Patrols are Broken Beyond Belief in Helldivers 2

Patrols are Broken Beyond Belief in Helldivers 2
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[@TeletubbiesRcute]

yeah they ruined the stealth aspect of the game by making patrols "know where you are"

[@Blakkrazor69]

Exactly! I was in Scout Armor, prone behind a larger rock and mobs came straight for me after finding my mines. There was no way anything had LoS on me. These things have Telepathy with unlimited range.

[@josephhein9497]

Scout armor is now the most arbitrary piece of equipment in the game. I haven't worn it in two weeks and it used to be a staple in my arsenal.

[@trevordrakenor2063]

Those patrol are made to force a fight. Hell they even made them shoot through walls or having brood commander or scavenger tunnel straight towards you when you put yourself on a mountain they can't reach normally.

[@saunorine]

@@josephhein9497 only reason why i still use it is that it's my only light armor wish i had another set

[@OscarGreenworth]

That’s the worst fucking game “mechanic” ever. It’s so fucking bullshit in every game. “Yeah you were spotted once and they’ll know where you are forever even if you’re out of the line of sight”

[@dez3940]

Idk its kinda dumb that destroying factories increases the amount of bots

[@lucasvallet4487]

Not really, its basically to compensate the fact that there is less heat maps over the maps (getting close to heavy and medium base will increase patrols) and that it reduce the patrol spawn locations. Because of the very reduced spawn locations, patrols become far less randoms, their psths naturally avoid you and can even be completely blocked off.

[@UltraKardas]

@@lucasvallet4487 Except that enemies know where you are at all times. My team (nearly) all died in a helldive. I was hidden waiting on the timer to start calling them in, and 2 patrols perfectly tracked me down and started shooting. They can find you if they want to.

[@caspianconstantine27]

Right? Just feels so damn contradictory for that to be what we have to expect nowadays

[@thelastpresident1097]

@@UltraKardas they only ever know where you are if you've been out of combat for a while and even then its like 1 or 2 small bots so you mighta just gotten really unlucky (or theres some pathing stuff i don't know about that leads them to you i dunno)

[@josephhein9497]

@@UltraKardas Here's something I've noticed about how the game has programmed me to think... "I wonder if by placing a marker on the map for my next intended go-to location (objective or POI), I'm giving away my intentions to the game which will respond accordingly. I better not mark that location." This probably isn't true, but the fact that the game has me considering the prospect and it isn't unbelievable, is a very, VERY bad sign for how this game works now.

[@ChrisBeaufait]

I have been in business leadership positions for many, many years. When you think you know better than your customers, because of "design philosophy", which is an excuse not to listen, you are always WRONG. You can see it in the stats, weekends used to be 300K helldivers, now barely 100K. Agree wholeheartedly with MrDough, fix it or lose your player base, asap. Else, we will move on.

[@antiquechrono]

Honestly when it comes to game design the players are really good at pointing out that something is wrong but are usually terrible at fixing what's wrong. It's usually for the best to acknowledge something needs fixing but fix it in your own way. In this case the devs seem to be ignoring that anything has gone wrong at all.

[@NorthEevee]

Wish more people like you were in those kind of positions. I feel like most CEOs and other leaders only care about their investors and short-term profits, forgetting what probably got their company there in the first place was putting the consumer first.

[@ireallychosethisname]

fucken arrowhead, hire this man immediately

[@joshuanissen8803]

@@ireallychosethisname I doubt they could afford him. Or can't afford not to hire him.

[@indigenoussober407]

Same sentiment as “Two heads are better than one” or in a games case 2-300k concurrent players vs a handful of devs.

[@brokenenglish619]

Arrow head: "so...what can we learn from this video?" "he said autocannon is great don't nerf--" "got it, let's nerf autocannon"

[@UnGodly_Overlord]

Sadly this is accurate and the Autocannon needs buffed is the sad part. The reason I say this is because of it bouncing off chargers which should penetrate and open up their armor. Not bounce off like a golf ball hitting against a damn wall.

[@ghoulbuster1]

If that idiot alexus nerfs the autocannon, I'm personally sending that guy a bag of dogpoo.

[@ldcnu]

​@@UnGodly_Overlord "But they're supposed to be hard enemies and you should use stratagems to deal with them UwU" - Alexus, probably

[@2355Kyle]

​@@ldcnu a we have to wait 50% longer for a strat to deploy or the recharge time is increased by 100% or we have one less slot... fun

[@metaforeva3744]

​@2355Kyle yeah the modifiers that screw with stratagems suck. Especially if they want you to us strats on the chargers and there's a ton of chargers to deal with

[@griffiththechad9483]

I will always be on the side of “destroying bases lowers patrols”. It makes zero sense to me why I’m running into a dozen patrols on the way back to extraction *after* clearing every base and side objective.

[@Uncertainty2]

Eh, it kinda makes sense to me. The longer helldivers stay active in an area, and the more shit they go around breaking, the more attention that they'll start to draw from the wider enemy force. Fewer bots are being assembled locally, but more patrols/dropships are being sent in to squash whoever's fucking with the bots' AA guns or whatever. Helldivers aren't an army after all; they're suicide squads sent in to complete surgical objectives inside overrun/enemy controlled territory. There might be 10 factories inside the mission area that you blew up, but there's another 100 within a 1km radius that are all still running.

[@somax2705]

The reason (given by the dev 2 months ago) : you are behind ennemy lines, in the heart of their territory, doing side objectives and destroying bases make them aware that something is going there and make them send more people from other areas to investigate.

[@hipperguy1654]

@@somax2705 Yeah but that literally encourages not playing the game, so this reasoning from a gameplay perspective makes zero sense.

[@qwertyq4073]

@hipperguy1654 People know that's how the patrols work and destroy nests anyways lol. What "not encouraging playing the game" are you talking about?

[@Uncertainty2]

@@hipperguy1654 Secondary objectives and outposts give extra rewards for destroying them (plus samples if you take the time to loot). The tradeoff is that completing them makes things get *marginally* harder as time goes on. Seems fine to me...

[@WowieZowie03]

I miss when patrols would walk through the map instead of directly towards you. It feels more like defeating waves in an arcade game rather than navigating through a world that would've existed without you in it.

[@joshuachristensen5287]

100%correct 😢

[@kristopherjohnstone1296]

This is a great point!

[@redcenturion88]

Its futile to keep an eye on enemy blips on the map because the moment you avoid a patrol it spawns another one in the direction you're traveling.

[@redreaper1991]

Yes! This. I haven't even been following non-weapon changes, but this was drastically noticeable. I was like, Okay, so I just have to fight every scout group that reaches near me? Even with my niche use of eagle smoke, etc.

[@PatientZERO100]

Bro I've noticed this on the last few matches I've played, especially when we tried to move to extract. We were about 300 or so meters from extract finishing up the last optional objective, and when we turned around to head to extract we had at least 6 patrols spawn right in our path moving towards us. Super frustrating; we'd get jumped by 2 patrols at once and once were done, two more would spawn right in our faces that we'd have to fight since they're were moving right at us.

[@robadams12]

It is sad that someone had to programme and design some weapons that no one ever uses.

[@gravity6664]

Really felt it when Dough said the game changed his life and how things were going down the shitter, it hit me, things have been rough and this game helped a lot, especially when the gaming industry has been treating everyone like shit.

[@----.__]

Couldn't agree more. I grew up on the C64 and A500, I'm nearly 50 now and didn't spend much time gaming outside of DCS and strategy games. Then HD2 popped it's head over the parapets and I remember having fun in HD1 so thought, "why not?" I made it to level 113 with a little over 500 hours played before I stopped due to the constant tug of war the balance of this game seems to be going through. Haven't played in weeks now and it's disappointing because the game rejuvenated my enjoyment in gaming - then equally eroded it week after week of nonsensical changes that took away a lot of the fun. Like the CEO said, "whenever someone finds something fun in the game, the fun is removed" Perhaps I'll play again in the future, who knows, I just happened to have some down time these last few months so had time - unfortunately I don't think I'll have the same luxury when this game finally gets good again.

