Techbot Alpha

Glad this is back up again =]

Vix shook her head sadly as the Lieutenant and his squad headed off. Psioniphobia was alwas a problem, and it never helped when you'd spent what felt like your entire life dedicated to helping people with said power.
With a faint sigh, she turned to the bulky Rector.
"Let's get going, then. Every second counts here."

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Offtopic, yeah, Rikti are great from 35 onwards

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Still sort of on topic: I did mean using MA.

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Oh, right -sigh-

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Simple answer that i don't think anyone has suggested. Make MA a zone itself. Sort of like Midnighters club (MA is bigger that that tiny place so i don't see it being a problem)

You click on the door (like Midnighters) and LOAD into the MA building instead of just entering it.

It'll stop the spam in the lower level zones.
It'll be eaiser to impliment a level restrition if the devs choose to do so.
It'll stop confusing chat with some people wanting MA and some people wanting normal missions etc.
It'll mean new players don't see an easy option to level as soon as they enter the game.


I would say however that unlike the midnighters club, they won't join together.
So if you type /sea on heroes they'll be

Atlas Park Mission Architect
Steel Canyonn Mission Architect

etc etc


Personally i just use RWZ to powerlevel all my new charactors anyway.

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Could work, that. Tbh, they dont really need as many buildings as they have got. I think they wanted to show off the shiny new building/graphics
Level limit might work. Tbh, if your new, like brand new, you SHOULDNT be making missions and suchnot, because, by dint of being new, you wont know how the game works.

Offtopic, yeah, Rikti are great from 35 onwards

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I don't think the devs should or will.

It seems to me (without reading all of the posts) that the main problem is people talking about farming in broadcast.

Either ask them to talk in local, or remember...
There is a /ignore command for a reason

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You just admitted to not understanding what the thread is about
Removing MA from starter zones to, basically, stop all new players from only ever playing the game 1.) in MA and 2.) In Farm missions.
Otherwise the devs might as well stop work on all future missions, and call it CityOfVirtualgaming. And theres irony if there ever was any

Yeah, my minituarised mechanical alter-ego. He took his time to get to 50, but nowadays, despite rampant altism and suchnot, Alpha is the one I can always pick up and play. He's great fun to RP ('What are you doing? Get out of my lab!') and mass AoE destruction tails him whenever I go missioning

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I've played a few MMOs by now, and what I've learned is that there are always players (and I use the term loosely) who don't know how their class works. I've actually heard someone in another game advise a new player not to choose the healer class because "the healer class is [censored]. Whenever I team with a healer on my tank, the healer always dies real quick."

MA farming is a very high-profile road to not knowing how to play, yes, but let's not pretend that restricting MA is going to suddenly make clueless noobs disappear.

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Naturally. Ages ago, before we even heard of MA, I teamed with an invul tanker who had all the attacks and only resist physical damage and inviciblity. This was mid 20's

However, as you said, MA does massively up the likelihood of players that have no idea how the ATs work. That, and it results in none of the rest of the game content getting played. Which im pretty sure the Devs dont want, seeing as they keep adding more of it

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Personally, I would favor: locked out of the MA until you have at least 1 level 20.

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But then that would temporarily restrict one of the newest selling points for this game? Isn't the point of the Architect Edition (Correct me if I'm wrong) to highlight that the game has a mission creator? Now, someone goes to buy that and finds out they can't use it they have a level 20.
Personally I think we should be allowed to create and test arcs without level restrictions but shouldn't be allowed to play arcs until after completing an arc from a contact (The Studio Instructor could be used for this and could give the tutorial after the arc)
This way people can contribute content to the community but they would only have to do a short arc to unlock the playable function of the MA whilst enjoying the normal content.

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How does this solve the issue of farming and farm-raised players?
Praf's idea (god help me for saying this ) actually has some merit. Lock the MA until a player has a lvl 20 character. That way they can't be MA farmed to lvl 20, and will have to play some standard content, against standard enemies.

The main issues atm are (In no order);
MA filled with junky farm mission
MA spam in Atlas being bad for new players
MA farming in Atlas etc creating 'Farmed' new players
New Players having no idea of how the rest of the game/ATs work

Thanks for the intel, much appreciated =]

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My ONLY problem with farming is that it is now impossible to get a normal low level team. All the normal teams are lvl 50s doing tfs and laughing at the farmers.

