CoyoteShaman
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Posts
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Joined
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That was a lot to go through for the simple point made in the last part of the last line.
Besides, they wouldn't dosey-doe. They'd mix up a fruit salad. -
Normally I don't like doing betas because I'm no good at bugging things and I feel like I'm not helping, but this time I REALLY want in! The power customization is cool, but this stuff is just making me drool.
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Quote:I'll start saving up now! Yes, please! Do this!Originally Posted by Tarkenchi
This is pretty awesome. You guys really need to offer a lifetime subscription option.
And since people who buy this will be certain to get all the vets rewards, they might as well be all given as soon as they come out...
That last part is sort of a joke. Sort of...
Robin -
The super-sidekicking stuff concerns me a bit, but I have faith that they'll do it right and it'll be a plus. So far it sounds like they're doing it really well, but we'll have to see. One thing I'm confused about is mega-SK-ing. Doesn't this mean you could get one lvl 46 person and 7 level 10s, jump the diff to be fighting +4s and wind up with the same effect as bridging 7 people at once? Of course the risks would be huge, but with the right lvl 46 tank it should be pretty massive.
The email changes, however, are total WIN! I hope you devs know how happy you just made me!
Nevermind... I didn't realize this was so long and thought that I had already read everything. This had been answered. Darn thread is building too fast. -
I play mostly MMs red-side, Skeet, and I agree with you completely. They're mainly solo-toons for that reason. They don't team well unless the player is VERY good. They're never going to push defenders out of teams.
Since they feel a bit like being on a team, however, they will make soloing defenders even less desirable.
Robin -
I'm not suggesting that either their primary powers or secondary powers are under-powered. I'm suggesting the AT as a whole is under-represented. Take a look at Phil's surveys in his thread comparing controllers to defenders.
The point I try to make is not that either of their sets should be made more powerful. I'm trying to say that defenders are built wrong. Giving them buff/debuff primaries and ranged secondaries is an inherent problem because both of those set types are already available to their competition. The only other hero types that have that are Tanks and Scrappers and those are so different due to HP, DMG and inherent powers that the overlap isn't nearly as great. Additionally, the melee combat is so vibrant and active that there is much more room for more players to enjoy it. When talking about villains, you have brutes and stalkers which are massively different for a ton of reasons but none of the others have the overlap problem on both sets types. When allowing cross-overs, this problem will be aggravated slightly by corruptors and masterminds.
The solution is not, in my opinion, to buff any part of defenders or nerf any part of any other AT. The solution, which I'm sure is well beyond the resources the devs will consider worth investing, is to completely alter the defender secondary to make them unique.
The primary power sets for defenders, with a few exceptions, all have powers that work best at close range. These powers are important to the benefit of the team as well as the defender. Therefore giving them a ranged secondary set is inappropriate in my opinion. Their secondaries should be replaced with close-range sets which combine offense and defense in a way similar to how the dominators' secondary combines ranged and melee offense. A couple personal shields, a utility or two, and a few mediocre attacks would be much more than enough to get the AT up in the front lines where they would be much more useful tactically as well as more fun for a larger number of players (hence this game being called City of Scrappers for so long). This would have the added benefit of making them much more soloable without making them over-powered since any overlap between their primary powers and secondary powers would benefit only themselves and not their team which is where they really shine.
Robin -
We need two things for contacts directly related to this, Bill, as far as I can see.
First, as you say, we need to only be given contacts in our level range. Second, we need to be able to manually control Active/Inactive status. By that I mean that we need to be able to push contacts off our main contact list if/when we don't want to do their arcs and then bring them back later on if we decide to. I'm sure I'm not the only one who wishes for a cleaner contact list. Isn't that the reason for having it split between Active and Inactive?
A third thing I'd really like to see is to have the newspaper/radio contact moved to the freakin' detectives tab. Perfect-world, as far as that goes, would be able to select which of the two you wanted it on. If I'm doing contact missions I don't want that damn thing at the top of my list.
My $.02.
Oh, and /signed.
Robin -
One last comment here before I completely stop involving myself in this thread, as it seems to be getting far out of hand and going nowhere.
