Does anyone enjoy TFs anymore? I haven't lately.
By
ArcticFahx,
Posted on: 2009-07-01 07:49 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
I couldn't do the Khan TF because our team couldn't do anything against the AV in the first mission.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. --- Thomas Jefferson
Formerly known as YFNDBA
Sounds like you're just ending up on bad teams. That's PuGs for ya.
This is why I always RUN my own TFs. Take a look at my sig and YOU TOO can once again have fun playing TFs, because you're in charge.
My personal rule on TFs is what I call "steamroller": We wait for NO ONE, people catch up if they have to do stuff, but we DON'T "stealth" ANYTHING. We fight from the start to the end for every mission. It's the most fun that way if you ask me.
And to be honest, steamrolling is rewarding. You get all the rewards from beating all those enemies, it's fairly idiot-proof and very fun.
Though if it's 2am or something, it's understandable if you wanna get it over with quick.
Last weekend I ran 8 Trials/TFs, mostly with coalition folks, but some with PuG members. Havign a core of people who play the way you like is essential.
As rule, we tend not to stealth that much, but beline from A to B in a defeat boss/guards mission defeating anything in our path. Exceptions would be Posi on principle, and some of those 7 floor Manticore misisons, or if it is gettign late and folks are feeling tired and want to just bully through.
So find yourself a group who feels the way you do, it makes the game a whole lot more fun
@Catwhoorg "Rule of Three - Finale" Arc# 1984
@Mr Falkland Islands"A Nation Goes Rogue" Arc# 2369 "Toasters and Pop Tarts" Arc#116617
We've been running Saturday task forces for over a year now, usually two teams, sometimes three. We simply run through the task forces in sequence. First we did the sequence on Heroic, then we did the sequence on Unyielding, and now we're almost up to the Shadow Shard task forces in our Invincible series.
Generally, it's best to make it clear to everyone ahead of time that the team will NOT be speed running. In other words, we have full teams of 8 people that are steam-rolling everything.
Stealthing a mission is plain boring because everyone is just standing around. Instead, there is more satisfaction by keeping the teaming fast paced, with perhaps 5- or 10-minute breaks when the team needs it (leveling, drinks, bio, food, etc.).
-Johnny
Reward at the end. I have done msot task-forces so many times i coudl quote the dialogue from memory, and faught the villaingroups contained in them so often I could do it blindfolded (I actually did that once, with my dom - it was depressing how well it went). Also, an issue in more taskforces than not: I hate the exemplar system with a passion.
As a general rule I'd rather finish the task-force as fast as possible and move on to something that I actually enjoy, like roleplaying, or AE missions (real ones - not that I have anything against farming, but like taskforces thats something I do for the payoff more than the direct entertainment value), or raiding, or maybe an STF run, or new content (when such is made avaialble with a new issue). Fighting every spawn between the start and the final objective isn't fun for me, its boring, and its pointless. Some enemies are more of a challenge to fight (Cimeroran Traitors and the Soldiers of Rularuu, in particular), but honestly, even then, fighting the same enemies for hours gets old after a while. The max level task-forces I msotly enjoy (although Jason Augustine is a little annoying), but once again there's only so often I can run them in a set period of time before I just don't care anymore.
I am very goal-oriented in general though, in video-games and elsewhere. I don't do anything "just for fun" I do it to win - the more effecient path between me and my objective (whatever that may be) is the one Im likely to take. Taking longer than necessary for no significant gain in some other area is just pointless.
REALLY enjoyed the ITF this Monday night... The second time I've beaten it! And we did it in a 100% different way.
The last time we steamrolled over Rommy and his pets with a team made up entirely of VEATs. =-3
This time my Archer and the team's AR Blaster stood at range and KOed Rommy's Nictus pets before they could aggro on us or hit us with their AoE heal.
It was awesome!
-Rachel-
OK. So I was just really really unlucky the last few times.
I can appreciate heading straight towards the boss and defeating everything in the way. That's pretty much how I'd expect to do it. I also don't mind not waiting for everyone. Rather, if people are zoning and on their way, I don't mind waiting a minute for everyone to load. If someone's selling or training, they can catch up later though.
The last several I've been on was very unrewarding because nobody even wanted to stay together as a team. They felt they could do it faster if they just split up. So we had people rushing to each shadow crystal, destroy it, and then head off to the next one while ignoring everything else. It was frustrating.
I can easily see skipping lots of the early task force missions (like Posi's) because it's brutally long and very repetitious. They were designed with a certain playstyle in mind that nobody really engages in (supergroups spreading the task force out over a couple days). But when the task force consists of four missions, I don't see the point of rushing it like that because, well, it's just four missions. I'll run more than four missions in an evening, I don't need to get that out of the way as fast as possible because I'm just going to be doing the same thing anyway. And every mob I defeat I get influence and possibly drops, so it's rewarding to fight your way to the end.
