Tip mission difficulty
By
Aquila_NA,
Posted on: 2010-08-27 05:15 in ALL ACCESS Gameplay Technical Issues Bugs
Quote:
Two reasons. First, I was a soft capped shield scrapper, and that character has zero difficulty in main tanking the ITF. Second, Frosty got killed inside of 10 seconds. Somehow his meatshield abilities weren't overly impressive.|
Originally Posted by NordBlast
Why wouldn't you use Frostfire as a meatshield? He hits them pretty hard. I've done this mission multiple times on my bane without any problems. Well, YMMV.
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I was surviving until one of the four sappers got lucky and drained me dry; after that I faceplanted within a few seconds.
COH has just been murdered by NCSoft. http://www.change.org/petitions/ncso...city-of-heroes
Quote:
Just run it with bosses enabled, then Frosty will be boss himself and he wouldn't die in 10 seconds.|
Originally Posted by Call Me Awesome
Two reasons. First, I was a soft capped shield scrapper, and that character has zero difficulty in main tanking the ITF. Second, Frosty got killed inside of 10 seconds. Somehow his meatshield abilities weren't overly impressive.
I was surviving until one of the four sappers got lucky and drained me dry; after that I faceplanted within a few seconds. |
Well, anyway, this mission is in the middle-to-bottom part of my list of tip missions, I would still do it, if it were 5th tip mission for the day.
My favorites are:
- 2 DE missions (bombs/scientists),
- Polar Shift,
- Agent Freymuth (or whatever his name is).
Missions I would always dismiss (I hate escorting multiple NPC that are 1/2 mile away from exit):
- carnie debutants
- Sister Jocasta
- rescue PPD from carnies
I just ran this mission with my BS/Regen Scrapper ate a bunch of purples and blues and faceplanted during the 3rd wave coming in the room. Set at 0/+2/Yes/No.
But because I died before the 4th and 5th waves came in the room the waves froze in place. So when I came back from the hospital the boss I had to defeat was right near the entry with only 1 sapper. I looked down the hall and saw at least full 3 mobs down the way. yuk.
Protector Server
Woeful Knight (BS/Regen/Body Scrapper)
Kevin Christian (MC/FF/Primal Controller)
SilverCybernaut (Eng/Dev/Munitions Blaster)
Apixie OhNo (Fire/Fire/Pyre Tanker)
Y'ru Glowen (Rad/Rad/Psy Defender)
Quote:
We ran this last night as a super group set to +2 (I was side-kicked so +3 to me) and an 8 man team. This is exactly how it went down for us.|
Originally Posted by WoefulKnight
But because I died before the 4th and 5th waves came in the room the waves froze in place. So when I came back from the hospital the boss I had to defeat was right near the entry with only 1 sapper. I looked down the hall and saw at least full 3 mobs down the way. yuk.
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As we were re-entering the mission someone walked too far in from the doorway and aggroed the boss before everyone was ready so it was a very messy fight. I managed to survive but the majority of the party was face-planted when we got done and the mission completed. We jumped up on the balcony just to see what was left and found wall-to-wall Malta down the hall. We decided that using the Mission Exit button was the better part of valor.
If they nerf the Malta Action figure mission i'm gonna cry.
I'm soloing at x6/+0 and it's tough, but oh so fun. The mission is short but intensive. Yes i get defeated sometimes, but it's nice there's actually a challenge for once instead of being coddled all the time.
Just target the sappers as soon they spawn and kill em, then the rest of the stuff is easy peasy lemon squeezy.
The only mission i actually wish they fix, is the Miss Tystle one where you rescue her and frost fire from nemesis, As both of them are very frail and often die before they can be rescued, making mission impossible to complete.
Black panther is my all time fave atm. And the only one i actually been defeated on more than once. It's so insane i love it!
I do the two carnie ones (masks and save debutantees)
I also quite like the save jocasta one. It's very easy and quick to do.
Explosion in peregrine is fun too.
So is the bomb trigger one, always a riot to kick maelstroms tush.
And the council one with Doc quantum 
I refuse to do miss thylste and any devouring earth ones.
Fairly indiffrent on the nemesis missions, they're easy but annoying.
This is on a BS/Shield hover scrapper.
Quote:
I think Frosty died in the first wave when I ran it.|
Originally Posted by Call Me Awesome
Two reasons. First, I was a soft capped shield scrapper, and that character has zero difficulty in main tanking the ITF. Second, Frosty got killed inside of 10 seconds. Somehow his meatshield abilities weren't overly impressive.
