Difficulty in CoH: Community Discussion

[Heraclea]

7 hours ago, MunkiLord said:

I’d love to see another tier of badges above Master with significantly more difficult challenges for pretty much every task force. 

Simply done: make Master badges for the lowest level TFs in the game.  Master of Rule of Three/Posi 1 is going to be much, much harder than Master of Ms. Liberty. 

[MunkiLord]

6 minutes ago, Heraclea said:

Simply done: make Master badges for the lowest level TFs in the game.  Master of Rule of Three/Posi 1 is going to be much, much harder than Master of Ms. Liberty. 

Agreed. It's something I'd love to try.

 

For the really hardcore people, I'd also like the option to immediately end a TF if the Master Of condition was failed. So not only does the team not get the badge, they don't get the merits either. This is something that I feel would need to purely optional and something each member would have to click to agree to. Hell, a team that takes that gamble could even get more merits than a typical run, maybe double. Would make things really interesting when something is the weekly task force.

Edited March 31, 2020 by MunkiLord

[Wavicle]

Just now, MunkiLord said:

Agreed. It's something I'd love to try.

 

For the really hardcore people, I'd also like the option to immediately end a TF if the Master Of condition was failed. So not only does the team not get the badge, they don't get the merits either. This is something that I feel would need to purely optional and something each member would have to click to agree to. Hell, a team that takes that gamble could even get more merits than a typical run, maybe double. Would make things really interesting when something is the weekly task force.

You want to encourage the behavior of quitting a run because they didn't get a badge?

[MunkiLord]

1 minute ago, Wavicle said:

You want to encourage the behavior of quitting a run because they didn't get a badge?

Not team quitting, but the team getting kicked out of the task force if the new super master conditions were failed at any point. It's a risk sure, but the reward would be a a new shiny badge and maybe some extra merits. 

 

So I'm clear, I don't think current badges or Master rules should be changed or altered in any way at all. This would be a new set of badges and conditions in addition to what we already have.

[Galactiman]

This game is too easy, only if you either have certain powersets and/or an expensive build. Especially on the powerset front, some of them are objectively terrible and are only ever picked because of thematic reasons (Stone Armor, Invulnerability, Ice Melee, the list goes on). Inversely, sticking to certain powersets for thematic reasons can feel punishing.

 

I also hate how creating a build requires too much planning, and equipping yourself into your final build as you level is only really possible by having a ton of influence, generally by farming on a level 50 alt.

 

I really wish IOs just dropped. I hate having to craft something and I hate playing the market. I guess I wish the looting was more like Diablo. I may be in the minority on that front.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Galactiman

[DSorrow]

I think the difficulty of the game is fine as it is. The problem right now isn't so much that there's no content that requires a high-end team, it's that a lot of the actually hard content suffers from a couple of issues:

• everything "hard" is often just enemy groups that spam you with so excessive debuffs that they essentially nullify all defensive abilities which leads to nuking being by far the most viable strategy
• there's very little point in playing against the more difficult enemy groups because fighting Council gives you the same rewards, I think a lot more people would be willing to partake in harder content if the rewards matched the effort/difficulty
• much of the hard content is hidden away in zones that are pretty remote (Shadow Shard), pain in the ass to navigate (Shadow Shard again) or don't have any sort of natural progression to them (Shadow Shard........)

If something had to be changed, I'd tune the rewards for existing harder enemy groups like the Vanguard and add extra difficulty options for incarnate characters (difficulty up to +6, all enemies get a rank bump, etc) with appropriate extra rewards. Given more time, I'd look at more creative ways to make enemy groups difficult. Perhaps there could be summoners so that the aggro cap for one tank is typically exceeded in an encounter which would necessitate an offtank, controls and/or debuffs in addition to nukes. Maybe priority targets like the surgeons in Cimerora to require target prioritization. What about enemies resistant to taunt but not controls or vice versa, or enemies that have to be mezzed in order to be rendered defenseless like in the Hami fight?

