NancY

Gotta call you on this Emnity.

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The more time passes, the harder it is going to be for piecemeal players to light a fire of concern under anyone's rear that the portion of the game they choose to limit themselves to is more deserving of new content or changes than the product as a whole.

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Don't make it sound as though a player that limits themselves to one side, the red side, is in the wrong here. There are plenty of hero only players that post(ed) that they couldn't and/or wouldn't play the "bad" side yet want everything the red side has to offer. I didn't see anyone telling them not to limit themselves to one side. I will in the future though.

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I am certain <snip> we'll see regular updates about how the devs "hate" some of the subscribers <snip>

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There's a great urge to start off posts such as this with things like "Why do they HATE US!?!?"

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That's not the title of the thread, nor is it in the OP. I don't recall anyone making it personal.

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At some point, you folks are going to have to realize we get "game updates", not "my side of the game updates" - otherwise it's going to be a long, frustrating road as you continue to insist the game is divisive while the devs continue to treat it as the whole product that it is.

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Personally, I don't see it as one game. I play both, but I don't see it as one game. However, I'm glad you and others do. That way if there is an issue devoted to the red side no one should have any complaints. Since it's one game, and it's an update to that one game, and no one should limit themselves to one side, it's all good. Yay!

Time to lobby for a red only issue.

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I could go on there are lots of improvements for villainside but that isn't the topic of this thread. The topic is why is COV abused and ignored which is patently untrue.

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So there are lots of improvements needed on the red side, so many that you don't want to have to list them all...they aren't being done regardless of how many times villain players post about it...and yet you wouldn't describe that as being ignored?

I rather think you proved it right there.


Also, you're getting confused with game engine, mechanics, and story limitations. There is no reason whatsoever that the game engine couldn't handle better, more thought out stories than what villains now have.

You don't agree with the OP, fine. You've stated your opinion, others can state theirs. Whether a person sees the red side as ignored, neglected, or hated is a matter of semantics. The fact is it needs help. If you don't want to address that constructively that's fine too. Just stop the bully routine by trying to force your opinion on everyone else like they're suddenly going to see the light and agree with you. Ain't gonna happen. Time to agree to disagree.

Well, if it's content that doesn't really fit the story line very well then it's not just a matter of "not liking it personally." If the red side needs more help, it should get it. Period.

I bet that if the shoe were on the other foot, the people here that are trying to dispel the idea that the red side is neglected would be complaining just as much, if not more.

But it's okay. Every year there are more new games coming out. Every year there will be more players leaving these 2 games that are 1 but aren't. Eventually the blue side will be as neglected as the red side. Too bad by then these people that actually care about the red side and try to get things changed for the better will be gone and unable to gloat.

I know the games I'm waiting for aren't by NCSoft. Too bad.

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CoH has a bigger population, who whine more, and whine louder than the CoV community.

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Sorry, but I keep looking for the 166-page thread full of CoH players whining about something, and I just can't find it. Could you provide a link? Thanks.

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There might be one out there.

Hmm. When I saw Manti I thought I was looking at Richard Garriott.

Is Sexy Jay sending a message? Dressed in red and black, a skull head belt buckle? He's a sexy villain! Yay!

Happy Birthday CoV, you red headed stepchild.

I'm not sure he still plays either. I haven't seen him post lately.

Ex? Do you have 2 different color eyes or did you lose a contact? Or is it a camera malfunction?

Aw. Thanks for the wonderful stories. Stay safe, be happy.

Or, what if it logs the last 10 tells sent to you and some were of a personal nature? Maybe they don't want to say that because people might fear using the command, even though they (NCSoft) wouldn't care what personal stuff was said.

Hey people, stop cybering!



edited for clarity

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Heroes already had the crash site, villains are now able to enter it after it's been changed, and you see that as new hero content?

Weird.



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Ummm... I did say that heroes had it first. Not that it was new hero content.

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Oh, so sorry. Let me fix my error.

You said, "And as said before it looks like just another issue towards Heroes."


I'm saying, "Heroes already had the crash site, villains are only now able to enter it after it's been changed, and you see that as just another issue for heroes?

Weird."

Wha?

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And as said before it looks like just another issue towards Heroes. Yeah sure villains now get to go into the "Rikti Warzone" but heroes had it first so there's just a portal or transport connecting villains to it.

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Heroes already had the crash site, villains are now able to enter it after it's been changed, and you see that as new hero content?

Weird.


I think it all sounds awesome so far.

Yup.

It's the obligatory Cryptic response.

