Ukase

So...that's interesting to me. If these players are not interested and/or competent, why are they pursuing a badge? To me - that doesn't make sense. I can count on one hand the folks I've run into in game that have a badge count greater than 500 that were not both competent and interested. (that's not to say that there aren't competent/interested players with badge counts of less than 100 - there certainly are.) I'll concede the point though, you're making sense, as much as it pains me. And, what's worse, you're confirming something some of us have always thought. Our fellow players, on average, are simply not smart enough to read, or perhaps worse, can't be bothered to do so. This is what you're telling me, right? It's just my opinion, but I don't think a leader is supposed to dumb things down and spend needless moments of time explaining things to those who are joining a league or team in pursuit of a badge. The players should have experience in the same trial or task force prior to a master effort. Not just the leader - all the players. Again, that's just my thought on the matter. To have a new player expect to badge with no experience? That's an unfair burden on the rest of the team. Now - if you're in an SG - I'd expect the SG to break things down very clearly and be patient. But for a PUG Mo run? No, that's too much to ask.

Sorry, but I disagree with you on #4. This is the squishy's fault, absolutely. Unless you have control of their keyboard and mouse, in no way is this any leader's fault. Anytime you're going for a Master badge, everyone on the league should have run the content before - perhaps not on that character, but on an alt, at a minimum. They should already have a clear understanding of what's expected. For an incarnate trial, most of the time, inexperience isn't much of a deal breaker, as there's so many buffs/debuffs in a league, it covers a multitude of errors. But for a Master of Task Force that doesn't allow defeats, if they've never experienced the explosion of a Cyst in ITF, and don't stay at range, that's something they should know before hand. It doesn't hurt for a leader to remind them of it - but if they don't, that's something I would expect people on a Master run to know before hand. The leader's role is simply recruiting & inviting and sharing the strategies. With your criteria, nobody but you would be leading anything. You have to leave the onus of familiarity of the trial or task force with the players. Granted, different leaders will employ varying strategies - and it's the leader's role to make those strategies clear. But we shouldn't set the bar of leadership so high that nobody will want to lead anything.

If you're not a praetorian, for whatever reason, it won't show for you until you're level 50.

They will likely need to. Having nothing else to do with my inf, I intend to buy a ton of them, just for the merits. Gonna buy so many I won't even get to open them all and won't need to buy any next year. Like maybe 100 Billion worth. Or maybe I'll just buy all the enhancements on the AH. But that'd be a damn lot of clicking.

So, fun fact about To Hit. In game, not shown in the combat attributes is something called "beginner's luck". But - the toHit value in combat attributes will reflect the base amount of 75%, the Kismet Accuracy (I place it in Combat Jumping, a toggle I tend to keep on at all times) Note that 75% and 6% should equal 81%, but my level 9 character's To Hit is listed as 89%. The 8% increase comes from the Beginner's Luck mechanic. You can read more about it here: https://hcwiki.cityofheroes.dev/wiki/Attack_Mechanics#Beginner.27s_Luck Beginner's Luck is the community's name for a scaling ToHit bonus for low-level characters that was added as part of Issue 12. Under Beginner's Luck, characters at Combat Level 1 get a +15% ToHit bonus — exactly enough to raise their chance of hitting equal-level PvE enemies to 90% from the standard 75%. This bonus steadily decreases as the character gains levels and eventually disappears after Combat Level 19. The full table of Beginner's Luck bonuses, by level, is at the end of this article. It is almost, but not quite, +1% per level under 20. The Beginner's Luck bonus also applies to player pets and pseudopets, though it's based on their levels, not the player's. Also, since Beginner's Luck is based on Combat Level, it is affected by Sidekicking and Exemplaring.

Candidly, I agree with you. But apparently, while they don't wish to discourage solo play, they seem to be hell-bent on encouraging team play. At least, that's my take-away from all these changes they're making. I mean, the new content is really compelling from a story telling perspective. I just wish they'd left things on Beta for a couple months longer so some of us could have found a way to spend more time testing over the holidays - even though I detest going to test because any gains are washed away without notice, and have no bearing on any characters on the regular servers. But, I was convinced recently that time spent there is worth the investment. Just wish I'd had more time. And I hope I'll be able to revoke the 8 hours worth of empowerment buffs I got from p2w since we can't use them in iTrials anymore.

