Memphis_Bill

/this.

If I need to write something and I'm looking at a blank piece of paper, I don't tear off and crumple it up to get to the piece of paper underneath it.

Riiight.

And given the same arc, who's going to actually FINISH faster and have greater rewards?

Typically the team, in my experience. Unless by "Solo" you mean "Scrapper at x1/+0."

Also,

/this.

Wanting to stop and go through content (not to mention having to stop because YOU are doing all the work/need to rest/etc and not having a "rest of the team" to keep going on to finish the mission) is going to affect that speed.

Not really, no. Not until we get into "Need 8 or more people."

Congrats. You have JUST hit on why people have been asking for a solo/small team path! And part of why this game is considered casual friendly!
And once the team is formed, the content is steamrolled through.
What if it takes me 3 minutes to set up a team, and, say, 20 minutes to finish an arc, that soloing takes an hour? You do know not all teams need to be a team of 8, right? And that it doesn't need to be a team of 8 to trivialize content?

And no, the time taken to make the team does NOT mean the solo task is easier. It means you *might get started sooner.* There's a difference. Take a /Psy defender into Striga. Fight that "warehouse full of Mek Men" mission from Steph. Tell me (and my emp/psy defender) just how much "easier" that task is solo.

It might - *might* - take longer to set up a team (again, the team does NOT need to be 8 people, team does not mean "Group of 8.") Once that team is inside, the content is EASIER barring utter facepalming incompetence.

Your argument has *just* a few flaws.

Which content, pray tell, would be deleted by going through the often-requested revamp of Dark Astoria?

It's true when you're looking at (say) redoing Synapse - though that gets moved to Ouro, so even then saying "It gets deleted" isn't true. Even Calvin Scott is back.

Do look at what you said:

ONE PART.

Not "The whole thing."

What's the point? That I can socialize, if I choose. Even when I solo, I'm talking to other people. I'm checking out costumes as I go by. I'm using the market (mostly to dump stuff on.) I'm helping others out.

"Working together" does not mean "YOU MUST TEAM!"

Much like the endgame, Incarnate content doesn't have to mean that.

Why does it HAVE to be raids? I mean, honestly - why the "but it's always done this way" post?

Why does MMO have to mean no player created in-game content? See AE. Yes, I know people farm - but people also create arcs.

Why does MMO have to mean gear-based costuming? See our costume creator and enhancement system.

So...

Why does "End game content" have to mean raid? Why are our devs insisting on remaining in *that* box?

Edit: Before Arilou or anyone else misreads that - that's not "there should be no raids." But there can be something ELSE coexisting, and the apparent surprise that people would want it... Let me put it this way. I like raids... as a spice. Much like I like salt. I add a little to some foods I eat. I do not chow down on blocks of salt for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

The direction of Incarnate content? "Here, have some Salt Krispies, they stay crispy in salt! Oh, we're having salt for lunch. And how would you like your salt for dinner... wait, what do you mean, water? Salad? Huh? No, really, have some salt."

I don't believe I mentioned rewards in there at all. And in fact have been fine with "Getting rewards more slowly" on a teaming path - just so long as that's a REASONABLE timing.

Do try not putting words in my mouth, or making assumptions. Especially when those assumptions go against something I've said already.

You mean like introducing Mothership raids?

Note that introducing that did not preclude getting solo/small team content related to it as well. (Or the zone events.) And nobody would suggest one means the other can't happen.... well, except in this case the incarnate "raid raid raid" crowd who, since the Incarnates beta, seem to be absolutely adamant that it's the only way to get Incarnate stuff unlocked in a reasonable (IE, less than - what was the latest estimate with what was announced? A few years?) timeframe. And who seem to want to demonize anyone wanting anything else.

Strangely enough, nobody asking for solo/small team content has said "No more raids!" They may have said they're not fun for them individually, but nobody's argued against having them or having more of them.

And yet, somehow, it was so far out of the devs orbit to consider - given the nature of this game's audience - that people might want solo/small team content instead of or in addition to the "OK, herd 12-500 people together!" raids?

The other thing that's getting me is that posi somehow seems to believe having that available would kill the trials. Again, if that's the case, there's something *wrong with the trials.* However, I'd feel fairly safe putting money down that most people would run *both.* I have half an hour? I can hop into an Incarnate arc and run a mission and make some progress, as opposed to spending a part of it waiting for the trial itself to form (since the LFG tool is useless) and running out of time. I have more time? Run part of the arc because I missed the one leaving, then join up with the next trial run.

Amazing how that works. But it apparently is an alien idea now... *shakes head*

That's true of most MM attacks.

Really, want to feel useless? Make a Ninja MM and take the bow attacks. It's like you're shooting mosquitos at the enemy. Really tired, sick mosquitos. And you can't even proc the things.

... because, by their own admission, *they didn't consider it.*

That's like pulling a Henry Ford and making a line of cars all in black, then saying "We didn't think people would want other colors." (I know that's not why he did it.) And you're arguing that, basically, the design of a car includes the requirement that it's black because all cars so far have been black, since they never considered people wanting something else.

