War Witch the New Lead, Content is King for 2010

Your format leads a bit to be desired...

CoV was a good idea but with poor implementation and negative long term effects. I said at the time and I think history has proven this correct; they do not have the player base nor the resources for two games. CoV itself was done fairly well. The missions were well above the quality of most of the CoH missions. While the AT's didn't mesh as well as blue side, individually they were done well and most well suited for solo play. But look at the player bases; you divide each server into camps that can't play with each other, except a limited number of task forces/repeatable missions that were added later on. You have to add content that only one side can play. Look how hard it is to get a team going a lot of times red side. A lot of times there's only a few dozen people online red side on Victory.

I've always felt that CoV was put in as a way to force/encourage/as a vehicle for zone pvp, which has largely been a failure. Sure it's popular in other games, but CoH hasn't really taken a shine to it.

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Currently listening to R.E.M.'s Live at the Olympia

Eh, not too different from what we have been saying for a long time. We really do need more maps and more tilesets. I know running around redside really opened up how diverse things felt for me while playing- if the devs could do that again, it would make a real difference for normal content and the AE.

I don't really care about the "we're stuck in a city" comments. Jack Emmert tried to make a big deal about how CoX is limited to one city (talk about a blatant oversimplification), and I don't see it that much. Our only real limitation is maps and tilesets- you can come up with more variations on bases, labs, apartment buildings, different types of outdoor environments (Zamuel's newest AE arc made me wish we had more forest and jungle maps), and CoX would be fine for variety.

The desire has been posted about a lot on the forums, so I don't know that it's a secret to the devs (and I doubt that any of them is against the idea). I dunno, it'd just be better if they just acted on it sooner rather than later (and we're already at later, heh).

But part of it is that Paragon Studio's marketing department needs to move. Castle has posted today, saying he can only comment on things that don't reveal what's coming, so he doesn't step on toes of marketing a nd such. Which does make sense. What doesn't make sense is why so much about Going Rogue is being kept mum. Likely we'll get an announcement this week or next by the sound of things, but that's still weeks too late in my mind. People were pretty patient waiting until January for the most part... once that broke and we got nothing was... not good.

That's part of where all the "dhoom" comes from. People don't have anything to talk about, so then they start conjecturing wildly. Give us some solid info, and people will tear that apart for a week, ready for the next bit of info. Little tidbits are better than random conjecture.

RE: the article - It's lambasting instanced missions and comparing it to zone-asthetics (faultline). When was the last time you were on a team that wanted to strictly stay in a zone and fight mob after mob? I know I never did. Ever. Not even when this game was a wee baby trying on it's spandex for the first time.

There is only so much scenery/tileset you can put in instanced missions; it's still going to be a grid of some size, with open lanes to travel through, filled with mobs. Even the "outdoor"/custom/completely different instanced missions get repeptitive. And the bigger they get, the more annoying they are IMO; and when in teams, they choose to head/fly up high and scout for the objective anyway.

I'll agree doing the exact, and I mean exact, same layout umpteen times in a row would get on my nerves, but overall, I just don't care for the tilesets that much. Be it a "warehouse", or "office" or "cave" or an "artificially restricted outside setting". They blend into what I actually enjoy about the game; flashy lights, big explosions, falling bodies, and making fun of teammates when they can't kill me.

Roaming vast lands of lush scenery for hours and hours just isn't what I want. That's why I'm here. Yes, it'd be great to get some new color into the instanced missions......but you will get bored of them too. And faster than you think, because there really isn't much you can do to the grid you play in.

If tileset is a major concern for "new" content to you, I'm glad you're not in charge of the game There are some great custom/never-seen-anywhere-else tilesets strewn throughout the game. If they were more used, they just wouldn't be that interesting.

/rant . Go back to your regularly schedule dume

I've already forgotten about most of you

Voo, I have a different interpretation of the comment regarding Faultline. I think the main thrust of the argument was that in other MMOs, the environment changes as you level up, giving you a sense of accomplishment as well as keeping things fresh. I don't think the point was to eschew instanced content in favor of zone content; I think the point was that revamped Faultline is pretty cool looking, and wouldn't it be great to have the same attention to detail and effort put in to instance maps.

There are so many things that could be done with maps to make the game more interesting. The suggestion in the article of a steam-powered Nemesis base is a great idea... how come we don't have that in the game already? I would love to see more varied environments, more environmental gimmicks (traps, etc.), more faction specific tilesets... just more stuff! GR is a perfect excuse to add this to the game.

CoX will always be a heavily instanced game; that's a large part of its appeal. In an interview about CO Jack said that CoX was "too" instanced, but all I think he meant by that was that if you're going to go that route, you better have a metric ****-ton of maps to start with, because before too long someone like DC will come around and memorizes everything. Not to mention the average player who will get burned out on the monotony before long.

I'll preface this with: I do not disagree with the idea of the article, or you Mental. I just think the article was heavily skewed without any real thought beyond the rant. And secondly, this even isn't a topic I care about overall, I just dislike when actual thought isn't put into use.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mental_Giant Voo, I have a different interpretation of the comment regarding Faultline. I think the main thrust of the argument was that in other MMOs, the environment changes as you level up, giving you a sense of accomplishment as well as keeping things fresh. I don't think the point was to eschew instanced content in favor of zone content; I think the point was that revamped Faultline is pretty cool looking, and wouldn't it be great to have the same attention to detail and effort put in to instance maps.