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Exactly. And that is what new players will be thinking. 'Wheres all the teams gone?'

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A battle theme for each enemy group would be nice

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That gets my /signed too

Can see this breaking a few things.
If it works, then leave it alone or we send people to break fingers.
What? I never said it was nice >.>

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There is a big difference between Tweaking the MA, and placing obsticles between starting characters and the MA.

I'm not saying it shouldn't be done, just pointing out that in political terms it would be a policy U-Turn.


And there is also the "Devs hate villains" aspect: it is much easier to get to Kings Row than Port Oakes at level 1.

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Seeing as Villains doesnt seem to get farmed as much as Heroes anyway (Theres nothing as bad as the situ in Atlas atm), and the fact that the MA building is in Upper Mercy anyway, that shouldnt be so much a problem.
E.g. Mercy always has been the same sort of level range as Atlas/Galaxy + Kings Row, since the very start. Its just the different play styles.

If it's only a problem in Heroes, then make the change there. It's either that, or we have the new generation of players that dont know what the ATs do, know none of the lore, cant team outside a farm and expect hand-feeding. Which is good for no one.

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NPC voices aside, The Soundtrack to the game does need updating. Anyone who has played the CO Beta knows what I am talking about.

Its about giving character to a location, a real distinct local flavour, and epic soaring themes that add to the ambiance of 'being a Hero and doing Heroic things'.
See the Massively.com article three posts up to see why that matters and just how much it can lift/compensate a game.

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Aye. CoX has one list of musics for the whole game. And gets recycled.
Its not really something you could buy the Music CD/Download of, eh?
They should at least do a full score for, say, 'The Phalanx' and 'Arachnos'.

On a side note, I love games that use the intensity level for music. Best example I remember playing was Transformers (the non movie one) for PS2. Went as follows;

Basic/Ambient Music (No one around)
Threat level 1 (Enemies in sight/1-3 basic enemies)
Threat 2 (In combat, engaging mid level enemies)
Threat 3 (Large group of mid enemies, tank level enemies)
Threat 4 (Oh holy jebus thats a lot....)

And thats not even mentioning the Boss music! Seriously, in terms of epic, that game had it all. The music had all those music levels *for each zone*. Every one was different. Gave the place real atmosphere, and made it a joy to play.

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Since when does taking a train level you up? You can go straight from the starting point to the station/to King's Row and run towards the MA without getting a single xp point.

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The point is, you have to do something in the game world before you can level up. If you are a villain that something would probably involve repeated trips back to the hospital or a very long swim all the way around the coast of Mercy Island.

And they point is, only an experienced player would know where to go, and Positron's intention was that a new player would be able to level entirely using MA; not an experienced one who already knew thier way around.

So to remove the MA buildings from the starter zones would require a fundemental change of policy.

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Im pretty sure thats not going to be 'omfgEndofTehWorldlololroflcopter!!11' or anything that horribly drastic.

But if the Devs are serious about cutting down on farming, or in fact saving the starting levels on Blueside, then it would *probably* be a good idea. After all, they changed policy on the 90 odd badges in MA.

Anyway, if a little walk kills people, they should probably be playing a different game. Like, Iunno, Tetris

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Yet then people moan that there are no teams... merge the servers!

TBH I think that if you hate broadcast being filled up with people playing the game you should just switch it off.

But while I disagree on reasons for the change I support the change to remove the too easy access to people who don't know what is going on yet from PL teams. I'd also support a minimum entry level to MA even though I use it to PL my alts from 1 upwards. (I have been around a while and do know mostly what I'm doing ).

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I don't mind the broadcast. I find it mildly annoying, and sad, but I just go on my spree until lvl 5, then run the Hollows missions.

But my point was the horrible effect this is having on new players. (E.g. You agree with me )The broadcast is all they will see in Atlas. LFFT, LFM, LFEmpath, No tankers, etc. There are lvl 50s walking around that have been made in one week, and have no idea how to play. As far as Im aware, thats a pretty bad thing.

Yeah, sure, you can argue that 'People pay to play how they want, [censored], so shuddup.' But, in the long term, thats not going to work out. As it will be bad for the game, and thus bad for the players. Bad for Us.

