Live Feedback: Issue 14: Architect Reward System
By
Ahurani,
Posted on: 2009-04-16 13:37 in Developers' Corner
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So it annoys the living daylights out of me that tickets largely seem to be based on how much damage one does, whether or not one buffs. I go into a mish with a scrapper, tank, or brute, and they get a heck of a lot more tickets than my buff players. In one case, a fire tank gained nearly ten times the amount of tickets as the sonic I was playing.
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I don't see this at all when I play buff casters. Random drop is random.
@Mindshadow
I'm also in agreeance that the rewards for AE are to high. This regards both XP and tickets. People can level to 30 or 40 in less than a day. A higher ticket cap my be nice for people who do want to store tickets.
AE is now more important than major task forces once were because there is more to be gained with less effort. I hate seeing years of work develping the primary stories being replaced by weeks(if that) of work to create a farm mission in AE.
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I'm also in agreeance that the rewards for AE are to high. This regards both XP and tickets. People can level to 30 or 40 in less than a day. A higher ticket cap my be nice for people who do want to store tickets.
AE is now more important than major task forces once were because there is more to be gained with less effort. I hate seeing years of work develping the primary stories being replaced by weeks(if that) of work to create a farm mission in AE.
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Actually I think adding "ticket storage" as a SG base option would be a good solution there to the ticket cap.
For me though, I think what really irks me is that one of the killer features] of CoH has rapidly turned the game from a must play into a what's on the PS3 and Wii that I haven't touched lately. And it's not the game itself. I love CoH. I love the gameplay, the costume creation, the interaction with other players.
It's constant stream of join an AE farm? tells... The number of new players who don't realize there's a lot more to the game than player created content accessed in AP... and the fact that most of AE is just simply junk.
The idea is that lessening the rewards for playing AE would lessen the number of people farming it and give a chance for the story creators to shine through is perhaps flawed. There have been multiple changes made to the game to discourage farming in general. Influence, exp, prestige, and salvage drops have been decreased on certain developer missions. Many common farmable missions in PI now require all players to be in the zone to play them. However, such changes haven't stopped the farmers.
I can easily see a reduction in AE rewards not impacting the farming at all. Players will just take longer to get the same effect out of the system.
As I see it, there are two ways to do this... carrot and stick. The developers can either punish players by making AE so un-inviting that nobody wants to use it...
or the developers can make other aspects of the game so appealing, players will find better value in developer created content than in AE content.
Or a combination of the two...
So, here's an extended proposal, and some of these actions I know aren't going to sit well with a large quantity of players.
Step 1: Stick: Remove the Gold recipe rolls from AE.
Currently you can only outright buy recipes with Task Force and Mission Reward merits. Which is great if you specifically want to purchase a single Miracle, Luck of the Gambler, or so on. However, as I've witnessed on multiple global channels, the Gold roles are handing out many of these extremely valuable and rare recipes on a regular basis. Which is great... only the current balance of earning these recipes heavily favors farming tickets in AE over going out and running Positron, Cap'SF, and so on.
By removing the Gold Recipe roll, players will find better value in going out and doing task forces and real missions in the pursuit of the best IO's.
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Step 2: carrot: Positron Equivelent for Villains
I can't hammer on this topic loud enough or often enough to get the point across. As much as people hate PosiTF, it's great for racking up prestige and influence for high levels, and helps a lot in getting level-pacted avatars up past their travel powers.
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Step 3: Stick: reduce rewards in AE
Already discussed. While in most cases the current reward benefits favor running real missions, select players have figured out how to tweak MA to give better ticket values or better exp values.
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Step 4: Carrot / Stick: Buff TF / SF / Mish merit rewards based on conditional objectives
here's one the developers are going to hate to implement and a large percentage of the player base will hate if it gets implemented. Currently select groups of avatars are speed running ITF like KTF used to be run. Hit only the stuff that needs to be killed, and move on. The devs handled speed-running on KTF by making Mary a requirement to kill ten times in a row. Players complained, but the devs largely held their ground, and KTF was better for it.
What I think the devs should do is add conditional awards to Task Force Completion.
Example: Complete MSTF, get double Merits.
Complete ITF with first two maps cleared of enemies, get 50% extra merits
Complete Eden Trial with final room cleared: get 25% extra merits
Complete Caves Trial with no deaths: get 50% extra merits.
