Zen_Concern

I can tell you that it was a bit much that at level 22 I could herd an entire level in the Synapse TF because my glacial armor and frozen armor floored mobs to a 5% chance of hitting me.

Although it was fun to have 8 bosses going "whif","whif", "whif". Just had to be carefull for that "SLAM".

It is a nerf to Ice tanks but thats about the only people it will be affecting. Oh, snap. It will also effect bubble defenders. Now they "have" to slot their bubbles.

MMmmmm Spy Drones.

This is a damn good idea. My respect for you just went up a bit Poz. Don't let it go to your head. I'll just run out and buy a little more NcSoft stock before the jump happens due to the slew of people joining for the unique PvP in CoH.

Or, I could give you a cookie. Your choice.

I am all for it poz. Making two different bind schemes is definately player friendly and the right move in my book.

I just wanted to say that I bound my shift key so that I could use the secondary tray useing it. It is a heck of alot easier on the pinky.

Oh, and I never use the numbers to select teammates. I am seen as an awesome healer in my SG as well so it certainly has not impacted that. Click name use power bam, done.

I do like having the control key access the third bar. I just hope you don't change the binds we currently have in place.

I would say that after Issue three the Cape mission seems to be alot easier.

That is my impression of it anyway. I still had people asking me for help with their mission though. I would walk in and wonder what they needed help with. Then I saw them play and saw how they handled the last room.

This mission is now doable by just about everyone, but some people still ask for help.

You know if Statesman wanted to encourage grouping he could have contacts give out cell numbers faster. That would allow people more flexibility in choosing missions amongst teammembers and would encourage grouping. If contacts gave you their number after the first time you talked to them that would be great and greatly improve life in Paragon.

Oh, well I guess you could do the boss thing too but I think the above is a step in the right direction.

I have been suggesting this kind of content that Benefits all ATs for awhile but few people want new content unless they can be joined at the hip with someone. Sorry I shouldn't say "few people", I should say half the people that responded to my Teamo, Solo, Water polo post.

As to Kali commenting on the guy who flamed me for no apparent reason he was totally off base.

This game was marketed as solo friendly. People bought the game thinking the goal and direction of the game was a solo friendly MMO. Slowly changes started happening in the game that encouraged grouping. I make a few posts saying what the intent of the design team is and express my dislike for there view and get flamed by people who don't know grinding for xp from Solo content. Some people think grinding is Solo content.

In my opinion most of the people who say if you play in an MMO you should expect to team are the worst Teammates because they have preconcieved notions of how an MMO team should work. They know their cookie cutter play style through and through and they don't want to change it. In my opinion the MMO=Teaming attitude is more of a hindrance than a benefit to this game.

Some people just don't understand how both styles of gameplay can be fun at different times regardless of AT. Sometimes I want to take that controller out and feel like a friggin hero without a team and before I am level 32. Sometimes I am looking for people to play with.

The current system is just another forced group (encouraged teaming with no viable option) MMO waiting to happen. 3 white minions = one hero at all levels is a concept that needs to be deep sixed.

Minions are minions are minions and it does not matter what level they are. They would like to give minions more powers and give LTs more powers as the levels increase to make it seem like you are fighting more powerfull minions. In my opinion that takes away the concept of the minion.

Minions you fight at level 50 could just as easily been bosses at level 30. Someone will say that that is the point. You are progressing to the point that something with powers at lower levels that you would consider a boss is now a minion to you.

Problem is it makes no sense story wise. It makes sense balance wise but storywise it blows goats.

Wow, I could just go on and on why the design currently stinks to high heaven and how some of Kali's thoughts on how conning should work give a more heroic feel to the game but no one has probably made it this far down the post anyway.

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And I don't feel they should. Besides what is a "successful" game anyway? Is it successful if you design and build a game that you are dissapointed in?



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If success is determined by whether or not your target audience likes the game and you want to succeed then yes even if you are dissapointed it is still a success.

On the other hand if you define success as making a game that you feel proud of and damn all the critics and profit margins then success is determined by self gratification.

You seem to be argueing that the devs should ignore their market in order to fullfill their vision and to let their product die rather than answer a market demand.

In the majority of every market that I can think of businesses that succeed provide both a means of meeting market demands and a clear direction for meeting those demands. In the end though they are selling a product to a market not making a product for themselves.

