In Marathon’s most recent closed playtest, many changes were implemented in an effort to enhance the player experience, and make it more appealing appeal to a broader audience. One of these changes was significantly lowering the time to kill (TTK), which has had a massive effect on how the game feels to play, and which strategies are viable. In this essay, we will take a closer look at how these crucial parts of the player experience were impacted, directly or indirectly, by the game’s average time to kill, and discuss what Marathon would look like with a high TTK, some problems that might arise from a high TTK, and some solutions to those problems.
Let’s first examine how TTK impacts how the game feels to play. A recurring sentiment I encountered in the feedback forums for this playtest, is that players felt like getting caught was happening often, and was a consistently frustrating experience. Getting caught is a part of every extraction shooter, if you’re running in the middle of a field with no cover, and you get ambushed by a squad, your odds of coming out alive are vanishingly small. In Marathon, in it’s current state, you don’t need to be in the middle of a field to get caught. With the TTK so low, you can be in what would normally be a safe spot, scouting for other teams, and still get deleted without coordinated fire, from very far away, almost instantly (and even instantly with a sniper). This is an issue because there aren’t tools that players can use to circumvent these situations, like other similar games before it. In Apex, there is plenty of utility players can use to scout for players in addition to a much higher TTK, in Hunt players with bounties have a limited amount of dark sight, allowing them to see player heat signatures through walls, and in Tarkov, catching and being caught aligns with the game’s ultra-realistic philosophy, and in close quarter areas, footsteps reveal the position of other players. In Marathon, players can maneuver around the map without making almost any noise, and the only reliable utility that can spot players is Blackbird scan, which reveals her location, has a very long cooldown, and does not scan players far away. This lack of ways to get information, combined with a punishingly low time to kill, leaves players feeling frustrated; like there is often nothing they could have done to not get caught.
Lets look at the game’s optimal strategies. The most (and only) optimal strategy in Marathon as it stands, is playing the cat, and optionally, preying on mice. Lie in wait or skulk around the map, letting ticks eat away at your shields, collapsing in on or running the opposite direction from the first noise you hear, and if you elect to collapse, hope there isn’t another team behind you with the same idea. This strategy is more powerful than ever now that the TTK has been lowered because, as I mentioned previously, teams can’t reliably position a lookout on the roof while their teammates fight off UESC, and the element of surprise is much more important. Snipers and marksman rifles kill too quickly for the lookout or the first player the “cat” team sees to react and get back under cover, and without a lookout, shotguns will tear teams to shreds now that they can get in close so consistently, especially with the element of surprise (which is the main reason why there has been a noticeable increase in complaints on void invisibility. the immediate combat advantage of enemies not being able to see you nearly as well as you can see them has always been an issue, but the amount of time void gets to shoot at you before you can react/readjust is much more potent now, especially with shotguns). All that to say, the lower TTK has forced squads into adopting a noiseless strategy, as getting caught preoccupied with looting or AI very often translates into a swift death, whereas in previous playtests it usually only meant you had to heal back up and give up some space.
Now, let’s take a look at what Marathon would look like with a higher TTK; lets say the average TTK of the no NDA playtest, some problems we might run into with a higher TTK, and some solutions to those problems. First, lets talk about its implications on game feel. Conflict between squads becomes more attritional, but not without big swings in the action; like chunking someone with a sniper headshot, or dashing in with Destroyer and downing a player with two well placed WSTR shots. This makes PvP feel much more skillful, and fair, as you need to land more shots to kill an enemy, and players can react to being shot before they get downed. One problem with a higher TTK, is that in PvP, less skilled teams lose fights more consistently to higher skilled teams, as scoring downs is much more difficult. The way I see it, there are three solutions to this side effect of a higher TTK: incentivizing high skill players to avoid where low skill players play, making the gameplay outside of PvP appealing enough for low skill players to stay interested despite being at such a disadvantage, and making it easier for teams to avoid PvP through design decisions or new tools. Fortunately for this essay, all of these three are relatively simple to integrate into Marathon in a variety of different ways.
Incentivizing high skill players to play in other areas can be done in a couple different ways. It could start with introducing a ranked gamemode (it sounds like thats already in the works), ideally with small, cosmetic rewards for climbing the ladder. It can also be done at a deeper, systemic level by adjusting faction upgrade material cost, by type and amount, forcing players to go to harder, more skilled-player-concentrated, but more rewarding maps to gain the materials required to progress their shell, or unlock new trade deals. This feeds in to a philosophy I believe marathon would benefit massively from: easy to survive, hard to thrive. Marathon is not supposed to be another tarkov, it shouldn’t punish the player like the more hardcore titles in the extraction shooter space.
