Make Defensive Units (DU) Scale/Split with the Number of Players

[Draker Raze]

I know this is a dead horse, but has the Community Development Team reconsidered either a DU split or increase for Coop mode? I have played Dungeon Defenders since release back in 2011. I have always loved the game, being an avid fan of Tower Defense Games. Yet, time and time again, my friends and I are driven off due to the DU limiting how you can play. With the release of the Summoner, my two-man groups came to life, we finally had our own DU that we could spend how we wanted! You must have seen the community response to the MU/DU! (With the exception to the fact that Summoners became mandatory in solo or high end play, just to utilize the extra defense slots.)



I have always been part of the Split DU crowd, there is nothing more disappointing than getting 4 friends together to play Dungeon Defenders, just to end up stepping on each others toes by using up the DU someone needed.



Option 1: go from X DU available, to X/X/X/X DU for Player 1/2/3/4 (Each player gets their own X DU to spend). Buff the monsters. Allow the players to decide if a joining member has adequate gear for what they are doing, and remove them if not. (Risky/unpopular approach, but it is already happening, but with DPS players)



Option 2: go from X DU available, to 1/2/3/4xDU for 1/2/3/4 Player matches. (Multiply the amount of universally available DU by the number of players). Buff the monsters. This would allow the 3DPS/1Builder meta to remain, but would also allow for the more friendly groups to simply delegate lanes or heroes to building defenses (for those who don't have multiple types of players at the range they are playing with).



Option 3: go from X DU available, to X/X/X/X DU for Squire/Mage/Hunter/Summoner/Monk/EV. Buff Monsters (possibly by number of classes "Seen" in that match). The Least popular of the 3 options, this would take the MU concept that the Summoner has, and spread it across all classes. Every class would have their own building pool. This would allow friendly groups that roll one class and stick with it for a full game clear to not step on each others toes, meanwhile allowing late game multi-class accounts to play as usual.



Not everyone enjoys being forced into the 3dps 1 builder meta. This is a Tower Defense game by default, after all.

[Milkman]

Ruins the feel of the game, You can beat every map solo and with 4 people even with 3 afk. No need to change something that isnt broke

[Draker Raze]

I feel that being able to clear a map "even with 3 players afk" is the very definition of broken.

[Draker Raze]

This is a Co-op Tower Defense. If there are 4 players in the map, all 4 players should be allowed to, or even be expected to, contribute to the match. The only limitation should be space and, to a lesser extent, mana.

[Divusmor]

Wouldn't this basically turn DD1 into DD2?

[asas2007]

Enemies already scale with number of players... nothing new...

An increase in DU will only throw away alot of the difficulty of the game imo...
ps: you dont have to use the whole du in order to win anyway...

[hawklaser]

I get where the OP is coming from on this. Not sure how to best fix it though. There comes a point when playing with friends, where some lose interest due to not being able to do anyting in the build phases, or on the other end you get one who isn't the best of builders and causes problems by "wasting" DU by putting towers in bad spots.

Part of the fun with playing with friends is having everyone involved and having fun the whole time.

And if want to comment on how much DU is needed on a map, might want to consider ones stats in that as well. As at lower stats you often need to use up more of the DU in order to clear a map. And there are certain points in the game where that becomes quite evident, such as the transition from insane to nightmare for a newer player that didn't get carried into and/or given Trancendent or higher quality gear.

So its not really a question of how to find a way to mess with DU/MU and enemy scaling, but how to allow more people to participate in each phase of the game at the same time. The most obvious way is tweaking the DU/MU in some way, along with some tweaks to enemy scaling, so can allow more people to build while also bumping things up to warrant the extra DU/MU. Some of the enemy tweaking could be like how Hall of Court gets Ogres from the both directions with 3+ players, but only one direction with 1-2. There are a few other levels where the extra Ogres come from odd directions with 3+ people, and that can really change up how one has to build a level when on the lower end of stats.

[Dryden]

Have any of you thought about how this would impact the end-game balance, where a single player uses more than one character at a time? There are so many ways that these suggestions could be abused, and even more ways that it could cause problems for how the game currently works.

If the number of players present increase the MU/DU, then what happens if a player leaves after placing defenses?

[YungGoat]

Dont need more du or your own seperate du if your playing with friends just work it out between eachother. Simple as that.