What would you do to make Keyes fun?
Except that BAF and Lambda haven't had a period where players haven't run them.
The Issue 9+ Hami raids are no where near the amount of times it was run before Issue 9. Before Issue 9, Hami Raids happened nightly. Even now, on Triumph, hami raids happen 1 or 2 times a month (if that). That also tells me that the "new" hami raid isn't as liked as it was before it was changed. |
Why is that? It's because I don't like multi-team content in general (I've run plenty of LGTFs, and enjoy the Hamidon encounter there), and Inventions made HOs mostly obsolete. The only reason I ran Hamidon past the first time before Issue 9 was because HOs were the best enhancements in the game.
I think (I'm not claiming it as fact) that the vast majority of CoH players do not like multi-team/raid-style content, and I think that the only reason most people running them do them so often is because of the rewards. I don't think any but a very small number of players like herding cats (which is why raids are mostly run by the same people), and I don't think any but a small number of players like feeling like a tiny cog in a big wheel, especially not in a superhero game. I think that if the rewards weren't so heavily weighted towards multi-team content, the trials would be run as rarely as Hamidon. If there were 4-8 player versions of these exact Trials that gave the same rewards in the same amount of time, I think they would be run a lot more than the multi-team versions, and by a larger variety of people.
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Except that BAF and Lambda haven't had a period where players haven't run them.
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Its not something I would personally hang my hat on.
The Issue 9+ Hami raids are no where near the amount of times it was run before Issue 9. Before Issue 9, Hami Raids happened nightly. Even now, on Triumph, hami raids happen 1 or 2 times a month (if that). That also tells me that the "new" hami raid isn't as liked as it was before it was changed. |
Popularity is easy to engineer these days. Just give lots of stuff away for very little effort. The pre-I9 Hamidon *initially* took effort, but within a year or so from our first full defeat on Triumph Hami was an ATM machine.
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One more thing contributing to the lower rate at which post-I9 Hamidon was run: Issue 9 also introduced the Statesman TF, which allowed us to get HOs with only 8 people.
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... One of my biggest complaints about Trials is that far, far too many Trial leaders and regular players simply assume people know how the Trials go and/or think they have read guides. I even had that said to me after a Trial today, in fact...
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I've said it before and I'll say it again...
I think this is the only trial that actually needs a leader that explains things as you go along (unless the leader knows everyone knows what to do).
This trial requires communication.
Think about it, BAF and Lambda are run so often the leader hardly talks (beyond maybe the "watch the rings!" in a BAF and "use grenades/acids now!" in a Lambda).
They're easy and "everyone" knows what to do and if you're lost you can just follow the crowd since both trials are an easy "A to B" point (except I guess for Lambda in the sabotage phase).
One of the things I like about Keyes is that you can have multiple "teams" doing different things. When I'm with certain people doing it and I'm on my Mind/Emp; I'm usually with the tanker healing him during the reactor phases (while he's taunting AM) as well as he's clearing (taunting) the mobs away from the terminals so that way people don't actually have to defeat them.
Then you have the other people gathering temps/defeating the mobs that didn't get taunted to the tanker, etc...
Heck, in the 2nd and 3rd reactor you could even have 3 'teams'. 1 team being the tanker (taunting AM) and 'healer', one team being the 'defeat mobs near stations' while the other team get temps/use 'em.
That takes A LOT of coordination....which is why, I assume, most don't like it...because the league leader doesn't explain things and communicate.
In the trials I've run (I'm not perfect by any means) I don't do what I just said above (3 teams, etc...); usually I stick with the tanker healing him (not that he needs it most of the time) and if possible, I try to go stand near a terminal saying, "this terminal needs temps", etc...or "1st lvl done, go to 2nd lvl".
Communicate, communicate, communicate! (not saying you just in general).
And the new Underground trial seems to be a walk through "defeat all" so no real coordination (except at a few spots)...so....*shrugs* we'll see how popular it is
![Smile](images/smilies/smile.gif)
And not saying that the UG isn't fun...I like it, more things to do
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I've said it before and I'll say it again...
I think this is the only trial that actually needs a leader that explains things as you go along (unless the leader knows everyone knows what to do). This trial requires communication. |
Those communication tools aren't in the game. I've found that leading the Keyes that most people don't want to read what the leader does have to tell the league.
