So, I don't think I need to say which game I'm referencing with this topic title. Anyone that's played the big popular MMO's knows what I'm talking about.
One thing I enjoyed about City of Heroes was that you could do endgame content and you never heard anything like that. I was able to bring some friends along with groups that never would have seen that content on their own, and certainly would never see that content in that OTHER game.
What do you guys think? Should CoT have things like item levels and "required" builds and whatnot? Is there a benefit to it?
—
[color=red]PR Team, Forum Moderator, Live Response Team[/color]
You realize, CoH did in fact have people who required builds?
We also had people, when IOs came out, who could get an idea of people's builds from the set bonuses and judge them from that?
Then there's also the fact that CoH had players who whined and whined they couldn't keep their blue bar up, but people with the same build and SOs could before IOs, so it started to sound more like the people where lying about what they had slotted (or maybe to dumb to know the difference?). Those same people would ask for help, get an easy build to setup and then say "That's to much work, I'd rather be carried."
CoH had the same problems as other MMOs in that area, CoH just tended to be a bit nicer about it than some other MMOs would be (maybe it was the hero mentality of the game).
That said, I never thought a game needed to give a players gear score and it's likely only really needed in games with serious raids. I don't even think CoH's Incarnate content really required the best builds, though they helped for sure.
I liked that 'gear' and 'build' was usually irrelevant in CoH, except when it came to extreme performance. Yes, one's build and enhancements could be crippling, if one did not understand the game, or one's own playstyle. Different people had different approaches to powers and slotting and they all could work fairly well.
I think it would be... a negative, to introduce any sort of 'judging' metric to character abilities.
Be Well!
Fireheart
I liked how even *I* could put together a stamina-replenishing and in-character build, especially when my guildies gave me their extra Numina and *purple* IOs. I played ALOT of missions with them and, even with PuGs, I rarely got kicked off the team (unless someone wanted specific Kheldian powers -- which AK didn't have -- like the lobster morph).
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
Gear ratings and required powers/builds/classes is an exclusionary part of games. It's use in modern games is primarily as a way for the game to earn extra money. It's a predatory practice.
The devs have said they are not going to include those elements.
So, everyone thinking they needed a Defender or Controller of some sort or even a tank in CoH (which was still quite common even at the end) is going to be done away with in CoT?
I loved my all scrapper teams, but I can't say everyone was able to pull that off on some of the TFs.
I agree with 'not needing', but I do admit that adding a particular powerset to a team is still an efficient way of tipping the balance. Your All-Scrapper team may be amazing, but they could be more amazing with the inclusion of one buffer/debuffer.
Be Well!
Fireheart
Having a sliding scale of difficulties that is easy to understand and use will be key to making the game as PuG friendly as CoX was. There will be times when people are trying for some uber hard achievement or another and want to build the perfect beast of a team for it, and that's fine. But the ability to move difficulty sliders a round ought to alleviate any unnecessary "You musty have gear THIS good to get on this ride" type behavior in the more general sense.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
In the SO days, we actually completed a STF with no tank back when everyone "needed" a Stone tank because "no other tank could do it." The final fight with Lord Recluse was really the only challenging part, mostly due to the hit-or-miss aggro with Phantom Army. Once IOs came out, we had our scrapper friend tank LR.
I think that was one of the CoH/V's boons; the ability to be flexible with ATs and to be able to complete content with non-traditional or asymmetrical methods. Hopefully, CoT will have similar flexibility.
To the OP; I'm currently in Secret World Legends, and with the release of Elite Dungeons, gear score (or item power level in SWL) is the go-to for determining someone's worth or contribution to the team. It was pretty much the same in The Secret World (TSW), unfortunately.
I completely disagree with this outlook. Anyone can grind out gear with enough time (or money with P2W games). And someone can have all the best gear in the world, but if they have a sh*t DPS rotation, or the tank doesn't use interrupts on the boss' big attack(s), or the healer only uses AoE heals, their worth or contribution isn't very high. I will always pick someone who knows how to play their class/AT/spec with a lesser gear score than someone who's a gear score wh*re.
I do recall Kinetic Defender's who refused to use their ability to Speed Boost team members.
I recall people screaming 'No Speed Boost!' on teams. The poor Kinetics can't get a break.
Be Well!
Fireheart
If someone is more comfortable with a traditional team composition they are free to have one. The key point in my statement was that they will not be 'required' to. What is the point to your post?
