They'd have to rewrite the entire difficulty setting to make it not function with MA, and they'd have to make sure that change didn't affect regular Taskforces. I sincerely doubt they'll go through that much trouble when the benefits will be so obvious, both to the AE farmers and non-farmers who hate farming.
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I thought it was impossible, but I think the devs have stumbled upon a masterstroke in killing 90% of the complaints about AE.
Why do people complain about AE? It's not because the people who farm it are getting massive rewards - if these people didn't know where the rewards were coming from, or if they thought about what the rewards of AE brought to the rest of the game, they'd realize that AE farming is beneficial to everyone. (For example: How many people could afford a Steadfast: Res/Def before AE? How many people seriously planned on grabbing that Regenerative Tissue Unique? How long, before AE, did you have to wait for a reasonable bid on a +Knockback protection enhancement to go through?)
I, for one, had stopped reading the same old story text over and over long before AE - so the fact that AE has killed the 'story' of the game is also a rather pointless concern.
There are two reasons, logically, why so many people hate AE.
1) It's visible.
2) It takes the teaming masses of 'average' players off the streets.
I'll explain in a bit more detail.
The concern with #1 is that you can no longer go through the most populated zones (Cap, Atlas) without being bombarded by AE spam. Hell, a lot of people go onto the Request or Help chans spamming for it nowadays. Clueless newbies who have never leveled themselves past 30 now have multiple 50s they have no clue what to do with because you can go to one of these zones, spam the broadcast channel, and eventually get a team.
#2 comes up from the simple fact that those clueless newbs (and more average people - the ones who may not be clueless, but 'just play' instead of IOing out) are now riding along as fillers in the farms of people like me and many others who -do- have a clue and can trick out a character to take down boss spawns in the time it takes most people to team wipe against mixed minion/lt groups. Those people aren't out there on taskforces, street sweeping, doing paper missions- and they need to be. That's how you learn the game, and it's how newbies get exposed to the true team play that will get them hoked to CoH.
The devs are about to fix both of these problems with one change, one that I don't know if they fathom the consequences of:
In I16, you will be able to set your AE mission to spawn as if you had a full team of 8.
Instantly, you have eliminated most of the spamming - random average joe will no longer have a place on -my- boss farms, for instance. Why would I pad out my team with pointless non-contributors and reduce my inf/prestige drops? Why would I leech XP from the toons of my friends - people who can already play, people who know the game, people who just want to skip that 1-35 grind before the characters they want to play actually become fun? People who realize the game -starts-, rather than ends, at 50?
The answer: I won't. I won't ever again make myself feel dirty for broadcasting that I'm running an AE Team LFM. I won't ever have to worry that I've just PL'd some newb who won't know what he's doing with the toon I've just taken from 1-35 in a few hours.
Imagine a world where AE slowly transforms, organically - from a loud, noisy crowd to a few silent solo farmers moving in and out of that glowing cylinder with their close friends, silent but for their Skype or Ventrilo chats. Where the random average joe who wanders into AE does so for actual story arcs because he can't boss farm - and if he can, he can do it alone, for much greater reward than spamming the channels.
Imagine those huddled masses of lowbies and newbies and AE babies forced back onto the streets and into paper missions again. Out into the game where they'll have to learn the ropes for themselves, carry themselves from 1-50 like we did before AE, because nobody needs them to get proper-sized spawns anymore.
I think this is the best move the devs have ever made. I hope that they were smart enough to realize what they were doing, that it was on purpose, but really? Even if it's an accident, I think it's the best accident to happen to the game since AE.
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You know what? I think you are correct, sir. Brilliant deduction.
What I've always felt all along is that the devs actually are not looking to 'kill farming' so much as what they are really trying to do is reduce the amount of server resources being used in the pursuit of people getting in an actual mish and doing something, regardless of whether its a series of mishes or one mish run repeatedly.
Also, I believe the devs are trying to find solutions to the 'farming' problem that reduces the amount of work they have to do later in dealing with the 'farming' problem.
The devs don't want to be mission police. The devs want to make new zones and powers and badges and rewards and stories and stuff.
The custom difficulty thing is a brilliant change coming.
Now the regen/wp, etc. scrappers and fire/kins can make a solo/small team mish set to 8 and just go to town.
Good luck everyone. And to the farmers: more power to ya. And to the non-farmers: more power to ya.
