Redname posts are saved, so I'd encourage to try and find when Stateman said this.
According to my recollection, the change was officially cited as a method of stopping players from "kiting" npcs, preventing any return fire. The original fix, which only lasted a few days before the eventual introduction of suppression, was a -50% tohit debuff to "encourage" players to turn off travel powers before attacking.
I was not a PvPer at the time, so its possible that I missed a post related to PvP, however I can't recall a single developer post that mentioned suppression and PvP.
That is something I can certainly agree with Arcanaville.
The original devs of CoH may have intended to add PvP all along but if the game was actually designed w/ PvP in mind there was a lot, and I mean a lot, of naivete in the process.
If the original devs designed CoH w/ PvP in mind they did a lot of things to impede their on progess that could have been implemented much more simply and/or smartly.
One could easily argue CoV was designed specifically w/ PvP in mind...but, no, not CoH I think. I've *always* viewed CoV as the devs taking all the mistakes they made in CoH and learning from them, both PvE and PvP.
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Uh, for the apologists - Malta, Tsoo, CoT and all the other mobs in the game do not start 100 threads on jousting being unbalanced.
PvP players did.
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Broken arguement.
I rather doubt Malta, Tsoo or CoT started threads on being herded into dumpsters and Burned, either. And yet somehow, for some reason, they still decided to nerf Burn.
Unless PvP was responsible for that one too?
Your description is more accurate than mine. CoX was most likely "intended" to have pvp eventually, not exactly designed for it.
As for your list of what's all wrong.
Sit down and make a list of everything the Devs did right as far as pvp is concerned. Each power and how it relates to each other power in the game. Then compare that list to what you have above.
Even in the early days of I4 on test, a regen scrapper hitting MoG against any blaster with Energy Manipulation who was smart enough to take both Aim and Build up was a death sentence for said scrapper.
It was the perma Elude scrappers that were killing teams by themselves. Blasters could hit them but not do enough damage in 8 seconds to kill them, especially with all the Super Speed jousting going on.
Fun with searching:
Statesman 05/04/05
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First of all, thank you for everyone who got on the Training Room server and gave us feedback. It was always appreciated.
Secondly, I've got some news for the Superspeed and Super Jump crowd. The Accuracy debuff, though only equal to Flight, has negatively impacted players' gameplay. I challenged myself and our team to come up with a possible alternative to a flat out debuff - and yet still address the PvE and PvP issues with both powers.
Our solution: suppression. When someone attacks, they temporarily suppress their speed or leaping - making them temporarily vulnerable to attack (and we've removed the accuracy debuff). We're playtesting it internally now and we hope to get it up to the Training Room server for your input ASAP.
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Statesman 04/28/05 (Before the -tohit was changed to suppression)
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Agreed.
We should try NEVER to change a power because of PvP alone (BTW, this is what I've always promised). The changes now aren't solely because of PvP - there's signifcant PvE issues, too.
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Statesman 04/48/05)
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We endeavor NOT to change powers solely because of PvP. The powers we are changing are usually because of PvE or PvE AND PvP.
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For other dev posts around the introduction of PvP, limit your search date to Older than 21 Months, Newer than 26.
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Sit down and make a list of everything the Devs did right as far as pvp is concerned. Each power and how it relates to each other power in the game. Then compare that list to what you have above.
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Prior to when PvP arenas hit test? Ok:
1. Hitting another player with a melee attack did not cause you to explode.
2. Hurricane wasn't invisible.
3. Positron picked rad.
We're talking about design decisions here: the list of powers that happened not to cause serious problems by coincidence is not really relevant. The fact that flurry wasn't overpowered in PvP is not a point in the devs' favor when it comes to PvP balancing, unless there is specific evidence that flurry encompasses a specific design decision directly relevant to PvP. And it doesn't.
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Even in the early days of I4 on test, a regen scrapper hitting MoG against any blaster with Energy Manipulation who was smart enough to take both Aim and Build up was a death sentence for said scrapper.
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They would have had to also be smart enough to take power boost, and know it boosted tohit buffs. Even then, not necessarily. Also, perma-MoG was at least as strong as perma-elude back then: MoG had higher defense, and was healing to full every 90 seconds or so: about as good as aid self, but with less interruptions.
