Going from Level 9 to Level 16 Within 1 AE Mission
By
AncientSpirit_NA,
Posted on: 2009-07-06 07:58 in Mission Architect
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If you think I am full of it, ask yourself how the Devs determine when a bump should be made to the XP Curve, or how they figure out when an enemy group isn't giving quite enough XP?
They datamine... and all your PLing messes with the results of those calculations, which thereby impacts the potential for a smoother game experience for me.
So, how is it again that your gameplay doesn't impact mine?
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Actually, I do believe you're full of it. You're basing your arguement on a completely hypothetical assumption that may or may not reflect the actual methods that the devs use to make adjustments to their game.
Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. An individual (in this case me) PLing my alts is not nearly significant enough to actually skew the results collected from a sample size of hundred of thousands of characters, if not millions. Your assumption might be true if the majority of the CoX subscribers have multiple accounts and they all use the PL method to level their alts. However, since there is no concrete evidence to support such a drastic claim, your guesswork does not qualify as a fact thus your argument falls apart.
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I ocassionally find myself ranting about those L45+ ishs without a single Vet badge who (for some strange reason), still haven't figured out how to utilize their AT/powers decently.
You know, the ones who got PL'd and cause wipe after wipe until leave/kicks occur.
So, in more cases than are comfortable, it does effect others.
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Oh, here we go again. Someone who sucks at playing their AT must be they're PLed. Sorry to burst your bubble but I have 14 level 50s, 11 of which hit level 50 prior to the release of AE. I don't need to slog my way through the first 30-40 levels of each new character to know how to play it properly. CoX isn't astrophysics, it isn't even the multiplication table. The game itself is ridiculously easy for *some* people to figure out when compared to a lot of other MMOs out there. This isn't my first trip around the block so spare me of the "you must not know how to play those characters which you PL'ed" non-sense. If someone else can't figure out how to play their characters properly (whether it is PL'ed or not), that is in no shape or form my fault. I will stand by my original assertion of how I PL my own alts has little to do with anyone else.
the game is simple. it is easy to build something survivable and effecient in killing tons of enemies.
u just gotta know how to do it 
Ignoring anyone is a mistake. You might miss something viral to your cause.
this topic is still coming up when i click on active topics?
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One of my characters yesterday went from level 9 to 16 within the span of a single AE mission. Total time spent was around 30 minutes.
The clincher is that he was level pacted, so wasn't even getting full xp.
I'm not going to enter any value judgments here about farming, the morality of gaining fast levels, and so on. I just think that the XP system needs further review because as long as its possible to gain levels so quickly, the strategy of playing radio missions or contacts is pretty much moot. In particular, the ability to auto-SK in the AE seems broken.
As it is, I'm afraid I'm going to have to avoid using the AE in teams at all until something is done. The reason is that I'm afraid I'll accept an invite to a team, like this one, that appears to offer "too much" XP and then get in trouble for abuse. I didn't join the team with the idea that I'd be exiting the map in the double-digits, and only played the mission one time.
I should further note that nothing about this mission was particularly more "farm like" than any other mission. The levels came because a single level 50 character was able to solo the map without any assistance from the rest of the team, and my character gained levels from the sheer number of enemies defeated. There were no obvious exploits employed. The system is just handing out too much XP in certain situations.
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Ohhhh if this was on Virtue I was the 50 !! you were very polite and friendly when you exited the team merely stating that "it felt a little too easy " and excused yourself before the mission was done .
If it wasn't on Virtue , totally ignore the above
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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I ocassionally find myself ranting about those L45+ ishs without a single Vet badge who (for some strange reason), still haven't figured out how to utilize their AT/powers decently.
You know, the ones who got PL'd and cause wipe after wipe until leave/kicks occur.
So, in more cases than are comfortable, it does effect others.
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I've seen people with tons of vet badges who still cant play for crap. its got nothing to do with how new they are. some players are just terrible.
Want comedy and lighthearted action? Between levels 1-14? Try Nuclear in 90 - The Fusionette Task Force!
Arc ID 58363!
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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I ocassionally find myself ranting about those L45+ ishs without a single Vet badge who (for some strange reason), still haven't figured out how to utilize their AT/powers decently.
You know, the ones who got PL'd and cause wipe after wipe until leave/kicks occur.
So, in more cases than are comfortable, it does effect others.
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I've seen people with tons of vet badges who still cant play for crap. its got nothing to do with how new they are. some players are just terrible.
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No use telling them that. They don't understand that concept.
I love the datamining comment. Hate to tell you this, but AE is far from the easiest, or even fastest leveling that has ever occurred in this game.
Anyone remember the old blinkie mish? You could be in a different zone grinding away while the guy clickin the blinkies got you an insane amount of xp with regards to level. The krakens farms, which were all kinds of fun. Oh, and don't forget the set and forget BP farms, no server reset and you could hit 50 in like 24 hours and didnt even have to be at the computer.
