Mieux

Hilarious. I notice that this incentive coincides with DDO's double XP weekend. You gotta love the free market.

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Can we move this thread to the Tank forums? It feels like a Tank thread.

[/ QUOTE ] That is hilarious.

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I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

[/ QUOTE ] I'm actually quite fascinated with board mentality. It's really interesting the lengths that people will delude themselves about reality and facts because of their emotional stance on certain issues. I think it was Jem's response to me that players are more limited with every issue....ignoring I9 of course right? Or that players can't adapt.....ignoring respecs right?

The problem, imo, is that there isn't enough adapting in this game. Our enemies don't change and we haven't had to either. Obviously too much change is stressful, but I'm all in favor of putting more pressure on players to have to pay attention. Maybe not a lot more, but some. Maybe not in every aspect of the game, but in more than just the Hami raid.

I don't think these devs are perfect by any means. The Stalker mechanic in PvP is one of the worst decisions I've seen a design team make or allow to happen.

For all the people who feel something like this is worth quitting over, consider that one of the reasons for change is so that players are faced with new challenges. Common sense tells us that if the game becomes stagnant, people will get bored and quit. This approach is beyond obvious and evident in the release of patches and expansions in almost every major MMO. As someone has already stated, the game has to change or it may not remain financially viable. Again, as someone stated, sometimes those changes work against specific players and sometimes the work for them.

You have to take the good with the bad or you'll just keep bouncing between MMO's endlessly.

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in order to make a single entity that can be attacked by 50 players at the same time we have to step outside of the bounds of 'normal' rules in order to make it challenging

[/ QUOTE ] I wouldn't even say you are steping out of "normal" rules. To do so acknowledges a limitation that simply does not exist. This is a comic book game. Last I checked anything and everything was possible in the world of comics. Hell, Scarlet Witch created an alternate universe were everybody lived none the wiser....then she undid it all. The people that are getting all bent out of shape that Hami is hitting their precious PA, need to remember context under which this game takes place....limitless.

I emphatically salute the devs for remembering that. I think it is an excellent precedent on their part to make aspects of the game responsive to the players themselves. I think they need to take this a step farther. Make the AI's far more sensitive to what powers are being used against them. Allow them to see that they are constantly being held and let them start recruiting/training/spawning/hiring mob types which can protect them from holds. Hell, give mobs a way to adapt to stone tanks.

Obviously the bad guys should have a limit as to how much they can adapt and they shouldn't be able to cover all their holes at the same time, but it think this is one very immersive way to improve the AI.

Bravo. Compared to other games, I've consistently been impressed with the overall quality of decisions that Cryptic has made. I will gladly invest in any new games you guys come out with.

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I believe the game was intended to have PvP from the beginning.

[/ QUOTE ] For a long time, I held on to this belief. Mainly because I knew they were going to launch CoV at some point, and that all the mobs used the same powers as the heroes (with different parameters). But I believe it was Statesman (might have been Posi) who explicity said that with but a few exceptions, nothing was originaly designed with PvP in mind. The devs knew that at one point PvP would be looked at, but based on what they posted, I was disabused of my belief they had truly kept an eye on PvP implications.

Arcana listed but a few of the extant problems when PvP was first allowed. As people have facetiously pointed out, the NPC's aren't allowed to post about the all the broken mechanics in PvE. Many of these, like Perma-X powers, had to be fixed in order to bring PvP out of Ludicrous Speed it which it was traveling.

I've been meaning to respond to this...

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What I was referencing is actually a concept that the devs originally had in the plan for CoH 1.0: combat stances.


[/ QUOTE ] In reality, the game already posses combat stances. It isn't a coded construct, but an inherent aspect of tactics. If I want to play defensively, I leave on my travel power, don't attack, and use terrain to minimize my exposure. If I want to go on the offenseive, I do things like hit Hasten, BU, pop Rages, etc, and generally use less mobility in order to maximize DPS. Imposing actual stance constructs is unnecessary.

What I do agree with in principle is the need to have more circumstancial powers. Elude use to be exactly that kind of power....it was in effect, a Defensive Stance power. But the devs have taken that away. Unyielding Stance was similar. Using the power had severe tactical advantages and disadvantages.

Now, I'm not saying the changes to those powers were a net negative, but it revealed a very important psychological aspect of power set design:

People don't like circumstancial powers unless there is an overcompensating benefit.

Part of that assessment is undoubtedly affected by comparaing powers against powers in other sets. When I first read about Elude (the version where you couldn't attack) in the game manual, I immediately thought that this is a cool power and is consistent with my concept of when Spiderman is trying to get away. It'll be neat to pop Elude and escape, or make it to a door safely, so on and so forth. However, when I started playing the game, you can't just toggle Elude on and off. It's on...and it stays on. This is severly limiting from a tactical perspective. In addition, the other sets had no need of such a pure defensive power. There was no situation where Elude was critical to the missions success. The game didn't offer any context in which Elude (wiithout the ability to attack) offered an overwhelming or even a substantially important tactical advantage. And here's what made it worse. Other comparable tier 9's like US and MoG, allowed people to attack. Here is my "Oh s**t!!" power and so what? I'm the only who has a power like this and it turns out to be comparatively worthless. Great in concept, lousy in practice.

