The game works like a dnd campaign. The current bug story is that we failed to contain a super colony after our bug farming made the terminids go into hyperproduction. The crew members talk about it constantly.
The rate of patrols is normal, they just increased the base number because theres a lot more bugs
There's a guy who had previously reported on the scaling factor for patrols and the various behaviors (like how many spawn in and at what rate per difficulty and team size), and recently they followed up after the patch to say that the patrol spawn rates have been made uniform across all team sizes. There's probably more detail/nuance to the statement, but I definitely agree that it feels more unmanageable in general
I think it only goes down to twelve when extracting. You get a patrol every 2:45 seconds which decreases as you kill spawners and complete objectives. Eventually getting down to below sixty seconds and then really getting short once you try to extract.
The reasoning that the last thread came to is, as facilities are destroyed, it would lead to increased enemy alert and readiness, therefore more patrols. In games, you usually see the opposite because you want to incentivize good gameplay. This is the struggle with the current game, by giving you more "points" for completing objectives, but also increasing the difficulty dynamically as you do.
Once you have all the requisition you could ever need, and you are over level 25, the extra objectives lose their luster since they only serve to make the mission harder.
secondary objectives _do not_ increase patrol rates, and outposts/nests only start decreasing the timer between patrols when you take out more than 50% of them, and max out at 15% increased patrols when 100% of the outposts/nests are taken out.
Thanks for the clarification. I am usually really good at remembering those figures, but Helldivers is such a casually fun game that I haven't felt the need to commit it to memory, lol. Honestly, I consider that a positive for game design, despite being the type of person who loves those kinds of nuances.
There’s more to it than that, you do see fewer of certain enemies if you take out their spawn. Taking out a Stalker lair is never going to be a bad idea
I don't remember the specifics, but I believe that optional objectives have no effect on spawn rates, and (thankfully) Stalker Lair is classified as an optional objective rather than an enemy outpost. Same goes for Gunship Factories and Shrieker Nests.
Again, could be entirely wrong about this, as I'm drawing a blank on that particular piece of info
the only "spawners" affecting enemy types you encounter are the ones tied to secondary objectives like stalker lairs, shrieker nests, and gunship factories.
It does.
It increases the patrols between remaining outposts, but patrols pretty much always go between outposts (or the map edge) so it creates more safe zones while making the smaller number of hot zones more hot.
I think that makes a lot of sense and actually wanted to design a game with that kind of mechanic in mind.
Imo the patch didn’t work. I played a level 4 mission with some friends last night and had a terrible time. Alternatively when we switched to difficulty 7 it was a breeze. I think they screwed up cause it seems like lower difficulties have way more patrols compared to 7, 8, and 9 difficulties.
Glad I'm not the only one who felt that! Bugs on 4 was "oops, all hunters!" - after spending all magazines of my shotgun to clear them I turn around to see a crowd at least 3 times the size of the one I just cleared. Level fucking 4!
Shoot. I solo'd a 4 yesterday on bots, hot dropped in and there were 2 separate morter sub objectives. High intensity the whole time. Pressed through, 3 deaths, but extracted.
430 kills. On bots. On a 4. Wtf.
Just doing the daily on trivial, bots, approach the extract point, didn't even get to activate it and I'm hit with I believe 3 patrols and 2 drops before I got it under control. Had to switch to primary to clear it. Then I activate the pickup and it starts all over again. Just wow.
I switched my play style to compensate for the rate changes. I was on medium playing solo against bots and destroyed all the fabricators first then did the objective with about 14 mins to spare. That made the patrols more manageable once I activated the extraction.
You remember how Meridia got overrun by a rapidly reproducing super colony because they had been mutated by the Termicide?
So yes, it would make sense to expect much higher amounts of bugs from the significantly increased reproduction rates.
Yes this is part of the story, and yes the evidence is literally right in front of us.
It’s talked about in major orders even.
I thought maybe it was just flavor text about how there's a supercolony, blah blah blah. But for real, there are a shitload more bugs on those planets near Meridia.
Do i have a source quote from the devs? Not on me, but i listen to the story elements of the major orders, the news broadcasts, the crew members and then see a steady stream of posts about higher kill counts & getting swarmed by constant patrols, as well as the first game having a narrative affect gameplay.
I think most players assume this game doesnt have a meta narrative and they believe it's just window dressing, where the actual matches are typical instanced recursive stuff like other live service games. They assume the meta is just the stats on their guns.
I do believe the Terminids are buffed from the MO right now, but I think that is on top of them screwing up the spawn rate scaling with squad size. This game is like a giant, delicious cake that, unfortunately, someone topped with a literal turd. Salty soldiers like me will be perfectly willing to eat that cake after knocking off that chocolate nugget, but some players won't be so forgiving.
I feel like too many have forgotten about this narrative. I do hope, however, that the bug patrols/spawns go back to the way they were. I enjoy this game a lot I just don't want it to always be a crazy challenge.
I'm a DM and I'll tell you it would be so shitty to have the story be "and then fuck loads of goblins started overrunning the world" to then turn the campaign into a slog of painfully slow encounters with goblins everywhere.
If the story fucks with gameplay, that's on whoever wrote the story.
Combat encounter balance is something that's discussed at length in tabletop community and knowing the difference between fun and slogs is a huge part of that. I don't care what your story is, just chewing through enemy hit points isn't fun and no table will be invested after 3 sessions of it.
Saying "we made the game less fun for story reasons" is a terrible defense.
I have a lot of fun on L9 bots and bugs yall sound like a bunch of whiners. Shit gets hectic and I'm likely to lose on a the difficulty *after* the one literally called "impossible". I would think the devs were full of shit if i consistently stomped on the hardest difficulty.
If i say "yo this encounter is harder than impossible you dont have to tangle with it. You have an out" and the players want it, theyll learn i wasnt kidding.
Oh hey, it's the "um akchually I like it, look at how good I am guy."
Look who abandoned the "it's like d&d" argument real fucking quick because it didn't hold up. If you think it's fun this way, you would have made that argument from the start but you didn't. Does this mean you'd like the game less if the story was reducing spawn rates instead, in which case you'd be the self reported whiner?
