LordXenite
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Posts
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Joined
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Quote:That emphasized part is the inane argument because if an AT is not fun, then there's no point to arguing how effective it is because it has failed to be effective in doing the most important part of its raison d'être which is, to provide entertainment. It doesn't matter to me how effective any class can be if its core gameplay concepts put me off playing it because they do not feel fun.Originally Posted by docbuzzard
This is equally nonsensical. There are objective means for comparison of the effectiveness of an AT. You can measure DPS. You can measure defenses. You can measure control effectiveness. These are all measurable quantities. Fun, however, is not one of them by any means. To say that your argument of fun trumps objective measurements of effectiveness is just plain inane.
Which is why this whole debate about Kheldians feeling like "fail" cannot be debated on the grounds of performance and effectiveness. Those people who value performance and effectiveness as major contributors to their personal sense of fun will never be happy with Kheldians because one of the design goals of Kheldians is that they are never allowed to be better at any doctrine than any of the normal AT's.
While this design-goal is true and implemented, performance-enthusiasts will feel Kheldians fail them, but Kheldians-enthusiasts will regard any level gained on a Kheldian a victory! If CoH was a game with heavy "raids" where you would have to have very specific AT requirements and each player had to play their AT in just the "right" way to accomplish the task at hand, I'd say Kheldians are a design-failure, but as long as CoH can be about being effective in killing enemies to some and about getting to Lv50 for others, and still about the character stories for others, judging classes by their performance is only an argument that can be justified between two performance-enthusiasts.
Kheldians are WAI, it's just that some players intend for their Kheldians to perform in ways Kheldians were specifically designed not to. -
Quote:That is completely subjective as my personal experience with both Kheldian types Peacebringers and Warshades contradicts your statement at its very core.Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Kheldians mechanics are just poorly executed. The forms feel tacked on, not integral to the AT. They limit the human form, not enhance it.
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Put me down for 6 fluffies too with the aid of several Kin/* Rad/* (or */Kin and */Rad)
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Everything that Justaris said, plus if you're taking an extra Kheldian to help you, I'd take a PB simply because they are so self-reliant in comparison to WS's.
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Quote:Thank you for saying this as you just demonstrated your bias with it.Originally Posted by EvilGeko
This game is about killing and surviving while doing same. Scrappers can do both. Control and range are irrelevant when you can do the above.
Every class in this game is designed to kill and survive, they simply do it by employing different concepts and different gameplay mechanisms. Melee classes being the most straightforward because they do not have many weaknesses that ensure they need rely on anything more than DPS to kill and survive.
Every class, other than Scrappers, has weaknesses designed into that class that require the player to figure out ways to kill and survive. Kheldians are a bit more intricate than other classes. Kheldians have both melee and ranged abilities but lack major characteristics in each doctrine and so the player can't simply rely on either doctrine to be successful when solo. When a Kheldian is form-dancing, or when a Kheldian is on a team, then the potential increases and the Kheldian classes become more interesting to play.
If everyone playing this game was interested in nothing more than pure DPS, everyone would be playing Scrappers. The fact that not everyone is, simply suggests some people are still interested in something more than chasing enemies to smack'em in the face, and for me, any other class is superior to Scrappers because most other classes actually offer both strategies since I can smack stuff in the face both at melee and at range but I'm required to employ tactics other than chase-your-enemy and beat it!
What's more, Kheldians feel epic to me because when I'm in Nova, blasting things, I know how vulnerable I am, and I'm just waiting for those Bosses to come chase me down so I can shift to Dwarf and whack'em in the face as a Dwarf with awesome damage-resist numbers in comparison to what I had a moment before as a Nova. Scrappers are simply not that exciting for me, because there's nothing exciting to me about playing Superman. There never was.
