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Moridin, I think part of the point in saying that the missions are solo content is that given the nature of the dynamic in teams you do not really get to take the time to read and appreciate the story content becasue most teams operate on a go-Go-GO! basis and aren't going to wait around while you read and savor the "content". And the text of that content changes to a summary once the mission is over and you return to contact. If it stays at all (doesn't often in one offs).
Then there is also the fact that in teaming you are not following through just one person's story arc, but whatever mission the team goes after in sequence. Consequently you may wind up doing the same mission multiple times, or if you team a lot, outlevel your own contacts to where you are no longer offered any more missions from that contact, ie: miss out on the game story content available from that contact, presumably including story arcs.
So in that sense, yes, the game content is effectively solo content. More likely to be accessed and appreciated solo.
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Not to mention that if you're in a team playing in someone else's mission, you get none of their content. No clues, no info from the grateful hostage you've rescued, no immersion in their storyline at all. All you get is XP. You're essentially playing second-banana in the mission holder's adventures. 
OK, slight correction. You can, if you want, pull up the mission description in an info window. That's it.
Bottom line for me is...why make the game less fun?
Ok...some people were having fun and found the difficulty level about right.
Ok...some people were having fun (but not quite as much as the above people) and found the game a bit easy.
Bingo...problem solved by the difficulty options!
No need at all to touch bosses...AVs being beefed up I can understand....as some of those nasty Min/Maxers found ways of soloing them.
So yeah make AVs much tougher if you want...but there seems little point, from an enjoyment point of view, of making ordinary bosses tougher.
I do a lot of team. In fact most of what I do is team and staying up into the wee hours of the night to work with a regular team of people. The problem I have is like last night. The people I regularly team with (and ones I team with on occassion) were not online. So that left me two options:
1) Soloing
2) Casual Team
Things have been extremely tough since I3. I play a Blaster and my debt has skyrocketed, while the scrappers and tankers I play with regularly are able to keep their debt fairly low. This just means that they will advance faster than me. Now I've been one shotted before and I've thought, you know, that happens sometimes, I don't like it and so try to keep the Tankers and Scrappers between me and those baddies. But I have been one shotted more times since I3 than all the rest of my time put together.
Anyway...back to the story.
So I join a casual team. Don't know any of these folks from Adam and we end up with a Tanker that jumps into the middle of a bunch of baddies every time he sees them thus bringing their rath down on everybody. Now I'm playing in a group with a good mix. Scrapper, two Tankers, two Blasters, a Controller and a Defender. Maybe coulda dropped a Tanker or the Scrapper for another Defender, or a Controller since it was a Tsoo mission, but still a good mix. But due to this imbecile Tanker charging in all the time, we had no way to control the hoards and keep the Blasters, Defenders and Controllers safe. I died 4 times in a mission that should been handled by this team. There were bosses all over the place and with the Sorcs keeping them alive, we had twice where the entire party died. All thanks to this guy I didn't know and who had no concern for the rest of the party. And you wonder why I prefer soloing over this?
Or how about the other team I was in pre-I3. They had been through the mish so many times. In the final battle, there is a temporary power you can get if you get the blinkie. These guys raced ahead to get that temporary power leaving me by myself against the mobs. The mission was completed. One of them got the temporary power. I got debt.
I'll team with my regular folks any day and have a great time doing it even if on occassion I get killed, but putting up with things like this turns me sour about teaming with anyone but my regular folks. So what am I to do? If my friends aren't online and I still want to play a little, all that leaves is street sweeping. Not exactly the most interesting thing after a whlie. There seem to be too many people who don't care about teaming or just use it to get what they want and the hell with the rest. I team with the people I do because I trust them. I've learned their style, they've learned mine, and we have a great time doing it. But casual teaming had caused me a lot of heartache and made me want to give up this game. So my only other option is soloing. Otherwise, with the debt I amass as a Blaster, I won't be able to play with those folks I really enjoy playing with because they will surpass me while my xp goes to paying off debt as much as it does to keeping up with them.
I just want to say something....
I am a level 34 earth/storm controller. I hit 32 just before I3. I had never been able to solo, before I got my pet and got him slotted. I was very concerned that my one chance at soloing was going to be negated by the I3 boss changes. It wasn't. I have gone solo on every one of my missions since I3 and not had a single problem, and I am usually in no danger at all. I upped the difficulty slider, and I am loving finally being able to solo, especially with the greater boss xp.
