It would be nice to have a dedicated helicopter game mode like every other vehicle in the game. Instead of helicopter arcade, realistic, or simulator, we get a half-baked game mode thats about as entertaining as a bag of wet flour. Heli PvP would’ve been fine if they just did a BR rework so we don’t have AH-1Gs getting spawn camped by Ka-50s. Devs decided to scrap the gamemode instead of fixing it for some reason.
Last time I played (2-3 months ago) there still were a couple of BR brackets, with the highest starting from 9.7 up to 12.0+. Have the removed them all now with starter helis playing together with top tier helis?
Yeah i played Heli PVE around the Time they removed the wagers to grind the Japanese Heli Tree with the Prem AH-1S and i was doing absolutly fine.
Rewards were not crazy but it was kind of relaxing flying Helis without worring about crazy Missiles Sams targeting you (unless i flew near Bases who still had these Sam Sites at this point).
But for a “Dead gamemode” that would likely never be touched by the DEVs again i never thought it could get so much worse over the time with the AIs etc to a point where it could be said its a super early Alpha release.
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I was hoping their release of several new helis perhaps indicated tweaks to heli pve could be inbound. Apparently not…maybe the aerial warfare mode will give better options.
For now, the helis (especially the LMUR equipped mi-28) can just keep pummeling me in ground RB ;)
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They need a separate bracket for FNF helis in PvE, try getting any points in a game with 2/3 helis that have FnF missiles unlocked while using some of the worse Helis stock such as the AH1E/F/S/Tzefa D/HKP9A/Gazelle/Z9W/BOE 105 ect
But we can see here why it becomes such an issue. You are part of it:
You just demonstrate where the problem is: 40 min of game time will provide the same reward with about 1600 score, provided you survive. You have basically taken away score options from others for virtually no gain at all. You can play this mode safe; as long as you collect 400 score every 10 min, you are fixed. Doing more will just make life harder for others.
If you want to earn better, understand the economy.
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The log scale is around 50% 100 score, 75% 200, 90% 300, 98% 400 per 10 min scoring period.
Yes exactly, but people seem immune to this simple knowledge. The key to this scale is to survive. If you survive 10 min with 200 points you are much better off than if you die after 3 min with 800 points.
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To be fair, the game doesn’t make it easy to track these values. It really wouldn’t be that hard for the devs to add something like this to the scoreboard:
It would significantly help with tracking your score in the current reward interval. At the lower helicopter bracket it’s fairly easy to keep track of these values, but at the top bracket it’s much harder to keep an eye on everything. Dying makes it even more complicated - you have to remember both the time of your respawn and the score you had at that moment. Maybe that’s why so few players bother keeping an eye on this.
Hi Paul,
it is more than just that.
As Heli PVE can get boring on times, I tried to talk to several sweatlords who piled up like 800 in 6 min.
They don’t even believe it. The idea that they are on a different economy is completely alien to them. Some don’t even bother to look at their stat cards to confirm the changed rewards. They consider it a good idea to win faster. Basically, they do everything to ruin profits, including their own.
Adding that station arrival information would help only those who hardly need it in the first place. We can guestimate when we have reached 300-400 extra. But most players don’t even know where the train is driving to.
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This. Only a few players actually understand this and most just race each other to get as much targets as possible. At higher tiers it’s almost impossible for some players to score. It’s even more infuriating to hear the devs say that there are enough objectives in the game mode even though the map is constantly empty. And his response about Heli PvP almost made me crash out. They make a game mode shit, no one plays it because its shit, then he says “The mode wasn’t popular” well yeah, you made it terribly. Heli PVP would have been just fine if they just made more BR changes, so we didn’t have KA-50s fighting AH-1Gs. And no one plays heli PVE because it hasn’t been touched in 4 years. Players are somewhat to blame because they refuse to learn the useful actions mechanic.
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Actually, there are quite some people playing it, including myself. But surely, it could be better.
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Mi-4s vs AH-1Gs wasn’t much better.
Not being as dead as Air Assault is one thing Heli PvE has going for it.
BR changes would fix that issue too.
I would hardly call me being part of the problem I dont even play the game mode enough to pop up on statistics
If gaijin designs a gamemode poorly thats on them its straight up just bad game design to make the player sit there doing literally nothing for a whole hour just because its more ideal for grinding
If your previous statement is right, you definitely are.