[@TheCosta5000]

The bots can shoot you from over 200 metres away with pinpoint accuracy to your head in a snowstorm.

[@Coach_Brian]

Facts. I have it clipped as well.

[@UmbraWeiss]

It gets even better when they shoot you way before you even peek....

[@josephhein9497]

@@UmbraWeiss Yep, or they one-shot you as you come around a corner behind them, with their backs turned to you, and only your shoulder is exposed when they fire.

[@TheHuffur]

@@UmbraWeiss I love their damn turrets, you shoot down some bots and run around a small cliff and like 0.03 milliseconds after clearing it: *INSTANT DEATH* by massive anti-tank shell applied to forehead. Same crap with their missile guys, they literally stand and aim at you through solid cover but wont shoot at you because solid cover... but they wont hesitate to use their wallhack to damn near pre-fire on you when you move out of cover.

[@leonc9760]

Can’t see anything due to weather, random rocket to the face out of the void…good stuff

[@yourstrulli9089]

I thought I was going insane. I think they even broke 4 man squads, I’ve never seen so many patrols. Also don’t like the fact that destroying enemy bases doesn’t decrease patrol spawns but increases them.

[@eimaipiswsou3198]

4 man squads are def broken as well. Extractions are pure chaos sometimes. We are far away from the extraction console and when we get there there are like FOUR PATROLS not moving there and ofc the moment they see its insta bot drop along with these existing patrols and it becomes a pure shitshow since most extraction areas are wide open if a factory strider comes as well its even more fun

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

They broke the game in general. Every single player count (1-4) has the exact same spawn rate for patrols, plus spawn rates were generally increased across the board (meaning enemies can call in reinforcements more often than before). Every player "group" (players within 50m of each other or so) gets one patrol. So if you often split from the group like I do in order to take care of POIs and side objectives, you have to keep in mind that an additional patrol WILL spawn for you every 2 1/2 minutes (I think that's the interval iirc).

[@Amberelocke]

Spawn rates on diff 6 are now faster than diff 9 spawn rates were

[@givenchymamajama3859]

You’re behind enemy lines. The more you mess w/ their bases, the more they send out patrols to go investigate that area. It’s not a battle. You’re a 4 man squad sneaking into enemy territory to sabotage.

[@RamonAlek]

​@@givenchymamajama3859Enemies traveling are patrols, not scouts or mercenaries, they supposed to be there patrolling and not alerted by our presence.

[@cbarkley6439]

Asked my mom about "different strokes, different blokes" and she gave me some home videos she made back in the 80s. Gonna check them out tonight! Thanks for the tip!

[@mkaleborn]

And don’t mind that ‘boom chick-a-bow-wow’ background music, not all music in the 80s was like that! And for the love of…. Be kind, Rewind.

[@minko595]

i love when the hulk bruiser appears behind me and one shots me without a SOUND

[@Max_Ohm]

Yeah I swear bile spewers are freaking ninjas, man

[@BlahBohogun]

Fucking Alexus Kravchenko is the lead on Helldivers 2 balance, and yes it's the same Kravchenko who tanked Hello Neighbor 2.

[@OscarGreenworth]

💀💀💀

[@mkaleborn]

I thought he was ‘just’ the gun balance guy, but if he’s got his toes in to other game systems that’s not good. His theories and overall philosophy on what players find ‘fun’ sounds very anti-player to be honest.

[@MarcSy]

Is he one of those gamer haters? He should be replaced asap. He is doing a good job sabotaging what ever AH is trying to accomplish.

[@doctorhealsgood5456]

bet he is the guy who made patrols home into your position because ''stealth was a pointless gimmick'' or whatever

[@thedog5k]

are you for rizzles?

[@alexthehopeless3778]

the patrols always knowing where you are and headshot damage are probably the worst changes out of these

[@redcenturion88]

I made the mistake of trying out scout armor for the first time on a suicide bot mission. Any aggroed enemy on the map from my teammates resulted in me getting hammered. There's no point in detection reduction when the enemies are able to cross-map aggro like that.

[@Naomi-gr7fm]

​@@redcenturion88It absolutely skewers me when I will be scouting the fire fight prone - not engaging - and after my teammate dies I'm watching a bot mechanically turn to face me directly down my barrel and approach. They should NOT be aware of my position.

[@Trenchfood]

Don't listen to people calling you a moaner. Your points are valid, well made and you obviously care a lot. I appreciate you.

[@maulbrook5263]

For real

[@irazmuth]

11:50 I really do hate that design philosophy of making things "realistic" because you have enemies (rocket devastators) that completely go against this and are allows to shoot off volleys after volleys of rockets... it's so inconsistent. If it applies to the player it should apply to the enemies as well.

[@josephhein9497]

"We're not doing transmog, because it's unrealistic..." *proceeds to apply the engineering trait to a medium armor that looks like a light armor and has no pouches or pockets.*

[@petercottantail7850]

"enemies walk and shoot through walls." nahhhh that's fine, let's fix the patrol spawns instead 💀

[@apriliand1975]

@@josephhein9497 Not to mention that we are fighting Kaiju bile titans and giant bugs plus walking robots the size of buildings. And we are supposed to be 100s of years into the future. Realism much? It is supposed to be a fantasy.

[@regina5447]

the argument of "It's a 4-player" makes my brain rot. if the devs intended for you to MANDATORY play with four people, why the absolute fuck can you go into missions solo/duo/trio still to begin with? people should play how they want, not be punished for wanting to play a certain way.

[@anstorner]

In helldivers 1 you can play solo or duo or any amount of people and it would go as it should, you even managed to defeat bosses as an duo with some caviats, but it was not so much more difficult than in 4. However here their fixation is getting way too ridiculous.

[@mkaleborn]

100% !

[@matteparent2468]

I like the fact that dropping alone or with 4 changes nothing to the difficulty. Playing solo is more of an achievement. It adds depth like ''I need 3 randoms to help clear this difficulty, but with just my 1 buddy we can duo it''. Plus from a gameplay perspective, it makes sense that the bots/bugs don't give a fuck if there's 1,2,3 or 4 helldivers. Battlefield's the same. It's the same reasoning for why Elden Ring doesn't need an easy mode. Make the game, don't just cater to the audience - that's the best way to turn a work of art into a simple commercial product.

[@safiquazi2704]

​@@matteparent2468 except elden ring doesn't nerf every weapon into the ground, you can do ridiculous damage to even bosses In that game, but it's skill dependant, here we are using duct tapes peices of trash against high tech enemies, there's no skill it's just if you can survive long enough and it's a shitty game design for a so called "war".

[@regina5447]

@@safiquazi2704 true. I was playing before the first patch, but all these patches have just pushed me to play other games with better balancing. Just sick of terrible balancing in games like this and destiny 2.

[@Morbak546]

Destroying spawners should lower this imo

[@conspiracy1914]

i heard it was opposite

[@wvubebop]

Yeah what backwards ass thinking is that? Destroying bug holes and factories should DECREASE the enemy presence.

[@Tombadole]

@@conspiracy1914 you read the word "should" right?

[@dibby4482]

​@@Tombadoleare you dumb

[@12SickOne34]

My thoughts exactly

[@isaaccallaghan4585]

You’re my favourite content creator that covers HD2 man. Everything you talk about, i talk about with radoms. Your opinions absolutely reflect those of the community. Thank you for giving us a voice.

