Chase_Arcanum

Star wars mmo had a budget projected at over 10x this game's original budget and a bigger dev team... as star wars dev himself said, they need to hit ONE MILLION subscribers just to have a chance at breaking even.

Comparing that to a game that hit their profitability projections when they hit 100k subscribers... well, no offense to CoH, but thats kinda like telling a local bar band they'd better get their act together because Lada Gaga's new album is coming out and is gonna pwn them.

There will be some inevitable subscriber loss for it, but you can't play a superhero there, so not too worried.

DCUO? Not thrilled with direction of the art style, but its growing on me. Never was thrilled with the idea of playing DC Universe... particularly the alternate-spin they're taking here, but I know it'll have some draw... but much the same was said about CO.


Yes, you've said it in both places. Odds are that they haven't thought of it themselves. Amazing how just saying something is a lot easier than actually making it work.

Servers are localized for several reasons- and even the technical issues (like increased transoceanic latency affecting the user experience) could be addressed, you'd still have the legal, social, and contractual barriers to address. Partnerships are made to do business there- obligations and roles for both sides are defined. Different regions have different laws and expectations and liabilities, and the partners help manage these differences. All that needs addressed.

I was impressed when I was told that AoC managed to have universal transoceanic servers- the game's combat system is much more prone to latency and they apparently hurdled many of the organizational and legal issues... but CoH came out before AoC, will have older underlying tech, and already has agreements that'll take a lot to get broken or redone.

Now, also I don't know a lot about the EU servers, but I'd assume that merging the language-specific servers with a nation that doesn't speak that server really won't have THAT big of an impact in the player populations there....

Right. At a convention, I overheard a MMO developer quip that he could probably make all-new content for an average player if he had:
- a subscription fee at triple to quadruple the current rate,
- a stable playerbase at a million strong,
- a parent company that would be OK with low profits and little or ROI,
- a staff focused on just creating content and server stability not new tech or coding alternate game mechanics
- no fancy things like voice talent

... there was more, but I have a terrible memory. Needless to say, he wasn't serious- just was illustrating what was really necessary to an overenthusiastic, but not quite aware player.

The question is that there is no real consensus on what 'Endgame content" means. By definition, it's content that comes at the point where the traditional GAME ENDS. It isn't part of the core game... it's what to do when the core game is over

In the past, devs have addressed it many ways:

- "PvP is the endgame"
- "You many stop leveling the character, but you never stop interacting with the world" common with world-y games.
- "Raids. Big... massive... one-wrong-step-and-everyone-dies-raids."
- "There is no end... advancement just gets slower and slower and slower..." and if you reach the cap, you probably need an intervention. (you usually don't have content outlevel you in these ones, so you're just out there fighting what everyone else is fighting... only more effectively)
- "Raids... leaner, smaller, more tolerant raids, but still raids."

Now, when you look at preconceived notions on MMO's... WoW's ways are seen as the "standard" -- not because most dev's do it the way WoW did-- (really fast leveling + smaller, leaner raids + increase leveling cap to newer smaller leaner raids) but because thats what the players have experienced. My WoW-playing friends often say "the game begins at the endgame" without the slightest bit of irony intended.

That's a problem.

CoH came out before WoW and had it's own ideas on how to handle the end-of-advancement that weren't copied off of WoW's.... People coming to this game with WoW expectations race through what they see, reach the endgame, then look around waiting for the game to begin.

There isn't one.

Here, reaching the end you'll find a few raidlike events, several task forces, and the ability to do any of the dozen odd task/strike forces that auto-exemplar you. There are options to do story arcs you missed via Ouroboros -even apply difficulty options to challenge yourself-- or an endless supply of newspaper missions -- or regular repeatable content so you can chase after the very rare purple recipes. There are Architect Entertainment stories that you can play or MAKE. ...or you can roll an alt.

That's the devs' "endgame"- keep playing the game that you've enjoyed this far.

It doesn't offer a dramatic shift in tactics that raids often do. ( You have slight shifts that make strike/task forces more effective but not a big re-learning of the game). It doesn't raise the level cap (which, they've said before, is already hitting the ceiling of what existing mechanics allow). It doesn't give a clear and concise path... just a variety of things similar to what you did during your leveling experience for you to choose between. *

For many/most of us disagreeing in this thread, that's the best endgame they could offer.

