Live Feedback: Issue 13 : Merit Reward System
By
1VB_FIST,
Posted on: 2008-12-11 18:56 in Developers' Corner
[ QUOTE ]
I just turned my exp off on my newest hero.. I havent gotten any exp for the winter event... but people think its wierd I have the Frostfire mission at lvl 6 
Want all those lowbie Merits? turn your exp off 
[/ QUOTE ]
so the game has come to this: a choice between progression and development, not both.
that's a problem from where I'm sitting.
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I just turned my exp off on my newest hero.. I havent gotten any exp for the winter event... but people think its wierd I have the Frostfire mission at lvl 6
Want all those lowbie Merits? turn your exp off
[/ QUOTE ]
so the game has come to this: a choice between progression and development, not both.
that's a problem from where I'm sitting.
[/ QUOTE ]
Of course this might have something to do with the xp curve, lowering debt, no more detoggles, and other changes that have made this came cake. PvE is so simple now, I don't even get enjoyment playing. I want a different difficulty setting to actually make this game challenging. But, hey, after I get my new graphics card, I'll be playing Left 4 Dead a lot more anyway. Might even switch to Champions once that goes live. This game is just too easy...it's a real shame because I love the lay out and the powes but it's just not fun.
Oh, and I hate merits. A casual player will never get enough merits to afford something like a LotG +recharge or Numina. I would run a TF once a month or so and see if I get lucky. Now, I'm not even going to bother to waste my time for six hours with a bunch of WoW crossover noobs.
Also, since I'm on a roll, why do the new holiday auras cost 1,000 candy canes? Doesn't anyone seem that's a bit excessive since we only get one candy cane per present?
[ QUOTE ]
[Also, since I'm on a roll, why do the new holiday auras cost 1,000 candy canes? Doesn't anyone seem that's a bit excessive since we only get one candy cane per present?
[/ QUOTE ]
Check your facts. Each aura costs 25 candy canes.
@cozmic
Kid Kozmic - lvl 50 Ill/Emp Controller
Agent Chance - lvl 50 Traps/DP Defender
Venatores - lvl 50 Broadsword/Shield Scrapper
Objective Feedback
Keep an eye on his post as it will be edited and added to as time permits
Merits In General
OBJECTIVE FEEDBACK
The transition to the merit system is a good idea in concept since it allows greater selection in choosing how a player gets the rewards they want . In Issue 12 anyone wanting Pool C or D recipes had to either run Taskforces and / or trials or earn influence to buy them off the market. Now players can run through Story arcs to slowly accumulate merits to get the rewards they want. This change does help casual players who want to use the invention but do not have all the time in the world to run taskforces or who cannot stand the monotony of farming. Greater flexibility among paths to a given reward will encourage most players to stay with the game as they can now play how they want to play to get the rewards they want (eventually).
Subjective Feedback
I feel the Merit system is great in concept but in operation is in need of tweaking and is let down by other support systems within the game. Due to the design of Ourobrous, Story arc contacts, changes and the Merit prices of items themselves. I will go into why each of these individual issues are letting the potential of the merit system go unrealized in more detail in other parts of this post. One of the great strengths of this game was that you basically had free market teaming. There was no holy trinity of AT's required for every mission door, through Sidekick and Exemplar options everyone could participate in a team regardless of level, Furthermore no one was required to team or solo to earn equivalent rewards. A team based character could team and would recieve experience Xp and item drops at a comparable or even greater pace than a solo based character while the solo based character would be able to control the pace of thier gaming by slowing thier rewards and completing missions solo. The rewards for completing ones own story arc were not significantly superior to discourage helping another to complete their story arc. The merit reward system as imposed on the current game system changes this dynamic.
It sucks. It takes too long to get enough merits for anything worth having. At least before you had a [censored] chance to get something worth a damn...
Mission complete bonus at least should include a merit bonus....
It's not like it got easier to do the TF / SF's with now even less people playing due to the exit of so many subscribers to the game....
