Reduced XP for Freakshow now
By
8_Ball,
Posted on: 2009-08-28 14:47 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Awwwwwww. Like anyone asked you to give a damn.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
What a moronic statement. Everyone knows and accepts that some people get upset over nerfs. The debate is over whether they're being childish little prats with over the top entitlement issues When they get upset about nerfs.
As Statesman said, it's an MMO. People come and people go. People leave because real life makes them or they've stopped having fun. If they can't have fun with the game because their favorite whipping boys lost some XP per kill, so be it. That's their choice. But they shouldn't expect the rest of us to give a damn. |
Let's yank the argument back on track, sans ad hominems: the bedrock argument being discussed here is not whether you, Razoras or anyone else thinks people do not have a right to express opinions over negative changes to gameplay - this is a forum staple, the idea that only the opinions of certain people matter... said opinons being those of our various Dev Cheerleaders. [I swear, we have people here who would cheer if the developers detonated a suitcase nuke in Times Square. "YAAAAAY! Take that cheating New Yorkers, you exploiters! Now you are BALANCED!!! You had it coming!! YAAAAAY!!"]
The argument here is really: are sub numbers up or down? It looks to many of us like they are down significantly.
Do you think this is good for the game, if true? Do you "give a damn" about that? I do. If you don't, good on you. Your opinion is not my problem.
I thought the argument presented in the OP was that Freakshow got their XP nerfed.
Your conversation is just a tangent, technically speaking.
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....You sure are flapping and squawking over a "groundless argument." |
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow
Existentialist nonsense. I am not "afraid" you may be right. I am "afraid" your argument is completely groundless
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| I misunderstand nothing. You are presenting these problems as "CoX's problem" when they are quite evidently YOUR problems which you are projecting over the entire game. |
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| See, this is what bugs me. People keep stating their experiences and then basing global conclusions on them |
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| Stop grasping onto the one explanation you want to believe and approach this a bit more objectively, please. I'm as worried as anyone about the game bleeding population, but I'm not about to jump into panic because I didn't see many people on once in a while. |
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| And one more thing: please stay away from the embarrassing straw men. Trying to invent alternate agendas for your opponents and paint them as small, deluded minds so that you can then patronise them in an insultingly passive-aggressive tone does not help your argument. Facts do. Have any? |
S'funny. My opinion is all I posted, too.
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Back at ya. But please, carry on with the doom crying. I enjoy watching people make idiots of themselves.
| Your opinion is not my problem. |
Be well, people of CoH.
No one is saying you don't get to have an opinion. We're all just pointing out that your opinion is wrong. No one is shutting you up. I mean, is that not obvious?
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That would only be the argument if you didn't understand how MMORPGS like CoH were supposed to work with respect to subscription numbers. Which you apparently don't.| The argument here is really: are sub numbers up or down? It looks to many of us like they are down significantly. |
If it were healthy, typical MMORPG, the sub numbers should be down. I don't have a line of best fit on my graphs but you can guess a line of best fit pretty easily yourself since the numbers have remained pretty stable. I'd wager that we're below the low point we were at when the game was experiencing huge subscription trouble in 2004 (it should never have dropped that low, as evidenced by the recovery after changes were implemented).
I'd even go as far as saying the decline is probably much worse than it should be since Issue 14 introduced Architect. Any actual increase it introduced has probably been destroyed by the number of players driven away by AE-related behaviors and impacts on the larger game in general.
In the very near-term, however, we are seeing impacts from mostly external sources. School has started up again. Bubba has pointed out many times in many threads that our first competing product just had a massive open beta period and will be released soon. Our numbers are also down because Issue 16's PC is highly anticipated so a lot of people are on test instead.
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one more year till star wars old republic..thats all im saying
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Long time in game buddy of mine quit, for what I'm guessing to be forever, when he had a character deleted and his account locked down for three days.| Any actual increase it introduced has probably been destroyed by the number of players driven away by AE-related behaviors and impacts on the larger game in general. |
My brother, the guy that got me started, has also left the game, but that was only due to boredom. He might be back some day.
Bad Influence isn't trying to have an actual discussion. This thread was about Freaks getting their XP nerfed. BI is attempting to use the fact that there are less players now than at the peak of subs on nerfs.
I just gave two data points showing that BI's theory is false.
As have plenty of other people in this thread.