Keep in mind that the devs aren't nearly as fanatical about any particular AT as some fans are (I would hope). Lum has made some very good points on how they have to go about deciding on what/when/how to buff/nerf some power/set/AT. I think, however, she's confusing "if" with "what/when/how". The "if" comes from player desire relative to available resources. Case in point is that I16 is power customization. The player desire was always very high, but the resources weren't available so they put it off.
The problem with defenders getting something done is simply that the fewer people who like them, the fewer people who speak out about them. The fewer people there are who speak out about it, the less important the changes are to make and therefore the less resources it's worth it to devote to them. It's an ever-decreasing spiral. Less fun -> less people playing them -> less noise about the problems -> less dev attention -> less fun -> etc.
It's not about defenders v. controllers/corruptors/masterminds. It's about squeaky wheel customers. If we have 100 people who kick and scream about the need to get defenders changed (in some way), and the threat is that those 100 people will just go roll something else, but there are 10,000 people mumbling about new low-level content, and the threat is that some customers won't stay interested in the game and therefore let their accounts lapse, which is going to get the development resources? It's not even really a question.
Support? Force Multipliers? Weak? Powerful? None of it matters. Software developers NEVER change a feature of their applications because it doesn't match up with other features. We change it because the customers want it changed and because we don't have more customers wanting other changes first. It's a very simple equation. The defender could be obviously and horrendously underpowered and if nobody played them then they'd never get changed. At best the AT would get dropped and a different one would replace them.
And that, after a fashion, is really what's happening here. It's just happening due to attrition instead of decision.
That's the last of my two cents on this subject. Have fun continuing to argue it out using game numbers or feelings or whatever. When you start to look at the numbers that really matter--customer counts, time played, dollars earned--then you'll start to get to the heart of what will actually get the AT changed.
Good luck. If/when it ever happens you'll see me at the front of the line playing a defender.
Robin -
Quote:Yeah, I know. I was commenting on the verbal (out-loud) sound of it. A claws/regen scrap who is "Without Pause". Say it out loud. "Without paws". Jokes are no fun when you have to explain them. I was assuming you had actually intended that as a subliminal double entendre, but obviously not.Originally Posted by Amy_Amp
Scrappers are delicate?
The whole concept was finding a scrapper that could in theory go from point A to point B the fastest.* The original name was a play on "Rebel Without a Cause," but shortened down to fit as a name. /regen allows for the "without pausing" type of playstyle. Also see my love affair with Kins speedy nature.
* Enough of the game has changed to where it's not the fastest, but it's fun enough for me. -
Umm... Amy?
Is your sig-graphic some kind of masochistic verbal pun? I mean, if you say the title out loud keeping in mind you're talking about a regenerating person who keeps sticking their claws into dangerous situations, it's really kinda... painful sounding.
Just sayin'.
Robin -
Quote:What a defender "can" do and what a defender is competitive in doing are completely different.Originally Posted by SkeetSkeet
A defender can do all those except melee and melee isn't even on the list of concerns for a defender.
If you're forming a team and decide you need a melee damage dealer, do you think "hmm... should I get a scrapper or a defender?" If you need someone to occupy the spawns while the others do damage, do you think "should I get a defender or a tanker?" If you need raw damage output, do you think "should I get a blaster or a defender?" If you need someone to lock down your enemies, do you think "should I get a defender or a controller?" In all likelihood you, as everyone else, does not. You think "I'll get a scrapper/tanker/blaster/controller" respectively.
But if someone needs a buffer, they'll quite often have to think about whether they should get a controller or a defender. In fact, the deciding factor is often whether or not they already have a controller on the team. That's the problem. Not "can this AT do this" but "is it worth it to replace this AT with this other one". People often consider it worth it to replace the defender with a controller when doing their recruiting.
Mind you I'm not saying they kick the defender when a 'troller starts LFT. I'm saying before doing the inviting, they look at what's available and say to themselves "should I get that defender who buffs and might add a small touch of dps, or should I get that controller who does pretty good dps, locks out the spawns and can buff nearly as well as the defender on top of it?"
The people who care about soloing aren't really at issue. It's the people who love to team but hate to start/lead teams. Those are the ones that are thinking they really need to be playing something else. That cuts down the number of people who would otherwise be playing defenders.
Robin -
Quote:I think the word "missed" is an understatement. That fact went so unnoticed as to have left me blind in my left eye. Sorry about that. :SOriginally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
I think you missed the part where I was agreeing with you. Thank you for noticing, regardless.
