Kruschev

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Also, I want to make one thing clear. Forcing players to group will not get you more players to group with. The player who will /only/ play solo will not group if forced. He will leave the game. The player who groups when he is able and solos when he is not will not group more if forced he will just forego playing when he cannot group or he will also leave the game.

The key to encouraging grouping is not in making soloing less attractive but in making grouping more attractive.

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Most intelligent post on the thread.

AoE's have almost no effect on teams, this is just random whining about people solo'ing.

When you fight whites or maybe yellows, then you get some alpha strike kills, but you dont even come remotely close when you fight groups of red/purple.

The real problem is that xp bonus for teaming sucks, and the scaling difficulty for people at +4/5 is brutal.

No more blaster nerfs please. It is NOT needed.

My ar/dev blaster hasn't been out of debt since Issue2 went live.

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stop trying to solo huge mobs above your lvl if you want a game that you can solo go play doom III. /end rant

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Yes because this is only deserved for other ATs!!!

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One quick question Statesman, what about the Defenders and Controllers that ALREADY have a hard time with mobs?
How would these changes affect them?


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We'll need to give the more "oomph" to keep up!

Oh - and on the XP - if we up mob HP, then we definitely need to up XP rewards! If the battle is more challenging for a player, then he should definitely get more reward.

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You should put that XP bump quote in your signature.

People around here have the reading retention of a Fig Newton.

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One thing I've NEVER seen in a game is the xp return/time increased proportionally to the decrease in performance of the characters fighting the mobs. Typically, you see drastic reductions in power, minor to moderate bumps for weak abilities, and a minor to moderate bump in xp. This leads the overall result to be slightly better or no gain for the worst off, and drastically reduced results for the best off.

I could be overly cynical (I prefer realist) however they're already doing that. Bosses and Lt's are being made more difficult to kill, while the best hero's are becoming weaker, and there is no increase in XP coming for those same bosses/lts, or compensation elsewhere in powersets for the nerfs/fixes/whatever being handed down to Illusion, Fire Control, Kinetics, Devices or whatever else I'm missing thats being neutered.

So, basically what I've said will probably happen, has actually started happening with Issue2 already, albeit slowly.

Theres so many factors that go in to xp/time, and the factors aren't even consistent across powersets.

Regardless, my biggest issue is, I don't care even if it ends up being the same xp for killing 3 whites as I used to get for killing 10 oranges - I have more fun killing oranges and feel more superheroish and I LIKE the scaling in relative power.

Everyone might not feel thats important, but a significant portion of the game does, just simply talk to people in a random team in the 20s and ask them (thats what I've been doing).

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I held out for awhile, Vegetator. I tried. I really did... but, I'm afraid:
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*** You are ignoring this user ***

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Peace out, troll.

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Pot, meet the blackest kettle in the thread.

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At any given level, why would I ever feel more powerful if I can only ever reasonably fight the same number of foes?

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Because they're STRONGER foes. They would have wiped you out a few levels earlier. What's so hard to grasp about this?

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It's not that we don't "grasp" what you're saying, it's that we don't agree, which is fine. You are happy with the exact same play experience after 35 levels, we prefer to grow in relation to the environment

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35 as it was at lv 15, will make it so that I'll never have the oppurtunity to feel more powerful as I grow/level.

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Sorry, but being able to take down a mob at level 35 that would have 1-shot killed you at level 5 doesn't make you feel more powerful?

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No. It's a relative power issue, not a direct one.

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What the hell is that supposed to mean? You are more powerful at level 35 than you were at level 5. But you're not fighting the same foes anymore. You're fighting more powerful foes. The foes you are fighting at level 35 would have wiped the floor with you. You're now powerful enough to take them down. That's being more powerful. End of story. No made-up spin doctored terminology can change that. If you don't feel more powerful being able to one-shot bosses that posed a challenge 30 levels ago, then you never will.

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Direct power is: I shot a level 30 mob at level 5 and he killed me with one shot. I came back at level 30 and wiped the floor with him.

Relative power is this: at level 5 I killed 3 white minions. At level 30, if I can still only kill 3 white minions, my power relative to what it was at 5 and towards the environment has not grown at all.

A lot of people, including myself, really like the relative power vs environment growth the game has.

Hopefully, that clears it up for you

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Actually, it's not that imaginitive.

It was stated that minion hp would increase by roughly 30% and that the xp would scale with it. That would seem to imply at MOST a 30% increase to minion xp. The xp might not even scale on a 1 to 1 basis with the minion hp.