Yeah, I really hope CoT avoids this kind of thing as our old City did. In the old game I never encountered anyone insisting that a certain character type was required or banning characters from joining. At the most it was, "It would be nice if we had a Rad Def, but if we can't find one let's try it with the current team." That let's-try-it-ness (both with teams and solo) was one of the things I loved best about the old City, and something I hope to see in CoT.
Come to think of it, I never even heard the term DPS till I tried other MMOs, and I still think it's a misleading stat, for the reasons Cobalt Azurean mentions above.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Luckily, as Brainbot pointed out, this has already been decided against. Agreed with Cinnder & Cobalt.
It's great that CoT will have new elements that weren't in CoH--either from other games or from the Dev's imaginations--as long as those elements are a logical extension in the direction that CoH was evolving. I personally don't want CoT to become too much like, well, all those other games out there that I've tried to play but just didn't enjoy nearly as much as CoH.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
Oh, it'll probably get worse in SWL when Nightmare dungeons get released. I'm already seeing it now where it's requested or highly suggested that people install ACT (Advanced Combat Tracking, a meter mod for healing, damage, etc) where other people with ACT can see your damage output. That way, they can monitor your progress throughout the dungeon, and if you aren't putting out enough DPS, they can kick you from the team.
I don't hold the players completely 100% responsible for this behavior, as in it's not entirely their fault. They're just responding to the criteria of the dungeon mechanics with their hard/soft enrage timers and trying to ensure that they can DPS the boss down in time. It was that experience that was the major contributor to the way I feel about enrage timers, as mentioned previously.
Word. Agreed about rage timers too. Once in a blue moon for a change maybe, but not as a common boss mechanic.
We're safe there too though from what MWM has said, due to their ability to use momentum to create dynamic fights instead.
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
hhmm, Speed Boost.
To me that was a situational requirement. There were times on my SS/Inv tank that I didn't mind it, and others were I would have gladly kissed the Kin/* Defender for it.
I do remember being on teams where they were crying NO, and others where they were begging for them. How does the Kin Defender win?
Lord Recluse, we took him out with an all Dark Defender team. That was fun. I've heard of all Scrapper teams doing it as well. It was in the synergy of the players and How Well They Knew their Characters Pluses and Minuses.
I'm with you, Radiac. I think the difficulty slider goes a long way towards adjusting for all the creative teaming arrangements players can put together.
However, I would strongly caution against there being a badge for completing x content with a maxed [url=https://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Notoriety]notoriety[/url] scale. In fact, I would even say that rewards should not be gated behind notoriety scale settings either. The number of reward drops and the odds for obtaining higher rarity drops should scale with notoriety, in all fairness. So long as nothing is offered that is not also available at lower difficulty settings, albeit with adjusted probabilities.
This way everyone who competes the same content gets access to the same rewards. You just have to decide if you want to run it twenty times at an easy setting for the same chance as running it once at maxed notoriety.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
I'm not sure I agree. If you start making character improvement rewards like IGC or drops the benefit of doing higher difficulty then it encourages players to require optimal teaming over experimentation. I mean, just increasing the difficulty should increase the number of mobs your face which increases your IGC and drops by itself. Changing the drop rate or IGC rewards on top of that might be overkill.
Rewards like badges, costumes and other non-improvement rewards will allow for players to be more inclusive with their teaming choices.
In the end it would take some well thought out balancing to make notoriety based reward rates work well.
I can't tell what you don't agree with. Could you please explain, because to me it sounds like you just repeated what I said.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
It's not that I don't agree with you, it's that I am not sure I agree with you. I just want to be clear on that because my mind is not made up about this.
To explain further, you are saying that higher notoriety shouldn't have badges as a reward and should increase the drop/reward rates. I am saying the opposite, more or less.
My reasoning is that drops, IGC and other game influencing rewards are more desired by the average gamer. If you change the reward rates too much the average gamer will begin to optimize their characters and, by extension, what they require from team mates. In short, players will start refusing team requests from sub-optimal players.
I expect that an increased notoriety will increase the amount of mobs you face which by itself increases the amount of drops and IGC rewards so increasing the drop rates on top of that could easily become a negative influence on the social aspect of the game (teaming) and possibly an unbalancing factor on the games economy.
I personally think messing with established drop rates is a risky endeavor and it should be well thought out before doing so.
