Massively: news about I20?
By
Adeon Hawkwood,
Posted on: 2010-11-09 11:20 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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I took all that time because I wanted to and I was hunting down badges. I could easily have bulldozed through the content in a single day - I know because I did that later with a different character, wanted the merits but not the badges and had already seen the content so I wasn't poring over the writing.|
Originally Posted by Carnifax_NA
For the time needed (to get 87 you'd have to do all 4 storylines all the way through basically) that is crappy. Especially compared to the alternatives Hero and Villain side where a 4 mission and 1 hunt arc tends to reward anything between 9-16 merits.
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Not to mention, I don't have to hunt for a contact to give me a story arc, the contacts are all smooshed together in a very small trio of zones. That was me just doing most of both Resistance arcs, not even every single one (I think all I did in the last zone was Crusader, since I'd already seen the Warden stuff on an earlier alt)
Of course, I only play Blue and I know that Red is a lot more organized as far as giving out coherent storylines without having to hunt for the contact who gives them. But I think it's about equivalent, really.
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I should do that, too. It never occurred to me to play the game other than straight through, as I assume the arcs (especially in Praetoria) were designed for you to do one after the other with no lockouts. I certainly never noticed any arcs going unfinished. It also never occurred to me to see if someone had made a list of which arcs gave more merits since I assumed they all rewarded the same -- or at least similar. I vaguely recall some Dev (Positron?) saying that arcs gave X amount and TFs gave a bonus of 2X or whatever, so I figured outside of big story arcs like Envoy of Shadow or Freakalympics we just received 0 to 2 per arc based on a random roll.|
Originally Posted by Feycat
That was actually a typo on my part, it's 87 not 187. It's still not "crappy" to me though.
Also... I really don't know how you're having so much trouble getting merits. They're not based on luck. You just have to complete an arc, and they're all available via Oro. Paragonwiki has a whole list of them and how long they are and how many merits they give. I made myself a little list of every arc that gives more than 20 merits, so I can go bang those out when I need some. |
Okay, screenshots of 3 of my 4 Praetorians. 2 of them have been out in Paragon City for a while and they've managed to cross over the 100-merit threshold, which actually surprises me a bit. Not much of a difference between the L26 and L30 guy, though. The L16 guy has the typical number of merits I generally get. I can't recall ever getting 20 merits at a pop, though, not even in a TF. With rare IO recipes being in the 150-300 range and merit drops increased recently, you can see why I don't really pay attention to them. Even at these accelerated rates, by the time these guys are 50, I'll only be able to buy 4 or 5 rolls... if I'm lucky.
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
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Can I make a suggestion?|
Originally Posted by Ironik
With rare IO recipes being in the 150-300 range and merit drops increased recently, you can see why I don't really pay attention to them. Even at these accelerated rates, by the time these guys are 50, I'll only be able to buy 4 or 5 rolls... if I'm lucky.
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Rather than rolling your merits for specific recipes, why not trade them for Hero merits? Or just do tips instead of doing arcs and not even bother with merits until you have 50, then cash them in for a Hero/Villain merit. It only takes 1 or 2 alignment merits to get the oranges that will cost you 200+ regular merits.
Is that a dog on your lap or are you just happy to see me?
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@Zethustra
"Now at midnight all the agents and the superhuman crew come out
and round up everyone that knows more than they do"-Dylan
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I didn't know merits could be exchanged like that.
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Originally Posted by Feycat
Can I make a suggestion?
Rather than rolling your merits for specific recipes, why not trade them for Hero merits? Or just do tips instead of doing arcs and not even bother with merits until you have 50, then cash them in for a Hero/Villain merit. It only takes 1 or 2 alignment merits to get the oranges that will cost you 200+ regular merits. |
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
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If I can see a level 50 Dual Pistols blaster within a few hours on the day of the powerset being unlocked, I'm betting that we'll be seeing an Alpha slotted hero by the end of the day that issue 19 drops
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Originally Posted by Judgement_Dave
As you note, drop rates can be easily altered, but do they necessarily need to be?