Of course BI ignores any facts that don't correlate with his/her little rant, and we all know what to call those kinds of posters.
Be well, people of CoH.
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As others have stated, this itself wasn't the core argument...|
Originally Posted by Bad_Influence
The argument here is really: are sub numbers up or down? It looks to many of us like they are down significantly.
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And the people that are saying "they are down significantly" are so misapplying the data (and don't seem to care) that there is really no point in continuing it...
but in an effort that you DO care, I'll try:
-The Business model that CoH worked into its base is a kind of "surge and decline" model where large bursts of numbers come with expansions & then trickles down. There are fluctuations with the seasons and similar economic factors as well that are easily weighed against the raw numbers, much like we don't compare December's and June's temperatures when trying to determine year-over-year trends.
-What's notable about the numbers that we have available isn't whether there's a decline or not, but that the slope of the decline defies industry numbers. Thus, a decline in numbers is expected, so a "significant" decline would have to be a relatively large decline.
-What's also notable about the numbers is that there is no steep decline that can be associated with nerfs. That also fits most industry standards. At conference panels, MMM designers rarely saw an increase in subscriber loss after a nerf- particularly not at the levels player anecdotes usually attribute. (things as dramatic as SWG's NGE might be an exception. SOE says otherwise, but that may be because people that quit playing, but used the station pass, were still considered subscribers) Since many people interested in this tangent are trying to make the case that we're down due to nerfs, the evidence doesn't support this.
What the evidence does support is that the biggest surge in subscribers comes from the launch of a new expansion. Given that, it is in the devs' best interest to get everything clearly in place for the cleanest Going Rogue launch possible. Part of that involves getting as much imbalanced gameplay under control as possible before that time.
That supports the idea of getting the hard adjustments out of the way NOW.
one point-
as players observing the game from inside, we have NO IDEA what subscription numbers are like.
I could log on tonight, not see anyone in Atlas on Freedom and it wouldn't tell me anything about what the sub numbers for the game were doing.
I paid a year in advance the last time I re-upped.
There have been weeks at a stretch when I haven't been able to log in.
Did that affect their sub numbers?
If I wanted to check out CO (which I don't) and bailed for a while to play their beta, would that affect CoH sub numbers?
We can't tell anything about subscriptions by looking around this or that server. Only the suits know what kind of numbers they're pulling.
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This thread was better when it was about how much xp various enemies gave. I can debate the meaning of a bunch of farcical charts and numbers at work. I dont care if the numbers are up or down. Do any of us, really? Not unless those numbers are effecting our personal game play experiences I expect. Even then it's a dull as dirt debate to have.
Just to focus the debate back into something interesting; Freakshow don't give enough xp now. Either that or Council and 5th give too much.
Paragon Unleashed, Unleash Yourself!
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The problem is, I don't think there's anything BUT a consensus on that point. No one has really supported the degree to which Freak XP is slated to decrease. On its own it seems like too much of a decrease, and then when you put it into the context of other groups it seems even more out of whack.|
Originally Posted by Blood Spectre
Just to focus the debate back into something interesting; Freakshow don't give enough xp now. Either that or Council and 5th give too much.
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Farcical charts? The only farcical aspect of any of the charts is the one based on Aceman's "nerf campaign." All the data there is verifiable and as accurate as it gets, and I've recently updated my local copies to include the data from Q1-Q3 08 as I had originally thought the data ended before then.
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I want the game to be successful enough that it keeps going about like it always has, so I can keep playing.|
Originally Posted by Blood Spectre
I can debate the meaning of a bunch of farcical charts and numbers at work. I dont care if the numbers are up or down. Do any of us, really?
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Other than that, no I don't care what the numbers are.
I had an argument a while back with some dude who's point was that other MMOs had more players, and that this one was losing players, so I should be really upset (or something). He wasn't able to fathom my response of "so what? as long as the doors stay open, I'm happy where I am".
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I agree. The first thing I thought when I saw it was that it was a nerf specifically aimed at making Freaks undesirable for PL'ing. I disagree with it because it impacts normal gameplay as well. That amount of reduction is just too much, imho, and will cause me to avoid any Freak-centric story arcs entirely in favor of arcs where mobs give standard xp levels without having to hope for a random gimmick (the self rez) to bring them up to normal xp (on the scale of an entire mission's worth of mobs).