I was surviving until one of the four sappers got lucky and drained me dry; after that I faceplanted within a few seconds. |
I had a few bad moments during this mission...they kept coming, and coming, and coming.
Luckily, however, I was playing my Dark/Mace tank, which had some advantages; Op Gloom to stun the minions, significant end drain resistance to help against the sappers, and Dark Regen.
I made it through without face-planting, but it was a much closer thing than usual when soloing one of my tanks.
My Characters
Knight Court--A CoH Story Complete 2/3/2012
Really? People are having trouble with the Panther 952 mission on base difficulty? Something screwy must be happening to you guys; my empath has no trouble soloing it at that setting. I mean, sure, it's Malta, and the spawns are pretty quick, but there's only two at a time. The only thing I find really annoying in it are the Ops Engineers--Frostfire always seems to wind up in a corner somewhere, obsessing over a handful of auto turrets, while I kill the boss. It was tough, but doable, at x0/+3; I had to burn a few inspirations.
There's definitely something wrong with the boss spawns, though. What I've seen is specific to the Greater Devoured bosses; they always spawn as bosses, no matter what your settings are. Did the devs forget to make a lieutenant version of them or something?
All the other spawn-as-lieutenant mobs seem to be correct; remember that it doesn't change the mob's powers, it just downgrades their stats. A lieutenant Master Illusionist still spawns 3 Illusionist lieutenant decoys, a Phantasm, and a Dark Servant, so she's still really nasty, but she has less mez protection, lower damage, and lower hit points.
The Way of the Corruptor (Arc ID 49834): Hey villains! Do something for yourself for a change--like twisting the elements to your will. All that's standing in your way are a few secret societies...and Champions of the four elements.
Quote:
By "two at a time", do you mean two foes, or two spawns? Because I was getting a least 4 or 5 foes in each ambush wave, with a sapper in each one, and almost no time between waves.|
Originally Posted by Balanced
Really? People are having trouble with the Panther 952 mission on base difficulty? Something screwy must be happening to you guys; my empath has no trouble soloing it at that setting. I mean, sure, it's Malta, and the spawns are pretty quick, but there's only two at a time. The only thing I find really annoying in it are the Ops Engineers--Frostfire always seems to wind up in a corner somewhere, obsessing over a handful of auto turrets, while I kill the boss. It was tough, but doable, at x0/+3; I had to burn a few inspirations.
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Now granted, Tanks don't kill super-fast, but still, they were coming so fast that I could only take down one or two in a wave before the next one arrived.
My Characters
Knight Court--A CoH Story Complete 2/3/2012
Quote:
In my experience based on 5-7 runs with settings 0/x1/yes/no, every ambush wave consisted of 2 foes (in random combination: 2 sappers, sapper and operation engineer, 2 operation engineers). In total it was 5 or 6 waves, sometimes 2 or more spawning in very quick succession.
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Originally Posted by Finduilas
By "two at a time", do you mean two foes, or two spawns? Because I was getting a least 4 or 5 foes in each ambush wave, with a sapper in each one, and almost no time between waves.
Now granted, Tanks don't kill super-fast, but still, they were coming so fast that I could only take down one or two in a wave before the next one arrived. |
Quote:
Hmm, I could have sworn that I got more foes than that in a wave, but that could have been just the perception on my part since the waves were so close together. ("Oh #$%@, MORE of them?!?)|
Originally Posted by NordBlast
In my experience based on 5-7 runs with settings 0/x1/yes/no, every ambush wave consisted of 2 foes (in random combination: 2 sappers, sapper and operation engineer, 2 operation engineers). In total it was 5 or 6 waves, sometimes 2 or more spawning in very quick succession.
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Next time I do the mish I'll try to keep better track.
My Characters
Knight Court--A CoH Story Complete 2/3/2012
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Finduilas
By "two at a time", do you mean two foes, or two spawns? Because I was getting a least 4 or 5 foes in each ambush wave, with a sapper in each one, and almost no time between waves.
Now granted, Tanks don't kill super-fast, but still, they were coming so fast that I could only take down one or two in a wave before the next one arrived. |
Quote:
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Originally Posted by NordBlast
In my experience based on 5-7 runs with settings 0/x1/yes/no, every ambush wave consisted of 2 foes (in random combination: 2 sappers, sapper and operation engineer, 2 operation engineers). In total it was 5 or 6 waves, sometimes 2 or more spawning in very quick succession.