Now, if the current better builds are relegated to fighting off 3 whites as a challenge, that is going to be *roughly* 10% of the xp they were getting prior to issue 2.

Therefore, while having no psychic ability, it would seem reasonable given the developers stated direction with the game, that the end result would be this.

Man, I actually consider myself a fanboy for this game and give some pretty glowing reviews when I get asked about it. I'm nothing compared to your blind flaming & demeaning of any suggestion that something won't be done right.

Cause, we all know Ignite was "fixed" so that it was still a good power. Oh.. wait... nm...

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Very nice, but it's ALL speculation. You said they WILL do this. However, you have no way of knowing that they WILL do it unless you have some nifty precognative abilities...

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Ok.. fine nitpick me.. I'll change it to..
"if he does exactly what he says with no tweaking, this will be the result"

Happier now? I admit its unlikely to happen this way in the end, but one of the reasons its unlikely is because people like me will point out cause & effect, not because we sat quiety by hoping for the best

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35 as it was at lv 15, will make it so that I'll never have the oppurtunity to feel more powerful as I grow/level.

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Sorry, but being able to take down a mob at level 35 that would have 1-shot killed you at level 5 doesn't make you feel more powerful?

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No. It's a relative power issue, not a direct one.

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See thats the problem, I don't really have much faith that in this happening at an appropriate level. He'll cut the good builds to 1/10th the xp/hr then compensate by upping the xp of minions by 30% (leaving lt's/bosses alone). So minions will be 2x as hard to kill, lt's/bosses become much harder but worth no more xp, and all you get is a 1.3x for the minion kills.

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Put the phone down. Miss Cleo is a fraud. You're apparantly behind on the times...

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Actually, it's not that imaginitive.

It was stated that minion hp would increase by roughly 30% and that the xp would scale with it. That would seem to imply at MOST a 30% increase to minion xp. The xp might not even scale on a 1 to 1 basis with the minion hp.

Now, if the current better builds are relegated to fighting off 3 whites as a challenge, that is going to be *roughly* 10% of the xp they were getting prior to issue 2.

Therefore, while having no psychic ability, it would seem reasonable given the developers stated direction with the game, that the end result would be this.

Man, I actually consider myself a fanboy for this game and give some pretty glowing reviews when I get asked about it. I'm nothing compared to your blind flaming & demeaning of any suggestion that something won't be done right.

Cause, we all know Ignite was "fixed" so that it was still a good power. Oh.. wait... nm...

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See thats the problem, I don't really have much faith that in this happening at an appropriate level.

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Who can blame you? I mean, with all the experience we have with Cryptic releasing content updates for this game, I don't think anyone has faith in them knowing how to adjust their game properly.

Oh... wait, that's right, there have been no major content updates. So, what's your lack of faith based on, besides your desire to have something to complain about?

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He'll cut the good builds to 1/10th the xp/hr then compensate by upping the xp of minions by 30%

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Aww, cute. Thanks for the totally baseless, almost certainly wrong assumptions with numbers you pulled from deep within the recesses of your turd factory.

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This is far more likely to happen in a mmo

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Haha. Yes, based on all the other Super Hero MMOs from Cryptic Studios, I think it's safe to make this assumption.

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and is what we're on the path to seeing.

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Yes, it's easy to say we're "on the path" once you make a string of arbitrary assumptions to get us there.

How about instead of making these completely random assumptions, we wait and see how he ACTUALLY fixes the issue and then critique the result?

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They've already boosted the difficulty of bosses/lts in Issue 2 and there was no commesurate increase in xp for them.

Thanks. Play again. Actually don't, stop trolling me. Please.

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1) Missions are WAY too easy. A level 6 hero going into a mission and fighting 3 even-cons is fun, because the hero actually has to work at it. And when the battle is over, he will often have to take a break and heal because he took SOME damage. Post 20 this hardly ever happens. Post 30 it's a joke. My team and I tear through mission without ever even encounting a challenging fight any more.

2) Missions yield too little XP. Can't wait for Update 2 to fix this!

3) Street sweeping is INCREDIBLY BORING! Sure, you can find and fight orange, red, and even purple mobs on the streets and rake in XP, but I can't even begin to imagine why anyone would want to. If I want to do tedious, repetitive, mind-numbing, thoughless tasks, I'll go to WORK!


