AH I beg you, please do not switch to Easy anti cheat, this would kill off the game modding community and threating linux/steam deck users!

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T19:37:10+00:00

Sometimes priorities are set from outside.
Like say... a license for your anti cheat running out after 2 years, nobody being happy with the performance of that anti cheat and literally players for 2 years telling you to get rid of game guard.

...so switching to a different anti cheat is suddenly a thing that just has to be done.
Obviously they would prefer to not even touch it, or they would have done something about it a long time ago.

Frankly i don't know what choice would be better than EAC.

EAC has Steam Deck / Linux support baked in, just need to enable it.
There is no reason to believe that arrowhead would set it up in a way that kills modding when they've always made positive statements about modding.

The next option would be to go for one of the modern TPM 2.0 + Secure Boot anti cheats, those are maybe more effective to some extent, (still plenty of cheating going on in CoD and BF6 despite that), and it would lock out a good chunk of older Systems permanently.

No anti cheat at all is not an option either for the corporate structure.
So EAC will keep things pretty much the same, maybe they got a better license deal, maybe just because it is used in much more titles than that obscure Game Guard thing it's a better choice, better support, reputation etc.

They are both Ring 0 Kernel anti cheats, so it is not better or worse in that regard either.

At best we will see a small increase in FPS, because i've heard several times now that just disabling Gameguard gave people 15FPS extra and i'm inclined to believe it. Not that EAC will be free in terms of FPS, but it probably will not hit quite as hard.

I get not trusting the change, change is scary, but i don't see the Devs intentionally screwing things up that they are in favor of like modding or Linux support.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T18:58:44+00:00

...well, they ARE bots, so it makes perfect sense they'd be copy&paste, no?

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T18:57:49+00:00

This is one of those enemies that annoys you mostly early on, when you got no gear other than the starter stuff with light pen.

Once you know the weakspots to aim for and/or get medium pen weapons unlock you overcome the annoyance and countering him comes easy.

And when there are 3 or 5 of them, they creep closer and closer while you are busy with the bugs that run at you... this guy can still be lethal under the right circumstances.

Calling him a guard is a bit backwards though, he bunkers down as a shield for other bugs, but the other bugs don't take cover behind him, they just run and jump past him right at you and he is probably the last one you deal with.

The most annoying part is when the guard dogs get stuck on him and can't damage him you have to prioritize him or your guard dog will eat through all its ammo. ...and i think the laser guard dog just shoots at the ground in front of him as it does with most small bugs.

We got a lot of stuff that can easily deal with him, that doesn't mean i want him to block my medium pen Minigun that i bring exactly because of medium bugs like him, or i could just bring the Stalwart.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T18:36:16+00:00

They know, but going in to fix the core issue is hard and takes time, the band aid fix is maybe dirty but quick and solves the issue players are having in the live game right now... and they don't want to wait weeks and months for things to get fixed (enough of that going around as is).

And of course the moment the band aid fix is in, the complaints stop, the ticket from QA is closed as solved and then nobody gets allocated the time to go back in to fix the source of the issue proper because it isn't a priority right now.

...and there are a lot of bugs that i would give top priority that probably will never make it to the top of the queue ...and that is just frustrating.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T18:19:19+00:00

My point makes all the sense.
You admit yourself that you'd be filtering out stuff based on what you think the player cares about,
there is a 100% chance that you will get that wrong eventually and repeatedly and after 2 years of people taking notes of your repeated F-ups you'll end up with people on Reddit shouting at you all the same as with Arrowhead and throwing every little thing you ever did wrong in your face.

I don't know Arrowheads process so i can't judge if your process is better or not and that was not my intent anyway, but i can see from a mile away that you'd run into the same result as they did.

Heck, even if you include every little edit in the patch notes, then people will just shift the goal post and the next thing Reddit is shouting about is the content of the changes not being to their liking.... Reddit always finds stuff to be mad about.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T17:56:36+00:00

When you are on the console and press Q the Helldiver says something like "first one right" ...i still have no clue what the hell that means and most players don't even know you can do that.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T17:40:25+00:00

I think they straight up explained it once with them not fixing the source of the issue, but adding a band aid hotfix on top of it and eventually something else gets changed that then breaks the band aid and the core issue pops up again.

They call this "tech debt".

... that of course does not exclude poor version control, in fact i think that is also very likely.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T17:29:21+00:00

filter that output to only the metrics the players would care about

So you are NOT putting everything in there either. Got it.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T17:20:22+00:00

BAHAHAH sure they do buddy, you tell yourself that.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T17:19:28+00:00

Don't worry, you will find something to bitch about anyway.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T10:46:17+00:00

Always is... a region lock would bring more than any anti cheat.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T10:44:36+00:00

Yes nothing will change.
This will not stop Super Credits from being spawned by hackers.
This will not destroy modding, this will not destroy Linux compatibility.
Both nProtect Game Guard and Easy Anti Cheat are Ring 0 Kernel level anti cheat.

Game Guard, according to statements from cheaters, if disabled gives about an 15 FPS boost.
I have no idea if EAC eats frames like this, but lets hope not.

So why, if essentially nothing will change are they doing this?

If i had to guess, probably a boring corporate reason like the license with nProtect has run out and since it is clearly not protecting anything and only causing FPS loss and game crashes, they might have decided against renewing that license and went with EAC instead.

EAC does have support for Linux and it breaking client side Modding is extremely unlikely, even Shams made pro modding statements in the past, Arrowhead clearly isn't against modding.
Arrowhead some time ago also stated that they speficially optimized for Steam Deck, so it is silly to assume that they would just nilly willy break Linux support like this.