[@jonathanngo7452]

It's bad even in 4 man. We had 4 drop ships spawn on us, and before we finished clearing them out a patrol of devastators / heavy devastators / hulk flanked us. We got pinned down, and decided to run INTO a heavy bot outpost for cover at one point since the outpost had less to deal with. Like many other comments say, destroying outposts / fabricators should reduce spawns and patrols. You're essentially getting punished for being thorough in your map clear.

[@caleballeman8779]

100% agree. The game we originally got sold was about the major orders, galactic war, interconnectedness and having an impact on the player base as a whole. If they had only fixed bugged weapons and community managers had kept their mouths shut, people would not have latched on to all the negativity Post-Sony debacle.

[@Michelle-kc8ht]

It's crazy how you lack self awareness

[@gabusdeux]

@@Michelle-kc8ht no, he is right.

[@Michelle-kc8ht]

@gabusdeux how does his lacking self awareness here make him right or wrong? Fuck, you tribal white boys are just getting more and more smoothbrained

[@BobbieRys]

@@Michelle-kc8htnice try AH dev, theres no excusing how you guys butchered any type of fun in this game

[@ghoulbuster1]

@@Michelle-kc8ht Enough with the shilling, the devs fucked up and they ain't recovering.

[@orangejuice9396]

This game on launch vs this game now is like night and day with how un-enjoyable it is now, not even taking into account the weapon problems, the enemy balance is much worse than the railgun ever was for the game.

[@TheCosmicAstro-]

Og railgun was never a problem and could be brought back right now and itd be perfectly fine

[@LordZedz]

@@TheCosmicAstro- OG railgun wouldn't even compete. It needs to be buffed above what it ever was.

[@TheCosmicAstro-]

@@LordZedz I'd like to at least see how it feels with just og railgun. Even if they kept the same charge amount as now. Like the current unsafemode charge amount for full damage(70%). But just all the old numbers. It might need to be buffed youre absolutely correct but I'm not sure. It all depends on how it handles things like bile titans, factory striders and gunships

[@Max_Ohm]

I have to agree. I am truly just putting the game down for a wile and it's pretty frustrating

[@safiquazi2704]

I stopped playing after the last patch, I'm just waiting and watching now, this will either turn into a train crash, or they will be able to reach their stop safely let's see

[@SovereignZuul]

OhDough, you've been consistently on the right track about all the updates. I've played every day since launch, and never missed a daily personal order. The game is getting worse and worse, it was so much better at launch it's not even funny now. I was a lead developer for an award winning video game and understand balance. The HD2 devs have no idea what to do, it's terribly sad for such an amazing game.

[@RonJeremy514]

What "team"? There is only one guy in charge of balancing. Reminder: it's the guy who killed Hello Neighbor 2.

[@C4MG1RL]

"We're doing a 4 man raise the flag and nothing's spawning so we're singing kumbaya" It's weirder because you can have extractions or missions like this where you're supposed to have spawns, and nothing happens. BUT you can also have just normal walking around and it just sends non stop enemies at you for like no reason at all. Just dropped in? 4 patrols immediately, reinforce beacon that calls in 2 striders, a tank, and a bunch off devastators. More patrols, more reinforce calls. Like, what the actual hell is going on?

[@CreamIc7]

It's so stupid

[@fresnel149]

Raise the flag is super weird, because on the one hand you have the geological survey mission where you have to complete tasks on the console while scripted spawns happen around you, plus random patrols and the inevitable bot flare/bug call, but then you go on a raise the flag mission and there's no scripted spawns at all, just patrols. You can do all three flags on some maps and just get lucky and nobody bothers you for the entire duration of the flags raising. Honestly with the loudspeakers on the guard dog blasting the Super Earth Anthem, they have a built-in excuse for it to draw enemies to you.

[@LifeCompleter]

Before the last balance patch I played on level 7 4-player randoms all the time. It was the most enjoyable experience for me, tense, long fights, followed by a couple minutes of what felt like earned calmness. Now, I honestly could not tell you a difference between levels 6-9. The horde spawns all feel the same now.

[@SteveDave.]

Did anyone notice bile spewers are back to full speed and one shooting you?

[@spleenm]

Yup

[@Eight-Bytes]

They somehow STILL manage to sneak up behind you and kill you.

[@oxoKumakichioxo]

Full speed, vomit tracking even harder and damage of spew even slighty delayed perfect dive you take death damage vs being able to somewhat survive from hulk flamethrower. Its wild man,

[@trevordrakenor2063]

They say they lowered the number of heavy spawn. Hell no, it still the same amount with even more fleas and grasshopper.

[@akiramurakami3177]

Spewers can 1 shot even dive, bile titan always slow u without fail, spawn rate of the heavy is ridiculous, guns are shiet; only few that are viable on 9. Statragems on 9 are almost same every game because heavy. Tf is this? This game is getting less and less fun. I would prefer all guns are strong. If they make all guns viable, hell increase the spawn rate. I wanna have fun shooting bots and bugs. Hell dive is god dam easy anyway

[@9unslin9er]

There's nothing more infuriating than spending 30 minutes clearing objections, and then have 10 Hulks just pop out of thin air on evac. Alexus and Evil Bosse are douchebags.

[@dj_wilson]

Amazing content man. As someone who absolutely cannot solo Helldive, I have seen my progress in this game absolutely stunted with this last patch, essentially locking me into the mid levels. The fun meter is dipping. And now I feel “locked out” of progress because I’m simply not skilled enough to complete the higher difficulty levels. So, the motivation to play is also waning. like you, this game came along at a point in my life when I really needed something fun and positive. I want it to succeed. Anyway, thanks for all the effort and passion you put into these videos, and for that truly earnest close in this particular video especially

[@Coach_Brian]

Man, don't sweat the people giving you crap. You're one of the better KZbin'rs out there. I love your honest analysis and look forward to every one of them. The game was amazing. It was fun. I enjoyed playing it for hours...up until the last patch change. There's something wrong when that happens. It wasn't me that changed, it was the feel of the game. I hope you have a great day. And thank you so much for pounding the drum on this! Cheers!

[@IMPNT]

Spot on 💯

[@AeroZephron]

It kind of feels like they tried to up the challenge, by increasing the amount of random chaos. It's not that it's more difficult, it's that you can experience these wild difficulty spikes that make a 7 feel like Helldive and Helldive sometimes feels like a 5. I liked it prepatch until about 2 weeks ago and lately it feels like getting slammed from all directions.

[@Zarcondeegrissom]

yeah, I've seen more bots/bugs spawning in at dif 2 than some vids I've seen of others doing dif 9, it's wild and beyond not fun, I dread it some days. I used to do a trivial mission to start the day out as a warm up, now if I don't survive extraction cuz I run out of ammo dealing with the mobs, I close the game and do anything else. I get that some want a challenge, forcing it on others that don't isn't the way.

[@broman191]

I never really felt the difference between 7-8-9 and I don't think we need 9 different diff levels anyway, looking at all the balancing issues at this point. Easy-normal-hard would be fine, maybe with some adjustable modifiers when everything feels properly balanced.

[@BackwardsPancake]

It makes sense, since the same thing happens on a per-individual-enemy level too. Especially with bots, there is a massive variance in their power level depending solely on whether the RNG rolls to hit you (in the head) or not.

[@AeroZephron]

It might have something to do with them "fixing" the no-spawns-on-the-edge- of- the-map glitch.

