I15 badge-cull cured my badge-obsession!:)

When i15 went live I only lost about 30 badges, because I stopped actively looking for more after seeing the badge-farm arcs that were being made. However, I thought that once i15 went live, I'd start to badge-hunt again.

Seeing my total badgecount drop by 30-odd in one swoop made me realise that badging can never be about the destination, because that elusive number of 'all' badges will never be fixed. Aiming to 'get em all' is utterly meaningless. The most anyone cam day is they've got em all so far, and knowing that yesterdays So Far can even be more than today's - and we've seen some serious negative badge progress with I15 - makes badging beyond the normal rate of progress even more risky

It's such a relief.

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)

*fixes title*

This Eco phenomenon oughta clear up the clutter a bit.

*j/k, Eco!*

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I went from 690 to 622, but then quickly got up to 632 with a few of the new arena badges. (Badge Hunter says I hit 700)

Losing badges sucks a little bit, but it's not like it was a big surprise. I'll get what's available and move onto the next objective.. it's not like I have to spend all my time dedicated to badges... and I didn't spend much time getting the ones that were taken away.

The funny part is i still have "Architect LXXV" as my badge title, even though there aren't even that many AE badges remaining. lol

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*fixes title*

This Eco phenomenon oughta clear up the clutter a bit.

*j/k, Eco!*

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lmao that made me thunk of those war films where some guy gets blinded by a land mine: 'leave me, guys...I'm just slowin' you down...just gimme a coupla grenades...'

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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The funny part is i still have "Architect LXXV" as my badge title, even though there aren't even that many AE badges remaining. lol

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Bastage. I had Chosen One reset to "City Traveler" on all my heroes. :P It WASN'T reset on one of my MMs, but I changed it reflexively when I saw I was awarded a badge that I already had (Poor Impulse Control - ironic, huh?).

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My main badger lost 76 badges on Monday. It probably would have been more than that but karmically enough I was on overseas travel during most of the time between I14 going live and the announcement that many MA badges would be removed in I15 so I never had the opportunity to waste the time earning most of the Dev Choice and Hall of Fame mission badges. Lucky me I guess.

It does bother me that the Devs decided that it'd better for the game to just slash-n-burn these badges rather than to spend the time trying to rework the requirements to save them. As others have pointed out it sets a bad precedent for the future. If the Devs had the stomach to axe this many badges what would stop them from removing ANY other badge from now on for any pretense? I understand they always had the power to delete badges whenever they wanted, but at least up until now they hadn't actually exercised that power in any serious way. The floodgates are open now for any badge to find itself on the chopping block.

It's too bad we basically can't "trust" the system like we used to. If I didn't already have most of the badges in the game I'd probably be more frustrated about this than I am. Ultimately I don't think this will cause the top badgers in this game to stop badging, but I could see how it could easily demotivate most people from ever trying to get into it from now on.

I sadly suspect the long term consequences of removing the MA badges will be far worse than any problems they were causing in the first place...

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

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It does bother me that the Devs decided that it'd better for the game to just slash-n-burn these badges rather than to spend the time trying to rework the requirements to save them. As others have pointed out it sets a bad precedent for the future. If the Devs had the stomach to axe this many badges what would stop them from removing ANY other badge from now on for any pretense?

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I would think the fact that badges they removed had such a short history of existence made it easier for them to justify pulling them out of the game. I just honestly cannot see them applying this same logic to badges that have been around for years and for which people worked really hard to earn. Lessening the requirements ala Zookeeper - e.g. changing Illusionist from 500 to 100 - I could see, but pulling a badge like Illusionist, Empath, or anything else that is hard to get, but which has been around for ages, just isn't the same as pulling back badges that have been in the game for a few weeks (as of the time of the announcement).

So while I'm not worried about this setting a precedent for the Devs removing any other existing badges, I am concerned about what precedent it (and the new Arena badges) may be setting for future badges.

There's a reason collectors like things like rare coins and stamps, autographed trading cards, and variant cover comics - they are things that you can't just get by "falling out of bed," so getting them feels like something of an accomplishment. Removal of badges won't necessarily kill my interest in the badge-hunting minigame, but removal of any reasonable effort to earn a badge will.

