Samuel Tow hates Tin Mage and all he stands for
When the developer start taking working strategies off the table, then yes it is cheating.
Players figured out how to slow (AoE mezzes & Pets) or prevent the invisible mine layers from getting close (Force Bubble), and within a week all that was removed. Oh, and the Aspect at the end of the CoP is likely still shooting through its "Only Affects Self" shield. |
I would have to disagree here...maybe the devs intended the 'invisible pets' to be...you know 'invisible' (to us and to everyone; meaning they can't die/etc).
Only the devs know for sure but I don't think they'd change something just to watch people cry and moan (maybe they do
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Leader of The LEGION/Fallen LEGION on the Liberty server!
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You know, it's funny - even though Jack left the game years ago, the new content is the very essence of "Statesman Fun".
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I felt the new mechanics were tough but fair: if you do the wrong thing you will surely die, but if you do the right thing you don't have to take a single hit. And I prefer that style of play to the kind that this game usually presents, where it's just a matter of over-statting your opponents. That does not work here, and I like that.
J_B: I can see where a dedicated Tanker player, who pretty much has contractual invincibility in most ordinary content (that is, you trade away some offense for sufficient extra mitigation that you practically never die), would be upset by having victory through statistics taken away as an option. I don't think that these encounters leave Tankers without a role, nor do they leave them without adequate tools for that role. Tankers control and survive aggro, and there's plenty of aggro to control and survive in these encounters! But if one is offended by the idea that a Tanker should focus on controlling aggro as part of a team strategy rather than, say, be an invincible do-everything hero, then yes, there's not much for you here. There's the whole rest of the game, though, where I hear Tankers do just dandy. I should know; I have four.
Five if you count the one I deleted.
The same goes for all the archetypes, really. There are encounters in these TFs where the standard methodology of making a big ball of player characters and enemies, overlapping buffs until statistical invincibility is achieved, and pouring on damage and debuffs until everything melts, will not work. If this bothers you, then Incarnate content may not be your cup of tea. If you are tired of beating every encounter with essentially the same strategy, however, then this will be a delightful surprise.
(Don't even talk to me about Trapdoor. Pulling enemies out of range of static buff auras has been old hat for anyone who has ever fought Devouring Earth, and enemies that refuse to be so pulled were introduced with the STF. In fact, it's the strategy du jour on the very next mission!)
@SPTrashcan
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Just got done with a pick-up Apex and Tin Mage double-feature for 80 merits in around 3 hours. I used to get annoyed with what I thought was an anti-melee bias in the Apex task force but tonight our team was about 4 Scrappers, 2 Brutes, 1 (Radiation) Corrupter and 1 (Radiation) Controller - and we got the Master of the Apex badge from the whole thing.
For those who are having trouble with the Blue Patches, there's a ledge southwest of the Blyde Square statue that you can hide under to keep the blue death from spawning on your characters often - note that characters must be completely under the ledge for this to work, and there isn't enough room for everyone to fit without having some characters peeking out and spawning the Energized Halberd attacks.
The Hydra guarding the Pylons require melee to joust after using two +Res inspirations, but that's not difficult.
It's annoying to see Battle Maiden tearing up Blyde Square so handily after she was such a push over, but after RPing you learn to allow your expectations of Cannon to be somewhat elastic.
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J_B: I can see where a dedicated Tanker player, who pretty much has contractual invincibility in most ordinary content (that is, you trade away some offense for sufficient extra mitigation that you practically never die), would be upset by having victory through statistics taken away as an option.
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I've always maintained that the devs have rendered the Tanker's benefit for the trade-off they make of offense for increased defense to be trivial. Well build Scrappers don't die a lot in most regular content, but they get much more damage.
These TFs demonstrate exactly what I've railed against. The sword bombs don't care if you're a Scrapper or a Tanker, they mostly negate any survivability difference. Both ATs get slaughtered. The same thing extends to the enemies with the massive stacking debuffs. I'm rendered just as squishy, yet, my damage remains as inferior as ever. The devs strip me of my armor, but punish me for having that armor anyways.
