Eiko-chan

Okay, I'll concede the point. If that were true, then it would be factually incorrect.

I don't think it's true, but I suppose I could be fooling myself.
They're probably not always responsible - but every once in a while I catch someone at price fixing.

I did that for a while. I got a little tired of doing the same Tips repeatedly, and keeping up with the timer burned me out a bit too.

But you do realise that I agreed I-don't-know-how-many-pages-ago-because-I-view-100-posts-per-page that the shard cost far outstripped the inf cost and that it didn't really matter, right?

How does the system determine the "League Leader"? I'd guess in a pre-formed, it'd be just like team leader, but what about in the Turnstile version?

I don't think "I don't like capitalism" can ever be factually incorrect.

Uh, I never said that.
Nothing. Introverts make friends slowly.

I'm still recovering from losing them. The death blow only came down a month ago. I can't just grab a new person and decide they are my friend and run with it. It takes a while for me to warm up to anyone. Most of the people I've interacted with on the forums that I feel friendly with play on other servers. I'm not yet ready to give up my characters to move servers to try to play with them.

In another thread, you accused me of assuming everyone wanted what I did (which I haven't - I simply don't see how me getting what I want hurts anyone else. I've never advocated removing task forces, or raids.) Perhaps I'm not the one projecting; you seem to think everyone should have as easy a time making friends and connections as you do.

I'm glad it comes easy to you, and that you have a group of people you like to play with. That's awesome. Seriously.

That doesn't mean I have to play the way you do, though.

The reason I refuse to marketeer has nothing to do with time, it has nothing to do with not knowing how, it has nothing to do with hating crafting. It has to do with principle.

I don't like what marketeers do. I don't like the way prices fluctuate, or how simple things cost ridiculous amounts (I admit, here, that the WST seems to have alleviated this a bit; there's more common salvage for sale right now that I have seem cumulatively in six months.) I don't want to fleece people for "billions". I'm perfectly content to sell the stuff I earn to them for reasonable amounts and live with it. That's why it took me a year to finish building my Brute's build, and why I'm still not done with my Mastermind.

I don't really mind being slow. I'm not too wild about not being able to see the goal post because of the curvature of the Earth.

My villain group has slowly left for other pastures - mostly other games - over the past couple of years. For the past several months, there haven't been enough of us active to even think about running Strike Forces like we used to. Nowadays, I'm lucky if I see one of them while I'm playing.

When did I say I refused to use the auction house? I refuse to engage in Marketeering - buying things other people put on the market, playing around with them (either by gathering them or by crafting them) and selling them back to the market. I use the auction house to sell things I earn constantly, as I have referenced at least twice in this very thread when speaking of purple invention recipes.

I want to kill lots of dudes, get my boosts, and once in a while beat up a hero. Why am I wrong? What part of that is not what this game is about?

I threw that in there to stop that excuse from being thrown back. If you didn't want to say it, you could simply have not commented on it instead of assuming I was accusing you of something I wasn't.

"Because a lot of players that left said it's what they wanted" is, actually, a valid reason. Now they just have to hope there aren't a bunch of other players who're going to leave for the reason of "we wanted smaller (I didn't say solo on purpose) end-game".

Playing mission arcs on x8, crushing my enemies, seeing them driven before them, and hearing the lamentations of the women the devs forgot to put in most of the enemy groups (I don't really mind that last part; it actually gave me the concept for one of my favourite characters, who is whom she is because the Tsoo are sexist.)

As for what I'd use the boosts for - soloing AVs in less than half an hour. It's kind of fun to take on Manticore or Miss Liberty or other big names by myself, at "full" (I consider AVs mostly a cheat, but it's still fun to beat the cheat) power, but I get bored doing it because even the fastest still takes fifteen or twenty minutes. With more power, I can significantly speed up that rate, and take on AVs I currently cannot.

Is there a reason, other than "it's an MMO!", for the end game to be "team-based"?

Remember, the "MMO" did not start with Ultima Online. That was just when they added graphical sprites.

I have never been on a TF shorter than 90 minutes in my entire play history. I don't like doing speed runs (I get lost and disoriented when you skip around objectives) and I tend to run slower than "steamroll" teams.

Usually, TFs I've been on have taken 2:00 to 2:30.

And no, I don't want you to invite me to your speed run. I'd be no better than a door sitter, and I'm not willing to be a door sitter.

