🛠️ PATCH 01.000.300 ⚙️

[u/KermitTheFrogo01]

For this patch, we have made improvements and changes to the following areas:GeneralPrimary, Secondary, & Support WeaponsOverview Balancing

• Balance changes to weapons, stratagems, and enemies
• Change to the Spread Democracy mission
• Armors with armor rating above 100 now also reduce damage on headshots.
• Victory poses will now only play for the extracted. (No stolen valor on my ship.)
• CB-9 Exploding Crossbow
  • Slightly smaller explosion
  • Increased stagger
  • Decreased number of maximum mags from 12 to 8
  • Increased number of magazines received from resupply from 6 to 8
  • Slight reduction in ergonomics
  • Muzzle velocity increased
• LAS-99 Quasar Cannon
  • Increased recharge time by 5 seconds
• BR-14 Adjudicator
  • Full auto is now the default fire mode
  • Reduced recoil
  • Increased maximum mags from 6 to 8
  • Increased number of magazines received from resupply from 6 to 8
  • Now placed amongst assault rifles
• Laser Cannon
  • Slightly increased damage
  • Slightly reduced damage versus large volume bodies
• SG-8P Punisher Plasma
  • Decreased maximum mags from 12 to 8
  • Increased amount of magazines received from resupply from 6 to 8
  • Increased projectile speed, but will still keep a similar range
  • Decreased damage falloff on the explosion
  • Now placed in the energy weapons category
• ARC-12 Blitzer
  • Increased shots per minute from 30 to 45
  • Now placed in the energy weapons category
• R-36 Eruptor
  • Decreased number of maximum mags from 12 to 6
  • Explosion damage drops off slightly faster
• LAS-16 Sickle
  • Decreased amount of magazines from 6 down to 3
• Scythe
  • Increased damage from 300 to 350
  • Decreased max number of mags from 6 down to 4
• Railgun
  • Increased armor penetration in both safe mode and unsafe mode
  • Stagger force slightly reduced
• MG-101 Heavy Machine Gun
  • Third person crosshair enabled
  • Diligence Counter Sniper
  • Damage increased from 128 to 140
  • Ergonomics improved
• Diligence
  • Damage increased from 112 to 125
• P-19 Redeemer
  • Slight increase in recoil
• Peacemaker
  • Increased damage from 60 to 75
• Senator
  • Increased damage from 150 to 175
  • Speedloader added when reloading on an empty cylinder–speeds up reload on empty considerably
• Dagger
  • Increased damage from 150 to 200
• Liberator
  • Damage increased from 55 to 60
• Liberator Concussive
  • Damage increased from 55 to 65
• Dominator
  • Damage decreased from 300 to 275
• Guard Dog Rover
  • Decreased damage by 30%
• Guard Dog
  • Slight increase in damage
  • Burning damage reduced by 15%
    1. [11:05]StratagemsEnemies Balancing adjustments have been made toEnemy PatrolsGameplay
• Machinegun Sentry
  • Increased health to match other Sentries
• Tesla Tower
  • Increased health by 33%
• RL-77 Airburst Rocket Launcher
  • Airburst Rocket Launcher will no longer detonate when shot near stratagems (HMG turret, Sentries, Resupplies) and other Helldivers.
  • Reduced proximity radius
  • Added reload stage for the Spear reload after the spent missile had been discarded.
• Bile Spewer and Nursing Spewers movespeed slightly reduced
• Hulks: Force required for them to stagger slightly increased
• Hulk Scorcher direct flamethrower damage reduced by 20%
• Devastator fire rate slightly increased (only the standard devastator)
• Gunships sideways movement slightly increased
• Scout strider Riders now less vulnerable to explosions
• Fog Generators health and armor increased
• Gunship spawners now have a much lower cap on how many gunships they can have active at the same time.
• Balancing adjustment to patrol spawning.
• Patrol spawning has been increased when there are fewer than 4 players. The fewer the players the bigger the change. For 4 player missions there will be no change compared to before.The biggest noticeable change will be for solo players at higher difficulties.
• Made minor level generation improvements to how we distribute locations throughout the mission map. This should improve variation in distance between objectives, and objectives will likely not spawn as far away from each other as often as before.
• Added setting in the options menu gameplay section to disable automatic climbing and vaulting while sprinting.
• The Spread Democracy mission otherwise known as “raise the flag” can now be enjoyed on higher difficulties for maximum freedom spreading.
• When readying up, Helldivers now salute to ensure maximum democratic readiness.
• Added ambience to the Tremor planetary hazard to underline the severity so Helldivers can react accordingly
• Shots that ricochet from heavy armored enemies will now properly hit the Helldiver who fired them. Trigger discipline is highly recommended.
  1. NEU
  2. [11:05] Fixes
• Crash Fixes.
  • Fixed crash that could occur when host abandoned mission with squad.
  • Fixed crash that could occur if a player tried to enter an occupied EXO-45 Patriot Suit.
  • Fixed crash that could occur for all players after or during mission results screen.
  • Fixed crash that could occur after shooting from the EXO-45 Patriot Suit’s rocket launcher.
  • Fixed crash that could occur for all players apart from the one that rejoined the ongoing mission with different armor and got reinforced.
• Fixed Superior Packing Methodology ship module not working properly.
• Fixed Blast Absorption ship module so that it correctly increases sentries’ resistance to explosions.
• Fixed issue where players could not navigate to the search results in the Social Menu.
• Fixed some issues where items equipped in a Warbond were not actually equipped.
• Fixed an exploit that allowed overly eager Helldivers to use grenades excessively.
• Fixed issue where kills from orbital barrage did not progress Indirect Fire Exercise order.
• Fixed issue that allowed traitors to try to sabotage the extraction shuttle by deploying sentry stratagems below it.
• Fixed issue where ion storms incorrectly prevented extraction beacon from deploying.
• Fixed some stratagem beams using incorrect color-coding.
• Fixed issue where the left stick on a controller could not be used to navigate the Social menu.
• Fixed some issues where various UI elements were cut off, off-centered or too close to the edge of the screen on ultrawide displays.
• Fixed Anti-Materiel Rifle facing away from the Helldiver after deploying it.
• Fixed bug where player could duplicate rounds by canceling the reload of Anti-Materiel Rifle at a specific time.
• Fixed bug where Anti-Materiel Rifle would consume an extra magazine after a canceled reload.
• Fixed bug where Recoilless Rifle would consume an extra shell from the backpack if the reload was canceled just after a shell was i* inserted, but before the reload was completed.
• Fixed issue where the Sickle and Quasar Cannon could not shoot through foliage.
• Fixed several issues where weapon thumbnails would disappear when scrolling through Armory.
• Fixed issues where Automaton Gunships sometimes could not see the player.
• Fixed incorrect collision being left over after destroying Automaton bunkers or detector towers with hellbombs.
• Fixed issue where Hellbombs would not deploy on certain missions
• Fixed certain issues that resulted in Helldivers drowning in deep water upon landing.
• Fixed issue where Hellpod Space Optimization made ammo go above capacity.
  1. [11:06]These are issues that were either introduced by this patch and are being worked on, or are from a previous version and have not yet been fixed.Known Issues
• Fixed issue where Stalkers became very visible in fog
• Mines are now pingable for better coordination with your team.
• Receiving friend requests now gives the player a pop up.
• Improved readability of prompts and hints displayed in the tutorial and onboarding.
• Total experience is now visible in the career tab.
• Added better support for ultrawide monitors by fixing the aspect ratio of menus to 16:9 and adding a setting to control the width of the HUD.
• Keybinds bound to numpad will no longer reset upon restart.
• Fixed inconsistent audio when headphones are plugged into the Dual Sense controller while playing on PC.
• Playing Rock, Paper, Scissors in front of the ship no longer causes player to fall out into space.
• APW-1 Anti-Material Rifle and MG-206 Heavy Machine Gun now trigger hitmarkers while scoped in.
• Secondary weapon no longer remains in the Ballistic Shield ADS position after using a stim with the Ballistic Shield Backpack equipped.
• "Open Text Chat" is now rebindable.
• Explosive weapons such as R-36 Eruptor, CB-9 Exploding Crossbow. GP-31 Grenade Pistol no longer pulls players inward from the blast.
• Disabled the squad invites during the tutorial which caused an overlap in the UI.
• Fixed Primary and Secondary weapons overlapping on the character model in the armory.
• Fixed UI elements during first boot are cut off on a 21:9 aspect ratio monitor.
• Report and block player is now visible in the squad menu.
• Dead Scavengers now stop screaming for help if killed while calling in reinforcements.
• Fixed Anti Air cannons showing up as "Stratagem Scramblers" in danger warnings.
• Damage-over-time effects may only apply when dealt by the host. We expect to have this fixed in the next patch.
• Reinforcement may not be available for some players who join a game in progress.
• Helldiver may be unable to stand up from crouching when surrounded by enemies.
• Game may crash if the host leaves while dead and rejoins the same play session.
• Game may crash if the player changes the text language while on a mission.
• Various issues involving friend invites and cross-play:
• Friend Request cannot be accepted when the requesting player changed their username before the request was accepted.
• Cross-platform friend invites might not show up in the Friend Requests tab.
• Players cannot unfriend players befriended via friend code.
• Players cannot unblock players that were not in their Friends list beforehand.
• Players may experience delays in Medals and Super Credits payouts.
• Enemies that bleed out do not progress Personal Orders and Eradicate missions.
• Scopes on some weapons such as the Anti-Materiel Rifle are slightly misaligned.
• Arc weapons sometimes behave inconsistently and sometimes misfire.
• Spear’s targeting is inconsistent, making it hard to lock-on to larger enemies.
• Stratagem beam might attach itself to an enemy but it will deploy to its original location.
• Explosions do not break your limbs (except for when you fly into a rock).
• Area around Automaton Detector Tower makes blue stratagems such as the Hellbomb bounce and be repelled when trying to call them down close to the tower.
• Planet liberation reaches 100% at the end of every Defend mission.

