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I only think the ticket nerf went a little bit to far is all, regardless of what type of toon you have.
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Several people are saying the rewards before the nerf were huge to begin with. I for one, agree.
I believe that a Kheldian Gold Standard should be based on SO's, and for anything above that... there's Platinum!
Save Ms. Liberty (#5349) � Augmenting Peacebringers � The Umbra Illuminati
Save Ms. Liberty (#5349) � Augmenting Peacebringers � The Umbra Illuminati
Custom critters using the players damage scale are in fact more difficult and time consuming than facing PvE critters, no real way to dispute the math involved here.
You do realize those crowds you spoke about were dealing with new/shiny AND the others were using a "PvE" outlier to farm. Once that was gone the crowds decreased quite a bit.
In the end the devs will not increase the reward for the increase in time/risk it takes to deal with custom critters made more powerful via the ever growing list of standard powers given to custom critters. That is their choice.
Its a stretch at best to say that customs and PvE are on the same level therefore the reward should be the same when that defies the reality and math showing its not.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
Custom critters are like everything else in coh.
"5 minutes to break, 5 years to fix"
I don't think anyone is saying that the MA critters are not tougher. But I think it is possible that the lack of travel/hospital/fluff time may be beleived by the Devs to balance some of the increased toughness. After all, they want to keep the xp/hour within some min/max range, and you would gain xp faster than otherwise with the MA setup if the critters were not tougher.
Critters that were only as tough as regular PvE critters in the MA would give less xp, or you would have to move the store and hospital out of the MA building and possibly increase the amount of time it takes to get into and out of the datastream.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
Do you really think that or are you just throwing stuff up and seeing if it will stick?
You do realize that you can use PvE critters in MA right? Using PvE critters instead of custom blows that theory out of the water.
In the end as I stated the devs have decided not to give the fair amount of increased reward for the increase in time it takes to defeat a tougher foe, no problem. Trying to spin that into a comfortable spot to make people "think" thats fair/balanced lacks sound rationale.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
Sure, you can populate the MA with standard critters, and many do.
I'm just saying that a mission in the MA populated with standard critters is faster xp than one with custom critters.
I am postulating that such missions might even be faster than the Devs want them to be, which might be one of the reasons that the MA was held back until custom critter creation was available.
Of course, even with custom critters available, the Devs still allow faster xp regular critters in the MA; I am just speculating that they might have also considered NOT doing so to keep risk/reward where they wanted it (and if they had been able to work out some of the issues with critter powersets and animations prior to launch).
I bet some Dev was looking at the meow farms and going, "Told you."
If you are saying that travel time was not a consideration in the design of the MA system, then let's just say I would be surpprised if that were the case.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
The last nerfs have hit a little too hard MA imho.
Been doing some missions alone and with team of 8, getting most of the time a paltry 300 tickets overall.
Considering that we are getting no enhancement drops, no slavage drops and no recipe drops, reward if now on the very lowside.
300 tickets in a mission. What does it mean? It is worth about 4 SO enhancements or 4 pool A uncommon recipes. That really is not much compared to what can be earned through standard gameplay.
I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Voltaire
?? the ticket cap and increased mob dificulty should have no effect on you getting 300 tickets per mission, if you finished the mission and cleared all. The mission cap is 1500 tickets.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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Again, who is talking about xp?? I'm talking about ticket rewards. And Again those mish's I used to do HAVE lost a ton of tickets as rewards and in my opinion you do not reap decent rewards for your time spent on them. None of the mish's I like have All boss mobs. They have boss, LT's and minions like a normal mish should.
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My apologies, I inserted XP as a generic term for rewards in general. What is your arc number. I would love to run your challenging mission(s). Circling the Storm Palace is fun, but variety is great.
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Ok, hmm let's try this. I will give you two arc numbers to try. One is a single mish and one is and actual arc of 3 mish's with content and funny comment's from the NPC's. What I will do is tweak it down some so that allot of toons can do it to see what I mean about the ticket rewards. Keep in mind that since AE came out you got more tickets for completing them, which made up for the time it took to do them and the amount of times you may have died. Let me know if the amount of times the average toon dies and the debt you collect is worth the ticket rewards you get. And Again I have turned these down just a bit so more peeps can see what I mean.
