Lothart

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As it stands, rent is somewhat, for lack of a better word, stupid.

What in the world do you purchase and then have to dump 10% (or whatever end of the sliding scale I'm on) of the purchase price into each week or two (I'm not sure which it is, the message seems to pop up at random).

What am I renting and from whom? Is the interdimensional transit authority taxing me? This sounds like an MMORPG design hold-over from some other game to me.

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Rent may have just been the wrong term. Really, it seems more like depreciation than rent...

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If you don't pay rent for long enough then you will be locked out of the base.

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I thought the power was just shut off but you could enter?

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Yes this is the part I don't understand. The logic is bass-ackwards.

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Any other design would mean it would be better to have higher level characters in an SG than lower level characters. That was something the developers have stated they designed the system specifically to avoid. They want it to be just as valueable to an SG to invite a level 1 member as a level 50 member.

Once you take that goal into account it's a brilliant design.

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People at level 25 are usually (unless they've been in perma-debt on purpose or doing lots of exemplaring) really, really strapped for inf.

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Actually people at level 25 are usually given a ton of INF from a higher level toon/alt. At least in CoH that's been my experience and I think it will be the same in a few months in CoV. In fact, the current prestiuge system encourages higher level toons to stay out of SG mode and earn INF for lower level members so that those lower level members can stay in SG mode. Another benefit of the present design: it encourages inter-dependency within SGs.

And let's not get into the entire issue of whether people are actually "really strapped for INF" or simply have very high expectations as to how many SOs they should be able to afford by level 25.

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One thing people also haven't mentioned, but I will: the Base/SG/VG system discourages allowing alts on the same team. If you really want to earn max prestige at max rate, you want 75 different people on your SG. Why? Because you can only play one character at a time. A 75-character SG with 10 people each playing 7 or 8 alts, is only going to earn prestige at roughly the rate of a 10-man SG with no alts, because you can't play multiple characters at once.

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Ok, even if we assume that SGs can always find 75 players willing to join, it's not a tough matter to swap your alts in and out of the SG. It just takes a leader being online.

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That's really a shame... I see no reason why a 5-man SG shouldn't have a functional base.

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Hence why they announced they will introduce something for smaller SGs in the near future.

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Small, sure... but functional. The way things are now, you can only have a small NON-functional base in a reasonable time frame.

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Runs counter to anecdotal evidence I have experienced. Even smaller groups seem able to get the PvE basics in a reasonable time frame. This is aided by the ability to sell back items at 100% value.

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Lets look at the Greek gods....

Lets say Olympus was their base.

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Bad analogy warning! This analogy will divert you from what you are actualyl talking about and send you spining into endless debates aboitu analogies (i.e., exactly the opposite of what you expect an anlogy to do) however, looking back we were already there.

The Greeks had hundreds of Gods and spirits who resided on Olympus; far more than the current SG cap. The core pantheon was made up of 12 (11 before Hermes was born). And really, the reasons for the changes had more to do with assimilating other cultures and the significance of numbers in Greek society preventing them from simply expanding the number of "core gods". If anything the core 12 were just the people with base editing privledges.

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As to the poster concerned for our society. Going into this game with our friend group in mind, we thought 4 or 5 members could make a nice base. We find out we can't, but we feel obligated to stay committed to our friends. So that being said, what is the answer? Abandon our friends for a larger SG? Abandon the game to spend money elsewhere which also causes us to abandon our friends (as related to the game, not ending friendships here)?

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Possible answers:
-Don't make a base
-Wait for apartments, or at least more details on howmany people will be able to share one
-Accept that you will probably be able to make a base of some functionality before you reach the point where weekly rent = weekly prestige income
-Move all the members of your SG to another en masse (I've suggested in the past that SGs be able to merge and keep their earned prestige)
-Move all the members of your SG to another game en masse (I've heard of people doing it in other games)

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I figure the socially right thing to do is voice our grievances, to the devs where the the devs have asked us to, and see if we can affect change before giving up.