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After I faceplanted roughly 60 seconds in and had a chance to look around there had to be 20-30 Malta in the room with me including 2 Zeus Titans; they really were coming much faster than I could kill them off. I was also getting bosses while set to "no boss" in addition to the Zeus which could have been from voltron'ing Hercs.
I just took the death train out and dropped the mission. I can only imagine what it would have been with a team or with my normal settings of +2/8. The next times I've gotten the mission I just deleted that tip. Challenging is one thing, but something that broken on those dif settings is something else altogether.
COH has just been murdered by NCSoft. http://www.change.org/petitions/ncso...city-of-heroes
Quote:
Two foes per spawn (not counting the blasted turrets), and a total of maybe 7 spawns plus the boss. I usually had a wave show up just as I finished off the previous one, sometimes a bit sooner.|
Originally Posted by Finduilas
By "two at a time", do you mean two foes, or two spawns? Because I was getting a least 4 or 5 foes in each ambush wave, with a sapper in each one, and almost no time between waves.
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Where were you standing in the mission, and could you see where the mobs were spawning? If they were spawning some distance away, maybe some of them were getting stuck briefly, and multiple waves were arriving at once. Other than that, I'd recommend checking your difficulty settings and making sure you're on base difficulty. If you are, the spawns shouldn't be that big.
The Way of the Corruptor (Arc ID 49834): Hey villains! Do something for yourself for a change--like twisting the elements to your will. All that's standing in your way are a few secret societies...and Champions of the four elements.
Quote:
Well, I just did it again. |
Originally Posted by Finduilas
Hmm, I could have sworn that I got more foes than that in a wave, but that could have been just the perception on my part since the waves were so close together. ("Oh #$%@, MORE of them?!?)
Next time I do the mish I'll try to keep better track. |
I was wrong about 5-6 waves. In fact it was 10 waves + boss in the end. Each wave started with NPC dialog. In addition to sappers and operation engineers, I had tactical operatives in the mix. Still waves consisted of 2 foes with 1 wave consisted of only one Operation Officer. Frostfire spawned as a boss was very strudy and was excellent as a meatshield. During whole encounter his health was never below 95% and he pwnd incoming vawes very quickly.
Maybe, I'll FRAP it next time
Quote:
If that's the case, I guess the secret is to run the mission with Bosses enabled so Frostfire won't die (or won't die so quickly). If I get that tip again, I guess I'll give it a try that way and see what happens.
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Originally Posted by NordBlast
Well, I just did it again.
I was wrong about 5-6 waves. In fact it was 10 waves + boss in the end. Each wave started with NPC dialog. In addition to sappers and operation engineers, I had tactical operatives in the mix. Still waves consisted of 2 foes with 1 wave consisted of only one Operation Officer. Frostfire spawned as a boss was very strudy and was excellent as a meatshield. During whole encounter his health was never below 95% and he pwnd incoming vawes very quickly. Maybe, I'll FRAP it next time |
Quote:
I've been running it with no bosses, but I've also been playing my empath, so Frostfire gets loaded with buffs--Fort, CM, and AB. Still a lieutenant, but a lieutenant in god-mode, which makes a difference...at least until he wanders off to play with turrets.
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Originally Posted by Ssyrie
If that's the case, I guess the secret is to run the mission with Bosses enabled so Frostfire won't die (or won't die so quickly). If I get that tip again, I guess I'll give it a try that way and see what happens.
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The Way of the Corruptor (Arc ID 49834): Hey villains! Do something for yourself for a change--like twisting the elements to your will. All that's standing in your way are a few secret societies...and Champions of the four elements.
Mmm, Giggles...
I had a lot of difficulty with my Emp/Psi Defender and the TIPs that envolves ambushes. The Panther 952 is very tough, mostly because of the fast coming spawns, and the hevey handed use of Snipers with questionably long range zapping, are these snipe ranged? It sure appeared to be.
What I have done to mitigate the aweful Zapper range, is to instead of fighting in the middle of the room, I stay in the same lab area where the Longbow Commander is originally located, and go to the right side edge of the door that provides access to the room. Frosfire, will follow you and stand between you and the ambush mobs, thus giving you a little bit of a buffer from being ground zero for all the attacks. I also engage hover and fly beyond melee range; that also decrease the number of attacks on you, and giggles, places more on Frostfire. That so far, has been sufficient to let me focus first on the 4 Malta Zappers as they come, and then deal with the other nuasances as time allows. So far this Strategy has been very effective for me. At least for this TIP mission, the ambush spawns elsewhere and the mobs have to travel to you. You could take advantage of this feature, to go to another room, use Super Speed and Celerity Stealth to stay away from ambush, which will eventually go to the final room defeat Frostfire whose survival is not a requirement and stand around there, wait for the raid leader to spawn, use a snipe to kite-him out of the room and to your area and then its a one-on-one event.