*Incarnates DOES seem to be directed toward more "endgame-ish" activity.... but we know too little now to say whether it'll provide the experience you're looking for.

First 4 aren't bad, though adding yet another merit system to the game, I'm not thrilled for. Maybe if it replaced the regular drops- a more-frequent reward that you can use to purchase the PvP rewards...

Fifth one? Well, there are a few things to iron out.
-social issues: there's a good portion of the PvE community that wants total segregation, and there will be a good portion of the PvP community that will be irked when they're flagged for fighting when all their potential prey isn't. The result is usually bitterness by both parties- one annoyed at the battles raging around them, the other grouchy that so little prey wants to participate. PvP zones at least concentrated players with similar intent (PvP) in a common area.

-Technical issues
- You're flagged PvP on a team, your teammates aren't. Do their buffs/heals affect you? Are they auto-flagged PvP for assisting you?
- Is there a cooldown / switch timer for PvP, or can I toggle off my PvP flag mid battle? Can I suddenly toggle it on and jump someone without any warning?
- Bystander buffs. How do they apply?


I wouldn't mind trying it, though I probably wouldn't instigate much. When I've played full-zone PvP like AoC, I preferred straight-up fights where my foe knew I was coming and wanted a fight... rather than sneaking up on someone trying to complete a PvE mission or talk to a contact (AoC cutscene ambushes seemed to be 99% of my deaths). Guess I'd probably get much more use out of a /duel command.

A "quick internet search" trumps the cost estimates and business projections of a PROFESSIONAL IN THE INDUSTRY in well-cited and well-referenced writings that have been used by startups for budgeting? I did concede that the information was old, but it was current with the designs that the devs used with making this game.

Look, there are ways to make the game work with less server load- and therefore less costs. ArenaNet's GuildWars does that nicely-- but you can also see the limitations of the design by what the community zones do and do not offer.

CoH does things better than, say, Eve Online's server setup (which has such massive database read-write that they had to use what was at the time the world's largest solid-state hard drive system to get the response times they needed) but it's far from Guild Wars lean.)

Also be careful of what they're including in that "MMO" estimate-- on may of those sites, MMO can mean everything from Habbo Hotel to web-based multiplayer text games.

Point is, there's a RIDICULOUS amount of costs that goes into every monthly fee.. and these chip it down... and even when you get down to profits that aren't "daily operations" you've got to include a return on the original investment.

Now, you conveniently ignore the rest of that-- that DESPITE all those costs, the devs STILL managed three significant "free" issues last year. I conceded that these were tech-intensive not content-heavy, but since you have little clue as to how much effort goes into that workload, take a moment to visit other MMO's and see how many major updates they release annually, What the CoH dev team has done compares favorably them.

I loved PvP generalist play in the zones without a single bit of min/maxing. The problem was that, even for casual play, I had to exclude whole powersets-- there were too many rock-paper-scissors moments where the outcome was predetermined.... and would be over and over every time we met.

Now, even that wouldn't be an issue in a large well populated zone where teammates cover each others' strengths, but for the sizes we encountered... it was totally worthless.

SINCE the PvP revamp, I haven't bothered going into the zones at all-- even though one of the reasons for the revamp was to make more powersets & archetypes more viable. I listened to enough of the brouhaha to know that I needed to relearn fundamentals before going back. Personally, while I liked PvP, I'm a casual enough PvP'er that I didn't like it enough to bother with that. There's enough for me to do elsewhere.

Agreed. I haven't found an MMO where the PvP community was satisfied with the PvP mechanics. In general, the PvP community tends to fall into two camps- those complaining about the PvP mechanics and those that have already quit over them. (Edit: that's a bit too broadly-stated... there are one or two PvP systems out there where the participant population averages to a lukewarm "meh" too...)

Thats actually a feature of the CO iphone app... and something several other MMO's have been able to successfully install into web services. Realistically, as it requires a legitimate username/password, it'd only be as easy to bot as the current system is for spammers.

Again, a feature that EQ2 offered two years ago (as part of their fee service) and it was a bit spotty, but popular. People that can't get online for a guild meeting could follow along there. People that want to check in with online friends while, away from the gaming PC, people that are connected at the level my neice is- texting or facebook updating constantly- would love the chance to connect with their online friends through the medium they're most used to finding them in.

