Power Customization - Low Hanging Fruit

[EmmySky]

I wish it were easier to tell just what IS low-hanging fruit.  According to live devs, it was impossible for MM pets to not brawl without breaking the game, yet here we are.  You'd think typos in mission text would be simple but 15 yrs later there are still typos.

 

It would be a MASSIVE undertaking for someone super smart and super dedicated to go through this plate of spaghetti we call a game and annotate it properly and organize it, BUT, that may be the only way we can find out what is easy and what is not.  😞

[DR_Mechano]

3 minutes ago, EmmySky said:

I wish it were easier to tell just what IS low-hanging fruit.  According to live devs, it was impossible for MM pets to not brawl without breaking the game, yet here we are.  You'd think typos in mission text would be simple but 15 yrs later there are still typos.

 

It would be a MASSIVE undertaking for someone super smart and super dedicated to go through this plate of spaghetti we call a game and annotate it properly and organize it, BUT, that may be the only way we can find out what is easy and what is not.  😞

I am honestly curious as to why devs, who were clearly paid and knew the code better couldn't figure out how to stop ranged pets running into melee but a group who do this in their free time, came in to this blind without any sort of background in the CoH code worked it out.

[Goblin Queen]

I'd like Blind to have an alternate animation with the flash of bright light coming out of your hand. It's one of the standard alt animations for other set customization so I hope it's not too difficult to port over.

[VileTerror]

I suspect the answer comes in the form of OpenSource, Mechano.  The original Live Devs were just a handful of people.  While the Homecoming Team is an even smaller handful of people, the leaking of the code to the wider web and groups like OuroDev are essentially think tanks for solving these sorts of problems.   I don't know how much Homecoming has leaned on OuroDev, but from what I've seen, a -lot- of "Impossible" problems are getting solved by fresh sets of eyes and community efforts.

[Menelruin]

Regarding spines NOT coming out of your body....

 

I've actually wanted someone to do the following powerset reskins, but didn't know how hard it would be:

 

1:  Reskin all Archery powers to use a throwing-knife animation.

2:  Replace the bow with a CoT crossbow, then use rifle animations. 

3:  Reskin Trick/Tactical Arrow to use the "web grenade" throw animation, to have a "bomber" set. 

[VileTerror]

I'm not against the throwing-knives animation thing for Archery . . . but I'd also really, really like a Throwing Knives "Blast" Set for all appropriate Archetypes, and a Daggers Assault Set for Dominators regardless, heh.

[DR_Mechano]

17 minutes ago, VileTerror said:

I suspect the answer comes in the form of OpenSource, Mechano.  The original Live Devs were just a handful of people.  While the Homecoming Team is an even smaller handful of people, the leaking of the code to the wider web and groups like OuroDev are essentially think tanks for solving these sorts of problems.   I don't know how much Homecoming has leaned on OuroDev, but from what I've seen, a -lot- of "Impossible" problems are getting solved by fresh sets of eyes and community efforts.

That is a fair point, I remember dual auras being 'impossible' according to the devs back in the day. I know MM customization was seen as 'Impossible' but the fact you can change your PA from regular to Mirror suggests that model swapping is clearly a thing. Yet here we are...all been solved by OuroDev (I remember the ranged pets staying at ranged first being a thing on one of the i24 servers). I also guess that a lot of stuff was simply shoved far on to the backburner like MM pet customization (I remember Positron being really not keen on the idea and since MM population was pretty low, seen as non-essential I imagine).

[Menelruin]

Just now, VileTerror said:

I'm not against the throwing-knives animation thing for Archery . . . but I'd also really, really like a Throwing Knives "Blast" Set for all appropriate Archetypes, and a Daggers Assault Set for Dominators regardless, heh.

Agreed, I'd also love a bomb- throwing blast set (and would settle for a debuff or control set....hmm...control grenades.....)

 

One other thing I forgot:  A lot of "themes" have comparable representation across ATs and sets....such as whether a Thermal defender shields you, or you use Fiery Aura to shield yourself.  The closest thing to a self-armor FF equivalent is Energy Aura, so I think it'd be cool to have some EA power options that resemble FF powers.....just a "one-person" protective field.

[Razor Cure]

17 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Stalkers could use some alternate animations for the quick portion of assassins strike.

The AS on Fiery Melee is also a big load of crap, at least to me. It is the animation for Blazing Bolt, and, fittingly, actually LOOKS like your toon is trying to take a crap.

[Replacement]

* Prestige sprint customization (Bright, Dark, MinimalFX)

* Flying versions of Martial Combat animations (I understand that may be hard with Storm Kick, since it's a new animation, but I think Dragon's Tail and Eagle's Claw both make you "stand on air")

* The handful of other "Dominator/Blaster versions are missing customization" powers that I suddenly can't think of.