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Quote:To elaborate on Turbo_Ski's very salient point:Originally Posted by Turbo_Ski
Powers do matter for Power balancing but not AT balancing. AT Balancing relates to modifiers and inherents and doesn't look at any power scalars. Power balancing focuses on the scalars and how balanced they are amongst themselves using the common modifiers derived from AT balancing.
You don't however look at fulcrum shift or enervating field and base the modifier around such powers existing. Such an act is working backwards and utterly destroys any hope for balance.
We're not talking about how this particular action/power/combination/set relates to the balance of the AT and how the balance of this particular AT relates to the balance of another AT. We're talking about why this AT is so horribly under-represented across all servers at all times. As Trashcan wisely pointed out, it has at least something to do with human nature. That human nature is directed against filling only the role for which Defenders are most well adapted. When one can fill both that role and another, one is going to do so. No analysis of powers is going to change that. It's the role and how the roles interact that are at issue. We can discuss numbers from here to Recluse's Victory, but those numbers aren't going to accomplish anything unless we can very clearly state that the role of Defender is one that needs to be addressed for the simple reason that players think they can fill that role without playing a defender.
That elaboration might have not been very coherent. Turbo, feel free to give me a "quit helping" exasperated command on par with Buffy telling Xander to shut the hell up.
Robin -
Quote:We're talking about heroes prior to GR which I mentioned later in my post. The "epic" ATs are specifically created to be JOATs and are massively irrelevant because they're not available until after you get a 50 which lets out the vast majority of the player base. Since the point of my post was competition for players (which ATs get the most), we can discount those ATs which cannot yet compete as well as those who's competitiveness is limited by the necessity of unlocking content. Further, the standard is SOs, not IOs and especially not IO Sets because, as has been mentioned, that's the standard set by the devs.Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
In no particular order:
1) Blaster, Dominator, Corruptor, Mastermind, Crab Spider, Fortunata, Warshade, Peacebringer
2) Scrapper, Brute, Stalker, Dominator, Controller, Night Widow, Crab Spider, Bane Spider, Warshade, Peacebringer
3) Tanker, Brute, Scrapper, Mastermind, Night Widow, Fortunata, Crab Spider, Warshade, Peacebringer
4) Dominator, Controller, Tanker, Brute, Fortunata, Warshade
5) Defender, Mastermind, Controller, Corruptor, Crab Spider, Bane Spider, Fortunata, Night Widow
VEATs are a fraction of the team buffers that Defenders are. Yet when VEATs were introduced, suddenly everyone suddenly discovered the sheer power of stacking team buffs. Why? Because VEAT team buffs are a side effect of their core soloing powers.
Honestly, I think low Defender population has very little to do with their functionality as an AT. The problem with Defenders is that most people are selfish, and it takes a great deal of altruism - or at least a lot of enlightened self-interest - to create a character whose best powers can only be used to make other characters stronger, better, and more fun to play. The biggest problem with Defender design is that it flies in the face of human nature, especially in a recreational activity.
If City of Heroes is a sport, then playing Defender is volunteering to play goal - a vital position, but the whole point is to enable others to do flashy stuff, nobody pays attention to you or the job you do, and you're only noticed when you screw up. And god save you should you try to play alone in your goalie pads.
Given the discounting and other than mine, your list is:
1) (nothing)
2) Controller, which is not hand-to-hand which therefore means it doesn't apply
3) Scrapper, which is highly arguable when discussing the general capabilities as opposed to specific builds.
4) Tankers, which don't "shut down" anything. The best the Tanker does is occupy the spawns while the spawns continue to attack. Again, we're talking about general capabilities and not specific builds.
5) (nothing)
Worst of all, even in your greatly enhanced list, you STILL don't include defenders in ANY other roles. Thank you very much for proving my point so dramatically by seemingly trying to argue against it.
Please keep in mind, however, that to some large extent I agree with your point that selfishness must be considered when determining if the AT is going to be enjoyable to players. That is, indeed, a large part of why this AT is under-represented. It's that exact fact I am suggesting we have to find out how to solve.
Robin
PS: Huge bonus points for knowing what "enlightened self-interest" is and how it applies to the current discussion. Very nice. -
I hate to say this, but I think the problem with defenders is options.
