So Solo Friendly Incarnate Path=Team?
By
Amy_Amp,
Posted on: 2011-05-25 15:39 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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Actually Bill, that specific statement was due to a very specific league mechanic change that was doing something so bad it was hurting leagues all over the place, not just trials. It made a mothership raid on Triumph I was on look like it was a PowerPoint presentation.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
You lie.
Even Positron says so. |
Tony doesn't have to be lying about not experiencing lag in the trials, because I don't experience lag in the trials sufficient to impair my ability to function most of the time. In fact, except for the aforementioned case where the devs literally turned City of Heroes into an email-based turn by turn MMO I've only experienced serious functional lag during BAF escape phases, and maybe twice in Lambda collection phases. Whatever is causing lag in Lambda collection phases is not universal server-side lag, because I keep track of that.
My system is powerful enough and my internet usually fast enough (bandwidth and latency) that I'm usually no longer a victim of any source of client-side lag, so its possible what people are experiencing is a combination of the two and the buff thing mentioned in the thread (I have that enabled, incidentally, because I haven't experienced the problem yet). Weird interactions between some server side lag, client side lag, and data streaming issues can explain why some people seem to have extreme lag problems and other people seem to experience none of them. It would be more complicated than tracking down any one root cause, which would make it difficult to isolate and correct.
As to the topic at hand, I've read the announcement and it doesn't say the vouchers are a "solo path" or a "solo option" even though people are using those phrases in quotes like they are quoting someone. It says:
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It says if you prefer to play alone, there will be a way to unlock alpha and make some progress on other slots and powers after completing the trials once on one character. That is a very strong improvement in the situation if it stands for people who prefer to play alone. It doesn't help people who refuse to team ever but the devs did not say they were presenting a solution for those players. Their wording is specific: people who prefer to play alone.
The only weird thing is that the way the entire article is written its implied that Astral Christy and Empyrean Michael sell things specifically *for* astral and empyrean merits, which players who run the trials once cannot currently earn any other way. If that's not the *only* currency they take, its possible that once unlocked those two vendors will sell vouchers for other payment: shards, influence, etc. If that is so, then it is still a way for a player who prefers to solo to have a way into the incarnate system for their characters that only involves running a single trial, which means they can continue to exercise their preference after running only a single prerequisite trial. That's more than fair to those players specifically.
But if Astral Christy and Empyrean Michael only accept astral and empyrean merits, then I would have to concur that the devs misspoke, again. They really should take me up on that offer to sanity check these things.
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And that's the important part right there, A. It's a far cry from "I don't get lag."| because I don't experience lag in the trials sufficient to impair my ability to function most of the time. |
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| I've only experienced serious functional lag during BAF escape phases |
Now can we guess why my response to you is so different than my response to him?
Be well, people of CoH.
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The length isn't really the issue with the trials (or even with the TFs these days). It's the repetition of the same content and scenarios. Running BAF 10 times with the same toon for what basically amounts to a carrot to entice me to run BAF 10 more times with that very same toon for a slightly nicer carrot to entice me to run BAF 10 more times to get another carrot...is what I do the day before I blow my fool head off.|
Originally Posted by MTS
How does dislike of an 8-hour meat grinder TF apply to trials that are over with in 30-40 minutes tops, win or lose?
I'm genuinely curious. |
I tried the similar endgame system in that extremely popular fantasy MMORPG we cannot name and it drove me crazy. So, I quit pursuing it, did my own thing for a couple of years, eventually ran out of new things to do, and ultimately left the game. Some people have fun with a system like the Incarnate System. I simply don't. Part of CoH's appeal all these years was it had no mandatory system for anything but a couple of TF and Trial-dependent badges, accolades, and costume pieces, none of which were required to progress in the game.
So, let the folks who like the Incarnate System do their thing while the people who opt out are given something else to do that is meaningful and consistent with the gameplay of the last seven years. As it is, the last infusion of something else meaningful - not to mention free non-aura costume pieces - was Going Rogue. By the time Issue 21 and its rumored new zone, etc., rolls around, the expansion will probably be at least a year old. Two and a half issues out from GR, the wait is kind of starting to suck.