 

I think the final step would be adding proper story arcs to places like Shadow Shard and maybe introducing something completely new, but I'm pretty sure this would be a pretty large undertaking and not within the realm of possible, at least in the short term.

[golstat2003]

8 hours ago, Galactiman said:

This game is too easy, only if you either have certain powersets and/or an expensive build. Especially on the powerset front, some of them are objectively terrible and are only ever picked because of thematic reasons (Stone Armor, Invulnerability, Ice Melee, the list goes on). Inversely, sticking to certain powersets for thematic reasons can feel punishing.

 

I also hate how creating a build requires too much planning and equipping yourself into your final build as you level is only really possible by having a ton of influence, generally by farming on a level 50 alt.

 

I really wish IOs just dropped. I hate having to craft something and I hate playing the market. I guess I wish the looting was more like Diablo. I may be in the minority on that front.

I would not mind if you could turn on from P2W that crafted IOs just drop. (The rare and purple ones would stay at the rarity and drop conditions they currently have).

[Yomo Kimyata]

3 hours ago, DSorrow said:

 

• there's very little point in playing against the more difficult enemy groups because fighting Council gives you the same rewards, I think a lot more people would be willing to partake in harder content if the rewards matched the effort/difficulty

I hear you, but given the fact that inf, merits, xp, and any other rewards currently in the system literally fall from the sky, would anyone actually start running Carnie farms for 1.25x-2x inf/xp/purple drops?  

[DSorrow]

20 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

I hear you, but given the fact that inf, merits, xp, and any other rewards currently in the system literally fall from the sky, would anyone actually start running Carnie farms for 1.25x-2x inf/xp/purple drops?  

No idea if anyone would do it for farms, but I hope it would at least close the gap in other types of gameplay, because I feel like the part of the gamer population who play purely for the challenge is actually very small. I'm quite sure the more average player would do a lot more arcs with Carnies, Nemesis, Rularuu, etc. if the rewards were matched to their challenge As a consequence, I'd end up doing that stuff more often as well because I prefer teaming to soloing most of the time.

[jubakumbi]

From my POV, adding new, optional, 'harder' content is the easy part.

The hard part kicks in from the players that then want the new 'harder' content to create 'better' drops...and now the circle starts all over again...

 

Not against having more significant challenges for those that want that, not at all, but IMO, I agree with the poster above me, most players play for shinies and progression.

If hard things get added, they will want the rest of that treadmill...

 

The people who push the envelope will have the new content on farm mode in a couple hours and start looking for more...

 

I have yet to see a live game in which this has not happened, personally.

[Lines]

37 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

From my POV, adding new, optional, 'harder' content is the easy part.

The hard part kicks in from the players that then want the new 'harder' content to create 'better' drops...and now the circle starts all over again...

 

Not against having more significant challenges for those that want that, not at all, but IMO, I agree with the poster above me, most players play for shinies and progression.

If hard things get added, they will want the rest of that treadmill...

 

The people who push the envelope will have the new content on farm mode in a couple hours and start looking for more...

 

I have yet to see a live game in which this has not happened, personally.

 

I agree that upping difficulty doesn't have to have unique rewards (besides maybe badges?) and certainly not unique drops, IOs, anything like that. Nothing that some players would be gated from. Actually, I think since the introduction of merits, CoH has a very positive 'play the way you like' system, and I'd like to see that widened rather than narrowed.

 

Quantity of the same things, maybe. It happens already with XP and inf, but not merits right now. A taskforce run at +0/x1 has the same merit value as +4/x8.

 

I actually think the whole reward economy needs a look at, to give merits more direct buying value anyway. But I don't know that territory nearly as well as others do. In many ways, I'm in support of making the character building part of the game easier.

[jubakumbi]

8 minutes ago, Lines said:

 

I agree that upping difficulty doesn't have to have unique rewards (besides maybe badges?) and certainly not unique drops, IOs, anything like that. Nothing that some players would be gated from. Actually, I think since the introduction of merits, CoH has a very positive 'play the way you like' system, and I'd like to see that widened rather than narrowed.

 

Quantity of the same things, maybe. It happens already with XP and inf, but not merits right now. A taskforce run at +0/x1 has the same merit value as +4/x8.