I am sure someone will come along and say that if they catered to every whim of the market and tried to please everyone that no one would be happy. More the fool you are for not understanding the above.

Having a clear direction to meeting the market demand is what is in question here, not whether or not they are willing to please everyone.

Many people thought this game was directed at people who wanted to play an MMO but did not like the forced teaming aspects of MMOs. That is the market that was targeted. It turns out that the market they should have been targeting was something else all together. As statesman has said this game was really aimed at people who want to team and that should have been clear at the outset before people bought this game.

Statements about how this game was going to be solo friendly were made eroniously in light of the design focus. This game was misrepresented as an innovative MMO that was breaking out of the mold. Instead we find that it was designed to be just like all the other cookie cutter MMOs with a better combat system. Kudos on the combat system and thanks but no thanks on the rest of your group dynamics. Balance through imbalance has been done to death and could have been left out of the game entirely. I personally think that if Statesman regrets one thing it was the implimentation of the Archetype System.

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We want gameplay that encourages the best part of the game: teaming up.

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The best part of any game is the story and the gameplay.

When one neglects or destroys either the story or the gameplay in order to obtain teaming or soloing they are making a bad design change in my opinion.

Teaming and soloing are optional. Emphasis on optional.

That the devs consider teaming to be the best part of the game disturbs me greatly. It is merely a facet of gameplay nothing more nothing less. For some it is an attraction and for others it is a hindrance. Don't ignore the Yang for the Yin.

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IMHO, I fear no nerf bat, it has already hit me.

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No, the first one hit you.

Considering that Statesman believes that a Scrapper and a second AT are what is required to take down a boss I would be a bit leary of chest beating. Then again if you think this is where the Nerf Bus stops then you can enjoy your time. Personally I think Statesman is on the Nerf bus till it hits the dump.

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Be a hero. Don't give up.


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I am not giving up. I am getting debt. After Statesman has finished Data Mining the changes and comes to the conclusion that the boss changes are pushing the game in a direction that a large group of vocal players don't like, I am expected a refund of all the influence lost during this debt fest.

Don't get me started on teaming. Currently I stear clear of Large 8 man teams unless they are all the same level and include a bubbler or Debuffer plus a healer. Anything less and bosses **** my tank. My Defenses seem to get hit by streak breakers too often for my healing to catch up with the damage. Maybe its just the Tsoo. I have more testing to do with my tank. On test I only tested with my blasters and scrappers and a low level invul tank so I never saw what happens to Ice tanks in the mid-levels. Right now solo I am fine but in large groups I am getting spanked by bosses.

Yeah this was reported on test 4 weeks ago. Good to see your getting on it when it is now live.

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That's the whole point of different classes, complementing eachother.

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No, not complementing. Relying. There is a difference.

If all the classes were balanced and had different areas of expertise then you could say that they compliment each other.

The current balance as it stands forces classes to rely on other classes. That is why people are upset. Because of the poorly designed classes.

Check out the known issues thread on test. All of those were enough of a reason for me to wait for issue three to be fixed before it was released.

Pushing issue three when there were regressions in the code was foolish in my opinion. The blinky sound no longer working is a clear regression from Issue 2.

Armors not useing resistance enhancements to protect against toxic was another clear reason to wait.

Heck any of the reasons on that bug list are a good reason to wait. Especially when the free respec was not ready. The respec not being ready alone was enough of a reason to wait.

How many more reasons do you need. Do you want ten reasons? 20 reasons? I am sure the "External Testers" can supply you with a long list of reasons.

You didn't hit the uber-drive button on your blaster? Its right next to the god mode button you use for scrappers. You just have to unlock the developer mode and then............ hey wait a minute, I promised the devs I would never tell anyone how the QA team plays the game.

I just got done doing some DE missions on test. Whoop dee doo more exp. Wish they gave twice the influence they do. Maybe I could make up for all the insperations that I bought.

Oh, did I say insperations? I meant equipment. Yeah I am a little bitter about the direction this game is going.

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Most people don't even have this problem, as the only AV they've probably fought in their own missions is probably Dr. Vahz.

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Most people don't have that exact problem but there are times before level 40 that you will find yourself with a mission that is not solo friendly. The option to that mission is usually kill XXX. Whoop deee friggin dooo. Kill XXX is Statesman saying that you can solo by Streetsweeping. It's not a mission its a chore. If you happen to be playing a support class pre-32 on test you can find it to be a at times not possible to solo your missions due to some bosses that are extremely difficult or you happen to be out of the correct insperations. Then its either off to find a team or off to by insperations if you are lucky enough to be playing a class that can get by with just insperations. Wow lucky enough to leave your mission to go and buy an insperation to kill a boss. When did I start considering that lucky?