The point it not to criticize the devs for their initial design decisions, but to point out that this game, does not really reward anything but the ability to defeat your enemies. People won't embrace "Defenseive" stances so long as there is no PvE reason to have them. People simply run away since there is no mission that I can recall where you simply need to survive for a given amount of time to win.

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Combat stances change the equation somewhat. Even if you've fought the same person ten times before...

[/ QUOTE ] You're suggesting that Stances would allow someone to force the other person to respond tactically, that Stances should be outcome determinative. If not, then who cares what stance you use? In fact, you say this here:

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Firing an opener and running gains you no significant knowledge, because that stance can be reset periodically.


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But this isn't going to accomplish what you think it will...because this already exists. Ultimately, your suggestion still results in a fixed, finite set of options. As such, experienced PvPers will intuitively learn the performance boundaries. Either I will be able to defeat you in pure defensive mode or I can't or vice versa, because if you can't defeat me, you'll switch over and so will I. We haven't gained anything.

In fact, we already have that situation now. When I fight /Fire brutes or /Inv Tankers, they can basically just go pure defensive by putting HF/DP on auto, using Aid Self when ever it recharges, and making sure they never run out of endo. Similarly, I can do the same with Touch of Fear and Siphon Life. Avoid attacking except to heal and Fear the opponent. Ergo, to beat an /Inv tanker, I already have to be able to defeat him in his "Defensive Stance" and he has to be able to beat me in mine.

The game has already provided us with "Combat Stances," they just aren't artifically linked to buttons. What we have now, provides a far more fluid transition between defensive and offensive extremes with infinite variation between them. More importantly, I would vote against such an imposition. It runs the risk of unnecessarily limiting tactical flexibility and creativity.

The other thing I read in your suggestion is this idea that we need the ability to reset the battle. I obviously disagree with that.

If you want to create more situationally, PvP-centric powers, I'm listening, but they had better be useful in the context of PvE or people will complain about useless powers....and frankly, creating new powers primarily for PvP is expensive from a development perspective.

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Part of the problem with 1v1 combat, or even teamed combat to a certain degree, is that at some point, there are really only two things a player can do to alter their effectiveness in a material way: hop around, and shoot in a different order.

[/ QUOTE ] This is just not an accurate assesemnt of PvP, in my experience. I think this exposes the crux of the problem and perhaps provides insight as to why many people don't like PvP. No offense, but PvP is far more tactically complex than what you've described. You're attempting to compress all uses of powers as a modification of firing order. Timing....is the critical element...not firing order. I can even use the same firing order but achieve dramatically different results based on when I excecute my attacks. When I use BU and Hasten is a tactical consideration and to simplify it as a change in firing order is to demonstrate a fundamental disconnect with how PvP works. Such a categoriztion will lead you to false assessments on the nature of PvP.

In addition, you've completely ignored envorinment as well as inspiration use. Even in the Arena, you can achieve dramatically different outcomes by using terrain. I have played lame duck through most of an Arena battle and then popped my four Rages at the end to steal a victory.

If your perception of PvP success is truly based on people's ability to hop around and change their firing order...and if there are many others who agree with you....then the devs/player community has a separate issue to address.

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Once I know how you hop around and the order in which you shoot, I can easily tell if I have a mathematical advantage over you or not from an offensive or defensive perspective:

[/ QUOTE ] This is somewhat baffling. I know my range of outcomes based on what set you have. I know a Trick Arrow defender isn't a threat in melee where any */EM blasters is. I know from past experience how long I will survive when I see a */EM blaster hit BU+POwerboost+AIM if I let him get within melee. Experience, is what tells me what upper limit is...not how you hop around. As far as the order in which someone shoots...???? I never use a consistent attack chain. It's completely dependent on the exact situation I am in. Obviously some powers like Siphon Speed you might fire off as soon as they recharge, but that gives you no clue as to what order it will appear in a set of my attacks, unless you are an android with an internal chonometer. While I believe you exhibit android-like tendencies, I don't know anyone who has an internal chronometer with atomic-clock accuracy...or even Swatch acccuracy for that matter.

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That ratio is largely fixed for any two combatants in PvP, except for running and jousting which, even if you thought was a good idea for combat in an MMO, this game engine doesn't support well.


[/ QUOTE ] I have to disagree with both halves of that statement. First, while there is a theoritical max DPS you can do...the fundamental issue here is execution. I can tell you that any time I see someone hit Build-Up, I react to make sure they can't deliver their full spectrum of attacks for the 10 seconds it lasts. As to your statement that this game engine doesn't support running and jousting....????? You must mean to say something other than what you said because CoX supported running and jousting so well they had to impose travel suppression. And despite travel surpression, there are many jousting techniques that still work extremely well.