Perma-Elude vs I3 Regen (non-MoG), now those were some interesting fights: I used to brawl-TK-brawl-TK at high speed, trying to knock out integration and have the stun kick in, then finish off fast, while they would try to land the one-two lucky shot before I could aid-self back to full.
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Perma MoG was just as good, except while running it left the scrapper at around 10% of his total health.
Yes, Power Boost was nice to use but wasn't neccesary. Aim with 6 To-Hit Buff SOs + Build up with 3 To-Hit Buff SOs+ Total Focus Joust would do the trick against a MoGger. Not so the Perma Elude guys. It would hit and do the damage, but trying to follow up with another high damaging attack before they got out of range or behind cover was nigh impossible. Then the blaster's buffs would time out and the perma elude scrapper would go back to being unhittable.
As for the rest of your post....either I just don't understand what you are saying or it's a dodge.
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Yes, Power Boost was nice to use but wasn't neccesary. Aim with 6 To-Hit Buff SOs + Build up with 3 To-Hit Buff SOs+ Total Focus Joust would do the trick against a MoGger. Not so the Perma Elude guys. It would hit and do the damage, but trying to follow up with another high damaging attack before they got out of range or behind cover was nigh impossible. Then the blaster's buffs would time out and the perma elude scrapper would go back to being unhittable.
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Prior to travel power suppression, Elude's run speed did not offer any significant jousting advantage over anyone else in PvP. You seem to be suggesting that the difference between MoG and Elude was that MoGed scrappers had lower health: that's not true: in relative terms MoGed scrappers had *higher* health, and were more difficult to kill. That's because the lower health washed against the resistance in MoG, but regen scrappers also had dull pain, and while the heal of DP was blocked by MoG, the +health of DP was not: you could permanently have higher relative health while under MoG, with well-slotted DP (you could even stack it for short periods).
They were really, really hard to kill. Especially those 6-slot membrane bastards.
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What I am saying is that in I4 everyone used SS and jousted.
A blasters extreme burst damage was about the only counter to Mog at the time but you needed time to hit BU and Aim. This was difficult while jousting getting the timing just right to land a TF on a SS/jousting scrapper. While a blaster had minimal defenses and only "ok" resistances, which did nothing against scrapper criticals.
Please don't take offense but did you spend a large amount of time on test prior to I4 being live or do you just read the numbers? I ask because I don't recall ever seeing you back then. Then again, I don't know your alts.
^^^ I tried about 3 times to word that nicer but gave up. Any way I put it, it comes out crappy.
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Please don't take offense but did you spend a large amount of time on test prior to I4 being live or do you just read the numbers? I ask because I don't recall ever seeing you back then. Then again, I don't know your alts.
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I've fought perma-elude against perma-MoG. That should answer your question directly. And I still do not know what the tactical difference is between MoG and Elude you are referring to, but not stating. Both require high order tohit buffs to hit through, both have high burst damage as their weakness.
By the time they were made non-perma, though, the days of MoG being an overwhelmingly effective PvP power were strictly numbered.
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Please don't take offense but did you spend a large amount of time on test prior to I4 being live or do you just read the numbers? I ask because I don't recall ever seeing you back then. Then again, I don't know your alts.
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I've fought perma-elude against perma-MoG. That should answer your question directly. And I still do not know what the tactical difference is between MoG and Elude you are referring to, but not stating. Both require high order tohit buffs to hit through, both have high burst damage as their weakness.
By the time they were made non-perma, though, the days of MoG being an overwhelmingly effective PvP power were strictly numbered.
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Perma Elude scrapper required Sustained Burst damage. (kind of an oxymoron). A Perma elude scrapper keeps his total HP when activating Elude. Even without resistances, a blaster needs to land 3 high damaging attacks in order to defeat the scrapper simply to go thru the amountof HP the scrapper has.
A MoG scrapper however loses most of his hitpoints and rides at the low point for the duration of MoG. Healing does not work on a scrapper in MoG. While at this low amount of hit points, Blasters could defeat the scrapper with one well timed and well buffed Total Focus.
I am sure you are well aware of this already.
There were class imbalances before PvP was introduced. PvP simply brought them to the forfront.
Back to the topic:
I believe the game was intended to have PvP from the beginning. It simply wasn't important enough to add until it was determined CoH was a success.
When CoH was launched it could be said it was a very incomplete game. I remember people complaining about having to pay to beta test a game that had already been out a year.
Wasn't dull pain's +hp non-enhanceable pre-ED?