The best game is the one that lets some people play their Superman, while others get to play their Aquaman that can turn into SpiderBatMan at the press of a button. -
Quote:Kheldians are blasting everything from above while the team is actually rushing to the spawn, then landing in the middle of the spawn in Dwarf form, firing some AoE's and then fight is over before it has began at least for most of the minions. The rest is even easier because the team has arrived. Sorry to burst your little scenario, because that's exactly how I play my Kheldians on mixed teams that are not my usual All Kheldian teams.Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Scrappers, don't need anyone to spearhead anything for them. The best of them can do on their own, what a team is expected to be able to do. There's a reason they specifically mentioned Scrappers when talking about the new difficulty slider.
Tankers, don't need a spearhead. THEY ARE THE SPEARHEAD!! They can walk into situations that even the most well built Khelds can't.
Controllers and Defenders united grant themselves and their minions the power to do anything.
Blasters can melt most things so long as a real Tanker is there to handle what's left.
Where's Kheldians in that picture?
I've been confronted about this playstyle of mine exactly once, by a Tanker who tried to lead the team and basically wasn't happy with how "independent" I was being... You do the math.
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Quote:They are harder to play and tiresome to play if and for as long as you try to play them using the playstyle you've gotten yourself used to while leveling up a "normal" AT to Lv50.Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Yes, as I said, tedious. You're fighting the deficits inherent in the AT, but still managing to be successful. I understand and respect your grit. It's that same tenacity that's allowed me to get my Kheldian's to high level.
But I don't fool myself into thinking that this somehow makes them harder to play. Just tiresome.
I'll also add another point of reference that people are going to flame me for... I've never classified Kheldians as a DPS-centric AT while most people I read on the forums, do.
And so do we. Haven't you seen Kheldians fighting purple-cons yet?Quote:Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Yes, VEATs handle the standard content with ease. If I want to "put effort in to fight the enemies" then I up the difficulty or take on bigger game. And I get rewarded for the trouble.
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Quote:When everything works according to plan, sure... a Warshade can be a whirlwind dervish of destruction, and with smart inspirations-use all it's all good, but it still requires players to actively do the work.Originally Posted by EU_Damz
See i find that warshades are OVERPOWERED. Once slotted correctly and used to their playstyle, you can basically do insane amount of damage with also capped resists.
Getting into a spawn and activating Eclipse still carries some risk. -
Quote:Actually, if you think about it, it's a perfect design for a LEADER, in the sense that if the team stands united behind the Kheldian, the whole team will benefit because the Kheldian will be able to spearhead the team's efforts to win the fight.Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
...yes, Khelds are the "challenge AT" - in a way that makes them deeply undesirable as teammates for anyone not looking for extra challenge.
And yet their inherent directly benefits only them, and requires a team to function. That's incoherent design.
Sadly, most forumites I've seen, that speak against Kheldians seem to care only about combat performance and how to most effectively defeat as many enemies in as little time as possible. They require that Kheldian limitations be removed and that Kheldians get MOAR DPS NAO and other such things.
Clearly, the Devs, bless their RP'ing minds, actually care enough to supply us with different themes and different sources of entertaining ways to defeat our enemies, some faster than others. We call this "having options" and also "variety", and it's been proven a good thing... if not for that, we'd all be playing City of TankMages.
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You know... I actually started writing a long post in response to yours, but then, I took another look at what you've started with:Quote:I want to thank you for that because you've saved me the trouble of actually analyzing things and explaining things in detail, so here's the TL;DR:Originally Posted by EvilGeko
Cerebral = Tedious
To me Kheldians feel like an Epic Win because I actually have to put in the effort to fight the enemies. With my VEATs, every victory feels like it's actually the Devs who have won the battle rather than me because of the passive defenses and defense-multipliers VEATs have. -
Quote:Your minions. Go play a Mastermind!Originally Posted by Samson_Sledge
Who's with me?!
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Quote:Indeed, you got me there!Originally Posted by AlienOne
What other servers can you do that on?
