The real difference between Trial and non-Trial Incarnate Advancement
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Thank you. I do remember that now, and appreciate the summary.
You have two choices on converting shards to threads. You can convert one to one, but only once every 20 hours at a 10 to 10 swap. So using this method, you can only get 10 threads per day no matter how many shards you have.
The alternate method converts 10 shards to 5 threads, and you can do this an unlimited number of times per day. But its only half as efficient: using this method can double the effort required to earn a set of threads. But as a practical matter, it won't really double that effort because no one can really earn hundreds of shards per day. Assuming you manage to earn 30 shards per day, then every day you'll be able to convert ten into ten threads, then the other 20 into 10 threads, for a total of 30 to 20. Your 30 shard per day earning rate becomes 20 threads per day using the two conversion methods, a 1.5 to 1 ratio, if you go as fast as possible and don't skip any days of play.. |
City of Heroes was my first MMO, & my favorite computer game.
R.I.P.
Chyll - Bydand - Violynce - Enyrgos - Rylle - Nephryte - Solyd - Fettyr - Hyposhock - Styrling - Beryllos - Rosyc
Horryd - Myriam - Dysquiet - Ghyr
Vanysh - Eldrytch
Inflyct - Mysron - Orphyn - Dysmay - Reapyr - - Wyldeman - Hydeous
Sidetrack on this, though this could be seen as a marketing effort, I've wondered recently if the GR gating of this content is so they can use the higher advertised minimum specs for GR versus vanilla CoH when considering player tech while designing these new challenges.
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I wouldn't even try for the 10 assist badge if my badger wasn't a Vigilante and wasn't still missing most of the MO badges. It should have been 50 WSTs, period, if they wanted a long-term WST badge. This badge falls into the "what the hell were they thinking?" category. A badge for "helping others"? Do they think people don't have alts that would also want to run the WST? Do they think the hardcore badgers that really want this badge wouldn't get it during the initial WST frenzy when nobody needed "help" getting a WST together?
I hate that badge. I'm a badge hunter, I've got 1214 badges right now, and I will not get that badge. Ever. I can't believe they added it after lowering so many of the other ones.
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Agreed. It pretty much amounts to the same thing, and it wouldn't have required a hamhanded story explanation either.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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You still don't understand.
Yes, don't let previous experience in any way be a guide. Just because we've never really seen that sort of behavior in this game (only in initial runs of STF and LRSF before they were figured out) doesn't mean the player base won't morph into a bunch of rabid jagoffs.
Yes, of course. Everyone I've ever played with on my server will suddenly change. Why didn't I see that coming? |
I am not talking player behaviour. I am talking about the devs designing content that requires a player to have the Level shifts and powers from issue 20.
Like I said its only natural, because if the devs are handing these shinies to us they must have plans for content that will use them otherwise what is the point of these powers?
If you could tell me right now with 100% assurance that the future issues of the game will not have 54+3 enemies or encounters that need teams with Destiny buffs I would drop what I am doing dragging my most treasured 50s through these raids, and go back to rolling new Toons.
Again: I am not talking about playerbase behaviour, I am predicting that future content will be designed (at least till the inarcnate stuff is done) with the current power increase in mind. And that is what people want.
When something good happens to me, I can never enjoy it....
I am always too busy looking for the inevitable punchline...
BEHOLD THE POWER OF CHEESE!
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It still doesn't help when people are firing off Judgement nukes on Lag Hill.
Sidetrack on this, though this could be seen as a marketing effort, I've wondered recently if the GR gating of this content is so they can use the higher advertised minimum specs for GR versus vanilla CoH when considering player tech while designing these new challenges.
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Nor does it excuse designing content that their tech can't handle. People report "my powers look recharged but aren't" issues during the BAF, and to my understanding that problem is not on the player's end.
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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OK, fair enough, I didn't get your point and misinterpreted. I don't believe the devs have that kind of thing in mind (given the inclusiveness of the current trials as my basis). But of course we will see.
You still don't understand.
I am not talking player behaviour. I am talking about the devs designing content that requires a player to have the Level shifts and powers from issue 20. Like I said its only natural, because if the devs are handing these shinies to us they must have plans for content that will use them otherwise what is the point of these powers? If you could tell me right now with 100% assurance that the future issues of the game will not have 54+3 enemies or encounters that need teams with Destiny buffs I would drop what I am doing dragging my most treasured 50s through these raids, and go back to rolling new Toons. Again: I am not talking about playerbase behaviour, I am predicting that future content will be designed (at least till the inarcnate stuff is done) with the current power increase in mind. And that is what people want. |
Too many alts to list.
