Ironik

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This technically isn't possible with our engine. It would have to be a huge animated texture refreshing at 20+ frames per second.

We did think of it, but the engineers' eyeballs popped out of their sockets when we suggested it.

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Did you get any mocap of that?

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Hide Park (Skyway City)

My take on it is this:

Hide Park => Hyde Park (in London) => Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde => a man who mutates into something else after ingesting a chemical formula => kind of similar to what's happening to The Lost, yes?



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There are also Hide Parks in Cincinnati and Chicago.

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And ya know, the architecture in Brickstown always reminded me of Blade Runner, I don't know why, something about the Zig I think.

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Well, if you're going to talk architecture... has anyone else noticed that some of the buildings look suspiciously like computers or computer components? I'm thinking of the building that looks like it has vertical floppy drives and of the stores that look like they have an HVAC unit that looks like a giant computer chip on the top. Seemed very Tron or ReBoot! to me.

And there is a continuity error in Dark Astoria. It has recent billboards and cars, yet supposedly became DA many years ago. It's just a resources thing, of course, but it would be cool if the place reflected the era in which it was lost. (And they could re-use the tileset for a time-travel story arc.)

I chortled at the "Abyss Towers." It struck my punny bone just right.

Dark Astoria

Might be a Dev's hometown. I'm familiar with the one in the NYC area, but I'm sure there are others.

St. Elegis hospital is the name of the hospital from TV's St. Elsewhere.

Toffet Terrace might be a version "tophet."
SYLLABICATION: To·phet NOUN: 1. An extremely unpleasant or painful condition or place. 2. Hell.

Barca might be Catholic; there are a lot of Catholic references in the game. As I recall, Barca was a see (diocese) that was destroyed. Crusades, maybe?

Founder's Falls

Thomas Hutchison was the royal govenor of Massachusetts in the run-up to that whole "revolution" brouhaha. Then there was Anne Hutchison (or Hutchinson), America's first feminist, also in MA, but a century or so before Tom's infamy. (Who says PBS is waste of money?)

Terra Volta

Challenger Technology -- could be a reference to Professor Challenger, the protagonist of Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World. There's also the comic Challengers of the Unknown.

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What tweaks would you like to see for Super Groups?

What new features?

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75 accounts instead of 75 characters. You can only play one character at a time, anyway, and it's a pain to have to create multiple alternate SGs just to house everyone.

We couldn't recruit more because we were full, then when EQ2 came out half the members left, leaving us with three 3/4-empty SGs. If we'd had more people, we might've avoided this. Plus, a number of them have indicated that they're going to come back after Issue 4 is released, and I'd hate to go through the same thing again.

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Well, I may be one of the few, but I don't care at all for the decision to rollback Bosses. I could STILL solo a changed Boss with my SS/Invun Tanker and Grav/FF Controller (my only to alts besides Armsman); and BOTH these alts were built to CHAMPION character concepts (had these two since 1985 as well).

My honest question to you though is this:

For those few of us who liked and enjoyed teh Boss changes would you consider either changing the Invincible difficulty level to KEEP the Bosses spawned for it at the same level they are now; or (imo) better yet, ADD a sixth difficulty level taht is the same as Invincible with regard to how it spawns MOB groups yet KEEPS ant Bosses spawned at the current 'non-rolled back' difficulty?

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I think that's a very good idea; if it hasn't already been implemented, it's certainly worth a look. A truly over-the-top Insane difficulty level would satisfy that sliver of players who really want an extreme gaming challenge. One of those "I'm doing the Terra Volta Freakshow respec mission solo" kind of thing.

And if you do institute it, install an automatic demofile capture system that posts them on the CoH website so we can all watch.

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Part of the problem with many members of the testing community is that they believe what they say is golden and that the game is completely broken until everything that they comment on is changed to their specifications. Often times, this is done rather rudely (Read anything ever posted by Balron).

