Discussion - Release Notes for 18.20090422.5T
By
Adar_ICT,
Posted on: 2009-05-12 10:28 in News, Events and Announcement Discussion
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For those of us who like a good story the # of tickets you get means nothing so capping it does nothing for us.
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You're wrong, it does do something for us. It makes all the people that are there only for "1337 r3w4rdz" leave MA so that we can actually run normal teams that will allow us to enjoy the story rather than rushing through everything in the fastest and "most efficient" way possible. You can see this already in this thread.
Yay for reward nerfs! 
[/ QUOTE ] really? so whast gonna happen when you want to io out a toon but wait.... there no ios at the Bm cause of the ticket nerf. like it or not but villain side market has always been in a rough state. Then the devs say o we gonna nerf rewards again and give ya merits. that foollish decision and had literally destroyed what was left of the market. then we get tickets (yay) instant influx of ios and ppl now able to by things that werent currently there. now there nerf and your saying tickets dont matter. your glad there nerf cause now you can run your stories with teams that enjoy the story and dont care about rewards or the rest of the ppl in th game. kinda short sideed and selfesh of ya aint it?
As to the remark of calling midas a farmer. you say it like its a bad thing. whether he is or isnt is besides the point. whether you or the devs like it or not farmer and farming in essential to this game. If it wasnt for farmers, and farms. where would you get your ios from? certainly not from the few merits you get as you lvl to 50. where do you think most of the io come? You think prices are high now? lets kick all the farmers out of the game and lets see how the market is then.
Its the farmers that are selling services for RL money that is the problem. not the players that farm so they can have ios for there alts or have the inf to buy the ios they need. the devs and the players need to relize that there are 2 very distinct types of farmers.
lastly, im really getting sick of hear about the devs whining like children about farmers. They may be great video game developers but there business skills severely lack. If they truly wanted LESS farming then they need to stop nerfing rewards. and actualy give a NICE boost to drop rates. It will only creates more farming so the players can get the enhancements they want/need sometime before the servers go dead. But there actions say they want more farming and want something to whine about. They nerf rewards time and time again. Any time the villain market started to look good they nerf something. this time it was ticket. last time it was merits. Yes merits was a nerf. between giving us a 24hr timer and dimishing returns you couldnt earn as many ios in the same 24hr period as you could before merits. Befor some says "well now you can buy what you want". Big deal ya need 200+ merits. the old system you could earn enough ios to trade/sell to buy what you wanted alot faster then you can earn 200+ merits.
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In terms of the game, I've been trying to view MA primarily as a tool to provide the creative outlet for the CoX subscribers, which I think is innovative for any MMO currently out there. Does anyone think this is the way MA was intended to be viewed, or am I in the minority?
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And/or as an alternative to doing the same content you've
already done two-dozen or more times.
Problem is, only the most diehard story-fans are going to use
MA without rewards, and even they're going to get tired of
doing that after playing enough bad ones.
Like it or not, I'd wager MOST players do not want to use MA
"just" to experience 95% of the stories in there. The true
cream of the crop, SuperAwesome stuff...maybe. Maybe some
of them. One time. Otherwise, no.
Without providing incentive on par with the normal game, to
make playing that content an acceptable use of time, MA
would be a complete ghost town and a "commercial" failure.
The players wouldn't be playing, the creators wouldn't be
creating because noone plays, and it'd just sit there as a weird
looking building in multiple zones, that you have to visit once
per character after level 10 to get rid of the contact.
I suspect that's not what the devs wanted to see from it.
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**Hands "Player" a couple of tanks of Oxygen**
I would hate for him to pass out way up there atop his soapbox
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i LMAO when i read this
Wow Gear_Freak, how did you EVER play this game before IOs and the market existed?
You do realize that you can still play the game just fine with SOs and less, right? IOs are an optional feature that can be completely ignored, as can the market.
Sounds like the people that are getting all excited over imaginary "stuff" need the oxygen more than I do... they seem to be hyperventilating.
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Not possible, unfortunately.
As I said, it was a very small map, two or three spawns, one glowy, and an ambush or two. Even on a very difficult setting I don't see anyway that the tickets granted from defeats could be more that 75 to 100, and even that's pushing it a bit.