Alternately, badges, cosmetic and other rewards which do not have a direct game influence are rewards that have a much smaller impact on the games social aspect and economical aspect simply because they are a single acquisition. Just so I am clear, I am not including badges that lead to character boosts (like accolades), cosmetic drops you can sell or any other trade enable reward.
This type of reward is more palpable to me.
I am not disagreeing with your suggestion exactly, I am more wary of it, as I am with any reward rate suggestion.
If you could present some kind of reasoning for this suggestion beyond 'gated rewards' I might see things differently. As it stands, your reasoning behind your suggestion seems off to me. There is nothing wrong with gating rewards behind higher difficulty.
This is one in the same as far as I am concerned. Increased number of opponents by its very nature means an increased number of drops. And since the rarity of the drop is probably loosely associated with the rank of the opponent, i would expect the probability of rarer items would also correspond to the more frequent lieutenant and elite encounters one would see with a higher difficulty setting.
But what I would be more concerned with would be the elite named opponents, each of which would only appear once per mission. I would want the drops from these opponents to scale in probability and quantity according to the difficulty level.
This is where I see a rift.
This is exactly what I would NOT want to happen.
For the same reason why the masses are campaigning not to put badge accomplishments behind PvP content, I don't think there should be badge accomplishments for consuming content at the highest difficulty settings. Or let me restate that. There should not be badges behind the successful completion of missions at the highest difficulty settings. I don't see why we wouldn't have a badge to at least 'try' the highest setting, especially if it requires being defeated. And I say this using the rationale stated by others in this thread about the freedom to create your own character build and team composition.
I would like to put forward a disclaimer, however. I would be amenable to a minimum difficulty setting for most badges, so players don't just race through cakewalks to farm badges. I am just opposed to badges that require elevated difficulty settings such as the badge "Butt Plugged" awarded for "Completing the Mission: Prevent The Flatulator from stealing the auto-igniter at Maximim Difficulty Setting"
Noted.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
I wasn't just talking about item drops but IGC and other game influencing drops like temp powers, stat boosts and so on. If your only concerned with item drops then I will limit myself to that for now.
I thought we were talking about drop percentages, as in the set percentage an individual mob has to drop a specific item. This percentage should not change regardless of your difficulty settings.
Your wording, specifically when you said 'amount [b]and[/b] odds', implied that you wanted to not only increase the number of times you rolled that RNG for rare rewards (through individual mob defeats) but also increase the percentage per individual mob.
If all you are talking about is increased opportunity through volume of defeated mobs and not increased chance per mob then I have no issue with that.
I would like to cautiously say that I think you might be over simplifying the how drops work.
You may already know that the devs have implied that they will be using a time investment metric to determine drop rates. In case you don't know, this means that the major deciding factor in drop percentage is how long it takes the average player to defeat a mob of equal level and on normal difficulty.
So while it is true that luets or bosses will likely have increased drop percentages, its because they should theoretically take longer to defeat and not simply due to their rank. There will be obvious exceptions like drops that only come from specific mobs and so forth.
Like I said, you might already know this but I wanted to be sure we were on the same page.
PvP should have badges. They should just be for PvP activities.
I expect there will be badges associated with every kind of activity in the game. Crafting, healing, damage dealing and so on. There will probably even be badges for collecting badges.
As long as the badge is specifically for that activity, like your later example of Butt Plugged, then it is an appropriate badge. I would prefer the badges be less specific but it isn't a bad example. Personally I would limit difficulty badges to more simplistic descriptions like 'complete 10 missions on highest difficulty' over a single specific mission requiring a high difficulty for a badge.
I would equate these badges with other badges that have similar restrictive requirements. Much like how you may get a badge for crafting 10 rare items in addition to crafting 10 items of any kind. You may get a badge for doing 10 missions as well as 10 missions of highest difficulty.
I just don't see badges having any significant impact on team composition. Perhaps you can explain.
I would not equate those at all. Crafting rare items is completely independent of a character's build or team composition or anything else that could possibly be used by elitists to limit a player's ability to participate in consuming the game's content.
One way to balance things would be for a badge like "Complete so many missions in a 5-man team comprised of all the same archetype." That would be doable and would be inclusive by its very nature rather than used as an elitist's measuring stick to exclude someone from a team, which is what the difficulty setting badges would do. It would also be educational. Along with it would be badges such as "Complete so many missions in a 5-man team with each member of the team being a different archetype." ...along with badges such as "Complete so many missions in a team with a stalwart in your team" and an enforcer, and a commander, etc., etc.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Ok, how about badges for Raids or Trials.