 

EDIT:

* Two handed animations even when using a shield!

Edited January 25, 2020 by Replacement

[Leogunner]

1 hour ago, DR_Mechano said:

I am honestly curious as to why devs, who were clearly paid and knew the code better couldn't figure out how to stop ranged pets running into melee but a group who do this in their free time, came in to this blind without any sort of background in the CoH code worked it out.

Along with the fact they weren't a large group of devs, it might also have to do with needing to dedicate a decent amount of development time into creating more content to monetize or keep subscribers subscribed.

[Haijinx]

1 hour ago, Razor Cure said:

The AS on Fiery Melee is also a big load of crap, at least to me. It is the animation for Blazing Bolt, and, fittingly, actually LOOKS like your toon is trying to take a crap.

Yeah that is used in a lot of sets.  And yeah, its so bad 

[Haijinx]

1 hour ago, VileTerror said:

I'm not against the throwing-knives animation thing for Archery . . . but I'd also really, really like a Throwing Knives "Blast" Set for all appropriate Archetypes, and a Daggers Assault Set for Dominators regardless, heh.

Crossbows 

 

Preferably Joerg repeating crossbows ..  let me show you its features!

 

-----

But yeah throwing knives and xbows probably don't count as lowhanging fruit. 

[siolfir]

6 hours ago, Haijinx said:

I was going from memory as I was/am on my phone but I was pretty sure in at least one case the animation times for quick AS  was the same as Blaster SK at 1.32 (SJ has a fairly slow AS)

Ignoring Arcanatime, Street Justice AS is 3.17 seconds, so the fast version is 1.17 seconds (just knock 2 seconds off of each AS to get the fast time). Blaster Storm Kick is 1.07 seconds.

 

The problem with alternate AS animations is that IIRC they're just using the same animation and starting 2 seconds into it (skipping the part that happens during the 2 second interrupt), so you'd have to have the long version and it wouldn't be a low hanging fruit. I'm fairly sure that's why KM's quick AS didn't have any extra time added to it, at any rate.

Edited January 25, 2020 by siolfir

[aethereal]

3 hours ago, VileTerror said:

What harm do you feel it would do to decouple effects from numbers, though, @aethereal?
With the exclusion of PvP, where the option already exists to force specific Generic Customization, and with the ability to check other players' Powers in PvE; how do you see the greater wealth of customization options for other players being a problem?

I think it reduces diversity of builds and harms immersion.  I like being able to make some connections between what I see and what a Toon's strengths and weaknesses are.

[Replacement]

5 minutes ago, aethereal said:

I think it reduces diversity of builds and harms immersion.  I like being able to make some connections between what I see and what a Toon's strengths and weaknesses are.

I feel strongly this, but also that sometimes I want to customize a thing to look completely different.  

 

What I'm saying is I'm a human capable of holding 2 contradicting viewpoints, ok?!

[Haijinx]

35 minutes ago, siolfir said:

Ignoring Arcanatime, Street Justice AS is 3.17 seconds, so the fast version is 1.17 seconds (just knock 2 seconds off of each AS to get the fast time). Blaster Storm Kick is 1.07 seconds.

 

The problem with alternate AS animations is that IIRC they're just using the same animation and starting 2 seconds into it (skipping the part that happens during the 2 second interrupt), so you'd have to have the long version and it wouldn't be a low hanging fruit. I'm fairly sure that's why KM's quick AS didn't have any extra time added to it, at any rate.

I guess I was hoping it was possible to use 1 animation for quick mode and just use default for AS 

 

 

[Chris24601]

5 hours ago, DR_Mechano said:

That is a fair point, I remember dual auras being 'impossible' according to the devs back in the day. I know MM customization was seen as 'Impossible' but the fact you can change your PA from regular to Mirror suggests that model swapping is clearly a thing. Yet here we are...all been solved by OuroDev (I remember the ranged pets staying at ranged first being a thing on one of the i24 servers). I also guess that a lot of stuff was simply shoved far on to the backburner like MM pet customization (I remember Positron being really not keen on the idea and since MM population was pretty low, seen as non-essential I imagine).

To be fair to the original devs, some of the stuff was less “impossible” in a technical sense, but rather “impossible” in the sense of...

 

“if we let every player run around with two auras and both a back and a butt cape simultaneously it’s going to crash out the graphics on the lower end machines some of our players use every time that person has to go to Atlas Park.”

 

You have to remember they were making decisions based on computer processing capabilities from nearly a decade ago (to more than a decade ago in the case of low end machines of the time) when making these decisions.

 

Nearly a decade of advancements in computer processing just make some of those problems irrelevant. For example... trying to run max graphics settings on the computer I ran CoH on during the retail years would have dropped my frame rate to 10/sec or less. The completely average machine I have today runs CoH at max settings as smooth as butter.

