Uruare
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Posts
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Joined
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Quote:
Again, defining something you don't like as an "exploit" doesn't mean it is.
Exploit in MMO Nomenclature: The act of capitalizing upon an unintentionally available means by which to accrue and-or acquire abilities, capital and-or benefits that, via creator-intended gameplay, would not be available or would not be available by those means.
So, given that operable definition of 'exploit', do ya wanna try to sell me on that the AE speed runs ain't technical exploits? How much would you like to bet that, come i17, Henchmen will either be non-usable in the AE or will be ramped up like bosses in all-boss farms to counter the...uh..."exploitation" (sic) of henchy farming?
Not a very well thought-out kneejerk there.
And also, yes, it is a market. Quite clearly so, as its full of shmucks, drips, two-dimensional cads and ethical sociopaths that do not realize they are playing a game and will win at any cost, especially when that cost is paid by others.
Such as the multitudes of people that do not happen to be stockbrokers and have no real interest in playing City of Wallstreet.
Funky little thing about that, y'know? I can play the market too. I've experimented with this flipping, I keep my own RL portfolio of stocks and I work in an industry in which markets, marketing data and data interpretation is, in fact, my job.
Do ya -really think- I want to pay to play a game that reminds me of my /job/? Yes, that's quite personal and personally biased right there, but c'mon -on- man, /think/ here.
Most of us (I presume; maybe I'm just delusional) play games like these to have fun.
Lots of people have fun in rather different ways. Some by being all organizational and gung-ho and regulatory and charging around in massive SG's streamlined like para-military organizations, running 1000 TF's a month and Hami raids on the dot, on -every- dot, like clockwork.
Some others, by toodling around, teaming when they can, yakking with people in /b and mostly just goofing off and fiddling with various builds.
Yet -others- by getting amped up, build-tweaking, trying to find just the right configs of powers and IO's and stomping around in PVP zones.
Yet -others- to jaw around and type a lot and roleplay.
HOLY CRAP that's indicative of a lot of divergant interests!
And every single one of them deserves, contingent upon the grounds set forth by the EULA and its authoring bodies, equal opportunities to enjoy "The Game Content".
Now, call me greedy if you like (o'wait, you already did, lawl), but I think that one of the absolutely best ways to ensure that equal opportunity exists for everybody is to cater to the LEAST powergamey-grindy-farmy strata of the gaming population.
Y'know, those mythical 'average gamers' that do reasonable amounts of some stuff and dabble in most of the rest. It's a broad pseudo-category, but it -is- a category largely defined by it's exclusion of extremes.
The average gamer does not farm 12 hours a day, nor do they spend 80 hours a week logged in. They do not powerlevel from 1 to 50 in six hours, nor do they try to make the cover of Newsweek by refining their Wallstreet accumen in Wentworths or on the Black Market.
So uh...yeah.
I'm greedy because I'd like to level the playing field and ensure that the least obsessive (o'wait, did I go there?) denominator amongst the stratified playerbase can, within reasonable expenditure of time/effort/funds, experience all the game content.
Who exactly am I ah...robbing, with that?
Who's the greedy one, I wonder? Those like me that would happily artificially cap the market to maximize availability of its use, or those that fight rabidly to maintain their abilities to profit egregiously off it irrespective of what impact this has on mythological and irrelevant figures (Read: Everyone else).Quote:Look at some of the PVP IOs. Off-market they're going for 3-5 billion.
Think before you reply. You didn't once already, and it's tacky. -
In any event, there is absolutely no particular reason why the solution to this marketing debacle needs to be an overcomplicated fiasco.
Drop rates are, currently as of the time of this posting, very plainly broken. I don't kneejerk on topics of relevance, and my recent live testings of drop aquisitions between soloing a +0/x8 map versus 8-man teaming the same map were staggeringly telling.
We ran the same map 20 times, my team and I. And then I ran it 20 times solo.