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Then this should be investigated and quantified. Let's get Arcanaville on it right away, seriously.
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WTH does he have to do with anything? Last i looked he wasnt a redname unless its a devs alt account. If thast the cas. you may want to keep that under your hat so to speak. he may not want that getting out. but idk.
Plz explain why his testing is so superior to others and how SaintTzu is too incompetent to test this issue out. An issue that he found and brought it to light in this thread.
I know thats not what you directly said but you definitely implied that. Just not in as many words.
If I have to explain why Arcanaville is excellent at crunching data and testing, when SHE showed the devs problems that they never even knew existed so many times in the past.... well, I don't think there's anything else I can say to prove it to you. Go read some of her guides, if you're so inclined.
Here's a start.
QR
i could understand them adding a ticket cap because they dont want poeple capping their tickets in one mish. but 1500 tickets, which includes the bonus, is WAY too low. it would take 2 runs to get even the cheapest gold roll and 1 run isnt even worth 3 silver rolls. i think if they want to put ticket limit in, increase the ticket limit to at least 3000 or 4000 which is worth 1 gold roll. i still play MA stuff becaus i can make good money and such, but i rather not read stories, i rather play fun and exciting mishs and reap the rewards that actually reflect the difficulty of the mish.
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Wow Gear_Freak, how did you EVER play this game before IOs and the market existed?
You do realize that you can still play the game just fine with SOs and less, right? IOs are an optional feature that can be completely ignored, as can the market.
Sounds like the people that are getting all excited over imaginary "stuff" need the oxygen more than I do... they seem to be hyperventilating.
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With the complete lack of new villain only content. i would have left along time ago if it was for things like ios and stuff like that. Sure the game is awesome. the devs did a great job but not worth playing for 5yrs if your gonna do the same stuff with the same rewards. everything gets stale and old. especally if i cant make my toon stand out amongst other players. Its very rewarding to know you have toons that others think are awesome. And with ios and E.D. (yes, i actualy liked ED and the regen nerfs) this is now possible. You now have the ablitiy to do stuff that you cant do with with SOs alone. I love my permadoms and atm little nervous of talks about posi making adj to the dom set (we all know how the devs like there sledge hammer). the dr jekle mr hyde things is whats makes doms fun and makes you want to achieve permadom status. But it takes alot of IOs, inf and time to do this.
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If I have to explain why Arcanaville is excellent at crunching data and testing, when SHE showed the devs problems that they never even knew existed so many times in the past.... well, I don't think there's anything else I can say to prove it to you. Go read some of her guides, if you're so inclined.
Here's a start.
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I think the issue he had is more this:
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Plz explain why his testing is so superior to others and how SaintTzu is too incompetent to test this issue out. An issue that he found and brought it to light in this thread.
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To me, it came across like cult of personality worship. Mileage
varies, but it definitly came out funny.
Arcanaville does not have a patent out on basic math. A
problem that's pretty simple to look at and check out, is better
reported to the devs as a non-WAI bug, rather than "nah, this
can't really be an OFFICIAL problem until Arcanaville says it
is..."
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QR
i could understand them adding a ticket cap because they dont want poeple capping their tickets in one mish. but 1500 tickets, which includes the bonus, is WAY too low. it would take 2 runs to get even the cheapest gold roll and 1 run isnt even worth 3 silver rolls. i think if they want to put ticket limit in, increase the ticket limit to at least 3000 or 4000 which is worth 1 gold roll. i still play MA stuff becaus i can make good money and such, but i rather not read stories, i rather play fun and exciting mishs and reap the rewards that actually reflect the difficulty of the mish.
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You do realize that the 1500 is for a single mission right? two missions with capped out rewards would be equal to a low level gold roll, a reward previously only available through task forces and costing 25 merits. three missions can give you up to the highest level gold roll and enough left over for some other stuff as well.
I think the level is fine the way it is. Its enough to reward people well enough for playing while still making it profitable to run regular missions. I think one gold roll a mission would be too much.