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Fair enough. The key difference here is you are voicing greivances whereas many people come to these boards to make demands.

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So if that isn't hard work and socially healthy, thoughtful and/or considerate, I don't know what is.

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I donb't see how it's hard work to type up a message; but I agree on the other points.

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THERE ARE NO HELPFULL PVE FEATURES!!!

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I'm sorry but that's ridiculous.
-The Black Scorpion Task Force
-The Cathedral of Pain trial which I /believe/ can be completed without placing the IoP and opening yourself up to raiding which means one can use the TF purely for PvE content
-The base teleporters (incredibly useful for lowlevel members to reach higher level members in other zones to team up)
-Machines that sell inspirations and buy them too. Where else can you sell inspirations?
-Base medbays which allow you to go to the base instead of the hospital. Now granted, the most important use for this is to avoid having to go to a hospital in a PvP zone. but if you like to PvE in a PvP zone this can be a major lifesaver

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Anyone who actualy has a base can also stress how poorly the bases actualy help your pve experiance....

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I have a base and disagree so "anyone" can't tell you that.

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DONT COMPLAIN ABOUT THE LACK OF A BASE IF YOUR NOT INTERESTED IN PVP BECAUSE CURRENTLY BASES ARE DEAD AS FAR A PVE IS CONCERNED.

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It's in ALL CAPS it must be true!

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I don't like that you seem to be taking any suggestion that there is a problem as a call for extreme nerfs.

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The problem being Cryptic has a reputation for turning any suggestion into an extreme nerf...

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2) Fix the prestige bug when teaming. Why do I get more prestige per mob when soloing than I do in a team (by double or triple)? I get an xp multiplier when in a team, why not a prestige multiplier when in a team with people who are in SG mode?

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Heck, why do they have to be in the same SG? Why not just make it a bit easier to earn Prestige in a team period?

After all, we don't want to make it even harder to find PUGs, do we?

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It allows guilds who WANT to be great to make war

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Wars not make one great.

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getting one-shotted by anything is equivalent to the game randomly deciding it is time for you to die.

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Randomly?

Well, in a sense.

The to hit chance is random but it's modified by the statistics of both the attacker and the defender

The damage done by any given attack is not random, it's a combination of modifiers from the attacker and the defender.

The hit points of a toon is not random, it's a fixed value modified by their choices of build.

The resistance to any given attack is also not random. Again it's determined by build and AT.

So, the only random element in the entire equation is the to hit check. I fail to see how we can remove the to hit check from the game.

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And not being afforded an opportunity at all to respond isn't challenging in the sense that an adventure game is fun to play,

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If anyone is guarenteed the ability to activate Personal Force Field (or any of the other "uber" defense powers, PFF is just particularly nasty because it's a level 1 power) between drawing aggro and dying then the game instantly becomes unbalanced in favour of people with those powers.

If you dislike getting one-shotted so much it ruins your enjoyment of the game perhaps you should consider an AT with higher hit points? Invulernability Tankers are quite hard ot one-shot now that Perma-Dull Pain is available.

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Gonna add my voice to the displeased. I was really hoping to slot the first tier pets for recharge and end redux. Especially at the higher levels, when they're mainly used for canon fodder.

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Quoted for Agreement in Principle (QFAIP?)

You can sell everything back at cost, right? You'll only lose salvage.

The other benefit is that for the chronic rerollers and alt-holics they can just keep rerolling toons, taking them to 25 or so and rerolling again and, in the process, help their SGs a lot.

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And one more thing, you have got to introduce a way to get prestige from crafting. Even if it's something as simple as crafting items rather than purchasing them.

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Can crafted items be traded between players?

If so one could, in theory, sell the crafted items to other players for INF which could be converted to prestige. But, as long as prestige costs are high for placing crafted items I don't think this would ever be cost effective. As is, most people are drowning in common salvage before they can afford to use it and rare salvage may as well be sold directly for INF rather than taking the extra step of refining it.

I only feel compelled to respond to one point, since we botrh seem to agree more data is needed.