In a nutshell, your perspective seems to be of someone with very limited exposure to the complexities of PvP in CoX. I'm not chastising you for it, but it underscores how preceptions differ and the challenge the devs face in making PvP enjoyable to the larget number of people.

Your exposition on the problems also underscores a critical question in who should PvP enjoyment be centered around. People with relatively little experience, or the hardcore players? Clearly you'd want it to appeal to all, but if it was somewhat of a zero-sum game, I'd focus on making it fun for the neophyte over the veteran.

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I don't agree that the arena causes short battles.

[/ QUOTE ] I didn't say the arena causes short battles. I said that the Arena is where I normally have short battles, I also suggested that when you have a 10 minute timer, if you came to fight, then you'd better get on with it.

The Arena dynamic lends itself to people using all-out tactics and going for broke because you are in a box, becuase you get respawned to full health, and in timed battles, there is no limit to how many times you can be defeated. Nowhere am I saying that people only have short fights in the Arena.

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I'm glad you're amused. However, I'll reiterate for the sake of clarity that I don't believe travel powers ever were in any way being "exploited" in PvE. In fact, I believe travel suppression wasn't even REMOTELY a PvE consequence.

[/ QUOTE ] There's a common fallacy that many players, across almost any MMO, operate under. Allow me to dispell it:

Just becacuase something doesn't change after an update doesn't mean the devs are happy with it.

There have been many powers in this game that the devs have not changed for several issues, but they knew it was a problem from the start. There are still things like this.

I won't speak for the devs and say how they speficially felt about jousting in PvE...but I will say that they have explicity talked and designed and modified this game around a risk vs. reward model. Penalty-free travel powers substantially skew the risk vs reweard in PvE. I am of the belief that PvP just forced them to deal with the problem sooner rather than later.

I realize it's in vogue to blame PvE changes on PvP, but it may not be accurate and may actually be detrimental to understanding what the real reasons are.

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PvE is balanced around very rapid combat, and because there really isn't any PvP combat adjustments that attempt to alter that, PvP combat is intrinsicly designed around very fast combat also.

[/ QUOTE ] I'll have to say that's incorrect on a number of levels. PvE mobs, on average (Excluding AV's, EBs, and GMs) have substantially less hit points than players. In some cases, an order of magnitude less. PvE mobs have a far fewer array of powers at their disposal, nor can they use inspirations, accolades, temp powers, or even find a perfect teammate. Most importantly, PvE mobs (with a few exceptions) don't have the mobility of players with travel powers. PvP doesn't have to make any changes to create longer lasting battles, the differences are already there.

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That makes it difficult to give PvP a tactical feel in my opinion: its over too quickly for tactical decisions to have any real chance to take strategic effect

[/ QUOTE ] If this is your opinion then I suggest fighting a wider range of opponents. My /SR battles with /Regens, stalkers or scrappers, don't last less than 10 minutes assuming there is a victor. I can say the same for Brutes and Tankers.

IME, the only time I have short battles is either in the Arena where the time contstraint forces the action and you have two people who want to fight a priori, or against go-for-broke blasters or people who just aren't very good at PvP.

I recall a fight against a BS/Regen in Warburg that took me 35 minutes to finally beat him and it was a monument to patience and tactical planning and execution.

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a tactical decision has to have immediate reward or its likely to be a waste of time.


[/ QUOTE ] I find the exact opposite to be true. PvP combat in FFA zones and the Arena is very tactical and the longer the battles, the more tactics are the decideing factor. There are some builds that my non-PvP build DM/SR simply cannot defeat without inspirations, but there are many I can and more often than not, the difference is my ability to make tactical decisions.

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one of the things that I think is problematic in PvP is the time frame of the combat.

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The time frame of combat is not a problem, in my opinion. Some battles are quick, some are long, and some are indefinite. That is exactly what one should expect. Tactics plays a roll in deciding the fate of all three. When I use powers, when I go from defensive to offensive mode, when I use inspirations, are tactial decisions that come into play in PvP battles that I've been in.

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The real problem is travel powers: slower fights not only create tactical opportunities, it can make it impossible to kill anyone if everyone can escape combat.

[/ QUOTE ] Once again, I disagree. From both a comic book perspective and a game play perspective the problem is not travel powers. "Escaping" is the primary plot extension device in comic books, for both Heroes and Villians. One of the things any good FFA'er does is make sure they have an exit strategy. Where to run, how for you have to go, and the best travel power are all important and valid parts of PvP combat.

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slower fights not only create tactical opportunities

[/ QUOTE ] There's nothing inherently better about slower fights. The ability to make the correct tactical decisions is as much of skill in a short fight as a long one. The devs don't need to artificially extend the fights.

