Arcanaville
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Quote:That quote was regarding extremes of Fury generation and has nothing to do with Shield Charge. Shield Charge was massively overpowered due to two different calculation errors that occurred at two different times. The previous damage modifier numbers were so high, you'd have to be high to think they were reasonable. Shield Charge was approaching Nova levels of damage for a power in a defensive set with no crash.Originally Posted by eryq2
Now, notice where he said "at the extremes". Well, all purpled out toons or any other toon heavily IO'd are going to be "at extremes". Therefore should not be adjusted if the system is based around "normal play" with which he said "was fine".
Now, Castle, don't get ticked at me for pointing this out, but it's not right to "fix" toons based on extreme toons heavily IO'd. If so, just axe the whole IO system (imo) and go back to SO's so that we will all be equal.
I think SD was the same way. Was fine under normal play but not at extremes.
Shield Charge was broken unenhanced. And while the fix was delayed, this subject was discussed months ago when the subject first came up on the forums.
Beginning with Castle's post here at the beginning of May, then my reply, my clarification, and then Castle's articulation of likely source of the problem.
When you're dealing 200 points of damage, base without any enhancements or buffs, in a huge AoE, and you think the problem is only at "extreme" levels of play, the wheels have come off the wagon. For the amount of damage the power did it should have recharged once every other wednesday. -
Quote:Player A has 50% resistance. Player B has 25% defense. A critter attacks both 100 times for 100 points of damage each attack (just to make the numbers simple: its the same on average no matter how many attacks it is - even if that number is one).Originally Posted by Burst_Eagle
Now, this is probably just my ignorance, but this doesn't seem to make sense. Shouldn't the -DMG in essence ... reduce damage dealt to you, and having that add to your resistance values (of which are also reducing damage)?
It seems like it should, unless there is some hidden formula to resistance that could explain it. Otherwise, this concept just isn't clicking for me!
EDIT: Eric seems to have figured it out. The -damage is applied before resistance mods. That makes sense ... but it still seems like -DMG would help out resistance sets more than defensive ones for that reason; it still is reducing said damage farther than before, right?
Player A gets hit 50 times (base tohit of critters is 50%) for 50 points each attack (50% resistance) for a total of 2500 points of damage. Player B hits hit 25 times (25% defense) for 100 points each for a total of 2500 points of damage. On average, both take the same amount of damage.
Add 10% resistance to both. Now, Player A gets hit 50 times for 40 damage each or 2000 points. Player B gets hit 25 times for 90 points each, or 2250 points. Notice the resistance helped player A more.
Now apply -10% damage to both attackers. This time Player A gets hit 50 times by attacks that were reduced to 90 points, and its 50% resistance reduces them to 45 points each, for a net of 2250 points total. Player B gets hit 25 times for 90 points each, for a net of 2250 points total. The -DMG helped them both by the same amount, at least on average.
One simplified way to think about what is going on is that in the case where you add resistance to defense, some of the resistance goes to reducing the strength of attacks that then miss anyway. So some of the effectiveness of that buff is "wasted" in a sense. But when its allowed to be focused on only the attacks that hit, that buff ends up being much stronger. When you add resistance to resistance, you're concentrating the buff. When you add resistance to defense, you're diluting it a bit on attacks that wouldn't have hit anyway.
Here's another interesting mental model. Imagine both defense and resistance are two deflector shields in front of you, one in front of the other (it doesn't matter which is which). Imagine those shields are designed like checkerboard meshes, but with 100 squares. Both shields start off empy, with none of the squares filled in, so they basically do nothing: attacks go right through both of them and hit you for full strength.
Now imagine I give you 50 little squares and tell you to put them into shield #1. So now, half the squares are filled in, and thus half the attacks get blocked by shield #1. The other half get through.
Now I hand you 50 more squares and I say you can put these anywhere you want. Question: would you put them into shield #2, or shield #1.
If you put them into shield 2, then shield 2 will block half of all attacks that try to pass through it. So half will get blocked by shield 1, and then half of those that get through will get blocked by shield 2. One quarter, or 25%, of all attacks launched against you will get through and hit you. 75% will get blocked.
