Arrowhead Game Studios released an extensive balance patch for co-op shooter Helldivers 2, bringing several changes, improvements, and fixes. The update nerfed weapons, tweaked game-level regeneration, reduced much-needed headshot damage, and much more.
While the community has appreciated the developer for this major patch, one particular change with the patrol spawn has not sat well with the players and has drawn controversy. Fans have criticized the developer for making the game harder for solo players and killing the fun for them.
Helldivers 2 Fans Are Not Happy With the Enemy Patrol Changes
The patch 01.000.300 update for Helldivers 2 brought changes to armor, weapons, stratagems, and enemies. The patch has increased the enemy patrol spawns when there are less than four players in a party, and the players going for solo runs will find it more difficult to take down the bugs.
This means that players with a party of four will see no changes in enemy patrol spawns, but those without a party will have to face the wrath of more enemies. The patch update states that “the biggest noticeable change will be for solo players at higher difficulties.”
Increasing patrol spawns for smaller squads is a dick move.
byu/ItsDaFunkMonkey inHelldivers
This may have been well intended to give more challenges to solo players, but fans do not like it. User itsDaFunkMonkey on the r/Helldivers subreddit labeled the update as a “braindead move.” They said that they want to play with a smaller squad at times than random people.
They questioned Arrowhead about why it is trying to “ruin the experience with more spawns.” They also said that if the developer isn’t going to buzz on this, it should meet “halfway.” The player said that the Arrowhead must increase the rewards for players completing missions with a smaller squad.
Arrowhead Explains Its Decision to Increase Enemy Patrols
Fans agreed that increasing enemy patrols for smaller squads was a bad move from Arrowhead, and it does not make sense given that the situation is already bad for parties with 1-3 players.
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The controversy also made its way to the Helldivers 2 discord server, prompting developer Arrowhead to come forward and explain the reasoning behind this change. The response was also shared on Reddit by community manager Spitz, who quoted Arrowhead’s design director, Niklas.
Update from Worlds team on increased patrols for solo players
byu/SpitzerFX inHelldivers
The response reads:
We unintendedly had non-linear scaling of the patrol spawns, so they didn’t spawn as often as they should have when less than 4 players. The intention is that 1 player has 1/4th of the patrols compared to 4 players, but it used to be that they had 1/6th.
Spitz further said that the patrol spawn scaling was already “exponential,” but it felt too empty when smaller parties were players, “especially when playing solo.” The decision was taken to make patrol scaling more linear, and solo players will get 25% of enemy patrols.
Spitz added that the change is made so that the game world feels less empty for 1 and 2-player lobbies and increases difficulty on high-difficulty missions, which were, as per Arrowhead, “slightly too easy for solo players compared to our intentions.”
What are your thoughts about the enemy patrol change in Helldivers 2? Let us know in the comments.
