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We also will be actively monitoring datamining on every aspect of this system through all of Training Room and into Live.
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This part is discouraging because it implies the exact opposite of the other part. Makes it sound like you'll datamine it, as you currently have it programmed, all the way through going live with it. And only then, if datamining on live shows a problem, might you consider changing it.
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The problem is that datamining on test is not going to say anything about how tying Pool B drops to the mission owner only affects teaming, since most people solo on test.... 
I second (third?) the motion to make the Pool B rewards drop for finishing a safeguard/mayhem mission. Those represent a 4-6 mission investment of time, which seems to be comparable to most story arcs. (Shut up, Tina McIntyre.)
They're infinitely repeatable and span all levels.
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Didn't the Devs say once that an issue with Flashback is that not all enemies go the full range? Only a few do, most notably CoT, Longbow, and, uh... help me out here.
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Council and Arachnos.
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Thanks!
So, except for those 4 groups, you'd need to modify all enemies. That's a tall order!
Agua Man lvl 48 Water/Electric Blaster
"To die hating NCSoft for shutting down City of Heroes, that was Freedom."
{ Replying to original post }
OK, this does make me feel a bit better. If it's only the rare sets that require doing story arcs, task forces, and trials (and only some of those require doing more than one of those things), I'm not as bothered by the idea. It does, at least, open up a bit more hope that when I am in the situation of wanting a rare thing that's only TF-accessible, I won't be in that situation very often.
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I'd still rather have Pools A, C, and D and make Pool B (Story Arcs) contain a nice subset of some of what can be obtained in both Pools C and D. That way the reusable content (A C and D) contains everything one could possibly want, while Story Arcs get you valuable things via soloing that you could otherwise only get via teaming (C and D).
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I like that idea.
TFs and Trials are long-duration multi-player content. Have a drop source of that same stuff for solo-oriented characters/players or for people to chip away at 1 mission at a time.
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Just so you know. The actual Trials shouldn't take longer than 1.5-2 hours each. Some can be cleared in as little as an hour if you know what you're doing. TFs depend a bit more on which one you're doing, but again, most can be done in 3-4 hours by a team that knows what it's doing.
Even Posi and the Shard TFs. It's obviously still a major commitment but if you're teamed with sane people, chances are noone will complain if you need to take out the occasional 10-15 minutes to address real world concerns. That's just the breaks, and people accept that in my experience.
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Someone is obviously lucky enough to never have to PuG. Good For You. Now How about the rest of the players in the game?
I know that *I* personally want something that is fair to all players and all skills and all capabilities, guilded or unguilded, uber or noob, PL's and Casual, not just the few elite. Give the few elite a Bonus, a Reward, sure, just not exclusive rights.
Like I said elsewhere. A lot of people are completist 'collectors' about stuff. I know I'm that way about Badges, and I've seen people who collect Temp Powers and even Base Salvage. It's part of their enjoyment of the game. I can't fault them for it, even though I might not 'get' what's so great about having 1 of each piece of Base Salvage. Can you?
"If you're going through hell, keep going."
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
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Yea, I think we have hit a big contradiction with the story arc issue. I may be wrong, but I thought these changes were going to give the 50s something to do......I suppose that's true if I wanted to delete and reroll my 50s so I can get the arcs again. 
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You mean as soon as you hit 50 you're immediately blocked access to every other aspect of inventions that aren't story arc recipe related?!
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. --- Thomas Jefferson
Formerly known as YFNDBA
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Inventions has been touted as something that shelved level 50's can partake in. Level 50's that have completed all their story arcs already. Please, how can both of those occur? Level 50's can not experience IO's if they are locked out of acheiving specific rewards because they happened to hit the level cap before I9.
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Doctor Brainstorm wrote:
It's like I said, we are looking into other options that keeps the mechanic of the four pool system. Our intention is to not make people feel "gimped" for previously completing all their story arcs.
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Please keep this in mind when posting. No need to get too worked up folks! We appreciate the feedback, thanks!
Lighthouse
Community Relations Manager
If you have a specific in game, account, tech or billing problem please contact our Customer Support team via The Knowledge Base "Ask A Question" page.
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I'd still rather have Pools A, C, and D and make Pool B (Story Arcs) contain a nice subset of some of what can be obtained in both Pools C and D. That way the reusable content (A C and D) contains everything one could possibly want, while Story Arcs get you valuable things via soloing that you could otherwise only get via teaming (C and D).
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I like that idea.
TFs and Trials are long-duration multi-player content. Have a drop source of that same stuff for solo-oriented characters/players or for people to chip away at 1 mission at a time.
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That sounds like a great idea 
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. --- Thomas Jefferson
Formerly known as YFNDBA
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Didn't the Devs say once that an issue with Flashback is that not all enemies go the full range? Only a few do, most notably CoT, Longbow, and, uh... help me out here.
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Council and Arachnos.
