Solarverse

You absolutely have permission. Any time, @Michiyo. 🙂

I have deleted everything related to CoH. However, I have given permissions for anyone to add any of my mods to the current Modder Tool, I am pretty sure a lot of them are already there. @GM Crumpet would you mind adding this in please? It was a mod that silence the screaming sound of the Fire Sword.

Is this part of Heroes Unlimited?

You expect far too much from human beings. Your first mistake is believing that they somehow have intelligence to begin with. Most humans are purely reactionary and tribalistic followers who are better at repeating the things they see and hear rather than giving actual thought to anything outside their own bubble. Rational thought is simply too complicated and requires too much energy to actually think. In short, it simply won't happen. Remember, humans are nothing more than evolved upright walking apes; don't expect much.

I would make the Hazard zones actually hazardous. I would first make them scale to level, they would always con much higher level, as in minions being orange named on some mobs, red on others and even purple on others. Their hit points would be Quadrupled, that means Minions, Lieutenants, Bosses, Elite Bosses, AV's and World Bosses. I would increase the number of NPC's in any given mob and increase the range of aggro detection. The missions inside the Hollows and other Hazard zones would be the same way. I would make completing certain challenges in them rewarding enough to entice even the most casual players to take a stab at it. I would leave the nonhazard zones as they are, but I would make sure that the hazard zones were actually hazardous. Mobs would be far more aggressive, spawn at random and add a new world boss or two in each one. Then I would contact @Solarverse and tell him that there is a new addition to the game that might peak his interest. Secondly, I would contact @Nope and ask him for his input on how to properly change Force Field powers, and offer other players to vote on his suggestions. If the suggestions he gives garner primarily positive replies, I would implement his ideas...and let me tell you why; because if you are going to be brave enough to enter MY Hollows...you are going to need his damn bubbles whether you want them or not. Mr. Nope (AKA Philotic Knight) will probably scream and hit me for bringing his name in to this...but...too bad. He was the person in this game who has shown to be the absolute most experienced Bubbles player this game has seen, he understands the powerset beyond any capacity I could ever achieve. Simply put, he was on a different level with that powerset. Who I ask would be a better candidate to work with as a Dev than PK? Much love, my man...even if you are grumpy. 😉 Then, I would make Healers actually relevant in the leveling process again and not just professional door sitters at A/E buildings. Healers would have a new home in my Hazard zones, Healers would get any buffs they might be lacking to make them far beyond desirable and needed and be set loose upon the new and far improved Hazard Zones...because good f'ing luck surviving in those zones without one. I would leave the rest of the zones alone, but the Hazard Zones, Bubbles and Healers would be the focal point of my improvement mission as a Dev member. Edit: Misspelled a word and added a bit more clarity.

You all keep bringing me out of retirement...don't make me slap you in the face with a slice of bologna. All kidding aside...this game for me had a slice of both during the leveling experience. You had the easy stuff (the blue zones) and then there were the hard ones (the red zones). If you wanted virtual easy, you had Atlas, Steel Canyon, Talos, and so forth. If you wanted a challenge, you had the Hollows, Faultline, and so forth. Then they changed those zones to be far easier than they were. Now all that is left is just the easy stuff. So at one time the game felt like it had a little something for everyone. Now, it feels to me like it caters to only one type of player...and that was the primary reason I left the game. So I am happy that you enjoy the game the way that it is, but there is some players who liked the game as it was before it was changed. If the Devs were to make the red zones actually challenging again...I just might come back. I shit you not, I once fell asleep and woke up with my face on the keyboard while playing. I woke up after a few minutes and realized I killed everything around me with only my aura...yeah, I woke up and realized the mobs were dead and I literally just stood there completely oblivious. I just can't roll with that.

