Aura_Familia

[ QUOTE ]
David and Goliath: Will be severely tweaked to allow more tolerable enemies. One AV will lose Energy Transfer, one will gain Strength of Will, all units will lose Rage/BU and Cobra Strike.

The Dark Past: Previously unreleased. Story of a necromancer. The new ability to rename, rebio, and recolor enemies will go a long way toward making this one a possibility. That, and the custom options so I can get rid of Detention Field for my FF ally.

The Night Owl: Previously unreleased. With the new reduction in filesize, I may be able to fit the extra units I needed in. Custom will go a long way toward making the units how I wanted as well.

[/ QUOTE ]

Awesome. I say again the best thing of this issue, were the modifications to the MA.

[ QUOTE ]
Mid-week lull is all. It should start picking up tonight by the people who set stuff up for the weekend.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah the weekend is nuts for these sort of things.

When/if I get into these types of things, I'll need to remind myself to have patience till the weekend swings around on many items I'll be putting up/playing with.

Once saw a purple that normally goes for 80-100 mil go for 175 mil during the weekend.

[ QUOTE ]
I do small stuff and figure I make 3-4 mil per item I sell, I will post things to make only 500K to clear a recipe or supply the market on a slow sell item. I also gone and made 30-40 mil per sell at the last push for my ebil. those dont alway turn around as fast.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really thinking of biting the bullet and getting into this myself. This might just keep me subbing a bit longer if I could get into the inf/market games.

What do you guys and gals think?

http://blogs.zdnet.com/gadgetreviews/?p=4546

Looks impressive to me. Does it still FAIL just cause it's under DELL?

(I've never had issues with Dells, but some have from what I've read here and other places.)

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

Yes. I do win.

[/ QUOTE ]

That picture makes me wish they would update the hand models.

[/ QUOTE ]

[/ QUOTE ]

What, you don't think hands that look like cardboard cutouts are impressive for this day and age of graphics?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Is it just me or do some of the new male faces look like Christopher Walken?

[/ QUOTE ]
No, it is just you that looks like Christopher.


[/ QUOTE ]
*Evil stare*

[/ QUOTE ]

lol, I nicknamed that actor Creepy Walken a while ago.

[ QUOTE ]



Q: How can I tell if I'm likely to contract NTFSSS from my team?
A: There are signs you can spot early on to prevent NTFSSS from taking root.
Signs such as your teammates saying things like:

"I haven't played this character in a looong time. LOL!"
"This is a concept toon..."
"Where am I?"
*heard in the middle of combat* "How should I slot [insert power here]?"


.

[/ QUOTE ]

ROTFL!!!

[ QUOTE ]
Changing TFs back to recipe drops will defeat the entire purpose of merits existing in the first place. It's not a perfect system, but I like it. It caused people to actually run some of the formerly less popular TFs. Before merits no one, and I mean NO ONE, wanted to do anything except Katie Hannon because it was the best reward for time spent. Now if I want to run, say, Dr. Q, I might be able to spark some interest in it rather than get laughed at for even suggesting it.

Flagged PvP is not as good of an idea as you think it is. The players like you mentioned that don't play the game because flagged PvP is not a feature are in an extreme minority. Trust me on this. The vast majority of the current playerbase PvPs seldomly, if ever. Flagged PvP would drive away ten times as many players as it would draw to the game.

And my last point: If your suggestion somehow comes to fruition and forces me to leave Pinnacle I will hunt you down and beat you with a sea bass. Forcing anyone to change the server they play on is never a good thing. People like myselfr who play almost exclusiely on one server will be very angry if all the work they have done on their SG disappears. And if a character's name is taken on the new server, what then? I become Claws and Effect1? No thanks.

I'm not even touching the AE suggestions, because, frankly, I'm sick of talking about it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just want to say, I spit out iced coffee when I got the "beat you with a seabass" part.

That is all.

[ QUOTE ]
I am kind of shocked that we don't have a badge by that name, now that I think about it

[/ QUOTE ]

A badge named "time sink"?

That's . . . yeah why don't we? lol



I think the "payoff" badge for 1000 tickets comes close though. The "ebil" smiley face on it always makes me smile.

As an aside, /sign to this idea as long as it takes minor programming.

I would actually like an "uno-like" game stick in there somewhere.

Or perhaps use some of our earned gladiators in a YuGiOh type battle game?