If you want to play a toon that:
1) does massive ranged damage.
2) can dish out a ton of hand-to-hand and stay somewhat safe.
3) can survive damn near any conflict.
4) can shut down a whole spawn.
5) can make your whole team better at what they do.
What are your options?
1) Blaster
2) Scrapper
3) Tanker
4) Controller
5) Defender or Controller
Of all the ATs, the Defender is the only one that has a role which can be filled by a different AT, but that can't really fill the roll of another AT in turn. And that doesn't even include the red-siders. Once GR hits we'll have another two ATs that can replace us but that we can't replace. We only do one thing well, and there are three other ATs that do it pretty well.
Until the options for the others are limited (not going to happen), the options for defenders are extended (would take an entire rewrite of the AT to change their secondary type) or the difference in value within that role is made extreme, defenders are going to be replaceable and therefore are going to get replaced. Not completely, of course, but to the degree found by Phil's surveys.
It's not more damage that I think defs need. They'll never be able to compete with blasters or corruptors and they shouldn't be able to. What defs need is more extreme buff/debuffs. So much greater that when you want a buffer/debuffer on your team it's not even a question of "should we get a defender or something else?", it's a question of "which defender should we get?".
Tankers don't compete with controllers by trying to be scrappers. Scrappers don't compete with blasters by trying to be tankers. Defenders shouldn't try to compete with controllers by trying to be blasters!
Tankers compete by being the best tanks. Scrappers compete by being the best scraps. Defenders should compete by being the best defenders. Right now the degree to which we are the better defenders is not a sufficient competitive advantage so other ATs are winning out the war of attrition.
Robin -
What is /threadlock?
Are you asking for the thread to be locked? How come? Has anyone in the hundreds of posts said they were against a BRB? -
Quote:EXACTLY! We can argue numbers until we're blue in the face but the majority of players are not playing level 50s and are not crunching numbers. It's about how it feels to play a defender. And that's what we have to address.Originally Posted by dave_p
Still, perception is what drives the lower populations for defenders, so it must be addressed all the same.
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Quote:Again you're ignoring preference and saying "just do it". Please try to at least consider the possibility that some people will never think it's easier to start/lead a team than it is to just roll up a different AT. We're not here to argue about whether or not people should lead teams. We're discussing the qualitative differences between defenders and other ATs that make defenders less-often played, and how to make the AT more enjoyable to a broader range of people. No one will ever convince the broad range of people that they should change their likes and dislikes so the option is to change the product being offered to them. How many different kinds of pickles are there in the pickle aisle at the store where you shop? Do the pickle companies say "Gee, if you don't like they way we make pickles then you should just make your own."? No, if people want different pickles they make different pickles.Originally Posted by SkeetSkeet
Too much is made of being leader or having the star. I know some people view it as a kind of cross between James Kirk and Pol Pot but it doesn't have to be that way. A minimalist "behind the throne" approach works just as well. As long as you ensure a workable mix of AT and levels as you invite people, the rest will fall into place.
Robin -
Quote:I'm lost. How does that at all relate to saying that the EPPs make controllers edge out defenders? How do inherent powers have anything to do with EPPs?Originally Posted by SkeetSkeet
Only if one accepts the premise that having a better inherent makes controllers inherently better. I don't accept that particular premise.
There are two characters: one's a level 38 controller (C), the other is a level 38 defender (D). C now has all of D's primary powers. C also has some of the best mez powers in the game while D has some additional watered down blaster powers. Which is more appealing to your average player (not players of any particular play-style, the average player)? We're completely discounting inherents here, mind you. Assume their damage potentials are the same, even though in the actual game they're not. Most players don't look at numbers so don't consider numbers when you answer.
Now both characters are three levels higher and getting their first EPP. C has a chance to get some blaster-type powers which means that D no longer has that advantage. D has a chance to get some personal defense powers and maybe a minor soft mez or a melee attack. The effective difference between melee attacks and ranged attacks is only that melee attacks can't be used at range so that can be discounted. D already has defensive powers so while the personal defense powers are nice, they're not really an additional advantage over C. The mez will never compare to the C's mezzes so that's irrelevent.
In the final analysis, C has everything D could want and D gets nothing to outshine C even in their own specialty. Of course C is going to edge farther ahead and it has absolutely nothing to do with inherent powers.
