Vengeance

Feh, I don't see why people are really complaining, it's not like you have an 'unfair' advantage. Hammy Enhancers are available to everyone and if you have them and someone else doesn't, then that's the way it is. It's no different to me being able to 50++ everything I have at 50, but someone else not being able to and having all Yellows.

I'm going to go into the Arena and kick [censored] against people with the enhancements or not. Until it hits test no-one has any actual proof that having those enhancements will make them unstoppable and I'll pit my tactics against someone with a bunch of extra enhancements any day. Yeah, that's a challenge and with my balls being that big, I might just win

But to the point (and before you explode), for me the real issue is the *availability* of Hammy enhancements. If only a handful cropped up ever in the game or if you could get them by a mega trial which could be done by any pickup group, that would be fair enough. Basically, I should stand a chance of getting them by virtue of the fact I am level 50.

Unfortunately because I may not be able to get them due to repeatedly getting the cold shoulder by hammy-farming SG's (not knocking any SG's on Victory, just speaking generally), I might be denied something my level char should be allowed to attempt. THAT's what needs to be looked at by the devs, not the fact the enhancements are powerful or not.

If the devs plan to support open and fair raiding of Hammy then that chance won't be denied to everyone, however I read far too many horror stories of regular players never getting the chance to get near it and I believe that'll get worse now so therefore should be looked at.

In case people missed it, these changes have just been put onto Test so expect them on Live soon.

Thanks Statesman.. I look forward to levelling up my Kheldian once I reach 50.

The best part is not that these changes were rolled back, but that I felt someone listened. Thank you.

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Perhaps you should think about your reasons for disliking soloing in multiplayer games. All I've seen is repeated assertions of "It shouldn't be like that."

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I absolutely agree with this, not neccessarily aimed at who Valerian was referring to but it does seem that many 'pro-groupers' see no reason to allow any soloability except mindless street sweeping, however you rarely, if every see pro-soloists supporting changes which would deter grouping or even commenting on the fact people shouldn't be able to get good grouping content.

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and you end up meeting other players.

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But not everyone wants to do that.. I have an SG, it's three other people. That's our group, that's our 'team'... And sometimes it's still not good enough for some of the upgraded mission AV's. We don't exactly plan on taking Hamidon..

We don't want to go and get another person to help us and even less do we want to have to go ask a level 50 to bail us out.

We want to jump in as an estabilished, tight team and take out every AV we encounter. Sure we might need some tactics or suck a few deaths (now we can easily be one-shotted), but no single persons's mission AV should be spawning above the owners level and neither should they be unbeatable by anything over three people.

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Seriously he says these same things with such regularity can consistency I have to wonder of some of you people even read these forums.

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Yes, he keeps reaffirming his 'vision' and the fact the bosses were effectively bugged as they were not meant to be soloable.

Many of the posts in this thread (mine certainly) are about the fact that whether Statesman's vision of forced grouping is a sensible idea at all. People like teaming, that's great, however most people in this thread do not and suggest many very good solutions to allow hardcore team players to get a good game and soloists to do the same.

For me, the boss changes are managable. I can still just about take two red bosses.. however if I get an AV what these changes DO mean is that my original group of 4 now has difficulty in taking them. It's bad enough being forced to group, but being forced to group into a much bigger team with a pic n' mix of AT's is, in my mind, unreasonable.

If I'm selfish, these boss changes can stay (however I think for the squishies, they shouldn't) but if it's Statesman's plan to keep piling on barriers to soloing then I think he should reconsider. These changes are symptom of the problem, not the cause. Luckily, if I read his last posts correctly, he's going to do that.

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wasn't even reflecting the original vision it's designer's held.

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But the problem with the 'Vision'(tm) is that you are not selling a burger or a car or a snack bar. It's a world *dictated* by it's players and not by it's creators. Every company in the world does market research on what it's customers want, why should NCSoft be any different.

"Hey, people are buying our chocolate nut bar in droves. But a few people are spitting out the nuts and eating the chocolate."
"Well, make the nuts BIGGER then, so they can't eat around them."
"But they're still buying the bars.. and it's not affecting the guys who *do* eat the nuts?"
"So, I want *everyone* to eat the nuts, or not at all".