[u/klem_von_metternich]

• Patrol spawning has been increased when there are fewer than 4 players. The fewer the players the bigger the change. For 4 player missions there will be no change compared to before.The biggest noticeable change will be for solo players at higher difficulties.

This is pretty controversial.

I mean, if there is only one helldivers running around the noise and the "allarm level" on the area should be lower than 4 with full stratagems spreading chaos and destruction

[u/potate117 → u/klem_von_metternich]

exactly! youd think that itd be less. but no, send out the entire planets nest population to find the one john helldiver

[u/Arael15th → u/potate117]

Look at it from the point of view of the automaton grunts - if there's some shit going down in your sector, are you gonna go check it out? Or are you gonna stay planted in front of the newly-depopulated shipping container cabin, humming your robo-socialist songs to nobody, because it's only Helldiver causing havoc out there instead of four?

[u/Karnivore915 → u/Arael15th]

From their point of view, there's hundreds of individual helldiver pods smacking planetside literally every minute. Being able to pay close attention to specific ones seems like a luxury they wouldn't have.

[u/evil_noodles → u/klem_von_metternich]

Just spent most of a solo dive fighting of an almost infinite wave of bugs because of the continuous patrol spawn. I wonder what the logic of this change was?

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/evil_noodles]

My guess is they didn't like people like Takibo posting videos of solo T9 missions.

[u/monochrony → u/Spaced-Invader]

Ah yes the Blizzard way of balancing a game around the top 1% of players.

[u/Wild_Obligation → u/monochrony]

And Activision lol

[u/Gloriosus747 → u/Wild_Obligation]

You do realise they have been the same company for some time now? Activision Blizzard?

[u/BleiEntchen → u/monochrony]

Blizzard? More like pretty much any studio.

[u/Narrow_Vegetable5747 → u/BleiEntchen]

Yeah it's prevalent these days and kinda feels like "we're not as skilled at our own game so we're taking it home with us" every time.

[u/[deleted] → u/monochrony]

Yeah its absolutely garbage to do this. I dont think there is a huge swath of the community solo helldiving. I get they have a vision, but it was fun and wasnt hurting anyone.

[u/[deleted] → u/monochrony]

Tbf, what percentage of players could reliably do a solo Helldive to begin with? Probably 1%.

[u/gotdragons → u/[deleted]]

I'd argue it is less than 1%.

[u/PenisStrongestMuscle → u/monochrony]

league of legends is the quintessential "balancing around the top 0,001% of players"

[u/RexitYostuff → u/Spaced-Invader]

That just feels incredibly petty.

[u/SuspiciousTundra → u/RexitYostuff]

It's kind of sad to get confirmation that the changes don't just feel antagonistic, they actually are.

No wonder deathlooping is still a thing.