(Was kidding about those last two . . . or was I?)

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Since there are people out there saying "I'm maliciously voting things down," and I've seen the evidence with my own eyes, I'm inclined to believe it, too.

[/ QUOTE ]

Didn't happen to me, but did happen to a friend of mine. Someone asked on a channel for recommendations on some arcs to try. My friend mentioned his arc and said he'd been trying to get some more people to play it so he could get input about how to tweak it. No spamming, no begging, just an answer to the question.

Lo and behold, someone said that because my friend said he was trying to get people to play it, said someone was deliberately going to play it and one rate it, just to 'teach him a lesson'.

Had I not seen it on channel, I wouldn't have believed it. But there it was. What a maroon.

The stated low-rater *did* play the arc, *did* give it a one star, and even stated in the comments that it wasn't because of the content, but because he'd tried to 'solicit plays'. Excuse me? How is that helpful to *anyone*?

Y'know, if my friend had been spamming, that would have been one thing (although personally, I still think that would have been an abuse of the ratings system). However, he wasn't, and I, for one, am always glad to see people mention an arc they've done. And hey, someone was *asking* for arcs to be recommended!!

The star system needs to be gutted for the same reason that the rankings on the message boards were eliminated: too much potential for abuse by trolls. It's a sad thing, because it *could* be very useful. Unfortunately, as it is, if it's not abuse by trolls, it's artificially inflated ratings to avoid hurting feelings. Either way, the information's rarely accurate.

~Elizabeth

[/ QUOTE ]

THIS.

Again for the 100th time, the star system needs to die in the perpetual fiery depths of the 7th circle of hell, in a blaze-glorious and heinous way.

And yes, that's how I REALLY feel.

Numerous folks in numerous threads (including this one btw) have come up with excellent replacements. Use them, devs.

[ QUOTE ]
There appears to be a bug in the system that may set your vote to zero stars under some conditions if you exit without selecting any stars.

On some occasions I notice that upon completion of an arc it says "You have rated this arc 0 stars!" even though I have never played it before and have not made a rating. Normally it doesn't say anything unless I click one of the stars. I don't know what conditions lead up to this, as I cannot reproduce it at will.

The question is: if I click finish or just exit, does that register a rating of zero stars? From my experimentation it's not clear whether it's actually casting a zero rating.

If it is registering a zero rating in this case, it could be the source of some unexplained "griefing." It may not really be griefing, but a bug that occurs occasionally.

[/ QUOTE ]

The way it's SUPPOSED to work, is if you quit and don't touch the stars, no rating.

If you double click 1 it's 0.

If it's doing what you say as a bug, that . . .

would be EPIC FAILURE.

[ QUOTE ]
Unfortunately the "random" button on test only gives you one random arc, not a page of them. So you have to keep clicking it until you get something that sounds vaguely interesting, rather than having a whole page to look at.

I would honestly like for the DEFAULT search to be randomized somewhat. Have maybe three randomly chosen Dev's Choice arcs at the top of the first few pages, two or three Hall of Fame arcs when we get some, thereby still showcasing those arcs but not to the exclusion of all others, and the rest be completely random until you click on a "sort by" button.

Right now, we have: Dev's Choice arcs. Two 5-starred arcs that likely deserve it, since they have kept their rating for over 100 plays. Three or four 5-starred arcs that might deserve the rating, having over 20 plays. And then on page two you start getting into 5-starred arcs with a single rating and a one-sentence description such as "So and so is attacking paragon city and you have to stop him." Your 4-starred arc is better than those.

[/ QUOTE ]

Really. The page organization of MA NEEDS to be improved.

[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, the problem would be having a limit on the "recommended" list. I've 5-starred more than ten arcs. Although I do like the idea of having a box you can tick to indicate why you liked the arc.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think the idea is to MOVE away from the star system (not going to repeat my having it DIE in FIRE suggestion. ) and to a system of what folks of similar interests to you liked .

COMBINE this with having what arcs appear on the front page be randomized from time to time and it would help.

Also the ultimate COMBINATION is to DROP THE EXTRA SLOT reward from being tied in anyway shape or form to playerbase whim.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
It is rather telling. From that data, it seems that most players are inclined to rate favorably, but a core group is determined to downrate higher rated arcs. Unfortunate, but unsurprising.