29778 - Introducing the Gia mob. This is a custom critter mish that introduces my custom critters in preperation for the arc that follows which due to memory constraints I couldn't put all the Gia Mob characters in. It is not a farm, it's a story created to be challenging to "strong" toons and introduce critters that could not be fit on my arc. This mish does not have an AV in it so feel free to solo it on relentless or whatever you feel you can do. All memory allowed to you is used up in this single mish and is why there is only one mish. There are allot of different Gia mob characters and I spent hours making them. Allot of thought and effort was used creating them to be challenging.
25641 - One Fiendish plot. This is my Arc with Three mish's and again has been tweaked down so that more toons can try it. This Arc does have AV's in it so I do not think you should try to solo it even at it's current settings. This arc was intended to be done as a team arc. I spent hours making it, writing content, making it amusing and hopefully enjoyable to others. Now the ticket reward nerf has completely and utterly destroyed the rewared you should get for doing it.
What I'm attempting to do here is just show you that the average toon may find these hard and that the amount of times they die may not be worth the ticket reward. AND that these are fun mish's with content and thought put in as well as many hours worth of my time. They are not farms proving that not all hard mission arcs are farms. So, they have "content" and are "fun to do" "custom critter included" "none farm" mish's that were created and used for EXACTLY what the devs intended MA to used for. Built just days after MA came out. No one will do them now because they are hard in the first place and you don't get compensated enough for completing them. Imagine me tweaking them back to be even harder.
EDIT-- this is on the INFINITY server -
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I only think the ticket nerf went a little bit to far is all, regardless of what type of toon you have.
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Several people are saying the rewards before the nerf were huge to begin with. I for one, agree.
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I tend to agree that the ticket rewards were "a plump" amount, but I also don't think taking the "whole chicken away" and giving you just the wings to replace that chicken was fair either.
This is why the Risk to me is not worth the reward any longer.
Player on Infinity server
Overlord of "The Fiend Army"
39 Level 50 Toons
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?? the ticket cap and increased mob dificulty should have no effect on you getting 300 tickets per mission, if you finished the mission and cleared all. The mission cap is 1500 tickets.
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Nothing to do with ticket cap. Mobs simply are not dropping enough tickets when you do a "warehouse mission". While huge outdoor missions can still yield some profits over time, smaller maps like offices and warehouses rarely will net you more than 200 tickets. Which is too small imho.
Rikti Comms officers were maybe giving too much but now most everything gives crap ticket reward.
I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Voltaire
Are you saying there was a nerf on individual critter rewards? If so, I'm not aware of it. A warehouse mission should give as much out as it did before, unless it was giving out more than 1500 before.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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I'm just saying that a mission in the MA populated with standard critters is faster xp than one with custom critters.
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Which is why customs should offer more for the extra time. The rest of the post is a lot of speculation, which is fine.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
Or standard critters should give less. Either works 
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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I think the Devs simply intended that our story-arcs involve a healthy mix of canon critters and custom critters so that story-arcs are both interesting, and present acceptable challenge levels across all AT/power-set combinations.
The thing is of course, that this still leaves the opening for people who so wish it, to twist the system and design a mission with crazyu88er critters.
The Devs however, coming from the point-of-view of maintaining their definitions and ratio of Risk vs Reward, are the ones who get to restrict us and determine for us what should be considered a healthy mix of canon critters and custom critters so that story-arcs are both interesting, and present acceptable challenge levels across all AT/power-set combinations.
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which is absolutely silly.
How many canon arcs are there with more than one mob type in a single mission?
Want comedy and lighthearted action? Between levels 1-14? Try Nuclear in 90 - The Fusionette Task Force!
Arc ID 58363!
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Are you saying there was a nerf on individual critter rewards? If so, I'm not aware of it. A warehouse mission should give as much out as it did before, unless it was giving out more than 1500 before.
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To be totally clear with you, yes, all mobs in MA should be giving more tickets than they are giving right now. Not saying that they were nerfed. Im saying they never gave enough from start. Now, was i clear enough for you this time?
I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Voltaire
Ah, okay, clear enough this time.
Story Arcs I created:
Every Rose: (#17702) Villainous vs Legacy Chain. Forget Arachnos, join the CoT!
Cosplay Madness!: (#3643) Neutral vs Custom Foes. Heroes at a pop culture convention!
Kiss Hello Goodbye: (#156389) Heroic vs Custom Foes. Film Noir/Hardboiled detective adventure!
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When taken in the context of my original thought of a squishy toon absorbing an alpha strike from 3 even con minions is ALMOST like facing 3 player controlled toons is not hyperbole.
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I'm sorry, but I still disagree. Though, the crux of my disagreement is in your use of the words 'player controlled'. Custom mobs may have "player level" damage potential--which seems to be all you're really saying--but they are not even remotely akin to "player controlled" opponents.
