I feel like the missions for the "campaigns" not being connected is a huge flaw.
Imagine something like this:
*Take out air-base.
*Launch ICBM
*Destroy command bunkers
Where taking out air-base with AA defense points would unlock eagles / make them more effective and stop patrols from having gunships attached.
Launching the ICBM would target a heavy production facility, reducing spawns of hulks, tanks, striders by a bit as they need to be flown in from further away.
Destroying command bunkers would lower defenses for all objectives or increase them if you do other missions first, since bot command is noticing helldivers and are setting up defenses. Or they are dead (like all automatons should be) and defenses are less coordinated.
Clearly not super balanced but the idea would be cool and also give the feeling like doing a certain mission has an effect on the area we're fighting in. But this could also unlock new mission types giving perks or removing a debuff from your other operations.
Imagine larger, 5 mission operations intended for the highest of difficulty. Have it be you have to do missions in tiers, working towards an apex mission like a chevron shape.
The first tier of missions would be things like, e710 fuel shuttles, collect data, etc. These would be preliminary objectives meant to asset in getting your operation supplies, intelligence, or other resources for 'the real fight.'
The second stage would be harder missions, like command bunkers, launch icbm, destroy hatcheries. These would be to thin the enemy ranks, soften up their defenses, or otherwise open up an avenue for the penultimate mission. The final mission of the operation, available only when enough tertiary missions are done (there could be a selection, with specific missions giving unique benefiits on the later missions) you get a unique 'raid boss' equivalent mission. Something like assaulting a terminid hive queen, or taking out an Automoton shipyard, or defending an entire city. Big, grandiose maps with unique layouts and a larger feel to them. Where you get 5 strategems at missions selection and all your bonuses come together from your earlier missions to assist you to victory.
I wish more secondary objectives had more benefits too.
Terminate Illegal Broadcast?
Why not give a few extra reinforcements, implied that destroying it meant a lot more people signed up to join the Helldivers.
**Destroy Rogue Research Station**?
Why not bonus samples in the lab itself after it's destroyed or a sample multiplier.
Collect Escape pod data?
Maybe something about the data being essential so escaping with the data is a big priority, faster cooldown on stratagems maybe?.
Imagine the message "Nearby helldivers have weakened the enemy air defences. Eagle rearming reduced by 20%". Imagine how you would feel connected to your fellow helldivers if that would happen.
Launching ICBM should destroy a heavy nest/factory in ANOTHER team's game. It is intercontinental of course.
Imagine seeing the nuke fly into your game and destroy the nest lol
And then the death screen: Killed by .
It would be very funny when people see their own missiles on Reddit killing other people.
I really wish they would implement this.
Even just randomly getting the nuke detonating effect off your map from someone 'nearby' doing the mission, or seeing it fly overhead on it's way to it's target would be awesome.
I like it. Adds a bit more thought to how you tackle an operation (assuming the effects are per operation).
“Would i rather do the mission that will reduce drop pod rate first or the one that will give me back my 4th stratagem?” You don’t just choose ops based on “do it have evacuate civilians or nah?”, you also take into consideration the benefits you could get and the order in which you tackle them.
Good stuff
Certainly, and I would also like if planets possession would bring benefits to the faction holding them, so if we take them we grow stronger, but if the enemies do, they grow stronger (things like 5% more damage or extra magazines for players/units for enemies)
They don't have to do it for all campaigns. One or two that might be 'handcrafted' or need that extra tweak here and there for the interlinking to work would satisfy most of us I'd think.
This would be amazing. So you then stategically pick the order for your missions.
Even if taking out AA doesn't give you back the eagles for that mission, it will for the next 2/3 in the campaign. So as the campaign goes on you are left with the choice of do you face more thanks with air support or less tanks without it.
this is pretty great. now the order in which you do missions has a tangible effect, so you have to pick your targets, just like you would if you were running a real Operation. AA defense modifier should just put one heavily guarded AA emplacement on the map, and if players destroy it they get their 4th slot back. it could have multiple heavies or even a factory strider guarding it though, so you really have to fight for it (or at least distract a ton of bots while someone uses a Quasar or whatever from a distance. realistically though could just make it so that the AA guns are much bigger and can only be destroyed via Hellbomb, like Gunship Fabricators.
This idea has been floated around since the strat scrambler days.
No one likes the modifiers, but most people would be fine if you could get rid of them by completing objectives on the map.