I don't even look through rated arcs anymore -- I scroll through the arcs that have never been played or rated looking for something that piques my interest. I've found some really good arcs that way, but it's time-consuming. Though a little reading never hurt anyone.



[/ QUOTE ]

Really ? So if 60% of the arcs aren't 5* the system isn't working ?

Seems that data shows most of the stories are horribly overrated

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm sorry but THIS.

The idea that 60% of arcs are high quality is highly ridiculous based on some of the stuff I keep getting pulled up when I try as best I can to randomize my search in MA.

When i get pages and pages of "asdessf" nonsense . . . umm NO!

Hopefully the issue 15 "more" section and tags helps.

[ QUOTE ]
Oh no! You mean things might happen during development that push an *estimated* time back!

Say it ain't so! Obviously that never happens *Anywhere* else.

Go visit the dairy section, you're in danger of running low on cheese to go with that.

Oh, by the way... we had to pay for the *last* expansion - NOT ISSUE - as well.

[/ QUOTE ]

This. But I would have said it a bit more nicely .. .

lol, who am kidding?

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Its in "UNKNOWN" status..............

what is there NOT to know???? We want in ....lol

[/ QUOTE ]

Unknown is more like "Limbo". Hovering between life and death.

Test Server...step away from the light! Come back to us, test server! Arise!

[/ QUOTE ]

I knew I should have taken Resurrect sooner on my empath.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
And I ask again: What does one guy's rating style have to do with griefing?

[/ QUOTE ]

The relevance is that while I recognize that ratings griefing does occur, I cannot think of an obvious way to clearly distinguish between ratings griefing and genuinely harsh ratings in the general case, which makes its very difficult to formulate an enforceable policy regarding ratings griefing except in very obvious and extreme situations. Even then, its unlikely to be enforceable automatically, without the involvement of customer support to research the issue carefully. That may require more time than its worth to enforce.

[/ QUOTE ]

On the other hand, if they were serious about banning repeat offenders, someone like Heavens_Agent would be ok, as he had actually played the arc in question and THEN decided he didn't like it, rather than the more obvious "this person has started x arcs, and immediately quit and assigned them a low rating."

If this is too difficult to datamine, then it's a case of the devs making promises they can't keep to assure the players that what we predicted would happen, wouldn't.

[/ QUOTE ]

The devs need to learn to listen to the players in CLOSED BETA when they state something. This is the reason the HAND PICK who they do in CLOSED BETA.

With that said, I admit for this closed beta, they may have had LESS ability to delay the issue any further for reasons already stated in some dev interviews.

[ QUOTE ]
IMHO:

quits/finishes info: Bad and griefable.
deaths/finishes info: bad and griefable.
"You have not played this mission log enough to rate it.": Cuts down on legit ratings, and does not impact deliberate griefing.

I am more and more getting the idea that we should have a way of seeing what arcs people actively LIKE and WHY, and being able to couple that with a list of players with the same preferences.

Who cares if a lot of people dislike an arc, if people with your similar preferences like it?

Hudson Hawk died at the box office, but it's one of my top favorite movies.

[/ QUOTE ]

I would be completely opposed to any forcing of putting players through dreck if they want to give an honest rating of arc that might be simply bad, unless it came with the first two things that you stated were bad (and honestly are just as griefable as the current systemn)

With that said my ultimate suggestion is: Let the ratings system DIE IN FIRE.

And then choose any of the more intelligent suggestions I've seen being given by players on these boards since before/during/after closed beta for issue 14. Your idea of matching like minded authors/arc players up is included in that list of good ideas.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I think you need to look at the bigger picture, some of us arent using the AE to farm but to create challenging non-wussified content unlike what the devs created in the past. So if I create a bunch of misisons with luietents set to extreme with deadly powersets does that classify me as a farmer?

[/ QUOTE ]
Nope. And I'm sure there were legitimate missions that used the Vampire incubators and snake eggs too.

It's obvious the honor system doesn't work for curbing farming/PLing. The safest thing to do is to put in controls that simply make certain types of exploits impossible. I am 100% sure there are lots of legitimate story-based arcs out there that have maps with all minions or all LTs or all bosses on them. But the truth is that most of the farming also uses maps of that type. So don't be surprised to see them go.

[/ QUOTE ]

Actually I think those things were taken out just so the devs could rebuild them WITH CONTROLS for just as you stated.