Statesman's non-denial in this thread about moving this game towards forced gaming is almost an admission to me. At the very least it is avoiding the issue.

It was menchi but now it is a more potent avatar!

There are times when I wonder if Statesman has actually played through the game. I don't mean that he hasn't played the game. I know that he has. The last time he played he just made a level 30 character and popped on to test controllers. Starting out at high level is a bad way to test a game in my opinion. I am just really wondering what AT he has played if any to level 30. Then maybe he could use in game experience to explain some of the changes he is making instead of simply saying that the changes are going to help the game. If he is depending on QA to determine what changes are needed for the game then I think he needs his head examined. QA has let alot of bugs through on the test server recently. Before someone says that its the test server read what the test server is for in the test forum. It is not for players to find bugs. It is for opinions.

I am not saying that the current boss changes herald an era of non soloable missions. I am saying that I see a trend of changes that are encouraging teaming at the cost of soloability among the various ATs.

Or in other words. Slowly over time the changes that the devs are making are turning support ATs into support classes only with no option to solo. When this happens I expect to see a large bulk of people who are tired of playing a scrapper and play the game casually to find something else to do with there time.

This is what I think will happen. Give me a cookie if I am right and show the me the door while you are at it. Hopefully I will never be given a cookie but with the changes that are being made I am afraid its going to be a double fudge nut cookie in my stocking next year.

Force did you read my original post?

Bosses. You know those things that your controller will run into every mission past level 10. Statesman said that you should usually bring help for those. Usually bring help for every mission past 10. Nope no trend toward grouping here just move along. He refers to soloing as street sweeping. I already posted my thoughts on street sweeping.

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Gee... I dunno about the rest of you, but I don't have a lot of trouble soloing bosses with my lvl19 mind/emp controller.

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People here that have problems soloing are mostly talking about test. And when they are talking about soloing they are talking about the general missions you get from your contact not street sweeping. Street Sweeping is not soloing its an xp meat grinder with sound effects.

I just wanted to reply after reading all the statements. Sorry, I would have responded to the threads sooner but family issues kept me away from the computer.

First I would like to thank all those who share the same point of view I do about where this game should go. A couple of posters made some very long and well thought out posts that took into account playstyles that were not there own but those of other players. Kudos to Fraktal and Cursed_Headsman.

Both players are staunch supporters of teamplay. Anyone who says otherwise has not read Cursed_Headsman's arguements against me in regards to the respec trial. Both players took the time to think about players other than themselves and for that I thank them.

It is truly hard to spot and think about what motivates other people without having your personal outlook veil your thoughts. Although I try to see things from everyones perspective there are times when my own selfishness overcomes reason and I post some foolish things.

I posted this time to let other people know that I felt that this game was starting a trend that I felt was harmfull to the game as a whole. I firmly believe that to have a strong team game there must be a strong solo game at its core. Without the strong solo component you are left with a fractured game when not all the pieces are together. Teamplay should be more than simply allowing a group to function together it should take the solo elements of everyclass and combine them with the group to make a product that is greater than the sum. In all honesty tankers and blasters have come closest to this goal with the new changes in I3 in my opinion. Their base abilities allow them to function steadily by themselves but when they are in a group their normal functions that they use for themselves in turn benefit the group more than it benefits themselves. This concept works across all blaster and tanker levels.

For those of you who cannot see where Fraktal and Cursed_Headsman are coming from I would encourage you to pause and try to see things from there point of view.

Icarus_Factor misses the point I believe of Fraktals arguement and wishes dearly that nothing is wrong or is going to go wrong with this game. This is what I interpret from his posts.

G_Kaiser, I don't think you actually read Fraktals post at all before you responded to it. I believe if I remember correctly that you were also against my proposal for an alternate respec trial.

Well there is way to much to go over in this thread in one post. I just want to say thank you to everyone who posted whether they were for or against my position.

Yes I am sure you have taken out two bosses, I have taken out three tankers with my energy blaster but the point is not where the game is today but where it will be next year.

Well Nozy that came from Statesman's keyboard and I believe everything Statesman says like a good soldier.