Sadly there are a few TIP missions, where spawn occurs right on you, freaking me out so much, but also its very nasty when you are a Defender and a mass of status effect spammers appears on your face out of the blue.
Hugs
Stormy
Quote:
Here it is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uza1bsKVNpQ|
Originally Posted by NordBlast
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Frostfire spawned as a boss was very strudy and was excellent as a meatshield. During whole encounter his health was never below 95% and he pwnd incoming vawes very quickly. Maybe, I'll FRAP it next time |
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Stormfront_NA
Mmm, Giggles...
I had a lot of difficulty with my Emp/Psi Defender and the TIPs that envolves ambushes. The Panther 952 is very tough, mostly because of the fast coming spawns, and the hevey handed use of Snipers with questionably long range zapping, are these snipe ranged? It sure appeared to be. What I have done to mitigate the aweful Zapper range, is to instead of fighting in the middle of the room, I stay in the same lab area where the Longbow Commander is originally located, and go to the right side edge of the door that provides access to the room. Frosfire, will follow you and stand between you and the ambush mobs, thus giving you a little bit of a buffer from being ground zero for all the attacks. I also engage hover and fly beyond melee range; that also decrease the number of attacks on you, and giggles, places more on Frostfire. That so far, has been sufficient to let me focus first on the 4 Malta Zappers as they come, and then deal with the other nuasances as time allows. So far this Strategy has been very effective for me. At least for this TIP mission, the ambush spawns elsewhere and the mobs have to travel to you. You could take advantage of this feature, to go to another room, use Super Speed and Celerity Stealth to stay away from ambush, which will eventually go to the final room defeat Frostfire whose survival is not a requirement and stand around there, wait for the raid leader to spawn, use a snipe to kite-him out of the room and to your area and then its a one-on-one event. Sadly there are a few TIP missions, where spawn occurs right on you, freaking me out so much, but also its very nasty when you are a Defender and a mass of status effect spammers appears on your face out of the blue. Hugs Stormy |
I am usually too impatient to wait for ambushes there, so I would grab Frostie, summon my disruptor pets and start moving toward ambush spawning point, defeating all waves on the way. I would usually get Blackhawk 5-X near mission entrance room. It saves me about 30-60 seconds, so instead 3.5 minutes I spend 2.5 minutes
Rescue Crey Scientists:
My mission settings are +0x4 no boss, no AV. I've run this a half dozen times now and I always get boss-level Greater Devoured in this mission, usually four to six of them including the named boss at the end. About 33% of the time they will be level 51s rather than 50s. As has been suggested above, I suspect the problem may be that the mission coding specifies GREATER Devoured and there is no lieutenant version of this spawn.
Boss spawning is a little whacky in "Save the Debutantes" as well. Even at x4, multiple spawns with two Master Illusionists or an MI and Ring Mistress should not be happening. Even as downgraded lieutenants, dual MIs are a PITA.
"He may be arrogant, but he happens to be correct" - Ellis
"The server is full of crazies" - New_Dark_Age
Rainbow Arcana / Diamond D: Legion of Freedom - Virtue
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Mmm...
Not sure this suggestions needs to go here, or should be a thread of its own, what you all advice?
I noticed that many of the TIP missions, especially Hero class, are escort missions. While its a no big deal when I play my melee alts, it is a big deal when I am playing support types, particualrly when I am forced to turn off all forms of stealth so the aggroe gaining crazy "rescued victim" can follow me. Having my Stalker, Fortunata, Defenders, and Controllers having to give up their very few protective powers is simply said: Wrong. It would be like demanding the melee types to turn off their protection toggles or the victim they are supposed to escort to the exit would refuse to follow (as if they are saying, you are not handicapped enough to rescue me, I will not go).
My suggestions with regards to this:
1. Escorted victims, can see and follow you, regardless of your stealth status.
2. Escorted victims, are considered part of your team, and can be teleported to safety with the rest of the team.
3. Escorted victims, are set to defensive mode, and only attack when attacked and struck, instead of attacking anything in the room, regardless of how remote they may be, after all; I thought they were being rescued and they would quietly follow you to safety and let "you" rescue them.
The bosses thing is definitely an eye opener.
I have a tank I love that solos at +0/x8 without breaking a sweat against any type of mob.