IIRC this is the new CoX endgame - it's not meant to be something that's done in 5 minutes then players get back to the usual moaning about nothing to do/whens the next issue... If rare can be gained within a couple of months of casual gameplay (doing whatever you'd be doing without the new system, not grinding TFs) is that too slow/too fast or about right? |
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Does look like it takes a bit of doing to get the pieces necessary.|
Originally Posted by Aura_Familia
If it's really taking you THAT long I wouldn't even bother with Inventions, let alone purples and Incarnates.
Keep playing casually, it sounds like you are having fun. Just pretend that the Incarnate system doesn't exist. You will save yourself a lot of unnecessary stress. |
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Originally Posted by Leandro
Warning: small sample size ahead.
Incarnate Shards drop only from level 50+ enemies. Based on minion and lieutenant defeats, they are slightly more rare than Rare Salvage, and a lot more common than Purples or even Rare Pool A Recipes. Defeats: 1424 minions 969 lieutenants 2393 total Incarnate Shard drops: 1 from minions (1 in 1424) 5 from lieutenants (1 in 193) 6 total (1 in 398) Other drops: 61 Pool A Commons 18 Pool A Uncommons 3 Pool A Rares 1 Pool A Purple 148 Common Salvage 46 Uncommon Salvage 8 Rare Salvage Here are some more numbers by Lord_Cyclones that don't report other drops for comparison: Defeats: 2178 minions 1242 lieutenants 98 bosses 3518 total Incarnate Shard drops: 2 from minions (1 in 1089) 8 from lieutenants (1 in 155) 2 from bosses (1 in 49) 12 total (1 in 293) The numbers are close enough to blame the discrepancy on the RNG, so here is the combined list: 3602 minions, 3 shards, 1 in 1200 2211 lieutenants, 13 shards, 1 in 170 98 bosses, 2 shards, 1 in 49 5911 total, 18 shards, 1 in 328 |
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
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No, I wasn't thinking you were lying at all. I just meant what I said, I don't understand *how* you manage not to get enough merits in a year for even a single random roll, even by accident you should have that many.|
Originally Posted by Ironik
I guess you guys think I'm lying or something, but I've never had good luck with drops in this game.
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| I never got a single costume recipe drop until *after* they changed the drop rate, so I missed out on all the nice 100 million Influence gains people had in the early days. |
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| As for buying a rare IO recipe, I recall it cost something like 175 merits or thereabouts, maybe even more. It's been a while so I don't recall exactly, but it was definitely in the triple digits. When you get a couple merits at a time, it takes a while to build up enough in order to afford a roll like that. |
It's even beter if you do tip missions and earn A-merits. You get 5 rare recipes for those. Even if you do only 1 tip mission per day, you can get an A merit in 11 days.
You can also convert 50 reward merits and 20 million inf in an A-merit. But I guess that's a big investment if you don't have that kind of money. You need a very, very unlucky roll to not at least make those 20 million back, after crafting, though.
I made over 500 million profit (so after the 20 million and crafting expenses) from 8 A-merits converted from reward merits. And that's without selling the 3 Lotg 7.5% I got as well. The other expensive ones I recall are: 2*Miracle unique, 3*Numina unique and 1*Kinetic combat triple. (I roll in the lvl 35-39 level range.)
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| I played my 38 Dual Blades/Willpower Scrapper solo for about 3 hours (on and off) last night. Early in the evening I decided to buy a full set of Analyze Weakness (Def DeBuff) just because I felt like it. At first I didn't think I'd be able to get the special "Chance for +ToHit" because there didn't seem to be any for sale at any level, so I checked the merit vendor and the cost was 220 merits. No way THAT was going to happen. Fortunately someone decided to sell one at level 34 or 36 or something, so I snatched it up for a million+. (I had 9 million on hand.) |
All you can do about that is place some bids and wait for them to be filled.Quote:
| I did 5 tip missions, a FedEx, dropped a radio, did another radio, plus 3 or 4 regular missions from my contacts. Through all of that I got about 9 merits, what I consider a really good night, merit-wise. All told, I think I got about 11 SOs and 2 DOs. I got a few minor recipes. Jet Pack temp power, a Calibrated Accuracy, a Positron's Blast and a bunch of level 40 Common IOs (Defense Buff, Accuracy, Damage, Snare, etc.). |
@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.
