Helldivers 2 'Escalation of Freedom' major update released

Orangee

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To be honest this is a good step forward for the health of the game. I personally find d10 kinda shitty to play; haven't lost yet but the amount of shit that you basically can't do anything about is overwhelming which makes the main viable playstyle running away from everything, even impalers which you aren't supposed to be running away from. it's still possible to fight through everything if you have a good team but it's tough when quick playing with randos. The amount of ragdolling is excessive, once or twice and it's funny, when it happens every 10s it gets old. Once they recalibrate the baseline for the game then new content will be amazing. Without it new content won't really feel that great.
Isnt that the point though? It's a team game. It's a difficulty made for the best and most coordinated teams. The fact that you managed to beat It with randoms on quickplay just indicates that's still too easy.
 
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anonpuffs

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Isnt that the point though? It's a team game. It's a difficulty made for the best and most coordinated teams. The fact that you managed to beat It with randoms om quickplay just indicates that's still too easy.
It's not about difficulty, it's about the amount of annoying uncounterable mechanics. Cannon towers that shoot you from across the map 150m away with no warning and you can't even see it targeting you due to all the fog on the level is super "difficult" - not. It's not fun, it's aggravating. Also the "reward" for clearing mega nests and fortresses being 2 super and 4 rare samples is a fucking joke. Just because I can occasionally clear d10 with 0 deaths doesn't mean anything about it being easy or not, the underlying mechanics are not fun to deal with. The amount of times control is taken away from the player in this game is excessive, and the way they've introduced "difficulty" doesn't actually reward good gameplay, it rewards running away.

Finally, just because it's a team game doesn't mean that it should only be balanced around perfect teams. The game has quickplay, it allows you to play solo, duo, trio. Souls games aren't difficult in multiplayer, they're actually exceedingly easy - in fact they aren't generally hard at all since in most souls games you can outlevel the content with only a few bosses being exceptions where you actually have to try.

Finally, you may think you're right but the fact is Arrowhead themselves acknowledge that they didn't hit their design goals and are changing tack going forward. The fact is Arrowhead wants a large playerbase. They don't want to have the 100 people play the game because they feel like they are some elite gamer be the only ones that remain.
 

ToTTenTranz

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It doesn't look like some people are really grasping what's going on, so I'll try to use different words in a story:


Arrowhead: Hey gamers, I heard you're looking for a good steak with fries restaurant. So here I am, a restaurant serving steak with fries. We'll have variations of steak and fries, like well done or rare steak or fries with bacon and cheese, but we're serving steak and fries!

Gamers: Wow Arrowhead you're great! We really wanted steak and fries! Here's 10 million meal purchases!

(2 months later)

Arrowhead: Hey gamers, after careful consideration we decided steak & fries aren't really what we want to serve and it's best for you if we serve something more balanced for your diet, so here's boiled fish with cabbage.

Gamers: WTF Arrowhead? You didn't announce a balanced diet, you announced steak & fries! Steak & fries are all over your marketing material. We don't want a balanced diet, we want steak & fries! If you keep serving boiled fish we're leaving.

Arrowhead: Wait, ok we're changing boiled fish with cabbage. But it still needs to be balanced so here's a vegan pizza.

Gamers; We don't want vegan pizza nor boiled fish. We wanted steak & fries. We're leaving, bye.

Arrowhead: Wait, wait! Ok, after careful consideration, we're sorry about not giving you what we said we would. We're now in the process of changing back our menu to give you steak & fries! We'll do better from now on. Our CEO is stepping down so that he can join the chefs' team and make sure we keep serving steak & fries.

Gamers: Finally, thank you. We'll start coming back.


(2 months later)

Arrowhead; Gamers, after careful consideration, we're changing our menu for boiled fish and mashed potatoes.

Gamers: WTF Arrowhead, this again?! Are you stupid?

Icon-Era User: Lol Arrowhead needs to stop bowing down to Gamers' demands.
 