Such conditional merit objectives give players additional reasons to go do developer created events, and to do those events as the developers either largely intended, or to add in additional challenges.
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Step 5: carrot : decrease time between Freedom Phalanx TF and equivalent main Villain SF runs.
Currently players who run task forces have to wait 24 hours between task forces to run them again. I propose turning the clock down on the main set of task forces for each side to 12 hours. This will make it easier for level-pacted players to justify two or three task-forces over a weekend where they probably won't hit the level cap on the first run.
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I could really go on about what can be done to fix the reward sytem so that players find value in doing everything the game has to offer... but I'll cut my list there.
Objective Feedback:
Experience rewards are too high in the MA. I don't mean just the exploitive farm maps. There are a few reasons that this is the case.
1) No travel time required. Even with radio missions (the fastest and easiest content prior to MA) part of the time you spent was travel. It could take you 30 seconds to a minute to travel to the next mission door and 5 minutes (or less) to run the mission. The MA is a measureable increase in experience/time.
2) Auto side kicking feature of the MA. This feature just allows people to self power level massively increasing XP/time. Even on a non-exploitive map/arc you can go from level 4 or 6 (where ever you get your first AoE) to level 20+ in 30 minutes to an hour even when solo.
3) Mob types that exist only in the 42-42 range. 'Nough said here. These should be disallowed from the MA. Almost all, if not all, exist in other places with wider level ranges. This allows number 2 above to have an even greater impact.
Ticket rewards are not in line with non-MA rewards.
1) The ability to choose Rare and Uncommon salvage with tickets makes these salvages neither rare nor uncommon, they simply cost more tickets. This trivializes the strict rarity divisions "baked into" non-MA content. In an hour of heavy AoE use in a hazard zone you can expect to get 1 or 2 pieces of rare salvage and the salvage you get is 1 of 6 possible (12 possible in the case of mobs that drop both tech and arcane) at best getting the rare salvage you want from normal content takes an average of 3-6 hours. The only control that you have over this in non-MA content is whether you are fighting arcane dropping only, tech dropping only, or mixed. Non-exploitive MA content allows you to purchase the exact piece of "rare" salvage you want in approximately 10 minutes of play. Exploitive MA content allows you to purchase 10 pieces (or more) of "rare" salvage in as little as 10-20 minutes.
2) Salvage purchases should come in the same ratio as they are awarded in non-MA content. The Common:Uncommon:Rare ratio is 22:5:1. MA salvage rolls should be brought into line with non-MA salvage drops.
a) Purchase a single roll for X tickets that has a 1:28 chance of being a rare, a 5:28 chance of being uncommon, and a 22:28 chance of being common. The only thing that you should be able to specify is tech, arcane, or mixed.
b) Purchase a "package salvage roll" you should get a package of 1 rare, 5 uncommons, and 22 commons for a lump sum of "X tickets". The only thing that you should be able to specify is tech, arcane, or mixed.
The same is true of recipes. The non-MA Pool A Common:Uncommon:Rare ratio is: 32:8:1
1) Common recipes are purchaseable from the invention tables. Common recipes should remain purchaseable with tickets as they are now.
2) Common recipes should be included in the Bronze and Silver roll tables. Ratios and costs should be adjusted accordingly to bring MA recipe awards in line with non-MA recipe award ratios.
3) The easiest Non-exploitive MA missions have the potential to be easier than radio/safeguard missions, the exploitive ones are much easier than radio/safeguard missions. Radio/safeguard missions do not award merits that allow you to roll for Pool C/D recipes because they are "too easy" to justify this level of award. Following this same line of reasoning, MA tickets should not have the Gold recipe roll option.
Tier blurring. This was a problem that was noted with the introduction of merits for pool C/D recipes. Merits that were earned while a character was in tier 1 range could be saved and spent in a later tier vastly decreasing the available tier 1 Pool C/D recipes, this also held true with tier 2 though was not as significant.
MA ticket awards makes tier blurring even more pronounced. It is quite easy to carry over every single ticket earned while in the tier 1 range to tier 2 rewards (the reverse however, was never a problem due to exemplaring and especially after the introduction of flashback) which causes a shortage of all non-common recipes except at the top level that any particular recipe exists.
A partial solution would be to have MA tickets drop in 3 tiers. As an example:
1) Tier 1 tickets would be earned only while at tier 1 levels and could only be spent on tier 1 rolls that would never exceed tier 1 level ranges no matter when the tickets were spent.
