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Please read the current update for instructions on downloading the latest update. Players with Mac versions of the game will not be affected, but you will have a slightly longer wait for your version of the new maps. Please make a copy of your character folder before running the new update, just to make sure you don't lose any of your custom work.

It looks like we can give everyone a list of minimum specs for running City of Titans. Please keep in mind that this is 'for now' until we are able to add more graphics and other system refinements. Currently you will need :
Windows 10 or later required; no Intel integrated graphics like UHD, must have AMD or NVIDIA card or discrete chipset with 4Gb or more of VRAM
At least 16GB of main DRAM.
These stats may change as we continue to test.

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Lothic
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Cinnder wrote:
Cinnder wrote:

If veteran rewards are rewards for time subscribed, as they were in the old game, then I see them differently. They are a reward to a player for being a long-term revenue stream -- income that the game has definitely received, rather than potential future income.

I also have no real problem with a vet award system in a game like this.

Sure it's possible that a person who's been playing the game for 5 years might potentially always have more vet status stuff than another player who just started playing the game today, assuming the current 5 year vet never stops playing. But the more important point is that by the time the new player has 5 years under his/her belt they'll have the SAME EXACT REWARDS that the original 5 year vet had when he/she was at their 5 year mark. In this scenario the older player will never have something that the newer player will never be able to get for themselves eventually.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Cinnder wrote:
Cinnder wrote:

Radiac wrote:
1. Newbie friendly policies = attracting new players = more people taking up the game = more money in purchases of the game, if nothing else.
2. Veteran rewards = reward players that we already have for play that they've already done = promote elitism
Note how line 1. leads, possibly, to increased revenue for the game, and line 2 does not.
If veteran rewards are rewards for time subscribed, as they were in the old game, then I see them differently. They are a reward to a player for being a long-term revenue stream -- income that the game has definitely received, rather than potential future income. That is income that seems well worth rewarding, in my book. And they can serve as an incentive to keep subscribing, in which case they also potentially increase future income as well. They are also not exclusive, in that anyone can earn them if they remain subscribed long enough.
Note that time subscribed does not necessarily equal time played, so the premise that anyone earning a vet reward will already have more stuff accumulated in the game won't necessarily be true for every player.

I'm not saying "don't do veteran rewards" I'm just saying "don't go nuts with that". I mean, we now know that competitive badge hunters are going to get competitive about that. If you WANT more complaints from people who don't have the 4 year subscriber badge and know they'll have to wait 3.5 years to get it, go ahead, but I would rather use the veteran rewards as a nice SMALL token of appreciation, maybe a few Stars, plus maybe some crafting materials or something like that, maybe a free unlock of an existing costume piece that saves you some effort. Stuff that you can point to and say "I have this and you don't" but not anything that's going to be really desirable to everyone, like the trenchcoat costume piece. A lot of faction-specific in-game stuff is not terribly important to most people's characters, but a trenchcoat (or overcoat, or duster, whatever you want to call it) is so versatile and ubiquitous, it was really a bad idea to put that behind a veteran reward wall, I feel.

In GW2 the annual rewards I got were mostly things like a free dye unlock (you have to pay IGC to unlock colors in the costume editor in that game...) or maybe a chest with some random crafting materials in it, etc. Nothing truly unique that can't be gotten elsewhere, and nothing so useful as a costume piece that is otherwise unavailable. It would have been okay by me if there were OTHER styles of overcoat available and the veteran trenchcoat was just a special veteran reward variant on that theme, but the ONLY trenchcoat in CoX was the vet one, for a long time, and that was bad, IMO.

So like:

"There's only one jetpack, and you can only get it by being a subber for 5 years" = BAD
"There's a special jetpack that you can only get by being a subber for 5 years which is different from the other 5 jetpacks in the game" = acceptable, to me

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Radiac wrote:<
Radiac wrote:

I'm not saying "don't do veteran rewards" I'm just saying "don't go nuts with that". I mean, we now know that competitive badge hunters are going to get competitive about that. If you WANT more complaints from people who don't have the 4 year subscriber badge and know they'll have to wait 3.5 years to get it, go ahead

Trust me as one of those "crazy competitive badgers" you're alluding to the thought of missing out on a one-time anniversary type badge is about a bazillion times more annoying than being in the scenario of having to wait 3.5 years to get the 4 year subscriber/vet badge. At least I would know that if I played for another 3.5 years I'd eventually get that badge... the idea that I would NEVER EVER have a chance to pick up a missed one-time anniversary badge would drive me ABSOLUTELY BONKERS, to use a pseudo-psychological term. ;)

Radiac wrote:

"There's only one jetpack, and you can only get it by being a subber for 5 years" = BAD
"There's a special jetpack that you can only get by being a subber for 5 years which is different from the other 5 jetpacks in the game" = acceptable, to me

Sure, this is pretty obvious. The Vet awards need to be designed properly so that they are meaningful WITHOUT creating elitist "I have the only type of jetpack in the game and you don't" scenarios.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
I never saw a problem with rewards that were based on time spent with the game, the problem was other people who cried when they came late to the game and some of them were because "I just didn't think the game would be this good." Well then, suffer with the consequences. :p
Why should there ever be "consequences" like this? What benefit does ANYONE playing a game gain from having some players permanently barred from getting certain things in the game? I will always question anyone's desire to want to have permanently exclusive things in a game. Is it a primal need to fulfill their elitist desires to feel superior to someone else? Whatever the motivation it's ultimately pathetic as far as I'm concerned.
If it were only just a matter of getting things based on "how long you've been playing the game" then at least eventually a newer player could still get those things as long as they end up playing for a long time as well.
The "problem" comes when you set things to be awarded based on the real world calendar (that has nothing to do with actually playing the game). If a certain badge/reward was only earnable during such-n-such dates years ago then it permanently screws over newer players even (ironically) if one of those newer player ends up having more time playing the game than somebody who just happened to be around to get the time-based award. I saw players of CoH who loyally played the game for almost its entire 8.5 year run (having only missed like the first 18 months or so of the game) who were forever screwed out of the first anniversary badge just because (through NO fault of their own) they weren't around when the GAME had an anniversary which had absolutely nothing to do with actually PLAYING the game. These screwed players played for YEARS longer than most anyone else they ever played with yet they were the ones forever penalized. That's just plain stupid no matter how you try to defend that via pleas for elitist entitlement.
Brand X wrote:
Mind you, I didn't care for certain costume pieces being in those vet rewards, when I thought they should've just been given to everyone (Belly Tees!)
Yet another reason why having any exclusive items/rewards are intrinsically "questionable" at best. People are always going to be able to easily debate what makes for a reasonable Vet award versus something else you could have Day One without any vet status.
Brand X wrote:
However, more unusual costume pieces would be a different story.
Why? Again what makes one item worth having the first day you start to play a game and other item something you arbitrarily have to wait years for?
Brand X wrote:
I remember CoH had some special cape kinda like that and no one ever really used it :p
And here we have a good anecdotal argument for raising the question "Why should there ever be anything permanently trapped behind a wall of exclusivity" if even the people who have the exclusive toys in question rarely ever use them?

No one was ever permanently barred from getting any vet reward in CoH. Everyone was able to get every vet reward in CoH. So there's no real argument against it, other than "Well, I don't want it." Which if you don't care for vet rewards, okay. I don't think there's a problem with them, as I believe it encourages people to stay subscribed. :p

As for the badges. If you weren't there on such and such date that such and such badge is signifying, then what's the issue? You couldn't get the anniversary badge. Oh no. Others did. Again, it's a non game issue item that encourages others to be there for that badge.

Also, the cape I mentioned wasn't trapped behand a wall of exclusivity. All one had to do was buy the item that gave the code for the item. No exclusivity. Anyone could have gotten that cape and I recall posters on the CoH forums mentioning how they got the cape for 5 dollars as they just bought the game box when it was on clearance sale.

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@Radiac, I'm quite confused

@Radiac, I'm quite confused by your response, I was saying that if you don't get offered anything as far as veteran rewards, and everything gets set back to 0(default) a.k.a. starting out fresh whenever the game officially comes out, how is that deterring new people or promoting elitism?

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Fireheart wrote:
Fireheart wrote:

Redlynne wrote:
Brand X wrote:
I remember CoH had some special cape kinda like that and no one ever really used it :p
That would be the Cape of the Four Winds.
That's my cape!

Be Well!
Fireheart

I used it in a few costumes as well.

(insert pithy comment here)

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

No one was ever permanently barred from getting any vet reward in CoH. Everyone was able to get every vet reward in CoH. So there's no real argument against it, other than "Well, I don't want it." Which if you don't care for vet rewards, okay. I don't think there's a problem with them, as I believe it encourages people to stay subscribed. :p

As I said I never had a problem with the CoH Vet Award system, including the badges related to it.

Brand X wrote:

As for the badges. If you weren't there on such and such date that such and such badge is signifying, then what's the issue?

The point (one more time) is why should there EVER be badges that are related the things that have NOTHING TO DO WITH PLAYING THE GAME in the first place? The CoH anniversary badges "signified" that a group of Devs in the real world managed to launch a MMORPG on such-n-such a date. How exactly did that affect any of YOUR characters IN THE GAME? Did your characters even know they were merely characters in a game? Mine didn't...

Brand X wrote:

You couldn't get the anniversary badge. Oh no. Others did. Again, it's a non game issue item that encourages others to be there for that badge.

It became a GAME ISSUE precisely because the Devs decided to commemorate a REAL LIFE event in the game via badges. If they had NOT made that fundamental mistake then you would be right in saying that celebrating the game's anniversary would have literally been a "non game issue".

How can you encourage someone to "be there for the badge" if they hypothetically never knew the game even existed for YEARS before they finally started playing it? Imagine how those people felt when they simultaneously A) first learned about the badge system and B) found out that there were some badges they'd never be able to get through absolutely NO FAULT of their own? What advantage does it serve the game in general to provide for a system where new players will be forever screwed from being able to fully enjoy it? It's simply stupid to let a game badge system "allow" for that sort of thing to begin with.

Brand X wrote:

Also, the cape I mentioned wasn't trapped behand a wall of exclusivity. All one had to do was buy the item that gave the code for the item. No exclusivity. Anyone could have gotten that cape and I recall posters on the CoH forums mentioning how they got the cape for 5 dollars as they just bought the game box when it was on clearance sale.

*headsmack* You're assuming it would always be easy for anyone to "hunt down" the out-of-print City of Heroes Collector's DVD Edition game box in the real world just for the code for this particular cape. Do you really not hear how ridiculous it sounds when you say things like that? This cape was the very definition of something that was PERMANENTLY EXCLUSIVE because if you couldn't redeem the out-of-print code you'd NEVER get the cape.

P.S. As an extra bonus the Collector's DVD Edition box also provided for the Prestige Power Slide sprint power which I believe (IIRC) became one of the very last PERMANENTLY EXCLUSIVE things in the entire game after most of the otherwise originally exclusive things were eventually released to the game via other methods.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

The point (one more time) is why should there EVER be badges that are related the things that have NOTHING TO DO WITH PLAYING THE GAME in the first place? The CoH anniversary badges "signified" that a group of Devs in the real world managed to launch a MMORPG on such-n-such a date. How exactly did that affect any of YOUR characters IN THE GAME? Did your characters even know they were merely characters in a game? Mine didn't...

