Folonius
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Posts
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Joined
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Back Alley Brawler = 31
pohsyb = 29
War Witch = 190
pohsyb -
BaBs + -
BackAlleyBrawler = 37
pohsyb = 36
War Witch = 177
pohsyb -
BaBs + -
BackAlleyBrawler = 40
pohsyb = 39
War Witch = 171
pohsyb -
BaBs + -
During one day at the height of summer, six glittering starships appeared out of nowhere. Suddenly everything went dark. It was the curse of the evil monkey that eats cotton candy!
The people all fled in terror at the sight of the sticky-fingered monkey. It hurled large chunks of cotton candy at the innocent Omegatron Zeta Warbot, "Koo Koo Katchoo", who, caught unprepared, pulled up his iron underpants, and ran screaming into a brick wall.
Then the monkey laughed and said, "where's my punchline?" A man named Alfredo von Wigglestein appeared and said, "I think, therefore... I don't care. Now, you need to go to talk to the guy about registering for the special buns and thigh class. After all penguins have anurisms and I wear polyester thongs to school. Where was my jar of Honey Bees? Who will not drag my fat butt? Now what was the price of eggplants and bees again? I forget things quite quickly since I'm old. Although old is relative."
So then my sister Bruce bought a banana from a passing street vendor. He grabbed a dictionary and started to read aloud the definition for monkey curses. He then looked at the crumpled warbot, pointed and said, "Beware! Chaos is brewing beer!"
Then the warbot stood and drank beer.
Then my sister stripped naked and started to dance a sexy dance.
But the police helped her undress. Afterwards they ran in circles chasing Folonius while yelling the words to that pop hit polka song by the Andrews Sisters. That made Folonius roll out barrels of Rikti Monkeys. This proved problematic for the newly created government of the Rikti, for it had finally caged all of the barrel monkeys.
Lady Grey said, "I like to do weird stuff in the nude with the Rikti." So I took out my camera and filmed her from within her secret monitoring station. "I will never spy on her," said blpup pervertly as he passed out from poison. But just as he died, a passing noob stole his influence. Then burnt his body.
Soon the monkey scattered the ashes and ran home crying to mommy he'd been Riktirolled. The momma monkey ate Chaos Creator's little can of sausage to get even. Suddenly, the sausage regurgitated itself out of the monkey and said this, "Let my people go you jerk!" But then the Freedom Phalanx came and revealed that Chaos was happy. This surpised noone.
Then Chaos died a little inside. Later, he got on the interwebs,but got lag when he tried to look up sheep tied onto a kite. This saddened the chickens who wanted to eat sheep.
Suddenly a man wearing a big target on his jockstrap with three arrows on it, all pointing to his third nipple, busted into song:
"I can't get any more funny during this chaotic event, please help!"
Suddenly, Statesman said, "He who laughs first loses their chance to punch Defender in the genitalia! Don't laugh!"
Not laughing, Manticore took off his ill-conceived costume and started to dance like a meandering lama in split pea soup. Swan giggled and got naked before Popeye the Sailorman had a chance to eat spinich. This left him an opening to get Olive Oyl in the mix. Bluto was furious. Wimpy ate burgers.
Meanwhile, back at the hall of justice, Betty Boop was preparing to bath her puppy in a vat of boiling oil. She was killed by a man wearing a yellow sweater with matching socks. He also rode a Harley that did not stop eating Statesman. "Lego my Statesman!", -
BackAlleyBrawler = 43
pohsyb = 41
War Witch = 166
pohsyb -
BaBs + -
Quote:Late game = 50Originally Posted by JohnX
So here's the thing. I define "late game" as the high 30s and up.