Then you comment on the current state:
The point is, that to get even to 1600 score in 40 min will require a lot of activity on your part. But you don’t have to fight your team mates to the blood to collect those 3000 points. Even if you only collected 1200, you’d still have 92% of the income you’d get with 3000. Just kill the SPAA and the the little choppers deal with the remaining infantry. Or farm planes, if the others can’t.
Once you understand, that you will earn about x RP for 10 min of active survival, the whole game gets more enjoyable, because you don’t have to play in an elbow mentality. For me, that part is actually a good decision in the game design, because it would allow for team play. Just that the team doesn’t want to learn this, even if told in chat.
It is even worse than that, because the devs did not think about how the new helicopters with fire-and-forget missiles would affect the Heli PvE game mode.
Since the maps in this mode are relatively small, these new helicopters can simply hover in the middle of the map and use their 15-20 km range fire-and-forget missiles to hit everything that spawns.
There will be more and more players unlocking these helicopters and completely dominating battles with them. The situation is already very bad even when there is just one such helicopter in the match.
For example, here is a battle I played yesterday after 10 minutes:
Spoiler
You can clearly see who has the new fire-and-forget missiles unlocked.
I wrote to this player that getting such a high score makes no sense, because he gains nothing extra from it and only takes score away from other players, but he ignored me. And I understand that I cannot really blame players for playing the game. This guy was simply doing what the game and his new helicopter allowed him to do.
After 20 minutes:
Spoiler
And at the end of the battle:
Spoiler
It is completely ridiculous that a single helicopter can dominate a battle like this. The worst part is that he does not even move for the entire battle. He just positions himself in the middle of the map and, whenever enemies spawn, quickly rotates and fires all his missiles within seconds. Because these new missiles are so overpowered, he can destroy most planes and ground targets before anyone else can even get them within range.
So when I hear the devs saying that Helicopter PvE mode is perfect now and needs no changes or improvements, I seriously ask myself whether they have played even one Helicopter PvE battle recently. This statement is so out of touch that I cannot believe any player who actually plays this mode would say everything is fine. It is an unbelievable level of ignorance.
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I reported a bug related to broken sector attack and defense objectives:
Helicopter PvE - All sector-related objectives failing to spawn
In my latest Heli PvE battle, not a single sector-related objective spawned. Normally only a few sectors get bugged during a match, so having all sector-related objectives broken at the same time is extremely rare. Because of that, this battle is actually a very good example of the issue.
Since no sector-related objectives were generated, strike aircraft also didn’t spawn at all during the battle, as they are tied to these objectives.
Bugs like this are honestly very frustrating. From a player’s point of view, a battle like this is basically a waste of time. I stayed until the end just to make sure the objectives wouldn’t suddenly start working later. When the first convoy reached player-controlled sectors and no sector defense appeared, it was already clear how the entire match would go. I only kept playing to properly document the problem.
What makes this even more disappointing is that the developers have stated that Helicopter PvE development is finished and that the mode doesn’t need further changes. Meanwhile, even the most basic mechanics, like objectives that are required to earn score, can completely fail.
Issues like this are one of the reasons why Helicopter PvE isn’t very popular. Even in this battle, other players were saying that matches like this simply make no sense to play.
There’s a chance my report won’t get any attention or might get closed for some trivial reason, but at least this specific issue is now properly documented.
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Its been like this for 4 years. Devs asked the players for feedback, players gave them feedback, then the feedback gets ignored. We’ve got tons of awesome gameplay mechanic suggestions and those are also ignored. We’ve got a bunch of unique helicopter suggestions, but instead we got 14 Hinds, 17 apaches, and maybe a few premium helis. It’s really demoralizing waiting for improvement for helicopter gameplay. The most change we’ve gotten is fnf agms but giving top tier helis fnf missiles isn’t a fix, its just more frustrating for ground players and stock helis in Heli PvE. The overall gameplay has essentially remained the same and in some aspects actually gotten worse since the introduction of helicopters. I mean most of the problems could be addressed with little to no effort. Primary examples: The KA-50s dominating heli PvP. Could have been easily fixed by adjusting BRs so it wasn’t facing 8.0 helicopters. Game director’s solution? Get rid of the gamemode.
Low player count in heli PvE. Could be easily fixed by making the gameplay engaging. The game director’s solution? Ignore all feedback and suggestions then forget the game mode exists.
Helicopters aren’t even worth grinding or playing at this point and I’ve tortured myself through 3 whole tech trees. It’s an absolute waste of time.
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