And I'd like fries with that (LOL) [some what humorous non rant]

Okay so earlier today I was on and saw this post for a MOM:

[Virtuebadges09] Xxxxxx Xxxxxx: last call for MoM itrial leauge LFM. +3 incarnate shift appreciated, full io sets please. widow or dark miasma prefered, pst for an invite, thanks.

I couldn’t help but want desperately to add something like..

Must enjoy long walks on the beach and watching the sunset. Will be required to submit detailed list of all purple enhancements and a complete diagram of build. Certificate of accomplishment detailing successful completion of all Itrials at LEAST once. MUST have appropriate costume and no one will be permitted to join without a Bio that is at least 450 characters in length. Check box to indicate preference(s) [ ] Star Trek Next Generation [ ] Battle Star Galatica [ ] Star Gate One [ ] Futurama .. Note: anything less than 3 check marks disqualifies automatically.
　
First as the title indicates let me clarify this is NOT a rant. I could care less what these leaders want and my very solution to dealing with them is very simple.. I don't send a tell and don't join their teams... EVER!

I realize that on some of these new trials having a team with more 50 (+0)s than those with 3 level shifts can be a problem. On trials like the UG or MoM attention to who has clarion, barrier, etc can spell the difference between victory and defeat but .. FULL IO Sets, 3 level shifts and widows or characters with Dark Maisma required? Please!! LOL

A while back the league I run with nightly had a guy join that INSISTED we needed at least 3 widows to have a chance at succeeding on a MoM .. The combined Mind Link helping to counter the effects of the psi.. Strange we do Mom nightly and prior to his arrival had succeeded constantly with exactly NO widows at all

Some of the advertisements are funny and others make you wonder.. “So back when you were a 50 (+O) how would you have felt if no one wanted to invite you to their team until you some how managed to obtain 3 level shifts with no ability to get on a league and do trials?”

OF course things are going to go easier with a 16 man league that all have 3 level shifts. But when you start requesting specific ATs and even Powers maybe its time to take a short break from the game and get back in touch with reality.. I'll take 16 players, with the right amounts of Clarion, Barrier and Rebrith, that know how to play the game and their character over a goof that can't follow instructions, can't grasp the concept of PINK CLOUD kills and spend more time whining about being dead than fighting any day!

Please feel free to add your own stories of ... ?? I am not even sure what to call it .. Trial Sobbery? hehehe

The only thing that catches my eye on that note was "full io sets needed."

The "widow or dark miasma needed" could be one of those 'things' where the leader would like x AT/powerset....okay no biggie....

But full io sets? Really?

*shrugs* Not that it bothers me.

Oh, I saw this person on Virtue last night, in the Rikti War Zone. I immediately gave them a 1-star and noted why just so I'll know to avoid that person again.

What made it worse for me was that I'd just logged in my level 50 blaster, whom I'd only recently started unlocking and equipping Incarnate slots, and as such did not have any rare or very rare Incarnate powers yet. I've already got three +3 Incarnated characters who would have qualified for those silly rules* that player was making, but I kinda wanted to get my blaster up to +3 that night, sooo.... yeah, completely useless to me!

*(Maybe not my Warshade, who has no purple or PvP sets; No purpled out Warshades for me, yet!)

Its more of a symptom of current iTrial design.

I don't think I would 1 star people for trying to increase their odds of beating trials. There are not enough people leading the "harder" trials anyways and when people read posts like this, it will just create the "silent" screen.

Also, WW you don't know the makeup of the team, there might have been enough 50s on the team that the trial leader did not feel comfortable inviting more.

*goes back to running BAF, LAM and Keyes*

In the case of UGh, TPN and MoM (and soon to be DD) I'll just wait til they are fixed to be more inclusive.

So much hate for a person who didn't even say he wouldn't accept anyone else, just gave a list of what he'd prefere.

Yeah, I also see that occasionally on Virtue. And, like Wicked Wendy, I simply ignore those leagues and go do something else.

I agree with pretty much everyone around here that high player competence is more valuable, in general, than full IO sets or particular power sets. But the level shift thing I sorta get, after all, the purple patch imposes significant penalties for level differences, and when you simply don't have the survivability and dps to take out MM in under three minutes in the final fight, well, there's not much point in even starting the trial. The scant astrals and threads you'll earn aren't worth it, IMO.

Yeah, seen that exact add a few times. As I pretty much stop running trials at +3, never been tempted to join or bother to find out how strict it is.

If they were going for a MoMoM then I could see the 'requirements' being so galvanised to ensure success. Protection against Psi damage, Dark Miasma for healing and Howling Twilight mass-rez/stun, full IOs for say positional defenses and regen. But then that's why I don't do them anymore.

Something humourous of my own: before the cutscene skipping, BAF was a good place to pop up some cutscene side-bubbles. So mine was "I fancy some KFC". Few trials went by and someone asked just what the heck I was on about. So I told them it's because they're famous for their 100% chicken breast. Yes, they did groan at that.

Best one I saw was someone who'd made two binds and when it jumped to Siege and Nightstar they blurted out two lines from South Park Mel Gibson "Oh, my nipples are so tender. Don't squeeze them anymore!". Needless to say, we were all in stitches for the rest of the trial.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dispari I don't know why Dink thinks she's not as sexy as Jay was. In 5 posts she's already upstaged his entire career.

