Not once, not twice, but three times...
By
008Zulu,
Posted on: 2006-01-10 16:26 in Developers' Corner
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With so much of the insanity that explodes across these boards everytime the developers make a change or a mistake is made, it's not suprising they only talked about the here and the now with what the players knew. Why discuss changes that might not be needed and therefore not be released? In the end they decided they were needed after all and implemented them. It doesn't seem to matter how they handle things though, there turns out to be a spectacle regardless. They tried to play it cautiously and it blew up in their face anyway. Seems to be no matter what they do they lose.
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This is doublespeak of Orwellian magnitude. The boards exploded in a way NEVER SEEN BEFORE over ED. This was because of what had been done, how it had been done, and because the LAST nerf was sold specifically on the idea that something like this would NEVER be done, hence slotting could compensate for base-value reductions to a certain extent.
To claim that the company failed to tell us because we might not like it, and so it was better to just lie to us, mislead us, and then implement it in a backdoor fashion calling it "diversification" and hiding it behind an NDA SO THAT IT WOULDN'T MAKE US AS ANGRY OR TO AVOID PLAYER BACKLASH is just ridiculous.
Players get mad when changes are made that they don't like. Players get more angry when changes are made that they don't like with no warning and little testing. They get even MORE angry when all the testing they HAVE done, and past complaints they have made, result in MORE changes in the SAME direction with NO warning and LITTLE testing. To then tell them "it's to encourage you to slot more effectively", exactly how the LAST nerf was essentially explained away, is just BEGGING for a volcanic eruption.
First came the earthquake, THEN came the Tsunami.
Jesus people, why can't we just all get along, I mean all these changes have NEVER affected my gaming in any way, I've never had any problems with it and I've been playing since it went live, I own both games and I love them both, why waste all this energy in flaming the devs for the hours of work they put into their work, think about it; if you spent half as much time playing the game as you do flaming the devs you could really improve on your playstyle and perhaps open your minds to other ways of playing the game than to have the BEST toon....
"Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles but misguided men."
* Martin Luther King *
Because every single person on earth is utterly incapable of blaming themselves for making thier life harder, so the moment someone else definably does something causing the saame effect, they get verbally beaten. Ever wonderd why we complain so much? Simple. And when something that makes many people's lives more difficult, regardless of how incredibly insignificant and unimportant it was, it creates a seething melange of hatred that feeds off itself and simply never dies. If ED made one person, a few people, or even a small minority of people feel from their perspective that they had been negaitvcely affected nothing would have happened. But what we have here is that critical mass being reached and surpassed. All I really have to say on ED is it happened, thed developers know you don't like it, and there's nothing more you can do about it that will achieve any positive results.
Think about it this way. For each hyperbolic rage-infused message they have to read, they lose time that could be spent making the game you enjoy better. When this colossal quantity of people whose anger is completely and utterly disproportional to the actual events sends mails cinstantly as though it achieves something, a great deal of time is eaten up. This would be excusable in cases where they do not know of the problem and it alerts them to the need to fix it, but in this case a develop[er would have to be completely oblivious to the world outside his head, an attribute that isn't exactly positive on a job application.
And also, there will be a reason they've done this and refused to change it. If you do something that unexpectedly produces a bad reaction you change it back, unless the consequences of changing it back are more severe than those of leaving it. If they were goujng to undo ED they would have done it by now. They will no at any foreseeqable point in the future, and no amount of pointless swearing and/or ranting will alter that. Hell, if it matters to you to that extent, organise a mass boycott and get soimething actually done about it rather than waste developers time to no effect.
Gosh, you're right. Why didn't I ever think of it that way?? Oh my God, I could've been making the game better, creating new code, even making the WORLD better!! What on EARTH have I been thinking, posting my trivial thoughts out here during server down time or slow times at work??! I mean, it's not as if this forum is here just so a bunch of paying customers can post their concerns, thoughts, creative impulses, constructive criticisms and just occasionally vent about the very game they love and are paying for!!!
No, wait a minute....I'm right, and you're being a self-righteous prig about what people SHOULDN'T be wasting their time doing, basically calling them fools, while following in their very footsteps. Well, let me ask you then: Who is more foolish, the fool, or the fool who follows him?