Heh, I know... but as others have mentioned, they do have the feeds to the places that go elsewhere. A good app center would put those rss feeds in an easy-to-use location (and adjust their feed code a bit so the devtracker doesn't CONSTANTLY re-list all the old dev messages as new in things like google reader). It could also embed twitter feeds & do similar mashups.


Exactly... still got a minor tick that globals aren't private anymore, myself. Again, I waver on whether they should make a full Vault or just periodically publish batches of XML data that a dedicated fansite could build a Vault around. You could go ingame and choose what data to make public, and the XML would start publishing, for example.


Again, not necessarily for the account owner. If you opt to publish that data, then (for badging) badghunter could use that rather than a third party app. A supergroup hosting site could pull the supergroup members' feeds in for community purposes. The VirtueVerse writers could add the feeds to their profile there. Heck, I see TWITTER users that send updates about their dinging for games. I don't give a crap, but all it would take is an RSS monitor app checking that feed and posting it to whatever social network they want to bother with.




The idea is simple-

If you give people the choice to share the feeds (and default them to OFF), then THEY can choose to share them, and fansite creators, rather than being marginalized by a dev app that did something they tried to do, but with more exclusive features, can make these feeds part of the services that they offer.

The forums are an extension of the game, in a way- the users here are able to connect with other CoH players regardless of their ability to log into the game. Some people prefer realtime chat. Some prefer private email. Adding both of these allows more people to interact more often, and THROUGH the game's services... not some third party. if your network is using a third party app, all of you can just hop over to the next MMO, keeping the app as you go. If you're USING the game's services to stay connected, there's more friction in such a move.

heh... I was thinking of that myself.

For me, I'd be happy if they just made something that published raw RSS feeds. I could have an RSS reader subscribe to it and inform me... or enthusiastic players could make entire apps dedicated to doing more with the raw data (texts, twitter feeds, social network, a player-driven Vault like Virtueverse, etc)

Don't forget power spectrum last September within that timeframe. It added a new primary for all AT's except controller, dominator & mastermind while also adding new secondaries to all AT's except blaster, brute, and stakler.

Interesting.

That would be interesting to see. I'd assume we'd have to make the buffs include self-buffing options, as not having a defense set would be a detriment to a melee class (even with a tank nearby taking aggro, there's AOE).

Well, since you seem to assume that all that money is directly available for just continued development, some budget info from a few published sources:
(these are estimates from memory, part from this older book IIRC, part adjusted for subsequent updates made in conference or online. I'm using broad numbers here from memory for expedience)

...of every $15 subscription
- About $4-8 goes to bandwidth costs and hosting operations-- the devs don't get a "unlimited access to the internet"deal for $40 like we might.
--About $1-3 more is recommended for customer support costs, including basic bugfixing, depending on product stability
--About $1.50-3 is lost to payment processing, offsetting fraudulent charges, and staffing efforts associated with credit card and fraud issues. Financial fraud is HUGE for mmo's and the card processors really hike up their fees for this business. IIRC, the book noted this around $1.50, but there's been much said online regarding costs here doubling or tripling in the last half decade

What's left might be split between paying back the initial investment and continued development.

As for what's happened in a year:
- specific CONTENT was slim, until the expansion to be honest. Some story arcs and task forces, but the lion's share was probably Going Rogue. Going Rogue added a lot (150+ tip missions, 4 good sized tracks of content for level 1-20 in Praetoria, Cathedral of Pain, etc)

-tech-wise there's been a good deal- and tech is by far the costliest and riskiest to add. We have the new doppleganger tech, ai's capable of a broader powerset range, powerset customization, supersidekicking revision, ultramode, new mission mechanics, Architect enhancements, alignment system, market UI revamp, etc.

-no new archetypes, but powersets tend to offer more variety within archetypes than most other MMO's. Other MMO's often add an archetype that's more of a variation of an existing AT, whereas the devs here can get the same overall effect by adding a powerset into an existing archetype. The devs had added some more powersets in that timeframe- two rounds of proliferation, IIRC

I'd suggest just making it a basic web app. Since 'net access is necessary for the realtime data, you really don't need an offline-available app. iPhone Safari/android browsers should be able to manage it just fine that way... and if someone DOES want to create an unofficial app that accesses the web, they can.