Please refrain from circumventing the filter when posting. ~Niviene was here
[ QUOTE ]
Speaking as someone who despises this entire invention system period (and therefore, speaking purely subjectively), I find the merit system basically reinforces the 'bad' aspects of MOGs: farming, loot-[censored], loot-mongering and the like.
CoH/V was supposed to be a different kind of MOG, IIRC.
I think the entire system is wrong for this game and is one of the reasons I'll be shipping off to the competitor asap. No hard feelings, all. But if I had wanted to play a loot-centric game, I'd have stuck with EQ or it's various clones. You guys have decided this is how you want CoH/V to proceed into the future. Fine. Your game, your money, your call.
My fun, my money, my call 
Cal2
[/ QUOTE ]So what will you be doing when Champions Online (if it even comes out) gets lewt? What will you do when DCUO gets lewt? The lack of lewt is why so many folks left this game for other games initially when they came out. I dont see those newer games making the same mistake the devs made at CoX launch by not having real lewt.
Bump and Grind Bane/SoA
Kenja No Ishi Earth/Empathy Controller
Legendary Sannin Ninja/Pain Mastermind
Entoxicated Ninja/PSN Mastermind
Ninja Ryukenden Kat/WP Scrapper
Hellish Thoughts Fire/PSI Dominator
Thank You Devs for Merits!!!!
[ QUOTE ]
It's not like it got easier to do the TF / SF's with now even less people playing due to the exit of so many subscribers to the game....
[/ QUOTE ]
Completely wrong. Firstly, there has not been an "exit of so many subscribers", unless by "so many" you actually mean some small number.
Secondly, lots of people want merits and TF's are the way to get them. There are lots more TF's being done on my server for sure. I can't speak for your server, but I can't imagine it would be dramatically different.
Paragon City Search And Rescue
The Mentor Project
I totally agree with those people that have posted about contacts giving the missions in order so that team members can follow along in the story and get their hard earned merits at the end of the arc.
I think this is essential, or just give every team member one merit for completing missions in the arc, and make the arc reward to the owner mcuh smaller (two maybe?). A little extra reward for the mission owner to go hit the contact for the first few missions and probably running the team deserves a small reward, but as it sits now, it is bad that the arc owner is the only one that can get the Merits.
This game has been great at always rewarding teaming, and the way things are, it seems to reward soloing. Teaming to me is what makes a MMO fun. I could go play Baldur's Gate again if I wanted to solo.
City of Heroes (Sorry Villians, I like playing the good guy) is such fun for me when you have a full team working together well and mowing down the opposition.
Subjective Opinion:
I13: Rinse and Repeat - introducing the Merit Reward System!
Hey, guys, we know some of you are a maybe little tired of repeating the same old stuff you've already done dozens of times over and over and over, and, well, over, and that's understandable, sure, but now with I13 we've made it so that while you're re-doing all this old content for your 400th alt you'll be earning MERITS with which you can obtain GOODIES! See the MERITS? Nice MERITS! Now get out there and earn yourself some MERITS! And maybe while you're at it you won't notice we're pretty much out of ideas for anything really new...
Soon to be followed by:
I14: Here, Make Your Own Damn Content.
Pardon me if this seems disjointed or pseudo-rantish. It's 5AM and I'm a bit loopy.
Subjectively:
Merits Discourage Arc Teaming!
The fact that only the person who the story arc belongs to gets merits is a giant, throbbing digitus impudicus to everyone else on the team. As if their contribution to the success of the arc meant NOTHING.
Sure, they get drops, and inf, and prestige. See below.
Merits Are Going To Scuttle The Market!
While this isn't QUITE so pronounced blue-side, with it's huge, entrenched market base, red-side, where things are comparatively scarce (markedly moreso), this like kicking a man who is down with spiked taser-boots. You've now decresed the drop rate of certain recipies to "when someone buys it". Sure, there's going to be people crazy/stupid enough to random everything. We always need more Crap of the Hunters and Pacing...of...the...Turtle. Because, save for rare cases, that's all that's going to go to market.