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Orangee

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It's not about difficulty, it's about the amount of annoying uncounterable mechanics. Cannon towers that shoot you from across the map 150m away with no warning and you can't even see it targeting you due to all the fog on the level is super "difficult" - not. It's not fun, it's aggravating. Also the "reward" for clearing mega nests and fortresses being 2 super and 4 rare samples is a fucking joke. Just because I can occasionally clear d10 with 0 deaths doesn't mean anything about it being easy or not, the underlying mechanics are not fun to deal with. The amount of times control is taken away from the player in this game is excessive, and the way they've introduced "difficulty" doesn't actually reward good gameplay, it rewards running away.

Finally, just because it's a team game doesn't mean that it should only be balanced around perfect teams. The game has quickplay, it allows you to play solo, duo, trio. Souls games aren't difficult in multiplayer, they're actually exceedingly easy - in fact they aren't generally hard at all since in most souls games you can outlevel the content with only a few bosses being exceptions where you actually have to try.

Finally, you may think you're right but the fact is Arrowhead themselves acknowledge that they didn't hit their design goals and are changing tack going forward. The fact is Arrowhead wants a large playerbase. They don't want to have the 100 people play the game because they feel like they are some elite gamer be the only ones that remain.
I agree with the fog. It starts to become ridiclous how you cant fucking see anything all the time lol


But most of the things you complain about can be simply avoided by sticking together and having loadouts that compliment eachother.
You cant go to difficulty 10 and then complain that it's not fun on quickplay with a random uncoordinated team. It's not made to be played on quickplay. That's the whole point of making this difficulty.
And the casual playerbase you mention, will probably never manage to even unlock Super Helldive, so it's not really a problem? They'll stick to 5-7 difficulties.
I dont think that Super helldive is supposed to be balanced. It's just pure chaos for coordinated teams that want such a challenge, and you are not forced to play It. It's not like they are locking any content behind It.
 
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Yurinka

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Regarding Super Helldive, I played 4 or 5 matches with randoms with no other coordination than -as usual- markers in the map and some very rare text chat message. Failed once (we were so close), completed the mission normally the others. Before that, I consistently completed Helldive level 9 missions with no problem with teams of 3 or 4 random players.

Yes, obviously it's difficult. But it's doable when you're let's say above level 50, when you know your shit. The difficulty isn't always the same, sometimes enemies spawn more (I think depending on liberation % of the planet) and sometimes the fog is insane increasing the difficulty, but others is more chill.

In the highest levels it's important to don't stop to kill all enemies or get all the probes or loot, but instead normally ignore/avoid them when possible and move to the objectives.
 
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Remember_Spinal

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Regarding Super Helldive, I played 4 or 5 matches with randoms with no other coordination than -as usual- markers in the map and some very rare text chat message. Failed once (we were so close), completed the mission normally the others. Before that, I consistently completed Helldive level 9 missions with no problem with teams of 3 or 4 random players.

Yes, obviously it's difficult. But it's doable when you're let's say above level 50, when you know your shit. The difficulty isn't always the same, sometimes enemies spawn more (I think depending on liberation % of the planet) and sometimes the fog is insane increasing the difficulty, but others is more chill.

In the highest levels it's important to don't stop to kill all enemies or get all the probes or loot, but instead normally ignore/avoid them when possible and move to the objectives.

Yeah, the most extreme difficulty should be extremely difficult
 

Remember_Spinal

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It doesn't look like some people are really grasping what's going on, so I'll try to use different words in a story:


Arrowhead: Hey gamers, I heard you're looking for a good steak with fries restaurant. So here I am, a restaurant serving steak with fries. We'll have variations of steak and fries, like well done or rare steak or fries with bacon and cheese, but we're serving steak and fries!

Gamers: Wow Arrowhead you're great! We really wanted steak and fries! Here's 10 million meal purchases!