The entire notion of badges is to achieve something. Limiting those achievements based on difficulty is counter to their purpose. Some badges you can get through regular game play but most should take extra effort or extended time to achieve.
Badges are not a reward that influences the way players behave in any significant numbers. Being excluded from a badge elitist group is an anomaly, not common enough to warrant the prominence you are placing on it.
Besides, as far as I understand, the devs have already said that there will be badges for using the challenge system so it's not a stretch to have some for difficulty.
I don't see how this is inclusive. You are setting up a specific requirement for team composition which means anything that does not fit that composition is excluded.
I am sorry but I think these would be horrible badges.
Just a point of clarification from one of those campaigners; it's not generally about badge accomplishments behind PvP content but specifically [i]PvE[/i] accomplishments behind PvP content.
I have no objection to gating badges behind raids or trials. After all, raids or trials are designed for a base player level in terms of strength and skill. However, difficulty levels are not, by their very definition. Badges gained for completing content based upon difficulty level will be easier or harder to obtain, not based upon any skill level or effort, but on the decisions players make at character creation.
They are inclusive because every player has an equal opportunity to achieve them and an equal opportunity to be a desired teammate by other players. I didn't think I would have to explain such a simple concept, unless you are just being truculent now.
I see you do not share my opinion. vive la différence
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
Yes, I assumed familiarity with that discussion on the part of the readers of this discussion. It is good of you to clarify that.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
No, they aren't. They are designed to be a more difficult, larger scaled and in many cases unique challenge that you cannot find elsewhere in the game.
I think your are talking about classes and power set selection and their different combat capabilities. But that does not make your conclusion is correct. A class may sacrifice some of it's combat capabilities for additional support abilities or vice versa, but that does not make those classes inherently undesirable in higher difficulty teams. The only way this is true is when the games combat system is designed to make certain combination of classes or powers the clear best choice and anything else an obvious detriment.
Consider this, in CoH a defender could not, in most cases, get the 'deal damage' badge as easily as a scrapper could. A difficulty badge is no different from a conceptual point of view.
Ok, let's try again.
Using exaggeration to emphasize a point, in order to get a '5 gunner team' badge I need to either be a gunner or be able to occupy one of the remaining team slots. The badge requires a restricted team composition and due to simple math will end up excluding more players than it can include.
Here is another way to look at it. I am playing a stalwart and my friend is playing a gunner. We form a team with 4 other gunners and go for the '5 gunner team' badge. In order to immediately go after the '5 stalwart team' badge we have to break up the team and look for new members. We would have to exclude our current team for future activities.
The backhanded insult and accusation was not needed either.
And again, I think you are placing too much importance on badges as a reward. I find it highly improbable that there will be any significant elitist exclusionary practice based on a difficulty badge reward.
+1
Agreed. Anyone can achieve top level "gear" (thank god enhancements didn't really meet that concept), but it's no guarantee that the player knows how to effectively play his/her character. I remember too many PUGs where the tankers were demanding blues like some sort of fee for their services because they hadn't a clue how to pace themselves or effectively taunt.
Unfortunately, it went the other way as well: too many team leaders who didn't understand the flexibility of the game. My main was a gravity/radiation/psionics controller who kicked ass as a team healer (with that single AoE heal properly enhanced and on autocast), but because the build didn't have any other heals many leaders would request a healer in global while we were still in the mish. Nobody ever died on my watch. It was insulting.
On the other hand, I remember a bad PUG experience when the leader insisted my ice/storm controller could be the sole team healer. The build didn't work that way, no matter how you slotted it. It had only one end-thirsty single target heal and no self heal.
There was a lot of player ignorance about roles and classes throughout CoX's history. I'm hoping that most of the initial players in CoT will be more aware of the game's mechanics.
Yeah, and one of my favorite characters to play was a Trick Arrow/Archery defender. I don't think the guy had a single heal in his repertoire. And I got kicked from a lot of teams because of it. But I kept playing him because he was fun.