[@swanqlord3048]

Unfortunately, i really don’t think that this change is a bug. I am almost certain that this is yet another example of Arrowhead’s incompetence and their failure to properly communicate changes. I believe this is their thinking. Right now, in four man squads the game tries to spawn one patrol per player. However, if players are close together and their patrol spawns overlap, then the patrols cancel each other out. This means that if a four man group stays together they only get one patrol spawn, whereas a four man group that splits up gets four patrols. I think Arrowhead is buffing around a four man group that has split up. In this case, assuming everything else is equal, then a solo player really would be getting 1/4th of the patrol spawns of a full group. In the patch notes, Arrowhead explains that they upped the patrol spawn rate for solo players from around 1/6th to 1/4th. I think they got the 1/6th number because they were taking into account the scaling for the time between patrols with more players. So, by just straight up removing all scaling, they got the “1/4th” they claimed. I obviously don’t need to explain why this is a dog shit change, nor do I need to explain that this was not at all conveyed by the patch notes. I really hope I am wrong in thinking this change is not a bug, but I have truly lost all faith in Arrowhead making reasonable changes at this point. The fact that they have not addressed complaints about patrol spawns in any capacity since the patch is also telling.

[@ragingfurball5419]

I just love it when a charger eats five rockets and keeps chugging while there's four more chargers and two bile titans wrecking our shit. On only level 7 difficulty...

[@Zero12303]

Yeah or when it's missing half its body and shrugs it off as a flesh wound and can still run full speed

[@metaforeva3744]

​@Zero12303 or when you shoot off the head of a damn brood commander and it rushes you or still acts like it cam detect your exact location even though, there is no possible way for it do that.

[@fowlWarDog]

The more you like something, the more enjoyment can be withheld or cancelled by problems and interference, therefore it is far from uncommon for folks to rant and rave about something they like. I've never understood what's so hard to understand about this dynamic. just replace "enjoyment" with monetary value and poof, people are angrier when you ruin their $20 burger as opposed to a ruined $3 burger, shocker I know.

[@TheCosmicAstro-]

Very good analogy

[@Jabokrazy]

It's that the people who don't understand the passion never will, so they can't see why it's so important to you. Perception is a bitch.

[@punishedmatteson7108]

That's the main reason why I'm pissed off. I love this game, love the first one, and am upset at the 'fixes'.

[@PatientZERO100]

Yep, this right here. Passionate people will react passionately when they thing they're passionate about is either positively or negatively affected; it's what makes us geeks and gamers. Normies and tourists will never understand, and unfortunately a lot of Helldivers groups online have been infested with them cuz they're Fortnite/Apex/Valorant transplants.

[@shacksonsolar]

My $40 railgun Burger is still not fixed and balance man don't give a damn. Man spat in my face and told me my super soaker primary is working as intended, and that I should no longer live in solo missions literally dropping 3x patrols on my ass. ☺️

[@cobc11]

Devs speedrunning killing the game

[@SmakerDaper]

can’t wait for the video essay in a year “how devs killed the best game of 2024”

[@shepherdlavellen3301]

the worst part is this is a pve game, where broken equipment wouldn't ruin the gaming experience

[@MrJohannson]

*Alexus the dumbfuck is killing the game

[@K0sm]

A perfect time to uninstall and play Hades 2

[@habibi8964]

Game is not going to die lmao casuals come and go the die hards will keep this game floating

[@recolored_crown]

I pointed this out on reddit first day it was happening, I got immediately down voted to oblivion, was told it was just a skill issue, would consistently tell them that no matter how good you are at the game these spawn are impossible. And people just kept yelling at me.

[@petercottantail7850]

what's ironic about the gatekeepers saying skill issue, they don't even play solo. solo has always been harder than co-op and they pretend they are actually God gamers when this game with 4 players is the easiest coop game I've played.

[@recolored_crown]

@@petercottantail7850 it’s gotten to the point of being impossible even in coop helldivers, but yea, your point still stands

[@MrCelloman999]

Well many on reddit are delusional so yeah checks out.

[@jakestakes9075]

@@recolored_crownyou should play with me then because I really don’t feel like this game is hard until you wipe the map and you have the entire automaton army on your ass

[@TheCosmicAstro-]

As much as we see people trying to shame you for being critical or gaslight you saying "skill issue". The vast majority of people i interact with in game and out of game almost exactly reflect your same sentiments about the game. Thanks for doing what you do and giving us a voice to be heard

[@pseudowoodo6154]

I think people posting solo helldive clears, especially those with "1k+ kills" etc probably are making them feel solo is too easy. I solo q in groups and often am that solo doing objs and nests, and ill barely see enemies often as it seems/feels like patrols maybe target the host. Patrols having a bias towards walking over objective points is fine, but when you hide from a patrol to let them pass and they stop walking and look around its like cmon, i purposely didnt engage the 10 shield devastators for a reason.

[@sdas-cs4jl]

The problem is those people run 10s of runs to get that video. The devs balance off the complaints from these video's. It's a joke and all the stupid ass clowns saying immagine heldive being easy. The people that say that shit don't even play and they seriously need to stfu.

[@rthj6446]

No. The bot drops / bug spawns happen where the most people are next to a point of interest. You as a marathon runner is making the game less controllable and less enjoyable for the rest of the players. I quit as soon as I see someone like you in the team. Because you increase the threat level by being away from your team, but you do not help the team over come the issues you create. Solo play in a 4 man is the easiest the game can be.

[@pseudowoodo6154]

@@rthj6446 I do stick with the team often, and frequently trigger breaches and drops to handle alone when I don't. If me doing the objectives alone means 3 people can't handle themselves idk what to say. I cover the teammates a fair bit even when not close by dragging a patrol going to them to me. Edit: drops and breaches happen where they are called, and certain objs have scripted call ins. I can trigger breaches as a solo in a squad.

[@genericman1966]

@@rthj6446someone’s gotta do the objectives while you fight the same patrol for 20 mins

[@Enonymous99]

Yea I swear they’re nerfing and buffing based on the top 1% skill base It’s driven a lot of us out of the game already, let’s see if they realize that before it’s too late

[@AthamAldecua]

Make it difficult, sure. Make it fair though. I don't want patrols to know where I am without seeing me first. I don't want automatons tracking me behind walls (wallhacks), I don't want them to shoot through cover. I don't want to get almost one shotted by a goddamn hunter. Seeing your hp decrease by 90% from a freaking trash mob? Lol Stop making good weapons bad. Fun > Balance. This is not a competitive game. Stop saying "skill issue" everytime someone asks a good question or gives constructive criticism. The only skill issue I see here is coming from the devs and the CMs tbh. We want to like this game. Easy money for you (if you don't screw it up)

[@redcenturion88]

*checks map* Welp there's literally nowhere I can go where I won't be fucked

[@pnb328]

Fun > balance. Except Fun is dependant on balance, once the game's balance is ruined, it's impossible to have fun ever again.

[@giganticimpact8941]

The CEO recently addressed balance issues and said simething along the lines of "it feels like when something fun comes along it gets taken away". Sadly balancing isn't his job.

[@DanielFerreira-mh2hd]

And to think the game was almost perfect BEFORE the first patch.

[@dagdamor1]

Silver lining: Difficulty 1 and 2 are much more amusing with these changes because it’s just wave after wave of silly chaffy Wilburs waddling at you

[@anstorner]

You dont see anything in difficulty 1, just in the objective and during extraction. However i did notice the amount of enemies that pursue you in 2, it felt weird as hell since in launch i never seen anything like that.

[@fresnel149]

Difficulty 2 has gone insane, I drop down there from my normal Suicide Mission fairly often, to farm medals/super credits or to clear personal orders with weapons I hate. It used to be a quick romp around the map on solo and then extract, now it's just a constant running firefight for 30 minutes as wave after wave after wave of enemy pours onto you faster than you can kill them. I used to be able to just slap on whatever guns I felt like trying out and taking a run around, now I have to take ONE test gun, and plan the rest of my gear around covering it in case it doesn't work well. The time I tried out the airburst rocket launcher I got so overwhelmed I actually had to abandon a SEAF artillery battery because I was out of respawns, and I hadn't even activated the console yet.

