Official Discussion: Issue 10 Invasion
By
Aztec_Mummy,
Posted on: 2007-07-24 17:57 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
I have to agree with Zimmy Zim, I was on Liberty last night about 10 CST then again about 1 CST and the lag was so bad it took me about a minute or two to get from WW in KR to the tram. During the fighting, my powers kept saying recharging or not going off at all. I also got map servered a few time. I know it is not my video card or machine (one of my machines was built in March '07 and both video card and processor are very good and it was the one I was on last night) cause my boyfriend in another room was also having the same problem, I was also getting this on Sunday before I10 went live with getting into mission site or for example going from Steel to Sky, taking a minute or 2 to load. Dev please look into this problem I love this game and have pushed it at work. I really look forward to playing for years but this lag makes it frustrating to play.
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Ok, Start with the negative 1st, which has been stated over and over again. LAG! I noticed one person upgraded his graphics card and had no problem, but the majority of us CAN NOT DO THAT! I was fighting an invasion last night and noone understood how we were able to take down the invaders cause noone was doing anything due to the lag. Hearing that this was constantly complained about while this was on test, I heard a lot of people saying they wished it was tested out of the system before going to live, and yes it should have been. The Admin Messages in all windows was the other big complaint that I heard of. People who were trying to do missions only to avoid the lag problems also were not happy, due to the fact that they could not get to missions easily, especially timed missions.
Now the Good. RWZ looks great, the whole invasion idea is amazing, and when lag isn't a factor is a ton of fun. The fact that this will be going on for a while is a great idea, then the attacks due to finishing the RWZ TF continue is great also.
Overall, right now, I have to give it a grade of a D though. Great content, great ideas, but the poor implementation and testing (and yes I did try to play on test during open testing) really takes away from the whole experience.
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When I first got on yesterday I didnt think it was so impressive. All the hype and I saw nothing to get me excited. I went to RWZ and it hadnt changed much. Love all the new badges though. Then started doing some mish and started to warm up to it. The new maps are fabu and Im liking the new look of the Rikti.
That said the lag is horrid. I know its not my machine as it was only built in April with high end graphics because of COH and I wanted to make sure I didnt have a problem playing. In fact for a whole team and majority of the server to be complaining about the same problem its either 1) a new devastating power of the Rikti or 2) something wrong with the game. Otherwise everyone on victory server around 1030-1100 last night needs to get a new computer or graphics card ASAP and how likely is that?
It wasnt bad in the RWZ or on mission maps but during the invasion event in skyway and later steel it was like standing still. Thankfully my emp had healing aura on auto cause that was about all she could do.
I see a lot of complaints about the redname spam but I have to say in the grand scheme of things its not bad at all. It takes a second to look at it and ignore it and it doesnt interfere with convos at all. I play with a chatty group with convos going on two different global channels, coalition, SG and friends channels not to mention private messages and not once did the announcements interfere with keeping up with our convos. (the alternative would be awful pop up windows that are so much worse)
I loved that broadcast was full of heroes cooperating and coordinating to fight a common enemy rather than just a bunch of people bickering constantly. Of course there are those who are still looking to bicker cause last night someone was complaining about people using broadcast to communicate between teams (whatever!)
In all honesty I think the lag will get better as the excitement of a new release dies down and 50 million people arent all trying to play at once. Of course that will make invasions harder when there are less to fight them off but hey we love a challenge dont we?
Where are we going and Why am I in this Handbasket?
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My biggest pet peeve is the new sonic graphics. I have no problems with cast able shields but sonic dispersion isn't the greatest change. The sine waves are fine but the static effect when it pulses makes it where I can't see anything. If you all can remove that it would be great.
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/signed
I was thoroughly enjoying the wonderful new content until our team had a Sonics toon join. After a few minutes, the static effect was enough to make my eyes hurt quite badly. The static is too dense and you literally can not see what you are fighting. Combine that with the dreadful sounds of sonics, and it a headache and a half waiting to happen. But I guess I can avoid teaming with any sonics because of it.
Beyond that, the invasion event is truly spectacular. Well done! 
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I disagree, I played on a few "piles" of heroes who had the sonic dispersion bubble active, it looks freekin awesome to me, and I had no problems seeing what I was fighting (well, no more problems than when the sonic bubble wasn't there). The shields look fantastic, as does disruption field. I love the bubble effect of sonic dispersion, and find it no less (if as) intrusive than the dispersion bubble from FF.
Mark me down "PRO", I love it.
I too like the new sonic graphics. I give them a thumbs up!
The visuals were fantastic. Watching bomber streams rolling over Cap was great. The new Rikti models look awesome. The downside is, I got plenty of time to watch those new models. I had a Stalker up on Virtue and it took so long between punching Build-Up and Assassinate actually cycling that BU was gone by the time AS fired. I dumped my graphics as low as I could get and it didn't matter. Once I got into a mission it was fine again.