2) Tier 2 tickets would be earned only while at tier 2 levels and could only be spent on tier 1 or 2 rolls but would never exceed tier 2 level ranges no matter when the tickets were spent.
3) Tier 3 tickets would be earned when the character is in the tier 3 range and can be spent on rolls in any of the 3 tiers the same as current.
-Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein.
-I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
-When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty. - Thomas Jefferson
'As much as people hate PosiTF, it's great for racking up prestige and influence for high levels, and helps a lot in getting level-pacted avatars up past their travel powers. '
I think there is an issue here that is important. If you set up the premise that 'this mission is annoying and slow and has lots of boring or obnoxious obstacles, so it's worth lots,' then you have created the farming problem; you have introduced the idea that the rewards are far more important than actually having fun.
So when you make people jump through annoying hoops to get at goodies, it's no wonder that, conditioned for this, when there is an easier path people go for it.
Here's a novel idea:
Make content fun. Enjoyable. Thrilling. Make the rewards a cherry on top, not the only reason to put up with obnoxious eye-shriveling content.
Maybe then people will see AE as a source of potential cool, rather than an engine for more efficiently acquiring arbitrary virtual rewards.
Doc: you didn't actually read the proposal that I made for a Villain equiv of Posi did you...
No, I didn't, but just pointing it to an example of a pervasive design element. Which is hardly unique to MMOs, but encourages (IMO) the farming issues.
The people screaming "nerf MA rewards" are overlooking the implied intentions beyond that of encouraging use of the MA system and allowing players to aquire things they can use for their characters: Making the market viable again.
I say: Do not nerf MA rewards. MA rewards are not the problem.
The problem is the ease of creating unbalanced farms. That is what needs to be addressed. I've said it before, I'll say it again. Fix the farms. Remove the exploits that allow players to create those unbalanced maps. The developers know what they are. The exploiters know what they are. And the farmers use those maps because they give the best rewards.
Rewards for playing real MA content are in line with what they should be. This is why rewards should not be nerfed across the board. To do so will kill MA and punish the players using the system as intended.
Farming will continue, but it should not be aided and abetted with a nod and a wink as it is being done now.
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)
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Governments have fallen to the power of social media. Gaming companies can too.
What makes me nervous is that I'm not sure you can stop unbalanced farms without removing significant creative tools to players.
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What makes me nervous is that I'm not sure you can stop unbalanced farms without removing significant creative tools to players.
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well, one could try to address some of the problems that generated unbalanced non-MA farms, too. To cite the giant one: the rewards a SK'd-to-45 gets from a +8 boss killed by the 50's on the team. The *real* issue is the general benefit from sitting there as a 45 and not SK'd to the 50 - how you get to 45, or what the 50 targets, are both beside the point (so the MA removing the need for a 46 bridge is irrelevant to the farming problems).
I did enjoy bringing the prices of stabalized mutant genomes down from 500,000 to 2,000.
I make it a point to "farm" for this reason alone.
edit: I'm still working on re-supplying scientific theory's. I had no idea they were in such short supply. I think that should be my goal for today.
Ignoring anyone is a mistake. You might miss something viral to your cause.
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The people screaming "nerf MA rewards" are overlooking the implied intentions beyond that of encouraging use of the MA system and allowing players to aquire things they can use for their characters: Making the market viable again.
I say: Do not nerf MA rewards. MA rewards are not the problem.
The problem is the ease of creating unbalanced farms. That is what needs to be addressed. I've said it before, I'll say it again. Fix the farms. Remove the exploits that allow players to create those unbalanced maps. The developers know what they are. The exploiters know what they are. And the farmers use those maps because they give the best rewards.
Rewards for playing real MA content are in line with what they should be. This is why rewards should not be nerfed across the board. To do so will kill MA and punish the players using the system as intended.
Farming will continue, but it should not be aided and abetted with a nod and a wink as it is being done now.
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I'll start my subjective post by quoting this and pointing out that this is not strictly true.
