reiella

Very annoying . It does make the inventory limits more 'practical' but still it's annoying.

It's even more fun when you're the MM that will most likely cause the drift .

Not really on topic, but, just curious here. Is there a way to keybind popping an inspiration to a pet?

Hah, maybe we should all PM EvilGeko and asking him he nerfed accuracy again.

Slots do increase it. One slot will get you about 2 more end [how I currently have mine slotted].

Now the value of that 2 end, I dunno.

The other solution is to lengthen the fights and increase health pools. I don't think that would really work for this game though. Would hit too hard on the theme.

I think you can simulate the same issue with AE though, if you set the 2nd ambush to occur at say, 3/4 health, or whatnot instead of defeat. Of course, I think that actually requires named entities for AE to handle it.

Actually, from a technical standpoint these events appear to handle the lag better. And that lag issue is a big part of why they want to stress test those systems [hence the sneak peak for BAF].

I will disagree completely that they should have pathes that have a similar time frame as a powergamer /hard core 'anything' though. But that's most likely just a difference of interpretation of terms, which is prolly ok in the end. A character that is optimized/well played should perform better. For terms of absurd, should the rate be similar for a blaster who forgoes almost all their primary and secondary in light of power pool abilities? It should be a goal range, the problem, I feel, is that the range on (shard) generation for characters is far too broad, so it creates this ugly mess where something looks very intimidating at the low and mid-range.

My bulk of problem with a time gate [on the combine] is that it doesn't change the time commitment to acquisition, it just encourages the character to log in on every cooldown. A time gate on acquisition [WST, or some of Arcana's theorycrafted ideas] is a different matter, at least then you're logging in to do something more than hit combine on your cooldown .

Ten more turtles would be awesome. That pretty sums up Mario Strikers though I think.

I think you are mistaking System Design with Game Programming. And System Design most certainly involves math. They're all interlinked, so it's very disingenuous to claim they are not involved.

That said, it looks like the argument is going to devolve into definition quabble, which is silly .

Dude, The Battalion wants to steal our inventions. Don't let them come back!

I so want the Shard redone. I doubt it'll happen, but it would be really nice.

Erm, I think that was more a case of unintentional consequences. I mean, Powers thought activation time was X, and it wasn't. Probably would have been better handled by better unit-tests of the systems in question before heading to productive. Most likely, the differences fell within their acceptable tolerances, so even if the discrepancy was observed, it wasn't considered significant. And perhaps unforunately, there's a very wide range of performance in this game, so I suspect acceptable tolerances are higher than perhaps they should be.

Of course, that's all conjecture. Math is certainly important though . Checking your math is even more important [ie, Statesman's Super Scrapper].

But there are going to be aspects that the math by itself can't convey too well. Defiance and Vigilance come to mind here [mostly the emotional outcry issues]. Then there is the 'creative aspect' of establishing the weights for various powers in their critters power budget.

Anycase, not really disagreeing with you [especially on specifics ]. Math doesn't lie, that is true, what has been put into the math may obfuscate actual issues [creative assigned weights, player perception, special synergies].

Hehe, I doubt Doc Q will happen anytime soon, simply as there is nothing comparable Redside.

And while I would love to see the Shard revamped/opened up to both sides, if it were to happen, I imagine Q would be 'updated' at the same time.

Time will tell, although, supposedly you will be able to unlock your Alpha [and I believe the other two slots] via the Incarnate Trials in I20. We don't have much information on that though. I'm guessing it may be related to those % numbers we see on the interface though.

Don't some Rularuu combine up too? Or is that only to Lt?

Two different responses.

Praetoria's starting area is the new recruiting land, it's the shiniest, and it should be the best foot forward to recruit. Now it may be that we're trying to 'recruit' challenge players, but I think that effort will fail will the massive drop off in difficulty as you leave Praetoria.

10x ambushes is excessive. Unless you're talking about Katie, it's just plain excessive. Chain ambushes are just really frustrating. Endurance runs are fine, when that's really the extent of the mission [Katie is a good example I feel actually], but they really feel overplayed in Praetoria.

Median? Hmm, ah CoP was the odd ball, that pretty much you either finish fast, or you don't finish. Ah, I think I was misinterpreting the issue with LGTF. Not positive, but regardless I was wrong . Thank you.

That or I didn't really pay too much attention to Castle's defending the merit awards for TF. Both quite likely . Median does make sense though, especially if accounting for the reality that as time increases, the likelihood of completion decreases, so it would skew slightly towards the faster rate, but not likely at anything that matters.

I think there are few rather grumpy problems at play, specifically with Sam's situation.

Stalkers + Ambush = Fail. This is just frustrating and annoying for them. I just wish they would do more of the Ambush to Location Of, instead of Ambush Player. Would still be difficult, and maybe a bit of metagaming solution to allow Stalkers to still kind of benefit from being stalkers. But this mechanic will always suck for stalkers.

The other being just too many ambush waves, too frequently. The diff slider, as said, may be able to help with clearing a group before wave 2 arrives, but even that feels bleh. 10 Waves in a story-arc mission is excessive. About the only time I think 10 waves is reasonable is Katie though.

As you said, the Praetorian groups feel far more like mid 30s mob groups in terms of their abilities than 1-20. It does a good thing in trying to get people in the habit of using their inspirations, sure, but it's a bit too harsh.

To me, #5 is the one that really showcases the problem. There is a tendency to balance around the high end. The same with reward merits being balanced around what a speed run generates rather than a casual run.

The other big aspect [I believe you mentioned it, I dunno, I'm just waking up] I think, is that there is a difference between solo and casual. There is a some overlap, yes, but it is a different matter. It looks like we're getting closer to the point of contention being casual soloists. Which is still a legitimate concern [and hopefully provides to be a less charged term than 'anti-teamer'].