I'm just glad that I had a string of bad luck as opposed to this being the standard way everyone plays now.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
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Reward at the end. I have done msot task-forces so many times i coudl quote the dialogue from memory, and faught the villaingroups contained in them so often I could do it blindfolded (I actually did that once, with my dom - it was depressing how well it went). Also, an issue in more taskforces than not: I hate the exemplar system with a passion.
As a general rule I'd rather finish the task-force as fast as possible than fight every spawn between the start and the final objective. SOme enemies are moer of a challenge to fight (Cimeroran Traitors and the Soldiers of Rularuu, in particular), but honestly, even then, fighting the same enemies for hours gets old after a while.
I am very goal-oriented in generla though, in video-games and elsewhere. I don't do anything "just for fun" I do it to win - the more effecient path between me and my objective (whatever that may be) is the one Im likely to take. Taking longer than necessary for no significant gain in some other area is just pointless.
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Well, if "fun" isn't a factor, and you take away the combat, then what are you "winning"? Digital data in a virtual world?
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
I've experience the same situations and flustations that you have. The problem for me is that I stick with it once it get's started. It's very extraordinary for me to quite a TF once started. I'll grin and bear it, but it ticks me off to no end for players who take the speed runs to the extreme when run the TF for the XP. And by extreme, I mean people who SJ/SS to and completing missions before the rest of the team can even reach the mission door.
But the thing to do upfront is to ask as they doing a speed run or a more normal run. If you don't want to do speed run, quit the TF before it gets started. Thankfully on Justice, more people are upfront about doing speed runs when they are looking for members.
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Reward at the end. I have done msot task-forces so many times i coudl quote the dialogue from memory, and faught the villaingroups contained in them so often I could do it blindfolded (I actually did that once, with my dom - it was depressing how well it went). Also, an issue in more taskforces than not: I hate the exemplar system with a passion.
As a general rule I'd rather finish the task-force as fast as possible than fight every spawn between the start and the final objective. SOme enemies are moer of a challenge to fight (Cimeroran Traitors and the Soldiers of Rularuu, in particular), but honestly, even then, fighting the same enemies for hours gets old after a while.
I am very goal-oriented in generla though, in video-games and elsewhere. I don't do anything "just for fun" I do it to win - the more effecient path between me and my objective (whatever that may be) is the one Im likely to take. Taking longer than necessary for no significant gain in some other area is just pointless.
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Well, if "fun" isn't a factor, and you take away the combat, then what are you "winning"? Digital data in a virtual world?
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Pretty much, yeah. Rewards that allow me to make my character better at other content - content which may actually be a challenge. But more than that, the same thing you get when you accomplish anything ina video-game; or a real life sport or hobby or activity not direclty tied to your material well-being: an artificial sense of accomplishment.
This sums up about how I felt playing the Khan TF yesterday. We blew through everything so fast that I could hardly tell what was going on. I'm level 50 and I only got about 500K influence from that because that's how much they were avoiding fights.
I really only like stealthing missions when it's possible in the Freedom Phalanx TFs because they're so long. All the newer ones that all seem to be only 5 missions, I'd rather play like a normal mission. Maybe not neccessarily clear all but not just teleport straight to the end.
I enjoy doing speed runs (21 min itf, 22 min RSF, 49 min stf, 14 min cap tf,24 min lady grey) But i also run regular tf runs, and i always let people know before hand what we're running. For example, a speed itf, i will only accept 50's and will steer away from mm's/khelds and focus more on people that can move quickly. Most people on my server will announce a tf, and then just take whatever toon people decide to bring. I prefer to ask people what they have then build the team based on that. Once I was invited to a "speed itf" which turned out to be my kin, and 7 tanks/scrappers. And it was on invince. An hour in, on the second mission, i "accidently" used my ouro portal and got the hell out of dodge.
Leader of the NITES of DARKNESS VG
Join my fan club today!
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This sums up about how I felt playing the Khan TF yesterday. We blew through everything so fast that I could hardly tell what was going on. I'm level 50 and I only got about 500K influence from that because that's how much they were avoiding fights.
I really only like stealthing missions when it's possible in the Freedom Phalanx TFs because they're so long. All the newer ones that all seem to be only 5 missions, I'd rather play like a normal mission. Maybe not neccessarily clear all but not just teleport straight to the end.
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Actual of all the tfs, speeding the missions in the new tfs make sense for one reason: time spent on the last mission.
For some teams the final mission can take a looooong time.
Makes sense to rush the rest of the missions if the final beat down on Reichman may take you an hour or more.
Although from what I've heard this is more the case for the SF, with the TF being a cakewalk mostly.