Just because you disagree with a change that's been implemented and they aren't changing it right away doesn't mean that it's entirely bad for the game. Invul changes for example. Despite the HUGE outcry from (it seems) every Invul tanker here, the changes have made most Invul tanks I've talked to on live BETTER overall, myself included.

Additionally, yes... I3 was released with bugs. The fact you seem to ignore is IF Update 3 were postponed to fix every issue you deem problematic (Nevermind what the people that actually work on the game think) we would probably never see an update. Seriously. There will always be problems, there will always be bugs, there will always be bad decisions... but waiting until everything is completely flawless is unfeasible, unrealistic, and problematic in it's own right.

Get off of your high horse. The bottom line is that we ARE being listened to. We ARE being taken seriously. And "our" ideas and suggestions ARE being considered.

P.S. I do believe Statesman stated that these changes came about BECAUSE of data collection (what you folks on the test server have done) and competent player feedback on the forums. Not once did he suggest that these changes were all his idea.

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Well, I'm certainly not on any high horse; far from it, in fact. I merely posted my perception of the situation. (And I knew I'd get flamed for it.)

I have posted praise for the Devs for the smooth release of Issue 3, because they very obviously did learn from the mistakes made during Issue 2's release. I have likewise posted that demanding immediate response from the Devs is childish behavior that should be ignored. You can see this for yourself by checking my posting history.

That said, I stand by my opinion that the Training Room forum is filled with valid posts by reasonable, well-intentioned and polite players who bring up well-grounded concerns... concerns which are eventually proved to be accurate. I'm extremely impressed by those people, and even a cursory read-through of a smattering of threads will cause those even-tempered posts to stand out from the pack. It's my hope that the Devs are following those posters, because they provide valuable information. As I say, I don't know if they are regarded as valuable or not, but it often seems like they aren't.

Just to reiterate, I don't include myself in that list. I don't crunch the numbers, I just go by intuition. That works for me, but probably not a reliable method for tweaking game mechanics.

I also said that disagree with geekchick's characterization of Statesman -- I don't think she's right about his attitude, but I can see how it might seem that way. You'll do well to not conflate our two posts, because we part ways on that point.

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Well. Since I've already cancelled my subscription over the boss changes, let me be the negative voice here and explain why this isn't going to get me to re-up.
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Statesman, a number of us told you repeatedly, the entire time the boss change was testing, that "part of our game’s strength is the ability for a player to log on for a half hour, have fun, then log off" and "people aren’t clear when a mission requires a team up and when it doesn’t" and even "Mission Difficulty Slider to satisfy the demands of those who want something more challenging in the future"
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We said all those things, and you ignored us, and the change went live. And now suddenly (because you are losing subscriptions, I imagine) you come and parrot these things back as if they were your idea all along.
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Also, in this post, you say that story arcs are not normally given until a contact has been fully raised. This is not correct. In fact, I have almost never received a new story arc from a contact after their bar is 75% full; most often I receive the first mission of an arc as my third or fourth mission with that contact, so.. roughly 25% full.
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This troubles me, because when we originally complained to you that raising boss difficulty would be problematic for soloers doing missions, you said that mission text always warns when a boss will be present. That also was not correct, and we said this to you, and I don't believe you ever retracted that statement or said that mission text would be looked at and corrected.
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In short, I think it's offensive that you ignore the players and then try to pass of our warnings to you as things you yourself thought of, because clearly you DIDN'T think of them, or the change wouldn't have gone live. I also think it's very disturbing that you have repeatedly made statements about the state of live gameplay which are not accurate, implying that you are actually not familiar with your own game.
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My confidence in you, the devs, is non-existant at this point. I always appreciated the fact that you would come this board and respond to what we have to say. But now I realize that the only thing worse than devs who don't listen is devs who just pretend to listen.
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Well, I've got nothing more to say to people who aren't really listening. So I'm out of here.

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Despite the fact this will likely get me flamed, I actually rather agree with this post and posted similar thoughts a few months back. I've long since given up on playing on Test for any purpose other than to look at the new stuff and try different builds for my characters for the very reason geekchick states: the experiences of the testers doesn't seem to be listened to very much.