There was a huge push during Homecoming to ease up on the aggro limit. It was completely shot down. As far as the addition of an aggro cap being needed, that is HIGHLY debatable. Most people who would put up a fight on that one has already left the game. Also, the whole, "wait for the Tanker" was covered in that post that you quoted. Why did you leave that out when I covered it already? Just curious. I responded to your statement before you even made the statement, seems odd to me to make a statement while ignoring the proactive response, as if I never brought it up. My privilege? What privilege? This is something else that I already covered. I am beginning to think that you only read the first sentence of each paragraph because I did indeed touch up on how the devs gave players the means to get back the stacking sound effects through a /command. In other words, you only hear it if you activate it on YOUR end. I actually wrote a mod that fixed the issue of Sonic Powers. So I was not without empathy myself. The problem was, is that those nerfs were made without making it an option, it took quite some time to get an option to get those powers back. By then the damage was done, players had already left the game over it. The number 1 complaint I heard often in game and even a bit on these forums...Foot Stomp. There were a number of players pretty upset over the stacking effect being removed from Foot Stomp. I personally watched two friends leave over it, almost 3 friends. The third actually stayed a bit longer, but he eventually left later on due to other in game issues he took with the game. I never said the game directs people to it. Not once. I did however say that it was an issue that has caused some players to leave the game. It's the constant begging in chat to be PLed, it's how players will PL newbies without a care in the world as to how it affects others in game when they have to deal with a player who was an AE baby. New players see the chat, then gravitate to AE. "How do I get to the AE building?" is a question often seen in chat. It was not the debt that made things challenging. It was the fact that people got killed teaming in those days enough to make debt a pain in the rear. I used that as a point that the game was once challenging enough to gain people enough debt that they complain on the forums. I did not use debt to indicate that it was debt that made the game hard. I think you misunderstood the point there. Not true. The way people talk to each other on the forums is rough, and that is only a G-Rated version of how players talk to each other in game sometimes. Also, they leave the game because while they are on the forums trying to ask for change that could potentially bring a more challenging experience, they are met with some nasty responses. When this happens, they realize the game will never be the challenging experience they had hoped that it would be, so...they left. I had a few friends who left due to this very reason...I soon followed. Except that it has. The introduction of being able to change the difficulty of the game for starters. Getting all the Large Inspirations upon Leveling. High level players who are geared to the teeth joining lower level teams, not having to work for your travel power, having everything open from early level, such as Hasten, Stamina, Health. All of which if you wanted in the older days, you had to work for it. The instant gratification of instantly having capes and auras available upon character creation, instead of earning them. There are many aspects that made the game easier. I could go on and on about that. Easier to play and easier to obtain the things that was once a stage in your character's evolution. Now, I am not trying to have a back and forth with you, I just wanted to respond to your questions/statements, so I won't elaborate further and am going to drop the conversation. I don't even like posting these forums anymore. So I am going back to radio silence after this. I do however hope that helps you see where my head was in that post.

I don't think it is an either or, I think it is more of an all the (between the reasons I gave and the ones you gave) above. Having said that, I believe your reasons listed are just as valid. I most certainly do not have the monopoly on reasons people quit. 🙂

I get what you are saying, however, many players wanted to see the game grow in a more challenging way. It never did, it went the opposite direction. That's pretty much my point. Adding things to make you stronger is fine, however, you need more challenging content to compensate...I know the Devs have done a lot to fix this over the past couple of years, so hats off to them for that, however, level 1- 49 content is still face-rollable IMO.

If that were true, we would not have seen players complaining about all the debt they accumulated and demanded the debt be nerfed. I was 28 years old when I first played CoH. My memory of it seems way off from yours. The game was never insanely hard, but you at least could die several times in even some of the more easier missions, such as Frostfire. Hollows used to terrify players, nobody would even go in there without a Taxi or Hover. So we clearly recall the game much differently.

