Shadow_Kitty

Most likely because they go pyewpyewpyew, not ratatatat.

The subscriber curve of a MMO generally has a spike at release as everyone rushes to test it, then a rapid drop as the free month runs out and only a fraction renews. Then fewer and fewer renews, but the curve flattens out to a steady long and slow decline.

Sometimes new content can repeat that cycle, but the new spikes are rarely as high as the original spike, as it mostly attacts old players, not new ones.

There are a few games that do no not follow this cycle, and I would be surprised if CoH was one of them. On the contrary, when MMOGchart was still updated, CoH followed this pattern precisely.

Unless CoH has drastically changed subscriber behaviour since then, there should be a spike right after Going Rogue was released, followed by the usual half-life pattern drop-off. Being at 6 months after the release, we should be in the slow decline phase by now. From the very limited data of the dot colours of the EU servers on the server list, and the last months' dot colours on the NA servers as well, I'd say that it follows this pattern.

Actually, it's not the difficulty that makes it non-casual. It's the grind. If you have to commit yourself to grinding, it's NOT casual.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to foresee that grinding trials in a casual MMO will be controversial.

And it doesn't take a rocket scientist to foresee that locking an entire progression system behind very little content would also be controversial.

So I don't know what to believe. I agree that they didn't do it out of sadism, but then why? Good faith or plain ignorance, or something else?

Actually, I dislike Synapse and Citadel TFs, about as much as I dislike the trials.

But I only have to do them once, and that's assuming that the character really needs the epaulets, or that I happen to want more badges on that character.

And therein lies the difference.

I don't think that any player wants epaulets, bald witch hat and nictus sword/armour on every character. More likely, they want epaulets on this character, bald witch hat on this other character, and the nictus sword on that character.

But there have not been rewards locked behind gates that players have to grind. They just have to play it once, with the ITF as the notable exception. And if you need them on other characters, I still suspect that players rarely level two roman nictus characters at the same time and need those parts unlocked at the same time.

And as for the witch hat, you get two much better hats with hair in the Magic booster pack, from level one, on all your characters.

The difference is that you don't have to grind them. You just have to do them once.

Granted, the task force epaulets requires you to do seven different task forces once, but they're fun so you would probably do them anyway, and you only have to do them once each.

Well, okay, you have to do the ITF twice. To be specific, you have to kill Rommie five times, and he only have four lives per ITF, and no extra life no matter how many zillion points he gets.

Actually, I'm in the latter group. I would rather *not* run the trials, because there are just three of them and they're grindy because you need quite a lot of their rewards to get anywhere.

Maybe the cosmetic stuff wasn't meant as an incentive to players like me. But it is an incentive, no matter if it was meant for players like me, and I still can't stand the grind. And that's darn frustrating.

The difference is that they're multiple. Not only the bribes, but what you do to get bribed, so to the point that it can hardly count as being bribed. If I could choose to eat something else than spinach to get the cake, there wouldn't be an issue of "go to bed without dinner", would it?

"But I really like tennis!"

Actually, it's because I'm using your word "bribe".

We can use Posi's words, "motivator" or "reward" instead. That still doesn't change very much in Posi's statement; they are there as an incentive specifically aimed at the people that preferred cosmetic improvements which otherwise wouldn't do the trials.

It certainly doesn't sound as if you have to enjoy the trials to be "eligible" for the rewards. It actually just sounds as if you have to value cosmetic items enough to do whatever the devs point you at, no matter if you actually like the trials or not.

On the contrary, this sounds very much as if the devs are trying to get people that value cosmetic thingies and otherwise wouldn't play the trials, to actually play the trials, by dangling cosmetic bits in front of them.

Sounds very much like a bribe to me.

Possibly. It depends on whether you define IO-build and accolades as polish, refinement or progress.

Well, of course it's a kind of progress since you actually progress, but it's a kind of progress that I don't feel is progressing very much, simply because "nothing" is really happening except for a few numbers that increases, but you really don't get anything new that you couldn't do before and those numbers are hidden away anyway so you don't see them unless you open the stats window, so it doesn't feel like progress but rather a bit more like polish, (deep breath) and hence often overlooks.