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While there are a few vocal posters here who've made vocal statements to the contrary, from what I've seen, most players are unhappy with the current drop mechanism.

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Odd, I've been reading the opposite. Most players are not unhappy with the current drop mechanism. There are a very vocal few, but that's about it.

What about the soloers who need shivans in order to complete certain missions. Most of my characters are MMs. One of the ATs a lot of people don't want on their team. I've no problem with that, I solo at a leisurely pace. However, there are missions, (and I'm set no higher than middle difficulty and very often on lowest difficulty), where I get to the end and find an end mob I can't take down without a shivan. I don't go up against AVs solo, but some EBs might as well be AVs to me.

I don't use shivans often, I don't farm them to make all of my missions easier, but if I was faced with never having them ever again, I wouldn't be a happy camper. I don't think I'd be alone either.

If you don't like shivans or nukes don't use them. If you think they shouldn't be usable on the SFs, fight for that. But don't go calling for the total removal of them just because you don't like them, because we both know they aren't going to change missions at this late date to compensate for the loss of shivans.

Why should I be penalized if I drop my mission difficulty to the lowest setting but the stupid mission still gives me a boss or elite boss that is impossible to take down without a shivan?

How am I supposed to overcome that then? Ask for help? No one wants to come into a mission just to clear the end mob. Wait to out level the mission? Sure I could do that, as long as it's not timed and I don't mind getting crap XP for the mission, and I don't run out of contacts in the meantime. Not to mention having a dead mission take up a mission slot. Stupidest design ever only allowing us to have 3 missions at a time. Or maybe I could drop the mission, except not every mission is able to be dropped.

Oh yeah, I could team.


As if.

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Someone upthread speculated about the market for common items. There won't be one. That stuff is common. Before long you'll have more of it than you know what to do with. Those of you who have played Magic: the Gathering know what I'm talking about -- people opening packs and throwing 14 of the 15 cards into the nearest trashcan.

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Except for those assembling a deck. Yes, eventually common stuff will be pretty worthless. But in the beginning players like you, who have money but not necessarily the time or the inclination, to gather all that common loot for all of their alts would probably be more prone to just buy it up than spend the time it would take to get the loot for 12 characters.

And I don't see what the big deal is if, as you said, Freedom and Virtue do buy most of the items up for sale. Honestly, if they're the largest servers anyway, chances are they'll be putting up most of the items for sale. I'd rather have a global market than per server because that only punishes the players on the small servers.

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To me, this system seems more designed to prevent twinking than about protecting either buyers or sellers. I think we can all agree (or I hope so anyway) that it will be possible to manipulate the market. Even if not by oneself, as a part of a "cartel". That's just unfair, and I believe that the devs can do better than this to stop it.

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The only way it prevents twinking is by the risk involved with trying to use it to pass inf. to an alt. We can still twink the way we always have: let a friend pass the inf. between our characters, do it with 2 accounts, or post a request on the boards to transfer between servers. The consignment house does nothing to stop that. No AH system is designed to stop that, not can one be developed that would stop that.

Since you claim that this system allows a player or a "cartel" to control the market, please point out to me a system that does not allow a player or cartel to control the market. We already know that in games where prices and sellers are not kept secret, many players snatch up the lowest priced items and re-list them for a higher price. So I'm curious as to what system would keep that from happening.

First of all, players will continue to get involved with private trade between friends, SG mates, etc. The consignment house isn't going to stop that, and that's fine. Players will continue to offer items for sale in chats because they don't want to pay fees or be bothered with the consignment house, that's fine too. It's fine because I don't think the devs are planning on the AH becoming the only means of trade in the game, which it seems like some people think it will be. I'll still sell normal drops to stores, but I will try to unload salvage that I don't need in Wentworth's. I don't expect to get rich off it, but it's better than it sitting in my inventory doing nothing for me.

In one interview Posi gave there was the following:

Q: Auction houses can offer a huge boost to a player economy. What will players be able to buy and sell in CoH and CoV?

A: Anything they can trade right now is sellable in the Consignment House. The Hero’s Consignment House and Villain’s Black Market take a fee on listing and selling items of course, but now you have a greater market for your goods than just selling them back to the origin appropriate stores. Many players are going to seek out the last pieces of their Enhancement sets here, or that one piece of rare salvage that they just could never find in order to make their costume piece.

