New Merit Changes List

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Oh don't worry, once we get the much-anticipated Side Switching everyone can just play their Masterminds, Brutes, Doms, Corrs and Stalkers heroside anyway. Heck, VEATs can come too. Can just shut CoV down then.

(Gosh, what an unusually pessimistic post from me... But I'm moody for other reasons, so nyah.)

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And exactly this is why I think that the changing sides thing is dumb idea, which I hope will never happen. It'll completely defeat the point of having different AT's for different sides.

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@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.

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And I've never done it. Do you have a point?

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Nor should you want to Khorak... nor should you want to.
*hugs knees and rocks back and forth in remembrance of having done that TF and what it did to own sanity*

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Rabbits & Hares:Blue (Mind/Emp Controller)Maroon (Rad/Thermal Corruptor)and one of each AT all at 50
MA Arcs: Apples of Contention - 3184; Zen & Relaxation - 35392; Tears of Leviathan - 121733 | All posts are rated "R" for "R-r-rrrrr, baby!"|Now, and this is very important... do you want a hug? COH Faces @Blue Rabbit

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*hugs knees and rocks back and forth in remembrance of having done that TF and what it did to own sanity*

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More due to you spending a whole day travelling through the Shadow Shard due to faceplanting 3 seconds into each mission, than anything else I expect.

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Chairman of the Charity of Pain; accepting donations of blood and guts.

Prophet of the Creamy Truth; "If it's empty, fill it with cream."

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And I've never done it. Do you have a point?

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Nor should you want to Khorak... nor should you want to.
*hugs knees and rocks back and forth in remembrance of having done that TF and what it did to own sanity*

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On the first ever 2XP weekend, we did three Shadow Shard TFs in a row - about 19 hours of madness

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@Golden Girl

City of Heroes comics and artwork

EFT.

First Law of MMO: Devs can do no good. Seriously, whatever they do, it's GUARANTEED to be hated, hated, HATED! Fixed a semi-exploit everyone used? Hate. Left it in place? Hate. Buffed something? Hate! (because you don't use it) Nerfed something? HATE! (because you do) Released new cool content? LOL, r u n00b? Who needs content, gimme 1337 pvnz0r g3/\r! Didn't release content, - yawn, nothing new in game, going to cancel.
/sarcasm off

Actually, merits did that they were designed to do, - made most of TFs from completely pointless into something you might consider running. It's easier to find TF teams now, and teams in general. And from that point "time spent on task" is perfectly valid metric, because that's how most players think. "Yeah it's a bit tricky the first time, but you can ghost mishes 3, 5, and 7, and the AV is vulnerable to [insert tactics here]. Can be completed in 45 minutes! Bargain! Farm it!"

Now, the developers made a mistake, - villains market being separate from heroes and content being differently structured, there ought to be some kind of "fudge factor" in either rewards oi prices for villains. But, truth be told, same is true for heroside, - recipes prices skyrocketed there too, you know. And, most importantly, devs neither could foresee all that (general trends maybe, but in no way exact values for those fudge factors), nor they can react to the current situation before at least I14 (again, more changes=more change-haters, if nothinfg else.) So, I hope year from now merit system would be much smoother, and less controversal.

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hey thanks for these merit changes guys, thanks to you im now getting 10 merits every 20 minutes

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@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

hmm what can we do to increase the rewards... Oh i know. After speedrunning it, immidiatly start a new one and log for the night. Continue the next day with the tf (more hours to compensate)!
(Now if every player on the US thought like this... the possibilities...)

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Lady Arete on Unionhandbook
My Excel Badge tool

Tip for anyone wanting to get 20 - 30 merits per hour solo:

Start the flashback "dreams of peace and acts of war" (obviously go on heroic so bosses are down to Lieut lvl)

Use the first run as a practice run, the majority of the spawns are in the same place everytime so get used to where you have to go quickly.

First mission = Click glowie + defeat lieut/minion: Total time 2 minutes.

Second mission = rescue hostages. Trick here is to find the soldier captive, free him then let him get defeated. This will end the mission but the arc will continue.

Third mission: The longest of the missions because you have to destroy each portal/rescue the 4 hostages. Its a small map though and theyr always in same location. Portal usually takes 2 hits to destroy. 5 - 7 minutes tops it takes.

Fourth mission: Rescue Aeon/take him to glowie/defeat boss. Map is always identical/spawns in the same room. Very easy to get done in under 5 minutes.

fith mission: rescue captive/defeat boss. 2 mins tops

Final mission: Defeat EB. I always take 3 purples/2 reds with me just incase. Again just find him and kill quickly.

And there you go people! After some practice you too can get 10 merits every 20 minutes or so! There are ways to make it even quicker but i'll let you find them out for yourself

Logged on this morning and got myself 60 merits in bout 90 minutes time. Now none of you have an excuse for complaining about lack of recipes in WW

Damz < Always looking for ways to get money quickly >

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@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

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Second mission = rescue hostages. Trick here is to find the soldier captive, free him then let him get defeated. This will end the mission but the arc will continue.


[/ QUOTE ]you lose merits for this now don't you??

