Hamidon Enhancements in the Arena

My blaster can already do 3k damage on one attack and that's only 4 HO's in it.

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On a related note: Why oh why are people who invest minimum amounts of time in the game (or just suck at it)worried about competing in the arena against those who play for 8+ hours a day and are good at what they do? Putting a limit on Hami-Os in the arena is somewhat akin to communism. Oh look at the lazy and unfortunate. They should have the same as everyone else... No thanks, I prefer capitalism. You have the same opportunity as everyone else. Take advantage of it... or don't. Your choice.

If you are level 45+ and are worried about getting spanked in the arena, stop. You played the game this long without PvP. You can still enjoy it without PvP. Winning at PvP is not eveything. PvP is not everything... just a small new feature we are getting sometime in the future. If you want an absolutely level playing field for PvP, go play Half-life 2. That's what FPSs were made for. At least there, you can scream "cheater!" when someone creams you instead of "elitist!" or "fotm!" or whatever... Just so you know, I usually take someone calling me elitist as a compliment =P

If you are level 45+ and complaining about not having any Hami-Os, go get some. Now, I only play on Justice, so have no frame of reference for other servers, but all you have to do there is keep tabs on the Hamidon global channel and show up. If you want to participate, follow directions; if you want to be a lazy mooching bum, just sit there and watch. You'll get a Hami-O either way.

If you are level 44 or less and complaining about Hami-Os at all... GO. HUNT. KILL SKULS!

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I would love to "go get some" HO's...but I can't. I've tried it and only get kicked offline. The only thing I got out of it is a story to tell about the most epic lag I've ever seen!

As for PvP...good grief...I just thought I might TRY it. But certain defeat because I can't get HO's doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun. I may have to just skip it. Too bad for me, I guess.

I don't require HO's to beat people who have already lost in their own minds.

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I'm not opposed to players being able to make informed decisions. I'm opposed to "players who have invested their time and have obtained rewards legitimately" being treated as though they did something wrong.

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I don't consider it "wrong"...because I would like to do it myself. I cannot. Apparently my connection won't handle the Hami raid. So I'm left out in the cold while others can put in the "work" to gain an advantage over me. This effectively takes away the PvP option from me. I was looking forward to it...

Ahh, someone mentioned the holy grail of Pvp Skill, Honour, and expertise.

Starfleet Command.

I need to reinstall Empires at War or Orion Pirates and serve a hot deliver of Flaming Fusion Doom to some overconfident hot-shot kid pilot...

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From this I conclude the following.

Players will opt out of getting decimated by HOs one way or the other

If the only way out is to avoid PvP then it shall be so.

If the majority of players avoid PvP. Then PvP is an effective failure.

The failure of PvP will be bad for CoH.


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You left out one very important probable 5th result, one that I haven't seen many beside myself point out.

The failure of pvp spells serious problems for the success of cov.

Why? Because again it's gonna be a pvp enviroment, and I can see four big problems already.

#1 The best laid plans of any villian can easily be wasted by heros who, say do 3k damage with only 4 HO's slotted.

(Good thing we don't know anyone who can do that right?)

#2 Villian players have no HO equal to the best of my knowledge, how will they compete against howitzer packing heroes?

#3 The old EQ raid mentality. "You don't have the HO's like the rest of us to fight this guy? Bah you'll be too wussy to help out!" *kick*

#4 The vicious raid circle of doom. "You don't have the loot from the raid to be effective? Nah You'll be to weak to help out to get the loot you need!" *kick*

Also, if that becomes the case, are we just going to "avoid" cov the same way many plan to avoid pvp if HO domination becomes the norm?

I'm sure the accountants at NCsoft and Cryptic would just looove to see that happen.

I'm glad coh has managed to stay loot free, this ongoing debate just shows how loot isn't the means to keep a game viable if the hostile anti loot response is any indication. Some call it a carrot, I call it a poison pill for the long term viability of a game that has been moldbreaking up until now.

Skills, kickass content, badge hunting, and gameplay are a means to keep it going. And even then they made it so badge accolades aren't overpowering in pve or pvp.

Personally I also plan to make a lot more then two 50's (at least one of each AT) for that very reason, the content is so great as is the gameplay.

I'll say it again, if coh becomes, loot farming, constant playing to keep up, nothing but raiding, EQ in tights knockoff, I'll take my 15 a month elsewhere. I've been down this road before, I'm not about to do it again.

