Fiery_Redeemer

I think I have the hang of most of the system now. There’s one more question I’d like to ask about Morality missions.

I know they ignore the Fame timer. I know they drop as your next Tip, if you have 10/10 in the chosen alignment. However, are they limited by the “3 Tips Max” rule though?

Real Example = My Rogue is now 10/10 Hero Alignment bar. Fame is irrelevant for Morality Missions, I know. However, due to a huge map, just before he got 10/10 on someone ELSE’S Tip, he EXIT-ed with 3 Tips, before getting that 10th Hero Alignment shift.

It’s been a while, and, despite lots of fighting, no morality mission (yet). Now, I’ve had dry patches when it comes to Tip Drops, so, it could just be a bad RNG streak. But, just so I’m not wasting my time…

Will I get a Morality mission as my next Tip drop despite that I’m at 3 Tips? Or, am I blocked against Morality missions until I dismiss one of the 3 Tips (to make room)?

I hope the above made sense.

Two separate things I’d like to comment on…

On the Manticore PPP vs “teaching a player to shoot an arrow” thing… at the end of the day, I think it’s because it’s an MMO not a single player game. Which means, the world is based on key signature characters, made by the devs, and they are and ever will be the toughest things out there in the stories they write. Most of the arcs are about you being “the new guy”, and barring a few obvious ego boosting arcs (cf A Hero’s Hero), the stories are about “What you do while the A-Listers are busy somewhere else.”

Thematically, it’s easier to fit it what Positron, Manticore, etc… is doing, story wise, in order to bring in a new arc, storyline, Issue, expansion, than to write in “This is how YOUR hero changed the world.”

Or, put another way, if this was Marvel, I’d EXPECT the world to revolve around Thor, The Avengers, Spider-Man, and you tag along, or if this was DC, it revolves around Batman, Superman, Wonder-Woman, etc… CoH just has its mythology made up for the game in that, before CoH, there was no Positron, Statesman, Recluse, Ghost Widow, but it’s basically a made up Marvel or DC universe.

Sure, you can have an important part in it, but what are people going to read about in the next release? (Your character name) that the devs have no idea about the background, powersets, etc… and come up with a suitably universal line, progression, powers in the story?… or base it off their own characters story and powers wise. If that’s dev ego patting, they deserve it for making this great game. Try and play a Marvel MMO, say, and it not being based on Spider-Man or whatever.

Sure, in your mind, you’re a better web-spinner than Spider-Man, but, if you play a Marvel MMO, expect the “THIS web spinning power can only be learned from Peter Parker.” makes sense, it can be written tightly, and for many of us, it’s cool to learn from a known character. Switch Spider-Man with Manticore, and you have the same thing here.

I’m sorry you’re not the main focus of the game, story or powers wise, and I truly am, but that’s the downside of an MMO. It’s probably really hard to code. Single player games can be more centered on you personally, and can have a story arc that matches that, say, Neverwinter Nights, because they KNOW it’s just you and your sidekick adventuring. Powers wise, for (I’ll risk putting a number to it) but for 95% of us, a signature Hero or Villain AV needs a team to take down, because they are THAT much above us. I happy some people can solo 8 of them at once, but, the devs have to and should cater to the majority, and many of us get our butts kicked even with a team of 8.

Thematic PPP, hero or villainside are cool, just for roleplay reasons, fun factor, and some of us don’t need to be center stage. And if you do, pretend you are doing the Manticore arc, and, in your mind, you’re teaching HIM how to shoot the bow, and ignore those word things. And, you get access to the power as you teach him the basics, just as a timing-wise coincidence.

Or, put the whole darn thing to rest, I’d say match APP powers to a PPP, and just have PPP powers have a signature uncopy-able effect, like an Arachnos and Freedom Phalanx holo-icon appear, for those of us that enjoy the story, and you don’t need to ruin your hero image that you had to get “instructions” from Manticore. You get the power, we get the story, everyone is happy.

Now, on to topic 2…

It was said earlier (and the quote feature won’t let me get that section for some reason, but I’m old and these board things frustrate me) that many MMO have gods sullying the lore of the game, well, worship is part of life and game.

Whether it’s secular (if I have the word right, I’m English Second Language… I mean non-religious worship), like worshipping movie-stars, scientists, activists, politicians; or religious (pick one), or personal (pick a friend / family member you want to emulate), worship tends to happen for a lot of people. Sure many of you are probably fiercely independent but I have no problem admitting that myself, and probably many others are followers, and I’m ok with being Stateman’s sidekick, etc…

Godhood is not as clear cut as some might think either. If we went back in time, with our aircraft carriers, and modern medicine, and cell phones, and 70+ year life spans, we’d be gods to 20 YO life expectancy cavemen.