That being said, I really don't like these changes. I had two street missions for crey that I completed in Brickstown. I found a +1 Paragon Power Tank. It took me longer than it was worth, but I defeated him, and he never touched me, or my pets. A blaster and a defender duo stopped to watch, and after I was done said to me... "I wish we could do that still..."
They said even with the two of them it is hard to fight anything but even bosses, because the emp simply couldnt keep up with the amount of damage the bosses give out now. I just got my solo capability, and I love it, getting my own xp on my own time is great, so I don't want that taken away...
But someone tell me how it fair or right or makes sense, that the one AT that is supposed to be the worst at soloing, is now able to do it as, or more effectively than the AT's that used to be the best at it? My wife is an energy/energy blaster, and she has been able to solo fairly well so far, but not as easily, or in the safety that I can. I really just do not understand the thinking behind the changes. The attack on bosses needs to be rolled back, period. Have the defense and hp stay the same, so they will be in fights longer like States wants, but don't give them the ability to kill even level heroes in one or two shots, that is not fun, and it is not what the majority of the paying players want.
"You're the sun and the moon to me..."
My Antiquated Earth/Storm Controller Guide!
@KokopelliJoe
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Every time somebody says to you that the Devs promised solo AND team play, you keep replying as if people are demanding solo play to take priority.
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They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content. The only way one could ever justify such a position was if they considered this a solo game with an option to team if you want. This is the complete reverse of what Statesman has repeatedly stated as his vision for the game.
One-shots also happen to supposedly solo possible types as well. I have a level 33 MA/Regen scrapper who has been killed four times by one-shot bosses. Two fixes I would recommend
One, you need to really look at the activation areas for powers on the screen. I have clicked several times on a healing or regen power, or toggles, etc., only to not have the power activate at all. Binding keys for the other powers leads to confusion or constant changing of the keyboard, and I deal with that enough at work. That has been the biggest pain in dealing with the new boss changes.
Two, lowering the damage output the bosses makes much more sense. Bosses with increased HPs are not as dangerous, and it allows low health types the ability to hold or restrain/debuff bosses and AVs. A level 43 defender, in order to defeat Nemesis, had to recruit my main to defeat him, as he could not do enough damage to him to lower his health by an appreciable amount.
I believe that any mission should be soloable, Arch-Villain, boss, named lieutenant whatever. One of the most interesting parts of comics revolves around the stories of those heroes who defeat villains by themselves, not with a group of 10 to 50 heroes. Would Wolverine seem as fearsome if he constantly had to ask the X-men for help to fight SabreTooth? No. Does Batman ask the Justice League for a hand in taking on the Joker or the Riddler? No. Do you ever see the Punisher asking a SWAT team to help him eliminate a crime boss? No. Like many others on this board, the main feature that drew me to COH was the ability of players to solo missions. Games like EQ and SWG turned me off due to their heavy focus on 30 to 50 players being required to complete higher end quests. I would hate to see COH go the same way.
The amount of issues that many of the other players have posted with higher level ATs then mine doesn't ease my fears.
I have a level 23 blaster who I have not touched since July due to the insane effectivness of mez and hold equipped minions in every mission. Tsoo Ink Men particulary are unbalanced. Now that the free respec has been offered, I may go back and start using him again. Please take some time to consinder these changes.
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Every time somebody says to you that the Devs promised solo AND team play, you keep replying as if people are demanding solo play to take priority.
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They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content. The only way one could ever justify such a position was if they considered this a solo game with an option to team if you want. This is the complete reverse of what Statesman has repeatedly stated as his vision for the game.
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Dude, please show me where this game a) had broken team play and b) this is the end-all be-all fix for it.
I play with as heavy a set of power gamers as you can find. About the ONLY thing we don't try to do is race to 50 - we all do missions and enjoy revealing the lore of CoH. We build the most powerful, min/maxed heroes we can because we think that's fun. Most of us never come to the forums for builds, either - we come for numbers and do the designs ourselves.
And we use good, sound team tactics when we play.
And we were having fun. We still could find the challenge in the game.
You are speaking about your opinion as though it was some hard fact. It is not. It was not. Your opinion is valid and you are welcome to it and to state it here. But stop wielding it like a sword to try and strike down the opinions of others.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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It was marketed as a team game that was solo friendly. Notice the emphasis was still on team play. There is FAR to much emphasis on solo play to live up to this prior to issue 3 and even post issue 3 due to peoples ability to solo most or all of the team content.