Most of the character's I play are "squishies". Most of the people I play with play squishies. Some of the people I play with are brand new to the game, some are long-time vets. I've run MA content solo with everything from a level 50 Defender to a lowbie Psi Blaster. I've tested my own stuff with a wide range of archetypes.
I have not found custom mobs to be the sharp upturn in difficulty you and others seem to be presenting them as. Are they more difficult? Yes, certainly. Are they exceedingly more difficult? No, usually not. Can they be made to be exceedingly difficult? Yes, but, by and large, I haven't run into that, and when I have, I've called them cases of 'Killer GMing" and dropped the arc.
My fundamental issue with your presentation is you've likened facing Custom Mobs to facing opponents in PvP. And that just isn't the case, not by any stretch of the imagination. If it were, there'd be a whole lot more people freaking out about it. The boards would be bursting with complaints.
The Cape Radio: You're not super until you put on the Cape!
DJ Enigma's Puzzle Factory: Co* Parody Commercials
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What I will do is tweak it down some so that allot of toons can do it to see what I mean about the ticket rewards. Keep in mind that since AE came out you got more tickets for completing them, which made up for the time it took to do them and the amount of times you may have died. Let me know if the amount of times the average toon dies and the debt you collect is worth the ticket rewards you get. And Again I have turned these down just a bit so more peeps can see what I mean.
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Turning down the difficulty defeats the purpose. I asked for your challenging missions, not some watered down version. If you turn them back up, let me know.
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They are not farms proving that not all hard mission arcs are farms.
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I am continuously baffled why people equate hard content to farms. Most hard mission arcs are not farms. Most farms are a bit easier than normal content. Hard content and farms are generally exclusive, although one could farm hard content for fun, they will go slower (which of course is what this thread is about, hard content is not "worth" doing).
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
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What I will do is tweak it down some so that allot of toons can do it to see what I mean about the ticket rewards. Keep in mind that since AE came out you got more tickets for completing them, which made up for the time it took to do them and the amount of times you may have died. Let me know if the amount of times the average toon dies and the debt you collect is worth the ticket rewards you get. And Again I have turned these down just a bit so more peeps can see what I mean.
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Turning down the difficulty defeats the purpose. I asked for your challenging missions, not some watered down version. If you turn them back up, let me know.
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Then don't do them. Simple. : )
Player on Infinity server
Overlord of "The Fiend Army"
39 Level 50 Toons
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Then don't do them. Simple. : )
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It is simple. It just seems odd to me that I would ask to run your challenging arcs and in response you remove some of the challenge.
I have a theory about that, but I already told you I believe you are lying. 
Why Blasters? Empathy Sucks.
So, you want to be Mental?
What the hell? Let's buff defenders.
Tactics are for those who do not have a big enough hammer. Wisdom is knowing how big your hammer is.
ok so how about I say that those three minions have the damage potential of player controlled toons would that make you feel better? you know exactly what my point was from the start you just enjoy picking posts apart in an attempt to make your point seem more valid. You are saying you can handle these custom critters with no problem.
I am saying people new to the game defnately will have trouble with them compared to normal content. It really doesn't matter that a veteran player as your self can adjust to this change easy.
I mean for you to call my post hyperbole when you know exactly that what i was saying had nothing to do with the ai being as smart as a player. I clearly stated it was the damage from the alpha strikes that squishies would have trouble with.
To end this post i will bow down you our new king of the internets. Surely some one here welcomes our new king
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Are you saying there was a nerf on individual critter rewards? If so, I'm not aware of it. A warehouse mission should give as much out as it did before, unless it was giving out more than 1500 before.
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To be totally clear with you, yes, all mobs in MA should be giving more tickets than they are giving right now. Not saying that they were nerfed. Im saying they never gave enough from start. Now, was i clear enough for you this time?
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If I had to put it more concisely, I'd say that the interval and/or rarity of ticket drops has changed, like they went from say a 20% chance of a ticket drop to 10-15% chance.
I noticed this last night in a quick mish I put together to see if I could get close to the ticket cap of 1500 now. I used to hit 9999+ with it at 50 when the same map was filled with level 52 (53 technically?) Comm Officers, but this time I only hit the 1500 cap with the end mission bonus fighting level 54 minions.
<_<
It'd be a lot easier to test this kind of stuff if we could get some sort of pseudo-ticket salvage for test mode that was only there for testing to see how well the mission was performing.
