XP curve was too steep before, Now its a downhill slope.
First point: Yeah, the thirty to forty slog is still just that; a slog. Mostly due to lack of any decent content there. Even at forty onwards, blue side at least, there's still not much going.
What's that? Portal Corp? Oh, yes, send me off to every bloody giant outdoor map with a hundred and one glowies and a defeat all! No, I think not...
But, honestly? I still find I have a lot of characters sat around the twenties mark and up to about 32. Although I mostly try and skip to 22 as fast as possible.
Why? Because I have altitis and I have run low level stuff over and over and OVER again. The new stuffs good (except you, Graves. Go take a long running jump...) but it ends about level 10. Meaning you still have twelve levels to fill until you (finally) get SOs and start feeling super instead of average and handicapped.
So, no, I don't harken back to the 'good old days'. Because, to me, debt SUCKED and destroyed my fun. Good riddance to it. I, for one, don't play this game to have to grind my way out of exp debt and frustration (which, when running a Blaster, fighting to get OUT of debt often got you MORE debt!)
Second point; No. Unlocking EATs at 50 was bloody awful. 'Epic' didn't, doesn't and never will mean 'More Powerful'. If it was a more powerful or something AT then yes, sure. It should be something you might need to, dare I say this in game context, work at.
Kheldians especially are by no means more powerful than a normal AT. In fact they are often held as being WEAKER than regular ATs (I know its not true, but it's a conception. I also know that they are damn complex to get the hang of) and VEATs, while utterly awesome in a team of eight, are no solo tankmages.
In a game where altitis is the norm and indeed on record as being Dev encouraged, gating stuff at 50 doesn't sit well. Incarnates aside, I guess.
And even then they stole our bloody costumes and emotes ¬¬
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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I like it the way it is now. It makes soloing much less sisyphean than it was in the old days.
My opinion..hmmm..I agree with what you say about leveling kitten quick in the early levels...I don't like it because there is so much stuff to do in those levels...I actually had to turn my XP off in 1st Ward because level 30 was staring me in the face and I was afraid if I did reach 30, I would come to a screeching halt.
Heroside The early 30s are ok because there is Croatoa, and in the 40s you get all the cool missions in PI....to me, the gap between leaving Croatoa and getting Tina's PI missions needs either another XP smoothing, or more content. If I am going to get bogged down, that is where the bogging happens for me.
I have not been here since launch, but I vividly recall what the game was like before XP Smoothing....shudder....I don't want to go back...no, no, no.
Lisa.
So don't wait for heroes, do it yourself
You've got the power
winners are losers
who got up and gave it just one more try
***Dennis DeYoung
The old grind was too long. I have several 50s gotten that way, and much prefer more recent leveling.
Khelds were never that great. They're at the same power levels as other ATs when played very well, and the presence of Voids makes them actively worse. The shape shifting, for me at least, is off-putting in the extreme. And the story was pretty thin.
That's one area of the game that has improved.
I'll agree with others. Leveling speed doesn't bother me. It's the lull in engaging content that comes in the late 30's and 40's. We have tons of leveling routes in the 1-20 range now. We need to beef up the mid to late game.
Yeah, that was kind of a strange response to a standing complaint, wasn't it? "We're bored of having only the one mission progression for each origin from 1-5." "OK, hang on... voilà! Now you only have one for all origins from 1-10! You're welcome."
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It's also why so many folks do the DFB trial to death on their alts.
Blazara Aura LVL 50 Fire/Psi Dom (with 125% recharge)
Flameboxer Aura LVL 50 SS/Fire Brute
Ice 'Em Aura LVL 50 Ice Tank
Darq Widow Fortune LVL 50 Fortunata (200% rech/Night Widow 192.5% rech)--thanks issue 19!
![Big Grin](images/smilies/biggrin.gif)
Yeah, that was kind of a strange response to a standing complaint, wasn't it? "We're bored of having only the one mission progression for each origin from 1-5." "OK, hang on... voilà! Now you only have one for all origins from 1-10! You're welcome."
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Personally, I find the early game surprisingly quick now. I don't mind, except that I'll need to turn off xp one of these days if I actually want to see the new stories.
The 30's don't feel as if they drag so much now as they used to. I'm pretty happy with the rate of xp gain in the 30's.
Things are a lot slower in the 40s. It's not nearly as bad as it used to be though, when I could spend an entire evening playing and not gain a single bubble of xp. (No, not because of debt, but because my idea of an entire evening doesn't start until the kids are asleep and ends early enough so I can still drag myself in to work the next day, so it's kind of a short evening compared to some of the whippersnappers around here.) I wouldn't mind seeing the 40s move a little faster, but its really not bad.