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If I have to explain why Arcanaville is excellent at crunching data and testing, when SHE showed the devs problems that they never even knew existed so many times in the past.... well, I don't think there's anything else I can say to prove it to you. Go read some of her guides, if you're so inclined.
Here's a start.
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I dont doubt you one bit about HER (i assume everybody is a guy til i KNOW different) ability to crunch numbers and find hard problems. But you respond like she is the only one that is capable of doing this and that SaintTzu was incompetent. Granted this may not have been your intent but it did come out sounding that way. That is all i was really trying to say.
But that does bring out a very good point. I know she has help the devs in the past. I would bet a wks pay check that she was well as other very competent and good testers, were in closed beta. If that was the case why did the devs release MA when they know(by there own admittance) it would be farmed and exploited. they did have mos to work on it after all. Then have the nerve to rant and throw fits like a 2yr old. And even going as far as banning accounts and locking up ppls MA slots. That is just completely asinine of them. Lets act like adults and make lvl head decisions that actually make sense.
This whole situation is kinda like a group a kids playing in the sand box. 1 kids give the others a toy to pass around and share. Then gets made cause they are playing with it. So he breaks the toy and if that wasnt enough. he kicks sand in there eyes.
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really? so whast gonna happen when you want to io out a toon but wait.... there no ios at the Bm cause of the ticket nerf. like it or not but villain side market has always been in a rough state. Then the devs say o we gonna nerf rewards again and give ya merits. that foollish decision and had literally destroyed what was left of the market. then we get tickets (yay) instant influx of ios and ppl now able to by things that werent currently there. now there nerf and your saying tickets dont matter. your glad there nerf cause now you can run your stories with teams that enjoy the story and dont care about rewards or the rest of the ppl in th game. kinda short sideed and selfesh of ya aint it?
As to the remark of calling midas a farmer. you say it like its a bad thing. whether he is or isnt is besides the point. whether you or the devs like it or not farmer and farming in essential to this game. If it wasnt for farmers, and farms. where would you get your ios from? certainly not from the few merits you get as you lvl to 50. where do you think most of the io come? You think prices are high now? lets kick all the farmers out of the game and lets see how the market is then.
Its the farmers that are selling services for RL money that is the problem. not the players that farm so they can have ios for there alts or have the inf to buy the ios they need. the devs and the players need to relize that there are 2 very distinct types of farmers.
lastly, im really getting sick of hear about the devs whining like children about farmers. They may be great video game developers but there business skills severely lack. If they truly wanted LESS farming then they need to stop nerfing rewards. and actualy give a NICE boost to drop rates. It will only creates more farming so the players can get the enhancements they want/need sometime before the servers go dead. But there actions say they want more farming and want something to whine about. They nerf rewards time and time again. Any time the villain market started to look good they nerf something. this time it was ticket. last time it was merits. Yes merits was a nerf. between giving us a 24hr timer and dimishing returns you couldnt earn as many ios in the same 24hr period as you could before merits. Befor some says "well now you can buy what you want". Big deal ya need 200+ merits. the old system you could earn enough ios to trade/sell to buy what you wanted alot faster then you can earn 200+ merits.
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Here is the thing. This cap wasn't put in place to stop farming, it was put in place to prevent eggregious exploits like the meow farms from errupting like they did. 1500 per mish is reasonable, if you think its unreasonable, please prove it with some kind of evidence that shows that 1500 tickets is a significant reduction in rewards to what can be accomplished in a normal mission of comprable size.
I have never farmed for IO's, I never felt the inclination to do that, and yet all of my characters are IO'd out because I used the market, sold my drops, and was patient with the market. The IO's will be there and the ticket "nerf" will do nothing to impact the market at all. The market will in fact probably be better despite the "ticket nerf"since it was doing fine before it.
Your position on the devs "whining like children over farmers" is just not based in reality. They didn't whine, they didn;'t throw a childs tantrum. You really want to see what a childs tantrum looks like go back to that initial post where Positron set his foot down and see all the /ragequits from the sock puppets. read all the posts from the hard core farmers threatening to quit and the rabid anti-farmers feeling vindicated for no reason. The devs put these actions in place to curb exploiting, not farming. Exploiting the system is bad, very very bad. I have not really seen the devs ever really "nerf" rewards, in fact they usually adjust rewards up, they did so for merits in regards to not just the number given, but they also reducedthe cost of rolls.
