Smaller, better leagues


Adeon Hawkwood

 

Posted

I'm sure most of you that participate in the incarnate trials have seen the advertising for mini BAFs. ost are probably keenly aware of what it means but I decided to post here and go over some of the benefits.

Okay lets start with size.. A maxed out BAF requires 24 players and depending on the time of day can fill quickly or take as much as 20-30 minutes to fill. A mini BAF can have as few as 12 players so recruiting takes up much less time

Now lets discuss LAG .. Not everyone deals with this but most of us do in one form or the other and it can cause attacks to take a lifetime to fire off or casue problems as extreme a crashing. The worst lag time on a BAF of course occurs during the Escaped Prisoner Phase and with a smaller team the lag is not nearly as bad and the number of prisoners is much smaller so it becomes much easier to prevent any escapes thus earning an extra astral or if its your first time ... a badge, the astral and a component.

Adds .... Okay this is one area where if you are still working on IXP a mini may not be for you. With a smaller team there are less adds meaning less stuff to kill so less XP. However is you have your Judgement and Lora open a mini means less Adds trying to take off hyour character's head while you are trying to defeat the AVs.

Time in trial .. I haven't really tried to gauge this but I think it's pretty much about the same on a mini as it is on a full sized BAF. Less adds may make it easier to concentrate on the AV but less team mates means it may take a bit longer, depending on the team make up, to defeat them.


Now the important thing with a mini is .. SIGHS .. it does require the players to actually pay a bit more attention to instructions. If you are on team one and team one and two are supposed to go to the south and do choke points ..... standing at a door up north is not helping your team andmay result in the trial failing. Quite a few of us now have multiple incarnates and what we are working on is either tier 4s or just accumulating astral and empyrean merits to but stuff at the stores in Ouroborus.... FAILING the trial because you don't feel like paing attention means you just blew an emp and now get to start all over again. Now keep in mind that 4 astrals = 16 threads while 1 empyrean = 18 at the store and you can see why folks don't like the idea of failure.

I have done both the full sized and the min and enjoyed each but I tend to lean toward the mini trials.. I am not sure but I think my rare and very rare drops may be better since I started joining them. Anyway that gives anyone that has no clue an idea of what a MINI is.. so go join one and see for yourself!


�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon

 

Posted

My friend who plays and does lots of iTrials raves about how much faster and easier BAFs are with smaller sized groups.

Having less escapees with better spacing and less ambushers, and the less lag, makes him much happier.

I think he said Lambda was faster/easier, too, but I don't recall for sure.


 

Posted

I prefer the large groups myself.

Mostly as the larger chaos is far more entertaining.


Let's Dance!

 

Posted

Another slight variation I have seen is Lam/Mini-BAF back to back. Ideally with all the same folks.


It's not how many times you get knocked down that count. It's how many times you get up.

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by ImpulseKing View Post
Another slight variation I have seen is Lam/Mini-BAF back to back. Ideally with all the same folks.

Yeah I have been a part of a number of those recently and they are a lot of fun and very quick. Perfect for people that don't have a lot of time or players that are pretty much set on power slot just looking to collect astral and empyrean merits to use at the store.

For new incarnates the speed Lamdba does skip a good bit of potential IXP because you jump the wall of the facility and just clear out the IDT forces in the courtyard. But depending on how much INF a player has buying IXP with threads is faster than running multiple trials anyway so the more Astrals and Emps you can earn and convert to threads the quicker you can open powers.

heheh A small warning.. I did one of the Speed Lam/Mini Bafs recently and despite the briefing prior to entering the queue once inside, and after jumping the wall, we had one league member begging for teleport. As it turned out he had never taken ANY travel power and used nothing but Ninja Run and Jet Packs to get around. He quickly discovered that NR wasn't enough to leap the walls of Lamda section and, of course, the Jet pack was a temp and unavailable on ANY trial. I have been on a few since that seemed to adapt to address that problem.. We didn't jump the wall but took the shortest path possible to the main gate, fighting our way north and then across, and then entered the courtyard and cleared before heading in to take out the security guard.

One other small warning.. on a speed Lamdba if you hit the hospital be prepared to avoid all those street mobs and the gun turrent while trying to get back and help with acid and grenade collecting. Here again flier seem to have a big advantage.. I can easily avoid street mobs and as long as I stay low and in the middle between two turrent I have never had a problem. Not sure how other travel power users fair but aside from that one guy I mentioned earlier I have never heard anyone that mentioned having a problem.


�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Wicked_Wendy View Post
heheh A small warning.. I did one of the Speed Lam/Mini Bafs recently and despite the briefing prior to entering the queue once inside, and after jumping the wall, we had one league member begging for teleport. As it turned out he had never taken ANY travel power and used nothing but Ninja Run and Jet Packs to get around. He quickly discovered that NR wasn't enough to leap the walls of Lamda section and, of course, the Jet pack was a temp and unavailable on ANY trial.
Strange. I know the Raptor Pack I purchased in Grandville worked fine on a mini-BAF last night because I was using it to hover/Assassin-Strike Nightstar a few times. Is it just the ones built from temp recipes that don't work?


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Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zem View Post
Strange. I know the Raptor Pack I purchased in Grandville worked fine on a mini-BAF last night because I was using it to hover/Assassin-Strike Nightstar a few times. Is it just the ones built from temp recipes that don't work?
Yeah, I'm with you. I'm quite sure I used a raptor pack briefly in a Lambda the other night. Maybe there's a bug that's letting us use them when we shouldn't be? Or maybe travel temps are an exception.

EDIT: Found it. Travel-only temp powers were enabled in the 4/26 patch.

http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/pat...-_41511_1.html


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Wicked_Wendy View Post
heheh A small warning.. I did one of the Speed Lam/Mini Bafs recently and despite the briefing prior to entering the queue once inside, and after jumping the wall, we had one league member begging for teleport. As it turned out he had never taken ANY travel power and used nothing but Ninja Run and Jet Packs to get around. He quickly discovered that NR wasn't enough to leap the walls of Lamda section and, of course, the Jet pack was a temp and unavailable on ANY trial. I have been on a few since that seemed to adapt to address that problem.. We didn't jump the wall but took the shortest path possible to the main gate, fighting our way north and then across, and then entered the courtyard and cleared before heading in to take out the security guard.
If you run into more people like this, you should point out that Ninja Run allows you to take advantage of even the slightest inclines. The walls into Lambda sector are not straight up & down. I've had the best luck wall scaling with Ninja Run where the wall connects to the gun towers. (Less geometry to get stuck on.)


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Zem View Post
Strange. I know the Raptor Pack I purchased in Grandville worked fine on a mini-BAF last night because I was using it to hover/Assassin-Strike Nightstar a few times. Is it just the ones built from temp recipes that don't work?

Really .. I don't usually keep those out in my trays since I only use them occasionally. All I know is every other temp power I ever earned goes greyish and doesn't work. The only ones that do are Ninja run (puchased) Mystcial Fortune (purchased) and Secondary mutation (purchased). Even my vet reward powers are useless.. I will HAVE to check that out next trial I am on. Oh I did discover one other temp that satys active .. the Dimensional Grounding Ray gun you get on a Kahn TF... and it works on Maurader, Siege or Northstar just as well as it does on Reichmann.. well maybe not AS well but it helps.

See NOW I have to LOG back on and run another trial JUST to check on my raptor pack availability LOL


�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon

 

Posted

hehehe Okay I definately stand corrected although I am still confused...

Not a single one of my vet powers works during a trial (Sands of Mu, Blackwand, Ghostslaying Axe, Nemesis Staff, etc)

Not a single power I have earned in completing day job requiremnets for accolades. (Ability to heal or rez comrades, smoke grenades, frag grneades ect)

Not a single temp power I battled for or earned doing missions (Shivan, Warwolves, ect)

Not a single power I crafted or purchased (Vanguard HVAC, Back up radio, evenomed dagger, ect)

But for some reason out of all the temps many of my characters have earned my Raptor Pack, Goldbricker Pack and things like Ninja Run do. When the trials first started and every temp I had in trays, and I AM a temp power junkie I had plenty, was useless so I simply assumed that like the old style Master of Task Forces .. the trials were designed to force players to live, die, succeed or fail with only those powers they aquired through training or the well. Even on a master of run things like Ninja Run continued to work because.. well because we paid cold hard cash for the right to own those so the devs left them alone.

This brings up a question.... My Crab Spider Operative Tessa currently has .. Shivan, a Snow Beast, Back Up radio, and a HVAS. In addition she has 3 Spiderlings, 2 Arachnobot Disruptors,1 Arachnobot Blaster and 2 LORE Seers. In short a small army that if I was allowed to summon could make the prisoner escape portion of a BAF much easier. Now the Shivan I worked to earn in Bloody Bay, the HVAS I battled Rikti to earn the vanguard merits required to purchase, the Back Up Radio, like all of the IO enhancements in my power slots, I created on the crafting tables of my base and the Snow Beats was a gift I opened during the Holiday Season.