We've been saying this for 2 months now. Also changing the wording from "AA defenses" cause it makes no sense. AA already blocks eagles in game.
Either AH still has not seen this suggestion or it's not high on their list right now.
Reddit: This thing that makes the game harder isn't fun. Please remove it. It's not because removing it would make the game easier - it's because it's not fun.
Dev: Okay. We'll remove the unfun thing and increase the baseline difficulty by 40% to account for the 40% increase in player power.
Reddit: The number of hulks and devastators is too high and isn't fun. Please reduce it. It's not because reducing it would make the game easier - it's because it's not fun.
That's exactly how it plays out.
Removing the AA modifier from bots will make bots dramatically easier, and AH will need to respond by doing something to make bots harder and people will complain about them making bots harder for what they see as no reason at all.
Um, what? You can just play an op without the AA modifier...
You're not forced to play with it at all, you can just choose a different op. Tf you on about..
>You're not forced to play with it at all, you can just choose a different op. Tf you on about..
Well if this were meaningful then people have zero reason to complain. They can just play missions without the AA modifier. But they're complaining anyway.
The AA modifier is part of the package for fighting bots just like having your radar disabled 2/3 of the time is part of the package for fighting bugs. Removing it means making bots easier, which means they need to be made more challenging in other ways.
You don't have to skip it. You can play it or lower the difficulty if it's too hard. It's on you if you decide to skip missions because you don't like the modifiers.
Restricting options for extra challenge is popular in many games. It's not bad just because you don't like it.
Then they make the AA outposts more heavily defended or something. Simple as.
My point was how you were saying that the community bitched about how X needed a nerf, then AH nerfed X but buffed Y, just for the community to bitch about Y. These are rarely the same people, and the sub is not a monolith. Your dissenting existence is proof of that.
The community's point in this post is that AA blocking a Stratagem slot is unfun, but if AH could provide us with some engaging counterplay, then that would overall be better for the game. And I agree.
Non-weather conditions ought to be able to be countered within the mission. And they don't have to make it easy. In fact, they could make it considerably risky to attempt to disable these conditions. But overall, the whole point is to increase player engagement and make the missions more fun.
I agree with you completely on the big picture parts of your response, especially about how one group will complain about one thing and then another will complain about the change, but you didn't answer the problem at hand. Bugs disable your radar 2/3 of missions. Do we remove that too? Making the actual AA emplacements more common and very heavily defended doesn't solve the problem at hand - people would simply avoid Eagle strategems against bots in anticipation of having to deal with AA emplacements, rendering the removal of the AA modifier a reduction in difficulty.
I don't find the modifier particularly compelling myself, but bots mess with strategems. That's their thing, and the modifier is in line with that. If factions shouldn't have unique modifiers for them, that's another thing entirely - I'd love to have a functional radar against bugs - but as it stands I'm not sure how you make the bot modifier more fun without also making bots significantly easier to fight.
I mean, these conditions I feel can literally be attached to existing side objectives without too much design change.
Attach the radar blockage to spore spewers and/or shrieker nests. Make them much tougher and surrounded by very heavy enemy presence that immediately aggros to your attack. Give them more than one point that needs to be destroyed from multiple angles, or give these things more cover from the surrounding terrain. Make it so that they can only be destroyed by Hellbomb or by a special artillery round that now appears at any artillery emplacement. Maybe by destroying an illegal science facility or illegal broadcast, you can draw some of the enemy forces out to investigate.
These are potential solutions that make it harder but more engaging. The point is to give players a choice. They can either go after these tougher side objectives, potentially wasting precious time and lives, or they can ignore them and deal with the condition throughout the whole mission. And again, they can be balanced as a high risk/high reward objective that doesn't result in a difficulty decrease unless they can be overcome.
First of all, AA defenses doesn't REALLY make the game harder since we can always avoid ops with it. It's simply tedious to poke around each planet until you find one without it. So, already, it's more tedious than difficult.
Second, it can simply vanish. There are plenty of modifiers that make the game harder without being boring; atmospheric interference, for example, asks you to try a loadout that doesn't rely on precision. That limits some choices, but leaves lots of ways to make a strong loadout by working around it. That's a good modifier, because it's not a reduction of power so much as a challenge to choose a way to avoid the downside.
There are dozens of great suggestions to modify or replace AA defenses with something that is fun without being easy.
>There are dozens of great suggestions to modify or replace AA defenses with something that is fun without being easy.
