Regarding Recent Changes to Architect

I definitely look forward to the proper and appropriate fix to this issue. I wish the developers all the best on doing so.

No quitting the game here. Besides, I'm paid up through January or something silly.

I HEART COH!

My hope is that this "stopgap" doesn't become a permanent fixture just because it falls off the radar.

I may be misremembering as I've tried to forget most of the things that have really bothered me in this game, but iirc the pet recharge change was also a stop gap solution until something more suitable could be employed. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on my behalf as it is such a poor mechanic.

At any rate. I hope the real solution is forthcoming in a timely manner as Aeon implies.

You know Dr. Aeon, it's interesting that you're preaching patience when you know full well (or should know as an employee) that time isn't a luxury PS/CoX can afford. I know where to find NCSoft quarterly reports and what to look for when it comes to CoX revenue. I'm sorry but I couldn't help myself. This is part of what I do for a living. In anycase, since the introduction of AE in April of last year, CoX sales revenue all the sudden plummeted 40% (compared to a 43% revenue decline in a rolling 12 month period ending in Q4 2009). Basically, during the course of Q1 2009, CoX revenue went down 3% which can be attributed to the natural decline of most aging MMOs. Then came AE in Q2 in the final two quarters of 2009, revenue fell off a cliff and dropped 40%.

Next let's look at the chronology of AE itself. The first 2-3 months after the introduction of AE, there was no doubt that it was wildly popular and widely utilized. Everyone and their extended family were crammed into the AE buildings in AP or Mercy/Cap. That kind of player interest couldn't have been bad from the revenue standpoint and the fact that revenue only dropped 3% from Q1 to Q2 of last year seems to reflect just that. Then came the fine-tuning or nerfs to be more blunt. In chronological progression, ticket cap, custom critter exp, MM pets, and now allied NPCs, just to name a few of the big ones. If you log on during peak hours right now, the players in Mercy and Cap AE buildings are a mere small fraction of where it was a year ago. Going back to the revenue decline in 2009, you can't honestly tell me that these two trends had no correlation. The fact is that drastic and persistent nerfing of popular (and maybe even integral) features in a MMO can contribute significantly to the eventual demise of the game itself. After all it has already happened several times in the short history of MMORPGs. Two prominent examples would be SWG and more recently, Tabula Rasa.

Now let us consider the obvious fact that PS is not exactly flush with subscribers and rolling in dough (at least compared to years before). It wouldn't surprise me one bit if the bigwigs at NCSoft corporate have already expressed their concern over the steep decline in CoX revenue last year. After all in the corporate world, if a product line suddenly loses 40% of sales revenue in a matter of months, it usually gets discontinued. NCSoft may be willing to deal with it for now given that the overall company profitability skyrocketed last year due to the popularity of AION in Asia but how long is it going to last? What if GR doesn't generate as much revenue as desired? That projection isn't all that far fetched given the short term memory nature of the MMO population, ample competition and the fact that CoX is an aging game. This is not to mention that patience isn't exactly a virtue in the world dominated by corporate balance sheets.

With all of this in mind, I am simply shocked that you guys haven't switched to a more conservative approach when it comes to AE fine-tuning. The nerf now and deal with it later approach as exhibited by this latest episode is extremely shortsighted and irrational. It's almost as if PS is willing to alienate some player now while banking on GR to inject fresh blood later but that scenerio is far from a guarantee. Regardless of what the "good riddance, let them leave" or "we don't need players like that anyways" crowd is saying, CoX is currently not on a solid enough footing to be able to afford the hemorrhaging of even more subscribers (revenue).

P.S: If you dislike my bluntness and challenging tone, feel free to put a temporary or even permanent ban on me. If that is to be a consequence of me saying what needs to said, so be it. My main account was already canceled prior to all of this and this account only has about two weeks left. However, allow me to say this one final thing. The reason I canceled originally was due to a perfect storm of busier real life schedule, low CoV population and other diversions. It was not the result of some ragequit over any particular prior issue. However, now that I've seen the way this particular nerf was handled and the continuation of collective tunnel vision on the part of PS, I doubt I would've renewed anyways. Good luck.

Thank you, Dr Aeon. You had me at hAEllo, but it's nice to see that you're addressing the woes of those who felt this nerf more strongly than I (I mean storytellers not tge jellybean farmers).

Eco

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow [The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."

The problem isn't maps, it's builds and the basis of the in-game economy.

First off, the "right" build can farm anything. It was the average player that needed the help.

Second, the game is currently set up to reward farming AE maps and punish trying to get sets via merits. You could spend 18 hours on whatever you want working through all four shard TFs to get ONE numina recovery/regeneration, or you could farm for thirty minutes on a scrapper with... shall we say a positive charge and an extra piece of equipment to "shield" them and earn enough through sales of ticket rolls to buy one, or maybe two.

People farm because that's the way the game is set up. Applying band-aids doesn't affect the root of the problem.

Thanks for the exploit fix.

My friend re-activated her account now that it's been fixed.

Thank you for your post and for starting this thread.

I did not have time to read all the posts, so I don't know if this has already been said.

My first request is that you back out the "fix". People who want to exploit will no doubt find ways to do so. This punishes legitimate story arcs was too much.

As an example, my arc Suppression which I wrote for the 2nd challenge has a first mission which is populated with groups of ally hostages surrounded by ally groups. Each group is engaged in various activities. They are there purely for flavor.

I tested this on a level 7 against level 7 minions, I got 2 xp per kill. I ran out to Atlas and could only quickly find a level 6 minion. That gave me 18 xp. If this arc wasn't level 5-15 this wouldn't be so upsetting, but the audience for this arc is definately going to want to level.

Currently this arc is sitting at 5 stars, which raises another issue I have had for a long time. Any time my arc appears on page 3, it gets hit with 1 star ratings with no comment. I am almost positive, that these hits come from farm creaters who want their arcs to bump up and get played. I actually have no problem with non-exploitive farmers making and playing their farms because every paying customer should be free to enjoy the game as he or she sees fit so long as they don't harm anyone else. I DO have a huge problem with someone 1 star rating an arc to cause it to fall back so their arc can pop up and get played. This "fix" makes it worse. Someone who enters my arc and in mission one gets a whopping 2 xp per kill my get legitimately annoyed and 1 star it.

So my next suggestion is that when you one star an arc you should get a warning and that the author of the arc should be notified they have received a 1 star rating (no need to disclose by who). I then think if the author is sure this is a griefing the offense should be reportable. It is extremely unfair that good stories can be griefed in this manner with no recourse. To me this is way worse than any exploits.

My third suggestion is to provide us with a mechanismn to add groups of people to our arcs for flavor. They should be able to be in groups, performing actions and have dialog. This would solve lots of issues for me above and beyond the issue created by this "fix".


As you may have noticed, I am kind of wordy , so in summary I suggest the following:

1. Back out this fix
2. Provide a mechanism for us to report 1 star grief ratings
3. Provide a mechanism to populate our arcs with people who can have emotes and dialog.

Thanks so much for the attention you have given MA and for giving us a forum to voice our opinions.