 

I actually think the whole reward economy needs a look at, to give merits more direct buying value anyway. But I don't know that territory nearly as well as others do. In many ways, I'm in support of making the character building part of the game easier.

Most players of these types of games will not touch content unless there is a shiny associated with that content though...

I have never seen a place where harder content was added and the playerbase did not expect subsequent power increases.

 

I am sure there are a whole lot of systems that can be 'looked at' and refined in the this game ... who's going to do all that work? 🙂

 

Just being real here.

 

I think the tools exist to make/enhance some content, possibly even make it 'more challenging' for the top-end IO builds in a group, etc.

That's a huge undertaking on it's own ... that's shoots itself in the foot two hours after it's live, because 'people' want 'approprite rewards' ...

 

IMO, people that really want to be challenged are looking at the wrong game.

The only way for COH to possibly offer the level of challenge these players desire would be to start with a server with no IOs and other restrictions ... which is seen as a cop-out ...

 

It's obvious to me that the players want a full dev house behind the game making it into to modern MMO, which is just wishful thinking and not based in reality.

*shrug* 

[ZeeHero]

11 hours ago, golstat2003 said:

The reason why it doesn't get that used is that a lot of newer players of this game probably don't even know it exists. Or the most of the vets would rather play this game as an action rpg for relaxation and not for challenge, so they just don't go there (plus the rewards unless you do the farming trick for the one for components, just aren't that great).. Or a combo of any of those.

COH is the furthest thing from an action RPG, but the fact remains most people who play COH do so for relaxation and not challenge. almost any other MMO out there today can do challenge better than is possible in COH due to COH age and engine limitations.

[therealtitanman]

45 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

Most players of these types of games will not touch content unless there is a shiny associated with that content though...

I have never seen a place where harder content was added and the playerbase did not expect subsequent power increases.

 

I am sure there are a whole lot of systems that can be 'looked at' and refined in the this game ... who's going to do all that work? 🙂

 

Just being real here.

 

I think the tools exist to make/enhance some content, possibly even make it 'more challenging' for the top-end IO builds in a group, etc.

That's a huge undertaking on it's own ... that's shoots itself in the foot two hours after it's live, because 'people' want 'approprite rewards' ...

 

IMO, people that really want to be challenged are looking at the wrong game.

The only way for COH to possibly offer the level of challenge these players desire would be to start with a server with no IOs and other restrictions ... which is seen as a cop-out ...

 

It's obvious to me that the players want a full dev house behind the game making it into to modern MMO, which is just wishful thinking and not based in reality.

*shrug* 

agree, coh is a chill game, if want endless grind keep dying phase, try wow or eso.

 

Edited March 31, 2020 by therealtitanman

[Jackanapesink]

Here's a thought. The game itself doesn't need to change.  It seems all agree that fun team play is one of the unique parts of COH.  (At least I agree with me...LOL)

 

Why not a new set of badges based around team play, construction, etc?  Such as:

 

-Win Ms, Liberty's task force with an all blaster team.

-Win Ms. Liberty's task force with an 8 player balanced team (say, no repeats of archetypes?)

-etc.

 

It could even apply to radio teams:

 

-Run 10 consecutive successful missions with an all tank team

-Run 20 consecutive successful missions with an all tank team

-Run 20 consecutive successful missions with an 8 player balanced team

-ad infinitum

 

All you'd really need to do is add a new badge category, some new graphics, and set the benchmarks.  It would encourage a whole new brand of play.  Might even expose the nuke em all plow through content players to a new enjoyment they never knew they could have.

 

Sort of like the Arena badges, but easier, since there's more teams than arena matchups.

 

Thoughts on that?

[Wavicle]

12 hours ago, Galactiman said:

(Stone Armor, Invulnerability, Ice Melee, the list goes on).

As an aside, both Invulnerability and Ice Melee were buffed considerably. Both are quite good at this point. Stone Armor I'll give you, and there are others, Force Field, Dual Pistols, etc.

