Multi-group content is not the way.

This.

A lot of what you get out of these trials is what you put into it. If all you put into it is mashing buttons....well, that's all you're going to get out of it too.

I like teaming with people who don't treat the game like a job. Interact with each other, if the only person talking is the league leader then you ARE a faceless grunt.

If you talk, or crack a joke, or interact with your fellow players.....your fellow players will remember it and want to do things with you again. It's not about the game remembering you did something, it's about other players remembering you did.

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

What makes you think that these roles are not as important or more so in the trials? Why would adding more people to a challenging situation diminish these contributions?

Also, mindlessly mashing buttons is a great way to fail these trials right now. The people who are succeeding right now, without a team loaded up with T3 J/I/L/D slots, are teams that are not "mindlessly mashing buttons" but approaching the trials with a plan and definite roles for every member at critical phases.

I love these new trials. I love that fun new content is available to me when I dont have time to form a big team or teams. I love that even if we fail, we still get some useful rewards. I love that the enemies are not weak and pitiful, to be killed en masse by my softcapped scrapper off on a tear a mile from the team. I'm quite glad these trials are a little tougher than the shard/merit vending machine that Apex/Tinmage turned out to be, although I do expect that once people get the J/I/L/D slots populated, they are going to be a lot easier.

Amen.

I love to talk when teamed and doing stuff (obviously during some situations it's good/fine not to talk but...in general)...when no one talks but me...man it's booooring...

I can? Cause the full BaF I was on, first I lagged to crap, then there were a bunch of flashy lights, then we fought Nightstar, then we started killing prisoners and crashed. Some people fired off Judgement nukes and Destiny buffs. I have no idea who did it. Somebody was using Storm powers. I have no idea who the stormy was. There was another Scrapper running around killing Vickys with me. I don't remember his name or powersets. There was a Brute at the prisoner door with me with the Soul Mastery immobilize. I don't remember his name or primary or secondary either.

On the other hand, I still remember some of who did what on the STFs I ran back when it was WST.

It isn't necessary. Anyone who thinks it is needs to learn to type faster or let a faster typist lead, or take five minutes before starting and explain everything to people who don't know what to do.

This is a common misconception, in that it mixes up two distinct concepts: 1) likes socialising with other people and 2) likes crowds. I am the former and am not the latter.

Personally, I like socialising. With one other person, two at most. A third other person is already a crowd, eight is unpleasant and 24 is a chicken coop. Just because I like hanging out with a couple people, this doesn't always translate into liking to hang out with a couple dozen people.

If given the choice, I will always pick a duo over solo. If given the choice, I will always pick solo over a full team. You can't "chat" with a large group of people. The most you can do is perform in front of the them as on a stage, and take turns with others who do the same. Pay attention to that when you're in a party, in a club or out with a large group of friends sometimes - whenever someone "talks," he's talking to the whole group, and attitudes and personalities change under those circumstances.

I've been on large teams. I've been to Hamidon raids. I'm a member of several very large global channels. I occasionally get suckered onto voice chat. Every time it's the same thing - once you get more than two or three other people on board, communication is no longer personal and instead becomes a public broadcast to the whole group. This isn't impossible to manage, it's just a chore and rarely if ever fun.

Please, don't try to paint people who don't like to join forces with 23 others and "banter" with them as reclusive. We're not. We just prefer smaller groups, and there's nothing wrong with that.

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More to point, I find any story, game or movie which requires multiples of anything ends up turning said thing faceless. If you need and have, say, one person with a gun, that person is memorable, because he's "the guy with the gun." If you have two, they may be memorable, say "the guy with the gun" and "the girl with the gun." If you have 12, they're just people with guns and no longer memorable.

I don't play games to be another brick in the wall, and I don't appreciate gameplay which requires me to be that.

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.

And if you had interacted with any of those people beyond just being on the same map....you probably would have a better memory of who they were.

Originally Posted by Dechs Kaison See, it's gems like these that make me check Claws' post history every once in a while to make sure I haven't missed anything good lately.

THERE WERE FOUR LIGHTS! hehe, sorry had to stop there and do that

Okay so I'm not seeing the point in this. Sometimes when I'm in a CoP or even in an 8 man team I don't know who did what.