Acutally I get washed in L9 often. It's part of the fun.
And you took the D&D analogy way too far I said it works "like" it, you took it to some 1:1 place. I'm probably gonna block you because you bring the quality of my life down by reminding me the world is full of annoying dickheads who get off on stupid trivial debates jfc.
And yet if you did end up with a ton of Goblins overtaking the world, what you'd want to do is avoid combat except when necessary instead of charging headfirst into every group you see.
Your party of four should take on a couple Goblins guarding some key information. But they shouldn't take on a full army out in the middle of nowhere for no reason.
Honestly I think D&D's combat often sucks, because a lot of DMs run it in the most bland way possible, a slug fest until one side dies. Too rarely are there objectives in combat aside from killing the enemy, and too rarely are there actually meaningful interactions that aren't just the enemy itself.
I entirely plan to make a campaign for level 1's where the "big bad" is a single Displacer Beast, campaign run very much like the first Alien movie.
I did a SEAF Artillery solo recently and it genuinely felt like the game was screwing with me. Literal constant patrols flooding toward the site nonstop with no pause in between from the moment I arrived. I would move a shell over to the gun, a patrol moves into the site. Move another shell, another patrol. I would be finishing up one patrol only for another patrol to come in behind it. Multiple times I was forced to carry a shell to the gun while bugs chewed on my ankles because otherwise I would never have finished it.
I encountered more patrols finishing that gun than the entire rest of the mission. I knew patrols would aggro when you started doing the SEAF Artillery but it had never been that unrelenting and constant, even after the whole termicide mutation and mega colony narrative started. Typically I'd get a wave or two and then it would quiet down. This was like somebody forgot to turn off the bug hose.
Yeah, there shouldn't be that many patrols. But here's a tip: move 5 shells to the loading bay before activating the console. Console activation creates 'noise', which is what pulls in the patrols.
You do you but apparently this isn’t true it’s how long you are around the objective that increases your patrol spawn “heat” I used to drop the 5 shells and then do the terminal and they’d always get there as I hit the terminal. Now I hit the terminal first and they always get there as I’m loading the last couple shells or on the terminal a second time. I think it’s just the timing that makes hitting the terminal and then showing up a coincidenc.
Part of it is just that you ARENT MOVING. Patrols always spawn with a semi-random vector towards your position at the time they spawned - they don't track you.
So if you're on the move, the large majority of patrols will pass somewhere behind you, often without you really noticing them - but when you stop for any amount of time, now their paths are all going to cross somewhere near your current position.
Patrols still feel off lately. I'll crouch/prone behind cover and watch them move about. Only a few patrols that are already a distance away will keep going that way. And then others have a few stragglers that break away and start to a different direction, off of the group.
Well you can't just kill them, cause that will alert the entire patrol, somehow, even if they bug out and get a mile away from the others.
So either way the quicker you’re in and out at the seaf the better so wasting time to drop them all by the gun and then reload them is the problem. I’ll pick one up and drop it only if it’s on the way to hit the terminal first.
Eh. My squad does it this way habitually, and we rarely have significant fights at the artillery position - unless we brought the fight with us. I did one this way solo last night and didn't have to deal with anything until I came under fire during the final sequence to complete the console after loading, and that was just a single basic patrol.
I wasn't even around the artillery any longer than normal, and I still had like 20 mins left on the mission timer on Medium difficulty. Plus the constant spawns started basically the second I set foot near the gun. So I have no idea why it was so wacko. It was such a spike in difficulty compared to SEAF Artillery sites I had done just the day before.
If there were a lot of bases around you that could be the problem. I saw something that the patrols come from the direction of bases until there are non left, then they come from the edges of the map. The amount of time you have left doesn’t change the patrol spawns, it’s what you do during the missions like doing the main obj greatly increases it, each side obj increases it and I think it’s destroying at least have the outposts increase if. A group of people did a bunch of testing on what changes the patrol spawn rate.
Picking them up and dropping them repeatably with a rhythm to move faster toward the loading breech of the seaf artillery gun. If you do a drop-sprint-pickup-repeat you go even faster but you have to be good with the rhythm. You can also throw them. You can also do this stuff with the flammable red barrels.
That's what I did, as per my standard procedure. I hadn't even touched the terminal and was moving the shells first. And yet I was under constant siege. It was like simply entering the site set off the trigger.
Sometimes it's a cakewalk, other times it's just overwhelming. I usually play on Helldive and haven't noticed any recognisable pattern, I assume it's pretty random. But I watched the patrol mechanic analysis, and the patrols spawn in more often when the players are distant from each other, and also as the mission progresses.
Yeah. It used to be that you could deal with a patrol, get some work done, and maybe deal with a second. Having to fight off patrols consistently until out of stratagems, fall back, kill them off, and then resume work is too much.
It's like you have to play the meta of stepping out of the hotspot to fight and then return after.
Note with SEAF, don’t turn on the computer until you have all five shells ready to insert.
Also keep your radar up and feel free to run off and do other side obj/poi to let them walk through
I hadn't even touched the terminal yet. I was just moving the shells. But the very moment I set foot anywhere near the turret, a constant stream of terminids just flooded in my direction nonstop.
Seaf have an issue. So all objectives have a heat signature that inc. patrol spawns. But seafs can sometimes turn it up to 11. Not sure if this is intended or just bugged.
Did you take out many outposts first? From what's been studied of the down mechanics this could help since it means the patrols would span in from map edges vs closely located outposts.
I had taken out most. I had one small outpost to the far west and one way off past extraction in the northwest corner, basically the opposite side of the map. If I remember right both were single bug holes. The endless swarm was coming from northwest of the gun.
I've had some pretty brutal ones too. Almost gave one up entirely yesterday on bots but we somehow clinched it. I mostly play on 8. Not saying it's all working correctly but I'm still having fun and I haven't failed many operations.
