Make contact stores useful again!

I cannot find the article on paragonwiki, but I remember reading about the way you went about buying enhancements in the olden days of City of Heroes. There were no stores, and the only way to get enhancements was from contacts.

But then, they went and added stores. Stores were a lot more time-efficient, since I could just run to the store instead of doing X missions for my contact. They were also cost-efficient, being cheaper than contact stores. Right now, I'm pretty sure it's safe to say that absolutely no one uses the contact stores anymore.

And yet, I'm informed all the time of which types of enhancements contacts sell, and they always make sure to remind me that their store is open. Why hasn't this been fixed? They now stand as a tribute to a long forgotten system that is no longer used by the players.

I suggest we breathe new life into the contact stores. Nobody uses them now because they are far too expensive, so why not just lower the prices? They could be equal-to or less-than the prices set by the stores. In fact, you could have the more difficult contacts offer cheaper prices, or maybe the prices lower when you complete their story arc. Give us an incentive to actually pick contacts based on their enhancement offers.

Actually the stores were hidden. What was finally added were the icons for them. What you could get from contacts were the "power 10" enhancements (and heck if I can remember them - Acc, Dam, Confuse, Recharge, End Reduction, Holds... I don't know if the two that were combined into EndMod were in them or not - in any case, they're still, IIRC, the ones available from contacts.)

Wouldn't argue with the price being changed - of course, the other issue is that the contact may well not *sell* the stuff you want, and there's no way of knowing other than remembering what was said at their intro. (And why do the RWZ contacts sell DOs?)

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Not a bad idea a'tall.

Or make contact enhancements --->slightly<--- more powerful and more expensive than store enhancements (you'd get discounts as you gained favor with the contact) in the level 30+ game.

I still think the idea of doing missions to unlock the lvl 35+ and 40+ stores was a bad idea.

Goodness, I still recall running the Bricks/Founders store contact missions just for enhancements. Never really bothered me back then because I like the atmosphere of those two zones, but since the markets and IO's I don't think I've run any in years.

I'd be all for updating the contact stores. I wondered that myself the other night when I got the standard check out my stuffs message from Hardluck. I mentally asked why he even bothered.

I particularly like the unique temp recipe at the end of arcs. It would be IC and immersive and would be more incentive to run the arcs! Win/Win.

Currently, I only use contact stores is buying inspirations after exemplaring for regular missions. After my team comes out of a mission, I can quickly visit a nearby contact to replace any inspirations, and then get to the next mission in the story arc without delay.

This requires preparation when initially doing the contact missions, though. For example, doing enough of their missions, such that they "open up" to sell the entire range of inspirations. Once I'd opened a scattering of contacts throughout each zone, that makes them useful for quick inspiration stops.

-Johnny

I used to do that for inspirations, until AE came out. It slowly became easier to just look for the recognizable building in every zone.

Even more so now that all the hospital's have helpful nurses!
I haven't bought anything from my contacts this year.

The game has changed, generally for the better and/or more convenient.
That's my reply to the OP as well.

One way for contact stores to be interesting again would be the possibility, every time you complete a mission for them, to buy one common or uncommon salvage piece for a reasonable price. Some contacts would sell arcane, tech or even more thematical slavages in their level brackets (think Rikti Metal for the FBI guy in FF, or Carnival Mask for the editor in PI.) Completing a story arc would let you buy one RARE material. All those would be available only once per arc or mission, but it would really make Flashbacking for salvage a worthwhile thing, and it'd be far easier than AE farming for some common stuff. Of course, the option still would not unlock until you got the first level store for common salvage, or second level for uncommon/rare.