Personally, I think 'balance' is highly over-rated...

Congratulations, you have managed to debunk an argument that I never made in the first place.

Your original point was "people make fire/kins for speed boost." I said they do so for Fulcrum Shift, not Speed Boost, and that those who do have it suck about giving it out.

This is fairly unrealistic assumption. The play-testing phase will never be able to duplicate every possible scenario as it applies to power combinations or enhancement slotting for a particular power or powerset. It also can’t hope to predict or preempt every possible abuse by the live server player base, the developers simply don’t have the time or resources to so do.

They can create, develop and tweak a power or powerset based on known or obvious exploits, alpha and beta testing results and, on occasion, player input but the really insidious bugs normally don’t come out until the changes hit the live servers. It’s just the nature of the beast especially in an ever-changing production environment like an MMO. The alternative is stagnation and failure of the game.


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I made my first kin to join Pinball Wizards.

My most recent Kin I made for Transference.

The only thing you have destroyed is anyone's respect for your reading comprehension skills.

He never said that fire/kins never take speed boost, only that speed boost is not the reason people make fire/kins. Fire/kins are as popular as they are because they are a good farming build, and SB is worthless for that. They may take the power for the occasions when they want to group, but it is not the reason for the popularity of that particular combo.

This game can require some skill in places. Forethought, timing etc. I don't play this game as much as everyone else but I still like it.

same. Perfect place for Knockback and Resist + Def procs.

First if anyone is being trolled here I am. My original point was fire/kins get invited to teams for speed boost. This makes it easy for them to level up. As opposed to a power they don't get till level 38.

Second your logic is that if speed boost is why kins are desired on teams they wouldnt take other things ? That's so bad as to be beyond comprehension. Its like saying having a home in the Hamptons eliminates the desire for one in Malibu.

vs

Just for you RS and in red and bold so you can't miss it.

Seeing as you and Quint can't seem to get it. For a power that isn't being used there is much concern about how to use it and the etiquette in using it. Especially when there are posts in that thread about kicking people from teams for not using it.

I can read it. And it doesn't contradict a thing I said. In fact, it agrees with the fact that fire/kins tend to not take sb. And no one has said SB isn't taken, only that the standard fire/kin player doesn't take it. You do realize not every character with kin is a fire/kin, don't you - hell, there are two whole other ATs that might occasionally take it.

And as for ...
That would be a very odd point for you to have in a post responding to a comment about why fire/kin is FOTM. Basically, you just claimed that you responded to a post about why the build is popular with a 2 word non-sentence, yet people were supposed to magically know that you had changed the topic from why the build it popular to why players with that build might get invited to teams.

So, either you are the worst communicator known to man, or you're just trying to retroactively cover for that really stupid thing you said.

wrong again buck-o. that is your logic that kins are invited to teams because of speed boost and that SB is the only reason to make a kin. my logic is kins are invited to a team for several reasons other then SB and that people do not build kins for just SB. as far as me saying something about SB and kin building, if the only reason a person took kin for SB, you wouldn't see a whole lot of the other powers from that set in their picks. you fail at reading comprehension and trolling. good job.

Good heavens. I nearly dribbled my chardonnay onto the carpet of my Gulfstream just now.

i glanced at the tags right after reading this and nearly sprayed the keyboard with tequila. Somebody doesn't like having insight and accurate facts used in a discussion.

I'm on your side, because it would be great if this game could more closely resemble the comic book universe, rather than the tired mage-warrior-ranger-enchanter-healer fantasy MMO class recipe. But in the comics, one writer is playing all the heroes so the story doesn't devolve into, "Let Superman do it." Or even worse, "Let's all roll Superman characters and steamroll through the game that's designed for varying power levels."

You seem to think that only a few people would select Superman over Batman. In MMOs, virtually everyone goes for the Jedi character over the boring smuggler. Without class balance, this game would rapidly become City of Invuln/Super-Strength or whatever is most powerful. Alt-itis is the lifeblood of this game, and it would be seriously compromised.

City of Heroes really hasn't resembled that model for a long time: the devs certainly haven't designed under its premise since maybe a couple issues after launch. Granted: at launch archetypes like Blasters were very likely designed with weaknesses intended to emphasize their team role. Things had strengths and weaknesses in a way that would complement each other in teams in a manner similar to the classic MMO triads.

But now, things are different less to make them fill a specific MMO-tropical need on a team, but more to make each archetype offer a unique experience, and their strengths and weaknesses intermesh on teams mainly to make teaming reasonable, not necessary. That's why controllers and tankers overlap a lot: they are allowed to, becaues there is no requirement that each fill a unique role on a team. Furthermore, City of Villains archetypes all but threw the standard MMO model out completely.

The archetype balancing requirement really comes from two CoX design requirements: a) every archetype choice should have a reasonably unique and valuable gameplay offering (factoring out player preference) and b) combat is the primary mode of advancement in the game. The limitations of (b) combine with the requirements of (a) to make overall combat effectiveness, averaged across all aspects of the game from soloing to teaming and all situations therein, have to be roughly equal.

I personally wouldn't mind seeing them add the need to aim for ranged attacks and having to keep your opponent in your proverbial cross-hairs (i.e. facing an opponent) for melee attacks kind of like DDO. Defense and accuracy would still come into play but skill would also be a factor. The fact that hit or miss is down to a simple roll of virtual dice can, in some cases, be somewhat immersion breaking.


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Yeah ... No.

LOL

That was my exact thought.

Eh, to each their own. I like the strategy and interaction required in DDO combat.


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