I made bold the important part. If you think someone that has a lot of inf. wouldn't pay 5 million for a rare piece that they need to complete a costume piece or IO set, then you don't know your average CoX player very well. I think they'll go for it, not only because they have to have it, but moreso because they'll be one of the rare few that has it at all. And they won't want to risk losing the bid by starting at 50 or 100K and working their way up from there.

Oh, and I wanted to add: If you don't like my example in the previous post, knock off some zeros. Make it 5K, 1K, and 5K. Is that better? Player B still makes 4K more than he was asking.

Ok, let's look at what Posi said:

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Player A1 puts up a Level 12 TO for 5,000,000 inf.

Player B1 puts up the same Level 12 TO for 1,000 inf.

Player A2 (trying to transfer funds) offers to buy that level 12 TO for 5,000,000 inf.

Since player B1 wants less, and is obviously trying to move his items faster, his "for sale" is processed first, so he ends up with 5,000,000 inf (minus fees).

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Now let's change that from an inf. transfer to a sale scenario:

Player A puts up a Rare IO for 5,000,000 inf.

Player B puts up the same Rare IO for 100,000 inf.

Player C offers to buy that Rare IO for 5,000,000 inf.

Since player B wants less, and is obviously trying to move his items faster, his "for sale" is processed first, so he ends up with 5,000,000 inf (minus fees).



Where is that at all keeping the prices low as you keep saying? Player B made 4,900,000 more than he was asking. Pretty sweet. That means his item is worth 5 mill because someone was willing to pay 5 mill for it, not because he thought it was worth that and listed it for that, and everyone that can see the listings in an open bidding system can put theirs up for 5 mill too and control the price of that Rare IO. Does that mean that player A may get screwed if another 5 mill buyer doesn't come along, sure. But then as you said, "economies are often brutal and there are winners and losers. You can't stop that."

And when you think about it, the worth of anything is only as much as someone is willing to pay for it.

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Because high prices will increase supply. If the rare enhancers are going for 10 million inf. for example, that's enough to get a lot of people in. Very few characters can just drop 10 million influence whenever they want. At those values people are going to sell because it's worth it.

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I don't get that. If the rare IOs that can go for 10 million inf. will make more people sell them, yet you say very few character can drop 10 million inf. whenever they want...who's buying them?

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That's desirable because as the supply increases, people would naturally bid down the price in order to obtain the sale. No need for some blind guesswork auction.

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Putting a price of 10 million inf. on a rare IO isn't going to increase the amount of rare IOs in the game. They're rare. Chances are players won't even sell the rare ones till they've used as many as they can themselves. There won't be any bidding down, ever, if it's done the way you want.

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But the price you would settle at would reflect the true value of the good to the economy.

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No, what it does is allow only those rich characters to control the economy. The pre-prestige characters mostly. Let's face it, if you had 500 million inf. and you put a rare IO up for sale, why not hold out for a high price, you don't need the money, and you know they'll be a sucker with the same amount of inf. as you who will buy it because what's 10 mill to him.

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What this system does, is create very real incentives to circumvent the sales system. That's not healthy because it keeps resources on the native server, giving an advantage to larger servers. That's important because those servers can also draw whatever winds up on Wentworth's. While it won't be the good stuff, it means that some players by accident of server choice will face a market artificially leaning towards them.

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How is this possible if it's all cross server? That means that more items will be available to smaller servers for a lower price, thereby allowing those players a fair shot at items. If anything it gives them an advantage that they wouldn't have if it wasn't cross-server.

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There will be stuff sold at Wentworth's. Probably a lot. But this selling system keeps prices low by choking suppliers. And that's never healthy.

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Prices being set too high isn't healthy either. I hate games like WoW, and EQ, that have hardcore players controlling the market and overpricing items which keeps the small guy from ever being able to afford anything decent. This isn't WoW or EQ, so why should they do things like those games? They're trying to implement something that's fair to all players, not to make a few players richer and leave the rest out of the loop.

I get the impression a lot of posters here are upset that they won't be able to transfer funds from one server to another, and failing that, are upset that they won't be able to milk the market for all it's worth. Since that's what the devs are trying to avoid, I support their decision to do it this way. The AH is to unload items you can't use for a higher price than a store would give you, but at the same time sell for a reasonable price to another player who can't buy it in a store, period.

Are you even going to be able to put an asking price of 1 inf? I thought if you sell something you have to pay a percentage fee. And I'm not sure, but I thought if you list something for sale and it doesn't sell you still pay a fee, if anyone knows for sure about that please let me know.

In either case, how can Wentworth's take a fee on a selling price of 1 inf? I think there will be a minimum listing price and it won't be 1.

