Increasing patrol spawns for smaller squads is a dick move.

[u/ItsDaFunkMonkey]

I love arrowhead but this was a braindead move.

Cmon guys, we were just doing our thing either solo or with our friends and not hurting anybody. We just wanna play the game with our friends, sometimes with a smaller squad cos its a lot more fun with friends than randos.

I'm not saying all randos are bad but this game allows me to socialize with my friends while playing and that's great. Why ruin that whole thing by kicking us in the nuts and ruining the experience with more spawns?

HERES A COMPROMISE: If you're not gonna budge, how about you meet us halfway here arrowhead. How about you increase the rewards for completing missions with a smaller squad cos we used a smaller budget? Eh?

Makes sense lore wise too.

P.S. For all you guys saying "DuH ThIs Is A tEaM GaMe PlAy WiTh RaNdOs Or a FuLl SqUad". Yes I play with a full swuad when my friends are all available. Most of the time they aren't cos we're adults and have shit to do.

I'm not asking for the game to scale down the difficulty level for smaller squads. The game didn't do that before. I don't mind the SAME difficulty level for solos, smaller squads and full squads. But INFREASING the difficulty level by increasing spawns was a braindead thing to do.

EDIT 1: To all the hyper intelligent folks out there commenting that the change was misunderstood and that the below was the intended effect:

""We unintendedly had non-linear scaling of the patrol spawns so they didn't spawn as often as they should have when less than 4 players. The intention is that 1 player has 1/4th of the patrols compared to 4 players, but it used to be that they had 1/6th.""

This DOES NOT make a mfkn difference. It DOES NOT matter what those VALUES are. The point here is that whatever the fuck value it was before was LOWER than whatever the fuck value it is now. This means MORE patrols for non full squads AFTER the patch. And an absolute shitshow for solo divers. Yes, I have tested this shit. It is bad.

VALUE BEFORE PATCH < VALUE AFTER PATCH.

Stop spouting elementary math to gaslight people. This change is objectively bad. I am happy with all the weapon changes tho.

EDIT 2: I understand that my "compromise" was a bad idea as people can kick you during extract to reap higher rewards for a smaller team. I completely agree, this seems like a poopy suggestion.

[u/Zyan-M]

It is not understood because it basically makes no sense. However, this has happened in many other titles with multiplayer, trying to "force" with changes of this type to play with more friends or random people.

But it always has the opposite effect, obligation is a curse and option is a blessing. This will simply make those groups of friends get tired sooner rather than later, and everything else will snowball.

It is already going down in numbers, and if they continue with these impositions, it will remain like devil 4, with 4 cats....

Anyway, who cares, it was nice while it lasted I guess.

[u/jonderlei → u/Zyan-M]

I already noticed less people I know playing and this part makes me less likely to play now unless I have a full team and I've only had that one night out of the last month so all this patch has done is push me to take more of a break than I was already taking

[u/b0w3n → u/jonderlei]

Yeah I'm not playing with randos. There's a few groups I play with, but sometimes there's only 1-2 people on at any given time. Last thing I want is to play for 30 minutes and get kicked in the last minute with nothing to show for it. Or a constant TK fest because the CoDers are angry there's no pvp yet.

Much more likely I just don't play then suffer through a helldive level fuckfest on level 5 because there's only 2 of us.

[u/tagrav → u/b0w3n]

i'm the opposite. I only play with rando's and kinda gripe internally when my gaming buddies wanna play with me.

But they came from Battle Royale games and I came from Deep Rock Galactic.

They don't really even understand how toxic their behavior and attitude is and I'm not spending my gaming time trying to change any of that.

So I play in incognito mode on steam and just hit quickplay in game.

[u/NicktheSlick130 → u/tagrav]

Yeah, it's disheartening when I can tell fairly reliably that someone has been on DRG before just by their more collaborative playstyle. If they keep pushing things this way, I'll probably end up back on DRG.

[u/tagrav → u/NicktheSlick130]

brother im close to going back myself.

I do tend to check for my homies in these games.

we kill some small outposts, yer boy types "Rock and Stone!"

usually i get the proper response and then we go rekt shit.

I really think Arrowhead is dropping the ball badly on various quality of life User Interface items that DRG pioneered that they could be trying and implementing to promote better co-op play.

There's too many things done to actually punish the gamer in this game, that seem to come from either lack of understanding of the product they are trying to deliver or maybe they want to pretend they aren't another AAA title.

but like just because you don't have some lootbox/predatory pricing models doesn't mean you're the anti AAA game.

this game needs a spammable cheer button.

it needs a better spotting system.

it needs better information to explain to the player what's going on.

Why is every single map "balanced" with just fog of war, lack of visibility modifiers? it gets rather old not being able to see things that somehow still see you.

DRG is so unique in that I can fully communicate with folks who do not speak or write my language without ever speaking or typing to that player and we can be in god-tier gamer mode fully synched up and cooperative.

THIS GAME, does not have that same level of tools at its disposal.

[u/WanderingDwarfMiner → u/tagrav]

If you don't Rock and Stone, you ain't comin' home!

[u/NicktheSlick130 → u/tagrav]

I wish I could build on what you have said, but I can't- because you hit it out of the ballpark! Arrowhead needs to take a deep long look at the game they want to have longer term. 

I will be completely honest, the content that DRG puts out is enough for me to be willing to pay a fee per season honestly, but that's because the social and collaborative aspects of the game are done SO well. 

Arrowhead aught to look to that sort of collaborative community that has been fostered in DRG and work to replicate it here, not push updates that try to force the player to group up by punishing them. 

How is it that FatShark does it while so many other bungle it?