All that PLing, and they smoothed the leveling curve. Now, if your datamining comment held out, they would have made it HARDER to level, not easier. Hell, double XP, I mean really, I am surprised you arent whining about that too.
Now, I don't particularly like seeing noobs get PLed. I leveled my first toon the hard way, went through the content, and most of my PLed toons got a few levels then ground a few levels just so I knew how to play them. That said, PLing and vet badges dont mean a bloody thing when it comes to player skill. I was in a mish the other day, playing a tank, and there were 2 morons with kheldians and at least 2 years worth of vet badges(i checked) that couldnt grasp that knocking the mobs away from the tank into another group was a bad thing. After telling them this 4 times, I was asked to "chill out". The mish went to hell, and everyone eventually quit, cus we got smashed.
This is the fate of most of the evil farms out there. The people that are unorganized and trying to just get quick levels. Whether they do it in farms, or TFs, or regular contact missions is really a moot point. AE didnt create these morons, they are your fellow players, and to be honest, there are a lot of em.
If I PL a toon, it is because I want to try something new, and dont feel like grinding through those first 30 levels. On my first 50 I soloed when I couldnt find a group, and grinded my [censored] off, on an emp/elec def. Oh, and all the whining about not being able to find groups doing content is crap. On that same emp I had a harder time finding groups than i do on any of my lowbies now. I have been asked to do more TFs of every level than I ever did on my emp when I was grinding him up the hard way.
You don't like the way I play, go pound sand. No one is making you do it, so why do you feel that it is your job to tell me how I should play. I used to love the old Shadowhunter farm. That was taken away from me, then Dreck, then made it so I cant stack up ninjas like playing cards, then ED, which by the way made the game so much better half the people I know quit. Some of us ran those missions cus they were FUN. For a game that has a terribly limited end game, taking away what is fun makes me want to play something else, like WoW. Oh wait, I quit WoW, cus after I got bored playing my level 70, the last thing I wanted to do was grind up another toon doing the same content I already did before, grinding out levels that took forever, and I knew that game well enough to level up relatively quickly.
Dark Armor is like that kid you knew in school that didn't know when to shut up, and no matter how bad he got beaten down, he got right back up again and kept on talking.
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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If every MMO were working on your principle, there would probably not have any left going on the market. You know that?
Devs certainly did not create 50 leveling steps to see them bypassed in less than a week, a day or even a hour.
This is non-sense.
I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
Voltaire
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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If every MMO were working on your principle, there would probably not have any left going on the market. You know that?
Devs certainly did not create 50 leveling steps to see them bypassed in less than a week, a day or even a hour.
This is non-sense.
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You don't like the way I play, go pound sand. No one is making you do it, so why do you feel that it is your job to tell me how I should play.
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This....
and
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If I PL a toon, it is because I want to try something new, and dont feel like grinding through those first 30 levels.
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This
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Ohhhh if this was on Virtue I was the 50 !! you were very polite and friendly when you exited the team merely stating that "it felt a little too easy " and excused yourself before the mission was done .
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Yes it was you, I recognize the name. You were very polite yourself so I wasn't going to cause a huge scene. I was pretty amazed by how well your character performed solo and it was worth the mission just to see that. I do still think I got too much XP for doing nothing but dying but it wasn't all bad! Truly amazing build you have there.
In response to some other posts (not related to the quote above):
Again I don't have an ethical issue with farming per se, but I do think the rewards are out of wack. I don't think this leads, necessarily, to fewer people to team with, people not knowing how to make a build, or throwaway characters in general.
Rather, my issue is that having an option for overabundant XP leads to the abandonment of alternative strategies. It is sort of like creating a powerset with 8 interesting, fun attack powers that require practice and skill to use and then throwing in a single power that does auto-hit 1000 damage per shot on a half-second recharge. The existence of such a power eliminates the need to strategically use the other 8 powers in the set. Perversely, what results is a population players who slavishly use that single power, many of whom hate every minute of it. And no matter how outrageously overpowered the ability was, some players would insist they are entitled to use it because it is a matter of "playstyle," as if paying a subscription fee means they get everything they want. Some of them would even cancel their accounts if it changed. Others would cancel if it were not changed, for some of the reasons discussed here.
I think one thing a lot of people who oppose farming (me not included) and/or huge XP payouts (me included) mean to say but can't quite find the words for is this: our problem with mega-XP alternatives is that they also tempt us. Just like "farmers" we often want to seek out the highest possible XP rewards we can. Where we differ is on the what source of those rewards should be and how high they should go. Right now they go very high and the source of them runs counter to actual gameplay.