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You're ignoring the iXP you already get in the trial.
If I stick to making precise comparisons instead of just randomly guessing, my *breakdown* thread earning rate in the posted calculations above would have been (on successful runs):
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Real numbers:
~40% XP from one trial
3 Astrals because getting 3 on Lambda is easy.
1 Emprean
You need about 20 since it's 3% per trade, so that leaves you with 12 threads to spare. No breaking down of any components needed.
ITF
0% XP from trial
You need 33.3 thread/shards round to 34
So, that's 7 shards. About average for a run.
You still need to get lucky and get 2 more to put you on the same level as the trial runner, and that's ignoring that nice uncommon he got.
Sure, maybe 1:5 is a too good exchange rate, but to claim that it's faster than doing the trial is plainly wrong. Don't do statistical analysis when simple counting works better.
I do get a lot of that ("dammit! judgement fire you bloody thing!"). Then again I run on a Mac and the interpretation business doesn't help my cause. I don't imagine my performance will ever be top notch.
Too many alts to list.
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This is probably the one part I want to comment on the most. I don't want to take away from your enjoyment of the writing, but I have to go Venture on this one and completely disagree. Praetoria's writing was pretty good, but it's ruined by the ham-handed approach to introducing morality to it, and anything since then has been a right mess. Current writing almost completely disregards the game's timeline, often ignores canon partially or entirely and doesn't actually make for a good story.
A big part of my disappointment is that newer writing is starting to feel like an unimportant excuse to bring us from one mission to the next, and no-one cares to treat it as a legitimate story. Most of the time, stories are even written with placeholders. Like, we'll be looking to recover the "thingamajig" because it's very important for the "doohickey machine." WHAT am I looking for? WHY am I looking for it? Remember those old Rikti piles of bones? "doesntmatter." And it bugs me, because it feels like stories are rushed out and not given due attention. |
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Are you enjoying the newer storylines, or the newer gameplay? It's an important distinction that I've noticed a lot of people don't make. "It's fun to play" makes for a good mission, but not necessarily a good story. I love running the ITF but the story is weaksauce.
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For me, it very much is the story not the gameplay that I'm loving here. I can't stand redside because I feel THAT is "ham-handed" in that it actually tells me WHY I'm motivated to do things, and that motivation changes randomly. The redside content, through the writing, tells me my character is absolutely psychotic and unable to hold a coherent thought or objective for more than maybe 20 minutes.
Conversely, in Praetoria, the game tells me what is happening, and I'm able to fill in the blanks with WHY my character is doing this thing. For me, a lot of the things left out are IMPORTANT to be unstated, because I can finish it in the context of my character. I'm much more engaged, and whenever I hit one of the morality choices, I actually have to read the options, then mull it over for a while, the game sitting there 'paused' while I try to work out what my character will do. And it's often agonizing to me because I can see it both ways.
That, to me, is DEFINITELY engaging, and I'd like to see more of it.
Similarly, the tip missions. If I see one that doesn't fit my character, I can simply drop it, grab another. More often I just play through them and treat them as apocryphal, since I KNOW it's optional. It's harder to do that redside when you pretty much HAVE to go through the stuff that bothers me in order to advance at all.
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Just a tangent: for a while there I've had this idea in the back of my head to see if I could redo some of the legacy story arcs using AE. That's a five mission maximum....the trick is to do it without losing any story integrity. The one that got me thinking about it was World Wide Red, which would be very tricky and would probably require chained objectives to the point of extremely annoying, but To Click a Thousand Glowies or a Hero's Hero (or a Hero's Epic for that matter) could definitely be done. A Hero's Hero could be done in three missions.
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Mortimer Kal's SF is just a fancy MacGuffin chase. The entire SF is literally "Go get your temp power." Yes, it has some fun mechanics, but the basic story is about as deep as the one you get from the scientist in Bloody Bay.
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Maybe someday I'll get one of my praetorian characters to 20 that would reasonably go redside, and try again. I'm somewhat doubtful.
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In fact I got tired of waiting on Lore because I was getting ~8% per BAF, so I just spent 22-23 threads on finishing it off.