WE are actually sending constant petitions, by way of these very e-mails explaining what we would like changed and what left alone about the game we love. Sometimes, that involves criticism. Sometimes, praise.
Which brings me to: Nice job again on the EB/AV, Stealth changes, devs...and the costume options, what's good for the goose and all that.
But YOU? What are YOU doing? Why, you're actually participating in the very thing you classify YOURSELF as a waste of time, and do so with wild predictions (If it hasn't changed yet, it won't, no sir, I foresee that in my Tarot cards, nope, that's the future all right).
Personally, I'd say if you have an argument, make it, if you've made your argument, move on if you think it's a waste of time. But don't insult those who DON'T think it's a waste of time to opine on what they like, and would like to see next, in a thread created for that very purpose, and then presume to act as though you are somehow "above" alll of the rest of us poor peons.
I'm not buying it. And I doubt anyone else is, either.
There was a time when someone posted that if they hadn't made AV changes yet, thery weren't going to. A couple days later, this thread was started by statesman. AV changes were announced. Stealth changes were pulled back. If people don't like ED, they should be posting about it. it may never change, it may change in a week, month, or a year.
In short, time spent trying to get somethig done is only time wasted if you give up before it happens, or the one in charge flat out tells you it's never going to happen.
I'm not a child. I can play with dead things if I want to.
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Then we repeal the hated stealth nerf. The reason why: many well reasoned posts. It's that simple. You guys pointed out the problems.
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Thank you thank you thank you. This made missioning solo or in pairs very difficult for my scrapper, who is the main (only!) active scrapper in my sg.
Holy G Molly..I viewed someones comments but somehow it came across like this:
"Why are you picking on the Devs.....My world is all Gravy, Doh I see don't see what the problem is. Maybe it's not them , maybe it's you...maybe your playing style needs improvement and you should expand your way of viewing things."
LOLOLOLOL.....(you have to be Bush fan) Are you kidding me!! I like your opinion it was a very eloquent slap in the face.
Since when is the expression one's opinion a waste of time. Imagine the following, Picture the Dev's getting on here and saying just one time that they don't care about the opinions the customer, this is it and if you don't like it, stuff it. I can bet big money that this game will end up in the graveyard, like so many other games where the Dev didn't pay attention. Of Course with exception of those with opinions like "Mr. It's all Gravy" still playing. I agree with Scionosatan, some changes are just a plain pain in the ______. Not all the changes are good, some are great, and It's our right to express our displeasure. I'm pretty sure that the Devs have thick skins, and they can handle a few lumps. They look to us to develope their game in part, so that we can make it our game. All Ego's side, We are the ones that make the game valueable ....not the Devs (Okay you get Good doobie points for making the game, thumbs up 
). Without us this game would be a lost investment, and heads would roll. I know spin when I hear it, cuz I didn't Vote for Chaney and So I don't agree with all the reasoning behind some of the changes (not going to argue specifics just results).
I personally would have prefered a tweaking to my 50 SS/Invuln, instead of the plan Old hack butcher shop job done to it. It's just my opinion and as long as I'm paying for the game, You can bet your Sweet Rosie Buttock cheeks that I'm going to express my displeasure until they redeem the Tank that I spent 1100+ hours making(with 5% PL). If not, that would be another kick in the pants making my effort a waste of time. Imagine that! 
"If we could all get along...Rodney King wouldn't have received that oh so special Stomping" 
"New perceptives can be found but first pull your head out of the Devs (free blank fill in) _______"
"I'm all about the Hugs and Cuddles baby!"
Any word when this is going live?
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There was no 'might be' about it.
Sure there was but it happened and that's all that matters.
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All playtests, QA checks, difficulty adjustments and balances have been done with Enhancement Diversification in mind since March 2005.
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It was planned and implemented (ED) and led to a huge explosion here on the boards
The boards just want to explode. It is their purpose. It is so on any internet gaming forum.
My how history gets a bit twisted with the passage of time.