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Implied?|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
The only weird thing is that the way the entire article is written its implied that Astral Christy and Empyrean Michael sell things specifically *for* astral and empyrean merits, which players who run the trials once cannot currently earn any other way.
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| Astral and Empyrean merit vendors are now stationed in Ouroboros. They offer new in-game merit rewards in exchange for Astral Merits (less valuable) or Empyrean Merits (more valuable). These rewards include Ascension Armor pieces, chest emblems, auras, social and costume change emotes, account rewards, and Invention Origin recipes. |
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For me personally, I wouldn't necessarily say tiny, but smaller than the forums make it appear. Since I don't see the same sort of ranting going on during the Incarnate Trials I am on.|
Originally Posted by McCharraigin
Golden Girl I apologize for my tone, but I am curious as to how you are so darn confident that we are tiny.
Lisa-Going back to game |
It's important to really remember that folks will be unhappy with anything with a MMO. Something interesting that BAB relayed way back was just how high the churn rate was for the game.
One side comment, Marketing doesn't typically intend to do things to sabotage the game. They may fail, and be misguided, yes, but those that fail and are misguided, themselves fail. Just a minor pet peeve at the vilification of marketing
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I wouldn't expect to hear a lot of griping about the lack of a solo incarnate path by people running large team trials.
| For me personally, I wouldn't necessarily say tiny, but smaller than the forums make it appear. Since I don't see the same sort of ranting going on during the Incarnate Trials I am on. |
Be well, people of CoH.
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Well, when one of the counterpoints is that "they have no other choice but to run trials", *shrug*.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
I wouldn't expect to hear a lot of griping about the lack of a solo incarnate path by people running large team trials.
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But, sure, okie-doke.
Let's Dance!
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My point was that I haven't heard any griping for a solo path while doing those trials either. From myself or anyone else.|
Originally Posted by reiella
Well, when one of the counterpoints is that "they have no other choice but to run trials", *shrug*.
But, sure, okie-doke. |
What would be the point of griping about it there? At least here, the devs (well, maybe not anymore) read these threads. My league mates aren't going to be able to do anything about it.
Be well, people of CoH.
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I'd contest that people [edit: I have no clue why I had don't here but, now it's gone] do pointless complaining. After all, I remember the gripes during the Praetorian surge on our server, during the MSR, and other large event incidents. Pointless complaining about the nerf/fix to Interface. I complained pointless in AE groups in the aftermath of the anniversary announcement |
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
My point was that I haven't heard any griping for a solo path while doing those trials either. From myself or anyone else.
What would be the point of griping about it there? At least here, the devs (well, maybe not anymore) read these threads. My league mates aren't going to be able to do anything about it. |
.I see people complaining pointlessly fairly often in the game
.Again, it's just a perception thing, same as with the forums, I imagine the vast majority are really just impartial to the system.
Let's Dance!
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It does say that, but it doesn't say that is the *only* thing you can buy them with. Its commonly stated that the alignment vendors allow you to purchase recipes with alignment merits, which is technically true. But they also allow you to upconvert normal merits for alignment merits, which means in a functional sense they allow you to spend normal merits as well - with a time gate. Its possible Astral Christy and Empyrean Michael will work similarly (I would have called them Astral Amy and Empyrean Edward myself).|
Originally Posted by Eva Destruction
Implied?
It pretty much flat out states that these things are bought with Astrals and Empyreans. |
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| Can you blame anyone for reading it that way? |
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I agree it's weird. But since you're here, Arcanaville, I'll ask you in earnest the question I asked rhetorically earlier: what else could be used to buy the vouchers that would be reasonable? Moreover, if it's acceptable to use things other than iMerits to buy them, why limit the vouchers to characters* that have run an iTrial at least once?|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
No, which is why I said it was weird. If they accepted other currency, you'd think that would be something marketing would want to hype. If they don't, its not really "a boon" to people that prefer to solo. I know its weird for one of those two reasons, but not which one.
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In another thread you mentioned that the whole point of the Incarnate system was to reward the character being played, hence why the components are bound to the character. I felt the same way. Yet the only point I can see in this new system is to let you progress one character by playing another. So I really don't understand what the thought process is here. Can you make any sense of it?