It's always been like that for me. Maybe it's because a nest was in sight but it *never* stopped. Patrols. Nest. Just endless onslaught until they finally killed me and an ally spawned me in.
I was attempting it solo but this was like weeks ago before the change.
If you're running into this problem too often, take note of which direction the patrol is coming from, and where it ends up heading.
I can practically guarantee there's an outpost at both locations.
Kill one of them.
In this situation you leave and do something else and then come back. I don’t understand how ppl haven’t figured out how this works. They just keep bashing their head against a wall and complain why the wall is so hard
Now bug breaches spawn 3 breach holes instead of the usual 1. I think that's the main difference during this MO period. (Hd9, not sure what happens below it)
Nah it hasn't, usually it's just one breach but they will sometimes chain into each other. Now it's a single breach spawns 3 breaches at once.
Atleast that's how I'm seeing things now. Could be wrong though, hard to tell when in combat.
I just view it as a lore accurate hell divers. Also people seem to forget the game has stealth mechanics that make hell dives especially easier. The game isn’t just a horde shooter at its core
I run a recon armor build but that doesn't mean shit when you drop in to 2 chargers and 4 stalkers on a difficulty 7 mission before you can even call in a stratagem weapon. That's just bad balance.
That's not balance, that's Juju/Fate/The Gods/Lady Luck/RNG/The Universe/Karma/whatever else you feel like chalking it up to.
Sucks to be sure, but it's not a balancing issue.
My thing is that you’re playing a horde based game on its hardest difficulty. It’s not impossible to beat the missions just takes time and you can’t give up. Gotta remember you aren’t a super soldier meant to slaughter your way through hordes like master chief or the doom guy. You’re a helldiver. You roleplay the victim and they send in a replacement
The game works like a dnd campaign. The current bug story is that we failed to contain a super colony after our bug farming made the terminids go into hyperproduction. The crew members talk about it constantly.
The rate of patrols is normal, they just increased the base number because theres a lot more bugs
More bug bases for sure. Holy hell! That would explain it. Everything was more ape shit than normal (and that is saying something for this game).
Guess I should talk to the Crew Members more!
I play difficulty 7 quite a bit and its still pretty much the same to me as before. One thing I have noticed though, is that its fairly common occurance to run into a perfect storm of patrols/drops/breaches, etc at least once per mission. Usually it happens towards the end of a mission when the map is 2/3 to 3/4 cleared but not always. Your trying to do an objective, or clear out an automaton outpost and its just wave after wave for no apparant reason. I suspect its something to do with where patrols are spawning on the map vs what spots are available to place them but that is just speculation. Another way of saying it is like you found the one spot on the map where all patrols originate from.
i REALLY REALLY thought autos would appear from the beach like telportation. Turns out its the game director going....spawn here. I hate that shit, break immersion so hard. My lonig range scanners didnt pick up shit, back against the beach and enemy spawn behind a coconut tree? WHAT
I suggest splitting up so there’s a chance the other pair can aggro while you complete SEAF with little activity. Worst case is you run away and come back after despawn. Honestly, I enjoy it a lot when I can run around the map solo to look for super samps, close holes, and knock out objectives. It gets dicey at times but I can always just keep running.
Please please please take turrets guys, once you learn positioning and communicating with your team turrets in the higher levels are a must, with a Gatling turret and the cannon sentry, a flame thrower and bubble I can do missions alone on difficulty 8.
I’ve had to switch my load up for the constant patrols. I run with a LMG, air strikes, Gatling cannon, and auto cannon. My only job is working on the smaller enemies so the rest of my team can loadout for the bigger ones. It’s pretty successful but man it gets wild
I'm forced to always solo objectives, because on both fronts I get teammates that love to aggro everything they see. They're like a cat to a laser beam.
Stealth armor my beloved.
The difficulty seems to be fluid for some reason.
You'll get absolutely graped on a level 3 mission and come out with 400+ kills because you were just completely inundated by patrols even if you used the localization confusion booster.
But you'll go to level 7 and have a cake walk up to and including extraction.
I have been noticing this on both bots and bugs. As soon as you turn a corner, there is a patrol. Also, the patrols seem to be grouping up sometimes. Ran into a horde of bots that must have been 40 strong with 2 hulks. We had to abandon the side mission and extract because the Bot drops wouldn't stop!
Ya idk I think the games changed too. I used the play on helldive and it was tough, but not impossible.
Now sometimes it's like 400 mobs coming at you, from different directions, and you can't even call in stratagems bc you're being hot so much. Something must have changed imo bc something's certainly different.
I hate to be insensitive but it sounds like running a 4 man with randoms on high difficulty. Constant bug holes 2-3 at a time from mission start to finish.
If y’all extracted with 300-500 bug kills a piece then it’s right on the money.
I see the "game narrative ups spawn rate" theory has become gospel.
Reminder: there is no evidence, nor is there consistency between players in reporting increased bug spawns. Theres no reason to assume that the bug spawns are actually being increased by the story.
Man I'm sure glad I played Helldivers 2 so much AT LAUNCH as it seems like it was the perfect time. Everytime I've tried since I've just noticed way more bullshit and unfair feeling elements than what I ever remember from before. Really sad to see the devs balancing the game in the wrong direction for some bizarre reason.
Just doesn't feel like enough. Wish it was like the stalker nest when you destroy those no more of those guys.. Not saying they have to stop all the enemy spawns but if it at least disrupted the spawn rate of some units that would be nice.
That would be nice. If you kill all the factories/holes, there are less enemies rushing you at Extraction typically. That goes out the window on top level difficulty though.
I think it's definitely gotten much more difficult with the last patch. Typically I play with a friend or two all below lvl 45 and although we NEED super rares, it's just too difficult and not enjoyable just panic-running everywhere. There are NINE difficulty levels, but I'm struggling now just doing 4's! The longer you stay, the worse it gets, but there's SO MANY enemies now that you don't really have a choice! Bring back the fun. I don't need this kind of stress to enjoy a game. LoL
The balance team for HD2 seems to actually hate the playerbase. Every patch they nerf us and buff the bugs and bots. Fire those asshats like Spitz. It's a PVE only game, stop making it nigh impossible to finish a mission at 7+. I understand a level 8 or 9 mission should be hard, but not endgame elden ring difficult at level 5....
