MindmasterZero

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Pos,

Just killed Babbage in mission with several other high 40's and 50's, no exemplars. None of us received any badge.

As a side note, please do not add any more badges that you get by killing a single-spawning outdoor creature (Kraken, Adamaster). It screams "I HATE EVERQUEST" in burning lights in the sky. You want kill stealing, mad players all hunting in one area trying to crush the spirits of each over a single creature? Keep CoH unique and fresh....please don't use this horrible, terrible design method

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Babbage or Psychic Babbage (two different beasts)?

As for the kill stealing... several groups can get "badge credit" off one monster... just like several heroes can get defeat credit off one villain.

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I was killing the kraken and a blaster ks'd me. I got the first blow, and dealt a sizable chunk of damage. He got the badge, I didnt. We were both about 15 levels over the monster (I'm 27, he was 29ish). Perhaps the badge is only awarded to multiple groups if they get exp from the kill, and awarded to the person who deals the majority if no exp is gained?

Eh, I dunno. I re-made my dark defender yesterday, and got him to level 7 in roughly an hour and a half. The +1 mobs in my missions were pretty welcome. Didnt face any red bosses though. I just saved my inspirations for the orange lts. Challenging yet fun. This may change when I get to the hollows, we'll see.

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True - but they'll have fun battling 3 white minions - which is something you can say at level 15, but not at level 35. Long term, the entire game will sparkle once this sort of balance is restored - because so much of the game design hangs upon it.

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Yeah, and at only 50+ hours to reach a new level, and only 3 levels to reach a new power, and only 5 levels to get new story arcs.... boy, this game is getting casual friendly!

I seriously hope an exp re-tuning comes with this. Most people I have talked with enjoy having multiple heroes they play. Let the hardcore have a few medium-high level heroes, let the casual have 1. Instead it seems like this is putting people doing the same content with the same character for months. Forcing people to grind even more on one character to see new things and have different powers...

Were people leaving too quickly once they reached the level cap? You said you were comfortable with people's rates of advancement. Why are we seeing so many player nerfs and enemy boosts to slow things down?

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Do you actually play your game from time to time? I keep hearing you say that you do, but if your toons are good for 3 minions, than I can only guess you are playing a controller.


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3 minions = 1 hero is the desired goal. That's approximately what it is at levels 1 to 22 or so. Past that, heroes become disproportionately powerful. That WILL be addressed soon after the expansion goes live (that has priority at the moment).

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If this is the case, I'm SERIOUSLY hoping theres an appropriate exp change. You said yourself you were happy with people's rates of advancement. I dont mind fighting fewer, but more challenging foes to level (Id prefer it actually). Something like this would also help balance AE vs single target heroes. However, post 30, slowing the game down this noticably isnt a good thing IMO.

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I have soloed to level 8 with the worst AT power combination possible. I took about 3 days or around 8 hours. I got a level and hour, which is acceptable for a build designed to be the worst possible. I still got team invites during this time. I was a hero, not superman, but more along the lines of booster gold.

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/golf clap. My, the first 8 levels sure are an accurate portrayal of how things go at later levels.

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I've stated before - I don't want FORCED grouping.

All Archetypes CAN solo. Some do it slowly, some do it quickly. Some can solo most missions, some can solo fewer missions. And worse comes to worse - a hero can always hunt the streets and stop some crime there. That was always the intent of city zones.

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Quite laughable. Try soloing as a pre pet fire, ice, earth controller. Try soloing a timed mission. Considering every group I have been in would rather have a 2nd blaster or scrapper over a 2nd controller (supposedly the best group class lol?), hell... considering when I click the "find" button and all I see is blue and purple dots... do you really think they can solo?

Better yet, try soloing as one of these classes and tell me you feel like a hero. You know... like the box says? You cant, unless you pick on grey skulls in Perez. Great... so I can be a blaster, a scrapper, a handful of defenders or tanks that arent gimp... or a bully.

edited double post

So, when can we expect a dev to explain the rationale behind the PA nerf?

Illusion was the hybrid controller. Ice blaster's counterpart if you will. One gave up control for damage, the other damage for control. Many of us picked illusion for this reason, we liked the idea of a controller who could solo theri way out of a paper bag. You took illusion's damage without supplying adequate control powers to replacement. In essence, you puleld a bait and switch, taking away what many felt was the defining feature of the powerset.

Illusion doenst have staying power with its controls. It gets flash to deal with groups, thats it. Other controllers get ae immobs, disorients, mmultiple ae holds, etc. Flash is PB, and rather risky, esp w the inclusion of mobs that see through invis liek the Rikti drones.

PA was decent burst damage. There was downtime, random targetting issues, knockback, random number of PA's summoned, etc. In many occasions, it could be wonderful. In others, your PA's would fail to arrest, attack poorly, etc, leaving you running with an empty end bar and no exp, assuming you werent killed.

Illusion, because of mob healback, cant afford to take longer to arrest. Fire imps, which received the same level of nerf, are much less effected. The fire controller has otehr tools to lock his mobs in place while his imps go to town. They have to simply take a little longer. PA's damage becomes low, heals back, and then the mob poofs, transferring aggro to you.

Simply put, PA didnt deserve the same treatment fire imps got, and was MUCH more negatively impacted than imps.

Statesman said they are fine with people soloing, and fine with people's rates of exp. By your own admission, controllers arent that needed in groups, so why nerf the 2 controllers who were having a decent go of things. More importantly, why nerf the one who was less effective at soloing even MORE than the other? I realize they took the same damage, enrf, but as stated, the impact is much more painful on illusion.

Illusion now offers a group bad damage, and inferior control. We could contribute to a group with damage and some control before, beating a few enemies on our own (imagine... a hero beng a hero) to make up for our control shortcomings. Now we cant, and our control wasnt significantly upped.

The aggro management isnt nearly enough for a power used so infrequentyly, and even if it was, disorient/root and other RANGED ae control powers do a far superior job of locking things down that doesnt cause major knockback and rely on random mob AI.

This change is similar to letting ice balsters holds only work on +1 or less minions, and not upping their damage appropriately.

If you insisty on majorly impacting illusion's damage, upgrade its control siginificantly.

1) Give Spectral terror the upgrade terrify got. Include accuracy debuffs in there as well.

2) Remove knockback from phantasm and PA. They arent real, how are they making stuff fly 10 feet? Replace ti with knockdown. Its a better CC tool, and makes sense (guy things hes hit, falls down).

3) Reduce reuse timer on PA to 2 mins. Its up too infrequently to be an effective CC tool. Street sweeping or moving between rooms in missions with decent spawns will leave it down for a large number of the fights. The PA's dont move well between battles to simply run from one to the next. Moreover, when they poof, they transfer all aggro to the controller, making it a very poor choice to begin a fight with a PA that might poof shortly thereafter.

Again, I think changing the damage was a mistake. PA had the potential to be good damage, but was random, and cause plenty of problems (knockback, killing debuff anchors, aggroing other groups while chasing fleeing mobs, etc).