However, from reading some posts recently, some folks seem to assume that "late game" comes much earlier than that. One recent dicussion seemed to refer to post-22 as "late game"
I think of it like this:
Early Game (EG) 1-22
Mid Game (MG) 22-37
Late Game (LG) as 37-50
So with that, I ask you...How do you define these game phases? -
BackAlleyBrawler = 40
pohsyb = 43
War Witch = 167
Babs +
pohsyb - -
Quote:That's an oxymoron!Originally Posted by Vel_Overload
(as im sure they are atleast alittle hurt that players would rather hit 50 in record time than actually play the game)
And they did do something about AE farming, the got rid of boss farms, and skewed the risk/reward ratio in the process unless your farming AE the same as you would farm regular content. -
Quote:If Ocho == alive thenOriginally Posted by Kheldarn
If Ocho is still alive:
Back Alley Brawler : 40
pohsyb : 42
The Ocho : 2
War Witch : 165
TheOcho +1
BackAlleyBrawler -1
If not:
Back Alley Brawler : 40
pohsyb : 42
War Witch : 166
War Witch +1
BackAlleyBrawler -1
{
Back Alley Brawler : 40
pohsyb : 42
The Ocho : 1
War Witch : 166
Ocho -
Witch +
}
Else
{
Back Alley Brawler : 40
pohsyb : 41
War Witch : 167
Witch +
pohsyb -
}
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Quote:Indeed, that is all I'm saying. In the scope of Co*, let right and wrong be determined by the individual player and the coding of the game in regards to the entertainment value of it.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
Eh, I just realized I was being a bit of a hypocrite since I've gotten upset at people elsewhere trying to tell ME what the right way to play is, it's not really right for me to turn around and do the same thing...
Feel free to disagree, because you are allowed to, and let the developers change the game for good or bad. -
Quote:I'll put your doubt to rest, no they didn't create AE for mindless farms. To many people, however, mindless farms are fun. I enjoy mindless farms just because of the sheer number of mobs, the difficulty, and the rewards. I enjoy farms with viable content even more.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
I seriously doubt the developers put in AE with the sole intention of allowing people to create their own mindless farms and to make the game even more of a grind.
Being able to farm and the rewards gained for finding a way to farm particular mobs is what I find fun. Take away the rewards gained for finding a way to farm, and now I'm only having half the fun. What's the point then?
Prove it. I find quite the opposite, that many people run AE farms. The people who believe that AE farms are a bane are the minority.Quote:I seriously and utterly don't believe that at all because IMO if that was their intention with this system then that's a very stupid thing to do. In my eyes (and in many other people's eyes) AE farms are the bane of this game and have put the game in a stranglehold,
So teach them. You were a noob once to, and so was I. I had a level 50 with no stamina, and 3 travel powers when I started playing. Heck, I had two 50's like that before I finally learned better. And one of them was an eng/eng blaster. People were kind to me then in explaining what I was doing wrong WHEN I WAS AT LEVEL 50 ALREADY. What's the problem doing that now?Quote:plus it breeds noob after noob who gets powerleveled all the way up and then either runs off not knowing how to play his archetype or probably even what half his powers even do, or he just makes a new character and does itall over again.
The game mechanics isn't the only thing that changed in Co*. The caliber of people have changed as well and it's changed for the worse.
I plan a build, and I look forward to the destination because, believe it or not, there is end game. I enjoy the journey to a certain extent, but I far more enjoy playing a level 50 toon.Quote:It's obvious you only care about the destination, but there are many who care more about the journey, and in a game like this I think that's much more important.
That's the great thing about this game, you can have it either way and it's ok. But then you have people like yourself who says its not ok. -
Quote:I'm aware of that, and I'm indifferent about being able to do level from 1 to 50 in atlas, but it IS intended. You can effectivly see 100% of what the game has by fighting in AE, but it is heavily diluted with customs and mobs that don't actually exist in the game.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
Which is the one of the saddest things I've ever heard, reaching the level cap without ever leaving Atlas Park...my friend's told me there are some actual new players who have done this. People who have actually never stepped foot outside of Atlas Park ever except to maybe get their cape/aura costume pieces.
Excuse me, I'm going to go resub to WoW and try to get to lvl 80 in Durotar while only seeing about 1% of what the game has to offer...or wait, no I'll go play FFXI and reach 75 in Valkurm Dunes, or better yet maybe pop on Everquest 2 and level up only in Antonica.