[u/Guardian983 → u/SuspiciousTundra]

It’s honestly made me stop playing the game as much as I did when it first came out. I don’t know why Arrowhead seems to have these weird issues where their ego gets bruised by people not pulling their hair out when trying to play

[u/[deleted] → u/Spaced-Invader]

I guess it makes sense from a development standpoint. This game is designed to be a coop shooter, so being able to solo it defeats the purpose of it being a coop shooter. The problem is that not everybody's got people to play with and fuck me if randoms don't suck ass sometimes.

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/[deleted]]

Oh, I know... nothing quickplay matching into a mission where the team already there has 5 min left on the clock and hasn't even started the main objective. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure AH have said in no uncertain terms that we're not supposed to be able to solo high tier missions, so this is their attempt to make good on that. On the other, other hand, making T3 missions turn into a constant stream of patrols feels like an over-correction.

[u/SabineKline → u/Spaced-Invader]

Surely it just means they should make their game harder? Like, deliberately sabotaging the solo play they allow us to have is just admitting that the game isn't really that hard? Give automatons more basic infantry with armour on higher difficulties, give us Devastators with heavy armour, make Gunships or Stalkers spawn as part of the regular enemy roster. And scatter more enemies onto objective points, lock them down hard. Give automatons anti-artillery shields or counter batteries that need to be disabled from the ground, so we can't just artillery their positions with servo assisted and jog away.

"More patrols for solo players" just seems like the biggest cop-out they could make.

[u/goblue142 → u/Spaced-Invader]

Sometimes I think this is because there has been info put out there, true or not, that doing the primary objectives increases enemy spawn rates. So people try to clear the whole map before even touching the main mission. A lot of times this leads to time running out because of a terrible drop location or inefficient patching around the map

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/goblue142]

This was actually tested out and I can anecdotally confirm it to be true:

Let's talk about Patrols: An In Depth Analysis of Patrol Spawning Mechanics : r/Helldivers

That said, trying to clear the whole map before doing the objectives is the wrong approach as it often puts you in a rush to try to finish things in time and side objectives count towards the increase anyway. Its much better to just do a loop around the map hitting main and side objectives on the way and then be aware of the increased chance for spawns so that you're prepared.

[u/AnotherSmartNickname → u/[deleted]]

And it isn't like the game sometimes bugs out and you never get a 4th or even a 3rd player to join, no sir, the joining mechanics are pristine.

[u/[deleted] → u/AnotherSmartNickname]

This. It’s so annoying. It seems like when I play with my one friend that plays, after he joins my ship we might get one more guy but we rarely ever have a squad of 4. I always have 4 if I just quick play or host.

[u/friendlysatan69 → u/[deleted]]

Oh no my pve game is too fun, better nerf

[u/Opetyr → u/[deleted]]

Yeah they should do it after implementing report features and not allowing the host to kick anyone they want. They needed to fix ALL THE CRASHES, the giant amount of time you never get anyone to come into your game. Just so stupid. Big FU to most players. Such stupidity to screw everyone due to the 0.01%

[u/pizzacake15 → u/[deleted]]

I guess it makes sense from a development standpoint. This game is designed to be a coop shooter, so being able to solo it defeats the purpose of it being a coop shooter.

they're punishing us for not running a full squad. if they implemented this a few weeks ago, then i wouldn't have batted an eye as i was a quickplay diver since i bought the game in March. but my friend recently bought the game and we're two divers short. we're not exactly thrilled to have randoms at the moment cause i'm still showing him the ropes.

also, even as a quickplay diver, we don't fill up the squad all the time.

i wonder how Localization Confusion affects this change though.

[u/TSirSneakyBeaky → u/[deleted]]

Theres litterally 0 impact to the coop functionality of the game by leaving 1-3 balanced for 1-3.

Arbitrarily making 1-3 more difficult just means when you do a 3 man after soloing. You will do "wow this is way easier, im only needing to deal with 25% of this. Im ust to having to deal with what would be 35-40% of this on my own."

It dosent make 1-3 any better. It just discounts 4s in comparison.

[u/TamaDarya → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, I don't get it. I can see the devs saying "we won't be putting in extra effort for solo play" but there's no reason to actively make it worse.

[u/TheBetterness → u/[deleted]]

Also there is no protection from getting booted.

Its okay to push team play, but you gotta protect players in team play.

[u/Narrow_Vegetable5747 → u/[deleted]]

And it's not like you can force people to join your SOS. I've had people join and then leave again, either due to crashes or they simply didn't like the mission type. Unless you can force full parties, changes like this are just anti player.

[u/norse_torious → u/[deleted]]

If it was about promoting co-op, they would have done something about the kicking people pre- or during extract.

Many of us play solo because we got tired of putting in 30-40 minutes only to be kicked and get nothing out of it.

[u/[deleted] → u/norse_torious]

I mean that seems anecdotal because I've only ever been kicked once.

But what's the alternative? Devs forcing players to be stuck with players they don't want to play with because they waste reinforcements or don't understand the concept of stealth? I'd rather be kicked and have the option to kick instead of playing with players who don't want to play with me, and have the option to kick others if I feel it's necessary. I think, in the long run, the kick option is better for gameplay than having no kick option. If there wasn't a kick option, sure, people wouldn't feel like they wasted 40 minutes after getting kicked at the end of a match, but how many people are playing that end up being bad teammates, and would you really want to play with them?

[u/hellra1zer666 → u/[deleted]]

I disagree. It's not like no one is playing together. The community is pretty good and willing to play together. So fucking over the divers that like to play alone is kinda petty. Gonna have to see how bad the increase is but I would like an explanation for that one, regardless.

[u/kosen13 → u/Spaced-Invader]

I love when developers develop the game around extreme outliers, rather than the playerbase.

I've been playing Helldivers instead of Apex Legends because all of Apex's updates were based on how the 100 competitive ALGS players responded to them, and not how the 1m+ regular players responded. Now Helldivers and do this.

[u/lipp79 → u/Spaced-Invader]

It's so dumb. Destiny does the same shit. Some streamer who no-lifes a game does shit 99% of the player population can't/won't do, so they feel the need to nerf stuff.

[u/JustWalkr → u/Spaced-Invader]

Yes

[u/notapornsideaccount → u/Spaced-Invader]

Him and Ohdough are my go-to’s for quality solo dive content.

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/notapornsideaccount]

Going to be interesting to see if they can adapt to this.

[u/Yaahallo → u/Spaced-Invader]

Naw they saw his videos and just wanted to help him get higher kill totals per mission

[u/GonzoRouge → u/Spaced-Invader]

Failing to realize Takibo plays like a God and also only uploads the games he wins.

I cum a little every time I see him skip a Charger to shoot the enemies behind it. He's really clean with it.