[@ramsenc]

Patrols feels like the spawn right behind me. Just feels cheap.

[@vik1837]

Totally agree. I am level 90 and struggling to stay around. Hopefully they get this addressed soon. Loved week 1-3 of this game. Then it just seems to get worse at each patch.

[@DarkFoxes]

Helldives are two things in a 4 man squad : either you don't get much action at all the entirety of the match or its a absolute gulag the moment you go out of ur hellpod, no in between 😂

[@noxiebobo]

Honestly it is EXACTLY this, they need to find a way to reign it in on both fronts and give us a more consistent experience. Unfortunately, these devs will be made aware of this discrepancy and want to always make it the gulag at all times, which a majority will not enjoy.

[@napowolf]

Most games: Unpolished and with platform exclusivity at launch. Helldivers 2: making the game less polished and patch in platform exclusivity POST LAUNCH.

[@ragingmonkey4592]

Dude, seriously. Can I have my fkn frames back? Used to run this shit at 90fps or more, now I'm lucky if I can stay above 40fps

[@Fluttersniper]

Tried to get side objectives solo for personal mission. Did the main, on my way to extraction. Found an artillery. Cue 20 minutes of fighting constant, unending bugs as I try to load the gun. And not bug breaches! They spawned away from me and kept advancing on the gun, as if 50 random patrols kept spawning and hearing the gunfire, over and over. Got out, but didn’t have enough time to complete the order and had to quit for the night. Wild.

[@Auzzymandias]

Honestly I completely avoid SEAFS unless I have at least 2 other people with me to load the shells quick, fucking enemies will SPRINT to it as soon as I touch the console and call reinforcements the nanosecond they get there

[@hoteleight4217]

You can kick the shells really far. With practice it's not too bad. Just pick up the shell, drop shell, pick up shell and immediately switch weapons. If done right, you'll kick it.

[@mkaleborn]

Yeah the artillery mission is usually a death sentence now. Endless spawns leading to huge fights with heavy enemies all over the place.

[@NoneK4]

@@Auzzymandias Pick up the shells and put them next to the loading bay, and then activate the console. No enemies outside of normal patrols will go there. Sometimes not even patrols if you're playing in a group but you're alone at the SEAF. Of course, they'll come once you activate the console, but you just have to put the shells in and tweak the console and you're out.

[@Auzzymandias]

@NoneK4 I've done this before and I've still had patrols camping around the whole site and walking through it

[@corykeena3055]

Every word out of this man's mouth is reading my mind. Every single complaint I've had is every complaint I've had, thanks Dough.

[@Brandon-yq1tm]

It's crazy that almost every single buff that has a noticable impact so far have been by accident

[@SPACE_BOOOOOST]

At this point, I can't tell if the devs are lying 24/7 or just hilariously incompetent and simply can't make the game do what they want, but neither options are all that promising.

[@Superdave-vf7vs]

You can thank the Ses of Balancing for that, as he is the man in charge for it, don’t blame the entire dev team, just the balance side

[@arizonaanalog389]

I think it's both. Like saying their recent Eruptor patch isn't working properly? How isn't it working properly it's working in the exact manor the patch notes said, that's just back peddling from the community reaction. Also why the fuck does almost every weapon have light pen? That's a flat out design flaw.

[@Superdave-vf7vs]

@@arizonaanalog389i have said this before! What is the point of light armor pen in late game when more than 60% of what you encounter is medium or heavy!

[@Alex-K94]

Played a lvl 3 mission solo. Wanted to get my 60 AMR kills real quick. Ended up gettin 370 kills in 20 minutes and almost failed. A lvl 3 Mission. 3!!! There were sooo many scout striders.

[@Jumbuck1151]

Wtf that's insane

[@Coach_Brian]

Yup. I put something similar on Reddit and i was told "i need better trigger discipline" and i wanted to scream.

[@IceDragon1377]

For real, and they made those god damn things so much more tanky. Only way I effectively deal with them is either the amr or quasar, and in both those cases you're still screwed because there will be like 3 of em coming at you while you're getting surrounded on all sides.

[@thePontiffsSnickerdoodles]

​@Coach_Brian Well there's your first mistake of going to Reddit and expecting a serious answer. But seriously, patrols are NUTTY right now.

[@skywardsoul1178]

If you shoot just below the armour plate (there's a little square of lighter grey metal) with the AMR, you've got a decent chance of one shotting the strider. Can also shoot the leg joint I think. I believe this works with the AC, but I've only recently started having to aim more carefully at striders as I'd usually just 1/2 tap them anywhere. Not a fix obviously but it may help you somewhat if you don't know already.

[@michaelk433]

My top theory is that the original game designer bailed to work on some other massive project. Now we're stuck with some junior dev trying to figure out what the previous guy was going for, and they're just not cutting it. I mean, these new balance patches make zero sense. Take the crossbow, for example - it was launched as an anti-medium weapon, but then it got nerfed into a nothing-killer instead of working on the core issues. The scorcher? It was supposed to be a weakspot gun that could take out devastators in three headshots, but thanks to a bug that the new dev doesn't know yet (direct shots with split damage do not apply limb damage correctly), its damage got buffed twice, so now it kills them in six body shots. That's a completely different design from what was originally intended.

[@petercottantail7850]

it really feels like they stole someone else's game with all the changes

[@kevinnguyen8498]

Spawns are right. It literally just makes no sense. We destroy nest and fabricators, we reduce spawns until it’s zero. That’s the whole point of liberating a planet by getting rid of everything. If we kill everything and stuff still spawns, it’s like saying whatever we did doesn’t mean a thing.

[@dapanda2068]

I remember when levels 3 to 6 were lowkey relaxing, now it just feels like slightly easier helldive

[@josephhein9497]

Yep. And it's inconsistent too. Some days 4s feel like 9s and others 4s feel like 1s. My buddy and I swore up and down they did a stealth update with the new warbond this past Thursday because we just couldn't get it right on our 4s at all that day. Every one was a nightmare... Then, Friday night we played and it was stupid easy. The only difference was the day of the week. WTF?!

[@icata12345]

yeaap you still get hella swamped but you dont see any heavies...

[@redcenturion88]

​@josephhein9497 I'm almost certain there's some type of dynamic difficulty algorithm at work in this game. Perhaps loosely based on a string of performances. If I go a few missions without dying, the game suspiciously causes enemies to single me out when other teammates are closer. It's like the game is saying "sorry but you've survived long enough". Even my teammates were perplexed, they just stood there wondering why nothing was targeting them as they watched me flounder and dive and fight for my life.

[@josephhein9497]

@@redcenturion88 Funny you say that, because I have openly said a few times these last couple of weeks, "Oh yeah, sure... I'm not shooting the Hulk but he's coming for me anyway... Sounds right."

[@redcenturion88]

@@josephhein9497 plus they can see through walls and rocks like there's nothing there. So you can't even reliably fake them out or evade behind cover because they know exactly which side of the cover you'll emerge from. They're borderline omnipotent - the bots. I hate them.