That is a good point. As long as you are viewing badges as a character reward. Because Brainbot talked about this in a very educational post why achievements are aimed at driving the player's own behavior.

With that post taken into account, there is a very good case to me made for some achievements associated with the player and the player's account and not the character or what happens in-game. For example:

  • Has created "X" number of characters
  • Became a subscriber
  • has played for "X" long
  • has maintained an account for "X" long
  • referred a friend to play
  • donated money to the capes for kids charity fund

Those are all achievements. They can all be goals which a player can set for him or herself to accomplish, and not one of them has anything to do with what a character accomplishes in game.

If the reward for one or more of those achievements is a badge, then so be it. But I am of a mind to prefer that badges like those are set aside as account badges and not character badges. In my own opinion, which it sounds like you share, a character's badges should be limited to what the character actually accomplishes.

For the sake if this discussion I grouped all rewards under the term "badges" since it appears from your posts that you have already done the same. So it could be a cape, a vanity item, or a title and not necessarily a badge, but it could also be a combination of those.


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.
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Nothing to do with playing

Nothing to do with playing the game?

"You logged into the game on this day!" Has just as much to do with playing the game as "You have visited this spot!" :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Nothing to do with playing the game?
"You logged into the game on this day!" Has just as much to do with playing the game as "You have visited this spot!" :p

What does your character do when you log in? Nothing. Brought your character to this spot is a thing you can do in-game. Clicked the log on button in a menu isn't an in-game thing. It's more of a launcher thing than a game thing.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Nothing to do with playing the game?
"You logged into the game on this day!" Has just as much to do with playing the game as "You have visited this spot!" :p
What does your character do when you log in? Nothing. Brought your character to this spot is a thing you can do in-game. Clicked the log on button in a menu isn't an in-game thing. It's more of a launcher thing than a game thing.

Logging in is something you do in game to play it. Happen to travel past a spot in game is just as low of an activity :p

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So moving to a specific

So moving to a specific location is the same thing as clicking one button... Ok then.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Takes just as much effort.

Takes just as much effort. You know it takes just as much effort. The problem isn't in that it takes any more effort, the problem is, you don't like the idea of a badge that you yourself are afraid you may miss :p

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Actually I don't care about

Actually I don't care about badges, never been much of a completionist. But I can tell the difference between doing a thing out of game to get in game and performing an action within a game.

I wasn't aware of any exploration badges in CoH that could be gotten with one click. But I guess your mileage may vary.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Exploration badges didn't

Exploration badges didn't require any clicking. You just got them for passing near by. You didn't even have to stop at them. They required absolutely no effort at all. :p

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Other than learning where

Other than learning where they were (if you wanted to look it up, if not and actually wanted the challenge of it you could have spent hours searching all over the maps) and getting to the place they were or getting someone else to go there and then teleport you there because you didn't take a travel power that could get you there. But other than that it took no effort at all!

Exactly the same amount of effort as clicking "Start Game". Sheesh they took so little effort they might as well have just given you all the exploration badges as soon as you make a character and logged in! I remember that they were so easy to get that I got them on every single character, I mean it only took a few seconds, right? Definitely didn't require any kind of time investment or any effort on the player's part.

(The amount of sarcasm in my post, I believe, caused my phone's browser to crash twice making me retype the entire thing.)

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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You never needed anyone to

You never needed anyone to help you teleport to a badge. That was done just so you can say "I got the badge!" Also, someone else teleporting you to the badge? That takes no effort for you.

Yes, there where out of the way, hidden badges, you may have had to go out of your way to really be looking for to find (the hideout in faultline for instance) but no, badges just required you to pass by them. You could get them without even trying to get them.

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Try getting on top of the

Try getting on top of the Atlas globe with just the fitness power pool and then tell me you don't need someone to teleport you up there. And getting someone to teleport you places requires no effort? Must be nice to be able to find someone who will for free take hours out of their day to teleport you around so you can get all the exploration badges.

You could get them without even trying to get them... That was more or less every badge I got, personally. Vet badges? No effort. Take x damage? "Oh, sweet. Wasn't even trying for it." I got a ton of badges without even trying to get them. In fact the only badges I ever remember -trying- to get were the accolades. Everything else just happened while I was just playing. But then again I was no badge hunter.

And the exploration badges -would- take effort if people went after them like they were intended to be sort after. Not with some list online telling you where to get all of them. But on your own. Searching for them. Maybe getting a few because some folks were kind enough to point out some for you.

The way you talk about them is that they'd be ten times harder or require ten times more effort if you had to click on them instead of just be within x distance from them.

The internet and the ease of use trading information makes any award like the exploration badges kind of trivial. But sometimes people are like "no, I'm going to find them without help." Which can be a fun way to do things. I've done things like that before on various games "I'm going to find them myself this time" "I'm going to do this without a walkthrough"... So yeah, try hunting all the CoH badges on a single character without a guide and tell me how zero effort it was.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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You just said ALL the badges.

You just said ALL the badges. So, is the idea that exploration badges in CoT will actually take more effort than logging in and oh look, standing right on the badge? Or how it's right there, next to the contact you HAVE to meet? :p

Hover, jet pack, flight, super jump, teleport, all ways to have gotten up on top of the statue without requiring anyone else to help you get up there.

So, since badges should require some sort of work to make them worth while, and logging in is to simple, is your idea that there won't be any easy exploration badges?

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A search for "all the badges"

A search for "all the badges" only turned up your post. When have you ever logged in and just happened to be next to an exploration badge? That makes zero sense. Having some exploration badges being easy to get is necessary for it can show folks that they -exist- in the first place. Not only that but based on the badge name (and if there's description) they can impart some lore info.

Jet packs weren't available in the early days, so that's out. If you didn't have any of those travel powers you -could not- get some/most of the badges. Like if you were a super speedster. Or like a character of mine relied on fitness and Ninja run. And while yeah, all those things can get you up there the point of it was that -without- those travel powers it becomes a lot less easy.

The thing you don't seem to be grasping is that they should be things rewarded for what you do -in game- logging in isn't something you do in game, it's something done to get in game. I'd like it if you got an exploration badge for entering a new zone, as that'd encourage exploration especially of it was the first in a set of badges which you'd then be able to see greyed out which would encourage people to visit all the zones, and maybe hunt some badges. Especially if said badge gave a lore tidbit about the zone.

There should be badges that are easy to get, and ones that are tricky. But all should be based on actions performed in game. Not by starting the game up.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Takes just as much effort. You know it takes just as much effort.

No... this is a bald-face false equivalency that's simply wrong.

The question isn't even about how much "effort" it takes to get badges like the Anniversary badges... but if you want to go down that particular rabbit hole then it's absolutely clear that even compared to the average Exploration badge the amount of "effort" to earn the Anniversary badges was effectively nil. If your cat happened to walk across your keyboard and stepped on the right keys there was a statistically plausible chance it could have logged you into the game and earned those badges instead of you.

The anniversary badges (as I stated in other threads when this topic has come up before) represented only 9 badges out of thousands available in the game. There was no overwhelming reason why they even HAD to be in the game at all. They were literally (unless maybe if you count the Bug Hunter badge) the ONLY badges in the game that had anything to do related to what happened OUTSIDE OF PLAYING THE GAME. Logging into a game is NOT playing a game. I contend that they (being in such the tiny minority) had no legitimate reason for being in CoH in the first place and it'll be unfortunate if the CoT Devs feel the need to continue the "tradition" of celebrating their OUT OF GAME launch day with a similar set of badges.

Brand X wrote:

The problem isn't in that it takes any more effort, the problem is, you don't like the idea of a badge that you yourself are afraid you may miss :p

Sure I'll admit I'd be afraid to miss them. I was afraid I was going to miss them back in CoH and I regularly played the game from April 2004 to November 2012. But what's appalling to me is that you've expressed zero empathy for the poor folks who may have started playing the game years -after- launch because they may not have even heard of the game until then. You've used language in other posts that's implied it could have only been a player's "fault" for missing those badges because if they had only "kept playing the game" they wouldn't have missed the badges. In what universe would that have made ANY SENSE to a player who didn't even know the game EXISTED until years after launch?

Bottomline the ONLY purpose having one-time only badges is for older (luckier?) players to be able to laugh at newer players for not having the opportunity to get those badges and I consider that absolutely pathetic and sadistically elitist. Frankly I question a person's ability to sympathize with others when they actively want to preserve/defend an otherwise pointless scenario like this. CoT does not NEED ANY badge that can only be earned on the basis of the calendar of the real world and would be a better game if it managed to avoid the concept completely.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

But what's appalling to me is that you've expressed zero empathy for the poor folks who may have started playing the game years -after- launch because they may not have even heard of the game until then. You've used language in other posts that's implied it could have only been a player's "fault" for missing those badges because if they had only "kept playing the game" they wouldn't have missed the badges. In what universe would that have made ANY SENSE to a player who didn't even know the game EXISTED until years after launch?
Bottomline the ONLY purpose having one-time only badges is for older (luckier?) players to be able to laugh at newer players for not having the opportunity to get those badges and I consider that absolutely pathetic and sadistically elitist. Frankly I question a person's ability to sympathize with others when they actively want to preserve/defend an otherwise pointless scenario like this. CoT does not NEED ANY badge that can only be earned on the basis of the calendar of the real world and would be a better game if it managed to avoid the concept completely.

I'm not attempting to defend Brand X's position on this, but I do want to bring attention to this statement you made.

First, you are presuming that folks who missed out on a badge require empathy. I'm not saying that people who are so ill adjusted that they need empathy shouldn't get empathy, it is just that you state it like someone so ill adjusted is normal and the people who are healthy in mind are the sick ones.

It is possible that neither side is right in this scenario.

I think we need to acknowledge that some people take completionism to unhealthy levels. And people who are ill like that deserve our empathy. I have empathy for drug addicts too, but that doesn't mean I should make sure they get a hit every time they want one.

As long as anniversary badges aren't required for an achievement, why should it matter whether someone has it and you don't? If you have your own reasons for not having an anniversary badge, like maybe you were only 12 and you couldn't play the game it's first two years, then that is a pretty good reason and you should be able to accept that reason. If you can not accept that reason, I can empathize with you because let's face it, there is a part in all of us who wants what others have; but it never reaches a point in a healthy person where anyone has to tell them to deal with it.

Whatever echo chamber your friends were in that fed their feelings of low self worth for missing a badge is not a healthy place.


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.
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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

As long as anniversary badges aren't required for an achievement, why should it matter whether someone has it and you don't?

As long as badges like the Anniversary badges represent less than 1% of the total number of badges in a game where every other badge in the game is based on what specific characters do instead of what a player does OUTSIDE of playing the game why should they even be in the game to begin with?

Huckleberry wrote:

I think we need to acknowledge that some people take completionism to unhealthy levels. And people who are ill like that deserve our empathy. I have empathy for drug addicts too, but that doesn't mean I should make sure they get a hit every time they want one.
...
Whatever echo chamber your friends were in that fed their feelings of low self worth for missing a badge is not a healthy place.

Tell that to the several thousand people who regularly logged into the third-party CoH badge tracking websites...

If these tiny minority of badges were not in the game to begin with then we would not have speculate/worry about anyone's psychological health with regards to badge completionism / envy / elitist sadism or the like. With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight from CoH I tend to like eliminating the causes of problems before they actually become problems. *shrugs*

Huckleberry wrote:

because let's face it, there is a part in all of us who wants what others have; but it never reaches a point in a healthy person where anyone has to tell them to deal with it.