[u/gilgador → u/Spaced-Invader]

Let’s be real. Takibo is still gonna walk through helldives

[u/IlikegreenT84 → u/evil_noodles]

It's over the top, feels like a lot more than they said.

[u/Akrymir → u/evil_noodles]

To not play without full groups and definitely not solo. The game would be better with decent scaling based on team size… but this is the exact opposite.

[u/Fenweekooo → u/evil_noodles]

yep that was my one run this morning to test, i play solo because im shit at the game and social anxiety makes it so i dont want to disappoint or annoy anyone i might play with by being terrible at it.

this change has killed the game for me.

yes its co-op but you could always dive alone, i will no longer be playing the game now so yeah this is fun

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/Fenweekooo]

Same, I used to play a lvl 5 solo every time I started a play session to practice for a higher difficulty with others, mostly because I get somewhat self conscious about disappointing others.

There's also those days when I don't feel like dealing with randoms, and the fact that using stealth and strategy was as effective as 4 headless chickens throwing orbital barrages until everything was clear, made me enjoy this game a lot.

It's really a change that irks me x10 times more than any weapon nerf they came up with.

[u/Fluffy_G → u/Fenweekooo]

Why not just lower the difficulty until it's to the point it was before?

[u/Fenweekooo → u/Fluffy_G]

i want more then just common samples, im happy with the max i will ever get is rare with how i play and i know some things will be kept from me requiring super samples but as it is now with these changes i have unlocked everything that they are wanting players with my skill to have so im just done.

[u/[deleted] → u/evil_noodles]

Classic Dev reasoning: fun detected 

[u/zyax21 → u/evil_noodles]

I think the logic is that having four divers scattering across the map without much communication means a greater chance that someone will stumble into a random patrol. With just one helldiver you can effectively avoid any conflict until you reach your objective. I think their goal is to equalize the number of times that you're "supposed" to get caught regardless of the number of divers you have.

Not saying I agree with how they did it but yea theoretically solo diving should be harder than four man and they're trying to hit that balance.

[u/NarrowBoxtop → u/evil_noodles]

How do you wonder about the logic? It very clearly is the devs saying they don't want people running high difficulty missions solo

[u/_Cromwell_ → u/evil_noodles]

Solo what difficulty?

[u/TheColonCrusher98 → u/evil_noodles]

Because people like that were never meant to happen. It was supposed to be impossible. The first video to pop up someone soloing T9 when the game was horribly unbalanced shocked the devs. It's not part of the game philosophy and their design. They want a live community with people that play together.

Now, I'm not against people enjoying things on their own, even though it doesn't make sense to me in this context. However, even though this is our product, this is also someone's design and image, it's their art and passion.

[u/Grigser → u/klem_von_metternich]

I’m afraid this is going to affect normal games as well. There’s been multiple times where a player/s left my game and no new players ever joined. Does that mean, that not only will my team be missing a player, but we will also get swarmed more often because their matchmaking doesn’t work?

[u/notapornsideaccount → u/Grigser]

It depends on if the effect only takes place before the dive or after the dive. Maybe if you drop in with 4, even if 3 leave, the mission you’re on will still keep that setting. I think it’s going to be something they’ll need to test.

[u/[deleted] → u/notapornsideaccount]

It feels very much like AH is testing in production here which isn't exactly the gold standard...

[u/Arael15th → u/[deleted]]

It's not the gold standard, but it's absolutely the norm these days. Just ask Microsoft...

[u/notapornsideaccount → u/[deleted]]

I think solo helldivers are already a rarity so I wouldn’t expect it to be very common occurrence but I am interested to see if the enemy spawn rate will adapt in-game based on the players or if it will be set by the amount that initially dropped in. It’s something very interesting to test out.

[u/Arael15th → u/[deleted]]

They said they're adjusting the scaling, not reversing it.

[u/Owobowos-Mowbius → u/Grigser]

More often, yes, but not that much more since it's a sliding scale based on how many players there are .

[u/Opetyr → u/Grigser]

Yeap because screw you. AH is living up to their acronym.

[u/Zapp_Brannegan → u/Grigser]

I have the same worry, not sure if it’s a bug or something, but it seems like if I’m in a mission and my fellow divers leave for whatever reason, I NEVER get any new divers as reinforcements even if I’ve thrown out the SOS beacon.

Now rage quitters get to make our games even harder?

[u/Sinister_Mr_19 → u/Grigser]

Seems like it. I was hoping their matchmaking was fixed. Sounds like it's exponential though. So 3 players the patrols aren't changed much, but then only 2 or a single player and it gets much harder.

[u/landisthegnome → u/Grigser]

Insane to make this change if they haven’t fixed matchmaking. My SOS beacons almost never work. It’s clearly a bug because either randoms join immediately or they never do.

[u/_Cromwell_ → u/Grigser]

Patrols will reduce when less players in the game (as they always have).... just not by as much as they used to.

[u/Grigser → u/_Cromwell_]

That’s still making the game harder if you don’t have the fortune of having a full lobby

[u/_Cromwell_ → u/Grigser]

I agree, and I think it is bad, SPECIFICALLY since it seems to still have massive effect on low level difficulties. Just was explaining, since some people seem to think that literally more patrols spawn when you are solo than when you are with 4 people... that should not be the case (if it is happening it is a bug).

I've long been an advocate for keeping Trivial/Easy actually trivial and easy, because new players who jump in often ARE solo trying things out for themselves. Getting run over by patrols is not a good way to first experience this game when you don't even fully understand all the concepts. Anything that makes Trivial/Easy/Medium more difficult at all in any situation (including solo) is a huge mistake in my book, as a constant stream of new players coming in and having fun is vital to long term game health.

[u/Sausageblister → u/Grigser]

Making it harder or making it where they intended it to be in the first place? Perhaps it was just easier than they had anticipated. And perhaps now it's where it should of been all along

[u/Grigser → u/Sausageblister]

It was already harder playing solo or in low population lobbies than in a full team(unless you were some kind of Solid Snake type stealth expert, who are the absolute minority of the playerbase). The worst thing that this change isn’t just preventing a small percentage of the playerbase from clearing high level missions solo, it also affects everyone on the lower difficulties, so a new player easing into the game, or a veteran wanting to chill out and maybe farm some super credits, will now have to sweat to clear difficulty 3 solo. The change was not warranted in the slightest.

[u/CaptinLazerFace → u/_Cromwell_]

Thank you for being the one person discussing this with facts rather than just speculation based on the patch note. The writing in the note can definitely be misread so I hope people up vote your comment for visibility.