Oh yeah... the vault. Still disappointed it never came to be, though wasn't thrilled with the "friends" list social network part. Best I can figure-- and this is only a guess-- the Vault was announced and even demo'ed before the NCSoft buyout from Cryptic... and the vault bears very similar featuresets to what we see in CO's site-- character profiles, item wikis, an app that lets you access ingame mail, etc. I'm wondering if something wasn't included in the buyout, and redeveloping from scratch wasn't a viable option...


EDIT: My preferred list, for both web/mobile. No particular order:

1) send email to ingame players
2) see/manage supergroup list, based on your sg rights.
3) supergroup/coalition chat, (IIRC, EQ2 offered that at one time via web app, but was buggy)
4) market activity, status, and management
5) Feeds of CoH announcements, dev & community trackers.
6) Character profiles, complete with picture & bio (optional build details, optional social details, optional souvineer list, badge list, etc.
7) Optional character RSS feeds that track notable events (dinging, badge earning, etc)

Well, we're all working under the assumption that there IS a large number of names that will be freed by this. The devs noted that previous name purges had little effect on name availability. That's why they were stopped.

Heck, for all we know cross-server name parking could be a much larger obstruction.

Ah, I did not know that feature.

Now, are we certain that these are 100% guaranteed to be global-free names?

Back when globals were introduced, there were assurances of privacy- that the @global would be only available to those that you shared it with. I remember vaguely that there was a change to that over the past year or so... was kinda too busy to follow through on it... but is there ANY way that users may have to not share their global when you do it that way?

Just trying to be 100% sure that what we see IS what we assume it is.

No, NOW we heckle you about your costume selection. That's totally different

I'm reading these thinking "ok... ok... thats reasonable... ok... wait, I thought everyone did that!" then it hit me: THERE ARE NO RULES GOVERNING/SCORING THE USE OF INSPIRATIONS.

... and I thought you were hardcore.

I'm making a banner for that.

The big challenge with vigilantism here is that these cases are so challenging BECAUSE the evidence of guilt can be spotty. These guys, by definition, can be pretty slick.

Our criminal justice system is based on the understanding best summed by Sir William Blackstone "better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."

While this can be frustrating, a vigilante seeking out these people is by definition working with a wider margin of error. What if he doesn't have all the facts? What if he's blinded by an idealogue? What if he's intentionally fed false information?

Will you, the vigilante, faced with PROOF that you killed/punished a truly innocent man, turn yourself over for murder, or are you, too, turning the legal system into a joke?

Well, that's where we get into a different definition of crime, justice, and change, where the source of the law and ability of the law come into question.

I'd argue that, based on your definitions of a hero, and the situations given, a true hero that worked within the constraints of the law would have to adopt another additional role- that of a true revolutionary. Revolution need not be violent... in fact, in a true and open democracy that offers a legitimate method to seek change, violence would not be the hero's path. The hero would work to change the legal structure that's being abused, then enforce that legal structure.

However, in the case of Cole's- where the man makes the laws, exploits the people protected by the laws, and gives no legitimate recourse of merit to remedy those injustices (the token governing council cannot make the structural changes at the root of the injustice) then violent revolution is STILL a "heroic" option.

I'm making a sharp distinction here. This "heroic" revolutionary is not a vigilante.

A true heroic revolutionary advocates is not interested in imposing punishment on those that acted unjustly but legally under the old regime-- his focus is on replacing the old structure, assuring that those abuses won't continue. Once those new laws are established, people are judged based on them. A revolutionary thus seeks to ESTABLISH, then ENFORCE, a rule of law. Also of note-- I'd argue that he cannot solely establish the law. As a member of a society, he has a right to have a say in how that governing society is ruled, but that voice has no more individual weight than any of the others. He may participate in the public discourse and his stature will likely add weight to his words, but he MUST seek a legitimate rule of law adopted by the people for the people.

A Vigilante fighting in a revolution, on the other hand, is just ENFORCING his rules without authority or establishment. He would seek to punish/kill Cole and his minions for their "crimes" first, then possibly, if he finds himself on the throne, he might ESTABLISH them.