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Or remove MA from Atlas, GC... etc as you suggest and have broadcast devoid of pretty much everything but occasion costume comps and the occasional DJ spamming broadcast to listen to whichever radio is currently in vogue.

I do agree with you on removal, just not the reasoning.

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Ninja, did you ever stand in Atlas before I14?
It DID have broadcast. Yes, there were costume comps, and the odd DJ, and random shout fights. But it was a healthy sort of broadcast. It wasnt spamming LFF.

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The AE buildings are in the starter zone because the philosphy behind the MA was to create an alternative way of leveling from 1-50.

So the suggestion should actually be: "change the philosophy behind MA, and don't expect players to be able to level from 1-50 without playing game content outside the MA".

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Not really.
If they want to level from 1-50 in MA, and really want it that way, its only a yellow line trip to Kings Row. Not that hard, is it?

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It would still mean you wouldn't be able to level from 1-50 entierly within the MA, since you would also have to take a train journey and zone.

And for villains, the journey from Fort Darwin to Port Oakes MA is actually quite difficult and dangrous at level 1.


I'm not saying that the buildings shouldn't be removed though, just that the policy should be changed.

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And since when did you start by spawning in the MA building?
This is exactly my point, however. You still CAN level from 1-50 with just the MA. If people cant be even bothered to travel one zone, they wont.
If people dont have them in the starting zones, only the people that want to use them that bad will go to one. The rest will play the game the normal way.

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Oh, I can't possibly say.

If I tell you, you'll tell someone else, and they'll tell someone else, and pretty soon Paragon Studios will be knocking on my door and be inserting red hot needles under my toenails trying to find out who my sources are!

All will be revealed... But not Soon™

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Right. Let me get that address book...
>.<

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So it's impossible then

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Ah, now.. I didn't say it was IMPOSSIBLE! Anything is possible, given enough time, money, and programmers. It just doesn't fit in with the info I have.

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Alright, get a hit-team together! We're going to plumb the chubby one for intel
What sources, what info? Whats going on?!
@_@

Theres a Mac mini pack, which has all the bonus gubbins in.

And theres also a Questions and Answers thred Welcome to the forums!

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well we know that the carnies are good guys, do some of the portal corps arcs.

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well i know that But they dont exactly seem a resistance group that we would join to help, need a group like vanguard or something military to get me to join, not a circus

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Even if it might seem appropriate?
/burn

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The AE buildings are in the starter zone because the philosphy behind the MA was to create an alternative way of leveling from 1-50.

So the suggestion should actually be: "change the philosophy behind MA, and don't expect players to be able to level from 1-50 without playing game content outside the MA".

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Not really.
If they want to level from 1-50 in MA, and really want it that way, its only a yellow line trip to Kings Row. Not that hard, is it?

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Yet then people moan that there are no teams... merge the servers!

TBH I think that if you hate broadcast being filled up with people playing the game you should just switch it off.

But while I disagree on reasons for the change I support the change to remove the too easy access to people who don't know what is going on yet from PL teams. I'd also support a minimum entry level to MA even though I use it to PL my alts from 1 upwards. (I have been around a while and do know mostly what I'm doing ).

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I don't mind the broadcast. I find it mildly annoying, and sad, but I just go on my spree until lvl 5, then run the Hollows missions.

But my point was the horrible effect this is having on new players. (E.g. You agree with me )The broadcast is all they will see in Atlas. LFFT, LFM, LFEmpath, No tankers, etc. There are lvl 50s walking around that have been made in one week, and have no idea how to play. As far as Im aware, thats a pretty bad thing.

Yeah, sure, you can argue that 'People pay to play how they want, [censored], so shuddup.' But, in the long term, thats not going to work out. As it will be bad for the game, and thus bad for the players. Bad for Us.

Because

^ The best reason ever.

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I assumed you wanted them removed because newbies and low level players don't learn the game or character properly by avoiding the normal game.

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That assumption is correct
By channels I mean broadcast (brain still in its jar...) You only need to stand in Atlas for a few minutes to get an idea of what brand new players must think;
"Hmm, wonder what this games like?"
"Lvl 1 LFFT"
"Lvl 47 LFFT"
"Farm LFM, Empath wanted, No tanks"
"...I guess I found out."

I mean, come on...