Merits Destroy The Value Of Inf!
As the market purges itself, and new supplies of recipies DO NOT come in, you're going to be unable to get various things for ANY price, save merits.
Congratulations, you've just replaced one common currency with another! With no meaningful conversion between! Research the term "Confederate Currency".
The Merit System Lacks Real Control!
Sure, you can get the particular recipie. But you have zero control over the actual level. This means you have to try and have merit farmer toons with XP turned off at specific levels to buy precise recipies. However, this is a problem because:
Merits Penalize Alt-ism!
Instead of allowing people, as they have in the past, to cycle through different content by means of alts, merits, because they are non-tradeable, encourages one to play a "Main Merit" toon to that their merit earnings stay consolidated.
This kind of negative incentive to alt is in direct opposition to your day jobs initiative! Unless you're trying to tell us that "Working As Intended" means you want us to grind a single toon forever and ever and only sporadically turning on XP gains to hit newer content, while all our alts day-job badge to death.
This leads to:
Merits INCREASE Grind!
Sure, it takes a while to work up millions to buy stuff like Hecatombs, and such. However, there's a broad swath of content that can be played, and cycled through, so it doesn't resemble a grind. With merits, you either have to farm Ouro, farm Taskforces, or turn off XP earnings and exhaust story arcs left and right!
I like my shiny as much as the rest of you do. But that's [u]NO FUN[u]. Currently, I have a main badge/set-application toon. However, he isn't the only toon I play. I'm actively working a villain-side equivallent toon (main badger, IO set-out, etc), as well as multiple heros in different, interesting powersets. Do I want to go back to grinding one single guy all day every day? HELL NO!
Merits Are Exclusionary!
Some people have limited amounts of time to play. Meaning that they are going to take inordinately huge amounts of time to rack up even a random roll's worth of merits.
Others, like myself, have larger blocks of time to play. However, we team a lot with friends (see the part about the huge middle finger to teaming and merits) who happen to hop on.
I can run a taskforce or Ouro arc! GREAT! But when my friends pop on (since none of us are even in the same TIME ZONES, let alone state, never mind city) I can "Sorry! Taskforcing, merits are more important than you!"! Or I can drop a taskforce and go play something besides "City of Soloists".
I'm on a low pop server. I don't mind soloing now and again. But I have a LOT more fun when teaming.
And NO, "Move to another server" is NOT an acceptable "solution". Because it's not a solution! Hell, it's no more than peripherally associated with the root problem anyhow!
The Time Based Metric Is BROKEN!
First, it simply shifts focus away from previous min/maxed reward-earning content to a different set of min/maxed reward-earning content. Yes, it MAY have slowed the earnings down some, but it hasn't eliminated the behavior.
So you're still rewarding people who speed through while penalizing those who actually play through the content.
Also, I see this huge worry about "well what if someone stealths the content?"
SO WHAT!?!? If you didn't want people to be able to stealth content you shouldn't have put in stealth powers! This is simply more of the "penalties for efficiency and creativeness" mentality.
The Current Merits Implementation Destroys The Notion That They're Rewards!
Seriously! They're CURRENCY. Something that can only be spent. Not traded. Not gifted. Not sold. In i12, yeah, finishing up a TV Trial and getting Crap of the Hunter was kinda a letdown. But there was still a good modicum of "I was rewarded for my effort". We already got currency (inf) from the completion bonus as it was.
The whole "attaboy!" feel is missing from merits.
********** **********
Now, I don't feel that the Merit system is completely unsalvageable. It's a good idea that, when done properly, would give a better modicum of control to players.
What I would do:
1: Revise merit prices UPWARDS, drastically. (Read the rest before you go up in nuclear flames here). Look at doubling or tripling the price of uncommon. Double/triple the price for rares over that. Then allow for purples at double/triple/quadruple over that.
Take a LotG: D/E/R. The one I was looking at on the merit system (misremember level) was going for 250 merits straight-buy. Under the new system it'd be 1000-2250. While some of you may look at that and go *EXPLETIVE*! He's NUTS!, keep reading.