Now, having said that, one of the perceived problems in PvP is the lack of player determinable settings. Zones seem wide open and it often feel impossible to corner people. Nevertheless, within limits, you can chose locations, or even draw your opponent to locations which are more or less mobility restrictive. I've goaded a number of flyers and jumbers below the streets of Warburg where their movement was crippled and my Super Speed had the advantage. Obviously some Arena maps and PvP zones have more or less to offer than others, but in any case, artifical restriction of mobility is exactly that: artificial.

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are two ways you can do it. First, you can give travel powers disadvantages in PvP. The devs were probably on the better track when they had flight have a tohit debuff.

[/ QUOTE ] I emphatically agree with this. It is absolutely beyond me why the devs did not slap a 100% Acc debuff (which also lingers for 10 seconds after being shut off) on Super Speed, Super Jump, Flight, and Teleport. Travel suppression was the wrong way to deal with this and it still is. It continues to feel illogical in both PvE and PvP. At 100% debuff, it would take a full team to ovecome the debuff, and the other team would have access to the same options.
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The other thing you can do is create more ways in which maximum effectiveness tends to automatically preclude travel

[/ QUOTE ] I would not use that approach beyond the Acc debuff. Instead I would make it so that some powers cannot be activated with travel powers on. This will preclude SS/SJ Empaths from avoiding the travel penalty despite providing tremendous beneift while avoiding attack. If Empaths want to keep SS/SJ on the entire time ...not a problem. You just can't get away with drive-by Fortitude or Heal Other or Ressurect, or any other single ally buff; AoE's heal/buffs I would allow. Travel powers should also turn off any Toggle Debuffs as well. You wanna run? Go ahead...you just don't get to debuff someone while traveling at 80mph. I think this would be a vast improvement to PvP and also mitigate a lot of the cheese builds/tactics people employ.

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First, you'd want to ensure that the act of making a build decision has population-based negative feedback. Each person that chooses to build in a particular way reduces the value of that build. ***This means even if a particular build is "better" than all the others, that fact is only true so long as not too many other players take it.

[/ QUOTE ] Fundamentally, this is something that I argued for over a year and a half ago: The context of the game determines how powerful you are. You don't really talk about a mechinism, so I will. The game should [u]not[u] change your powers. Thor is 100% correct in that such an approach ignores the psychological impact of players having the environment imposed upon them rather than the other way around. What should happen is the mobs that are spawned should be sensitive to the players that exist. If the number of DM/Regens that enter a zone exceeds a certain % or amount, then the mobs start using weapons that are specifically targeted to /Regen powers. If the number of controllers is high...mobs start spawning their own Empaths-type support. This if is a far far more immersive and acceptable way to create the negative feedback loop without directly affecting the player's toon.

EDIT: Just to clarify, I'm not saying they use powers based on who they are fighting, but the game spawns mobs with certain powers based on population statistics. The AI doesn't have to change one lick. You could even use this technology to make the missions themselves to create a increasing difficulty in that later spawns "adapt" to the invaders.

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Second, design proportional stacking rules, so that no game attributes exponentially increase, and so incremental improvements always have constant incremental value.

[/ QUOTE ] I'm really not sure why this wasn't a no-brainer from day one. The fact that someone can stack on 12 Rages is silly. Thor, while your instincts about this really only affecting teams is noted, inspirations and pool powers make this a far bigger deal for 1v1. Any and all benefits should have a greater decreasing rate of improvement. Many effects such as +RECHARGE already do, but it should be more dramatic, IMO. Most importantly, it needs to be applied to inspirations.

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Third, create a requirement to commit to combat to achieve maximum effectiveness

[/ QUOTE ] I'm not sure where you pulled this from, but it's not a principle of 1v1 PvP combat, nor should it be. Part of any battle is knowing when to retreat, knowing when to pursue, and knowing when and how to limit your enemies' abilities to do either. This is true for 1v1 or 1000 v 1000.

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and force the decision to commit to occur prior to gaining complete information about the combatants.

[/ QUOTE ] First off, that's already in effect because you don't know you are fighting and you never knew what inspirations they carried or what Accolades they possesed. Second, the devs have already subscribed to this idea by removing the ability to look at the powers of Villians. This is something many of us identified very early on, and the devs responded. I also partially agree with Thor, in the getting rid of the Archetype labels...however....I think there is a psychological necessiity to provide the combatants with some information along those lines, it may break the immersion to some degree, but I think it cuts down on some of the frustration. I also think it serves as a form of cross-game advertising. Getting beat by a Brute or a 'troller may motivate many to go and make one.

And yeah, the r/p/s analogy/metphor propogated by the devs does the entire community and the devs themselves disservice in looking at the issue objectively. Such an analogy suggests that 1/3 of the time, any given build will win, lose, and draw. Such is not the case. Such is not even remotely the case. The fact that every scrapper primary has access to some +To Hit boost and none of them have access to a -regen/heal power creates an unnecessary asymmetry; I've already covered how grossly unfair Geas/FoN is to many sets in PvP.