I'm excited to see how everything shakes out once the lag gets better. I10 looks great though.
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My biggest pet peeve is the new sonic graphics. I have no problems with cast able shields but sonic dispersion isn't the greatest change. The sine waves are fine but the static effect when it pulses makes it where I can't see anything. If you all can remove that it would be great.
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/signed
I was thoroughly enjoying the wonderful new content until our team had a Sonics toon join. After a few minutes, the static effect was enough to make my eyes hurt quite badly. The static is too dense and you literally can not see what you are fighting. Combine that with the dreadful sounds of sonics, and it a headache and a half waiting to happen. But I guess I can avoid teaming with any sonics because of it.
Beyond that, the invasion event is truly spectacular. Well done!
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From what I understand the new Sonic graphics aren't complete. I think BAB said there were more changes on the way.
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Gotta add my name to the "Boo to Lag" list. I don't have a suggestion to fix it, but wherever there's a zone invasion, be prepared to be mostly ineffective due to "click-your-power, go-make-a-sandwich, click-another-power" debilitating lag.
This pretty well sucks, but I can't express how awesomely terrifying it is to zone into somewhere like Atlas Park and see the skies filled with enemy ships and the ground awash with invading enemies.
It's cool. Damn Cool.
Thank you dev team!
There was rumor that I10 would be something special,
and you did not disappoint!
A++
@mr-blaze
-The Corporation-
Justice
Mega kudos to everyone. This is my favorite issue to date!
I love the Invasions (and the Red Admin Spam doesn't bother me much at all)! The sky change, the dropships, the War Walls down, it's all great. Then the bombs fall and the troops follow (and get pounded on by the resident NPCs to boot). All told, fantastic. Lag does indeed stink royally though.
I also love the new missions in the Rikti War Zone. I'm still early into them, but the story and "vibe" and new tiles I've seen thus far are awesome.
Plus Hero/Villain Co-op is a long wanted feature, and now we have it.
Well done Devs!
I won't touch the lag as I understand that it may well be something that is mostly out of your hands, but my big dislike on the event so far is that I just don't feel like the Rikti are to be feared. I mean sure they pop through the war walls, and that is impressive as all get out, but getting a bomb dropped directly on you should hurt more than it does, and the Rikti dropping on the groups of Heroes should be more likely to have an affect. As is, they're often neutralized before they even finish teleporting in.
The lag doesn't help me to feel like a hero as the Rikti fall like chafe while I'm stuck at a standstill, sure, but I would hope that with us stuck like that, we'd be more likely to have the highest chance of being offed by Rikti drops too, I mean, we're only fighting at about 1/10th speed while they (presumably) get to attack at full speed.
My other, and similar, complaint is that the invasions don't happen often enough. Though I will say that when the waves happen it is pretty cool. Suddenly half of Paragon and the Rogue Islands are covered in Rikti as the day quickly turns bleak. Very cool effect there, I just wish that it happened more often.
Oh, another and related issue: the alerts don't diferentiate between instances of a zone, and new zones don't innately spawn with a raid in it, even if it spawned because of said raid. This can create confusion when trying to coordinate defenders.
Beyond that, and those ar emostly just tweaks too, I think, the issue is awesome. I really do enjoy what the devs have done and have tried to do, though I haven't had much time in the RWZ off of test. Still, can't wait to see more of it. And Jay is still sexy, as are his costumes.
I can't really give an adequate opinion of I10. I don't normally have any lag problems (even when other people are complaining about lag), but last night it was so bad, even when I was by myself hunting, powers were taking 5 to 10 seconds or more to activate. Some powers wouldn't activate at all (Accelerate Metabolism never activated at all no matter how many times I tried it), other times, even though no power had gone off, I got the "recharging" message on anything I tried. Meanwhile, the Rikti I was fighting waltzed up, smacked me 3 times and I was dead. I couldn't even get my heal off.
I know lag is unfortunately common around the time each of the issues go live, but this seems worse. It basically makes the game unplayable in regards to how it is intended to be played. Until the lag settles down, I'll likely steer clear of anything relating to new I10 content since I can't play it anyway. All I really accomplished last night was racking up more debt on my character than he's ever had before with little to no return. That=no fun.
Clear up the lag so that it's truly playable and not just a mindless button click-fest and then I'll be able to give a fair assessment of I10.
<-- I'm a [u]Monkey's uncle[u]!!
Great freaking job on the new issue! The invasion rocks, the new content rocks, the tweaks to some powers ...everything is great.
Performance actually seems to have increased by 25% for me, I dont lag anywhere, and have very small amounts during invasions. THe red letter things doesnt bother me either, since there isnt any chat im gonna miss so bad that itll scroll away.
