gameboy1234

I tested the AH on Brainstorm this morning, there was a chunky patch that needed loading first. After I logged in, I started flying, typed /ah and I got a very noticeable stutter or graphical pause when the window popped up. Then I closed the window and got no pause at all when I typed /ah. I moved to a different zone and tried the procedure again, no stutter. This is pretty acceptable if it continues to work this way, imo. Incidentally, I get exactly the same sort of stutter on my system whenever there's a large amount of graphics to load. Flying towards Ms. Liberty in Atlas Park for example, will almost always do it because of the large number of people and SFX around her. If something could be done about that as well (load resources in the background instead of the main rendering thread?) that would cure a lot of "lag" issues I'm personally experiencing.

A minor miracle! Thank you! Thaaaaattt's going to mess with the muscle memory... You have ruined my favorite head canon: the ghost in the Mek machine.

It's World Detail and it only goes up to 2 (200%) in the UI Options dialog.

Other games have the concept of a "point of interest." It a detailed and interesting piece of scenery that makes players go there to check it out. Once there the players usually find something interesting to do (although some POI scenes are just pretty to look at). I don't think CoX really has this. Even something simple as a gang fight in Kings Row, just some dudes duking it out in a rundown neighborhood yard, can be a POI. I've bumped these in KR, fought it out, and it just turns into a bunch of random dudes to fight. If it lead to something more, that would be much more engaging. The design of the gang fight was interesting enough to make me check it out. But I think you have to put the POI there first, for players to feel that they found something and did the content. Otherwise random street sweeping is just too random and the players don't feel engaged enough in the content they're discovering.

I'm thinking about this, you're not wrong. But I'm also remembering what I know about game design and cognitive psychology; "doing something different" to get a reward is often a very good, even necessary thing. Before, Perfidy could defeat enemies, for an XP reward, or hunt badges for an XP reward. Both give the reward, but they're very different activities. Now, Perfidy can hunt badges but still has to defeat enemies to get the reward. It's basically the same activity, there's fewer ways to get XP now. I'm starting to slide over to the side that seems to think something was lost here, that an "outlet" consisting of different game play while still getting a reward was removed, and the result is not as good.

Just logged in to do some testing. Yes, most of the rocks pop, there's no fade-in. A few do fade in, it seems to be related to my movement speed. At my current fly speed (64.6 mph) they pop a lot. A /visscale 2 seems to improve this (as will setting World Detail to 200% on the Options dialog.) A /visscale of 4 seems to eliminate any visual problems. No setting I tried, World Detail, /visscale 20, or Character Detail from the Options dialog, had any effect on P2W. (Character Detail might have but if so it was really slight.)

Talos Island does this too. A lot of the rocks that are placed around the shore area of the big island pop horribly. You'll be quite close to them before they'll very visibly start rendering. I think they actually "fade in" but they do it so close it looks really bad. I'm not 100% sure what could be done but a pass looking at distance and drawing might help in at least some cases. I haven't tested this with /visscale so I'm not sure if it's the same thing. Given that modern graphics cards are much better now having longer draw distances seems like an easy solution. Also P2W's (now START) skirt has the same problem for me, and it looks pretty bad as well. At quite close distances her skirt basically doesn't render right, there's huge chunks missing. I'm not sure if this is LOD (level of detail) or something else but nothing on her model pops the same way so I think it's something wonky just with that piece.

Random thoughts by me: To send someone a message directly, click on their name in chat. This can be any chat window, but if you're looking at the LFG chat it's easiest to just click there. Left click, you'll get at pop up with the top of the menu saying "Send a Message to [name]". That's the easiest way to respond to people in LFG chat who are looking for more members. Posting in LFG chat that you are looking for more folks to help you with a mission does work. (Posting that you are solo and looking for any team tends not to work.) If you are looking for stuff to do and nothing seems to be happening, try looking through your contacts, finding a mission, and starting your own team. You can usually get at least two or three members even during slow times. It's true that the LFG queue (the auto-team function) tends not to work. It's been buggy since live and nearly everyone avoids it except for some missions where it's required or as a fast travel hack. One day in the future they might get this to work. A little of column a and a little of column b for me. Running some missions and arcs solo, and running some missions with small teams, is a great way to learn how your powers really work and how to use them on various types of enemies. I'd recommend you take some time to do this every 10 levels or so, at least, so you can feel like you're playing your character correctly. OTOH grinding XP can get boring, there's level ranges where the content isn't great or to your liking, so no worries power leveling if you're bored. I do it all the time myself. If you are just leveling up, take a look at the Temporary Powers that START (used to be P2W) has, the level boosters will help you get more XP for the time you spend.

Gotta agree. While I don't think we should hold up the release candidate, plopping another NPC into both Outbreak and Breakout with some additional info should be a priority as soon as RC is out the door.

