Help me understand the hate for the "meta loadout"

[Bennyester]

I hear complaints about people using the "meta-loadout" here and there and wonder... do you think about the options?

On difficulty 7 and up you pretty much have to have anti-armor equipment and if you don't want to be stuck waiting for minutes long cooldowns you have to use a special weapon.

Now think about how many special weapons are viable in this case, and now tell me how many of those require no backpack for ammo.

As far as I can tell there are only 3 options, the one-use bazookas, the flamethrower when you fight bugs and you guessed it the railgun. Do I really need to explain why the railgun is the far supperior option here?

Add to that how many enemies the game throws at you at higher difficulty levels and the most obvious choice for a backpack becomes the bubble shield because it's the only thing in the game saving you from getting one-shot by automaton rockets you didn't see comming or from getting slowed to a crawl by every other bug. Hell, it can even safe you from a teammates wiffed orbital sometimes.

Obviously, in a team of four friends you can coordinate your orbitals to make the problem of cooldowns neglegent but would you rely on that if you play with randoms?

Pretty much the same thing goes for primary weapons too. If two third of the games weapons are shotguns, the breaker being the strongest of them why would you take anything else except energy based weapons to worry less about ammo?

Correct me if I am dead wrong about something here, but the way I see it you should blame the game for a lack of more viable (and reliable) options, not the player for using what they are given.

What do you think?

[Mr.Dark]

Originally posted by Bennyester:

I hear complaints about people using the "meta-loadout" here and there and wonder... do you think about the options?

On difficulty 7 and up you pretty much have to have anti-armor equipment and if you don't want to be stuck waiting for minutes long cooldowns you have to use a special weapon.

Now think about how many special weapons are viable in this case, and now tell me how many of those require no backpack for ammo.

As far as I can tell there are only 3 options, the one-use bazookas, the flamethrower when you fight bugs and you guessed it the railgun. Do I really need to explain why the railgun is the far supperior option here?

Add to that how many enemies the game throws at you at higher difficulty levels and the most obvious choice for a backpack becomes the bubble shield because it's the only thing in the game saving you from getting one-shot by automaton rockets you didn't see comming or from getting slowed to a crawl by every other bug. Hell, it can even safe you from a teammates wiffed orbital sometimes.

Obviously, in a team of four friends you can coordinate your orbitals to make the problem of cooldowns neglegent but would you rely on that if you play with randoms?

Pretty much the same thing goes for primary weapons too. If two third of the games weapons are shotguns, the breaker being the strongest of them why would you take anything else except energy based weapons to worry less about ammo?

Correct me if I am dead wrong about something here, but the way I see it you should blame the game for a lack of more viable (and reliable) options, not the player for using what they are given.

What do you think?

the hate is kicking people for not using the loadout

[Dew]

There's nothing inherently wrong with the current meta.
It's everything surrounding it that is the issue.
This isn't a 10% better than other weapons situation; we're talking weapons/strata that don't feel like the developers ever used them.

[Fractured]

Also just to add, the reason there is meta hate here...

1. People forcing meta

2. The meta here is a HUGE difference. Day and night. There will always be a meta, but there shouldn't be a meta like this, where you can clearly see the potency difference by just glancing in its direction.

[Tenebris]

Originally posted by Mosey:

I don't think it's a particular loadout that people dislike, it's the players that insist on people using a particular loadout that's irritating.

If someone needs the whole team to bring 'X', it means that player expects you to carry them in my view.

Nobody needs the whole team to bring a railgun, for example, unless the person making that demand just isn't very good with a railgun. Two is fine, but 4 is pretty much a waste and really overloads on anti-armor and leaves the team open to swarms.

For me, I don't even bring a support weapon most of the time. There will be plenty of them laying around when I need one and I kind of like just using whatever I find on the map. Those guns are free and don't count against my drop equipment.

I bring Railgun when I see other bringing it because I have 0 Faith that people will actually use it effectively, and I'm right 9/10 times. That, and I seem to magnetize heavy enemies towards me

[Bennyester]

Originally posted by Mosey:

I don't think it's a particular loadout that people dislike, it's the players that insist on people using a particular loadout that's irritating.

If someone needs the whole team to bring 'X', it means that player expects you to carry them in my view.

Nobody needs the whole team to bring a railgun, for example, unless the person making that demand just isn't very good with a railgun. Two is fine, but 4 is pretty much a waste and really overloads on anti-armor and leaves the team open to swarms.

For me, I don't even bring a support weapon most of the time. There will be plenty of them laying around when I need one and I kind of like just using whatever I find on the map. Those guns are free and don't count against my drop equipment.

