What about losing already earned AE badges?

Hi Guys,

"Currently, some badges are being modified, and some may be removed from the game entirely. The list of changes being made to the MA badge system is not final yet, but you will be made aware when we have a concrete plan." - Positron's statement yesterday.

So we might lose some of our already earned badges!
Any clues as to which and more to the point why are we losing them?

Modify them yes, but to remove badges whilst leaving for example that stupid two minutes in The Shards badge is at the least a bit of a mystery.

And if he removes any badges what impact would it have on say, the 100 Earned AE badge? I only need one more badge to get it and have worked long and hard to get there!

Why are we not stamping our feet and asking for more detailed info on this proposal (Arbitory imposition).

To make the statement, he must have at least some of the badges in question already identified. Let us know so we can discuss this before the event, not after when it will be too late!

Do we not deserve at least that amount of courtesy in the part of the game that we participate in the most. Or are we just another tiresome interference that they could do without?

Discuss. Cheers

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Age is of no importance,
unless you are a cheese!

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Why are we not stamping our feet and asking for more detailed info on this proposal (Arbitory imposition).

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The list of changes being made to the MA badge system is not final yet, but you will be made aware when we have a concrete plan.

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To make the statement, he must have at least some of the badges in question already identified. Let us know so we can discuss this before the event, not after when it will be too late!

[/ QUOTE ] Test Server? It's never too late.

I'd guess the rating badges would be the ones to go if they wanted to prevent people from creating "5-star cartels". I personally wouldn't be sad to see them go.

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Amen. Giving the Playerbase the ability to 'make' a badge happen or 'grief' one from being gotten is hoo-ha. Those need to be nixed. And Virtual badges are just plain silly, and... well, I could go on.

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Ninus Lvl 50 Bots/Dark/SM Mastermind Badges: 1384 @Ninus on Global
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my take on it: pretend like the devs had done the sensible thing and put out the MA without badges and then later decided exactly what uses of the MA should have badges rewarded.

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my take on it: pretend like the devs had done the sensible thing and put out the MA without badges and then later decided exactly what uses of the MA should have badges rewarded.

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I'd agree on that.

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Qr - If they remove badges from the system, should they remove those badges from people who have already earned them?

Eco

Edit: added 'qr'

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

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Qr - If they remove badges from the system, should they remove those badges from people who have already earned them?

Eco

Edit: added 'qr'

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I'd say so, sure. Maybe "hide" the badges from display, so when it IS fixed or adjusted, people who had them don't necessarily "lose" anything. Although in the past, when they'd release a badge that they've been tracking telemetry for, the badge would just auto-win on re-release. I think the only badges in MA this would negatively affect are the ranking badges (Builder series, for instance, where your averages can get worse over time, as opposed to a "do 100 DC mission" badge which can only go up over time).

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So we might lose some of our already earned badges!

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So? I rather lose a bunch of badly designed badges than be forced to deal with them cobbling a band-aid fix. To my mind, the only badge that has ever been wrongly removed is the Multidimensional badge from villains.

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Any clues as to which and more to the point why are we losing them?

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As others have said, the "fan vote" badges (Builder, Hall of Famer), possibly the Dev's Choice (really, why have the double reward?). I suspect that even if they are not removed, the requirements would be changed.

I suspect that all the Virtual badges will get their requirements modified.

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Modify them yes, but to remove badges whilst leaving for example that stupid two minutes in The Shards badge is at the least a bit of a mystery.

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Because the Firebase Security Detail badge can be fixed. It has a clear condition as to how it rewards so that condition can be modified. How do you balance the Builder series, Hall of Famer, and Dev Choice badges?

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And if he removes any badges what impact would it have on say, the 100 Earned AE badge? I only need one more badge to get it and have worked long and hard to get there!

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From past examples, you will keep the Architect C badge. If you were at the Architect L badge and they removed 10 badges, you would need to get the 10 more to start counting past 50 again. Think the PVP rep badges.