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SG snobbery COULD be the reason the system is designed this way. However, the system could be designed this way because it is simply what they came up with based on the factors they envisioned. As Colin Powell says, though, "No plan survives contact with the enemy." Indeed, if the system worked well out of the box, States wouldn't be inclined to throw the small groups a bone since they would have had a bone to gnaw on when I6 went live.

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There's multiple issues going on here.

Statesman himself said "Bases, as they currently stand, really focus on mid and large sized groups earning Prestige" so the issue around throwing small SGs a bone is not tied inherently to how prestige is rewarded. Statesman seems to have been under the impression that people who really wanted bases would join medium tolarge SGs (with no real definition of the cut off point of medium).

He may have underestimated loyalty to existing supergroup and desire to play in smaller groups. That's not surprising given that there's no way to data mine to determine in advance how people feel about such things. They are qualitative measures not quantitative ones. Without a decent market research budget that issue is one developers are likely to be caught by surprise on, certainly far more than any system based on a mathematical model-such as prestige earning.

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You calling me out, Lothart? Can I say, "Zug Zugt" to you?

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It doesn't seem to violate the forum rules so feel free.

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But seriously, I for one won't stop suggesting it.

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Well, most wishes don't come true so I see no reason this one should be any different

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Right now earning appears to be a bell curve. Prestige earning really kicks into gear around 18 or so and then falls off at 26 or so.

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I think it's early to make such conclusions. The system is a bit new. In CoV, in particular, we have not reached the point where many SGs will have a number of level 40s who can work to provide infamy to lower level players to ensure they can remain in SG mode as they level up.

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Given how incredibly expensive most things are,

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That, to me, is a seperate issue.

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"Fixing" prestige earning to be in line with the rest of in-game economics would seem to be in order...If that affects one's ability to get into a min/max uber SG, I can see that *maybe* being a problem.

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I can see it being a serious problem and, as far as I can tell, it's the only reason that jusitifes the current design. So the devs must have seen it as an important issue as well, otherwise why would they have designed the system this way?

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Plus, if you're over level 34, why would they want you in the current system? Lowbies earn more Prestige than you do.

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I don't understand how that can be. Yes, lower level missions tend to be shorter and allow low level characters to earn more prestige than higher level characters. But higher level characters should be able to kill ten even con minions at a faster rate than low level characters can. There should be balancing factors already in place. Further investigation may reveal these balancing factors are imperfect and in need of adjusting but I think it's really soon to be calling for scrapping a core element of the design when we don't even have 3 months of experience in order to base our number on.

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From the anecdotal evidence in just this thread, there are a lot of smaller groups with different personalities out there. It shouldn't be that hard to form one that values having all levels around, or finding an established larger one to join that's under 75 members that also values having a good "spread."

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Think about the customer relations issues over setting up a system that biases in favour of any level? Think about how easily people's feelings can get hurt when they are rejected from an SG or (worse) kicked out of one. Is it worth it to change the system at the risk of alienating people in real life? I don't believe so.

If the current system is /not/ roughly equal across all levels then I'd support refinement to make it so but not a change to deliberately unbalance it.

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3) Fix the Prestige scaling. Higher level heroes should earn more Prestige; after all, they're more prestigious.


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I do so wish people would stop suggesting this. I don't care how "realistic" it is that various flying people in tights get the same prestige as other flying people in tights. I care that the system is designed to make it equally advantageous to have members across all levels in your SG. The last thing I want is SGs saying "you can join when you reach the level cap" you'll generate more prestige then.

My (futile) attempt to standardize the various terms of SG sizes:

So let's try categories again

Very Small 1-9
Small 10-25
Medium 26-40
Large 41-60
Very large 61-75

This is based on /players/ not toons.

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As you will note - I did in fact edit and apologise for that comment being unfair.

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Noted and appreciated.

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As for societies issues - that's between you and society.

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I do not agree. MMOGs act as a microcosm society. One of the ways to dervive real value from MMOGs is to examine how people function under a set of constraints to see if the principles used to design those

Studies in game theory from the likes of Nobel Prize winner (and inspiration for the movie A Beautiful Mind) have had frar reaching implications for other aspects of society.