I guess I really don't see the big deal unless someone actually posts some evidence in regards to how some missions are set up and what the average rewards are in game vs MA and if they are comparable.
really? ALL your toons have the most elite ios, totaly purpled out and with no farming and dont in a reasonable about of time? Im seriously doing something wrong then.
I totaly agree with you about the devs closing exploits. they do and should.
reread posi post. all that was was whining and ranting. reg players have been flamed for far less. but yea there were a lot of players that were whining also. 2 wrongs dont make a right though. and thta does go both ways. for the devs as well as players.
As for the market. NO the market was not fine. not by any means. At least not villains side. Hell its not fine now buts its a hell of a lot better then it was before tickets. the prices have dropped on all the rare stuff, common salvage is now worth something. But how long will it last
As far as the testing of the tickets. ill go and double check but really SaintTzu already has. he got what ..75-100 tickets first mission then 118 or something like that the second. you can get better rewards if ya ran a paper mission. they are just as fast. But they are a hell of alot easier and with better rewards. So do we
A) Nerf paper missions now?
B) Only use the risk vs reward scenario when its convenient reason to nerf something?
Also , plz try to rationalize why they gave all melee toons overpowered range attacks? I completely under stand them adding range attack for exploit reasons. that i saw coming but the range damage on some is just sick.
Lastly why are they banning accounts and locking out MA slots if they admitted they knew players would farm certain things. Yet lock them out. Kinda like a kid telling his friends they can play with his toys. Then start crying cause they actually played with them. Like he knew they would. But if you dont call it childish what would you call it out of curiosity?
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As far as the testing of the tickets. ill go and double check but really SaintTzu already has. he got what ..75-100 tickets first mission then 118 or something like that the second. you can get better rewards if ya ran a paper mission. they are just as fast. But they are a hell of alot easier and with better rewards.
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Assuming that's where the cap is actually cutting off at. I
don't imagine it is, or else there'd be a giant uproar about it.
The average mission in many arcs have always paid out about
that for one person, and that IS our fault, actually.
Many MA players are so ADHD, they go around 0-1 starring
any arc that takes a little bit of their time. Oranbega map?
Zero star. Too large of a tech map? Zero star. Too many
objectives? Zero star. Kill-all of any kind, no matter how
small? They'd give you -5 stars if they could.
So people write shorter missions so as to not get ratings
griefed by these players, and the result is small rewards.
SaintTzu's issue was that the cap is not working correctly, or
not working as advertised, and cutting off bonus tickets
incorrectly. Not that the overall rewards weren't large enough
for what he was doing.
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really? ALL your toons have the most elite ios, totaly purpled out and with no farming and dont in a reasonable about of time? Im seriously doing something wrong then.
I totaly agree with you about the devs closing exploits. they do and should.
reread posi post. all that was was whining and ranting. reg players have been flamed for far less. but yea there were a lot of players that were whining also. 2 wrongs dont make a right though. and thta does go both ways. for the devs as well as players.
As for the market. NO the market was not fine. not by any means. At least not villains side. Hell its not fine now buts its a hell of a lot better then it was before tickets. the prices have dropped on all the rare stuff, common salvage is now worth something. But how long will it last
As far as the testing of the tickets. ill go and double check but really SaintTzu already has. he got what ..75-100 tickets first mission then 118 or something like that the second. you can get better rewards if ya ran a paper mission. they are just as fast. But they are a hell of alot easier and with better rewards. So do we
A) Nerf paper missions now?
B) Only use the risk vs reward scenario when its convenient reason to nerf something?
Also , plz try to rationalize why they gave all melee toons overpowered range attacks? I completely under stand them adding range attack for exploit reasons. that i saw coming but the range damage on some is just sick.
Lastly why are they banning accounts and locking out MA slots if they admitted they knew players would farm certain things. Yet lock them out. Kinda like a kid telling his friends they can play with his toys. Then start crying cause they actually played with them. Like he knew they would. But if you dont call it childish what would you call it out of curiosity?