This issue is absolutely amazing so far. Seeing everyone out of missions ready to fight is great fun, even if the lag is absolutely terrible. I can't really compare it to anything else, since its been so long since we actually had people out and about in zones and not passing through.
I love the chaos and impromptu team work. The fact that people just start randomly clumping into teams and fighting whatever comes their way is awesome. Not having to decide anything, team makeup, level differences, anything, really makes this something special. You just invite people and fight with all you've got.
Last night we had two major battles in Mercy and Oaks, each with 2-4 teams piled up fighting for their lives. The lag sucks, but with no debt it's not that punishing. Well worth it to see just how massive this game really is. It's easy to forget sometimes with everyone hiding indoors.
Long live Invasions!
I have to toss my voice in...
Issue 10 and the Sonics grahpics changes actually brought me back to Paragon City as a full time player for the first time since Issue 5.
I created a new troller a couple weeks ago in anticipation of the new Sonic's graphics and love (despite the complaints of others) how Sonic Dispersion, Sonic Cage, and the other graphics look. To me they're dead on perfect.
I got to play with the Warzone last night and pounded through the first story arc with a team of 8. It was quite fun and the new Rikti Maps look very cool. Playing on my stone tank was a bit annoying though b/c the maps have a LOT of little itty bitty curbs that you can't walkover while in rooted or Granite Armor.
It was a frustration for sure.
The biggest problem I saw was the ADMIN spam. As I've seen many other folks comment on, this was just a bad idea from the start. How can teams function and communicate when the ADMIN channel is forced on every tab.
I realize that we're not supposed to be able to turn it off but they need to make it so that the game allows us to turn it off in all but one tab.. at one point last night during an invasion on Justice it got to the point where all of my Supergroup/Coalition chat died b/c no one could keep up with the spam.
There is no easy solution to this but it needs to be the top priority to fix. You can't destroy our only means of communication and think its ok to push live. This really doesn't sit on the realm of minor inconvenience.. its not just a quality of life issue, this is an issue that halts the ability of groups to function in game.
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I've just found and read Positron's post on this issue.. perhaps instead of trying to make the Admin channel a seperate channel you simply filter it out so it only displays in the default tabs? Tabs that users create are often for team/sg or global channels so if those tabs are ADMIN free the rest would be something that would be easier to deal with.
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Also, has anyone gotten some costume drops yet? I'm curious if they seem more often to anyone. The drops I got last night totaled to 4 IO recipies over the course of the 3 hours we played the first arc of the RWZ.
w00t Radio
Issue 10: The Slide Show Invasion !!!
Invasion event lag is so gameplay destroyingly horrific that until this issue is resolved I am, for all intents and purposes, unable to participate meaningfully in the invasion events.
One of the really formiddable sources of lag was (of all things) the Dropships themselves! I'd fly my scrapper into position to kick one ... wait 5 seconds for the animation to activate ... and then wait some more completely locked into the X/Y/Z position (toon not responding to keyboard inputs!) where I attacked while the dropship "stepped" away from me in stop motion rather than "cruising" away smoothly. This of course forced me to "chase it down" in order to wait through my next attack.
Even on the streets, well away from hordes of players, the NPC citizens and cars on the streets were rubberbanding wildly around in stop motion fashion. When approaching "dogpile on da wabbit" concentrations of heroes, it was just ridiculous.
Although, amazingly, I never once saw a LOST CONNECTION TO MAPSERVER message.
As far as the Admin Channel spam is concerned, I'm wondering if it would be possible to (almost completely) offload the admin spam onto ... of all things ... The City Map. Everyone's mini-map has two tabs for it ... Zone and City. Most people never look at the City Map, since it's basically just the tram map you see in the PTA stations ... but what if it could show you WHERE the invasion events were occurring? That way instead of needing to backtrack through chat records to find where an event was in progress, you could simply flick over to the City Map Tab on the mini-map and the invasion event(s) would be shown in a slowly glowing on/off red-ish color on the zone under attack.
Simple. Easy. Intuitive.
KISS.
For extra bonus points, you could add the same effect to the maps you see in the PTA tram stations.
And Sexy Jay ... we the players WORSHIP the fantastic costume (re)designing of the Rikti. Glorious eye candy there.
The new indoor tilesets for the rikti missions in the RWZ are also really cool, and I wish we had a lot of those components available to us for SG Bases! It was really weird wandering around a mission and NOT knowing instantly what every single module already looks like before entering it. Serious applause for War Witch and the Level Design Team.
It's the end. But the moment has been prepared for ...