-D
* EDIT: On second reading, it sounds more like players.
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And you bore me. Wallow in your misery and tell yourself whatever heinous things you imagine about me to make you feel more important, I don't care. I like how the game is going, I have for a long time, I'm not having these problems that seem to be destroying you, everyone I run across in game seems to be pretty cool and pleased, and I've got better things to do than to bicker pointlessly with you.|
Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
You lie.
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By the way, my box is an Intel Core i7-2600K quad-core hyperthreaded CPU, 16 GB DDR3 1600 RAM, an ATI Radeon HD 5800, and two G.SKILL Phoenix Pro 120 GB SSDs, all plugged into an ASUS Maximus IV Extreme mobo, connected to the Internet via a Comcast 22 Mbps Internet connection and running 64-bit Windows 7. When I'm running City of Heroes, I disable active virus scanning and try to keep background processes to a minimum. Try that. Maybe you won't be so quick to make impossible to justify assumptions about my gameplay experience.
We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.
(If you love this game as much as I do, please read that post.)
Okay so don't get me wrong I enjoy teaming and enjoy the trials for the most part.. I am very happy with 2 things that will occur in 20.5
1. A new trial .. cause I have done the two we have now WAY too many times.
2. the ability FINALLY to shut off the cut scenes so we can just do the mission at hand!
But this whole Solo Freindly thing that obviously someone in marketing dreamed up confuses me. Solo friendly TO ME would be, as mentioned here by some, Incarnate arcs that award IXP, shards, threads, components etc... required for a player to open and slot the various powers now available only by running the two trials.
All these vouchers do is allow me to grab my favorite character(s) and run the same trials over and over.. then buy vouchers which I can email to me other 50 levels so they don't have to run trials to become an incarnate. I can't gift or sell those vouchers to another player so they NEVER have to run a single trial on ANY character to become an incarnate I can only send them to myself.
Okay I do have more than twenty 50 level characters on Virtue and presently only 12 have any incarnate powers. this system will allow me, eventually, to open powers and slot them on the other characters without having to do all that TFing and Trialing again and again. But just HOW in heavens name does that equate to being solo friendly? Some character I own still has to actually do the trials to earn the merits and BUY the vouchers.
There are players out there that due to PC limitations or just personal preferences can't or won't team. One of the truly great things about this game is you DON'T need to stand around waiting for a team to advance. I have been telling people for years.. team when you can if you want to level quickly BUT solo when no teams are available. If you stand around for 30 minutes waiting for a team ... how many solo missions could you have completed? QUICK ANSWER .. in my experience about 2 or 3 maybe 4 if your fast enough.
Some players just like to Solo because it truly makes them feel SUPER. Sure there are plenty of super heroes groups in comics but we also have Superman (mostly a soloist), Batman (solos and from time to time is part of a duo), Spiderman (Somehow I don't think a sexy red headed wife counts as a team mate.. soloist). What these players are saying is UNTIL these trials and the incarnate stuff arrived it was possible to be BATMAN or SPIDERMAN. You could team but there was nothing preventing you from going it alone. And when they spoke up after the incarnate system began and asked about earning incarnate powers they were TOLD it was coming.. This hardly seems like their desires were fulfilled.
Little Billy Hero: "So explain to me again how this new stuff lets me solo and be an incarnate Marketing Man."
Marketing Man: "Well Billy instead of all your characters running trials over and over you just pick one and run trials with it. Then buy vouchers that allow your other characters to skip the trials and just add the new powers."
Little Billy Hero: "But doesn't that mean that one HERO will have to run an AWFUL lot of trials?"
Marketing Man: "Why yes Billy. in fact your hero will have to run tons and tons of trials to make this work."
Little Billy Hero: "But if that happens when do i have time to play the other 50 levels or my lower level characters?"