Avatar: "Cheeky Jack O Lantern" by dimarie
Want to experience debt? Keep playing the character until you run out of patrol XP and die a few times. There, you now have debt.
![](http://i778.photobucket.com/albums/yy70/KojiroJames/neversurrendersig.jpg)
Okay lets see to respond to several posts..
First I do like the new 1-10 content but as a vet I am not about to do it over and over .. I have said it numerous times in other threads I have close to 6 years in game and do not need a mission that requires me to a) find the train station in Atlas Park and then b) ride the train to Kings Row. The only alternative, at this point, is Death from Below. I do like this option and I have started several new characters and each has run the trial 4 times for the buffs and left between level 13 or 14 to go do other things. While the old missions were boring beyond belief I think they should have kept them in game as a third option for players.
Second.. I agree with the majority here. I do not MISS being in debt. Not even a little tiny bit. I also don't miss being dirt poor.. thanks to innovations all it takes is one rare bit of salvage to fund a low level character for quite some time and keep them performing at maximum. Between that and how easy it has become to erase debt the game has become much more enjoyable.
Third I agree that more content between 30 -40 is required but perhaps even more important is content betweem 40 and 50. As bad as it is from 30-40 there are still several TFs that open up and you can jump on to level faster. Manticore at level 30, Numina at 35 and the ITF at 35 all give you other options beside just running contact or radio missions. Once you hit 40 all you can do is go back and exemplar down to run anything you may have missed or run the same stuff again until you reach 45 when the STF and LGTF kick in. Thankfully at all levels, above 20, we now have the added option of tip missions to increase the different means we have to advance. Its much better than it used to be but we could definately stand for a few more options between 30-50.
�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
"Bombarding the CoH/V fora with verbosity since January, 2006"
Djinniman, level 50 inv/fire tanker, on Victory
-and 40 others on various servers
A CoH Comic: Kid Eros in "One Light"
If you think you are leveling too fast just go under options and turn off your exp. Problem solved.
If you think other people are leveling too fast then mind your own [pancake] business. Problem solved. There's nothing stopping people from leveling at a slow leisurely pace if they so desire. |
I remember the early levels back at the beginning. Run through your initial contact missions but still be below the minimum needed for the next contact. So you street grind until you finally pop lvl 5. Then you go get your **** handed to you in KR, and of course you always get sent to Perez and the Hollows with missions that you CANNOT do on your own so you team up and take down Frostfire over, and over, and over, AND OVER.
No, I do NOT begrudge ANYONE the ability to level up to 20 with DfB without breaking a sweat. I've got a dozen toons though, dying for teams to do just about anything once they've hit 20 and have done all the DfB that can tolerably be done. I know what the problem is but it's the same that everyone else has - nobody wants to START the team/RUN the team; we all just want to be there for the loot.
I almost wonder if there shouldn't be some additional reward for leading teams. Badges or something. Yeah, yeah, I know. Can't be done for technical reasons....
I prefer a slower leveling curve. On all my characters now,in order to maintain a steady but not fast rate, leveling from 35-50 is done exclusively using the SSA's, Tips/Alignment system and RWZ Borea missions. And each character is limited to play time of no more than 2 hours per day.
Often, I am quite sad when a character does reach 50 because, other than opening the Alpha slot, it means the end of my run with that character. So, I go to another server and create a dupe and start the whole process over again. On average it takes each of my characters about 6 months or longer to go from 1-50.
The Incarnate system simply does not provide enough incentive to level faster or take characters deeper into the system beyond Alpha level.
In order for the game to stay interesting, I try to have multiple chars at various stages of development. At any one time, there will be 2-6 below level 10; 2-6 @ 10-20; 4+ @ 20-30; 3 @ 30-40 and 2 @ 40-49. 75% of all my chars get played on at least a monthly basis.
I do have a couple of favorite level 50 chars I play weekly (including one who reached 50 in 2005) but I do not identify with any one character enough to call any my "main". I simply like a lot of concepts and have fun experiencing their variety.
As is quite evident, the process of leveling is far more important and enjoyable to me than the end point itself.
haven't ran some of the old content for a while...and Allison King reminded me why I don't...the back and forth from Brickstown to Dark Astoria to everywhere else wasn't worth the 21 merits...
I started just before i6 hit, and my first two characters took around a year to get to level 50 (with several bouts of Altitis and a couple breaks away from the game). Then the the VEATS became available. Some of the levelling/XP changes had been put in place already at this time, and I found it only took me a single month to get my Fortuna up to 50 with no Powerlevelling, running just with PUG's and my teammates.
Half of me is thankful for the changes, yet the other half of me thinks that they've made the game a little too easy.