It should be *guided* by the devs, but seeing as everyone is a paying customer what the players want should be what the players get, not what the devs think they want. If Statesman is making the perfect game for him, great.. he can go off and code it and play it alone in his bedroom, however he is making a game for me, you and the thousands of other players here.

So far we have over 40 pages of literate, intelligent 'This change is the worst desicion ever, why not do it this way?' replies, he has had inordinate feedback explaining why people do not like this change, what it does and doesn't affect and concern that forced grouping is going to be *real* bad for the game. This is real, raw evolution of the game right here, not in a developers head. I'm sure if they said "Hey, let's have a level 60 monster smash through city hall every 2 mins and only the players who could get away in time get to keep their characters!", then I'm sure the same amount of people would absolutely love the idea as have admitted their appreciation for the boss changes. It's the nature of people.

At the end of the day, yes Hindsight is always 20/20 and right now, by revising the Vision(tm) of having forced teaming, hopefully they won't have to look back at all the people they lost who came here because the soloing is so good. Here's some food for thought:

If I could solo every Archetype to 50, I *would* solo every Archetype to 50 for the experience of playing all the fantastic character types. I would spend more time online, and that's more money for NCSoft. As is stands now, I'll end up soloing my one 'uber' character to 50 and then likely quit.. that's less money for NCSoft. They just need to do the maths.

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As for why we put Bosses in missions at all – in other words, why isn’t everything solo-able – the answer is simple. We want gameplay that encourages the best part of the game: teaming up. Soloing is fine, but a MMP really shines when you meet other people and play alongside them.

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Wouldn't you want gameplay that encourages people to want to play? Yes a MMPORPG 'shines' in group mode, but it glows from the continual increase of players who come for all reasons and surely soloing is a massive part of CoH's pull? There is this terrible misunderstanding that people come to MMPORPG's to make friends, in truth they come to achieve whatever social desire they want. Mine happens *not* to be interacting with random people and going round being a one-man-band.. so why change the game to take *away* what brings me to the game, when it doesn't affect the people who *do* want to be here for the grouping?

I have not done a single TF, that is my choice and I know there is content I have missed on. However, to be penalised for soloing just seems pointless.

In short, why force one subsection of your customers away from the game? People who group will group, people who solo will leave. Once I get to 50, I was planning to play through my new Epic AT as far as possible.. now I know that as soon as I get to 25 it's going to be like crawling over barbed wire, I don't think I'll bother and I'm sure I'm not alone.

Your time would be better spent making grouping more rewarding, than soloing more tedious. CoH is unique as it actively supports the Soloist, don't turn it into EQ.

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There's an AV on this map. I've defeated everyone but him. The missions doesn't end. Where in either of these descriptions does it warn me that I'll need to bring a team along to defeat the AV?

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Same here with the Clockwork King.. hey, Portal Corp don't even know *what's* going on down there!

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If a player sees a boss of his level, he should probably get help...

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States, I gotta say... I'm not real fond of this here statement.

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Woo, so 3 Minions = 1 hero, 1 Boss = 2 Heroes so that leaves... City of Lieutenants!

<echo>

39/DM Regen - Min Maxed Build (I like to solo)

2 people @ Level 40 Carnie mission to the Ringmistress or something: Level 40 Boss (conned Red) sapped me for End, toggles off took me down in less than 15 seconds.

Clockwork King mission, no mention of AV in the text description, level 40 AV; not attempted, guess I should /bug the mission text so I could have avoided it. (In fact, opening mission of Arc, "We don't know what's going on down there" or something. So much for allowing me to avoid AV's)

Arrest Dr Voight & Visitors: 2 x Level 40 Boss. Just managed to beat both with lots of inspirations and running away on red health more than 2-3 times. Only beat because Malta boss seemed to have just one attack.

Level +1 Rikti Boss/Fake Nemesis (Seperately): Tough/Weave/IH/Int/DP/CJ/Crey Pistol + Luck/End/Heal Insps - Just beat due to conservative running away and timing.

Othe friends reporting similar if not worse problems given I'm supposedly an 'uber' build.

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Everything in else in I3, great.. bosses/AV's, spoiling it for all.