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Of course, then there's the behavior after the revolution, where the lines may start to blur. Does a vigilante that writes his own moral code into law now become "heroic" since he's working within the law? How do you handle the previous regime? Do you hold their past acts to the new laws? Do you appeal to a greater "crimes against humanity" cause? Do you give them equal and proportionate voice in the legislative process or barr them from public participation?

While this appeals at a common level, it doesn't stand up well against much criminological or psychological study. Just making a punishment more harsh isn't going to serve as a useful deterrence. To modify a behavior, a deterrent has to have a degree of certainty (likelihood of getting caught), a degree of severity, and a degree of celerity (immediacy).

We don't have a high arrest rate, so we lack certainty and celerity.... so the common thought is just to ramp up the severity, but this has been shown to have very little behavioral effect. When an act's severity reaches a point where it seems out of proportion to the offense, it can start to lose its effect as a deterrent.

If you believe in "punishment as a deterrent" then we need to find ways to increase celerity (accelerate the criminal justice system) and increase the likelihood of being caught (something a more involved public or "hero" can do without going Vigilante). At the same time, we look at the punishments to see if they've gotten TOO disproportionate to be a useful punishment.



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Sidenote:

When much of the general population thinks about stopping crime, we think of "getting tougher" - and sometimes that can have a reverse effect. A good example was when there was public outcry when it was found that a local prison paid for basic cable (it had 1 tv for 200 inmates and couldn't get any reception via antenna). That was wasteful spending-- coddling the inmates! So it was cut... and rather than save money, it ended up costing more to run the prison.

TV time was one of the few rewards that could be meted out for good behavior. Violent prisoners would be barred from the community room- it was a well-controlled island where any misbehavior had immediate, certain, and proportionate punishment (you were barred from the room for days/weeks/months). It was a subtle social-conditioning tool for rewarding good behavior in a place where CHANGING behavior is one of the goals.

In its place, prisoners had a great deal of idle time. TV was one of the cheapest and most broadly-accessible activities for a prison to offer. Without it, prisoners were left with less to do and more time to interact- and these are people with questionable social skills (at best). Predators that would stay in line to have access to the TV preyed. Nonviolent offenders learned that violence got results- the "law of the jungle." They became tougher to keep in line, requiring more guards, more staff injury claims, more infirmary fees etc.

Heck, the TV even served as a (admittedly very weak) link to outside society- seeing how the mainstream sees, experiencing what many of us experience. As tenuous as this bond may be, it's still one small tie where very few exist. How do we CUT social bonds to productive society, INCREASE bonds to a violent society and then expect a positive outcome? How does increasing their time there help things- particularly for nonviolent offenders?

Don't get me wrong-- this was not a story of "they took my TV! WTFBBQ" rageriots. There was no immediate flashpoint or anything like that... just a documented year-over-year comparison that showed just measurable violence increases, minutely measurable recidivism rate increases, and NOTABLE cost increases when compared to previous years and prisons containing similar prisoners that kept their TV. It's just a note that-- as counterproductive as it sounds-- 'getting tougher' isn't always the answer.

Agreed. Heck, there's a good deal of evidence that suggests that a greater degree of harshness may actually increase lawless behavior by diminishing the individual's belief in the righteousness of that law.

I always cringe when watching the Hollywood typical "fight the way the bad guys fight is the only way to win" tough-cop fantasies that perpetuate the myth and has so many people believing it's a truism.


I guess that also answers Marcian Tobay's original question, though:

I'd take the heroic path. Heck, I'd probably oppose vigilantism as much as I opposed any criminal act. Its harmful, unnecessary, and more often than not leads to tragedy.

Sadly I can relate: my namesake is even something of an inside joke.

When my friend Rian_Frostdrake tried to sell me on this game, it was a bit of a twist for him-- he almost exclusively plays non-human characters, so the fact that he'd play something where the options were so HUMAN was a testament to the game's appeal. But, in typical Frostdrake fashion... when raving about this new MMO, he worded it a bit awkwardly,

"So, you know how you usually play characters that look like you, but I don't." ... he said this while I was playing a character that... well, the character was wearing a metal bikini, so you figure it out. My wife and I heckled him about it and let it drop.

A few weeks later, though, when I rolled my first character- I chose the hair color, ponytail, beard, glasses, and background closest to my own, dressed in the khaki pants and white shirt I often wore while teaching, and made him a university professor and army veteran....