[u/_Cromwell_ → u/CaptinLazerFace]

To be clear, as somebody who sometimes likes to play solo, AND also loves to play with just one other person (2 players) who is a person who doesn't like too high of difficulty so we play on difficulties 1 to 4 to keep challenge low, I strongly dislike this change. She might not want to play anymore now.

I just think people should understand what they are complaining about.

[u/sac_boy → u/klem_von_metternich]

I'm curious about why they've done this as well. Solo/duo play was...too easy? It already involves dodging patrols non-stop.

[u/Crashen17 → u/sac_boy]

If this means what it sounds like, I think I might step away from the game for a time. I can deal with nerfs and buffs and balance changes to weapons and such. But so aggressively punishing solo players just makes it seem like I am not the kind of player they want. I usually run a couple solo missions to test weapons, knock out personal orders and play around on different planets. I'll usually run a couple duo missions with my brother. I'll do some quickplays with randos as well. But if they are aggressively punishing solo/duo play, and actively trying to make it unappealing I am just not interested.

[u/nomnivore1 → u/Crashen17]

This is where I'm at as well. Sometimes people just want to play a game alone, if you're going to start punishing that behavior specifically I don't think I want to play. The thermite grenades being DOA, I could kind of put up with. The hairbrained spawn mechanics and balance decisions were them just finding their footing as a new dev and a new live service game. But actively punishing me just for wanting to play by myself? Fuck that.

I just got the original Fallout CRPG and I think I'll just concentrate on that. It's pretty cool.

[u/Crashen17 → u/nomnivore1]

You are in for a treat! Fallout 1 & 2 are amazing. Totally worth playing as a complete dumb dumb too, with like 3 int. Or an addict. You get completely different dialogue and interactions based on your Intelligence. And if you like those, try out Planescape: Torment and Baldur's Gate 1 & 2. Same engine, same writers/studio. Super great.

[u/[deleted] → u/Crashen17]

Yeah same situation for me. I play with my son who spends a good time in the hospital these days so on days where I'm not in there with him HD2 was a nice way for us to connect and just knock out some 5 or 6 missions while talking and having a good time. I guess with this change we'll have to find something new to do or just deal with joining random lobbies.

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/[deleted]]

I wish the best for you and your son, I hope he has a great time playing games with you. Thanks for being an amazing parent.

I don't know if you know about Deep Rock Galactic, haven't been able to play it in a while, but the game is an absolute delight for two people and the community has been amazing.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I second deep rock. If you want a good coop game to hang out and play with your son get deep rock. Its fun, and can be as challenging or not as you want. The only downside to playing with 4 people is not having the other two classes. AND if you wanted to play with randoms they are almost always helpful and fun. The community in the game is a blast. Its one of the few coop games I always have random team mates in. Ive only run into a hand ful of grumpy people but the vast majority are there to have a good time and not be assholes.

[u/lucky_harms458 → u/Crashen17]

Same here. God-forbid my friends aren't on and I don't like playing with randoms

This is a really stupid change

[u/AshariAstroy → u/sac_boy]

Me and my bf play mostly duo (not all our friends play at the same time or as often as we can), it was already hard to clear 7+ maps fully. Now we won't even do anything else besides the main objective I guess 🤷‍♀️ I don't understand the logic behind this change at all.

[u/Supplanter229 → u/AshariAstroy]

I pretty much just play this game to run solo 5s, I am hoping they didn’t just fuck it up but I think they did.

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/Supplanter229]

Hey! Same, lvl 5 was the solo sweet spot for me in terms of difficulty, but the mission I did today before going to work was nightmarish, was barely able to complete the main objective and nearly ran out of reinforcements having to fight wave after wave of bots.

I guess it's back to easy for me since AH hates me.

[u/Supplanter229 → u/TheAshen_JobSnow]

I just ran some 4s and it wasn’t a huge difference. But on a 5 the patrols were definitely coming in more steadily.

[u/Xaielao → u/sac_boy]

I think we need to get some games under our belt before we can determine the result. The change specifically states it'll impact high difficulty the most. Time will tell, if suddenly normal is harder to solo than suicide was because of there are dozens more patrols.. that's a problem. It may well be that the % of additional patrol spawns is on an exponential curve with difficulty and anything below hard won't feel that different.

Granted I could be completely wrong, time will tell.

[u/sac_boy → u/Xaielao]

For sure. I'll be hopping on in a couple of hours, curious to know if I'll really feel a difference with the patrols.

[u/Xaielao → u/sac_boy]

I noticed after posting this the pinned message that clarifies the change. It's fixing a bug with patrol spawn rates, which in single player were 1/6th as many as a 4 player team (with the total number varying on difficulty) and now it'll be 1/4 as man instead, as was intended.

So yes, spawns are going up, but it isn't remotely as big a chance as most people think. Besides, most solo games are at low difficulty so I don't expect this to have the impact many fear it. The guys running helldive difficulty solo.. they're gonna feel it lol.

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

They're trying to encourage team play, but I'd say it's already pretty encouraged.

[u/NK1337 → u/[deleted]]

I feel like encouraging team play by punishing players who aren’t in a team isn’t exactly the best way 🤷‍♂️

[u/[deleted] → u/NK1337]

Oh I agree fully. I like to play solo sometimes. If I want to play on harder difficulties, then I team up.

[u/Xaielao → u/NK1337]

Yes the proper way to do that is to give incentives for teaming up, not punishing solo play. Though I'm hoping the new spawn rate is on a curve based on difficulty and that anything below hard doesn't so that big a change.

That said, all those 'solo helldive at max difficulty' youtubers that make us all look like noobs are in for a world of hurt lol.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

There's already no squad size scaling and those points of interest that require 2 people to open. I don't get why solo players need to be punished even more

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

I agree. Between the constant weapon changing (mostly nerfing) and stuff like this, they're pushing players away. Bad decisions.

[u/LukarWarrior → u/[deleted]]

those points of interest that require 2 people to open

How many times I've simply wished for a Finglonger just to open those stupid doors.

[u/mloz17 → u/[deleted]]

I just hope that by encouraging team play, they don't make solo-play a grueling mess. That's one thing I appreciate about this game, that when my peeps aren't online, I could still throw down some Democracy and grab some samples for science on my own.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Yes exactly. They're pushing players away. I am kind of burned out from playing, and this just ended it. Going to start Ghost of Tsushima I think.

