jubakumbi

Illusion/Storm Controller is my goto for this, simply because I am not a MM fan. It's like a 3d pinball game...I love it.

If that cat knows where you sleep...seems unwise...does the cat think the human in this case is toxic, or a benevolent snack/toy giver, I wonder...seems like a big gamble with my soft fleshy parts...and now I want crackers...

Love them all. Repel and KB rule. IME, anyone that is all up in arms about not having the groups in tight bunches is simply no fun to play games with, and not a loss for me if they don't like me because of that outlook. The possible levels of chaos is this game are a ton of fun to me, in teams, solo, does not matter. IMO, missions are not a time sensitive task that must be finished using some specific play-formula to maximize profits, that's a Job. I'd rather literally be forced to play alone through /gignore than to have to play with people that get uptight about Repel and KB, life is too short to play games with crabby people.

My current WIP. She is 45 now, so not field tested, not built to 'farm', but might give you ideas.

This is my current take, perhaps it will help your thought process.

OK, I should have said, 'at scale'...sure, HC is adding stuff, but not the scale it could be, IMO, because they have chosen a different path, which they publicly share. There is nothing to disagree about, HC has said they are more focused on controling what enters the game than they are in getting a bunch of players to collectively make content at scale, they are trying hard to control the narrative of the games developement. Suggestions are one thing, allowing a more open and collaborative creation pipeline is totally different, IMO. HC has shown they have a very specific vision for the addition of content...and that's fine. It does not mean I cannot have the POV that many of the choices they have and do make are not the best ones, I don't have to agree with all of thier choices, no one does, to be a member of the community, you just have to be a player. As for off topic, I disagree. The choices HC has made have a direct impact on the pipline that needs to be created for you to have the content you desire. You are wanting to talk about the things that could get added to the game, gated content, incentives for playing new conent, etc., and all of that revolves around the abilities of the server runners and the communities to actually produce it, so talking about the ways it could/would happen is, IMO, on topic, because an idea without a plan is just a dream. This idea of forum threads being some sort a straight line railroad tracks about ideas continues to amuse me though.

And that is an awesome day dream without VC and a solid plan of action. That's the bottom line here. We can all desire new content in all kinds of forms, nothing wrong with that, but it's just a day dream. I want meaningful content as well, having nothing to do with reading someone elses stories, but I know it won't happen at scale, I know it's a day dream. My hope was that whatever group had the biggest following would create a method for players to aid in this content creation collectively, but from my POV, HC has decided to go the corporate route of extreme control and not open this door, so it makes such things an even harder thing to do, IMO. We are at the mercy of a handful of players that control the HC servers for any changes or additions to the game, rather than in a collective group working together to extend the content in City. So, it's just like Live now, where a few control the majority, IMO, whereas it could be so very much more...

For many of the color blind, there is no Blue, only Grey, which explains almost all of the Hero bios I see.

Sounds great, but still like a ton of work. We know level scaling can be implemented as others have done that, making most all content available most of the time to any character. This is why I love to do Radios as you mentioned for the random factor. I can do them all day long, because I can just make up the story, I am not painted into a corner by a writer who could only think of two branches/choices/options. I don't play these games to play/read the stories of others, really. My wife does. She has done like every combination of ending and stuff on things like Dragon Age. She loves the branching story games! I sit thorugh 'story/cutscenes/dialog' wondering when it will be my turn to have fun... 🙂 Totally understand and agree with the outlook - you set your own goals, you set your own dopamine hit. My only point is that for me, even with my own goals, I do not play, will not play, refuse to play, anything I don't find fun in the moment, because that is my goal. The very moment in any game I feel like I might be 'grinding' - defined by me in this case to be hitting the buttons in the game just to get to the next stage, over having fun in the moment - I stop playing that game right then. I find another game, take a toke break, paint the house, whatever. CIty, ESO, STO, Civ, BattleTech, you name it - the moment I am 'just hitting buttons to get to the next thing' I am out, even if I come back to the same mission/goal/task at another time and I am having fun, the moment I am not, ESC -> Quit to Desktop. For me, life is just too precious to spend it in a game that is not bringing me joy in the moment. The thing I love so much about the software that makes this game is that is was and still is a 'happy accident' that allows us to have such diverse playstyles and all still enjoy it. It is truly a singular product when it comes to enabling players to do what makes them happy, IME.