I think many of us agree that the devs need to make a psychological commitment to providing a less binary outcome and a more equitable experience in PvP. Failure to commit to this creates a self-perpetuating excuse for them to avoid expanding PvP: 1) PvP is grossly unfair and people hate that 2) Because so many people hate it, it's not as financially important as PvE 3) Since it's not as important as PvE, we won't address it....which means that we'll never get past 1.

To be fair, I think the devs have taken some stride to address PvP issues. I think they need to keep taking them. They need to take more steps. Traditional PvP needs to evolve and expand.

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Sorry if I missed your point, but this paragraph seems to be aimed at the zones.

[/ QUOTE ] The paragraph is specifically aimed at identifying the need to create a PvP environment that is not like that which we have in zones.

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Where I disagree is trying to work on 1v1 balance, its a waste of time and resources and always will be.

[/ QUOTE ] Then you'd need to eliminate the ability to have 1v1 PvP missions. Only let PvP occur on teams of four or more players (and of for the reading impaired, i'm not talking about changing the arena or PvP zones that currently exist).

For the record, I don't think that's necessary, but perhaps in the short term it might be advisable. However, I also partially agree with Arcana: You can't solve team PvP without addresing the problem at an atomic level. In a different post, she astutely identified that the real fudnamental problem is that the devs even allow a power like Geas/FoN to be available to players in PvP. Why is it acceptible that a power is allowed to completely nullify those who depend on +DEF, but there is no corresponding power that allows us to completely nullify those who depend on +REGEN/HEAL/HITPOINTS or +RES? I interpret this as a "PvP be damned" approach to adding such changes to the game.

As long as they devs subscribe to this mentality, they'll never get PvP to a point where it doesn't feel grossly unfair. The devs seem unwilling to tackle this problem head on and I, for one, think they should. PvP needs to evolve, and in its current state, too many people might reject any expansion.

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I think we've had this discussion before Mieux, but I hate to tell you that even if your (mythical) 1v1 balance could be achieved it wouldn't stop ganking or the complaints about it.

[/ QUOTE ] I think you need to reread my post. Specifically the part about 1v1 balancing.

And as for not stopping ganking you're completely wrong. You know how many university shootings they've had in Great Britain in the last 20 years? ZERO. Why because they gun laws are different. The devs can stop ganking if they wanted to.....It's called consensual PvP. But the point is not to stop ganking in FFA zones, but to set up PvP missions where the inequities are reduced.

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You consent when you enter the zone. Read the sign, if you dont agree leave. LEAVE! It's that easy. It'd be the best descion for everyone.

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Here, let me emphasize this since you missed it the first time...

But the point is not to stop ganking in FFA zones...

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I think we've had this discussion before Mieux, but I hate to tell you that even if your (mythical) 1v1 balance could be achieved it wouldn't stop ganking or the complaints about it.

[/ QUOTE ] I think you need to reread my post. Specifically the part about 1v1 balancing.

And as for not stopping ganking you're completely wrong. You know how many university shootings they've had in Great Britain in the last 20 years? ZERO. Why because they gun laws are different. The devs can stop ganking if they wanted to.....It's called consensual PvP. But the point is not to stop ganking in FFA zones, but to set up PvP missions where the inequities are reduced.

I have not played SWG...but I've had numerous conversations with several people who have and it's ill-advised to draw conclusions about CoX from SWG. We don't know what constraints or pressure the developers/designers were faced with. Were they seeing their population declining steadily? Perhaps the writing was already on the wall and they were facing the inevitable. I think portraying PvP as the culprit for SWG's downfall is woefully inaccurate.

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The only reason why I don’t feel CoX is destined for this is because the auction and invention system is so poorly thought out and badly implemented...

[/ QUOTE ] I can't offer an opinion on this, but it will be interesting to see what "loot" will do to this game. I am in the camp that thinks the devs have most likely ignored the negative consequences of how "loot" econcomies affect the mind set of the population and are probably marveling at their own creativity in being able to do such a thing. I also suspect that many of these global changes are based on beliefs about subscription rates. There will be people who become obsessed with "loot" the same way we saw with badges.

But my reason for posting is to reiterate the need for this game to evolve in the area of PvP. I'm all for non-combat xp opportunies...heck I think they need to dramaticially expand PvE and include rescue missions where you have to manipulate objects, actually use powers to carry people, etc. None of which need invovle doing damage to a Hellion or a Malta. But I also trust the devs when they've elected not to implement skills because it just didn't work or make sense.

However, PvP also needs be given a real purpose. I'm not advocating forced PvP, but it has to be in the context of real missions and not just the free-for-all zones and arena.

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Most of my friends do not engage in PvP at all because of the behavior attributed to PvPers.