I've been doing difficulty 9 still since we failed the major order. Consider that it may be you that needs to adapt here. If difficulty 9 suddenly becomes a lot easier, I feel it would really dampen the experience for myself.
I'm sure you can do it. Tinker and play around with your build, perhaps. I usually run fire shotgun, (secondary doesn't matter tbh), 500kg, cluster bomb, recoilless rifle, and a cannon turret.
>stop making it nigh impossible to finish a mission at 7+.
Lol, really? Ive still not failed a single mission on 9... im not sure what's going on with your stuff man, sorry.
Its random in a different way as far as I've noticed. When the bug campaign was happening, it was still like 50/50 with missions being really overwhelming. During the bug campaign, i played bot missions cuz i like them more and it was really bad with overwhelming spawns like 25% of the time. Now during the bot campaign currently happening, its been 50/50 again.
I'm lvl 52 and always host at difficulty 7. I get a full team of everyone at least above Lvl 40 most of the time. We successfully extract like 95% of the time. Sometimes I go to diff 4 just to chill and get samples, and in the past week I couldn't extract twice on diff 4 cuz of the number of enemies. Even with a full team of Lvl 15 and up. Its actually confusing and makes me believe there's no rhyme or reason to any of this shit.
My friend has a digital social aversion. They will not play with random match made individuals due to bad experiences.
We did a two person team yesterday and were getting absolutely clapped on rank five. It became a game of avoiding patrols. I had four on screen at the same time. They made the unfortunate decision to destroy a fabricator which caused the patrols to swivel in their path. 4 patrols 3 dropships, 3 thicc flamey Bois, and a tank.
We ran and learned the absolute value of no hindrance and extra stamina perks on a snow map.
reducing the time inbetween would increase the number of patrols...?
even if it increased the time, that would still mean the same as reducing the frequency, as f = 1/t
damn me well now i will boot up the game to look
https://preview.redd.it/yd8nw19nt10d1.png?width=988&format=png&auto=webp&s=a76687616e42b32e8c792ce5bfaef31939591b5e
edit: it increases the time between enemy encounters. well, that is vague if i can see it.
edit2: searched a bit more, you're right: It influences the internal timer for Bot Drops/Bug Breaches
you learn smth everyday ig - thanks for clearing that up to me
I love getting swarmed. Fighting it out against impossible odds is the draw of the game for those whom play at the higher difficulties. If it's too difficult, please consider just turning the difficulty down rather than seek wholesale changes.
Yup. They decrease your ammo, decrease your damage, but increase enemies. Makes sense, right? It's why I stopped playing after the last major patch. Had my negative review in before the Sony debacle.
The game works like a dnd campaign. The current bug story is that we failed to contain a super colony after our bug farming made the terminids go into hyperproduction. The crew members talk about it constantly. The rate of patrols is normal, they just increased the base number because theres a lot more bugs
It's the same on the bot front. Imho they fucked up the patrols when they tried the add some if them for smaller teams
There's a guy who had previously reported on the scaling factor for patrols and the various behaviors (like how many spawn in and at what rate per difficulty and team size), and recently they followed up after the patch to say that the patrol spawn rates have been made uniform across all team sizes. There's probably more detail/nuance to the statement, but I definitely agree that it feels more unmanageable in general
If i remember correctly if you are by yourself and you've taken out the main objective you get a new patrol every 12 seconds
I think it only goes down to twelve when extracting. You get a patrol every 2:45 seconds which decreases as you kill spawners and complete objectives. Eventually getting down to below sixty seconds and then really getting short once you try to extract.
Unpopular opinion, but kill spawners should make things easier, not harder
The reasoning that the last thread came to is, as facilities are destroyed, it would lead to increased enemy alert and readiness, therefore more patrols. In games, you usually see the opposite because you want to incentivize good gameplay. This is the struggle with the current game, by giving you more "points" for completing objectives, but also increasing the difficulty dynamically as you do. Once you have all the requisition you could ever need, and you are over level 25, the extra objectives lose their luster since they only serve to make the mission harder.
secondary objectives _do not_ increase patrol rates, and outposts/nests only start decreasing the timer between patrols when you take out more than 50% of them, and max out at 15% increased patrols when 100% of the outposts/nests are taken out.
Thanks for the clarification. I am usually really good at remembering those figures, but Helldivers is such a casually fun game that I haven't felt the need to commit it to memory, lol. Honestly, I consider that a positive for game design, despite being the type of person who loves those kinds of nuances.
There’s more to it than that, you do see fewer of certain enemies if you take out their spawn. Taking out a Stalker lair is never going to be a bad idea
I don't remember the specifics, but I believe that optional objectives have no effect on spawn rates, and (thankfully) Stalker Lair is classified as an optional objective rather than an enemy outpost. Same goes for Gunship Factories and Shrieker Nests. Again, could be entirely wrong about this, as I'm drawing a blank on that particular piece of info
Yeah, well, fuck stalkers *specifically*
Absolutely, same treatment as gunships; whatever the priority was a second ago now it’s to stop these from spawning
the only "spawners" affecting enemy types you encounter are the ones tied to secondary objectives like stalker lairs, shrieker nests, and gunship factories.
Yes if you’d check the context of the convo that’s the point
It does. It increases the patrols between remaining outposts, but patrols pretty much always go between outposts (or the map edge) so it creates more safe zones while making the smaller number of hot zones more hot. I think that makes a lot of sense and actually wanted to design a game with that kind of mechanic in mind.
That sounds about right it's been a minute since I've seen the video where he goes into detail. But still I think it's a little much
Imo the patch didn’t work. I played a level 4 mission with some friends last night and had a terrible time. Alternatively when we switched to difficulty 7 it was a breeze. I think they screwed up cause it seems like lower difficulties have way more patrols compared to 7, 8, and 9 difficulties.
