Everything is still too easy

7

I'm really digging the new power level scaling and progression system. I think it's a pretty big step up from what we had before. However, maybe it's just me, but everything still seems way too easy. The first couple missions, I'm doing stuff around my power level, getting re-oriented with everything. Before long, I start branching out and try higher difficulty missions, and I'm surprised to find they're not noticeably harder.

So I try harder. And harder. And harder. In this short video, you can watch me run through a mission where enemies have +40% damage, I'm at -40% damage, and I still don't die or even have to use my armor skill to rip through it.



After this, I tried going even further. I went to +150 challenge rating. +80% enemy damage, -80% to my damage. Still didn't die. Still one-shotted many enemies with my plasma gun.

I'm barely having to use cover, and, while it's great to feel like I'm actually playing as a Space Marine instead of a regular human, I feel like I'm missing out on some of the game's tactical options, because simply going full dakka is the straightest and easiest path to victory.

Did I just randomly find a magic combo of gear, am I just actually really good at this game, or does the balance still need additional tweaking? I GUESS I can try going even higher in difficulty, but I would think after a certain threshold my damage output will be reduced to basically zero, which might make it a bit tricky, even for me, heh.

The other downside to progressing this fast is it feels like I don't get a proper opportunity to max out my influence in a system before I move on, unless I want to keep running missions where I can all but literally sleep my way through. I'm not sure what the approximate cap of power level is supposed to be, or what "end game" power levels will look like, but it seems like 3-4 missions to grow beyond the challenge of a system is a bit quick.

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Everything is still too easy
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6 years 223 days ago
+2

Hello,


All i can say is that in version 0.6, playing a space marine make us (me and friend) feel like a space marine, not a gimp or a victim.

Actually lvl 14 and power rating around 350, account level 6.

On the leveling path, we tried some insane rating (200ish over our ratings) and it was just perfect.

Minions and regular mobs were a deal, but no so much.

Champions and bigger ones were hard and we had to use some tactics to avoid chain wipes

Things may change later, better or worse ... But it's an alpha ! I guess at lvl 20 things will be very different, but i'm still far from it (And i'm late on account leveling).

And since i can't judge about other's experience, i just wanted to add some input about 'perceived difficulty'.


6 years 224 days ago
Rilyana

A shield helps a lot. If you use the "1" skill, that should give you a momentary boost to your defense against attacks coming from your front, though it costs a bit of focus for it. Shield slam from a suppression shield also helps stop enemies from shooting at you while you chop them up. I've done well with melee weapons, though ranged does seem to be a little stronger, and I've gone full-ranged more for role-playing reasons than anything else.

6 years 224 days ago

Hmm this makes me feel like a noob, playing and enjoing my melee crusader power rating ~470. but if i go into missions 525+ enemys just melt me down :(


If it isn't me there should be a buff of melee survivability (maybe melee weapons give deflect change or something)

6 years 224 days ago

Yeah, I missed that memo. :P


Well, that definitely makes everything make a lot more sense now, heh. I didn't realize the percentages were busted as well. I mean, I see something say "-100% damage", I ASSUME that means I'm going to do zero damage to anything, so anything beyond that is just window dressing.

But, if that's not the case... I guess it's time to see how much further I can push it. I do enjoy a challenge, as you can likely guess, and I was hoping this game wasn't going to go the route of ultimately only catering to the lowest common denominator (I've been playing Star Trek Online for almost eight years now, and one of my longest-running complaints is how easy everything is in it, partly because the average skill level of players is shockingly low, so that's the main reference point for difficulty). By all means, if they can balance the system to appeal to both ends of the spectrum, that sounds great to me.

6 years 224 days ago

You might not have met the wrong enemy types. At about 150% extra damage taken there are enemy combination that will quite simply melt you in seconds. If you meet a pack of 8+ reborn gunners or traitor guardsmen that don't happen to be standing in an easily nukable clump you get deleted.


It helps that you've got one of the stronger item combinations. Frags, Autoguns and Sentinel Turrets are all fantastic.

This comment was edited 6 years 224 days ago by DatonKallandor
6 years 224 days ago

Airsick Hydra pretty much nailed down the core reasons you may feel the game's current progression system is too easy. I'm pretty sure after it gets changed we will all feel much better about the leveling systems as a whole.

Although i would say having the base mission parameters of less than +200% enemy dmg and -200% player dmg dealt has a very marginal level of challenge associated with mission completion.

Slight side note we all thought the Inquisitor cap was 20 it is in fact now 50. 

So reaching Inquisitor level 20 gives you access to all weapons and items for your chosen class as well as enabling you access to better power rated gear drops from missions run. 

Not sure when you would be best to min/max gear with the current system in place but with the addition of these extra Inquisitor ranks from 20-50 you can now progress to earn gear of an even higher power level than previously obtainable so i would i expect the final 1200 PR rated system in the Subsector we have access to will now not feel such a daunting task to accomplish in single player unless of course the hardcore challenge was what you were seeking in which case you have the option to choose, farm better items to make it easier or stick to low PR and run high PR missions.

Happy Hunting to you fellow Inquisitor. 

6 years 224 days ago

Think you may have missed the memo that the games progression is currently broken due to the story content. It's being worked on and being changed within the near future, so there's that to look forward to. As for min/max'ing gear that's really I think intended moreso for the end content for the sector. Aka  Rating 600+ when you are Rank 20. 


Note - The % aren't accurate clearly, a character that does 150% less damage still does a fair amount of damage to enemies. So i'd presume for the meantime they don't actually reflect the real figures.

As for the difficulty setting I kind of agree that it gets somewhat easy, but i'm curious why you didn't just turn it up more? Myself and my group are playing are +500 difficulty and enjoying it. In a sector of 1200 rating going +100/+200 isn't really a big jump. Just go further..

That being said for the long term I do feel that could perhaps make the scaling quicker so it gets harder slightly faster, but then the 1200 mission when you hit max rank would be literally impossible (they are already tbh in single player mode)

This comment was edited 6 years 224 days ago by Airsick Hydra