[@thatonedude8313]

I remember playing a solo helldive a couple days ago on a bug raise the flag and every time I would get to a flag there would be like 2-3 patrols and then a bug breach. The very second I killed everything another 2 patrols of nursing spewers came out of nowhere then another bug breach got called I was literally put in an infinite loop of that for 20 minutes ON ONE FLAG. But ig since I’m not god himself it’s a skill issue

[@thatonedude8313]

Oh yea I’d run out of ammo every patrol cause primary’s are given enough ammo for like 3 patrols. “Just call resupply” kinda hard when 4 chargers 2 biles and 3 stalkers are on my arse and I have no ammo or stims from the previous 2 patrols of chargers

[@Kratos176]

@@thatonedude8313bro so many chargers spawn on 9 in one breach it’s wild now lol

[@thatonedude8313]

@@Kratos176 you actually can’t get anything done cause there’s 4 chargers running at you at all times it’s actually irritating and just not fun

[@UnGodly_Overlord]

All I have to say is the Devs need to play their own game

[@ShinobiGunZ]

@@UnGodly_Overlord i heard the balance guy tests the new balanced weaps in difficulty 3 and 4 only. and i've heard devs only play on 4-5 difficulty

[@jamesmckenzie9551]

Watched this hours ago, but came back to make a post. The gameplay mechanic should be that the actions of the player have consequences. If you agro the enemy, they call in more enemies. Cause and effect, something we can all get behind. But then we get these enemies who know where we are, and the stealth aspect is taken away. We aren't in charge of the gameplay loop at that point, we cannot stealth, and as soon as we fire, the enemy knows we are present, behind what rock we threw the stratagem from etc. When the player has no control over the situation, that's when the frustration creeps in. Take last night, I was doing a level 7 with friends. We drop in, and within the radius of the drop were THREE aircraft towers, with two of them so close they were almost touching. So in addition to the bot ground patrols, we now have 6 aircraft raining death down on us, whilst mortars fire at us from the outpost 200m away. What do you do in that situation, once you've expended your stratagems and ordnance? If you haven't specifically loaded out to take on that many aircraft, what is your gameplay choice? Combine that with the wonky hellbomb that goes off and doesn't kill the factory, it was an unwinnable situation. Or another game last night, where I did level 7 flag plant vs bugs, I took 15 minutes on the SEAF (which I hadn't activated, I stacked the ammo next to it first) due to endless loops of patrols, which I utterly annihilate with the gas/napalm combo, but which always squeeze off that bug hole orange gas as they choke. I am returning to extract with 8 minutes remaining, with the super samples in tow, and patrols of half a dozen spewers walk straight towards me. I could not physically get past them, could not stealth it, agro'd nothing all to extract and had the "mission complete, failed to extract" after spending 40 minutes fighting and killing hundreds of bugs and failed to get any samples off-world. What was the gameplay loop there?

[@steven66maye76]

Their priorities aren’t right at all too. They will step over their toes by doing something like making the railgun unplayable then dropping the quasar. Or go out of their way to nerf the crossbow when it was just decent at best. I don’t understand how tough it is to simply focus on things that are extremely weak first.

[@waynee6878]

Man, i felt that sob at the end but it is nice to hear that it worked out well in the end. Keep up the good work, that feedback you give is valuable.

[@NormanAmoss-yo5id]

I am the mid tier average player you are talking about. Watching your content and other,s, learning the skills and tactics to “get gud”, I slowly worked up to lvl 6 solo. After patch, back to lvl 4. I am not as skilled as others,, but was having fun learning. As solo players know, mistakes in the game can cost you the mission. Previously (before patch), if I made a mistake I had a chance to reset. Now, it is to unforgiving. I quit playing. Maybe if Arrowhead sees your video and makes changes to welcome solo players, I will come back. I love the game (still watch your content)and would think I am their perfect demographic (lvl 52, 302 hrs). The average soldier in the war, I played on lower lvls (3-4) for the war effort, to max liberation. I would play the solo high lvls, to challenge myself with the goal of playing on solo 7 to get super rare for my last ship module upgrades. Arrowhead pushed me out and ruined the player experience for me.

[@MrCelloman999]

Right there with you. I’m a solo diver and the patched demolished my enjoyment and feeling of progression. I feel like AH snatched the game away from me and said coldly “not for you.”

[@UkDave3856]

You’re absolutely 100% correct. The game is becoming less and less fun to play with every patch. The devs have made a superb game, but they’re steering it down a blind alley and into a dead end and will kill it if they don’t back track and listen to their player base. I’m 220 hours into this game, so I’m prepared to wipe my face of it and call it done. It was fun whilst it lasted, but that fun is rapidly turning into frustration.

[@St.Raphael_]

I'd really love to have modifiers like the ones in Deep Rock, telling you about the enemy types. It would also lead to more different builds to be played. When you do not know what will be there, most players choose the tools that are somewhat the "best" against all types, but those who are only good for specific enemies stay in the closet. I almost never see a machinegun 7 and above, but if there was a "Hunter Spam"-modifier, that boy would see the sunlight again.

[@Spectacular_Insanity]

I can't wait for the Internet Historian's video on "The Rise and Fall of Helldivers 2".

[@DanDanyul]

Won't happen til someone writes a detailed article for him to plagiarise ;)

[@Spillow-C]

we're still in time ok???? right? right?

[@NIkolla13]

Look for a guy called "big boss", he is the "fine, I'll do it myself" of Internet Historian

[@Auzzymandias]

@@NIkolla13 big boss is great, just as funny and just as good editing with no plagiarism that I know of lol

[@chimbo7787]

Watch out, Nbomberguy will start seething

[@Danuke708]

The problem is that most of the weapons have small ammo capacity but they want us to go against armies. What were they thinkin?

[@Max_Ohm]

Yeah that was a huge mistake...I feel like I spend 50% of my playtime either running away while reloading or just reloading.

[@1caiser]

Seeing that "pin of shame" hot-take get deleted almost in real time, along with each reply taking Dough's side shows that Dough knows what he's talking about. Paraphrased from 4:33: "when people are able to comfortably chill at playing their current difficulty, then all of a sudden they can't handle that and have to drop down two or three levels, that's a terrible experience" Patrols have significantly become more noticable about this massively increased patrol behavior, especially if you've played an amount of solo missions. I was able to comfortably solo both Bot and Bug T5, and now I'm completely swarmed if I get a single Bug breach through or face two too many Hunters (Bots are the same, but to a slower degree). Even if I manage to clear a bug breach turned tsunami mid-mission, all I know is that, nowadays, extracting solo always seemingly devolves into a massive ring-around-the-extract-console, EVEN on T5.

[@aslightlystablefootsoldier9838]

The thing is this really messes everything even four man, recently it's just gotten worse. You'll wipe a whole bot drop and look in the distance just to see another patrol housing the local Hulk on it's way to instantly start fighting you and reset the cycle of beating that patrol only to advance a few thirty meters to see another patrol with the added bot drop special. The game is starting to promote the four man splitting up into 2 groups which one takes the whole game's patrols and the others do objectives which is not at all what Helldivers 2 is strong for.

[@mrblackout22]

It's not negativity when it's problem solving criticisms or constructive thinking. You're so far from negative ignore that nonsense.

[@miltaire3235]

If it ain't broke don't fix it. Devs should try that

[@Superdave-vf7vs]

Except rn it is broke

[@shadowkhan422]

@@Superdave-vf7vs Well yeah , devs broke it when they did exactly opposite of what the op said

[@Superdave-vf7vs]

@@shadowkhan422precisely, the messed around and found out

[@MDestron2282]

And if it is broke, fix it. Don't fucking brake it more!

[@briannewton9316]

Mr. Dough is the people's content creator. Any sensible player would agree with you, keep up the good work brother

[@bordobereeet]

The worst thing is that when you do the main objective, patrols spawn like every 10 to 20 seconds making it nearly impossible to extract if you play on helldive difficulty even if you are 4 people in the team. If you get spotted by one or two patrols, the chain reaction starts if you fail to destroy them before they call for dropships.

[@ntb-gaming7876]

I tend to do solo every now and then on level 4 or slightly higher (I don't play as often as I used to), and I can definitely say it feels like I'm being swarmed, and I have to try a lot harder than I used to do.