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My one toon that I run more than anything and is my only level 50 has as many purple sets as I want to have on him and is IO's to the gills and with no farming. My other toons that I don't care that much about have been frankenslotted really well for their level and with no farming and not even a need to transfer any inf. I used the market. In the end I don't even need IO's to play I just like to have them for kicks because I don't have to replace them every so often.
As far as Positrons post I suggest you re-read it. To me it didn't come off as whinney or as him throwing a tantrum, it came off as reminding people that they can be dealt with if they keep exploiting the system as they have and that the worst offenders MAY lose access to a character and if they continue to abuse the MA system by using exploits in the system then they can lose the privilage of using that system. All of that info was made public when I14 hit beta. We were told up front that we could loose access to MA if we chronically abused it. Posi was reminding people that they can and will take action if they deem it neccesary but also said that it would only be fore the most eggregious of offenders.
Giving a ranged attack to all melee mobs was neccesary to put a plug in the exploitation that was happening with people hovering out of melee range and sniping from safety. Personally I have yet to test these new changes and if what I am hearing is true then maybe the ranged attack needs to be looked at. I also understand that come I15 we will have much better control over what mobs have what powers. I would suggest joining in one of the training room threads about it and offer constructive alternatives to the ranged attacks that solves the problem of the risk free hover sniping while not being over powered. I agree that the fix was at best a band-aid and not a very good one for the situation.
As far as the banning thing goes, once again they never threatened to ban farmers for farming MA, they threatened to maybe possibly lock toons that were heavily exploiting the system, which is a far cry from farming. Its more like a kid letting another borrow his toy and then get angry when the other kid breaks it. I would bet the kid whos toy got broken would not let the other kid keep playing with his toys. Thats not childish, thats being reasonable. A slightly better analogy would be that a friend wishes to borrow your car so he can get to work the next day. You don't need the car tomorrow so you agree and hand your buddy the keys. Three days later your friend comes back with the car, the windshield is cracked, theres 15,000 more miles on it, the gas tank is empty, the seats are trashed, and there is an expired prostitute in the trunk. I imagine getting angry and telling your friend you would never let them borrow your car again would not be childish but reasonable.
I disagree with positron in retroactivly punishing the heavy exploiters even though he has full authority to do so, and would be reasonable in doing it. I feel that this particular exploit, the meow farms, would have been dealt with very differently if it wasn't happening in the midst of a publishing blackout period. I imagine it would have been fixed a whole lot quicker, but because they couldn't touch it they had to remind people of the rules. I feel that the better course of action would be to remind people of the rules and put a line on the sand and say from this day forward if anyone seriously abuses an exploit they will lose that character.
In the end I dont begrudge a farmer for farming. They pay the same as me to play the game and as long as it doesn't impact me I don't care. I personally don't have the time to farm and like to play with what little time I get to play the game. I don't see a lot of the devs actions as being heavily anti-farming but rather a way to try and future proof themselves against exploiting.
Again I would suggest, if you think 1500 tickets is too low, develop a comparison between MA missions and regular missions that lay out what the rewards are per minion and see if there is a massive difference. Its my experience that the devs respond better to hard numbers proving a point than pure hyperbole.
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I feel that this particular exploit, the meow farms, would have been dealt with very differently if it wasn't happening in the midst of a publishing blackout period. I imagine it would have been fixed a whole lot quicker, but because they couldn't touch it they had to remind people of the rules.
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They knew about this particular problem back in beta though.
And it had been going since MA went live, with steadily
increasing popularity - well before the "blackout." Basically,
they had a chance to nip it in the bud before it was even a
small problem, failed/chose not to do so, and the result was
the firebreathing DracoPosi, followed by the fields going up in
flames.
The BETTER course of action would've been to do something
about the "exploit" when they were made aware of the exploit.
Letting it go as long as it did, only created the feeling that there
was tacit agreement that using it was OK, greatly excerbating
all problems when it was removed in such a dramatic fashion.
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Wow Gear_Freak, how did you EVER play this game before IOs and the market existed?
You do realize that you can still play the game just fine with SOs and less, right? IOs are an optional feature that can be completely ignored, as can the market.