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Actually, I do believe you're full of it. You're basing your arguement on a completely hypothetical assumption that may or may not reflect the actual methods that the devs use to make adjustments to their game.
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True, but we have to know that they do use some sort of number crunching method to ascertain what changes need/should be made.
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Let's not get ahead of ourselves here. An individual (in this case me) PLing my alts is not nearly significant enough to actually skew the results collected from a sample size of hundred of thousands of characters, if not millions.
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I guess I should have made it clear that while I did direct my post at you specifically... I was speaking rather more generally. Lots of people have the same attitude that you do: that PLing their own characters doesn't impact anything. None of us have numbers on that. However, I think we can all agree that is the case. Likewise, there are a whole lot of people using the AE to PL. I think it is clear that all of them put together ARE impacting the numbers the Devs use to make adjustments to the game.
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Your assumption might be true if the majority of the CoX subscribers have multiple accounts and they all use the PL method to level their alts. However, since there is no concrete evidence to support such a drastic claim, your guesswork does not qualify as a fact thus your argument falls apart.
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If one takes that narrow of a focus on the discussion of PLing, then yes, my argument would lack substance. But, I think that you and I both know that there are a large number of folks out there PLing frequently.
Edit:
Also keep in mind that when I used "your" and "you" I was using it in the general sense of "people's" and "they."
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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If only you were right. If that were the case, I wouldn't give 2 squirts what you did in game.
If you think I am full of it, ask yourself how the Devs determine when a bump should be made to the XP Curve, or how they figure out when an enemy group isn't giving quite enough XP?
They datamine... and all your PLing messes with the results of those calculations, which thereby impacts the potential for a smoother game experience for me.
So, how is it again that your gameplay doesn't impact mine?
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Waaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh
[Snipped]
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So... you don't dismiss the point of the post, but instead relegate it to little more than whining?
I guess that means there isn't anything there that you can refute on any actual basis?
(QR)
The whole point of an MMO is to play and affect a community and be affected by it as you play. If you truly believe your gameplay has no effect on any one else in the community, go read a bit about the Butterfly Effect. If you don't believe MMO's are complex enough to elicit the Butterfly Effect, that's a whole other issue anyway.
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
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(QR)
The whole point of an MMO is to play and affect a community and be affected by it as you play. If you truly believe your gameplay has no effect on any one else in the community, go read a bit about the Butterfly Effect. If you don't believe MMO's are complex enough to elicit the Butterfly Effect, that's a whole other issue anyway.
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Your actions do affect the community.
However, you sure as hell don't have to play with the community just cause you subbed to an MMO.
If this game had a single player version I'd be playing it. This game being an MMO is DEAD F*&^%$#G LAST of the reasons why I picked it up so long ago. In fact after playing FFXI, it being an MMO was almost one of the reasons I didn't buy this game. (Not too important to discuss here, let me just say that FFXI almost completely soured me on mmos. 
)
That's what folks don't get. The folks farming and pling probably WOULD NOT be playing with YOU (rhetorical) if they weren't farming or pling. They would have stopped subbing ages ago.
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!
You clearly misunderstand what I'm saying, Aura Familia. I'm not saying that people affect me just (or only if) while they play with me. I'm saying people are affecting me even when they're playing their character while I'm offline.
Just as a little example, think about this little mind exercise: lets say there are 100,000 subscriber to the game. Out of those 100,000 players, 80,000 have made Scrapper characters. Out of those Scrappers 40,000 are Spines/DA. Eventually, because of whatever set of circumstances these Scrappers are getting to Lv50 faster than other Scrappers. This may trigger changes to Spines/DA power-sets which essentially affect the whole community of Spines/DA Scrappers, but it also forever changes the Spines/DA power-sets in a way that prevents future Spines/DA Scrappers from ever experiencing the "original" state of Spines/DA! Isn't this effectively how ED has changed the game for all those in it and those who came in to the game after ED was introduced? ED itself... wasn't it triggered by how people flocked to builds with extreme slotting for 6xDmg and the likes?
Every one of us counts for something... whether we like it, or not.
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
The question is why is the OP or others concerned at all. Avoid the AE do the PVE content. Why are you level pacted? The game encompasses all kinds of players - some want full immersion, finely crafted ae missions with amazing content and lots of lols all around. Some want to lessen the grind of going to PI and doing battle maiden over and over again. Find the people like you and play with them. Don't accept random ae invites, don't pad if asked.
If you don't want to go from 9-16 in one AE arc, that's fine but are you arbitrarily saying everyone should be like you? Before AE, and before I ever heard the word PL I went from 1-20 just doing streets in atlas and gc then getting on a few mishes. I know people who will just fight streets to 14 then get on a posi and do all the tf commander arcs and level to 50 doing it.
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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If every MMO were working on your principle, there would probably not have any left going on the market. You know that?