That and the mean mean person within me, wonders how States would react if he suddenly found a mailbox full of PM's with the title. "Keep your uber loot out of our game!"

Cause the only thing killer about HO's is how they kill my pvp interest.

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Skills, kickass content, badge hunting, and gameplay are a means to keep it going. And even then they made it so badge accolades aren't overpowering in pve or pvp.


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Only kickbutt content WITH equally kickbutt rewards will have any effect in whether I stick with CoH.

Badges are the worst thing they ever added to CoH. I only do them for the accolades. Statesman likes to say that he doesn't want to reward boring behavior, well I wonder if he thinks I had fun hunting level 14 Clockwork bosses in my 40s to finish up an accolade. The other badges are just silly. A little graphic and a bit of text. I seriously can't see why high level people put up with it.

The skills system is not here yet so I'm not sure what that will do for the game. My sense is not much. Without items, there's really only so many rewards. Perhaps skills will lead to specialized powers and such. If so that could be cool. We'll see.

Loot like many other things can be done well or it can be done poorly. The question is whether the developers allow themselves to fall down the slippery slope of having to create ever greater loot to keep people playing. I don't think they need to, but they need to create a way to improve your character post - 50 besides HOs. Because so long as that's the only way, you can bet the old boy will be farmed to oblivion.

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My blaster can already do 3k damage on one attack and that's only 4 HO's in it.

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OK, I'll bite. And remember, this is for posterity.
What power at what level?
Against what villains at what level?
With what buffs/debuffs running on you and said villains?
Single target or cumulative AoE damage?
I await your reply.

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Badges are the worst thing they ever added to CoH. I only do them for the accolades.

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Thats funny. I don't give a [censored] about accolades but I love to get every badge that I possibly can.

lvl 49 Fungi Monster class.....

Me - 50 fire/dev - inferno.

Didn't see any rad debuffs on him at the time...and my damage total there was cumulative.
And the exact total was like 2990.7 i believe.

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I'm not opposed to players being able to make informed decisions. I'm opposed to "players who have invested their time and have obtained rewards legitimately" being treated as though they did something wrong.

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I don't consider it "wrong"...because I would like to do it myself. I cannot. Apparently my connection won't handle the Hami raid. So I'm left out in the cold while others can put in the "work" to gain an advantage over me. This effectively takes away the PvP option from me. I was looking forward to it...

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Actually, it only takes away the 45-50 portion of it, and even then it might not. (Teamwork for the win.) You'll still have 15-45 to play around with it.

quick question from a newbie, at what lvl do hami's become available?

For you to get..level 45..for you to use 43 or at least I've never seen a level 45 HO only 46's.

You can't get them yourself until you are lvl 45. But, if someone u know gets some lvl 45 HO's, they can pass them off to you if they so wish it. U could use them if u were a lvl 42.

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Just to clarify, this means that the official stance is that from levels 45-50, COH changes from being a loot-free game, to being a loot-based game. I'm not sure why the devs want this, but it's their game. Shame, some of us liked COH because it wasn't like other mmos.

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That’s it in spades, essentially after all things are said and done the developers feel that a good way to keep people paying for CoH after they tap out the content is to keep on upping the bar for relative toon power. Not a bad thing in a PvE world, but in PvP it tends to burn the possibility of a level playing field to ashes. Once again the logic of getting people to keep paying money in a PvE world thrusts itself into the heart of PvP play, empowering the dedicated individual at the expense of the community.

Also how do you know there wont be some kind of option that disables hammie-os like the no travel power option, it could be your choice. Since you have to agree to fight someone you can set the terms, if you dont like them dont fight.

Maybe they will add something where if you have a hammie o and you select this option it will just drop it down to the equivelant of a normal SO for only one benefit, or possibly lower the percent for the dual/triple ones so that the 2/3 items it enhances equal that in total of a normal SO

I think that would make it pretty good, personally I will play against people with hammie os if I have them or not on my toon but I can see why others wouldnt want to.

From past experience the dev's seem pretty good with this stuff so im sure they thought of something (or atleast hope)

Kid "Hey, want to come play baseball with us?"
New Kid "Sure, can I bring my bat, its twice the size of yours".
Kid "No, sorry, we will have to cut your bat in half."
New Kid "OK, I will go play with someone else then."