[@MrPanggs]

On the official Helldivers reddit, they are removing any posts that contain "drama" or openly criticize the devs. They are essentially only allowing those RP posts the sub used to be filled with. Ridiculous. Could you imagine if this was the case during the whole Sony debacle? We would all be required to create and link PSN accounts. I'm more upset regarding the fact that we can't mention weapon balance either, which gives Alexus, the guy who ran Hello Neighbor 2 into the ground, and is currently doing the same for balance patches in Helldivers 2 (alongside mocking the community) free reign to continue making the game less fun, while laughing about it...

[@OhDough]

helldivers 2 has terrible people in charge of moderation. they need to clean house IMO

[@user-ve3fz3bm7z]

a subreddit cant allow its userbase to single out and harass an individual. Like every public internet forum, no matter how far gone it might be, has that rule implemented. Guess its united states law for us websites. The sub is quite big and the whole cm debacle may have put them into the spotlight

[@doctorhealsgood5456]

Nice the discord and reddit are now an echo chamber. It's so over.

[@PayYourTick]

@@user-ve3fz3bm7zpeople like you are just allergic to responsibility. If a couple of people are the ones doing a bad job then we have to call them out. Bullying needs to make a comeback cus people like you are so soft it’s pathetic.

[@Boamere]

I actually can't believe I check out the reddit and it's gone full censorship mode! Well this game is dead. Tbh sony could have bribed or forced the moderators to hide the attitude of the public, wouldn't be surprised at all at this point.

[@markedfang]

"Anti-aircraft defense." "Complex strategem plotting." "We want our players to rely on strategems more." Their strategems : "puff of smoke."

[@anstorner]

They should also change how the Rescue 15 minute mission works, it's very dumb to have 9 hulks and 4 Tanks appear in the course of 3 minutes at difficulty 6, not counting the stupid amount of Berserkers which goes over 20 easily, shield devastators, striders etc, at the end of it we have the same amount of kills than an entire full clear lv 8 40 mission yet we get overrunned anyways and run out of everything even with the best loadouts. Making go towards somewhere else that is not the objective should not be an thing at all to be required to make the mission playable at all.

[@thirteen8582]

Why the f are there more bugs when I destroy bug nests. It should be backwards. It is so dumb getting punished for closing bug holes smh.

[@captaincool6785]

yep agree

[@OhDough]

I'd rather it be a modifier that can be toggled on that makes it work how it does now and with it off works how people want it to. less bugs at this point would just make me fall asleep

[@bluegolisano7768]

that kind of only has a 'yesn't' response. it raises the spawn rates around the existing ones because of either how the heatmaps were programmed or because the engine just does it that way. some game engines have quirks that are so deeply engrained that it's impossible to fix, and this could be one such case. still fucking obnoxious though.

[@dynomight3855]

​@OhDough maybe destroying bug nests can lower the spawn rate of certain units in patrols like spewers or brood commanders? So, in a way, we can still keep the chaff swarms just the elite and heavies need a bug breach to spawn when the nests are closed could that work?

[@unscbug12-52]

@@dynomight3855that would be a great idea,it’s like the elites thought it was more important to guard their bases instead of going on a patrol, makes logical sense.

[@KaryonTheirStory]

I only play on helldive for max exp and samples so I can only comment from this perspective, but I swear for people playing on lower difficulty, it’s hard to even recommend playing on helldive with how frequent the spawns are right now especially on a solo run. You see a group of 4 or 5 enemies and within 3 seconds 2 of these damn roaches call in a bug breach that spawns 2 chargers, 3 bile titans, 20 Australian spiders, and 30 other roaches. Meanwhile I got 2 mags left on my incendiary breaker and stratagems on cooldown. If they don’t start buffing weapons or at least leaving the fun guns alone then nobody is ever going to play on helldive difficulty.

[@josephhein9497]

Absolutely. I play bots almost exclusively. It used to be that if you got engaged, you had to pay attention to where you're running, so you don't aggro another mob nearby. That was the tactic - take out the patrol and don't move until clear. Now, it seems that no matter what happens, staying in one spot aggros absolutely everything on the map. You see one bot-drop get called in, but out of nowhere there are 237 enemies instantly on top of your location. The game HAS to be spawning them. I know I'm not aggroing them and there can't possibly be 42 patrols within 10 meters of my location when I get engaged. It's impossible. If the game doesn't have to follow the rules, what is the point of playing??? Why would I want to play a game where the AI is allowed to cheat?!!!

[@mkaleborn]

It’s the same at all difficulties to be honest. Anyone who logged in the day after the patch probably felt like they were playing 3 or 4 levels beyond what they were used to and what their skills/load outs could handle.

[@josephhein9497]

@@mkaleborn I eased my way up to challenging on solo. I'm not great at handling stress, so I avoid it in my videogames. That said, after the update I dropped back down to easy and have only now gone back up to medium. Not sure if I'll ever move to challenging again if the update isn't reverted/refined.

[@petercottantail7850]

its actually very homogenous across all difficulties. the fact you get unpredictable flanks multiple times causing more time wasted because of repositioning snowballs. dying on hard just once usually means a giant horde of enemies where your body is and you have to fall back and start over. then enemy spawns get capped without enough dps. but there's a lot of rng if you get bothered or not, sometimes it can be smooth sailing so I'd say that's the one advantage but why bad roll and it's back to chaos

[@sebasou2277]

at 3:24, you forget probably the worse change of ennemies: socut strider been way more resilient to explosion, now taking no elss than 2 AC shot on front no matter how close to the head you shoot

[@terencemcgee2580]

Something that is not being talked about for this update to the patrols, is the game punishing you for not having a four man team. Just because you drop an SoS doesn't mean someone is going to join your game. I get it, HA wants you to play the game with a full squad but, if you can't get a full squad for what ever reason, you are going to get hit with more patrols. That is my gripe with this update. It is just them saying 'It is "your" fault you don't have friends.'

[@mawnkey]

I think my biggest problem right now (even bigger than the balance team) is how often changes _don't_ feel deliberate and turn out not to be. It seems like the dev team has a real problem just putting out the correct release tag. Like they have a PM dropping the ball or no PM at all coordinating releases, so you never know what the devs will kick out the door. I think _every_ new content release has had stuff not working and an "Oops, sorry, we released the wrong version!" That indicates a fundamental software development problem that _needs_ resolution.

[@mkaleborn]

They are desperately in need of a Test server for players to play and give feedback on pre-release of any patches. They clearly have version control issues with all the yo-yo’ing of in-game systems.

[@ghoulbuster1]

They are incompetent and lazy.

[@mawnkey]

@@ghoulbuster1 they're doing enough work that lazy isn't the case and they released a great game that makes it clear they're not incompetent. It's a process problem clearly.

[@falseblackbear3553]

they have these missions completely backwards when it comes to enemy spawn rates. If you're dropping in and there's 10 outpost, there should be the maximum amount of enemies patrolling the area. Your incentive as a player is to go outpost to outpost destroying them, thus reducing enemy numbers. The way they have it now, not only is it deincentivizing you to clear out areas, but they're actually punishing you by bringing in more enemies.

[@c0c0asauce]

The devs seem to be building a game for people who aren't focused on learning how to beat the game. I think the right way to modify difficulty, in the short term, is to make the player want to take more risks. Imagine we could blow up a tank turret with a rail gun or amr shot through the main gun barrel between the light flashing and it firing if its aiming at us. It adds a completely optional challenge that is balanced through all difficulties. You didnt take away anyone's toy you just give them a reason to try others. How about being able to stir up environmental hazards like orbital bombardment or 500kg on an ice map could open up a deadly pit fall. You aren't gonna stand on the spot where the bomb lands in the first place but the hole could prevent you from fleeing or save you from enemies. Just add fun risky ways to use stuff we already have.