Statesman himself said that ED wasn't a done deal at the time of I5. Your quote doesn't actually disprove this fact. It does prove that they've had the system in place for quite some time and could have possibly pushed it out much earlier if they saw it as needed immediately.
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Here's the issue.
All developer playtests, QA checks, difficulty adjustments and balances have been done with Enhancement Diversification in mind since 2005.
But all player testing, player feedback, player comments prior to the announcement of ED was done without Enhancement Diversification. There had been NOTHING to suggest that it was going to be changed. And many of the complaints for players (particularly in terms of recharge times) were answered by rednames pointing out the effect of the change with permahasten and six slotting.
ED may not have been a "done deal" but if we are to trust the first statement it was pretty clearly something they were considering. They knew we were evaluating I4 and I5 without ED in mind.
Had it been presented as something to consider during testing, as something they are testing internally and may happen, at the very least the feedback would have been different.
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With so much of the insanity that explodes across these boards everytime the developers make a change or a mistake is made, it's not suprising they only talked about the here and the now with what the players knew. Why discuss changes that might not be needed and therefore not be released? In the end they decided they were needed after all and implemented them. It doesn't seem to matter how they handle things though, there turns out to be a spectacle regardless. They tried to play it cautiously and it blew up in their face anyway. Seems to be no matter what they do they lose.
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Yeah play it cautious and sneak it in. When was it offically anounce to the COH crowd and why.
It wasnt till the COV beta noticed and brought it over and then we had what a week to test it.
I think we would have been better off with I6 ED than most of I5 to get the desired effects they wanted but why the heack not nerf everything and let the Dev's sort it out later.
ED with the AOE restrictions and the Aggro limits would have reduced the tankers a lot. Plus hitting stamina and hasten.
Pinnacle
Arch light L50 INV/SS
Psiberia L50 Kin/Psi
Screaming Mentallica L50 Sonic/MM
Infinity
Arc Voltinator L50 SS/Elec
Mind Fire Kinesis L50 Fire/Kin
Flaming Screamer L50 Fire/Sonic
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With so much of the insanity that explodes across these boards everytime the developers make a change or a mistake is made, it's not suprising they only talked about the here and the now with what the players knew. Why discuss changes that might not be needed and therefore not be released? In the end they decided they were needed after all and implemented them. It doesn't seem to matter how they handle things though, there turns out to be a spectacle regardless. They tried to play it cautiously and it blew up in their face anyway. Seems to be no matter what they do they lose.
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Why?
(1) Those who spent hours testing I4 and I5, carefully seeing what the problems were, where things got cut too far, etc. wouldn't feel slapped in the face as they are told "Guess what? What you were testing wasn't really what we were looking at."
(2) Some of the changes like recharge rates that were hard to swallow even without ED could have been argued for what they did to the real game going forward
(3) There would have been more than a couple weeks of testing the concept of ED and would have been more time to address things like powers that only take one type of enhancement (by, say, adding extra effects) or whose secondary effects are so minimal it's not worth slotting (by, say, making knockback or disorient enhancements increase the chance of the effect instead of "should this effect happen once per blue moon it happens longer")
(4) It would have been honest. We wouldn't have been told, for example, that Instant Healing can be active almost half the time with six-slotted recharge and permahasten.
As I've said elsewhere, I approve of ED conceptually. But ED on top of the nerfs in I4 and I5 make harsh nerfs even worse, and ED needs some tweaking to actually give us a reason to diversify instead of just punishing us for using the only effective enhancements.
With this stealth issue, I think it's clear that as players from our perspective, we see things that the devs don't see from their perspective. Same with the AV to elite boss for small teams (not just solo). It's there game, they have to make the tough decisions. But by talking about things with us, we can provide them with another perspective that sometimes can help them make better ones.
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Well said congrats nice to see a cool clear head hear rather than the Fanboyz and anti Fanboyz rantings and flames.