(If you aren't aware those are all low level zones...actual with the level sync system they have now in FFXI I probably could lvl up all the way in Valkurm Dunes...so sad) -
Quote:I used to have alot of fun soloing carnies spawned for 6 on my fire/kin/fire. It took me awhile to figure out how to get through a group, having to flashfire right as the illusionists all unphased. Actually very tricky, but the rewards for farming them were great. Trying to figure out how to farm a group is part of the fun in farming. Once you figure out how to farm a hard group, you can reap the rewards all that easier.Originally Posted by Rikis
No, characters that can solo groups spawned for 8 are mostly outliers. Example (only on test, I don't do "fillers" on live), my level 40 Zombie/TA Mastermind cannot solo a group of Carnival of Shadows spawned for 8, but my level 35 Robotics/Storm Summoning can solo the same group. Regardless, a farm arc spawned for 8 soloed will still give vastly superior rewards than a story arc spawned for 8, because the farm arc was made specifically for that, while the story arc was not. While i16 remains on test, a story arc on live will give appropriate rewards for the risks it presents.
The thing about MA is it's just all 2 dimensional. Everything is worth the same amount, and even less now because of the upcoming nerf. What's the fun in figuring out how to farm a custom group in MA if you don't get anything for it? There's no fun there for me. -
Quote:The intention of AE was to level from 1 to 50 without leaving the starting zone and to create their own content (not stories). That is what they put on their marketing ad. Obviously, for some reason they underestimated the number of people who would farm AE. I saw it coming when they first hinted at user generated content last year.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
"The intention of AE"? I'm pretty darn sure the original intention of AEs weren't for players to create an army of mindless farm missions that would rocket them through the levels without them even having to leave the starting zone (which as I've said elsewhere is freakin' sickening to me). As was said earlier, the intention of AEs were to allow players to create their own stories.
Leveling is quicker than intended, yes, but that's because all boss farms are easily made that target the characters strengths. Don't allow all boss mobs and you won't have players still using them. An all boss mob will most likely give less xp than a mixture of minion, lt, boss mob but will be much harder.
Boss farms spawned for 8 will no longer be the norm for farming, it will be arcs with minion/lt/boss combo's spawned for 8 set to the max difficulty. My guess is that AE will become a ghost town once the farmers leave it anyways, so you may not have to worry about people giving 1 stars to missions that give fewer rewards. -
Quote:Originally Posted by Rikis
Then the analogy of someone going to a horror movie expecting a comedy is dead on. Otherwise, you would simply skip it for the next farm arc you could find. Going to a story focused arc and expecting farm rewards is absurd.
Have you solo'd regular content spawned for 8? The rewards are insane.
Edit:
And no, the analogy is a strawman. I expect rewards no less than going to the demon farm in PI spawned for 8. That's not an overreaching goal. Anything can be farmed, but now with making an all boss farm 30% (or whatever it is now) of normal xp is dumb. If I were staying in Co*, I would be giving alot of MArcs one star. Most likly, I would just stop playing MA all together, but then the dev's just wasted their time for however long they spent making MA. Why would I want to keep playing an MMO where the dev's waste their time? -
Quote:If I ran it spawned for 8, and gave me significantly less rewards than the next MArc, yes I would give it a low star rating.Originally Posted by Rikis
So let's say you pull up a random MArc, you see in the description it has a well thought-out plot description, custom enemies, tags that focus entirely on story. It's obvious it won't have the rewards of a farm. Would you still give it a low star rating? It still gives the correct rewards according to the intention of AE.
Edit:
Also, the intention of AE is being nerfed to hell. As is, I think the reward/risk ratio is skewed to much to the risk. An all boss ambush should not be worth less than a mixture of minions/lts/bosses. It will just cause people to hand pick minions, lt's, and bosses that all have attacks against the characters strengths instead of just bosses, yet an all boss mob that has strength in everything you might be weak against gives significantly less xp and can face plant an entire team.