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What "emphasis" was there on solo play? It was possible, therefore it was emphasized?
The XP was better solo? Increase group XP.
The game was too easy in a group? That's what the difficulty slider was added for!
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This is a strawman. No one has suggested solo play be reduced to an insignificant part of the overall experience. This is entirely different then suggesting team play is the first focus.
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Bosses being unsoloable WOULD lead to solo play being reduced to an insignificant part of the overall experience.
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It is becoming more and more apparent that the real source of much of the discontent is coming from solo players who have appropriated 99% of the games content as their own despite the consistent position of the dev team that this was a team game first and foremost.
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"Appropriated" content? How is anyone "appropriating" it?
If a law gets passed that people named "Bob" can't drive on 80% of highways, and the pro-Bob lobby raises an outcry about it, are people named Bob "appropriating" the highways?
And could you provide some examples of this "consistent position" that this is "first and foremost" a team game?
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Since when is bribing people with xp in order to get them to undertake an overly simple unchallenging task an acceptable way to promote group play?
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Since when is forcing people to street sweep because they can't accomplish that simple task on their own an acceptable way to promote group play?
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Promoting team play means providing people with a source of good challenging content to undertake as a team. If that means that you cant do some of it solo, it is not a big loss as there are always other solo tasks available.
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There are NOT always other solo tasks available. Street sweeping does not cut it; it's even been explicitly recognized by the developers that street sweeping is a sub-par form of gameplay.
Now, if it was possible to tell a contact to shove it when he wanted to offer nothing but group missions, and there were enough soloable missions in a tier to get you a good fraction of the way through it, you'd have a point here.
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They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content.
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Now who's got the strawman? I haven't seen a lot of posts with people suggesting that task forces and trials be soloable. In fact, I haven't seen any.
And what was "needed" about this fix that wasn't covered by the difficulty slider? Or, at least, couldn't have been better addressed by adding higher settings to the difficulty slider?
I too not only wonder what comics Statesman has been reading. Also, I wonder did Statesman ever really count the number of single hero titles (solo heroes) and the team titles. No doubt I could go to my local comic book store called Dizzy's Dugout and find more single hero comics than team comics. By the number of single comics on the self, suggest a solo friendly game when a player first sees it on the self. Remember, not everyone that has bought this game has learned about it from the Internet. Some like myself like what they saw at the store and bought it with the idea of being able to play the role of a real hero like superman, spiderman, etc...
Then when they get it home and find out that they can't be the hero they invisioned they will cancel their subscription immediately. This game actually brought the world of comics to life when it first hit the stores. Since issue two and now with issue three this game is slowly transforming itself to a city of teams instead of a city of heroes. If this game becomes a city of teams, that would make the heroes no stronger than the citizens of Paragon City. No stronger than a police officer.
I know that team play is where the mmo's shine but the comic book world suggest a solo friendly game. I can understand that sword and sorcery games, and science fiction games need to be very team friendly. Why these type of movies always have a team to defeat the head villian. Even if they only role the other team members is to get the hero (star of the movie) to the final fight with the villian. To me the devs have changed their vision from bringing the world of comics alive to one where you have a city of teams not a city of heroes. Go ahead devs and make your city of teams because when my subscription expires I will not renew it. I will still visit the forums if I can and see if the devs ever change their mind and return to their original vision a city of heroes that brings the world of superheroes to life.
Ebony Fists: Level 50 DM/Regen Scrapper, Gloom Piston Robotics/Dark mastermind level 34, QueenFireMare: Level 34 Fire blaster (pure fire),
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but god help you if you get one of the hidden team missions or missions with an unannounced boss.
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If this happens its a bug. Petition the GMs thats one of the reason they are there.
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The fact that the overwhelming number of games for PC are solo games (or solo games, with an afterthough MP component to it), to me at least, indicates that there's a huge market for soloable content.
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It also indicates that its far better to deliver solo content in other game formats, which is why any MMO is going to place team content first.
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Which is all entirely beside the point... solo players want, at the very least, missions that can be soloed. If you have content not designed to be soloed, I'd gather most people are fine with that... just don't stick it in a single player mission.
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There are plenty of missions solo players can do. Most people can even solo those missions with bosses in them once they adjust. If you stopped assuming every single mission in the game was a single player mission perhaps you would no longer have reason to complain.
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The fact that the overwhelming number of games for PC are solo games (or solo games, with an afterthough MP component to it), to me at least, indicates that there's a huge market for soloable content.
