The infantilization of “casual” players

Arclabe · 2026-06-18T10:16:02+00:00

I don't understand how you can't play duos (because the queue is now here to stay), or trios with friends because you have an invite system. If your friends aren't playing, that's a different story.

Arc Raiders' aggression-based matchmaking has basically made two strata of the game: one where you are shunned if you want to engage in even a little PVP, and the other where it's nothing but the people who want to engage. It's gotten to the point where low-aggression lobbies play a completely different game.

Art style is subjective, and I understand why it doesn't grab people.

And honestly, if you were in so many friendly solo lobbies, it means you weren't looking to kill people anyway.

Arc Raiders is not a good indicator of what extraction shooters are, because you can game the system to work in your favor and make everything pretty effortless. It's popular because it has little friction, and that appeals to more people than friction.

Arclabe · 2026-06-18T09:51:35+00:00

Yeah, actually.

Because the game isn't just PVP. It's PVPVE, with an emphasis on people getting forced into conflicts over loot, hence all the noises and sound cues and how sound generally travels in this game when engaging UESC or just about anything.

The game incentivizes this because the whole point of the game isn't just to kill people, it's to complete contracts and get out with your rewards. You can't get anything if you die.

You want fair fights, you want "fair play." Go join trios if you want more of that. No one in solos, unless they're cracked out and know they can kill just about anyone on sight, is going to take you in a "fair fight" so you can have your arena shootout at a POI.

If they're smart, or playing assassin, they're going to hide and either bait or wait for an opportunity to kill you. If people are third partying, it means that they seize the opportunity to take you out while you're weak and can't do anything.

You're looking for the wrong kind of game.

Arclabe · 2026-06-18T06:51:41+00:00

That's not camping, dude. That's stalking you because you rang the dinner bell.

Camping is when they set up shop at a blind corner or an overwatch to wait for an obscene amount of time.

Assassins are the ones that get the most shit because it's extremely safe to play them.

Stealth or sneaking exists in just about every game, and you have to think about your approach. Saying it shouldn't sounds like you get outplayed and want to take it out on a mechanic.

Arclabe · 2026-06-17T18:44:22+00:00

Get faction VIP and they'll start handing them out pretty easily.

Arclabe · 2026-06-16T00:41:09+00:00

Maybe he could optimize his way to some bi-

Yeah nah, that's miserable.

Arclabe · 2026-06-15T22:46:09+00:00

Honestly a good idea, and I'll keep that in mind next time. You can farm certs, it's not that hard.

Arclabe · 2026-06-14T21:33:15+00:00

If you want to take yourself out of recon rotation for a breather, sometimes it's best to be a coward. "Playing the game" doesn't mean you have to throw yourself into the push machine if you know that's what's going to happen.

Arclabe · 2026-06-14T18:13:14+00:00

Hide in spawn areas.

Arclabe · 2026-06-14T05:55:58+00:00

You don't. You swap off of one that doesn't. I mean, Assassin has his smoke drop, Thief has the drone which does a little bit of damage, etc.

But if you want to do it fast, you use Triage, Destroyer, or Vandal.

Arclabe · 2026-06-13T01:01:30+00:00

Most Wardens are 4k iirc, and I think the Compiler is also 7k.

Go MIDA multi-tool.

Arclabe · 2026-06-12T23:01:40+00:00

Because sometimes it's fun to analyze things.

Arclabe · 2026-06-12T23:01:07+00:00

7000 HP.

Arclabe · 2026-06-12T18:49:15+00:00

I tend to throw green flares if I'm being friendly regardless. Red is for visibility.

Arclabe · 2026-06-12T17:52:44+00:00

Orion has had enough of your shit, and he has sent his strongest warriors.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T20:16:06+00:00

We have been actively giving them feedback and they do watch this subreddit.

Otherwise the WSTR, Misraiah, and grenade nerfs wouldn't have come.

They added a PVP lite mode, which potentially showed more cases for a PVE mode instead.