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A MoG scrapper however loses most of his hitpoints and rides at the low point for the duration of MoG. Healing does not work on a scrapper in MoG. While at this low amount of hit points, Blasters could defeat the scrapper with one well timed and well buffed Total Focus.
I am sure you are well aware of this already.
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You aren't factoring in the resistances of MoG. Unless you were playing a psionic blaster, you couldn't one-shot a MoGed scrapper. The amount of non-psionic shots it takes to defeat a MoGed scrapper will also defeat an Eluded scrapper if they happen in rapid succession. Except MoGed scrappers can use Dull Pain under MoG for +health (its only the heal that is blocked): it actually took 40% more damage to knock out MoG than Elude, barring the use of Aid Self or respites.
Not even with 30% unresistable damage could total focus at the 400% damage cap one-shot a MoGed scrapper under dull pain. It would take at least two, and two total focus hits at the 400% damage cap would also two-shot an SR scrapper under Elude.
I never saw it happen, and I do not think it's possible given the numbers.
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[ QUOTE ]
Wasn't dull pain's +hp non-enhanceable pre-ED?
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Yes: I believe the ability to enhance the +health was added after ED was released: it was sometime around the I6 release.
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Here are the two threads for anyone wanting to actually sift through them for more info/answers:
SS/SJ with the -Acc Change
SS/SJ with the Suppression Change
Man, just browsing through those brings back a lot of memories. There were a looot of people against any change in general, but EVERYONE was against doing anything to PvE. Interesting stuff.
Many scrappers did not know about the +health being able to be applied under MoG.
Just like many people didn't know Power Boost increased Aim and Build Ups To-Hit bonus.
I know, I fought many many scrappers on test when I4 was on there. I quickly disabused them of the notion that MoG was an "I Win" button. Perma Elude scrappers still spanked me.
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I believe the game was intended to have PvP from the beginning.
[/ QUOTE ] For a long time, I held on to this belief. Mainly because I knew they were going to launch CoV at some point, and that all the mobs used the same powers as the heroes (with different parameters). But I believe it was Statesman (might have been Posi) who explicity said that with but a few exceptions, nothing was originaly designed with PvP in mind. The devs knew that at one point PvP would be looked at, but based on what they posted, I was disabused of my belief they had truly kept an eye on PvP implications.
Arcana listed but a few of the extant problems when PvP was first allowed. As people have facetiously pointed out, the NPC's aren't allowed to post about the all the broken mechanics in PvE. Many of these, like Perma-X powers, had to be fixed in order to bring PvP out of Ludicrous Speed it which it was traveling.
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Jousting was the problem cited.
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And thats where they went wrong. Jousting was never the problem.
This is a song about a super hero named Tony. Its called Tony's theme.
Jagged Reged: 23/01/04
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Jousting was the problem cited.
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And thats where they went wrong. Jousting was never the problem.
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Seeing as how almost every serious pvp'er slots Swift, Hurdle and Combat Jumping to get very good unsurpressed movement in combat, I have to agree with you.
Jousting is still present. And I have heard no complaints about it since Issue 4.
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Seeing as how almost every serious pvp'er slots Swift, Hurdle and Combat Jumping to get very good unsurpressed movement in combat, I have to agree with you.
Jousting is still present. And I have heard no complaints about it since Issue 4.
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QFE
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Jousting was the problem cited.
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And thats where they went wrong. Jousting was never the problem.
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Seeing as how almost every serious pvp'er slots Swift, Hurdle and Combat Jumping to get very good unsurpressed movement in combat, I have to agree with you.
Jousting is still present. And I have heard no complaints about it since Issue 4.
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Could a campaign to address the real issue and repeal suppression be the way to unit PvPer and PvEers in common cause?
*Jagged dreams of a happy utopia where PvPer and PvEer live in harmony while enjoying combat at super powered speeds*
*sound of needle scraping viynol*
Nah, course not. What was I thinking?
This is a song about a super hero named Tony. Its called Tony's theme.
Jagged Reged: 23/01/04
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Many folks (like me) disagreed with this facade and called it what it truly was, a significant correction of a PvP problem that significantly affected PvE playstyle. My sarcasm above clearly reflects my chagrin with the devs' answer to jousting. There were no problems with PvE for 4 isssues. As soon as PvP reared it's ugly head, all of a sudden it was all about how unfair we had been exploiting the AI of all those poor NPCs. Thank you, very much, Dread Lords. 