Pinnacle
Arch light L50 INV/SS
Psiberia L50 Kin/Psi
Screaming Mentallica L50 Sonic/MM
Infinity
Arc Voltinator L50 SS/Elec
Mind Fire Kinesis L50 Fire/Kin
Flaming Screamer L50 Fire/Sonic
These changes are all part of a series of changes that are yet incomplete. It's like tasting a meal before it's finished cooking. Some meals you can sample and they will taste good right away. Others require for all the steps involved to be completed before the meal can truly be appreciated. This is one of those "meals." And later on of course there will be small tweaks, like adding a little more salt or pepper to adjust the flavor of the food as needed. A good example of a meal such as this would be lasagna. So for now I think we should all just sit back and enjoy the aroma from the kitchen and then we can enjoy the meal when it's ready.
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With so much of the insanity that explodes across these boards everytime the developers make a change or a mistake is made, it's not suprising they only talked about the here and the now with what the players knew. Why discuss changes that might not be needed and therefore not be released? In the end they decided they were needed after all and implemented them. It doesn't seem to matter how they handle things though, there turns out to be a spectacle regardless. They tried to play it cautiously and it blew up in their face anyway. Seems to be no matter what they do they lose.
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This is doublespeak of Orwellian magnitude. The boards exploded in a way NEVER SEEN BEFORE over ED. This was because of what had been done, how it had been done, and because the LAST nerf was sold specifically on the idea that something like this would NEVER be done, hence slotting could compensate for base-value reductions to a certain extent.
To claim that the company failed to tell us because we might not like it, and so it was better to just lie to us, mislead us, and then implement it in a backdoor fashion calling it "diversification" and hiding it behind an NDA SO THAT IT WOULDN'T MAKE US AS ANGRY OR TO AVOID PLAYER BACKLASH is just ridiculous.
Players get mad when changes are made that they don't like. Players get more angry when changes are made that they don't like with no warning and little testing. They get even MORE angry when all the testing they HAVE done, and past complaints they have made, result in MORE changes in the SAME direction with NO warning and LITTLE testing. To then tell them "it's to encourage you to slot more effectively", exactly how the LAST nerf was essentially explained away, is just BEGGING for a volcanic eruption.
First came the earthquake, THEN came the Tsunami.
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If this is the case, then the developers would now know better to inform players beforehand. Then again, what about all those players that left before even trying the changes? Not telling people would prevent these losses. Just a thought.
Sorry but i have to do this.
Yeah its Lasagna but they took out the Meat and replaced it with Spinach and Kale.
Pinnacle
Arch light L50 INV/SS
Psiberia L50 Kin/Psi
Screaming Mentallica L50 Sonic/MM
Infinity
Arc Voltinator L50 SS/Elec
Mind Fire Kinesis L50 Fire/Kin
Flaming Screamer L50 Fire/Sonic
^lol
By the way love the avatar, I have always liked Rogue
I liked stealth the way it used to work. I had hoped this meant they were going to put stealth BACK like that. That was my first reaction to Statesman's statement.
I do not stealth my glowies, and that play style never really appealed to me. I clear 99% of all my missions, and usually the ones I dont want to clear are the "kill all" missions, so logically it makes no difference if you clear or not, the mission forces you to do so. But that's beside the point.
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I wasn't the one who asked the question. I was only responding to your comment that "most people said leave it alone." That's it.
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Then I apologize for the first part of my statement then. I do believe that the Devs sometimes need to take the attitude that if its not broke dont fix it. Improve Yes!
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Meh, no apologies needed. Forums sometimes R teh confuzzling.
Anyways, in retrospect, it is no surprise that this will get looked at. As mentioned somewhere else in this thread, all it takes is one Glowy mission per level and someone could farm that mission for the level.
Combine that with the well-displayed tendancy of Cryptic Devs to come down hard on anything resembling low(no) risk/High Reward and it becomes evident.
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Ok, I'm only up to page 37 or so, so if someone else pointed this out, I appologize.
Now, isn't there a mission somewhere in the 40-50 COH content that is a 10 minute timed click the glowy mission? The proposed changes everyone has come up with will make this mission uncompletable as it stands.
I read a bug thread on the mission, I recall quite clearly people stating it was not a bug and the mission had to be stealthed.
Trying to dismiss my viewpoint by calling me a fanboi/fanboyz (along with anyone else who disagrees with your viewpoint)? Isn't that just being plain lazy? Meh, then again I spend so much time playing, it's not like I've spent the time to sift through the forums to grab all the quotes to back up all my insights. 