Sounds like the people that are getting all excited over imaginary "stuff" need the oxygen more than I do... they seem to be hyperventilating.
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I have heard this bs for a long time. Yes, you can play without them. yes you can stay in atlas and never level up also. The content for the last several years seems to be more and more optional. If I was not intended to use it, then as far as I am concerned, they didnt make it. So for the last 2 years the devs have screwed around and not released any real content. Or are they just making content for a select few? If we arent intended to use IO's, please get the damn WW out of our zones (along with ae) to reduce the lag while we continue to do "intended" content.
Lots of 50's yada yada. still finding fun things to do.
Cthulhu loves you, better start running
I�! I�! Gg�gorsch�a�bha egurtsa�ar�ug d� Dalhor! Cthluhu fthagn! Cthluhu fthagn!
You are in a maze of twisty little passages
your right you dont need ios to play the game and im glad your happy with only 1 fully trick out toons. But I for one love to have lots of toons and want them all IO out. like i said before in a post further up. I like Ed and love IO. its the best way to make your toon stand out amongst other toons with the same power sets.
As far as the devs looking at range attacks and actualy adj are often two different things. track record has shown they are quick to over kill on nerfs but take forever to actually balance.
as far as posi ranting. we ill agree to disagree here. it may be his in his authority to ban and lock out toons . doesnt make it right. It was very petty and childish of him. like i said. they knew about this stuff then whine cause they knew what was and it happened. kinda like your scenario with the buddy and the care. Well if you knew he was gonna do that . like they knew. then how are you gonna get all butt hurt when your buddy comes back with your car all broken up. It was your stupidly to have let him take the care. same thing here. If you think of it in terms of the devs are cops they set something up enticing you to commit a crime . thast call police entrapment. not much different here. I didnt know about no Meow farm but either way. after mos of testing and players pointing out exploits and you do nothing and release the issue anyways. You have no1 to be mad at but yourself.
As for the devs trying to stop exploiting and not farming is kinda BS. they try to limit farming every chance they get.
The bottom line is that the risk dont equal rewards anymore and that why ppl are upset. If risk equaled rewards the AE building wouldnt be as bare as it is now in compared to how it was a few days ago. Its not hyperpole just cause you say so. SaintTzu has tested that on a small map he has gotten inf and 118 tickets or something like that. hell i can run a paper mission and get better rewards then that. Not to mention papers are a hell of a lot easier and are just as short as he stated.
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hell i can run a paper mission and get better rewards then that
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Then do so.... solution to the "problem"?
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hell i can run a paper mission and get better rewards then that
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Then do so.... solution to the "problem"?
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far from it really. paper missions repeated ly suck but it still dont sovle the risk vs reward problem does it?
so back to a previous statement. Do the devs
A) nerf paper missions
B) Actually balance MA rewards around the rest of the game instead of nerfing and adding overpowered attacks. and get over there little tantrum
C) Admit that risk vs reward only applies when they can use it as an excuse to nerf things?
What do you think they should or will do?
D) Ignore it and let other mmo's remove their playerbase.
Ignoring anyone is a mistake. You might miss something viral to your cause.
Okay, let me try to understand this logic, please:
<ul type="square">[*]1) CoX exists without the MA system. The players are reasonably happy for 5 years.[*]2) The developers introduce a new MA system on April 8th, which includes its own reward system. The players are still reasonable happy.[*]3) The developers take away (let's be a little extreme here) 75% of the rewards on May 12th, a little over a month after the Issue was released. Many players are upset and some are even thinking about quitting.[/list]
Huh?
So, why does 3) somehow make the game worse off than 1), before the MA system existed at all?
Have you ever had someone take something you like... and then smash it right in front of you?
Ignoring anyone is a mistake. You might miss something viral to your cause.
Something that someone just gave me? Sure. It didn't bother me, because I didn't have enough time to grow an emotional attachment to it.
But we're not talking about things that you have already, we're talking about potential "stuff", "stuff" that you COULD possibly earn in the future.
Are you honestly saying that you have an emotional attachment to the virtual "stuff" that you haven't even gotten yet?
Sure sounds good to me, nice analogy.