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Those communication tools aren't in the game. I've found that leading the Keyes that most people don't want to read what the leader does have to tell the league.
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Needless to say, this is not an idea capable of skirting controversy.
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Well I know the 2 toons that I have done Keyes with (I've possibly done it on 3 toons but can't remember)...I have self-healing powers (main is Kinetics and the other one I do it with is a mind/emp controller so pbaoe heal there plus RA/rebirth destiny powers).
You know you can buy more (green) inspirations from the hospital NPC inside right? |
I am well aware that one can buy greens inside the hospital. Since on a squishy, each Death Pulse takes about 50% of my hit-points, I don't find greens exceptionally useful. I can get past the first few pulses, then I'm out of greens. The next pulse will kill my squishy. Guaranteed.
Needing to carry 50 greens in order to not be continually faceplanted is crap gameplay mechanics, in my opinion, and is yet another reason why I avoid this trial like the plague. I hate it. I have run it twice and never again, i don't care HOW many Emp merits they tack on. Crap. Gameplay. Not. Fun.
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.
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Try this on an alt with no healing powers and no shields, and get back to me... rhetorically speaking.
I am well aware that one can buy greens inside the hospital. Since on a squishy, each Death Pulse takes about 50% of my hit-points, I don't find greens exceptionally useful. I can get past the first few pulses, then I'm out of greens. The next pulse will kill my squishy. Guaranteed. Needing to carry 50 greens in order to not be continually faceplanted is crap gameplay mechanics, in my opinion, and is yet another reason why I avoid this trial like the plague. I hate it. I have run it twice and never again, i don't care HOW many Emp merits they tack on. Crap. Gameplay. Not. Fun. |
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THIS, God, THIS! What the hell was the 'logic' behind this stupidity?!
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Sadly if past experience is any indicator, that decision will not be revisited. Probably not ever, or at least in the next couple of years.
The hospital timer is there so that you can't instantly rejoin the event.
I actually think a much better solution would be to remove the hosp door timer entirely, and put a 20 second timer on being able teleport to the hospital after dying. More or less the same result but with moved timers, and some opportunity to use Resurrection powers.
I am completely wierded out by people saying folks avoid Lambda. It's the shorter of the two trials, and I consider it easier. People I play with, and with iTrials (as opposed to other content) I have to PuG a lot, generally succeed Lambdas more readily.
I'll readily conceded that the combat risk is higher in Lambda than BAF. As long as you don't let the 9CUs get out of hand in the BAF, the IDF in Lambda are scarier than the WarWorks in the BAF, and I consider Marauder more dangerous in combat than Siege and Nightstar standing next to one another. All that said, I find people better able to deal with Lambda than BAF. While folks need to listen and pay attention in both trials, they don't have to particularly coordinate in the Lambda trial, other than to avoid splitting up too radically. I haven't found people failing to follow direction to be nearly as likely to lead to failure on the Lambda than I have on the BAF.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
I am completely wierded out by people saying folks avoid Lambda. It's the shorter of the two trials, and I consider it easier. People I play with, and with iTrials (as opposed to other content) I have to PuG a lot, generally succeed Lambdas more readily.
I'll readily conceded that the combat risk is higher in Lambda than BAF. As long as you don't let the 9CUs get out of hand in the BAF, the IDF in Lambda are scarier than the WarWorks in the BAF, and I consider Marauder more dangerous in combat than Siege and Nightstar standing next to one another. All that said, I find people better able to deal with Lambda than BAF. While folks need to listen and pay attention in both trials, they don't have to particularly coordinate in the Lambda trial, other than to avoid splitting up too radically. I haven't found people failing to follow direction to be nearly as likely to lead to failure on the Lambda than I have on the BAF. |
I have a weird relationship with the BAF and Lambda. I think that if the BAF were designed as a regular Task Force for 8 people that I'd enjoy it a lot more.
Lambda is pretty fun on some of my characters and murder on others. To me it pushes "thall shalt have invisibility" on squishy characters far too much. Right now I consider invisibility pretty much mandatory on a squishy toon running these trials.
Rather than BAF or Lambda I would have preferred a system similar to radio miissions where you do tasks that are BAF or Lambda-like but with a variety of enemy types and on maps that vary. The item gathering stuff is not altogether bad so much as it, like all the elements of the trials, is very scripted and become somewhat lifeless once you memorize the locations of everything.
