Honoree mission Awful

Pretty much this. Last night when posting I was still probably a little too hacked off to post without coming across very ragey. But, like I said, the EB fight itself wasnt hard. At least, not overly. It was the right sort of level for two EBs versus a 50.

And the answer to 'why not team' is because this is supposed to be quite a personal arc. When this is a mission all about, supposedly, me....why should I want to envolve other people? Sure, I'll do it on characters like my Empath/Psi defender, and maybe on my AR/Ice blaster knowing what I'm facing now. But on something like Alpha? Yeah, fine, I got blindsided. The disconnect did nothing to improve my mood.

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

No, I didn't. What I meant was, I targetted Holtz and jumped on top of the first two portals and taunted. I didn't target the portals, though. The first two died from AoE. The back two or three were constantly spawning Rikti for the whole fight though.

Holtz and Honoree were fighting me for two to three minutes while the portals spawned rikti.

What I keep trying to say is: If you got to the point where the room was absolutely flooded, you should have just backed out, reset the mission and tried again. Don't throw your mouse against the wall then come here whining that it's impossible.

Please, stop putting words in my mouth. I have not once 'whined that it's impossible'. Annoying? Yes, very. Cheap anmd cheaty? Sure. Potentially frustrating if you don't know what to expect? Yes.

I will say it once more;
I. Completed. The Mission. Well, I would have, had my net not dropped me while I was talking to the downed Hero 1.

My points were;
1) The Incessant Rikti spawn made it so that I got to a point where the mission was taking a lot longer and becoming more tedious than it should be. The EBs were, despite having a few cheap tricks (Curse of Weariness) no more of a problem than any other EB. The 100+ Rikti, however, made actually fighting them more of a chore than it had any right to be. Note; not challenging or tactically difficult. Just a chore. Getting to one EB in the middle of a swarm of exp-less minion is a chore.

2) Saying 'You shouldnt be allowed to drop this!' is just stupid. The reason that function is there is so people can drop bugged missions, or ones that become impossible to complete. For all intents and purposes, I completed the mission. The fact I would have to re-do it entirely due to a net diconnect is what caused me to auto-complete it, because going through that again was a level of tedium I did not want to face.

Those are my opinions and my reasons. I feel that the portals being capable of spawning that many Rikti should not be considrered WAI, because it makes the mission not-fun. I was on a soft-capped character with pet back up, and I found it more of a struggle than a x8 mission. This was on x1. If other people on other characters ran into that (and by that I mean the 100+ Rikti surrounding the Honoree) then you can likely bet there would be posts about it too.

Originally Posted by Zwillinger GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.

Originally Posted by Captain_Photon NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

What EB?

Also, CAN, not NEEDS. But then I don't particularly imagine you're the least bit interested in that sort of differentiation since you seem to be of the mind that things should only vary between to wildly different extremes.

If Player A using Set X can do Feat Z, while Player B using the exact same Set cannot... then it boils down to simple player skill. Which is exactly where it should be.


Clearly the only step then is to stop using the warning and/or remove it in some cases so as to increase its value.

If you want to see it that way, you are free to do so. That is not what is written, but you're free to think what you like. I do, however, believe it speaks more for your own mindset.

I believe an average skilled player should practice and learn to be a better player.

<sigh>

I'm so *******.

Angel Red
"We're heroes. Fighting injustice is the thing we do." ~Rebel Scum

Two people are handed a guitar. You, and Eric Clapton.

You, by comparison to Clapton, suck. What should you do?
Answer A: Quit.
Answer B: Learn and get better.

Pick the one you like, and quit whining about the people who have done B. And FWIW, I think an "average skilled player" is going to have trouble the first time, see what's going on, and be just fine afterward.

See my Guides and Tutorials

The new balance point for what, exactly. Being unable to solo the Honoree mission says exactly nothing of balance significance, for any definition of balance I'm aware of, including all of the ones the devs use.

If you're trying to imply that the existence of the mission implies everyone should be able to solo it, with any build and any restricted set of tactics and any playstyle, I'm afraid you're mistaken.

On the other hand, if this is actually performance art demonstrating that meaningless repetition can be annoying in a variety of circumstances other than in mission content, bravo.

EG is displaying his usual sense of tact, but it should be pointed out that most players, including most of us veterans, would have been hopelessly lost trying to complete anything of any consequence in this game in the first week when we didn't have any experience with it. Even if you handed us autoleveled 50s, it still would have taken us months to figure out how to complete something like the I1 (level 50) Hamidon, or the STF, or even the respec trial. I19 has been around for barely a couple of hours. Declarations of how hard the Incarnate arc is are not really likely to be accurate. The +5 LRSF was said to be virtually impossible by many, many players. By the time the devs got around to dropping it to +3, lots of teams could have completed it at +5. It might have still been very difficult, and even out of the reach of many players, but its clear the statements that it was virtually impossible were very wrong.

Some people think its too hard, some people think the difficulty is just of the wrong kind, and some people think the difficulty is unnoticable. Personally, I think its fine, but regardless I don't think we know if the average players who have reached level fifty and are going to seriously pursue an end game progression system will find it terribly difficult in a month. Its not like I'm unaware of how hard the game is relative to average players, rather than forum readers. I still have to remind people that blasters radically underperformed everything else, even the lowest damage defenders, simply because their difficulty in play made them debt-magnets to a far higher degree than anything else, regardless of powerset combination. Still, I don't think its certain, even with initial complaints, that we know if the arc will really be a stumbling block in the long term.

If it is, it bodes badly for the end game system because if we can't ratchet difficulty upward over time as the system progresses and have the playerbase adjust accordingly, it'll become pointless. And personally, I'd feel greatly disappointed.

I'm a Bots/Traps MM. I found the mission to be quite easy, running at a casual +0/x4.