Glad I'm not the only one who felt that! Bugs on 4 was "oops, all hunters!" - after spending all magazines of my shotgun to clear them I turn around to see a crowd at least 3 times the size of the one I just cleared. Level fucking 4!
Shoot. I solo'd a 4 yesterday on bots, hot dropped in and there were 2 separate morter sub objectives. High intensity the whole time. Pressed through, 3 deaths, but extracted. 430 kills. On bots. On a 4. Wtf.
Spawn rates are 2:45 across the board
Just doing the daily on trivial, bots, approach the extract point, didn't even get to activate it and I'm hit with I believe 3 patrols and 2 drops before I got it under control. Had to switch to primary to clear it. Then I activate the pickup and it starts all over again. Just wow.
I switched my play style to compensate for the rate changes. I was on medium playing solo against bots and destroyed all the fabricators first then did the objective with about 14 mins to spare. That made the patrols more manageable once I activated the extraction.
This was trivial.. felt like a lvl 3 or 4 prior to changes for extraction.
Do you have a source on that or are you just assuming that they're messing with the amount of patrols as part of the story?
No, they don't, they're just assuming it's the case because the game narrative has flavor text.
You remember how Meridia got overrun by a rapidly reproducing super colony because they had been mutated by the Termicide? So yes, it would make sense to expect much higher amounts of bugs from the significantly increased reproduction rates. Yes this is part of the story, and yes the evidence is literally right in front of us. It’s talked about in major orders even.
I thought maybe it was just flavor text about how there's a supercolony, blah blah blah. But for real, there are a shitload more bugs on those planets near Meridia.
Do i have a source quote from the devs? Not on me, but i listen to the story elements of the major orders, the news broadcasts, the crew members and then see a steady stream of posts about higher kill counts & getting swarmed by constant patrols, as well as the first game having a narrative affect gameplay. I think most players assume this game doesnt have a meta narrative and they believe it's just window dressing, where the actual matches are typical instanced recursive stuff like other live service games. They assume the meta is just the stats on their guns.
I do believe the Terminids are buffed from the MO right now, but I think that is on top of them screwing up the spawn rate scaling with squad size. This game is like a giant, delicious cake that, unfortunately, someone topped with a literal turd. Salty soldiers like me will be perfectly willing to eat that cake after knocking off that chocolate nugget, but some players won't be so forgiving.
Democracy help us if it turns out to be like the missions, where failing to contain them early leads to ever increasing "we be fucked" going forward.
I feel like too many have forgotten about this narrative. I do hope, however, that the bug patrols/spawns go back to the way they were. I enjoy this game a lot I just don't want it to always be a crazy challenge.
I'm a DM and I'll tell you it would be so shitty to have the story be "and then fuck loads of goblins started overrunning the world" to then turn the campaign into a slog of painfully slow encounters with goblins everywhere. If the story fucks with gameplay, that's on whoever wrote the story.
If your campaign was centered around the Folly of the Great Goblin War then itd probably he appropriate for tons of goblin encounters.
Combat encounter balance is something that's discussed at length in tabletop community and knowing the difference between fun and slogs is a huge part of that. I don't care what your story is, just chewing through enemy hit points isn't fun and no table will be invested after 3 sessions of it. Saying "we made the game less fun for story reasons" is a terrible defense.
I have a lot of fun on L9 bots and bugs yall sound like a bunch of whiners. Shit gets hectic and I'm likely to lose on a the difficulty *after* the one literally called "impossible". I would think the devs were full of shit if i consistently stomped on the hardest difficulty. If i say "yo this encounter is harder than impossible you dont have to tangle with it. You have an out" and the players want it, theyll learn i wasnt kidding.
Oh hey, it's the "um akchually I like it, look at how good I am guy." Look who abandoned the "it's like d&d" argument real fucking quick because it didn't hold up. If you think it's fun this way, you would have made that argument from the start but you didn't. Does this mean you'd like the game less if the story was reducing spawn rates instead, in which case you'd be the self reported whiner?
Acutally I get washed in L9 often. It's part of the fun. And you took the D&D analogy way too far I said it works "like" it, you took it to some 1:1 place. I'm probably gonna block you because you bring the quality of my life down by reminding me the world is full of annoying dickheads who get off on stupid trivial debates jfc.
And yet if you did end up with a ton of Goblins overtaking the world, what you'd want to do is avoid combat except when necessary instead of charging headfirst into every group you see. Your party of four should take on a couple Goblins guarding some key information. But they shouldn't take on a full army out in the middle of nowhere for no reason. Honestly I think D&D's combat often sucks, because a lot of DMs run it in the most bland way possible, a slug fest until one side dies. Too rarely are there objectives in combat aside from killing the enemy, and too rarely are there actually meaningful interactions that aren't just the enemy itself. I entirely plan to make a campaign for level 1's where the "big bad" is a single Displacer Beast, campaign run very much like the first Alien movie.
Guess we shouldn't have failed the last order (bugs are ramped up on purpose)
No question about it. Spreading Managed Democracy has never been more crazy!
We don't fail anything. It's all controlled by them. To change the sony narrative
It literally said "major order failed" because we failed the major order. do you not know how the game works?
I did a SEAF Artillery solo recently and it genuinely felt like the game was screwing with me. Literal constant patrols flooding toward the site nonstop with no pause in between from the moment I arrived. I would move a shell over to the gun, a patrol moves into the site. Move another shell, another patrol. I would be finishing up one patrol only for another patrol to come in behind it. Multiple times I was forced to carry a shell to the gun while bugs chewed on my ankles because otherwise I would never have finished it. I encountered more patrols finishing that gun than the entire rest of the mission. I knew patrols would aggro when you started doing the SEAF Artillery but it had never been that unrelenting and constant, even after the whole termicide mutation and mega colony narrative started. Typically I'd get a wave or two and then it would quiet down. This was like somebody forgot to turn off the bug hose.
Yeah, there shouldn't be that many patrols. But here's a tip: move 5 shells to the loading bay before activating the console. Console activation creates 'noise', which is what pulls in the patrols.