I'll also add that I am not screaming "nerf MA rewards" I'm pointing out that MA rewards are totally unbalanced when compared to non-MA rewards and that they need to be rebalanced to make either type content "worth the time it takes" or so that the reward strengths in one content are balanced out by reward weakneses in the other type of content making a mix of content the ideal way to play. (Variety is one of the strongest features that this game has always had. This is no longer the case in regards to rewards for playing pre-existing content.) New content should not be a replacement for older content (story arcs, task forces, and yes even the market) but should instead be a compliment to it with similar (or at least comensurate) rewards for all play styles. Which is exactly what was done with PvP IO rewards.
Yes, I admit that I do use the market and I enjoy using the market but "reviving" the market is not my intention with my suggestions. Up to issue 13 every thing the devs had done including all the nerfs/buffs that many despise and other chortle with glee and clap their hands about were all very carefully crafted to maintain a, however shaky, balance.
The MA and issue 14 has thrown all that out the window. MA rewards are not at all balanced with non-MA rewards and not just for the reasons that I listed above. I feel very much as if I am a contestant on Let's Make a Deal with Monty Hall and that the devs no longer are concerned with reward balance and are giving away the store.
For salvage the MA is a store. You are simply redeeming tickets rather than influence to buy exactly what you want with out heed to any rarity structure or the "risk involved" taking your character up against a MoB type that you may be weak against to get salvage that you want.
As an example, many people dislike fighting "arcane" enemy groups which in regular content drop what was harder to come by salvage. The main reason was that many arch types had a harder time fighting the arcane foes and they were glossed over in favor of Tech foes such as Freakshow, Family, and Sky Raiders. MA content allows you to fight the easier Tech foes and redeem the tickets for arcane rewards. Trivializing the difference that was carefully maintained all the way from I9 (I5 if you are taking base salvage into account) to now.
As another example, a Forcefield/Sonic Resonance using "squishy" character gets mez protection except against sleep. Most dev content features at least 1 mob type that uses sleep in their power sets. A Forcefield/Sonic Resonance user can find/create an arc that has no sleep using foes in it and play with impunity having totally negated the one true weakness the set has simply by omitting sleep using opponents. This can occur either by design with intent to exploit this "feature" or by accident by a player creating MA content who has little experience or concern with play balance.
Why is this bad? Prior to I14 the devs did every thing in their power to maintain the "weakness" that was incorporated into every AT by design even to the point of not creating any IOs that provide mez protection and only adding a trivial amount of mez resistance.
On top of the above the MA designer can easily add buffing "allies" to their missions eliminating the need (and marginalizing players that prefer the support role) for buffing classes in these missions. Blasters, Scrappers, and Controllers become power houses that chew through extreme content with out any risk, reaping far greater rewards, far faster than other ATs, because their weaknesses have been negated, by either forethought or negligence, through trivial means.
-Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein.
-I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
-When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty. - Thomas Jefferson
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Why is this bad? Prior to I14 the devs did every thing in their power to maintain the "weakness" that was incorporated into every AT by design even to the point of not creating any IOs that provide mez protection and only adding a trivial amount of mez resistance.
On top of the above the MA designer can easily add buffing "allies" to their missions eliminating the need (and marginalizing players that prefer the support role) for buffing classes in these missions. Blasters, Scrappers, and Controllers become power houses that chew through extreme content with out any risk, reaping far greater rewards, far faster than other ATs, because their weaknesses have been negated, by either forethought or negligence, through trivial means.
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And what weakness do these classes really have? A scrapper? A tank? A brute?
The scenario you're describing enables other ATs, particularly the defender, to solo.
I don't see this as a problem. I see it as a strength, not that I have seen the MA used in this manner. When I have seen allies used it has been as an assist against an EB/AV, not to fill in the weakness of a squishy AT on a player's own arc, although I'm sure it could be used as such.
As for the MA store it is past time that this option was available. When game balance overrides fun (in this case of arcane enemies, squishies, and mez protection) there needs to be a redesign of gameplay or the rewards system, or even better, both. If people en mass avoid a certain thing in the game... that means there's a problem with it. Personally I find Freakshow boring but I don't take my solo defender up against Circle of Thorns either because that's just masochistic.
MA Rewards: I enthusiastically welcome the alternative to being a slave to our market overlords.
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)
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Governments have fallen to the power of social media. Gaming companies can too.
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And what weakness do these classes really have? A scrapper? A tank? A brute?
The scenario you're describing enables other ATs, particularly the defender, to solo.
I don't see this as a problem. I see it as a strength, not that I have seen the MA used in this manner. When I have seen allies used it has been as an assist against an EB/AV, not to fill in the weakness of a squishy AT on a player's own arc, although I'm sure it could be used as such.
