Lets talk about KF2's monthly player base.
- Thread starter OohItzMArio
- Start date
Not everyones idea of fun is the same as yours. Once youve beaten the same map over and over it gets a little boring. I like the tactical challenge of overcoming the odds. To beat a map when the team is almost down, is short on cash or has "the wrong" group of perks.
Abundance of money makes the game "easier" which is fun for a while but not so fun if repeated ad infinitum. May as well just give you an open trader and let you pick the weapons you want from wave 2. Still I know thats what some ppl want.
Balancing is not just about the dosh economy.... but if we are talking about that... you adapt and overcome to the situation (one which will no doubt change along the line) - go fb or zerk first. You can get enough cash easy for wave 4/5 no need to beg. Or play with what you have until wave 6 when you should be able to afford the aa12 . At least on Sui or below.
Maybe Im wrong in the following assumption but Ive always thought the game is balanced towards what HoE requires (to make it difficult) and the other levels are just extrapolated. Here you DO need co-op between players and that means sharing money. Cash for the medic first to get the mAR. Next the zerk who needs a zwei and then MWG for fb, AA12s for supp or RPG for the demo. Everyone else can make do until there *is* an abundance of spare cash.
Sounds like youre not after balance... more likely a quick fix for getting all the cash you need for the tier 4 weapon. Either that or your playing lazily with your perks and should be switching perks mid to your preferred one or dont have friends to help you with cash.
Ive been playing supp for the majority of game this last week. I usually start as a firebug or gs depending on the map and will have enough money to kit myself out by wave 6 or 7. When I do I switch to support. It really isnt rocket science.
Sometimes I dont even get the aa12. I make do with "lesser weapons" which seem to do as good a job: m4 or the dbs + c4 and nades for the fps. And use a deagle or .50cal cannon which is cheaper and do decent damage. Or I make do with just the aa12 and 9mm for a few rnds.
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I stopped playing for awhile now. I maxed all my perks. Played every map (excluding custom maps). The game after awhile felt monotonous where it was for the most part doing the same job (point and shoot. Yes the same first was the same but there was defined roles). Also any time I played I either have to pick either a Berserker or medic just to get past the Flesh Pounds. I enjoy tanking but being forced to play a role each time when there isn't anyone else to do it is rather frustrating.
I would play Demo but its lacking a lot of stuff. My favorite perk is for the most part trash.
Support I would choose but its such an expensive perk that I just havent touched since the first patch. I do miss juking scrakes from their attacks as support. Now its just run for dear life getting enough shots down.
Gun Slinger is also another perk I rather not touch. I enjoyed it at first until I noticed a giant problem. Dying is the most depressing thing with this class. Spending close to 3k in weapons being killed and dropping only one gun. Most of the time I never get that one pistol back (disappears).
I dislike firebug. Too easy to play (Ive fallen asleep playing it) and the exploding zeds really irked me. Cool but lets face the truth, the class shouldnt be doing that.
Commando? One of the classes I enjoy playing. If it had a slight increase in damage and ammo I would play it a tad more.
Fighting Hans also became a chore. Its either be a medic, Berserker or Gun Slinger. If everyone dies my class has the 25% speed boost which turned into the kite fest that Han's forces upon. Cant play a different class unless you want to die (douche magnetizing and combo'ing to death).
Fleshpound mechanics just arent fun. There are certain tricks to kill one but its just a giant sponge. If it were possible to kite one (as the old mechanics allowed) being a high risk/high reward I would be delighted and start playing again.
Hoping that the sharp shooter class gives me an incentive to play longer instead of waiting a few months for an update. The slight overhaul on Hans too.
I would play Demo but its lacking a lot of stuff. My favorite perk is for the most part trash.
Support I would choose but its such an expensive perk that I just havent touched since the first patch. I do miss juking scrakes from their attacks as support. Now its just run for dear life getting enough shots down.
Gun Slinger is also another perk I rather not touch. I enjoyed it at first until I noticed a giant problem. Dying is the most depressing thing with this class. Spending close to 3k in weapons being killed and dropping only one gun. Most of the time I never get that one pistol back (disappears).
I dislike firebug. Too easy to play (Ive fallen asleep playing it) and the exploding zeds really irked me. Cool but lets face the truth, the class shouldnt be doing that.
Commando? One of the classes I enjoy playing. If it had a slight increase in damage and ammo I would play it a tad more.
Fighting Hans also became a chore. Its either be a medic, Berserker or Gun Slinger. If everyone dies my class has the 25% speed boost which turned into the kite fest that Han's forces upon. Cant play a different class unless you want to die (douche magnetizing and combo'ing to death).
