We agree that our tutorial, new user experience, and leveling rewards aren’t the best they can be at the moment. We are looking into an improved tutorial and better user onboarding in general. We are also looking at various leveling rewards as well, but I don’t have any details to give out regarding these subjects yet.
Testimony from a lvl 12 player playing frequently with low levels.
Randomdeath
(Randomdeath)
#22
Seriously this game is SUPPOSED to be tough and grindy. Thats how it is (or was) advertised. Hard to pick up, impossible to master. Implying no skill ceiling! Then they nerf everything because new players are like “woo free game” then they complain about it being too hard and “omg this one merc killed me like 3 t imes in a row nerf nerf nerfffff” and that pisses me off. I can admit my first 20 hours in the game i was like that, now im not (with 450+)
bontsa
(bontsa)
#23
Which is exactly why proper tutorial is needed (and maybe put mandatory even, at the VERY least give an actual reward for playing through it) to explain certain stuff that is not very obvious for your average codder.
How else is this game going to grab interest of any other players than old ET vets if it smacks every newbie in the face with a morning star, accompanied with frustrated teammates who regress into toxicity instead of helping when enough of these clueless people they face.
Being tough and being unfair are completely different things. I agree that developers have made idiotic decisions in terms of lowering skill ceiling for the past few months, but that is indeed due to majority of more casual- oriented playerbase whining about stuff (look at Dome long-jump spot removals for example). Giving them chance to actually grasp basic mechanics of the game before hoppin’ into deep end will lower this outcry, resulting in that devs can actually keep more advanced stuff in the game, justifying it by “well, you have these and these tools to use in order to deal with it, you did the tutorial so you should know about it right?”.
doxjq
(doxjq)
#25
I think I only bought 2 mercs with real money, which was Fragger and Aimee. The rest I paid for with in game credits. I think it only took about 150 hours in game for me to have all the mercs and an abundance of loadout cards for each. I was only level 23 at the time from memory. It isn’t too slow at all. Do you daily gametypes and complete your missions as soon as you can. It isn’t hard to do 3 some times even 4 sets of missions in a day. It’s relatively easy to get credits in Dirty Bomb.
The biggest problem is new players want everything and take gambles. God kows how many friends of mine when they are new waste their credits on cases and multiple loadout cards and then complain they don’t have credits to buy mercs.
Cuck
(Cuck)
#26
[quote=“Rexitech;28211”][center]/!\Wall of text with maths and rants,TL:DR at the end. /![/center]
I hesitated to create this post because i know pepole will disagree with me, but whatever.
I installed the game in June, because one of my friends played it, back in September-October, i stopped playing it, because i had a lot of work to do.
I came back because my friends installed the game ,i taught them how to long jump,how to be careful when they see proxys running around in the map,how to move properly when using shotguns and ARs. etc…
But after a couple matches,until they got lvl 6-7,they realized the same thing as i did back in time.
The game is insanely unrewarding and imbalanced,and for my part,deep inside,i like challenges,hence why i keep on playing this game,but the thing is,most of my friends aren’t like me,that’s why they pointed out that:
1:The game is awfully grindy and unrewarding.
As i said before, the game ,albeit being extremely fun and enjoyable, feels slow and unessecarily painful in terms of gathering money, exp and loadout cards.Now, i know that stopwatch matches can give up to 400-600 credits alone i’f you top score on the winning team. Now, do the math i’f you want to get any merc worth 50k credits.
400 x 125=50000. 500 x 100=50000. 600 x 85=51000.
100 games of playing like a total war machine in general.now,that would be a bit unfair considering i didn’t counted missions in this situation.But i’m taking the fact that you’d still want to save money to trade up one card for your new merc,which means it’s credits won from missions that will be spent on it.
Knowing that stopwatches are objectives games but multiplied by 2,this gets even worse i’f you’re unaware of it.I’f you top score on the winning team in objectives,knowing that you get around 150-300 credits depending on how well you made,here’s the results:
150 x 335=50250. 200 x 250=50000. 300 x 167=50100.
Now for the exp part, on Stopwatches, top scorers get on average 15k. On Objectives, they get around 8k, now , you judge i’f it’s enough for pepole past lvl 10.
I know SD has to make a living off of this game,but they shouldn’t push their players to pay real money for expensive mercs,both with credits and real life money. They should let players be paid at least 500 credits on objectives and at least 1000 credits on stopwatches (top score).
By the way,see the loot you get every level? This leads to
2:Unessecary leveling and RNG.
As you might have judged from the question i asked you earlier about leveling being terribly slow very early in the game on a game that gets players to go up to level 100 (i think), you also see that you win stuff up to level 21.
And one thing i found kind of lazy and useless is that,after lvl 8,you only get equipement cases,the thing you drop 40% of the time in matches is worth weeks of grinding?
Pepole don’t need these,they need something that can motivate them to keep on continuing the hard and frustrating grinding the game encourages them to do. Instead of hearing them say:“yey i leveled up oh great a new lead card i’m never gonna use oh f*ck i don’t even have the merc for it”,i mean,give them elite cases,or another type of cases,since more than a hundred matches is worth 10 Euros in your eyes,that’s a win-win.
About those equipement cases, i tried to search any other word than “joke” to stay neutral and not to sound too bitter about it.
Just look at those ridiculious stats.
I like the card loadout idea, it’s fresh and original,but to make these cases worth the 1k they need, make it so you win 3 cards instead of 1.
3:Starter mercs vs. the world.
Now,don’t get me wrong,i main Aura in defense,i sometimes use Skyhammer because he’s the most deadly against EVs,but that’s all they got for themselves.