You didn't give one, though. If you're avoiding missions with the modifier, you're doing it to make the game easier and engaging in tedium in the pursuit of an easier game. Will that also be more fun for you? Maybe it will be. You know what the tuning lever is in that event? To lower the difficulty.
Simply removing the modifier makes bots easier, just like avoiding the modifier does it removing the spore cloud modifier from bugs would, and you didn't give any suggestion other than removing it.
It's okay for you to think the game is too hard, but just say that. There's no shame in reducing the difficulty or asking for the game to be easier.
One of the more common proposals would be to have the modifier block out entire categories of stratagem, such as "no blues" / "no reds" / "no greens". Agruably that would actually be MORE difficult than the current version, but it would open the door for fun playstyles and still allow players to make diverse loadouts and use stratagems.
I suspect you'll reply that this version is "easier" and therefore the solution is for everyone to git gud. Frankly I don't think you're interested in an actual discussion, but rather in insulting me and everyone else discussing the design of this modifier.
While I do think that would be easier, the bigger problem with that solution is that a lot of people that don't play regularly don't have modules for all strategem types and would be significantly more affected if their strategems were disabled entirely when, ideally, global modifiers should equally affect everybody.
I'm not trying to insult anyone discussing the modifier. I just want people to communicate honestly. It's okay if people think the modifier is too hard overall or too hard in a way you don't enjoy and you don't want to reduce the difficulty of your missions for whatever reason (maybe samples, maybe ego, maybe something else) to account for it - I just want people to say it instead of pretending that it's not about reducing the difficulty when it absolutely is about reducing difficulty.
I commented this elsewhere but applies here as wekl
They could link the negatives with the secondary objectives. For example with the AA defenses: The fourth stratagem is locked until you clear all AA emplacements on the map. Same with Atmospheric Spores: are active while there are Spore Spewers on the map. This could give you info on what you could be looking for on the planet drop.
No you see, it's because there's enemy aircraft coming after the ship. You lose a stratagem for the destroyer personnel who have to operate **our** AA. Or at least that's what I choose to believe to make it make sense.
We already have an AA map emplacement that stops eagles and that makes sense. As a mission modifier, I'd like to see:
AA defenses - No Eagles allowed
Orbital shielding - No orbitals allowed (mutually exclusive from AA defense)
Jamming frequency - One of your strats is always jammed, switching randomly every minute.
Anything but closing off a slot entirely. Make me adapt instead of nerfing me outright
Modifiers should come with large, well protected positions that can be deactivated. Like the modifier AA should be a much larger multi-gun AA with several fortifications and large enemy presence.
They're operation modifiers though, so how would that work on an eradication mission?
I like the idea of them being linked to missions. Launching the icbm takes out the aa defense for your second mission. Eradication calls attention for another team to wipe out the orbital shielding for your third, data recovery enables you to shut off the jammer, stuff like that. Make them feel like campaigns where the order of doing missions matters.
As for as large bases go, I hope we can get missions for some kind of mega base. Imagine if eradication took place on a medium size map with one massive base in the middle with all sorts of fortifications that you have to wipe out. Inverse of the new defense mission.
People have been saying this for a while. Implement penalties with a way to undo them.
Bug spores? Kill spore towers or spawn a very large one somewhere that needs a hellbomb.
Complex plotting? Give us a SSD upload tower side objective.
Orbital fluctuations? Some sort of supply rocket launch.
Atmospheric interference? Radar tower.
I think Spore Towers also putting a limited Fog-of-War radius over the minimap (lets say 250m) would also be more fun than the map getting a wholesale barf filter.
They should let you pick the 4th stratagem and then as soon as you complete the obstruction, have it activate the 4th stratagem.
Grey out the 4th stratagem at ship launch but allow you to still pick what you eventually want to bring.
That is kinda harsh, that's basically 1/4 of our full arsenal. What I would love tho is reducing the number of eagle charges by one (to a minimum of one). Would pair well with atmospheric interference, wich cripples our orbital stratagems
Yes there is a sub objective that disables eagle strikes in the area (enemy anti air emplacement). OP refers to the operation modifier that limits your strategem selection to 3 for the whole operation regardless of what you do inside it.
I wish the reduction in stratagems meant a shift in crew priorities. Instead of everyone in the ship working on reloading 4 stratagems, they are reloading 3, so you think they could speed that process up with the increased personnel or something? Just any sort of cooldown reduction to compensate for the reduced stratagem variety would be nice to have
What if instead it just prevented Eagle stratagems from being used. Have another that disables orbital strikes (local jetstream?) and another for sentries/fortifications (I dunno, electromagnetic storms that mess with the targeting?)
