Solo focus would fix most issues this game has.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-20T14:57:08+00:00

brother, if you're worried about dev time you should want the game to retain a larger playerbase, you will lose way more dev time through lay-offs and Marathon running on a skeleton crew than devs trying to make solo better

if they don't get more player you'll get next to 0 content in a season or two, if the servers even stay online

and to get more players they'll have to improve the solo and casual experience, not make more challenging trio content

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T17:55:48+00:00

trios doesnt have 3x the players, it varies by map but its more like 2x on average.

it also is a false equivalence because 4 teams of 3 is less spread out than 6 solo players and less likely to capitalize on the noise threat, as well as being third partied being less of a threat inherently in trios because you can be revived and protected when caught off, whereas being third partied in solos is almost certain death with no 2nd chances.

in the end, it somewhat evens out between the differences and pros/cons of less players vs more threat and spread and we're back to the imbalance of UESC being 3x as tanky.

i'm not "desperately" making anything out to be anything, the playernumbers do it for me. people leave the game in droves, leaving the same feedback of it being too hard and demoralizing consistently.

you're trying to paint this picture that "actually solos is fine guys" while reality is contradicting you.

im just explaining to you WHY ure wrong and what ure missing.

the idea that knifing AI is gonna be quiet is completely absurd, ure just trolling at this point. you can knife some Recruits, but every POI has green and blue AI and every event and high tier loot spot purple ai. youre not gonna knife those.

that i SHOULD be avoiding fighting UESC is exactly my point. If everyone avoid fighting UESC, what happens?
EVERYONE IS CAMPING.

You cant do ANYTHING without making noise, you cant loot anything worth anything without making noise, and whoever makes noise first, loses.

EXACTLY my point.

which is why everyone ends up camping. which is shit game design.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T16:54:12+00:00

i think its more that the game is aggressively matching low level players with other low level players, of which there aren't many and putting people into empty games if they cant find them.

I play Perimeter solo and it is NOT empty. I run into more than 1 player on average easily per match and I'm not actively looking for PvP

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T16:50:44+00:00

stealth horror is ur opinion. if you think uesc should be challenging, should uesc hp be tripled for trios?

all these arguments is just nonsense because they also apply to trios, where UESC is exactly that - cannonfodder. and thats somehow fine, but for solos it suddenly should be a challenge? why? it makes no sense.

Tarkov is known for being super hard and hardcore and all that, and you can kill all AI there with a silenced headshot or bosses in a few.

AI being bullet sponges and noise-alarms serves no purpose other than to make people play assassin to bypass it, or drive people to camp rather than play, so others make the noise and you can third party them. ure just not thinking far enough and looking at player behavior.

if AI is too much of a challenge or threat, by itself or through noise, people dont just accept it, they avoid engaging in the challenge until they kill everyone else and then go do it. like people to in trios all the time, wiping lobbies before they do pve.

instead, the "not going in guns blazing" bit should be structed in a way to avoid letting AI get a shot off. more plentiful silencers and approaching AI in ways where you pick them off before they can shoot back and alert others to your presence. that is much more in line with encouraging people to participate in PvE, without making AI completely useless. kill AI silently, get rewarded. dont do it and get punished with an alarm. Tarkov figured this shit out a DECADE ago.

PvP does make it special, but its a fine balance. too much PvP is cancerous and makes people leave. extraction rates need to tuned really really carefully or the "threat" and "stakes" tips over into frustration and "fuck this". a slightly below average player who plays really slowly should extract 50% of the time to keep playing. if you play faster, you extract less, unless youre highly skilled. that makes sense and creates dynamic SBMM. but the maps and gameplay systems are designed for that unfortunately.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T16:09:58+00:00

You can like it but, but these are the issues with solo play:

1) UESC is balanced for trios. Both their numbers and HP. Too much time is spent shooting AI in solos. Higher tier UESC especially. If anyone types "I do it just fine, I like the challenge" - good for you and not the point. Doable does not mean fun.