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If this is the case, then the developers would now know better to inform players beforehand. Then again, what about all those players that left before even trying the changes? Not telling people would prevent these losses. Just a thought.
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That's like saying, "Well, when we wait till the ships half-sunk to launch the life boats, we lose 100 people to drowning. If we wait till it's AT the waterline, we won't lose so many." The proper answer is: When you are making a huge change to the live servers, one you've had planned and had lots and lots of time to "internally test", give the Players time to hammer on it for a while on test, do datamining, get feedback, consider suggestions, poll your users via e-mail, really shake it out. Then, AFTER people have seen what it will really DO to the game, do an analysis of your results, and discuss whether or not this is something you REALLY need to do, and if any of the PREVIOUS nerfs are maybe overkill, looking at the numbrs and reactions you've gotten.
In other words: Be honest and forthright, and don't just PRETEND you care what the players think, actually take your users' requirements into account when doing your software design.
no, you can't please all the people all the time. But if you're only pleasing a tiny minority who wouldn't say "[censored]" if they had a mouthful, you really need to re-examine your idea.
For that matter, when a thread about coming anti-nerfs comes along, and it gets hijacked into a replacement for the Consolidated ED thread MONTHS later, maybe you should STILL consider a slight redesign.
Because obviously, not everyone unhappy with it has left already.
Please tell me since WHEN did a single 8 man spawn - half th map? :P
Hyperbole aside, it would represent a significant portion of a single-player map.
BUZZ Wrong, see i was in CoV Beta...ED was added in th e weak before it went live...it was /never/ intergrated with it
I was there too. It was turned on, maybe, in one of the later patches -- or maybe just the mouse-overs with the exact percentages was turned on, I don't remember now if there ever was a version of CoV without ED. (Positron was using ED-compliant slotting on his Mastermind powers even before the ED announcement.) In any case, the devs made it clear at the time that CoV had been designed with ED in mind. That means rolling back ED requires redesigning CoV at the least -- not gonna happen.
As for the several pages of blatherscite about ED -- it doesn't matter if the devs BSed us about its implementation (they did) or whether or not it was necessary (it wasn't). What matters is that it is here to stay, and people have to get over it or get out. They're not changing it back. They can't.
if by bad old days you mean when the server was chock full of people and teams were easy to find and the game was really fun to play- I say bring me back the "bad old days"
The servers are chock full of people, and teams are so easy to find that many of us find the sudden intrustion of the invite box without so much as a "hello" first quite annoying.
Essentially incorrect. MMORPGs can be a social activity but how fast you level and how fast I level are not related.
Yes, they are related. For one, how fast you level is how fast I can level, or how fast anyone can level, if he chooses to use the build and tactics you are using. Thus, we can't have a godmode class on the grounds that you being able to utterly destroy everything in sight doesn't affect anyone else -- because they can do it to, and history shows that they will. Then they will get bored and quit.
Secondly, how fast you can level affects that grouping dynamic you were complaining about above. If people using the latest powergaming method are rocketing into their 40s and everyone playing the game as intended is still slogging through the 20s, you will essentially end up with two separate communities. As powergaming becomes more popular, the regular gamers become more and more marginalized -- encouraging them to roll up FOTM builds themselves.
Wether folks PL, cheat, exploit, run macros, or hire folks to level their toon, has absolutely no effect on the way you have to play your game.
This is technically correct but empircally false, as history has shown.
Either the PC's are balanced hero and villain, or they're not. If they ARE balanced, then rolling ED back won't alter that balance, just the way people can slot, and how slotting choices affect balance.
First off, PvP balance isn't what's at stake. PvE balance is. If ED were rolled back without a massive redesign of CoV, villain ATs would be insanely overpowered with respect to the environment.
Second off, it's just plain wrong that rolling back ED won't affect PvP balance. Removing ED will not "multiply both sides by a constant" -- it will multiply both sides by a variety of wildly different numbers in different circumstances. It would effectively randomize PvP balance.