Fleshpound mechanics just arent fun. There are certain tricks to kill one but its just a giant sponge. If it were possible to kite one (as the old mechanics allowed) being a high risk/high reward I would be delighted and start playing again.
Hoping that the sharp shooter class gives me an incentive to play longer instead of waiting a few months for an update. The slight overhaul on Hans too.
The only valid strategy for HoE is zerk walling, 6x gunslinger, 6x firebugs, 4x zerkers with 2x medics.. All other strategy are a complete waste of time as the odds of failure are too high. This is what happens when you don't know how to balance, you end up pigeon holing players in to very specific strategies.
Demolition or support specialist without zerk walling on HoE? Keep freaking dreaming mate
Killing Floor 1 players has tons of dosh on HoE. Was HoE easy despite super powered demolition and sharpshooter? No, because the zed amount compensated for that. It was still fun and difficult.
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The only valid strategy for HoE is zerk walling, 6x gunslinger, 6x firebugs, 4x zerkers with 2x medics.. All other strategy are a complete waste of time as the odds of failure are too high. This is what happens when you don't know how to balance, you end up pigeon holing players in to very specific strategies.
Demolition or support specialist without zerk walling on HoE? Keep freaking dreaming mate
Killing Floor 1 players has tons of dosh on HoE. Was HoE easy despite super powered demolition and sharpshooter? No, because the zed amount compensated for that. It was still fun and difficult.
Maybe you need to choose your games or teammates a little better. There are different tricks to win HoE you can use. And if we dont have a zerk, you will need to kite obviously.
Sure its a bit hit-and-miss in terms of luck. But only cause of the teleporting. And 10wave games arent necessarily balanced.
Though personally Ive been in enough games to know that if you rely on your zerk 100% you may not necessarily make it. So many times FP/SC spawns on top of them and kill them in the blink of an eye. So players who have a bit of mettle become invaluable when you need to recover. And recover u can.
Still the game is still in EA so Ive no doubt it will become easier to beat as we go on.
...................what?
id be ecstatic if i could have gotten all my perks to 25 in 2 hours each. and you think that is too slow?
i didnt even think that is possible to rank up that fast. so im left suspecting you use perk training maps.
Tell the truth i don't even think the math is there for perk training maps to do that in 2 hours.
Im trying to think of the max rate you could kill things on HoE with a low level perk. Even say if every enemy was a FP and awarded that much xp you would still need to sit there and do it pretty much all day long to get anywhere which is most likely boring as ****.
Considering the way most perk leveling maps also work it would still take longer since if i remember correctly they can't force a spawn anymore and need to spawn waves in as normal, even if they are in a small box which limits it even more. Throw in the round waiting and then your still taking a while to level even 1 perk, even from killing the boss.
From a pure numbers standpoint 2 hours seems like a massive exaggeration. If i could get my perks up to 25 in 2 hours in normal situations? Hell i would be jumping for ****ing joy, you would not see a single god dam complaint out of me regarding leveling.
There was a specific perk training map I only ever played once and never saw again. It was a large room with lots of buttons to spawn any zeds. Anyway the point is one button I found spawned a bunch of hans worth a couple thousand xp each. In five minutes I had lvl 25 medic, zerk, demo and commando. So I got to try all these perks and test the skills afterwards without all the grinding on classes I don't want to play. Was cool and I don't regret doing it, but just wanted to provide an example of a perk training map that didn't just drop trash from the ceiling for 10 waves and take forever.
Well good for you but I wouldnt necessarily declare that you did this in public. Pro players detest 'faked players' because a) they didnt spend the same amount of time and effort they did to get their level 25 perks and b) ppl who dont put in the time dont know the game, make the most basic of mistakes and generally get the team killed. If the team does make it, most of the time those players were carried.
This means those players havent spent time playing enough maps through the difficulties, learning the weapons, which ones to use on which enemies etc etc. They havent learnt from their mistakes. In the end all theyve done is cheated themselves out of the enjoyment of playing the game!
But as you wish. Im sure there are exceptions and you always win your hoe games.
I will give you that with some perks like demo and zerk but at the same time i think it's a big hupla about nothing when it comes to the other perks.
Really apart from very subtle nuances which you can't even get though normal play a lot of perks at least on a base to mid level play very similar. A lot of it can be summed up as shoot the head, conserve ammo and don't shoot the big things unless everyone else is shooting at it as well or the zerker is in trouble.