I thought I'd run through some tips. When he walked into Carnie and Arachnos tips for the first time it was a big fat helping of "Surprise!"
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Quote:
I definitely suggest using the /report in game to suggest this and making a thread doing so wherever suggestions go.|
Originally Posted by Stormfront_NA
Mmm...
Not sure this suggestions needs to go here, or should be a thread of its own, what you all advice? I noticed that many of the TIP missions, especially Hero class, are escort missions. While its a no big deal when I play my melee alts, it is a big deal when I am playing support types, particualrly when I am forced to turn off all forms of stealth so the aggroe gaining crazy "rescued victim" can follow me. Having my Stalker, Fortunata, Defenders, and Controllers having to give up their very few protective powers is simply said: Wrong. It would be like demanding the melee types to turn off their protection toggles or the victim they are supposed to escort to the exit would refuse to follow (as if they are saying, you are not handicapped enough to rescue me, I will not go). My suggestions with regards to this: 1. Escorted victims, can see and follow you, regardless of your stealth status. 2. Escorted victims, are considered part of your team, and can be teleported to safety with the rest of the team. 3. Escorted victims, are set to defensive mode, and only attack when attacked and struck, instead of attacking anything in the room, regardless of how remote they may be, after all; I thought they were being rescued and they would quietly follow you to safety and let "you" rescue them. |
I certainly hate turnign off Energy Cloak on an energy aura brute and any other stealth power that rgants defense. It's annoying and make it much harder to do the missions.
I also very much HATE the npcs who have to fight absolutely everything, especially when there are ambushes coming right after the last one was beat.
The "rescue longbow agent from arachnos" mission is especially painful because the npc moves so slow, fights everything and the ambushes start ahead of you on your route out and always spawn immediately after the last enemy goes down from the previous ambush.
I'm surprised I ever make it out of there with a the npc alive.
The worst part is that npc claims "I'm too weak to help you fight so I'll just follow you out" and then proceeds to fight. WTH?!
I hope to all the deities int he universe that they are looking at escort AI and code for issue 19 and making it a lot less aggravating and stupid for us.
Here is an idea:
Characters, if they were real, would likely give the npc something to track them with, through stealth, or just "follow my directions out....head straight and then right at the intersection" to lead the npc out with stealth on.
That's a logical and easy way to explain keeping stealth on to escort npcs while still having ambushes after you because you have an unstealthed person behind you.
I think the difficulty settings are broken. At the same time, I think that they are WAI. How can this be?
I think that spawn sizes/Bosses, etc. are working exactly the way they are programmed to work, and I think that they were programmed to work exactly the way they wanted them to.
How they're broken is that apparently the mechanic used to determine the actual mob behavior in any given mission, with any given enemy, at any given "real" team size is so convoluted, so arcane that "none" of us know how the hell its supposed to be working.
Add to that the fact that for any of the enemies, missions, ambushes, etc. the difficulty system can be overridden to produce whatever experience the developers WANT to see occur and we're down to a few individuals who through luck of the AT/Powerset or just their 1337 skillz telling us that its our fault and that we need to lrn2ply and stop whining. 
I think that a much more comprehensive evaluation of the spawn mechanics is in order. "Teach to the lowest common denominator?" Yes, please.
Quote:
I've been complaining about them for a while, now.
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Originally Posted by Rainbow Avenger
Rescue Crey Scientists:
My mission settings are +0x4 no boss, no AV. I've run this a half dozen times now and I always get boss-level Greater Devoured in this mission, usually four to six of them including the named boss at the end. About 33% of the time they will be level 51s rather than 50s. As has been suggested above, I suspect the problem may be that the mission coding specifies GREATER Devoured and there is no lieutenant version of this spawn. Boss spawning is a little whacky in "Save the Debutantes" as well. Even at x4, multiple spawns with two Master Illusionists or an MI and Ring Mistress should not be happening. Even as downgraded lieutenants, dual MIs are a PITA. |
Yes the tip mishions are a lot tougher then normal mishion's.
First time i have seen a npc your supposed to rescue die from aoe damage before you even free it.
Kittens Club Supergroup Leader@Savannah (Freedom)
Save Black Panther 952:
Stone/Stone Tanker, Level 47, +0/x1, No Bosses. Waves came extremely quickly, about 10 seconds in gap.
Rescue Crey Scientists:
Devouring Earth 'The Executioner' spawned as a boss for a +0/x0 Blaster, set to no bosses. Had Boss HP and damage.
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