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1. Mission difficulty needs addressed - but not by lowering hero's, but by raising the bar on the missions. Allow 2 sliders on the bar where you get to pick A) Size of mob spawns, from 1 to 15ish and B) Level of mobs that spawn, from -1 to +4 (or if they'll give up the purple patch, +8.. hehe in my dreams).

2. Part of the reason missions give too little XP is #1, the other part is being addressed. On a side note, raising the difficulty of the mission should give a multiplier bonus on the reward xp. *HINT HINT*

3. Street sweeping is boring because that is the only efficient way to get xp. When missions are viable, it can be a nice change of pace. Anything done ad infinim will get tedious.

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I believe that Statesman has said in other threads that, along with an increase in difficulty, an increase in experience earned would come also. In other words, the devs aren't looking to slow the game down, just to bring the level of enemies to fight back into the 'white' range.


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See thats the problem, I don't really have much faith that in this happening at an appropriate level. He'll cut the good builds to 1/10th the xp/hr then compensate by upping the xp of minions by 30% (leaving lt's/bosses alone). So minions will be 2x as hard to kill, lt's/bosses become much harder but worth no more xp, and all you get is a 1.3x for the minion kills.

This is far more likely to happen in a mmo and is what we're on the path to seeing. The reason I think this is likely is because we're already seeing lt's/bosses becoming more difficult in issue2 and there has been no increase in reward relative to them.

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I thought I'd post here to explain why developers make changes to MMP games. In a nutshell: because they think it'll make the long term enjoyment better.

Human nature often demands immediate gratification. Sometimes, this comes into conflict with the long term enjoyment.

Case in point: much of our zone distribution, spawn placement and mission difficulty is based on a simple supposition. Players should be entertained/challenged by mobs -2 to +2 levels different. A single +2 minion should be REALLY hard - a single -2 minion should be pretty easy. But that's the range that much of the game hangs on. And that works great for levels 1 to 20, in my opinion.

Starting at level 22, when players get S.O. Enhancements, they quickly outstrip their foes. The missions cease to be entertaining, because a +1 mobs are just too easy. Better XP can be found by taking on +4 mobs in zones. Single characters can take on spawns that are intended for many heroes. And there's no place for a maximum sized group to go in order to find a tough and rewarding battle.

In the case of making the higher level game more fun, I want to make the difficulty of the later levels resemble early gameplay. At first, some players will decry "but I can't do what I used to! Ack! I can't solo two +4 bosses anymore?" True - but they'll have fun battling 3 white minions - which is something you can say at level 15, but not at level 35. Long term, the entire game will sparkle once this sort of balance is restored - because so much of the game design hangs upon it.

Anyway, sorry for my rambling. I wanted to give you a glimmer of the developer reasoning.

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I'd like to give a fairly short response to this, speaking for myself and my rl friends who are either still in game or have recently cancelled.

1. Fighting -2 mobs is seen as a waste of time. The xp rewards are so paltry I'd shudder to even calculate the number I'd have to kill in a small team to level up. When I run around a zone, even if I'm hunting even and +1, I skip these and leave them for hero's who are more appropriate.

2. We considered it FUN that we could take mobs ranging from 0 to +3 with scaling risk vs reward, even solo. Teaming allowed us to fight bosses or take on bigger groups. As one of the "ar/dev" blasters, I NEVER took two +4 bosses, in fact I fairly often died to a +2/3 boss who was smoked.

3. Even my friends who built gimpy characters with poor slots could take on even cons, while better builds could yield better results. This was a great thing!

4. It's not fun to battle 3 white minions at 35. One of the BEST things about this game was, as it went on, you felt more powerful relative to the environment. This is different from most games where you become weaker later and MORE dependent on teams. I think THIS IS THE REASON YOU HAVE BEEN SO SUCCESSFUL.

5. I'm almost afraid to tell you how much stuff will need nerfed to get the better builds to the 3 white minions challenge area.

6. If 3 white minions are ever to be a challenge for a good level 30s character, the xp scale needs rethought, the grind is already pretty ugly, and you're talking about stripping my xp/time rate to about 1/10th.

Thank you for reading and seeing what I was getting at, and bypassing all the people who think this thread is about specific nerfs.

Kruschev

#1 They're trying to reign in the FOTM builds.
The level of reigning in that is needed is up for debate. Ignite is now the worst power in AR - they should look at how many AR blasters since they "fixed" it have the power. They tend to overnerf, like all companies, and sometimes they bring something back up but sometimes they dont.