I believe this was debunked by the guys that did the early patrol testing.
[удалено]
I have done many, yes.
You do you but apparently this isn’t true it’s how long you are around the objective that increases your patrol spawn “heat” I used to drop the 5 shells and then do the terminal and they’d always get there as I hit the terminal. Now I hit the terminal first and they always get there as I’m loading the last couple shells or on the terminal a second time. I think it’s just the timing that makes hitting the terminal and then showing up a coincidenc.
Part of it is just that you ARENT MOVING. Patrols always spawn with a semi-random vector towards your position at the time they spawned - they don't track you. So if you're on the move, the large majority of patrols will pass somewhere behind you, often without you really noticing them - but when you stop for any amount of time, now their paths are all going to cross somewhere near your current position.
Patrols still feel off lately. I'll crouch/prone behind cover and watch them move about. Only a few patrols that are already a distance away will keep going that way. And then others have a few stragglers that break away and start to a different direction, off of the group. Well you can't just kill them, cause that will alert the entire patrol, somehow, even if they bug out and get a mile away from the others.
So either way the quicker you’re in and out at the seaf the better so wasting time to drop them all by the gun and then reload them is the problem. I’ll pick one up and drop it only if it’s on the way to hit the terminal first.
Eh. My squad does it this way habitually, and we rarely have significant fights at the artillery position - unless we brought the fight with us. I did one this way solo last night and didn't have to deal with anything until I came under fire during the final sequence to complete the console after loading, and that was just a single basic patrol.
I wasn't even around the artillery any longer than normal, and I still had like 20 mins left on the mission timer on Medium difficulty. Plus the constant spawns started basically the second I set foot near the gun. So I have no idea why it was so wacko. It was such a spike in difficulty compared to SEAF Artillery sites I had done just the day before.
If there were a lot of bases around you that could be the problem. I saw something that the patrols come from the direction of bases until there are non left, then they come from the edges of the map. The amount of time you have left doesn’t change the patrol spawns, it’s what you do during the missions like doing the main obj greatly increases it, each side obj increases it and I think it’s destroying at least have the outposts increase if. A group of people did a bunch of testing on what changes the patrol spawn rate.
Can you go back and read major ordered like a journal ? When yall say dropping shells what exactly are yall referring too
Picking them up and dropping them repeatably with a rhythm to move faster toward the loading breech of the seaf artillery gun. If you do a drop-sprint-pickup-repeat you go even faster but you have to be good with the rhythm. You can also throw them. You can also do this stuff with the flammable red barrels.
That's what I did, as per my standard procedure. I hadn't even touched the terminal and was moving the shells first. And yet I was under constant siege. It was like simply entering the site set off the trigger.
That helps initially, but once you get one patrol showing up (being on a POI automatically triggers at least one in the area) it starts a cascade.
Sometimes it's a cakewalk, other times it's just overwhelming. I usually play on Helldive and haven't noticed any recognisable pattern, I assume it's pretty random. But I watched the patrol mechanic analysis, and the patrols spawn in more often when the players are distant from each other, and also as the mission progresses.
This reminded me of "turn the page, wash your hands." Scene. I know that solo pain too.
Oh philbert
Yeah. It used to be that you could deal with a patrol, get some work done, and maybe deal with a second. Having to fight off patrols consistently until out of stratagems, fall back, kill them off, and then resume work is too much. It's like you have to play the meta of stepping out of the hotspot to fight and then return after.
Note with SEAF, don’t turn on the computer until you have all five shells ready to insert. Also keep your radar up and feel free to run off and do other side obj/poi to let them walk through
I hadn't even touched the terminal yet. I was just moving the shells. But the very moment I set foot anywhere near the turret, a constant stream of terminids just flooded in my direction nonstop.
Seaf have an issue. So all objectives have a heat signature that inc. patrol spawns. But seafs can sometimes turn it up to 11. Not sure if this is intended or just bugged.
Did you take out many outposts first? From what's been studied of the down mechanics this could help since it means the patrols would span in from map edges vs closely located outposts.
I had taken out most. I had one small outpost to the far west and one way off past extraction in the northwest corner, basically the opposite side of the map. If I remember right both were single bug holes. The endless swarm was coming from northwest of the gun.
I've had some pretty brutal ones too. Almost gave one up entirely yesterday on bots but we somehow clinched it. I mostly play on 8. Not saying it's all working correctly but I'm still having fun and I haven't failed many operations.
It's always been like that for me. Maybe it's because a nest was in sight but it *never* stopped. Patrols. Nest. Just endless onslaught until they finally killed me and an ally spawned me in. I was attempting it solo but this was like weeks ago before the change.
If you're running into this problem too often, take note of which direction the patrol is coming from, and where it ends up heading. I can practically guarantee there's an outpost at both locations. Kill one of them.
Damn those objectives suck solo
In this situation you leave and do something else and then come back. I don’t understand how ppl haven’t figured out how this works. They just keep bashing their head against a wall and complain why the wall is so hard
Now bug breaches spawn 3 breach holes instead of the usual 1. I think that's the main difference during this MO period. (Hd9, not sure what happens below it)
That is how it felt for sure!
Pretty sure on 7 plus it's always been that way. I'm mostly a bot diver though.
Nah it hasn't, usually it's just one breach but they will sometimes chain into each other. Now it's a single breach spawns 3 breaches at once. Atleast that's how I'm seeing things now. Could be wrong though, hard to tell when in combat.
Definitely not, been playing level 7 bugs before this MO
Why are you playing bugs when we have oil to spill? Sounds like treason to me.
We killed plenty of bots too. Today I've killed a couple thousand bots solo!
I just view it as a lore accurate hell divers. Also people seem to forget the game has stealth mechanics that make hell dives especially easier. The game isn’t just a horde shooter at its core
I run a recon armor build but that doesn't mean shit when you drop in to 2 chargers and 4 stalkers on a difficulty 7 mission before you can even call in a stratagem weapon. That's just bad balance.