As for the MA store it is past time that this option was available. When game balance overrides fun (in this case of arcane enemies, squishies, and mez protection) there needs to be a redesign of gameplay or the rewards system, or even better, both. If people en mass avoid a certain thing in the game... that means there's a problem with it. Personally I find Freakshow boring but I don't take my solo defender up against Circle of Thorns either because that's just masochistic.
MA Rewards: I enthusiastically welcome the alternative to being a slave to our market overlords.
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I see it as a problem. It's taking me, as a player, down a road that I don't wish to travel. Some of this games greatest strengths and unique features are teaming to do story driven content and the sidekick/exemplar feature. Both of which have been all but neutered inside MA. (Yes, neutered. 95% of what's posted in the MA at this very moment is dreck and farm arcs. In most cases it's not even worth the time it takes to find story driven content in the MA and assembling a team to do it once you find it is nigh impossible.)
Whether you like it or not there are people that play this game to fill a team support role and play defenders to do just that. Every issue the defender's uniqueness and role gets smaller and smaller and you are here telling me that woohoo the toon I created explicitly to team is now capable of soloing by exploiting MA content and I'm supposed to be thrilled by this? I'm not.
The MA as a store is not good. Anything that nullifies existing content is not good.
This is the very reason that the devs are so hesitant to change core functions of powers and the reason that epic pools had powers added in the 11th hour rather than replaced.
The MA as a store changes one of the core functions of inventions. They are now so easy to get and craft that all characters can solo and we are back where we were pre-ED and pre-GDN. Support characters with out roles to fill and everyone capable of soloing content.
The market is almost an entire issue of content that has all but been rendered obsolete. I see that as a waste of dev time.
As far as market overlords go.... pfft anyone with an ounce of patience and 4th grade math and problem solving abilities could get any thing they wanted from the market or make a profit if that was the goal. (My 10 year old grand daughter was able to, I don't see why anyone else ever had a problem.)
Be that as it may, I won't be replying in this thread again as this is a Feedback Thread and not a discussion thread.
I've said my piece, I'm not alone in my views, and my daughter, son-in-law (who had been playing since beta) and grand kids have suspended their accounts and moved on to other games.
-Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. - Albert Einstein.
-I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo Galilei
-When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty. - Thomas Jefferson
I, on the otherhand, see the previous post as a list of things I liked that improved this issue.
I like the fact that if I feel like playing a support build, I no longer am restricted to team play.
I like the fact that non purps are pretty much available to anyone instead of the powergamer. I like the fact that Other pools besides the gold rolls are now available at a fairly constant supply.
I like the fact that when I form a group to run AE content, 99 percent of the missions will let me take anyone who wants to go without worry of finding mentors for everyone who needs them.
These same things you list as detriments, I cheer.
Shadowstepper: Agreed.
I also agree with Shadowstepper.
When we talk about the balance of risks and rewards in MA, we need to discount the things that we already know are fixed on Test -- specifically, Comm Officers and lack of ranged attacks on melee sets. Nerfing the Comm Officers back down to minion XP will pretty much eliminate the super-fast leveling. There will still be people who design highly-efficient maps, no doubt, but these maps are unlikely to significantly exceed the commonly-farmed dev-created missions, in terms of their time-to-XP ratio. When that firehose runs dry, both XP and tickets will normalize to some extent, and the extremes we've seen recently will go away.
I love not spending a lot of time running. I love the fact that the devs are not wasting my time with non-fun stuff, not sucking my time up into something that is useless, like travel, just because they hope to increase the length of time I subscribe. Maximize my fun-to-time ratio and you are much more likely to keep getting my money, because I'm evaluating a money-to-fun ratio when choosing my entertainment.
I also love not worrying much about team composition. I love being able to play with anyone without worrying about their level. I love the fact that my SG can pick a level to play content at without worrying about whether there are enough SKs or exemps available.
Now, I know that for a while, we're all going to deal with the headache of pick-up teams of level 50 noobs, but you know, we've always had a problem with those anyway; it's not the end of the world to deal with two weeks' worth of mass-powerleveled population. It will work itself out, just like the Winter Lords mass-powerlevel of I3 worked itself out in short order. I suspect, though, that we've also got tons of veterans who have used the temporary XP firehose to try out some new ATs and powersets, and who will probably keep subscribing at least in part because they've got some new toys to play with. (I'd bet that there are an awful lot of people out there who might be using Comm Officer farms to get a bunch of toons past the first 20 levels which they've played umpteen times.)