If you put them all into shield 1, however, you'll completely fill up that shield. Now, none of the attacks that hit that shield will get through. Its clear that its better to fill in the remaining 50 holes in shield 1 than fill in 50 out of the 100 holes in shield 2, right?
That's basically how defense and resistance work together. Each takes its own bite at the attacks, and having two shields is better than having one. But if you have a *choice*, and the choice grants an equal amount of squares, its always better to use them to fill in the shield will less remaining holes, because filling in 50 of the last 50 is better than filling in 50 of the last 100. Similarly, its better to fill in 10 of the last 20 rather than 10 of the last 50, which is why small defense buffs help people who already have lots of defense, and vice versa for resistance. -
Quote:Do you really expect anyone to take you seriously when you're claiming that the Brute changes caused you to now level more than twice as slowly? There's no way the small changes in Going Rogue could possibly do that.Originally Posted by Q_Candy
The brute I am leveling now moves less than half as fast on the experience bar. I cannot max my fury bar even when I am taking on enough mobs to pound me into the dust. I die way more easily... so really now I am forced to take all my IO's off my Brutes and move them to Scrapper or Tank.
I know everyone plays differently and circumstances can be radically different and yada yada, but this is just blatantly impossible. If you're leveling less than half as fast as before, then somehow you got slower or you've fallen into a localized temporal anomaly. The absolute fastest solo brutes from I17 might now be 10%-15% slower, maybe. Some really unlucky guy that happened to be doing the worst possible thing might be leveling 20% slower, although that is really unlikely. Most Brutes are going to see single-digit difference, some of them faster than before. Nobody is going to have their performance cut in half. Nobody is going to have their performance cut so low that it could look subjectively like its cut in half.
I find it impossible to reconcile your observations with the requirements of observational reality, even under the most generous circumstances possible that don't involve mind-altered states.
This is really an empty threat. You're not the first to make it. You won't be the last to make it. They are always seen as transparent attempts at a grand gesture of indignation, and come off as something far less.Quote:I will go back to the shadows, and in a few weeks when I am tired of the emperors new clothes my subscription will be canceled again, just like so many others. -
Quote:Without the stack cap Power Siphon would be insanely good. Scrappers and Tankers would be damage-capping themselves while it was up with not much effort.Originally Posted by Nihilii
At 28, I like it, although it doesn't perform as high as I expected, as I mistakenly assumed there wasn't any hard cap on the number of siphon stacks you could have.
For those that don't yet know, the maximum buff stacks you can have at a time is five. That's +125% damage for Brutes and Tankers (+25% per buff), +156.25% damage for Scrappers (+31.25% per buff).
And the best way to track it if you are interested is not with the buff icons in your buff bar which are laggy, but by using the real numbers attribute monitor to monitor damage buff, which is fairly quick responding. -
Quote:The reason why tough is considered usually good to add to resistance sets - in the sense of more good than the obvious good of adding it to anyone - is because if resistance stacking. If you have no resistance and you add 18% resistance on top, you will take 18% less damage (to smash/lethal at least). But if you already have, say, 30% resistance to s/l, adding 18% on top reduces incoming damage by 26% relative to not having it. By the time you get to 50% resistance, you're reducing incoming damage by 36% relative to not having it.Originally Posted by EricHough
This is the theory I generally subscribe to as well, however it seems to me that if adding tough to a resistance based set is good, then adding -damage is also good. Not as good as adding -to hit to a def set maybe, but still good.
-DMG doesn't stack that way with +RES. -ToHit *does* stack that way (more or less) with +DEF.
Adding -DMG to a resistance set is good, but no more good than adding it to a defense set to a first order approximation. -
While there are some things I just always do, like think up a bio (even if I don't always write it in) or the way I think up character names, I think the only personal game rules I have are that one: I don't respec before 50 except under very rare circumstances, and only if I have a use-it-or-lose-it freespec I need to burn before a new one is pushed out (and even then: the number of characters I've respeced before 50 is exactly two), and two: I don't twink between characters before 50, I play with what that character earns herself.
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Quote:Not exactly. -tohit linearly stacks with defense because in effect -tohit *is* defense, at least in broad terms: both reduce attacker tohit.Originally Posted by EricHough
I would say that any of the secondaries that are either fully or at least partially resistance based would be good (so electric, dark, fire, wp and invuln, maybe shields a bit). The -damage in KM's attacks will effectively stack with any resistance you have to further reduce damage you take, just like the -to hit in dark melee stacks with def sets.