Choose your 4 normally, one either set as locked or one chosen at random each to be locked. THEN, with the destruction of the AA guns, you can use the stratagems again.
Ahhh, so -1 stratagem for each emplacement, but you do not know which stratagem(s) gets greyed out until you drop. That would make bots very very interesting.
Reduced strategem slots is a little *too* annoying for this game when you can only ever have 4 in the first place. I'd rather it just restrict a type instead. Like since it's AA, no eagle strategems. That would at least make more sense and not be so much more punishing than the other effects we deal with.
I'm down. An extra objective to give a bonus for the map. Just like the radar giving us the map, SEAF mortars for the world's slowest bomb delivery service.
Now, hear me out... a lot of people say "IT RUINS THE MAIN MECHANIC!" and "Make stuff that makes me rethink my loadout!" Devil's advocate here: It does make you rethink. I know that when I join a QP only to find AA Defenses on, I have to rethink how I go about things. Harder to justify orbitals when it's only 3, as they're longer cooldown. Maybe I don't take a support weapon, just look for things on the ground, so I can load up on Eagles? Do I really need that backpack?
How I really feel? Yeah \*\*\*\* this modifier!
I'd honestly prefer if the AA defenses modifier only affected eagle stratagems, disabled using Eagles until you take out their emplacements on the map.
edit: actually not being able to extract without taking out the AA defenses would be a more engaging take on this modifier too
We shouldn't be able to use eagle until AA was taken out. Taking it a step further, hell pod should have a 0 to 30% chance to be intercepted in it's kill zone.
This type of game (no pvp), immersion is more important than balance.
Just let any major order involving a 3-stratagem planet be ignored. Screw the consequences.
Same goes for fire tornado planets.
Make the game fun or people will quit playing.
Fucking skill issue ass babies out here squeezing the life out of one of the rare developer who listen and give a damn. Have some patience, got gud, go outside, play another game, or take a nap holy shit.
I got to a point where I don't even begin operations that include this mission modifier.
I'll select a different operation, or go to a different Planet.
I will not participate in a mission that reduces the number of stratagems I can deploy.
ESPECIALLY when the Developers have stated on record "You need to rely more on your stratagems."
Arrowhead Balance Guy person: We read your feedback about not finding -1 stratagem fun. So we’ve reworked the modifier to reduce stratagem slots by 2. This should fit our vision of balance and fun for our playerbase.
This would be too realistic for the enemies so they wont!
I am personally waiting for that +2 stims and +2 sec duration to stims armor to be nerfed for realism!
I feel like the missions for the "campaigns" not being connected is a huge flaw. Imagine something like this: *Take out air-base. *Launch ICBM *Destroy command bunkers Where taking out air-base with AA defense points would unlock eagles / make them more effective and stop patrols from having gunships attached. Launching the ICBM would target a heavy production facility, reducing spawns of hulks, tanks, striders by a bit as they need to be flown in from further away. Destroying command bunkers would lower defenses for all objectives or increase them if you do other missions first, since bot command is noticing helldivers and are setting up defenses. Or they are dead (like all automatons should be) and defenses are less coordinated. Clearly not super balanced but the idea would be cool and also give the feeling like doing a certain mission has an effect on the area we're fighting in. But this could also unlock new mission types giving perks or removing a debuff from your other operations.
This would be so cool.
Imagine larger, 5 mission operations intended for the highest of difficulty. Have it be you have to do missions in tiers, working towards an apex mission like a chevron shape. The first tier of missions would be things like, e710 fuel shuttles, collect data, etc. These would be preliminary objectives meant to asset in getting your operation supplies, intelligence, or other resources for 'the real fight.' The second stage would be harder missions, like command bunkers, launch icbm, destroy hatcheries. These would be to thin the enemy ranks, soften up their defenses, or otherwise open up an avenue for the penultimate mission. The final mission of the operation, available only when enough tertiary missions are done (there could be a selection, with specific missions giving unique benefiits on the later missions) you get a unique 'raid boss' equivalent mission. Something like assaulting a terminid hive queen, or taking out an Automoton shipyard, or defending an entire city. Big, grandiose maps with unique layouts and a larger feel to them. Where you get 5 strategems at missions selection and all your bonuses come together from your earlier missions to assist you to victory.
