XeroShadow

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It is really nice to see you addressing this player concern. Would it be too much to ask to also get the descriptions of the powers in game updated? I know that takes time but I am asking regardless because I think it is important.

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Agreed and also would it be possible to add in some info for endurance usage?

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All but Psi...interesting. Quick question...how come PSI wasn't included?

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Because then powersets that have a psi-weakness like invul would stack up on psi-defense powerpools.

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I'd also say thematic reasons. Most of the power pool defenses are based on your character being able to move out of the way of an attack and a mental attack isn't exaclty something you can simply dodge. SR I'd say is the exception because they are supposedly highly trained both mentally and physically.

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Like I said, I thought buffing the villians was a good idea, just unfinished. Maybe they could've buffed the higher-level baddies, while leaving the lower-level ones alone (since casual players are less likely to get to the higher levels in the game). Maybe they could've made it work, maybe not. But you bring up a good point about it affecting everyone (pros and noobs alike), which only strengthens the idea of coming up with an alternative to nerfing/buffing (or however we want to look at it). I'm talking about thinking outside the box..

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You've got to understand the problem before you can come up with an appropriate solution. There were multiple problems involved with the game that it was too easy for some and too difficult for others. They were actually attempting to even this playing field with a combination of reduced abilities for heroes/villains and some alterations for heroes on the plus side as well.

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Unfortunately, this is not the way business works. While educating customers certainly helps to this effect, a business cannot rely on the public "coming around" to their way of thinking. I know this very well because I've run my own business for the past 5+ years. If a percentage of your customers don't like what you offer, you either make changes or lose those customers. Period. Telling the customer they're wrong is not only naive, but it's a sure way of losing that customer. If CoH can afford to lose the people that don't like being nerfed, then by all means nerf away.

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The real quesiton is "How many players were already lost due to the game simply being too easy for them?"

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In the case of us "pros", we may not be in the majority, but we are the more stable/guaranteed source of ongoing income for the devs. "Guaranteed" (I use the term loosely because nothing is truly guaranteed) month-to-month income is a very valuable thing for any business to hold onto.

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We were also split fairly well on the changes.

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PS: I'm not trying to trounce on anyone's ideas or opinions, so I hope no one thinks I'm disprespecting them. I'm not

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You've seemed to be more civil than most despite not liking the changes you at least understand the why they were done.

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Thinking a little more about what you just said...

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I was actually more just referring to our nature to focus on negative things and ignore positives in favor of complaining about those negatives. Many things actually got buffed in i5 that nobody seemed to care about but they certainly weren't complaining about them.


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It sounds like maybe we're talking about two different things... the definition of "nerf" vs. the purpose of a nerf. The definition is, in simple terms, "a change that negatively affects a player, enemy, item/weapon, etc." The purpose of a nerf is completely different... to enhance gameplay overall.

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From a perspective standpoint any nerf to the mobs is actually just a buff to the players and any nerf to the players is a buff to the mobs. The real problem is that buffs/nerfs to villains affect all players and tend to have an overall greater impact than what was intended and as such don't get to be used. The general assumption that they made the game harder for all is starting to get on my nerves bacause any non blapper blaster was actually buffed as were defenders for the most part.

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Whether anyone likes or dislikes the nerfs done in I5 is really besides the point... the point is, again, that there is enough of a public outcry over nerfing in this game and many others that the industry would be wise to find other more positive ways to balance their games... and then put those ideas into action.

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I see this more of a problem with the public than with the industry itself. When people start comparing alterations to their character to having their eyes poked out they need to step away from the computer.

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Granted, but regardless, it seems the end result is almost always the same... nerf. This industry needs to pull itself up out of this downward trend. If they come up with inventive solutions behind the scenes, great... use them.

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Actually it's just you thinking that everything gets nerfed. Most poeple only ever see the bad yet ignore the things that were actually positive increases. It's a matter of perception not actually matching reality.

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Just to make my opinions clear, I do realize that there were some "balance" issues in the game, but the nerf bat is a cop-out solution that is used 95% of the time in this industry... when it should really only be used 5% of the time. It's become the de-facto method of solving ALL balance issues in games, when it should only ever be a last resort.

C'mon devs, you used creative thought to MAKE this game, now use that same creative thought to FIX it.

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A lot goes on behind the scenes that never makes it to the public.

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If I were invited to it, as positive as I am about CoH/i5, one would hardly see me on either! That would hardly be grounds to say "See? Even Katahn hates it!"

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I think a lot of people might not be in CoH lately due to CoV beta akin to the reason you tend to avoid eating if you know you are going to your favorite restaurant later that day.

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That... or the fact that i5 may have hit some people in the wrong place.

You know this may actually be the change in gameplays fault and lack of and end game... Imagine that

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I've randomly run numbers for my server and several other of the high population servers and the numbers pre and post i5 are not all that different. The lack of endgame is a problem Statesman has acknowledged and is attempting to fix by adding PvP elements first then the Legends System when it is completed.

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We can thank CoV beta for the shortage of people too.

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Beta only runs for a few hours at night...wouldn't account for that big of a drop off in numbers.

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Since many people often only have a few hours a night to play it could account for a bigger drop off than you think.

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So...you're basing it on how many dots a server has? That's server performance, not population. If you want population, go in-game, hit team, find member, then search and look at the number at the bottom.

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Actually it is population. A server turns yellow at around 1500 people though and if you check I think you'll find many are still close to that number and Freedom seems to still be yellow nightly.