To Hell with that.
I don't think that these encounters leave Tankers without a role, nor do they leave them without adequate tools for that role. |
But if one is offended by the idea that a Tanker should focus on controlling aggro as part of a team strategy... |
There's the whole rest of the game, though |
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Yes, forums, kindly do remember me, please.
Yes, I realise that. I'm not saying I should suddenly become this unstoppable juggernaut of destruction. But since when are MALTA tough enough to one-shot punch me? Like I said - I'm doing World Wide Red now, and I'm kicking their *****, yet all of a sudden I can't even beat up an Operations Engineer? |
So, you go into one of two new taskforces which are heavily advertised at finally being a challenge for 50's.... and... are shocked they can hurt you? (unlike most the other content).
Maybe you had gotten so used to how easy other content is that you kept playing the same way as the "normal world". Running around jumping into multiple groups of mobs expecting to one shot them... everyone doing their own thing...
I have a feeling you also never touch the difficulty slider off of the basic low settings they are at.... "a boss on a solo mission??! wtfff!"
Mew
You know how we as Incarnates should deal with being shot at from orbit?
This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQh26wKS6f8 Heaven forbid we're allowed to be proactive against these attacks and stop them. Nope, we have to react and run around like idiots dodging them. . |
When I did the Apex TF, my Dual Blades/Electric Armor brute never once dodged an orbital beam from the War Walkers. She barely even flinched at the damage. Unless you're talking about Battle Maiden's Javelin attack, in which case I'm confused as those aren't orbital, but they do royally suck. Specially, on my first run, where I badly mistimed my 1k Cuts attack. That was really painful.
I did a master of Tin Mage which we completed in a pretty short amount of time, and had 3 total deaths.
Of course, I was playing with some pretty skilled people, and they did some prep with pets and nukes for the Director 11 battle. Then again, being my badge character and the only one interested in doing things like master runs, I already had those sorts of things laying around. I'm used to pulling out a Shivan if my team can't handle something hard, so being told "This next part is hard so use pets and nukes," I say "Okay."
I had fun wading through level 54 enemies and seeing how well I do against things that are 50 feet tall. I enjoyed the AV fights and cutting down the war walkers. It's a very short TF, and nobody's making you run it if it's not your cup of tea. It does take some skill and coordination, but at the same time I wonder what sorts of people just throw together a PUG to run it and expect to win. There has to be SOMETHING in this game you can't just faceroll at.
Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.
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Samuel_Tow: Your avatar is... I think I like it
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There has to be SOMETHING in this game you can't just faceroll at.
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Mew
I don't mind things being hard, if they're hard in an interesting way. BM, Director 11 etc, they're fine IMO. They mix things up, add new challenges. Maybe a few tweaks needed, but overall, I have no real issues. Level 54 Malta aren't. Bobcat suddenly hitting me for 10 times what she used (ie in the pre-incarnate content) to is not. Just boosting enemy stats purely for the sake of "challenge" is, IMO, unfun, particularly if, as in this case, there's no lore reason for it. The devs were going on about us being more powerful, but instead, we feel weaker, as stuff we could easily beat before is now, without any explanation, much stronger than us.
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Why does everyone make a deal about vengeanced Bobcat, when it's easy enough to just take her out first?
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Samuel_Tow: Your avatar is... I think I like it
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As a dedicated Tanker player, I consider these TFs to be the $%^&ing Antichrist.
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I have tanked both of them and had PLENTY to do besides being a taunt-bot, including doing respectable damage to BM up close.
Go have a good cry and and some ice cream, you'll feel better.
"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45
Here are my thoughts, for what they are worth (not much, probably).
Dodging meteoswords is hard. If you do not (re)act you get killed regardless of AT. If you do then then you take 0 (or a few hundred, when running out/past burn patches) damage. Keep this.