I am completely wierded out by people saying folks avoid Lambda. It's the shorter of the two trials, and I consider it easier.
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Completion Time
I measure the time from the first "radio transmission" to the moment the final AV is defeated. I don't use zoning into the map as a starting point because then the opening cutscene time would appear in some runs but not in others, screwing up the data; also, not everybody zones in at the same time. The first speech bubble gives me a good consistent point in which to begin measuring. ![]() BAF: The fastest BAF run took 13:34; the worst, 35:33. Don't ask about that one. It was a horrible, horrible situation and I swore to never speak of it again. The average time to complete was 17:45; the median time, 17:09. Lambda: The fastest run took 19:33; the slowest, 34:06. The average completion time was 25:08, and the median, 24:26. While it is longer than BAF, it's not that much longer; and usually, at least on Freedom, people run both back to back. Keyes: Oh boy. Keyes. The fastest run took 31:46, and the slowest, 54:20; the average time to complete was 41:19, and the median, 41:15. If run with people who know exactly what to do, sub-40 minute times are the norm. If you have to explain things to people, better schedule an hour for this trial. I sorted the data in order to show the "time trends" better: ![]() The worst BAF runs will still be faster than the best Lambda runs (I'm still not talking about that extremely bad run that soils the graph) and the worst Lambda runs will be faster than the best Keyes runs. It's no surprise that broadcast in Pocket D sees a lot of "looking for anything but Keyes". |
I have to PUG a lot as well.
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After being on several Keyes trials that have managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, I will loudly proclaim that many people cannot play and yes, it is their fault.
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This Trial disincentivises you to play it, period. I'm sure you might retort with 'oh, there's a strat, you can use that', but strats are pointless when there are mechanics involved that you can do nothing about. No amount of trickery, planning or anything else will prevent those damage pulses and the Time Stop and the Disintegration.
These are not fun.
Fun is being able to shut them down temporarily. Fun is being able to shut them down permanently. Not fun is being subjected to an overpowered mechanic.
Unless you'd like to provide an answer in your perfect world where players know how to play (and of course, where ones that don't are totally at blame, because being perfect it wouldn't be your fault, would it?) that this can be overcome, your statement reeks of fallacy.
S.
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I've been wondering for a while about the feasibility and usefulness of allowing league leaders to gain the ability to direct messages directly to people's screens in a manner similar to but perhaps in-between the visibility of how the game sends trial chat or how the drop system works. Drop text is a little too obtrusive (and too large a font to send meaningful messages) and the trial chat is a little too ignorable. Something in the middle might be useful, but it would have to be limited to perhaps only league and team leaders. For it to serve the purpose intended, though, it would have to be impossible to disable, because the whole point is to make sure that while players can ignore instructions, there is never an excuse for not receiving them.
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Otherwise, the people who don't want to pay attention won't, the people who do want to pay attention already can.
Try this on an alt with no healing powers and no shields, and get back to me... rhetorically speaking.
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I am well aware that one can buy greens inside the hospital. Since on a squishy, each Death Pulse takes about 50% of my hit-points, I don't find greens exceptionally useful. I can get past the first few pulses, then I'm out of greens. The next pulse will kill my squishy. Guaranteed. |
I actually think a much better solution would be to remove the hosp door timer entirely, and put a 20 second timer on being able teleport to the hospital after dying. More or less the same result but with moved timers, and some opportunity to use Resurrection powers.
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It must be fun to live in your perfect world where everyone knows everything and how to do it.
This Trial disincentivises you to play it, period. I'm sure you might retort with 'oh, there's a strat, you can use that', but strats are pointless when there are mechanics involved that you can do nothing about. No amount of trickery, planning or anything else will prevent those damage pulses and the Time Stop and the Disintegration. These are not fun. Fun is being able to shut them down temporarily. Fun is being able to shut them down permanently. Not fun is being subjected to an overpowered mechanic. Unless you'd like to provide an answer in your perfect world where players know how to play (and of course, where ones that don't are totally at blame, because being perfect it wouldn't be your fault, would it?) that this can be overcome, your statement reeks of fallacy. S. |
There are a number of things one can do to alleviate the problems faced in the trial. If you honestly cannot see that then it would probably be best if you left the trial for those of us who enjoy a challenge and active participation.