You make a lot of sense. Looking at the discussions for this game I am getting the impression that people want to kick you for using the shield backpack and railgun.

This begs the question: What if the things you like happen to be the current meta? What if you play bubbleshield because you want to use light armor without being a glass cannon? What if you like the railgun for no reason other than how satisfying it is to blow through a hulk's face?

[Tenebris]

Originally posted by Bennyester:

This begs the question: What if the things you like happen to be the current meta? What if you play bubbleshield because you want to use light armor without being a glass cannon?

I mean, this is a moot point considering armor is STILL bugged and medium/heavy armors still do not properly give higher protection

[Bennyester]

Originally posted by Lost:

As someone who has run helldive solo and with groups, every weapon has a role as well as every stratagem.. outside the few rare exceptions like gas strike.

Mines - Lures the closest patrol into it after deployment [AP = Bots, Incendiary = Bugs]

Anti-Material Rifle - Easily blow off limbs and disables fast enemies, Can two tap a Hulk in the head.

Eagle Cluster - Amazing crowd control, dropping one on your position during a 'chase' can net you 20+ kills.

Smoke Grenades, Orbitals - Breaking line of sight forcing the enemy to advance to 'find' you, forces cyborgs to stop firing and advance on you or fire extremely inaccurately at your last known position.

Starting AR is by far the most versatile weapon, switching the zoom range and firing modes can help fill roles lacking in your loadout, from close range support to long range sniping it can disable and kill most enemies in a few shots.

Using a "meta" build has you mimic someone else playstyle instead of finding your own, now copy paste that build x4 and you have no diversity in tactics or response.. no such thing as a "best" build because again everything can be used effectively based on how you use it.

Except you don't need to mimic someone to find out how strong both the bubble shield and railgun are. At least I found out by myself. I was sceptical of the bubble shield even, thinking it might only block projectiles like the shield generator thus being completely useless against bugs, then I gave it a try...

It was only after that I took a look at this games forums and was surprised by people both wanting to enforce the exact same loadout and kick you for using it.

[Bennyester]

Originally posted by Tenebris:

Originally posted by Bennyester:

This begs the question: What if the things you like happen to be the current meta? What if you play bubbleshield because you want to use light armor without being a glass cannon?

I mean, this is a moot point considering armor is STILL bugged and medium/heavy armors still do not properly give higher protection

but it'll be fixed someday, won't it? I thought ahead with this statement!

[yourallygod]

Originally posted by Flo:

Originally posted by yourallygod:

spear works
so does recoiless

plas 1 scorcher works well against bots as well as the slugger variant of pump shotty being very good against both bots and bugs both need to keep an eye on ammo and can't horde clear if your the only one doing it BUT it does work well enough

autocannon sentry/rocket sentry good alternatives to take down mass amounts of titans/chargers/hulks/tanks

orbitals and eagles are also great at not only hoarde clearing but also high precision on early stated heavily armored enemys

SO if you see NO other option thats an unfortunate skill issue because yes the shield and railgun are ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ easy to use :D but they ain't the only option

All those things are meta though. No one ever complained for you taking that.
People complaining about "muh meta" are running with sniper rifles, laser guard dogs and stafing eagle strikes.

... i mean sniper rifles good for them bile spewers/ taking out minor points of interest from a safe distance

laser guard dog is good for keeping a majority of the little guys off you side affect of accidental tk's oh well

eagle strafing i have seen do well with horde cleanup for when the final few or if to many smol things around big guys making use of ANTI tonk weaponary harder :)

there you go found reasons to bring em that help

[Onimusha]

What's funny is that this "meta-loadout" is just something that most people would naturally drift towards because other gear parts are just lacking right now.

I'm not a fan of meta in any game. It just fosters elitism and that's never good in a game that is supposed to be just fun and where failure should be taken as an entertainment itself.

I think we all agree that griefers, who constantly blow up the team on purpose, are a pain in the butt. And you can tell when someone is totally acting with purpose.
The problem right now is that the kick feature is being abused. That one needs to be adjusted.

[Grubilman]

Originally posted by Bennyester:

This begs the question: What if the things you like happen to be the current meta? What if you play bubbleshield because you want to use light armor without being a glass cannon? What if you like the railgun for no reason other than how satisfying it is to blow through a hulk's face?

Seems to be the opposite of what's happening. Lots of folks are stating that if you enter Difficulty 8+, you're going to get kicked if you don't have the copy paste loadout.

Personally, I feel like it's a bit of a crutch. Are they strong options? Of course, but they aren't really required. And that's the big difference. These folks are REQUIRING you to use their build or get kicked.