Again if the Devs create a situation where eventually anyone can have everything (in this case badges) that anyone else has then you've eliminated the entire potential for "unhealthy envy" in this scenario. Questioning whether any of this is "healthy" or not would be entirely moot.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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It was a badge. The only

It was a badge. The only badges that meant anything in the game, where those that gave you an accolade that increased your stats. :p

Any other badge was merely window dressing. Nothing of importance to the playing of the game. Those who had to have them all was just something they had to do.

And no, as someone who was late to the game, I didn't care if others where late to the game as well :p I wasn't there on day one. Was I there for all anniversary badges? I could've been. I missed one because I took a break from the game. I didn't stop paying the sub, I just didn't play for a month, which happened to be during the anniversary.

During the other anniversary badges I was there for, did I try to get them on all my characters, of course, I was there, why wouldn't I? :p

So, no, it's not a lack of empathy for people. It's a lack of caring if someone misses a badge when it was their own fault. I accepted that I missed a badge due to my own life getting in the way, why wouldn't I expect others to do the same, when it's a badge that meant absolutely nothing.

Hell, it's not like there was a badge that said, "Hey! You got em all! You must be a pokemon Master too!"

No, it was a badge that may give incentive to players to pay for the game and that is a good thing. :p

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Several thousand or a few

Several thousand or a few hundred? :p

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Kiyori Anoyui wrote:
Kiyori Anoyui wrote:

@Radiac, I'm quite confused by your response, I was saying that if you don't get offered anything as far as veteran rewards, and everything gets set back to 0(default) a.k.a. starting out fresh whenever the game officially comes out, how is that deterring new people or promoting elitism?

As far as early access is concerned, you're fine. But the game will continue on for years after release too. I was more concerned with veteran rewards post roll-out, which admittedly is a tangent that probably derailed this thread at this point.

R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising

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Radiac wrote:
Radiac wrote:

Kiyori Anoyui wrote:
@Radiac, I'm quite confused by your response, I was saying that if you don't get offered anything as far as veteran rewards, and everything gets set back to 0(default) a.k.a. starting out fresh whenever the game officially comes out, how is that deterring new people or promoting elitism?
As far as early access is concerned, you're fine. But the game will continue on for years after release too. I was more concerned with veteran rewards post roll-out, which admittedly is a tangent that probably derailed this thread at this point.

Which reminds me, the Vet badges, more badges you got for not playing the game. :p

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The difference being vet

The difference being vet badges could be gotten by anyone. Literally anyone. Where as once a limited offer badge is gone it can be gotten by literally no one.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

It was a badge. The only badges that meant anything in the game, where those that gave you an accolade that increased your stats. :p

This is merely your opinion that many people did not share. I could easily name several hundred badges that "meant" far more to me than the "accolades" based on how difficult they were to achieve and how much fun they were to work on with other players.

Brand X wrote:

Any other badge was merely window dressing. Nothing of importance to the playing of the game. Those who had to have them all was just something they had to do.

Now you're going to pontificate that there's a "right" way to play a game and a "wrong" way? Who put you in charge of that?

Brand X wrote:

And no, as someone who was late to the game, I didn't care if others where late to the game as well :p I wasn't there on day one. Was I there for all anniversary badges? I could've been. I missed one because I took a break from the game. I didn't stop paying the sub, I just didn't play for a month, which happened to be during the anniversary.

If the Anniversary badges didn't exist in CoH this would have been a moot point for you (and anyone else) regardless.

Brand X wrote:

During the other anniversary badges I was there for, did I try to get them on all my characters, of course, I was there, why wouldn't I? :p
So, no, it's not a lack of empathy for people. It's a lack of caring if someone misses a badge when it was their own fault. I accepted that I missed a badge due to my own life getting in the way, why wouldn't I expect others to do the same, when it's a badge that meant absolutely nothing.

So now people are supposed to react to the circumstances of how/when they could play the game the same why you did? Who put you in charge of that?

Brand X wrote:

Hell, it's not like there was a badge that said, "Hey! You got em all! You must be a pokemon Master too!"

If the game ever got to a point where it would never add any more badges then having a "You got em all!" badge might have been a legitimate thing to be in the game.

Brand X wrote:

No, it was a badge that may give incentive to players to pay for the game and that is a good thing. :p

The only "incentive" it provided was as an angst-generator for those people who cared when they got screwed over by not getting them for whatever reason. These specific badges were not a "net positive" for the game by any stretch of the imagination.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Several thousand or a few hundred? :p

When you accounted for both the hero and villain re-named/re-graphiced versions of all the badges in the game there were in fact several thousand.

The Anniversary badges represented far less less than 1% of the total - that fact alone should be telling you that they were "misfit outliers" that could have easily been removed from the game without major incident.

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I'm not pontificating there

I'm not pontificating there was a right way or wrong way to play the game. You are.

I liked the anniversary badges. YOU said it was wrong to like them. :p

Why did I like the anniversary badges? Because I could look at someone's badge list and go "Oh hey! You were there that first year! You there day 1? Me? No. I started at the infamous Winter Event, making me believe that was all there was to the game! :p"

If someone gets angst over a badge, that is totally on them. I get angst over anyone with a concept character I deem stupid, annoying, not even trying. That's on me. So is anyone who gets angst over not obtaining a badge. It's on them. :p

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Several thousand or a few hundred? :p
When you accounted for both the hero and villain re-named/re-graphiced versions of all the badges in the game there were in fact several thousand.
The Anniversary badges represented far less less than 1% of the total - that fact alone should be telling you that they were "misfit outliers" that could have easily been removed from the game without major incident.

You said several thousand PEOPLE, not several thousand badges.

I doubt there were several thousand players who used the sites to track their badge count. :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

I'm not pontificating there was a right way or wrong way to play the game. You are.

I'm providing ample evidence for why a tiny minority of badges were bad/unnecessary for the game. All you're doing is reinforcing that they were merely instruments of entitled elitism.

Brand X wrote:

I liked the anniversary badges. YOU said it was wrong to like them. :p

I don't care who "liked" them or not. I simply explaining why their inclusion in the game was a fundamental mistake.

Brand X wrote:

Why did I like the anniversary badges? Because I could look at someone's badge list and go "Oh hey! You were there that first year! You there day 1? Me? No. I started at the infamous Winter Event, making me believe that was all there was to the game! :p"

I've explained (in countless other threads) how "character birthday badges" could do exactly the same thing without the negative downsides of the Anniversary badges you apparently wish to continue into CoT.

Brand X wrote:

If someone gets angst over a badge, that is totally on them. I get angst over anyone with a concept character I deem stupid, annoying, not even trying. That's on me. So is anyone who gets angst over not obtaining a badge. It's on them. :p

Right, that angst is on them - never denied that.

But when it would be TRIVIALLY SIMPLE to design the new game so that the very concept of "permanently missing a badge" is not even POSSIBLE to begin with you've offered absolutely no practical/workable reason why CoT should not be designed that way. The only reason you seem to have to want the possibility to ever be able to "miss a badge" again to continue is the enjoyment of knowing that some people are going to be pissed off by that. Are you actually that sadistic that you'd actively WANT that to happen in CoT.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Brand X wrote:
Several thousand or a few hundred? :p
When you accounted for both the hero and villain re-named/re-graphiced versions of all the badges in the game there were in fact several thousand.
The Anniversary badges represented far less less than 1% of the total - that fact alone should be telling you that they were "misfit outliers" that could have easily been removed from the game without major incident.
You said several thousand PEOPLE, not several thousand badges.
I doubt there were several thousand players who used the sites to track their badge count. :p

Yes, there were that many people who were registered on those sites. Obviously the top few hundred of us were probably on those sites more often than the ones who might have visited once or twice. Badging in CoH was not like PvP - a significant number of people actually liked to collect badges.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

I think we need to acknowledge that some people take completionism to unhealthy levels. And people who are ill like that deserve our empathy. I have empathy for drug addicts too, but that doesn't mean I should make sure they get a hit every time they want one.
...
Whatever echo chamber your friends were in that fed their feelings of low self worth for missing a badge is not a healthy place.

Tell that to the several thousand people who regularly logged into the third-party CoH badge tracking websites...

I would gladly do so. Gather them up for me. Maybe we can get a collection together or start a crowdfunding campaign, because this problem is likely prevalent online and there should be some sort of help group for it. Otherwise game manufacturers will continue to prey upon them with one-time only promotions that exist only to leech off the addicted.

But what do you mean by badge tracking websites? because I am a completionist, too, and I did go to the websites (especially paragon wiki) that showed me where I could go and what I needed to do to get the badges. If you are talking about those websites, there is nothing obssessive about them. Rather they are a very useful tool for research and to save time and effort.

On the other hand, if you are talking about some sort of global tracker that kept a tally of the people with the most badges, then that is a user-created construct and I say more power to them for doing so! Its great that some users could get together to make their own meta-game out of CoX. Just realize that if those same users included things like anniversary badges as points in their tallies, then the fallout that results is purely on them for doing so.

Lothic wrote:

If these tiny minority of badges were not in the game to begin with then we would not have speculate/worry about anyone's psychological health with regards to badge completionism / envy / elitist sadism or the like. With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight from CoH I tend to like eliminating the causes of problems before they actually become problems. *shrugs*

That is looking at it from the completely opposite angle from which the badges were meant. The badges were intended for those who where there, not those who were not. Badges can be rewards for achievements. Achievments are used to drive player behavior, so by definition they are design for the players who do not have them yet. Badges like the anniversary badge are not tied to any achievement. They exist solely for the players who got them. They are a nice momento from the makers of the game to the player that they acknowledge the player is part of the story of the games own success. They are not used to drive player performance the way an achievement badge would. Don't you see the difference?

Lothic wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

because let's face it, there is a part in all of us who wants what others have; but it never reaches a point in a healthy person where anyone has to tell them to deal with it.

Again if the Devs create a situation where eventually anyone can have everything (in this case badges) that anyone else has then you've eliminated the entire potential for "unhealthy envy" in this scenario. Questioning whether any of this is "healthy" or not would be entirely moot.

Coming from someone who is a proponent of something even more divisive that the devs have chosen not to include, you have to admit the irony. Where do you draw the line between what is or is not going to alienate a segment of the playerbase? It is a rule that no matter what you do, there is going to be some segment of the population that will desire you had done something different. This has been immortalized into the phrase "no good deed goes unpunished." If MWM wants to reward players for anything, they should not withhold that reward because of some others' personal and inappropriate obsessions.

But this does highlight a trend in contemporary MMORPG design. The trend is to avoid exclusion as much as possible.
Does anyone remember back in the day when there were rare named Ranger pets in World of Warcraft? That was back during the transition from a fantasy RPG which happened to be MMO to an MMO that happened to be fantasy. I remember getting Vile Sting, the rare scorpion pet from down in Thousand Needles. Then a few months later they made it so all the pets had uniform stats. They did this because people were camping on the rare pets 24/7. It made sense to do this from a game design and business perspective. But it was just one more paper-cut thin slice into the heart and soul of the RPG side of the genre. I miss the days when choices mattered. I miss the days when your own story was your own and not something that everyone could duplicate. I miss the days when someone would ride into town on a super-uber mount and everyone would crowd around to see it. But at some point, the MMO side overtook the RPG side and now games don't even bother with the RPG side anymore, except in a freeform text field on your character's bio page. Players in CoT even want to run the same mission over and over so they can make different decisions each time. I always thought that's what alts were for.
/rant.