Marketing Man: "Well probably never Billy or at least not for a very long time until you slot all your characters or just stop and settle with the ones you have slotted. I mean after all so far those characters you mention are 5 powers behind but don't forget we have AT LEAST 5 more still to come. So really you will never completely catch up.. EVER"
LONG SILENCE
Marketing Man: "Why are you crying like that Billy. We said we'd make the incarnate system solo player friendly. You CAN eventually have heroes that never ran a single trial and they can solo as much as you like and still have all the new powers. Hey we gave you what you wanted.. DIDN'T WE?"
UMMMMM NO! 
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It only shuts off the intro cutscenes - so that means Sister Silicone won't be seen so much, but Marauder will still be doing his big dawg routine on every Lambda run.
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Originally Posted by Wicked_Wendy
2. the ability FINALLY to shut off the cut scenes so we can just do the mission at hand!
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@Golden Girl
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Two good questions. On the matter of the first question, I think an obvious potential source of alternate currency for the merit vendors that can be earned outside the trials are shards and notices. You can already convert shards to threads and then to components and iXP but that is timegated to 10 threads per day (for the efficient path). The devs could have atomic timegates for singular conversions: 60 shards into a single uncommon component voucher in one conversion, rather than 6 shard to thread conversions timegated to six days.|
Originally Posted by Darkonne
I agree it's weird. But since you're here, Arcanaville, I'll ask you in earnest the question I asked rhetorically earlier: what else could be used to buy the vouchers that would be reasonable? Moreover, if it's acceptable to use things other than iMerits to buy them, why limit the vouchers to characters* that have run an iTrial at least once?
In another thread you mentioned that the whole point of the Incarnate system was to reward the character being played, hence why the components are bound to the character. I felt the same way. Yet the only point I can see in this new system is to let you progress one character by playing another. So I really don't understand what the thought process is here. Can you make any sense of it? -D * EDIT: On second reading, it sounds more like players. |
You could also have (probably very high) influence driven conversions for people who have alts that have earned lots of influence but not as much incarnate rewards.
The second question is trickier. I don't want to hit the devs too hard about a system I don't know the details about and hasn't launched yet, but if you can earn incarnate progress on character A and then transfer that to character B, then fundamentally the incarnate system is no longer a character progression system. Its a player progression system of sorts, where the player can spread that progress around to whichever characters they want, but its not specifically a character progress system anymore.
I don't know if the devs fully appreciate the position that sort of decision puts them in. The system as it is now ties incarnate progress to direct character activity, making it character progress. That property affords them some defense against certain kinds of changes. That defense evaporates in a system where incarnate progress can be traded. Incarnate progress becomes a currency, not a progress metric. And once it becomes a currency, a huge weight of argument that currently works in defense of the current system will be turned against the system in its current form.
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But isn't that what people already do? Like they mail millions of Inf to their new avatars, or send purple recipes to alts?
@Golden Girl
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And yet you come back for more in a sad attempt to cover your BS. Nice rig. You still get lag in the BAF and you're still a liar. You can't avoid code side issues.|
Originally Posted by TonyV
And you bore me. Wallow in your misery and tell yourself whatever heinous things you imagine about me to make you feel more important, I don't care. I like how the game is going, I have for a long time, I'm not having these problems that seem to be destroying you, everyone I run across in game seems to be pretty cool and pleased, and I've got better things to do than to bicker pointlessly with you.
By the way, my box is an Intel Core i7-2600K quad-core hyperthreaded CPU, 16 GB DDR3 1600 RAM, an ATI Radeon HD 5800, and two G.SKILL Phoenix Pro 120 GB SSDs, all plugged into an ASUS Maximus IV Extreme mobo, connected to the Internet via a Comcast 22 Mbps Internet connection and running 64-bit Windows 7. When I'm running City of Heroes, I disable active virus scanning and try to keep background processes to a minimum. Try that. Maybe you won't be so quick to make impossible to justify assumptions about my gameplay experience. |
While your attempts to overplay my statements are sad and pointless, much like your cog in a huge corporation job where you have no important decision making responsibilities, nothing about the developer decisions are destroying me or causing me misery. If I get annoyed, I simply walk away from the game. As I have before and will no doubt do so again.
It's a pleasant diversion to come back to from time to time. Much like our lovely conversations.
Be well, people of CoH.
