MindmasterZero

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We're still analyzing the numbers for Defenders & Controllers. We need to get a better picture of the impact of the mob hp/damage increase. If we make any changes, I can't say whether it'd be an Endurance decrease or a Damage increase or both.

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More HP on mobs means my tank and defenders not only have to swing/shoot more, but also keep their toggles running longer per fight. Id vote for the both category.

Also, while on a team, my friends ice blaster needs 10 more shots to help finish off 10 more mobs. Another friend's fire blaster only needs 1 more shot (if that) to finish off those same mobs (or as many as we can cram into a small area). Given you ahve stated AE attacks are a concern given their disproportionalte value over single target attacks, how do you view these changes in terms of fire blaster/spine scrapper vs say, elec/claws? The team value for AE vs single target attacks got DRAMATICALLY boosted if this goes live without a boost in damage or a significant end reduction for single target attacks.

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In response to the guy who said, 'No one would go hunt Vahz in Faultline when you can go to Boom and hunt 5th" I say that people can already make that choice not to hunt Vahz. At least this way if you did decide to go to Faultline (usually because its more suitable for your level) you wouldn't then choose to skip Vahz in favor of, say, Clockwork. This is because the Security Guard would tell you which gang to hunt. The incentive would come in the form of a more structured 'street hunting' team who receives a bonus for teaming up in a Hazard/Trial zone for a certian amount of 'Defeats'.


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Right. I liked the idea, what I meant to add was a way to expand it. Put timers on mobs when they spawn. At a certain point, increase their exp and influence value for these style missions. So, generally, hunting mobs in boom will yield more than on the streets. Hunting mobs in faultline will yield more than hunting them in either, because its less traversed. Hunting unpopular factions in either zone will yield more than popular factions. I think that would encourage spreading out and going to new places, and fighting things which might ordinarily be more trouble than they are worth, compared to easier targets worth the same exp. I didnt mean to bash the idea, merely expand it.

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And we like the lack of loot, generally.

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I love you folks! I really do! Please, please, please keep us loot free!!!

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Costume options and temporary powers are "loot" too. Special titles, decorations for bases etc.

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There is already a bonus for doing missions, why not have a small XP bonus for hunting in Hazard zones?

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It would need to be worthwhile for the factions people avoid fighting. Why get hazard pay on vaz in faultline when you can get hazard pay on 5th in boom. Or more importantly, why kill vaz in boom when you can kill 5th in boom? Bonuses per zone AND per faction. The devs know which factions people dont kill. When was the last time you saw people going "Yay, lets farm knives for mega exp!".

Daoc kind of had this where mobs that had been left around longer were worth more exp. It kind of stands to reason that bad guys who have been left to their own devices for a while would have comitted more crimes, and at least be worth more influence, if not exp. Influence isnt worth anything at upper levels, but in the teens (the level range for fault and boom) it can be pretty important for DO's and SO's if you dont g et given 99999 while standing around Ms Liberty.

Track mobs killed, and give a bonus to the lowest killed faction that naturally spawns in an area, these are the guys who are getting away with stuff while the Nemesis are piling in the paddy wagons. Increase exp awards for mobs unkilled after a certain point. It would encourage people to spread out and patrol, vs running a circle around the same street corner in Brisk for 4 hours at a time.

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You don't realize how bizarrely laid out the streets are in the regular zones (like Skyway) until you've run them for a while, and then you think, "The guy who laid out the traffic patterns in this city must have been dropping acid. This whole place should be in perpetual gridlock." And then you find there are whole *sections* of the city where ground transport is totally impractical?

Apparently Paragon City has a thriving market in hovercars.

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The office buildings crack me up too. Paragon City University offers advanced degrees in anti-ergonomics.

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But on the "a reason to go there" subject, hopefully if the Devs are listening that they don't do a SOE/PlanetSide/Core-Combat number and make more "reasons" by making it mandatory to go there like perez (ie at lvl 7 all contact want you to go to perez, shortly thereafter that is the ONLY mission any offer)

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Agreed. If the zones are clunkers, the solution sint to force everyone to visit the zone they dont enjoy, its to make them WANT to go there.

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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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The problem with Faultline is that you need a fairly big (4+) person group to hunt in there because the Clocks/Vahz both have fairly potent ranged attacks and come in big groups.

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Vaz puke is incredibly deadly. It is fire typed, which is something most people dont realize, but tanks dont really have great fire resists at that level. Its a heavy damage attack, with a strong dot. As a fire tank, I got wasted with an empath and some other teammates trying to tank groups of vaz there. Its a TON of frontloaded damage. Who cares if they have long recharge, its the initial wave of attacks which reams you. Add in slow darts and eidalons... Faultline sucks because the all the mobs are bastards to fight, and give the same exp as everything else. The whole its full of lts and bosses doesnt apply. Boomtown is full of the same mobs, and they go down easier, hit less hard, etc. If the devs dont want to give hazard zones bonuses, they should deifnately give certain mobs or factions bonuses. A sapper should be worth more exp than a jaeger, its a hell of a lot more dangerous. Rikti mentalist vs freak tank? Tsoo Sorcerer vs family lt class goomba. Aberrant vs Hellion buckshot. I've never even seen anything on why this is the case. They should have left the elemental attacks on low level outcasts, and boosted the exp. People dont go for the path of least resistance, they go for the path of fast exp. Fighting hard mobs gives less exp/time than easy ones. Make hard mobs the same exp over time by giving them a boost, and you will see more people branching out in their targets. Not everyone mind you, but more. The solution isnt to make everything hit like vaz at low levels. Leave some mobs weak, so that defenders/controllers etc have targets while leveling if they have to solo in lowby levels. Leave some hard, but worth more, so well balanced teams progress quickly.

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I find it interesting that people are trying to maximize their xp, I seem to spend all my time these days trying not to outlevel story arcs and task forces, ninja-ing mission objectives and deliberately building up debt.

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I assume you are under 30 then. I havent had missions for 2 levels now. If I had died more, it would be even more dull.

Lets look at the mobs in faultline....

Vaz: Whee! Paks of heavy damage puke, multiple eidalons, and more slow darts than I can shake a stick at...

Clocks: End drain, energy damage, holds, flyers

CoT: Madness mages, oh the joy, other suicide mages. Spectral foes that phase and sly into places annoying to reach

Tanks tend to have protection vs lethal and smash, and are working on their energy, or perish the thought, one attack. Scrappers defenses are relatively low. Fair amount of status effects. And thats just from mobs.

Terrain layout sucks for superspeed. It isnt a pleasure with teleport eitgher, since it takes multiple ports to get out of a hole. 1 up, 1 diagnally down if landing spot looks good, otherwise 1 over then 1 down. Faultline isnt a fun zone to traverse for many, and the exp is the same as anywhere else per mob. Exp/time is less because the mobs are harder.

Boomtown always had a fair number in it. 5th column arent annoying w status effects. Lost minions are gun toting weenies. Hunt those for the win!

On to DA. I liked DA a lot as my fire tanker, this was post reduction of zombie fire weakness too. The fog does suck to TP in, and mobs have a habit of "spawning" on top of you w superspeed, but overall a decent zone.

TV - sky raiders. AKA chumps. They might be a tad more formidable with sky skiffs now, I havenmt hunted through this zone, but it was a gravy train of easy exp back in the day. Kind of annoying for superspeed, but worth running around.

And then you are in brickstown until 36, then you can go into the abandoned sewers.

Creys folley sucks. Big areas w nothing but swarms and monkies. Spawns with level 40 lt's in with 33 mobs, etc. mobs are poorly distributed in level ranges, packs of high level mobs mixed in with lower levels. Groups of 32 and 37 fighting side by side. This zone coudl be good if it wasnt buggy.

Eden: Same spawn problems as Crey's Folly, with packs have at least one +7 lt in them. Nothing like an uber cairn to make the game fun. Full of devouring earth, so multiple emanators per group, not to mention them spewing underlings, whcih take time and endurance to kill, and give nothing in return.

Abandoned sewers - Good zone imo.

Awarding a hazard zone exp bonus might help. Recognizing that some factions are simply harder than others and giving them an exp boost (similar to how prisoners exp was nerfed) might get people to fight different stuff.

Another factor is sidekicks. In my group of real life friends who play, our levels range from 41 to 25. We cant bring our friends into hazard zones, so dont hunt there.

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Lastly, you should give something extra special to the Dark Defenders, since everyone has been so down on them and there have been problems with their powers in the past. Psionic resistance is very rare in the game, and many status effects come from Psionic attacks. How about a group buff that gives resistance to Psionic, Energy, and Negative Energy? This would not only reduce the length of all status effects from those types of attacks, but it would reduce the damage taken too! To make it fit the dark theme, you should add a side-effect like stealth or something, if that's not too overpowered. Give it a really cool evil name like "Shadow Fall."


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I love posts like this, because you reveal your ignorance in poking fun at others. Shadowfall doesnt reduce the effect/duration of status effects. Its a stealth, defense, damage resist power. The PSI resist applies vs psionic damage like psi clockwork attacks.

More tp the point, reducing the time a status effect is on the target is largely useless. Once the toggles are down, even tanks are smears.

Why not let existing pink inspirations do this, instead of creating a whole new type?

Inspirations are handed out randomly, by adding a new type, you decrease the chance of actually getting the one you need...

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I have played EQ from day 3 until a bout 8 months ago. Did you know there are still quests that are in the game from launch day that are broken even now?

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Hundreds of units of good content are greater than 10. A few rotten apples doesnt spoil the orchard, and its still a hell of a lot more fruit than one tree. Thats the difference here people. CoH has nothing to compare with the top 100 quests, its got a few working single group encounters that require a bit of skill (sewer trial and some others), and one obviously broken one (Hamidon) that pale in comparison to strats/prep required on high tier raids. I was looking forward to challenging single group encounters vs AV's. Instead I get blobs of dps and HP that you beat in the exact same way. Tank, heal, kill. Dude, compare to Terris Thule, a chump mob in EQ. She throws out hordes of mephits, summons gargoyles you have to kite, debuffs, etc. Its a simple, very striaghtforward, basic encounter. And its rocket surgery compared to beating Tyrant, the leader of the Praetorians. It wouldnt take much either.

Take the Envoy (please! hah). Lets say he has a bunch of crystal prisons with the souls of MAGI members in there. He can teleport to them, to refill his HP and END and get a huge buff. You can attack these crystals, when they reach a certain level, they change colors, indicating they have cracked and the soul inside can retaliate. One person tanks the envoy, kites him, whatever while the others damage the crystals so when he ports over to refill, he gets hurt. They move back and forth, splitting their attention between these 2 goals. Give him some mega dark defender powers to make him more fomidable, let him summon minions at several points. Sounds hard? But wait! We went through all this crap to learn this jokers true name, and it supposedly helps us, though we never actually use it. OHO! I smell temp power!! $$ Team resist vs his damage type, or huge demon type mob specific debuff, or hold or I dont care. Spice these things up a bit though.

I paid 15 for yksha. I loved the expansion because I loves me some pirates, it offered some very nice features, a new race, and many quests and tradeskill recipes. It was the weakest of all the expansions, and it still spanked issue 2.

CoH has the foundation to be a great game. I recognize that, its why I'm still around. However, and this has been the universal complaint among critics, its the content thats lacking. Fortunately, that comes w time.

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The success rate on the respec for those who can't find a team is 0%.

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Yep. It is also 0% for people who don't have two hours to do it.

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2 hours is watching a movie. Can you stand to go out to a movie? Then you got enough time to do the respec trial. If you cant somehow find a 2 hour block of time in the course of, what... 2 months now... you need to manage your time better. What would you ahve them do, break it into 10 minute units? Thats pretty unfailr to all those players who can only play in 5 minute bursts...

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Remember this whole thread was speculation and even what Gaffer said about it relating to any increase was not fact. ALSO REMEMBER we are getting updates small or large on a regular basis for FREE what other MMO out there is doing that??

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Tha actual content in issue 1 and 2 is still far less than any EQ expansion I picked up. Even discounting the bugged quests (and youd have to discount the buggy missions, arcs, task forces etc), theres still tons of them that are good, and allow for players solving them, rather than being lead around by the nose by a janitor NPC contact, or bringing something to Azuria every other arc. AV fight "strats" consist of get tank and hit mob until mob dies. They are incredibly simplistic compared to nearly every single raid post tier 1/2 in EQ, not to mention the single group trials in GoD and Omens. Theres nothing in comparison to an epic weapon quest (and I'm not talking the item itself, I'm talking problem solving).

I love CoH a lot. I stopped playing EQ for it. EQ's expansions contained a lot more. CoH has the foundation for a good game, and its getting better, but theres some aspects I wish were a bit more complex. Hopefully the detective system will fix some of those flaws.

But CoH's free content isnt nearly on par with expansions people pay for. Can you imagine them charging 20 bucks for issue 2?

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Who are you folks who consider $15 a month a lot of money?!

How can you afford a computer capable of playhing CoH if you can't afford $17 a month to play it?

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Then you wont mind paying for my fee if its not a big deal. :P 2 bucks more a month on my 3 accounts isnt a large amount of moneyl. Its the the price hike for BS reasons when competing products offer more for less that I object to. If they charged me 5 bucks every time I leveled, it wouldnt break the bank. Id be opposed to that crap too.

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Exact billing is still TBD (COV is a while off). However, it will -not- be $15 a month for COH and another $15 for COV if you're playing both.

It'd be nice to charge a bit more per month for the COH+COV combo (like the $15+$5 mentioned above) but in practice, if you can only play one character (regardless of it being a hero or villlain) online at a time...but it'd be tough to justify. Our bandwidth or support costs wouldn't go up as long as it's still one player with both games enabled...though it'd be nice to financially support the extra content development needed to be increasing the content of both COH and COV. And we like money. The question is, would we not really just be incentivizing most players to turn off whatever game they were not playing for most of the month...which would be a) annoying to users and b) not make us more money - not exactly win-win.

However, the exact model is TBD - or, if it's decided, I haven't heard the final decision. Thoughts welcome.

-jg

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I'm sure it "would be nice" to charge us per level, to get paid for developing additional story arcs... I mean, the higher level guy can go in more zones, why not stiff him a little more?

Even if its 5 bucks more a month, thats about twice what Id be paying for any other online game, considering they offer multi month subscription plan discounts. And PvP in the beginning... and more content... So Id tend to say a price hike is fairly unacceptable to me. I dont get charged more for other games once I buy an expansion pack. I know, CoH's expansions are free. They also contain MUCH less content than an EQ expansion, and EQ released free content too (chardok b, sol c, zone upgrades, quest revamps etc).

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<font class="small">Code:[/color]<hr /><pre>
Power Activation Recharge Damage
-------------------------------------------------------------
Charged Bolts 2 4 33.08
Lightning Bolt 2 8 54.25
Ball Lightning 1 16 9.92+5.95x4
Short Circuit 3 20 5.95x5
Zapp 6 12 91.31
Tesla Cage 2 10 4.95
Voltaic Sentinel[+] 3 120 41.00
Thunderous Blast[*] 4 240 33.08+66.16+33.08


[+] Voltaic Sentinel does not report fractional damage, fires up to 10 times.
[*] Thunderous Blast sometimes gives a 4th package of 33.08 damage
</pre><hr />

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I'm assuming this is base (unslotted) damage at 41, but does it factor in AM, EF, Aim, etc?

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As a Victory Dance---The Carlton dance from the "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air"

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I think its called the cabbage patch.

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Ooh.. howzabout a "POOF" emote... the villain throws down a little smoke gernade thingie, which does nothing but make smoke for a moment for a dramatic entrance!

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YES! That would totally rule!

We need a finger across the neck gesture too. Off with his head!

Something to pull out bags of loot with the dollar sign on them.

A "false sorry" thing might be fun. Where the villain pretends to cry and ruyb his eyes, then breaks into mocking laughter.

Also we need the ultimate headbanger "devil horn" hand gesture.

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!

I'm hoping this means my high level and brilliant hero will no longer have to go back to my janitor contact to spell out every single step of every mission. Please let us feel SMART as well as strong. Eventually we shoudlnt have to take every trinket to Azuria, the level 1 magic contact for analysis lol.

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If they ever implement teen bodies, they better have new sets of costumes that are not too revealing. No point having pedophiles enjoying themselves the wrong way while playing this game.

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Considering a fair number of actual teenagers play the game, I dont think that would make them pedophiles per se. Anyways, an adult would be a pederast.

Regardless, I dont think it would take a huge amount of effort to swap to new bodies for existing characters. Going through and datamining for old badges was probably more work.

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Probably not. I mean, when you get a new costume, can you change your height, build or sex?



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No, but those body types were avialable at the beginning, so if you had wanted them, you could have picked them. If you wanted a female character that didnt look like she stepped out of Fake-Juggs-R-Us you were kind of out of luck.

Oh, I also didnt mean to imply that the new body types were going to come out w the next issue, only that it was stated it was something they were looking at.

Its been announced teen and animal body types are going to be available. It honestly wouldnt be THAT hard to allow you to swap to a new model. I think they definately should allow it.

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We'll also be tuning down Trolls and Outcasts even more - to make them like Skulls and Hellions (fewer powers, etc.).

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Why dont you guys up the exp for them instead? Why does every level X minion/lt/whatever have to be worth the same exp? Prisoners are weaker, worth less exp, family lts vs devouring earth lts... make the dev earth worth more exp. Have different tiers based on difficulty. If people wanna train on harder factions within their level range, reward them with more exp.