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Originally Posted by Razoras
The problem is, I don't think there's anything BUT a consensus on that point. No one has really supported the degree to which Freak XP is slated to decrease. On its own it seems like too much of a decrease, and then when you put it into the context of other groups it seems even more out of whack.
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Which is sort of my point. We shouldn't lose that message behind a lot of quibbling over numbers entirely unrelated to the debate. If we can all agree that, woops, we bonked the nerf bat down too hard this time, then a more balanced interpretation is far more likely to pop up than it is if we get sidetracked on what the sub numbers are.|
Originally Posted by Razoras
The problem is, I don't think there's anything BUT a consensus on that point. No one has really supported the degree to which Freak XP is slated to decrease. On its own it seems like too much of a decrease, and then when you put it into the context of other groups it seems even more out of whack.
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Originally Posted by Razoras
Farcical charts? The only farcical aspect of any of the charts is the one based on Aceman's "nerf campaign." All the data there is verifiable and as accurate as it gets, and I've recently updated my local copies to include the data from Q1-Q3 08 as I had originally thought the data ended before then.
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Originally Posted by Steel_Shaman
I agree. The first thing I thought when I saw it was that it was a nerf specifically aimed at making Freaks undesirable for PL'ing. I disagree with it because it impacts normal gameplay as well. That amount of reduction is just too much, imho, and will cause me to avoid any Freak-centric story arcs entirely in favor of arcs where mobs give standard xp levels without having to hope for a random gimmick (the self rez) to bring them up to normal xp (on the scale of an entire mission's worth of mobs).
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And there is the heart of the matter. The Freakshow are NOT any weaker than any other faction. If you rely on a lot of Smashing/Lethal damage in your build, they die much slower than comparably leveled alternatives. This is important, I think because we have more sets that so Smashing/Lethal than any other damage type in this game, and what's more, a lot of dev hours have been spent making thos sets more attractive. From Weapon Customization, to new animations in MA and SS, the devs have worked hard to make these sets just that much cooler. So you really do have to consider what the leveling up experience is like playing that set.
I know for me, with characters in those sets, I tended to avoid Freakshow. A rezzing tank is a serious concern on the climb up. I'd go ahead and take that risk before, because the reward was worth the risk. That's no longer true, so now I will tend to avoid them if I deal smashing or lethal on a character.
And I'm not asking for a rollback. It's clear they were giving too much. But I think we've erred too far on the side of worthless.
Paragon Unleashed, Unleash Yourself!
I'd just like to say that I've always thought that it didn't make sense for Freakshow to give an XP bonus while Malta and Carnies do not. Still, I think .8 is too low for the pre-40 game.
Regardless, I will still love fighting Freakshow at any level, because fighting hordes of over-the-top cybernetically enhanced gang members hopped up on performance drugs makes my characters feel powerful.
They'll always be second only to fighting hordes of Nazi werewolves, vampires, robots, and super-soldiers.
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For sure. It was too high before. The proposed build though is too low.
Also, Malta and Carnies are probably also too low. But I love Carnies on my Weapon users. They slice up good.
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Man, I'm glad now that I didn't buy that Freakshow Tank costume code on eBay. It's only worth 80 cents on the dollar now!
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If Sappers xp is ever reduced, I'm taking sterno and match to my original game cd. |
Originally Posted by Blood Spectre
For sure. It was too high before. The proposed build though is too low.
Also, Malta and Carnies are probably also too low. |
Let's put Freakshow up to 1.0 and give a reason for people to fight Malta and Carnies by upping them to 1.1 or 1.2 or something like that.
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Originally Posted by macskull
Let's put Freakshow up to 1.0 and give a reason for people to fight Malta and Carnies by upping them to 1.1 or 1.2 or something like that.
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Paragon Unleashed, Unleash Yourself!
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stop with the crazy talk plz!!11
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Originally Posted by macskull
let's put freakshow up to 1.0 and give a reason for people to fight malta and carnies by upping them to 1.1 or 1.2 or something like that.
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Sounds good to me. Carnies are my favorites.
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How it 'looks' to any individual or statistically insignificant group is irrelevant. We have been told the numbers are up, by the only ones who actually know. Personally, I don't believe the devs are a pack of liars so I believe the numbers are up. Believe what you will.
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Originally Posted by Bad_Influence
The argument here is really: are sub numbers up or down? It looks to many of us like they are down significantly.
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