Robin -
While I agree with c., Skeet, I'd like to point out that since teams can have up to 8 people and only one of them needs to lead, it should be basic logic that only 1 in 8 players needs to be a leader-type personality and therefore 7 in 8 shouldn't have to be the kind of player that likes the star.
I hate the star. With a comment by Phil I have started to be willing to start teams and run with them, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't prefer to have someone else do the starting. Even if you assume half the people who aren't the leader-type are willing to lead, you've still got 4 in 8 players who would rather just go roll a scrapper or some other AT who can solo better. Being a defender is kind of a "behind the throne" play-style and therefore isn't going to generally appeal to leader-types. That further decreases the number of defenders as those people give up and go build something else. That's the real problem here. Attrition. We are trying to stop that and we're not going to do it by telling people "well your personality just isn't cut out for being a defender 'cuz if it was you'd just start your own team". To a lot of players saying "start your own team" is going to be the same as saying "go play something more solo-able." That promotes attrition.
Robin -
I'm going to jump in at this point because I find some inherent flaws in some arguments here, along with the equally strong inherent accuracies. I'd like to keep the accuracies but at least point out some of the flaws I'm seeing.
First, Phil, I think your methodology is very sound and definitely goes quite some distance towards proving TS's, and now your, point. Defenders need to be adjusted and it seems obvious. The problem, however, is not with your methodology or your final analysis, but with how you get from the data to the conclusion. You're using inductive, rather than deductive reasoning. This has been pointed out indirectly at least once in this thread, but I think it's important to be more direct and explicit so that the main strength of your argument can shine through more fully.
Your premise is that Underplayed = Underpowered. That is inductive reasoning based on the assumption that Power = Fun. The problem there is that "power" is subjective rather than objective, just as is "fun", and therefore cannot be used in the factual analysis. You have, without a doubt, proven that defenders are underplayed. That does not prove, nor is necessary or even relevant to prove, that they are underpowered. What it proves is that the player base doesn't like them nearly as much as they like the other ATs. Different players like different kinds of things, true, and therefore will tend toward different play-styles and goals. Using some simple sociological truisms (I do not say "facts" because there are no "facts" in the soft science of sociology) we can build towards a deductive application of the results of your survey.
1) The long tail is a vital part of marketing in a massive customer base.
2) Massive, in the context of the MMO, does not equate to a massive customer base in the context of marketing.
3) Discounting the long tail, due to the size of the customer base, the importance of each product (AT in this context) in the product line must draw and keep customers.
4) One of the best product development strategies is to "manage from the bottom". This means to find the least productive product and adapt it until it is no longer the least productive.
5) In this case, it has been shown to be obvious that the Defender product is the least productive, and therefore in the greatest need of modification.
The next step is not to argue about how to change the defender product, but instead to discover the truth of why it is underproducing. We can make assumptions based on our own preferences and how we feel about other ATs, but those assumptions are inherently biased and therefore invalid. Instead, I'd recommend we use the methodology you've already established to narrow down the field.
First, we need to discover the base-line of defender performance. By "performance" I mean the productivity of the AT relative to acquiring and keeping customers. In order to do this, it would be best to make another survey of only the starting level defender counts. Lets see the ratios from level 1-10 by themselves and not as they relate to anything outside that range. This will show us how well they are liked based on, essentially, the views of new players seeing only the description during character generation; short-term players seeing only how they relate to other low-level ATs; mid-term players who have seen a bit of how they solo and how they team without knowing about the end-game values; and long-term players who have seen defenders run the whole spectrum of strengths and flaws. This will give us our base-line.
We then would need a "drop-off" chart showing not how defenders rate against other ATs, but how defenders of level 1-10 rate against defenders of level 12-20, etc. I would recommend using two surveys with one having no overlapping datapoints and the other having half-mark overlaps. In other words, the first survey would study 1-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40 and 41-50 and the second survey would study 6-15, 16-25, 26-35 and 36-45. Both surveys could then be combined for a more detailed overlap study. This would show us in much greater detail if it's the basic function of the AT or if it's how the AT relates to other ATs (Controllers getting the last of the Defender AT's powers at level 35 and 38 would cause a significant drop-off at 35-40, Tanks getting taunt and therefore being stronger protectors would cause a significant drop-off at 10-20, Blasters doing a ton more damage would cause a significant drop-off at 30-40 when both ATs have gotten their nukes, etc.).