And I rather like what the MA store has done for the broader accessibility of IOs. For the first time, as an occasional player, I've been able to afford the IOs I want (non-purple, of course), with only a handful of exceptions, and to get a very nice build without having to grind and grind and grind hopelessly. It's tremendously satisfying, and it means that NCsoft is going to get more of my money.
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I suspect, though, that we've also got tons of veterans who have used the temporary XP firehose to try out some new ATs and powersets, and who will probably keep subscribing at least in part because they've got some new toys to play with. (I'd bet that there are an awful lot of people out there who might be using Comm Officer farms to get a bunch of toons past the first 20 levels which they've played umpteen times.)
And I rather like what the MA store has done for the broader accessibility of IOs. For the first time, as an occasional player, I've been able to afford the IOs I want (non-purple, of course), with only a handful of exceptions, and to get a very nice build without having to grind and grind and grind hopelessly. It's tremendously satisfying, and it means that NCsoft is going to get more of my money.
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This is exactly how I feel.
I will play a large pickup team of 8 of just about anything, TF, MA, normal missions, paper missions or street sweep for fast xp to level an AT I'm familiar with (anything but an epic) to pick up a level or two to reach a specific goal (often stamina at 20). Otherwise I almost exclusively play with people I know from my SGs, friends, or global list. Usually I'm duoing or soloing.
The ability to purchase salvage and recipes with earned MA tickets has enabled me to make things for myself and SG at a rate that I wasn't able to before. Anything I can't use, but my SGmates or alts can I make and put in the base (as there are only five of us, and only two of us play regularly, knowing who needs what is easy).
IOs are accessible to the casual player, the new player, and player friendly in a way they never were before. This is a very good move. Now the market truly is optional as was promised when it was introduced. The market is a convenience, if I want to avoid it and still make IOs I could do so, the market just makes it easier. Thank you, Devs!
Player friendly games make money. It's so simple.
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)
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Governments have fallen to the power of social media. Gaming companies can too.
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The MA as a store is not good. Anything that nullifies existing content is not good.
The market is almost an entire issue of content that has all but been rendered obsolete. I see that as a waste of dev time.
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I have to disagree, if I had a say I would get rid of the blackmarket/ww in a heartbeat. It was nothing but a headache unless one wanted to play profiteer. Sorry I play games to have fun, if I wanted to flip stuff I would get a job in ws.
My main gripe was it wasn't optional at all like it was supposed to be. Casual players had no way of ever getting enough $$ to buy anything worthwhile, and yet with the way drops work I seem to have such lousy luck, doing even regular tf's would not assure you would ever get your io's filled. (Speaking mainly redside where the population or supply/demand is just plain depressing.)
The MA store is a godsend to players like me and I'm sorry you don't feel that way.
If MA gets "fixed" or taken away as you suggest I might as well leave. I have had enough sleeps, snipes and confuses to last me a lifetime as well as immoblizes and the funny thing is I have 0 characters that can use any of these. Not to mention they sell for less in the market than vendoring them. Rare or not. bah
I really hate that loot *was* added to this game, but its here to stay so we have to make the best of it one way or another.
The only other option is allowing people to choose what drop they want from a TF/arc/whatever. Let people pick a recipe and be done with it. At least with the ma I have a better chance at rolling a lotg, I have 0 and many 50's...ugh
With the current MA reward system there are massive rewards for NOT doing Developer content.
I can skip contacts, zoning, and travel. If I can skip travelling I can skip getting a travel power.
I can create a toon, run to the Atlas Park AE building, be on a team in two minutes, and be at level 50 within hours or at most a couple of days. The only time I leave the building is to run to Miss Liberty to slap on a few more powers, then a run to WW to slap on a few IO's, then I jog back to AE and repeat.
With the current reward system there is little incentive to use 95% of the game.
It seems to me that the purpose of MA was to see stories and maps and baddies you can't see in the rest of the game; the unending fresh content is reason enough to go to WW. You don't need any other reward then to play the unexpected!