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.
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I think it's definitely true

I think it's definitely true that CoX players reacted to the badges in a way that the devs themselves hadn't anticipated. That was a mistake on their part, and one we have to understand and learn from moving forward.

CoX players treated badges like Pokemon and got competitive about getting all of them or just more than anyone else, and given that there were some that were impossible the get for some people, it wasn't a fair competition in the first place, but then people could have known that going in, as it was public knowledge. The players definitely misused the badge system for purposed that it was never intended for, but then that's player for you, they'll find a use for something that you never thought of. Also, some people just like collecting things. It's human nature for some.

Badges in CoT should take this information into account before awarding any particular badge.

R.S.O. of Phoenix Rising

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Radiac wrote:
Radiac wrote:

The players definitely misused the badge system for purposed that it was never intended for, but then that's player for you, they'll find a use for something that you never thought of.

That's a choice selection of words, Radiac.


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.
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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
I'm not pontificating there was a right way or wrong way to play the game. You are.
I'm providing ample evidence for why a tiny minority of badges were bad/unnecessary for the game. All you're doing is reinforcing that they were merely instruments of entitled elitism.
Brand X wrote:
I liked the anniversary badges. YOU said it was wrong to like them. :p
I don't care who "liked" them or not. I simply explaining why their inclusion in the game was a fundamental mistake.
Brand X wrote:
Why did I like the anniversary badges? Because I could look at someone's badge list and go "Oh hey! You were there that first year! You there day 1? Me? No. I started at the infamous Winter Event, making me believe that was all there was to the game! :p"
I've explained (in countless other threads) how "character birthday badges" could do exactly the same thing without the negative downsides of the Anniversary badges you apparently wish to continue into CoT.
Brand X wrote:
If someone gets angst over a badge, that is totally on them. I get angst over anyone with a concept character I deem stupid, annoying, not even trying. That's on me. So is anyone who gets angst over not obtaining a badge. It's on them. :p
Right, that angst is on them - never denied that.
But when it would be TRIVIALLY SIMPLE to design the new game so that the very concept of "permanently missing a badge" is not even POSSIBLE to begin with you've offered absolutely no practical/workable reason why CoT should not be designed that way. The only reason you seem to have to want the possibility to ever be able to "miss a badge" again to continue is the enjoyment of knowing that some people are going to be pissed off by that. Are you actually that sadistic that you'd actively WANT that to happen in CoT.

Wrong. Character Birthday Badges don't tell us anything. The anniversary badges told us "Oh hey, you've been here since sometime in the first year most likely." A character birthday badge just means, "Oh hey, you've had the character for a year."

Which then leads to...

"And you're not max level yet? You must suck." or "You got to max level already? So, a farm baby, huh?" or even just "Oh hey! Gratz on having the character for so long!" :p

I'm not sadistic. I just hate to see something not put in that wasn't bad (I liked the anniversary badges :p) just because someone whined and said "I can't get them, so life is so unfair!"

By your own logic, whatever could hurt someone shouldn't be put in the game, where as I can point to many things that could trigger someone's angst that will be put into the game. So the question really becomes, why does your crying get put over someone elses crying? :p

"Oh man! That person is being mugged! I was mugged once! Now I'm reliving it! I never should have played this game! Why would it make me relive such angst?!"

See! Angst on anything :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

...So the question really becomes, why does your crying get put over someone elses crying? :p

Because Lothic is right on this point.

"THE TITANS ARE COMING! THE TITANS ARE COMING!"

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Hero_Zero wrote:
Hero_Zero wrote:

Brand X wrote:
...So the question really becomes, why does your crying get put over someone elses crying? :p

Because Lothic is right on this point.
"THE TITANS ARE COMING! THE TITANS ARE COMING!"

Lothic is wrong on this point.

Lothic's point is "I don't want to cry over not getting a badge. I will be all full of angst if I can't get the badge, so this means others will be too!"

Okay, let's go with that line of thinking.

What's something every player/character will do in this game? Do damage and kill enemies. To varying degrees of speed and success I'm sure, but every character will be set up to do those two things.

What won't every character be able to do in this game? Heal! So, get rid of those heal badges, that I'm sure those dedicated healers really liked, because dammit, I'm a scrapper and I'm going to angst over not being able to get that badge.

Also, do we get rid of those Defeat 100million of this enemy, because someone who's all angst ridden, knows they can't find the time out of their game schedule to kill that many of just one enemy group?

I'll tell you what, I'll concede Lothic and others are right in the badge debate, if the idea is to only put in badges that EVERY character can get on their own and not with the help of alts (some people don't want alts!) and without really effecting the concept of a players character.

Not to mention, what did a lot of badgers hate? PvP! What did they complain about? PvP Badges! What could EVERY player do? Get PvP badges!

What did badgers say should be removed from the game? Any badge that dealt with PvP!

Why? Because they where criers :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Wrong. Character Birthday Badges don't tell us anything. The anniversary badges told us "Oh hey, you've been here since sometime in the first year most likely." A character birthday badge just means, "Oh hey, you've had the character for a year."

This clearly shows us the ONLY reason you actually want something like the Anniversary badges is to lord it over someone else and be able to prove "Ha! Ha! I'm cooler than you because I've been playing longer than you have!". If you still want to pull that dickishly elitist move all you'd have to do is re-log into your oldest character (which you'll likely keep around just for this purpose no doubt) and then use that character's birthday badges to measure e-peens with.

Brand X wrote:

Which then leads to...

"And you're not max level yet? You must suck." or "You got to max level already? So, a farm baby, huh?" or even just "Oh hey! Gratz on having the character for so long!" :p

Really?... talk about desperately grasping for "angsty" things to worry about in this game. ;)

Brand X wrote:

I'm not sadistic. I just hate to see something not put in that wasn't bad (I liked the anniversary badges :p) just because someone whined and said "I can't get them, so life is so unfair!"

I'm sure at least a few people really "liked" the CoH Anniversary badges although I (ironically?) suspect far more people didn't actually care one way or the other. I'd perfectly be willing to leave it to the CoT Devs to weigh any potential benefits of having such badges in CoT versus the obvious downsides caused by their permanent exclusivity that by all other accounts the Devs seem to be trying to minimize as much as possible.

Brand X wrote:

By your own logic, whatever could hurt someone shouldn't be put in the game, where as I can point to many things that could trigger someone's angst that will be put into the game. So the question really becomes, why does your crying get put over someone elses crying? :p

"Oh man! That person is being mugged! I was mugged once! Now I'm reliving it! I never should have played this game! Why would it make me relive such angst?!"

See! Angst on anything :p

And here we go with the futile attempt to equate the avoidance of a few Anniversary type badges with the "slippery slope" of having this game become some kind of care-bear Nirvana where the Devs have to try to make EVERYTHING angst-proof. Don't be silly with this.

Suggesting that the Devs avoid a few problematic badges is not even remotely approaching the point of suggesting everything that in the game should be made safe for all the special little snowflakes. All I'm talking about is a trivial design policy meant to AVOID known problems. As someone who claims they didn't mind/care about missing a few Anniversary badges yourself why would you actually miss them from being in the game at all, especially if they were replaced with something like character birthday badges?

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Anyone can get a heal badge

Anyone can get a heal badge thanks to multiple builds and tertiaries!

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Wrong. Not everyone can get

Wrong. Not everyone can get the heal badge, because some people actually care about concept. Which was stated in the first post. :p

As to Lothic. I already said I didn't even get all the anniversary badges. :p I didn't get angsty over it. I didn't get upset for missing it. It seems however, you did, or at least others who where never there at that point in the game to get it, did.

However, the comments have been "If everyone can't get it, it shouldn't be in the game and if it causes angst it shouldn't be in game." Also, it should require real play time to get and not just pushing a button.

Now, let's go with the Vet badges. Everyone could get them, but there was always going to be someone who was behind the others in the top badge rankings, because, hey, they started the game later. :p What was the comment about the angst? That someone couldn't win the top badge collector spot, because they missed a month of logging in. :p

So Vet badges must be bad too, but then it was said, "No, not bad because all could get them."

So the answer is obviously, leave the badges to exploration badges (that all travel powers can access), kill counts (which hey, we can take those all the way up to Googol Kills of Skullz!) of various enemies, maybe even separating the player kill badges into alignment types, damage taken, time being controlled (but not time controlling others), experience levels gained, damage done, mission specific and events that will happen more than once, but never for one time events.

Did I miss any?

There we go! How to do badges and avoid the angst. Except for those PvP badges, those will angst people, but at the very least, everyone has the same access to them as everyone else.

Also, since this goes for badges, do we not do one time chances at titles, as well? "I Made It To the One Year Anniversary!" title shouldn't be a thing, right? No "Kickstarter!" title for those who missed out on the KS?

Or are titles different than badgers and no one cares about collecting ALL THE TITLES?

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Ironically, my memory of CoX

Ironically, my memory of CoX vis a vis badges is that they never really worked the way I would have expected them to. To clarify that statement, I used to think that if I was doing a TF and I put on my "Did this TF, got the badge" badge, people in PUG TF teams would maybe take me seriously when I would offer suggestions as to how to proceed. Instead I got a lot of "hey, don't tell me what to do" and "I'm level 15, I'm not a noob!" from people who didn't even know what a badge was, or how I had gotten the sub-title under my name in the first place.

The only badge that actually got noticed like that by anyone was the Charmer badge, which was for completing the Abandoned Sewers Trial. As hard as that was, a lot of people still had no idea what it was from, but those who knew definitely had a little respect for you if you had it.

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Lothic is wrong on this point.

Lothic's point is "I don't want to cry over not getting a badge. I will be all full of angst if I can't get the badge, so this means others will be too!"

Okay, let's go with that line of thinking.

Sure let's go down that road. I knew several good in-game badging friends who were constantly upset by having been screwed out of several of these badges by starting the game a few years after launch so this whole thing is not just some kind of hypothetical issue to me. The subject came up often for years between us.

Brand X wrote:

What's something every player/character will do in this game? Do damage and kill enemies. To varying degrees of speed and success I'm sure, but every character will be set up to do those two things.

What won't every character be able to do in this game? Heal! So, get rid of those heal badges, that I'm sure those dedicated healers really liked, because dammit, I'm a scrapper and I'm going to angst over not being able to get that badge.

Also, do we get rid of those Defeat 100million of this enemy, because someone who's all angst ridden, knows they can't find the time out of their game schedule to kill that many of just one enemy group?

I'll tell you what, I'll concede Lothic and others are right in the badge debate, if the idea is to only put in badges that EVERY character can get on their own and not with the help of alts (some people don't want alts!) and without really effecting the concept of a players character.

Sorry but you barked up the wrong tree with this one with this one as well. I managed to get ALL of those badges (the one Billion HP version of Empath, the 100 million HP version of Immortal, and so on) on both a Fire Controller and an Electric Blaster. Don't talk to me about "my character build won't let me get such-n-such badge". ;)

Both of these badging characters had over 1,392 badges each by the time the game ended. The only badges that would have literally been IMPOSSIBLE for me to have gotten at that point was any Annverisary badges I might have missed.