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ok so how about I say that those three minions have the damage potential of player controlled toons would that make you feel better?
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If that's what you're actually saying, it'd help that you were clear on it, sure.
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you know exactly what my point was from the start you just enjoy picking posts apart in an attempt to make your point seem more valid.
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Nope. You has failed at mind readz!
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You are saying you can handle these custom critters with no problem.
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What I've said is: in my experience, they're more difficult than standard mobs, but not as sharply more difficult as you and others seem to be implying.
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I am saying people new to the game defnately will have trouble with them compared to normal content. It really doesn't matter that a veteran player as your self can adjust to this change easy.
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Firstly, again, some of the people I play with are brand new to the game. One started a few months ago, another just last month, and a few others have been around less than a year. They've all been adjusting just fine.
Secondly, I disagree. it does matter how I adjust, how you adjust, and how everyone else adjusts.
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I mean for you to call my post hyperbole
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I called a particular assertion in your post, as I understood it, hyperbole. As it turns out, what you stated isn't precisely what you meant. No, I am not a mind reader, I had no way of knowing what you really meant. All I can go by is what you actually write in your post.
Your hostility is misplaced, and your squelch attempts aren't appreciated. You made an assertion. I disagreed with that assertion and explained why. No more, no less. I do get to do that, y'know.
And I don't think what you're saying is completely without merit either. Just seems to me you've been overstating it.
The Cape Radio: You're not super until you put on the Cape!
DJ Enigma's Puzzle Factory: Co* Parody Commercials
Well your observations have been countered by several people in the test server thread some of whom have put forth numbers and examples of just how overpowered the custom critters have become in relation to the rewards we get for them.
And as far as my hostility you were the one who said
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This is flat-out hyperbole.
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I took that as a direct insult and that you used the term in a negative tone. As in i was intentionally exaggerating a statement on a forum for a game.
Frankly I see anybody who feels the need to disect a post made by someone and take the time to counter some one's opinion when the post was not even remotely directed to them in any way is retarded. you have the right to post your opinion you however do not have the right to be rude in doing so and not be called on it.
You could have been nice and ask me for clarification on my point. Yet you took the internet tough guy approach and insulted me.
I havent really noticed that much of a difference in the difficulty of the custom mobs. I have two missions which use custom mobs (in one you fight them only in one mish, in the other you fight customs the whole way through) and I havent had any complaints about them being too hard. Now granted, I added a couple of ally characters, which can help balance out the hard hitting. In the first mission the allies arent customs, just a couple of mid level security guards plucked from the prefabricated lists. In the second arc they are custom allies, and they did take some tweaking (first round they were too uber powered and wiped every mob before you got to the bad guys, second round they were too weak and faceplanted within a mob or two, third time seems to have been the charm.). I have solod and played on teams on mine to test them and it worked both ways.
Furthermore, I solod my wifes arc with my LVL 2 controller, and her final mission has entirely custom mobs of a wide variety (scrappers, tankers, blasters, controller), it also has one minion level ally. I found that while the customs were a little more challenging than the baddies in her earlier mission (Family), I was still able to solo the mission without dying. Granted my ally took a dive in the ending boss fight, but I survived and it was a challenge without being a frustration.
Now, I didnt really notice the reward part of those mission. I have no idea how many tickets I reaped (my LVL 2 controller leveled twice through the course of my wifes arc though, so not bad there). For me, personally, the tickets are secondary. I farmed a few times, and it was fun while it lasted, but I always saw MA as way to get some really cool and unique stories from my fellow players (even when I farmed the first thing I spent my tickets on was all the unlockables for building MA arcs *laughs* and used the ill-gotten money from selling my reward rolls to either host costume contests or fly around Atlas dropping presents on newbies (costume slot salvage, a mil influence, so on) I personally found that more fun than spending it on IOs, but thats just me. The XP I kept for myself though *grin*). Not saying, my way is the right way, but worked for me, I had fun, and meant that I wasnt distracted for frustrated by custom mobs.
In case you are curious, My arcs are:
Heart of the Stone, ID 51905
And
Enter the Clique, ID 57080
My Wifes is,
Lights, Camera, Fashion!, ID 170448
Heart is a more or less serious arc, dealing with one of my all time favorite mythical creatures. Enter the Clique, and Lights, Camera, Fashion are both more classic superhero fare, and are intended to be light hearted, fun arcs filled with little tongue in cheek movie references, like what you find in the real missions. We are both open to constructive criticism on them. To be honest I havent run through mine since the changes made to the MA system, so I dont know if it affected them or not.