There’s also a lot of thematic precedence in media. In Stargate, Gua’Ould (? spelling) are just 1,000+ year old parasitic slugs, in a body, and they fly around in pyramid shaped space ships. Knowing what they are, from the series, I still consider them gods in the AD&D (showing my geek roots, sorry) sense of the word, as would most primitive worlds.

And, especially from a super-hero standpoint, there’s a lot of godlike characters, or power origins that have been popularized in both mainstream comic books. In Marvel, Thor is an actual God of Thunder. The Eternals (from the 70s, not sure if they were remade) were aliens that happen to be worshipped and they became the Greek Gods. Ghost Rider got his power from an evil god/demon. For DC… Wonder Woman (in some of her many origins) has her powers from the Greek Gods. Captain Marvel also have godly origins to his powers. I’m sure if Green Lantern landed on a primitive planet, he’d be considered a “god”, and so on.

So, godly Lore, is common both here on real earth, in movies, in comic books and in MMOs. So, common things being common, of course they’ll put a godly Lore to it. Now, if you don’t like it, you don’t like it. Just like the person in topic #1 not liking his hero not being central, you have every right not to like it and tune out those elements.

But, CoH being a business, they should, business sense wise, cater to what people like the most. Hopefully, for your sakes, they can do it in ways in which you can still enjoy the game. But, godly Lore, and you being an important side kick instead of the mainstay, makes sense to me to get the most people interested as well as being an easy way to overcome hurdles for the stories, powers, and updates of an MMO.

DISCLAIMER = I’m in my 40s, not primarily English speaking, and going through some translation issues most likely. It’s not my intention to pick on, or ridicule, or insult, so if it comes out that way, I do apologize. Treat anything offensive as language or crotchety old man origin, and not anything personal. You have every right to dislike any part of the game, “common” or not.

I also have the "Wrong game version, run patcher and reconnect, server 1800.201005212331.2T, client 1800.201006040036.3T" error. Here is the strange part = It's happening on my computer, but my wife's CoH computer doesn't.

Also, this morning, my computer did a patch upgrade for CoH, so I thought a new patch came in, and was confused when I walked over to my wife's computer, and there was no download of files.

So, obviously, some accounts / settings are triggered on mine, but not on hers. Has to do with the "phantom patch" that happened on mine, and has now locked me out. I'm the farthest thing from a techy there is. I clicked on "Verify all files". No help. I tried to log-in on safe mode. Still no help. I hate to say it, but I hope it's a widespread problem, ergo, it'll be fixed by CoH. If not, I guess I'm doing something else till I get a new computer I suppose.

Well, to introduce my skills, I’m 42, arthritis in multiple joints, and I’m very VERY distractible. Yet, after 2 years, I got my gold in both runs. Now, some points might be incorrect, but this is how I did it. Do not take anything I post as absolute.

First off, I made my second build purely on the basis of the Holiday runs. Don’t use it for anything else.

Sprint = 1 RUN enh.
Why? = As backup whenever I have Super Speed off.

Flight = 3 FLY enh.
Why? = I can’t for the life of me use the air jets. It’s just 1 shade easier than the Shadow Shard ones for me… barely. And, you’re going to fall off the toboggan course… a lot. This allows you to get back on, and, at least, practise during the end of your run.

Super Speed = 3 RUN enh.
Why? = I hadn’t read this post until AFTER I had gotten both gold badges. Also, just on the off chance that the thread is wrong, it’s a backup.

Hurdle = 3 JUMP enh.
Why? = Stacks with Combat Jumping and helps for air control.

Combat Jumping = 3 JUMP enh.
Why? = Stacks with Hurdle and helps for air control.

Swift = 3 RUN enh.
Why? = For when I turn off SS at key points during the run. I know SS with 3 RUN caps me out, but having Swift helps when I want…

Ninja Run = No enh.
Why? = Well, I bought it for the “cool factor”, so why not. And, numbers wise, Sprint + Combat Jumping + Hurdle + Swift is pretty much Ninja Run + Sprint. Or close enough. Substitute one for the other for my examples.

General Tips

1-Doing 1 run as a try, really doesn’t help. Repetition is key. Unless you’re lucky or great with twitch control (in which case you really don’t need my input), you have to repeat a LOT in 1 sitting to get a feel for the course.

2-Once you get a badge, STOP. This is supposed to be fun. Celebrate your win. Do something else in CoH. Walk outside. See a movie. Let the last thing at the keyboard be a victory, not a victory + a fail at the next step.

3-Do 1- again. (ok, I could do the cutesy thing and make every odd Tip 1-, but it really is the best thing you can do)

4-Put your powers tray customised for this run. Put all your toggle-able powers in 1 bar. You’re not fighting here, just skiing or tobogganing. The difference between 1 vs Alt-1, or moving your mouse just off the row, makes a difference.

5-Fly your first runs. Go slow. I’m not kidding. Get a good look at the course. If you’re reacting, you’re missing stuff. PLAN things. Get the feel of each turn. Don’t care if the timer runs out. You’re essentially getting floor-plans here.