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Second mission = rescue hostages. Trick here is to find the soldier captive, free him then let him get defeated. This will end the mission but the arc will continue.


[/ QUOTE ]you lose merits for this now don't you??

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Nope tested it a few times last night and each time the arc didnt fail and i got the 10 merits at the end

100% confirmed

Edit: Its a good thing too because that guy went against just 2 even level minions and lost without killing either of them. Imagine him on a team O_o

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@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

It's 6 mission, so no dimionishing returns. It's also not the final one, so it won't cause them anyway, as long as the arc itself continues.

Well,it's still not Nictus Insurrection (half of it from what I understand) but yeah, "nothing is 100% farm-proof"... And it shouldn't be, really, although moving farm's locations around is a good idea, - keeps it somewhat lwess tedious for non-hardcore farmers.

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It's 6 mission, so no dimionishing returns. It's also not the final one, so it won't cause them anyway, as long as the arc itself continues.

Well,it's still not Nictus Insurrection (half of it from what I understand) but yeah, "nothing is 100% farm-proof"... And it shouldn't be, really, although moving farm's locations around is a good idea, - keeps it somewhat lwess tedious for non-hardcore farmers.

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Well you and i both know there are 2 certain arcs that can be completed in same amount of time for higher rewards But for casual/soloers this arc will be perfect for people who just want fast/easy merits xD

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@Damz Find me on the global channel Union Chat. One of the best "chat channels" ingame!

Since it's obvious that we're going to be punished for sticking with underdeveloped Villain content, it's time to take a good hard look at what's being offered here and ask if it's worth it. With such obvious bias, it's a time for reflection indeed.

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Since it's obvious that we're going to be punished for sticking with underdeveloped Villain content, it's time to take a good hard look at what's being offered here and ask if it's worth it. With such obvious bias, it's a time for reflection indeed.

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I was reading through and was just about to post similar... it really is pathetic that they are STILL completely biasing nearly all game changes/new additions towards heroes....

though, to give in, you just hurt others playing City of Villains as the more people that let themselves get forced into heroes the more developers will think "it's ok then"

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There is 49 double digit merit rewards for Heroes ( counting the triple one ), and a grand total of 11 for Villains.

If you do all the 11 double digit Villain tasks, you will be one point short of a LotG 7.5 with 199 Merits. I'm not even going to try adding up the Hero numbers. It's... daunting.

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There is 49 double digit merit rewards for Heroes ( counting the triple one ), and a grand total of 11 for Villains.

If you do all the 11 double digit Villain tasks, you will be one point short of a LotG 7.5 with 199 Merits. I'm not even going to try adding up the Hero numbers. It's... daunting.

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I'm by no way trying to claim that the sides are equal, nor that there is any meaningful disparity, but if you did as you suggest how much longer would it take to do all of that CoH content than it would to do all the CoV content?

I trust that you don't just play redside, and have done all of the blueside content you're on about? If you don't know what you're letting yourself in for, some of it is akin to a masochistic endurance test.

I play both sides - and, in general, I much prefer the CoV content. More interesting and also generally shorter - which helps keep the interest whilst doing them (at least the first few times). I'd guess that it's also easier to get teams to do a task which takes a couple of hours for 40 merits than it is to do a task that can sometimes take 5-8 hrs - a lot of people may not have the time to spare no matter how many merits are on offer.

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By my mohawk shall ye know me!
my toons
Funny: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! #3662 * The foul-mouthed Handyman! #1076 * City of Norms #132944
Serious: To Save A Single World (#83744) * Marketing Opportunity (#83747)

If I'm in it solely for the merits, not the xp or fun - and this thread is about merits, specifically - then I'd much rather do one TF for 111 merits that only has diminishing returns with itself so I can do other TFs in between for full rewards, than do 5 for ~25 merits a pop, across varying exemplar levels (I HATE EXEMPLARING), putting all of them on diminishing returns for the next 24 hours.

Give us villains some badly designed Hero-less agonizingly long TFs to make up for Positron, Doc Q(!), and Synapse (okay, that one has the CWK). Sure, they're long and boring, but I'm sure I'm not the only person who does TFs rarely and thus would prefer more merits for a single one.

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I'd guess that it's also easier to get teams to do a task which takes a couple of hours for 40 merits than it is to do a task that can sometimes take 5-8 hrs - a lot of people may not have the time to spare no matter how many merits are on offer.

[/ QUOTE ]Doc Q isn't exactly hard. Heck, my Warshade on SOs with sub-optimal slot placement could probably solo it. It hardly matters if one or two people drop.
I wish villains could get 40 Merits for a single SF, gee...

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I thought about adding the following, then forgot to - adding as a seperate post as my original has been replied to already.

Whilst liking the shorter arcs/TFs in CoV, I do think it could do with a couple of big TFs (a similar size to Posi or SSTF1). It's fine having shorter TFs that people can do without having to commit to (potentially several hours of play but at the same time it could do with a couple of long ones for those teams who do have the time.

Merits aside, if you've got the time why shouldn't there be a chance to team for hours on one venture?