I mean,why even bother using Aura in attack when her station is only useful on choke points in the map on some special occasions when you get Sawbonez that can do the job better and more effectively, both on defense (Aura still does the job better in this regard in many cases) and in attack or use Skyhammer when you got Arty that has multiple airstrikes in addition to ammo packs and burst riffles/semi autos. Not that Arty is better,but it is way more flexible than Skyhammer, and in this game,this counts a lot.
Starter mercs are good,but they feel stiff and very situational. (Sky’s airstrike,Aura’s Healing station)
Again,pepole feel pushed to pay real money for those mercs that are much more flexible,despite being a bit less better suited on some special occasions.Rotations don’t really help the situation either in some degree. I remember waiting impatiently for Kira and Sawbonez to be in free rotation.2-3 weeks later,they finally went on rotation. But i already bought them with real cash.
Also,im my opinion,to show to pepole how engineers work in this game,they should create (or give) one as a starter merc with Sky and Aura.
Before you go and say that i’m needlessly hating the game,first, i love this game, and second let me say that these observations were from the persective of fresh players who clocked around 50 hours on the game and not hardened vets with 200+ hours.
This game has an amazing potential for a free 2 play, it can even equal or surpass Team Fortress 2 in this regard and gain a bigger population with what i said. SD is doing it wrong with this sneaky freemium model.
In my personal opinion,they should also add:-The ability to make private matches with a minimum of 2 players.
-Pepole that are below lvl 5 should be forced into max lvl 5 games,unless they want to join their steam friends. (i’f it wasn’t already done by the time i was gone)
TL:DR:Reduce RNG,make the game a bit more rewarding,and quit the freemium bs.[/quote]
pushed to pay money?
i only used money for event cases.
its entirely optional.
and for “better merc” for 50k
i did better with 30k sawbonez than 50k sparks.
especially after sparks nerf.
to get all the merc its what motivate most people to keep playing.
Pumpkiller
(Pumpkiller)
#27
[left]Where did i said that 50k mercs are better than the 30k ones?
My calculations about 50k characters were all about proving one point:that they’re pointlessly expensive. (even though i did exagerrated a bit the situation)
I even went as far as to call Sawbonez better than Aura in many situations.
About your “goal” argument,well,it’s entirely irrelevant to newbs (60-70% of the community),because it’s not gonna be their first goal,since most of them expect Dirty Bomb to be a FPS game and not a free Pokemon game for grownups,in addition that most of the time,they might have spent all of their money on one merc or on equipement cases. And they will feel like it takes forever to get to 30-50k of credits to get another merc.
Basically,most pepole just buy the merc they want or need,not all of them. Just because you enjoy collecting stuff doesn’t mean everyone does.
As said before,in terms of collecting loadout cards,this games does a sh*t job at this,because it’s an entirely luck-based system that backs it up.
[spoiler][quote=“Randomdeath;170554”]Seriously this game is SUPPOSED to be tough and grindy. Thats how it is (or was) advertised. Hard to pick up, impossible to master. Implying no skill ceiling! Then they nerf everything because new players are like “woo free game” then they complain about it being too hard and “omg this one merc killed me like 3 t imes in a row nerf nerf nerfffff” and that pisses me off. I can admit my first 20 hours in the game i was like that, now im not (with 450+) [/quote][/spoiler]
To “Hardcore vets” in general that say that the game should be “borderline unfair and grindy” (not the pepole who tried to analyze and correct me about credits and levels because i was wrong):
Consider this as a fair critique of your mindset and your personality and not a personal attack:
You’re a terrible person for being that self centered.
Sure,the game must be hard in order to make it fun and addictive,hence why i still play it. But my suggestions just involve making it a bit more fair in general,especially when it comes down to RNG stuff and progression. (remember that you can go up to lvl 100.)
New players aren’t MLG $w4gl0rdz.And i’f you do remember where you came from,you should know that.
A game can be hard while being fair as much as Olympic games are hard and fair.
You went as far as to not read what i said just to say that the game should be unfair.
Sorry i’f this looks like a necro,but i had to put my 2 cents here.[/left]
Amerika
(Amerika)
#28
@Rexitech There is no account level cap. There are quite a few people above level 100. Also, Randomdeath was talking about the gameplay and not the loadout system. The gameplay is meant to be a bit tougher than your typical “I saw you first so I win” modern military arcade shooter game. I agree that loadouts could be monetized in a manner that is a bit more fair when it comes to cosmetics. However, it’s extremely easy to get any loadout you want. You just won’t get the skin you want without doing the heavy RNG thing. There is no “progression” as there is no level cap, levels mean nothing and once you obtain the bronze card or three you want per merc you’re done. In some cases the Iron cards are perfectly fine as the 3rd augment isn’t worth it on some of the loadouts.
Pumpkiller
(Pumpkiller)
#29
I see,thanks for clearing that up to me.
I’m not really talking about the skins though,but the loadouts itself,for someone as unlucky as me gets to try to trade up one card,i never get the one i wanted unless i try again 5 times later.
litterally happened to me lately.
Amerika
(Amerika)
#30
[quote=“Rexitech;170900”]I see,thanks for clearing that up to me.
I’m not really talking about the skins though,but the loadouts itself,for someone as unlucky as me gets to try to trade up one card,i never get the one i wanted unless i try again 5 times later.
litterally happened to me lately.[/quote]
Each merc has 9 cards that are available in the shop for a couple of dollars or 17.5k credits. No RNG or trade-ups involved.