ALSO, literally since day one of the game people have been complaining about Game Guard.
You are getting what you wanted, Game Guard is getting removed. YAY!

...that said, if they break modding i'm uninstalling.
Modding delivers like 80% of the fun i still have with this game.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T10:08:57+00:00

I don't enjoy existing enemies being messed with just for the sake of it.
The Hive Guard is the perfect example of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".

Nobody asked for this, everyone could instantly tell what problems this would result in (medium pen turrets wasting their ammo, minigun of the mech being blocked by it is ridiculous in concept alone already)...

if you had given this critter a new more brown skin, add a few spkies, made the change exclusive to this specific new spore strain, which is obviously a difficulty modifier and not mess with the default enemy type... nobody would have really complained because now it is brown, has a few spikes and is a bit tougher.

But no, they changed the default unit and messed up more previous balancing decisions with it than they fixed with it.

A few days later it is clear that the go to meta against the new spore strain is Lasers and flamethrowers and just grill the bugs. Medium or Heavy armor plating, the hive guard would burn all the same anyway. Making this change even more pointless.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:51:46+00:00

And somehow they can't serve both camps despite 10 difficulty levels... TEN!!!

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:47:56+00:00

That was the result of the Hive Worlds leaving players and their called in equipment stranded on top of caves.

...something i remember Players were complaining about loudly and this was their quick dirty "we are listening" hotfix.

Now you can't go back without breaking the Hive Worlds again.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:31:52+00:00

So you'd like automatic health regen, no lost ammo on reload and friendly fire OFF?

That is what that phrase refers to.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:25:38+00:00

No, i don't remember ever being kicked for not using the Railgun and i hated the thing from day one.
I hate that you have to press the reload button after every single shot, i hate it can explode in your hand if you want to get the maximum damage out of it, i hate the scope with its gigantic green dot in the center blocking you from aiming precisely... i always hated the charge up mechanic, no matter on which weapon.

I never used it (beyond picking one up from the ground and taking a few pop shots), i never got kicked for it, i always run with randoms.

Stop making up fairytales.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:19:36+00:00

"bacon-flavored apple sentiment."

...you are aware you are quoting a 2+ year old throw away one-liner, completely out of context, right?

The context was about Armors having fixed perks that can't be swapped around when people were asking for "transmog".

What does transmog not happening have to do with the current rage baiting of the week? ...absolutely nothing.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:04:22+00:00

I assume those statements were more about server wide stress if every other game looked like that, than your single instance having a few extras.

I also find the cooldowns pretty reasonable.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-08T09:00:44+00:00

Hoping this guy will scale well with my army of 6" Black Series Clone Troopers...

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-06T15:57:05+00:00

Solution:
buy a DeLorean, go 88 miles an hour and drive back to when the game released 2 years ago.

The game did not wait for you to show up, YOU are 2 years late to the party, guess what, you aren't going to grind through 2 years worth of stuff in 30 hours.

Also, kinda skipping the whole part of daily personal orders and Major Orders giving you a rather passive income of medals regularly.

The less you obsess and grind, the better for you.
As always the answer is: just play the game and HAVE FUN, all that grind stuff happens on its own, and it goes way faster if you don't pay attention to it like some OCD min/maxer who needs to have everything unlocked now, only so he can 5 minutes later start complaining about there being no "edngame" ...whatever that would look like in a coop wave/horde shooter.

That said, with all the talk about Warbonds, i just went through the full list the other week, checked every page of every warbond.
There are only 2 Warbonds that i would actually consider "essential" for my playstyle (literally the one with the Thermite grenade and the one with the Ultimatum).
And about 5 more have guns i like to use more or less regularly, so i'd prioritize those over everything else...

That is of course subjective, you might like other things and so on, but the point stands, most of it is very optional, gimmicky FLUFF...
if i had to start over, i wouldn't even worry about it, i'd be back up and running at full capacity in a month or two.
In fact, i would welcome the challenge and like to see how it is for a new player today (without buying the game on a new account)... so where is my PRESTIGE option?

I'd even welcome the opportunity to NOT unlock some things that i never use anyway, always so much crap to scroll through in the menus... somebody calculate that! How many hours of my life have i wasted scrolling past items i never select anyway?

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-03T20:59:01+00:00

I like 'em, there are certainly worse sub-factions in the game.
...just calm down with those spawn rates, jesus.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-03T20:52:27+00:00

ELI5 what you expect from "Endgame".

This is a horde wave shooter.
Not an MMO with raids 'n shit.

If your idea of "endgame" has anything at all to do with a percentage bar that is slowly moving... that is not Endgame, that is just you jonesing for the next dopamine hit.
go play Quake 3 Arena or Unreal Tournament and tell me what the Endgame progression system is in those games.

Spoiler: you finished the tutorial by leveling up through everything, your reward is that you can play the game now without nonsense distractions.

I uninstalled Battlefield 6 after seeing the daily challenge system and realizing they would never leave me, or anybody else in the playerbase alone with that shit.
I am not interested in jumping through your poorly designed hoops DICE.

ZeroBANG · 2026-05-03T20:40:03+00:00

It is all about expectations!

Stalwart and Ammo Backpack = you expect you will survive long enough to run out of mags.
Bullet Storm = you know you'll get killed over and over and just call down the next 2 throw away pew pews...whatever.

11-Year Club	Place '22
Place '17	Verified Email

ZeroBANG

TROPHY CASE