All I'm going to say is that after more than a dozen failures... there are only two characters of mine that will set virtual foot inside a MoM trial. Both are +3. One's a Dark defender. The other's a Dark corruptor.

I don't care about what anyone else brings... I go in there with level shifts and Shadowfall, or I don't go in at all.

I know this guy, I was on the trial.

It went pretty smooth. Not badge perfect, but no OMG WTF WHY ARE WE FAILING! Dark and Widows make the zone a lot easier on a team, but they aren't needed, it is possible to do it without them.

But the IO thing was stupid. I'm full IOed and I need to be to play the game how I want as a tanking crab, but you can still rock this in SO, or basic IOs or whatever. He didn't ask me what IOs I had though, I just said I was a 53 crab and he was happy to have me. Maybe it is all that sweet buffing I bring :P

And he also had a bit of a thing about destinies. He wanted everyone rebirth/barrier, failing that, whatever gave you a shift.

So basically, a little silly, but it worked. I still prefer teams where anyone can join, so long as we get a majority of +3s :P

That's one of the reason I have benched all my 50's and up. I was trying to work on getting all the Alpha level shifts on one and it seems there is a headlong rush to have perfect characters for the new trials.

As a Tier 9 if I went premuim all I would lose are incarnate trials*

*sure, FW, some character slots, base rent, etc....

If there is no reason to run trials, there is no reason to pay money.


Thinking about the topic more, it just seems like WW is trying to shame someone trying to make a winning trial. To which I will say, its both a symptom of trial design (debateable as to how much level shifts are needed) and how hard it is to lead a trial (aka catherding)

Just wait until the DD trial shows up with 54+3s.....I'm hoping the devs make that a 54 trial and not do the 54+3 stuff.

Well now why not just have a level 60 trial?

The AV could look at us and say, "You're all gray to me. No XP!" and then fly away. Trial failed!

Wait... they're asking for full IO sets now? That is unfortunate.

I, personally, have hosted many MoM trials. My first few hosts, I failed most of them (back when the trial was actually *new*). But then, I added one stipulation to my teams:

"Forming MoM Trial! PST for an invite if level 52+. Meeting in RWZ1"

And all of the MoMs I have hosted with that stipulation have succeeded... I think. At least I don't remember any of them failing, as often as I have run them. No required ATs, no required sets, no required destinies or lores, nothing. If you have the levels, come aboard the soul train, because we're doing MoM tonight!

I have also been on many successful MoMoM runs that only had the stipulation of being +3. Even one of my +2 runs got the three MoM badges. The secret to this is that the enemies don't do all that much base damage, even with psionic damage not being frequently resisted. The real killer is the level shifts, and in general you shouldn't be fighting something higher than maximum difficulty in the first place. With a few level shifts the damage becomes manageable enough that you don't instantly die in the second phase, and you can probably do enough damage to get past the final two phases.

The secret to MoMoM badges isn't more level shifts, either. The biggest killer to the MoMoM badges is the second phase (... again), where some n00bs decide to kill every void the second it wanders near Penny, despite when everyone says not to. Keeping Aurora healed and Severing the connections is quite easy to do the first time around, so long as your volunteered healer can grasp the concept of "stand in the glowing portal for a few seconds while facing Shalice and you'll see when the room changes".


For the DD trial coming out... yeah I'm probably going to go with 53s. You really shouldn't fight something higher than +4 to you.

To continue with the humorous intention of the thread: does this mean I'd be disqualified on my main, because I have an SO slotted?

In Rest.

I've spent roughly 1.5 billion Inf on his current build. Everything else is IOd to the nines. But because I don't have him completely stuffed with IOs, I'd not be able to join!

That bit's silly. Everything else he asks for is pretty much okay, though specific powersets seems a little OTT.

To me, this is just emblematic of every other raiding system that's ever come along in a game where in order to do x, you must have y.

It also assumes a level of dedication to tricking out your characters and having builds that maximises success in Trials. This is no different to me than having stat-specific armor, particular stat-boosting traits and so on.

If the point here was to make these accessable to everyone, then they've failed. Players will of course put more or less time into whatever activity they like to do, and you'll of course get cliques who do things 'hardcore'.

But this divides the player community (small enough as it is, really) along lines that if the Trials were truly designed to be friendly to all (and frankly I've had enough of some named Devs saying 'it's just a slightly steeper learning curve' as a means of trying to smokescreen the tricks and mechanics that do not encourage newcomers to such things), that too has failed.

But there's a mandate either from Positron or marketing or both that this is a 'necessary' part of gameplay. I'll leave it to other posters to answer whether that is true or not, but for my part, I strongly disagree.


S.

To be fair, all the bosses in MoM are 54+2 so you really need to be +2 at least or you get smacked hard by the purple patch.

Out of curiosity, I joined the trial mentioned in the OP. It was among the smoothest ones ever: Penelope died after only 3 voids even though we weren't intentionally going for the badge. Almost nobody died to purple patches in phases 1 and 4 because Malaise was dying so fast that he tended to go down after only 1 round of world of anguish.

I have a feeling that much of the stigma against asking for level shifts on trials simply comes down to people wanting others to let their +0 characters tag along for rewards. And yes, while player competence technically matters more than build, player competence in this game is low in general, yours truly included.