I can even see this argument about medic as they need to spend equal time healing but compare gunslinger to sharpshooter. Realistically they will play about the same with guns that have a somewhat limited ammo pool, a focus on scoring headshots and being tasked with taking down big targets. Same thing will probably somewhat stand for the helmet guy and commando as well as the martial artists and zerker. I think once your got 2 or 3 perks to 25 it's safe to say you know the game well enough to play nearly anything else to at least a competent degree, doubly so if you played a lot of kf1 alongside kf2.
Granted some players are not as great at the game so they can't just pick up on some stuff from looking at a class but there are also players who can do suci with level 0 perks.
On the flip side there are also just bad players who will never get good no matter how much time they put into the game. Bad at level 0, bad at 25, perk leveling map or not.
Personally i don't care if someone got to 25 legit or if they level mapped their way though their last 3 perks, as long as they play well and arn't a dick im all good at this stage. It was a different story when the game first came out and leveling a perk was a sort of testing and data gathering experience but at this stage i find it really hard to care, especially since we need more people playing, not less.
Well put. Sounds like these sorts of players should stay away from sui/hoe then... at least until the nuances are dealt with and gameplay becomes more "mainstream." Which is likely going to closer to that with Sharpie and the railgun.
Its not the getting to level 25 legit or not thats the problem. I have players from my private server groups that have done this, as you say after level 15 or 20. But they have several hundred hours in the game anyway.
To some degree they even served a great way of making aware new/better/necessary tactical SOP when they made mistakes a normal level 20-25 would not have made (or made less of.)
Its more the inability for them to play as part of a team when they join a hoe (and sui) game. So many errors like: buying armor before wave 5, not giving money to the zerk medic, not healing if the team has no medic.... just so many little things that add up and make the difference.
Its not even an issue if they play on easier levels or even on harder ones if say ppl arent going for achievements. And sure I accept that not all testmap users will have poor skills. If they dont mess up then its kinda of hard to fault them. But on probability its more likely most testmap players will still need a few hundred hours to be a worthwhile teammate. Its just they will be more likely the cause of a wipe than not in the games they play on sui/hoe when they should have been learning stuff on easier levels.
Until the nuances are reduced alot more (on HoE) at least faked players are still gonna be more a problem than not.
I don't care if some elitists want to judge me because I don't have all achievements or win hoe with only a knife. TW is interested in how many people use perk maps and why, so I figured I'd share. Most people who you describe that level up without learning the game don't stick around anyway, and I already had the common sense to learn what I was doing before skipping to the end.
Fair enough but if you feel my comments were judgmental of you personally you missed the point! No one judges bc you dont have achievements or are able to win on HoE. Infact its the opposite. Its what skillz you can bring to the match. Ergo... meaningful coop skillz are learnt in a proper game environment. Not some xp farming workshop!
To make it clearer - while these players may play the game for a few short sessions they bring v. little to the community and if they dont stick around then there little point in those maps existing. Except to lead to what I posted prior. Players with the hours who have to put up with "faked players" will just as soon as leave if the community is drenched with them. Dont you think?
Levelling up on a perk map isn't an instant win by any means. People who think they can level up to max and then expect the game to be simple are indeed a nuisance, but people like me who cant be bothered to do the same grind with every perk, but still want the class skills and scaling bonuses of a lvl 25, aren't the same thing. Just because you use a perk map to level your commando doesn't mean you're a bad commando. And grinding out the levels doesn't help you "learn the class" any better than getting to 25 then playing from there. Plus I was already level 10-15 on all the perks that I boosted to 25, not 0 or 1.
At the end of the day it's not the perk training maps that are the real problem, it's the attitude of the player. Whether they're using the maps to try to compromise for their lack of skill, or simply want a better perk to compliment their existing skills. You should blame these bad players who join hoe games on wave 5, die, then leave, not the perk map he used earlier. As for me specifically, I barely play KF2 right now. I hop in for a couple weeks each update, try the new stuff, test out perks and weapons, new maps etc. Just lurking about Early Access waiting for more perks. So I'm not a regular player and thus felt it more suitable to just "cheat" my way to the top so I got to personally test all the perk strengths and weaknesses, and see how they all feel at max power. I think a lot of people do this and just wouldn't admit to it, but it helps TW understand as it's a form of feedback.