We can help low skill players stay engaged through PvP losses by first, giving players an unlimited free kit with a pistol (CE sidearm, volt pistol; what rook currently spawns with), a stack of ammo, and 3-5 shield and heal charges. This would mitigate rook’s solo only restriction for when a team of players run out of resources or doesn’t feel like putting together a full kit again, which I would imagine heavily impacts engagement. Though this would in turn make rook obsolete, so in conjunction with this change, rook would be buffed to spawn with a higher tier weapon (retaliator, overrun, volt thrower), with a stack or more of ammo, and 5 shield/heal charges. This loudout buff is balanced by rook always spawning late in a run, as a solo. With these two changes, rooks have a fighting chance against bots, but not against teams, and players in squads always have an option to fall back on, without needing to resort to rook, abandoning their team. This also presents players with a meaningful choice: do I take a free kit as a void and have first dibs on loot, or do I run rook, have a fighting chance, but miss out on the loot other players got to first? Another way we can keep low skill players engaged, is by making other aspects of the game as fun to engage with as possible; notably looting and PvE. I’ll admit, I’m not as in touch with what makes looting or PvE satisfying, so take the following suggestions with a sizeable side of salt. For looting, I think reducing the amount of different materials in the game would be a wise decision, in addition to giving those remaining materials a “sink” of sorts, like a crafting recipe you unlock by questing; something like 3 spark leaves for a blue shield charge, or 4 obedience matrices for a blue backpack. With proper daily stock values, I think this change would both reward players for progressing through quests, and provide a funnel for materials that currently feel like they are dead in your stash. Also, I think that the guarded crates, along with incursions, are an excellent way for players to feel rewarded for engaging with PvE. They feel very satisfying to complete and loot, and also incursions act as something of a lure for skilled teams, so less skilled teams have more breathing room to loot up. I think that their frequency- both incursions and locked crates- should be increased a noticeable amount, though I’m unsure about the implications this would have on Marathon’s economy.
I believe the difficulty of avoiding other teams in Marathon is one of the most pressing issues it faces in it’s current state. Being able to maneuver around the map in close to absolute silence, combined with very few options to gain information on the whereabouts of other squads, results in a frustrating amount of ambushes out of nowhere, which is not a sustainably fun gameplay pattern, especially for the teams that are getting ambushed. Uncoordinated (and sometimes even coordinated) squads are disincentivized from having a lookout scanning for other teams, because while you’re looking out, you aren’t getting any loot. Forcing selfless players to sacrifice furthering the primary goal of a run: getting loot, to ensure their team doesn’t get ambushed is something that absolutely must be addressed. So long as this is the case, uncoordinated teams will continue to be ambushed out of nowhere, and sneaky, coordinated teams will continue to feast on them. There are two half-solutions to this problem: preventing players from being able to move around the map in silence, or by substantially increasing the TTK, so ambushes are less consistently deadly. A couple ways the Marathon team has already implemented in an effort to force players to make noise as they traverse between POIs, are tick nests, and turrets. I think turrets were an absolute slam dunk for Marathon on outpost, notifying players in a large radius of the presence of players in the area, but doesn’t pose an immediate threat, as it’s bullets don’t move fast enough to hit a running player. This allows teams preoccupied with looting or UESC to be notified of an approaching squad before they are right on top of them. I think we could take this non-threatening noise queue in a slightly different direction, with an armored camera that alerts all UESC in a certain radius to a runner’s position, or spawns UESC to fight whoever it spots. This camera would take multiple shots to be destroyed, and could have a grace period where players can destroy it before it spawns UESC. Or, ticks could be buffed to be much larger, less erratic, but deal much more damage, and perhaps spawn multiple ticks at once or at a faster rate, so players moving between zones are forced to destroy the nests, lest they be downed. Or positioning a limited number or UESC in the areas between POIs, which don’t pose much of a threat, but still alert preoccupied players that another squad is approaching.
To wrap this essay up, I’d like to talk about what I believe this game’s strengths are from a PvP balance perspective (so I won’t be talking about art, as amazing as it is). The POI design is masterful. Each has its own optimal strategy, and learning those strategies was, and still is, extraordinarily satisfying. The shell design is also a highlight; each shell has its own role and playstyle, they are all very fun to use well, and there is no shell that is way more powerful than the others. The gunplay is also great, though I have my quarrels with the bloom and aim assist. But the crown jewel, for me at least, was the teamplay. No other game felt quite like marathon when you had a squad of 3 players all communicating their needs and ideas, enemy positions and damage taken, large scale strategies and runner compositions. THAT is the Marathon that sunk its teeth in me and hasn’t let go. And I sincerely feel that a low TTK diminishes each and every one of those things. You don’t need to learn optimal strategies for each POI, or squeeze every last bit of value out of your runner’s kit, or land all of your shots if you want to score a down or chunk a player enough to push at an advantage if players die before they can even react. Increasing the TTK might make the game harder for less skilled players to compete, but there are a multitude of other ways to ensure less skilled players stay engaged, without diminishing what makes this game so great.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this essay, if indeed you have. If you have any feedback for me, my discord is riis.dss, I would be honored to hear what you think, especially if it stunk!