It was better for Issue 3 than Issue 2 -- okay, anything would've been better than the release around Issue 2 -- but it does seem as if valid posts on the Training Room forum are not regarded as highly as they should be. There are some really excellent game testers playing CoH, and to seemingly ignore their findings is not a good policy. I use the word "seemingly" specifically because it's a perception from this side of the screen, not because it necessarily reflects the actual state of affairs. I am more than willing to be proven wrong.

From my vantage point, it really does look like the overall player experience on the Test server is valid when compared to the playerbase as a whole, despite the fact that only a tiny fraction of CoH's players actively use the Training Room. The response from player-testers there seems to accurately reflect the eventual response of the wider CoH community. Again, that's just an impression I've gotten, but there you have it. I would hope that the Devs follow some of those player posts pretty closely, because a lot of them are solid number-crunchers who are thorough and even-tempered. (Which leaves me out, clearly. As Clint once said, "Man's got to know his limitations.")

I don't agree with geekchick's characterization of Statesman, though. I think some of the "no comments" happened because it's mostly impossible to follow every thread, and with the holidays mixed in there, stuff was going to be missed.

I really hope the Devs treat this as yet another learning experience. It's pretty obvious lessons were learned from the Issue 2 boondoggle, and the process has improved. Here's hoping Issue 4's release will be even better.

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I want to make this very, very clear...these changes are due to not only the "data", but the well reasoned posts on these boards.

I really do read & really do listen! The "devs" aren't cooped up in an ivory tower; we love this game just like you do! In the end, we're all players. I have the privilege of being the lead designer. I want to do what's BEST for the game.

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Best ding-dang Dev team, ever, by crackey!

Edit: Okay, that's faint praise considering the competition, but at least they do listen, eventually.

Awesome. That was the right answer, no doubt about it.

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The changes have made it impossible to solo a even-or-higher boss.

At the same time, I STILL have no issues with minions. I tried out the slider (and you know, larger groups of evens are harder for me to deal with than normals sized groups of Tougher minions). When I saw a group of Orange minions, I prioritized targets and my alphastrike dropped two out of three before they had a chance to get off more than one shot, and the last was cold meat with only minor damage to me.

Bosses didn't need upgrading: Minions are still wusses.

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That's my experience, as well. A large group of even-con minions is more difficult than a smaller, +1 group.

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Sorry, but I don't think you can state that only the casual players are left. hell, every night, 4 of the 11 servers are in the yellow Post I3, when previously they were all in the green. Don't know about you, but with 1.5 weeks having passed, and the server load increasing, I would say most players are enjoying the changes, and have RETURNED to playing the game again.

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Be careful not to confuse "enjoying the boss changes" and "logging in to see what's new with Issue 3". I expect that the latter is certainly true, while the former is, for many people, not true.

Indeed, many of us are playing our pre-25 alts, and checking out the new content, while crossing our fingers and hoping that the boss changes get rolled back. My attempts to play my blaster post-I3 have been frustrating and disappointing, doubly so because that toon is in the perfect level range for the higher-end Striga content. Content that's a blast (cool stories and set-ups), but which leaves me deep in debt, ends up leaving me with very mixed feelings at the end of a play session.

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After sampling the I3 additions on the Test Server, I actually haven't been messing with the live versions; I've mostly been dealing with the changes. Despite a very smooth rollout, I am overall less than pleased with the changes.

The increased Boss and Archvillain hitpoints has been unpleasant. Missions that were once viable for solo or duo are no longer so. Three members seems to be the minimum you need, particularly for multiple Boss missions, if you are at all interested in avoiding debt. (It's always been that way with most Archvillains, but some now require far larger teams.)

It seems to me that the Boss changes were unnecessary on top of the ability to alter the mission difficulty. I really see no point in paying influence to increase the difficulty level when the missions are already plenty hard enough at the lowest setting. I increased the difficulty on the Test Server, which just resulted in multiple deaths per mission rather than one or two with the Boss changes. Perma-debt just isn't fun for me because I feel like I'm not making progress. When you need xp in the multi-millions to attain the next level, playing rather than powerlevelling the higher content becomes less attractive. I'd like to try a Kheldian, but getting to 50 from my current 45 now just seems like a Sisyphean task.