#2 It looks as though they're working on making grouping more desirable.
Unforutunately, they're doing it by bring DOWN the soloability attractiveness considerably, while raising those who have issues solo'ing slightly.


#3 They are looking into fixing AT's that clearly have broken powers.
As they should be doing, unfortunately some power combo's will always appear "broken" and there will always be a "best" power that needs "fixed"

#4 Statesman also said that soloing for ALL classes will remain an option.
Yes, but I shudder to think about the xp I would get off -1 and even con mobs in order to solo from 35-40. Solo'ing as an option is not the same thing as soloing as a viable means of advancing in the game.

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I never called for a nerf to anything on anybody.

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I never said you did.

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I simply was amused at how people who called for a nerf on what wasn't the most overpowered thing in the game (but still needed a fix), suddenly found themselves nerfed.

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Included in this statement is the assumption that somehow a particular group of players were calling for the nerf any moreso than any other group. Just more baseless paranoia to add to the heap of this imaginary nerf conflict.

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If you don't think the message board nerf wars & video clips dont contribute to what gets nerfed, you're kidding yourself. Even if it only brings a bug to the devs attention

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If the boards bring something to the developers attention, it is still fully in the power of the developers to determine whether or not a fix is actually in order, and if it's something that does indeed need fixing, then it would have come to their attention in one way or another eventually anyway. That's it. That's the extent of the forum involvement in the adjustment of powers. The only people "kidding" themselves are those who have concocted this vision of the developers scanning the forums and compiling what people are "complaining" about most, and then basing their decisions on what powers to adjust on these compiled numbers of whiney posts.

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You think AoE's would be getting tweaked (even if indirectly) if it wasn't for general outcry?

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Yup. Absolutely. They have data on what powers are doing what kinds of damage. They know about herding. They don't need whiners on the forums to point out the disparity in usefullness between single target and AoE blasters. It's their game. Believe me, they're not using some SGs latest "uber build" video to determine how they're going to do their jobs.

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When powers get nerfed, there will be new "best" powers and those will get screamed about and nerfed. It's a never ending cycle.

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...in your head. "Powers will get screamed about." <-- True, unavoidable. "and nerfed." <-- assumption, based on your misconception of the developers as mindless zombies, responding to the whining rants of 0.01% of their players.

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I've seen it happen in multiple games, so please don't say it is imaginary tripe.

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You have seen powers adjusted in multiple games? Wow, I'm so shocked. Because, you know, it happens in EVERY GAME. I'd wager "the forums" never played as major a role as people seem to want to believe.

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Do you really want to track down the string of posts where it slowly dawns on Geko & Statesmen that the front end damage loading from multiple AoE's makes the 30+ a bit too easy?

Of course, too easy because we're fighting +2/3 instead of +5/7 in teams, but that was seemingly forgotten.

That was direct feedback from the forums on why certain AT's felt their usefullness was lacking, leading to changes that will "lessen" AoE relative effectiveness.

I bet your a systems admin

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I can vote with my money

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Maybe if you got all 75 people from your SG to quit, but really this isn't a mom and pop store. $15 less a month means jack all...

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If you read the thread, most of them already did :/

And you're obviously not a businessman, cause even big companies realize that losing even an individual customer is terrible, and will typically go to great lengths to maintain them.

You also never lose "a single customer". You lose many customers for each one that complains, another 10 simply dont go to your store any more for without ever saying a word.

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Actually, I did nothing of the sort. My comments were about the nerf whines in general. I didn't say that you were a min/max'er or focused entirely on levelling. Strangely, you responded by saying first that you didn't care about that stuff and second that you are levelling too slowly...

As others have said, the Devs have to worry about making this game fun for over 180,000 gamers. Most of whom may not share the same idea of "fun" as you and like me may think many of the changes the Devs have made are just fine and actually improve the game.

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Sorry then, your wording seemed to direct it at me specifically.

If you read what they said, they've had 180k subscribers "with a good retention rate". Say a good retention rate is 75%, that means they're really under 150k charged credit cards every month.

Looking at my friends list & SG, the retention rate has been heinous, so that must not be what everyone else is seeing with theirs

I didn't say I didn't care, I said I don't care a LOT but I don't want to make very slow progress either -- and I think you'll find everyone but some hard core RPers will agree to this.