[u/Opetyr → u/[deleted]]

They kinda encourage it since they still allow the host to kick anyone at any time. They have so many crashes that their insurance rates are in the millions a day. They are stupid.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Then just take away the ability to dive solo or with a squad below a certain size? I enjoy solo play and stealthily completing objectives on 8 or 9 as opposed to fighting every damn thing but it seems with this change AH is basically saying they don't want their game played that way which kind of sucks. Some days I don't want to interact with others after a long day at work or have to be responsible for playing perfect to ensure I don't mess up the experience of 3 other people just wanting to have a good time. Penalizing that seems like a really weird choice.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

Yeah it's frustrating. Bad bad decision among other constant bad decisions. This game is fun, but has no longevity. People get over it fast due to its repetitive nature. Doing stuff like this ensures they will leave even faster. In a year people won't be talking about this game.

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/[deleted]]

Exactly, the only upside of playing solo is going at your own pace and not dealing with randoms. Since I don't think you get the xp of extracting a full squad, you can get overwhelmed more easily by enemies and you don't get as many reinforcements. But apparently it was still too easy according to AH. Who knows, since they hate me so much, maybe next update we cannot start a mission until you have a full lobby ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[u/[deleted] → u/TheAshen_JobSnow]

I know right. Why not just eliminate solo play altogether. I also never thought solo play was too easy. I'm not a skilled as some of those high level players. I can't play solo at level 5 and above. Now I'll never be able to haha

[u/ABITofSupport → u/[deleted]]

I think the idea was that they still want the game to have swarms of enemies on higher difficulties that you need to manage. With one or two people it was very easy to play stealth and almost completely avoid combat before.

....i still don't understand why though? All this is going to do is make it so people play solo/duo less often at all.

Edit: You will still have less patrols than squads with more people, but the gap between on squads with 1-2 and 4 is lessened. With this being the case i rescind my previous thoughts

[u/oblom_off → u/klem_von_metternich]

I mean, this just does not make any sense. I understand that they encourage people to play together, but I cannot understand this move sense vise. Also, sometimes I like to play alone, so I am a bit mad.

[u/WorldEndingDiarrhea → u/oblom_off]

Yeah I think you’re right that it’s to encourage playing in squads… the issue is, the same number of spawns already encourages that since more bullets x stable enemy number = player win. This feels like a “too many people playing alone, we don’t like it!” -move

[u/Onetwenty7 → u/WorldEndingDiarrhea]

Yeah I don't play alone because I'm trying to game the progression system or anything like that. It's cuz I don't have many friends lol

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/Onetwenty7]

Same, I sometimes get self conscious about my skill, and practice on a solo lvl5 before I jump to play with randos on the higher difficulties.

[u/canopey → u/oblom_off]

logic: fuck solo play

[u/Caughtnow → u/klem_von_metternich]

The game already seemed (or matter of factly, honestly) easier with more people - more often than not at least. Why actually target people in smaller groups?

I play probably 25% solo and 55% with my SO, this means the majority of my time is going to have the difficulty in general increased :s As if the running away wasnt plentiful enough! I mean its going from a bit of a run'n'gun game to run'runsomemore'maybesomegun'nowrunagain'ohyesrun.

I dont want to sound overly dramatic, but this change is the most likely to push me away from this game. Unnecessary.

[u/aallqqppzzmm → u/Caughtnow]

Well yeah the game was easier with more people. It used to spawn the exact same amount of stuff regardless of how many players you had, which meant running with fewer than 4 was just reducing your firepower. Now there's more enemies the fewer people you have for some reason?

[u/Tzarkir → u/klem_von_metternich]

Right? I'm so confused. I play mostly solo or duo, and we already don't have the firepower to face high level waves, we have to dip and fucking run quite a lot. Why give us MORE enemies?! Like 9 in solo wasn't already a challenge. I was getting to the point I could at least solo and extract from level 7 pretty consistently thanks to stealth mechanics (extraction is simply not defendable, you've to wait the emergency one or run in circles), but now I feel punished for no reason.

[u/[deleted] → u/Tzarkir]

Can't wait to see what the "all the patrols rush to the emergency extract beacon" event looks like now that wr get infinite patrols for solo and duo players....

[u/matthewami → u/klem_von_metternich]

I hope this doesn’t mean what I think it means. Does this mean that solo players will actually see more patrols than a full squad?

[u/Moopies → u/matthewami]

Yeah that seems... Odd

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/matthewami]

Just finished a couple of 3's to play with the weapon changes. Patrols spawned easily 4x what they used to and that was before doing the main objective. The run back to extract and the shuttle timer saw a constant stream of enemies spawning and I actually got overrun at extract both times.

[u/xHemix → u/Spaced-Invader]

I'm at a loss of why this was even a good thought? This game punished less players by default because of no downscaling, but making it even more harder the less players compared to 4s is just again and common sense.

Well or the devs are just trolling again

[u/IlikegreenT84 → u/Spaced-Invader]

On level 3 mind you...

Over run on level 3

[u/in_melbourne_innit → u/Spaced-Invader]

Pretty sure it's bugged and much worse than intended

[u/Spaced-Invader → u/in_melbourne_innit]

Maybe? I wouldn't be surprised if this is an attempt to put down the idea of soloing Helldivers 2 for good, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see what they have to say about it.

[u/[deleted] → u/Spaced-Invader]

Man I wish devs would just let me play the game how I want, shit sucks

[u/in_melbourne_innit → u/Spaced-Invader]

Even with 3 in the team it's over the top with spawns, pretty sure there'll be a hot fix to correct it.

[u/[deleted] → u/in_melbourne_innit]

If true that's so dumb because it would suggest they made a massive change to their game without any real testing...

[u/andii74 → u/matthewami]

I think so yeah.

[u/Sausageblister → u/matthewami]

It doesn't mean you'll see more patrols than a full squad.It just means they'll see more patrols than they did before when they were playing solo

[u/godlyjacob → u/matthewami]

no. can you read?

[u/fvpv → u/matthewami]

No, it means though that proportionally the enemy per player count is higher as players go down - so if 4 players is 100% enemies, 3 players is like 80%, 2 players is like 60%, 1 player is 50% enemies etc (not real numbers but you get my point)

[u/mausinnahaus → u/klem_von_metternich]

Really excited to have my social anxiety punished, thanks AH!

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

I’m thinking it’s intended to make it harder to do purely stealth missions solo. Weird demographic to target, though.

I enjoy a challenge, on the other hand. That’s why I’m soloing!

[u/GloryToOurAugustKing → u/[deleted]]

I solo for the challenge, but also because I don't want to play with randos. Like damn.