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As far as the Admin Channel spam is concerned, I'm wondering if it would be possible to (almost completely) offload the admin spam onto ... of all things ... The City Map. Everyone's mini-map has two tabs for it ... Zone and City. Most people never look at the City Map, since it's basically just the tram map you see in the PTA stations ... but what if it could show you WHERE the invasion events were occurring? That way instead of needing to backtrack through chat records to find where an event was in progress, you could simply flick over to the City Map Tab on the mini-map and the invasion event(s) would be shown in a slowly glowing on/off red-ish color on the zone under attack.
Simple. Easy. Intuitive.
KISS.
For extra bonus points, you could add the same effect to the maps you see in the PTA tram stations.
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Brilliant. I love it. Gold star for Redlynne!
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Issue 10: The Slide Show Invasion !!!
Invasion event lag is so gameplay destroyingly horrific that until this issue is resolved I am, for all intents and purposes, unable to participate meaningfully in the invasion events.
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This is basically where I am as well. When I do the street fighting I have to relive it with screenshots. I can look at the screens and say "oh that was cool!" because I gaurentee you that I never saw it during the actual fight. Kinda reminds me of my first Hamidon raid...
Hate the ADMIN channel shoutouts. Confused by rikti from bombing runs disappearing as I begin to attack them. Wondering how rikti in king's row at level 40 (white to me) will be handled by my low level chars.
looking forward to the rikit zone itself attempt tonight!
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Wondering how rikti in king's row at level 40 (white to me) will be handled by my low level chars.
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Invading Rikti use the giant monster code. They are as white to you as they are to a level 4 or level 50.
As for the Invasion, Skyway City is the only area I've been able to acquire A Bombs, as every other zone loads long enough that I've missed the bomb phase entirely. The zoning is the only real issue I've been having with invasions, I was perfectly fine gameplay-wise when I got in.
Despite the lag, I think this is the best issue evar. Seeing a Rikti Crash Zone 8 on Victory, pounding Rikti bombs soloing (this close l------l to getting the accolade), and the scenery of invasions along with the new map tilesets is just phenomenal.
bored with it. i tried it on test and got bored with it after about 5 minutes. give me powersets and maybe a new AT and i'm happy.
Issue 10 is a blast so far. It's got me responding to Rikti warning alerts, and playing my level 50 characters again. Getting more story line is great, especially since it means more content in terms of missions and TF's.
Finally!! you did something in the RWZ! (RCS). Since I was able to enter the zone years ago, I've wanted something to happen with the crashed ship. Good stuff! I am looking forward to spending time in the zone with my 50's.
In short, excellent job, all the additions are great, but most of all, anything you do to enable me to play my level 50 heroes is the best of all. I don't want to play my 50's every day, but this inspires me to dust off my semi-shelved heroes and have fun with the characters I've invested so much time (and money) in.
Wild-
The AI in the Serpent Drummer Mission "Rescue the Diplomats" pretty much had my team fail the mission. The schmuck of an airforce general ran up beyond the team who was making our plans, drew his side arm and began to attack the cavern full of nemesis.
He then promptly died and we were ejected from the mission.
Aside from the lag issues, everything else seems to be going quite well.
@PlasmaStream
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Addressing a few things I've seen on this thread:
1. There is no debt during invasions. The Rikti might down you during a lag spike, but it's painless beyond a free trip to the hospital. If it's absolutely unbearable, try leaving the zone or entering a mission.
2. Invasion Rikti personally scale to level like Giant Monsters do, so any characters level-suitable to Kings Row (for instance) aren't going to see any level 40 Rikti stomping about.
3. Frankly, level 40 characters shouldn't be running to Kings Row to fight invaders in the first place if we're really serious about how irritating the lag is. My very first invasion (possibly THE first invasion) was in Skyway with an alt that scaled with the zone and I had a blast. Zero issues. There were some other heroes around but not scads and scads, as other alerts had been going off nearly simultaneously.
Since then, I might as well be a civilian for all the good my powers do in these invasions. Sitting in Cap Au Diablo with my level 14 Corruptor watching a level 39 Mastermind smite foes isn't my idea of a good time. Try sticking to zones suitable for your level and perhaps we might not experience all of the claymation. There are heaps more lower level alts around than higher, anyhoo. Help yourself along with others.
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The lag was pretty bad last night, but since I have never done a Hami raid I don't have anything to which to compare. It is a little weird hitting buttons and then waiting to see if the power ever activates.
But that'll change after the first couple of days, and it's the only complaint I had. I appreciate that many of the issues brought up in closed and open beta were addressed -- and that we were given explanations for the issues that were not addressed -- and the game play is much, much smoother than it was originally. (I survived getting blasted by the drop ships, yeah!) The content is great, the effects are amazing, and the game is feeling more like a superhero game, not a generic fantasy game with superpowers bolted on. I hope there will be more along this line in future expansions.
Nice job!
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We can beat them, just for one day
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