Same as above.

Sounds like you were 'doing your part' in this whole thing...what's wrong? Is it because you didn't know everyone's name and their whole backstory/haven't teamed with them a lot?


I remember a few things that most don't either. I remember a few fun/great times I had doing x,y or z in the game....

The one and only trial I was on yesterday I remember who led it (or at least one of them...the other one I never really have seen in Liberty before to be honest ) and who was there (at least on my team) and what AT they were at the very least.


I almost always check the AT/powersets of the people I'm teamed with; now I'm not sure if you got into this BAF with/through the turnstile or not but...*shrugs* Even on STFs/etc, I always check powersets...just to know what I'm dealing with.

It's very easy to stand out on a LAMBDA trial with only 16 people/2 Teams and even on a BAF trial with 24.

Stand out by showing the initiative to speak up and offer advice in L-Chat. Stand out as a buffer by keeping a tank alive while he's trying to tank one of the AVs. Stand out as a tank/brute/meleers by saving the squishies' behinds from said AV.

A lot of people here have their blinders on because they hate the very premise of large scale trials/raids. Every year there are at least 4-5 crossovers that consist of 16 or more superheroes. Right now we have Age of X going and then we have Fear Itself with Marvel alone. Hell, Matt Fraction's Uncanny X-Men has a cast of about 30 X-Men in it. Does that make Emma Frost or Cyclops or Namor less "super" because they are in it?

Any crossover will have a handful of heroes who are there that just blend into the background due to apathy or the laziness of the writer. Any raid/trial will have a handful of players who are there that just blend into the background due to apathy of the laziness of the player.

OK, so you don't pay attention much, or perhaps you were overwhelmed by the new content and couldn't pay attention to who was doing what. It's not the case that because you don't remember people, that means nobody will or that nobody will make memorable contributions. It just doesn't follow, because your experience is not universal.

I remember the Blaster who parked himself in a great spot to pick off the Commandos I missed from the door my Scrapper was guarding. I remember the Tank who volunteered to call out sequestration warnings for a player who had some very low graphics settings. I remember the Mastermind who pulled Siege and Nightstar with a pet so nobody would have to eat hot death on the pull. I remember the Scrapper who led the four-super wrecking crew that handled the reinforcements for all the AV fight phases. I put at least four players on my five-star list that trial because I noticed them doing some good stuff.

That's really not true.

For one, part of my job is teaching university classes, and being that I teach "computers," this requires rather a lot more personal interaction with students than just reading off a powerpoint presentation. I have yet to remember a single student's name.

For another, I team with a lot of people in-game, when I feel like it. I ran an Admiral Stutter TF the other day, and I couldn't tell you the name of a single person on that, or what characters they were playing. I remember... I think one was a giant robot, though I forget the inspiration, and another was I think a zombie lady, whom I remember because she had the same Bolero my own character used. That's from an hour-and-a-half TF in which over half the chat was mine. There were just too many people to keep track of, and the only person who stood out was one who kept getting lost, whose name and costume I don't remember.

I'm perfectly capable of chatting with complete strangers, and have developed a speech pattern where I never have to address any person by name, or address any person directly almost ever. I can interact with people just fine without knowing who they are, what they're called, where they're from or what they do for a living. And most of the time, I have to deal with so many strangers I don't pay much attention anyway. The only way I remember people well enough for them to stick with me between play sessions is if I get to interact with them one-on-one or in small groups, or at the very least be with another talkative person on an otherwise silent team. But all that does is let me remember ONE person and forget the other six.

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.

100% agreement from me on this I have Ventrilo but never use it...don't like to.



I'm not a social person at all in real life ('getting better' at it though ) so I can understand. I'm not saying your reclusive or anything and I am fine with people being in smaller groups.


I know what you are saying in regards to the whole "guys with guns." Like any "hero/action" movie if the 'hero' is going up against 1 'evil guy' with a gun/sword/whatever you know it's going to be a good fight; but if there are 1 vs 100 then you know the hero will win because they are just 'minions'.