Bump the random rolls to double/triple their current values.
2: ALL missions (save "talkies") award a merit to every participant.
Paper/Radio: 1
Safeguard/Mayhem: 2
Story Arc (Red or Yellow)/Taskforce
Talkies/Deliveries: Zero
Get/Destroy Item/Rescue (without leadouts) (Possible to do stealth): 1 (or chance of 1)
Fight Boss/Rescue (with leadout)/Defeat All: 2 (or 1 with chance of one more)
Final Battle (AV fights): 2
Arc Completion for Arc Holder: 2-5 (Depending on difficulty/grind-factor of mission.
This is probably the only point that should be arc-holder/captain only. So we don't encourage people to simply jump on the last mish for a bonus.
Trial/TF Completion: 5-10 depending on difficulty and grind factors. Posi and Doc Q should be max, Katie should be minimum.
Difficulty Level Modifier for Arc/Trial/TF Completion:
Heroic/Villainous: 0
Tenacious/Vicious: + 1
Rugged/Malicious: + 1 (with chance for 1 more)
Unyielding/Ruthless: +2
Invincible/Relentless: +2 (with chance for 1 more)
I won't require that merits be tradeable. With this type of system, merits become more plentiful, meaning that it's easier to accumulate them (though not necessarily cheaper to buy what you want).
Introduce some method of controlling EXACT level of a recipie. Possibly by having all recipies drop at the MINIMUM of the level range by default and allowing a slider to specify exact level above minimum for a given range.
This system, or something like it, would insure that even very casual players have a fighting chance of accumulating reasonable amounts of merits and straight-purchasing things in weeks or months (as opposed to years-to-never). At the same time, it would place brakes on people hell-bent to purple themselves "like yesterday", yet still allow them to bust their butts and work towards the eventual goal.
Moreover, with the merit system being more accessible, there's less incentive to hoard merits, and more to attempt random rolls, with some of the byproducts recipies filtering back to the market. Indeed, I can see the market toons wearing the tires right off the random rollers and converting stuff back to inf in the market.
While this wouldn't eliminate the issue of merits supplanting inf, it WOULD mitigate most of the unpleasant side-effects. In addition, it would also (at least for me) eliminate some of the disappointment of simply being handed a stack of cash at the end of an arc/taskforce instead of my "shiny".
Okay, been typing for an hour and a half. I gotta get a bit more sleep before work. I will put addendum posts into this thread as I get the chance.
Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.
[ QUOTE ]
The Merit System Lacks Real Control!
Sure, you can get the particular recipie. But you have zero control over the actual level.
[/ QUOTE ]
No, you have it backwards. When you roll RANDOMLY, you can't control the level. When you buy a specific recipe, you can choose the EXACT level.
Paragon City Search And Rescue
The Mentor Project
Oh. Lemme just put a few things in here:
Objective Feedback
The infamy price of purple IO's and recipes has raised dramatically on villain side.
The infamy price of the vast majority of 'somewhat useful' TF drop IO's has raised dramatically on villain side.
The infamy price of the vast majority of trial drop IO's has raised dramatically on villain side.
Due to the huge merit bug, the price of Luck of the Gambler: Def / Increased recharge speed IO's has dropped 40% in relation to the rest of the market's inflationary shift. This gain has been offset by the phenomenal increase in the price of everything else I would like to go into my build.
Hyperstrike, there's a slider in the Merit Vendor to allow you to choose the exact level of the recipe you want.
What is missing, however, is price-adjustments for levels. I can see why Procs would be the same throughout (since they function the same regardless of level), but there should be some tradeoff for decreased effectiveness. Sure, there's set bonuses and exemplaring, but still, the prices should still reflect level to some extent. It's not like SOs or CIOs are the same price regardless of level, why should SIOs be flat cost?
[ QUOTE ]
Hyperstrike, there's a slider in the Merit Vendor to allow you to choose the exact level of the recipe you want.
