Just a heads up, to add to the confusion regarding EXP gain, the last patch introduced a UI-only bug that doesn’t show the correct amount of XP earned at the of the mission. It looks like you only receive a tiny amount of XP. You actually get the full/correct amount, but the display is bugged right now. Don’t be alarmed if you run a tough mission and it looks like you got 1,200 XP.
Great post up-thread Kevin.
This thing right now is an absolute mess of systems trying to be a game.
Yeah, the game could use a real streamlining pass. The devs could use a Xanax or two when it comes to balancing as well.
I love the core gameplay, though. Compare this to the bevy of early access games (especially of the survival variety) and the gameplay, gunplay, etc is top notch. I really do have a blast running through missions and actually playing the game. They just need to stop getting in the way of that and embrace what they have!
It would be nice if they had a list of the next set of big changes in the works. It would be nice to know that they know X is a problem and will be fixed in the next big patch however many weeks / months away that is.
The really do need to fix the lower level zone xp thing too OR give some kind of other reward when you outlevel a zone by a certain amount. For example, I have a daily quest to win 3 stonewood missions. All of them are grey to me. Also, grouping with a friend OR helping out on a storm shield defense, etc…
I just want them to decide either/or, not both. Either cap my effectiveness in low level areas and still give me XP, or let me go God-mode running around Stonewood, blowing apart husks and stacking up stone and metal like crazy. It’s a PVE game, who cares if I’m overpowered for an area?! It is completely at odds with the feeling of progression that is important in RPG systems. My guns are actually weaker in Stonewood right now than when I was still in Stonewood! :)
They did a little dev update livestream thing last Friday, where they announced the next update is scheduled for late August/early Sept. I got the impression that more details on that will be coming soon. I totally agree with you that they could really use putting out a “State of the Game” type manifesto where they detail what their responses to the feedback are going to be. I don’t need dates or deadlines, but just a general direction of where they’re going.
That is a good point. If you are level capped in a certain area, then yes, full XP does make sense. If you are not, then lower XP does make sense. They could make is really granular, rather than level capping Stonewood to say, level 18 or whatever, if you are in a level 5 zone, then your cap is level 5. Your only advantage would be that you are at the maximum power level for a level 5 person.
I am not sure which way I would go. Id rather be more powerful in a lower level zone, but then there has to be some reasonable reward for players going to lower level zones if they are very strong, but not getting any xp, other than getting raw materials easier.
I think something like where you could pick a few resources to get rewarded with. Maybe a bunch of a somewhat common type, and a lesser amount of a more rare type. Currently, I am loving my rocket launcher for crowd control, but I am burning through my coal pretty fast. I started with like 110 coal, and now I am down to 66. Now if I could do a low level mission and pick like 20 coal per mission as a reward, it might be worth doing more of them.
Plankerton basically ruined the game for me. It is at this point where the devs reveal their grand plan, “Fuck you single players!”
It isn’t even about difficulty. It just is not reasonably workable for a single player to do these missions. To even be able to do them at all, you need to spend a lot more time gathering resources to get tier 3 walls and you need to defend in every direction because enemies attack from every direction.
Then they add in defending two points at once, which makes things even worse.
Just poor design.
The grind is pretty bad. I am mostly playing because there isn’t much else out now that interests me. I am just hoping the next big patch will change things a lot. The really do need to address the grind.
However, on spending resources building a well defended home base…
I spent a lot of time doing this, and even on SSD 10 in stonewood, with a team of 4, monsters almost even got to my maze of traps, let alone through them. It seemed that players are really good at killing them quickly, even when the game is throwing huge waves at you.
Then I helped some people on plankerkton SSD 3 and 4. They had the most basic setups. A pyramid of wood on one, and a few basic steel walls on another. It was more than enough. It makes me wonder, why even bother with some kind of super fortress base? Why bother with traps? Sure they may handle the few guys that momentarily make it by you, but that is about it. They are not stopping waves of enemies.
One thing that would really help is if you could see the creep paths when you build. It really sucks to spend a huge amount of resources building defenses in one area, then the waves start and the monsters just never even go there, taking some other route.
This game really has some great ideas at its core, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. I can only hope that KevinC is right about the developers being responsive. Fortnite can be great, but its going to need to re-design some of its major systems.
I don’t think this will work with how much variation there is in map generation, base design, and just what the players are doing. You can’t really do a path unless you went with more static maps, because the AI doesn’t trundle down a scripted path like it would in a TD game.