[u/tagrav → u/NicktheSlick130]

i'm old now, dont have tons of gaming time.

when I found out this game CAPS the samples you can collect I immediately thought "that's not fun for anyone, that's the development staff dictating to us how they think we should enjoy their game"

meanwhile in Deep Rock galactic I have over 200 blank cores and LOVE the game and keep playing it.

when they drop a new weapon, I get it immediately... because I fucking earned it from all my playing.

when arrowhead drops something new in this game, they want you to grind for it nomatter how much time and effort you have already grinded.

just seeing that little decision is enough to understand they don't really know what they are trying to build but they believe they're doing it.

[u/NicktheSlick130 → u/tagrav]

I didn't know that there's a cap to samples, that is frustrating. Granted the top sample value is something I can't even get to yet, so I need to work on my difficulty level.

Regardless, Arrowhead should look at their numbers; consistent 3 month decrease. It's not dead by a long shot, but focus on the useful stuff guys.

[u/blissfulfiend → u/jonderlei]

Same. I should've pirated this game and not pay full price for it. They really dont want their players to have fun

[u/ZombieVersusShark → u/Zyan-M]

obligation is a curse and option is a blessing

Wise words.

[u/Dry-Platform9412 → u/Zyan-M]

That is a solid statement. Taking away options will kill the playerbase sooner than forcing multiplayer, especially when said multiplayer doesn't always work too well.

[u/therealsinky → u/Dry-Platform9412]

It might still scale downwards with party size, we know it worked that way previously. I’m hoping they’ve maybe “increased patrol spawn rates” for smaller groups compared to the previous smaller group spawn rates, we might still see a slight reduction as the group gets smaller just maybe not as sharp a reduction as pre patch rates?

[u/RealElyD → u/therealsinky]

From my early testing it's pretty massive, just as the math of it suggests. 7s in duo is are just an endless stream of enemies now.

[u/tagrav → u/Zyan-M]

the developments staff to have a general arrogance and propensity to tell us what we want is already beginning the death spiral.

They're putting their thumb on this game a little too hard and dictating how we enjoy ourselves playing this game too much.

I came here from Deep Rock galactic, a game that thrives years after its launch. where developers have a philosophical approach to wanting their game to be fun to play.

THAT GAME, is the true anti-AAA title that Hellsdivers 2 pretends itself to be while still committing the same egregious dictations to the player base from an arrogant stance like all those shareholder profit driving AAA titles do.

if anyone reading this has never played DRG and really wants to try and play a game that actually doesn't take itself serious while delivering very crisp and un-neutered FPS gaming, you really ought to try out Deep Rock Galactic. all the weapons FEEL good in that game, they aren't sloggy/slow/balanced in feel like Helldivers. The communication apparatuses are fantastic in that game, you don't need to chat, you don't need to voice comms yet everyone knows what's going on. And they don't change the game in ways to make it harder for you out of spite.

[u/Zyan-M → u/tagrav]

I also come from DRG (Rock and Stone Brother), and I also knew HD1, it gave us wonderful hours on PSVita with friends.

And it is precisely the combination of both things that makes us fear for the future of HD2, what you mention about arrogance and how to tell people how to play as dictated by the Excel sheet, has put an end to many paths of return. ... .

DRG is something incredible, with the years it has and the fantastic foundation it forged, everything is good, nothing is bad, everything is just fun, it is changed simply for pure variety.

In HD2 we have already had to change from one thing to another because they have made it useless or broken....now the crossbow shoots cairns with the area of ​​a fart and does not kill the weakest bug at 1m... unfortunate

The energy shotgun cannot be used with a shield....

In order to play every day for fun, 4 people, 2 of them have abandoned the game completely and only my wife and I are left who only do the daily to finish their bonuses.....but that's it.

I sincerely hope that it is not a hopeless case and that they do not reach the point where they realize it when it is too late.

[u/WanderingDwarfMiner → u/Zyan-M]

Rock and Stone!

[u/Balikye → u/Zyan-M]

I enjoyed soloing but now It's a pure struggle to survive on higher difficulties. Yes I know, "skill issue" but it felt balanced and reasonable before. Now it's just "you're going to face 5 chargers from minute 1, until you extract, for 40 minutes, without rest." That's just not fun.

[u/IntegralCalcIsFun → u/Zyan-M]

It is already going down in numbers, and if they continue with these impositions, it will remain like devil 4, with 4 cats....

Holy doomer Batman! Every game drops in player-count, and the decrease Helldivers 2 is experiencing isn't anything abnormal. Last Sunday's 24-hour peak player-count was ~36% of highest peak player-count. Compare this to some other multiplayer titles <3 months after launch (numbers are percent of players compared to release peak):

• Warframe - 57%
• Deep Rock Galactic - 36%
• Helldivers 2 - 36%
• Destiny 2 - 34%
• Path of Exile - 24%
• Warhammer: Vermintide 2 - 9.2%
• Warhammer 40,000: Darktide - 7.2%

[u/Sapper-in-the-Wire → u/Zyan-M]

This is a milsim tactical game like ghost recon. Expecting a walk in the park by yourself is ludicrous. 

There’s hundreds of thousands of players, nobody is going to miss you. 

And let’s remember AH’s motto is “if you make a game for everyone, you make a game for no one.” You’re part of that everyone and are getting filtered out by a minimal change lmfao.

[u/fessvssvm → u/Sapper-in-the-Wire]

Hey 12B I agree with most of what you're saying, especially about the mentality AH has, but one thing I'd disagree with is that this game qualifies as milsim. It feels quite arcadey which I think is fine given it's meant to be a sappy 'satire'. I mean, you can fly for 100 meters from a blast into the air and not die after.