And some wait to kick you until right before extraction as a "punishment" for not having the "correct" gear.

[Bennyester]

Originally posted by Onimusha:

What's funny is that this "meta-loadout" is just something that most people would naturally drift towards because other gear parts are just lacking right now.

I'm not a fan of meta in any game. It just fosters elitism and that's never good in a game that is supposed to be just fun and where failure should be taken as an entertainment itself.

I think we all agree that griefers, who constantly blow up the team on purpose, are a pain in the butt. And you can tell when someone is totally acting with purpose.
The problem right now is that the kick feature is being abused. That one needs to be adjusted.

Dunno if you read the other comments, but here's what I had to say that fits what you said about drifting towards the meta loadout:

"At least I found out by myself. I was sceptical of the bubble shield even, thinking it might only block projectiles like the shield generator thus being completely useless against bugs, then I gave it a try...

It was only after that I took a look at this games forums and was surprised by people both wanting to enforce the exact same loadout and kick you for using it."

Feels like I am torn between two sides because I happen to like what is considdered meta.

[Turk]

Originally posted by Lost:

As someone who has run helldive solo and with groups, every weapon has a role as well as every stratagem.. outside the few rare exceptions like gas strike.

Mines - Lures the closest patrol into it after deployment [AP = Bots, Incendiary = Bugs]

Anti-Material Rifle - Easily blow off limbs and disables fast enemies, Can two tap a Hulk in the head.

Eagle Cluster - Amazing crowd control, dropping one on your position during a 'chase' can net you 20+ kills.

Smoke Grenades, Orbitals - Breaking line of sight forcing the enemy to advance to 'find' you, forces cyborgs to stop firing and advance on you or fire extremely inaccurately at your last known position.

Starting AR is by far the most versatile weapon, switching the zoom range and firing modes can help fill roles lacking in your loadout, from close range support to long range sniping it can disable and kill most enemies in a few shots.

Using a "meta" build has you mimic someone else playstyle instead of finding your own, now copy paste that build x4 and you have no diversity in tactics or response.. no such thing as a "best" build because again everything can be used effectively based on how you use it.

Your post would be a lot more accurate if this game didn't have such a strict "lock and key" approach to gameplay. At higher levels, armor is spammed SO MUCH that it simply isn't worth it to deviate from "the meta" unless you're playing solo and stealthing the whole time.

The railgun is the only practical weapon for dealing with the insane amount of armored enemies the game throws at you. I've seen *five* chargers stacked into one patrol before on difficulty *7*.

No other support weapon can handle that thanks to the combination of strict ammo consumption and long reload times.

[Grubilman]

Originally posted by Flo:

Originally posted by Chaplain Svenn:

I'm not here to play the game the way you think it should be played. If you think you have to play a game with a specific loadout to be good at it, you suck at the game. Put more hours into being better at it instead of whining to everyone

Post your solo helldive guide with anti-material rifle and eagle smoke

Credit where credit is due... AMR and Eagle Smokes are freakin' amazing against the bots.

[Fractured]

Originally posted by Bennyester:

Originally posted by Onimusha:

What's funny is that this "meta-loadout" is just something that most people would naturally drift towards because other gear parts are just lacking right now.

I'm not a fan of meta in any game. It just fosters elitism and that's never good in a game that is supposed to be just fun and where failure should be taken as an entertainment itself.

I think we all agree that griefers, who constantly blow up the team on purpose, are a pain in the butt. And you can tell when someone is totally acting with purpose.
The problem right now is that the kick feature is being abused. That one needs to be adjusted.

Dunno if you read the other comments, but here's what I had to say that fits what you said about drifting towards the meta loadout:

"At least I found out by myself. I was sceptical of the bubble shield even, thinking it might only block projectiles like the shield generator thus being completely useless against bugs, then I gave it a try...

It was only after that I took a look at this games forums and was surprised by people both wanting to enforce the exact same loadout and kick you for using it."

Feels like I am torn between two sides because I happen to like what is considdered meta.

I personally would never blame anyone for going meta, as long as they are having fun, cause that is what games are about.

If there was anyone to blame, it's the devs, for making it so GLARINGLY meta. They just need to bring the other weapons up.

I am one who tends to prefer things that other people don't. With a team, I don't go meta at all. But when I solo, the meta is hilariously perfect for soloing.

- I take liberator, cause I hate shotguns, and prefer AR's
- Scout armor for stealth
- Bubble for survivability
- Railgun cause it doesn't require backpack, plenty of ammo, and all around good. ALong with the fact that it gives an awesome commando vibe
- Rockets/Railcannon for heavy armor strats, sometimes swap rockets for airstrike to quickly clear areas