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I'm in complete agreement, but the source of the problem is the system, not the players. The devs tell us it's rock/papers/scissors, but that's false. It's more like Scissors/Rice Paper/Printer Paper/Cellophane/Cardboard. A build like an EM/Fire Brute (with Insp + Accolades) will outperform any scrapper set that doesn't have Slow. Mind/Rad, Ice/En, etc....these builds are not balanced in the context of PvP because PvP isn't balanced for 1v1. So the devs need to address these things and they won't. You can't have gankers if people can't gank. Now, you can't truly balance 1v1, but the gap in peformance is reducible and they have mostly ignored the issue.

Self-elected PvP, in the context of real missions, is a huge area of growth for this game. It can be made to dramatically reduce many of the inequites we see in the arena and FFA zones. Someday, some development team is going to clue into this and make a killing because people will love it. I'd like to see Cryptic be that team.

This is an MMO. Other players are what separate this from a console game. It's silly not to use that.

One problem I am inclined to believe is the undo influence whiny groups have on development, but that may include the anti-PvP crowd as well.

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Oh Mieux I concur with your point but man am I chomping at the bit for the auctions...

[/ QUOTE ] All games which have economies have people who enjoy it. A working economy provides players with a fundamental task and incremental rewards. This is really boils down to a game within a game. I have nothing against economies, per se, but I honestly think it ruins games like DDO. Teaming becomes dominated by loot farmer mentality...and I'm not talking just those of the Gold variety. It will be curious to see how many people turn to farming the same missions over and over to get recipes. I suspect, just like with the Fortune Teller mission, you'll get people auctioning spots on the team.

As general rule, the more people who play the game, the better I think we all are, so I'm glad you are excited by the auction house. I just think allowing us to have PvE missions with a PvP option would do a whole lot more for a lot more people if they did it right.

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Player Auction houses are a great example of PvP content that is typically embraced by PvE players....

[/ QUOTE ] I understand your point, however, I would submit that there are many traditional forms of PvP that could be employed that, imo, would be far far far more compelling than what we currently have. And more to the point, should be pursued long before we start looking for non-traditional ways to expand the player versus player envorenment. I swear you guys have gone out of your way to avoid the natural progression of CoV and CoH.

For example, I sent a detailed PM to Positron asking for changes to CoV mayhem missions. Let villians elect to choose mayhems that allow heroes to respond to the robberies instead of Longbow.

Here's another idea, let CoV VG's earn the right to invade CoH PVE zones...use a PvP flag to so that only heroes that attack them can be attacked.

I mean, come one...this is a super Hero game and as such should allow fights betwween good and bad/evil. This is such a fundamental aspect of the comics that I am amazed that devs seem so incredibly reluctant to give us PvP that actually means something outside of the PvP zone cheese (and yes, ganking in Warburg with your Ice/En blaster or Em/* stalker is cheese).

If ever there was a game that lends itself to PvP between two sides, it's CoV and CoH. Why are you guys avoiding the obvious? Bite the bullet, step to the plate, and do what has to be done. Give us the option for real missions with real PvP. I know you guys have the brain power and creativity to make this "fun." Yeah, you've got to fix some of the horrible PvP mechanics that currently exist (like the asymmetrical benefit of Break Frees), but that's what you're paid to do.

Nobody said it was going to be easy, but you've got to start opening things up.

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CoX seems to be opposed to the idea of content that requieres any particular skill set. There are few if any missions where the inabilityt to fly precludes you from completeing or accepting a mission. THere was one mission where I had 5 minutes to disable a computer network upon leaving another mission. Without Super Speed and Stealth, I would have not been able to complete it in time solo. That was only one mission among hundreds and hundreds where I need any particular powers...and I just got lucky with the right tool set. But the problem, imo, is you don't do this enough.

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Actually, I'll have to voice a concern against skill prerequisties. There has been nothing more frustrating to me in a D&D game than having a party of 6 and not having a single person who could open that frikkin door to the "phat lewt" treasury, so I had to pass it by. And I had a thief, mind you, just apparently not a good enough one. In Fallout, I'd spend countelss skill points on lockpicking, just because half the game world is hidden behind locked doors to which there are no keys.

I believe that skills, while a good thing, should be made into a system that is not exclusive. There is no more frustrating thing in a game than being told: "You just cannot do this thing. Period. Go away and never come back." This sucks, quite honestly, and has turned me off on more than one occasion.

IF there is ever a skills system, it needs to be capable of being overriden in some way. Can't unlock the door? Smash it, but raise an alarm. Can't reach that high terrace? Break the pillars and bring it down to you. Can't get past that spinning laser corridor of doom? Find the generator and shoot it until it smokes. Make having the skills make life easier, but not be the only course of action.

[/ QUOTE ]I agree with what you're saying. It would be bogus for a DM to foreclose creative solutions that do not solve the problem in exactly the way the DM envisioned it. But at the same time, I think there should be more incentive to take non-combat specific powers.

I also think the world should have more consequences for decisions about how you build your toon. There should be badges and story arcs accessible to only those who have not used a respec (obviously this is less viable since many respecs are triggered by the devs changing powers).