But -DMG doesn't stack with resistance that way. A -20% damage debuff would reduce incoming damage by 20% for a high resistance, a low resistance, and a zero resistance character. A -20% tohit debuff helps a defense character more than a resistance one, which was one of the reasons why DM/SR was considered a good pairing in the days before it became easy to buy additional defense with things like inventions.
One theory is that the -DMG in KM will help anyone with a burst damage weakness, since -DMG will reduce damage bursts. That means it would be a good pairing for Regen.
Another theory is that KM wants speed to improve the uptime of Power Siphon, which directly translates to more damage. Sets like SR would pair well on that basis if you're going to load up on recharge IOs like LotGs and take quickness.
A third theory says if you have a nifty power like Power Siphon, give it something serious to boost. Thus, KM/Shields and shield charge.
The last theory is that you're a Scrapper, so you just can't lose, so you should pair it with whatever secondary you think is awesome this week. Thus, KM/Willpower, KM/Shields.
Me, I'm going KM/Fire because I want to see Power Siphon and Fiery Embrace. -
Quote:I don't think the content writers literally use the AE to make the game content (although they might prototype in their version of it), but there have been many cases of AE tech fallout improving many parts of the game and the game development outside of the AE.Originally Posted by Slashman
I'm pretty sure it's been stated that the devs don't actually use AE to make their content. And you're right in that I have no idea what percentage of effort went toward player only and what went toward developer tool improvement. Of course, unless you're part of the dev team, neither do you.
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Quote:Those who think these two are ever in conflict either don't understand what is fun, or don't understand what is numerically correct.Originally Posted by je_saist
There needs to be a balance struck between the aspect of what is fun, and what is numerically correct.
Fun defines where you aim. Numerically correct ensures you hit it. Numerically correct game design never dictates fun, because numerically correct game design only specifies the how, it never specifies the what.
Numbers are basically the language of game implementation. To say there needs to be a balance between fun and numerically correct is like saying there needs to be a balance between missions that are fun and missions that are written with proper punctuation. -
Quote:PS on paper is very strong. PS in practice is very very strong. If PS looks weak to you on paper, you haven't written it down correctly.Originally Posted by TheOlle
Did I ever mention Soul Drain? No? .. Okay then? lets begin again...
PS on paper, seems like a VERY poor power, thats what Im saying.. and hands down, I am comparing the entire sets with each other, and I see no reason to pick KM over SS as SS still have Rage, and basically the same powers as KM just named differently (To be rough when saying so)
Next time you reply to someone, be sure to read the post
1. Its up 20s with 120s recharge. That's better uptime than build up (10s out of 90s)
2. Being up means your attacks will start stacking damage buffs of 10s duration, which means the actual amount of time you'll be buffed is closer to 30s than 20s (on average, about 25-26s). That's almost the same uptime as Soul Drain (30s out of 120s).
3. It caps for scrappers at 156.25% damage buff with five stacks of the PS buff. That's the highest of all the damage self-buffs (Soul Drain caps at +150%).
4. Unlike its main competition for Scrappers, Soul Drain, it can be saturated regardless of the number of targets you're fighting simultaneously. Soul Drain can only be saturated with 10 targets hit at the moment you use it. On average, unless you are a very efficient herder, Power Siphon will do better than Soul Drain in damage buff over time.
5. Its damage over time benefit is vastly superior to Build Up. Its far higher than Follow Up unless you manage to double stack it permanently, in which case it is *slightly* lower.
6. Its only two real deficits are: its not front loaded like Build Up, and its tohit buff is lower than its peer powers (BU, FU, and SD). And technically, it takes slightly longer to cast.
7. On top of all of this, the Scrapper version will be insta-recharged 20% of the time you use Concentrated Strike, which is basically a total focus clone. That means for Scrappers specifically, its uptime is going to average being even better than the above, and second only to Follow Up which can be made perma (but which is much weaker in damage buff strength).