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(Sometimes, I wish there could be a Dev thumbs up button for quality posts, because you pretty much nailed it.) -- Ghost Falcon

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It does bother me that the Devs decided that it'd better for the game to just slash-n-burn these badges rather than to spend the time trying to rework the requirements to save them. As others have pointed out it sets a bad precedent for the future. If the Devs had the stomach to axe this many badges what would stop them from removing ANY other badge from now on for any pretense?

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I would think the fact that badges they removed had such a short history of existence made it easier for them to justify pulling them out of the game. I just honestly cannot see them applying this same logic to badges that have been around for years and for which people worked really hard to earn. Lessening the requirements ala Zookeeper - e.g. changing Illusionist from 500 to 100 - I could see, but pulling a badge like Illusionist, Empath, or anything else that is hard to get, but which has been around for ages, just isn't the same as pulling back badges that have been in the game for a few weeks (as of the time of the announcement).

So while I'm not worried about this setting a precedent for the Devs removing any other existing badges, I am concerned about what precedent it (and the new Arena badges) may be setting for future badges.

There's a reason collectors like things like rare coins and stamps, autographed trading cards, and variant cover comics - they are things that you can't just get by "falling out of bed," so getting them feels like something of an accomplishment. Removal of badges won't necessarily kill my interest in the badge-hunting minigame, but removal of any reasonable effort to earn a badge will.

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Your assessment about how likely it would be for the Devs to remove older badges is probably a fair one. But the Devs have been known to suddenly decree various things in this game that have been around for years to be "exploits" or "broken" so I would have to say the chance that any old badge could now be axed has gone up by some small degree at any rate. Bottomline as I mentioned before I think it's reasonable to say that our overall collective trust in the system has been reduced by this situation.

As for the precedent that the new Arena badges may be forging I'd agree that would be unfortunate. While I enjoy earning badges that some people might consider "too tedious" I can at least accept the compromise position that some badges could be made slightly less tedious in the future. But in the long tradition of our Devs overreacting to things it would seem that instead of making new badges slightly less tedious they are planing to make new badges absolutely trivial to earn. The phrase "moderately challenging" seems to be beyond the grasp of our Devs' understanding.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

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The phrase "moderately challenging" seems to be beyond the grasp of our Devs' understanding.

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Or the phrase "moderately challenging" is a variable value, different for every player and dev...

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Arc #345863 - When The Bough Breaks
"Curse you Perry the Plata...wait, is that Love Handel?" - Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz, Phineas and Ferb

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The phrase "moderately challenging" seems to be beyond the grasp of our Devs' understanding.

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Or the phrase "moderately challenging" is a variable value, different for every player and dev...

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Obviously the definition of such a phrase can vary between various people involved.
But when you consider the extremes of the spectrum it's much easier for people to agree.

Badges that take many months of daily 8 hour-a-day play could be considered a bit too challenging for most. But by the same token a set of badges introduced by an Issue that can be completely finished off in a single afternoon is probably a bit too non-challenging for most. YMMV.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

Yes, the developers do not seem to have the ability to make reasonable requirements for badges. If it isn't one extreme (too trivial) it is the other (too tedious).

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Consider too that the issue of reasonableness varies from AT to AT with regard to some badges.

For example, if my main badge toon is a Corruptor with Pain Domination, or a Defender with Empathy, earning the first healing badge is probably not going to be too hard. However, my main badge toons are a Dominator and a Scrapper, neither of who have room in their builds for Aid Other. So earning that first healing badge would take some serious, and seriously tedious effort on my part. I have resigned myself to probably never having that badge on those toons, but that doesn't mean the badge is broken, or needs to be fixed, it's just that every badge isn't necessarily intended for every toon. I would never want them to change the criteria for the first healing badge to "Heal one ally," or "Heal allies for 100 points of damage," because then it becomes next to worthless.

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(Sometimes, I wish there could be a Dev thumbs up button for quality posts, because you pretty much nailed it.) -- Ghost Falcon

There are bound to be special cases in a badge system as large as this one is. Heck we still have a badge in this game (Power Liberator/Master Thief) that some people managed to earn during the heavily broken CoP/IoP base PvP era almost 3 years ago that hasn't had a strictly legitimate way to be earned since.