Brand X wrote:

Not to mention, what did a lot of badgers hate? PvP! What did they complain about? PvP Badges! What could EVERY player do? Get PvP badges!

What did badgers say should be removed from the game? Any badge that dealt with PvP!

Why? Because they where criers :p

While there were some pathetic badgers who did complain about having to go into PvP zones to get badges I was never one of them. I lost count of how many stupid PvPers I wasted when they thought I was "just" a care-bear badger lost by myself in a PvP zone. Basically no top badger I'm aware of actually "complained" about how hard any badge was to get - we just talked about the strategies needed to get those badges.

Basically you are very sadly mistaken about all of these points, and about the Anniversary badges in general. Do you really have no other viable arguments left to throw against the wall here?

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Radiac wrote:
Radiac wrote:

Ironically, my memory of CoX vis a vis badges is that they never really worked the way I would have expected them to. To clarify that statement, I used to think that if I was doing a TF and I put on my "Did this TF, got the badge" badge, people in PUG TF teams would maybe take me seriously when I would offer suggestions as to how to proceed. Instead I got a lot of "hey, don't tell me what to do" and "I'm level 15, I'm not a noob!" from people who didn't even know what a badge was, or how I had gotten the sub-title under my name in the first place.
The only badge that actually got noticed like that by anyone was the Charmer badge, which was for completing the Abandoned Sewers Trial. As hard as that was, a lot of people still had no idea what it was from, but those who knew definitely had a little respect for you if you had it.

Frankly even though I had two badging characters which, as I said, effectively had every badge in the game I NEVER ONCE thought about going around and saying "I've got badge such-n-such so you should listen to what I have to say" to anyone. Unlike some people around here I never considered using my badges as a means to lord over my elitist narcissism over others. *shrugs*

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

There we go! How to do badges and avoid the angst. Except for those PvP badges, those will angst people, but at the very least, everyone has the same access to them as everyone else.

Again you're trying to tell the person who had very nearly every badge in the game on both a Controller and a Blaster about which badges were too angsty to get in the game. Why don't you let ME tell YOU about a subject you don't really seem to know that much about.

Despite all the smoke and mirrors you're desperately trying to toss around here the only badges that have the "problem" of being permanently exclusive were the Annverisary badges. All CoT needs to do is avoid having badges like that and EVERYTHING else about badges would be fine.

Brand X wrote:

Also, since this goes for badges, do we not do one time chances at titles, as well? "I Made It To the One Year Anniversary!" title shouldn't be a thing, right? No "Kickstarter!" title for those who missed out on the KS?

As long as titles aren't made to be permanently exclusive I don't care what titles appear in CoT. Are you finally starting to catch the drift here?

Brand X wrote:

Or are titles different than badgers and no one cares about collecting ALL THE TITLES?

If "collecting titles" actually becomes a thing in CoT I'm sure someone will care about it. *shrugs*

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Frankly even though I had two badging characters which, as I said, effectively had every badge in the game I NEVER ONCE thought about going around and saying "I've got badge such-n-such so you should listen to what I have to say" to anyone. Unlike some people around here I never considered using my badges as a means to lord over my elitist narcissism over others. *shrugs*

And here we have the entire rub.

It is obvious that Radiac wanted to use his badge as a way of identifying himself as someone who can help, without having to write an essay in the chat window with his CV. The badge says it all with one look.

So where one person intends, "I can help you," another persons hears "I am an elitist jerk and your opinions don't matter besides mine."

I acknowledge it takes both the speaker and the listener to complete the communication system, but the problem there isn't with the game or it's badges it is about the personalities and ability to communicate between two individuals.


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.
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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Lothic is wrong on this point.
Lothic's point is "I don't want to cry over not getting a badge. I will be all full of angst if I can't get the badge, so this means others will be too!"
Okay, let's go with that line of thinking.
Sure let's go down that road. I knew several good in-game badging friends who were constantly upset by having been screwed out of several of these badges by starting the game a few years after launch so this whole thing is not just some kind of hypothetical issue to me. The subject came up often for years between us.
Brand X wrote:
What's something every player/character will do in this game? Do damage and kill enemies. To varying degrees of speed and success I'm sure, but every character will be set up to do those two things.
What won't every character be able to do in this game? Heal! So, get rid of those heal badges, that I'm sure those dedicated healers really liked, because dammit, I'm a scrapper and I'm going to angst over not being able to get that badge.
Also, do we get rid of those Defeat 100million of this enemy, because someone who's all angst ridden, knows they can't find the time out of their game schedule to kill that many of just one enemy group?
I'll tell you what, I'll concede Lothic and others are right in the badge debate, if the idea is to only put in badges that EVERY character can get on their own and not with the help of alts (some people don't want alts!) and without really effecting the concept of a players character.
Sorry but you barked up the wrong tree with this one with this one as well. I managed to get ALL of those badges (the one Billion HP version of Empath, the 100 million HP version of Immortal, and so on) on both a Fire Controller and an Electric Blaster. Don't talk to me about "my character build won't let me get such-n-such badge". ;)
Both of these badging characters had over 1,392 badges each by the time the game ended. The only badges that would have literally been IMPOSSIBLE for me to have gotten at that point was any Annverisary badges I might have missed.
Brand X wrote:
Not to mention, what did a lot of badgers hate? PvP! What did they complain about? PvP Badges! What could EVERY player do? Get PvP badges!
What did badgers say should be removed from the game? Any badge that dealt with PvP!
Why? Because they where criers :p
While there were some pathetic badgers who did complain about having to go into PvP zones to get badges I was never one of them. I lost count of how many stupid PvPers I wasted when they thought I was "just" a care-bear badger lost by myself in a PvP zone. Basically no top badger I'm aware of actually "complained" about how hard any badge was to get - we just talked about the strategies needed to get those badges.
Basically you are very sadly mistaken about all of these points, and about the Anniversary badges in general. Do you really have no other viable arguments left to throw against the wall here?

You just proved the point.

You had TWO characters to get all those badges. What about those players who don't want to sacrifice concept and don't want multiple alts?

You cry "I missed badge because I wasn't here!"

Others cry "Why should I make multiple characters, just to get this badge?!"

And as someone who knew some top badgers, I can promise you, they cried about having to get the PvP badges :p They did it because they wanted to collect all badges, they hated every second of it. :p

So quit your whining and thinking you were the only one who knew heavy badgers, you weren't. :p

I knew heavy badgers who whined about the anniversary badges too, I thought the same thing then. Should've been there. They were just badges to say "Hey, I was there!" You weren't there, so you don't deserve the badge. It's not that hard of a concept to grasp.

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
There we go! How to do badges and avoid the angst. Except for those PvP badges, those will angst people, but at the very least, everyone has the same access to them as everyone else.
Again you're trying to tell the person who had very nearly every badge in the game on both a Controller and a Blaster about which badges were too angsty to get in the game. Why don't you let ME tell YOU about a subject you don't really seem to know that much about.
Despite all the smoke and mirrors you're desperately trying to toss around here the only badges that have the "problem" of being permanently exclusive were the Annverisary badges. All CoT needs to do is avoid having badges like that and EVERYTHING else about badges would be fine.
Brand X wrote:
Also, since this goes for badges, do we not do one time chances at titles, as well? "I Made It To the One Year Anniversary!" title shouldn't be a thing, right? No "Kickstarter!" title for those who missed out on the KS?
As long as titles aren't made to be permanently exclusive I don't care what titles appear in CoT. Are you finally starting to catch the drift here?
Brand X wrote:
Or are titles different than badgers and no one cares about collecting ALL THE TITLES?
If "collecting titles" actually becomes a thing in CoT I'm sure someone will care about it. *shrugs*

I got the drift a long time ago. Whiney player. :p

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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Frankly even though I had two badging characters which, as I said, effectively had every badge in the game I NEVER ONCE thought about going around and saying "I've got badge such-n-such so you should listen to what I have to say" to anyone. Unlike some people around here I never considered using my badges as a means to lord over my elitist narcissism over others. *shrugs*
And here we have the entire rub.
It is obvious that Radiac wanted to use his badge as a way of identifying himself as someone who can help, without having to write an essay in the chat window with his CV. The badge says it all with one look.
So where one person intends, "I can help you," another persons hears "I am an elitist jerk and your opinions don't matter besides mine."
I acknowledge it takes both the speaker and the listener to complete the communication system, but the problem there isn't with the game or it's badges it is about the personalities and ability to communicate between two individuals.

I'd accept that what badges "meant" to individual players could vary widely. As interesting as that philosophical point might be I'm talking about preventing a tiny handful of permanently exclusive badges from becoming a part of a new MMORPG. Not really quite seeing how one directly relates to the other here.

I'm quite sure CoT will have plenty of "meaningful" badges and if we're lucky we might even have ones that can highlight a player's time in the game -without- having to employ permanently exclusivity to do it (via character birthday badges). I'm simply saying that any badge/item/reward that could be designed with permanently exclusivity "baked" into it could easily be re-designed without that element involved.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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We already have items in the

We already have items in the game that are permanently exclusive...like KS moguls!

The special costume piece items said just a year of exclusivity, but the make your own base KS reward was never said "All people will be able to get this personal building reward later."

Talk about some angst! At least the base has an actual in game function.

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

You just proved the point.

You had TWO characters to get all those badges. What about those players who don't want to sacrifice concept and don't want multiple alts?

You cry "I missed badge because I wasn't here!"

Others cry "Why should I make multiple characters, just to get this badge?!"

The difference here is so painfully obvious a three-year old could probably see it:

Permanently exclusive badges robbed players of being able to make the CHOICE. It's ALL ABOUT PLAYER CHOICE. People who didn't get specific badges because it "was against their character concepts" CHOSE to not get those badges. With the Anniversary badges after their time was up there was no choosing one way or the other.

Good gravy did you really not consider that?

Brand X wrote:

And as someone who knew some top badgers, I can promise you, they cried about having to get the PvP badges :p They did it because they wanted to collect all badges, they hated every second of it. :p

As I said some people whined about this, maybe even top badgers I didn't know. Remember like I said there were THOUSANDS of badge collectors so I obviously didn't know all of them personally.

Brand X wrote:

So quit your whining and thinking you were the only one who knew heavy badgers, you weren't. :p

The several dozen or so I worked with on regular basis didn't whine about it. YMMV. Perhaps you needed to hang out with people with more intestinal fortitude. *shrugs*

Brand X wrote:

I knew heavy badgers who whined about the anniversary badges too, I thought the same thing then. Should've been there. They were just badges to say "Hey, I was there!" You weren't there, so you don't deserve the badge. It's not that hard of a concept to grasp.

I have never said I didn't "understand" the concept behind the Anniversary badges. But likewise it's just as easy to understand that as an extreme minority type of badge with problematic issues surrounding them why it would be trivially easy to simply not include anything like them in a new game. One more time the easiest way to eliminate a problem is to not repeat it.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

I got the drift a long time ago. Whiney player. :p

On this point if all I have to suffer is being called a "whiney player" I'll gladly take that. ;)

Brand X wrote:

We already have items in the game that are permanently exclusive...like KS moguls!

The special costume piece items said just a year of exclusivity, but the make your own base KS reward was never said "All people will be able to get this personal building reward later."

Talk about some angst! At least the base has an actual in game function.