8. Its main benefit over Rage is that Scrappers can't have Rage. However, Rage grants +80% damage buff to Brutes and Tankers. In testing I was averaging, factoring up and down time, about 58%-66% damage buff under normal playing conditions with builds that had nothing but -1 and even level SOs and no inventions of any kind to help recharge. With no crash. Factoring in the crash, Rage is only slightly better at damage buff than PS (albeit much better at tohit buff).
That's what Power Siphon looks like on paper. -
Quote:Yes: the attack must actually hit to generate the bonus Fury.Originally Posted by Deus_Otiosus
I just want to clarify, I believe that Fury bonus is for successful attacks, and not for attacks that miss.
I am very happy about that getting fixed though. -
Ah, this topic again. Although I am not a copyright attorney and also not giving legal advice per se, this subject is really not all that ambiguous. To the extent that *anything* in copyright law is unambiguous, this situation is unambiguous (which means, there's one answer if you believe lawsuits are based on the law, and a different one only if you dig up Johnny Cochrane to represent you).
First, in the US copyright is based on the principle that copyright attaches at birth: the moment a creative work is "created" (fixed in tangible form) the author becomes the owner. This happens as a matter of law. There are only two possibilities: the person actually creating the work is the author and therefore the owner by law, or the person's employer is if and only if the work is a work-for-hire.
When I make a character in the character creator, I'm the creator and owner of that work as a matter of law in the US. The EULA cannot supercede that under any circumstances unless the EULA was a work for hire contract. Its not.
Second, copyright cannot be transfered as a matter of law except by a specific written document doing so. This is to protect authors. Transfer must be signed and in writing (it cannot be a verbal contract) and must be specific - it must list the exact works being transfered ("anything you make with the character creator" doesn't count - the law explicitly states each work being transfered must be named specifically). So even if the EULA says I must immediately surrender my ownership of "anything I do," it cannot enforce that provision as a matter of law in the US.
Third, an exclusive, irrevocable licensing agreement is considered equivalent to an ownership transfer as a matter of law for the purposes of transfer, because it in effect transfers all rights to a third party. So it also has the same requirements as above. NCSoft cannot ask me to transfer control of my characters to them exclusively, leaving me with no rights to them. That is also a violation of US Copyright law.
Fourth, copyright law is silent on non-exclusive irrevocable licensing agreements which do not transfer ownership. That is why that is what NCSoft's EULA specifically demands. It asks for ownership where that is possible by law and where that is not possible (for example, anywhere within the United States - I'm unfamiliar with the situation in other countries) it asks for a non-exclusive irrevocable license to use the work in any way they see fit. That is where that phrase in the EULA specifically comes from: its there to comply with the requirements of US Copyright law.
This is all NCSoft needs. With this license, they can use that character I just created in the costume editor for any purpose whatsoever, and because the license is non-revocable I can never stop them (well, technically speaking I might be able to in 35 years when the author clause of Copyright Law kicks in). However retaining ownership grants me almost nothing, because I used their character creator. While they have a license to use my work, I don't have one to use theirs. I cannot use the graphics, art, animations, backstory, or any other intellectual property of NCSoft without an explicit license which they haven't granted to me. So I cannot use images of my character for commercial purposes, or the backstory if I've mentioned *anything* about the City of Heroes world or entities, or videos of my game play - nothing from the game.
I *could* use the character *concept* in another work, provided I used none of those elements. Which is basically recreating the character nearly from scratch in another original medium. I can take my MA/SR scrapper and make a fictional martial arts super hero that dresses in black and purple and fights crime and NCSoft cannot stop me from doing so because they don't own that concept. But that's about all I can do.
In short: if you make it, you still own what you made, but they still own what they made that you used, and they can use what you made however they want. You cannot do likewise.
Now, what happens if you are the owner of an actual copyrighted character and make it in City of Heroes? Absolutely nothing different. I *am* the owner of actual copyrighted characters. I'm no different than Jim Butcher in that regard. If he were to make Dresden in City of Heroes, the version of Dresden that he makes in the game would be something he would be licensing to NCSoft to do anything with they wanted. NCSoft wouldn't own Dresden, so they couldn't stop him from continuing to make Dresden novels. But from that point on, Butcher couldn't stop NCSoft from putting Harry Dresden on the box art for City of Heroes either - at least the version that Butcher created in the game.