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You know, its funny I keep seeing people post this and it always make me laugh. I certainly exploited travel powers in PvE with my Blaster (first character) and suppression is more likely to be negated in (team) PvP via buffs than it is in PvE. I can't say what the devs "true" motivations are/were, but to claim that there was no PvE justification for making changes to how travel powers operate in combat is false. Would if have been changed if PvP were never introduced? I don't know, but at a minimum the situation is more complex than you've presented it.
*anti-smirk*
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I'm glad you're amused. However, I'll reiterate for the sake of clarity that I don't believe travel powers ever were in any way being "exploited" in PvE. In fact, I believe travel suppression wasn't even REMOTELY a PvE consequence. Ironically, it wasn't until folks were getting pwned in the Arena when the devs starting justifying how imbalanced the PvE had become. The only things complex about this were the dance steps to sell it, sir.
This is a superhero/supervillain MMO. At a "minimum", comic lore does not support what our dev team justified needing to be done to travel powers. IMO, PvP balance is what supported it and PvE play fell victim to the excuse. We appear to disagree. And while that's ok, I feel compelled to distinguish your use of the term exploit from mine in the proper context.
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Even a nub like myself can go back and find that supression was added due to people using it to exploit the mechanics of the PvE game. People were jousting mobs, etc and never getting hit thus ruining the whole risk vs reward thing. This was the reason it was changed. Anything that affects PvP across the board with such a thing like supression not being there is balanced since anyone can do it. PvP would be just as balanced if supression was or wasn't there in my opinion.
Greetings, all!
No, I didn't read this whole thread, just a page every ten pages to try and get a feeling for it.
So, here's my feeling for it:
If you want to unite the PvP and PvE people all in one grand game, with no barriers and no borders between zones and no discrimination of content, the answer is simple--or seems so to me.
Flags.
You like PvP, you flag yourself as PvP. You don't, you don't--and you are immune in every way, shape, and form from PvP. Everybody lives in the same zone, everybody has the same content, those who like pvP can; those who don't can avoid it completely.
Now. I'm not a developer, not a games theory specialist, not an expert of any kind, so it's possible that this has been discussed to death elsewhere and, for legitimate reasons, just won't work. If so, mea culpa--it still seems like a workable idea to me.
Oh, and no, it's not original with me. As I recall, the original EQ had exactly that system--if you wanted to PvP, you could, on any server in the game, simply by raising your flag. And I never once heard anyone in that game complain that that system did not work for them.
As a side comment, my personal 2 inf on PvP is simple, and has been stated elsewhere in this very thread: being ganked is not fun. People who find ganking other people fun disturb me. Being ganked is, by my definition, harassment if it happens more than once in a one-hour period by the same parties and to the same parties. The instant I can set the number and type of PvPrs that are allowed to attack me at any given time will be the same instant that I develop even a mild interest in PvP.
My only argument with PvP in this game is a simple one and based on one aspect of play: badges. I have 3 50s, 4 or 5 40s, any number of 20s and 30s, and teens without end (I just today recieved my 36th month vet reward). I have something like 7 slots total across all the servers that are still unused. In short, I have played this game start to finish (hero side) more than once, and the ONLY time I have ever set foot in a PvP zone is for badges.
PvE does not, and never has, bored me for more than a day or so at a time.
If the Devs took all PvE badges (exploration, kill X, time spent) out of the PvP zones, I would have absolutely no opinion on PvP in this game whatever, because it would not effect me. As long as this is not the case, as long as I have no choice but to enter PvP zones in order to do PvE activities, PvP will concern me however unwillingly.
Summing up, if you want to stop hearing from me and people like me in terms of PvP comments, the fix seems simple. Flags and/or remove any incentive (aside from PvP itself) for people to even think about going into PvP zones.
Ll
Jousting was the problem cited.
Suppression was the solution we got.
Statesman did not say in the post Suppression and I did not say he did. He said jousting in PvP was a PROBLEM. This led to Suppression after the -acc was discounted as not being a fix for characters with Buildup + Aim could circumvent it.
So PvP Jousting did lead to Suppression. Then once it was announced as "the fix" suddenly all the NPC's in Paragon complained that if Heroes in PvP had Suppression they wanted it too! (uh sarcasm if your detector is broken)