6-If you fall or miss a gate, fly back to it, and continue from there. Once you know you’ve “blown” your run, feel free to experiment with turns, jumps, etc…

7-You don’t need to be perfect. You just need to not make a mistake. There’s a difference. If you’re trying to be the server best, yeah, you have to be perfect. But for that Gold badge, just don’t miss a gate, fall, or hit a side / rock. Everything else is just doing what you just did, but faster. If you do miss a gate, don’t “correct” or “catch up”. You can’t. Just practise the other gates as normal.

8-Never leave your finger off “forward” key (for me, it’s W) but use the mouse as well to look around and change your angle. Tap the Left or Right buttons if you need just a little “nudge” one way or another.

Ski Slope general points

Obviously, go between the gates, from one to another. For me, there were 2 tough spots I’d have trouble at.

1-The Gate 2 gates (or so) down right after the rocks on the left drops off.

It’s right after a steep fall to the right. If I stayed on the ground, I would often miss the gate by being too far left. If I jumped without jump powers, I had too little control to land on “the” spot. Any jumping powers helps a lot here.

2-The Final Gate

For some reason, I could never jump (again, without jump powers) to that gate. I’d usually overshoot it, and get it on my backward slide down.

Bronze Ski Badge

All you really need is Flight. You can hit every gate at full flight speed, and that’s pretty much a guarantee to get your bronze. Nothing more to it than that. However, once you have the bronze, on your next session, do it again “legit”. You’ll need it for later.

Silver Ski Badge

I used good ole Sprint + toggled Flight for the 2 “tough” Gates as above. I did the run legit till I hit the dropoff, then flew to that first trouble gate. Then detoggled flight, did the remaining run legit, then hit flight again for that final gate. It was close but doable.

Gold Ski Badge

Almost exactly as per silver, but use either CJ+H or NR instead of flight. It really didn’t take many runs to get Gold off Sprint + Ninja Run.


Toboggan General Points

You’re going to fall off the course. A lot. Deal with it. That’s why flight is a must. Even though your run is ruined, hit fly, go right back where you fell, and continue. Helps you keep “in the zone.” The more you toboggan, the better you are at it. You want to be more “on the slopes” rather than “on the ski chair” if that makes sense.

Know your options. Unlike for ski, you have 3 decision points to make your run.

Teleporter vs Hot Springs

I’ve found that the teleporter works far Far FAR better for me that the hot springs. On the hot springs, I tend to fly off into space, hit my head on the underside of the course, or, at best, pass what feels like 20 minutes in midair before I land on the far slope. Sure, the teleporter brings your speed to 0, but that’s why Super Speed (imo) helps a lot getting you back to full run speed.

Underpass vs Overpass

If you did your build like me, it’s Overpass, no question. In fact, if you have both CJ+H or NR, you might be able to jump and clear the overpass completely and land back on the track. I haven’t found the Underpass to be that much fast, and, 1 run out of 3, I faceplant right into the rocks, stopping me entirely and getting me stuck on the wooden rafters more often than not.

Long Circle vs Construction

Counter intuitively, the Long Circle is faster for me then the Hazard Construction route. Sure, the Construction route is shorter, but even with Jumps with no mistakes, the angles are such that I often lose a lot of speed doing the 1-3 jumps (depending on how many jump powers are on) needed to stay on track. Heading right on the Long Circle and constantly edging left is faster.

General inconsistencies

Sometimes I found the sides to be “sticky”. Good news is that you don’t fall off into oblivion. Bad news is that your speed is cut. Other times, the sides are “slippery”. You can stay right on the edge and stay at full blast for speed. However, one toe too far one way or another, and it’s kiss sky time. I wish I could say it has something to do with the graphics (fence vs no fence) but each spot in the course seems random.

Also, being in the center isn’t always the “sweet spot”. After the first drop off, there’s a big curve to the left, and, for me, the center wasn’t where I would be the fastest. Going to an edge, right on a snow railing, kept me going at full speed.

Bronze Toboggan Badge

Sprint is all you need. Just don’t fall, and don’t hit anything (cf Underpass rocks), and you should hit your time. If you are over, just do it over again, but faster. Really. That’s all there is to it.

Silver Toboggan Badge

Again, just like in Gold Ski Badge, you need some form of jumping. This just means that your overpass jumps are more tightly controlled, and you have a lot more “oops recovery” effect. Sorry to say, there’s no tactic for silver other than “go faster, jump higher.”

Gold Toboggan Badge

Unlike for Ski, to get gold, I had to do the course completely different. Super speed + all the toggles running meant that I kissed sky at that first turn, about half the time. The best way I found was as follows.

A-Get off the gate with small jumps. You want your feet to touch the slide only once or twice. This first part of the course WANTS you to fall. I can tell.