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99% would entail a whole lot more than "some missions" and "some streetsweeping." But nice try.
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Ummm ya it entails more then some missions and street sweeping. That is after all the whole point. The solo content you were promised is street sweeping and some missions. The content the devout soloists have appropriates as their own and refuse to give up is everything that isnt a task force or trial.
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No, they became outraged when the one area (missions) that everybody should 100% be able to participate in (soloists AND groupers) was unneccesarily changed so that only groups could do all of it. It was bad enough with the missions that have AVs showing up. It's even worse with bosses now.
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missions = 100% of the ongoing content of the game. Making them all soloabel and trivial for groups makes this a nearly 100% solo game. Again it comes back to the point of the people opposing this change thinking nearly 100% of the games content was specifically designed for them.
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Repetition on your part doesn't make it so.
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Nore does such silly comment on your part make it not so. A truth does not become untrue because its repeated. Since you seem to have trouble with the search feather I took the liberty of doing a quick search on your behalf and came up with the following quotes from statesman.
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You should always be able to do your own missions alone.
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I never, never, never said that. Many missions ARE solo-able. Many aren't. Bosses, Elite Bosses and AV's usually require help. So if you see any of those on a mission, get help! The mission text indicates this....
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"For the most part, everyone will be able to solo in some situations. Some builds and ATs more than others. But there are some mobs that can be a challenge - bosses, elite bosses, AV's and monsters - where you'll probably want help. Or not."
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EXACTLY. Bosses weren't meant to be solo-able UNLESS a particular player used Inspirations & strategy. Hence, the Help text & tutorial indicate that a player "probably" should get other friends to take out a boss.
Some builds are clearly better than others at taking out bosses.
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The Statesman has stated, recently, that everything in CoH should be soloable for every AT.
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That is NOT what I said. Every Archetype can solo. Everything? Certainly not. Every Archetype, if they don't feel like teaming up, can at least go out and fight crime on the city streets. Many missions are solo-able - but not EVERY mission.
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Even with the new bosses almost every single combination of power sets can solo a boss, they are simply no longer pushovers that anyone can take with no real skill or effort.
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thats bull-[self-censored] and you know it.
there are MANY builds out there, played by INTELLIGENT people who do use strategy and tactics that cannot solo one of the new bosses.
Don't spread this fallacy that anyone who can't solo one of the new bosses is a lame-brain who can't use tactics or only wants to press buttons in succession until the boss is dead all while watching a re-run of dawson's creek and singing "I don't wanna wait, till this boss fight is oh-ver".
The new bosses can be solo'd by a few builds & ATs, but they cannot by everyone else. There are those of us out there who used to see a boss in our solo mish (pre I3) and had to actually stop and think how to handle it, so they wouldn't kill us outright. What are they to do now? Other than wet their pants and call for backup?
And don't pull the "well you should team more then!" arguement... I team as much as possible. I keep my LFT flag on almost anytime i'm not already in a team, heck I'm always bugging my SG mates to team, but there are times when you just wanna solo.
When you want to savor your mission. Revel in the flavor of the world CoH has. When you want to be the ONLY hero in YOUR comic, and not be a cameo in anyone elses. I was in the middle of the organ grinders before I3, and was going from mission to mission quickly, like a hero in a comic would. Id finish 1 mish and move to the next, not going to other contacts for their missions. I saw a boss? I'd pause and start laying trip mines all over the place to make sure he's dead. Then I'd unload an alpha strike and take off through my minefield and hope he died. Then I3 hit. Now those bosses laugh at my futile squishy attempts to solo them before sending me to the hospital. And now I'm stuck. Fun. Yaaaaay. 
I said in a previous post: what made CoH different from DAoC, or EQ or any other MMO is that you could solo MOST of YOUR content IF YOU WANTED TO! it was your CHOICE. You wanted to make your punnisher, lone wolf hero, who grits his teeth and fights anything in his way until he's defeated and maybe, just maybe calls for backup if he's in over his head? Bang. There you go. Enjoy your missions till AVs or Elite Bosses run in your way.
You wanna be your moonlighter? you team half the time and solo the rest? bang. roll up your wolverine-esque character and go to town after joining a SG.
Wanna team exclusively? Go make your Storm / Elec defender and have fun! Name her OROROxxoR or some such and have a ball.