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Quote:Many players, both in-game and on the forums, have already declared their love for thrills that come from rushing into stuff guns-blazing and to heck with tactics, strategy or game mechanics.Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
That's compelling evidence of design intent, and I am now convinced that the implementation of Khelds does bear a relationship to that design goal. That an archetype designed to be difficult to build towards playability isn't universally appealing was probably a predictable outcome, and contrary to the opinions of some other posters here I don't think that necessarily reflects poorly on the player community.
I know this may sound mean-spirited, but to be honest, I felt cheated once I took my Dominator to Lv50 only to unlock VEATs and discover their playstyle revolved so much around passive abilities and active abilities that were completely uninteresting to me for various reasons. So for me, VEATs satisfy the thrill-seekers who are looking for the cheap and easy (passive force-multiplying powers coupled with reliable mez-protection and easily accessible attack-chains) while Kheldians satisfy people looking for a more cerebral experience.
We're all entitled to our own niches in this game, but what truly reflects poorly on the player community happens when the VEAT-enthusiasts want to mold Kheldians in the image of their precious VEATs, i.e. passively overpowered. -
I've never made a list of all the stuff I've never done.
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Quote:I'm in favor of making the whole rep system non-anonymous because it's been shown that anonymity facilitates negativity and prevents practicing reciprocal inspiration.Originally Posted by SwellGuy
...make it non-anonymous for neg repping...
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Quote:So no soloing for you? What about PuGing?!Originally Posted by AlienOne
...if I don't have people I can team with at all hours of the day (and I mean ALL HOURS of the day), then it's not worth it for me... I like to do the TFs, and since 95% of the TFs in the game require you to team up...
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Quote:Naturally.Originally Posted by Socorro
Very true, LX. Additionally, when one seriously talks about Evolution, one must always at least try to see things from the Gene's 'Point of View'. In your example, the trait of 'Willingness to Surrender Will to the Strong Leader and be part of His Group' is, from the Gene's viewpoint, a very good strategy for ITS (not the groups) survival. A Gene's likelihood of of passing along its 'stuff' goes way down if its parent organism is all alone and gets killed and eaten
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Quote:I don't know if this will shed some light on the issue, but here goes:Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
I agree that these are the results of Kheldian design, but I am not convinced (and indeed, I probably cannot be convinced) that the people who designed Kheldians did so with this result in mind.
Geko said that around December 2004. Whether Kheldian design is bad, good, or anywhere in-between, I think that if one believes Geko, one must therefore conclude that Kheldian design has achieved its intended goal and obviously, I believe Geko.Quote:"...Kheldians are supposed to be a challenge. They are designed for the most experience players... the players who analyze and dissect an archetype. You are given a lot of tools to work with and a lot of dials to turn. It will be up to you to figure out the best way to spec out a Kheldian..."
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Quote:BINGO! Douze Points and a triple DING for you!Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
Neither cooperation nor competition is supreme - total competition is apocalyptic, and total cooperation is only possible among genetically identical clones, which are an evolutionary dead end.
Sorry for the tangent/rant, but it really jerks my chain when people use a bad understanding of biology to justify a purely selfish (or purely cooperative, for that matter) blueprint for human society.
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Quote:Very true, however, and this is a HUGE however. For a group to function as a group, the individual group members must surrender their free will in certain situation and act as one under the leadership of the pack leader. In certain situation if even one member fails to do so, the whole group may be in danger.Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
Humanity evolved from pack hunters, and retain one of the primary aspects of that history: we work best in groups.
The only way to make a group leader is by competition because in battle, a group leader is alone and does not have anyone else to rely on to act. Human history proves and makes this point for us time and again. People surrender themselves to leadership. Leadership is borne out of competition and strife and not out of mutual cooperation. -
Quote:Humans, as odd as it may be, thrive on many things. Some of them are positive such as cooperation and good sportsmanship in competitions, and other things that are negative by nature. In essence, people thrive on a complex variety of factors, and giving us only one thing or the other will create an unhealthy environment.Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
Humans thrive on cooperation, not competition.