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Thanks!
So, except for those 4 groups, you'd need to modify all enemies. That's a tall order!
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Not if the flashback system just auto-exemps the player, rather than trying to bump the enemies to theplayer's level.
@Quasadu
"We must prepare for DOOM and hope for FREEM." - SirFrederick
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You might need a team, that's OK. But story arcs can only be done once. Fix that or no recipes be available only from story arcs. All you're going to accomplish is creating:
ULTRA RARE LOOT
Which goes against everything you said you wanted to accomplish. It will make the game more hardcore than WoW or Everquest II.
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What EvilGeko said.
Either that or GIVE CREDIT to already completed Story arcs. Yep. PAY UP.
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Let us go back and redo the arcs!!
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You'd think it'd be pretty simple to do too. Autoexmp the mission owner to the mission level, add a mission flashback option to all contacts that lets you continuously cycle through a contact's missions and voila. Flashback.
They should probably not give you temp power rewards because then you could like do the blackwand/wedding band/whatever missions over and over and never run out, but I think all other rewards would be pretty kosher.
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I do not know if temp powers have a flag to you could not get the same one twice but it could be added so this could not be a problems. I am trying to remember, if a mission has a temp power, does only the owner get the temp power?
Personally, if it was like the autolevel for taskforces and only could get a temp power once, I would be happy with a flashback system. Doing the content with influence, salvage and recipes would be enough of a reward.
This is a service-oriented business, and it's all
about keeping the player happy over the long term.
So you have to listen and pay attention. If a large
portion of your playerbase is screaming about
some change, you be wise to listen. - Raph Koster
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I'd still rather have Pools A, C, and D and make Pool B (Story Arcs) contain a nice subset of some of what can be obtained in both Pools C and D. That way the reusable content (A C and D) contains everything one could possibly want, while Story Arcs get you valuable things via soloing that you could otherwise only get via teaming (C and D).
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I like that idea.
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Very, very nice.
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I'd still rather have Pools A, C, and D and make Pool B (Story Arcs) contain a nice subset of some of what can be obtained in both Pools C and D. That way the reusable content (A C and D) contains everything one could possibly want, while Story Arcs get you valuable things via soloing that you could otherwise only get via teaming (C and D).
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That's a good idea too. Not exactly what I'd ask for, but a very good idea. I think I'd expand that to be Pool B contains all of Pool C and D. And for the same reasons.
That still doesn't help the 50's, but it's a great idea for the rest of the players. More Arcs, or some repeatable Arcs, for 50's combined with that Idea might work. Toss in a Flashback Auto-Exemp system and 50's could be set.
Good Idea.
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I'd still rather have Pools A, C, and D and make Pool B (Story Arcs) contain a nice subset of some of what can be obtained in both Pools C and D. That way the reusable content (A C and D) contains everything one could possibly want, while Story Arcs get you valuable things via soloing that you could otherwise only get via teaming (C and D).
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I like that idea.
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Very, very nice.
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I could dig that too.
The City of Heroes Community is a special one and I will always look fondly on my times arguing, discussing and playing with you all. Thanks and thanks to the developers for a special experience.
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Just so you know. The actual Trials shouldn't take longer than 1.5-2 hours each. Some can be cleared in as little as an hour if you know what you're doing. TFs depend a bit more on which one you're doing, but again, most can be done in 3-4 hours by a team that knows what it's doing.
Even Posi and the Shard TFs. It's obviously still a major commitment but if you're teamed with sane people, chances are noone will complain if you need to take out the occasional 10-15 minutes to address real world concerns. That's just the breaks, and people accept that in my experience.
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Someone is obviously lucky enough to never have to PuG. Good For You. Now How about the rest of the players in the game?
I know that *I* personally want something that is fair to all players and all skills and all capabilities, guilded or unguilded, uber or noob, PL's and Casual, not just the few elite. Give the few elite a Bonus, a Reward, sure, just not exclusive rights.
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Please keep in mind this section of the Original Post:
Now again, I must stress, the majority of sets, including entire complete sets come from simply defeating enemies. All the costume piece and temp power recipes come from defeating enemies. There are Rare recipes (ones that have a worse chance to drop than others) in Pool A (the defeating enemies pool) as well.
Lighthouse
Community Relations Manager
If you have a specific in game, account, tech or billing problem please contact our Customer Support team via The Knowledge Base "Ask A Question" page.
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* Not every level has all four pools (early levels don't have Pool D, the Trial pool)
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Well, in THAT case...
... why not just remove the Story Arc pool from levels 45-50, and assign all the relevant rewards to trials and TFs, since level 45-50 characters can do ANY trial or TF from anywhere in the game?
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Or add some repeatable arcs or something to the 45+ game.
Something. Anything. Otherwise, there's no point to playing a character right now for fear of missing something and outlevelling da kewl loot.