But in your specific example the 6 healing badges are pretty much the only badges in the game that are heavily dependent on the exact powers (and thus ATs) a particular character has. And that's not even considering all the Scrappers and Tanks and whatnot who actually have the Empath badge right now thanks to gladiator heal farming.

I'm not calling for a complete rehashing of every badge in the game here. But it's worth realizing that there are badges set on the extreme fringes of the badge earning spectrum that any reasonable person would have to agree are either much too tedious OR much too trivial for any player regardless of AT/powersets.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

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Yes, the developers do not seem to have the ability to make reasonable requirements for badges. If it isn't one extreme (too trivial) it is the other (too tedious).

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Not all the Architect badges were unreasonable, however. A fair amount of them were very reachable within the first few weeks of "normal" gameplay.

I'll reiterate my original premise: Badges should not have been released with I14 at all for Architect, but released in tiers for several major updates afterwards (while still tracking the values behind-scenes from day one). That way, the "urge" to farm for badges becomes deadened by not knowing the req's for them right out of beta, but becomes more and more an objective acquired through normal gameplay.

If they had done this for Architect, I think most people would have focused on Architect itself, rather than being a vehicle for badge farming, which is what triggered the "mah bucket^H^H^H^H^H^Hbadgez!" response.

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Yes, the developers do not seem to have the ability to make reasonable requirements for badges. If it isn't one extreme (too trivial) it is the other (too tedious).

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Not all the Architect badges were unreasonable, however. A fair amount of them were very reachable within the first few weeks of "normal" gameplay.

I'll reiterate my original premise: Badges should not have been released with I14 at all for Architect, but released in tiers for several major updates afterwards (while still tracking the values behind-scenes from day one). That way, the "urge" to farm for badges becomes deadened by not knowing the req's for them right out of beta, but becomes more and more an objective acquired through normal gameplay.

If they had done this for Architect, I think most people would have focused on Architect itself, rather than being a vehicle for badge farming, which is what triggered the "mah bucket^H^H^H^H^H^Hbadgez!" response.

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Having a "delayed MA badge rollout" scheme might have spared the MA badges from being caught and used as a scapegoat in the general MA farming witchhunt. Hard to say for sure.

Ultimately I think there were only about a dozen MA badges that were truly problematic.
The ones that encouraged "Badging PvP" specifically.
I suppose the Devs decided to ham-fist the other 60 or 70 just to be sure.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

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Having a "delayed MA badge rollout" scheme might have spared the MA badges from being caught and used as a scapegoat in the general MA farming witchhunt. Hard to say for sure.

Ultimately I think there were only about a dozen MA badges that were truly problematic.
The ones that encouraged "Badging PvP" specifically.
I suppose the Devs decided to ham-fist the other 60 or 70 just to be sure.

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As I stated in another tread, Badges and badge farming were made the scapegoat for the very different problem of xp/inf farming. They wouldn't fix that problem so they could at least get the very small % of badge farm mission out of AE by removing all the associated badges. The funny (to me at least) part of all this is we badgers had already removed almost all of out badge farm missions with in he first week or so of the issue, and were focusing on how to best advertise and gain votes for hall of fame, and what kind of gift basket to send to get dev's choice. Which even though I did moan a lot about these two badges, I was even trying to work the problem and get them anyway, and in an odd sense enjoying the process of trying to figure out how to get over 900 strangers to play and love my arc.


Now moving forward I am sure badges will all be one off events just like in i15, the only challenge I can foresee is more "master of the" type badges. but it will be hard to add those without making them beyond the grasp of the casual gamer, I mean a sub 30 minute ITF, or a 0 death LGTF would be a cool challenge, but in this softer gentler CoH I fear that may be too hard; and there will be a few that can even show you the math as to how impossible it is.

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Card Carrying DeFulmenstrator--Member Crazy 88s
We burn more Influence before 8am than you make all day.

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When i15 went live I only lost about 30 badges, because I stopped actively looking for more after seeing the badge-farm arcs that were being made. However, I thought that once i15 went live, I'd start to badge-hunt again.

Seeing my total badgecount drop by 30-odd in one swoop made me realise that badging can never be about the destination, because that elusive number of 'all' badges will never be fixed. Aiming to 'get em all' is utterly meaningless. The most anyone cam day is they've got em all so far, and knowing that yesterdays So Far can even be more than today's - and we've seen some serious negative badge progress with I15 - makes badging beyond the normal rate of progress even more risky

It's such a relief.