At the end of the day it's not the perk training maps that are the real problem, it's the attitude of the player. Whether they're using the maps to try to compromise for their lack of skill, or simply want a better perk to compliment their existing skills. You should blame these bad players who join hoe games on wave 5, die, then leave, not the perk map he used earlier. As for me specifically, I barely play KF2 right now. I hop in for a couple weeks each update, try the new stuff, test out perks and weapons, new maps etc. Just lurking about Early Access waiting for more perks. So I'm not a regular player and thus felt it more suitable to just "cheat" my way to the top so I got to personally test all the perk strengths and weaknesses, and see how they all feel at max power. I think a lot of people do this and just wouldn't admit to it, but it helps TW understand as it's a form of feedback.
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Far be it from me (or anyone else) to tell TW what is useful feedback or not. Im sure if it is they will use it. If ppl want to use testmaps thats their business. Maybe for KF3 theyll get rid of levels (or skills) and just go for a game with equipment based abilities.
I.e. Flamethrowers with splash damage module or flamethrowers with longer range adjustment. Or a SCAR with bullets that cause higher damage or a Scar with bullets with webbing that cause big zeds to stumble by 30%... if that makes sense. Or nightvision goggles vs longer duration flashlights.
That would remove the need for XP gains and leveling. Though lots of ppl actually find this fun. KF1 for instance has modded gamemodes that go to level 100 even if they have no skills.
If Tripwire nail versus then I wouldn't be surprised if the player numbers got a sizeable bump after that release. It just depends how well advertised it is.
I'm not saying the community is based on pvp enthusiasts (and I imagine it's probably the opposite) but it will definitely have a group of players who find more longevity in games with pvp modes and, depending on that advertising, will potentially pull in a whole new group of players.
Obviously, the player base split effect is there. But I really don't see that as a problem providing we don't have more than two to three core game types (and not loads).
Personally, I don't have enough time these days to invest in getting good at pvp games. So I'll try versus but will probably play coop survival most of the time.
I'm not saying the community is based on pvp enthusiasts (and I imagine it's probably the opposite) but it will definitely have a group of players who find more longevity in games with pvp modes and, depending on that advertising, will potentially pull in a whole new group of players.
Obviously, the player base split effect is there. But I really don't see that as a problem providing we don't have more than two to three core game types (and not loads).
Personally, I don't have enough time these days to invest in getting good at pvp games. So I'll try versus but will probably play coop survival most of the time.
If PvP takes off in any meaningful way I will eat my keyboard. Playing as trash sounds really unappealing and playing as a big zed sounds like the players have no hope.
Yeah, i need to second this.
I really don't see how this could be balanced or fun in any way. I could easily see it as going like this.
Clot: Lol, dead. No discussion on this one. Maybe, just maybe you can sneak by and grab someone so they are turned around for half a second but the team by that point is probably already blind and deaf.
Stalker: It's like a clot without the ability to grab, isn't that great. Again, most teams who arn't totally blind will kill anything around them fast so maybe a player will get 1 swipe in.
Crawler: Same story but with a slightly better chance due to being shorter. They will tend to get the jump on someone once, maybe twice before being lit on fire. Would be slightly better if the crawler wall climb was there even in a basic form.
Bloat: Some more chance and a little more useful but will end up just like a L4D boomer with less survival chance.
Gorefast: Doing a little better but at the end of the day doing a little better is only getting 2-3 swipes in vs 0. Slightly better than the stalker and clot due to being somewhat faster and more durable but apart from that not doing much.
Husk: In the wrong hands potentially broken in favor of the zeds, in the wrong hands useless tank of explosives. This also depends on what the restrictions are on the secondary flamethrower and suicide move.
Siren: Broken in favor of the zeds. Most people are saved by the fact that sirens are faily dumb AI wise and don't actively attempt to hide behind other zeds. Imagine a siren sitting behind a fp or scrake constantly? Fun...real fun to fight.
Scrake: Oh god, where to begin. On top of having a large amount of hp and doing a fair chunk of damage the player controlled scrake will probably get the same annoying tendency of Japanese players in rising storm to zig zag thus making it ****ing impossible to land a headshot or any meaningful amount of damage before he gets right in the middle of your team to carve them up.
FP: like the Scrake but even worse, now with a rage charge mode that entirely blocks the chest and a kick to dislodge even the most persistent of zerker walls.
Boss: HA HA HA. HAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA. Oh god, my sides. Most people can't even beat a boss on hard when it's controlled by the ai and you want to put a player in that thing? oh god, i can't breath. I can tell you right now, all the player controlled Hans would be doing is chasing down slow players to melee them to death all while reenacting Don Quixote as the part of the windmill and patty will just pelt the crap out of everyone with rockets and minigun fire while landing perfect grab attacks with his gaping chest tentacle.
I will be amazed if you could even make the mode fun for both sides, forget actually balanced.