As I said above, I agree with you about DDO's mandate for Rogues. It's bogus we can't bash every door down, or use spells (does 3.5 no longer have the Knock spelll?). The problem is that CoX has virtually none of this while DDO has too much.

Consider this....when CoH gets its "newspaper" equivolent, why not list the expected mob type and information that tells you if any particular powers might be needed. This way you can choose missions that are geared to your powers..or attempt to overcome those that aren't. Obviously, the main story arcs would be generic like they are now, but it would add such a wonderful dimension to be able to complete missions that relied on Super Speed as essential to success. for example:

<You defeat some evil professor super villain at a world renown scientific University college. Upon defeating him/it/her, he says..
"I have sabotaged the nuclear accelerator. You'll never be able to fix it because I've decoupled the the seven magnetic restrictors along the accelorator and it's three miles long. Not even you can replace them in the 2 minutes before it fires. Muahahahahahaha."

The map is one huge circle with a low low ceiling. Unless someone on the team has Super Speed or Speed Boost or max slotted Sprint/Quickness/Swift you won't be able to do it. You could do this for all the travel powers...you could do similar things for other powers.

Here's another idea...

Create a mission where you are teamed with an NPC who has to fight, but everyone is caged with an interrupt inhibitor (no teleporting out..) and can't help him directly (some reverse damage field surround the cage...any thing you shout ends up damaging you instead - AoE's only hurt you). The NPC can't be healed, but it can be buffed and it's opponents can be debuffed.

I realize this is a total thread jack...but it just kills me that devs don't make missions like these. They've got the tool set to do it, I know some of them have certainly thought along these same lines, but it feels like there is some mission scope groupthink going on or someone is snuffing out these ideas.

This game engine is just wonderful...but the CoH content is by and large just so damn repetitive...uncle, Statesman, uncle.

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If I were to wax philosophical for a moment – I wonder whether it’s the genre (super heroes), the medium (City of Heroes) or the nature of the internet which has led to a greater demand for individuality.*** and usually customization wasn’t that big of an issue. ***There’s certainly some demand for customization in other games (as I read on their boards), but it’s never quite the same as it is here for CoH.

[/ QUOTE ] I think there are primarily three things at work:

1) In PnP D&D...your customization is manifest in your actions. How I interact with the NPC's (via the DM) makes me feel like an individual. In MMO/Console RPGS, I am always constrained. I cannot argue with NPCs, I cannot curry-favor, I cannot fight them unless given the option. I have very little opportunity to express myself in a video game beyond the axis the designers provide. The desire for individual expression remains even if it is not accommodated.

2) In PnP, you don't have 75 other people to distinguish yourself from. It didn't matter that all Rangers and Paladins had exactly the same powers in 1st edition because you're often the only Paladin or Ranger in your group. In DDO, pretty much all the fighters or mages look the same. There's little chance I'll remember someone visually from one day to the next as I pass them on the street. In CoH, if I were to see Mad Kow in his Holstein costume, I'd recognize him immediately. You gotta love that.

3) You've given us the option and once that expectation has been set, people take it for granted and often feel they are entitled to it...no matter how little they pay.

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People wanted to earn individuality over time, not receive it.

[/ QUOTE ] I can understand that anything earned is perceived to be of greater value. But the reality is that we don't earn our own individuality, we express it. Letting us express it from the beginning was the right thing to do.

As an aside:
I think there is something else very critical at work here. On-line RPGS, seem to boil to down to combat too often. The ability to provide a truly interactive/stochastic (in that things that happen next depend on what you've done already) world a la Morrowind, is a lot tougher to do when you can have hundreds of people wanting to rob the same store. Because combat becomes the central purpose, it rewards min/maxing in a way that can't be avoided. Min/maxing is a way of life for many players. Min/Maxing is only possible if there are choices for customization. Kind of hard to min/max a 1st Edition Ranger.

In other words...because it's really just about combat, min/maxing is perceived as proffitable path. Min/Maxing became an enjoyment path and you need options to satisfy that need.

The new edition D&D has seemed to foster this min/max approach for PnP, but there is a fundamental difference in that the DM in PnP can custom tailor the dungeon to require lots of non-combat skills and thus penalize a Fighter who ignores all their non-combat skills.

CoX seems to be opposed to the idea of content that requieres any particular skill set. There are few if any missions where the inabilityt to fly precludes you from completeing or accepting a mission. THere was one mission where I had 5 minutes to disable a computer network upon leaving another mission. Without Super Speed and Stealth, I would have not been able to complete it in time solo. That was only one mission among hundreds and hundreds where I need any particular powers...and I just got lucky with the right tool set. But the problem, imo, is you don't do this enough.