Both times, I kept very specific count of all drops, and categorized them into Salvage (Common, Uncommon, Rare) and Recipes (Basic IO, Uncommon Set, Rare Set and Ultra-Rare Set).
The results:
Soloing--
Salvage -- Common: 118 pieces
Uncommon: 38 pieces
Rare: 7 pieces
Recipes -- Basic IO: 77 pieces
Uncommon Set: 26 pieces
Rare Set: 5 pieces
Ultra-Rare Set: 0 pieces
8-Player Team-
Salvage -- Common: 5 pieces
Uncommon: 1 piece
Rare: 0 pieces
Recipes -- Basic IO: 9 pieces
Uncommon Set: 1 piece
Rare Set: 0 pieces
Ultra-Rare Set: 0 pieces
20 runs per iteration. Soloing at +0/x8 and then 8-manning the same map (The Family map at the end of an Unai arc) at +0.
Repeat it yourself; it's quite repeatable, as any actual scientific affair is.
As for interpretation of this data, at the prelim, it seems very evident that teaming reduces drop rates. In the very near future, I will be testing this further with teams of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 in total (Actual players) just to see what the comparative results are.
This is not speculation, however; drop rates -are- reduced in teams. The variables in place governing the drop rate mechanics are not intimately known to me, but disparaging results like those I finished testing just yesterday are not likely to be the result of 'just bad luck in the engine's rolls'.
But do please repeat the experiment yourselves. Don't take my word for it.
Anyway, the ancillary consideration to which this data is relevant is that drop rates are quite likely not the crux of the problem. I don't know how long it's been true that they scale down the more people you have in your team, and it seems fairly self explanatory that it's probably been set up like that to diminish mega-farming's returns (A primary means of capital acquisition by inf-sellers), but that is aside of the fact that the solution to the problem of the markets themselves need not be complicated.
Cap the maximum listable prices. The Devs clearly don't want to do this, or they'd have done it already, but it would work and it would work -well-.
Yes, there'd be some screaming by those whose favorite flavor of profiteering-cheese had been moved, but frankly I think those sorts deserve to scream anyway.
Salvage max listing at 2 million, recipe max listing at 100 million, inf cap remains at 2 billion.
There's my proposed solution. Current drop rates, irrespective of the ancillary drop rate data I've begun and will continue to be collecting, shows results that are thus-far quite /favorable/ to the casual player.
Sure, it looks pretty unfriendly to teams, but that's another can of worms unto itself, and has likely been implemented in its fashion to curb another problem of the market, which I've half-ranted about in an above post that, most likely, will neither be tl;dr'd and ignored.
Just the same, drop rates ain't the issue in this specific context.
Market manipulation and viability of illegitimate acquisition of currency are.
So sayeth I. -
Quote:It has absolutely nothing to do with need, but want. This entire game is a luxury, and everything in it is a luxury. The computer you're sitting at is a most certainly a luxury (as most of the world population, lacking such frivolities, could surely attest).
Do "casual" players NEED purples? No. They're a luxury item with commensurate luxury pricing. What you're seeing on the market right now is the result of too many too-impatient people paying a "buy it NAO" luxury tax.
People -think- they need things, and behave as though they need things, when in actuality people NEED relatively little.
Ergo, it stands to reason that since this entire game is a luxury (one that we are all paying for), who 'deserves' what more?
Is my $15/month worth less than yours if our playstyles differ? No.
Does someone that plays 80 hours a week contribute more to the game than, say, someone that only plays 10 hours a week?
Not really.
There's this underpinning of a sense of entitlement in most of what you're saying; your own entitlement. Bar that, and graduate to economics Graduate-Level, wherein which such factors as human psychology, social trends and relative anthropological factors such as cultural contexts and the realpolitik inherent to a given structure must be considered before making sweeping armchair statements.
Fact 1: People want things.
Fact 2: In the context of this specific game, there are a number of very specific things that the majority of people paying to play this game will predictably want.