Now if they could only 'fix' pvp in such a way that pvp toons that DON'T farm are at such a build disadvantage vs. pvp toons that DO farm. That's really Brüno.
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Now if they could only 'fix' pvp in such a way that pvp toons that DON'T farm are at such a build disadvantage vs. pvp toons that DO farm.
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You might want to check out Issue 13's patch notes.
Also, assuming you're talking about IOs in general, farming is so totally and completely not the only way to obtain them. Not even really rich-blood stuff like Purples.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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I am not a farmer. But I am a Scrapper and Brute player, and so I heartily endorse this change, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it applies to AE as well, because then I'll be able to make your "easily soloable, squishy-friendly" mission into a "challenging" mission when my Scrapper starts nearing 40 and everything becomes stupid-easy.
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While I tend to farm, it is simply an easy way to max out a mission, grab some money and tickets to help outfit toons that have literally sat on a shelf for years. I completely agree with this point of Eva's and would much prefer to sample lots of creative AE content on my own with maxed numbers and maxed difficulty without worrying about the noob I'm pling getting stuck on a light fixture somewhere. Should the change to mob sizes roll out as we all hope, I really do think as Das Bert suggests that AE will lose some of it's pling charm and while farming will continue, it should, with any luck, become one's dirty little secret 
X
"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind."
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The devs are about to fix both of these problems with one change, one that I don't know if they fathom the consequences of:
In I16, you will be able to set your AE mission to spawn as if you had a full team of 8.
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.
.
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Imagine those huddled masses of lowbies and newbies and AE babies forced back onto the streets and into paper missions again. Out into the game where they'll have to learn the ropes for themselves, carry themselves from 1-50 like we did before AE, because nobody needs them to get proper-sized spawns anymore.
I think this is the best move the devs have ever made. I hope that they were smart enough to realize what they were doing, that it was on purpose, but really? Even if it's an accident, I think it's the best accident to happen to the game since AE.
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This. I love this. It is bloody beautiful and I can't wait.
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*edit*
Actually I just had another thought about this.
Will the lowbies REALLY go back to normal content?
Won't they just form a team in their own level range and mindlessly farm the AE at their own level?
I can just see there will be level 20, level 30 and level 40 AE farms created & running and being broadcast anyhow.
Why would they bother to leave Atlas Park when they can run a farm in their own level range?
The only difference I anticipate at this stage, is the hard core farmers will farm solo with mobs spawned to 8, and lower levels will segregate off to form farm teams in the AE at their own level range.
*2nd edit* Also, another important fact here. Tickets. Why would the lowbies go back to doing normal content, when they can get 1500 tickets from running ONE mission? Enough tickets to give all sorts of juicy rewards from the ticket vendor? Mission rewards outside of the AE simply can't compare to the instant and guaranteed gratification that you will get from 1 AE mission farm.
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Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
I was thrilled with the Science pack cuz I finally got payback on the creepy guy that kept trying to ERP with my tween heroine, by hitting the costume change and turning into a 10' tall monstrous escaped prisoner and telling him, "You gots a real purty mouf, now bendover and squeal like a pig fo yo daddy, cuz you my little puppy now!" Haven't seen him since.
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This change is making me want to roll a new scrapper or brute... Oh god, more alts... someone stop me...
Actually maybe I'll just level my Shield/Fire tank for the time being. I'm sure he'll be able to handle big spawns.
Edit: I'm not a farmer. I just like my bad[censored] melee characters.
GOD I HOPE THIS HAPPENS just the way its described in the first post of this thread. So tired of being in the middle of a convo and getting interrupted with "will u PL me?" AAAAARRRRGH.....
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Imagine those huddled masses of lowbies and newbies and AE babies forced back onto the streets and into paper missions again. Out into the game where they'll have to learn the ropes for themselves, carry themselves from 1-50 like we did before AE, because nobody needs them to get proper-sized spawns anymore.
I think this is the best move the devs have ever made. I hope that they were smart enough to realize what they were doing, that it was on purpose, but really? Even if it's an accident, I think it's the best accident to happen to the game since AE.
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This. I love this. It is bloody beautiful and I can't wait.
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*edit*
Actually I just had another thought about this.
Will the lowbies REALLY go back to normal content?
Won't they just form a team in their own level range and mindlessly farm the AE at their own level?
I can just see there will be level 20, level 30 and level 40 AE farms created & running and being broadcast anyhow.
Why would they bother to leave Atlas Park when they can run a farm in their own level range?
