VEATs and HEATs

After some thought about it, I think this was a good idea.

I may not have gone as low as 20... but I wouldn't have gone any higher than 32, and probably would've favored 25.

Thing is, these ATs are a draw, and the name of the game these days is: retention. If making these ATs more accessible keeps more people playing, then that's great. I can personally attest to the allure of the VEATs. I love playing mine. A lot. More people getting to experience these ATs will no doubt be a positive influence on activity levels.

And it's a good point that making them more widely available might up the priority of them getting some dev attention. I think the HEATs could use some.

The achievement factor of unlocking these Archetypes isn't something to casually disregard. This is a game, after all, so achievement and reward are part of the draw.

But we now have IOs and the upcoming end game content and incarnate levels, which, to me, are (and will be) far more significant than unlocking a prestige AT (which really isn't that hard to do these days).

So, in the end, as far as I can see, this is a net plus.

Nope, doesn't bother me a bit.

I don't care about what other people do, as long as they don't do it to me. I don't care about what other people have, as long as they haven't taken it from me. I don't care what strangers think of me in a game.

I don't see where I have a stake in this, really. I already had Kheldians and Arachnos unlocked. I can't see where more people playing these ATs diminishes me in any way.

I don't think anyone ever respected me for having them, so I don't think I've lost anyone's respect because they will be more common.

/e shrug

I admit this rant does make me think of the time last Summer when I tried out World of Warcraft. There was always a big crowd of people hanging around the bank in their best armor and showing off their raid gear. And always at least one guy on a gnome-built motorcycle. That really doesn't play well here.

I had exactly *1* villian that I started about 2 years ago and he was lvl 30 or so when the announcement came out about lowering the requirements to 20. Purely as a personal decision, I busted my hump to get him to 50 just so that I could say I did it when it was "hard". Heroside it actually tok me about 2 years to get my first 50, more from Alt-ititus than anything else. As someone pointed out earlier, different people have different playstyles, time constraints, desires, etc.

I have no feeling one way or the other about them lowering it to 20, and I'm certainly not going to hate on some new person because the rules have changed. In fact, I'm glad in a way because my second account I only have *1* villian and I made sure that he hit level 20 the day before I17 hit

Personally, I would have preferred to change the requirements to completing a SF/TF. Moonfire would be a good TF to do for it since it gives honorary peacebringer and a new SF is always a good thing for red side. You can level to 50 by just doing TFs after getting to 10, but there are gaps redside.

Playing a Kheldian requires some work compared to others, but they can be pretty impressive. Arachnos Soldiers are awesome right out of the box provided you pick certain powers.

So now can we see some Kheldian story content that non-Kheldians can access without a Task Force?

It is my personal belief that the reason Kheldians are less popular than Spiders is not entirely a matter of mechanics (although Spiders being mechanically better doesn't help), but rather because when you unlock the Soldier of Arachnos villainside your response is "oh man, I can play as one of those guys I keep fighting with the cool weird attacks!" and when you unlock the Kheldian your response is "..a what now?"

ITF, Moonfire TF, one or two non-story-arc missions from contacts that you frequently just won't see on the way up. I think some clues on Tobias Hansen's story arc might mention Nictus too. That's your heroside exposure to Kheldians unless you're already a Kheldian yourself, and it can make the whole thing seem stapled-on rather than "Wow, I can be one of these guys now!" Give us more Kheldian-related content for non-Kheldians, let us get to know them like the other factions, and it'll be a lot more satisfying when you unlock your own whatever level it happens at.

I'm not a fan of the elitism that tends to surround these sorts of unlockables, and would rather they had just been available to everyone the moment they were put in the game. I feel the same way about unlockable weapons, costume pieces, capes, and auras. No matter how many times I've had to unlock such things myself, if they made them all available from the beginning to everyone starting tomorrow I wouldn't be "pissed" because IMO that's how it should have been from the get-go.