The exponential decrease in Enhancement drops is no big deal for my higher-level toons, but for my low-level characters it's a real impediment to being able to afford new enhancements. I haven't had to resort to shuffling influence around, but i might have to. (Especially if I hit a lull in winning contest/bio contests, which is where many of my low-level toons have been earning their influence.)

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I still think a modified "monster Code" where all players con white in any PvP contest would be the simplest and most elegant solution.

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Exactly. PvP requires "no levels." The Monster code is perfect for this. The advantage of higher players over lower players is not that they would hit harder per shot, but that they would have more powers to choose from.

A 50 against a 5 is still wildly uneven, but it isn't an instant kill, and with level-restricted zones it should keep the mismatches to a minimum.

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they should set fire base zulu up as a transport hub, allowing the gate there to 'dial out' to different zones in our dimension.

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I'd prefer to see a more "mundane" solution to mass transport issues - seeing as we're living in a modern-day city, how about a modern-day city approach to mass transport?

There's all these bus stops littered around the city, but the PTA (paragon transport authority) seems to have forgotten to provide us with any buses...

So, I'd like to see the addition of bus transport, for a nominal amount of influence per journey so the monorail remains as a free method of travel around the city. (I originally thought of taxis, but the bus stops are already there)

Talos Island to Atlas Park? Certainly. That'll be 1500 influence, hop aboard.

Founders Falls to King's Row? 3000 influence, etc

(run up to a bus stop, click the stop sign, chose from a tram-style menu & off you go - buses dropping you off at a specific location in the target zone, so travel powers are still useful - like, say, outside the police station in King's Row or infront of City Hall in Atlas Park, etc.)

Also, causes the least amount of hassle for the zone building department as it'd be extensable to new zone without having to build new monorail lines (which I'd guess is the main reason why we'd not see a "blue line" appear in Paragon City)

(I'm going to gloss-over and ignore the somewhat amusing notion of bumping into Captain Fantabulous riding the bus to work in the morning, urging the driver to go faster as there's hostages in peril on the other side of town )

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I'd actually prefer hero-only transporters for, say, levels 35 and up. Since there are plenty of varieties of teleporting in Paragon City (hero tp, Rikti portals, CoT portals, Malta/Tsoo tp), it'd be nice if there were teleport booths in the various zones.

Make it a mission like the Icon tailor mission, where you have to go to such-and-such a lab (run by Hero Corps or Portal Corp) to have your internal transport ID device implanted (which unlocks the transporter devices) and when you get there you find it's being assaulted by a variety of bad guys intent on stealing or destroying the whole shebang. Upon defeating them you get to have the the Transporter ID Device implanted.

Have the transporter booths themselves located in the least-visited spots in all the major zones (to reduce lag), but not in any of the Hazard Zones.

I think this would eliminate a lot of the annoyance factor of "get timed mission in Kings Row from Indigo in Founders Falls." If you could just zip over to the teleport booth and get whisked over to KR from FF, that'd be awesome. It would also be yet another reward for making it to the higher levels, like capes and auras. Lower-level heroes who click on the booths would receive the usual message: "You cannot use the teleport booths until you are level 35."

I think the main reason there are so many players in the Hollows is the fact that you get Wincott as your second/third contact, and most new players don't realize they can refuse to take his missions and get back out into the city. When I told a new player that, they were really surprised. Most players seem to just go from First Contact --> Wincott --> Flux --> Julius --> that magician guy, all without knowing they can skip it.

I don't like the Hollows because of its size. I don't die running from one end to the other, but then I have ten months of play under my belt. It's just tedious to make those long runs. I've soloed everything except the Cavern of Transcendance (which no one can solo) and haven't found any of them much more difficult than most other missions, but getting to them is a chore.