Oh, and the element of surprise, and the concept of the pre-emptive strike, are well-documented and effective battle strategies in the real world of military doctrine.
Which has little or nothing to do with how a game works, unless that game is a military simulation, which CoX most assuredly is not.
This is doublespeak of Orwellian magnitude. The boards exploded in a way NEVER SEEN BEFORE over ED.
Please, they explode in a way never seen before about everything. They just exploded about knockback.
Current Blog Post: "Why I am an Atheist..."
"And I say now these kittens, they do not get trained/As we did in the days when Victoria reigned!" -- T. S. Eliot, "Gus, the Theatre Cat"
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Sorry but i have to do this.
Yeah its Lasagna but they took out the Meat and replaced it with Spinach and Kale.
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So what you're saying is that now the game tastes better *and* is better for you?
I guess it really is a matter of perspective.
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The proper answer is: When you are making a huge change to the live servers, one you've had planned and had lots and lots of time to "internally test", give the Players time to hammer on it for a while on test, do datamining, get feedback, consider suggestions, poll your users via e-mail, really shake it out. Then, AFTER people have seen what it will really DO to the game, do an analysis of your results, and discuss whether or not this is something you REALLY need to do, and if any of the PREVIOUS nerfs are maybe overkill, looking at the numbrs and reactions you've gotten.
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And four years later when your first patch goes live... well, at least you'll still be around to see your absolutely perfected, balanced, analyzed code that no-one can find fault with.
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In other words: Be honest and forthright, and don't just PRETEND you care what the players think, actually take your users' requirements into account when doing your software design.
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Of course, when you're running and MMP game, the *only* reliable way to gauge your users' requirements short of doing a full playerbase survey, is to trust the instincts of your Lead Designer.
Doing stuff just because it's suggested by the hardcore fans/foes that bother to find the message board is definitely not a winner.
Complain all you want, but the Devs are only going to do what is best for the business of the game, and they could drive off every single person on these boards and just barely notice the hit.
Give them suggestions that improve their bottom line (and avoid unsupportable statements like "it's obvious people will like this because look at it's support on the forums!") and you'll be listened to *very* closely.
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And four years later when your first patch goes live... well, at least you'll still be around to see your absolutely perfected, balanced, analyzed code that no-one can find fault with.
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If the only reason you're adding a patch is to add global nerfs or completley redesign your powersets, you've got bigger problems than how long it'll take you.
Go ahead and add new maps. New content. New powersets. The context of the comment you quoted was in reference to a global nerf. Taken in that context, it doesn't exactly follow that it'll take you four years to come up with patches holding new content and the like.
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Of course, when you're running and MMP game, the *only* reliable way to gauge your users' requirements short of doing a full playerbase survey, is to trust the instincts of your Lead Designer.
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Not entirely true. There are other ways. And sending out a mass e-mail survey to people about a proposed major change isn't really that tough. Include checkboxes and an auto tally bit of software back at your end, and you could probably poll the majority, if not the entirety, of the playerbase in relatively short order. Or you could datamine. Or you could check your attrition numbers, etc, etc...
But I get your point. It'll never be perfect. Still, there's a BIIIIG difference between four years for "perfectly designed" product and 2 weeks for a hugely unpopular nerf.
Just saying. There might be some middle ground in there, somewhere.
Interestingly, with every scrapper, blaster, and defender I've ever made, I'm still finding the game a blast (pardon the pun). Hell, I've never even reslotted from pre I5 (when I took a 14mo break).
I find, in fact, some of the changes made in the interim, quite fun, interesting, and altogether more appealing. This is, of course, my opinion, such as it is.
All I can say is that this is the reverse effect, obviously, of the boiling frog analogy. In this case, it seems that those who didn't take a break are being far more juvenile and "drama queen"-esque over the changes over the course of the past year-ish than those of us who disappeared during that period of time and came back.
I find the game holds my attention far more than it ever did. I'm finally finding missions more than just a periodic challenge during AV missions. I'm finding the game, on the whole, far more appealing in nearly every aspect than pre I5, between cosmetic, content, and mechanics changes.