Fact 3: No single player is more or less entitled than any other to have or be enabled to acquire any of the base game content (barring booster packs and relevantly similar perk-errata) than any other.
Fact 4: The Devs, their Marketing division and their corporate shareholders will be in absolutely no way diminished in value of holdings or income if you do not even bother playing for so long as you are paying.
Now, to move along.
The current synoptic model of acquisition in CoX leans exclusively upon what is colloquially and with much venom known as "The Grind".
There are games wherein which grinding is even more prolific, and relatively few that are less so. Altogether, in terms of development and advancement of one's in-game toons, it's quite typical of the market standard.
Step 1: Make Character
Step 2: Do a lot of the same things repeatedly until goal is achieved.
Step 3: Repeat with new character.
It's quite simple like that. They provide you with attractive means to fulfil step one, seek to retain you and engage you in step two and hope, thereby, that you will continue on to step 3, whereby which more of your monthly fee payments will facilitate both their continuing to provide means to steps 1 and 2, as well as pay their own bills and buy some nice things for themselves as recompense for their trouble.
However, in that over-simplified synopsis, there's a whole lot in step 2 that needs to be tailored to the people who are paying you for the luxury of playing your game in the first place.
One of those things is striking a generally enjoyable balance between Time/Effort Expenditure and Acquisition.
Time is currency. Effort is currency. Money is currency.
Currently, there's this problem. It's a problem that it wouldn't take a whole lot to -fix-, but it /will/ take a whole lot to fix for various stupid and pedantic reasons mostly on the order of "Because people are stupid", upon which I shall not dwell or elaborate.
The market's screwed. Inf sellers largely direct it by making their commodity (inf) ever the more available in the face of being marginalized by a shrinking market. They're no longer perceivable as 'necessary' by the average gamer for anything but purple and PVP IO's, to wit.
But oh, people don't /need/ those so they shouldn't even want them, right? Is your comprehension of the human animal equivocal unto that of the common snail, or did you try very hard to completely evade the fact that people is people and want stuff whether they -need- it or not?
And frankly, why should the casual gamer just 'Shut up and be happy' with SO's and uncommons when they're paying the same monthly fee as the profiteers and the inf-buyers, who, by merit of their unethical and dubious to outright illegal practices, get to have the shinier toys?
You do not get ahead in CoX by working harder, and all of this poff about 'working smarter' by embracing the fine art of market flipping (that's all you flippers are really trying to say, after all) is tantamount unto saying that we who do not do these things do not deserve to have the goodies.
Apparently, following the rules and playing the game as the devs intended it to be played is both wrong and stupid. At least, if the inculcations presented are to be taken at face value.
We 'casuals' don't deserve the good stuff. We don't need it anyway, of course.
Praytell, who -does- /need/ such things?
Please, enlighten us on who deserves such things, if not everybody paying to play the same game? -
When Inf selling is gone, WW/BM inflation will come down.
Until then, it's entirely too easy for players to illegitimately acquire funds in virtually any quantity, pay whatever's being charged for anything they want and, thus, sustain a market that no legitimate player will ever be able to meaningfully participate in.
And don't you market-flippers start in about how what you do is legitimate. It's grey-area only because a strong enough case cannot be made to prove your directly prohibiting of others' abilities to experience game content.
Profiteering, however, is still lending validity and sustainability to a market that is, itself, prohibitive of the involvement of the 'average' players.
I personally think that caps on posting prices would be a grand thing.
No salvage postable for more than 2 mil, no recipe postable for more than 100 mil. With an inf cap of 2 billion and a sustainable demand that doesn't appear to be going anywhere but up, it would still take very little to repeatedly hit the inf cap by selling things on the market while, at the same time, ensuring that no single item's possible price was so outlandish and absurd that the average player couldn't possibly acquire it.
Current cost for a full set of Armageddon IO's at the time of this posting: Estimated 1.83 billion influence in total per the averaging of all current available sales data as per the WW listings.