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The difference is that all those arcs contain at least 1 kill all in a cargo ship map or something. That mission alone takes as long as a whole Praetorian arc (slight hyperbole).
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Originally Posted by Carnifax_NA
For the time needed (to get 87 you'd have to do all 4 storylines all the way through basically) that is crappy. Especially compared to the alternatives Hero and Villain side where a 4 mission and 1 hunt arc tends to reward anything between 9-16 merits.
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@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.
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You need to add 20 million inf though.
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Originally Posted by Ironik
I didn't know merits could be exchanged like that.
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@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.
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No, you can craft them from the shards dropped by the regular level 50 mobs. Four shards for a common component.
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Originally Posted by Knightfox
Looks like components for crafting Alpha slot enhancements will only come from task forces.
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Rabbits & Hares:Blue (Mind/Emp Controller)Maroon (Rad/Thermal Corruptor)and one of each AT all at 50
MA Arcs: Apples of Contention - 3184; Zen & Relaxation - 35392; Tears of Leviathan - 121733 | All posts are rated "R" for "R-r-rrrrr, baby!"|Now, and this is very important... do you want a hug? COH Faces @Blue Rabbit
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Originally Posted by Zombie Man
 Answer: You hired Rob Leifeld? |
Oh god please no... it'll have 4 spines and elephant hoofs
Thelonious Monk
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You mean in addition to trading them like Feycat advises
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Originally Posted by TrueMetal
You need to add 20 million inf though.
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| Rather than rolling your merits for specific recipes, why not trade them for Hero merits? Or just do tips instead of doing arcs and not even bother with merits until you have 50, then cash them in for a Hero/Villain merit. It only takes 1 or 2 alignment merits to get the oranges that will cost you 200+ regular merits. |
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
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Yep. 50 reward merits + 20 million inf = 1 alignment merit = 5 random rare recipes.|
Originally Posted by Ironik
You mean in addition to trading them like Feycat advises you also have to pay a fee? And a hefty one at that? My level 39 Scrapper (dinged yesterday) only has a touch over 8 million now.
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It's still a way better deal than doing random rolls 1 at a time for 20 merits.
@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.
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Well, I won't be doing that, either. I think the richest of my toons has something like 89 million.|
Originally Posted by TrueMetal
Yep. 50 reward merits + 20 million inf = 1 alignment merit = 5 random rare recipes.
It's still a way better deal than doing random rolls 1 at a time for 20 merits. |
I really am starting to think that farming is the only way to actually get ahead in this game, because just playing it the regular way isn't getting my characters anywhere near these uber levels people speak of. Of all of my toons, only one has a full set of IOs. Not purples, just IOs. Everyone else above 32 has some generic IOs and maybe two or three partial IO sets with a lot of SOs slotted in there.
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
Good grief. How are you not filthy stinking rich after all of these years? I don't even farm for stuff and yet I have a character build that is worth more than 4 billion Inf.
Do you even run TFs? What about Hero/Villain Tips? Yeesh!
Playstation 3 - XBox 360 - Wii - PSP
Remember kids, crack is whack!
Samuel_Tow: Your avatar is... I think I like it
It's not too difficult. Fund enough alts and be disinterested enough in shoving things onto the market and you'll eventually chew through the surplus, even if you were around pre-Inventions.
Dawncaller - The Circle of Dawn
Too many blasted alts to list, but all on Virtue.
I've never used merits either. I play an awful lot of alts which means I don't have much on any one character. I also almost never do TFs. And I don't want to use random rolls because odds are it'll just be garbage. I don't think I've actually even looked at how many merits i have on any of my characters for months.
As for Inf, I have one character with over 100 million, and that's only because of two lucky drops. For most of my characters a million or two is about it. I certainly don't have a "billion inf build" on any of my characters; I wouldn't have that much if I combined everything I have on one character.