Now Trust me I already know the answer i am just playing devil's advocate here but just exactly who sat down in some meeting and decided "They can't have access to anything that might add to their ability to buff, debuff, or damage but hey lets let them keep the travel power stuff." Gee thanks Devs.. I battle a solo AV hyped up on, I assume, water from the well of the furries in the Lambda. I battle two Mechanical death Machines that rez and require me to defeat both twice in the BAF, and I battle an obviously insane and obsessed AV with radioactive cannons in space during the Keyes Island trial Don't let me keep anything useful but give me travel powers I don't even really need. Yes I do use Ninja Run to get to the next fight faster or to TRY and outrun mobs and survive (Lambda) but all of the trials are one BIG map.. Why do I need a raptor pack more than an envenomed dagger.

lol Okay all done.. Hey with the incarnates I have who needs any of it. Like I said i started doing trials the day issue 20 hit and it took until NOW to discover I could use my raptor pack.. yeah I was really missing that. I guess the real question I have now is on that Lamda I described where the one MM had no travel power and was begging for teleport. If he used a jet pack a LOT to get over tall stuff.. why wasn;t it in a tray and why didnt he realize it still worked. NOT TOO BRIGHT was he lol


�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon

 

Posted

My guess is that they kept the temp travel powers because without them some people might not be able to access specific parts of the trial. For example the guns on top of the walls of Lambda.

Also some players use the temp/pack powers as their sole means of travel.


Quote:
Originally Posted by reiella View Post
Until I see something that states to the contrary, going to assume VK is right .

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zem View Post
Strange. I know the Raptor Pack I purchased in Grandville worked fine on a mini-BAF last night because I was using it to hover/Assassin-Strike Nightstar a few times. Is it just the ones built from temp recipes that don't work?
Funny story about that. Initially in pre-beta all temp powers, including microtransaction (MTX) powers like ninja run were disabled during the trials. After many complaints (and several months) it was fixed just before Issue 20 launched, but didn't include all travel powers until the 4/26 patch.

Ok, I guess it wasn't that funny. However that is how it came about.




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

 

Posted

I've been on a MiniBAF, and my only issue with it was that, it's a bit easier to get sequestered.

I play a Brute, which means that on a Normal BAF, aggro hops around a bit between myself and the other brutes and tankers depending on things like Gauntlet, PokeVoking, Taunt... that sort of thing. I don't get it too often, as I don't have taunt, and Willpower doesn't have the most powerful taunt aura. But I do enough damage that I still get blasted in the face at a reasonable clip.

On a MiniBAF, there are fewer high aggro classes, which means that I found myself with two warnings far more often, and people who don't normally -get- warnings were getting them as well.

Which lead to me spending most of the fight hitting adds because I would only get it one or two attack chains before my second warning popped up.

Or, on other occasions, getting sequestered because a scrapper or someone didn't notice that they were getting warnings, or expected someone else to pull the aggro in time.

So keep that in mind. A Smaller League means you -really- need to watch your rings. It's tempting me to snag Taunt, personally.


 

Posted

I've got no huge preference in terms of size, but I also prefer 'better' leagues.

What I have found however is that a 'poor' 24-man BAF is better thsn a 'poor' 16-man. I've never been on a full league BAF that's failed, but I've experienced som 16-mans that have. Those generally seemed to be led by juvenile 'i'm so hard I eat AVs for breakfast raargh!' types who also invariably were less than stellar leaders. One problem with smsller leagues is that there's less buffer to cope with dropouts. If a BAF starts at 16, teo people drop out (or are kicked by some 'CryMoarNoob' type leader, which I've seen happen), then the trial becomes much harder, whereas on a 24-man if a few dropouts occur it's easier to cope with.

Eco


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The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
[The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."

 

Posted

I don't think league size is an issue.. It's all about the moron to non-moron ratio.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by TwoHeadedBoy View Post
I don't think league size is an issue.. It's all about the moron to non-moron ratio.
Pretty much this. The leagues that fail have people that don't listen on them.




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

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Snow Globe View Post
Pretty much this. The leagues that fail have people that don't listen on them.
Or leaders that don't give them anything to listen to. One PuG BAF I was on, the leader said "You know the drill" after the cutscene (which you'd think would have alerted him to the possibility that at least one of us didn't), and then said nothing until his silence after NS went down prompted me to ask 'where d'you want us, boss?'
'chokes' was his rather sparse reply.
A little while later of course, and Escapees started escaping, since one of the routes or other was leaking due to no central coordination.