Nobody loses, nobody wins, nobody plays. Well, they probably do play, except most of the time with half a team on two differant fields...

...and thats only in player organised and managed matches... what of a zone battle with the rules set by CoH alone? A Hamham zone on and a Hamham zone off?

"Hammies are killers in the Arena" speaketh the powers that be. I can appreciate that enthusiasm IF it were PvE, but in PvP it's two sided, one to be the killer and one to be the killed.

Well I just dont see why the people that have gone out and killed hammi should not have the benefit of using these enhancements, i got a few on one of my toons yet hes not even the one i plan on using for pvp and i think they should be uber in pvp. my opinion, i know others will disagree

Great, grand, let them be "teh uberz" then. But give us a way to tell who is "teh uberz" so we can steer far and claer from them.

The little baseball scenerio above should be more like.

MLB Player/Hamidon user- Hey kid wanna play?
T-ball player/non hamidon user- Um... Your alot better than I am
MLB PLayer- Nonsense, you can beat me if you use good tactics! *throws a pitch over the plate at 103mph*
T-ball player- *tries to bunt and thus his wrists are shattered*
MLB Player- HAHAHA! NOOB!

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I'm not opposed to players being able to make informed decisions. I'm opposed to "players who have invested their time and have obtained rewards legitimately" being treated as though they did something wrong.

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I don't consider it "wrong"...because I would like to do it myself. I cannot. Apparently my connection won't handle the Hami raid. So I'm left out in the cold while others can put in the "work" to gain an advantage over me. This effectively takes away the PvP option from me. I was looking forward to it...

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Actually, it only takes away the 45-50 portion of it, and even then it might not. (Teamwork for the win.) You'll still have 15-45 to play around with it.

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They are availible in level 45s, and connection or not can be gotten. On the new system anyone on a team that does damage, gets one. If you have friends or SG mates that go to raids, simply ask to come with them, Explain your situation, i know for my end if a SG member or in game friend had the same problem i would have no issue letting them team, and i guess leech a hamiO for there time. But basicly you dont have to be in the thick of it. Infact depending on your build a defender or something could operate outside of the mass, teleporting fallen team mates, and rezing etc. But just being on the team will get you a HamiO

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Oh, you mean like in SWG? I thought you said they were unsuccessful in PvP.

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Ok seriously, if you actual think that SWG had anything at all resembling a healthy PvP system or experience then the differance in our opinions are simply too vast to conquer.

If you were refering to base raids in SWG then I say that even what is clearly a good idea can be mangled by a horribly executed PvP system. I was in fact refering to third party accounts of Raids systems in other MMORPGs such as Lineage, or possibly DAoC.

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They are availible in level 45s, and connection or not can be gotten. On the new system anyone on a team that does damage, gets one. If you have friends or SG mates that go to raids, simply ask to come with them, Explain your situation, i know for my end if a SG member or in game friend had the same problem i would have no issue letting them team, and i guess leech a hamiO for there time. But basicly you dont have to be in the thick of it. Infact depending on your build a defender or something could operate outside of the mass, teleporting fallen team mates, and rezing etc. But just being on the team will get you a HamiO

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Ok I just want to explain the reality of this situation. I am not try to be adversarial here just giving the facts on a small scale and extrapolating to a larger one. Here is my expereince with the Hamidon.

After I became aware of the seriouness HOs I would inform every member of my SG, every friend on my friendslist and even ran down the level 40+ list by individual AT and invited every person I knew on.

The NEARLY universal response I recieved was either "been there done that" or "Yeah I get around to that sometime." About three out of I would say 50ish were interested.

So I then politely asked most of these people if they were interested in PvP and if so did they realise how important HOs were to PvP.

Nearly every person was interested in PvP, as in I literally know only one lvl 40+ player who does not have at least a passing interest in PvP.
They were for the most part at least vaguely aware of HOs.
None of them were interested.

So I politely and carefully as possible, talked up the raid, PvP and pushed the "power of HOs " Trying to make it as clear as I could that I thought HOs would be very important and to really play uber tier PvP you would need some.

Yup that sucks, not interested was the answer I got.
For the most part they were pretty clear, no raiding for no reason. They are will to wait and see how much PvP hindges on raiding and though it was left unsaid I got the impression that if HOs were vital they they would look elsewhere for fun.
Not including the people I met at the raids I think I have 2 friends that are willing to raid.