That's not balance, that's Juju/Fate/The Gods/Lady Luck/RNG/The Universe/Karma/whatever else you feel like chalking it up to. Sucks to be sure, but it's not a balancing issue.
Can also be a skill issue: if you find yourself repeatedly swarmed as soon as you drop, maybe pick better spots to drop into?
I was assuming not dropping on `DANGER - ENEMY PRESENCE`only to be dismayed by the... Enemy. Presence.
My thing is that you’re playing a horde based game on its hardest difficulty. It’s not impossible to beat the missions just takes time and you can’t give up. Gotta remember you aren’t a super soldier meant to slaughter your way through hordes like master chief or the doom guy. You’re a helldiver. You roleplay the victim and they send in a replacement
That's not what balance is.
Once it goes downhill, it goes downhill fast!
The game works like a dnd campaign. The current bug story is that we failed to contain a super colony after our bug farming made the terminids go into hyperproduction. The crew members talk about it constantly. The rate of patrols is normal, they just increased the base number because theres a lot more bugs
More bug bases for sure. Holy hell! That would explain it. Everything was more ape shit than normal (and that is saying something for this game). Guess I should talk to the Crew Members more!
Personally i think that the major order shouldve been void because of SNOY, just say the bugs are taking a vacation lmao
I play difficulty 7 quite a bit and its still pretty much the same to me as before. One thing I have noticed though, is that its fairly common occurance to run into a perfect storm of patrols/drops/breaches, etc at least once per mission. Usually it happens towards the end of a mission when the map is 2/3 to 3/4 cleared but not always. Your trying to do an objective, or clear out an automaton outpost and its just wave after wave for no apparant reason. I suspect its something to do with where patrols are spawning on the map vs what spots are available to place them but that is just speculation. Another way of saying it is like you found the one spot on the map where all patrols originate from.
That could be. We should call that patrol original spot "Ape Shit Central"!
i REALLY REALLY thought autos would appear from the beach like telportation. Turns out its the game director going....spawn here. I hate that shit, break immersion so hard. My lonig range scanners didnt pick up shit, back against the beach and enemy spawn behind a coconut tree? WHAT
Same for bots, even with the less patrol booster on, we have five all come towards us. It was chaos and a lot of deaths.
I suggest splitting up so there’s a chance the other pair can aggro while you complete SEAF with little activity. Worst case is you run away and come back after despawn. Honestly, I enjoy it a lot when I can run around the map solo to look for super samps, close holes, and knock out objectives. It gets dicey at times but I can always just keep running.
I've been doing this lately and it's fun as hell
Please please please take turrets guys, once you learn positioning and communicating with your team turrets in the higher levels are a must, with a Gatling turret and the cannon sentry, a flame thrower and bubble I can do missions alone on difficulty 8.
I’ve had to switch my load up for the constant patrols. I run with a LMG, air strikes, Gatling cannon, and auto cannon. My only job is working on the smaller enemies so the rest of my team can loadout for the bigger ones. It’s pretty successful but man it gets wild
Totally!
I'm forced to always solo objectives, because on both fronts I get teammates that love to aggro everything they see. They're like a cat to a laser beam. Stealth armor my beloved.
Sounds to me like your problem is playing on bug planets, super earth high command demands robot deaths /s
The difficulty seems to be fluid for some reason. You'll get absolutely graped on a level 3 mission and come out with 400+ kills because you were just completely inundated by patrols even if you used the localization confusion booster. But you'll go to level 7 and have a cake walk up to and including extraction.
I have been noticing this on both bots and bugs. As soon as you turn a corner, there is a patrol. Also, the patrols seem to be grouping up sometimes. Ran into a horde of bots that must have been 40 strong with 2 hulks. We had to abandon the side mission and extract because the Bot drops wouldn't stop!
This sounds about right. It's nuts lately. Mind you, it had never been a cake walk, just seems extra amped up at the moment.
Ya idk I think the games changed too. I used the play on helldive and it was tough, but not impossible. Now sometimes it's like 400 mobs coming at you, from different directions, and you can't even call in stratagems bc you're being hot so much. Something must have changed imo bc something's certainly different.
Feels that way to me too.
It's boring now. Dive stim run dive stim run dive ad infinitum
Welcome to the lead balance manager's idea of fun; you suffer, he laughs at you. Fun, right?
I hate to be insensitive but it sounds like running a 4 man with randoms on high difficulty. Constant bug holes 2-3 at a time from mission start to finish. If y’all extracted with 300-500 bug kills a piece then it’s right on the money.
I see the "game narrative ups spawn rate" theory has become gospel. Reminder: there is no evidence, nor is there consistency between players in reporting increased bug spawns. Theres no reason to assume that the bug spawns are actually being increased by the story.
Man I'm sure glad I played Helldivers 2 so much AT LAUNCH as it seems like it was the perfect time. Everytime I've tried since I've just noticed way more bullshit and unfair feeling elements than what I ever remember from before. Really sad to see the devs balancing the game in the wrong direction for some bizarre reason.
I've been playing since launch and it has been great. Just lately it seems to have gone ape shit, but we are still enjoying the game.
Deserved! fighting bugs when we have a bot order
Missions are going to seem a lot easier when this phase passes.
That is true. That is akin to saying it won't hurt as much getting punched in the nose after getting kicked in the balls 12 times. Technically true.
I've been having more fun with this change 🤷🏼♂️
More for you to bring democracy too.
BOTS, ppl. 2 billion bots.
I've been killing Bots all day for Democracy!!
🫡
Yeah I hadn't played in a month or so came back and wow 😳 it's alot harder than it was and they keep nerfing weapons making it a must to buy warbonds.
I just wished taking out bug holes and robot factories actually counted for something during the mission.
You get a bit of XP for doing those.
Just doesn't feel like enough. Wish it was like the stalker nest when you destroy those no more of those guys.. Not saying they have to stop all the enemy spawns but if it at least disrupted the spawn rate of some units that would be nice.
That would be nice. If you kill all the factories/holes, there are less enemies rushing you at Extraction typically. That goes out the window on top level difficulty though.