(2 months later)

Arrowhead: Hey gamers, after careful consideration we decided steak & fries aren't really what we want to serve and it's best for you if we serve something more balanced for your diet, so here's boiled fish with cabbage.

Gamers: WTF Arrowhead? You didn't announce a balanced diet, you announced steak & fries! Steak & fries are all over your marketing material. We don't want a balanced diet, we want steak & fries! If you keep serving boiled fish we're leaving.

Arrowhead: Wait, ok we're changing boiled fish with cabbage. But it still needs to be balanced so here's a vegan pizza.

Gamers; We don't want vegan pizza nor boiled fish. We wanted steak & fries. We're leaving, bye.

Arrowhead: Wait, wait! Ok, after careful consideration, we're sorry about not giving you what we said we would. We're now in the process of changing back our menu to give you steak & fries! We'll do better from now on. Our CEO is stepping down so that he can join the chefs' team and make sure we keep serving steak & fries.

Gamers: Finally, thank you. We'll start coming back.


(2 months later)

Arrowhead; Gamers, after careful consideration, we're changing our menu for boiled fish and mashed potatoes.

Gamers: WTF Arrowhead, this again?! Are you stupid?

Icon-Era User: Lol Arrowhead needs to stop bowing down to Gamers' demands.

This would make sense if they were changing genre’s or the way the game actually played.

Its more like a bunch of whiny fucks crying over the recipe of the ketchup that sits on the table
 

ToTTenTranz

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This would make sense if they were changing genre’s or the way the game actually played.

They are changing from the gameplay dynamics of having overpowered weapons to mow down hordes of enemies to the gameplay dynamics of spending half the time running away from enemies because most weapons were nerfed into tickling feathers.

Captura de ecrã 2024-08-14 173906.png




Its more like a bunch of whiny fucks crying over the recipe of the ketchup that sits on the table
The only thing worse than the whiny fucks complaining about the game are the insufferable crying bitches complaining about the whiny fucks complaining about the game.
 
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Remember_Spinal

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They are changing from the gameplay dynamics of having overpowered weapons to mow down hordes of enemies to the gameplay dynamics of spending half the time running away from enemies because most weapons were nerfed into tickling feathers.

View attachment 5452





The only thing worse than the whiny fucks complaining about the game are the insufferable crying bitches complaining about the whiny fucks complaining about the game.

So you want the highest difficulties to be easy. Got it
 

anonpuffs

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So you want the highest difficulties to be easy. Got it
increased annoying mechanics are not the same as increased difficulty. Increased difficulty is more health and more damage from enemies, not having control constantly taken away from the player.
 

Remember_Spinal

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increased annoying mechanics are not the same as increased difficulty. Increased difficulty is more health and more damage from enemies, not having control constantly taken away from the player.

I’m just talking about weapon damage. The IMPALERs and chargers are annoying but having “overpowered” weapons doesn’t make sense if you want a challenge
 

anonpuffs

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I’m just talking about weapon damage. The IMPALERs and chargers are annoying but having “overpowered” weapons doesn’t make sense if you want a challenge
oh yeah most of the weapons imo are in a good spot right now, flamer nerf was dumb as it was already pretty balanced, but some of the assault rifles need a reason to exist. There's only a few outright bad weapons in the game right now, mainly thermite grenade, the ARs, laser pistol, the crossbow, and the purifier. Also they need to fix the arc thrower bc that shit is annoying when it stops working due to ground debris. I don't think the whining about incen breaker is justified, although it is pretty funny that the breaker spray&pray is basically the same weapon with less damage and no fire dot so you'd just never pick that over incen breaker
 
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ToTTenTranz

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So you want the highest difficulties to be easy. Got it
No, I want current Helldivers 2 to play like release-date Helldivers 2 and not like Monster Hunter.


