2009 Halloween Event Post-Mortem

What they should do, to be honest.

To rectify a situation to many of the complaint, is create a an All Hallow's Eve like zone, that only opens up during the event. Make it so any level can get in it & both sides(Red & Blue), then make the ToT Mobs have GMs status in their code,(Im not sure if GM status gives more XP?, if so they could reduce it) so doesn't matter who clicks the door, everyone going get XP & make fair fight for all levels.

Have this zone spawn the Banner Events at proper timed intervals, this will allow folks to still ToT, while others can do the Zone event. As for Zombie Apoc, have it spawn back in the normal zones on the off times the Banner Events are NOT going on. Make this zone big enough to allow folks able to camp 1 or 2 doors, without angry from folks.

As for Jack & E. Have 4 specific spots they could spawn(2 apiece) in that zone, build stuff around it to make befitting of them spawning there. You can even toss in some random wandering mobs(GM lvl for coding) so folks could all participate in killing them, Like the Unseelies or a Vampires, etc..

Bunch of random House or Cottages, Graveyards with Mausoleums, scary old shacks in woods, stuff like that. Should provide a really good feel for the event & help alleviate many of the complaints, they could even run the event longer, folks wont notice, unless they are in said zone anyways.

That is just my Idea


JJ

I enjoyed the event. I wish there was some sort of regen scaling code though worked into the banners so that a team of 8 may actually succeed while it would still remain a reasonable challenge when three or four full teams were present.

I did like that ToT mobs now dropped costume salvage. That was good. Once others figured this out, it reduced the risks of stray ToT mobs (at least on the servers I played on).

BUT I was pretty disappointed with the scaling code of ToT mobs when on a team. First, the costume salvage rates were phenomenally better running solo (some of us like to bank salvage for our SGs or privately for upcoming alts and with GR coming, myself and others seemed to be anticipating a big alt year ahead of us). Second, at low to even mid levels, fighting 2 and 3 +4 bosses (depending upon where in the SSK leveling system you ended up on your team) was a bit too much. It crossed the threshold into the territory of "un-fun" for me. So I opted for soloing. Lastly, if you were going for the costume badges, the ratio of costume treats to trick mobs seemed balanced for solo or duo door knocking. I found myself saying "yeesh, well if I'm going to need to keep knocking solo to get those badges, might as well keep it that way all the way through with the benefit of MUCH more costume salvage at the other end. All this adds up to an experience quite different from my memories of prior years ToTing. In the past it was much more casual. Much more social. In fact, several in game friendships that lasted years (till people left the game) and lead to many teamups actually began during prior Halloween events.

Overall, this would be my biggest criticism regarding this years holiday event dynamics: other than GM teams trying to get Jack to spawn, this year lacked that casual social nature that brings people together. The banner events tended to be high octane (mostly in terms of recruiting and getting enough heroes or villains in zone). And ToT (for me) just encouraged soloing.

That being said, if rumblings from hero con are true, that the Deadly Apocalypse represents the first of many more complicated zone events (hopefully not just seasonal), I'm a bit excited. That event DID leave me feeling like there was a reason this was an MMO not just a single player game with a steady flow of downloadable content.

The main reason why I thought the Halloween event went too long was the fact that it interfered with normal game content. Any mission, arc, or TF that involved street hunts was in danger of being sidelined by either zombie invasions or banner events. This made certain game content unplayable.

The Numina task force was simply broken by the event. Now, I hope they revise that TF as part of the overview of old content we've been promised. Sending level 35+ players to defeat 10 Hellions in Galaxy City is a pointless, too transparent time sink. I ran Synapses, Citadels and Eden trials that were interfered with by zone events. On one Synapse, the Babbage ambush did not spawn because of zombies. Numina, I just put on hold until it went away.

Since the winter event generally doesn't interfere with playing the game to anywhere near the extent this does, it can last as long as they want to keep it live; I won't mind.

<《 New Colchis / Guides / Mission Architect 》>
"At what point do we say, 'You're mucking with our myths'?" - Harlan Ellison

While I personally maxed out my Halloweening in just a few days, don't be surprised if the Devs disregard what's said in this thread and keep it running far longer than we think it should.

And the reason for that is they have access to datamining information. On the last night of Halloween, I still saw people forming ToT teams and working the Deadly Apocalypse.

While we hardcore City-ites are on almost every day and complete everything the Event has to offer in just two days... not so the casual gamer. In fact, I remember the bitter complaints when these events were originally less than two weeks long.

If the datamining shows people scooping up Halloween Costume Salvage and Badges the last days of the Event, the Devs have to be mindful of all their customers, not just us hardcore players.

Although... if the datamining does show the last week really had almost no one playing the Event, then they'd be justified in shortening it.

That's just because it was the last day. People procrastinate.

Still here, even after all this time!

my experience with Halloween

I moved to Freedom and have several characters up to lvl 25.

I was invited multiple times to ToT teams. Each time it was teamwipe after wipe. The ToT teams camped next to the hospital because the wipes were so frequent. After several tries I gave up on ToT. It just made it harder to find normal teams.

I participated in one banner event semi-fully. I didn't know what to do, joined a team, fought some enemies, beat up banners, fought the boss. It made no real sense. It had no story to it. It wasn't terrible but it wasn't particularly fun.

I created a new character and decided to start in Galaxy as I haven't done those missions in ages. Got the first magic mission - defeat 5 hellions. Zombie invasion started and I couldn't complete the mission. At level 1 I couldn't fight zombies either. As a new character this was about the worst possible experience.

Zombie invasions are just annoying for low levels. They are too hard to kill. I like the idea. The swarm of zombies coming out of the ground as you fight them off is cool. It just sucks at low levels.

To sum up - the Halloween event basically interfered with my game play as it was not something that a low level could really participate in.

I know its probably to late to do anything about it for the winter event, but one thing they added to this years halloween event i didnt care for was the repeticious event badging.

By that i dont mean earning many badges, but essentially doing the same thing for slightly different rewards. The banner event adopted that same menu reward system that teh winter event and val-day event has been using.

Though i generally like the winter event I really have disliked running the same mission 5 times on each toon to badge him out or earn the costume peices. I would much rather have seen some type of 5 mission arc made that seperately awards all those options, and then the badge at the end.

Same thing with this event, i would have rather have seen an event that required you do 4 seperate things to earn the badges then just be smart enough to split your team between banners to get kill credits when no where near the banners.

I like the events, i even understand developing them over time, but nothing burns you out more for them then doing the snaptooth mission 5 times in a row knowing you still have 6 more toons that need the badges.