In which way would you like me to elaborate? The amount of people who left in comparison to the people who stayed? Or would you like me to elaborate as to why I have seen people leave and the complaints they made over the last 20 years? PLAYER NUMBERS According to Google, City of Heroes (just this server) has over 300,000 accounts. At its peak, City of Heroes has a maximum of 4,600 players who play at their peak times. Let's keep in mind, at its peak, I think it is safe to assume that there are some of those numbers that are off due to all the people multiboxing for various reasons. That is a LOT of accounts no longer active. So even if those numbers are massively off, the amount of players who left the game or no longer play far outnumber (even in MMORPG standards) the amount of players left. VARIOUS REASONS PEOPLE HAVE LEFT Level of difficulty People have complained on how simple the game has become to play, how there is no real challenge, facerollable, and how everything is just handed to the players with no effort; or the fact that very little is earned. People were upset over how easy the game has become, how now the game has become about go go go rather than let's work together to defeat a challenging experience, I suspect primarily due to how easy the game has become due to power creep. I have seen others leave in the early years due to the nerfing of aggro limitations when that was never needed in the first place. The primary reason why it was nerfed was because Tanks could herd massive amounts of NPCs and the player's largest issue was being told to wait at the door. The easiest solution to that was not to nerf the number of enemies that could be taunted, the issue was with Tanks. Tanks should have gotten a HUGE nerf to defense and resistance so that the Tank would NEED players to stay alive. Instead they got a buff over the years with power creep, while still only being able to hold aggro of a ridiculously low amount of enemies. The game went from being a game that was challenging (outside of playing a Tank) to this extremely simple to play game that even small children can play it. The game went from being team focused, to now Blasters running solo on TFs and completing them in record times. Sound Nerfs Then you have the sound nerfs, they removed certain sounds out of the game because of the stacking problems that were bothering some people. So what ended up happening is that they removed the stacking effects of sounds all together. Now, in defense of the Devs of Homecoming, they eventually, and thankfully, brought the stacking effect back with an optional /command; which was wonderful. However, that doesn't help with the sounds that were completely removed and no longer exist such as Gravitic Emanation's hit sound effect, or the AoE Heal from Empathy's hit sound effect, or the hit sound effect from the Kinetics Fulcrum Shift. Those sounds were never brought back and those files are still silent/missing to this very day. Toxic player behavior both in game and on these forums Other players have left the game due to the player base being toxic, not only in game, but on these forums as well. One account of this is when I found a bad mod that contained nudity. I brought it to the attention of the players and was underhandedly called a liar. Well, when it was found that there was indeed a mod that had been tampered with, nobody who called me a liar had said a word...no "sorry for calling you a liar," no "thanks," no nothing. Quick to call somebody a liar, but not quick to admit they were wrong in doing so. The community has this tendency to attack people for small reasons. The reason was, the person who made the original mod, people wanted to defend that person. They felt I was attacking their hero...never stopping to consider that somebody else other than their hero had manipulated the file. I have also seen people post things that just got completely jumped on by the community, things that might be mundane to some, maybe even threads that just didn't really make sense. Almost as if written by somebody who was challenged. However, they were attacked even though they said nothing to deserve that type of behavior...and these are behaviors that was expressed by some of the more "respected" people who post these forums. So people tend not to mess with forums as much due to the way they have seen people who post them behave and are allowed to behave. In game, it's even worse. Other issues I have seen people complain about before leaving the game Then you had the problem of AE babies, who don't know how to play the game, but are directed straight to AE and then power leveled to instant level 50. These players are then cut loose and have no clue how to play the game what-soever and are so new at the game that they can't even find their way to Steel Canyon...nor do they have any idea how to play their powerset or mesh with other players. Wrapping it up All in all, there have been many reasons people quit the game and I find all of them to be valid. However, some players like the game the way that it is (I mean they should, they gatekept the forums and worked very hard to push for the game to be the way that it is today) and if you dare attempt to change that in any way, they will for sure attack you for your ideas; I have witnessed this happen more times that I can count. So rather than fight against them because of the gatekeeping, players just leave. And a lot of them according to the data. Now, all that is left, are the players who prefer the game being simple, easy, and left as is. So, if you enjoy the game as is, great...no problem...however, let us not pretend that players who preferred the game when it was more difficult (again, outside of playing Tanks) and wanted to see it become more team focused (meaning, it required a team, not just a Tank, to accomplish missions) and wanted to see the game grow in a more rewarding way, not just an instant gratification way; those players are no longer here to voice their opinion and left because the game is "not what it once was" nor did it go in the direction that players such as them, hoped that it would go. I could go on and on, I could even write a book about it (much longer than the book I already wrote here) but I think that should suffice.

That would be highly debatable if all the people who left were still here to say differently. I might argue more people left due to them not liking the direction the game took at any given time than the amount of people who remained and still play today.

As far as I know, all of those mods were transferred to the (I gave permissions to do so to one of the Developers) City Mod. However, I no longer update them since I no longer play the game and leave it to others to update as needed. So if nobody is updating the mods as the Developers make changes, the timing of some may be off, or sounds may be missing all together depending on the changes made. To that degree, I am not sure if anyone is staying on top of them or not.

You are one of the few who I liked, so much so I came out of hiatus long enough to bid thee farewell. DM me any time you want to talk, my man. You're one of the few who I would actually be here for. Good luck and know that I fully understand why you are done posting.