Dr_MechanoEU

hmm I do get the sense that they're going to apply the biggest sledgehammer possible, turning the MA from popular, if misused, item into a barren wasteland where only those with a really big interest in stories go.

Seriously before you apply your mahoosive sledgehammer atleast think about what's going to happen...

For the love of all that's holy do TWEAKS! Don't apply a rocket launcher to smoosh a bothersome fly.

Plus the [censored]storm that's going to happen on the gaming websites (alright CoX isn't popular enough to really create a big fuss) when people hear of banhappy devs, no matter the reason, the voices calling the devs jerks will outweight the more reasoned voices 10 to 1 since this is the internets obviously.

You know it's quite funny...

...yes the massive levelling speed was wrong but it did singlehandely kill or seriously dent any of the PL and inf selling business (especially that one that sounds like 'Gag Order') in one fell swoop.

So they moved the power levelling out of the seedy underworld of the paid for business and into the hands of players, also with the price drops on A LOT of recipes the need for inf is nolonger so great that there are recipes that cost increasingly silly amount of inf bar the uber-purples (how it should be).

So now we're going to go back to the spam emails of power levelling and inf selling...

...meh kill one thing only to have another raise it's ugly head once more...

Though if they can datamine how long a person has taken to hit 50 with a specific character...surely they can now be able to tell who has been powerlevelled anyway or up until now, when the problem got massively hugebig, they've not bothered...odd..

A very fine post.

I've noticed that doing normal content, level 1-10 come thick and fast, it takes about half an hour to hit level five, hour and a half to hit 10...then there's this massive slowdown period even with the XP smoothing.

10-20 just seems to grind solo espescially when compared with the pace that you've just had at levelling. Once you hit 20 with stamina and 22 with SOs the game picks up once again and the levels become quicker up until you hit 40, when they slow down again but by then you've got most of your funky powers and playing that particular character is a lot more fun anyway.

The early levels do need an endurance rebalance, you shouldn't have to rest after every two fights, four or five yes but after every two? Even with DOs?

The content needs a massive (and here's the word the devs seem to hate) revamp, especially heroside, all but three of the arcs and both taskforces are duller than dishwater (Synapse is fun but just plain too long for what it is), you get sent hither and dither all about the place by your contacts if you decided not to stay in the hollows, how many people drop the 'talk to wincott' mission at the first opportunity.

As said, the jump from DOs to SOs is a massive change, staggeringly massive infact, with Stamina as well you're endurance problems unless you're a particularly endurance heavy set, seem to ease off substantially, it shouldn't go from struggling every two fights with endurance to roflstomping your merry way though without worrying.

And for the love of all that's holy PLEASE make the 'talk to wincott' 'talk to security chief' 'talk to Herocorp rep' 'talk to PvP rep of [insert zone here]' optional.

The MA really is a twofold problem.

The devs begun the opening of Pandora's box with Wentworths/Black Market, Prior to that there was no reason for anyone who had amassed a fortune of inf at 50 to do anything other than fund new alts with it or possibly trade for Hami-O's (or use to fund costume competitions etc.)

With the coming of Inventions and the markets, Inf now had a value, before it didn't really have much of a value but now it did.

For a while, everything was priced skyhigh as those who had amassed fortunes of inf were willing to blow it all on the new inventions and the invention origin costume parts but over time, things stabilised and inf begun having a set and stable value.

About this time Pandora's box was about half open, they'd introduced an economy, reasons for people to level (to get the set IOs) and allowed those tricked out characters to return to pre-ED levels, albeit with a large inf cost.

With merits pushing the lid slightly more and now the MA and all it's associated rewards having blown the lid wide open.

As it has been said, the MA has become mother and father, everything is available through it...why bother with merits when tickets are massively easier to earn? Influence has had it's value completely changed, recipes that were expensive before have sunk completely in value (apart from purples which have increased in price and Uniques which have dropped a little but not a price crash). Why both buying salvage at the current ridiculous price when you can use tickets to roll for it and get it much easier and cheaper. Both these changes I love personally, it makes outfitting a character in IO's so much cheaper.

The MA has become everything to all peoples, that's the problem, they've opened Pandora's box and now there's going to be no way of closing it.

I think the other main problem is that pre-22, the game does kind of suck, once you hit 22 then it really begins to soar with SOs but prior to that attacks and toggles drain to much Endurance even with end redux DOs 3 slotted, Rest doesn't recharge nearly as often as you'd like or need and if your a melee toon your defense/resistances don't come into their own until SO level.