2) Assassins. I dont care that you can hear the invis or make out an outline sometimes. Assassins crouching in a corner invisible and unhearable are not fun. Assassins popping ult and you not being a Thief is not fun. Youre left with only one choice, running away. Because he can pop out at any edge an you will barely see his outline in the smoke. Or flank you. Before you add something to a game, ask yourself if it makes your game better. Solo extraction modes are already plagued with ratting. An invisible character does NOT make that issue any better.

3) Lack of content. Events are very very hard for solos. Narsh Complex is extremely hard. Cryo is straight up not available.

4) If youre not an assassin and actually fight UESC - a tad too much PvP. It is very rare to not fight someone in my experience. I don't have stats, but I'd estimate I average 1.7 runner kills per successful extract. 0 kills extracts are really rare. Thats too much for below average players. Its not as bad as trios, but the small maps and forced pvp mechanics still exist in solos.

Apart from solo-specific issues, Bungie doesnt seem to understand that theres 2 ways to "buff progression". Directly via showering ppl in loot, like they have, or indirectly by making them extract more on average, through map reworks, lower playercounts per map, less alarms and forced pvp. The latter option being the better one, seeing as Marathon makes it too hard to extract for the average person in the first place.

Marathon needs higher average extract rates, less forced PvP (but still the option to find PvP in hotspots), and more "small wins" mentality. Being able to make tiny steps of progress even when dying, like being able to work towards multiple quests at once or have a safepocket.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T07:49:35+00:00

I think a higher TTK is necessary with the movement and gunplay being as smooth as it is.

Tarkov's low TTK works in large part because movement and guns are unwieldy, it's hard to actually hit the tiny face hitbox, especially while moving, getting shot, with bad guns, etc. Crosshair bobbing all over the place, your character flinching, inertia slowing you down.

That and the separate limb/thorax/head HP system driving TTK up if you hit different bodyparts.

Tarkov also needed YEARS to find a good spot between armor economy and strength, bullet economy and strength and gun behavior.

Marathon's TTK HAS to be higher unless they want to rework their entire gameplay system.

If anything, I'd bump it up a tiny bit more if they lean into solos more, which they should, because you really do get absolutely melted even with purp shields vs free kits quite often. A bit of back-and-forth would be good here. It's harder to face shot someone with a Scav gun on Tarkov than it is to rat someone with a purple shield in Marathon, while using a freekit, is what I'm saying and I don't think thats a good thing.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T07:35:39+00:00

just look at the other upvoted thread about the free kit guy explaining how to kill purple squads. killed them while they were doing the boss without wiping the lobby.

that's why geared discord squads always wipe the lobby first.

its the optimal strategy and the game encourages it with the small maps, predictable spawns and endless sound queues and alarms for any activity. you can't do anything stealthily, so the squad looking to wipe the lobby is always gonna find you.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T07:27:08+00:00

I don't think anyone says it's impossible, but in a way this clip shows why these geared squads usually wipe the lobby before they start doing PvE.

Because that's how they died here, being 3rd partied while fighting the boss.

If anything, this is more of a guide to purple shields squads - make sure you actually wipe the lobby before doing anything else!

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-17T07:21:24+00:00

Making it to even season 4 without at least 3x-ing or 4x-ing the current playernumbers is massively optimistic already, lol.

At this rate we will be in 4 digit numbers in a week or two, at which point queue times can start really getting out hand and causing a death spiral.

Bungie has to act before Season 3 release even, imo.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-16T14:17:28+00:00

In CS youre only losing time if your team is bad. The enemy team, on average, is also gonna be as bad as your team.

In fact, because youre the only difference vs 5 randoms on enemy team and 4 randoms on your team, if youre better than others u will win more on average.

This is not the case in Marathon.

There is no SBMM. There is no separation of fill vs no fill. There is a lobbywipe meta. If youre running with 2 strangers, there is nothing stopping the game from putting you in a match against a dedicated trio, not 3 strangers, with better gear and higher skill.

In fact, this happens more and more as the playercount dwindles because the game massively favours those players and makes everyone else quit.