 

I remember the devs having pre-release downloads before issues went live because the full update would take HOURS to download (whereas if you downloaded the pre-release just the last changes needed to be downloaded). Now the whole of CoH can be downloaded from scratch using Tequila in 15-20 minutes.

 

The point is, just because modern computers make it easy now, doesn’t mean it wasn’t actually “impossible” back in 2004-2012.

[VileTerror]

There's also the corporate hierarchy of publisher over studio to consider.  It's a lot more nebulous, but there's always the chance that some things never happened because they weren't permitted to happen.  At least not until a way to monetize it was established.

[Replacement]

9 hours ago, VileTerror said:

There's also the corporate hierarchy of publisher over studio to consider.  It's a lot more nebulous, but there's always the chance that some things never happened because they weren't permitted to happen.  At least not until a way to monetize it was established.

Truth: Energy Melee basically drove me to quit the first time. I didn't necessarily have any skin in the game - one of my hundred characters was a EM Tanker that was probably level 30 tops - but the fact that they just weren't interested in fixing old content when they could monetize new (kinetic melee came out) frustrated me and kept coloring my perceptions of all their decisions.

 

And then they laid off BAB pretty much as soon as power set Customization was far enough along to not need him any more.  That was enough to get an already disenfranchised fan to unsub.

[Lines]

25 minutes ago, Replacement said:

Truth: Energy Melee basically drove me to quit the first time. I didn't necessarily have any skin in the game - one of my hundred characters was a EM Tanker that was probably level 30 tops - but the fact that they just weren't interested in fixing old content when they could monetize new (kinetic melee came out) frustrated me and kept coloring my perceptions of all their decisions.

 

And then they laid off BAB pretty much as soon as power set Customization was far enough along to not need him any more.  That was enough to get an already disenfranchised fan to unsub.

This vibe resonated with me a bit too much. I remember feeling the exact same way.

[Troo]

Energy Transfer

[DR_Mechano]

I think CoH shutdown at a sort of odd time, we were seeing its transition from what was considered acceptable for MMOs (even F2P ones) at the time into a more CO/STO style F2P model where they were clearly focused on pushing the new hotness along with superpacks as the go-to method of money grabbing, a lot of people forget that MMOs were the pioneers of lootboxes. They were basically told from, on high, that new coolness for money was better than fixing old busted stuff.

 

I mean look at modern NCsoft MMOs filled to the brim with loot boxes and grindy gameplay, it's no wonder CoH never really fit their model especially since it bombed in their home country. We've seen that, apart from Guild Wars 2 (which I put down more to ArenaNet than NCsoft), they couldn't care less about their MMOs/MOBAs succeeding in the west anymore and focus solely on Korea as being their market.

Edited January 25, 2020 by DR_Mechano

[Chris24601]

1 hour ago, DR_Mechano said:

We've seen that, apart from Guild Wars 2 (which I put down more to ArenaNet than NCsoft), they couldn't care less about their MMOs/MOBAs succeeding in the west anymore and focus solely on Korea as being their market.

Which is probably why they’re willing to entertain negotiations and haven’t come down on the rogue servers... CoH is so far outside their target market (and the playerbase across all of them small enough that any profits would be a rounding error) that it’s not actually worth expending even token resources on.

 

Regardless, there are a myriad of reasons that things could be considered “impossible” 7+ years ago that no longer apply now.

 

So, in addition to the Kheld non-shifting form forms, another I’d like to see is the perfectly smooth metallic they have for the males (metallic 2 I think it is) ported over to the females.

 

I’ve got a concept for an ex-Widow (a psi-melee stalker) who’s dropped the overt spider-themed bits, but still employs the armored bodysuit in their costume and it’d look a lot better without the seams on the basic metallic texture.

[Menelruin]

15 minutes ago, Chris24601 said:

Which is probably why they’re willing to entertain negotiations and haven’t come down on the rogue servers... CoH is so far outside their target market (and the playerbase across all of them small enough that any profits would be a rounding error) that it’s not actually worth expending even token resources on.

 

Regardless, there are a myriad of reasons that things could be considered “impossible” 7+ years ago that no longer apply now.

 

So, in addition to the Kheld non-shifting form forms, another I’d like to see is the perfectly smooth metallic they have for the males (metallic 2 I think it is) ported over to the females.

 

I’ve got a concept for an ex-Widow (a psi-melee stalker) who’s dropped the overt spider-themed bits, but still employs the armored bodysuit in their costume and it’d look a lot better without the seams on the basic metallic texture.

In that vein, there are some female-only headgear items like headbands and crowns/tiaras I'd like to have as options for male characters.