B-Once you hit the first gate, CJ, SJ, NR jump, SOMETHING JUMP to gate #2. At the speed I’m going, if I do a legit run, I hit the pavement every time. Instead, I jump from gate 1 to 2, never touching the course. From then on, I basically do the course “normally”.

C-On that large curve to the left after the first drop off, I hug the “rail” to the right as much as possible, then I do a hard left for the Y split to the teleporter. My finger is on heavily on “Forward” as I approach the porter.

D-As soon as I teleport, I go forward till I’m back to attack speed. At the Overpass / Underpass spot, I jump far enough to completely clear the overpass and land on the slide right after it. Basically, I bypass the whole damn thing.

E-From then on, it’s stay right, but curve left the whole time. I do little jumps when I feel out of control. Hit the gate. Collect Gold badge.

Now, it might all be in my head, but toggling on Super Speed during Straight parts and toggling it off for curved parts did help for everything except Gold Tobogganing. For Gold, I had Super Speed, Sprint and Combat Jumping on as toggles, with Hurdle on as an automatic. No buffs from anyone else. No nothing.

Of course, with so many movement powers, my build was toast for anything else, but I got both golds. And, if an old dude like me can get it, so can you.

So, in summary, make a build that has all the movement options except teleport, and practise a lot. If you fail a gate, still do the others “as if” you’re still trying to win the first time. Pick a set of powers / toggles that sits right with you, and adapt only the strategy as a whole. Meaning, don’t try to correct a mistake. Make a strategy. See it through. If it doesn’t work, try a new strategy. “On the fly” doesn’t work, at least for me, when the scenery comes at you at a million miles an hour, or so it seems.

And, finally, 2 hours in a row will help you a WHOLE lot more than 6 sessions of 20 min.

I hope you find the above useful.

A few things.

First of all, there should be a set of bonuses and penalties associated with every “Faction” of the morality Scale. Currently, as I understand it…

Hero
PRO = Use Hero Contacts and Wentworths
CON = Cannot enter Rogue Isle

Vigilante
PRO = Use Hero Contacts and Wentworths, Can enter Rogue Isle to team
CON = Cannot use Black Market or Villain Contacts

Rogue
PRO = Use Villain Contacts and Black Market, Can enter Paragon City to team
CON = Cannot use Wentworths or Hero Contacts

Villain
PRO = Use Villain Contacts and Black Market
CON = Cannot enter Paragon City

If you merge the markets, there’s little bonus to be a Hero or a Villain. Go and be a halfway-faction, whatever one it is. Sure, you could say “The markets are merged, but you can only access them in your ‘real’ zone”. Granted, if you can’t click on BM locations in the RI as a Vigilante, and have to hoof it back to Paragon to click on a WW, it’s a pain, but not that much of a deterrent.

Now, the next part is SUPPOSITION…

On the original FAQ, there was a mention of 10 “Generic Enhancement” or some such. They also mentioned about bonuses for “never having switched”. Those, could, with some extrapolation (and a lot of hope) be one and the same, kinda.

Put in 10 ENH slots, available through quests. But, unless you’re a pure Hero, or a pure Villain, they are greyed out.

If you’re one of the in between factions, you get markets, and fluidity of access. You’re one of the “extreme” factions? You get better stats (i.e. the 10 ENH, or whatever bonus it is). That way, it’s not a “permanent sucks to be you” loss if you switch from pure Hero or Villain, but it does allow a reason to be one of the extreme factions, instead of everyone being Vigilante or Rogue (apart from Roleplay reasons of course).

Many others have mentioned this, but I hope the Devs read this and come up with a good reason that’s a carrot (i.e. the ENH, or whatever post-50 bonus they were planning) to stay pure Hero, or pure Villain.

And, if you do it that way, Rogues and Vigilantes can access contacts of the opposite side (opposes the current FAQ, I know), but stats-mongers like me will feel the draw of being pure Hero or Villain, and there’s a reason NOT to be grey.

OR, if you have to, make it a stick. If Rogue or Vigilante, sure, you have full access but are at 50% INF / PRES.

On another note, I hope you stay in your Super-Group, whether Hero or Villain, just from pure selfishness’ sake. For me, my wife and my friends, we have our mains we play 80%+ of the time, then we go between our 10+ alts each. Our main is our main PRES makers. Getting kicked out of the SG to access Villain Content with my Hero Fiery Redeemer… will hurt the guild. If that’s how it goes, so be it. It’ll restrict who I get to switch.

Personally, I’d prefer a Pocket-D way of doing Super-Groups. Everyone has access. But, you can only go OUT through a portal, Teleport Pad, etc… that your faction allows. Rogue or Vigilante? Go anywhere. Hero? Can only go out through Paragon TP. Villain? Only through RI pads. That’s it.

And, roleplay wise, I do remember WAY back that Magneto and Professor X were once on the same X-men team for a real life year or two. Magneto even led the New Mutants for a while (not that the brats ever listened). (Yeah, I know. That dates me.)

