July 2019
Ranked: Point system is both nice, and also extremely flawed. Why is there a cap for how many points you get from kills? It's not like I didn't kill them. Why don't assists get you points? You help down a target, you should be rewarded. Why is there a penalty for leaving? As someone who leaves because their teammates are quite literally doing nothing, I don't see the point of punishing people for not wanting to waste their time watching someone struggle to push the 300 damage mark. Insert "You don't have to play ranked. Ha! Got 'em! I'm part of this discussion! My voice has been heard!" * here. You're right, I don't have to. But I wanted to get better and play with people who know what they're doing. Not stuck in the unranked queue playing with people who take 10 minutes to loot the area they dropped in. On top of that, respawning someone doesn't necessarily mean you'll win, especially later on with higher damage rings. Typically when I die, that's it for my squad. End game stat reports normally show me with 1k plus damage, while both of my teammates barely break 400 combined.
Battle-pass: Cool rewards, awful implementation. Randomized challenges ranging from, "Knockdowns in x specific area" to "Knockdowns with x weapon" to "Kills with x character" have extremely poor requirements to complete and even poorer battle-pass progression. Knockdowns in x area are the worst, seeing as how that's entirely based on ring position, drop-ship orientation, popularity of said zone, and whether or not you're the jump master. On top of that, why is this a multistage objective with each required area locked until you complete the first? If there's four areas I need to be, I'd love to adjust on the fly to a different area if the first one isn't a good spot to drop. Plus, 3k exp for a daily challenge, and 6k for a weekly? That's not only kind of pathetic, 6k exp is in my experience, 600-900 more than one win. Time survived exp is approximately 180 exp for 60 seconds, so I'd just have to be alive for five minutes in a new game to make up for 900 exp. That's pretty awful. Especially since some of these objectives are multistage, and require more than one game to complete. In short, time put into completing the objective isn't worth the reward. On top of that, you've optimized the battle-pass for length rather than actual progression. For perspective, I finished the season 1 Battle-pass with 55 days to spare. That's 110 (or 120 can't remember) in 35 days. That's roughly 3.14/3.4 levels a day. I've banked for at least 15 levels per week, currently sitting at 30 in 11 days. Roughly 2.7 levels per day while completing all dailies and weeklies. For putting in increased effort with the challenges, their randomness, etc. etc. and not changing anything up significantly, I'm not sure why I'm at a slower pace than before. Also it took me 16 games to do one stage of those "knockdowns in x area" because the ring never closed on said area, and no one landed there, and I'm not happy with that.
General: Hit reg both works, and also doesn't. It's better than before for sure, but I'm still getting hits with no damage, both at long range and up close. Disruptor and Hammerpoint rounds are nice, moreso because they're definitely way too powerful. I get why y'all removed bunny hopping (not saying I agree with it) but you could at least let me keep using a consumable when I hop once. I get extra distance when I hop, and now I have to redo my medkit. This especially sucks when you're running from the ring. Speaking of, I'm glad you guys wanted to change the meta to make 3rd partying less prevalent, but the ring changes are definitely not right. Faster ring + increased damage = keeping everyone in close proximity in fear of the ring = fights break out = 3rd party time. Also I'm glad a level 2 ring will permanently remove whatever teammate I just revived from the game because they can't out-heal the damage. Glad as Lifeline I can't provide a buffer for them to heal up so they can run. Also what's up with drawing weapons after I swap their positions in my inventory, or after I use a jump tower? Why exactly do I have to re-charge them? Why is there a cool-down between drawing your weapon and landing? What's up with me pressing a key to draw my weapon, my character not drawing said weapon, and me punching the air aimlessly? Also what's up with everyone being exactly the same color as the shadows in the game? Not sure if this is just me, but I can't see anything sometimes. Some characters' skins blend in seamlessly into whatever shadow they're sitting in and I can't see them. Bonus points for muzzle flash obscuring their model entirely. This isn't Escape From Tarkov, I kinda wish I could see. Speaking of muzzle flash, yes. I'm glad I can't see.
Other than that, fun game. Having fun.