But no matter which type of char. you made, you knew you would be giving up some content by going to either extreme, and the only way to experience it all was to team AND solo. Thats what made this game so dang fun. And as it stands now, only some scrappers, tanks, and post 32 'trollers can still play that way. So please keep the self serving over generalizations or assuptions baised on the most solo-friendly builds out of a rational and logical discussion regarding these recent changes. (and the wheel of time books)
C'mon, you know if your char. could solo an AV before, that now he can still handle bosses... do we really need your opinion about how much cooler the game now is with the difficulty slider cranked to mecha-striesand levels alongside the new boss changes? No. We KNOW you are having more fun. Its a given. You can HANDLE the new challange. But i bet if the devs added a new feature that the bosses could 1 shot tanks and scrappers and regularly shrug off any attempts at a hold, you might be changing your tune and "whining" about the changes as well.
I do also wonder about all those poor controllers stuck in the hell between unchanged bosses and the golden land of milk, honey and pets... 
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The way to do this is to provide content of suitable difficulty for a team. The only reason you perceive yourself as being punished for not teaming is that you have appropriated the team content for solo play when it was never intended to be.
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Just for emphasis, read this again:
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Question: The team dynamic plays a big role in earning experience points, but the lone wolf approach still works. Some like partnering up while others take the solo route. Was it difficult getting the balance right between the two?
Statesman: Definitely! Its a challenge to make a game experience challenging for both; groups can obviously hide their weaknesses easier than a solo player can and are thus far more effective than just the sum of their individual parts. Our solution for that was to create areas that are tuned for groups (certain zones, Task Forces, Trials, etc.), but make everyday tasks, such as missions, work for groups AND solo players.
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Since you just love attributing statements to Statesman (while never providing a direct quote) and using that as the entirety of your argument ... I'll play ball.
Let's see the last part of that again:
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but make everyday tasks, such as missions, work for groups AND solo players.
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Do you still say that missions were only ever intended as group content?
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Since you just love attributing statements to Statesman (while never providing a direct quote) and using that as the entirety of your argument ... I'll play ball.
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See the direct quotes above where he says flat out that you are 1) not supposed to be able to solo all the missions your contacts give you 2) not be guaranteed to be able to solo a boss, and 3) the ability for everyone to solo means that there is always something to do even if its only streetsweeping.
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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Do you still say that missions were only ever intended as group content?
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Did I ever say that? If so please provide a quote as I have no recollection of ever saying anything of the sort.
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I do also wonder about all those poor controllers stuck in the hell between unchanged bosses and the golden land of milk, honey and pets...
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If I was still pre-pet, the solo thing would be a non-issue (for earth control anyway) since I always had to rely on a team anyway. All the low controllers are probably doing about the same, relying on their teams and dying every once in a while. We are probably the least effected by this, without pets we don't solo, and with pets we are never really solo, even if we aren't on a team. (was that confusing?? lol )
"You're the sun and the moon to me..."
My Antiquated Earth/Storm Controller Guide!
@KokopelliJoe
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Every time somebody says to you that the Devs promised solo AND team play, you keep replying as if people are demanding solo play to take priority.
[/ QUOTE ]
They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content. The only way one could ever justify such a position was if they considered this a solo game with an option to team if you want. This is the complete reverse of what Statesman has repeatedly stated as his vision for the game.
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Here's a challenge ... provide one solid reason why THIS particular change is the only change that will address your concerns. For example, explain why returning the bosses to their pre-issue 3 state and then sliding the difficulty slider to maximum difficulty won't accomplish what you want out of the game.
I ask because you keep accusing us of trying to eliminate your preferred mode of play, but you are the one that seems totally unwilling to compromise. Not one of us has suggested that team play should be undervalued or eliminated, you have repeatedly asserted that solo play IS and SHOULD BE undervalued and all but eliminated, yet you have the temerity to suggest that it's us who want to ruin the game for you.
As I suggested when we discussed this in another thread, I think it is you who is holding the extreme minority opinion here.
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Every time somebody says to you that the Devs promised solo AND team play, you keep replying as if people are demanding solo play to take priority.
[/ QUOTE ]
They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content. The only way one could ever justify such a position was if they considered this a solo game with an option to team if you want. This is the complete reverse of what Statesman has repeatedly stated as his vision for the game.
[/ QUOTE ]
Ok, then let me ask you a question? How is this a fix to team play?