That's one set of IO's. Just one. The cheapest one last sold for 225 million. The most expensive one last sold for 550 million.
Those are ridiculous and absurd prices only an inf-buyer could sustainably afford, and cosequently, only the inf-buyers (or a couple people I know that massively abuse the henchmen speedrun farms for about 12 hours a day) could ever actually afford.
Neither of those are reasonable options. And, currently, to participate in that market, you have to do one of two things; abuse the crap out of something that's a technical exploit, or out-and-out violate the EULA and buy inf.
Or...(*magic tinkly noise here*)...by flipping things around in the craptacular market, taking it for all its worth and supporting it thusly until the wheels fall off.
Dwurr hurr hurr. Yeah, that's great right there; just peachy. Thanks, 'flippers', for profiteering on a grossly illegitimately established market.
'Legitimate practice' my foot. -
At 3:28 PM Central Time December 20th, Virtue timed out and returned DBserver login errors.
Return of da crash, looks like. -
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If CoX had been an online Real Time Strategy game...wait, wut?!
*Recluse[Spi] has joined the game.*
*Manticore has joined the game.*
*syNApse has joined the game.*
*Positron has joined the game.*
*scor-peon has joined the game.*
*wid0w has joined the game.*
*Statesman has joined the game.*
*Vahzilok has joined the game.*
*Brawler has joined the game.*
Statesman: hey sup
wid0w: y0
Vahzilok: hi
Positron: hi
Recluse[Spi]:cool, i start with bane spiders!
syNApse: lol more like lame spiders
wid0w: lol
Statesman: o this fockin sucks i got a rikti invasion!
scor-peon: haha phalanx sux
Vahzilok: hey recluse you dont fight me i dont fight u, cool?
Recluse[Spi]:sure whatever
Vahzilok: cool
Brawler: **** Recluse rushed some1 help
Recluse[Spi]lol byebye stumpy
Statesman: i dont got **** to help, sry
Positron: wtf the airachnids is attacking me
Statesman: get antiair guns
Positron: i don't have salvage 4 those
scor-peon: u n00bs know what team talk is?
syNApse: [censored]
Statesman: o yah hit the SG mode button guys
Brawler: manticore ur worthless come help me quick
Manticore: i cant do **** til satesman gives me an army
syNApse: yah hurry the fock up
Positron: d00d im gettin pounded
Brawler: this is fockin weak u guys suck
*Brawler has gone into retirement*
Statesman: im gonna attack the spiders k?
scor-peon: with what? ur underwear?
scor-peon: lol did u 4get u lost hero1 to rikti?
Recluse[Spi]:ROFLMAO
wid0w: lol o no phalanx im comin 4 u
Statesman: wtf! thats bullsh1t u **** im gunna kick ur [censored]
wid0w: not without ur numina u wont! lol
Statesman: u little biotch ill get u
Recluse[Spi]:wtf
Recluse[Spi]: phalanx hax, u had rikti invasion and now u got a huge fockin army
Recluse[Spi]: thats bullsh1t u hacker
Positron: lol no more victory 4 u recluse
Recluse[Spi]: widow help me!
wid0w: wtf u want me to do, im a ghost u retard
Recluse[Spi]: fine ill steal u a body
Vahzilok: WTF u arsshoel! WE HAD A FoCKIN TRUCE
Recluse[Spi]: i changed my mind lol
scor-peon: haha
scor-peon: hey ur losing ur guys in RV im gonna need help in st. martial soon sum1
wid0w: o **** i cant help u i got my hands full
Recluse[Spi]: im 2 busy 2 help
Statesman: yah thats right ***** im comin for ya
Vahzilok: posi help me
Positron: like u helped me before? sure ill just sit here
Vahzilok: dont be an arss
Positron: dont be a villain. oops too late
Manticore: LOL
scor-peon: hahahh oh **** help zombies
Recluse[Spi]: o man ur focked
syNApse: oh what now biotch
Statesman: whos the underpants man now biotch lol
*scor-peon has been eliminated.*
scor-peon: lame
Statesman: gj synapse
syNApse: thnx
Recluse[Spi]: WTF manticore hax hes killing all my ****
Recluse[Spi]: quit u hacker so u dont ruin my record
Manticore: Nuts!
scor-peon: wtf that mean?