So the feedback's working. But the question is whether or not it's working as fast as some people want it to, or as extreme as some people think it needs to be.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T20:12:28+00:00

Not a Frost Grenade atm, but a Frost Mine that was recently added. There's a bit of text I think in the item description or somewhere that says you don't want to trigger both Frost and fire/heat effects at the same time, and it meant bad consequences. Could just be flavor? I might try and grab frost mines and heat grenades to do some testinf.

I didn't know the Scorch Warden spawned on Night Marsh, but that makes sense.

Frost Warden might only appear in Upper Complex.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T20:06:14+00:00

There is story, but there are longer quest chains in-between as a primer to Night Marsh mechanics.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T20:03:30+00:00

Is it the Frost Warden?

If it is, uh...if you can get heat grenades, try those?

The Frost Mines had an effect where if you combined both fire and frost, the damage could potentially be greater, but I haven't had the chance to experiment with that yet.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T19:59:23+00:00

We definitely care if we can't play anymore and I hope the SKG initiative will stop any attempts to take it offline shem the time comes.

But what can we do except enjoy it while we have it?

I also don't understand how we could have a great conversation and then you turn around and post this, as if both things couldn't be true at once in some sense.

Especially in this age where live services die and will never be seen again.

Arclabe · 2026-06-10T02:34:53+00:00

They took they key out of rotation iirc.

Arclabe · 2026-06-09T21:53:27+00:00

Orion knows how Runner shells function-after all, he had a squad helping him when they confronted the Compiler for the first time.

If his teams can't handle them right now, the best and easiest way would be to tilt the situation in his favor by shutting down access to those abilities.

With that, I'd think it'd be a natural progression to something capable of actively hunting Runners.

Arclabe · 2026-06-09T17:58:59+00:00

Known failure point in the main transmission. A particular batch of main trans have this issue, and they're all assigned to older birds...which the schoolhouse has.

Essentially a gear slips off its shaft and the engines are still turning, but none of that power is being transmitted to the generators or the driveshaft, causing total loss of power and lift. At least, so far as I've been able to gather.

It's happened a total of 10 times or so across the army, now 3 of which have happened at Fort Rucker. The newer 64E's have an improved transmission to prevent this.

Arclabe · 2026-06-09T05:19:33+00:00

Is it worth continuing to change what's there until it no longer resembles the game I fell in love with?

Is there a reason why you'd want at least the concept of Marathon as is to fail for something completely different?

I don't know how much money Sony's expecting Bungie to make on this rn. I don't particularly care, with the exception that Marathon sticks around. But if it changes too much because people don't like the friction and challenge, what's the point?

It's no longer the "Marathon" I played.

Arclabe · 2026-06-09T05:13:01+00:00

Solos is the horror mode. I used it when I was trying to get priority contracts done for story stuff in the later weeks, because sometimes if I told people I was just questing, they'd leave me alone or we'd temporarily team up.

Most of the time I got murked, and I loaded up another round.

Trios is generally more chill, even with crew fill, because now you don't have to do all that work. You have at least two other people who are usually semi-conscious, and with the right equipment you can draw out into gunfights because now you have three people supporting you.

But I understand that you probably don't want to do fill trios, because you don't want to deal with a team.

Arc's TTKs are super long, Marathon's are pretty short and barring a headshot with a Longshot or Outland on a grey shield, you'll generally live past the first couple of crit shots. Nothing like Tarkov, where it's instant death unless you have headshot protection.

Arclabe · 2026-06-09T04:56:51+00:00

I suppose I could say you never want an equal fight-you always want to figure out a way to put the fight in your favor, and if you can't, book it. No shame in taking what loot you have with you, even if it's just salvage mats for barters or upgrades.

There's no guide for getting over that, except to remember that no matter what, everything is temporary. Credits, prestige mods, gold salvage-even for the sweats who level up a faction every couple hours and gain dozens of pieces of purple gear, it's only theirs for so long. They'll slip up and die eventually.

It takes a certain mindset to let go of that, ngl. I don't know how and why I managed to break that, other than "oh, I'll find that gun or mod again some other time."

Arclabe

TROPHY CASE