[/ QUOTE ]
Ah. This kind of humiliation is what I get for typing at 5AM after not sleeping all night...
Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
The Merit System Lacks Real Control!
Sure, you can get the particular recipie. But you have zero control over the actual level.
[/ QUOTE ]
No, you have it backwards. When you roll RANDOMLY, you can't control the level. When you buy a specific recipe, you can choose the EXACT level.
[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah, he was so busy ranting and so tired that he had a couple of factual errors.
I suspect that devs are about as likely to be able to manage the wall o' text as the typical user. They're still human, after all. Folks feeling strongly about this is fine, but keeping the suggestions relatively concise will make them more likely to be listened to and implemented - and give fewer chances for factual errors that hurt the case that's trying to be made. Having said that, I'll just bold the key points below, because I'm also long-winded.
Objective Data from my end: I've earned a large number of merits with villains who haven't run a TF since I13 went live, opening up rewards to me that I wouldn't have otherwise had the opportunity to get. At level 50, much of what I was doing was repetitive/grindy before, so that hasn't changed. Being able to get TF or Trial drops for doing regular content is enjoyable.
Subjective: I don't like that the system encourages running on lower difficulties to speed-run things in order to obtain merits. Lower difficulties = faster, but also = boring. I can be entertained by it for a while, but I'll be honest and say that fighting whites and yellows with my 50s is not something that will retain me as a customer; it is, however, what the system currently rewards. The difficulty slider absolutely needs to be incorporated into merit rewards.
In addition, there are sources of Merits that need to be fixed sooner, rather than later. The Kheldian arc that was the source of so many of the merits that allowed the market to be flooded with high-end recipes (via the combination of two exploits, but still) ought to get fixed before people get too used to it. I'm guessing that the relatively small number of Kheldians that make it to that range made it impossible to datamine the arc, plus who was flashing back to it with Nosferatu before the rewards went int? But I think that there's more than enough data now to change its value in the reward table.
Also subjective: I agree with the sentiment that the system as implemented does potentially discourage some "live" (i.e., arc-running) teaming. I would support a merit per teammate per arc mission system, but am honestly curious whether the "doom" aspect of this is present. It discourages random teaming for folks who want to game the system - but what do the data say about teams running arcs before I13 went live and after?
My postings to this forum are not to be used as data in any research study without my express written consent.
Just had a thought, How about if I run say an ITF @9pm then the next day run a Synapse or Numina, ect.. and then later that night I run the ITF again @9pm (all of this with the same toon as I want my merits to buy the big stuff so I have officially abandoned all my other toons). Why should I be penalized in merits for the ITF just because I happened to do it again? I mean WTH I did a Posi in between the 2 ITF's, So now I'm spanked for wanting to gain merits to buy what I want!
I think that if I'm on a toon and do a TF then do another equally challenging or harder TF that the Timer should be reduced to half. This would keep you from abusing the same TF over and over (although I should be able to play the content I want as I do pay to play!) but would still give you the ability to do the TF's you enjoy more often.
[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, he was so busy ranting and so tired that he had a couple of factual errors.
[/ QUOTE ]
At least I'm willing to step up and admit to anatomically impossible feats like having both feet in my mouth while my head is shoved somewhere dark and poopy.
Don't get me wrong. I like the concept of the Merit system. I just think the implementation could use some work.
Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.
When the merit system was touted as a way to get around grinding a TF for a certain recipe, I was ecstatic.
Then I found out that the merit system REPLACES random rolls, it is not IN ADDITION to them.
Then I learned I get about 10-20 merits for a TF.
Then I learned that a lot of recipes, such as Blessing of the Zephyr's KB IO would cost 240 Merits.
So, now instead of being a way around grinding TF's, the Merit system, to me, simply says "You have to grind it X number of times to get what you want." Really, a big letdown, and probably a step BACK. 
Simplest way to step back forward, in my opinion, is to restore random recipe rolls at the end of a TF, while still having them grant merits. Then you can at least have a chance to get what you want while you're in the process of grinding for it anyways...