Just jumped on Brainstorm, RC2 is looking good overall. Just some last minute thoughts: 1. I think my biggest issue is that running Outbreak sends you to the old contacts in City Hall. Would like to see this redirected to Matthew Habashy. 2. At the very start of Breakout, there's a dialog telling you to use WASD to move and other stuff. This is missing for Outbreak (I'm sure it was there at one time). Could it be added in? 3. I like the defaults for power timers, but I prefer to see the fractional seconds. Dunno who else feels the same way. I'd like to see the fractions as the default tho. That's all I can think of that we haven't all given lots of feedback on already. Looks good and great for new players!

There's two groups and both are part of Operative Kuzmin's missions. The first is "Defeat 5 Longbow" (his first mission I think), these respawn really quickly. A longer respawn timer would help. Also you could add something so there's an immediate repawn if *all* of this group of Longbow are defeated (ideally respawn only some of the group, but if you can't a full respawn is acceptable), I think that would solve both too fast respawn problem and also address times when there's high demand from people running this quest. The second I think is Kuzmin's third mission, "Find 3 codes from Longbow Technicians". This group also repawns really quickly, and there's a *huge* number of them. They also don't go away if you complete the mission, which is a shame. Same deal with these guys. First, reduce the number that spawn (keep the number of spawn points, but reduce how many are active at one time). Then increase the spawn timer so they respawn much more slowly. Finally if all of the groups are defeated then immediately respawn a few more. Last, this may be a big ask, but if phasing volumes support more than two phases, you might be able to get rid of them completely if the player isn't doing Kuzmin's arc. That would clean up the area completely for everyone. If Kuzmin's arc isn't started, or if it's completed, just remove these guys entirely. That I think would help a lot.

I don't play other MMORPGs, so I wonder how they implement something like this. (A "Party Finder" is a good idea, kind of a way of making a permanent and scrollable LFG announcement.)

Other random stuff, NPE-ish: 1. New MMs have three buttons in their tray for controlling pets. One, "Follow" directs the pets to "follow aggressive". Can we get that changed to "follow defensive"? I think new MMs should have at least one way to activate bodyguard mode available to them. The default buttons on the Pet Window could also use the same change. 2. The Longbow inside Mercy (the walled area of the red side starting zone) are just thick. I think it's worse than a hazard zone. I can evade them pretty easily with a Jetpack and Athletic Run, but new players might feel they need to fight their way through. Can the density of spawn inside Mercy be decreased? It feels a rather new player unfriendly as it is now. Longbow especially but some of the Ripper and Blighted too. Outside of the walled area I think the spawn is fine.

Note sure if I should post this here or the general feedback threads, but here's a new player talking about the game, from a different forum: I'm not sure what "didn't work" here means, but it might be either that it doesn't start the TF (and it's unclear to a new player what to do next), or that there's no intro or other directions telling you what to do once the TF has started, or that the queuing system is borked because no one uses it, or because certain options ("lock team") should probably be on by default. I could ask for more info, but I thought I'd post it here and let other folks think about it too.

I always liked the City Traveler badge. In Echo: Atlas Park you get a badge when you return to AP via the Tram (the badge is actually at the exit terminal of the Tram). Since Twin Shot's arc sends you to King's Row, this might be a nice tie-in for that trip.

If you went through the Galaxy City tutorial, you already made a moral choice. I think it was intended to reinforce (or change) that choice. It would be cool if the game did something with that choice, but I don't think it's strictly necessary. Something small, like a different clue (explaining in-story that you made a morale choice) would be cool, but I wouldn't overly worry about it. (On the subject of new player experience, I find the whole "clue" thing really unwieldy. The clues are seldom in order, they're hard to find if you have more than one set on the list, the UI is kinda clunky, and in general I don't find it great. A re-imagining of some the UI menus would be a great NPE addition. The clue bag should be a paper notebook or a computer (smart phone) screen with a bit more organization and easier way to read / organize the clues. Maybe clues and souvenirs could be combined into the same dialog.)

I like this idea. I'd like to see a couple more roles added in (like the original five ATs), but the HC team are volunteers and I don't want to overload them with requests. Let's see how folks react and take it from there. If all goes well more work can be done and Prismatic Aethers added too.

An extended tutorial, even it it just info dumps information on you, would be a good idea for some of the suggestions in this thread. Trying to do too much at the beginning is going to overload players, but pacing it out would help a lot. I'd like to see: Pool Powers in general are poorly explained, imo. I think I'd like to see the pool powers added to the regular power screen. Right now the right side of that screen is just blank, with a button way up at the top, and I think that can be confusing. Either add the pool powers to that screen, greyed out and blank, or maybe add four buttons that say "Choose a pool power!" or something, just so there's a more obvious thing to click so players will be encouraged to explore the pool power menu. A more general explanation (part of some extended tutorial) of pool powers, what they do, and how they work would re-enforce this. I'm not sure where I'd put this tutorial. I'd say add it to Twinshot's second arc, but I don't know how many players actually complete that arc. I'm not sure I've ever seen a pop up telling me Twinshot wants to talk to me again, and I think I frequently blow past it with out realizing it's available. Some NPC with a pop-up would be preferable.