[hr]I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
I remember a few fools screaming and cursing at my Dark/Dark Defender to "Heal Me Now!" while they were running towards the other end of the room. Dark Miasma heals were self-emanating (AoE from the character) and also required an enemy target to siphon from. How can I do my job if my teammates have no idea what my powers actually do?
Yeah, I do hope for players who are not so self-centered that they don't know how other people's characters work.
Be Well!
Fireheart
I had a dark defender for a bit, it was fun but I sure hated promising my teammates a heal and then missing the target...
-----------
[color=#FF0000]Graphic Designer[/color]
[color=red][b][url=http://cityofheroes.wikia.com/wiki/Dark_Miasma]Dark Miasma[/url][/b][/color] was one of the more versatile and powerful support sets and when slotted and used well it could keep even the most chaotic group alive.
The 1-2-3 punch of Tar Patch, Darkest Night and Twilight Grasp turned entire spawns into crawling, clumsy, weak as a kitten pushovers. Howling Twilight was a more situational rez than other sets had but as a 'OH SHIT!' power it excelled by stunning, slowing and damaging over a very large area. The nice compliment of mez like powers in Petrifying Gaze, Fearsome Stare and Black Hole helped lock down the more troublesome mobs like Sappers or Sorcerers. It even had a decent team stealth power with Shadow Fall that also gave a defense AND resist buff. Rounding the set out with Dark Servant was just icing, a pet that would cycle through a bunch of debuffs.
The set had pretty much everything you want in a support character, slows, holds, -acc, -dmg, stun, fear, -regen and the second most powerful AoE heal in the game.
A capable Dark Miasma character on the team made everything easier but a good one was the 'I win' button.
I don't disagree, but a successful team with a Dark Defender, needed to stay in range of the Defender's effects and not call for spontaneous healing from way across the room.
Dark Miasma was a potent Defender powerset, not a 'Healer' powerset. The same is true of several other powersets we had in CoH. And they benefited from a bit of Accuracy-slotting.
Be Well!
Fireheart
Yes, to get healing players had to be fairly close. But the thing is even if a team member wasn't in range for the heal they still benefited from the foes reduced accuracy and damage.
I wasn't trying to call your skill into question if that's what your thinking. I was just reminiscing about the power of Dark Miasma.
What made it, IMO, the best support set was the perfect synergy between any of it's powers primary effects with it's secondary effects. Howling Twilight was primarily a rez but it also damaged, stunned, slowed, debuffed regeneration and most importantly reduced the recharge of any foe in range. Twilight Grasp was primarily a heal but it also reduced the acc, regen and damage capabilities of foes. Tar Patch was a slow that also lowered a foes resistance. Pretty much every power in Dark was designed to lower the damage coming from foes while making them easier to defeat so direct healing was not needed as much. And with most debuffs having lasting effects it allowed for the defender to also contribute to the damage output of the team a bit more.
Dark Miasma was a debuff set and in CoH debuffs were king, well they were king until you got into the force multiplication aspects of multiple support powers each buffing one another.
I mean, CoH only really had 3 traditional 'Healer' support sets, Empathy, Thermal and Pain and of them only two (Empathy and Pain) were focused on healing. The other 12 or so were of the buff/debuff variety, 4 of which didn't have any healing powers at all.
I am not sure why you brought this up though, I didn't say Dark was a 'healing' set.
I meant that comment in general and wasn't aiming it at you. My point was that many of the players I encountered in Early CoH did not take the time to understand the powers of characters other than their own. They, instead, demanded that others conform to the classical 'Trinity', even though the ATs and powersets could not do so. This attitude did become rarer, after a few years, as the community of CoH players matured.
I expect, I hope, that the community in CoT will focus on understanding what a Guardian can do, and how, rather than trying to stuff it into some pre-existing framework. And the same with the other archetypes. A Stalwart might inherit the 'Tank' position, but that doesn't mean they actually work just like a 'Tank' in another game might. The same may be said for all of the other archetypes.
Be Well!
Fireheart
In a perfect world I guess, but the sad truth is some people are just incapable of understanding more abstract concepts such as how debuffing can be better than some green numbers over their head.
There will also be an abundant of players who simply want you to play the way they tell them to. They can be as demanding as telling you where to stand or a subtle as telling you to 'just keep them alive' while they rush headfirst into alpha strikes they have no business facing.
I agree the game would be better if people both learned more about it and let others play how they want but bad team mates are a fact of life in MMO's. Personally for those times I end up with bad team mates I either try to educate them, get educated myself (I am sometimes the one who doesn't know something after all) or just part ways.