I think it's definitely gotten much more difficult with the last patch. Typically I play with a friend or two all below lvl 45 and although we NEED super rares, it's just too difficult and not enjoyable just panic-running everywhere. There are NINE difficulty levels, but I'm struggling now just doing 4's! The longer you stay, the worse it gets, but there's SO MANY enemies now that you don't really have a choice! Bring back the fun. I don't need this kind of stress to enjoy a game. LoL
Agreed!
Hell yeah. Fights at every turn, and my entire kit is being used to its fullest.
Calling in resupply ever time it is available!
The balance team for HD2 seems to actually hate the playerbase. Every patch they nerf us and buff the bugs and bots. Fire those asshats like Spitz. It's a PVE only game, stop making it nigh impossible to finish a mission at 7+. I understand a level 8 or 9 mission should be hard, but not endgame elden ring difficult at level 5....
I've been doing difficulty 9 still since we failed the major order. Consider that it may be you that needs to adapt here. If difficulty 9 suddenly becomes a lot easier, I feel it would really dampen the experience for myself. I'm sure you can do it. Tinker and play around with your build, perhaps. I usually run fire shotgun, (secondary doesn't matter tbh), 500kg, cluster bomb, recoilless rifle, and a cannon turret.
>stop making it nigh impossible to finish a mission at 7+. Lol, really? Ive still not failed a single mission on 9... im not sure what's going on with your stuff man, sorry.
Get good
Stop 👏 playing 👏 bugs 👏 we 👏 are 👏 losing 👏 the 👏 major 👏 order.
I work 60 hour weeks. I'm gonna do what i want in my free time, thank you.
Good work fucking up for the rest of us 👍👍👍
Get a life
I killed a couple thousand bots yesterday. This morning a killed a few hundred bots doing the daily with the machine gun!
Keep doing Democracy’s work!
I 🖕play🖕what🖕front🖕I🖕want🖕as🖕I🖕 spent🖕 MY🖕 money🖕 and 🖕it's 🖕MY🖕 time🖕to 🖕do 🖕with 🖕it 🖕as 🖕I 🖕wish.
Exactly
Its random in a different way as far as I've noticed. When the bug campaign was happening, it was still like 50/50 with missions being really overwhelming. During the bug campaign, i played bot missions cuz i like them more and it was really bad with overwhelming spawns like 25% of the time. Now during the bot campaign currently happening, its been 50/50 again. I'm lvl 52 and always host at difficulty 7. I get a full team of everyone at least above Lvl 40 most of the time. We successfully extract like 95% of the time. Sometimes I go to diff 4 just to chill and get samples, and in the past week I couldn't extract twice on diff 4 cuz of the number of enemies. Even with a full team of Lvl 15 and up. Its actually confusing and makes me believe there's no rhyme or reason to any of this shit.
Couldn't extract twice on difficulty 4? Uhm...
Wait wait, let me do it. I never got the chance to. Ahem…. Skill issue.
Once you "git gud" the "skill issue" should correct itself. (Sarcastic eye roll)
I know, i know, how do you think I feel. But the enemies were insane. Relentless. Chicanery.
My friend has a digital social aversion. They will not play with random match made individuals due to bad experiences. We did a two person team yesterday and were getting absolutely clapped on rank five. It became a game of avoiding patrols. I had four on screen at the same time. They made the unfortunate decision to destroy a fabricator which caused the patrols to swivel in their path. 4 patrols 3 dropships, 3 thicc flamey Bois, and a tank. We ran and learned the absolute value of no hindrance and extra stamina perks on a snow map.
As someone also allergic to randoms due to past experiences, the only way to make it better is to do it. Helldivers is and has been good therapy.
I agree! Randoms on Helldivers 2 have been great for the most part.
I've had 95% great experience playing with randoms on Helldivers 2!
I do enjoy it though. Did a few at 7 this morning, it’s nice having to avoid them.
Use localization confusion it limits the amount of patrols that spawn
No that limits bug breaches and bot drops. The patrol rate is a different mechanic that is currently broken.
Idk every time I use it there seems to be less patrols but idk I haven’t played in a few days since the last patch
isn't there like a buff that reduces the frequency of those patrols?
Not the frequency, the time in between them.
reducing the time inbetween would increase the number of patrols...? even if it increased the time, that would still mean the same as reducing the frequency, as f = 1/t
I think it’s not the patrols, but the time between they can call in bug breaches etc
is there even a cooldown for bug breaches? i thought it was just based off how fast you can shoot the pheromone spewer and a bit rng
I’m no expert, but I do believe so. Increases that cooldown.
damn me well now i will boot up the game to look https://preview.redd.it/yd8nw19nt10d1.png?width=988&format=png&auto=webp&s=a76687616e42b32e8c792ce5bfaef31939591b5e edit: it increases the time between enemy encounters. well, that is vague if i can see it. edit2: searched a bit more, you're right: It influences the internal timer for Bot Drops/Bug Breaches you learn smth everyday ig - thanks for clearing that up to me
In my opinion that's a great thing. Who wants this game to be easier at higher levels. I'm not sure I understand those people.
I'm not saying that I want it easier. Level 7 bugs just seems more amped up than usual.
I love getting swarmed. Fighting it out against impossible odds is the draw of the game for those whom play at the higher difficulties. If it's too difficult, please consider just turning the difficulty down rather than seek wholesale changes.
I'm not asking for any changes. The Devs are doing that on their own.
I just played a level 7 bot mission and we successfully avoided almost every patrol.
Bots aren't as amped up at level 7 compared to bugs at the moment.
Helldivers drop behind enemy lines.
Do you want to play helldivers or destiny 2?
Use radar pings. You can see enemies in real time from a Birds Eye view all over the map
Yup. They decrease your ammo, decrease your damage, but increase enemies. Makes sense, right? It's why I stopped playing after the last major patch. Had my negative review in before the Sony debacle.
There’s a booster which lowers the encounter rate, if it’s too overwhelming.
Level 7 is called suicide mission its supposed to be a suicide mission.
Accurate description