Wouldn't surprise me if some more control will be taken from authors.

Unfortunate, but preferrable to the situation we are currently in.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I hope the Dom buffs are included.

[/ QUOTE ]

They aren't.

[/ QUOTE ]Ok then just tell us what we need to know so when they are in we can test. Or is it that this stuff wont hit test until I15 is live?

[/ QUOTE ]

Could have sworn that in another thread Arcanaville had already speculated that it would probably be AFTER issue 15 went live. i thought her analysis of that was spot on.

[/ QUOTE ]

And all she did was put Castle's post on the topic in chronological order.

I was still going to hold out hope that he would slip them in since there seemed to be a delay in getting I-15 to test.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ahh gotcha.

I think that delay might have been due to the badge issue that came up with MA, but I could be wrong.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I'm curious as to why people are allowed to rate before spending, say, 5-10 minutes on a mission.

[/ QUOTE ]

Let's say i enter a mission. The very first thing I see in front of me is that every single foe in the mission is an Elite Boss (AV downgraded to EB, won't ever be less than EB even in heroic.)

Should I be forced to wait 5-10 minutes to rate that thing 1 star?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes.

Better that than the alternatives.

[/ QUOTE ]

Is it? Consider a mission that someone dislikes because of extreme difficulty, and under the current system would give a 2. Now imagine that person having to spend ten minutes stewing over the fact that they have to spend ten minutes stewing before rating. This is unlikely to make them more generous.

Let me put it this way: if the *devs* put in a ten minute wait, I wouldn't hold that against the player, even if I was tempted to do so, to try to be as objective as possible. However, if the *player* somehow had the ability to flag their mission as "cannot rate until at least ten minutes of play has elapsed" I *would* hold that against the player if it turns out they've also decided to inflict ten minutes of continual stupid on me.

You might argue that if I really didn't like it, I should abandon it without rating at all, but that would make this feature a sycophant-switch, invalidly skewing ratings upward. I might tolerate the ten minutes out of principle if I felt that the author did that deliberately.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yep. We would end up in a situation far worse than the rating cartels 5 starring the farming arcs/bad arcs past the legitimate content situation we were in.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
One Reich to rule them all, and in the darkness bind them?

[/ QUOTE ]

You heard it here, Dark Bondage powerset

[/ QUOTE ]

Long as I get to pick my own safe word.

[/ QUOTE ]

I told you, your safe word is: "Yes, Ulli, I will make a thousand cookies for you."

NOW GO ASSUME POSITON #7!

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I hope the Dom buffs are included.

[/ QUOTE ]

They aren't.

[/ QUOTE ]Ok then just tell us what we need to know so when they are in we can test. Or is it that this stuff wont hit test until I15 is live?

[/ QUOTE ]

Could have sworn that in another thread Arcanaville had already speculated that it would probably be AFTER issue 15 went live. i thought her analysis of that was spot on.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I'm curious as to why people are allowed to rate before spending, say, 5-10 minutes on a mission.

[/ QUOTE ]

Let's say i enter a mission. The very first thing I see in front of me is that every single foe in the mission is an Elite Boss (AV downgraded to EB, won't ever be less than EB even in heroic.)

Should I be forced to wait 5-10 minutes to rate that thing 1 star?

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes.

Better that than the alternatives.

[/ QUOTE ]

Except in that instance it would still be one-starred. And if the person just quits then the arc IS NOT get a fair and representative view of what the playerbase thinks of said arc.

Now if you could display the number of QUITS for an arc, as well as number of playthroughs, in addition to having to wait 5 minutes, sure.

As an aside, as I've said before if your arc has AVs or EBs it should be stated in the intro. Personally if I ran into an arc like that after all the things I just said were put in place, and there was no warning at all from the author that that was the type of mission it was, I WOULD wait the FULL five to 10 minutes just to MAKE SURE I zero star it.

If you arc is a challenge arc SAY SO.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Giant Mech Men descending from the sky....

[/ QUOTE ]

We'd better be able to get purchasable G Cores to fight them, as we all know the only thing that can handle Kaiju robots is Godzilla.

[/ QUOTE ]

Hahahaha!

We need megazords!

[/ QUOTE ]

IT'S MORPHIN' TIME!

[/ QUOTE ]

GO GO POWER RANGERS!!!!