Basic procedure: before entering, make sure Forcefield Generator is recently summoned. As soon as the portals spawn, charge into the room, put down the basic traps (Triage Beacon, Acid Mortar), detail two bots to destroying the portals, taunt the Honoree (the remaining four bots will concentrate on him), and work on immobilizing him. Toe-bomb him with Poison Gas Trap once he's immobilized, and he'll go down in a hurry. At this point, there was only one portal left and maybe two dozen Rikti, so I took the two bots off portal duty and started taunting everything in sight. At some point in the fight, Holtz became collateral damage, and I talked to the Honoree while the bots finished off the Rikti.

I found the Curse of Weariness to be only a minor problem: Taunt doesn't use endurance, and with Holtz focusing on me, the bots were free to attack.

have me diving back in for a moment, and makes me glad as hell you two are not game devs, because i'd give your idea of coh a couple months before your pissed off playerbase left. If you want to have this opinion I think Jack went that way, towards that other tanking mmo.

Seriously? What part of some players will never reach the super geko school of awesomeness is going over your head here? A majority of your playerbase is average, they're the lowest common denominator. They're not going to be able to solo (insert something along the lines of honoree here) with all the (I'm geko i can do anything cause i'm awesome with any build!) skill you have because they just might not get a power combo, might pick a subpar one, or just simply might not be good at coh.

So regardless of that we should gear all the end game content to the eric clapton level? Oh yeah that's a GREAT way to keep your fans interested in the high end content. Because "it's supposed to be hard!" Even though we see the hypocrisy of this statement since apprently any AT can do it. Oh and we just need better "tactics" even though the only tactic I've seen is pull honoree from the portal gimmick then pop purples, which as Hydro said.

Is like EVERY. OTHER. EB. IN THE GAME!

And as I said did jack squat for me as my 1200 hp blaster ate an 1100 total focus hit through the purples.

But why didn't I kite Bill? Maybe because my blaster doesn't have inherent swift yet, just hurdle and combat jump (see that part about not every one of us builds for hover or super speed) by the time I landed it'd be jump, one attack, jump, another attack, or try using sprint, which is an end hog anyway. And my dps would be so low there's no way honoree would drop before my purple tray was gone, even with reds backing it up.

Maybe i should have just run around and let gun drone potshot him?

Regardless of whether you are right or arcana is, whether we solo it or have to resort to forced teaming, and maybe after all this wailing and gnashing of teeth we find a month down the way the trick to deal with the cheapness of the doom portals and the EB fights you still have to remember one important detail which is again where hydro nailed it.

Couldn't agree more.

Regardless of the challenge level, regardless of your opinion or mine being whatever passes for "right" if it's not fun then the mission is a design failure.

There's a fun challenge like the honoree fight at the end of the lady grey TF with rikti everywhere. That's a blasters dream on a good team. Steamrollered it myself tonight with a great group, even the Hami mission, and we had a blast.

Then there's a cheap and tedious challenge. Which two shot EB's, curse flingers, and portals that nonstop spawn enough non XP mobs to break the aoe cap, even when you break LoS easily qualifies as. And your only option is pull from the ambushes or the equally moronic advice to reset the mission? I mean if this was an AE arc, how often do you think it'd be played?

Difference between the two is night and day, that's the problem, and that's why I'll just auto complete it in the future. Not to mention the same reason I refuse to roll another character into Praetoria. And while we're at it the same reason I instantly drop the Malta gunslinger tip mission every time i see it. It's not cause of the hardness of the final room, it's because I've got better things to do then waste my time with a totally non fun mission. As the devs only trick these days seems to be pile impossible amounts of mobs on top of players through portals and ambushes till we die.

On a small side tangent, do you have any advice for people in a similar cheap shot mission over in Beholder's story arc? The one where you have to deal with 5 ambush waves of seers then have to finish off a mini mother mayhem EB? That one had me running all the way back across the zone from the hospital after restocking my purples. I guess in all that annoyance at getting killed by the EB once (due to empty insp tray after ambushes) and having to resort to nonstop purples I missed the fun I was supposed to be having?

Just curious.

I managed it on squishies in beta, which means anyone can do it. Given that I almost never run solo at anything other than 0/x1, except on some tanks and scrappers that benefit from larger mobs, and I'm an old guy without twitchy reflexes, who usually plays when he's too tired to anything more constructive, you can't claim I'm an above average player. All it takes is being able to think.

Now, one can't argue with people who did not find it fun. That's pure opinion. I liked it myself, except for the damnable Curse of Weariness. As I said in beta, it did not make the fight harder, it just made it annoying since it meant running away, breaking aggro, and breaking out a book to read while waiting for the overlong duration to end.

Sure, you want to pay me a salary and then I'll be happy to treat it as a job instead of recreation. This elitist snob crap is just as insane as Shubbie's comments.

Oooo... what a delicious notion - getting paid to play video games...

On trapdoor I was still solo... I run against him while he was debuffed with Darkest night and tar patch.. with all zzombs out. I cannot recall him ever making a clone. I havent seen him using his powers. I might have missed it. Just threw all powers I had on him with pets on aggressive. It took about 20 sec I think.

And I was on +1/x3

Ah, and here's the perfect quote to attach this Penny Arcade strip to.

*edit*
And on the topic of trying to be Eric Clapton: I don't get paid nearly enough to play this game that I'd want to abandon the fun and become a professional. This is neither a job nor a sport and should not be treated as either.

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

Oranges?

You forgot Answer C: Play a character that is naturally a good soloist, which is at least 50% of the reason some people can solo stuff and others can't. Yes, those powers and numbers DO mean something. I can solo this mission with some characters and not others. Does that mean I'm a good player sometimes and should quit playing others until I can satisfy your challenge?