I don't know about any perfect world or have any intention of being another victim of the internet fallacy police. Every Keyes run that I have ran (including failed ones) give detailed instructions beforehand along with a questions and answer portion. If people don't know what they are doing during the trial or just screw around, then yes, I am quite comfortable stating that it is their fault.
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Too bad the game makes that difficult. From the timers to the constant pulse damage to the lack of voice chat options.
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![Stick Out Tongue](images/smilies/tongue.gif)
Those communication tools aren't in the game. I've found that leading the Keyes that most people don't want to read what the leader does have to tell the league. |
![Frown](images/smilies/frown.gif)
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There are a number of things one can do to alleviate the problems faced in the trial. If you honestly cannot see that then it would probably be best if you left the trial for those of us who enjoy a challenge and active participation. |
The pulse is just cheap, plain & simple unavoidable & cheap.
To have to have certain AT, in this case healers, kills forming a tf, trial, or team.
To have to drag the av around to the consoles is just tediously boring.
There is no strategy to it, the consoles tell you anti matter must be present, so whats to figure? where's the challenge ? being sent to the hospital over & over from something that you can't avoid ? ...not my idea of fun.
I've gotten my badges on one of my mains & don't ever plan on touching this "trial" unless some serious changes are made.
I am completely wierded out by people saying folks avoid Lambda. It's the shorter of the two trials, and I consider it easier. People I play with, and with iTrials (as opposed to other content) I have to PuG a lot, generally succeed Lambdas more readily.
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I'll readily conceded that the combat risk is higher in Lambda than BAF. As long as you don't let the 9CUs get out of hand in the BAF, the IDF in Lambda are scarier than the WarWorks in the BAF, and I consider Marauder more dangerous in combat than Siege and Nightstar standing next to one another. All that said, I find people better able to deal with Lambda than BAF. While folks need to listen and pay attention in both trials, they don't have to particularly coordinate in the Lambda trial, other than to avoid splitting up too radically. I haven't found people failing to follow direction to be nearly as likely to lead to failure on the Lambda than I have on the BAF. |
That results in a situation with hundreds of things running around looking for a target and one death turning into a hurried rush to find someone to cling onto before that stack of purples wears off. Pick the wrong group to join or simply have a couple of lucky shots, and it's death number 8 and another run.
The whole forced large group set-up is to effectively force the people who could handle the trials with 2-3 people to group with those of us who are not able to do that so they can carry us. But then when you actually get in the thick of things, the disparity between different characters is so great that you might as well be two completely separate groups. And the format of the trials encourages that separation by forcing groups to split, making rejoining the rest of the group dangerous, and sticking that timer on the door just for ***** and giggles.
IMO bragging about your skill at completing iTrials is like crowing about how great you are at Daikatana. Yes you can succeed at it once you memorize the missions and learn to herd cats/NPCs/players but you certainly don't have to master it to know it's not for you.
And yes, Keyes does provide infinite potions/inspirations so you can heal back up, but I was hoping for a game where potion popping wasn't integral to the strategy.
I have seen BAF failed exactly twice. The idea that you can more easily succeed at Lam is crazy to me. Maybe is you have 2-3 uber people to carry the rest, but in general, if we don't have at least 8 acids, I'm sorely tempted to just quit.
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I certainly do gravitate to a core of players who know what they're doing and usually (but not always) have high-end builds. As much as I PuG the iTrials, though, I don't always have them along. (And when I do, they aren't always on something bad-***.)*
So it may be a server culture thing. Kind of like how some servers have a consistent Hamidon raid culture and can do raids by rote while others can't get a successful one often at all. Maybe reliable Lambda tactics became well-disseminated on Justice or something. Don't get me wrong, I've been on some disastrous Lambdas. Heck, I even led a disastrous one, but it was an 8-man with too many folks that lacked slotted incarnate powers.
* When I can get nothing but those players, we actually run 8-man Lambdas.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
Funny, during my last few weeks, I've only seen Keyes run 2 times (and heard one of one more that happened before I logged in) when I didn't lead it (usually on the weekends)
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[QUOTE=theOcho;3409811]As to the REAL reason I'll be leaving, I'm afraid it is indeed because Tamaki Revolution dc'd on me during a RSF.[/QUOTE]