What people are actually saying "Oh boy, it's going to be so much more fun to team now that bosses can one-shot us and take forver to take down," or maybe they are saying "dang, we used to always crash when we went into missions as a team, but now that bosses can one-shot us and take forever to kill the game runs smooth as silk when we team."
Nobody.
Face it, this did not "fix" a thing about teaming. What this did is nerf solo play in an attempt to FORCE certain soloists to team who weren't doing it before. Now we have people goimg "Dang! no way am I going to solo this mission. I'll have to team up to do it." There's a big difference between fixing somethign that was nbroken, and breaking something that was fixed. In my opinion, they broke much of solo play.
Infinity:
Ellen, 50 MA/Inv Scr
February Night, 14 Ice/Ice Blstr
Guardian:
SilverSwordmaid, 29 Kat/Rgn Scr
Vicious Killer, 33 Emp/Enrgy Def
Electromagness, 40 Rad/Rad Def
Sense of Humor, 50 Fire/En Tank
Virtue:
Kickfest, 50 MA/SR Scr
Freedom:
Glorious Ending, 29 EM/DA Bru
[ QUOTE ]
For example, explain why returning the bosses to their pre-issue 3 state and then sliding the difficulty slider to maximum difficulty won't accomplish what you want out of the game.
[/ QUOTE ]
I already addressed this in a previous post.
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They are. They are trying to get a badly needed fix to team play removed on the grounds it prevents some people from soloing 100% of the games content. The only way one could ever justify such a position was if they considered this a solo game with an option to team if you want. This is the complete reverse of what Statesman has repeatedly stated as his vision for the game.
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Hogwash.
First of all, people aren't trying to do anything to the boss change because it prevents people from soloing "100% of the game's content." People are upset about the boss changes because it prevents people from soloing a portion of the fraction of the game's content that WAS soloable... that's a longshot from "100%."
Statesman wanted to make bosses non-trivial for groups. That was his "goal" from the first post. Right now, he's changed the game so that an even con boss is non-trivial for a group and extremely dangerous to a solo player.
He could make the "badly needed" fix by rolling back the boss changes and simply making bosses in a team mission spawn at a higher level than bosses in solo missions. Then, bosses would be a challenge for a solo player (because they're even conned) and a challenge for teams (because they'd be + conned). The problem, which you seem to not understand, is that the + conned bosses (which are meant to challenge teams) are often one-shot death to soloists... and they FREQUENTLY appear in missions. We ALREADY couldn't do 100% of our missions due to mechanical functions such as "simultaneous disarms," (which rubbed many wrong) and now we can do even fewer thanks to difficulty. And for those of us who still CAN do missions with bosses, it's just not fun... it's just tedium.
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Since you just love attributing statements to Statesman (while never providing a direct quote) and using that as the entirety of your argument ... I'll play ball.
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See the direct quotes above where he says flat out that you are 1) not supposed to be able to solo all the missions your contacts give you 2) not be guaranteed to be able to solo a boss, and 3) the ability for everyone to solo means that there is always something to do even if its only streetsweeping.
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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I think all of have this wonder about someone who shall remain nameless.
You still haven't provided anything short of your own assertion that 1), 2) or 3) were said by anyone. I've been through two threads with you on this very topic, and I have repeatedly asked you to back up even one of your many claims about what Statesman or other devs have said. You have so far provided no backup short of repeating your assertions.
I have seen 2) asserted ... I have never seen 1) or 3).
(I did notice you appropriated my strawman accusation and levelled it against someone else here. Nice use of applied knowledge.)
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Do you still say that missions were only ever intended as group content?
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Did I ever say that? If so please provide a quote as I have no recollection of ever saying anything of the sort.
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Yes ... and I quoted it one message above us. Here it is again:
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The way to do this is to provide content of suitable difficulty for a team. The only reason you perceive yourself as being punished for not teaming is that you have appropriated the team content for solo play when it was never intended to be.
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/emote gets popcorn
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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Ok, then let me ask you a question? How is this a fix to team play?
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It doesnt fix it completely, but you have to start somewhere.
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What people are actually saying "Oh boy, it's going to be so much more fun to team now that bosses can one-shot us and take forver to take down," or maybe they are saying "dang, we used to always crash when we went into missions as a team, but now that bosses can one-shot us and take forever to kill the game runs smooth as silk when we team."
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Until people figure out what they have to do I suspect they will find large teams very challenging indeed. For teams of 7-8 players you now need several different ATs all played properly and using good teamwork to succeed. Missions spawned for fewer then that are likely still soloable for a large number of builds even on impossible.