Right now all we can say for sure is that Defenders are under-appreciated. We don't know why and claiming to merely shows our biases. We don't have access to the datamining capabilities of the developers so we have to rely on our own datamining techniques. I think Phil's methodology gives us some excellent extrapolation possibilities and combining that with Turbo's understanding of data-interpretation can get us what we need to find out exactly what is wrong, why it's wrong and how to correct it.
Thank you for your time. I know I'm very long winded.
Robin -
As I mentioned, the reason to play a defender is to make the team work together better. If you're doing your job correctly, most people on the team will only know the team was more fun because you were there. They won't know exactly why.
"Thank you"? If someone knows to say "thank you", it's already gotten out of hand. "Thank you" comes as the team is going their own ways and everyone says it to everyone else for the fun times they've had.
As Phil said, the Defender's job is make everyone else seem more super. The only sound of applause the Defender needs to hear comes from the enemies hitting the ground as the rest of the team is stunned by their own badassness.
We are the Hero to Heroes. We let the others have the Glory. We know the truth.
(Umm... Phil, you might have renewed my faith a bit *too* much.)
Robin -
Wow. How the heck do you people afford these builds? Maybe it's just my altaholism that's keeping me from really pumping out the inf.
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Since it seems very appropriate (and since Phil linked me over here), I'm going to cross-post this from the thread I started on trying to get my faith in defenders renewed:
Hey Phil, remind me to not start any threads any more. They tend to turn into massive debates that have little or nothing to do with the reason I posted in the first place.
To everyone who has been talking about damage and blasting people in the face... Come on! That's no reason to play a defender!
To everyone who has been talking about containment and soloing... Come on! That's no reason to NOT play a defender!
To Phil, and so far Phil alone, yes, the reason to play a defender is to make teams work together. Gone are the days when teams just naturally assume you have to have a defender for that. Here now are the days when you have Make Your Own Team in order to do that. After your post I did indeed go out and roll a defender. I did indeed start a team. I got a full pug for sewers in a matter of minutes in the face of all those AE calls for teams and teammates. We rocked the sewers faster than I've ever seen done before and the team went from 1-4 to 8-9 in an incredibly short time. It was a blast and reminded me what it's like to be The Hero to Heroes!
It's not about damage. It's not about kill-count. It's not about attacking. It's about knowing, in your heart and not your mind, that your team stays close to you because that's where they feel safe. It's about knowing that if your bar goes red the team's survival instincts will take over and protect you at all costs because you're the one that MUST live. It's about knowing that every person on that team will have added you to their friends list and want you on their team every chance they get.
A blaster is a killer.
A controller is a fighter.
A scrapper is a warrior.
A tanker is a protector.
A Defender is a Hero!
And THAT is faith. -
Hey Phil, remind me to not start any threads any more. They tend to turn into massive debates that have little or nothing to do with the reason I posted in the first place.
To everyone who has been talking about damage and blasting people in the face... Come on! That's no reason to play a defender!
To everyone who has been talking about containment and soloing... Come on! That's no reason to NOT play a defender!
To Phil, and so far Phil alone, yes, the reason to play a defender is to make teams work together. Gone are the days when teams just naturally assume you have to have a defender for that. Here now are the days when you have Make Your Own Team in order to do that. After your post I did indeed go out and roll a defender. I did indeed start a team. I got a full pug for sewers in a matter of minutes in the face of all those AE calls for teams and teammates. We rocked the sewers faster than I've ever seen done before and the team went from 1-4 to 8-9 in an incredibly short time. It was a blast and reminded me what it's like to be The Hero to Heroes!
It's not about damage. It's not about kill-count. It's not about attacking. It's about knowing, in your heart and not your mind, that your team stays close to you because that's where they feel safe. It's about knowing that if your bar goes red the team's survival instincts will take over and protect you at all costs because you're the one that MUST live. It's about knowing that every person on that team will have added you to their friends list and want you on their team every chance they get.
A blaster is a killer.
A controller is a fighter.
A scrapper is a warrior.
A tanker is a protector.
A Defender is a Hero!
And THAT is faith.