I have always tended to say, "what others call a Grind, I call playing the game". For me, the rewards many here are talking about 'grinding' 'just happen'. I play the game for the joy of playing the game and killing pixels, while creating stories in my head. For me, rewards and advancement are just 'what happens' when I play a game, not, at all, the reason I play. Sure, I make some really powerful IOed characters that break the game when I feel like it and I have the time, but I don't start out with that goal in mind, or as the 'focus' for when I will 'eventually enjoy' playing the character after I 'grind'. IME, setting your sights on something in game to 'work for' so you can 'one day' experience the 'fun' you think you are 'missing' by having to 'grind' is simply not a healthy way to approach the game, I like to have fun the whole time, not think I am 'working' toward anything, the point is to have fun in ones free time, IMO. Let's talk capes. I love the overall idea behind the unlocking of a cape in COH - you earned the right to wear it, you are a Hero to the City. However, that's not why the developers put it behind a wall - it was because they were afraid rendering too many capes on peoples machines would break them. Just like many of the restrictions on the AE were not about playstyle/PL/etc., even though they were presented that way, but because the developers could not make the things run well and it took up too many resources, so they villified players that dod not play the way they wanted. So, IMO, it's also good to understand Why some of these things seem typical or not. We all play to get dopamine hits, that's part of the genre. I, for one, prefer to be able to 'set up' the circumstances for my dopamine hits, over being told by the game that I am 'supposed' to get a hit of dopamine only when the game thinks I should. If I had to go back and run the cape mission on each character now that wanted one, I would have a lot less capes, because I simply do not see the artificial barriers placed by others as something to strive to overcome, just something annoying that I will skip, like I did on Live. No Capes! I don't hunt for badges, accolades, merits, none of it, I just play the game and some of my characters get one badge, others get others, they each become thier own thing. In the end, I just don't need or want someone else trying to tell me how to have fun, and I do my best to just let others do the same. When we come together for something we all want to do, regardless of the individual reasons, we all win, IMO, because we all get to play.

Even in your example, unless the role you are applying for has some direct link, like reverse engineering software as part of the role, etc., then talking about what you did in a game still does not, IME, actually promote your brand in the way you want it to...it shows you are passionte about something, which is about you as a person, not your skills. I simply think it's not a smart move for gamers to think the experience they have playing a game is a good thing to put on a resume, I want gamers to get hired. 🙂 YMMV. Now, if you find out the CEO is a gamer and loves the game you play, just as if you find out the CEO loves your 'team', then there are always exceptions. If you can show that you have created an entire gaming system in your spare time, like a system that could be added to CoH to extend current content, if you added a new set of powers and rules, etc., and showed your work, that's powerful. So, please all you gamer geeks, make new content/grinds/gates/whatever for COH so we can all play and you can use it to get hired! 😉 Invent that next 'treadmill' for COH and show you can create stuff. Prop up and run a set of servers. Organize and host and promote in-game charity activities. Anything that shows your abilities can directly transfer to teh real world. Hiring managers generally don't look for people that can 'think outside the box' they look for people that can perform the list of tasks they were given.

I work in Tech. Most geeks I work with are/have been avid gamers at some point. Thinking that adding that one runs a WOW Raid Guild as a positive to a resume for a leadership position is not, IME, a qualification. Listing that you are gamer as a hobby is great, we all love to hire people we think we will be able to grow to like, etc., but listing playing games as a qualifying experience for a position that has nothing to do with gaming is not, IME, worth much, for the person or for the company. There is a difference from being discriminated against for having a tattoo or wild hair and using it as a qualification for a position, just like being a gamer, IME. It's not about being open minded to gamers as staff, it's about thinking that having played games makes you better suited for a specific position, IMO. If the gaming in question actually raltes to the position is some way, provided a line can be drawn, great, but otherwise IME, gaming belongs in the same place on a resume as Golf and Competitive Eating.

I want more episodes of a lot of TV shows that will never get them, that's just life. It's been shown that new content, define it however you like, is what brings in new, brings back old, and retains current players. No MMO, even those made with huge development teams, have unlimited retention for this factor. Thinking COH will have regular content of size and quality at this point, unless you personally have the VC to make it a reality, is just a nice day dream. We have what we have, it will get some fan made stuff over time now and then, and hopefully generally survive...bit's lets be real, that's it. Enjoy it for what it is, for as long as or as often has the mood strikes you.

Great. Now I want to make "The Holy Handgun" ...

That many people cannot seperate the ideas they have from thier own self-esteem. Many cannot hear thier ideas get torn apart, without taking it as in insult on thier personal character. Great minds have bad ideas all the time. Nice people have bad ideas all the time. I have learned the hard way, plenty of people think I am attacking them when I am just challenging an idea/opinion/POV...

But your data sample of the population is based on subjective and anecdotal information with a big dose of personal bias, IMO. That's the problem. You are drawing a larger conclusion that the 'facts' you have can support, IMO. As I stated, if your intent is to get people to look at all the ways to play the game, then do that without trying to use another playstyle as an example of a bad way to play. You have decided that data you have points to power leveling being a reason there are no more players in your SG, without actual exit interviews or any other real data set. That's not a fact-based premise and IMO, it does not deserve to be called a Debate. If you wanted to make a list of ways to keep the game fresh, you could have chosen to do it without attacking a playstyle. Regardless of your intent, this is exactly what you have done here, IMO, and it's not the first time, so pardon me if I won't take what you say at face value any more than I take anything else based on supposition and personal bias fueled by anecdotal evidence. 🙂 You said in the first post you knew it was going to tick people off and that you could take the heat, and now try to make yourself the martyr.