Eco

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Now if you'd just get over your whining and moaning about how unfair the market is.

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Want comedy and lighthearted action? Between levels 1-14? Try Nuclear in 90 - The Fusionette Task Force!

Arc ID 58363!

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When i15 went live I only lost about 30 badges, because I stopped actively looking for more after seeing the badge-farm arcs that were being made. However, I thought that once i15 went live, I'd start to badge-hunt again.

Seeing my total badgecount drop by 30-odd in one swoop made me realise that badging can never be about the destination, because that elusive number of 'all' badges will never be fixed. Aiming to 'get em all' is utterly meaningless. The most anyone cam day is they've got em all so far, and knowing that yesterdays So Far can even be more than today's - and we've seen some serious negative badge progress with I15 - makes badging beyond the normal rate of progress even more risky

It's such a relief.

Eco

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Now if you'd just get over your whining and moaning about how unfair the market is.

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/splutters wine back into glass.

Lol what? Me? Moan about the Market?

What?

What?

...

What?

Haha that's so out of left field I don't know how to respond lol.

I think you must have me co fused with someone else. Or you're making a joke?

When have I whined about the Market?

Eco


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)

For the record, the badges weren't slashed and burned. They are just not being used at this time. If they were to fully remove them, they would have removed the names from the game, seeing as there are plenty of people that still have old badge names selected on their characters.

Think about it... 90 badges equals 90 less pieces of artwork to be made down the line and 90 less new names to come up with.

You will see these badges/titles again, just not associated with the MA.

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pohsyb: so of all people you must be most excited about the veats
Arachnos Commander: actually, I am
pohsyb: I mean you kinda were one already anyways ^_^
Arachnos Commander:

Most of the artwork can't be used again.

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I find it a bit funny that my badge-collecting days ended right around I9, primarily because we got more badges.

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Never surrender! Never give up!
Help keep Paragon City alive with the unofficial City of Heroes Tabletop Role Playing Game!

Meh.
I was disappointed to lose badges that I'd selected as titles, and ones that I had actively worked towards (I.E. specificly temporarily changed my playstyle), but am kind of glad to no longer see progress bars for badges that I never intended to work towards.

Did kind of feel dirty to suddenly have an Accolade pop up upon login, but the feeling went away quickly.

Edit to Add: The Loss of "X numbers of player have rated your arcs." badges have greatly reduced my motivation to write more AE arcs. I had been considering the purchase of just a couple more AE slots, but have decided against it for now.

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Most of the artwork can't be used again.

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In hindsight it's ironic the Devs spent all that time coming up with artwork for the MA badges that were benched yet we still lack artwork for the Clothes Horse, Fashionable, Ostentatious and Rescuer badges.

These badges have needed their own artwork for -years- now.
One would think that someone at sometime could have found a spare hour or so for that.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀

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Meh.
I was disappointed to lose badges that I'd selected as titles

[/ QUOTE ] If you selected a badge as a title before i15 went live, you should still have the title (as long as you don't change it to something else).

I have several toons still sporting the "Architect LXXV" title, and a friend of mine still has "The Chosen One" selected.. even though those badges are no longer available.

I suspect the badges didn't really get deleted, but are instead just hidden in the background.

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Meh.
I was disappointed to lose badges that I'd selected as titles

[/ QUOTE ] If you selected a badge as a title before i15 went live, you should still have the title (as long as you don't change it to something else).

I have several toons still sporting the "Architect LXXV" title, and a friend of mine still has "The Chosen One" selected.. even though those badges are no longer available.

I suspect the badges didn't really get deleted, but are instead just hidden in the background.

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Yeah I'm quite sure all the MA badges are still in the .pigg files.
I doubt the Devs ever actually "delete" anything like this.

As an example when the Devs were going to give us the arena badges back in I4 and didn't it was discovered that they were still buried in the game files ever since then and only got "switched on" live for I15.

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Loth 50 Fire/Rad Controller [1392 Badges] [300 non-AE Souvenirs]
Ryver 50 Ele� Blaster [1392 Badges]
Silandra 50 Peacebringer [1138 Badges] [No Redside Badges]
--{=====> Virtue ♀