I would pay a billion influence to p2w for toggles to suppress when mezzed as opposed to being turned off. Re-toggling is what I detest the most in this game.

The short answer is - it's faster and easier to get the t-3 in alpha using shards - IF you're trying to get t-3 in lore and destiny as fast as you can. I'm good with burning a trancendent merit to get there in some instances, but usually, just by running content organically (MSR, Hami, a few tfs) I'll get my Alpha t-3 without burning threads within a day. But I also try to avoid lengthy incarnate content until I get my t-3 in alpha complete. Shards do not drop as often as threads, that's true. But - if you do MSRs, Hami Raids, and other content that's not in Dark Astoria, they do drop. And they drop fairly often. Now, my ...methods aren't practical for everyone. I can blow through influence and reward merits and not miss any of it. Another player may not be willing to do things the way I do them. But, when I have a fresh 50, I will want to do the weekly. Not for the double merits, but for the Notice of the Well. I will also want to do Mortimer Kal (can be solo'd in 20 minutes without much fuss) and get the extra notice from the Flames of Prometheus conversion. But, in order to use the NotW, I need 12 shards for the Alpha t-1, and 20 shards to make the Alpha t-2. And 8 shards and the notice for t-3. So, 40 shards. But, if I do an MSR, I can trade in 150 vg merits for a gr'ai matter, which saves me 4 shards. Sometimes 8 shards, depending on the recipe. If I do a lady gray tf, I can get a hero 1 component. If I do an ITF, I can get an Ancient Nictus Fragment. I won't often do those, but I will do a 3x hami raid, which is generally good for 9-10 shards. I realize I could use threads, but threads drop in lumps only 8 times (aside from iTrial bonuses). So, in running these tfs, it's not out of the question to get t-3 alpha fairly quickly. Just depends on the rng sometimes. Because of that, I find it much smarter to save those threads for the other 5 slots. Once I have the t-3 in Alpha for the level shift, I don't even look at shards again until I'm t-4 in all the other slots. By then, I've usually got enough shards to finish the t-4 in alpha. If I do a lot of in incarnate stuff, say...a few underground trials, Keyes - - those leave a better chance of better rewards. (view the table below) But - in the past year, I've found myself growing weary of these trials. Regardless of whose leading these, it can take up to 20 minutes just to form up the league. That's a lot of time wasted that I cannot get back. Time is more precious than money. I can accumulate money, stash it for a rainy day. I cannot stash time away. When it's gone, it is gone, there's no getting it back. That's the biggest reason why I hate teaming. Whenever you team, you can bet that 95 times out of 100, you're going to be waiting at least 5 minutes for someone to show up and get in zone to get things started. I'd rather not wait. I will if I have to, I just prefer not to do so. So, I will three box heather townsend as fast as I can for 3 reward tables. And I'll do Mu's as well. And so on. I find that even though these are not as fast as heather's arc, they're still faster than waiting for a league to form, and complete the trial, than if I just proceed on my own. And each character will get a reward table 3x. Once you spend a thread on alpha - that's a thread you can't spend on any of the others. And they're limited in supply. They only drop 120 at a time, 2 vet levels out of 3. If one were to not use shards, it would cost you 320 threads (or 16 common components), 120 threads (or 2 uncommon components) 16 emps (or 2 rare components) & 30 emps (or 1 very rare compenent) ... and that would be for hybrid, Lore, Destiny, interface, Judgement AND Alpha. 440 threads x 6 vs 120 threads at vet levels 1,2,4,5,7,8,10,11 =1080 threads. But I need more than 2x that many, even not using Alpha. So, yeah, to me, better to save those threads for the non-alpha stuff. Now, threads will drop in a farm, or other content, just as shards would. But, you need SOOO many more threads than shards. Seems like a no-brainer to me to use them if they drop for you. If they don't, well, then, use what you get. Me, I'll use shards. Your experience may differ. A lot depends on the rng on reward tables, of course. The only trial I seem to get lucky with is Underground. Just anecdotal evidence that tells me all the other itrials suck.