Finally, practicality wise, everyone can stay and play together. Considering how much they are trying to keep players together more easily (see Super-Side-kicking), I’m hoping the SG thing will follow suit.

ALL speculation and conjecture, only to be finalized in Q2 2010, but still, interesting to think about…

I’m in a Devil’s advocate mood right now, so please take that into consideration.

Although I agree with many of the stances about content vs bugs, I do feel protective towards people that give bad examples, or grammar, or whatever. To be flippant, when someone points out on my posts that “Hey, dude, you said ‘The sky is bloo’ ” doesn’t make the sky green. And I’m the King of bad examples. That being said…

Obviously, you don’t pull content programmers that do packs, issues and costumes to do bug fix. However, you can change the company resources. Lets pretend no overhead and that there are only 2 divisions.

You got $300,000 to pay 6 people 50k a year salary.

Currently, in this pretend version of CoH, we have 3 Content Programmers, and 3 Bug Fixers. Voila. Budget achieved.

Then, people think there are too many bug fixes. You don’t pull a costume designer to fix bugs. Of course, they don’t have the same training, and one can’t do the other’s job. I agree with most of you on this.

BUT, they could fire 2 content designers and hire 2 more bug fixers, thereby changing the RESOURCES (not asking people to work out of skill set, as was the counter argument), and you have 5 people working on bugs, and 1 on content.

That’s likely what was meant.

Or, if it’s 1 actual person on each, give 1 less hours, and hire a part-timer to help the bug fixer (a painfully real example as my close friend was cut from 40 hours a week, to 24 hours at the beginning of the year, to 16 hours last month, so, of course, he’s looking for a new part-time or full time job).

To use the house example, of course, don’t ask the painter to do electrical work, but you reduce his hours and hire more electricians. And, sad to say, in this economy, most people will be happy with whatever hours they can get.

Obviously it’s simpler if it’s “Let 2 designers go, hire 2 bug fixers”, but I’m sure you get the point.

Now I’m not saying it’s a good idea. I’m just saying lets not beat on the guy because of bad wording / bad examples.

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Me? My opinion? Well, whatever keeps the company afloat. Packs are (presumably) pretty easy to make and easy income. If that keeps the company going, fine. It’s like those 2am steamy commercials about 900 numbers on network cable (at least they have them in my Country, not sure about USA). Sure, they have nothing to do with the “good” daytime and evening programming. But it’s revenue. And, if it keeps “Days of Our Lives” up during the day, my wife is happy. She just never needs to see those late night commercials.

Many MMOs have folded. It’s a recession. If CoH can make income because they offer “A stereo that goes to 11!”… why not.

But again, try not to slam the guy for badly wording. Contest the idea, sure. But please, try not to be too picky. Speaking as an English second language, it’s tough enough to get the concept across without my bad examples being shredded.

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Other Topic = People buying packs may trip flags if you buy too many of them. As a requested anniversary present, since we’re doing cheap gifts, my wife asked for all the Packs. I tripped a “You bought too many things at once” (paraphrased) error message, so, there’s definitely a limit of how much / how fast you can buy. Just wait it out. Depending on the amount, might take a couple of days, or a couple of weeks, but it does sort itself out.

As per many above, yes it's still bugged. At least it's "only" -1, meaning a visit to the mission difficulty change contact can bring it back using +1. Means I don't have all greys to fight.

However, the above does state that the named bad guys spawn at the proper level, meaning, going to +1 level makes them way harder for me. But, heck, at least I can still play. Hoping they fix this next week...

I logged out with "A Hero's Hero" with all default settings. When I clicked the "Send to mission" power, weirdly, instead of a Peregrine Island portal, I was sent to Ouroboros. All enemies were grey L45 and I'm a L50.

"Np, just a glitch", I thought. I quit the TF. Took it again. Same thing.

The mission level shows up as "0" instead of 50. They are still all L45. Mission entrance is still Ouroboros instead of Peregrine Island. Repeatable. /bugged.

Guess I'm playing alts until it's fixed.

Standard intro = As per my other threads, people can know, I am complainer. About the rain. About people. About Paris Hilton on Supernatural. About everything. If you hit 40 years old+ like me, knock on my door and come show me how you’re a nice guy halo-head; then more power to you. You’re better than me.

I complained about the AE badge removal. Few people agreed. It didn’t get reversed. I didn’t leave CoH. I’m just doing MUCH less AE, that’s all. No interest? No playing. The end.

However, I can’t in good conscience complain about purple drops. I’ve moved from doing regular content, having read almost all of it; to repeating my favourite arcs, and chip away at the INF needed to get purple recipes / ENH. I get a purple during a run? Cool. I either use it, or sell it to get an equivalent purple.