Sorry but we're JUST talking about permanently exclusive badges here. If you'd like to talk the merits of other things that might or might not be "permanently exclusive" in the game I'd be willing to switch mental gears for you on that.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Yes. My choice of not

Yes. My choice of not wanting to play multiple characters and focus on one, while still sticking to my concept. But hey, thanks for ignoring that type of player who may still just want all the badges, but now can't because you had to have a badge for doing something that not every character can do! Yay! You're so awesome! :)

I also told them they needed more intestinal fortitude. Though, I think I said it the same way I said it to those who missed any of the anniversary badges, "Suck it up!"

Which, I gave examples of badges that didn't really need to be put into the game, since every character can't get them, but your response to that was basically, "Sucks to be them."

Tell me, why do you think there should be a "Healed this many points of damage to other players" Badge? You know it's not a badge every character concept can get. So why do you like the idea of forcing that badge into the game?

I gave a list of badges that any character concept can get, while still maintaining a "Collect the badges!" mini game. The difference is, my suggestion didn't require an alt or a compromise of a characters concept. :p You however, fight that idea.

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
I got the drift a long time ago. Whiney player. :p
On this point if all I have to suffer is being called a "whiney player" I'll gladly take that. ;)
Brand X wrote:
We already have items in the game that are permanently exclusive...like KS moguls!
The special costume piece items said just a year of exclusivity, but the make your own base KS reward was never said "All people will be able to get this personal building reward later."
Talk about some angst! At least the base has an actual in game function.
Sorry but we're JUST talking about permanently exclusive badges here. If you'd like to talk the merits of other things that might or might not be "permanently exclusive" in the game I'd be willing to switch mental gears for you on that.

Hey, we all whine about something. :p I just like to save mine for aesthetics and mechanics, both of which will cause players to leave the game. I never once met or heard on the forums of someone leaving CoH because they couldn't get ALL THE BADGES!

You, I feel, may have known that mythical unicorn :p

Angst over exclusive content is angst over exclusive content. :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Hey, we all whine about something. :p I just like to save mine for aesthetics and mechanics, both of which will cause players to leave the game. I never once met or heard on the forums of someone leaving CoH because they couldn't get ALL THE BADGES!

You, I feel, may have known that mythical unicorn :p

Yep, sadly I did: One of those friends I mentioned earlier in the thread left the game for several reasons, but one of the main ones was her inability to get badges like that.

Now obviously I'd expect you to blow that off and consider that person "stupid" for having that be a reason she left the game. On the other hand I would like to make sure the new game doesn't have the potential to put other players in that situation, especially when the "fix" to prevent that scenario is so very trivially easy to accomplish.

Brand X wrote:

Angst over exclusive content is angst over exclusive content. :p

Again everyone has their reasons for everything. Despite my love of badges I'm personally willing to lose a few (as you yourself have pointed out) meaningless badges to prevent future players from being able to use anything as "dumb" as this to justify leaving the game.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Yes. My choice of not wanting to play multiple characters and focus on one, while still sticking to my concept. But hey, thanks for ignoring that type of player who may still just want all the badges, but now can't because you had to have a badge for doing something that not every character can do! Yay! You're so awesome! :)
I also told them they needed more intestinal fortitude. Though, I think I said it the same way I said it to those who missed any of the anniversary badges, "Suck it up!"
Which, I gave examples of badges that didn't really need to be put into the game, since every character can't get them, but your response to that was basically, "Sucks to be them."
Tell me, why do you think there should be a "Healed this many points of damage to other players" Badge? You know it's not a badge every character concept can get. So why do you like the idea of forcing that badge into the game?
I gave a list of badges that any character concept can get, while still maintaining a "Collect the badges!" mini game. The difference is, my suggestion didn't require an alt or a compromise of a characters concept. :p You however, fight that idea.

My answer to all this is the same as before: It's a player's CHOICE to decide which badges they want to earn based on any rationale they want to restrict themselves to. A player who doesn't want to earn the top healing badge with a specific character because it would be hard for that particular kind of character to do that OR because it would go against whatever character concept the player has in mind has that CHOICE every day the game is active. If for some reason that player changes his/her mind 4.5 years later then they would still be free to start working that badge at any time.

On the other hand badges restricted via permanent exclusivity removes the ability of a player to choose those things for themselves. That's why it's wrong - it takes the freedom of CHOICE away from the player. Period.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Not stupid. Anything and

Not stupid. Anything and everything this game does could lose players.

I think the badge issue however is going to have your friend be what I referred to them as...a mythical unicorn. :p 1 in a 1000 players. Not even 1% of the player base.

Things like aesthetics and game mechanics however, will have a much bigger effect.

As will the opening day "Can I get in?!" issues, I worry about for CoT :p

You read that all the time! "I couldn't get past the queues on opening day, so I just quit the game then and there. Shouldn't have to put up with that!"

Or you get, "I decided to put off getting the game right away because of opening day issues, but then since I had already missed getting in from the start, I said screw it and never played it."

Two things I hope CoT can avoid and much more player losing than "I missed a badge! I'm outie!"

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Have... Have we heard an

Have... Have we heard an actual reason why exclusive badges -should- be a thing? I mean, I don't know if anyone one's been actively giving any reasons for it other than "CoX did it so should Cost" maybe I just missed it in the deluge of talking about the pros and cons of badge hunting.

Like, can we get a summary of the pros and cons of exclusive badges?

Also also. Someone might leave the game for not being able to get exclusive badges. People won't leave the game for having no exclusive badges... So um... Point for 0 exclusive badges.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Yes. My choice of not wanting to play multiple characters and focus on one, while still sticking to my concept. But hey, thanks for ignoring that type of player who may still just want all the badges, but now can't because you had to have a badge for doing something that not every character can do! Yay! You're so awesome! :)
I also told them they needed more intestinal fortitude. Though, I think I said it the same way I said it to those who missed any of the anniversary badges, "Suck it up!"
Which, I gave examples of badges that didn't really need to be put into the game, since every character can't get them, but your response to that was basically, "Sucks to be them."
Tell me, why do you think there should be a "Healed this many points of damage to other players" Badge? You know it's not a badge every character concept can get. So why do you like the idea of forcing that badge into the game?
I gave a list of badges that any character concept can get, while still maintaining a "Collect the badges!" mini game. The difference is, my suggestion didn't require an alt or a compromise of a characters concept. :p You however, fight that idea.
My answer to all this is the same as before: It's a player's CHOICE to decide which badges they want to earn based on any rationale they want to restrict themselves to. A player who doesn't want to earn the top healing badge with a specific character because it would be hard for that particular kind of character to do that OR because it would go against whatever character concept the player has in mind has that CHOICE every day the game is active. If for some reason that player changes his/her mind 4.5 years later then they would still be free to start working that badge at any time.
On the other hand badges restricted via permanent exclusivity removes the ability of a player to choose those things for themselves. That's why it's wrong - it takes the freedom of CHOICE away from the player. Period.

I don't have the freedom of choice to ignore dumb characters (which btw, I totally admit someone can think that of my characters :p). I do not have the freedom of choice to ignore an empty bar that tells me my badge progress. I do not have the freedom of choice to know there's a badge out there that I can't get without making compromises to my concept or my willingness to play multiple characters. In fact, by being forced into making multiple characters to obtain a badge, you weaken me constantly working on and tweaking my other character.

That perma badge you mentioned missing? I can easily say "You had the freedom of choice to begin playing day one. You had the freedom of choice to log into the game that day." You didn't know about the game? "You had the freedom of choice to read everything on the net!" See, it's not hard to do the whole freedom of choice thing.

It's a game. The same game, you know, people complained about their freedom of choice to go into a zone to obtain a badge, even though they HAD TO HAVE IT ALL, but that one freedom of choice aspect just made them whine.

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That's a really weak argument

That's a really weak argument, Brand X. "What? I murdered them? They had the freedom of choice to not be here! Why it's practically a suicide!"

Hyperbole but still.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Not stupid. Anything and everything this game does could lose players.
I think the badge issue however is going to have your friend be what I referred to them as...a mythical unicorn. :p 1 in a 1000 players. Not even 1% of the player base.
Things like aesthetics and game mechanics however, will have a much bigger effect.
As will the opening day "Can I get in?!" issues, I worry about for CoT :p
You read that all the time! "I couldn't get past the queues on opening day, so I just quit the game then and there. Shouldn't have to put up with that!"
Or you get, "I decided to put off getting the game right away because of opening day issues, but then since I had already missed getting in from the start, I said screw it and never played it."
Two things I hope CoT can avoid and much more player losing than "I missed a badge! I'm outie!"

On the list of things that would "motivate" people to leave the game even I wouldn't rank "permanently exclusive badges" to be among the top reasons. But again since the "fix" for this is simply not have any of those types of badges I can't really see the overwhelming justification for not "implementing that fix" in CoT.

Think of it this way: Even if CoT had launched today it would be a full year from now before -any- of us would even have one Anniversary badge. We only got a new one of these things in CoH "once a year" (by definition). Would anyone even actually "miss" them if they never exist in CoT? Only the people who played CoH would even guess that they were missing - anyone new to CoT would never miss something they never had.

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

Have... Have we heard an actual reason why exclusive badges -should- be a thing? I mean, I don't know if anyone one's been actively giving any reasons for it other than "CoX did it so should Cost" maybe I just missed it in the deluge of talking about the pros and cons of badge hunting.
Like, can we get a summary of the pros and cons of exclusive badges?
Also also. Someone might leave the game for not being able to get exclusive badges. People won't leave the game for having no exclusive badges... So um... Point for 0 exclusive badges.

Someone might leave the game for no exclusive badge. 1 point for exclusive badge.

You all forget, that some players like the chance to have exclusive items. "Get this now or forever not have it!" and they rush for it! They love those moments in their game where they can go "Yeah! I got it!"

Now, while I may fight for these exclusive items, I should say, I don't care about them at all :p However, if we're going to fight for one's who angst over not getting one way, should fight for those who angst over it the other way.

You leave because you missed out? That person left because they didn't get offered anything exclusive. Imo, obviously both players suck and didn't really care for the game itself. :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Project_Hero wrote:
Have... Have we heard an actual reason why exclusive badges -should- be a thing? I mean, I don't know if anyone one's been actively giving any reasons for it other than "CoX did it so should Cost" maybe I just missed it in the deluge of talking about the pros and cons of badge hunting.
Like, can we get a summary of the pros and cons of exclusive badges?
Also also. Someone might leave the game for not being able to get exclusive badges. People won't leave the game for having no exclusive badges... So um... Point for 0 exclusive badges.
Someone might leave the game for no exclusive badge. 1 point for exclusive badge.
You all forget, that some players like the chance to have exclusive items. "Get this now or forever not have it!" and they rush for it! They love those moments in their game where they can go "Yeah! I got it!"
Now, while I may fight for these exclusive items, I should say, I don't care about them at all :p However, if we're going to fight for one's who angst over not getting one way, should fight for those who angst over it the other way.
You leave because you missed out? That person left because they didn't get offered anything exclusive. Imo, obviously both players suck and didn't really care for the game itself. :p

Does anyone actually like things like that? Like pre-order bonuses and garbage like that? I don't think I've ever heard of any game ever getting any kind of backlash for having no exclusive things.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Not stupid. Anything and everything this game does could lose players.
I think the badge issue however is going to have your friend be what I referred to them as...a mythical unicorn. :p 1 in a 1000 players. Not even 1% of the player base.
Things like aesthetics and game mechanics however, will have a much bigger effect.
As will the opening day "Can I get in?!" issues, I worry about for CoT :p
You read that all the time! "I couldn't get past the queues on opening day, so I just quit the game then and there. Shouldn't have to put up with that!"
Or you get, "I decided to put off getting the game right away because of opening day issues, but then since I had already missed getting in from the start, I said screw it and never played it."
Two things I hope CoT can avoid and much more player losing than "I missed a badge! I'm outie!"
On the list of things that would "motivate" people to leave the game even I wouldn't rank "permanently exclusive badges" to be among the top reasons. But again since the "fix" for this is simply not have any of those types of badges I can't really see the overwhelming justification for not "implementing that fix" in CoT.
Think of it this way: Even if CoT had launched today it would be a full year from now before -any- of us would even have one Anniversary badge. We only got a new one of these things in CoH "once a year" (by definition). Would anyone even actually "miss" them if they never exist in CoT? Only the people who played CoH would even guess that they were missing - anyone new to CoT would never miss something they never had.