[Galactiman]

6 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

As an aside, both Invulnerability and Ice Melee were buffed considerably. Both are quite good at this point. Stone Armor I'll give you, and there are others, Force Field, Dual Pistols, etc.

Invulnerability is still objectively bad. Honestly, I would say any set that relies on Defense for mitigation is pretty gimped in the world of IOs. It's too easy to cap defenses for any set, but capping resists is not as easy. It's why sets like Radiation and Electric are just so good. You can cap Resists and Defense to just about everything, while having perma-Hasten plus the Health and Endurance recovery options that both powersets have.

[Galaxy Brain]

@Yomo Kimyata, @DSorrow, @jubakumbi, @Lines, 

 

I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle of that discussion. I don't believe anybody wants to see a grind fest, nor do people want to see this become dark souls. On the other side of the coin, a significant amount of people do feel the game's "natural" ease is troubling and some are even bored if they roll around at full power. 

 

In between those extremes, we actually already have content that is harder than normal but often is passed up, and I do believe that there is an underlying reason that ties into Risk/Reward:

• Classic example is with random PuGs deciding to go after Council, Warriors, etc instead of say CoT, Carnies, Arachnos. On both sides of this sentance we see enemies that are easier and harder to combat than the other, but at the end of the day they are "worth" the same. A Council boss = A Carnie Boss = A Warriors Boss = An Arachnos Boss, despite them all being different "challenge ratings".  If they essentially scaled based on how tough the threats are "supposed" to be, then you may find more people being much more tolerant of running missions with harder enemies. Sure, the Carnie mish might be tougher than the Council one, but you get (X) more XP / Inf / Drops from em.
• Certain zones are ghost towns due to difficulty already. Redside is a bit tougher on average (Arachnos, etc as per point 1), Goldside, Hazard Zones (already discussed), and the Shadow Shard are all criminally underplayed. If there were a little extra nudge for playing these areas (like how Gold originally had the starter IOs iirc) they could be seen as an alternative rather than a novelty.
  • The Shadow Shard in particular also carries extremely dangerous enemies that are a shame to waste! Revamping this zone to be easier to navigate + special dimensional rewards or something could breathe new life (Incarnate content?) into a forgotten area of the game.
• Story Arcs are similarly underplayed IMO compared to just running Radios / Newspapers for XP, or Task Forces for Merits. Sweeping over them again to make them competitive with both (Ease of travel between zones / missions being picked up by having to return to contact, having competitive merits for the amount of missions and what you actually do, etc). If they are competitive, we may see more of it.

Way I see it with these, is that the perception of ease could be mitigated if we make the existing hard stuff worthwhile to direct our power at. 

 

Add in some new optional stuff like advanced enemy encounters, and so on, and we're on the right track to having some cool new content.

[Galaxy Brain]

1 minute ago, Galactiman said:

Invulnerability is still objectively bad. Honestly, I would say any set that relies on Defense for mitigation is pretty gimped in the world of IOs. It's too easy to cap defenses for any set, but capping resists is not as easy. It's why sets like Radiation and Electric are just so good. You can cap Resists and Defense to just about everything, while having perma-Hasten plus the Health and Endurance recovery options that both powersets have.

Side track here, but how the heck is Invuln bad?

 

You have solid base resists + solid base defenses, which allow you to build more leisurely for bonuses. At perma hasten levels of recharge, you are also looking at perma or near perma Dull Pain as well for a massive HP boost compared to other sets atop the Res and Def. Yes, there is a Psy hole but uniques patch that up reliably on top of Dull Pain.

Edited March 31, 2020 by Galaxy Brain

[DR_Mechano]

2 hours ago, jubakumbi said:

Most players of these types of games will not touch content unless there is a shiny associated with that content though...

I have never seen a place where harder content was added and the playerbase did not expect subsequent power increases.

 

I am sure there are a whole lot of systems that can be 'looked at' and refined in the this game ... who's going to do all that work? 🙂

 

Just being real here.

 

I think the tools exist to make/enhance some content, possibly even make it 'more challenging' for the top-end IO builds in a group, etc.