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I really think they need to revisit that, because it's unfair to give most of the rewards to one part of the league, when every team is just as critical.
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It still doesn't help when people are firing off Judgement nukes on Lag Hill.
Nor does it excuse designing content that their tech can't handle. People report "my powers look recharged but aren't" issues during the BAF, and to my understanding that problem is not on the player's end. |
(Also, I'm totally guilty of dropping my ion on lag hill. It makes me giggle.)
Just on the slight derail of how fast you get exp, my Dom has now done three trials (BAFs). She has a rare Pyronic, but the slot is only 49% unlocked.
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Dispari has more than enough credability, and certainly doesn't need to borrow any from you.
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Luckily, there seems to be growing awareness about how structuring the league on the BAF affects incarnate xp distribution. In the last couple of days I've more often seen leaders having 2-3 members of each team sent to fight adds, while the rest of the team members focus on the AVs.
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I missed the day that double-Incarnate rewards were activated on the servers. That's more than twice the earning rate I'm currently earning either iXP or Empyreans (I'm averaging about 15% iXP per run, and less than one Empyrean per two successful runs - 8 out of 20).
You're ignoring the iXP you already get in the trial.
Real numbers: ~40% XP from one trial 3 Astrals because getting 3 on Lambda is easy. 1 Emprean |
I've seen twelve shards drop in an ITF. I've never seen those numbers quoted above before, or anything close to them. Theoretically speaking they are possible if one team on a BAF hoards the kills. But I do not believe there is any strategy possible that can earn that level of rewards for an entire league, or even half of it. Its only possible in a BAF where one third of the league takes the vast majority of the iXP, which is why its nearly three times the average (and on such runs, everyone else is usually stuck around 8-10%).
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There have been a few posts from players claiming 40-50% per run. I haven't seen anything like that either but I just wanted to point it out.
I missed the day that double-Incarnate rewards were activated on the servers. That's more than twice the earning rate I'm currently earning either iXP or Empyreans (I'm averaging about 15% iXP per run, and less than one Empyrean per two successful runs - 8 out of 20).
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Fair enough. I guess I've been in too many arguments along the lines of "new content is better written because it doesn't have defeat alls," so I think it's important to make the distinction between better writing and better presentation.
Conversely, in Praetoria, the game tells me what is happening, and I'm able to fill in the blanks with WHY my character is doing this thing. For me, a lot of the things left out are IMPORTANT to be unstated, because I can finish it in the context of my character. I'm much more engaged, and whenever I hit one of the morality choices, I actually have to read the options, then mull it over for a while, the game sitting there 'paused' while I try to work out what my character will do. And it's often agonizing to me because I can see it both ways.
That, to me, is DEFINITELY engaging, and I'd like to see more of it. |
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I really think they need to revisit that, because it's unfair to give most of the rewards to one part of the league, when every team is just as critical. |
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(Also, I'm totally guilty of dropping my ion on lag hill. It makes me giggle.) |
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
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I have gotten as high as 49% on a single Lambda run. That is an outlier, however.
There have been a few posts from players claiming 40-50% per run. I haven't seen anything like that either but I just wanted to point it out.
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Though Lambda does tend to run higher, in my experience, than BAF due to the smaller team size I suspect.
City of Heroes was my first MMO, & my favorite computer game.
R.I.P.
Chyll - Bydand - Violynce - Enyrgos - Rylle - Nephryte - Solyd - Fettyr - Hyposhock - Styrling - Beryllos - Rosyc
Horryd - Myriam - Dysquiet - Ghyr
Vanysh - Eldrytch
Inflyct - Mysron - Orphyn - Dysmay - Reapyr - - Wyldeman - Hydeous
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I'm just curious about your Empyrean stat here. Do you mean that you've been on an average 12 failed trials out of 20? Or just that your total ratio of trials that provided an Empyrean to those that did not (including extra trails per day past the first) was 20 to 8?
I missed the day that double-Incarnate rewards were activated on the servers. That's more than twice the earning rate I'm currently earning either iXP or Empyreans (I'm averaging about 15% iXP per run, and less than one Empyrean per two successful runs - 8 out of 20).