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Right. I suppose it's totally illogical to want changes to the AI and environment in order to increase the level of challenge instead of taking certain things away from our own characters.

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Nope but lets take a look at your analogy.

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When I was in the military, we were required to qualify with a certain proficiency in firing an M-16. You started at 200 meters and fired while sitting and standing. To increase the challenge, you moved back to 300 meters and fired while sitting and kneeling. To further increase the challenge, you moved back to 500 meters and fired from the prone position.

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This analogy is useless since not everyone was actually starting at 200M on the firing range. That was a large part of the problem. They attempted changes to the villains and these ended up being disastrous for blasters and defenders and controllers to a lesser degree but only annoying to scrappers and tanks.

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Sounded to me like he was just saying that he'd rather the missions/mobs changed instead of the heroes

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Why everyone would feel all the better if everything around them changes but they remain the same is beyond me. I'd feel kinda left behind in that type of situation actually.

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Up to AVs, any team of any composition can do CoH missions on Heroic since I5

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Does the fact that I duoed a friends Vanessa Devore Mission him using an Ill/Kin troller and me using my En/En blaster make the game broken?

Statesman said:
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we’ve finished making large changes to the power sets.

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Neko said:
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Soi gues Enervating Field, Stealth, Phase Shift, Quantum Flight, Nebulos Form, uh i miss any?

Arent power sets.

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Nope these aren't power sets. They are singular powers. This fact makes the rest of your post pointless.

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If you'd care to quote where Cuppa indicated that Souvenir's would be left alone, that would be helpful.

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Here ya go.

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Thanks for that. I do recall the thread now after looking at it.

Still, tomorrow makes that post 3 months old and there are plenty of changes that have occured from then to now.

I'd still like current clarification.

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Don't blame ya and wouldn't mind cementing of my general ideas. But from an analysis of the sitatuion I'd say my general assumptions are correct. We could possibly come up with an idea they might use so I'm not going to discourage discussion just try to redirect it away from ideas that they already said wouldn't work.

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I talked with Manticore this morning about this and he agreed to rework these into shorter, more engaging, Task Forces in an upcoming issue (possibly 7 or 8, maybe sooner though)

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Issue 7 or 8 you'll make the TFs shorter? It didn't occur to you guys to shorten them up BEFORE you told the players "Hey, you're doing it again, deal with it"?

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Some people are so mean to poor Positron. He was trying to find a better solution but he couldn't. Although I do remember doing his TF.....Maybe the anger is not misplaced

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If you'd care to quote where Cuppa indicated that Souvenir's would be left alone, that would be helpful.

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Here ya go.

1) A Souvenir that was awarded for a SS TF represents an easily identifiable marker that can be used to award the subsequent Badge. Is there a reason that a script cannot be written to auto award the SS TF based on the presence of of the requisite Souvenir?

They still have to actually find the souvenir which is basically about what the datamine would have to do in the first place. So no this isn't actually a solution that is feasible


2) Are the TF Souvenir's being removed from the game with I5?

I believe CuppaJo said that any souvenirs you had would not be touched. If they aren't willing to look for them to give you something based on them why would they want to dig through everything to remove them?

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So that would be less then 12 months not 18. So all datamining for the Shadow Shard TFs should be from the date not from the start of CoH itsself.

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First you have to sort the data then you have to comb through it. There's also the possibility that the data in question doesn't have any timestamps for which to sort.

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So they aren't having to go back over 18 months of CoH. They only have to go over 12 months. I also cannot understand why it would take so long to go through the databases. Databases are made for data storage and recovery. They are MADE for queries like this. It's the whole reason to USE a database.

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What if the information they are sorting through isn't even in a database? And if it is in a database how many entries do you think are in the database? It seems not so much as a problem about actually finding the items in question but how many compute cycles it will take to find them.

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Wanted to explain the reasons for changing Burn...

It became apparent that Burn was the trump power...with it, a Tanker needed to do nothing else. He could lay down a Burn patch and Taunt foes in and out of it. The damage was so great that the Burn patch itself would do the defeating; the Tanker only needed to hit Taunt.

The question has come up - "what's the point of Burn now?" Well, it still offers Immobilization defense (we're actually going to increase that duration). And Burn does do a lot of damage. Taunt alone might not bring mobs into Burn continually, but stunning, holding, immobilizing mobs in Burn is just plain devastating.

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Ok from this it appears that burn wasn't doing what you quite wanted it to do. I feel the original intent of the power was to be a damage aura that damaged foes for engaging you in melee very similiar to what blazing aura does (I think). Would it be possible to actually change the power into a damage aura that does damage upon foes engaging in melee? This power could possibly be set with damage similiar to burn (possibly a DoT applied upon contact) or it could be variable damage based on the amount of damage you received. And on top of this you could even keep the name since effectively the power is doing about the same thing just a different way which would involve a bit more risk since you would have to be hit before the power could take effect. As a bonus it wouldn't have the annoying fear effect to scatter mobs about making it harder for tanks to do their thing.

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I strongly agree, no team should "need" a defender all the time but they should "want" a defender on their team. The same should apply to any archetype.

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I'm going to somewhat disagree. There should be a certain point when your team size is enough that you should NEED one of the particular ATs to fill in the gap of what you can't do. In general however I think you should always WANT a defender on your team because they make your team much better than if you didn't have them present.