Depends. For work, my job requires I build relationships with candidates and clients alike. I get to wear the white hat and put people in a better position than they're in now. Usually more money, better perks, etc. (I'm an executive recruiter) On LinkedIn, I've got over 8K contacts. It's a lot of damned Christmas Cards I'm mailing out each year, I'll tell you that. Over $260 in postage! As for people outside of work - I haven't related to anyone in person since the pandemic, outside of interaction at the grocery store. I mean - how could anyone? Socially distancing and all that. The game was always a place to get things done without having to team up to do them. Now, I still have teamed up for various badge efforts - Really Hard Way, Avoids the Green Stuff, other iTrials and the occasional Master of TF/SFs. I just don't enjoy the teaming experience most of the time. Occasionally, I do. And the new patch won't change much about that. Nobody's putting a gun to my head saying I "must do these things". I just would rather the new badges not be team dependent. But I'm just one voice. I'm simply not going to do them until I want to do them. The new SF is about 3x as long as it should be. But hey, at least it's new content. They'd have been better served making it Aeon Pt 1, Pt 2, and Pt 3, but that's just one person's opinion.

I never said my way of thinking was typical, lol. Bizarre fits!

Before you go - I think you should buy everything. Even all the salvage. Should be fun to see how the market acts. What an inf sink that would be! You could just buy all the salvage, deleting it as you go! And then buy all the recipes, deleting them as you went! Then the enhancements. Or maybe the enhancements first. Force people to craft a bit. Think of the chaos!

You guys keep calling it an MMO. I've stated this before - back in issue 3 when I got this game, I had no idea what the MMO letters stood for. And if I had known, I'd have likely not bought it. I continued to play in spite of it being an MMO, not because of it. But it's not an MMO anymore. There just isn't the player base to justify calling it that. It's a solo game with teaming optional. At least, that's the way I see it. I've never experienced any value added to teaming. If you team routinely, you can never really be sure if your next slot should be for more endurance recovery, or more recharge or more accuracy or damage - as you're getting all these buffs, so you're never quite sure what you're doing, and what's being done by way of buffs/debuffs. When you team routinely, you may find yourself choosing something like teleport target, which is suddenly a wasted power pick if you find yourself solo. It's just never made any sense to me to play with others - who all likely have mixed experiences with the game and different desires, different objectives, and different ideas of what's fun. On some occasions, I've enjoyed teaming with folks, and on others, I've quite detested it. I just don't see the appeal. Never have. That's not to say I won't do it, just that it's not my preference. I'll do it for the badges if I have to - but I'll likely try to solo it for the badge first. It's usually just faster and easier that way.

Quite sure you're right.

If I go to the trouble - and I probably will, I will likely do what I can to get the badges and then never run it in that fashion again. I've looked at some of the new badges, and well, I don't think they'll be fun to get. By "fun", I mean carefree amusement. They'll be interesting, but not fun. It may be terribly frustrating having to rely on 7 other people to not die in order to get some of these badges. (not to mention worrying about my own character surviving.) I had thought the GMs had gotten the message loud and clear that other people being defeated shouldn't cost team members a badge. Apparently not. I wonder if some of these will rival "Avoids the Green Stuff" on the annoyance scale. Any joy from new content is overshadowed by the requirement for teamwork.