As far as min/maxing, I played a Fixer for the first year of Anarchy Online, if you know anything about that game they were probably worse than the an all power pool controller.

Incidentally, I love a lot of the stuff second issue is bringing. Badges, respec, new trials are all wonderful additions. It's just too bad it's combined with nerfing my favorite hero both directly (SG, which wouldnt be awful except it seems like an overnerf) and indirectly (more CC mobs, err.. *sigh* - and like rikti didn't already own me 3 ways from sunday).

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So you're upset that you can't take a villian 4+ levels higher than you by yourself?

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When I first started the game, there was a nice scaling to how much risk I took to how much reward I got.

That scaling has been slowly eroded. Now I must take twice the risk for half the reward (even in teams).

To me, that isnt fun. Maybe to others it is. I'm an odd mix of power/casual gamer.

Im a power gamer at heart and in builds, but I'm a casual gamer in my time to play -- therefore, in my 10-12 hours a week, I would like to make nice progress. This game WAS great for letting me do that.

And you all are exactly right, I can vote with my money, but I'd like to see it not come down to that.

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will come around to everyones AT once they get rolling. It was kinda funny how fast that Illusion/Fire controllers who called for SG nerf got theirs, and it will come for Spines/Invul/Regen scrappers as well.

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*sigh* So difficult to have a discussion with anyone whose perspective is so distorted.

The developers are working on their game. They are making adjustments. This entire "nerf war" of players "getting theirs" and "calling for others" and the developers in their Ivory Towers actually paying attention to the whole ordeal, listening to people's complaints and "nerfing" based on the rants of a few whiners on the message boards is a total fabrication. It's an invention of your paranoid mind. It's tripe. Hogwash. It doesn't exist. It's spam to fill these rants on the forums. It's FICTIONAL.

Power adjustments will happen. Sometimes it will be ones certain players have asked for. The events are mutually exclusive. The developers are not standing up there saying "You get yours, muahahaha. Now you get yours! Hahaha. Nerf them all! Dooooooooom!"

The developers want the game to be fun and challenging. They want it to be fair and balanced. This will involved adjustments to powers. That is an absolute inevitability. Accept it. Play and enjoy the game for what it is and what the developers will make it. Or don't. But, please, please, for the sake of us all and in the interests of ever having a rational discussion on these boards, let go of the "you called for nerfs and so the developers did it, then you got yours serves you right," etc. crap. It's really tiresome.

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I should really be listening to that guy on the first page, but I'll respond here quickly.

I never called for a nerf to anything on anybody. I simply was amused at how people who called for a nerf on what wasn't the most overpowered thing in the game (but still needed a fix), suddenly found themselves nerfed.

If you don't think the message board nerf wars & video clips dont contribute to what gets nerfed, you're kidding yourself. Even if it only brings a bug to the devs attention (like the case with smoke grenade).

You think AoE's would be getting tweaked (even if indirectly) if it wasn't for general outcry?

When powers get nerfed, there will be new "best" powers and those will get screamed about and nerfed. It's a never ending cycle. Eventually, "your" AT or powerset will have the "best" and then people will scream for nerfs. I've seen it happen in multiple games, so please don't say it is imaginary tripe.

Kruschev

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When making a game a developer will soon realize their vision of a game might not always be in line with the will of the players. A good developer will realize that it may be neccessary to sacrifice parts of that vision to keep the game in line with what the players have decided their vision of the game is. Developers who do not follow this path are ultimately going to turn away their own players and damage the game for everyone, developer and gamer alike, with the changes that follow in their attempt to force people to play as they had originaly invisioned so long ago.

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Actually, I can't say it better than this

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My summary: Feel free to critique the game and offer suggestions and advice, but don't ask the authors of this work to make changes in order to generate more income or to fit the game to your desires or even the desires of the majority. It's their work, let them write it how they want. If you aren't enjoying it, then find something that you do enjoy. As someone else mentioned, there's plenty of MMO's out there to choose from.

- Pan

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That's how I ended up in CoH to begin with. I found a game, liked it, then devs decided how the majority of their high level players were playing it wasn't desireable and changed or didn't change things that really needed it.

So I cancelled it, and came here after my friends told me how great & fun CoH was. I in turn, have brought 3-4 other accounts to the game solely on my word that it was fun.

Now I see it happening all over again.

I don't really care if my exact vision (we all sort of have one) is implemented.