But there has been changes to zones; yes, they are slow coming, but they do exist. They have a vastly different opinion on what is "worth the time and effort" than the playerbase does. Yes, more should be done IMO, but then again, how much of it is actually going to be used (over the life-time of a character)? Especially for low level-only material?

As for the bolded, they have put effort into instanced maps. CoV came with a ton; blue side has gotten quite a few. I'm sure there will be more in GR.

But you cannot have that kind of detailed art for every instance, and to have it come up more and more often, takes away from it being "neat" or "special". There's a balance, and I still think the Devs are working towards that, in that regard.

Quote:

There are so many things that could be done with maps to make the game more interesting. The suggestion in the article of a steam-powered Nemesis base is a great idea... how come we don't have that in the game already? I would love to see more varied environments, more environmental gimmicks (traps, etc.), more faction specific tilesets... just more stuff! GR is a perfect excuse to add this to the game.

For the Nemesis base idea, are we supposed to always fight Nemesis in this base? Wouldn't that kind of defeat the purpose? If it were for a TF or a specific story arc, that would make sense. I'm positive GR will have this kind of stuff, more than CoV even. But it will get just as boring after time as well if you're already caught up in the notion that it's an endless stream of the same-ole now.

Quote:

CoX will always be a heavily instanced game; that's a large part of its appeal. In an interview about CO Jack said that CoX was "too" instanced, but all I think he meant by that was that if you're going to go that route, you better have a metric ****-ton of maps to start with,

Well, they did. And it all worked well for the idea of the game. And if you recall, they did a great job adding little details to the same-ole maps awhile back. There is only so much you can do, given the "concept" of the game.

Croatoa was a pretty big shift from that concept. And it's a great zone....for 5 - 10 levels. And then you're done with it, until the next time. I don't particularly want to see that kind of giant shift again.

"End Game" is where they need to focus, and I think they are now going to, finally. I just wish they had done it before this GR lag.

Don't even get me started on the notion that, given "enough" "end game" "content" (see the quotes, they all mean something different to different people), there will be the camps of "too much", "not enough", and "this isn't what I want!$!@#$!".

I've already forgotten about most of you

Just a random thought I had awhile back:

Remember those "Choose Your Own Adventure" books? I'd like to see future TFs done with the same concept. You go to the TF contact, pick up the first mission, but your actions during that mission will dictate the next mission; your actions during the next mission will dictate the subsequent one etc etc.

Of course merit rewards would be weighted against the amount of objectives you complete and things of that nature. So in essence you'd have a dynamic TF with dynamic rewards as opposed to the static TF/rewards we have now.

Part of this is the whole "we got a new shiny, but we want MORE new shinies!" attitude. Mission Architect was nice, but we wanted more content from the devs (and more options for the MA, darnit!). People have been asking for power customization for years, but we want more tilesets (and more customization, darnit!).

Heh, it would be frustrating to be a developer, I think. I think I do want more maps and tilesets, as it does make a big difference in the variety of the game to me (and this would be both unique ones, and ones used in common missions). After my long hiatus from the game, I really enjoyed the little touches that had been added. Running around AP, mobs were doing more natural things (rather than clumped around in aggressive groups), leaning against walls, etc. Same thing for a few of those missions you can get from your first contact, as they have a unique map (firelit, smokey room for the Hellions, a Superadyne lab for the Skulls, etc.).

Just one unique map can help out a lot, too. Some TFs stand out more to me because they have a unique map or look (Synapse, ITF, LGTF, etc.).

I do want this balanced out with other things in-game, of course, but it is something I'd like to see along with a bunch more story arcs and such to play through.

While I'm probably dead wrong, I have to wonder if due to The Television's recent comment, the devs may be merging the markets.

Hmm, I don't recall ever seeing anything mentioning how the markets would be handled with the whole side switching stuff... I'm thinking they'll probably just merge the markets, which I agree is long over due.

I don't presume to know the guts of their mission software, so I don't know what is or isn't possible. Those would be good suggestions if their current achitecture supports it. Considering what other systems in the game are like (excel for powers, text files for cutscenes, bizarre state machine for animations, etc), it wouldn't surprise me if it was beyond the realm of possibility (without additional coding, etc).

I just seem to remember people bringing up branching before (it may have been specific to story arcs) and the exponential requirements was brought up by a dev. (I can't try to search for the post atm, sorry.)

Zamuel, The Television was posting in a thread saying it seemed like a bad setup to have the market load the entire database of transactions, as that caused a bigger load time when first opening it. My guess would be that they're trying to make that process better (perhaps not start at loading anything), not necessarily merge the markets. I'm all for merging the markets (though I do like how some salvage is much cheaper redside... makes that part of crafting nicer), but I can't really read merging the markets into that kind of elliptical (yet funny) post.

EB, I do like this idea. Little bits of customization to story arcs and TFs like this would be fun. I'd also love to see a nemesis system here. Those would add a lot of variety and differentiation between all our characters.

I've read conversations that something like the nemesis program be implemented via the the Safeguard/Mayhem system... I don't remember if it was ever looked at or read by a Dev but maybe I think Pohsyb and maybe Castle commented on the idea.

The concept is that our character files are stored Server side. Given that when you enter a sg/mayhem mission the server looks at those on the team and picks a random toon from the other faction from somebodies account and uses them as the Hero or villain that you face in the mission. and if no one on the team has a toon from the other faction than it uses one from the current pool of NPC's

I could be totally making this up and have hallucinated the entire thing. But I still like the idea.