If they somehow (no idea how) made the pre-22 game suck less (imo) then perhaps it might also help with the farming (it's doubtful but hey I can dream).

For those in the know it really has reduced the cost of outfitting a toon in anything but non-purples/uniques by half if not more!

LORDS was/is very much the kind of villainous organisation that works behind the scenes for further goals.

The NWA, if it's headed by Mechano, would be much more of the overt kind of villainy one would expect of a James Bond villain, armies of trained agents in snazzy outfits out and secret volcano lairs with many, many doomsday devices!

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Otherwise it's waiting for Black Prophecy to come out for a decent spacebased MMO.

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Fixed!
Think CoH but in space. Almost infinite possibilities when it comes to how you can customize your ship!
And the best aprt of it? I'm there!

Jumpgate... Pffft... *pretends to be a dog and buries it in the backyard*

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Well just registered for Beta now...will give it a go to see what it's all about

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EVE Online is a job. At its core the game utterly sucks, it's the most damnably boring thing I have ever had the misery to come across in my life, what makes people like it is the whole PVP community aspect to it, which means corporations and such, and yeah, it's not a hobby, it's a freaking job. You've got to take it seriously.

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This..not only that it has the stupidly highest learning curve of any MMO, if you can take it real seriously AND get through all the guff you have to learn to play effiecently it might be an awesome experience for you.

Otherwise it's waiting for Jumpgate: Evolution to come out for a decent spacebased MMO.

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My gripe about MA is that it makes hyper farming very easy.

This isn't good for the game at all - IMHO - of course.

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The best thing about the farming of MA missions, for me, is the fact that I've not had one single email pestering me about paying money for farming/PL - though most likely unintentionally, by making farming accessible to everyone they've made farming profitable to no-one - except possibly, themselves.

If it keeps the spam out of my inbox, I'm all for it.

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This is indeed an interesting side effect...why bother paying for a PL when they're so easily obtainable just by heading to the MA and playing.

I suspect it may have actually put a bit of a dent in particular companies offering PL services, also with the massive price drop on recipes except the most expensive ones (Purples and the Uniques) it doesn't cost much to outfit a toon anymore either.

I believe she's applied for a job there before and been turned down.

Indeed..do like Valve do, they hired the guys who made Day of Defeat and the guys who made Counterstrike (both now 'official' mods) and there's been rumblings of them possibly hiring Garry from Garry's mod, the Valve team see talented people in their playerbase and go 'that's so damn good we're hiring you' (literally the Counterstrike guys got a phonecall from Valve telling them they were hired and the plane tickets and accomidation had already been paid for!)

It's just a shame it doesn't happen here...

Oh I definitely be for it, Edward has always wanted a proper 'sinister six' style organisation if only because it makes spreading chaos that much easier...

There's a thought that made me chuckle the other day.

Yeah somethings in this game aren't great...

...but it could be a lot worse...you could be playing Age of Conan...they're only just getting stuff that should have been in the game since launch along with servers shutting down...now THAT looks bad and an MMO can never shake the reputation it gains at launch. Age of Conan isn't bad now BUT because it's launch was horrendously crappy (I know, I was there) it's forever going to be 'that crappy Conan MMO' unless they somehow pull a miracle.

in the style of Yahztee
Long answer:
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOO

Short answer:
Hell no.

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Here's something I doubt anyone finds of any interest, but I'm gonna say it anyway.

Since canceling my sub, I'm finding that the bounce in back in my step, and the smile is back on my face. And that's even before my account actually lapses on the 3rd.

I'm going to stay canceled though, until either at least i16 (IF it has some decent content), or longer if not. Either way, I've shed my concerns over this game now and the emotional attachment I felt after 4 years of devotion has been broken; it's exhilarating to be free!

I might not even go to CO as soon as it launches, being free of MMO's is liberating. The sun is shining outside, my kids are getting bigger, and I've just noticed that the wife has bought a bikini...

Life is great, hugs to everyone, even those who don't like me.

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Welcome to a world of freedom FFM.

I too know this feeling, this feeling of joy at actually going, "finally...I have no restrictions on my time made by this game whatsoever!" though City of Heroes does lend itself more towards casual play, an hour here or there, World of Warcraft Hardcore raiding was a completely different story.

Logging in every day of the week three hours before a raid to grind gold to make sure I could afford all the potions, ammo, buff pots, pet food and armor repairs that were needed for a nights raiding, five times a week become so draining that I just had to call it a day, it had become so incredibly dull it was unbelievable.