So if you are the owner of copyright characters that you want to maintain 100% control over, don't make them in City of Heroes. Doing so costs you that control by virtue of the licensing terms of the EULA. -
Quote:This game is really not a "try them all until you find the one you like" game. Its really more of a "lots of different choices to play through more than once" kind of game.Originally Posted by Merchant of Chaos
Hey everyone. I'm new to the game and so far I'm enjoying it. However, I'm little overwhelmed and underwhelmed with the game's powers.
I'm overwhelmed by how many types of powers there are. There are ten classes, and then each class has like 16 primary and secondary powers. It's staggering.
I decided to try a few different characters out, but this is where I'm underwhelmed - for the first three or four hours of gameplay, I only have maybe three powers to play with alongside 'brawl'. It feels kind of sparse. A lot of my time is spent waiting for my powers to recharge. It also means I can't really get a quick feel for a power set without spending more time than I'm comfortable with.
It feels like there's too many power sets, which makes it hard to test them all, and powers are unlocked too slowly, which makes it even harder to test them.
If you're an action junkie, I would recommend starting off with a damage dealing archetype, say a blaster, scrapper, or brute, and spending the early levels focusing on offense rather than defense or utility. You should be able to get to at least level 6-10 in three hours of solo play, more in teams, and that should get you to at least four offensive powers, plus brawl, plus your origin attack. Six clicks should at least prevent you from waiting around too long for powers to recharge.
And welcome aboard. Hope you find something you enjoy playing. -
Quote:Before you chew your thumb off, you should probably test it carefully first. First of all, the patch note saying that fury generation starts dropping in efficiency at 30% is wrong: it actually starts dropping at about 37% or so. Second, because Fury decay is now only 0.75/sec while in combat, your effective rate of Fury generation is actually *higher* now than on live for all values of Fury below 37%. Beyond that, generated Fury per swing and per attack starts to drop slowly such that with the lower decay you'll probably still see a *higher* fury generation rate until at least 40%-45% or so (I don't have the exact numbers in front of me at the moment). And *then* the increased drop-off of the new curve will cause your fury generation rate to drop relative to live, until for very very high levels of activity what used to generate something like 90%-95% fury or a little higher will now generate something between 80% and 88% fury for the extreme case.Originally Posted by GangstaBlade
I'm still heaps pissed at that it's now 30% it should be atleast 55%, I'm litterally biting the skin off my thumb reading this.
The break-even point is actually not all that far from your own stated 55% mark, so you shouldn't have any problems at all.
Although this change is described as an across-the-board nerf, due to the nature of the new Fury generation curve and the lower decay rate, its not exactly. For those who used to say that in teams it was almost impossible to achieve more than about 40% fury (although I never saw that myself) its actually a *buff* - for the exact same situation on live they will generate more fury now than in I17. For those that used to hang around the 40%-65% range (approximately), its going to be about the same, maybe slightly lower. For those that used to generate 65%-90% fury, its going to be somewhat weaker. In the *worse* case, about 10%-15% fury, or 20%-30% damage buff.
The people the generation change most affects are those that were sitting at very high levels of Fury to start off with, that were definitely generating damage levels significantly higher than Scrappers. Those that were not aren't going to be hit as hard if at all because their lower Fury generation isn't hit as hard by the new curve, and the lower decay rate is thus proportionately more significant to them. To say that the change takes Brutes that were in teams and generating low levels of Fury to start off with and then makes them even worse is a mischaracterization of the change, that fails to take into account the much softer generation curve and the much lower decay rate.
Also, as an aside, Going Rogue finally fixes (to a degree) the bugged-since-the-beginning-of-time Fury bonus for hard targets. Brutes generate bonus Fury for every attack against either an AV or another player in PvP. -
Quote:That depends on the niche. The end game is a niche. Task forces are a niche element of the game. Accolades serve a niche. Respec serves a niche. The markets serve a niche. The invention system serves a niche. Purples serve a vanishingly small niche. HEATs and VEATs are a single digit niche element to the game. Probably less than half of all players ever play a single controller or dominator, so its probably fair to say only a small percentage of players will ever roll an electric control anything.Originally Posted by Nethergoat
If that's true then what a tremendous waste of resources I14 was.
