horde thing and the supposedly too tough enemies. I personally love it because it really forces you to play as a team or be insanely skilled or use very optimized builds which is very nice for me personally. Also you have to keep your team alive because otherwise you lack damage to not get overwhelmed.

Besides that I really like the banners and charging beastmen, you just gotta position yourself, dodge sideways or interrupt them. Or maybe have a career in your team that can do such a thing. IT WAS SO MUCH FUN TO CHARGE AT THE CHARGING BEASTMEN AS KRUBER TO PROTECT MY TEAM! Just amazing, very satisfying. Maybe you personally or your preferred careers struggled with the new mechanics, I personally like the added challenge. Of cours the knockback can kill entire squads if you place incorrectly close to an edge but this is just another reason to communicate, work as a team etc. I really ejoyed it personally.

Overall: The highest difficulty is supposed to annoy you and to make you fail from time to time. If you generally think its overtuned there is no disadvantage to play legend. I casually played Nightmare for a while in V1 and not every run had to be cataclysm. Generally Cataclysm should not be balanced so that you can deal with every situation with every career easily in my opinion.

About being abled to filter people I understand your point but I personally disagree again because if you want to filter people just add them as friends on Steam after you had a good experience with them, but I personally dont believe filtering out noobs in group search will benefit the game long term because new and potentially good players will quit if they are only paired up with other noobs and never with experienced players. Even though I understand why you would like to have a more specific search function I prefer it the way it is.

Also I disagree with you, RNG is the secret love of Completionists and fashionistas because if something is more rare its much more rewarding to own. Thats something that rewards players with a ton of playtime and gives them something to wait for. Of course its frustrating and unfair at times but if everyone has access to the cosmetics you got after 1000 hours within a week its a less accomplished feeling for me personally and I dont believe it should be changed personally.

I personally tested Way Kerillian, Ranger Bardin, Huntsman and Bounty hunter during Beta and compared them specifically. I never felt like they should add in temp hp for ranged kills again. Ranged gameplay felt very rewarding as long as I had a frontliner in my group who would provide some space for me from time to time and overall balanced even without that.

I agree on you that despite the recent changes twhohanded weapons and shields are still at a disadvantage compared to mobile weapons but for me its okay if they require certain builds to work well like for example attack speed builds.

Your overall post reads like a salty rant but has some true feedback in there and I respect your opinion. Most of your balance suggestions are to make the game easier overall. It seems like you are a skilled player but you expect to be abled to solve every situation yourself, which I personally believe is not the perfect point of balance to go for. With all the changes you suggest cata would effectively become the new legend which I dont want. I want Cata to be the new insane hard mode which rewards actual teamplay among very good players and veterans such as you and me.

I hope I could add some different views or ideas to the discussion and I hope fatshark will keep up their good work. V2 really is one of my favorite games of all time :slight_smile:

Quick Edit: I got my Beta key late as well and I sadly never got Beta Forum access as well despite providing my beta key to hedge so I can understand that very well, feelsbadman.

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^ This is how one communicates.

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You’re missing the bloody point mate. Me telling you this belongs in the beta feedback forum was a hint you still haven’t seemed to get. It is against the rules to post this in the open forums regardless if you did or didn’t get access. Which is why I suggested sending the feedback directly to Fatshark. I understand you were unable to post there but that doesn’t suddenly give you the right to do it here. Then you top it off with this extremely toxic behaviour and you wonder why you’re getting flagged by so many people.

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Why are we still feeding this guy?

locker

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Cool! Now this is more like it, let’s go through this:

Ok, first of all, the the emotion is there to give the logic more impact, not to somehow detract from it. The reason for it is evident from the history of this franchise. If you look through V1 and V2, you can see that Fatshark has been steadily getting lazier and lazier.

In V1 the first DLC we got was Castle Drakenfels with 3 unique maps and 2 weapons, followed by Karak Azgaraz (my favorite), again, with 3 unique maps and 2 weapons, followed by Stromdorf, now with 2 new slightly less unique maps, and 1 weapon for Kruber, then Death on the Reik with 2 relatively unique maps and 1 new weapon. AND by the way, each weapon in V1 was it’s own unique model for the Veteran items.

In V2, what did we get? We got new character models, and mostly recycled weapon models from V1, which is fine, this is an appropriate re-purposing of old content, because it makes sense. Except now all the Veteran items are just regular champion weapons with a glow. This is lazy.

Then we get the first DLC Shadows Over Bogenhafen which gave us 2 maps MOSTLY constructed from re-purposed assets and new weapon illusion which was the LAZIEST possible method of re-purposing old assets imaginable. Now they’re purple, yay! I’ve even hear one of the people I played with, describe The Pit level as “Every single previous level asset lumped into one level”, and you know what? This is kinda lazy, but still FINE because even though they’re using old assets, they’re creating a brand new scene with them.