Hitting cancel on that big old WoW subscription felt so uplifting, I didn't HAVE to do anything anymore...if I don't feel like playing City of Heroes...I have no obligation to, I could just go 'heh tonight is an MMO free night!' and play another game.

So welcome, welcome to a world where you're free...I may still be partially trapped but it's a good kind of cage, it's comfy and they bring me tea and biscuits on demand!

The explanation for that Carnifax is simply that people are too taken with the bronze/silver rolls rather than the common salvage rolls.

A lucky roll can earn you a lot of Inf but they didn't seem to think that simply rolling a hell of a lot of arcane low level salvage (for the charms of luck) will also net them a tidy profit compared to constantly trying to luck out on the bronze/silver rolls for the good ones, since 90% of the time you will get worthless recipes for your rewards.

*facepalms*

This is what I get for not sleeping in a 34 hour period...yes I meant Howling twilight

*files himself in the Noob draw and waits for Damz to come along*

I believe wondering_Fury made the point of that it's bad for new players to be caught in this, they are the kind of people who won't learn their AT especially if all their farms go 'well' and all it takes is following that shield/SS brute or ss/Shield tanker around while they roflstomp the mobs into oblivion, they're not going to learn anything.

Veteran players on the other hand, especially those with who have worked with similar (defender and they're levelling their corruptor) or the exact same classes and actually put the time in to read up on them on the forums in both cases, they're going to be a dab hand at a most ATs they put their mind to (I know that Twilight Grasp isn't just a rez power, it's also an awesome stun and a key -regen power but new players may just read it, see it's a rez, go "Why would I need that...nobody dies!" and leave it out).

Though I STILL can't level a controller...I like to be able to do decent damage solo!

The MA price hike seems to be affecting heroside vastly more than villainside.

Take the Decimation ranged IO set. Three out of the set are 10mil-20mil+ (whereas I distinctly remember them being a mid-price range set when I bought them a while ago, like Crushing Impact kind of pricing) while on villainside there's 51 level 40 Decimation chance for buildup procs selling and no buyers and only one of the recipes fluctates between 8-10mil all the rest are 1mil-3mil

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all i like to ask is where are these pl team and farming map as i can never find them

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Cap Au for villains is oddly more popular than Mercy (meaning it's actually quite a long trek for a level 1-4 to make it all the way to the Cap Au AE building and quite a bit dangerous, certainly teach you about aggro range on the way if you're new) or just Atlas for Heroes, hang around at 4-6pm and you'll see teams forming.

Hmm is there any way certain mobs can have lowered XP in MA form without reducing their XP outside of the MA.

Don't get me wrong, I loved speed levelling my Dark/Dark corruptor (and trust me when those farms go wrong, you certainly do learn how to play your character, especially when you're effectively shutting down three different eight man mobs from doing damage) to level 40, it made a refreshing break to the slow placed levelling I normally do (takes me god knows how long to hit 50 with each character, usually 6 months or more).

But perhaps reducing the XP earnt of Rikti Comm Officers back down to minion level in the MA instead of LT level XP gains but with minion health.

Well the mighty Power Pool Gal is now level 10 yay! 40 more levels to go...eek!

So far, as is often the case with the 1-10 game, damage isn't a problem so far, survivability is a bit iffy but I appear to be about as survivable as a low level Arachnos Widow.

It is making it harder to find low level teams though, well atleast it certainly feels that way.

But then what kind of fool would want to team with a low level brute with 'power pools only challenge' as their search message >.>

You'd be surprised to be honest...

Awesome!

Wow should really pay more attention to that overview...

An yes...not sure what the hell Frankie's problem is but I've tried changing powersets, spawning him in a different location, whatever I do, the AI just seems to go beserk.

A fair review.

All of the rescuee's are combat capable Allies.

The reason Sammy is indeed snappily dressed but for the choice of green, well it suits his nickname, the full name for the people are Frankie the Fist, Sammy "Bean" Polenski (hence tall and dressed entirely in green) and the Daughter has the surname Smalls but is obviously anything but...

The Skulls/Hellion bosses are there for level scaling purposes but you forgot to mention they all have dialogue actually EXPLAINING why they're there in each map so it doesn't make it look too untowards. If I could just select the level range of Longbow, Family and Private security guards as 5-14, I'd remove them in a heartbeat.

Having played through 5-14 arcs villainside, most of them aren't hugely exciting in terms of what goes on and I didn't want to make things too complicated with regards fighting.

Guessing that you find the contact dialogue kind of dry wereas another reviewer actually really loved the contact dialogue, so it's swings and roundabouts.

There are also ambushes after each rescue in the final mission which you didn't mention either.