I read the first post by Statesman, and a couple pages after that, so if I'm repeating somebody I'm sorry.
I'm an old hand at online internet multiplayer gaming, and I have a lot of quirks and opinions that makes it difficult for me to team with people occasionally. For example, AOL speak makes me insane and I've found that I can't team with people who type that way. It's rare that I will make an exception on that point, because trying to communicate is a chore instead of fun. I'm verbose, and I feel that everyone should at least try. Middle of battle shortcuts are fine, but not during conversation. Another barrier to me and teaming is that I don't enjoy being around people that are offensive, dropping the F-bomb all the time with crude jokes. No fun. I'm not a prude, and I'm prone to it myself occasionally but not with people I just met and not in public.
I'm trying to have fun, but I feel like people such as myself who enjoy running off and being victorious solo, as well as teaming, are being forced into something we would rather not do. I always though the Task force stuff was for teaming fanatics. I have yet to do a single task force, because I'm not interested. I'll do them someday I imagine, with some character or other, but it's not that important to me right now.
I really really like this game a lot, but my feeling is that I'm being forced to do things a certain way that is different from the way I've been doing things all along and having fun. I learned a long time ago that I can't force myself to be something I'm not.
Lots of you are out there that know I'm not against teaming, and join in with enthusiasm when I do, but I don't always want to team. Like with Dr. Vahz. He could stomp me flat, but I had no problem with accomplishing the mission without 'arresting' him because it was a lot of fun figuring out how to do it by myself with an empath defender. Maybe if that option was there a little more often instead of almost always having to arrest the bosses in addition to collecting the artifacts/finding a cure/confiscating the weapons. I realize that this is probably not going to happen, because it would require a lot of work, but I think it would be a healthy compromise to the tougher bosses.
I just wanted to vent I guess, and say that I appreciate that the 'squishy' problem is being looked into. 
City of Heroes Rules! The rest can drool!
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Ok, then let me ask you a question? How is this a fix to team play?
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It doesnt fix it completely, but you have to start somewhere.
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Teaming wasn't broken before, and this is not a fix to it.
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What people are actually saying "Oh boy, it's going to be so much more fun to team now that bosses can one-shot us and take forver to take down," or maybe they are saying "dang, we used to always crash when we went into missions as a team, but now that bosses can one-shot us and take forever to kill the game runs smooth as silk when we team."
[/ QUOTE ]
Until people figure out what they have to do I suspect they will find large teams very challenging indeed. For teams of 7-8 players you now need several different ATs all played properly and using good teamwork to succeed. Missions spawned for fewer then that are likely still soloable for a large number of builds even on impossible.
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You're not answering my questions here. The problem isn't that this makes it too tough for teams. the problem is that it doesn't actually provide any kind of "FIX" for teaming. The reason for that is that teaming didn't need a fix, especially not with the new difficulty sliders. All this does is BREAK soloing.
If you want to FIX teaming, then FIX TEAMING, don't BREAK SOLOING.
Infinity:
Ellen, 50 MA/Inv Scr
February Night, 14 Ice/Ice Blstr
Guardian:
SilverSwordmaid, 29 Kat/Rgn Scr
Vicious Killer, 33 Emp/Enrgy Def
Electromagness, 40 Rad/Rad Def
Sense of Humor, 50 Fire/En Tank
Virtue:
Kickfest, 50 MA/SR Scr
Freedom:
Glorious Ending, 29 EM/DA Bru
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I think all of have this wonder about someone who shall remain nameless.
You still haven't provided anything short of your own assertion that 1), 2) or 3) were said by anyone. I've been through two threads with you on this very topic, and I have repeatedly asked you to back up even one of your many claims about what Statesman or other devs have said. You have so far provided no backup short of repeating your assertions.
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Then read the thread again. I specifically quote statesman 3 times. He is very clear and specific.
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I did notice you appropriated my strawman accusation and levelled it against someone else here. Nice use of applied knowledge.)
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My arent you full of yourself. As it happens I know a strawman when I see it and I have never read a post where you accused someone else of one. Please note Im not saying it does not exist, this is a long thread and I doubt anyone has read every single post.
Someone posted this early in the thread but you might want to keep this in mind as the argument wages on:
"I think every Archetype should be able to solo. The reason doesn't matter - just 'cause you're soloing doesn't mean that you should be prevented from enjoying the game."-Statesman-