Then we got Back to Ubersreich. Uh oh, now we’re getting into some shady territory. Basically the same maps from V1, that were re-purposed to with minor puzzle elements and slapped into a DLC. It’s only saving grace was Fortune of War, which was ALSO, a re-purposed asset, used to create an arena. The only thing that even slightly redeems it, was that is was challenging, and fun.

Now, let’s take a look at WoM: 1 new map, then a mode that’s basically an edit of the original maps, with some minor gameplay elements attached to them. THIS IS LAZY! This is the equivalent of a musician, re-mixing an old popular song with an unnecessary techno track. Defending this decision would seem like it would only come from someone who doesn’t know how much they’re giving up by purchasing something like this.

You can still work as a team, and/or need to be insanely skilled to play this mode, the only difference is that, it would be WAY less grindy. The pacing of the levels in current beta cata seems twice as slow as a regular legendary game, and legendary game are now a piece of cake because everyone is using a super OP build that chews through the non-beefy mobs with ease. As I’ve mentioned before, the LAST thing Vermintide 2 needs, is to be more gridny.

The other thing I noticed is that, if you do make a mistake, and start to get overwhelmed, you can’t recover, because the way it’s currently balanced, there’s hardly any reliable ways to recover from a mistake. Say, for the sake of argument: The elf goes down, you’re mid 2nd wave of a horde. You got monks, the charging elites, stormvermin, about 20-30 clan rats and one disabler, or really any kind of special. This is usually typical for a Cata game from what I saw. The elf is already surrounded but you’re Kruber Foot Knight w/ charge ready. You charge in to save her, knocking the enemies away for that brief time needed for her to get up, (assuming you managed to click on her in time). You run the risk of: Being overhead stunned by a stormvermin not affected by your charge, being charged at by a beastman elite, friendly fired, being disabled by a special. You could not have your charge up because you used it to create room for your other team-mates. Assuming you botched your charge in the heat of the battle, you risk your guard simply being broken, you can be interrupted by a gun-rat firing from far away, ANOTHER of your teammates can go down since you’re not there to cover them and they’re also getting overwhelmed, The elf can simply DIE after being brought up because you brought her up into being surrounded, and a plethora of similar situations which make it nearly IMPOSSIBLE for most groups to reliably chew through that much hp, while performing team-oriented tasks. The ONLY solution is: Don’t go down, and the choices for builds must gravitate towards “Don’t go down” and “overwhelming AoE”.

Thirdly, I would personally LOVE it if this was a more team oriented game where everyone had a role to play, but that’s not the game we’ve been playing for the past year. To suddenly force people into it, is not what most people signed up for to begin with, and I fear there will be huge backlash if it’s implemented, or it’s ignored completely.

And what if there’s 2 charging beast men, in a hall way. You’re on grey health, and you managed to stop one from charging into you, and then the other one killed you, then your group proceeded to fail because you weren’t around to protect them by no fault of your gameplay? Does that seem fair to you? What if one of them charged from the rear and you didn’t get a chance to hear it through the horde or other sounds, and it just happens to stun you while you’re holding off a horde, opening your guard up and effectively downing you, does that seem fair or fun to you? What if they don’t even go for you and attack one of your squishies instead while you’re fending off another threat? Because all of these things have happened during my gameplay, and I can assuredly say that they were “not fun or fair”.

You also like how the banner resets your draw of the bow or fireball charge or charged attack, and jostles you from a mile away through a wall? Alone, this special is manageable, but combined with a disabler, or a horde, or any similar combination and they’re the worst thing in this game to deal with. All they do is drag out the fight, and make other enemies into meat shields, effectively wasting your time. AND it has the ability to group wipe? Tell me honestly, how cheated would you feel, if your entire team made it 80% of the way through a level, then got 1 shot by terrain, or even if half of them did, and then a horde came and wiped the rest of you? You’re telling me, you’d be completely ok with that? I find that very hard to believe.

-I’ve have never heard any reputable developer utter this phrase in the history of video game making.

A higher level difficulty is supposed to challenge the skills you’ve developed throughout your lower level gameplay. If you’ve played as an under-powered talent build because you could get away with it in champion, then get totally annihilated in legendary or Cata, that’s not the fault of the player, but of the balance and design of the talents and difficulty scaling, assuming, of course, that the build wasn’t bad to begin with.

That we know of yet. If there isn’t any prestige or better loot rewards inherent to Cata difficulty, there would be absolutely no reason to run it outside private group.

Easily, no. I agree, but that’s not the issue. The issue is that it’s virtually impossible to deal with it at all.