I'm actually finding myself creating (just to toy with, for now) more diverse builds. For example, as a regen scrapper, it was common for just about everyone... Fast Healing (3 heal slots), Integration (3 endredux/3 heal slots), IH (2 end redux/4 heal slots), DP, Swift or Hurdle, Health, Stamina, Hasten, and the rest just season to taste. Even I, a non power-gamer...a non min/maxer...knew this basic tennet of building a regen scrapper.
What do I do now? Oh, hell, I don't even run IH, since I forget to turn it on most times now that it's not a toggle, my current MA/Regen scrapper still doesn't have IH. I've 6-slotted QR, FH, Health, and Stamina, 3 slotted Integration for EndRedux, and I'm floating with almost 4 fully bought Power Pools.
There's more room for experimentation to find other combinations that work for how I like to play... Solo and taking on really...REALLY...absolutely stupid odds, such as 3 red Lt's and a Purple Boss in a single spawn...solo... I may not be the fastest leveller, but I'll be damned if I can't find a fun way to do it.
I've not found any crippling changes for my blasters or scrappers, and my Dark?Dark Defender is even more fun now that things are a real challenge. Hell, before I4, I soloed Baphomet with him in his non-outlevelled mission. That wa a fun 20 min fight. Frankly, I'm glad that isn't quite doable now.
Someone mentioned about the comic superheroes going at Arch-Villains solo. I'd like to beg to differ. Batman doesn't usually go it alone. Justice League takes on the Super-Villains. Let's not forget that rarely do the X-Men or Fantastic 4 go it alone. These are examples of what CoH is trying to represent, far moreso than the Superman type superhero. They face dastardly bosses alone, many times, but the biggies they often help each other to overcome. This is not to say that Wolverine, Batman, or Johnny don't occassionally go it alone, but usually have problems with minor "main" villains by themselves. Minions, they usually [BAM!] don't have [BAP!] any trouble dispatching [POW!] en masse. Often, as well, they deal with the bigger villains (with some problems) alone. But the Arch-Villains, or Super-Villains... These are the times we see the great teaming, through movies, cartoons, and comics hailing back to the "good ol' days".
There's no shame in admitting you need help. There is only shame in refusing to recognize when you need help.
Again, after all that's said and done, I find the changes have ultimately brought more diversity to feasibility of builds, and more variety of play. I notice that most of the people who are ranting ad nauseum about the changes are ones who refuse to adapt.
Darwin is probably smiling that, even in a video game, his precepts live (those who cannot adapt, die...though I'd add "wailing like banshees all the way down" 
)
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Again, after all that's said and done, I find the changes have ultimately brought more diversity to feasibility of builds, and more variety of play. I notice that most of the people who are ranting ad nauseum about the changes are ones who refuse to adapt.
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1) ED added no new options to the game. This is a fallacy. It FORCES people to slot in an even MORE specific way in order to reach max effectiveness now, but that was by taking AWAY something, not adding anything.
2) As to your repeated characterization of those unhappy with the repeated nerfs which you, having been gone for 14 months, weren't here for as "whiners" and those who "fail to adapt": it's not whining to express displeasure at a change in a product with which you are now less-satisfied, nor to repeatedly defend your assertion that it shouldn't have been changed. See "New Coke" for an example of why. And since I am one of the most vocal proponents of a partial rollback of the combined I5/ED nerfs, let me assure you: I have adapted. I have min-maxed my character through ED-compliant slotting, and I solo on relentless on every character I have over lvl 20 in both CoH (Invincible, of course) and CoV.
So, I guess what I'm saying is: you seem to be the one who's whining about people who complain, and "adapting" to the nerfs doesn't alter the fact that they ARE nerfs. Seeing as how you haven't played in over a year, it IS just possible that you're experiencing the fun of the game as if you had never played before, while those of us who stuck around have DEFINITELY noticed the difference.
Not everyone is equally against it. But ALMOST everyone agrees that SOMETHING has to be done for SOME of the classes that were hit hardest by these double-strength global nerfs.
If you don't LIKE this activity,, then feel free to move on to another thread. But don't come in here insulting the posters by denigrating their opinion en masse and categorizing us all as "whiners" and "drama-queens".