Very few elements of this or any MMO have ultrawide appeal or use. The game is composed of a large set of overlapping niches. In my opinion, there's a lot of improvements that could be made to the AE that would make it have a wider appeal overall, but calling it a waste of resources because it only served a "niche" of the playerbase is missing the point. Nearly all things added to the game since launch are as well. In fact, since the devs have consistently stated that only a small percentage of the playerbase ever levels to 50, you could argue that all of Issue 1, and everything connected to it since then, including the entire game above level 40, is essentially one large niche addition. -
Quote:Never stack Power Siphon. Stacking Power Siphon confers no benefit. All Power Siphon does is enable the stacking buffs to happen. Using Power Siphon twice only flips that switch twice, but the stacking buffs themselves are coded to be limited to a maximum stack of five regardless. Put it this way: the buffs come from the attacks, and PS only turns them on: the buffs don't come from PS itself, so there's no way to get "twice as many" of them.Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
I went KM/SD on a scrapper. Watched my damage buff tag 125% at level 6 last night. Saturate AAO on top of that, go for max recharge for the tightest attack chain I can, see what kind of DPS I can push out.
My only question is this: If the tier9 has a 20% chance of insta-recharging Power Siphon, does it cause PS to doublestack the damage buff if you're lucky enough to fire it off again while PS is up? (If this has already been answered my apologies.)
If it insta-recharges while PS is up, your best strategy is to wait for PS to expire and then reuse it to double the window of time you have the buffs. Don't overlap it.
Stalkers can overlap Build Up if they want because those buffs stack, although in general I don't think that is a good strategy, since you'll be using some of your valuable BU time to activate BU again, time BU will not be buffing actual attacks. Its only worth it if you want to see a really big number show up at the end of that sequence for some reason. -
Quote:You rolled a Scrapper. You'll be fine.Originally Posted by Cal_Naughton_Jr
Have I made a mistake?
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Quote:I'm rolling KM/FA first, but it was a toss between KM/FA and KM/DA for me.Originally Posted by BrandX
KM/DA!
I don't think either combination is necessarily optimal, but I think both have interesting gameplay possibilities. -
Quote:The AE is only useless if you believed its purpose was to generate rewards at a much higher level than the rest of the game. If you don't think the AE is a cash machine, the reward levels are fine: they are comparable if not always equal to the standard content in most cases.Originally Posted by Bad_Influence
They basically stripped 98% of the rewards out of AE, rendering mostly useless a system they had devoted an entire issues' worth of thought to.
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Quote:Only by osmosis. I can find out more about the F-22's avionics than I can about The Hypothetical Game That Paragon Studios May Or May Not Be Developing But Sure Seem To Be Hiring A Lot Of People To Work On.Originally Posted by EvilGeko
As much as I love her, I'm concerned that a certain math smartie might influence them too much into perfect boring balance.
Its such a black topic I would probably get in trouble just for saying what I don't know about it.
As to the topic of the OP, the question was: can city of heroes survive much longer on these numbers?
By my calculations, the answer is: probably. It would be better if they were somewhat higher, though. Either way, the numbers are only interesting to people generally interested in such things. There's nothing in there for the average player (or even the unaverage player) to do anything about. I'm certainly not looking at the revenue numbers and thinking to myself they are proof that the devs should turn the keys over to the OP or any other player. It changes nothing about whether I think the devs are right or some other player is right about the direction of the game on any given day of the week. -
Quote:Nothing different than when not Hidden. It just has the 20% insta-recharge crit. Its not a good alpha out of Hide due to the lack of a hidden critical for that reason. But if it recharges Build Up, it effectively gives you a much better bonus than a crit from Hide generally does.Originally Posted by Exxar
What does it do out of Hide for Stalkers?
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Quote:If you're making a new game, you are looking to target new players, not existing ones except by coincidence. You can't port your World of Warcraft characters to Starcraft 2, because Blizzard couldn't care less. As is true with any new game. And yes, I know Starcraft 2 is not an MMO: that's part of the point.Originally Posted by Coyote_Seven
And if you don't have character porting, I believe the devs would risk alienating the existing players of CoH1. As I rather vaguely recall, this is what happened with EQ?
