I read it. And I'm being skeptical about the part where Miguel mentioned that we would have nothing remotely close to the attack bike if we did not buy the founder's pack. That I would call a missing gameplay element, what a game that cost you money to buy should not have.

A related question to hopefully be answered on the live stream is are the only side grades available, the ones in the cash shop?

If there is only one standard of bolter or shuriken catapult (before any customisation) available and the only way to get a different version is from the cash shop then it'll really affect gameplay. If however there's a chance of finding different versions through playing the game. Either through random drops or something like that, I'd be much happier

Going to also play devil's advocate here and say...
I liked that read, it was satisfying.

With the exception of the bike-confusion (will non-founder players not have access to any sort of bike? I was under the impression that there were going to be regular bikes).

And on the topic of dreadnoughts... YES! Glad to hear that there's some very basic design ideas as to to how they would work later on.


A summary of how I feel:


I'm very confident in Behavior though. More so than any other developer or publisher yet. (including some indie devs)

As I understand it, those who purchase the attack bike will get it months ahead of those who do not.

Also, as regards gameplay elements, wouldn't the standard bike offer the FAV gameplay element, while the Rhino kept the transport option covered?

For some reason I just feel less concerned with the attack bike being somewhat exclusive, as long as the bike option is still available to everyone.

T

Yup. To be fair it WAS my idea to go this way. I did actually want to take that train out to the countryside and meet all my friends to go bird watching. I just wasn't informed that the conductor implemented a new feature that may cause many people to not make it with me and has a good chance of harming me as well.

See I think this is also what Miguel thinks about the situation and hopes for. The problem is that many of us have already mentioned earlier: the items can be balanced absolutely perfectly in their performance relative to opportunity cost but in a game like this that alone does not insure balance or fairness.

As a player I can always pick and choose my engagements, I can pick and choose my equipment and I can pick and choose my approach to any given engagement. What this means in practice is that if our skill and guns are perfectly balanced and are sidegrades, I will win in a situation where my gun excels and you will win where your gun excels, BUT I can also have your gun. I can pull it in my next deployment and have the same capability as you in the same situation as you. I can do the same with your tank. I will achieve the same performance as you with balanced guns/vehicles of the same role but I will also be able to switch to other guns/vehicles of other roles and beat you there on top of that because I am only ever as committed to my choice as my resources/ deployment options allow.
You can't do the same to me. It becomes even more of a threat if the unique sidegrades I have give me access to things my faction normally can't do but yours can. Then I am straight up filling in the holes of my arsenal with bits of your arsenal and completely negating the downsides of my faction flavor while retaining the advantages as buying these weapons/vehicles doesn't lock me out of anything.

With this the only way to limit me is to limit my resources and deployment options drastically so that I have to commit to everything I pull extremely heavily. I would have to be unable to change my kit outside of friendly facilities (I would still have the advantage over you in defenses then) or straight up need to go back to sanctuary to switch loadouts (then you have balance but you've also killed a good chunk of the fun by locking players down so hard). Likewise I would have to be very limited in how many vehicles I can get at any period of time and where I can get them (although then you can bet I'm gonna pull something bigger than a goddamn bike if I'll be stuck with it for a period long enough to ensure commitment to the role).

This is what the devs really must address and quite possibly the biggest game design problem they may face in regards to their monetization scheme.

No, thankfully there will be customization for all players. Just not the customization that cash shop items offer as the devs believe that would cheapen the cash shop stuff, these builds won't be possible outside of the store.
I'm also glad that David expressed the possibility that the 2 man bikes may be made available to non-founders later with a different skin.
My complaints aren't doomsaying and I don't actually want you guys to get the impression that everything is completely fucked.

So having read the whole interview I come away feeling fairly positive.

The team and tone seems really dedicated to creating a good 40k game for the fans, and if that's all there is to it i think i'll be happy.

I like the concept of side-grades though that will have to be looked at very closely because often all factors are not equal and a simple swapping of stats could create a clear 'winner' in terms of effectiveness. The bike is a little weird but i hear what he was saying, I think we might see regular bikes for non-founders but not attack bikes.

So long as the real money store is restricted to cosmetics (skins and decorations), visuals (alternate executions or battle cries), and True "side-grades" (ensuring that different but equivalent is actually the case) then I have no worries about the store. we will just have to keep an eye on it.

Honestly, the worst case scenario would be about equivalent to PS2, where every gun besides the most generic ones needs to be purchased with real moneys (and before someone gets on my ass, yes, technically they can be acquired via grinding alone, but given it takes several weeks of gameplay to unlock a single weapon, they're essentially the same.)

That's certainly not ideal, since:
a) this is a BTP game most people will already have spent 40$ to play
b) there's no indication whether cash shop items will even have a regular unlock option
c) PS2 was a pretty bad system that a lot of people hated and that probably missed its own potential.

But still, it won't be the end of the world. It'll just be moderately crappy and disappointing.

So, as players, what you're saying (or what I am hearing, maybe) is that you would prefer that weapons statlines be the same (prior to any player-side modification), and that any Founders changes be purely cosmetic.

So we will likely get the Godwyn pattern bolter, but you could get one of the less-common patterns from the Store and apply it to your boltgun.

Of course, there are variants that DO come with major changes (like Angelus pattern, for example), but those should be treated as separate weapons entirely, and have a requisition cost associated.

Using this method would still allow for weapon customization on the player-side, but would ensure the "balance" by keeping statistical variances out of the Founder Store.

OK, I could get behind that, the player still has some control over how his weapon looks and operates, but any player could imitate the functionality simply by installing the same mods/upgrades.

T

I do not like how side-grades work. I buy items from store/shop cause i want to look unique/cool, not because i want to have better/different weapon. These small changes will affect how you use the gun/vehicle (maybe you won`t notice that if you are a casual player but someone that wants to min/max will whine/rage for a good reason). If there is for example Ork Buggy in store there should also be Ork 2 man bike with same stats as shop one and same weapons that overall looks different but can be obtained in game. Please don`t say that people can pull out tanks if they don`t have bikes, that just sounds cheap. You either put both "normal" and "shop" bike versions, weapons, armors, etc. or you don`t put them at all.

To cut it short: Stick to aesthetics only. Don`t offer special items with stats that are not obtainable in game or unique vehicles. Everything in shop should have "normal" version obtainable in game through upgrades or something.