So Solo Friendly Incarnate Path=Team?

Ahh, lookit the petty wizziwig user trying to act like he knows what he's talking about.

End user system specs mean nothing to server side lag Tonyboy.

So sad that you can't get past your dev-worship to even acknowledge when THEY say that there's a problem.

I was thinking the exact same thing.

That "weird play style" wasn't weird for 6.5 years. In terms of character progression, until Issue 19, everything multiplayer was completely optional. I think this is because designers knew how weak the initial multiplayer offerings were. If players were *forced* to slog through the eight-hour, hell-on-Earth wipefest that the original Positron taskforce could easily become with every single toon in their character list, CoH would have been dead before it turned three.

I prefer to solo. I interact with other players just fine. I team up occasionally. Do I want to be stuck in a dungeon/raid/trial with *anybody* for hours at a time, and then have to repeat that experience indefinitely just so my character can upgrade himself enough to run the next dungeon/raid/trial? Hell no.

/agreed.

*chuckle*

For the next act, can he question Arcanaville's math skills?

Sorry, Tony, but you are way off here.

See my Guides and Tutorials

I missed the bit where this is in any way, shape or form a solo path. This is a team path for team rewards.

Handing it to another character hardly qualifies it for being a "solo path". It's a "I dont' want to do a trial on this character" path.

Originally Posted by Hyperstrike English does not borrow from other languages. English follows other languages down dark alleys, hits them over the head, and rifles through their pockets for loose grammar.

The saddest part is that is that he doesn't understand the fact that it's the devs he's questioning.

But, hey, OBVIOUSLY the devs know less about this game than he does.

I mean, this is the mighty TonyV we're talking about here. He can copy/paste information to a website!

No no, the sad part is there isn't more fire and brimstone being spewed. We've missed you BillZ!

It's not even that. It's an "I don't want to do anything on this character" path. Because that's the part that really wants me to track down that head-tilted confused beagle image. Unlocking the Alpha slot is the one part of the system that already has a legitimate solo path. So they're giving us a "solo option", which requires a League, and billing at as a viable solo alternative to something we can already solo.

Seriously, where's that dog?

He got eaten by facepalming Godzilla.

Say, we still haven't seen that guy in this thread, have we?

Here he is.

Yeah, that last bit is what throws me the most. Unlocking alpha has a solo component, so the solo path is to team so you can send a voucher to another character to skip the team AND solo component.

What I'd expect on a solo/small team path would, admittedly, be hard to balance - especially given the wide range of abilities. BZB's IO'd out monster is going to have a much easier time than, say, my SO'd out Ice/Psy dom (ok, used the SO build on her for Ramiel, which is why I'm using that example - does have some IOing done on another build.)

If we call each set of unlocks a level -
Alpha - level "0" (it's the unlock getting you into the whole thing, still, to my eyes,) Judgement/Interface - level 1, Lore L2, and so forth -

I'd expect to see two to three decent length arcs for level "1," probably an additional one on level "2" - for each side of the tree. Grinding the trials would still be faster, yes. The iXP would probably be rewarded at arc completion. They'd be a pain to come up with, write, and balance, I'm sure.

See my Guides and Tutorials

I don't disagree with you and have argued more than most of you know against the path the devs took. But we all have to recognize that the devs WILL move incrementally in this.

A bit off-topic to the solo thing, but the most recent patch offered a major bone that I'm not really sure has sunk in yet. A Notice now gives 40 threads. That's enough (with inf) to unlock Alpha or Judgment or Interface all by itself. It's only 5 short of what's needed to unlock Destiny and Lore. That's a MAJOR boon for those who don't want to do the trials.

I think the idea that the devs are moving towards is one where you have one-two trial runners, but can still advance any or all of your level 50s. They just don't seem to be interested in supporting the extreme soloist right now, but people willing to meet them half-way will probably find the system to be much more accommodating after Incarnates Ascend goes live. My guess is that the recent moves will open the Incarnate system to 90+% of the playerbase. Sure folks aren't going to be getting all T3-T4s in a week like hardcore trial runners, but right now a month of play with only an occassional trial here and there, plus doing the WST would result in all slots opened and commons or better in all slots. That's not bad in my book. It's enough that I'm not going to beat the devs up too much for not providing my perfect solo path to this stuff.

I want to be clear about something. I very much want a solo path. I have several characters who I have little desire to run the trials with, but would like to make some progress in the incarnate system. But I don't want some easy-mode system that kills the trials. Because they are fun. And if the devs make the solo path too accessible then yes it will hurt the trials.

OK, I admit, even a grumpy as I am, I did not manage to spot THAT particular bit of paradox writing. Thank you, Lazarillo, for giving me the first smile since I saw that announcement

---

In other news, I still dismiss the "This is a multiplayer game! Ya havsta team!" mentality. No, it's a multiplayer game and I have to INTERACT with other people. Nowhere in that definition, however, is there a certain minimum number of people I have to interact with at any given time, nor is there only a specific method of interaction - teaming - given. I have a couple of examples to offer.

I have a friend in-game whom I always chat up as soon as I see him on. Luckily, we happen to share interests, philosophies and preferences for fiction, so we always have much to talk about. I've gone entire play sessions spanning several hours splitting my time half-and-half between beating things into a greasy spot and leading a conversation about the proper methodology towards describing the inner torment of a fictional character, taking far more pleasure in the conversation than the actual game. I consider this multiplayer by virtue of involving multiple people playing a game together. I don't recall ever teaming with this person more than perhaps one or two extraordinary times.