Beating down mobs of 54 clockwork is slow. They take longer to defeat and random aggro is more likely to make squishies faceplant. But rezzes are common (as always) and the hospital is nearby. So we do the same things we always do but they take longer. Change this.
Having optional hard modes like Bobcats vengeance is fine. As is giving rewards for completing such hard modes. Especially if the rewards are of the "bragging rights" variety, that is, badges. Keep this.
Regarding lore: having war walkers and AVs be more powerful makes sense - the Praetorians have their special "drain machine" turned on for the invasion and all that drained power has to go somewhere. Having the same clockwork robots (not even war works) suddenly be more powerful does not make sense (to me). Same with random malta operatives.
Here is what I would do (but, not being a dev, I cannot).
- Drop the TFs down to level 50
- Keep the -4 debuff for non-incarnates
- Buff the stats of special encounters (meteoswords, mines, AVs, war walkers, tentacles) so that they have about the same level of difficulty
- Allow the use of difficulty setting to increase the level of the TFs, if players want to
- Give out a (new) badge for doing them on +4
And here is the big one:
- Drop the level shifts from incarnate abilities. They are not out yet so it would not count as a nerf. As it seems to me, they imply that the incarnate Delta (I21-I22) content will have level 58 mobs. That is a kind of arbitrary gating that this game would be better off without.
I want the incarnate path to be about my characters becoming more powerful. Hitting harder, being tougher and so on. I do not want it to be about collecting "stuff" just so some new content does not overlevel me by 8 or more.
I do not suffer from altitis, I enjoy every character of it.
You know how we as Incarnates should deal with being shot at from orbit?
This: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQh26wKS6f8 Heaven forbid we're allowed to be proactive against these attacks and stop them. Nope, we have to react and run around like idiots dodging them. . |
Okay so I just watched this video....it doesn't really give you a good example of what we should be able to do.
In fact from what I see, we can do the exact same thing in the game (minus 1 thing).
In the cartoon you see a shield/forcefield that goes around the 2 chars. after the 1st shot from the orbital death laser (or whatever it was).
Then the other toon flies into space and attacks the thing that was firing at them.....gee I think that's what we do when we're attacking the War Walkers....
In fact, the SOL satellite fires off a good 10-14 shots (didn't really count) before it got destroyed...hmm...yep, sounds like the War Walkers.
The only thing we can't really do per se is the force field to stop inc. damage (which I would like to see some sort of force field in this game that actually is a barrier with Hit Points so that it can stop inc. dmg....but that's beside the point).
Leader of The LEGION/Fallen LEGION on the Liberty server!
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No, what gives me lease to respond the way I did was the incredibly stupid response I got from a certain poster.
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Oh, you are calling out my post because of ad hominems, but then start doing your own. Pot meet kettle, you're both black. |
What did I say:
A) 'You have been whining about this since Beta'- demonstrably true. I can go back to those forums and cite examples
B) 'You want the game to be a walkthrough' an interpretation of your position based on your continual complaints about these TFs and the Incarnate arc being too hard.
And you continue to use ad hominems. Also the game is cheating. |
"If your idea of feeling more powerful is being able to walk all over the opposition, go wipe swarms of grays in Perez." is not an insult. It's an example how how you can feel powerful if you like.
On top of that, the game can't cheat. The rules are defined by the developers, and that ends that discussion. You might not like the rules as constructed and modified on occasion, but you don't get to define them.
If you want hard, then you should ask for difficulty settings that actually mean something. Oh, and ad hominem #3. |
I will stand by my statement that overcoming hard content is a measure of powerful.
Too many alts to list.
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I really hope this isn't anything like the coordination required for the Ski Slope, because I hate that thing with a burning passion.
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(I too hate the ski slope and do not have a single badge from it)
That's good to hear - thanks.
Suggestions:
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Random Merit Rolls: Scale cost by Toon Level
"As a dedicated Tanker player, I consider these TFs to be the $%^&ing Antichrist."
--Johnny Butane.