That's a huge undertaking on it's own ... that's shoots itself in the foot two hours after it's live, because 'people' want 'approprite rewards' ...

 

IMO, people that really want to be challenged are looking at the wrong game.

The only way for COH to possibly offer the level of challenge these players desire would be to start with a server with no IOs and other restrictions ... which is seen as a cop-out ...

 

It's obvious to me that the players want a full dev house behind the game making it into to modern MMO, which is just wishful thinking and not based in reality.

*shrug* 

There are a few, for example @Solarverse literally does just want an Issue 5-7 server which would be a no IOs, no Incarnates type deal (though I would personally add in the STF as it was back then just to balance out the LRSF even if IOs were introduced in the same Issue as it was, so both sides can get Synthetic Hami-Os).

 

However by and large, you are right, a lot of these people who keep demanding tougher content ALSO want shiny stuff attached to it that isn't just badges because getting a badge reward isn't 'good enough reason for them to do it' (this was said to me by someone who posted for higher difficulty options). No they want special exclusive IO recipes or Special unique costume unlocks or tons of other things so they can be an e-peen waving person saying "I'm better than the casual player because I managed to do this content" and as mentioned once they've done that...well then..where's the next challenge? And the next? And the next? It's a reason why WoW is widely known as having people say 'the real game starts at level cap' because WoW is built around the endgame gear treadmill because that's all they can do to keep the 'I think I'm Hardcore' players attached and with it comes the problems of massive power creep WITHIN an expansion (where faully kitted out, even in normal mode level, raider who has done the last raid tier of an expansion can go back and nearly solo the first raid of an expansion or at least do it in a very small group).

 

Also @Galactiman since when did Invuln rely on defenses alone, it's got good across the board resist as well to all but Psi and Toxic. It normally soft caps S/L resist and on a tanker has around the 40-50% resist to everything else.

[jubakumbi]

14 minutes ago, Jackanapesink said:

Here's a thought. The game itself doesn't need to change.  It seems all agree that fun team play is one of the unique parts of COH.  (At least I agree with me...LOL)

 

Why not a new set of badges based around team play, construction, etc?  Such as:

 

...

 

Thoughts on that?

Well, badge hunters would love it and hate it.

Beyond that ... I like it, but...

 

Bragging rights is really only a motivator IME for a small portion of the population, so while possibly an easy addition that I would never say no to, I don't think it would really appeal to a large portion of the playerbase.

 

It sounds like what the posters looking for more IME want, not just from this thread mind you, is for there to 'be a reason' they have all the cosmic power they do, as a group, and therefore really want group content that challenges a full group of full Incarnates...

 

I can see people possibly creating that, with many various ways to define 'challenge', using the tools that seem to exist.

But the problem is what form of 'challenge'...and the form of the 'rewards'...the same old carrot and stick.

 

IMO, what the players want is for someone to pick up the development of the content of this game with the knowledge of ALL the other games they have now seen to add new content Incarnates find tough to beat ... it's a great dream.

 

Adding more HPs does very little.

Adding in death patches is just 'learn the dance'.

Adding in more restrictions just gets called a 'cop-out'.

Adding in more enemies just increases the number of 'rewards' that these players would already have plenty of...

 

Do we really see thes small, often at-odds, volunteer teams doing what current full dev houses have trouble producing?

I am not trying to be a wet blanket, but I can agree that beyond badges and simply making more, larger sacks of hit points, can anyone really expect at this point?

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, jubakumbi said:

Well, badge hunters would love it and hate it.

Beyond that ... I like it, but...

 

Bragging rights is really only a motivator IME for a small portion of the population, so while possibly an easy addition that I would never say no to, I don't think it would really appeal to a large portion of the playerbase.

 

It sounds like what the posters looking for more IME want, not just from this thread mind you, is for there to 'be a reason' they have all the cosmic power they do, as a group, and therefore really want group content that challenges a full group of full Incarnates...

 

I can see people possibly creating that, with many various ways to define 'challenge', using the tools that seem to exist.