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Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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Lambda is a joy comparatively for iXP purposes. I think it's a combination of things. If you do both trials straight through and pretty much only fight what is required to complete the trial, you still end up defeating more stuff in the Lambda Sector trial. I think there is also more opportunity for "collateral defeats" as you do things like take out the containment chambers and weapon storage boxes. Much of what you defeat in the BAF is either minions or LTs, or the two AVs, and if you defeat the AVs rapidly, you don't get as many supporting boss mobs. Combine that with the smaller league size and LS just progresses you a lot faster.
I have gotten as high as 49% on a single Lambda run. That is an outlier, however.
Though Lambda does tend to run higher, in my experience, than BAF due to the smaller team size I suspect. |
I probably average just under 33% progress on Interface per LS, and only about 10-15% on Judgement per BAF.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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For the character I mention, 27 runs, 20 successes, 7 non-successes (failures, trial-crashes), 8 empyreans. That's confirmed by the fact that the character currently has eight, has never converted one, and the logs show eight total drops.
I'm just curious about your Empyrean stat here. Do you mean that you've been on an average 12 failed trials out of 20? Or just that your total ratio of trials that provided an Empyrean to those that did not (including extra trails per day past the first) was 20 to 8?
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The raw numbers are in this post from last night.
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Actually it wouldn't surprise me to see level shifted enemies on the higher level trials, say versus hamidon, the Well/Tyrant.
OK, fair enough, I didn't get your point and misinterpreted. I don't believe the devs have that kind of thing in mind (given the inclusiveness of the current trials as my basis). But of course we will see.
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It would make sense, because by the time we get there I don't think lvl 54 enemies alone will cut it. Some folks with their +3 were saying the mobs were red to them during the trials.
I definetly see them adding enemies like that.
Blazara Aura LVL 50 Fire/Psi Dom (with 125% recharge)
Flameboxer Aura LVL 50 SS/Fire Brute
Ice 'Em Aura LVL 50 Ice Tank
Darq Widow Fortune LVL 50 Fortunata (200% rech/Night Widow 192.5% rech)--thanks issue 19!

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The implementation of mechanical aspects in Praetoria is .. mixed. I think overall it's better, but where we had endless defeat alls and dozens of glowies, now we have enemy groups that are substantially more powerful than the level equivalents on Primal, and endless ambushes. The latter is definitely not cool in my opinion, and for the former, I think some of the enemies could be toned down a squidge.
Fair enough. I guess I've been in too many arguments along the lines of "new content is better written because it doesn't have defeat alls," so I think it's important to make the distinction between better writing and better presentation.
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I mean, I'm able to handle them on everything I've tried, but evidence suggests I'm a significantly above average capacity soloer, and rather patient when necessary. There's plenty of people who hit digital brick walls on this stuff, and that concerns me a little.. but despite that, with the availability of teaming, I think Praetoria is a superior early level range region than red or blue from a purely mechanical/implementation standpoint.
Obviously, opinions differ on story content. Subjective things are subjective.
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I'm really curious to see what happens as knowledge of how this works becomes more widespread. I'm sure there will be some jackholes who will try to hog the iXP for themselves, but it remains to be seen whether the non-jackholes decide that fair distribution is more important than convenience and efficiency.
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It's less elegant. We've lost some functionality this way. But at least everyone gets paid.
Because it's awesome. Every. Time. :D
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Another thought...once the majority of people have their slot unlocked and no longer care, it might be easier to stick those who don't on the reinforcement team. Again, it will come down to what kind of players end up leading these things.
I've been pondering that. If I ever get around to actually leading a BAF, and they haven't addressed the rewards issue, I'll probably just do something like "Last three of teams 1 and 2, last two of team 3, you're on adds."
It's less elegant. We've lost some functionality this way. But at least everyone gets paid. |
Eva Destruction AR/Fire/Munitions Blaster
Darkfire Avenger DM/SD/Body Scrapper
Arc ID#161629 Freaks, Geeks, and Men in Black
Arc ID#431270 Until the End of the World
A) Players don't get invited to Apex/Tin because they chose not to or have not yet gotten the required incarnate object that allows them to reasonably engage the enemies therein.
B) Players don't get invited to (hypothetical future incarnate content) because they chose not to or have not yet gotten the required incarnate object that allows them to reasonably engage the enemies therein.
"I can't handle these +8s because I didn't get my alpha slot yet" is the same thing as "I can't handle these +8s because I didn't get any level shifts yet" isn't it?
Considering that the trials don't have any hurdles to jump on board, (other than level 50) I would say they learned a lesson.
Too many alts to list.