Soooo . . . if I were King, Architect Entertainment would be just that, entertainment for a hero. I would go in, for example as a level 36 blaster, team up, play some cool player made content, have a ball; but when I left the AE building I would still be a level 36 blaster. Yes, I am suggesting no XP or any other main game related currancy would cross transfer to the main game from doing MA content.
How else do you make the main game relevant?
This is not a doom post by the way, the game is not collapsing or any of that nonsense. MA makes the game stronger and better clearly.
I am just looking at the long term incentives to use Dev content.
But that's just it.....why should they want thier content to surpass AE content? I'm not saying the AE should surpass Dev content either....just wondering. If you take the reward out of the MA, you will have put something into the game that took 2 issues just to refine that will be ignored by ALOT of the playerbase...especially when you are basing your new marketing stratagy for the game around this model.
'How else do you make the main game relevant?'
Make it more interesting. Carrot, not stick.
It reminds me of raiding in WoW, and raiders getting bent out of shape about 'casuals' getting 'same access to content.' "Raiding is harder, more painful, takes a lot of work! If I don't get more rewards, what's the point??" Well, just maybe you should be wondering why you're bothering doing stuff that you aren't enjoying?
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The MA as a store is not good. Anything that nullifies existing content is not good.
The market is almost an entire issue of content that has all but been rendered obsolete. I see that as a waste of dev time.
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I have to disagree, if I had a say I would get rid of the blackmarket/ww in a heartbeat. It was nothing but a headache unless one wanted to play profiteer. Sorry I play games to have fun, if I wanted to flip stuff I would get a job in ws.
My main gripe was it wasn't optional at all like it was supposed to be. Casual players had no way of ever getting enough $$ to buy anything worthwhile, and yet with the way drops work I seem to have such lousy luck, doing even regular tf's would not assure you would ever get your io's filled. (Speaking mainly redside where the population or supply/demand is just plain depressing.)
The MA store is a godsend to players like me and I'm sorry you don't feel that way.
If MA gets "fixed" or taken away as you suggest I might as well leave. I have had enough sleeps, snipes and confuses to last me a lifetime as well as immoblizes and the funny thing is I have 0 characters that can use any of these. Not to mention they sell for less in the market than vendoring them. Rare or not. bah
I really hate that loot *was* added to this game, but its here to stay so we have to make the best of it one way or another.
The only other option is allowing people to choose what drop they want from a TF/arc/whatever. Let people pick a recipe and be done with it. At least with the ma I have a better chance at rolling a lotg, I have 0 and many 50's...ugh
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*blinks*
okay. unless I'm wrong, "loot" has been in the game since day 1 as droppable enhancements. What the heck are you on about?
One thing you ignore about the difference between someone doing MA content and someone doing dev content are temp powers and accolades.
While seemingly trivial, these can make a HUGE difference in the effectiveness of two otherwise identical characters.
AFAIK, there's no way to duplicate these in MA.
Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.
Okay... where to start:
Subjective opinion : the prestige and exp rewards are too high in MA.
I say this because it used to be fun and sit around Atlas Park. Host a costume contest, talk with other players, recruit for supergroups, show new players the ropes, etc. etc. For the past week, for every 30 minutes I've spent in an Atlas Park on 3 different servers, roughly 3/4 of the broadcast chat is promotions of AE farms. I don't mean AE Mish. I mean people who explicitly broadcast : Looking For AE farm, or AE farm looking for players
Okay, I know that Freedom's been bad about the farming for years. I've gotten somewhat used to loading into Freedom's PI and seeing a level 5 asking for a farming team. Now that kind of behavior is spreading to other servers, and it's honestly pathetic.
I'm not saying that players shouldn't get some experience, prestige, or influence, from MA, and the difference is pretty dramatic as is. However, I think the average MA rewards need to be cut drastically.
Perhaps a better way to handle this would be for Dev's Choice missions to get half the current rewards, while hall of fame arcs get quarter current benefits, and everything else get one eighth current benefits.
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Subjective Opinion: Ticket drops need to be evened out for buff avatars
I like to play Buff Avatars. I've got a kin, a storm, a therm rad, a rad, a sonic, cold dom... if it's got buffs... or debuffs... I've probably got one.
So it annoys the living daylights out of me that tickets largely seem to be based on how much damage one does, whether or not one buffs. I go into a mish with a scrapper, tank, or brute, and they get a heck of a lot more tickets than my buff players. In one case, a fire tank gained nearly ten times the amount of tickets as the sonic I was playing.