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Adding Story Arc drops to Safeguards and Mayhem missions maybe?
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I definitely approve of this suggestion. This would give us something repeatable in every level range that can be used in addition to the regular story arcs in that level range. And it's a similar number of missions too. Most arcs seem to be somewhere around 4-6 missions long, and when you include the paper/scanner missions, that's how long it takes for the Mayhem/Safeguards.
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Inventions has been touted as something that shelved level 50's can partake in. Level 50's that have completed all their story arcs already. Please, how can both of those occur? Level 50's can not experience IO's if they are locked out of acheiving specific rewards because they happened to hit the level cap before I9.
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Doctor Brainstorm wrote:
It's like I said, we are looking into other options that keeps the mechanic of the four pool system. Our intention is to not make people feel "gimped" for previously completing all their story arcs.
[/ QUOTE ]
Please keep this in mind when posting. No need to get too worked up folks! We appreciate the feedback, thanks!
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Lighthouse, my own personal opinion is this:
If we can't go back and do our story arcs, and there's no way we can sway you from granting reciepes off them, then why can't we just award a reciepes to the whole team, when a story arc is completed? Sure this would cause a lot more reciepes to be accessed, but the chance would still be unlikely that you would get an ultra-rare drop out of it.
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Please keep in mind this section of the Original Post:
Now again, I must stress, the majority of sets, including entire complete sets come from simply defeating enemies. All the costume piece and temp power recipes come from defeating enemies. There are Rare recipes (ones that have a worse chance to drop than others) in Pool A (the defeating enemies pool) as well.
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How many complete sets are available from 45+ enemies only?
Hey Doc, will their be any drops for pvp related activities. Like could you trade bounty in SC for a drop the more bounty you get a different category becomes available. You could work it into other zones with a few adjustments? You collect the meteor pieces in BB you get to choose between a shivan or a drop, RV 1000 temporal points get a drop instead of a crappy longbow mech pet, WB launch a missle choose between the temp or a drop. Make it interesting except for the bounty idea for SC, the other zones their could be a small chance the drop comes from one of the better catergories.
OK people, we need to breath in and breath out. Missing out of the story arc recipes is not that big of a deal if only a small ammount of exclusives are in there. We still have no idea how things are distributed.
And there's a reason why Optimus Prime came to the Rogue Islands, to promote trade amongst people.
If 25% or more of sets can only be completed with Story arcs, then my level 40+s will join in with the fiery pitchforks. If its something in the 10-15%, then I'll buy them or find alternate ways to obtain them.
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Now I hear you guys... you all seem to dislike the Story Arc aspect of this system. I've had some discussions with the team yesterday about what we could do instead, and still keep the flavor of the four pool system, because having the extra three pools allows us to not only reward risk/reward, but time/reward as well. Takes longer to do a Task Force? Here's a nice bonus you can't get anywhere else. Finish the Respec trial, but already have all your Respecs? Here's a nice reward that carries with it some good inherent value.
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Several of my characters are L50 and have finished all the story arcs. What about them? Is just trading the answer?
Secondarily, if each hero gets 4 arcs only from L45-50 (Kheldians can get 5), and there are enhancements where those 4-5 chances are the ONLY chance to get them, and they are desirable, the value of those pieces of salvage will be ASTRONOMICAL. No matter what else you pick - TF, Trial, Killing things - it can be done ad infinitum. We raid 3 times a week, you can exemp down for TFs and Trials... but you can only do an Arc once, and it is gone forever. If you passed it en route to 50, it is likewise gone forever.
In other words, there are four pools, but one of them can only be accessed a finite number of times, and that number is small. This is going to cause those drops, unless they're simply not really worth having, to have a ludicrously disproportionate value compared to other drops of similar quality, because they will be obscenely rare.
At least, that's how it seems to me, and I don't see why this is particularly desirable. If Arcs could be repeated (flashback system?) then I'd be fine with it.
Forgot to add: If there are only 10 or so rare Story Arc recipes total, then at least normal play from 1-50 will offer decent rewards in that respect come i9.
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Didn't the Devs say once that an issue with Flashback is that not all enemies go the full range of levels? Only a few do, most notably CoT, Longbow, and, uh... help me out here. The point being that they'd need to add in logic to increase the range for ALL villain/hero groups and probably add some new powers/mobs at the high end.
Did I imagine this?
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I somewhat recall that, but I would've figured that the TF/Trial auto-exemplaring tech would deal with that problem.
Amusing aside: Auto-exemplaring in TF/Trials was cited as Flashback's replacement at some point, I vaguely recall.
DJs for The Cape Radio
Makes videos & podcasts about reviewing toys, covering conventions, and more at Vangelus.ca
Yea, I think we have hit a big contradiction with the story arc issue. I may be wrong, but I thought these changes were going to give the 50s something to do......I suppose that's true if I wanted to delete and reroll my 50s so I can get the arcs again.