So, with the new patch, things are likely to change. And, well, candidly, I don't like change. I know I'm not the only one. I only yesterday got an elec melee/bio scrapper to 50, and just now got enough shards (yes, I said Shards) to get him to +1. Ran the mort kal this morning, before the patch to get the notice, and an extra notice from the Flames of Prometheus conversion. Most of my characters get Agility alpha. But with elec melee, endurance is not a concern. The attack chain is just fine, so extra recharge isn't needed. But, when I looked to use my vet level emps for a Destiny...I got to thinking. Is there still a point to getting incarnate powers? They're disabled now in a lot of these new challenge runs - and well, Master runs are about the only content I team up for. So I have to ask myself, if the incarnate stuff isn't usable - what's the point? I'm certainly not likely to run any incarnate trials on a non-badge character. I'm absolutely bored with them. I've run them ad nauseum and just don't want to. So...that's where I'm at. Is there a point to getting incarnate powers if we can't use them in this challenging content?

A better poll might be "Did you play on live?" It would just be those that visit the forums, but it might give more information.

So, if I understand you correctly, you go on a "Master of" run, and have never done the content before? Or have only done it once or twice? Sorry, but while I do think a good leader should go out of their way to explain things when they can, whenever there's something you don't understand, it is incumbent upon YOU to ask questions. Even the best leaders are not mind-readers. They cannot anticipate all questions. I would encourage you to try and solo each TF (non-master) to experience these task forces and absorb how they play out. Some teams will go so fast, you afk for a drink, you'll miss a mission (or two). Teach yourself how things are, then you can lead a team and be as good as you expect a leader to be.

[-1083.3 172.1 4691.0] Battle Hardened was moved. Used to be above the door to the map that lets you clobber Romulus.

@Snarky New Cimerora exploration badges [-1002.0 137.9 3124.4] [-975.3 227.8 1389.3] [-1751.8 373.3 1350.8] [1010.6 389.3 4930.0] [1633.4 -55.3 5206.6] [-169.2 192.3 1489.8] You should be able to copy and paste each into your chat box and get the thumbtack.

I'd read about this change and ran it on test with my blaster. Instead of 3-4 minutes, it took 9 minutes. So, a bit of a bummer, but still quite simple to do solo. Not as fast as a speedy itf for some good teams, but certainly faster than most other weeklies.

I did that for a bit with no luck - finally just downloaded the new cim & cap maps. It's bit confusing, because I'd gotten badges 1 & 2 already - but they moved Battle Hardened (badge 2) and since I didn't recognize a badge at that location previously, I thought it wasn't working properly. But, if you download the new maps and upgrade your vidiotmaps, you can go right to them, no trouble. Now, if you're somewhat like me and find doing all those downloads of different maps confusing and annoying, I'm sure there will be some folks who will point them out to you.

Look here for the latest vidiotmap stuff. Recently, it's been updated - like in the past hour to reflect Cim's new badges and the minor change in Cap for finding Aeon to start the new SF.

Eh, I probably put it the wrong way. Just meant to say that AoE from a rain isn't going to do much damage. A lot of 1's. I could slot it 3x with damage IOs, and still get a lot of 1's. For the brute, none of the epics are really "epic", imo. They're kind of plain. Light damage AoE, or a moderate single target.

If it were a farmer, then AoE would be something to consider. It's not. Now, I like my AoE as much as the next guy, but if AoE is the consideration, then why play anything other than a Spines/Fire brute? (or rad/fire if you're one of "those" people)

So...I did something that may be of interest. Perhaps not. Made an elec/bio scrapper & brute. Guess which one is "better"? Now, this is just for me, and it's quite possible one build is better than the other, although, other than the ATOs, I have tried to build them the same. The scrapper is better - for one reason. Shadow Meld. How is the recharge on this so fast? It gives quite the boost Sidekicked to my level 50 (knocking out MJ's arc, collaboratively) without Shadow Meld. That's a sizeable defensive boost. I don't have the purple sets in yet, in a couple of powers. But, 15 seconds of solid stats, every 38 seconds now. With the Ablative Carapace & DNA Siphon, it's one of the more robust scrappers I can recall playing. Now, the brute is no slouch, either, but the lack of shadow meld is noticeable when fighting the AVs. (Been having them trade-off each mission, to see how they fare. ) Have to give the edge in this instance to the scrapper. So, thanks to those who are scrapper ambassadors. I wouldn't have done this comparison otherwise. I'm still more inclined to play a brute, but clearly, there's going to be exceptions.