We require the negative, if only to identify and accentuate the positive. It's in our nature. -
Quote:Kheldians were designed to require more player-effort, period. If a player wants to be successful with a Kheldian, they have to learn more about game mechanics than almost any other class out there requires, and the player is actually tested on their knowledge whenever they take out their Kheldian to the field. This more than anything else is probably the reason most people feel Kheldians are a failure. They require more investment to accomplish anything worthwhile.Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
In other words, one can only say that the HEATs are fully designed if you don't care about mechanics, as neither you nor their original designers do.
Like the title of this thread implies, HEATs feel like fail. Feel. Get it?
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Quote:Actually, that statement I also disagree with on the count of it being a generalization. However, if you were to follow my entertainment-focused habits, you would learn that I actually live by that statement and most forms of entertainment that do nothing more than stimulate my reflexes do not last long with me.Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
Keep your HEATs. I was simply replying to the blanket statement that "Anything that involves no or little challenge/skill is poor design if its main purpose is entertainment." I believe the evidence of the entertainment industry shows this to be a bald-faced lie.
Actually, as far as I'm concerned both HEATs and VEATs are working as intended because they are meant to truthfully and faithfully embody what being a HERO and what being a VILLAIN is all about. Kheldians work best when they lead teams and play as the spearhead with the team backing them and VEATs are like how comic-book Villains are in the first part of the book. Masterful, totally resistant to the Hero's efforts until the Hero isolates the Villain from their support network (their team and minions) and finally the last battle commences in which the Villain loses footing and finally succumbs to Heroic Justice.Quote:Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
Would it be more acceptable if I said that they were designed according to beliefs which have since been proven false, or at least not the whole truth?
So yes, as far as I'm concerned, both EATs are WAI. I do not judge a class only by its DPS-meter like most seem to do. -
Quote:Agreed.Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
...it's meaningless to debate whether the HEATs were designed well or poorly...
I completely disagree.Quote:Originally Posted by SpittingTrashcan
...when there's a good case to be made that they were hardly designed at all. -
Quote:I don't say it often, but... pics or it didn't happen. In other words, what are your credentials exactly?Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
I actually have a fair knowledge of game design. I think most designers do it wrong.
A tiny percentage of entertainment? Seriously? OK... and the Wii... I think the Wii has exploded in popularity because Nintendo created artificial demand for it by limiting the supplies. It's not that Wii games are worthless, but mostly that the fun Wii games that do not involve sports and are not party games, are essentially rehashes of games from other platforms, or re-creations of Nintendo stuff.Quote:Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
There's a reason video games are still only a tiny percentage of entertainment, and a reason why the Wii has absolutely exploded in popularity.
While I agree with you there, that model we may despise is the same model that sells mega-hits like HALO, GEARS OF WAR and other FPS games out there. So that model will not disappear so quickly.Quote:Originally Posted by Eiko-chan
The old traditional model of game design involving "Do It Again, Stupid" design, punishing difficulty, and competition over cooperation is a failing model, and every step CoX takes away from it (which it very strongly does) is a step in the direction of better.
In my opinion Kheldians actually demonstrate a different model which is the "Try again, and this time focus on being smarter rather than using brute force". VEATs on the other hand demonstrate in my opinion a "That's OK, you can go AFK and when you return, you can press your I-Win button and the enemies will die", somewhat like this demo-play-mode game designers are talking about these days.
If you're so knowledgeable in game design you should know by now that successful games provide their audience with satisfaction and the more varied your audience, the more forms of satisfaction and ways to gain that satisfaction you have to offer. Some people will be satisfied by pressing one button and seeing stuff fall over, while others need to feel they actually put some effort into the gameplay experience and are deserving of their rewards. One design does not fit all.