From my perspective what they did wrong with the Architect badges:
<ul type="square">[*]Introduced too many at once. They should have introduced 3 badges per series (at most). For Issue 15 (after they did datamining) introduced more badges based on the datamining.[*]Guessed what requirements should be. They were blindingly optimistic of what the requirements should have been. This is par for the course for the development team. The next change will be an overreaction in the other extreme.[*]Instituted "fan votes". This opened up griefing and a PVP aspect to actually earning badges. A bunch of player can look at an arc getting close to being a hall of fame, there is a wave of negative votes to prevent it from achieving it or staying there.[*]Made another arbitrary developer's "gift of the gods" badge. Bug hunter is bad enough, now it has a sibling.[/list]

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I'd guess the rating badges would be the ones to go if they wanted to prevent people from creating "5-star cartels". I personally wouldn't be sad to see them go.

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While removing rating badges would remove one reason for "5 Star Cartels" there's more than just that reason to have a 5 Star Cartel. HoF requires 1000 ratings over 4 (or 4.5) stars, so a cartel would work for that. The apparent lack of Dev/GM control/concern over rating griefers would be another reason to "buddy up" in rating cartels to offset low star drive bys. Getting one's arc higher up on the listings so it sees more plays would also be facilitated by a "cartel." Raising the Arc profile so MAYBE a Dev notices it, plays it and DCs it would be another function of a rating "cartel."

Thanks to the way the Devs designed the rating system, they made it almost inevitable someone would form voting blocks because of all the advantages a "cartel" brings with it and all of the "problems" (like griefing) it offsets quickly and efficently.

Removing the badges alone won't kill off the voting blocks, it just makes them harder for casual observers to notice. Only thing that will minimize Voting Blocks is to completely revamp the rating system into something that has no advantage to being upvoted in blocks or remove it entirely AND removing all rewards (including list placement) associated with ratings (HoF in particular, DC could arguably be one as well since visibility is a factor).

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From my perspective what they did wrong with the Architect badges:
<ul type="square">[*]Instituted "fan votes". This opened up griefing and a PVP aspect to actually earning badges. A bunch of player can look at an arc getting close to being a hall of fame, there is a wave of negative votes to prevent it from achieving it or staying there.[*]Made another arbitrary developer's "gift of the gods" badge. Bug hunter is bad enough, now it has a sibling.[/list]
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/signed.

These two badges, in particular, have had a really, really negative impact on my play experience. Rather than play and enjoy the new arcs, I must advertise, spam, beg, and brown-nose in an attempt to get my arc some plays and votes.

It's bad enough that I'm seriously considering a change of hobby. (Never thought I'd say that either. And no, you cannot have my stuff.)

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"OK, first of all... Shut Up." - My 13-Year-Old Daughter

29973 "The Running of the Bulls" [SFMA] - WINNER of the Mighty Big Story Arc Contest !
- The Stellar Wind Orbital Space Platform

I found Positron's little rant to be well...childish. In particular, he sees fit to mention "5-star badge cartels", but makes no mention of ratings griefers.

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The constant spam of MA PL teams forming, requests for “Meow” missions, 5 star badge cartels, and the inability to find quality content in the Mission Architect listing are all things I heard complaints about over and over while I was logged in on Tuesday.


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Three little 1 or 0-star votes bumped my arc from page 3 down to well, at least page 250. I never did find it, but that was about the point where 4-star arcs, rather than 5-stars with 1 vote, started showing up.

So, 5-starring is "bad", but 0 &amp; 1-starring appears to be "good".

One thing I would absolutely LOVE in the MA is for the author to see who starred their arcs and what rating was given. That would do a LOT more to cut ratings griefings than anything else. The only reason people do the 0 &amp; 1-starring is that they can get away with it and never have to face the people they are griefing.

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From my perspective what they did wrong with the Architect badges:
<ul type="square">[*]Instituted "fan votes". This opened up griefing and a PVP aspect to actually earning badges. A bunch of player can look at an arc getting close to being a hall of fame, there is a wave of negative votes to prevent it from achieving it or staying there.[/list]
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Yeah. I'd be very happy if that line of badges merely counted up a number of stars over time. Or counted up a number of people who gave you ratings of 3+ stars. (heck, on that latter option, I'd have preferred if the whole star rating system had instead been a kudos or thumbs-up system accumulating counts instead of averaging, but I digress.)
They'd also better count *all* arcs together, including removed ones, so that people who publish in quantity are not going to have a harder time getting them than 1-time writers who rest on their laurels.