Manticore: meant to say nutsack lol finger slipped
syNApse: coming to get u recluse u freak bugleg cocksocker
Vahzilok: rofl
wid0w: HAHAHHAA
Recluse[Spi]: u guys are fockin gay
Recluse[Spi]: ur never getting in my city
*Recluse[Spi] has been eliminated.*
scor-peon: OMG u noob you killed yourself
Manticore: ROFLOLOLOL
Vahzilok: OMG LMAO!
Recluse[Spi]: WTF i didnt click there omg this game blows
*Recluse[Spi] has left the game*
syNApse: hahahhah
wid0w: WTF my teammates are n00bs
scor-peon: shut up noob
Statesman: haha wut a moron
syNApse: wtf am i gunna do now?
Manticore: yah me too
wid0w: why dont u attack me o thats right u dont got no ethereal lololol
Manticore: fock u
syNApse: lemme go thru ur base vahzy
Vahzilok: go to hell lol
syNApse: fock this **** im goin afk
Manticore: yah this is gay
*Statesman has left the game.*
Recluse[Spi]: wtf? mapserved. where statesy go?
Manticore: **** now we need some1 to join
*CoXPlayers has joined the game.*
CoXPlayers: hi all
wid0w: hey
Vahzilok: sup
Positron: hi
CoXPlayers: OMG OMG OMG i got all his stuff!
CoXPlayers: EPIX ARCHTYPWS! HOLY **** I GOT EPIC ARCHETYPES!
Vahzilok: d00d gimmie some plz
CoXPlayers: no way i only got like a couple
Vahzilok: omg dont be gay gimmie epic arctpys
wid0w: wtf is epix archetypes?
wid0w: holy ****holy****hoyl****!
*wid0w has been eliminated.*
*The Phalanx team has won the game!*
Manticore: awesome!
Positron: gg noobs no re
wid0w: thats bull**** u fockin suck
*wid0w has left the game.*
*Manticore has left the game.*
Vahzilok: next game im not going to be on ur team, u guys didnt help me for ****
Positron: wutever, u just made zombies anyway dumbarss
CoXPlayers: l8r all, want 2 farm meow missions now.
scor-peon: bye
Positron: l8r
Vahzilok: fock u all
CoXPlayers: shut up zombie lol
*CoXPlayers has left the game.*
scor-peon: lololol u zombie
Positron: ROFL
Positron: bye zombie
*Positron has left the game.*
*scor-peon has left the game.*
Vahzilok: i hate u all jerks
*Vahzilok has left the game.*
syNApse: lol no1 is left
syNApse: weeeee i got a superspeed
*syNApse has been eliminated.*
syNApse: o ****!
*syNApse has left the game.* -
Purpose of this thread: Incredible potential exists in the exploration of both individual PC's and SG's/VG's regarding the things that traditionally see neither in-game examination nor have any bearing in mechanics representation.
This thread is put forth for the purpose of sharing stories and engaging in interacting roleplaying central to the theme of what your hero/villain or SG/VG does in their respective communities, and how they impact them.
Things that typically wind up as little more than backstory fodder or off-camera 'fluff' can, in their development, lend a sense of depth and revelation to not only individual PC's and SG/VG's alike, but also to those that become involved in the offing of such stories.
Moreover, with the marvelous advent of the Architect system, combat and game-mechanics-driven explorations and adventures have a whole support system already in place, leaving the necessities and intentions of this thread firmly and exclusively focused on that which is already described above.
Reference to, and involvement of, Architect Missions is encouraged in the posting of Set-Ups and their continuations where and as they are wanted, but are certainly not required for participation in this thread.
