Mirai

Well, I'm afraid new hazard zones, task forces and monsters don't really thrill me as a casual player. But then I'm a casual mainly solo player.

I'm sure these things have much to offer team-oriented casual players though.

I had a glowie stuck in a wall, of course the one glowie of many that would actually end the mission, and GM Hughe showed up quickly (within ten minutes) to help me out. During prime time yet.

Response time suffered back when Issue 2 hit, but it looks to be back to fast-and-helpful these days.

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If this is how you intended the respec trial to be and to stay, have the balls to just come out and say that you're dooming anyone unfortunate enough not to be a min-maxer to an end-game at the halfway point.

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Not even.

I mean, I am in no way contradicting that the respec trial is extremely difficult. But since the trial is an optional extra, there is nothing there to get in the way of advancement.

Yes, this mission is much better looking now. Originally it was in an office building, which didn't make any sense at all. The Clockwork prince parked near the garage equipment seemed to fit right in.

Yes, my new character's first... and so far only... defeat happened when I was jogging, with stealth on, and a large group of Outcasts spawned right around me.

I mean, I was directly in the middle of them. Surrounded on all sides. This was in the middle of the Hollows, as I was trying to get back to the Atlas gate from a door mission. At least my trip back to Atlas Park was very quick...

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One problem is now blindingly obvious: the solo experience is not at all representative of the group one, so while you throw yourself into the game solo to get an understanding of it, you get bored quickly of the monotonous pace.

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Please speak for yourself. As noted early on, different people get different things from the game. After playing for months, I am in no way bored with solo play. In fact I can play the same content with different characters, altaholic that I am, and still have a blast.

There are people who would be bored stiff by my playing style. Conversely I can get bored stiff with teams. I like to do my own thing, and spending a long time with a team means I'm compromising and doing what others think is fun. So I only team for specific missions, and that becomes unfun when I spend time trying to find others who are interested in doing them.

Meanwhile many people enjoy teaming and simply don't share my teaming outlook and have a blast at it. I think CoH does a great job letting people solo or team as they like, although of course there's always room for improvement.

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Explorers want to see/do everything.


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That's me. I don't care about XP/hour, I'm not into socializing, and I don't want to bother other players. I want to play the content, get caught up in the stories and plots, and if I get to 50 someday then that will be cool. No hurry.

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Well, at level 5 I only had 4 powers: 2 blasts, 1 slower and 1 heal.. At 34 I have 3 blasts, 1 heal, 1 immobilizer, 1 hold, 1 slow, 1 pet and 2x the endurance, 1 stealth, 1 debuffer, 1 intangible...

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And minions have more powers too.

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I don't think it's fair to have a character with that build and have him barely chug along.

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I agree. That's where increased XP per enemy comes in. Again, how much of an increase is the question, since that will determine how slowly or quickly people chug along.

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Peregrine was an experiment of a "mixed" zone. A hazard/city zone. We're changing it into a more typical city zone now.

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Yes!!!!! Thank you!!!!

Well, I'm a long ways from getting there, but I tend to avoid hazard zones like the plague and wasn't looking forward to the large spawns.

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I'm curious to hear what your (and others') opinion is. Many people on this thread are simply gushing all over Statesman's comments on this thread. I just want to know if ANY of you have even given his comments any real thought.

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My opinion is that Statesman is going to try to make a trio of level 35 (or any level) white minions just as challenging to a level 35 character as a trio of level 5 white minions was to a level 5 character.

If you had no trouble wiping out three level 5 minions at level 5, then you may also have no trouble taking out three even con minions in the future. If you struggled with them, you might find yourself struggling again.

I like that plan, simply because facing larger and larger numbers of even con enemies is just a method of inducing video lag.

Statesman's tricky task is to re-balance the XP gain so that people who are wiping out groups of oranges now won't be screaming for his head on a platter. Increasing same-level challenge will come with increased XP, but the question is whether it will be enough. I don't know, I don't wipe out groups of oranges like you do. And neither of us are quite at the 30+ target level.

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So, it seems the plan is to make it such that you must group to take on white con mobs and get even LESS xp than you get today. Thus the future of this game seems to be forced grouping with terrible XP. Soloing will be possible, but your XP will be next to nothing. Missions will become impossible as the even con mobs and bosses won't be doable by a solo player at all.


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That's not what I got at all. He seemed to be pretty clear that a player should be able to solo three even con minions. The difficulty of many enemies 30+ is simply too easy, and taking out 3 of them is very easy for a solo player. The plan is to boost the difficulty of those 30+ enemies, but still keeping the balance of approximately three minions to one player.

The possibility of increasing enemy XP was only tied to the conjectural idea of increasing 30+ enemy hit points, which is not necessarily the way they'll go.

The developers are bound to make one group upset. If they make things more challenging, and more fun to the people who want challenging opponents, then the people who want to level fast will face a slower grind. Making the enemies cough up more XP would help, but by that token so would lowering level XP requirements.

Frankly I get the impression that Statesman and company are more interested in making things more fun content wise than fast leveling wise. I'm all for fun superheroing content myself.

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The reason I brought this up is because it is a level 4 mission. I don't know about you, but I'd like new players to get into this game. The more money Cryptic makes, the more they can do for the game, and the longer it will last. New players will see those guys and likely have no idea that they have these tactics as options.


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Yes, I agree. Same level enemies are tough enough at level 4. When I was just starting out, I would occasionally level up instead of tackling +1 enemies in door missions.

A new Science-oriented player running into nothing but +1 Vahzilok in door missions could get very discouraged very fast!

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Here are 2 +1 LTs and 2 +1 Minions, right at the beginning of a solo level 4 mission.

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Those would be two separate spawns (Lt + minion), they just happened to end up right next to each other. I'd be willing to bet it's possible to aggro one pair without alarming the other, if you're careful (and can hit them with something from a good range). I did this recently with a couple intermingled Lost spawns.

Alternatively, a trick that works well if that situation is just too difficult: restart the mission. The enemies, except for any key figures, will be spawned somewhat randomly. It's doubtful you'd get them so close together twice in a row.