I play with Zero, Zip, Nada, Bupkis challenge, and I like it that way. I play CoH (when I solo that is… different animal with RL friends and with wife… they now like to charge and sort the bodies, ours or theirs… later) like Tetris permanently stuck on L1. 1-3 times a week, I try either my favourite Task Force (A Hero’s Hero, just for the variety), or, another on a whimsy, and spend 2 hours daydreaming, thinking about my day, clicking auto-attack when an Elite Boss is a guaranteed win, but a long Fred Flintstone fight (you hit me, I hit you, you hit me, I hit you…) and get myself a drink.

I don’t think you get more casual than that.

Out of the 30 Purples I want, I have 18. 18! And some are the “good” ones. You know, the 200M+ ones. Sure, some are the cheap 50M. but most are 110M+. If I really wanted to, I could have played 2 TF a day, 4-5 days a week, and I’d have my sets by now.

But, for me, why would I rush to get to a point where Redeemer (my main) is essentially shelved until Rogue, or some other expansion / issue comes up? Why hurry to be on top and have nothing to do? (Obviously, I’m not PvP, so I’m not commenting about that aspect of the game)

Hate to be old, crotchety, and all that, with the usual platitudes, but I gotta. It’s the journey, not the destination. I like playing CoH, so I play it. That why I ran… RAN away from EverQuest when I found CoH. EQ, for me at least, had been 8 years of destination > journey, with the first 3 being tolerable only because RL friends played. Then they quit. So now I’m here.

So, Purples are, well, just fine the way they are, at least for me. Between purples, and the now more reasonable “epic” badges, I’m in no hurry to make the game obsolete for me. And, as many others have said, CoH is almost unique in its measure that end game equipment is Timesink based, not raid based.

Can’t get better than that for me.

So, if you forget all else I said, remember this please = enjoy playing the game. Don’t focus so much on the goals. Don’t rush to make the game obsolete for you. After all, it is a game, not a job. Enjoy it while it lasts…

Thank you UberGuy and Archie Gremlin. This helps a lot. Getting a tiny handle on why, now.

Personally, the recipe thing bothered me a bit, but, I adapted. I did more of content A instead of content B. I altered my buying and selling at Wentworths. And, eventually, I just set my timeframes for drops based on the new drop rates i.e. I got comfy for a longer ride.

I’ve tried to adapt to content and drop changes. I liked AE when it came out. I obsessively badge hunted. Then, when the badges went away, my interest in AE went away. I didn’t scream or vent on the boards. I simply started to do something else in CoH. No interest, no playing. Simple as that. It’s not like there’s not tons else to do here.

Anyhow, I promised a peanut butter anecdote.

Almost a decade ago, when my father in law had health issues, we moved in his house to help him with daily life. We started to look at budget, and one thing was = change our eating habits from brand name foods to no-name. One of these was peanut butter. Translated roughly to “Too Good to be True” brand.

We got ready for our morning breakfast, toast was ready, and we opened the new jar of this new brand. We froze as we saw peanut butter settled on the bottom of the jar, and about 1/4 to 1/2 an inch of fluid that was collected on the top. We both thought EW but, hey, we were saving money. I carefully folded the peanut butter in with the fluid until it was smooth again. We spread it on our toast, and took a bite.

We looked at each other in mock horror. It…was… DISGUSTING. It had this horrible chemical taste. Maybe it was just the first bite. Again. Nope. Just as bad. So, we start joking about the horrible chemicals that must be in there. Polo-sorbo-something. Mono-glyco-watsit. I pick up the jar, and get ready to read my wife the ingredients.

Peanuts.
Water.

That’s it.

We looked at each other, stunned, then laughed and simultaneously said “Score one for chemicals, eh?”

We never ate that brand again.

Factually =

-It was healthier.
-It was cheaper.
-It had no chemicals.

We didn’t care. Perception > Facts. It felt / looked / tasted unnatural and unhealthy, and the fact that it wasn’t in no way altered our enjoyment of it, and, more importantly (from the company’s standpoint) our buying habits. We never purchased their product again.

In fact, instead of “Too Good to be True” we nicknamed it “Too Good to be Eaten”.

Something for you facts people to keep in mind when talking to us perception people. You’re totally right, but that in no way affects our behaviour.

Anyhow, thanks again to the above people for the explanation. Any other ones that come will be appreciated as well.

Later.

So, I’m glad the drop rates are back to normal. I still have a general question however. First I’ll preface it.

I’m English second language, older (40s), and very VERY drama-king type person. Very Old School non-USA customer service (i.e. I can teach the French about being rude, which is doubly funny because… well… I AM French).

So, the question is… what is it about computer games that cause most people to doubt customer complaint?

I come from EverQuest, and, barring a few bells and whistles, the thing there on boards was exactly as I see it here. People complain about drop rate, mob toughness, power toughness, and the overwhelming response is either…

“I don’t believe it.” Or…

“Prove it.”