I can say all the same things about 'running low level content'. "If you are bored with playing the same low level stories over and over, if the writing of the game leaves you thinking you are back in HS and you are ready to quit, perhaps try Power Leveling a few characters to find one that interests you and then play some other parts of the game, like farming hundreds of enemies with a tricked out character and feel like a god for a while, you might like it, rather than just quitting the game over reading the bad writing over and over and leave us with fewer players." IMO, if the intent is to simply show players there are many ways to play the game, a simple list of "If you are feeling bored with your playstyle, have you tried these?" would, IMO, work much better than some passive-aggressive missive about how "I have seen so very many players quit for reasons I decided in my head must be true". The Execution of the Intent matters. It's an old addage in Sales...never put down the competition, just upsell your advantages.

The circle so many seem to be caught in here, IMO, is a false premise. That premise being that people who power level don't play the characters they create, they just have some specfic form of alt-itis that makes them create fully tricked out characters and move to the next, or something, never playing 'the game' with those characters. There are people here that freely admit they don't PL, don't like PL, don't understand PL and then, armed with that bias, try and read the minds of those that do PL and decide 'it must not be fun' or it must be the reason people leave becuase they would...do none of those poeple see the implicit bias and terrible logic there? If you don't like to PL, if you don't understand why people PL, that's all fine, but don't try and turn that into a reason to convince others power levelers are the 'reason' you cannot find teams of people on demand because players are leaving. Regardless of your intent, it is, in fact, a passive aggressive attack on those that do enjoy PLing when you start trying to say it hurts the game. People page after page using a passive aggressive attack on powerleveling is what I see here ... "It's OK that you do that, but just so you know, you are playing the game wrong and driving players away." How is this NOT the refrain? I have never, ever, really cared one tiny little bit about the writing in this game. Most of it, IME, is high-school drama at best, and very little of pertains to the characters I create. I build characters and create my own stories. The dialog of the NPCs could basically not exist and while it would be odd to play in a world where people don't talk, the game would play the same for me. But to read threads like this, my entire playing experience becomes suspect because I don't play thorugh low-level OR high-level story content, if that's all we are going to base play 'right' about, my playstyles would be 'illegal'. Threads like this and the vast majority of the arguments I see in them are based on nothing more than supposition, bad logic, and a general intent, direct or not, to inform anyone that does not follow the 'right way' is harming the game. It's as sad as it is silly. IMO, but trying to make people look bad for not playing the way they do is gamer forum fuel, it never goes away. I have seen people making these same, circular, illogical arguments about every single MMO I have every played, from Day 1.

I think I have spent too long in tech support and playing this game to be able to help solve the issue through a forum post! 😉

Sounds a lot like your Left button is sticking and the system thinks you are holding both sometimes, making you move...just a thought...

Thunderspy has level scaling, so it can be done, although there are caveats, it works OK. Many of the big MMOs, even WOW now, have done this. I agree that some form of level scaling for all content is the best way to keep it fresh. The difficulty settings did wonders for keep things relevent, some similar thing with level scaling would be awesome, IMO, to extend the life of current content. IMO, the issue with doing some of these things is not, in fact, time, but the HC outlook of trying to 'be like live' to attract players. Some of the changes, IMO, that could be made will, on the surface, may make a lot of 'old school' players hate the servers, as they are change averse, IME. Since HC now owns the majority of the playerbase, it has to deal with the fact nothing that gets done will please everyone, just like every other MMO. I agree the groundwork being done is nice, but content is king if you want the modern gamer to stick around very long, IME. IMO, level scaling would really be a good move.

Just eat yellows...and whatever else you have...skittle up! It works. I don't have any more invested in a starting character than you do, I have just played more and know some tricks. One of them is to not save Inspirations. Eat 'em up yum. Makes the lower levels much better, IME. There was a time when the P2W powers did not exist and we still managed, so you just have to find your groove.

Cannot say the same. I presented my opnion based on my observations and was attacked, causing clean-up to occur. IMO, the game is not as fun when played on a personal server, they are easier to setup than you miught think, you just have to have enough HW to run it. The City is not intended to be that desolate, even for a loner like me. The worst thing that can happen is you download all the bits and it does not run, give it a try! I am happy the population has been as stable and long-lasting as it has, it a safe place for a lot of gamers. I had hoped the population would have spread out more, but that does not seem to have happened to any large degree. To the specifc topic of the thread, IMO, no one playstyle, no one type of player, no specific sub-group of the CoH community is any more, or less, responsible for the ebb and flow of players and to try and even start to take that POV is a negative way to see it. IMO, it's looking to draw lines and put people into little boxes, when there is simply no good reason to do so.

Yeah, you figured out how the things worked for the rest of us to then exploit leverage to our advantage! @arcanaville just makes the rest of us look like drooling toddlers with the math! 😉 The two of you help 'unbox' the whole game, IME. I rememeber the developers hating that we even wanted the real numbers!

@Luminara has studied the game in depth for more person-hours than most anyone, I think. Many of the CoH community base thier POV on the math work @Luminara did years ago. I would trust what they say about how things work more than just about anything other than the actual code. 🙂