Eco


MArcs:

The Echo, Arc ID 1688 (5mish, easy, drama)
The Audition, Arc ID 221240 (6 mish, complex mech, comedy)
Storming Citadel, Arc ID 379488 (lowbie, 1mish, 10-min timed)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
[The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by TwoHeadedBoy View Post
I don't think league size is an issue.. It's all about the moron to non-moron ratio.

Definately agree .. I have been on full sized (24 man) BAFs that failed because 1-2 or the players on the team assigned to Adds were all that actually were TRYING to deal with the adds and before long the entire league simply got over run. Lamba.. the classic is the league leader warning players not to aggro until the portals are closed so of course some dim bulb has the entire IDT and Maurader on top of the league before a single portal can be closed.

Now Eco I don;t know what server your on or who you are running into on minis but the leaders I have hooked up with are very well organized and run a very good league. I have run into more jerks on full sized league that just assumed because they never saw a BAF fail when they were JUST a team member that actually having a plan and organizing when they were in charge wasn't important. A good team is a good team no matter the size. the thing I enjoy with the mini is the lack of LAG.


�We�re always the good guys. In D&D, we�re lawful good. In City of Heroes we�re the heroes. In Grand Theft Auto we pay the prostitutes promptly and never hit them with a bat.� � Leonard
�Those women are prostitutes? You said they were raising money for stem cell research!� � Sheldon

 

Posted

All of the points stated in this topic makes me like mini BAFs over regular ones. Well, that and mostly because every time I'm on North, I end up soloing the entire northeast side and making my league bored.


@Leetdeth - Virtue | MA Arcs(all challenge arcs): Big Magic Blowout! #369774 | Who Really Cares About This? Z! #509577 | That Meddling King! (teams recommended) #21450

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Leandro View Post
Keyes is also much better with a minimum team size, especially if you're going for badges. Less people equals less chance of someone screwing up and getting caught in the green beam and/or dying.
/this

also have to agree with the less lag


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by NightErrant View Post
So keep that in mind. A Smaller League means you -really- need to watch your rings. It's tempting me to snag Taunt, personally.
This is especially important when you've got the two AVs close to each other. It's gotten to the point where I move away from the group around the AVs when I get the first warning, because if both AVs decide to ring me in quick succession we're all sequestered.

On the plus side, I've found that if you're at range and you do get sequestered, you almost always survive because you stop attacking, the AV stops attacking you, and you're just held and taking no damage.

Finally: don't worry about losing participation points for not attacking while waiting for your rings to go away. I typically tried to continue attacking adds around a corner, but I've been sequestered at least three times now while out of line of sight of the AVs (though I didn't die any of those times). So I decided to try just moving away and waiting till the rings expired, not attacking anything. In the last two BAFs using this tactic I got a rare and a very rare, which means my participation metric was not adversely affected.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by MrCaptainMan View Post
Or leaders that don't give them anything to listen to.
I always ask if anyone hasn't run the trial on the trials I lead. The trials I'm on has only failed due to ignorance because the people who haven't done the trial do not speak up. Even then there is the window with the "?" where players can find out what that section of the trial is about.

Are there poor leaders? Yes. However there is a smaller amount of poor leaders than there are poor listeners. Even though the poor leaders also fall into the "poor listener" category.




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

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Snow Globe View Post
Are there poor leaders? Yes. However there is a smaller amount of poor leaders than there are poor listeners. Even though the poor leaders also fall into the "poor listener" category.
I got REALLY lucky today. Got a poor leader AND a load of poor listeners. I don't even know.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Snow Globe View Post
Pretty much this. The leagues that fail have people that don't listen on them.
I think that everyone who joins a trial wants it to be successful; no one tries to screw it up on purpose. It's disturbing to read all this "everyone's a moron but me and my small circle of people with whom I regularly play" chest-thumping. Casual players, players who've only just got their first toon to 50 after x number of years preferring not to, players who don't read the forums, and players who love to play but may never be as good at the game as they'd dearly love to be are not morons. They are not "not listening" to you (generally speaking, not actually you, Snow Globe ) so they can screw up your chance (and theirs) to get merits or ixp or badges. This dismissive, condescending, mean-spirited attitude makes people afraid to say that they've never done the trial (if they are even asked, and I've been on a LOT of trials where the leader never asks this at all or says something like "so any cherries here?" or something equally off-putting that no one would pipe up and say, oh, yes, me! I'm an idiot who's clueless, thanks for asking). If you want people to play as well as you do, try helping them rather than being rude and dismissive. You may be surprised at how well they begin to listen.