I would one star anything that was that hard that gave no reward, and move on to a new MArc. -
Quote:Classic strawman. Going to see a horror movie and expecting comedy has nothing to do with running an arc and expecting a reasonable reward for running it.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
I suppose you can, but like I said it just doesn't make sense to me. It's like what I said about going to see a horror movie and not liking the movie because it didn't make me laugh. Well most horror movies aren't made to make people laugh so my opinion doesn't make much sense.
Friend: So Neg, what'd you think of the movie? Pretty scary huh?
Me: Eh, it didn't really make me laugh much..
Friend:Umm..it was a horror movie, it's not suppose to make you laugh.
Me: Still, I wish it had made me laugh. I didn't really like it because of that.
Same thing with a story based AE arc...
Creator Guy: So what'd you think of my arc? Pretty neat story, eh?
Me: Eh, didn't give me much reward...
Creator Guy: I know, that's because I actually decided to put some thought into it and create a cool story...
Me: You should ditch the story and just focus on rewards. *goes back to doing boring farms*
Maybe that kinda thing adds up for you but it sure doesn't for me.
In one you don't expect to see something, in the other you do.
Something more reasonable is going to see a Comedy expecting to see Comedy, but it's horror. A great example of this is Archnophobia. It's actually listed as a Comedy, but it's all horror.
Likewise, if I play a game, I expect rewards through my actions. If those rewards aren't what I'm expecting, then it's low on my rating.
I expect correct rewards through every mission, no exception. -
Quote:I can do whatever I want in the scope of the game. If I choose to one star an arc because the rewards suck, then that is my prerogative. That is the problem with giving users the power to rate other users content. IMO the rating system just needs to go away because of that aspect.Originally Posted by Neg_rogue
But it's not really fair to rate something based on what it wasn't intended to do now is it? I.e. if I made an AE arc that was all about story and you give it a low rating based on rewards when that wasn't even my focus in creating the arc, that doesn't really make much sense.
You can't just have one category that fits your only interest and then base everything else on that one category because everything else might not have been created with that category or interest in mind, and it's not fair to the individual to have such a narrow-minded view.
How is it selfish? I'm not at all expecting people to adhere to my expectations and gaming values. If I play something, and the rewards suck, I rate it low. If the rewards are awsome but it's a mindless grind, it's a 4 star. If the rewards are awsome and the mission is fun, it's a 5 star. I rate 90% of the arc on rewards, and that's my choice.Quote:Well I guess you could do that, but it's incredibly selfish to do so IMO, expecting everyone else to adhere to your personal expectations and gaming values.
I'm not demanding that they change it and adhere to my gaming values, I'm rating an arc based on my gaming values. See the difference?
Those who play ONLY for the story or other things of that nature are the extreme minority. If I were to have any say, I wouldn't make changes to a game to accomadate only that group. It's fine to include them since you have to make changes that include a variety of players, but to make a change that would only make the minority in that group happy, and nobody else happy is a waste of time.Quote:The only real truth here is that not everyone plays the game for the same reasons. Sure, I agree that a lot of people do play only to see how much they can get, but believe it or not there's also many people who do play for the story or other things of that nature. -
BackAlleyBrawler = 47
pohsyb = 42
TheOcho = 14
War Witch = 146
8 -1
BaBs +1 -
BackAlleyBrawler = 44
pohsyb = 43
TheOcho = 23
War Witch = 140
Ocho -
Witch + -
Lets break this down . . .
Quote:*cough* Majority *cough*City of Heroes, a multiplayer superhero game, decided to allow its users to design their own levels. While some users created some fun and imaginative levels, the majority produced incredibly easy treasure-hauls, the sort of quest we used to call "Monty Haul dungeons" in the D&D era.
I totally agree with this, but when you have thousands of people trying to get the same shiny object, inevitably, someone is going to get it quicker because they are more of a power gamer, and play more often. A balance needs to be struck between the power gamer and the casual player, and I think there in lies they problem.Quote:There's something weird and paternalistic about the relationship between gamers and game-designers. It goes like this: "I will deny you reward until you complete some arbitrary tasks of my devising, because I know that this will make you happier than simply giving you the rewards right away" (what's more, the designer is generally right about this).