"I want Johnny Sonata to open his Moon Casino so we can have some damn Wailers on the Moon." - Johnny_Butane
"The vet reward for 1200 months of play is we move the servers into your house." - BackAlleyBrawler
Objective:
Farmers just farm merits now, and casual players have to grind.
The problem of farming has not been resolved, the method of farming has simply changed, with consequences to the rest of the player population.
Together we entered a city of strangers, we made it a city of friends, and we leave it a City of Heroes. - Sweet_Sarah
BOYCOTT NCSoft (on Facebook)
https://www.facebook.com/groups/517513781597443/
Governments have fallen to the power of social media. Gaming companies can too.
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Yeah, he was so busy ranting and so tired that he had a couple of factual errors.
[/ QUOTE ]
At least I'm willing to step up and admit to anatomically impossible feats like having both feet in my mouth while my head is shoved somewhere dark and poopy.
[/ QUOTE ]
Y'know, I only came up with 2 factual errors. In a tome of that magnitude, that's really not too bad. 
I agreed with a lot of what you had to say. I don't like the overt grindiness of the system and its apparent team-unfriendliness. I'm doing a lot more soloing now than I did before, but I will admit straight away that I'm a powergamer, and soloing makes it easier for me to work the system.
My postings to this forum are not to be used as data in any research study without my express written consent.
Take everyone's current active account and multiply the months it has been active by 100. Grant that many merits to them as a onetime reward and wait for the next complaint...
Thanks for giving us the ability to choose the level of the merit that we want, Devs. I'll play this more once my Dark Elves' gear aquisition runs its course.
"I never said thank you." - Lt. Gordon
"And you'll never have to." - the Dark Knight
[ QUOTE ]
Objective:
Farmers just farm merits now, and casual players have to grind.
[/ QUOTE ]
Apparently, a lot of people don't know the meaning of the word 'objective'. Not only is this ENTIRELY subjective, it is simplistic exaggeration.
Paragon City Search And Rescue
The Mentor Project
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Objective:
Farmers just farm merits now, and casual players have to grind.
[/ QUOTE ]
Apparently, a lot of people don't know the meaning of the word 'objective'. Not only is this ENTIRELY subjective, it is simplistic exaggeration.
[/ QUOTE ]
Fine, I object and reassert that where I once had fun running TF's now they just feel like a grind on the same character all the time trying to get the merits I need to buy the big shiny that I no longer have a chance of getting in a drop.
I must add that I have spent more time grinding for CANDY CANES just to buy the winter sets than I have playing and I think that's just sad.
QR
The timer for earning merits from the same TF is too long. If you still want to make it to a once a day tf, them make it 18 hours or so. Trying to keep track of the 24 hour timer is pain. You either cant run the same toon on the tf on the next day, or you take a chance in losing the reward. (18 hours makes it a large enough window for those that get started at random times to not be penalized.)
The number of merits for recipes is too high and makes everything feel like a grind. Risk vrs Reward is no longer the question for me. Reward vrs time-sink is.
At least this makes getting the day job badges easier... I find my self playing less because I know it is going to take a while to get the IO's I want for each toon.
I do really like the idea of the merit system. I know that I can slowly get the merits needed for the stuff I want and that is what is important. (I really like that I can choose the lvl of the reward now. That in itself is worth the system, I just wish the timer was lower and recipes cost less.)
YMMV---IMO
Ice Ember
Speaking as someone who despises this entire invention system period (and therefore, speaking purely subjectively), I find the merit system basically reinforces the 'bad' aspects of MOGs: farming, loot-[censored], loot-mongering and the like.
CoH/V was supposed to be a different kind of MOG, IIRC.
I think the entire system is wrong for this game and is one of the reasons I'll be shipping off to the competitor asap. No hard feelings, all. But if I had wanted to play a loot-centric game, I'd have stuck with EQ or it's various clones. You guys have decided this is how you want CoH/V to proceed into the future. Fine. Your game, your money, your call.
My fun, my money, my call
Cal2