Devs certainly did not create 50 leveling steps to see them bypassed in less than a week, a day or even a hour.
This is non-sense.
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world of warcraft does that all the time, actually. Their major timesink is when you hit cap and can only do the dungeons you need for gear once a week.
Done right you can cap out in a week or less due to the xp smoothing and the 3x exp offer that can easily be taken advantage of by opening a second account.
Want comedy and lighthearted action? Between levels 1-14? Try Nuclear in 90 - The Fusionette Task Force!
Arc ID 58363!
I don't care if my actions affect the community. I pay to play this game how I want to.
I'm selfish like that....because again...this is a GAME, not real life.
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I don't care if my actions affect the community. I pay to play this game how I want to.
*
I'm selfish like that....because again...this is a GAME, not real life.
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Finally, someone brave enough to come and admit they're selfish.
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
Well yeah...it's a game. I have the right to be selfish.
Flipping prices, hoarding salvage and purple recipes to raise the price, getting tons of prestige and XP when I PL?
I find all those fun. And again...because this is a GAME......it's not REAL LIFE.
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You clearly misunderstand what I'm saying, Aura Familia. I'm not saying that people affect me just (or only if) while they play with me. I'm saying people are affecting me even when they're playing their character while I'm offline.
Just as a little example, think about this little mind exercise: lets say there are 100,000 subscriber to the game. Out of those 100,000 players, 80,000 have made Scrapper characters. Out of those Scrappers 40,000 are Spines/DA. Eventually, because of whatever set of circumstances these Scrappers are getting to Lv50 faster than other Scrappers. This may trigger changes to Spines/DA power-sets which essentially affect the whole community of Spines/DA Scrappers, but it also forever changes the Spines/DA power-sets in a way that prevents future Spines/DA Scrappers from ever experiencing the "original" state of Spines/DA! Isn't this effectively how ED has changed the game for all those in it and those who came in to the game after ED was introduced? ED itself... wasn't it triggered by how people flocked to builds with extreme slotting for 6xDmg and the likes?
Every one of us counts for something... whether we like it, or not.
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ED came about cause EVERYONE was basically near overpowered. Had nothing to do with one specific build being overpowered. It also came about because the devs wanted to build a more meaningful crafing and enhancement system that they wanted from the get go. Without ED we would never have had IOs.
Whether there is farming or not, the devs WILL ALWAYS look to correct things that are overpowered, or modify things because they feel system they intend to provide later on can't be provided with the current way somethings work in game.
has little to do with how much people farm or how fast they get to 50. The devs have datamining outside of farming to show them what needs changing.
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!
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I don't care if my actions affect the community. I pay to play this game how I want to.
*
I'm selfish like that....because again...this is a GAME, not real life.
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Finally, someone brave enough to come and admit they're selfish.
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Everyone is selfish to a point.
It's . . . a . . . videogame.
We are playing it for our entertainment. When we stop getting entertained, we stop subbing. Doesn't really matter (for some) what does or doesn't happen with other people in the game's community.
hell, arguably Darkfall and WoW have what I would call less than friendly communities, and folks still sub to both.
There is nothing at all wrong with unsubbing from a game that you don't find entertaining, don't like the community of, or don't agree with the devs decisions.
I say that, because the devs here have stated that the want folks to go from 1-50 in the AE as an alternative to regular content.
They will continue to destroy anything that goes beyond a certain metric of speed of going from 1-50 that they feel is an outlier. And NO, the playerbase has no say in what they feel the right leveling speed is. And rightfully so.
If they feel going from 9-16 in the amount of time posted in the OP is too much, they'll deal with it. If they don't, they won't. Doesn't matter what we think the right speed should be (that's so subjective it's not even funny). Anyone who disagrees has the ability to vote with one thing: whether they continue to pay for a subscription.
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!
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I will never understand why some people are so obsessed with how fast *other* people are leveling. How fast I PL my alt has nothing to do with anybody else. The world would be a far better place if people would just direct all that misguided energy to more worthy... causes.
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If every MMO were working on your principle, there would probably not have any left going on the market. You know that?
Devs certainly did not create 50 leveling steps to see them bypassed in less than a week, a day or even a hour.
This is non-sense.
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QFT^, although this concept is lost to most people on these boards.
Good for the game?? but what about me!?!? waaaahhhh!!!
There are some toons I won't mind giving this advantage to, i.e., my support characters. But for toons I really enjoy playing (like my DB/*) I drop out of anything that levels me too fast (and won't play them during double experience weekends).
For me, its not as much a matter of ethics as much as knowing what I do with my 50s. I play a few alot but the others usually sit around and collect dust (until I bring them out once in a blue moon). So I've never really understood/enjoyed the racing to 50.
But to each his own.