But the problem is what form of 'challenge'...and the form of the 'rewards'...the same old carrot and stick.

 

IMO, what the players want is for someone to pick up the development of the content of this game with the knowledge of ALL the other games they have now seen to add new content Incarnates find tough to beat ... it's a great dream.

 

Adding more HPs does very little.

Adding in death patches is just 'learn the dance'.

Adding in more restrictions just gets called a 'cop-out'.

Adding in more enemies just increases the number of 'rewards' that these players would already have plenty of...

 

Do we really see thes small, often at-odds, volunteer teams doing what current full dev houses have trouble producing?

I am not trying to be a wet blanket, but I can agree that beyond badges and simply making more, larger sacks of hit points, can anyone really expect at this point?

If the dance is tricky enough then learn the dance will do a lot.

[golstat2003]

2 hours ago, ZeeHero said:

COH is the furthest thing from an action RPG, but the fact remains most people who play COH do so for relaxation and not challenge. almost any other MMO out there today can do challenge better than is possible in COH due to COH age and engine limitations.

Pretty much my main point. When folks want challenge they go play other games. I'd bet most vets here (with no scientific way to prove it) are here for the nostalgia and relaxing play. Hell, many folks have said on these forums if they never changed anything about the game ever again they would still play it.

 

[jubakumbi]

3 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

If the dance is tricky enough then learn the dance will do a lot.

If you like to dance like that in a group...IMO, that is yet another valid, but small, portion of the playerbase - I detest 'the dance' and all the llama drama around herding the cats.

I would prefer pretty much any form of challenge I have played in games over 'stay out of the death patches'...

Edited March 31, 2020 by jubakumbi

[golstat2003]

13 minutes ago, Galaxy Brain said:

@Yomo Kimyata, @DSorrow, @jubakumbi, @Lines, 

 

I think the answer lies somewhere in the middle of that discussion. I don't believe anybody wants to see a grind fest, nor do people want to see this become dark souls. On the other side of the coin, a significant amount of people do feel the game's "natural" ease is troubling and some are even bored if they roll around at full power. 

 

In between those extremes, we actually already have content that is harder than normal but often is passed up, and I do believe that there is an underlying reason that ties into Risk/Reward:

• Classic example is with random PuGs deciding to go after Council, Warriors, etc instead of say CoT, Carnies, Arachnos. On both sides of this sentance we see enemies that are easier and harder to combat than the other, but at the end of the day they are "worth" the same. A Council boss = A Carnie Boss = A Warriors Boss = An Arachnos Boss, despite them all being different "challenge ratings".  If they essentially scaled based on how tough the threats are "supposed" to be, then you may find more people being much more tolerant of running missions with harder enemies. Sure, the Carnie mish might be tougher than the Council one, but you get (X) more XP / Inf / Drops from em.
• Certain zones are ghost towns due to difficulty already. Redside is a bit tougher on average (Arachnos, etc as per point 1), Goldside, Hazard Zones (already discussed), and the Shadow Shard are all criminally underplayed. If there were a little extra nudge for playing these areas (like how Gold originally had the starter IOs iirc) they could be seen as an alternative rather than a novelty.
  • The Shadow Shard in particular also carries extremely dangerous enemies that are a shame to waste! Revamping this zone to be easier to navigate + special dimensional rewards or something could breathe new life (Incarnate content?) into a forgotten area of the game.
• Story Arcs are similarly underplayed IMO compared to just running Radios / Newspapers for XP, or Task Forces for Merits. Sweeping over them again to make them competitive with both (Ease of travel between zones / missions being picked up by having to return to contact, having competitive merits for the amount of missions and what you actually do, etc). If they are competitive, we may see more of it.

Way I see it with these, is that the perception of ease could be mitigated if we make the existing hard stuff worthwhile to direct our power at. 

 

Add in some new optional stuff like advanced enemy encounters, and so on, and we're on the right track to having some cool new content.

Red side's design is extremely dreary and depressing. The bump there would have to astronomical for me to ever step foot in there on a regular basis. Same with the Shard. (You navigation point is . . . well on point.)