And, to steal buzz words I know nothing about (friend is a lab tech), to prove it, you almost have to have a double blind placebo control trial with negated observer bias having an extremely high sample size (I have no clue what I just said, FYI) for it to be acceptable. Otherwise, it’s “Not true”.

Um… why?

Here’s a mirror example. When my wife and I go to a restaurant, she likes the steak to moo as she bites into it. Mine has to shatter on the floor if it’s dropped. She routinely orders her steak rare. When the waiter brings her the steak, she routinely sends it back, saying the rare streak “is too cooked.”

My friend works in the food industry. My wife IS getting a rare steak. What she wants (loosely translated from French) is “Blue Steak”. But, she thinks it’s overdone, so, the chef makes her a new steak, barely cooked. Facts don’t really matter. She’ll only eat it one way, her way. The waiters now know what my wife means by “rare” since we always go to the same place. They don’t correct her, since she is the customer, but just give her the steak her way. Perception > Facts.

Ditto my friend’s wife when she visits. She asks for milk. We give it to her. The milk is perfectly fine, but she often feels “It smells rotten.” So, I take the glass, put it back in the fridge for us, for later, and she gets juice. The milk WAS perfectly fine. But she will not drink it, the end. But we don’t go “prove to my satisfaction the milk is bad”… we go to the fridge, and get her something else. Now, after the second or third type of drink she’d reject, we DO go “Well, then bring your own drink.”

So, back to computer games, why do most communities “demand proof” when it comes to drops, mobs, powers, etc…? If enough people think something is a problem, in almost any industry, it either changes, or we get a “It won’t change sorry, and this is why” of some sort through management. Or, at the very least… silence. But we don’t seem to get the vitriol for “daring to complain” that online boards give out.

I understand a bit about game balance, but isn’t it still perception > facts? This isn’t a science class, but a business, no? I completely get that, say, if 1 purple auto-dropped as EACH mission complete, it would totally ruin the game. It would render many if not most sets obsolete. Yet, wouldn’t the Devs cave if 90% of the player base was quitting unless they dropped? Or, do you honestly think that (making up numbers) if subscriptions went from 300,000 to 30,000 because of “not enough purples” that Devs wouldn’t up the rate, hoping to get customers back? And, if they wouldn’t… care to explain why?

If it’s only a few people, trust me, I’ve done my share of “Don’t let the door hit you on the butt on the way out.” French, remember? But, even without the “Wah, I’ll quit.” Part, wouldn’t well, common sense / courtesy / etc… mean = let the person talk / vent / whatever?

Case in point, I too thought the recipe drops had been much lower. However, unlike the super-dedicated people that did 100s of runs, talking statistics I have no hope of even grasping, just to “prove” their point to the community and the devs, I just told my friends, and they agreed.

The runs you did, that was 1,000s of person-hours of work, just to… not be yelled at, to avoid “can I have your stuff” posts, or to get dev attention. Stands to logic (I think) that means that if those hours weren’t invested, by the playerbase, by dedicated people, we’d be still at low drop rates, from now until the end of time (fine, I superlatize, shoot me, and yes, it’s not a word but it should be, heh) and no-one would have known it.

But, I didn’t “dare” mention it on the boards, for fear of retribution. Well, not drive-by retribution, but certainly a “I’m grumpy towards friends / family because the board yelled the crap out of me for daring to complain and now I’m in a bad mood.” type deal.

So, can people, using small words, and no “cool phrases” that a 40 year old will likely never grasp as to why computer games have so much of a “prove it” type mentality on boards, rather than most other places?

Any input to this daunted old man would be helpful.

Disclaimer = I press Power on my computer, and Double Click on City of Heroes, and hope to God it works, so keep that in mind if getting technical.

Side Note = People talk about BM hunting for Purple. What does that mean? Thanks.

P.S. It’s late, but tomorrow, I’ll post my Peanut Butter Toast story, that should show clearly my perception > fact issue.

I don't get that, but I do get key substitutions. I don't use the French Keyboard for anything other than wordprocessing. However, since the MON patch, every other log-in, instead of the question mark, I get the Capital E-dash (E accent aigu pour les francais). Same thing with all non letter keys i.e. for < > / : ' { etc...

If I tab out, I can use notepad fine, all other apps fine. I even disabled any french to english keyboard controls. But this only happens in CoX, and, only about half the time, on log-ins. Can be a pain to logout multiple times to get it right.

If it's only me and 1 friend, fine. We'll look at our drivers, though, they seem up to date. My friend also saw what he described as the Y with the 2 extra branches... a symbol of some sort, instead of the /.

Likely unrelated, but, I thought I'd give it a try here.

Thank you in advance for any replies.

First off, I’m not a big fan of truth or logic. I’ve found it has very little place in this world I’d like to introduce you called Earth, and this race of emotional, illogical and entitled people called humans. It’s a nice place, stay a while.

Here’s the final litmus test to whether to continue reading.