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By my mohawk shall ye know me!
my toons
Funny: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! #3662 * The foul-mouthed Handyman! #1076 * City of Norms #132944
Serious: To Save A Single World (#83744) * Marketing Opportunity (#83747)

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Merits aside, if you've got the time why shouldn't there be a chance to team for hours on one venture?

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I take it you haven't seen the people complaining that TF's enforce teaming and wish you could solo them?

I haven't read all this thread, but have read the US version (And the version on our SG forums) and it is definately a lack of long content that is affecting villains rather than low rewards. But even then you get some people asking for long TF's and other people saying they don't want long TF's, and other people saying that no matter how long the TF is a villain group will find a way of speedrunning it.

As long as the majority of villain players are the more hardcore players they will lose out on merits to heroes who have more newer/casual players. And I can't see that changing because I think the main difference is that hero AT's are just easier to get into than villains. Adding more TF's or increasing the merit drops won't bring over the type of players that villains need.

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Merits aside, if you've got the time why shouldn't there be a chance to team for hours on one venture?

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I take it you haven't seen the people complaining that TF's enforce teaming and wish you could solo them?


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I take it you haven't seen my replies in some of the threads by people complaining that TF's enforce teaming and wish you could solo them?

Point is that there should be:
* things you can solo that are quick
* things you can solo that take a long time
* things that need a team which are quick
* things that need a team which take a long time

Horses for courses - pick which you as an individual want to play on any one day/week/session.

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By my mohawk shall ye know me!
my toons
Funny: Ee-Ai-Ee-Ai-Oh! #3662 * The foul-mouthed Handyman! #1076 * City of Norms #132944
Serious: To Save A Single World (#83744) * Marketing Opportunity (#83747)

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I take it you haven't seen my replies in some of the threads by people complaining that TF's enforce teaming and wish you could solo them?

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Probably have and have probably agreed with you too! I am just very bad with names in real life nevermind names on forums

I was just saying that it is quite obvious changes have been made for soloers (Such as less 'click 2 glowies at once' missions) and any new content is also likely to be pitched at the 2 hour mark, which means quick teams are going to steamroller than in 1 hour and speedrunners in 30 mins.

Sad, but probable.

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Interesting that with the 40 merits. Too bad there is only one task in CoV that rewards you with more than 25 merits. 38 for the Pirates of the Skies SF. The one forcing you to use a Mission Computer. Which was bugged for a long time, kicking people from the base. But it does indeed take a few hours, mainly because you're exemplared down to level 25, that seems to kill off a lot of speed. The ONLY criteria for anything in City of Farmers. ;-)

The rest of Villain only content is at 25 merits or lower including the LRSF. So it's not like there is many options for a decent reward. 40 is far more than you can expect redside for a few hours, unless you wanna run that one SF endlessly. But then again, you get a reduced merit reward if you try that. ;-)

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people saying they don't want long TF's

[/ QUOTE ]These people have no right to whine anyway, so who cares? Nobody will be there forcing them to run these new long SFs, if we ever did get any.

A lot of "/unsigned" comments on new (or old) ideas are stupid for this very reason. People dislike the idea of content they wouldn't want to play, but they completely overlook the fact that the idea might be 1) completely OPTIONAL, and 2) something other people might want.

Honestly, why shoot down an idea that would not affect you -at all- if it was in the game, yet would make others happy?



Rant not directed at anyone in particular. I seem to be giving off hostile vibes with my posts these days, so just sayin'.

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Honestly, why shoot down an idea that would not affect you -at all- if it was in the game, yet would make others happy?

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I can understand why people say it because there are limited resources to go around all the projects that they do so have to try and do things that please everyone rather than just the few.

I have recently been argueing why co-op content is better and more likely than villain only content so I understand the mindset, but your post has actually just made me realise my selfishness.

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QR read thourgh dev digest
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Hero vs. Villain merits

If you stack hero content versus villain content side by side you'll notice that heroes have more content. Also, their story arcs and task forces are longer, on average, than villains. This is even more true when you look at old hero content. Since merits are a time based reward this means that heroes will--on average--earn more merits per task.

Villains also have the potential to level faster than heroes if both heroes and villains are doing story arcs. The reason for this is that at the end of a story arc or task/strikeforce there's a pretty big end of task XP reward. Since villain tasks are shorter on average this means they're reaching this big xp boost more often. This can lead to villains burning through content faster, which can lead to earning fewer merits over the course from level 1 to 50.

Recent data mining has shown us that at very low levels villains start off earning more merits than heroes. However, at around level 15-20 heroes begin to earn more merits on average than villains. This could be caused by a number of factors. It could be caused the big bursts of merits heroes are capable of getting by doing the lengthier taskforces which aren't present on villain side, or it could be a complete different play style common to heroes or villains. It's hard to say exactly, however the fact remains that if you run from 1 to 50 after Issue 13 a hero is likely to end up with more merits than a villain if they play the same type of missions.

There's a number of ways we can look at addressing this, but I wanted to let you know we are aware of it and are looking at the best way to help narrow this divide without causing problems down the road. If there's something that I can do on the data side (read merit formula adjustments) I will consider it as long as it doesn't punish either side.


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I dont think Synapse can see the forest for all the datamines

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