Oh how I wish we could do that here.Quote:This authority and arbitrariness is simpler to navigate when you're playing D&D with some friends around a table -- the GM is a pal of yours in whom you've put your trust for a few hours, and if she doesn't deliver the promised fun, she can be ousted and replaced.
IMO, this is where the focus of the farm/anti-farm debate lies. It's fun to farm because you get hordes of shinies, yet some people call it exploiting, and others call it fun.Quote:The GM doesn't even have to stick to the rules: if she thinks that the game's fun will go up if she ignores the outcome of a dice-roll behind her screen, she can make up an epic save or fail.
But it's different when the "GM" is a bunch of rules programmed into a computer by an engineer working at a multinational. In that universe, if the rules are bent for the sake of fun, it's cheating. And the social contract that comfortably defines the relationship between friends stretches and tears when it's applied to the relationship between customers and corporations.
As long as it's allowed via the coding of the game, it's allowed, regardless of whether it skews the risk/reward ratio. My view point has always been that if it seems like an exploit, report it, then keep doing it until the fix it. If they screw it up immensly after they fix it, I'll go play a new MMO. In the three and a half years of playing, this philosophy has served me well.
I know there are people out there who are 100% opposed to this, and believe that if you are making to much rewards/xp you should stop what you are doing. To those people, I only have this to say ... HAHA I HAVE MORE STUFF THAN YOU DO
Truth ... And I was one who rated arcs that gave low rewards with one star. Bottom line is, there will always be more players in a game of this size that care more about the shiny objects than the aesthetics of the game. This article cleary points that out, and I'm in 100% agreement with it.Quote:When City of Heroes released its user-created mission generator, it was mere hours before highly exploitative missions existed. Players quickly found the way to min-max the system, and started making quests that gave huge rewards for little effort. These are by far the most popular missions. Actually, from what I can tell, they are nearly the only missions that get used. Aside from a few "developer's favorite" quests, it's very hard to find the "fun but not exploitative" missions, because they get rated poorly by users and disappear into the miasma of mediocrity.
This was not what the designers hoped for. Somehow they had convinced themselves that the number of exploiters would be relatively low -- certainly not the vast majority of the users. But they were wrong, and now they're stuck between a rock and a hard place. They feel they must counteract these abusive quests, "for the sake of balance". But how? Well the first step is to ban people who make cheaty content. But what's cheaty? Do they explicitly list every possible exploit condition? What if they miss one? Nah, then the problem would start all over again. Instead, how about if they just issue blanket threats that they'll ban missions that seem "exploitative", without actually explaining what is and isn't "exploitative"? They went with the latter.
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Quote:It's not really bad mouthing. It's essentially my view also on how the whole AE situation has been handled.Originally Posted by Kiralyn
Hmm, not sure how that article was "bad mouthing".... seemed like a reasonably balanced editorial on issues of what players want, what they'll do when they're given total freedom, and other issues of game development. Seemed reasonably neutral in tone. /shrug
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Quote:The reading comprehension of people amazes me sometimes.Originally Posted by Kitsune Knight
Most of the article is just a quote of a completely different article with factually incorrect information (no, player bans weren't the first solution, they were hardly used at all!). There's really nothing new or insightful in the article.
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Back Alley Brawler : 47
pohsyb : 46
The Ocho : 26
War Witch : 131
Ocho -
Witch + -
Quote:Seriously, is it really that hard of a concept to grasp or are people just throwing strawman arguments out there because they don't want to actually address the issue. As stated above in your quote, no, it's not holy, and they can touch it.Originally Posted by NeverDark
By that logic, nothing can be changed in the game ever. As soon as it hits the live servers, it becomes "part of the game" and thus holy and untouchable.
As stated how I've stated it, yes it's holy, and it can't be touched. Reading comprehension is good for you. learn it.
Edit: Not going to waste my time reading the rest of your post if you don't understand the subject that is being debated. Come back when you know more.