There is another bit of trouble with balancing a grind solution with this metric, since a team's rate of generation scales (roughly, I think it's closer to geometric than a special logarithmic, but it's far too varied from party structure to party structure I imagine ) geometrically to the team size. And again, there is a tendency to balance towards the high end.

Balancing around the low end, still results in the high end achieving it at the same disproportionate rate faster. The imbalance still exists.

As a sidenote, I have a suspicion [that will most likely be proven wrong], that the Incarnate Trials will simply award a bucket of Incarnate Shards, weighted by your contribution ranking.

I have a minor point of contention there. While the mission rate [ie, per mission] should be effectively the same, the rate at which the mission is cleared should also be faster with a real team, as opposed to be a solo-diff 0/x8. Since, I'm pretty sure that Shards don't get split amongst the party like other loot drops. If that's wrong, then I hope I do get corrected so I know better .

I believe the 400 hour # came about for the Very Rare [480] from scratch, not the Notice. Which adjusting for that comes out ~ 74hr. Still an exceptional amount of time. And a closer number to the 1 shard/hr rate cited elsewhere in this thread.

Ah, thank you that rate is a bit less generous, and more probable. One side remark however, there is a distinction between a team doing a TF and a team doing paper/radio/farm missions. And that is part of the difficulty in creating a 'soloist' method that does not remove the value of the TF method [for those who are teaming].

Back to my earlier point, however. Let's consider a play time of 2hr/day, 5d/week. That'll generate roughly 10 shards a week, so we come out to 9 weeks. That is a significant time difference. Both in terms of /week, and in /hour. And it certainly feels grindy .

However, consider if we change the parameters a bit, and consider what that rate does to the 8 man farming team. They're going to still generate about the same base rate, but clear faster, at least in theory. Let's consider a Brute farm. 8 Brutes, one mission, much death. In theory, if they split up [optimally and efficiently, which is prolly far less likely than the aforementioned 8 Brute Squad happening ], they'll clear the mission in 1/8th the time. Again, this is a comical min/max scenario . So with that, we approach the situation, that for those 8 Brutes it's near equitable with doing the WST every week instead. Of course, it's still a 2 hr commitment per day/5 days a week. Which is a significant increase in time. For normality, I'd suggest that the clear rate would probably approach triple or quadruple that solo. It is hard to judge though, and while I think the numbers exist in the Market forum, I'm too lazy .

Then there's also the possibility of simply increasing the rate, jumping up to 3 hours, 7 days, for instance, and you're looking at a little over a month.

Again though, I do much prefer the hour rate, it's a bit more effective at conveying the big problem with comparing the rate with the time-gated WST. Especially when you're looking at something that's such a grind solution. And it introduces the incredible awkwardness of deciding if it's the solution is 'solo unfriendly' or 'casual unfriendly'.

With Toony, for instance, with my presumed 2 hr/5day format, you're looking at 30 shards [total] to make a Notice. Which, unless you introduce another time-gate (which was suggested), will make it something you could farm through in a few days with a team, and then have to question the value of the WST. Whether it impacts will, of course, vary from individual to individual.

On the matter of time-gating combines, that works a bit different. There's an 18hr time-gate on Vanguard Merits to Gr'ai Matter, that doesn't mean I have to run a Mothership raid every day to get a Gr'ai Matter, just run it once, and log in on subsequent days to pick up the rest that was already earned. It becomes a 'login game'. WST is much the same, but at least, it's login and do something more substantive than click combine.

Personally, I do feel a 30 shard count total would be low, but that's my view . Somewhere in the middle may be a better point, or perhaps even a non-grindy method, but I have no suggestions for a non-grindy method that really work.


Not you alone, a lot of the lower level TFs have that. In fact, I knew a few folks who got folks to pad a team just to start one solo [and oddly enough, that tended to make old-Positron easier iirc].

The proposed rate for the discussion was 3 weeks actually.

If you were soloing at 0/x8 getting 1 shard/mission, it comes out between 2 and 3 weeks simply doing tips [closer to 2 weeks if you add in the morality mission].

I can certainly sympathize with the idea that not everyone can solo 0/x8. The problem being that if you use 0/x1 as the baseline with 3 weeks, you'll have the optimal performing at a much faster rate [I'd like to say less than 1 week, but someone else can better chart the rate difference in shard rate for 0/x1 and 0/x8], and that can create a potential problem with the WSF serving it's function.

As both Eiko and myself have said though, it's really awkward to compare against the time-gated method. I'd much prefer to compare against the Incarnate Trial method to be honest, but we don't know that reward structure, so we have to make due with what we have.

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There is also the alternative perspective to compare, and that's the time investment, but the time-gate on WST makes that a different beast as well.

What rate of generation for the Notice of the Well for a soloist is practical in your view?

In terms of /week since we kind of have to contrast it against the WST currently.

Fair enough, so I pose this as a question. What sort of 'rate' advantage do you think would be fair, at least in terms of /week [since, we can really only work with the WST method currently].

I can see the merit behind the idea of 1/week, WSTs would have a far reduced time investment [30m to 3 hr a week as opposed to missions every day], personally, I dislike that avenue myself, but I can see the logic behind it.

Perhaps closer to 0.5/week, to appease folks like me who would like there to a be of difference in the weekly obtain rate?

Also, as an aside, adding in the morality mission every two [5.5 missions/day I guess], you're looking at ~16 days, which is a bit closer to the 0.5/week rate. So, I dunno *shrug*.

Given that we don't have a scaling level progression, it'd be difficult . And the cries would be harsh if they split the Incarnate System into different expansion parcels.

What is the right way? Please, since I struggle there too .