End game or not, they are the continuation of the core play, because it is the continued progress after hitting level 50. When you have reached level 50, the only way to continue progress is through trials.

I think that's pretty much core.

That's the explicit reason for the cossie and aura options that are not Ascension armor to be locked in behind the iTrials: as an incentive for people who do not enjoy trials to do them anyway.

If you think it's silly to do something you do not enjoy to get a digital power, then consider that the cossie/aura lock-in was designed on purpose to get users to do exactly that.

What I want to know is how large that segment is. Is it chinese gold farmers large? EU community large? Vocal minority large? A majority?

What I also want to know is if you want to use the option to farm for progress to rationalize the removal of the option to progress WITHOUT farming.

And yes, I still consider the non-trial path not viable; hence me saying that the option to progress without farming is removed.

Above all, it means that you have to leave the game and research online in a wiki describing everything in Paragon and elsewhere to see what level range your contact has. Leaving the game is never good.

A little note in the contact window showing the level range would be good.

I disagree, completely.

If you by "the incarnate path" mean the story of incarnates, there's a lot more incarnate stories that is not in the trials. In all the top level task forces, you get to kick an incarnate's bum. In the trials, you get to kick two minions of an incarnate and two robots made by a third minion.

If you mean the powers, then again no. You do not need to be on a trial to convert your ingredients, create powers or slot them, and you certainly do not need to be on a trial to use them.

The only thing that ties the incarnate path to the trials are the reward tables.

Some of those folks aren't really interested in the group content, but rather the non-group non-incarnate content that is locked in behind it as an incentive to run the trials.

Sure, they run the trials, but they aren't really interested in the trials per se. They're a chore that they do to get the rainbow trail.

Way ahead of you.

For instance, add an Incarnate difficulty to regular content, that makes things insanely hard (above the +4/8 player that we have today as top) and enables Incarnate drops.

Or add an Incarnate settings to task/strike forces, that imposes some limitations akin to MO setting, increases difficulty, and enables Incarnate drops.

Those, and similar suggestions, have been posted several times already.

They pay their subs as everyone else.

I don't think that the people that ask for a solo path actually mean that they want an exclusively solo path. There are a few faction choice missions in Going Rogue that have to be soloed, but the rest is in fact regular content that can be soloed, but is intended to be teamed, and I think that it's what they want.

If you compare to just about any other MMO, you will find something peculiar: their quest system is single-player oriented. You go to your contact, you get your missions (usually a whole bunch of "get me 12 rat tails", "gather 6 monkey poo" and "kill 15 dire bunnies"), and then you're on your own. You can often share those missions with team mates, provided that they would be eligible to the same quest (i.e. have progressed that far into the quest chain).

But that's it. Usually, the quest system in MMOs are single-player quest systems with a share button that mostly is useless, with instanced raids being the main exception. It's not often you can see other players' quests, and there is rarely a system that tells you that we should focus on player X's quest and shows you his objectives even if you don't have those quests. Even if players do their quests in the same world, and even if they are teamed, they aren't really playing as a team. They are more often playing as a group of solo players that have their own chat channel.

This game plays instanced missions almost exclusively. All missions are seen to all players, and the leader can select one of them to focus on and direct the players to it. We already have a lot better team support without raids or trials than most other games have with. In fact, the team/quest system in this game is the staple to which every other superhero MMO will be compared to, and the two others were never a match!

That means that if there were to be Incarnate content that plays as regular content instead of Trials, it will already be way more team-oriented than almost all content in almost all other MMOs. With the right build, it may also be soloable.

I would be quite content with just a regular sword-less chainsaw. That way we would really be able to give those pesky Croatoan pumpkins what they deserve!

If it is regular non-Trial story arcs and task force content of Incarnate difficulty, I would be a happy cat. If it is just more trials, no thanks.

Edit: I could settle for a rep setting "make everything insanely difficult so that there is a reason to have Incarnate powers", thus making ALL content Incarnate content if you want to.

Rather, "IP Grab!"

IPs are real estate over there in Hollywood, and studios and producers buy IP rights just in case they can make money one way or another, either by reselling the IP rights or by making something out of it. It's a risky investment, but a cheap risky investment, and you never know what might work.