Well, I think the more common complaint was that all the missions from 1-10 were horrible and they were actively driving away new subscribers. Now the beginning of the game is actually pretty cool the first time through, if a bit rushed and confusing.
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I will agree with you that the new beginning content is pretty cool the first time through. That, however, fails to address the actual complaint of the low-level content - it's repetitive and people who make lots of alts see it dozens of times over. That was made even WORSE by reducing the number of tasks available. And believe me - the new missions are NOT good enough to replace five separate paths.
As far as experience progression goes, I'm all for it being faster. Recently, I deleted three level 50 Blasters to reroll them as a Scrapper, a Brute and a Mastermind, I deleted a level 50 Scrapper to reroll her as a Brute, and come Titan Weapons, I'll delete another level 50 Scrapper to remake her as a Titan Weapons Brute. In addition to those, I have what is probably at this point 60 separate characters, and increasingly fewer of them are 50 at this point. As far as I'm concerned, the easier it is for me to get ALL of those to 50, the better.
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.
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I never saw that as a common complaint at all. It was common to a few specific people, but of any complaint was given to the low level content, it was always that people have done it dozens of times and are sick and tired of it.
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It takes me about a year to get to level 50. More in the past, a bit less now I hope. I only have 4 level 50s, with two more in the 40s. You won't find me complaining that leveling is too fast.
Avatar: "Cheeky Jack O Lantern" by dimarie
If you think you are leveling too fast just go under options and turn off your exp. Problem solved.
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IMO there is no such thing as leveling too fast when it comes to players that have been around for a little bit and understand the basic mechanics. Why spend months getting to 50 if you don't have to, unless of course you like to take your time.
I've turned off XP for a couple of toons across my accounts, one at 30 and one at 35 for recipe rolling purposes. Which on a side note I wouldn't have to do if the recipe roll mechanics gave recipes at the slider level.
Who do I have to *&^% around here to get more Targeted AoE recipes added?
Arc Name: Tsoo In Love
Arc ID: 413575
Well, I'll agree that I've seen both complaints often enough. And I certainly agree that it's a shame to lose all of those old missions. I was pretty surprised when I first heard that. Adding new missions is great, but why take some away? Well, other than the fact that they were boring and repetitive, but that's true of 90% of the original missions. I never advocated for any of them to be removed, just shuffled off to the side a bit.
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Hell, since 2004 I've been asking for one simple thing: More missions. They don't have to have complex mechanics, they don't have to tell game-changing stories. They just need to have a reason for why I'm going places and beating up people. And there have to be MANY of them. Not one or two, not five or ten, I'm talking of tens or possibly hundreds. If we restrict ourselves down to the very basic of objectives, like beat boss, grab stuff, then I'm sure even I can knock out at least a hundred of those in a week, just by myself.
Not all new content needs to be flashy and eccentric and replete with gimmicks. I would be more than happy to have "boring" content if I had a huge amount of it.
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.
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I like it the way it is now. It makes soloing much less sisyphean than it was in the old days.
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Captain Photon, +1 vocabulary points for you!
If you think you are leveling too fast just go under options and turn off your exp. Problem solved.
If you think other people are leveling too fast then mind your own [pancake] business. Problem solved. There's nothing stopping people from leveling at a slow leisurely pace if they so desire. |
OP's post is interesting in the sense that "you" can level up how fast you want to level up, up to the dev governor. Leveling too fast for your taste? Turn off xp. Not a big deal and no need for a thread about it since that's "your personal" decision.
The OP worrying about how fast "other" people are leveling makes no sense. OP you have no control over that and never will so no need to worry about that nor make a thread about it since its not your business.
The development team and this community deserved better than this from NC Soft. Best wishes on your search.
Out of curiosity, and of boredom im looking to see what other players think of the subject.
Ive been here since the launch and can fondly recall the early days, and also many things which were less than optimal. Taking the good with the bad, you could still feel accomplished when your first character hit 50, and that epic archtype unlocked was an awesome bonus.
Now its common to hear, got this one to 50 in two weeks. I know this is an alt heavy game, but several solutions to the old grind were added over the years, alone they are good add ons, together they are rediculous.
First the truly slow slog thru the upper thirties up to firty, yes that truely took a long, long time. So they 'smoothed' out that part of them game. I was actually very much in support of that.
Then they smoothed out the first part- yet that is where the most of the game content is located.
This along with the total destroying of debt, which is a laughable 'penalty'. At best it is gone within the mission you are in.
To cap it off we have the resting xp, patrolling whatever you call it.
TLDR
- Im not the only one who thinks the xp floweth too much too fast now. If you agree, say why. If not, by all means share your view.
-who else wishes kheldians/soa's were kept as lvl 50 rewards? you get to 20 now in a day, or an hour..