There is nothing in being an incarnate that's inherently tied with teaming. How do I know? I step out and still have my level shift and alpha slot working when I run missions in the RWZ. I still have my Judgement, Lore, Interface and Destiny working. It's designed to be *high end* content (not least because the powers vanish below 45 just due to general design of the game) but it's not inherently "team-only" - other than the utterly *blind* lack of consideration that people would want solo/small team content.

Which, given this game's history, is like opening up a baseball stadium and being amazed people want to see a baseball game there.

/this.

A mix of content, not just raid-raid-raid-grindlittlemonkey-raid. I can't see how that wouldn't have been "expected" to be wanted by the devs.

Glad someone quoted this bit of typical GG BS or I wouldn't have seen it.

"People" have been skipping content since before I started in I3 for various reasons. Or do you not remember farms in PI? Should we, using your statement above, "roll back" all the new content since Issue 1 because of it?

And yet people are playing ITFs. People are playing Midnighter arcs. People are playing story arcs. People are playing Kai.People are playing new-Posi. People are playing the arcs re:Protean. People are running tips. People are playing post-I14 content daily. And people are playing PRE-i14 content daily. Hell, AE is mostly unoccupied. I'll see a group (or individual) there every once in a while, the exception being Freedom/Atlas with the farmers there. But that's the exception.

I'd say "try again," but I'd really rather you not.

What are my rewards for RPing?

What are my rewards for coming up with a new costume? It actually *costs* me (time, in-game and, if a pack is involved, real money.)

What are my rewards for writing up a bio?

What are my rewards for writing stuff up out-of-game?

Those are fun activities with no reward. And people do them.

Um, no, part of the fun for the trials is nto "havign a whole crapton of people running them." I don't find them fun because we have "a whole crapton of people running them." I find it part of the irritation. If "suddenly half of more of those people went away," well, quite obviously that "whole crapton of people" wasn't fun for them either.

Right now you have "a whole crapton of people" because it's the *ONLY* way of doing it - and by the way, how are all those Keyes runs? It's obviously not being run despite having "a whole crapton of people" to do it. If the other trials couldn't hold up with a true, alternate solo/small team path - there's an issue with the other trials.

I'd say i'm amazed that Posi and crew didn't even *consider* that path, but... I'm not, sadly.

/this.

The only people who have made any claim about solo/small team Incarnate requests supposedly making progress "at the same rate" are those who argue against it. The people REQUESTING them have - well, basically said the above.

And /signed to the comment that "If you think an alternate path is going to make your trials shrivel up and die, maybe you should look at what's wrong with them."

/this

Most of the claims are not for a "realistic" barbarian but for something less (as several people, including myself, have put it) "Santa's Little Helper," especially compared to the male pieces.

However, I do have to take issue with this:
as you're bringing up "realistic." The biggest problem is "Barbarian" depends on who you're talking to. To the Chinese, the Europeans - you know, people who did have tailors and weren't running around in animal skins - were barbarians. To the Romans, the Celts, Goths, Visigoths, Britons (until they were brought within the border,) picts, etc. were all barbarians.

The word itself comes, eventually, from the Greek and basically means "not us" or "not greek." Know who they used it to describe? The Persians. a,pmg ptjers. Just look at these barbarians:



(They also used it for the Egyptians. And at times for other Greeks.)

So if you want to bring up realistic, barbarian dress could be anything from "nothing at all" to well tailored outfits.

However, since that's not what anyone's talking about, I'd say the slew of images earlier covers it pretty well as far as what people are requesting for a female barbarian outfit "look." (Note the lack of fur-lined thigh high shiny boots.)

That's BarbariAnne.

/off topic

You really take a theme and run with it, don't you?

Awesome. If someone believes that, I'll be able to sell a few lots of oceanfront property in Nebraska I've been holding on to.

Unless they need to be reminded with one word:

"Boresight."

I seem to recall people saying in beta that that would be in *incredible* demand on the market... and it pretty well never has been, as far as I recall.

And historically they thought SOs (and HOs) would be rare, as opposed to having builds full of them, and weren't prepared for what people did with IOs (softcapping *blasters,* for instance.) So it's not like it's a recent trend.

Yeah, slightly less metal (like the arm) - but the overall ragged look and such fits.

And the way in which she does so is? Just go look at her attitude toward people who want that solo/small team path. I've read enough of Lisa's reactions to her (and, frankly, her own posts for long enough) that I think the reply was spot on. I can't imagine her reaction to an invite from Golden Girl would be any more positive than an invite to dinner from someone who punches you in the nose twice a day would be for anyone else.

So it looks, to me, like the characterization was spot on.

And I've played with her in game and found her pushy and unwilling to shut up about the way we "should" be doing things.

Are we talking about the same person?
And are we talking about playing "BC 350, the MMO," or a comic book based game? This argument is irrelevant. As you eventually get to.

I'd say people want something in between those two extremes. Yes, the chainmail loincloth is one bit (note the requests for females to get the *male* loincloth?)

The requests seem to be less "Santa's Naughty Helper" and more, oh, skins, leather armor, that sort of thing. Seeing if I can find images:

SOmeone cosplaying at comic con 2007:


More leather:


Even going to the bikini, something rougher-made instead of the dinky lines:



or the classic:



Bulking it up some:


Looking like someone's shooting for more "stereotypical native" type:



Or this, since we're looking at higher boots too:



... none of which could be mistaken for "santa's helper."