I am concerned for the health of PvP so to several of these people I offered to let them team with me and I would fight the hamidon and they could afk, fight monsters or whatever so they would get the enhancements. Now I hate leeching, ALOT, however this is a greater good sorta situation so I was willing to offer. The biggest problem with making the offer is phrase it the least insulting fashion possible. How does one say to another player hey come into this zone I'll do the all work so you can play in PvP and not sound condeceding?

Everyone of them was very nearly insulted by the suggestion.

So the moral of this story is that no matter how easy or important something is most players will not parcitpate in it if the do not like it, and ALOT of people do not like the Hamidon.

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This, however, does not occur when fighting within your "weight" class. If you're in your weight class, Hamidon Enhancements are killer.

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So, then, the game really does end up boiling down to nothing but loot farming.

Pity.

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Oh, you mean like in SWG? I thought you said they were unsuccessful in PvP.

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Ok seriously, if you actual think that SWG had anything at all resembling a healthy PvP system or experience then the differance in our opinions are simply too vast to conquer.

If you were refering to base raids in SWG then I say that even what is clearly a good idea can be mangled by a horribly executed PvP system. I was in fact refering to third party accounts of Raids systems in other MMORPGs such as Lineage, or possibly DAoC.

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Knew you'd bite eventually, I threw that one in to piss you off a bit. I've never even played SWG... other than 7 day demo (in only a week, I found out why I'd only heard good things about this from 2 people total... everyone else wasn't so lost in their SW-junkie-ism [that's a word, I swear] that they couldn't identify crap with the SW name as crap)

I'm just ribbing you on that... I know a good base raid system can be way cool. In fact I'm looking forward to having it in game when CoV comes out.

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So finally after scores of pages we at long last come full circle back to my original, my final, my virtually unassailable arguement.

Highlighted for effect.
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The whole point is to increase Arena participation by increasing the number of options. I want you to have the choice of facing me with or without your loot. Simple. If you don't want to fight me without your loot, then *walk away*.


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This is the point they miss - one way or another the no-HO heroes will avoid the full-HO heroes. Either by using an Option (if added) or by limiting/skipping PvP (if an option isn't added).


Thats it.
Thats the one everyone seems so desperate to duck and avoid.
Thats the one that all the "I wannas" in the world have to do deal with.

You can argue all the other stuff that you want. How much work, how much skill whatever turns your crank. It does not matter at all.

The only thing that matters is what the majority of people will do and how much Cryptic cares.

I submit that the HOs will be a massive advantage in PvP.
I submit that most people will not farm Hamidon under any circumstances.
I also submit that most people will not abide excessively loosing to any one reason.
Finally I submit that it is in the best interest, of CoH, Cryptic, and the players to have a healthy heavily used PvP system.

From this I conclude the following.[*] Players will opt out of getting decimated by HOs one way or the other[*] If the only way out is to avoid PvP then it shall be so.[*] If the majority of players avoid PvP. Then PvP is an effective failure.[*] The failure of PvP will be bad for CoH.

I honestly believe that most players will not farm the Hamidon and nothing will convice them to do so. I also believe that the success of PvP, and perhaps a large part of CoH, will depend on enticing as many people as possible into parcipating. People will not play PvP only to loose so Hamidon enchancers are not just a killer in PvP but will be a killer TO PvP.

I strongly suspect that CoH stands on the backs of a dedicated casual base and pushing back skills to issue 5 left a bad taste in their mouths, now to strike them in the face with issue 4 maybe more than many of them can bare.

My sole stake in this disccusion is to illuminate for Statesman and the Devs what I think is a very serious issue and one I sincerely believe will prove to be a problem. It is my hope the Devs will make an informed choice in this matter and not simple choose the expiedent and potentially detremental choice of satifying the "hardcore players" at the expense of the majority.

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Some people bought this game for PvP, some people are waiting to see how PvP does before they buy CoV. My SG and I have teamed with people with HOs, they make a very noticeable difference, just one does. Another thread has a guy bragging that he only needs 4 HOs to cap his IH. Does anyone without HOs have IH capped? Does this mean that he can respec his toon and move those slots to something else to slot more HOs in? No kidding.....ya, still sounds fair to me. Flame on!