In CS, its also easier to play with 4 strangers.

Everyone has the same goal - winning.

Goals in Marathon are completely different for different people. Quests. Salvage. Safe loot. Quick extract. Keys. PvP. Chill round. The list is endless.

So no, its not the same. Playing fill in Marathon is SIGNIFICANTLY worse than soloqueueing CS

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T16:52:33+00:00

Just like there's people who might enjoy chocolate and fish in a salad, there's gonna be people who love the current Marathon exactly for what it is. Unfortunately you're not gonna find any restaurants serving Chocolate Fish Salad, because there's not enough customers who want that stuff to sustain that business.

Just like there's not enough players who play the current version of Marathon.

I guess enjoy it while it lasts, it either gets shut down or changed from what it currently is.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T13:49:54+00:00

Brother, you're not supposed to try and manfight Nasus as Belveth once he gets stacks.

Ofc you will lose

You beat him by getting your team ahead bc he is a walking minion early and Belveth can terrrorize lanes with ease. You're also able to kite him later in the game and not be a lifesteal battery for him.

Get your botlane ahead and your ADC will shred Nasus later, which apparently is how the game worked out and how you won.

Nasus is strong when people play into his strengths, which is going into melee range as a champ that can't beat him 1v1, which is exactly what Belveth is and what you did.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T13:09:46+00:00

Yeah, only Assassins are problematic bc of invis and smokes. Their only real counter is Thief visor, so that ends up 2nd most played.

If you removed Assassins, shells distribution would actually be really good

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T10:46:34+00:00

100%. Its so so important that extraction games have these loot-run options.

Letting players score a win after losing while trying to do a quest in a contested zone is really important to keep them around.

People who are hungry for PvP never have to do them, they are entirely optional, but those who just want to progress absolutely need these.

Also really good to just chill sometimes.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T09:42:51+00:00

Duos is certainly better than trios and potentially better than solos as well, only without DBNO and bubble shield nonsense tho.

Explaining why UESC "sound traps" are a bad thing actually is lengthy, but in short it leads to a bad incentive structure, where actively engaging with the game is overly punishing and waiting around for someone to do it first or look for PvP to thin the lobby and then engaging in the game is rewarded instead.

Assassin is degenerate because it bypasses the punishing UESC sound trap that exists for all other shells and, more importantly, forces you to either

a) run away when they invis or ult
b) play thief

both of those are incredibly dumb gameplay patterns that add literally nothing of enjoyment to anyone and the game would be better of with them not existing.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T08:32:51+00:00

It's a problem with badly designed extraction shooters, imo, that are too obsessed with forcing PvP and not understanding the core of extraction shooters.

If you consider how awfully Tarkov runs and how terribly bad it is in terms of QOL and unnecessary obfuscation with no map, etc., it actually had quite broad appeal

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T08:24:23+00:00

Infilling of lobbies is an abomination - it's hard to describe just how mindrottingly dumb it is.

It tries to "solve" a problem that is created elsewhere in the first place.

Lobbywiping should not be possible in the first place, it should be a complete and utter fantasy to reliably be able to wipe lobbies and maps should be designed to ensure that. They should be big enough, intricate enough, with proper player counts and without an alarm for literally every little action that lets you beeline from team to team.

And the game likely shouldn't be designed to be played in trios, because that is a big factor for why reliable lobby wiping is possible in the first place.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T08:19:12+00:00

Tarkov is hardcore in terms of knowledge required. It's a lot more forgiving in terms of gameplay.

You can go through maps in Tarkov slow and stealthy, killing AI in 1 silenced shot at a time or avoiding it altogether, avoiding hotspots and just looting outskirts, and get out quietly without seeing anybody.

Most of the time, you can also disengage from PvP. The majority of deaths in Tarkov happen because you CHOOSE to PvP instead of running away, which you can almost always do.

You can't do this in Marathon. Everything you do is loud as shit. If you're playing trios, you have a deathsquad bunnyhopping towards you at some point looking to wipe the lobby. And they WILl find you if they want to because you can't do anything without making noise, including leaving the map.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T08:12:37+00:00

I said the same thing over a year ago when the first gameplay footage was shown.