Leandro figured an "optimal" (killing a boss a minute on a constant rate) time of 400 hours to get the requisite shards. That's half as long as I've played my main all told in three years, and those 800 hours include a lot of RP time (and a fair bit of crafting; she has the Field Crafter accolade).

It probably averages out to me playing City about twice as much as you do, once you factor in the off weeks.

I've been faced with that situation before in many MMOs (it's possible to get somewhere, but only through extremely excessive playing). I have always chosen to find a better place to spend my money instead.

The latest victim was the brand new superhero game. I could get somewhere playing that, but only by doing 5000 missions. I decided that wasn't worth it. I'm really hoping City doesn't end up the same way.

My main has been played 847 hours (now, that's got a lot of RPing and crafting time (Field Crafter, remember) included). Over three years. So unless I step up my game a lot, it will take me a year and a half to get my Very Rare alpha slot, and that's if I do nothing but kill bosses while I'm in the game.

That sounds pretty excessive to me.

Generally, I either don't play at all (as has been the case for the past while), or several hours (2 to 4) a night (as was the case when I was trying to get my first Uncommon boost.)

At 88 shards ... yeah, you're probably right.

Stupid me, being optimistic. I keep hoping they'll lower the requirement to something sane. 88 really sort of feels like a "shut up, soloers" sort of thing.

I mention a lucky purple drop and you ask if I use the market? What good is a lucky purple drop without the market?

I don't do AE, though. Too hard to find worthwhile content amidst the dreck.
That I refuse to do. When I'm playing the game, I'm playing the game, not sitting around crafting. I have my Field Crafter badge, and I'm done with any crafting that isn't directly related to enhancing my characters.

And don't add it only for low-level characters.

It's a lot to me. I haven't been playing for seven years. I don't have 50s that have been at the cap for four years with nothing to spend influence on. 100 million inf takes me a fair while to collect, or getting extremely lucky by having a valuable purple drop.

Alright, I guess pithy GG has her moments too.

A Very Rare boost costs a bare minimum of 56 shards, no matter how you earn other parts (three uncommon components at 8 shards each and a Favour of the Well at 32 shards).

32 gets you an Uncommon (12 for a Common, 20 more for the Uncommon part; this uses up the Common.) You will need two Uncommons (so you can make two Rares) to get a Very Rare, so that's 64 already.

88 Shards for a Notice - you'll need two of these, for two Rares. 176.
Now you need two more, to make a Favour. 176 + 32 = 208.
That's Leandro's 384. It's not counting any other costs. That's just the Notices/Favour.

Two more common components for each Rare - that's another 8 each, 16 total. We're up to 464.

The Very Rare costs another common and uncommon - 16 more.

Total cost for a Very Rare from scratch is 480 shards (and apparently 400 million inf.) Those gaining Notices in other ways only need 128 shards (some of which can come in batches of 4 by gaining common components through TFs).

If you lower the cost of a Notice to 24 shards (which was my suggestion), that makes the total cost 224 - almost a hundred more than those gaining notices in other ways.

So no, I didn't expect it to cost "a hundred or so". I was expecting a couple hundred. Considering solo shard drop rates (even running at x8), that would be months of play.

Just so you know, I don't think 88 shards for a Notice qualifies as "accessible". It took me two weeks to get the 32 that my Uncommon boost cost.

Well, so much for feeling better.

I refuse to be pitied by anyone because I want to play the game the way I want to, and not the way you want to. I enjoy "no depth and no challenge added" - it's the prime reason I play this game and not many of the other games I am offered. The wonderful thing about an MMO is that I very often can get the same game play I enjoy, over and over and over again, without having to endure the same story leading to that game play over and over again. From a game play stand-point, destroying a bunch of Nemesis troops to save Television is the exact same thing as destroying a bunch of Nemesis troops to prevent a Rikti war - but from a story stand point, they are very different things.

The game play is what keeps me coming back for more, and the ever-changing story that drives it is what keeps it from getting stale. That's why I'm playing an MMO and not a single-player game, that's why I pay my subscription fee. And getting tools so there are more "same old AV" fights that I can actually overcome (because a tweak of a few numbers here and there on an AV make a big difference, regardless of what you espouse) is why I want Incarnate powers.

Your pity is misplaced, and I refuse to be talked down to by you because I like something different from you.