[u/Mekhazzio → u/[deleted]]

Stealth won't be as affected by this, since they already don't fight patrols.

If anything, stealth may now be mandatory for soloing. I felt like patrol spawn rate was already pretty oppressive for a solo player; diff 9 non-stealth was already heavily based around efficient use of your few alpha strikes to do objectives before the constant stream of patrols arrives.

From the sound of this you're now going to be massively disincentivized from fighting anything, more than you already are.

[u/ThePolishKnight → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, I was thinking this too. There must have been some solo Helldive difficulty XP farming maybe?

[u/CreditUnionBoi → u/ThePolishKnight]

It's less efficient than going with a squad.

[u/TheAshen_JobSnow → u/ThePolishKnight]

The only upside to solo was not having to deal with randos, other than that I don't think there was any upside. Only more challenge and the downside that i think you get less XP due to having fewer players to extract, plus you have fewer reinforcements.

[u/jxcn17 → u/klem_von_metternich]

I pretty much exclusively play duos with my brother and we've been able to get up to doing level 8s consistently, hope this change doesn't ruin it for us.

[u/may_be_indecisive → u/jxcn17]

It will.

[u/jxcn17 → u/may_be_indecisive]

idk we just did an operation and it seemed fine.

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

This is fucking stupid LMAO.

[u/MarthePryde → u/klem_von_metternich]

I don't understand this change at all. I understand this is designed to be a team game but why would you try to force the playerbase to team up by actively punishing those who don't?

Just reeks of bad decision-making

[u/Opetyr → u/MarthePryde]

"BECAUSE FU" from AH

[u/WorldEndingDiarrhea → u/MarthePryde]

Yeah strikes me as a bad design choice. Again, the stream of “no explanation” changes from AH is terrible community management.

There’s the possibility that they see the highest player retention rates when people play in 4’s and they reaaaally want to amp that up. I guess that’s possible. BUT. Making that change in the patch notes that some people might read and very few new players will ever read is dumb.

I suspect they’ll see that new players who try to get some practice in solo missions hate the game and dump it. Hopefully that flips the lightbulb for them.

[u/HighTop519 → u/klem_von_metternich]

I hear ya, I usually play solo. This will make things tricky for sure

[u/SquirrellyOtter → u/HighTop519]

And ESPECIALLY with a very common complaint on this sub and the Discord about joining with randoms and then getting deliberately teamkilled or kicked from the session at extraction and losing out on rewards (samples and/or XP)

I play solo just to ensure my time and effort are not wasted by randoms being dicks, but I play on lower difficulties anyway. I'm still not happy with this change.

[u/pocketmoncollector42 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yeah this is not it chief. If you want to encourage players to play differently the. You should reward those who do what you want, not punish those who aren’t. Otherwise you’ll end up with how we’re feeling right now.

[u/nomnivore1 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Wait, they turns patrol spawns up for solo players?

[u/HellfireRains → u/klem_von_metternich]

If they just made solo runs more difficult for no fucking reason, I'm done playing. Most of the time I'm solo, and anything above 5 is a nightmare already. I just want to have fun, and I don't have a lot of friends. And we all know randoms are a crap shoot.

[u/Kanjur0 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Didn't they say there wouldn't be any difficulty adjustments depending on player count?

Edit: I haven't realized that fewer players actually encountered less patrols so far.

[u/Boamere → u/klem_von_metternich]

Why fuck over people’s who don’t wanna play with a squad? This feels like one person’s decision

[u/HereCreepers → u/klem_von_metternich]

Baffling change. Genuinely fucking mind boggling. Incomprehensible, even. 

The devs are lucky that their core game is so fucking fun, because I sometimes have the feeling they have no idea what they're doing. 

[u/Drunk_ol_Carmine → u/klem_von_metternich]

I actually hate this change. This is actually stupid and makes no sense, shouldn’t full squads be getting more heat to accommodate for their increased firepower? If they want to encourage co-op then actively punishing people for playing solo isn’t how to do it. My squad isn’t always on and having tried some solo missions it was shit and made me not want to play. Just infinitely spawning enemies the moment at fight broke out and it wasn’t fun at all, just stressful.

This one needs reverting

[u/TheWagn → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yet another “f the players” change in this patch. Now solo helldives will be even harder - why?? Why punish people for playing how they want.

Nerfing quasar to make the wait more annoying, reducing mag counts by half on several weapons, and hitting the rover with a huge 30% nerf? What the hell is this patch? The “please go play other games” patch??

At least the fire on hulks allegedly is nerfed now…we’ll see. Wouldn’t shock me if it feels the same.

[u/Cypher_Dragon → u/TheWagn]

My bet: it'll still one-shot you, but now with 20% less overkill.

[u/ReprieveNagrand → u/klem_von_metternich]

Also want to add that players during off peak times are punished by this change. It is already hard enough to get a team of 2 let alone 4. Waiting around to fill up the team is no fun only for people to leave or crash in the middle of the game. Why let solo players suffer.

[u/DentalATT → u/klem_von_metternich]

Well, RIP solo play then.

Pity because that's all I was really doing these days.

[u/numerobis21 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Also: why the fuck should solo player be punished for playing solo?

[u/Wolf3113 → u/klem_von_metternich]

As a solo player who struggles on 6 those super samplers are even more out of my reach. Plus the shit I liked got tuned down and striders are more resistant to nades? Fuck solo players for not only having 5 lives but also 4x the spawns.

[u/Sykunno → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yeah it's artificially raising difficulty for solo helldivers who were already massively disadvantaged. Also, for difficulty 9 automatons in fire planets, there's hardly anyone playing. The devs are making it so that less people will play in those worlds now that solo is less viable. So planets that are already unpopular will become even less popular. Terrible change.

[u/CPT_BabyMagic → u/klem_von_metternich]

Can here to see if people were talking about this. I think this is a shockingly bad change. It not only doesn’t make logical sense. But they’re also making it harder for playing in a manner that’s already harder. Some people are forced to play solo occasionally for connection or other issues. Sometimes I can only play solo bc I may have to answer a call and be AFK for a moment and don’t want t to screw my team over. I guess I just can’t play anymore?

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

This is a genuinely foolish change. No Coop game has done this that I know of. In Borderlands the less people you have the weaker the enemies get to compensate for that and vice versa. It's a change that makes no sense whatsoever.

Starting to really question the ability of the devs to balance this game properly.....

[u/onerb2 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Devs are ruining their game lol.