If you don't like the trials don't do them...however I'm trying to say that even in a group of 24 you can do your part and be successful. You can be the healer or scrapper or whatever it is you usually play. Just look to your team that you are with and don't try to "save the world" or in this case "save the league" by doing what you'd normally do in a duo/small team (jump into the 20+ mobs and expect to live/etc...).

And I remember some of that stuff.

But more than a dozen STF's where I don't remember anyone in particular.

Sometimes people stand out, sometimes they don't.

You can coordinate a full group of players you've never even met before in the BAF no problem, unless they purposely don't want to listen. If that is the case, Ventrillo would not help.

I don't want you to ever worry about Ventrillo becoming something that is required. I was able to do all of WoW's original 40 man raids while deaf, and I'm positive that COH's raid-lites will be easier to coordinate.

Otherwise known as the law of conservation of ninjutsu Something like that, yes. The more the characters in any given story, the less face time they get and the less memorable and awesome they are in the end. To wax anime for a moment:

Take Naruto, for example. That show has loads and loads of characters. I haven't counted, but there are probably over 50 named ones. They almost never show up together at the same time for anything other than epilogue greetings. Most of the time it's a team of four (standard for the show's canon laws) or several teams of four scattered across several different events. And even then loads of those characters spend months with no screen time at all.

In fact, the show had a couple of jokes about that. One was when Garra and his friends were shown in the script that they wouldn't be appearing in the next few story arcs, much to their disappointment. And indeed, we didn't see them for around a year. The other was a few characters joking about renaming the show into "Shikamaru Shippuuden" or "Asuma Shippuuden" because the titular protagonist was about to spend two full story arcs training and having not much of any plot to him. You know, like the last 200 episodes, but I digress.

Another good example is Shaman King. This show has a main cast of over a dozen, plus quite a fat supporting cast, plus a whole cadre of villains and a whole host of cameo characters. However, it manages to make all characters personable by leading them through each character's personal story arc one by one, highlighting that particular character as the story's main protagonist, with the rest acting like supporting cast and combat team-mates. I don't recall a single encounter in 64 episodes that wasn't focused on one specific character, up to and including the final battle that highlighted the show's de-facto protagonist.

What I'm saying is that, at least for some people, what feels "epic" isn't the number of warm bodies tossed at a problem like one might dispense bird seed for the pigeons in a public park, but rather a story which highlights a specific character or two or three and focuses on them. In fact, I just got done writing an essay on why stories should make us care and what stories should make us care about, and "characters" was and is central to that, in my eyes. And you really can't design any sort of gameplay which lets everyone shine in his own way when you're dealing with more people than you can fit on a bus.

That's not to say there isn't a kind of "epic" feel to a large-scale war where everyone in the show thus far goes all out. But it's a specific kind of "epic" that doesn't work for everybody.

I'm not so sure about that, myself. One of the reasons I've stuck with this game for so long can be summed up in the old 2001 trailer tagline: "City of Heroes, where YOU are the hero!" For the most part, this game does a great job of making me feel like THE hero. Not always on a team, no, but I'm careful about who I team with and what I team for. For the most part, I try to be on a team that specifically needs what I bring, and that goes some way towards fulfilling that specification. But when the team just needs "more" of what I have, it starts feeling faceless. I'm not a named hero, I'm "a Scrapper" or, more commonly, I'm just "DPS."

A poster recently said "Screw concept." in those exact words. This, to my eyes, is what these Trials are leading us to. I don't question whether the gameplay is fun or not. I'm sure it is for those that like that sort of thing. But it comes at the cost of fracturing my suspension of disbelief like a mirror by rubbing my face in the fact that I really am just another brick in the wall, just another face in the crowd, just another hero in a city that already has far too many. I know that to be true, but I try to ignore it as much as I can, and indeed pretend that the game is, in fact, all about me. I can do that solo just fine. I can do that on a small team. I can... Sort of do that on a large team. I can't do that in a league. Just can't.

So, no, I don't intend to work the Trials, and I don't intend to try and stop people from working them. To each their own. I just want to do what I can to cull the misconception that people like me are somehow callous or deficient or wrong in their preferences. No more, no less.

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.

Actually, that comforts me a lot.

I appreciate it, because I was able to do stuff on a large scale as well, and I dont want it to be a an issue with others, or myself.