I already have dedicated groups of friends that I play with, and I can say without a doubt, it is a much better experience, but sometimes they’re not on, or they’re playing with someone else. So, in order to discover NEW people that don’t suck, this would be a really great feature. And I also don’t feel like people noobs would be alienated that much anyways, because:

  1. Like you said yourself, there’s other difficulties.
  2. People like myself still like to mix it up form time to time and be a mentor to newer people
  3. It’s a much better experience, in general, when people play in a group with similar skill levels

There’s no reason I should be forced to carry some noob facerolling his keyboard for the majority of the game.

1,000,000,000% disagree

There have been innumerable studies that show skinner boxes are a psychologically manipulative method to garner someone’s attention and make that person spend magnitudes more time or money or … whatever. In the case of this game, it’s your time.

I want you to watch this video:

Then, tell me whether you or anyone you’ve known has ever fallen victim to the examples presented in Vermintide 2. Cause I sure have. 1500 hours, and 100%ing the game, doesn’t just happen for no reason. The worst part about it, is that he talks about engagement vs. compulsion and the Zen state when playing the game. Ironically, Vermintide 2 has both of these in almost equal measure. The gameplay is the reason I WANT to come back, and master the mechanics of being a great X character player, but the grindy, awful crafting and reward system almost forces me to go through the grind in order to attain that mastery in a manner I deem fit.

If I really didn’t feel the need to care about cosmetics, this might not be much of an issue for me, but again, it is a psychological trap when you see someone wearing a fancy new hat, and you wonder: “why not me?” “I want to look cool, too.” In fact, this was the centerpiece around why EA got into so much trouble for the algorithm that paired players without cosmetics or certain weapons, to those with them, incentivizing them to make a purchase. To some extent - and I have no hard proof for this - but a lot of times, it sure feels like I get Quickplayed into A LOT of dlc maps, when I’m playing with people without the DLC. Vermintide 2 and Fatshark may not be profiting off of these decisions, but are just as guilty of employing them. This is wrong.

This is why I push for rewards for DIFFICULTY based rewards, not grinds, not skinner boxes. Because then it’s an incentive to get better, and a badge of pride and skill when you’ve attained it, much like the FoW border.

Lastly, and this is going to be a bit tacked on, but the difficulty re-vamp BREAKS the pacing of the game and the fluidity of the combat. They’re breaking their own rhythm of combat and this is instantly noticeable when there’s a horde on Cata. While the enjoyment of the new game flow is subjective, since you seem to enjoy it, while I feel it breaks many of the currently working elements, I believe it is the wrong move because changing the inherent pace of action in your game after it’s already been establish, and arguably the best part of the game, is a catastrophically terrible decision for the majority of the established player base.

Ah yes, but how often does this happen in reality? I would wager to say 5% of the time, and since there are even fewer capable builds and classes that can hold their own against a horde on Cata now, not to mention since stagger is the prevalent gameplay mechanic, unless you’re firing into a horde w/ bodyshots, I can’t imagine you ever feeling that you’ve earned a kill that you intended. Headshots will be even more difficult to perform because everything’s being bounced around, and the second your meatshield goes down, you can rest assured that you will soon follow, because if a fully specced tank can barely hold their own against a horde, you, as a ranged character, with dismal temp hp generation stand no chance at all.

Why are you ok with this? Almost every mobile weapon starts out as at least a DECENT weapon, then becomes amazing after properties, talents, and traits, but most 2hders and shields start out bad, and become decent, or good at best with an incredibly specific build. Why is this ok?

This sentence is a contradiction. If you really wanted to admonish my lack of tact, you could say something like this: “Although I disapprove of some of your choice of language, I begrudgingly accept that what you have to say has considerable merit.”

No, the goal of the changes I present is to preserve the flow of action in the game, which I believe to be vital to an enjoyable experience.

There would be nothing to stop team oriented gameplay in a difficulty mode that doesn’t involve turning the game into a meatshield grindfest. The most important part of difficulty is the amount of meaningful choices executed properly at extended periods of time. This means: if you have a blunderbuss or a crossbow, you have to make sure it’s loaded and not waste it on a group of clustered clan-rats, so that the weapon can be ready in case you need it for a leech, or disabler, or to handle some other dire situation AND you have to have the skill necessary in order to execute that action. It means you have to be ready to handle any situation fast enough and reliably enough.

The problem this new re-balance presents is that is compounds all the situations you would face, and effectively acts as a multiplier. This turns a hook-rat that takes 2-3 shots to dispatch, into 3-5, effectively doubling the threat, and what I’m saying is that currently, the problems that are presented to the player are overwhelming because just adding a multiplier like “health” into the equation, without considering any other parameters is a recipe to ruin originally crafted system. Combine this with poorly constructed talent choices and human error, and this starts to erode what was originally the fun gameplay mechanic and creates a FAR too narrow margin of error for most people.

I’ll reiterate, I like team oriented play, I personally would like to see more team-work, but I don’t think that should come at the cost of core gameplay mechanics, or poorly crafted enemies.

At least, I’m glad we agree on the second loadout being a terrible idea.

Thread has run its course.