Well, if CoH hadn't had them, I never would've batted an eye. If CoT never has them, I wouldn't bat an eye. I just don't want us to not have something because the sole reason is "Someone might cry."

I can say, after CoH did introduce them, I would be all "Oh! New badge coming up!" at the same time, like I stated before, I did miss one, even knowing it was there and I just needed to log in, because I was in one of my "Don't feel like playing" month long moods, that I tended to get about once a year. :p

I didn't blame the game. I knew the only one to blame was myself. Seeing as how I'm not special, one can easily figure, if I can live with it, other people should. :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

That perma badge you mentioned missing? I can easily say "You had the freedom of choice to begin playing day one. You had the freedom of choice to log into the game that day." You didn't know about the game? "You had the freedom of choice to read everything on the net!" See, it's not hard to do the whole freedom of choice thing.

Except when the kind of "freedom of choice" you're implying (the kind mixed with a mandate for "personal responsibility") would require a time machine in the real world. ;)

Even if you don't want to agree that a permanently exclusive badge is a form of "undeserved punishment" against newer players you still have to fundamentally ask what beneficial purpose does it serve the game to prevent one type of player from being able to freely earn everything that another player was freely able to earn. Why should there be any "non-positive impact" for being a newer player in a game like this?

If anything assuming the game wants to keep bringing in newer players it almost ought to adopt a concept for a "reverse exclusive" badge system that would effectively allow newer players to have access to MORE badges than an older player could ever earn.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:
Have... Have we heard an actual reason why exclusive badges -should- be a thing? I mean, I don't know if anyone one's been actively giving any reasons for it other than "CoX did it so should Cost" maybe I just missed it in the deluge of talking about the pros and cons of badge hunting.
Like, can we get a summary of the pros and cons of exclusive badges?
Also also. Someone might leave the game for not being able to get exclusive badges. People won't leave the game for having no exclusive badges... So um... Point for 0 exclusive badges.
Someone might leave the game for no exclusive badge. 1 point for exclusive badge.
You all forget, that some players like the chance to have exclusive items. "Get this now or forever not have it!" and they rush for it! They love those moments in their game where they can go "Yeah! I got it!"
Now, while I may fight for these exclusive items, I should say, I don't care about them at all :p However, if we're going to fight for one's who angst over not getting one way, should fight for those who angst over it the other way.
You leave because you missed out? That person left because they didn't get offered anything exclusive. Imo, obviously both players suck and didn't really care for the game itself. :p
Does anyone actually like things like that? Like pre-order bonuses and garbage like that? I don't think I've ever heard of any game ever getting any kind of backlash for having no exclusive things.

Of course people love items like that. Also, I have seen comments about, "Why nothing special for pre-ordering?" Whether or not it effected people's purchasing of a game, no idea, but it may have effected their pre-ordering.

Exclusive items and must pay WAY TO MUCH MONEY TO HAVE items are sought out by players all the time. :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Seeing as how I'm not special, one can easily figure, if I can live with it, other people should. :p

Why?

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Of course people love items like that. Also, I have seen comments about, "Why nothing special for pre-ordering?" Whether or not it effected people's purchasing of a game, no idea, but it may have effected their pre-ordering.

Exclusive items and must pay WAY TO MUCH MONEY TO HAVE items are sought out by players all the time. :p

Was this the reason that by the time CoH was shut down nearly EVERYTHING that started out as a "permanently exclusive" pre-order item became available via other methods to players who had originally missed out on those things?

Read what I've been saying: I keep saying that I'm against PERMANENTLY exclusive things. For what it's worth I've got nothing against things that are TEMPORARILY exclusive. ;)

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
That perma badge you mentioned missing? I can easily say "You had the freedom of choice to begin playing day one. You had the freedom of choice to log into the game that day." You didn't know about the game? "You had the freedom of choice to read everything on the net!" See, it's not hard to do the whole freedom of choice thing.
Except when the kind of "freedom of choice" you're implying (the kind mixed with a mandate for "personal responsibility") would require a time machine in the real world. ;)
Even if you don't want to agree that a permanently exclusive badge is a form of "undeserved punishment" against newer players you still have to fundamentally ask what beneficial purpose does it serve the game to prevent one type of player from being able to freely earn everything that another player was freely able to earn. Why should there be any "non-positive impact" for being a newer player in a game like this?
If anything assuming the game wants to keep bringing in newer players it almost ought to adopt a concept for a "reverse exclusive" badge system that would effectively allow newer players to have access to MORE badges than an older player could ever earn.

Which, again, I agreed to. I just said, why not take it to a level to help out EVERYONE!

You make it seem like a bad idea not to have a "Healed so many points of damage" badge or a bad idea to not have badges that require alts or multiple builds for one concept. I said, why not keep the badges to the items we know every character can get, regardless of build.

All your badge does it say "Ha! I healed this much so far!" Which, is basically a way to have something on someone else who's character(s) may never be able to get. Believe it or not, some players never made support characters in CoH :p Not all alt makers made one of every AT. Some just had a different flavor of melee DPS (not me btw...I made it a point to get every AT to 50 and only failed with the Kheldians :p).

Why put that badge in there, when it's not needed, will do nothing for the game, and not every player will have a chance at it, unless they compromise their concept or play style.

Doing damage to enemies, however, is not a compromise, as every character will ALWAYS be able to do damage.

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So it might have stopped

So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.

A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Of course people love items like that. Also, I have seen comments about, "Why nothing special for pre-ordering?" Whether or not it effected people's purchasing of a game, no idea, but it may have effected their pre-ordering.
Exclusive items and must pay WAY TO MUCH MONEY TO HAVE items are sought out by players all the time. :p
Was this the reason that by the time CoH was shut down nearly EVERYTHING that started out as a "permanently exclusive" pre-order item became available via other methods to players who had missed out on those things?

Not everything was made available, as they specifically kept items that required purchase of a box game to obtain a costume piece, unavailable. Four Winds being one of those items, because they were specifically marketed as available no other way to obtain them and to change that would've been lying to the players who re-bought the game just to obtain the item.

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.

Or if they were merely just "temporarily exclusive" which is what effectively happened to most of these things in CoH.

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.

By that thought, what does buying it after it's been released change?

Lots of games don't really have "Hey test me totally out, see if you want to buy me!"

Demo the games first 5 levels doesn't mean anything if the first 5 levels suck and the ones after it are awesome or the levels after suck, but the first 5 levels make you think they lied to you.

You buy a game, you take a risk at it sucking. The only difference with pre-orders, is it gets the money into their pockets a little sooner.

Unless you're someone who totally trusts reviews, but if we did that as players, I don't think we'd be here now, waiting for the spiritual successor to CoH, because I recall many a bad review of CoH. Especially as it got older and I personally LOVED LOVED LOVED CoH. It's why I hold CoT to a high standard and not just "Give me another superhero mmo!"

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Brand X wrote:
Of course people love items like that. Also, I have seen comments about, "Why nothing special for pre-ordering?" Whether or not it effected people's purchasing of a game, no idea, but it may have effected their pre-ordering.
Exclusive items and must pay WAY TO MUCH MONEY TO HAVE items are sought out by players all the time. :p
Was this the reason that by the time CoH was shut down nearly EVERYTHING that started out as a "permanently exclusive" pre-order item became available via other methods to players who had missed out on those things?
Not everything was made available, as they specifically kept items that required purchase of a box game to obtain a costume piece, unavailable. Four Winds being one of those items, because they were specifically marketed as available no other way to obtain them and to change that would've been lying to the players who re-bought the game just to obtain the item.

Saying "nearly everything" is not the same as saying "everything". Funny how English works like that. ;)

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Lothic wrote:
Brand X wrote:
That perma badge you mentioned missing? I can easily say "You had the freedom of choice to begin playing day one. You had the freedom of choice to log into the game that day." You didn't know about the game? "You had the freedom of choice to read everything on the net!" See, it's not hard to do the whole freedom of choice thing.
Except when the kind of "freedom of choice" you're implying (the kind mixed with a mandate for "personal responsibility") would require a time machine in the real world. ;)
Even if you don't want to agree that a permanently exclusive badge is a form of "undeserved punishment" against newer players you still have to fundamentally ask what beneficial purpose does it serve the game to prevent one type of player from being able to freely earn everything that another player was freely able to earn. Why should there be any "non-positive impact" for being a newer player in a game like this?
If anything assuming the game wants to keep bringing in newer players it almost ought to adopt a concept for a "reverse exclusive" badge system that would effectively allow newer players to have access to MORE badges than an older player could ever earn.
Which, again, I agreed to. I just said, why not take it to a level to help out EVERYONE!
You make it seem like a bad idea not to have a "Healed so many points of damage" badge or a bad idea to not have badges that require alts or multiple builds for one concept. I said, why not keep the badges to the items we know every character can get, regardless of build.
All your badge does it say "Ha! I healed this much so far!" Which, is basically a way to have something on someone else who's character(s) may never be able to get. Believe it or not, some players never made support characters in CoH :p Not all alt makers made one of every AT. Some just had a different flavor of melee DPS (not me btw...I made it a point to get every AT to 50 and only failed with the Kheldians :p).
Why put that badge in there, when it's not needed, will do nothing for the game, and not every player will have a chance at it, unless they compromise their concept or play style.
Doing damage to enemies, however, is not a compromise, as every character will ALWAYS be able to do damage.

I'm for "choice in badging". Want to earn a badge? Earn it. Don't want to earn a badge? Don't earn it. The only thing that stops "choice in badging" is permanently exclusive badges. Get rid of those and everything's fine.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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To me it boils down to who

To me it boils down to who the time limited achievement affects more.
Those who don't give two craps about most achievements are not going to be all that affected by not having an time limited exclusive badge. Those who treat achievement completion as an important part of the game will be greatly affect if they don't have (and can never get) a time limited exclusive badge.

Seems pretty simple, limited time achievements negatively affect more than they positively impact so don't have them.

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Brainbot wrote:
Brainbot wrote:

To me it boils down to who the time limited achievement affects more.
Those who don't give two craps about most achievements are not going to be all that affected by not having an time limited exclusive badge. Those who treat achievement completion as an important part of the game will be greatly affect if they don't have (and can never get) a time limited exclusive badge.
Seems pretty simple, limited time achievements negatively affect more than they positively impact so don't have them.

