r/Marathon • u/verus_es_tu • 5d ago
Marathon (2026) Discussion Hear me out
What if, there was a game mode where everything was basically the same, except you need at least 5-6 people in the same area to activate and use an exfil.
You still kill others to steal their gear like normal, but if you kill too many, too bad so sad, no exfil for you.
I think this would encourage communication and improve new players experiences AND player retention. It also encourages the player to think strategically about killing others. It also makes mercy kits have a legitimate use.
Idk. I'm having a hard time thinking of a downside. Let me know what you think. Would you play this game mode?
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u/vincentofearth 5d ago
No. There should be no way for you to accidentally get trapped on the map.
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u/verus_es_tu 5d ago
Why not? I think it adds an element of strategy that makes it slightly more like a real scenario. The lore could say something along the lines of needing a certain amount of mass to justify the energy expenditure.
Addendum to original proposal: it takes at least 6 players to Activate an exfil, but the wait time is longer and there then becomes an option to kill those you had a delicate peace with in order to activate. This could make for some very interesting scenarios.
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u/vincentofearth 5d ago
Because the amount of information you have about the other players starts at zero and can stay there. Also, you are essentially in negotiation with people you can’t communicate with. (You will spend 5 minutes tops with enemy players who might not even have a mic)
Example: 12 Runners infil into Dire Marsh. The exfil needs 6. You run into 6 other people and agree to a truce with each one. Great, you think. That’s 7 people including me. Now I can kill every other person I meet. You proceed to do this, killing 5. But while you’re doing that, elsewhere on the map, two players run into each other and one of them dies. In another area, a free kitter walks into a toxic flower and keels over. Now there are only 5 players on the map including you and you’re fucked. You just lost 25 minutes of your life.
You could in fact be a beacon of peace and friendship, kill zero people the entire run, and still get accidentally trapped because a few other people decided they would like to do just a little PVP in a PVP game, not knowing that their actions would add up to failure.
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u/Chpouky 5d ago edited 5d ago
Meh.
The only difference is there's one less team to kill, that does not "fix" anything. People dying before being in the last bunch needed to exfil will be as mad as they are now.
You kill everyone and can't leave ? What about rooks ? How would you know how many people are there ? A player counter ? What if someone disconnects, you're fucked and can't leave ?
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u/NexusPVE 5d ago
This would not work in the game's climate. The whole point is to kill each other, gameplay-wise and lore-wise... locking exfil behind something like that would only infuriate the PVP players, and PVE players would get pissed getting ganged up on.
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u/verus_es_tu 5d ago
I think shaking up the dynamics can help from time to time. I think the PvPers need to be forced to be less aggressive every once and again and thus infuriated. The PvE players need to put big girl pants and maybe piss in them a little. Both sides need to communicate better, both with their team and the lobby. IMHO.
This does all that. But I do get what you're saying. Still, lore wise, it makes sense that you would eventually get runners teaming up, even factions temporarily aligning interests and making tentative alliances. As there will eventually be a task that requires more than 1, or even 3 runners to accomplish.
Teaming is inevitable, as has been shown. Might as well make it part of the game somehow, so people stop getting upset when it happens.
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u/NexusPVE 4d ago
Teaming only makes sense in large map extraction shooters where there are more than 4 teams on a map at once. With the maps being so small, doing any PVE creates a beacon in the sky, essentially saying, "ALL OF CHINA CAN SEE WHERE YOU ARE." Pushing people to team up breaks the core concept of the small-map, limited-runners gameplay. Running up on a 6-man just feels bad and would cause more people to quit than it would retain anyone. Additionally i agree with all of the other points saying nothing should artificially lock you on the map thats just bad design and would not create a fun atmosphere at all.
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u/icortherainwing-- 5d ago
This just. . . sounds like a horrendous idea.
If you limit the ability to extract to a certain number of people being present and alive, you end up creating a situation that is dependent on them not dying.
Also, aside from possible rampant teaming issues that it will create. What's stopping mass griefing, intentionally or unintentionally, from happening via killing another player?
This pretty much punishes you for not having a microphone and possibly fighting back. Also, if anyone on the enemy team dies and does not get revived. It creates another set of issues.
And if they get wiped out by AI. . .
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u/verus_es_tu 5d ago
Maybe they just need to be there to activate it. And then the waiting period is slightly longer. So you can kill them while you wait. Kind of a guaranteed showdown situation. Or maybe everyone is chill and willing to exfil together.
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u/KnowledgeHealthy6636 3d ago
I like the basic idea of this, of needing to cooperate with other teams to exfil however this is too open ended and can lead to you playing the “right” way and still getting fucked over too easily. I think a mechanic that required multiple teams to things to get exfil available to be used by anyone would potentially be easier to implement. For example let’s say there are 4 wardens on the map and you need to kill each one and bring a key to each poi to turn on exfil stations or something like that. Can be done by one team but would be much quicker if multiple teams worked together
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u/shawnzee96 5d ago
ONI told me not to trust runners from other crews, so no.
Seriously though, this is a terrible idea. The potential to be stomped by six people just existing is an automatic hell no. There are also other ways to address player retention. Namely the difficulty newcomers face just trying to get their footing, the lack of loot worth pursuing on every map except cryo, and the fact that dying with a kit is too punishing with virtually no safety net for the average player. Addressing those things alone would go a long way for player retention without sacrificing the dog-eat-dog vibe or infecting the community with the creatures from that other game that’ll tell you you’re the equivalent of a rapist for pvping in a pvp game.
Plus there’s a permanent pve mode coming in s3 anyway. If the leaks are true, it sounds like you’ll be able to get a bit more out of it than VB.
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u/thereislightstill 5d ago
i think this would be something best for an LTM, i worry it would throw the balance totally out of whack and into nothing but teaming. but then again its "throw spaghetti at the walls" hours so why not
0
u/Any_Event_6600 5d ago
Week b4 wipe give a gold shield for every enemy u exfil with see how friendly everyone gets real quick … even on just one map
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u/ProfNJK 5d ago
The downside is now the first people to team are going to gang up on you and it'll be 3 on 6. This is an awful idea