Besides, aren't we all part of society?

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As such, we have a right to expect certain things in return for our money

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Less than you might think. Your monthly fee buys you access to the servers, nothing more nothing less. Any other expectations you may have (not rights, they are not enshrined in any consitution I am aware of nor part of any religious doctrine that might enshrine them under freedom of religion rules) are overrided by the phrase "game content may change online" or whatever equivalent phrase appears on the box.

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just as in the game we have a right to expect certain things in exchange for the level of effort we exert to achieve a goal.

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And those can change at a moment's notice. You are using the word right. That's a very strong word to use. A right is something you are guarenteed by your government or possibly your religion. It is not the same as good customer service.

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That's a basic law of consumerism - that the customer dictates the direction of the product based on their input.

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Where can I find these "laws of consumerism"? Do they vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction? Or were they handed down written on stone tablets by some sort of Ferengi god?

Consumerism doesn't work nearly as well when applied to art. Art is created by artists. If, once created, it appeals to an audience it accrues financial value. But the financial value is not the sole determinant of the artisit design. Creative vision from the artist(s) determines that.

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Your model of thinking is - we just need to try the product more.

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Hmmm...no I don't think so. My model of thinking is:

The developers will design the game they choose to, for whatever reasons they do. If you decide you like the game, keep paying to play it. If not, don't.

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Okay - fair enough. But since I'm the one having to put forth the effort - and I'm the one having to test it out - yeah, I expect something better than what we've seen so far.

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You can expect whatever you like. But please don't confuse your expectations with your rights.

Oh yeah, and base building prices are out of whack. If bases mattered to me more they are out of whack enough I'd be rethinking continuing to pay to play too.

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Is it just me or did the Ego in this place just double???

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Is this the part where I respond with something witty like "Yes, since you arrived?" to start a silly flame war?

Look, this forum is about a video game. Nothing about a video game is ever going to rate as a truly meaningful issue. In the end it's just a video game. That said, a forum discussing unimportant issues can still yield insight into important ones. And I've seen a lot of things on this forum that makes me very concerned about how impatient and entitled our society has become. Does that mean I'm exempt from that category, not necessarily, but I am at least conscious of the issue so I can watch myself and try to ensure I don't end up falling into the same category. I think society would be better off if everyone did the same but I have no right to expect it of others, only myself.

You could have a 75 member SG that's one player with 75 alts.

I always refer to players not alts. i think I already mentioned in this thread I think the limit should be based on accounts not toons.

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Note that I said there are 32 members, but only half of them are on regularly. So that really brings it to about 16 players. Some of those 32 have not been on in over 2 weeks...I have no idea if they ever plan to come back or not.

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Most SGs larger than 5 members are going to face the same issues. If you have 32 members and half log on and hey have 8 members and half log on the relative situation remains constant.

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I am also co-leader of a small COV SG. We have around 32 members, of which probably half are on regularly.

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This discussion is failing, in part, because we have a really broad definition of "small" being used here. I've been admonished for calling my 14 member SG small and here you're calling a 32 member SG small?! There's no way I could call a 32 member group small given the upper limit is 75. What then is an average group? A mid sized group? A large group? A very large group?

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The Devs have thier own idea what a long time goal is and the size a SG needs to be to complete it.
Players all have their own Idea.

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Additionally we have not been told:

What size SG (in terms of players not toons) are devs basing their projections on?

Will the upcoming apartment/hideout system use poretige or some other currency?

Will the upcoming apartment/hideout system be for lone heroes/villains only or can a number of players share an apartment? If so, what is the maximum and does it come close to the number being used as the ideal SG? Can I have 8 people share my apartment and SG bases are meant for groups larger than a single team?

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There is no reason what so ever not to allow Super Bases (for example) to be more casual and easier to obtain/maintain.

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What if the content isn't even finished? Would that be a reason?

I'm sure there ARE reasons; they simply aren't apparent at this time.