Like I said before, restrictive game design is the major contributing factor to bad team mates.
This is one of my great fears for COT. Because of AD its going to be hard for players to determine who is what and what each player is capable of doing. In COH, especially prior to power customization, when /dark or /empath were on your team you knew those powers on sight. With COT and AD you are going to have to look at something else to figure out what powersets a teammate is running. So now we have to combat the lazy and the added hurdle of decoding a players powersets through the distorting lens of AD. Maybe it's wont be an issue. Maybe there will be enough visual clues to distinguish the powersets in spite of AD. We've not seen enough of the combat and animations and UI to say one way or another.
Second Chance: https://store.missingworldsmedia.com/CityOfTitans/SecondChance/
Dev Tracker: http://cityoftitans.com/forum/fixing-dev-digest
Dev Comments: https://cityoftitans.com/forum/dev-comments
For me, in CoH, I always tried to judge other characters empirically. Basically "how are we doing?" and "Is this person a jerk?" If the answers were "OK" and "No", it was all good. People who were fun to play with would let you know if there was something special you had to do to make good use of their abilities (like "stay close or I can't heal you", or "squishies stay inside the big bubble", for example). The best could handle dealing with teammates who weren't optimal, the worst blamed their teammates for their own stupidity, and/or refused to adjust accordingly.
I mostly solo'd, but I ran on teams a lot too, for TFs and other "advanced" content. But when I teamed I rarely got hung up about what anybody else ran as an AT or a build. I'm hoping that in CoT that same outlook on teams will work. As long as the human behind the other character isn't a jerk, with any combo of ATs/Builds it should be possible to make a team work, with a little creativity.
In fact, some of the most fun I ever had in CoH was figuring out how to make a "weird" or underpowered team lineup succeed.
Obviously, no matter what, some people will still be jerks. But maybe having fewer easy visual cues about exactly what a character can do will actually encourage a culture of better communication. A guy can dream. :)
We can always look at their AT icon and approximate from that. As long as we don't let our expectations blind us to reality.
Be Well!
Fireheart
I'm completely with Geveo on this. It never was much of an issue in the old City, so I hope it isn't in the new one either.
Spurn all ye kindle.
Agreed. Things just usually seemed to work out and end up being a ton of fun--except for those who were trying to build a team/figure out who to kick off based on "stats".
FIGHT EVIL! (or go cause trouble so the Heroes have something to do.)
If you can look at someone and immediately know everything about them, wouldn't that get boring fast?
CoX was all about people coming up with crazy things nobody else did. Six-slot hover. Using oil slick with a DDD to group rez. No-Get-Hitsu. Tanking with non-tanks. Defenders that weren't healers yet still very effective. More than one way to kill a Hamidon. Bots masterminds with no bots just because they wanted the ray gun. I'm barely scratching the surface.
Why would we want to make something where you can look at one part of the build and deduce all the rest of it from that? Admiral Thrawn's been done.
[i]Has anyone seen my mind? It was right here...[/i]
I basically support what the last 5 posts have said. Anything else wouldn't be a spiritual successor to CoH. Imo, ofc.
What really [i]made[/i] CoH wasn't the engine or the design, or any of the many good and bad things that comprised the mechanics of the game; it was the spirit of the community, and the general attitude of being able to get things done no matter what.
That mentality was able to flourish because of the archetype design, though, and I would like to see that kind of enablement again.
of Phoenix Rising
Am I
QFT, man. QFT.
I concur, as well!
Granted, it *was* a bit disappointing, even frustrating, the couple of times I was kicked from a PuG because the leader expected a Kheldian with Lobster and/or Squid powers. You know what? It was his loss though. I would have been great at defense and offense, especially frankenslotting with some purples from my guildies ... and the 6- and 5-slotted Numina healing IO's (AK was developed chiefly to be the best healer that she could be; great for soloing, but with major attention to being an overall support character)!
With 9 lives, AK can afford to be quite magnanimous and comport herself with more than a modicum of decorum!
*sticks out sandpapery pink tongue at the elitist naysayers!*
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
The other side of that coin is this:
It has been 5+ years and people are getting itchy for a game. If the community is the thing that made the game good (even with the faults of the game/company), MWM runs the risk of losing that community if another game goes live and can approximate the old experience.