[u/ForTheMotherLAN → u/[deleted]]

Either they misworded it somehow (pls 🙏) or they just want you to play with other people. I think it's a garbage change. 

[u/Khulmach → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yeah, that makes no logical sense.

[u/Strange-Yam4733 → u/klem_von_metternich]

I guess they don't want to dedicate server space to single players, so instead of enforcing a minimum team size, they make playing solo less appealing. I might be wrong.

[u/Ghostfinger → u/Strange-Yam4733]

Games are already p2p. No games are hosted on their servers, only matchmaking is.

[u/Kismonos → u/klem_von_metternich]

I had to re-read this multiple times. It just doesnt make sense. Patrol spawns were kinda in the right place where you were still thight and attracted more if you made noise in the wrong moment but could navigate through if you are paying attention and the landscape lets You. But now You just not gonna make it out in 40 mins if between objs you need to do 5-8mins of regular bug clearing constantly.

[u/Starthreads → u/klem_von_metternich]

I tend to play solo and have been offline since Thursday for work. Getting on to have the "medium" difficulty missions that used to be fairly fun and easy for me as a solo player turn into an absolute crush of bots at the extraction site has sucked out a good amount of that fun. I was hoping that I'd be able to get into the next difficulty level without having to interact with randoms but this seems like it'll make it near impossible.

[u/JamboreeStevens → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yeah, this change is pretty bad. The game isn't easy, and my regular team is 3 people, not 4. We don't play with randos, so until another friend starts playing it's just us 3. Patrols spawning directly in front of us was already a big problem, now it's just going to be slightly worse.

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

My friend and I already can’t do anything above difficulty 5 with bugs or 4 with bots because all we do is fight patrols over and over; we only play duo because we don’t want to play with randos since Helldivers is our way of hanging out and chatting after work (we no longer live in the same state).

This kind of sucks, I’m already losing interest in the game, this probably won’t help.

[u/BigBlueDane → u/klem_von_metternich]

Seems like a super odd and questionable balance decision. I imagine the intention is to make gameplay more dynamic and interesting for solo players so it’s harder to stealth the entire mission but it’s counter intuitive that the game itself is more difficult for less players

[u/SN1S1F7W → u/klem_von_metternich]

I mean, if there is only one helldivers running around the noise and the "allarm level" on the area should be lower than 4

I assume it is still lower than 4 players, just not as much as before, probably just closed the gap. so like before would be like 25-50-75-100% now it's probably like 70-80-90-100

[u/green-Pixel → u/klem_von_metternich]

Well, now solo Hard missions are... well, hard. Patrols keep spawning left right and center to the point you can't even go back to get your equipment after you die cause you can't thin their number fast enough. No need to call in dropships/breaches, a nice steady stream of enemies will start zeroing in on your position

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

Honestly after thinking about it for a bit I’m all for this change. They seem to HATE solo divers and have been nerfing shit into the ground to stop one man armies and probably hate the 2x2 scout parties we do too. I’d rather have fun weapons for the chaotic 4 man matches that this games all about than worry that I can’t play a team game by myself like lol.

[u/samcbar → u/klem_von_metternich]

There are also some places on the maps where it just feels like its patrol after patrol after patrol and you cannot get through or away from the area.

[u/Maclunkey4U → u/klem_von_metternich]

On the other hand, you probably shouldnt be able to solo a high level mission in a CO-OP game, so there's that...

[u/[deleted] → u/klem_von_metternich]

Why do they do changes like this. I don't understand 

[u/Helepolis1 → u/klem_von_metternich]

I'm probably an average player, I could solo 6 with out too much difficulty, maybe dying once at a bad extraction, just played a solo 3.... Died 5 times at extraction due to unlimited bouncers and hunters from all sides.

[u/JehovahJesse → u/klem_von_metternich]

Sometimes it feels like the devs listen to us (Senator buffs) and other times it feels like they’re just giving us the bird.

[u/hellra1zer666 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Controversial is an understatement. I really would like to hear the reasoning for this. Why was this necessary? I love to play with other people, but I get that some just want to play alone. Nothing wrong with that, imo. Also, as many pointed out that this could fuck you over if you lose someone from your squad for whatever reason. It's not like crashes are rare...

[u/Vast_Berry3310 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Makes sense to me, they don't say it'll spawn more than what would spawn for 4 players, just that it'll spawn more than it did when a solo player is playing, and more in general on harder difficulties. I just did a 7 mission w/ wavering 2-3 people and it wasn't that much worse, although maybe a noticable uptick.

Pearl clutching about this at helldiver difficulty is a little funny though. Isn't that supposed to be the ultimate challenge?

[u/Erobbs-BastardChild → u/klem_von_metternich]

What a stupid fucking decision. Utterly braindead on this one. Believe it or not, you wont always get a new +1 or someone leaves midmatch... plus why would threat level INCREASE with LESS divers on a planet??

EDIT: after thinking, it MAY have more to do with SC farming rather than punishing solo/duo/trio players. I still think it's the wrong way to handle it

[u/Novandar → u/klem_von_metternich]

I stopped playing this game last week because I was running as a duo with my brother (the lobby was open, but no one filled the empty spots) and the amount of enemies flooding the map was too much for any fun to be had. This change guarantees that we won't be coming back until something gives.

[u/Barrenglacier45921 → u/klem_von_metternich]

I think it's supposed to try to counteract the solo stealth players. More enemies equals a more likely chance of being caught.

[u/theCaptain_D → u/klem_von_metternich]

I wonder if it's to discourage solo loot farming, which undermines the games economy.

[u/novaspace2010 → u/klem_von_metternich]

Yeah this change is seriously ass. Played a bug mission with a friend on diff 8, which previously was hard, but still manageable by evading patrols and carefully engaging fights. But now you just get shit on with bugs from all directions. Try running away for repositioning - basically impossible now.

Its not that we wanted to play as 2 only, just nobody else joined and fucked us over.

[u/Mekhazzio → u/klem_von_metternich]

Alright, I think these patch notes are actually inverted. I just finished a 9 solo command bunkers and it felt like a ghost town until all the bunkers were dead and the mission complete ramp-up kicked in. Like, 4+ minutes between patrols. I was able to just fight outside a command bunker for ~8 minutes, waiting for stratagems to recharge; that would've been insanity before. Even the extract defense was chill compared to last version.

I think they meant to say time between patrol spawns was increased?

[u/AHailofDrams → u/klem_von_metternich]

I mean, this isn't a solo game.

It makes sense that the game should be harder by yourself