[@BearDude2311]

This is the only thing that urks me. It’s like they purposely nerf guns the community enjoys. The more i think about it the more i wanna drop it and not even deal with it because so many other games have done it before. But with the CEO giving statements like he does. I realize theirs hope for a good future of HD2!

[@n16r49]

Comparing solo to 4 player is insane you get: 4x the patrols, 4x the breaches, 1/4 of the boosters, restricted load-outs because you need to cover all encounter-types alone, 4x more work on most objectives, or if everyone splits up 4x as many objectives/distance, though in that case same patrols. Even if they spawned 4x the mobs which it really doesn't feel like they do, that'd still be a huge imbalance, not to mention how much better aoe weapons and stratagems become. How does that sound like a balanced experience how can you balance weapons with two so fundamentally different player experiences. I can imagine they wanted to make a game where the player really feels like this helpless private dropped behind enemy lines, scrambling to fulfill objectives not knowing how to damage enemies efficiently, but that's not a state you can keep the player in forever, we effectively became veterans and seeing that improvement in ourselves is fun. Trying to artificially nerf players often times with stealth changes that aren't communicated isn't fun, you are just kicking over the sandcastle I build until I don't feel like playing anymore. I totally get why OhDough is complaining nonstop, why wouldn't someone when their time and dedication is not just not valued but actively punished.

[@raxnn]

i really do miss helldivers vanilla. This game has gone downhill since then. too bad there are so many AH fanboy droolers.

[@ExitusPax]

I noticed this immediately. I try to solo stealth a lot just to test myself, and I noticed I was fighting around 5 times more bugs than normal, and they would hone in on my position instantly even if I dropped somewhere out of the way. Re-stealthing even with the Scout armor suddenly became impossible.

[@gregthepeglegpregdreg]

dude, your negativity is on point, you're complaining without bitching, you're being constructive, and you're using your voice to make the problems the game has heard, and also allow a part of the community to also speak out. You are being negative, but you're doing so in a positive way, and that's what this game and community needs right now.

[@garrettwells5895]

I've completely given up on the game altogether. It just isn't fun anymore. There is no consistency with balance, and it feels like no matter what difficulty i play, it's a snoozefest. It's strange to say I'd rather watch the game rather than play it.

[@simplyyunak3189]

I feel you, if PvE shooter are a thing for you I can full heartedly recommend Deep Rock galactic for the meantime until the HD2 devs figure the balance out

[@garrettwells5895]

Thats not a bad idea, thank you!

[@CreamIc7]

Deep Rock is where you should go at least for now

[@jaipadv8282]

Shout-out to the increase of deep rock players that will come from this For rock and stone!

[@foulbeast3904]

Me and my buddy used to run 6 for a comfortable challenge about a month ago. Now, we are struggling at completing 5. A month of learning the game and getting better, just for these changes force us to have to drop down two levels just to have a semi-comfortable, non-stressful run, and even then, I have to make serious considerations about my loadout and not just experiment with goofy shit to see what works. I've been going back to Darktide recently.

[@quontox9247]

In my experience, 4 player helldive bugs is still pretty easy even with the extra patrols, but the amount of chargers has probably doubled, while bots is pretty hit or miss depending on your squad. If you stick together and focus on the objective, its fine, but if everyone starts spliting up and taking aggro from every patrol under the sun, then youre being shot from every direction 150 meters away and things get pretty bad and youre just constantly pushed back by the endless waves of hulks.

[@Marinetr]

because Arrowhead truly want people to play coop. Players like you will negated the "playing together" concept. You should feel lucky that Arrowhead did not make the AI smarter by utilizing real world military doctrine such as " rapid deployment" or spread out their patrol net or try contain you in one spot and start hammering from front, back and above.

[@user-ip6wq7vr7m]

Remember recently playing a level 7 Bot mission but holy crap man it felt like a level 9, it got so bad almost everyone left because we couldn't get it back to the point were we could get a foot hold, just when we thought ok we got this ...nope, another bot drop after bot drop lol, it was absolutely crazy, you had to have seen it. It didn't seem right for that level.

[@nibblets1961]

I've just played a 7 bot mission an hour ago, at first we were steamrolling through and heading to the extraction site until the host crashed. Bot drop after bot drop, ships coming down like no tomorrow. What felt like being the calm before the storm and boom more drop ships were on the way

[@user-ip6wq7vr7m]

@@nibblets1961 lol I feel ya, glad I'm not the only one.

[@Rockforce80]

Once I saw Luchs video I was waiiiiting for my boy dough to see his vindication. So many people ran 1 mission solo after the change and just said "eh seems the same to me" and dipped back to 4s lol.

[@mkaleborn]

That seems like what the devs and in-house playtesters may have done also.

[@Max_Ohm]

@@mkaleborn you're giving them too much credit saying they tested it at all

[@dragonoidsix]

I ran a full squad of 4 highly skilled Helldivers on a level 7 mission. Which we consider medium level difficulty with spikes where it can get hard. Normally these types of missions are not an issue for us. We can get a full operation done in about 90 minutes. And that's with looking across the map for the Super Samps and such. And this is against Bots. So even with Tanks, Hulks, Factory Striders and Gunships, we don't normally find it too difficult! This morning when i ran this same Level 7 mission, the Patrols never ended. You couldn't go 100m without running into a patrol. And by the time you finished killing one, no matter how quickly, you had another patrol nearby who was triggered by you taking out the 1st patrol! We legit ran into an issue where we could not advance to the Main Objective due simply to the endless patrols spawning around us and keeping us pinned for over 14 minutes, preventing us from trying to run away simply due to the sheer volume of fire all around us. So i fully believe that Patrols are broken ATM. Way beyond normal.

[@deathberry33]

The guys at Arrowhead are going to have a field day if/when they watch his vid. It seems like they take it as a personal insult when you think their game is easy and act as if you spat at their faces when you Solo Helldive.

[@superboss3758]

sorry to hear things weren't going well before helldivers released man. sounds like you were going through quite the hard time in life.

[@Coach_Brian]

I heard that as well. Dough, keep your head up. You seem like an awesome person, and you will go far in life no matter what you do.

[@yaypeace3792]

I said it in a different video, but i first started a mission with 4 randos and 2 left in the middle. Then at extraction, 3 favtory striders were dropped on our head. (This was difficulty 7)

[@trevordrakenor2063]

We see the same thing on 5. We tone down the difficulty so other guy can enjoy and they drop 2 hulks and tanks each drop and 2 strider every so often... On 5. Tone down my ass, there is still no difference in heavy spawn when they increased more medium and light.

[@IsfetSolaris]

As someone who used to play almost exclusively stealth because it's super fun - I've pretty much stopped playing unless it's with my friends. Stealth is completely impossible now. The ONLY way for you to stay hidden is to use Trailblazer Scout and then glitch up to a high place with the jump pack. It's not fun anymore.

[@pleebean789]

Just wanna say, you are my favorite helldivers 2 content creator. No clickbait or AI generated thumbnails, and you actually know what your talking about when it comes to this game. Keep up the great work man

[@TheReykjavik]

Matchmaking is nowhere near reliable enough to not have solo play be viable. Sometimes I start up a match, and everyone who tries to join through matchmaking just never actually makes it into the game. I should still have a fun game to play. And on difficulty 4, it is fun for me at least. But I don't think the radically increased patrols help, and certainly there are too many for me to have fun on a solo-helldive.

[@anstorner]

When the railgun nerf happened, in difficulty 4 i had 2 hulks and an tank drop simultaneously, it was an rude awakening because it did not stop from there.

[@Boamere]

All my friends have stopped playing the game because of the bad balancing decisions

[@Matt-iq7ci]

Man is so passionate about this game he skips the hair day and goes straight to recording. Kudos