Tigraine

It also does not help when they drop in to effectively say, "We don't like the feedback you're giving; tell us what we want to hear or we won't ask for feedback anymore." At that point, is there really any purpose in offering feedback?

To be blunt, this comes off as a message of "We don't like the feedback you're giving, so you'd better tell us what we want to hear or we'll stop listening," which of course isn't really listening at all. It makes me worry that you (the collective "you") are ignoring a lot of perfectly valid points and concerns just because there have been some responses that you didn't like. If you wonder why players feel that devs don't listen, this is why. I sincerely hope this isn't the case and that you are not ignoring the forest for the trees, so to speak, but it's the impression given by the responses so far.

I can't help but think of this: 😜

If a power is changed to the point that it takes different enhancements (and doesn't take ones that previously slotted in it), that's a pretty clear violation of the cottage rule. It indicates that the power has moved into a completely different category than it was previously, or has gained or lost significant key mechanics.

Or you know, they could adhere to the cottage rule and not change the fundamental function of powers, and then there would be no need to re-slot because the powers should accept the same enhancements.

These changes aren't going to alter that perspective; there are people who treat every MMO this way, and they're not going to magically disappear just because some enemy groups are a bit tougher than they were. All that these changes are going to do is push more of those people to doing AE farms instead of PI radios. At the same time, the changes create a greater annoyance for other players who preferred a more casual/less stressful experience at those levels (particularly solo players).

If high level teams are "steamrolling" Council, and solo play is "no different," then what exactly is the point of this update? It seems that the overall effect is to just introduce new annoyances and tedium.

I have. Less so on HC with the reduction of Kheldian-specific enemy spawns, but it still happens.

I already regularly run at lower difficulties. What do you suggest I do after these changes? You can only scale down so far.

I don't think one game making bad design decisions is justification for another game making the same mistakes.

Huh. Weird that it didn't make it into the Build 2 specific change notes. Thanks for posting the info. Anyway, good to see that at least some of the concerns regarding MMs are being addressed. I'm still concerned about the impact of the self-rez in general, particularly solo play. A lot of the feedback I've seen so far has been for teams. Unfortunately it will be a while before I can test this out for myself, possibly not until after this page is out of beta (dealing with an injury making prolonged mouse use difficult). So I'd appreciate info on anyone else's experiences running solo against Council with these changes. Are they as/more annoying than Freakshow?

OK, but where is that in the Build 2 Changes notes? I'm specifically looking at the expanded section under this: There's not even a section for Council changes under there, unless I'm completely blind and am just missing it?

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that a hallmark of bad currency design and currency bloat is having single-purpose currencies. That includes currencies that can be converted into other currencies. The conversion doesn't count as an additional purpose, it's just another layer of tedium. Renaming "Unstable Aether" to "Monstrous Aether" would seem to indicate that this currency will not be used for any other purpose, and appears to be a step in the wrong direction. So for now I'll agree with others that a new currency is unnecessary and should not have been used here.