I dunno.

He says "folly of errors" but when I look at that avatar I have to wonder. O.o

Avonlea should have won something. Great costume recreation and location. And because he handles loss like a man instead of a sore loser.

Heck, I'm tempted to buy him a prize myself. You want that there BFG AGEIA PhysX 128MB GDDR3 PCI Physics Accelerator Card by AGEIA Technologies, Inc.?

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Of course, the thing that has always stuck out to me the most is that the most fun aspect of bases is limited to a very small portion of the playerbase: building the base. It's a lot of fun to design and put together a base, but unless I'm a leader of a SG or appointed architect, I'm never going to get to experience this. Between the way it's currently set up and Cryptic's refusal to add individual bases, they've essentially spent a ton of time putting together an excellent feature that few get to play with.

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QFT.

If you have 100 SGs with 75 players per, that's 7500 players in SGs. However, more than likely only one person in each SG is the base builder/decorator. That's 100 out of 7500 players. That means 7400 people are just the financial backers. It's kind of frightening when you look at it that way. And he wonders why they aren't popular?

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After reading 2 pages I have to agree with Valkyrie about how much I am amazed how people don't get bases, or SGs for that matter...

I don't know a single SG on 2 servers where its 75 unique players, or even half that - it only takes 8 people to completely fill an SG with alts; the average active full SG is more like 12-20 players, fyi

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Um...if you're referring to ValkyrieRising's post, she was talking about the devs not getting it, not the players.

As for my quoted post above; the main SG I'm in was nearly full of unique players. Only a few had alts in the SG, and they'd drop those if someone new wanted in and there was no room. Personally, I wouldn't want the prestige burden of being in an SG with only 8 players and their alts.

Also, if the average SG is down to 12-20 players, that says a lot right there about the state of the game. Bases certainly didn't draw players together as the devs had hoped.

There will always be people that like what others dislike, or like things as they are and see no need for change. But 28/29 pages in this thread, with most posts listing things they dislike about bases tells me there's a real problem, even if you don't see it that way.

I rarely enter any base in any SG I belong to. I really have very little reason to. If you enjoy them, and spend a lot of time there, I'm happy for you. That still doesn't change my perception of not needing, or liking them, and my continuing to not use them.

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Other really excellent ideas have been offered that would have been easy to create, but have also been ignored.

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I would not presume that any of our ideas are "easy". One thing I've learned from being a coder, most of the time you can't really tell how difficult something is until you know the legacy code.

I would not assume the devs are ignoring us. This is all a complex cost/benefit analysis. Remember, most of the game is not bases, so significant effort put into bases is benefiting a minority of the game. For example, if the choice comes down to adding some features to bases or making missions more dynamic, I'd choose the mission upgrades without question.

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Bolded by me. Most of the game may not be bases but Mr. Emmert did say that they spent more time on developing bases than on any other feature of the game.

Where does cost/benefit fit into that equation?

As for bases (this is for anyone reading this post) in the main SG I belong to there is one "base monkey" to build and decorate and he's done a damned good job of it. However, I have no input.

We're told not to create certain things at the worktables because they don't need it or whatever. Or told to create certain things that they do need. I still have no clue how worktables work since I don't have the freedom to just play around with them.

We're discouraged from adding personal items. I think because only the owner can delete them. I may be wrong there, but that's the impression I got. The leaders don't want a bunch of crap all over, and I can't blame them, because they can't get rid of it. On the other hand, I wouldn't want to place something only to have a leader delete it.

Bases mean nothing to me. Going there instead of the ER means I have to rest or wait for my HP and End. to fill up. If I want to buy inspirations all they sell is the lowest tier heal and end. isnpirations. I can get those from contacts and have more selection.

I can never keep track of which teleporters go where and always have to click on them to see which is which, so it's just easier to go where I'm going the way I always have before bases came in.

CoP isn't working, so no IoPs or raiding.

Other than meeting there before teaming up, what purpose do bases serve me? None, really. I lived without them before they came in, I can live without them if they took them out.

Personally, I'd have had more enjoyment from an apartment. Maybe no one could enter it and see it, but at least *I* built and decorated it. That's more than I'm getting from bases at the moment, and it's sad, considering how much work, and time, the devs put into them.

Edited to add, and if there were no bases, I'd have a hell of a lot more infamy on my villain than I do atm. That's another thing I dislike about bases, the exchange rate of inf/prestige, and getting no inf. at all after a certain level. That's not any way to get me to like bases.