It just marks you as a closed-minded, self-obsessed....alright, I'm going to stop there.
Have a good one.
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Again, after all that's said and done, I find the changes have ultimately brought more diversity to feasibility of builds, and more variety of play. I notice that most of the people who are ranting ad nauseum about the changes are ones who refuse to adapt.
[/ QUOTE ]
1) ED added no new options to the game. This is a fallacy. It FORCES people to slot in an even MORE specific way in order to reach max effectiveness now, but that was by taking AWAY something, not adding anything.
2) As to your repeated characterization of those unhappy with the repeated nerfs which you, having been gone for 14 months, weren't here for as "whiners" and those who "fail to adapt": it's not whining to express displeasure at a change in a product with which you are now less-satisfied, nor to repeatedly defend your assertion that it shouldn't have been changed. See "New Coke" for an example of why. And since I am one of the most vocal proponents of a partial rollback of the combined I5/ED nerfs, let me assure you: I have adapted. I have min-maxed my character through ED-compliant slotting, and I solo on relentless on every character I have over lvl 20 in both CoH (Invincible, of course) and CoV.
So, I guess what I'm saying is: you seem to be the one who's whining about people who complain, and "adapting" to the nerfs doesn't alter the fact that they ARE nerfs. Seeing as how you haven't played in over a year, it IS just possible that you're experiencing the fun of the game as if you had never played before, while those of us who stuck around have DEFINITELY noticed the difference.
Not everyone is equally against it. But ALMOST everyone agrees that SOMETHING has to be done for SOME of the classes that were hit hardest by these double-strength global nerfs.
If you don't LIKE this activity,, then feel free to move on to another thread. But don't come in here insulting the posters by denigrating their opinion en masse and categorizing us all as "whiners" and "drama-queens".
It just marks you as a closed-minded, self-obsessed....alright, I'm going to stop there.
Have a good one.
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heres an interesting question.. instead of complaining about ED, and getting nothing done, why not accept that ED is in the past, and will likely NEVER be removed as a whole. instead of using your time, effort, and resoruces to complain about what has happened to you, and why your min/max toons have seen this GIANT hit in recent days, why not Look to the future, and tell the devs what you would like to see them add...
For instance. ED has severely effected one-enhancement accepting powers, like hasten, hover, health, stamina, etc.. ok, That change is in the past.. now, instead of whining about this, how about you take the approach that MIGHT ACTUALLY GET NOTICED BY THE DEVS, since you aren't linked into the stuff that nobody wants to read, and try this... Make a post that says "hmm, Hover is slow, is there any hope of increasing the base speed to make it more useful?"
or
"hmm.. It seems to me that I'm running out of endurance faster than it seems that I should.. My toon has endurance reducers in most of his powers, and it is still a problem. perhaps the base recovery rate of stamina might be boosted to compensate?"
Quit fighting the past. if you want to complain about somthing, so it while the patch/update is still on test, and the decision hasn't been set in stone. giving up on something has no purpose, but accepting change, and offering suggestions to make the game AS IT IS NOW better would likely get far better results.
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From what I've read, the changes in Issue 5 were done with the knowledge that ED might have to be put in place if the changes in Issue 5 weren't enough. So at that time they were presenting things in that fashion because they hadn't done enough testing to know if ED would be needed at all. After collecting the data they decided that ED was indeed needed. Now that ED has been around and they have more data collected I understand that they are now going to begin tweaking things with small buffs in those areas where they are needed to rebalance things. With things as they are after these changes they have a much better idea which powers and powersets as well as which archetypes are underperforming and by how much. I don't however expect these changes too much until the Defense Scaling is added. They will either be released simultaneously or after DS so that more testing can be done. Maybe even a little of both.
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Haven't heard anything about defense scaling, but if it buffs those who lost defense/damres in powers that only take that kind of slotting, it'll be an effective rollback of I5/ED to some degree. It will NOT, however, help those who lost out on OTHER single-enhancement type powers, or those who lost Healing potential and so forth.
Still, it's better than nothing. If that's what it is. Which I don't feel like researching. Just lazy, I guess.