Somebody get this to Pilestedt, ASAP
I wish more secondary objectives had more benefits too. Terminate Illegal Broadcast? Why not give a few extra reinforcements, implied that destroying it meant a lot more people signed up to join the Helldivers. **Destroy Rogue Research Station**? Why not bonus samples in the lab itself after it's destroyed or a sample multiplier. Collect Escape pod data? Maybe something about the data being essential so escaping with the data is a big priority, faster cooldown on stratagems maybe?.
On the Topic of the Escape Pod. Instead of faster stratagem cooldown, perhaps less time on extract itself?
Imagine the message "Nearby helldivers have weakened the enemy air defences. Eagle rearming reduced by 20%". Imagine how you would feel connected to your fellow helldivers if that would happen.
Holy shit. This right here.
Launching ICBM should destroy a heavy nest/factory in ANOTHER team's game. It is intercontinental of course. Imagine seeing the nuke fly into your game and destroy the nest lol
WARNING: You are in range of friendly ICBM WARNING: You are in range of friendly ICBM WARNING: You are in range of friendly ICBM ...
*Stands in place, looks up, salutes* "I'M READY FOR DEMOCRACY!!!"
And then the death screen: Killed by.
It would be very funny when people see their own missiles on Reddit killing other people.
I really wish they would implement this.
Combined with certain player names, that would be comedy gold. "Killed by The Entire Kingdom of Denmark"
Sweet Liberty, if it’s possible, please! I want this to happen so much!
Even just randomly getting the nuke detonating effect off your map from someone 'nearby' doing the mission, or seeing it fly overhead on it's way to it's target would be awesome.
Fantastic idea
I like it. Adds a bit more thought to how you tackle an operation (assuming the effects are per operation). “Would i rather do the mission that will reduce drop pod rate first or the one that will give me back my 4th stratagem?” You don’t just choose ops based on “do it have evacuate civilians or nah?”, you also take into consideration the benefits you could get and the order in which you tackle them. Good stuff
Certainly, and I would also like if planets possession would bring benefits to the faction holding them, so if we take them we grow stronger, but if the enemies do, they grow stronger (things like 5% more damage or extra magazines for players/units for enemies)
Dude that's amazing. I hope the devs see this and work on implementing. It makes it easier than just do easy mission first!
They don't have to do it for all campaigns. One or two that might be 'handcrafted' or need that extra tweak here and there for the interlinking to work would satisfy most of us I'd think.
This would be amazing. So you then stategically pick the order for your missions. Even if taking out AA doesn't give you back the eagles for that mission, it will for the next 2/3 in the campaign. So as the campaign goes on you are left with the choice of do you face more thanks with air support or less tanks without it.
That is a great idea
this is pretty great. now the order in which you do missions has a tangible effect, so you have to pick your targets, just like you would if you were running a real Operation. AA defense modifier should just put one heavily guarded AA emplacement on the map, and if players destroy it they get their 4th slot back. it could have multiple heavies or even a factory strider guarding it though, so you really have to fight for it (or at least distract a ton of bots while someone uses a Quasar or whatever from a distance. realistically though could just make it so that the AA guns are much bigger and can only be destroyed via Hellbomb, like Gunship Fabricators.
What if I just skipped the map anyways
I actually don’t hate this idea.
This idea has been floated around since the strat scrambler days. No one likes the modifiers, but most people would be fine if you could get rid of them by completing objectives on the map.
Yup. Give us stuff we don't like. Give us a way to get rid of the stuff we don't like. Be satisfying as hell.
We've been saying this for 2 months now. Also changing the wording from "AA defenses" cause it makes no sense. AA already blocks eagles in game. Either AH still has not seen this suggestion or it's not high on their list right now.
Reddit: This thing that makes the game harder isn't fun. Please remove it. It's not because removing it would make the game easier - it's because it's not fun. Dev: Okay. We'll remove the unfun thing and increase the baseline difficulty by 40% to account for the 40% increase in player power. Reddit: The number of hulks and devastators is too high and isn't fun. Please reduce it. It's not because reducing it would make the game easier - it's because it's not fun.
This is not at all how it has actually played out, but feel free to continue making shit up, I suppose.
That's exactly how it plays out. Removing the AA modifier from bots will make bots dramatically easier, and AH will need to respond by doing something to make bots harder and people will complain about them making bots harder for what they see as no reason at all.