You can increase difficulty by e.g. increasing spawn / patrol size, putting different enemy types forcing gamers to constantly adapt their strategies and making the terrain harder to defend.
Instead, they're constantly buffing all medium to heavy armored enemies into near invulnerability while nerfing the weapons. If I wanted that, I'd be playing Monster Hunter.
 
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Yurinka

Yurinka

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They are changing from the gameplay dynamics of having overpowered weapons to mow down hordes of enemies to the gameplay dynamics of spending half the time running away from enemies because most weapons were nerfed into tickling feathers.

View attachment 5452
I’m just talking about weapon damage. The IMPALERs and chargers are annoying but having “overpowered” weapons doesn’t make sense if you want a challenge

By "overpowered weapons" they meant the stratagems, look at the image. The three sentences are correct. Some stratagems like the 500KG bomb are really "OP" (there's cooldown to don't break the game and keep it somewhat balanced) and destroy everything.
 

anonpuffs

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By "overpowered weapons" they meant the stratagems, look at the image. The three sentences are correct. Some stratagems like the 500KG bomb are really "OP" (there's cooldown to don't break the game and keep it somewhat balanced) and destroy everything.
500kg is ironically pretty inconsistent and the AoE lacking, orbital precision is much better
 
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anonpuffs

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Ok, well as someone who has over 450 hours in the game, 98+% at d9 or d10... The changes they are making aren't making the game better. Not saying everything is terrible, but the things they've introduced lately don't do anything to improve the gameplay. For example, the new rocket tanks are just mobile mortar emplacements, except they have no weaknesses in terms of rotation speed or obvious weak spots (you can blow the tank base up and the turret will continue firing), they can clip their rockets through their own model so you can't even flank them from close up (ironic considering for a time our mechs killed themselves with their own rockets). The only way to deal with them is to immediately throw a stratagem on them or run away. That doesn't promote tactical or skilled play, it's just a way to drain player resources on demand. The way they should be deployed is as an anti camping measure, where they set up and flush helldivers out from behind cover. Which means you would have to immediately clear a path towards them to neutralize them once they engage, within the window given. And you should be rewarded if you can do that by being able to destroy a defenseless piece of artillery. But instead they're just a better tank that doesn't miss at close range.
 

Ezekiel

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Ok, well as someone who has over 450 hours in the game, 98+% at d9 or d10... The changes they are making aren't making the game better. Not saying everything is terrible, but the things they've introduced lately don't do anything to improve the gameplay. For example, the new rocket tanks are just mobile mortar emplacements, except they have no weaknesses in terms of rotation speed or obvious weak spots (you can blow the tank base up and the turret will continue firing), they can clip their rockets through their own model so you can't even flank them from close up (ironic considering for a time our mechs killed themselves with their own rockets). The only way to deal with them is to immediately throw a stratagem on them or run away. That doesn't promote tactical or skilled play, it's just a way to drain player resources on demand. The way they should be deployed is as an anti camping measure, where they set up and flush helldivers out from behind cover. Which means you would have to immediately clear a path towards them to neutralize them once they engage, within the window given. And you should be rewarded if you can do that by being able to destroy a defenseless piece of artillery. But instead they're just a better tank that doesn't miss at close range.
Okay, I mean, that's fair criticism.

I ain't a fan of the new rocket striders either.

I was specifically calling out the people who were complaining about the balance changes (Breaker Incendiary and Flamethrower). The whole outrage over "nerfs" is pretty ridiculous in my opinion.
 

anonpuffs

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Okay, I mean, that's fair criticism.

I ain't a fan of the new rocket striders either.

I was specifically calling out the people who were complaining about the balance changes (Breaker Incendiary and Flamethrower). The whole outrage over "nerfs" is pretty ridiculous in my opinion.
I actually think the rocket striders are pretty good, I just wish they didn't replace all the regular striders. 50/50 would be nice. If you shoot the rockets on their sides before they fire it blows up in their face and damages them heavily, which actually rewards you for being good. Which I like.

Also, funny meme

 
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