I went back through the tutorial on the current build, this time through Breakout. Overall I found it a much nicer experience than blue side (where I was sent to the original contacts in City Hall). The tutorial (esp. the distance between NPCs that I have to talk to) is much crisper, and gets the trivial stuff out of the way quicker. The only thing I noticed is that some NPCs would repeat their starting (introduction) text after I accepted a mission, which was weird and confusing. Sorry but I didn't write any of these down. I *think* it was H.T. (Find Nurse) and Angel Lopez (Talk to Mr. Verde). After Breakout I accept Kalinda as my contact and overall the experience was pretty good. I don't think any real large changes are needed here. Some small points: 1. A lot of snake holes (the mission entrance) are very subtle decals dropped on the map, and the yellow map marker for the entrance is off by a meter or two. New players might easily be confused. Try to scooch the markers closer to the entrance, and if the entrance could be made more distinct and noticeable I think that would help a lot as well. (Maybe a displacement map added to the decal? This would at least not require new geometry.) 2. Navigation is pretty tough still. The streets in Mercy (the walled area next to the docks where players start) are all kinda samey, and the buildings are tall enough that they block what visual markers do exist. Anything to aid player navigation would be helpful. I think maybe the minimum would be to add some searchlights that reach all the way to the skybox, and make sure they are visible all throughout the starting area (draw distance). (Arachnos is under attack by Longbow, so searchlights would make sense.) I'm envisioning some red searchlights (evil, right?) that just happen to be placed directly above the elevators (entrance) to the docks, and some white searchlights that are on the walls directly behind the player starting area.

At least some of the TF starter mission text is unclear or rather minimalist. If there's a planned "spiff up TF mission introduction text" pass planned, a nice orange text warning about "recommend a full team" or something would be a good addition. (Positron: "Character, how are you?" Literally that's all he says. Hey maybe explain to me what the TF is about and what my choices mean? The "Discuss events" player choice text should clearly indicate that they're starting a TF and which one.)

Just making pasta (throwing stuff against the wall to see if it sticks): require a trip to Null the Gull to unlock TF team sizes less than 6. Might be a bit of a pita, but we all seem to make the trip anyway so it's just one more thing as long as you're there. It might keep new players from making mistakes until they're a bit more experienced.

This is super minor but could contacts be sorted by relationship by default? I find that almost always matches what makes sense to me. Sorting them by name makes the contact I'm working with disappear when I complete a mission, which is what always reminds me I have to switch the default sorting yet again.

Thing is, we don't need "diversity" to play the game well. 8 Defenders, 8 Masterminds, 8 Tankers (I miss Tanker Tuesday), 8 Corruptors, 8 Dominators, 8 Brutes, are all equally likely to be a "good" team as one with 5 different ATs. Some suggestions up-thread had suggestions for "all same AT" as well as "5 different ones." That would encourage players to experiment and actually learn to play the game, rather than jut accepting the idea that one requires different ATs in order to do well. More "diversity" in the types of teams that the game encourages you to try would help people learn more.

Random thought: if you go with the idea of having an NPC give a tour of Atlas, at the end they could say "BTW while you were dealing with Outbreak, Galaxy City happened, blah blah." and then the player has an excuse to feel they were informed about the events before talking to Matthew. If any part of Matthew's text refers to events that the player personally dealt with, then that text should be changed to the player understanding the events happened, but not necessarily to them personally. Might smooth things over.

This is getting very extra, but I'll add some suggestions here ("extra" means I'm just piling stuff on here, might be too much to implement). Having Ms. Lib finish the intro with a short tour of Atlas Park after the Outbreak tutorial might extend the tutorial nicely. We should at least think about doing the same red side. 1. Send the player to P2W so they know where she's at. 2. P2W could say "Hey remember that you can use Enhancements to increase your powers? Here's some more for you." And then just dump the prestige enhancements on the player. That way new players don't have to know to go look for them. 3. I think P2W has a really weird menu for new players. Is there any real reason that new players should know what the old Prestige Powers are and why they're listed as such? I think it might be better to list all powers by function -- travel, attack, utility, fun, etc. -- and then just list all powers in the appropriate category. List temporary powers here too and just mark them clearly as temporary. 4. Now that I think about it, it might be OK to list some powers as "Beginning Powers" or "Starting Powers" or something, and just put all the early freebie powers there, plus the cheap jetpack. Means new players have one stop to find all the starting goodies. 5. Prob should also have Ms. Lib point out where the store(s) (the Longbow ones) are so players can buy and sell. 6. When I did Outbreak and got sent to Johnathan St. James Smythe, he sent me to read the history plaque of Atlas. This was a nice touch, explaining to players that the plaques are an intractable thing. Could have Ms Lib do the same if those missions aren't going to be used any more. 7. Could also have Ms Lib send the player to Longbow Sewer Inspector to learn about DFB. (I mentioned this already but I wanted to include it in this list.) 8. Finally Ms Lib should send the player to Matthew Habashy rather than one of the old contacts inside City Hall. OK, I think I got that all out of my system. Thanks for working hard on this for us!