Shadow Shard and FBZ are hands-down the coolest areas, but no one ever visits. I helped a couple guys out with a mission there, and the three of us were the only ones there. The risk v. reward is pretty lame, as well, and those geysers are just dangerous. A couple of times I landed in the middle of big groups of mobs. Fortunately I was just messing around since I had fly, but having to depend on the geysers would bite. Not going back voluntarily, that's for sure. (I asked the mission-owner who the contact was so I can avoid him in future. General Hammond. Funny, if you're an SG-1 fan, but I'm not going anywhere near him.)

Rikti Crash Site is incredibly dangerous and is just too far away from anything. I soloed some 100 or so villains in there because I had to, but I'm never going back. Too. Far. Away.

To paraphrase the old movie title Mars Needs Women, I just want to say, "Faultline Needs Ramps!" The minute I ever get a mission there with a non-flyer is the minute that toon gets deleted.

Eden, same deal as RCS. Dangerous and distant.

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To be honest, I needed help with a lot of +1 and duo bosses before this change, so perhaps it's always been a bit towards forced grouping for defenders, controllers, and blasters.

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Odd... I just soloed two bosses (Rikti Mesmerist and Crey Security Chief) in a mission last night with my Blaster. I sure hope I don't have to forego being able to do that, that would suck big time, as those types of spawns are the rule rather than the exception. I can't solo bosses with any of my Defenders, but I can with my Controllers.

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And now the world will explode for your pleasure and amusement, as two pirating ninjas is too much for reality to withstand.

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This reminds of the argument the twins from the excellent miniseries Maximum Bob had about the creature they saw the swamp...

Twin #1: "And that's when we saw the GatorMan!"
Twin #2: "That weren't no GatorMan -"
Sheriff: "Thank you!"
Twin #2: "- that were a ManGator!"

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Actually, you have a good break for one thing - it was timed, so if getting there is really, truely pissing you off, just let the timer run out.

No more mission.

Now my level 32 controller with those two missions deep in level 40 DE territory in Founders... well, I'm not sure what I'm going to do about them.

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Heh, wait 'til you get a mission in the BFE part of Eden where the door is inside the Perez Park-like maze and guarded by 6 Devoureds (Greater & Lesser), along with their attendant Fungoids and Deathcaps, all spewing out massive damage, holds and Swarms by the gazillions. Don't even bother to take Awakens, you'll die immediately upon rez.

I actually didn't mind the "far doors" in FF, since by then I was a pretty fast flier. It's those son-of-buck-toothed-rabbit distant missions in Perez and Hollows where you don't have any travel powers and you have to run through mobs that are higher than you just to get to the door. Especially in PP's maze. That place needs to be burned to the ground.

Can we please have an event where we get clean up PP once and for all?

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Just so you know ... there are no ambushes in hazard zones.

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That sounds like an interesting game... is it anything like City of Heroes, where we do get ambushes in Hazard Zones?

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I wonder if all the lumber and rebar used in the building of the arena is going to be carried onsite on the shoulders of the constructions workers.

"Why bother loading up a truck when we can just get Brent here to haul it in on his back?"

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Paragon citizens can leap off of 20-story buildings and can walk past an exploding Jaeger without getting hurt... it makes perfect sense to me that they would be more useful than any truck. Although a Warhulk might be handy around a construction site.

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Sorry to spoil the fun, guys, but that date is certainly not THE day. It all depends upon the bugs we squash and so forth. He asked "When's Issue 3 coming out?" and I said "Heck, a week? It all depends on the bugs." There's no set schedule, though next Tuesday would be nice.

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In that case can't you just put it out tomorrow and fix the bugs along the way?

(Its not as if there isn't bugs already

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They tried that once. I didn't work out so well.

Your forum reg date is the date that Issue 2 came out. Hmm, wonder if the buggy Issue that certain players begged to be released bugs and all inspired you to come to the forum to vent? If not, it's quite the coincidence.

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Yeah, we lost SG members because of Issue 2. Let's not do that again, please.

The mantra I hope is being chanted in Cryptic's offices, CoT-like:

"Fix the bugs, tweak the powers, then release. Fix the bugs, tweak the powers, then release. Fix the bugs, tweak the powers, then release."

I'd rather have an awesome, nearly-bugless release January 14th than a crapfest like Issue 2 released on December 14th.

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Id like to beable to go play in the hazard zones before they were hazard zones doing missions there and so forth.

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That'd be pretty awesome... Faultline pre-Faultline....

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This would be really awesome. The story arc where Faultline BECOMES faultline, and you are in the middle of it trying to evacuate the civilians?!

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Nerts, ya beat me to it.

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Id like to beable to go play in the hazard zones before they were hazard zones doing missions there and so forth.

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That'd be pretty awesome... Faultline pre-Faultline....

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Even better, playing in Faultline while it's becoming Faultline.

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Just for the record, making risk=reward is definitely one of our goals - we're trying to add spice and reward to bring people to the harder/underutilized zones.

One of the trickinesses of having a largely "loot free" game is trying to make rewards interesting for such things - obviously if characters are motivated largely by XP+influence as the major rewards it makes things a bit tougher for the designers - many players tend to go and do whatever the easiest source of XP is and ignore most everything else. And we like the lack of loot, generally.

But I know Jack & co are thinking on the issue, in any case.

-jg

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The rewards for just about everything aren't good enough. I hope you take this into consideration. It seems to me like the rewards for collecting a large number of badges is something akin to recieving a sticker for slaying hordes of mobs, a reward more suiting for a good week of preschool.

While the idea of keeping loot out of the game may be good, you have to reward players the most for their hardest to achieve efforts. The first time I saw a Crey Cryo Gun, I saw something cool looking but in actual function was pretty worthless or superceeded by another power for almost all of my characters. When I saw all the things required for the Archmage badge, I thought for something that difficult the reward must be pretty nice. I found it dissapointing yet again, as the power granted was only a slight tradeoff.

To have rewards that keep people interested and don't require giving out loot, you need something that has some kick to it. Rather than handing out a cheap little freeze gun (which is loot, already proving you've invalidated your principles of not giving out loot) I would suggest a power like buildup that boosts certain enhancements. Though somewhat weaker it would offer a way for you to do different quests that allow new types of boosts from endurance reduction to hold durations. If you collect all of them you can get one power that boosts all your abilites by a certain amount. This is something that every class could use at some point and is a reward.

Not a cheap trinket like Archmage or the Cryo Gun.

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I quite agree with you about this sort of reward. It's a very good idea, I think. When badges were first introduced, I was pretty keen on collecting them and spent a few days just zipping around various zones to do just that. As time passed and people started getting the rewards for amassing their collections of badges, it became clear that the reward wasn't really worth the effort. Now if I just happen to run across an Exploration badge or a history plaque, I'll stop and get it, but I'm not going out of my way for them. Same with "defeat X" achievement badges.

Now that I have a character who's looking at 1.5 million xp to make it to his next level where contacts will talk to him, maybe I will go out and acquire those badges just to make the time pass by. But other than that I don't have a huge incentive to get them all. I like the badge idea, I just don't feel that "gotta have it" urge to possess them.

That said, I do think that putting some badge-granting monsters and mobs in Trial zones will help repopulate those areas.

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Just for the record, making risk=reward is definitely one of our goals - we're trying to add spice and reward to bring people to the harder/underutilized zones.

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Putting a couple more monsters who give badges in those zones might help.

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People would just get the badge and leave. Temp powers, exp boosts, special enhancements would encourage people to stay.

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Yeah, you're right. The best badge idea I've seen in this thread is to make badges for specific villains in specific zones. Tesla Princes and 5th Column Unteroffiziers in Boomtown, Behemoth Masters and Cannon Princes in Faultline, Sentries and Devoureds in Eden, etc. And make them all 200 each.

Combine that with a contact for the "dry" levels where you are missionless who will also buy/sell Enhancements and Inspirations and those zones would be repopulated with players.