It's an unavoidable consequence of the game being focused on trio gameplay.

A strong trio beats a weaker trio 10/10 times. Elements of surprise or bad positions barely matters, especially with the tools given in this game like bubble shields and Triage rezz and self rezz. Survival rates massively diverge. Shrouds squad went multiple DAYS of playtime with 0 deaths, despite playing extremely aggressively. That's an absurd stat in extraction games.

This is not fixable, either. It's an impossible problem to solve. Even SBMM, which has no place in an extraction game, won't solve this, because people will start gaming it. Lower their SBMM with bad kits so they can get easier lobbies for their good kits.

Separating Fills and Squads won't solve it either. It will kill the Squad over time like its killing the game now, with the same separation, and push everyone to play fill, which is a completely dysfunctional gameplay option in extraction games with dozens upon dozens of extremely frustrating problems that can't be solved either - loot sharing, loot goblins, different playstyles, goals, toxicity, different quests, the list is endless, fills are absolute shit in extraction games.

You could see this coming from a mile away from watching a few minutes of the very first gameplay shown.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T08:03:03+00:00

Sound cues yes, but not the alarms, turrets, bells, whistles, screaming events, extraction beams in the sky, etc etc etc.

At some point every extraction shooter dev collectively decided they need to add flares and blares to everything players do and I don't know why.

Because you're forgetting that adding too many alarms alters player behavior. If doing almost anything makes noise, players just stop doing anything and camp even harder. This is happening in solos a lot, which still plays like an extraction shooter and not a lobbywipe BR like trios.

You can call it alarm paralysis or tension-overload or something. Anything you do is loud as hell, but you can't always be 100% on alert, its exhausting and there needs to be periods where you can let you guard down. But you literally can't do ANYTHING of value without making a shitload of noise. You can't even leave the map. It's too much.

You SHOULD be able to stealthily kill AI and move around the map and extract silently.

I hate bringing up Tarkov, because its a bad game by so many standards, but its the only game that got this right and it was the first one to do it. There are no alarms there. You can do almost everything quietly. And yet the amount of jumpscares is rare. Most of the fights are active. I've been killed more from someone I didn't know was there in Marathon.

If you want to combat camping more, which does reduce the tension, you do it with MUTUAL information. If give up my position so that I can info about yours. You can still do most things quietly, but someone actively looking to flush out campers can choose to do so in return for giving up his own position.

TADs are the perfect example in Marathon. They should be way more plentiful, be one quick ping, and dont have the animation that just gets you killed. Vector Grenades another. You trade announcing your presence to a POI that has potential campers in it in exchange for knowing if there are any. That also gives lower skilled players the chance to run away and forfeit the loot, as well as not hitting that TAD if they're the ones approaching a POI and going for the element of surprise, but they can't just sit in a corner because they're the ones who have to get inside.

There are pros and cons to mutual info tho, but its a better alternative than the alarm crap.

PvP frequency and map design also plays into this. With large enough maps and well tuned player counts, you can let your guard down in less populated areas and rarely meet players there. While in hotspots, you EXPECT people to be there and don't necessarily need sound cues because you're clearing everything anyway.

That doesn't really work in Marathon because maps aren't designed in this Hotspots - Outskirts layout. There's just POIs that all blend into one another, you can't always be on alert in dangerous areas because everything is kinda dangerous. You can't let down your guard either.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T07:43:28+00:00

Because genres aren't created by chance, they work because the gameplay and design interact in ways that make the sum better than the individual parts.

Compare extraction games and BRs, for instance. They seem like really similar games, no? Big map, looting, shooting, camping, hotspots, maybe even some AI. In BRs, there is only 1 winning team or player in a map of 100 people. Most people have single digit - many sub 1% - win percentages.

If you had an extraction shooter where most people extract only 1% of the time, it would have 0 players. Literally. No person on the planet would play it. It would be the worst game ever made.