In the middle ages (or so, roughly), if the question was = What and where is the Earth, is the Correct answer…

A-It’s a flat surface at the center of the Universe.
B-It’s a round surface at the center of the Universe.
C-It’s a round surface orbiting the sun.

The correct answer is… A!

In the middle ages of course.

Fact = The Earth is round.
Fact = It orbits the sun.
Fact = Answering anything other than A- got you hit, expelled or killed depending on where or when you lived.

That means actual truth or fact has very VERY little to do with day to day life, then or now. Perception > Facts. Emotion > Facts. If this is gobbledygook to you, please stop reading and have a nice day.

(I AM getting to Veteran Rewards, but it’ll be a while. Get comfy.)

Here it is, put another way. I work as a phone tech at a cable company. We’re not in the USA. We supply cable for Cable TV and Internet. That’s IT. It says very clearly we stop at the modem or the digital box. We do NOT service, install, or help you in any way with your TV, VCR, DVD, Home Entertainment System or your computer. You didn’t buy it from us? It’s not our problem. (We say it more nicely, but that’s the gist.)

Logical, said clearly in the AUP (Acceptable Use Policy). Should make my life easy right?

WRONG.

Every SINGLE day I get asked how to hook up a VCR. Every SINGLE day, I’m told “I don’t care whether you service the computer or not. HELP ME or I unsubscribe.”

And they do. I send people to cancellations by the HOUR, not by the day. “Unsupported issues” is the #1 cause of cancellation at the company. Doesn’t matter that the customer is self-entitled, and in all ways WRONG, s/he is gone, and that’s less income.

We tell them, we send an onsite tech, and, if we plug in our own TV or laptop to your cable, and it works, it means the problem was on your end and you lose (roughly $80 US) for sending our tech on a non-company issue and we won’t fix your issue.

Sounds logical right? We send OUR tech for YOUR issue, and therefore, it’s not free. You pay us. Cept, here on Earth, logic has very little to do with life. People are outraged, go “I don’t care. Fix my VCR / Computer / Whatever” and they unsubscribe.

Back to VR.

Every point you guys make about logic, patience, consistency is absolutely and in all ways right. You are correct. Sadly, you are neither representative nor going to “win” against the average customer. Most people are in the “now now now, I pay 15$ a month, I’m a God dontchaknow.” And they’ll walk. And they’ll bring their friends with them.

All it matters is to get those subscriptions in.

NOT opening the AE Badge can of worms again, but if, ***IF*** CoH lost 75-90% of its playerbase (it didn’t, but IF) over the badge changes, even though the devs might be totally 100% correct, do you really think it wouldn’t be reversed, then and there, with an apology? It’s a business. In a classroom, being right, and being logical trumps all. As a business, money is the only thing that matters. Case in point though, as far as I know, the AE badge changes did NO change to the subscription, ergo, it stayed. But don’t delude yourself that almost any business owner wouldn’t point at the sky and say “You’re right. It’s orange, it’s not blue.” If it gave them more customers.

(And to those business owners that go “*I*’d never do that”, ask yourself this = are you representative?)

All this to say, it doesn’t matter if the VR is fair or not, or logical or not. If it’s PERCEIVED as unfair, illogical, or disheartening, you lose people. The end. You can be right, but you’ll be in a tiny group, enjoying your right-ness, if, and I do mean *IF* the majority thinks VR is unfair and it’s enough to make them go away.

So, as much as I enjoy debate, logic, and patience, and removing entitlement as the other guy, on planet earth, ESPECIALLY in the non-essential goods section, that holds little weight to many.

Or, said another way, you can be right about every single point, but if the newbies leave, they leave, and we have to do something unfair and illogical to keep them.

-----

Now, throwing an anecdote in favour of the logic people

So, at the cable company I work for, they tried a 6 month TRIAL (with BIG huge font mailouts saying it was a trial) that we supported everything. VCRs. DVDs. Computers. We got training. They hired extra people for the call volumes. An entire section of supervisors had advance training and a hotline for us frontline agents to use.

We did that hoping to see if the added expense of the above was worth it to keep the customers.

After 6 months = net result = It cost us FAR more to support everything, than the money we got back from customer retention, and customers from other companies coming in. Turns out that, in our business, as per most, 20% of the customers consumed 80% of the resources (in this case tech support), so, going back to the old ways meant we lost only the illogical, angry, and self-entitled minority, and not the silent majority.

(And yes, I’m down on the customer. But YOU try working in customer service for 24 years, and not be down on humanity. And if you’re not, hats off. You’re a better person that me.)

All that to say, maybe keeping things as if for VR is the EXACT right thing to do. But, in other companies I worked with, we had to remove the expectation of logic, and patience from customers, just to stay in business.

Don’t think just because you are right… that this is the correct way to act… to stay afloat.

Something to think of, anyways. (Oh, and forgive the spelling, grammar. I’m English Second Language)