I have another friend who isn't much for in-depth discussions or idle chit-chat, but who enjoys playing the game greatly and luckily has agreed to expand on the servers where I play. We usually team up and run in a duo every time we're both on at the same time until one of us has to go to work, go to bed, go to dinner or falls asleep on the keyboard (as I have). It's usually only just a team of two, and we've levelled up quite a few characters almost together without levelling pacts or anything of the sort. I consider this multplayer by virtue of involving multiple people playing a game together.

But apparently THAT isn't social enough and teaming enough to qualify for the "solo" path. Doh!

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, the saddest part is that you and a few other people can't seem to get past something that 99% of the player base loves, and that whenever the devs post, "Hey, here's some cool new stuff!" and everyone else is getting excited, you can't help but wallow in the misery of some misperceived slight, as if they are trying to very deliberately and personally screw you over.

Actually, I don't do much copying and/or pasting these days. I do more of the managing the back-end server, software, security, and hosting processes that handles traffic as high as 3.5 million page loads from over 40,000 unique visitors every month with zero advertising, while periodically herding the cats who develop, release, and improve a handful of massively popular Titan Network applications. Edit: But yeah, to be fair, if you want to compare what I do to what, say, Guy Perfect, Keen, Diellan, and DeProgrammer are doing, I'd probably be towards or at the tail end of that list in terms of hours spent working on the Titan Network.

But I have to admit that for the people who are doing the copying and pasting, as well as so faithfully monitoring minute-by-minute game news and information, designing templates, formatting layouts, and scrambling for days after every game release; apparently unlike your computer's hardware and/or configuration, I'm proud that it seems to be working pretty well.

Hold a Mission Architect contest to solicit ideas from the community. Sure, there's things you can't do in MA that you can do in Incarnate trials... but some of them are cheating anyway. And, sure, there's legal ramifications to an idea like that. But they are not insurmountable with all the right notices and releases and a long chat with legal and maybe a shiny badge or something thrown in.

Darn it, Paragon Studios, you've got some damn fine features available in your own bloody MMO and a player community that has proven itself over and over to be very supportive of the future of the game. Leverage ALL your assets. If I thought about it a while I could probably come up with a way to involve the costume creator, super bases, PvPers, and the market in the idea of recruiting the players to help you figure this out. Not worth the effort for something that will just at best touch off a massive flame war... everyone forget I said anything...

I think Galactus just told Unicron his momma was fat...

You got any chocolate with that popcorn? /pulls up a chair

Also, Tony, when 99% of the people on raids are saying "Lag again?" "yeah, they've still not fixed it" then, hey, I think it's YOU who are the odd one out here, not everyone else. Not to mention the Devs have acknowledged it's laggy as all hell.

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.

It's still not a solo-friendly path, but at least it wasn't advertised as such. And at least you only need 3-7 other people to progress this way.
Honestly, that sounds even more boring to me than running them with multiple characters. At least it's a slightly different experience that way.

I did meet them halfway. I've run enough trials to have three T3s on two characters, two T3s on two more, and I'm working on unlocking the slots on a fifth. I'm bored of the trials. The new one will be nice to have, but it won't be new forever. If it's more difficult and/or time-consuming than BAF, it will be hard to form leagues for, especially since it doesn't have Lambda's advantage of requiring fewer people. And then what?

And I think at that point they'll have to question whether people really find the trials fun, and more importantly, whether people really find repeating the trials many many times fun. On the plus side for trial runners, people who really would rather solo won't be soloing in the trials.

Way to side-step his actual comment.

I look at it like this. I genuinely find Hamidon raids fun. But if there were a solo mission that offered 4 shards or 53 merits or a HO/SHO for the exact same time commitment, then I don't know that I would ever do a Hamidon again. Why?

Soloing is just less of a hassle than grouping. Grouping is great when it's effortless. I love when I log in, check the globals and see someone recruiting for something I wanted to do. Takes the hassle away. It's not the actual activity I dislike, it's the set-up and out of character stuff. This is why WoW's grouping queues are starting to crop up in every game. Those things take a MAJOR hassle out of grouping by making the server do it for you. They introduce new problems unfortunately, but ultimately they make the experience of forming groups easier.

In my experience, which is admittedly anecdotal, most solo focused players don't really mind the group activity, they mind the grouping process.

It's hard to find anything meaningful to respond to among the personal attacks and the "woe is me, life sucks, everyone's miserable" attitude, especially when some people play with blinders on that block out all the coolness. I'm a happy CoH player, not a therapist.

Issue: The Devs have acknowledged that, yes, ITrials are laggy right now.

You are claiming they aren't, when actually the majority, both in-game and on-forums, find they are.

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.

That's part of it, and of course the bigger the group the more annoying the process. A better system to group people up doesn't help when there aren't enough people who want to group when you do. Solo content can be done whenever the hell you feel like it, while group content can only be done when other people feel like it.

Then there is the "I watched the Simpsons while running a BAF" aspect. The bigger the group, the more it comes down to "use your most powerful abilities as fast as they recharge" and less a matter of picking and choosing what to do when so you can win. How long did you spend in Mids trying to make yourself as invincible as possible? Who cares, have some buffs from 12 people, now everyone is invincible. For something billed as a challenge, the trials often aren't, or at least they aren't enough of one that everybody actually has to be up to the challenge.

And there is are performance issues. Lag is one thing, and IMO it's something the devs don't do nearly enough to minimize, but there is also the flash bang boom flash flash flash I can't see the AV in all that crap flashy flashy flashy NEED MOAR FLASHY FX overload that happens no matter how good your PC is. Some people don't like that. I hate it when I can't clearly see my guy, let alone anyone else's.

LOL, TonyV is not helping himself right now.

The devs have pretty much said some parts of the trials are laggy and they ARE working to fix it.

It's been a while that I've seen the impersonation of an ostrich.

*gets more popcorn*