"Just, well, update your kickstarter email addresses, okay? Make sure they're current?" - warcabbit
I disagree. The community will coalesce around the game that gives them the best feeling, not the game that goes first.
Be Well!
Fireheart
With CoH, I almost never saw a reason to kick anyone except for those you came to realize, weren't even slotted.
That said, I also found many people who said what you just did, but really they sucked. :p This isn't saying you did. This is saying, those who say that, of course thought they were good just as is, and that was not always the case.
Like those Radiation Defenders who didn't like to take or run the toggle debuffs, saying "We do just as good without them, besides it drains stamina." :p
Sadly, you are probably quite right about people who did not understand the importance of proper slotting. I took it as a challenge to develop a proper stamina slotting strategy. I thought of it as sort of a mini-game and, as a roleplayer, I enjoyed strengthening AK's in-game dynamics in-line with her RP backstory.
[center][color=purple][size=16][b][I][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78N2SP6JFaI]Just a cat from another star![/url][/I][/b][/size][/color][/center]
There were Radiation Defenders who DIDN'T take the debuffs? What'd they DO? I mean, I skipped Choking Cloud because it mostly only kept minions on lockdown, which was pointless when teamed because those minions get dropped so fast it doesn't matter anyway, but those anchored debuff toggles were like the defining powers of that set.
R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising
There are good builds and bad builds. For the most part just adding another warm (relatively speaking) body was enough to increase your odds of victory. Assuming you didn't reset the mission.
Second Chance: https://store.missingworldsmedia.com/CityOfTitans/SecondChance/
Dev Tracker: http://cityoftitans.com/forum/fixing-dev-digest
Dev Comments: https://cityoftitans.com/forum/dev-comments
I always found it a bit silly to judge another player based on their build, slotting, power selection, etc because -- despite what some people claimed (and still do) -- there was no 'correct' way to design a character. I saw people do amazing things with completely non-standard builds, and I saw people contribute almost nothing to a team despite having a build that some called optimal. I'm hoping CoT will be the same regarding build flexibility.
Spurn all ye kindle.
I remember teaming with a guy who only used and slotted Brawl. Yes, the base attack everyone starts with. He did it just to see how far he could get in the game using just it. Still had fun.
He musta been One Punch Man, since he only had one punch.
Be Well!
Fireheart
Attacked, used the AOE heal the team buff (forgot it's name) and when asked to toggle debuff the AV, they said those were worthless as they ate through his stamina :p
A friend & I made joke / protest characters that were strictly normal in a super powered universe.
We slotted only the basic powers available to a character and completely neglected the primary & secondary powersets. Brawl, Sprint, rest slotted? Heck yeah. Sands of Mu, yup.
We would run around and lay a beatdown just to see what you could nominally expect a regular citizen to be able to do on their own. It gave us a good look at how to slot under these circumstances and how to tactically approach dangerous situations.
It was a fun experiment, but we didn't advance past our late 20's iirc.
"Just, well, update your kickstarter email addresses, okay? Make sure they're current?" - warcabbit
That's about where this guy was - my group ran into him street-sweeping Tsoo in northern Talos. If I recall correctly he said it was starting to get more difficult to solo at that point - and was having to team more often.
Yes
That reminds me of joining a group once with my human only PB and being immediately dropped because "I don't play with tanks, thanks anyway". Completely the opposite of this. This person obviously didn't have a clue what was possible outside of box. Like someone else said, are we doing ok? Is someone being an ass and getting everyone else killed? No? Great, keep on going. I for one never inspected others to try to figure it out, play and find out through experience and let them speak up if there was something special people needed to know. I personally liked being surprised.
The only people I ever kicked from team were kicked for behavioral reasons not for their build.
Excessive profanity, obscene vulgarity, sexual harassment, power harassment, etc.
Got a level one power slotted with six recharges? No problem, welcome aboard, keep your hands and feet inside the party as the natives do bite.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
My author page at Amazon: https://amzn.to/2MPvkRX
My novelty shirts: https://amzn.to/31Sld32
Or in the case of certain baddies. Cut, sting, melt, vaporize, or smush.
Second Chance: https://store.missingworldsmedia.com/CityOfTitans/SecondChance/
Dev Tracker: http://cityoftitans.com/forum/fixing-dev-digest
Dev Comments: https://cityoftitans.com/forum/dev-comments