The only difference I anticipate at this stage, is the hard core farmers will farm solo with mobs spawned to 8, and lower levels will segregate off to form farm teams in the AE at their own level range.
*2nd edit* Also, another important fact here. Tickets. Why would the lowbies go back to doing normal content, when they can get 1500 tickets from running ONE mission? Enough tickets to give all sorts of juicy rewards from the ticket vendor? Mission rewards outside of the AE simply can't compare to the instant and guaranteed gratification that you will get from 1 AE mission farm.
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These poor clueless newbies will end up being decimated on their self-run farms because they don't know good tactics for their ATs, how to successfully choose and slot their powersets, how to fill those slots (see that "why do I suck, lol!" thread) or how to team. And that's just off the top of my head, never mind other issues like "What's Talos?"
They'll either:
+ come here, read and learn how to play and become "real players" - hooray!
+ slowly work at learning what they were doing wrong as they keep playing and become "real players" along the way - hooray!
+ get bored by a game that demands a little attention rather than just raining goodies from the skies and leave - hooray!
No matter who wins, we all win too. 
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People who mistakenly believe that the game -starts-, rather than ends, at 50?
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Fixed.
To the rest of your post? You may well be correct. Let us hope that this is so.
Farming is necessary for the survival of most nations, industrialized or not. Farming provides affordable and reliable commodities for continued growth and expansion. Our nation would be nothing without farming.
It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it.
Anyway, growing up, I never wanted to be a farmer and I still don't. I am happy people farm. In the game, it is no different. It allows me to sell common salvage for millions of influence, and I keep my vault loaded as the market fluctuates.
I think the conspiracy theory that the devs are geniuses however is about as accurate as saying the FED planned the recession to lower the overvalued prices of housing. They had no clue at all what there actions would lead to. Hopefully, they will learn along the way.
Surely, there is some economics grad student who is playing the game who can provide some educationed insight versus some 5th grader who games so much, he is still in remedial mathematics.
Some PhD student should do some economics experiments on the market and watch how it models real life situations. That would be a interesting dissertation.
No, wait a second. The devs are geniuses. They just duped me and most of the other players into thinking they were clueless when all along, they just planned this since issue 4.
The dev's AT is mastermind. By the way, i only posted this so in one year, hydraulic pistons would cap at 4 million a piece before the great crash, and the post's impact will only be understood then.
Signed,
Bored at Work and unable to play at work.
Dear Bored at Work:
I feel like a columnist now.
The exodus from content to tickets caused the fluctuations in salvage. This is not the fault of the farmer, unless you want to blame them for playing AE instead of their responsible duty of farming to give you cheaper prices for salvage.
Rather, when you pay 'buy it now prices', you're helping the marketeer. Those are the people that rode the price spikes and milked the market for all it has. Buy cheap, sell high. It's the lack of patience in the common player that made prices rise.
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The problem is that if more people are playing enough to get purple drops, they're also making more money. More money entering the economy for high priced items when you're still only playing 3 hours a week means you're still never going to be able to afford purples.
Nor should you be able to with that kind of play schedule. They're not for the casual players, they're for the hardcore.
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Am I reading this right? Did you just make a point then refute yourself?
Quote:
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Originally Posted by eltonio
This is over the top mental slavery.
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I am not a farmer. But I am a Scrapper and Brute player, and so I heartily endorse this change, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that it applies to AE as well, because then I'll be able to make your "easily soloable, squishy-friendly" mission into a "challenging" mission when my Scrapper starts nearing 40 and everything becomes stupid-easy.
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You should be able to set team size and challenge level for AE test mode in the same architect options dialog where you currently set yourself invisible and invincible.
This will really help authors make missions that scale well to all team sizes.
Say it isn't so! Please!!!!
How will I leach experience now? All my badges are in doorsittting!!!!
Will I have to actually play the game now?
How do my powers work?
This is the end of CoX. i REFUSE to pay $15 a month for a game that keeps NERFING all its best features!!!!! 
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In I16, you will be able to set your AE mission to spawn as if you had a full team of 8.
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You are jumping to a huge conclusion there. It is just as likely that this feature will not work in AE at all.
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Why not? AE uses the current challenge level system (Hell, it tells you the Level you'll be playing an AE mission at due to your challenge level setting when yoiu first interface with the Virtual Contact). Why would it NOT use the new challenge system when spawning player created missions?