I think the game would benefit tremdously if you had lots of additional content that required certain builds or powers...that were especially contrary to the min/max philosophy. Obviously this conflicts with people who feel that their solo blasters should have access to all the content in the entire game. A valid counter argument is that there is so much replay value in the various AT's themselves, you don't need to restrict content to encourage longer subscriptions.

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Also, I'm sure Dominators are at the very bottom.

[/ QUOTE ] If it's true...then I'm sure it's my fault. About four months ago, I took my TA/A into BB at 15 and defeated a dominator solo. I'm sure that had to be the all time low for the entire AT.

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In terms of raw kills, Blasters are the better PvP killers, but only if they have Energy Manipulation. Without EM, they are roughly 60% of scrappers numbers.

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More proof that either...

1. /em is overpowered

OR

2. all the other secondaries need a lot of help (elec not as much as the "big crap three")

[/ QUOTE ]The problem with #2 is that you're limiting your design criteria to 1v1 PvP. It would be folly to modify the other sets simply so that non-/EM's can compete in 1v1 PvP. Castle's stats are only about 1v1...

While Ice/ maybe be "cool" in PvP zones...give me Fire/ in a base raid everyday and twice on Tuesdays...when we'll be scheudling our raids.

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In terms of kills to death ratio, Blasters are slightly behind scrappers with EM, but competing with Defenders and Dominators for lowest value Note, that these are solo values! Things are very different in team play.

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Raise your hand if you saw that one coming.

[/ QUOTE ]I did. I got into it with Powerfist and various Stalkers about how Blasters are not the equal of Stalkers. Mez protection and defense mean you have to be brain dead to argue that Blasters are the same as Stalkers in PvP.

The problem is that a lot of old school PvPers are used to the Arena which weeds out all the sets that can't do the burst damage that is needed to win in PvP. Hence, people only saw /Em blasters and this became "blasters" in their world view.

Blasters are defenseless and by and large are sitting ducks in PvP. They can get mezzed and held from range and then subsquently wiped out in seconds. Without an Emp or Kin backing them up...they get worked. I'm not the least bit surprised that controllers outpeform non-/Em blaster.

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Datamining -- I looked at Blaster/Scrapper a few minutes ago.

[/ QUOTE ] Any chance you could start a stickie which posts the stats by builds?

BS/Regen
DM/SR
Ice/En
Spine/SR
SS/EA...

We'd love to see that. And I can guarantee we'll do our best to make wild inferences and misinterpret the results every way possible.

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I dont know. The reason I bring this up is bc I was on test yesterday in the arena. I was watching EM blappers totally desimate a Broadsword scrapper in melee over and over and over again, dueing. It was just sad to see, the scrapper couldnt perform his function at all. That alone tells me there is something seriously wrong with roles.

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But you have to put this in perspective....you're talking about ONE set of blasters ...not blasters. Dark Melee Scrappers can slap two status effects on a Blaster...both of which immobilize them.

Claws can use two knockdowns ...which no Inspiration can defend (meaning the status, not the hitting).

Spines has Impale..etc...etc.

The problem is inspirations allow you plug the "balancing" holes. A /Regen could pop a bunch of +DEF or +RES inpsirations to survive the alpha

Perhaps the biggest defense I have against /EM is I can see it when the pop BU+Aim+PB. The key is neutralizing them while they are in that mode. I never understood why Goku let Frieza go through his transformations??? Beat the guy down while he's transforming.

I've fought /EM blappers. And while the margin for error with them is small..it's not zero. I went 1/5 in Warbug with my DM/SR and neither of us using Insp compared to my 0-Infinity against SS/EA or EM/* stalkers. More imporantly, I've only seen /EM achieve that kind of effectiveness. /El gets close...and Ice can be hell for squishies, but only /EM can consistently flatten you in three attacks.

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Grrr as a stalker i hate the idea of having to team in RV

[/ QUOTE ] Yeah..imagine how the heroes feel in BB, SC, and Warburg.

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You so took a piece of my sentence and turned it into a cheap one upper. after RV was a comma and this is the important part "but i guess it wont be a problem" because in highly active PvP zones like SC for one finding a team even as a stalker is an option. So when RV is crashing from the amount of 50's in the zone finding a team will be an easy task.

[/ QUOTE ]I didn't do anything "cheap" with your comment. It was not an attempt to potray you as a whiner, but to show others how unfair the teaming situation is to the heroes in BB, SC, and Warburg. You don't want team in RV...because you dont' have to team in any other zone. Too bad heroes by and large don't have that option.

You expressed a desire that Stalker feel should only apply to them...the desire to solo effectively. The changes we've seen so far, will barely make a dent in the K ratio in places like SC and BB....expect more nerfs.

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Grrr as a stalker i hate the idea of having to team in RV

[/ QUOTE ] Yeah..imagine how the heroes feel in BB, SC, and Warburg.

I am curious about the bug with Oil Slick in PvP where it shows up as a friendly and can't be lit/targeted.

In any event, thanks for taking the time to address people's issues with this set, considering all the other stuff you have to do.