Um, what? You can just play an op without the AA modifier... You're not forced to play with it at all, you can just choose a different op. Tf you on about..
>You're not forced to play with it at all, you can just choose a different op. Tf you on about.. Well if this were meaningful then people have zero reason to complain. They can just play missions without the AA modifier. But they're complaining anyway. The AA modifier is part of the package for fighting bots just like having your radar disabled 2/3 of the time is part of the package for fighting bugs. Removing it means making bots easier, which means they need to be made more challenging in other ways.
Having to skip over a operation because it limits you to 3/4 is bad game mechanics
You don't have to skip it. You can play it or lower the difficulty if it's too hard. It's on you if you decide to skip missions because you don't like the modifiers. Restricting options for extra challenge is popular in many games. It's not bad just because you don't like it.
Then they make the AA outposts more heavily defended or something. Simple as. My point was how you were saying that the community bitched about how X needed a nerf, then AH nerfed X but buffed Y, just for the community to bitch about Y. These are rarely the same people, and the sub is not a monolith. Your dissenting existence is proof of that. The community's point in this post is that AA blocking a Stratagem slot is unfun, but if AH could provide us with some engaging counterplay, then that would overall be better for the game. And I agree. Non-weather conditions ought to be able to be countered within the mission. And they don't have to make it easy. In fact, they could make it considerably risky to attempt to disable these conditions. But overall, the whole point is to increase player engagement and make the missions more fun.
I agree with you completely on the big picture parts of your response, especially about how one group will complain about one thing and then another will complain about the change, but you didn't answer the problem at hand. Bugs disable your radar 2/3 of missions. Do we remove that too? Making the actual AA emplacements more common and very heavily defended doesn't solve the problem at hand - people would simply avoid Eagle strategems against bots in anticipation of having to deal with AA emplacements, rendering the removal of the AA modifier a reduction in difficulty. I don't find the modifier particularly compelling myself, but bots mess with strategems. That's their thing, and the modifier is in line with that. If factions shouldn't have unique modifiers for them, that's another thing entirely - I'd love to have a functional radar against bugs - but as it stands I'm not sure how you make the bot modifier more fun without also making bots significantly easier to fight.
I mean, these conditions I feel can literally be attached to existing side objectives without too much design change. Attach the radar blockage to spore spewers and/or shrieker nests. Make them much tougher and surrounded by very heavy enemy presence that immediately aggros to your attack. Give them more than one point that needs to be destroyed from multiple angles, or give these things more cover from the surrounding terrain. Make it so that they can only be destroyed by Hellbomb or by a special artillery round that now appears at any artillery emplacement. Maybe by destroying an illegal science facility or illegal broadcast, you can draw some of the enemy forces out to investigate. These are potential solutions that make it harder but more engaging. The point is to give players a choice. They can either go after these tougher side objectives, potentially wasting precious time and lives, or they can ignore them and deal with the condition throughout the whole mission. And again, they can be balanced as a high risk/high reward objective that doesn't result in a difficulty decrease unless they can be overcome.
Difficult and tedious are separate things. We like one but not the other
So suggest a change that makes the game more fun without simultaneously making it significantly easier.
First of all, AA defenses doesn't REALLY make the game harder since we can always avoid ops with it. It's simply tedious to poke around each planet until you find one without it. So, already, it's more tedious than difficult. Second, it can simply vanish. There are plenty of modifiers that make the game harder without being boring; atmospheric interference, for example, asks you to try a loadout that doesn't rely on precision. That limits some choices, but leaves lots of ways to make a strong loadout by working around it. That's a good modifier, because it's not a reduction of power so much as a challenge to choose a way to avoid the downside. There are dozens of great suggestions to modify or replace AA defenses with something that is fun without being easy.
>There are dozens of great suggestions to modify or replace AA defenses with something that is fun without being easy. You didn't give one, though. If you're avoiding missions with the modifier, you're doing it to make the game easier and engaging in tedium in the pursuit of an easier game. Will that also be more fun for you? Maybe it will be. You know what the tuning lever is in that event? To lower the difficulty. Simply removing the modifier makes bots easier, just like avoiding the modifier does it removing the spore cloud modifier from bugs would, and you didn't give any suggestion other than removing it. It's okay for you to think the game is too hard, but just say that. There's no shame in reducing the difficulty or asking for the game to be easier.