Really, Vanden? Are you maybe confusing me with someone else? I'm not sure what I said that would give that to you, but the truth is that I actually rather like teaming. When I'm able to log in, I usually do about 1 full team TF a day. I try to limit myself to 1 of a particular TF so I don't feel burned out on them. When I'm not TFing, I usually send out an offer in global channels looking for members for mission teams.

My favorite part of teaming is finding a gestalt that works well within a particular group... like 'Defender is really keeping up with the buffs tonight. If we get a good rythym going, the Psi Blaster and Fire Controller can go in just behind the melee and melt the Cimerorans, EBs and all!'


I'd not really considered the Admiral Stutter TF when I said 'There wasn't a lot in i20 for me'. While it's not Incarnate content, it may be something good for my many mid-level characters. I've currently got a fun Elec/Rad controller, a Fire/Fire scrapper, an Energy/Elec stalker and a Fire/Psi blaster that could really benefit from new mid-level content.


Ideally, I'd like to see all level 50 content give at least SOME progress to the new Incarnate Progression. You can theoretically unlock one of the new slots with about 34 shards if you convert them to threads and then to Incarnate EXP. It seems like most of the common components were 10 threads... so slightly less than that to slot your first enhancer. Depending on how much I'm able to play, that's about 2-4 weeks of play for me assuming I don't play the trials.

The ideal solution to me would be the ability to trade Hero Merits or Reward Merits for Shards or Threads.

Now this may change as more people familiarize themselves with the trials, but right now, chatting hurts more than it helps since it interferes with giving useful information to newer players and coordination.

I generally know who's doing what in an 8-man team. I don't do CoPs because...again, big mess, flashing lights, who's doing what now?

I ran two out of three STFs when it was WST with complete strangers. I don't remember their names and I didn't read their backstories. The only one I ran with people I knew was a cakewalk and was boring. The two with strangers struggled in the last mission, but we did win, and they were memorable mostly because of the individual contributions that allowed us to win.

I pay attention despite the game's best attempts at overwhelming me with flashy lights and unnecessary pop-ups. I do not pay attention to who is doing what in a faceless mess of graphical effects. In a single team, it isn't a faceless mess. It's the really tough Invul Brute, the flying Energy Blaster who's really good at managing his own aggro, the Thermal who keeps everybody buffed all the time, the Fire armor Scrapper who keeps faceplanting and jokes about using RotP as part of his attack chain....it is a collection of individuals that come together to make a greater whole.

Da Nile is not just a river in Egypt ba dum zing....

This and this.

"Guys, we need more controllers and doms."

Is an Iron Man comic any less about Iron Man just because Spider-Man exists in the same universe and swings by in a panel or two? Is Sam's game any less about Sam just because you play the same game and run into him at the tram?

I have never seen a flood of people using their own personal experience as the reality of all players as I have this issue.

You might feel that way on a smaller team. I've done countless teams where I couldn't tell you what power sets people have. You know why? Because I wasn't obsessed with their powers or their bios, I was too busy chatting to them and inviting them to my global channel as a friend to team with next time.

Simply judging by your condescending tone in your post, you've painted your entire argument as null and void. We get it: Raids/Trials to you are just flashing lights and blah blah blah blah. Now please stop saying your experience = all of our experience and speak ONLY for yourself.

Ummmm...I don't think he was speaking of the aspect of Leagues. We all know that the Justice League and the Avengers have reservists etc beyond anything seen. And in comix huge multi-team/league aspects occure to gain readership. CoX is doing that with this content.

My understanding of what he suggested was that League content was not designed for CoX...Or I should say, that Cox, was not (And as of now, although new and will go through many changes) still not designed for it.

I didn't get that he does not understand the larger scale aspects of the comix.

I'm trying to tie in using Leagues for the new content and the difficulty of said content with the Dark Reign/Siege saga. We have to take down Tyrant, and to do that we have to smash up his Praetors. Eight people just isn't enough.

The heroes of Marvel had to take down Norman Osborn, and to do that they had to usurp him and those who follow him. Sending a few signature heroes wasn't enough.

My point: Regular 8 man teams usually won't be enough for this new content.