I think Spitting Trashcan responded to this adequately (more than once). My thought: If you play this game ONE WAY, you are sure to be disappointed. [And I am glad for that - otherwise, it would be City of (FOTM)]. And I would have quit long ago.
Do you feel there is content which is better suited to tankers? If so, then by definition, there is also content that is NOT better suited to OTHER AT's. (Storm's on Katie Hannon anyone?) I wonder how they feel about your "Tanker-awesome" content?
Perhaps instead of saying,
"My tank suxxors in this TF - CHANGE THE TF!"
Instead, one might say,
"Hmm, a tanker might not be the best choice for this TF, maybe I should try something else?"
An open mind is something to be encouraged. Causing people to vary combat tactics may be one small way to do that. Also, moar funnerer.
I have to repeat: I am SO GLAD I started the game as a blaster. Starting as nigh invincible (scrappers, tankers) is a path to disappointment, in my opinion.
Arc #6015 - Coming Unglued
"A good n00b-sauce is based on a good n00b-roux." - The Masque
It's not. You see blue underfoot. You get eight seconds (longer than any attack animation in the game besides Time Bomb) to get out. You move away and carry on. A sword looking thing drops from the sky and creates a highly visible patch of death that persists for a bit. Don't stand in that. That's all. If you die because you are animation locked, its because you queued up an attack after your current one and after the blue appeared under you. If that's a problem, learn not to do that.
(I too hate the ski slope and do not have a single badge from it) |
And I occasionally get splattered. BFD. YMMV. Vengeance is a Beautiful Thing.
Arc #6015 - Coming Unglued
"A good n00b-sauce is based on a good n00b-roux." - The Masque
galadiman: Pity that two of the four characters I planned to make Incarnates are tankers, then. (And one's a brute.) EDIT: Sucks for the masterminds too, I bet.
SPT: It's not that I mind the debt, or even the dying per se. I mind spending so much real time pecking an overpowered enemy to death because we can't use our more powerful attacks without getting rooted and killed. A half hour of hopping around with Taunt on auto watching one AV's health bar inch downward, interrupted by occasional wipes and near-wipes which lead to further delay, is not fun for me. (See also: Reichsman.)
Charcoal: Well said.
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To expand a bit further: the encounters I enjoy on this TF are the ones that admit no solution via preparation. The only thing that works is doing the right thing, right then and there, and doing that works 100% of the time for everyone regardless of preparation. That seems supremely fair to me. But it is an unusual addition to a game where preparation usually reigns supreme. Life or death decided on positioning is a fundamental of action games, which I happen to enjoy. Victory based on careful preparation long before the fight began is a fundamental of strategy games, which I happen to dislike. I suppose where the surprise comes in is that the Alpha slot is a strategic slot, and thus offers little help in an action scenario. But that's just how it worked out, I guess.
I mean, I do a fair amount of build jiggering and stat crunching, but it's refreshing to say that the "right build" for Apex is the one that gives you enough movement speed to cover 20 feet in 8 seconds. Or, if you want to be a real hero for the team, the one with Team Teleport.
... Come to think of it, Team Teleport would make BM a joke, wouldn't it? There's your 20 minute Apex strategy. And I just invalidated everything I said above. :P
@SPTrashcan
Avatar by Toxic_Shia
Why MA ratings should be changed from stars to "like" or "dislike"
A better algorithm for ordering MA arcs
Check the Apex TF thread. Someone's tried Team TP. It... sort of works.
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Faces of the City
Players figured out how to slow (AoE mezzes & Pets) or prevent the invisible mine layers from getting close (Force Bubble), and within a week all that was removed. Oh, and the Aspect at the end of the CoP is likely still shooting through its "Only Affects Self" shield.
Triumph: White Succubus: 50 Ill/Emp/PF Snow Globe: 50 Ice/FF/Ice Strobe: 50 PB Shi Otomi: 50 Ninja/Ninjistu/GW Stalker My other characters