Arc #40529 : The Furies of the Earth
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Look down, Alt Alphabet. Like Obscure Blade, I don't do TFs much. I've done more this past summer than in the past 5 years combined, and that's only because VexXxa has been organizing them and those guys are inordinately tolerant of my constant disconnects. I do the tips, pretty much just running missions now in order to get the tips, then doing all of them. I haven't noticed any amazing financial or merit gains from tip missions, though.|
Originally Posted by bAss_ackwards
Good grief. How are you not filthy stinking rich after all of these years? I don't even farm for stuff and yet I have a character build that is worth more than 4 billion Inf.
Do you even run TFs? What about Hero/Villain Tips? Yeesh! |
Also, on that 89 million guy, I gave a ton of Influence away to new players to help get them started. I think he probably had 220 million before I did that. Just one of the ways I like to be a good ambassador for this game. I also take the time to explain things to new players. I don't even know how many times I've done that, but it must be hundreds of hours by now.
The Alt Alphabet ~ OPC: Other People's Characters ~ Terrific Screenshots of Cool ~ Superhero Fiction
Good on you for helping the new players!
Playstation 3 - XBox 360 - Wii - PSP
Remember kids, crack is whack!
Samuel_Tow: Your avatar is... I think I like it
Your best bet really is to do Hero/Villain tips. They're pretty easy and quick, and with one A-Merit you can buy almost anything you'd want. 2 A-Merits and you can buy what's left(unless you want PVPOs or Purples).
You can either do normal content to get tips, or just go to Talos or Sharkhead and beat on guys till you get some. Doesn't matter if you're a 50, you'll get tips from the greys. Or you can join a Hero/Villain tip team.
Do your day's 5 tips. The next day, do 5 more, plus your Morality mission. The first time you do this you'll get 50 merits. This takes 2 days at minimum.
Then you do the whole thing over again. Gather tips, do 5 missions. Next day, gather more tips, do 5 missions plus Morality. This time and every subsequent time you will get an A-Merit.
Using this A-Merit does not cost money. The money is for converting regular Reward Merits into A-Merits. Using an A-Merit you already have costs nothing. Use the A-Merit for something you want, or use it for something you know will sell for a bunch, or use it for 5 random rolls, or save it to use with a second one to get some of the more expensive recipes like an LOTG +Rech or Numina's Rec/Reg.
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Well, that's plenty to get started. You will turn a profit. But it's up to you. Just get A-merits from tip missions in that case.|
Originally Posted by Ironik
Well, I won't be doing that, either. I think the richest of my toons has something like 89 million.
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| I really am starting to think that farming is the only way to actually get ahead in this game, because just playing it the regular way isn't getting my characters anywhere near these uber levels people speak of. Of all of my toons, only one has a full set of IOs. Not purples, just IOs. Everyone else above 32 has some generic IOs and maybe two or three partial IO sets with a lot of SOs slotted in there. |
I still have all the inf I'll ever need. Among my 4 most played 50s (got 8 in total) I got 2.5 billion of unused inf atm. My play time is divided 50/50 between those 4 favourite 50's doing TF/SFs and leveling all the rest of my toons.
As far as IO slotting goes I'm probably a bit strange. I build my characters for concept first, ie I pick powersets and powers that I think are fun and fit my concept over pure performance. Hardly any of my characters have hasten for example. Then I try to make the character as powerfull as I can with IO slotting. I don't use purples though. They're simply not worth the cost for the return imo. Though apparently everyone else disagrees with me.
I don't bother with IO's till I hit lvl 47. Since I hardly ever exemp down, unless to get badges, I just slot lvl 50 IOs. All my 50's are slotted this way. Builds varying from 200-800 million in costs.Even though I won't be soloing any AVs or clearing +4x8 maps with these builds any time soon (though my dark/dark corr could probably do the latter one, but it would take forever and my SS/invul brute could too depending on enemy type.), I got various Mo badges on several characters so I don't think I'm doing to bad.
@True Metal
Co-leader of Callous Crew SG. Based on Union server.
Also... I really don't know how you're having so much trouble getting merits. They're not based on luck. You just have to complete an arc, and they're all available via Oro. Paragonwiki has a whole list of them and how long they are and how many merits they give. I made myself a little list of every arc that gives more than 20 merits, so I can go bang those out when I need some.