EDIT: With that said I like both regular runs and speed runs. Regular runs on toons below 50, and speed runs on those that are 50 (I have better ways of getting inf by playing the market, so my 50s couldn't care less about inf or purples).
HOWEVER, it's best to ASK team leaders what type of tf you are getting on BEFORE it starts. Also best if team leaders NOT assume everyone wants to speed and say so beforehand.
Blazara Aura LVL 50 Fire/Psi Dom (with 125% recharge)
Flameboxer Aura LVL 50 SS/Fire Brute
Ice 'Em Aura LVL 50 Ice Tank
Darq Widow Fortune LVL 50 Fortunata (200% rech/Night Widow 192.5% rech)--thanks issue 19!
Most pug's on freedom that I run with will stealth all missions that can be, because many of them cannot be. Many are kill all missions, so we stealth when we can to make it a two hour session, rather than a three hour ordeal. I always get one to three levels from them and the length is just about right. I hate to run through every mission from beginning to end, clearing all of the way, and that never happens if somebody can stealth. We get good exp and level up well, but I am mostly there for the badge.
I was playing my Emp/Psi last week and was invited to do the Numina TF (figured what the heck, she needs to team to get XP and the family was away so I had the time).
The TF was very well organized (leader delegating duties for all the Kill X missions), ran really smoothly and had very few deaths (actually, I think the only one was ME, when I got a little too close to the tank and stole a little aggro 
). It was a nice experience.
The only regret is that it didn't get me from 39 to 40, even with loads of Patrol XP.
Suggestions:
Super Packs Done Right
Influence Sink: IO Level Mod/Recrafting
Random Merit Rolls: Scale cost by Toon Level
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Sounds like you're just ending up on bad teams. That's PuGs for ya.
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Truth, this haz it.
Carving a path of destruction through a task force is half the fun. I've "stealthed" on occasion (more like just pulled half the map to the last room with me), but usually I reserve that for obscenely long TFs like Dr. Q or when I didn't quite have as much time for the TF as I thought I did.
That said, I actually don't mind when the team decides to stealth that much, I just start steam rolling by myself until the mission ends, but that's part of the reason I only play scrappers these days.
Infatum on Virtueverse
I'm with you on this Barata. Speed runs are completely unfulfilling to me. This is especially so with the high level TFs where I've got my characters fairly tricked out with Sets and bonuses and for what? Hang out by the door to wait for the tp. Plus on a full team, I have more freedom to go all out since we can back each other up. That's fun and exciting. I'm not advocating doing a defeat all for every mission, but I'd like to at least fight my way to the mission objective. As it is, I might as well be a mission padder.
Teams are the number one killer of soloists.
Agreed. The "obscenely long" ones, I'd be incredibly annoyed if we didn't cut them short a bit. The devs seem to have learned their lesson though as new task forces are much more manageable. The heroside Reichsman looked to be a lot of fun. I mean, who doesn't like beating up nazis? The final battle was fun, but didn't seem too brutal. Maybe the team build we had was good. We just kept concentrating on Reichsman and ignored all the other AVs that came up to us, then took them out one by one after Reichsman was down. The entire TF was only about 45 minutes, and we only spent maybe 15 or 20 minutes fighting Reichsman and the other AVs. Any deaths during the TF happened before the final battle as many players found themselves alone in the various areas of the missions, but facing 8-man-spawns.
Seeing as even if you took your time, the Kahn TF looked to be no more than three hours, that's about my normal playtime. Spending that time in the one TF I wouldn't have a problem with because I'd just be spending that time in some other mission. At least with the KTF, I can beat up nazis.
People have been answering my question, and I do like what I hear. It's good to know that people do enjoy just playing the game and whacking down the enemies instead of just focusing on the rewards. I was just totally surprised to see that kind of playstyle with such a new task force. I was also stunned when someone said in the global channel it wasn't worth playing because the merit reward was too low. He did get called out on that by a couple people who said "who cares? it's fun", which is what I was looking for. I think I'll try again soon, but put together my own team. I want to steamroll through it, not stealth.
Keep in mind that I don't mind running a speed TF once in a while for the challenge. I was just concerned that everything was being run that way now.
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
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I was also stunned when someone said in the global channel it wasn't worth playing because the merit reward was too low.
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Yeah, and it's going to be even less once the dataming determines that it is being completed too quickly.
Teams are the number one killer of soloists.
Barata wrote:
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The reward for the missions became the focus, rather than the mission itself.
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I feel your pain, Barata. My anecdotal evidence indicates that a vast majority of players focus on rewards. Speed TFs, AE boss missions, go go go. I love to do TFs myself, but I like to do them, not blink twice and then wonder what happened in the past 20 minutes.
Also, especially with the public beta, some people have played content so much on Test that they honestly don't even consider the HUGE population of people that haven't. They just assume everyone's done it because they and all their friends have. And teamspeak/ventrillo doesn't help any.