And if we were talking about say half the badges in the game being permanently exclusive I might seriously rethink my stand on being against them because they represented a large percentage of the total.

But in this case we're only talking about 9 badges out of several thousand. Would players who never even played CoH even miss 9 potential badges out of thousands?

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Project_Hero wrote:
So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.
By that thought, what does buying it after it's been released change?
Lots of games don't really have "Hey test me totally out, see if you want to buy me!"
Demo the games first 5 levels doesn't mean anything if the first 5 levels suck and the ones after it are awesome or the levels after suck, but the first 5 levels make you think they lied to you.
You buy a game, you take a risk at it sucking. The only difference with pre-orders, is it gets the money into their pockets a little sooner.
Unless you're someone who totally trusts reviews, but if we did that as players, I don't think we'd be here now, waiting for the spiritual successor to CoH, because I recall many a bad review of CoH. Especially as it got older and I personally LOVED LOVED LOVED CoH. It's why I hold CoT to a high standard and not just "Give me another superhero mmo!"

It's the difference between I paid for this game six months ago when there was no information on it. And I bought this game despite all the reviews saying it was a pile of garbage. Like think of how many wouldn't have bought Aliens Colonial Marines if they knew what a steaming pile it would turn out to be. How many pre-ordered it based on the falsified footage shown off prior to it's launch? Granted it's an outlier, but still.

It's the difference between paying for a sausage and paying for the sizzle or the smell.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Brainbot wrote:
Brainbot wrote:

To me it boils down to who the time limited achievement affects more.
Those who don't give two craps about most achievements are not going to be all that affected by not having an time limited exclusive badge. Those who treat achievement completion as an important part of the game will be greatly affect if they don't have (and can never get) a time limited exclusive badge.
Seems pretty simple, limited time achievements negatively affect more than they positively impact so don't have them.

Okay, now tell me.

How many players will be obsessed with getting every badge ever to the point of quitting if they can't VERSUS the many players that will quit if they don't have the shot at something exclusive.

We can only guess! I'd say even or leaning more towards the exclusive myself. I'd like to believe most players are level headed adults who can realize they can't get everything, while at the same time believe most players like to lord what they can above everyone else (PvP community and the badging community itself seems to prove this idea).

Sooo...if the idea is to cater to those of greater numbers, I feel the exclusive offers win out.

Not offering exclusive items negatively affects more people than it positively helps.

Not to mention, without exclusive badges to obtain, if getting all the badges is a mini game in and of itself, so is the competition (and the reason for the badge sites in their rankings of most badges obtained) of obtaining a higher number of badges than anyone else, which means there needs to be a way for someone to have more badges than another and the only way that can happen is exclusive badges, unless the idea is to allow everyone to tie for first, which is effectively to tie for last.

Unless the collection of the badges wasn't a game about who could get more, but then why would the badge sites have a top 100 list of badge collectors? :p

Gotta stay on the ball to stay in first, if they offer exclusive badges. Also need to stay on the ball to get that exclusive badge in hopes that the #1 will miss out and you can over take them!

See, can totally see the reason to have exclusive badges in the collect the badges mini game!

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:
So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.
By that thought, what does buying it after it's been released change?
Lots of games don't really have "Hey test me totally out, see if you want to buy me!"
Demo the games first 5 levels doesn't mean anything if the first 5 levels suck and the ones after it are awesome or the levels after suck, but the first 5 levels make you think they lied to you.
You buy a game, you take a risk at it sucking. The only difference with pre-orders, is it gets the money into their pockets a little sooner.
Unless you're someone who totally trusts reviews, but if we did that as players, I don't think we'd be here now, waiting for the spiritual successor to CoH, because I recall many a bad review of CoH. Especially as it got older and I personally LOVED LOVED LOVED CoH. It's why I hold CoT to a high standard and not just "Give me another superhero mmo!"
It's the difference between I paid for this game six months ago when there was no information on it. And I bought this game despite all the reviews saying it was a pile of garbage. Like think of how many wouldn't have bought Aliens Colonial Marines if they knew what a steaming pile it would turn out to be. How many pre-ordered it based on the falsified footage shown off prior to it's launch? Granted it's an outlier, but still.
It's the difference between paying for a sausage and paying for the sizzle or the smell.

Are you kidding? I often find every game play footage of every game to be lies!

My biggest complaint on it is SW:TOR!

Why doesn't my game look like your ads?! Because we toned down the graphics for the actual game. Why would you do that?! Because some people can't handle it. But I can! Yes, but others may think they can and can't, ruining their game experience, so screw you.

See. :p

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

Brainbot wrote:
To me it boils down to who the time limited achievement affects more.
Those who don't give two craps about most achievements are not going to be all that affected by not having an time limited exclusive badge. Those who treat achievement completion as an important part of the game will be greatly affect if they don't have (and can never get) a time limited exclusive badge.
Seems pretty simple, limited time achievements negatively affect more than they positively impact so don't have them.
And if we were talking about say half the badges in the game being permanently exclusive I might seriously rethink my stand on being against them because they represented a large percentage of the total.
But in this case we're only talking about 9 badges out of several thousand. Would players who never even played CoH even miss 9 potential badges out of thousands?

You see the anniversary badges as the only exclusive ones. I see the vet reward ones as exclusive too. Sure, everyone may get a chance to get them, but year 5 player versus day 1 player, means the day one player will never nab that first place badge collector title from year 5, without the chance at exclusive badges.

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Outrage! Angst! Hyperbole!

Outrage! Angst! Hyperbole!

We've got it all, folks.

Be Well!
Fireheart

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How is a tie for first the

How is a tie for first the same as a tie for last? P1 "I'm one of maybe a dozen or so who have all the badges!" P2 "I have 1 badge." P1 "WE'RE EXACTLY THE SAAAAME!!!"

Like... What? Realistically how many people are going to 100% the badges vs. how many people play the game? People with 100% of the badges will be like 1% of the player base. How is that not still a point of pride? That's like saying "we'll yeah I got the gold medal in x event, but so has all these people in years before! This medal is pointless!"

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

Project_Hero
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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Project_Hero wrote:
Brand X wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:
So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.
By that thought, what does buying it after it's been released change?
Lots of games don't really have "Hey test me totally out, see if you want to buy me!"
Demo the games first 5 levels doesn't mean anything if the first 5 levels suck and the ones after it are awesome or the levels after suck, but the first 5 levels make you think they lied to you.
You buy a game, you take a risk at it sucking. The only difference with pre-orders, is it gets the money into their pockets a little sooner.
Unless you're someone who totally trusts reviews, but if we did that as players, I don't think we'd be here now, waiting for the spiritual successor to CoH, because I recall many a bad review of CoH. Especially as it got older and I personally LOVED LOVED LOVED CoH. It's why I hold CoT to a high standard and not just "Give me another superhero mmo!"
It's the difference between I paid for this game six months ago when there was no information on it. And I bought this game despite all the reviews saying it was a pile of garbage. Like think of how many wouldn't have bought Aliens Colonial Marines if they knew what a steaming pile it would turn out to be. How many pre-ordered it based on the falsified footage shown off prior to it's launch? Granted it's an outlier, but still.
It's the difference between paying for a sausage and paying for the sizzle or the smell.
Are you kidding? I often find every game play footage of every game to be lies!
My biggest complaint on it is SW:TOR!
Why doesn't my game look like your ads?! Because we toned down the graphics for the actual game. Why would you do that?! Because some people can't handle it. But I can! Yes, but others may think they can and can't, ruining their game experience, so screw you.
See. :p

Then you should have looked up gameplay footage. Like on YouTube. The information was out there you just didn't go looking for it. So that's on you not the game or the devs. Their adds may have been misleading (pretty sure they just use in game cutscenes) but you had the ability (provided you didn't pre-order based on those adds) to research the product you were going to buy. It's pretty much all on you.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

Redlynne
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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:

Seeing as how I'm not special, one can easily figure, if I can live with it, other people should. :p

"I've got a sandwich. Why would anyone in the world be hungry?"

Uh ... because that's not the way things work?


Verbogeny is one of many pleasurettes afforded a creatific thinkerizer.
Brand X
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Redlynne wrote:
Redlynne wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Seeing as how I'm not special, one can easily figure, if I can live with it, other people should. :p
"I've got a sandwich. Why would anyone in the world be hungry?"
Uh ... because that's not the way things work?

Hunger, needed to live!

Not being able to get a badge. No needed to live. Poor example. :p

Brand X
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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

Brand X wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:
Brand X wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:
So it might have stopped people from paying money for a product not out yet... So it made people be a little more responsible... Not seeing a negative here.
A pre-order exclusive is a sleazy way to manipulate people into shelling out cash for a product they're not sure will be any good though. If pre-order bonuses went away entirely I don't think many will shed any tears over it.
By that thought, what does buying it after it's been released change?
Lots of games don't really have "Hey test me totally out, see if you want to buy me!"
Demo the games first 5 levels doesn't mean anything if the first 5 levels suck and the ones after it are awesome or the levels after suck, but the first 5 levels make you think they lied to you.
You buy a game, you take a risk at it sucking. The only difference with pre-orders, is it gets the money into their pockets a little sooner.
Unless you're someone who totally trusts reviews, but if we did that as players, I don't think we'd be here now, waiting for the spiritual successor to CoH, because I recall many a bad review of CoH. Especially as it got older and I personally LOVED LOVED LOVED CoH. It's why I hold CoT to a high standard and not just "Give me another superhero mmo!"
It's the difference between I paid for this game six months ago when there was no information on it. And I bought this game despite all the reviews saying it was a pile of garbage. Like think of how many wouldn't have bought Aliens Colonial Marines if they knew what a steaming pile it would turn out to be. How many pre-ordered it based on the falsified footage shown off prior to it's launch? Granted it's an outlier, but still.
It's the difference between paying for a sausage and paying for the sizzle or the smell.
Are you kidding? I often find every game play footage of every game to be lies!
My biggest complaint on it is SW:TOR!
Why doesn't my game look like your ads?! Because we toned down the graphics for the actual game. Why would you do that?! Because some people can't handle it. But I can! Yes, but others may think they can and can't, ruining their game experience, so screw you.
See. :p
Then you should have looked up gameplay footage. Like on YouTube. The information was out there you just didn't go looking for it. So that's on you not the game or the devs. Their adds may have been misleading (pretty sure they just use in game cutscenes) but you had the ability (provided you didn't pre-order based on those adds) to research the product you were going to buy. It's pretty much all on you.

With that answer, the same goes for any player new to a game.

Do your research. See if there were exclusive items you can never get and decide if that will have an effect on how much whining you do in the game.

So, back to such items being okay to have, because people can do research!

Brand X
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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

How is a tie for first the same as a tie for last? P1 "I'm one of maybe a dozen or so who have all the badges!" P2 "I have 1 badge." P1 "WE'RE EXACTLY THE SAAAAME!!!"
Like... What? Realistically how many people are going to 100% the badges vs. how many people play the game? People with 100% of the badges will be like 1% of the player base. How is that not still a point of pride? That's like saying "we'll yeah I got the gold medal in x event, but so has all these people in years before! This medal is pointless!"

Easy. Base it on the idea that everyone can complete the list, so everyone can be first and if everyone is first, then everyone is last.

Seriously now. That should have been simple deduction by anyone who's ever watched The Incredibles. "If everyone is super, then no one is." :p

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