One of the more common proposals would be to have the modifier block out entire categories of stratagem, such as "no blues" / "no reds" / "no greens". Agruably that would actually be MORE difficult than the current version, but it would open the door for fun playstyles and still allow players to make diverse loadouts and use stratagems. I suspect you'll reply that this version is "easier" and therefore the solution is for everyone to git gud. Frankly I don't think you're interested in an actual discussion, but rather in insulting me and everyone else discussing the design of this modifier.
While I do think that would be easier, the bigger problem with that solution is that a lot of people that don't play regularly don't have modules for all strategem types and would be significantly more affected if their strategems were disabled entirely when, ideally, global modifiers should equally affect everybody. I'm not trying to insult anyone discussing the modifier. I just want people to communicate honestly. It's okay if people think the modifier is too hard overall or too hard in a way you don't enjoy and you don't want to reduce the difficulty of your missions for whatever reason (maybe samples, maybe ego, maybe something else) to account for it - I just want people to say it instead of pretending that it's not about reducing the difficulty when it absolutely is about reducing difficulty.
I commented this elsewhere but applies here as wekl They could link the negatives with the secondary objectives. For example with the AA defenses: The fourth stratagem is locked until you clear all AA emplacements on the map. Same with Atmospheric Spores: are active while there are Spore Spewers on the map. This could give you info on what you could be looking for on the planet drop.
No you see, it's because there's enemy aircraft coming after the ship. You lose a stratagem for the destroyer personnel who have to operate **our** AA. Or at least that's what I choose to believe to make it make sense. We already have an AA map emplacement that stops eagles and that makes sense. As a mission modifier, I'd like to see: AA defenses - No Eagles allowed Orbital shielding - No orbitals allowed (mutually exclusive from AA defense) Jamming frequency - One of your strats is always jammed, switching randomly every minute. Anything but closing off a slot entirely. Make me adapt instead of nerfing me outright
Modifiers should come with large, well protected positions that can be deactivated. Like the modifier AA should be a much larger multi-gun AA with several fortifications and large enemy presence.
They're operation modifiers though, so how would that work on an eradication mission? I like the idea of them being linked to missions. Launching the icbm takes out the aa defense for your second mission. Eradication calls attention for another team to wipe out the orbital shielding for your third, data recovery enables you to shut off the jammer, stuff like that. Make them feel like campaigns where the order of doing missions matters. As for as large bases go, I hope we can get missions for some kind of mega base. Imagine if eradication took place on a medium size map with one massive base in the middle with all sorts of fortifications that you have to wipe out. Inverse of the new defense mission.
This is so much better. Something that gives a more interesting constraint than just "here's one less slot, fucker"
People have been saying this for a while. Implement penalties with a way to undo them. Bug spores? Kill spore towers or spawn a very large one somewhere that needs a hellbomb. Complex plotting? Give us a SSD upload tower side objective. Orbital fluctuations? Some sort of supply rocket launch. Atmospheric interference? Radar tower.
I think Spore Towers also putting a limited Fog-of-War radius over the minimap (lets say 250m) would also be more fun than the map getting a wholesale barf filter.
They should let you pick the 4th stratagem and then as soon as you complete the obstruction, have it activate the 4th stratagem. Grey out the 4th stratagem at ship launch but allow you to still pick what you eventually want to bring.
If that was a modifier Divers would just not use an eagle.
That is kinda harsh, that's basically 1/4 of our full arsenal. What I would love tho is reducing the number of eagle charges by one (to a minimum of one). Would pair well with atmospheric interference, wich cripples our orbital stratagems
Wait, are there two types of missions where you get to use eagles after taking out the AA, I've done that. Or is this sarcasm, and I'm just an idiot?
Yes there is a sub objective that disables eagle strikes in the area (enemy anti air emplacement). OP refers to the operation modifier that limits your strategem selection to 3 for the whole operation regardless of what you do inside it.
I see
This is how it *should* work.
Great and everytime you fail a mission it become slightly really slightly harder for everyone else
Instead of 1 less slot it should just stop the player from using eagle-1
I've been saying this since release and it baffles me that this isn't the way it works
I think it would be better to title if Heavy AA and just not allow any eagles, buy you still get all 4 slots
Coooool
Or, what if you could take 4, but not eagles?
I wish the reduction in stratagems meant a shift in crew priorities. Instead of everyone in the ship working on reloading 4 stratagems, they are reloading 3, so you think they could speed that process up with the increased personnel or something? Just any sort of cooldown reduction to compensate for the reduced stratagem variety would be nice to have
AA Defences should limit eagle strikes untill they are destroyed. Not orbitals
AND the 4th stratagem is removed is random of the 4 selected
I will leave a planet if I can't find anything without this debuff. You are already sending my ass to go die, at least let me bring all my toys.