"Play with similar people" and "form your own team" work, yes, but they're workarounds for the true problem.
--NT
They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!
If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville
I am totally with you Barata. I play the game because i like to see my characters actually fighting stuff. I enhance my characters with cool IOs so i can enjoy fighting stuff even more.
When i start a TF, i warn people that i intend to destroy/kill/arrest everything that shows on sight in every missions. I would not have it any other way.
Oh and remember, the level 50 enemy you avoid always is the one that carries the Purple Recipe. Thats my motd
I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Voltaire
I've run four task forces in the past week. Synapse, Manticore, Imperius, Khan. None lasted more than an hour. Khan was the one that really ticked me off. To put it simply, each task force was run to be as fast as possible so the merits could be earned. One player on the task force channel said that it wasn't even worth running Khan's because the merit payout was so low.
With each of the task forces, I spent every mission doing this:
1) Enter map
2) See that teammates who have loaded the map are scattered all over the place
3) Start heading out to try to catch up to any player
4) See the mission completion message appear
I was playing my dark defender. Defenders don't really work well when teammates are scattered all over the map. With the Manticore TF, the leader was a superspeeding scrapper who, it turns out, formed a team just for the AV at the end. Without a word, he would speed off and complete each objective on his own.
This was frustrating, but I put it aside. Then ITF and Synapse turned out to be identical. What really upset me was the Khan TF last night. The first new content in a while, a brand new AV, and I truthfully don't really know what happened. Every mission I entered was the same.... a scattered team doing their own thing. I voiced my frustration because there was not even team dialog saying what was expected of us. I checked my chat window to make sure it was working as nobody was talking. The leader, at the last mission, said "I'm going to stealth to the end and teleport everyone to the AV". I said "of course", hoping he'd recognize my sarcasm.
He did and then sent me a private tell apologizing because he only then just realized it was the first time I was running it and didn't know that, so they were just speeding through it. Considering it was just two days old, I think the majority of people probably didn't have experience with it.
The final battle was very fun. It was exactly what I was hoping for. My complaint for each of those times is that I logged on when I knew I'd have some time to commit to a TF and enjoy playing the game for a couple hours, and 40 minutes later, I was teamless again looking for something to do.
I know that by going through them faster, you earn merits, but I just don't understand where the fun factor is coming in. All the rewards in the game serve one ultimate purpose..... enhance your character's combat ability. Merits are used to get enhancements. Recipe drops are used to make enhancements. Influence/Infamy is used to purchase enhancements. All of these are to complement and improve your gameplay.
So why do people want to avoid gameplay? I play because I enjoy the combat. I like being a part of a team and taking on a bunch of enemies and blasting them to pieces. I enjoy being a defender and tossing around debuffs and heals, and dropping holds on enemies hitting one of the squishies. The combat is the heart of the game. Some people may see it as avoiding unnecessary combat, but I don't see the point of that. If the ultimate goal is only to improve the character, why bother improving him if you're just going to spend time avoiding using your powers? With each of those nights running TFs, we'd speed through and avoid combat, and would be left doing what? Looking for another team so we can engage in combat? It makes no sense. We just had that opportunity.
I think this all started when rare recipes were granted as rewards. The reward for the missions became the focus, rather than the mission itself. When merits were implemented, it was indeed a more fair way of handling the reward system. After all, why do a 3 hour TF if a 1 hour TF gives you the same reward? I think the merits, while being more fair, gave more incentive to treat all task forces that way. Before, if you just wanted a quick reward, you'd run the fastest TF. Now there is incentive to run all TFs fast.
I really enjoy playing the game, and I think that's where my complaint comes in. Two years ago, I'd log on and easily find a task force team and my evening was booked with lots of fun gameplay. Now, I can still easily find a TF, but there's little fun to be had. The only fun comes from the final encounter.
I'm not saying I want to leisurely stroll through every mission and make sure every mob is defeated, but I would like to engage spawns as a team and feel like we're playing rather than more or less just working for a paycheck.
What did I wind up doing last night after the KTF? I went to the consignment house in Talos. After handling my affairs, I sent out a broadcast offering my services on a team. When asked what level, I said "50, but I'll exemp down to any level. I just like to team with people and fight." We ran various radio missions and had a good time. Technically, we could have just run to the end of the radio missions and complete the final objective, but nobody really wanted to. They just wanted to fight and get experience, so there wasn't much incentive to hurry through. We'd fight our way to the end, and then get a new mission with a different villain group.
I had more fun exemping down to level 28 and running radios than I did on the TFs. That's kinda sad.
I'm honestly curious if anyone actually enjoys task forces, or if the enjoyment comes only from the reward at the end. I have my fireproof suit on, so feel free to cut loose (but at least try to keep it civil).
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens