Nethergoat

MA crushes DA (and everything else) for generating drops.

Also MA has destroyed the value of rare salvage, which formed the backbone of my DA profits. Absent that, you're left with pretty good value for commons (which you can fill up on a lot faster in MA), good prices for uncommons (which I used to delete), a pittance for generic recipes and the unpredictability of IO recipe drops.

Given that one okay solo farm run in MA will fill up your recipe inventory, while back in the day a DA run would net me two or three at most, advantage: MA.

Tickets concentrate drops by allowing you to focus on the stuff that makes you the most $$$ while in the 'real' game you're stuck with whatever comes along. Greater efficiency = greater profit.

DA is more efficient than regular mission play, but MA is yards more efficient than DA.

Which is pretty hilarious, considering the dev's daydream that we not use it for farming.

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I was discussing it with Nethergoat, but he seems to think that casting an O-portal to go from AP to Peregrine is using the Oroborous system...

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When you trigger a power called Ouroboros Portal to go to a zone called Ouroboros, you are in fact using the Ouroboros System.

It takes a very special quality of intellect to argue otherwise.

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Aha! And now we get to the heart of the issue. You're projecting your attitude on the rest of the playerbase.

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I think most of the playerbase would prefer to enjoy the game without hassling other players.

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It's not a hassle to help a friend start a TF that they want to solo.

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There are many circumstances where it would indeed be a hassle. Think about it, you can probably come up with some.

And it's irrelevant to the point anyway.
Putting the capability in the hands of the players directly is a superior solution to having people bug other players to pad for them.

This is the logic behind the upcoming changes to the missions settings, and in my opinion ought to be applied to TFs as well.

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- The Shadow Shard. Beautiful. Different. Interesting. Too big, difficult to utilize and almost completely pointless. The wasted potential is staggering.

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I like the shard in spite of itself.

And I actually wish they hadn't added all the little travel amenities- it's still awful to navigate without fly or TP, so they might as well have left it alone.

There's really no other experience in the game like crossing navigating across the Shard, pausing halfway and just hovering and checking things out.

It will be a tragedy if they don't infuse it with meaningful content at some point. Its potential is staggering.

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But if all a user does is just use it as a fancy teleporter, it's not really utilizing Oroborous. That'd be like saying "Eden is a great zone because I use it all the time to get to the Hive".

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Yes it is, and no it isn't, respectively.

You're wrong an awful lot, aren't you.

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I take it you don't actually listen to yourself much. Anyone who would say what you say, and actually listened to themselves saying it, would shut up pretty quickly out of pure embarassment.

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I make sense and my positions are internally consistent.
I understand that this makes you feel confused and threatened, but I can't help that.

You're saying "Using Oroboros isn't really using Oroboros", which is gibberish. That caliber of argument doesn't deserve explanation, so it gets jranger'd.

If you'd like a detailed explanation, make a better case for your position.

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The new system is better than the one that's live right now.

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Yessir.

If it gets some people in the zones, we'll see recipes.

I'm sure prices on the super l337 ones will stay crazy, which just might inspire people to organize zone PvP events for their SGs or whatever, which just might create a lot of drops.

Wild guesswork yes, but the new rules are a much better incentive to PvP than the first version. Who knows.

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It's a shame you find putting together a team so annoying.

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It doesn't annoy me because I don't do it.

I team with my friends or solo, or occasionally join a desperate PUG if the leader sends a polite enough tell.

I have seen plenty of leaders on plenty of teams working overtime trying to find members, and I've drawn certain obvious conclusions about the process.


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What makes them stand out is that they're not something that's considered "casual play".

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Why not, since they're just "groups of common missions" strung together, by your own description?

If a TF is special on its own merits, it doesn't need a team minimum to make it special.
If it isn't special, a team minimum doesn't help.

And minimums don't stop people from soloing them, it's just a needless layer of annoyance.

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By fully removing team restrictions, they will then be considered casual play and no different than any other mission, with the exception of having a unique map.

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They'll still present whatever challenges made them special and interesting to however many players attempt them.

People solo TFs right now, people run and complete them with less than the "required" # of players right now.

Minimum team size is an anachronism from an outdated design brief and it should be done away with.

Annoying players without reason does not equal "special".

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I've taken part in MA arcs and farms.

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Then I'm not sure why you asked a question you should already know the answer for.

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TFs and SFs are not prizes, they're special content.

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Yes they are prizes.
You get badges for them. You get a disproportionate merit reward for completing them. You can only run them in certain level ranges.
That's a carrot on a stick- or should be, if the TF is any good.

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I've never heard a dev refer to one as some kind of prize you get when you hit a certain level.

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I've never had a dev tell me a Great Dane is a big dog but it's obvious to anyone with eyes.

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Arbitrary TF team sizes aren't a reward to anyone, they're a pain in the rear. Ask most people who've tried to organize one.
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Purely subective.

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It's more work to put a team together to run something than to run it solo. There's nothing subjective about it.

Which is, come to think of it, the only thing that actually supports your position. And yet you reject it.

Interesting.

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As opposed to arguing just for the sake of it?
What I said wasn't something I made up, but was the scenario carried out to a logical conclusion.

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No, it was arrant nonsense in direct contravention of Bill's suggestions. I'm speaking in support of those suggestions, not any fantasy you dream up in a failed attempt to undermine his logic.

Your position is weak, you made something up, you got called on it, now you try to justify it.

You'll do better in a debate setting if you stop reflexively lashing out at everything you don't understand. Stop and think for a minute first, you'll avoid a lot of embarrassment.

some > none

And now the system provides incentive to engage in zone PvP, which was the original intention. More people PvP'ing = more recipes.

We'll see how many more, but I'm guessing prices will settle down somewhere between where they during Arena Farm '09 and where they are now.

The changes make them farmable again, which means there will be more showing up on the market.

the drop chance doesn't need to change for players to generate more recipes.

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But if all a user does is just use it as a fancy teleporter, it's not really utilizing Oroborous. That'd be like saying "Eden is a great zone because I use it all the time to get to the Hive".

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Yes it is, and no it isn't, respectively.

You're wrong an awful lot, aren't you.

I have one character who doesn't mind IP, my fire/ice blaster who has super speed three-slotted and took Swift.

But I basically avoid it with everyone else. Not that I don't appreciate the design, but it should be about half that size.

Bad's out of control pessimism on pretty much every topic makes gauging the accuracy of her predictions so simple even a goat can do it.

DA's inconveniences are minor and easily overcome.

And I don't say that just because I own a vacation condo in the Rami Arcade. =)

I'm not sure what's going on anymore, I'm gonna bow out before I get too confused to find the door.

=P

you know it's a good sale when you can't collect your inf without bid-parking a bunch so you don't go over the cap.

=P

Real men blow their own niches.


Hmm....that doesn't sound quite right...

0.0

PP's name on the new forums should be The Thread Reaper.

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I am expecting not more than one new zone, if that.

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Matt Miller: Praetoria is several zones. I can expand on that in the future.

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OMG, I am like so good at predicting the precise amount of FAIL in Bad's predictions!

I wonder if there's some way to monetize this unerring sense of mine?

Also, let's note that people already solo TFs.

It's just an annoying process to collect padders, start it and then have them quit.

I used to run a TF once every blue moon or so, when I had more time. More often than not we'd have drops along the way and end up finishing with fewer than the required minimum.

There is no structural reason for the minimums, they're purely arbitrary.

there are always exceptions to the rule, but it's the sellers responsibility to run price checks before sinking inf into the project.

That's why I mostly stick to flipping recipes plain- I'm lazy.

It's impressive that you keep making predictions, since you're Nostradamus in reverse.

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I feel my argument carries quite a bit of weight.

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You are of course entititled to that opinion.

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TFs and SFs, with the exception of Rikti Mothership Raids and Hamidon (which nobody does anymore), are the only special content in the game. Degrade them so that they're on par with radio missions means you have no special content anymore nor anything that stands out.

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I agree, many of the older hero TFs are mostly generic missions strung together. I'm not sure how that's an argument to preserve minimum team sizes.

If the only thing making a TF "stand out" is the annoyance of putting together a team it seems to me getting rid of that annoyance would be an improvement.


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Everything is just basic missions. If you get rid of size requirements, why not get rid of level requirements too?

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Presumably you've visited MA?

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Why shouldn't a level 10 be able to run the STF or LRSF?

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Answer one, because they'd be useless.
Answer two, because its a carrot on a stick.
TFs at various levels are theoretically a fun prize for getting that far in the game (yes, the reality is often quite different with many of the older ones).

Arbitrary TF team sizes aren't a reward to anyone, they're a pain in the rear. Ask most people who've tried to organize one.

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I bet a lot of people would like that too!

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Given the popularity of auto SK in MA, you're probably right.

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Just slide the difficulty level down so that a level 10 could solo it. Tons of happy people.

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Hmm, where did Bill suggest that?
Or wait, are you making stuff up to buttress your feeble argument?

I guess it doesn't carry as much weight as you think it does.

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With all the hoopla about the cool stuff coming in i16, I have to note that it says nothing whatsoever about anything in the way of new story.

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So, the magical flying pony with cookies didn't bring any milk. Bummer.

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Har!

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Lots and lots of people use Oroboros, I'm not sure where you got that one.


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Using an o-portal to switch zones doesn't really count as using Oroborous.


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Yes it does.

It's a great design because it serves a practical purpose everyone enjoys and also opens up a lot of content for those players who're interested in exploring it.

It also quieted multiple categories of whiners.

It's an elegant system and an excellent blueprint for adding multi-use content to the game.

Good timing!

Availability will be increasing when the new patch goes live.

Kudos on the big score!
In the words of the SAS, Who Dares Wins.