I do care about the general direction the game is going (which is much slower leveling, more dependent grouping, castrated solo'ing compared to what I could do before). I'd rather see a team of 8s fighting +6-7 mobs and being rewarded with great xp for doing it.

How many of you truly want to travel on the street to your contact, then in a group to the mission? How many of you consider taking 3 whites to be the minimum baseline for any build to be able to solo, and a well built char/at could do more?

I know they've done extremely well so far, 200kish subscribers - I think that the dev team has done a wonderful job keeping in touch with the playerbase and being honest, it's refreshing to see it after AO.

I'd hate to see that 200k shrink to 150k simply because they're unwilling to let well enough alone about general game dynamics that really clicked with the playerbase.

Kruschev

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It might be better to set ego aside, look at how your players WANT to play the game (not at how YOU want them to play it), and build content/design around that.


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Says a */dev blaster whose wittle smoke gwenade is now no longer "broken". Need I say anything else?

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Yah.. if you actually read the thread... that has very little to do with anything.

The nerfs, while I'm generally against nerfing anything thats not game breaking (I certainly never tanked a +4 freakshow tanker with SG, and frequently died to +3 ones I was trying to kite), will come around to everyones AT once they get rolling. It was kinda funny how fast that Illusion/Fire controllers who called for SG nerf got theirs, and it will come for Spines/Invul/Regen scrappers as well.

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And if the big guys say that many villians have been much easier to defeat than they imagined, so what? It's their game, their perogative. Folks should really stop worrying so much about how fast they level and spend more time enjoying what's actually in the game. I never understood this desire to tear through all the levels to hit maximum level (at which point the "fun" is mostly over). How is that fun anyway? I mean if you and I spend the same amount of money on the game and I stop to read the stories and do the missions (you know -- "content") and you just min/max and only do the things that level you the fastest, only to get to the end and complain that it was too fast or too easy or there was no content, who's getting the most bang for their buck?

Geez. Get over it.

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Actually, I've done every single story Arc so far (probably more than you). I spend a lot of time helping SG mates (well used to, theres not many any more) SK'd to clear off their debt.

I don't even worry a TON about how fast I level. However, feeling like I'm making so little progress it will take me 10 nights of hardcore gaming simply to get 1 level isn't that much fun either.

The fact is, what CoH was at release was a wild success and people loved it. They loved that they could control the difficuly of what they fought, and the rewards scaled significantly. Adding people meant fighting harder things.

Then the purple patch went in, and it caused about 200 more balance issues with support AT's than it fixed. So now the answer is to nerf more stuff big time, and provide a bunch of small boosts to support AT's to bring the game in line with their vision.

I'm simply saying that is a dangerous route to go.

So you can get off your high horse, I like to build effective characters, but so does everyone. I've done task forces, story arcs (the arcs were fun, just not rewarding as they should have been), hunted trial zones, all mob types including their bosses, and probably died 10 times a level because I liked to push what I could do rather than sit and safely kill whites/yellows for max xp an hour.

Don't assume so much about me.

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I also have to laugh every time I see someone complain about 'nerfs'. Exactly what have they nerfed? Smoke Grenade? Sorry, that wasn't nerfed, it was merely fixed to work the way that the devs designed/wanted it to work in the first place. By far, whenever they've made balance changes, they haven't nerfed anyone/anything. Instead, they've mainly given boosts to those areas that they feel need the most work. Not weakened others. This is one of the things that I love about this game. That the devs fix what's broken instead of bringing everything else down to balance with it. To be honest, usually when someone's whining about nerfs, they're mainly just whining because their AT isn't getting boosted while other aspects of the game are fixed or brought up into line with how they should be.

So instead of whining because your AT/Powers aren't getting boosted, why don't you just let the Devs fix and resolve any issues/bugs that are brought to their attention. Just because you may not see any problems, it doesn't mean that they aren't out there.

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There was no mention of any specific nerf, or anything that I necessairly want boosted on my toons.

I was actually pretty happy with all my Hero's except my mind controller (they're kinda sucky).

What I don't want to see is progress soooo slow because we're "supposed" to be killing whites and things will be changed until that vision is met.

I've been attacked a lot in this thread, people assuming that cause my main was ar/dev blaster (rolled first week, liked the concept) that must be the reason -- truth is, its the 30s grind that makes me not want to play him. I see rolling back the purple patch as the key to making it more fun. The devs see forcing groups of 8 to hunt +4s as the answer (which of course would provide half the advancement rate for toons).

Well whatever

Kruschev