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If the component conversion costs are any indication, I think you'll find that the rate of transfer will be so incredibly inefficient compared to just running the trials on the character you want to progress, that no one will seriously use it. i.e. the progress you get from converting another character's merits is so glacially slow that it's only a "last resort" use for extra merits once you already have everything else you could possibly want to spend them on.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
The second question is trickier. I don't want to hit the devs too hard about a system I don't know the details about and hasn't launched yet, but if you can earn incarnate progress on character A and then transfer that to character B, then fundamentally the incarnate system is no longer a character progression system. Its a player progression system of sorts, where the player can spread that progress around to whichever characters they want, but its not specifically a character progress system anymore.
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I mean like in the 1 Astral to 1 Thread, 1 Empyrean to 5 Thread range. With as punishing as all the other incarnate-related conversions are, I just can't see them going with anything more than that.
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I can't speak for Tony and I really don't want to get in the middle of whatever issues you have with each other, but I do BAFs all the time without lag in the prisoner phase (and also many times with lag). It's much less of a problem in 16-player leagues, and nonexistent in 12-player leagues.
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Originally Posted by Bill Z Bubba
And yet you come back for more in a sad attempt to cover your BS. Nice rig. You still get lag in the BAF and you're still a liar. You can't avoid code side issues.
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I only get BAF lag on like half the servers - the rest are fine, and since the latest patch, I haven't run into any major BAF lag at all.
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Originally Posted by MTS
I can't speak for Tony and I really don't want to get in the middle of whatever issues you have with each other, but I do BAFs all the time without lag in the prisoner phase (and also many times with lag). It's much less of a problem in 16-player leagues, and nonexistent in 12-player leagues.
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@Golden Girl
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My box is a piddly i7-860 with 16 gigs of Ram and an ATI 5800, and I octoboxed eight logins to get the Swiss Draw badge. Seriously, what does disabling antivirus do on that behemoth, reduce the temperature in the room by a milli-kelvin?
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Originally Posted by TonyV
By the way, my box is an Intel Core i7-2600K quad-core hyperthreaded CPU, 16 GB DDR3 1600 RAM, an ATI Radeon HD 5800, and two G.SKILL Phoenix Pro 120 GB SSDs, all plugged into an ASUS Maximus IV Extreme mobo, connected to the Internet via a Comcast 22 Mbps Internet connection and running 64-bit Windows 7. When I'm running City of Heroes, I disable active virus scanning and try to keep background processes to a minimum.
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Oddly I'm more impressed that you have 8 accounts than that you can log all 8 in.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
My box is a piddly i7-860 with 16 gigs of Ram and an ATI 5800, and I octoboxed eight logins to get the Swiss Draw badge. Seriously, what does disabling antivirus do on that behemoth, reduce the temperature in the room by a milli-kelvin?
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Not the same thing in any way shape or form. Until 20.5 you cannot mail anything the you NEED to progress in the incarnate system to yourself. And before anyone says influence, no. Influence by itself CANNOT allow you to advance in the Incarnate system.|
Originally Posted by Golden Girl
But isn't that what people already do? Like they mail millions of Inf to their new avatars, or send purple recipes to alts?
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You still need shards, threads, commons, uncommons, and rares to be able to do ANYTHING with the slots. NONE of that can be emailed. . . yet?
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Yep, which is why I keep telling people not to get too excited about these new things they can buy with Astrals and Emps, until they see the costs of things.|
Originally Posted by MTS
If the component conversion costs are any indication, I think you'll find that the rate of transfer will be so incredibly inefficient compared to just running the trials on the character you want to progress, that no one will seriously use it. i.e. the progress you get from converting another character's merits is so glacially slow that it's only a "last resort" use for extra merits once you already have everything else you could possibly want to spend them on.
I mean like in the 1 Astral to 1 Thread, 1 Empyrean to 5 Thread range. With as punishing as all the other incarnate-related conversions are, I just can't see them going with anything more than that. |
Recent history DOES NOT give me confidence that they will get the costs to a place that everyone will like. Ofcourse for me personally I don't mind any of the costs. Hell I didn't even mind the ORIGINAL conversion costs.
But I get that not everyone can make 1-2 billion inf a week.
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