I’m not very good at this myself, but the trick is that husks are drawn like catnip to the easiest path to the objective, in terms of building HP. Just last night I watched a really cool double walled setup. There were the walls right around the objective, mostly metal, and then some low walls around them. At one tile on each side, the builder left a gap in the low walls that led straight to the objective’s surrounding wall. I believe the material used there was stone instead of metal, so it had a little less HP.
Watching that setup, the husks pretty much ignored everything in order to funnel to those two spots, which were heavily trapped. It worked really, really, well. I’m going to have to try that, my bases are usually just boxes sounded by traps, haha.
Anyway, regarding Plankerton 3 or 4 vs Stonewood 10 base setups, those earlier Plankerton missions are supposed to be much more manageable than Stonewood 10 is.
The spawn points are know, so the game can just simulate a few walkers moving quickly to the destination and then just draw some kind of purple line vector. It could do this once a second and then if you place a wall or whatever, then see what the new path will be.
I am not just talking about if they beat down a wall vs walking around it, but if they will even engage an area. For example in this one map there was an obvious spawn area up a hill. Right next to the hill was a down ramp which led to our base area. So a large array of traps and tubes were made. However when the match started, the husks ignored the ramp walking several tiles past it and then just jumped down the cliff.
Even if the maps are random, they can easily show us the path the creeps will take. Just run a ‘fake’ version of the invasion and draw some vectors of where they chose to go.
Yeah this would be tremendously helpful. I’ve built things so many times that were nowhere near where the husks ended up going. Very frustrating.
After levelling all 4 classes to 20, I have kind of run out of things to do that aren’t more of the same. I appreciated the new mission types that got doled out later in the progression (build the shelter, build the bomb, protect the shelter) but at this point I feel like I’ve seen everything the game has to offer outside of super mega rare legendary hero and weapon drops.
That said, the procedural levels are still absolutely fucking amazing, the best I have ever seen in any game, and the art style and overall look of the game is masterful. In many aspects this could be a Blizzard game, it’s that well done. The core fighting husks gameplay is pretty solid as well but needs a whole lot more stuff to do in it.
The husk seems to follow a simple A* pathfinding that take into account the hit points of the structures that have to destroy has “cost”. The map is based on “cells” and the more HP hitpoints you can stack in that cell, the more undesirable you can make it for husk to use. A |\ shape is generally enough, and can be stack with |\|\|\ made of wood. A palisade like that is cheap and fast to build.
The husk are not omniscient, people on the internet says that they only consider routes 3 tiles away. So you can’t cover your entire base with iron level 3 except from a hole and expect the husk to use that hole. On the contrary. Put the dead tunnels in the straigh forward routes the husk will want to use anyway, and block secondary routes so you only have to defend the tunnel.
For the reasons above, If the husk are going to attack from the south and the north, you need 2 death tunnels. If you have a defense and the place is really bad, with the mobs being able to attack from every direction, good palisades can reduce that to 4 directions, and sometimes to 3 death tunnels.
Edit: the |\ shape can be made stronger with a floor that include mid wall, but that takes more time to build and I think is unnecessary.
Screenshot in case my ascii art is too obscure:
nice!! great info!
This was detailed in a traps video someone else posted up thread. The problem is, 3 walls = 3x the resources. If resources were not such a horrible grind, it would not be such a problem. For example, placing fully upgraded walls around an atlas for a mission the other day, requires 12 walls. 999 resources only gives you 16 level 3 walls. Nevermind the roof or anything else. Wood is almost worthless except for utility for stairs and stuff, so your limited to brick and metal. Good luck with metal on a forest map.
It shouldn’t be just one person building and upgrading all those walls, though. Most maps there’s usually at least 2 contributing in some manner, whether it’s placing or upgrading.
Not that I would complain if they made harvesting base materials much faster or anything. I think it would be a good change.
or… simply allow a larger stack to be carried.
1 million players!
Anyone know a work around for the ‘Testing empty servers…’ when trying to go to your own stormshield?
Regular/random maps load fine but if I try to go to my personal base (stonewood or plank) it just spins. Happened sporadically a week or two ago, last couple days haven’t been able to get to it at all.
Edit: on PC.
Epic buying more servers? I don’t have that problem. In the PS4 that message usually last a few seconds.