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I hope they remove Dev's Choice and Hall of Fame.

Also reduce the virual badge requirements as mentioned.

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I hope they remove Dev's Choice and Hall of Fame.

Also reduce the virual badge requirements as mentioned.

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Agreed with this and basically what MadScientist said. Having these badges at the mercy of griefers is a bad idea. I could live with 5000 baddies defeated in virtual mode for the top badge. 50k is insane.

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"...freedom isn't a commodity to compromise." -- Captain America, New Avengers #21

Guide to Base Teleporters

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I hope they remove Dev's Choice and Hall of Fame.

Also reduce the virual badge requirements as mentioned.

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Agreed with this and basically what MadScientist said. Having these badges at the mercy of griefers is a bad idea. I could live with 5000 baddies defeated in virtual mode for the top badge. 50k is insane.

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I wonder if anyone has done any work to figure out just how many NPCs a character defeats on the way to 50. Ignoring, of course, PL'ing and the like.

I wonder how that 50,000 would factor against that.

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50k is 5 times the amount of the original Zookeeper badge. They reduced the zookeeper to 1,000 due to AoE and Taunt caps.

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Yes, I know this. Look at my reg date.

I'm just wondering how many mobs a person goes through on the way to 50. If that 50k is bigger than THAT, then there's a definite problem. Regardless of how the badge compares to previous badges.

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I found Positron's little rant to be well...childish. In particular, he sees fit to mention "5-star badge cartels", but makes no mention of ratings griefers.

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Well, if nobody's mentioned it directly to him, it might not have occurred to him to mention it there.

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I hope they remove Dev's Choice and Hall of Fame.

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This would remove the huge amount of pressure that I now feel every time I log in.

You know, the devs could pool everyone who already has these badges, to see if they'd be angry. You know... all 9 people.


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Also reduce the virual badge requirements as mentioned.

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Leaving these alone I could live with. Because, you know, eventually I'd get there. It's the badges that are outside of my control that are bothering me at this point.

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"OK, first of all... Shut Up." - My 13-Year-Old Daughter

29973 "The Running of the Bulls" [SFMA] - WINNER of the Mighty Big Story Arc Contest !
- The Stellar Wind Orbital Space Platform

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It's the badges that are outside of my control that are bothering me at this point.

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Fair point.

Go beat up Statesman. You'll feel better.

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The only badges I feel need to be removed are dev choice and hall of fame.

Everything else can stay, including the 50k kills in test mode, although it would be nice if it was reduced.

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Qr - I don't mind DC and HoF staying, but they should change HoF to be sth like the suggestion of X times 3+stars or what have you, but I'd like to see the 'play x HoF arcs' badges changed so that they were for playing DIFFERENT HoF arcs.

Eco

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MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

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Yes, I know this. Look at my reg date.

I'm just wondering how many mobs a person goes through on the way to 50. If that 50k is bigger than THAT, then there's a definite problem. Regardless of how the badge compares to previous badges.

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I was pointing that out to those that didn't know.

I'd say it depends. How many ITFs/LGTFs did they do for instance. I would guess that both my first two level 50s helped defeat less than 50k baddies each before reaching that level. Then again I didn't do a lot of repeated mission runs on the first, and the second stealthed a lot of missions while solo.

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Qr - I don't mind DC and HoF staying, but they should change HoF to be sth like the suggestion of X times 3+stars or what have you, but I'd like to see the 'play x HoF arcs' badges changed so that they were for playing DIFFERENT HoF arcs.

Eco

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Can you post a clearer version after you get to a regular computer, instead of posting from your cell phone?

I am having a hard time understanding what you are trying to say.

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(QR)

and in this patch, they changed Master Builder to be EQUAL to Hall of Famer. (and not just equal in number, they even draw the comparison in the notes.) I'm surprised no one's mentioned that yet: what's the point of keeping the HOF badge around anymore?

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