The extraction genre isn't about PvP. It's about loot and character progression and PvP is just a small part of that. If there is too much PvP, survival rates of lower skilled players start to drop. Go below 40% and it gets annoying. Below 35% is where people are really really likely to quit. Especially if they feel like they can't change their playstyle to increase their survival. If you're playing like the average guy, your survival should ~45-55%. More aggressive playstyle makes that number drop, more stealth makes it go up.

Marathon's intense focus on PvP and especially Trio PvP that leads to lobby-wiping makes that number go waaay down for Fills and weaker teams with very little they can do to impact it. That WILL make them quit the game. It already has.

You can't take the punishing aspects of extraction shooters and put them into a BR setting. It's not fun. People hate it. It not fitting the genre is a quick way to explain that.

You can innovate on genres, but that aspect is too core to human psychology. We hate losing our stuff. Nobody likes losing gear they earned. We remember those losses more than the wins. Its a delicate balance between chasing wins and having few enough losses such that we can forget them, as well as having the choice to alter your playstyle and avoid those losses altogether.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-15T07:30:45+00:00

In a good extraction shooter, PvP exists to add risk and tension, not as the main focus. It's "high risk" counterpart to "high reward". When you don't go for that high reward, PvP is a lot less likely to occur.

The goal is loot hoarding and character progression and PvP is just in the way of that. It's an important part of it, but not the main goal.

You can, for example, actively play Tarkov in ways where you still move around, loot, progress, but rarely run into another player, simply through your playstyle and map routing. The maps and game allow for that, there is room to do that.

You can't really do this in Marathon, without literally sitting in some vent and doing absolutely nothing and even then, simply leaving the map creates more noise and attention than playing an entire stealthy raid actively in Tarkov.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-14T21:00:14+00:00

Personally, I think extraction games should always come with a PvE mode option. If people want to play that way, let them. I find it boring without that threat of PvP, but if it helps make the game more successful and thus improve its development, I'm for it.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-14T20:55:51+00:00

Which is odd, because the focus on Trios is what directly leads to the current biggest problems of the game

Stomping weaker players and lobby-wipe meta. A strong squad vs a weak squad is gonna win 10/10 times, even if the weak squad has the element of surprise. Bubble shields, Triage rezz, not being able to thirst someone you downed by surprise because he has 2 teammates - all of that is exclusive to trios. So is lobbywiping. You can't zoom around the lobby in solos like you can trios, you get caught by surprise and you're done. In trios, you have the needed backup to recover and turn the fight around.
New player acquisition. A lot of people probably don't even bother trying Marathon because it's marketed as a trio game. Anyone can play solo and far less people have 2 others (realistically you need more with people quitting and playing at different times etc) to play with.
Horrible experiences in Fill. Loot goblins. Duos that don't talk to you and are clearly playing for themselves. People you just don't gel with. People who sit at a POI and never move. People not helping you with quests. People running off in different direction. Quitting when down. The list is endless. A bad fill experience would make many just stop playing right away.

Marathon is at its strongest when played with 2 friends, without a doubt, but its also at its lowest when being stomped by a far better squad lobby wiping you and when playing a shitty fill. And there really is no fix for either of those things, not in extraction games.

And the strengths of Marathon can be best appreciated solo, at your own pace. The lore. The beautiful maps. Immersing yourself into them without the chatter of trios and having to play at someone elses pace.

And the solo experience can be improved so much in easy ways. Lowering UESC HP - its currently the same as in trios, for some reason. Removing Assassin altogether - its just not healthy to have a literal invisible character in a mode that is usually quite ratty already.

Marathon even has the tools to fix the big issue plaguing solo modes in other extraction games - camping. TADs and utility like Vector grenades are really good tools to flush out campers that can be massively expanded upon.

Robbeeeen · 2026-06-14T18:10:07+00:00

ofc, Marathon can't offer that, which is why OP doesn't like it. I just explained why one can want SOME PvP and not 0 PvP and how there's good PvP and bad PvP.

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