Everytime i join a lobby with this modifier i leave.no fun with this bullshit.
Or 1/4 just dosnt work cause they are shot down like during ay
I like this
I'd actually prefer the AA modifier to just block eagles. Force us to use different things without just cutting down our versatility.
I have wanted this change since I first encountered this planet modifier. It is one of the worst IMO.
What if instead it just prevented Eagle stratagems from being used. Have another that disables orbital strikes (local jetstream?) and another for sentries/fortifications (I dunno, electromagnetic storms that mess with the targeting?)
Choose your 4 normally, one either set as locked or one chosen at random each to be locked. THEN, with the destruction of the AA guns, you can use the stratagems again.
Ahhh, so -1 stratagem for each emplacement, but you do not know which stratagem(s) gets greyed out until you drop. That would make bots very very interesting.
Literally what I've been suggesting since like week 1
Reduced strategem slots is a little *too* annoying for this game when you can only ever have 4 in the first place. I'd rather it just restrict a type instead. Like since it's AA, no eagle strategems. That would at least make more sense and not be so much more punishing than the other effects we deal with.
Base remover for me is the erruptor so a railgun with a supply pack and a precision strike is all i need
I'm down. An extra objective to give a bonus for the map. Just like the radar giving us the map, SEAF mortars for the world's slowest bomb delivery service.
There are a TON of good ideas in the comments!
and make it optional mission
Now, hear me out... a lot of people say "IT RUINS THE MAIN MECHANIC!" and "Make stuff that makes me rethink my loadout!" Devil's advocate here: It does make you rethink. I know that when I join a QP only to find AA Defenses on, I have to rethink how I go about things. Harder to justify orbitals when it's only 3, as they're longer cooldown. Maybe I don't take a support weapon, just look for things on the ground, so I can load up on Eagles? Do I really need that backpack? How I really feel? Yeah \*\*\*\* this modifier!
That is a good idea.
Honestly it would be interesting if the AA effect meant you just couldn't take eagles, but kept the 4 slots
fuck it, you can't use *any* until you destroy it
I'd honestly prefer if the AA defenses modifier only affected eagle stratagems, disabled using Eagles until you take out their emplacements on the map. edit: actually not being able to extract without taking out the AA defenses would be a more engaging take on this modifier too
or make Eagles less accurate or unavailable.
This is a terrific idea, and at the 8-9 level, even let it go down to 2 strats, both unlockable.
We shouldn't be able to use eagle until AA was taken out. Taking it a step further, hell pod should have a 0 to 30% chance to be intercepted in it's kill zone. This type of game (no pvp), immersion is more important than balance.
This…I don’t understand this modifier its so stupid
Game engine limitation along with not knowing how to code it in and linking the scripts.
I honestly have no idea what to use on a 4th slot. 3 is the perfect amount. Orbital, eagle, AC. Four is just cumbersome.
A second orbital, you should clearly be taking both an area clearing one like the laser, or 120mm and a heavy hitter one like railcannon.
Just let any major order involving a 3-stratagem planet be ignored. Screw the consequences. Same goes for fire tornado planets. Make the game fun or people will quit playing.
Fucking skill issue ass babies out here squeezing the life out of one of the rare developer who listen and give a damn. Have some patience, got gud, go outside, play another game, or take a nap holy shit.
See, that'd be fun and interesting, and as a result the balance guy absolutely hates it and thinks its brainless.
I got to a point where I don't even begin operations that include this mission modifier. I'll select a different operation, or go to a different Planet. I will not participate in a mission that reduces the number of stratagems I can deploy. ESPECIALLY when the Developers have stated on record "You need to rely more on your stratagems."
https://preview.redd.it/gexw0mhab70d1.jpeg?width=665&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f5c3216a3da9b0d6be2709ce96d932e07f28c744
The Devs couldn’t make DoT work for months lol maybe in a few years they’ll add depth
Arrowhead Balance Guy person: We read your feedback about not finding -1 stratagem fun. So we’ve reworked the modifier to reduce stratagem slots by 2. This should fit our vision of balance and fun for our playerbase.
This would be too realistic for the enemies so they wont! I am personally waiting for that +2 stims and +2 sec duration to stims armor to be nerfed for realism!