So, without further ado, I give you the Hearth and Home: Community Presence thread.
I shall follow this brief, explanatory introduction with what I feel may be a handful of example questions to reflect upon the nature of.
And so, on with those very things!
*In what ways does your PC, SG or VG interact with his or her given community? Do you/they have any unique crime-fighting/crime-causing quirks? Does your villain or VG perhaps run a soup kitchen? Is your PC, or even SG/VG in some part, famous rock musicians? Get creative!
*What is that community's general perception of your PC, SG or VG?
*Does your PC, SG or VG have any goals regarding development of their (or any) community? (Development may well include machinating the destruction of, of course!)
*If your character, SG or VG is famous, how does the community respond to this? How do they use/abuse their fame or notoriety in regard to their community?
****
A (Hopefully) Helpful Template:
Since there are literally thousands of off-the-cuff possible 'communities' that could be covered (and virtually infinite as soon as the imagination comes into play at all), it may behoove a given poster to showcase the community at the top of their post, and perhaps present whatever amount of description and set-up story they like regarding that particular place at a given particular time.
Any given post should be inviting of topical expansion by and involvement of other players, and naturally, the common sense rules of respecting your fellow players, no godmoding and so on should be considered in not merely the content but the invitational framing of one's community set-up.
Similarly, those jumping in after the initial set-up of a given community (Examples: Downtown King's Row, or Predichi Boulevard of Mercy Isle) should apprise themselves of the community-specific posts beforehand and at least make a reasonable attempt at honoring the roleplay and established details already in place.
Notation: A 'community' should, for purposes of reasonability, be individually cited as no larger than a given in-game area. Citing 'Mercy Isle' would be a good basis for starting a set-up, but 'The Continent of South America' is probably going to be stretching just a little far into huge generalities that might sorely hinder the ability of others to meaningfully interact with whatever it is you're setting up.
Keep the size of your 'stage' reasonable, and do try to leave room for others to play too
*** The Template ***
*Set-up Example Only*
Community: Predichi Boulevard, Mercy Isle
Theme: Mercy's Heart Homeless Shelter
Architect Missions: "Protect the Heart!" #??????, "Wherefor Art Thou Reaver?" #??????, "Down and Out in Dumpsville" #???????
Set-up: Mercy's Heart Homeless Shelter is a sad little affair near the center of Mercy Isle. Wedged between two larger abandoned tenements, it is known by locals as one of the few genuinely safe, neutral places where just about anyone can find a cot for the night (or at least a shipping pallet with a blanket thrown over it), a meal (maybe hot, maybe not) and a roof that usually doesn't leak too much.
It was started in February of 2003, scant months after the Rikti War, by a small team of known merceneries called "The Raptor Pack".
Whyever they started a homeless shelter, and whatever their intentions might've been for it, nobody really knows anymore; it's changed hands so many times that the locals have long since gotten used to not paying overmuch attention to just who (or what) is staffing the soupline anymore, though recently this has changed.
A female mercenery of Mercy Isle known only to the locals as "Reaver" has taken up not only personally staffing the place, but hiring other retired, often crippled merceneries needing a pay voucher to staff the place regularly and at least semi-professionally.
Word on the street is that Reaver used to live in this very shelter when she was a younger woman, though this and other speculations on her motives for putting forth a rather heroicly determined effort are becoming plentiful, and if there's any truth to any of them, Reaver hasn't yet said.
By and large, nobody really cares enough to pry; her money is good and the doors are open. More, she's kept the violent and/or disturbed riff-raff, the drug pushers and the predatory types well away from the place, at least so far, and so the place is starting to develop a bit of a reputation as a safe haven for not merely the homeless, but also as a take-off point for new merceneries looking to get a foothold somewhere outside of Arachnos and make a few bucks helping Reaver keep the place intact.
****
Let the exploration and development of just who your characters are to the communities they live in and impact begin!