The point to making a new game is not to pick up all the existing players and move them to a new platform. Its to make a new game. If you really are making a new game, backward compatibility should matter not at all. If backward compatibility means something to you, and you are targeting the existing COH1 playerbase, then stick to making COH1 expansions.
If I was the lead for COH2, I wouldn't be all that concerned about backward compatibility or pre-existing customers. In fact, I would probably not even name the game "COH2" at all if it was my choice. It implies a connection I would not be honoring.
If you want to improve COH1, you work on COH1 and improve COH1 for all COH1 players. If you want to make a new game entirely, you start from scratch, you take the lessons but not the baggage from the old game to help design a game around your own design concepts, and you don't look back. If you can't do that, you don't deserve to be in charge of making a new game. -
Quote:This isn't always escapable. Consider power customization. Because so many assets were not created to be tintable, power customization required basically recreating many of those art assets. So even when it comes to the "data" side of the game, there are pros and cons to starting from scratch and building incrementally.Originally Posted by Akiru_NA
That makes no sense at all. Can you explain that?
If you actually mean the core engine than I guess that could make sense, but that wasn't what I was talking about. None of what I listed involved the core engine.
I was talking about the fact that a new game would require entirely new models, textures, animations, VFXs, and massive amounts of effort thinking of how the game would function and coding it.
Then they would have to add entirely new content to it. And it would still be 6 years behind this game in terms of development time; it would be nothing more than an empty pretty shell until it's been around a few years.
Put it this way: its always cheaper to fix an old car than buy a new car, no matter how old the old car is. However, collectively, it can be more expensive to own an old car than buy a new car. It depends on whether you're looking at the short term or the long term.
Most of my knowledge of the literal game engine itself is inferred, but separate from game engine limitations CoH also has limitations in the entire constellation of development surrounding it. The powers system design tools has limitations, the mission editors have limitations, the animation system has really odd limitations. The thing about those limitations though is that the current dev team is used to them. If you gave them a whole bunch of newer, better, but radically different tools they'd actually slow down just from the learning curve. A new dev team using new tools designed for a new game would not have that problem, and could benefit much more from a radical new approach than the current team could some ways. The current team does better with incremental improvements over time that can be integrated into their current methodologies and skills.
The simple answer to the question "what can you do in a new game that you can't do in this game" is "make a new game." A new game with new rules, new design aesthetics, new look and feel. You can't change everything in this game even if you wanted to. You can in a new game.
Which is why I think wishing for "character porting" is likely to be fruitless. If COH2 had enough common ground to allow you to do that, it wouldn't be worth making. COH2 is only worth making if its so different from COH1 that its just not possible to move things over like that in any way except superficially (like saving a costume in COH1 and using it to make a new character on a different server).
There's really no sense in making a COH2 that could just as easily have been an expansion to COH1. But that's what you can do in COH2: make something that cannot, in any way, be connected to COH1 in anything except perhaps mythology. -
Quote:20%. For Scrappers it insta-recharges Power Siphon. For Stalkers it insta-recharges Build Up. For neither does it crit for damage under any circumstances.Originally Posted by Nihilii
What's the crit* chance on Concentrated Strike ? 10%, 15% ?
* By "crit" I mean "chance to instantly recharge Power Siphon". -
Quote:Not if you think the cottage rule can create balancing problems. By its definition, balancing problems trump the cottage rule. No balance problem of material importance is allowed to exist by virtue of the cottage rule itself.Originally Posted by brophog02
I understand the Cottage Rule just fine, thank you.
If I can prove a balance problem exists, the cottage rule only states that I must reasonably prove no other options which preserve it will fix the problem, and the cottage rule would be waived for that specific situation.
The problem is that most people think their problems are critical balance problems when they are not, and they assume its the cottage rule that is in the way when it is the fact their critical balance problem isn't seen as one by the devs.
Also, as a rule the cottage rule doesn't apply to things like magnitude changes in a power's effects, endurance, or recharge. Even with all of the changes made to MA in Going Rogue, not one of them even triggers the cottage rule, much less is forced to break it. At best, Cobra Strike grazes the cottage rule, but doesn't trip over it. Rebalancing around recharge wouldn't be governed by the cottage rule in general. Its a non-factor.