So...what's this I hear about changes to TW?

[Twisted Toon]

4 minutes ago, Chrome said:

my problem is this and it is the reason i will always advocate for buffs instead of nerfs...is balance doesnt matter in PVE...are bosses dying...GMs...AVs?...they are and they are dying without people being forced to play TW or BIO or fire blast or bots/time or yadda yadda yadda.  there is always going to be an outlier that makes people feel sad enough to complain, and then if the devs nerf this then the people who have been playing it will get pissed... with my sugesstion the reason for the sadness goes away.  the actual problem is that later in development, the sets were made had more thought and ingenuity put into them, making them 1) more fun 2) more interactive 3) more suited to modern players.  you guys want to balance the game to dark melee and Ice Control instead of bringing Dark Melee and Ice Control up to TW and Plant Control.  this doesnt make sense to me.  Stop Nerfing Start Buffing.

 

Im trying to remove the reason for being sad and you guys are talking about giving people tissues 

No, I'm talking about not wanting the volunteers that are working on the game to get burned out and quit because you want them to move the entire world to suit your feelings.

 

You see, in my previous example with the cattle, I neglected to mention that after all the cows were herded together with the one solitary cow (Titan Weapons), the devs then would have to move the river (balance the rest of the game to the new normal) to compensate. Just adding a new difficulty level or 12 wouldn't really work. Everything would have to be adjusted, just because you didn't want TW to be adjusted downward.

 

As I suggested before. Volunteer to do this work yourself to take the load off of the Devs who already have a lot on their plate as it is.

Are you willing to put your money where your mouth is?

[Chrome]

look i am not a coder and i am really sick of people stating developer time as a reason not to do things... you are implying that this needs to happen right now and if it doesnt happen the ship sinks...i am talking about three ideas that will not only help the long term life of the game but also prevent people getting upset...and finally revisiting old sets that should have been buffed before titan weapons was a thing.  you are ignoring that people are and have been complaining about things being too easy and lacking challenge.  You are forgetting that while yes my ideas will take exponentially longer to do, over all the homecoming developers are who decides what is worth there time and energy, and i am willing to bet you have no diea what they want or can do.

 

i am advocating for long term life of the game, long lasting changes that will not interfere with how anybody else plays the game, and brings lower performing power sets up to current standards.

 

no it is not the nerf TW idea that would make people feel good right now, its the long term happiness and health of the game, that would make people feel good for the long term without alienating anyone.

[golstat2003]

On 6/6/2020 at 2:58 PM, Bill Z Bubba said:

I don't slot SOs. Or DOs. Or TOs. At 32 I get lvl 35 basic IOs or start slotting sets. How can the game still be considered "balanced" around something that isn't used?

 

Even if you go with the argument that most are actually playing the first 32 levels and not doing the two PL me fast lowbie trials how can we ignore the fact that many that ARE playing that content are leaning on lowbie sets? Or P2W buffs?

 

The game needs to be balanced around how it's actually played, not how we once played or wish it was played. We now have many posters stating that an AT's lack of mez protection is meaningless because it's easy to stay loaded up with the defensive amplifier. I'm logged on to a nature/water defender right now with it and she has 19 set IOs slotted... at lvl 23. The rest are lvl 25 basic IOs.

 

"The game is balanced around SOs" was something people discussed back when we had the OLD difficulty settings. It was stated when we discussed HO builds. It's no longer a belief that has relevance.

Unless they intend to start dropping fully crafted IOs as mission/enemy defeat rewards, it has plenty of relevance.

Edited June 8, 2020 by golstat2003

[Chrome]

Also im going to mention the last few sets that were "OP" and were nerfed, then you can telll me if those were good changes or overnerfs that went way to far:

 

Super Strength

Kinetic Melee

Energy Melee

 

Now as another thought Buffs that the homecoming team has done to improve things:

 

MM pet AI

Tanker Changes

Behind the scene DB changes

 

so with this in mind, and i am certain i am missing something and you will definitely point them out, i want you to think about what they have done so far and how quickly it has been done

[MTeague]

13 minutes ago, Chrome said:

look i am not a coder and i am really sick of people stating developer time as a reason not to do things... you are implying that this needs to happen right now and if it doesnt happen the ship sinks...

I would say rather, if the people who are running this game have already made the decision to look at Titan Weapons and adjust it in a manner that they see fit... this evaluating has already been done by the available coders, and they have chosen a path closer to that laid out by @Twisted Toon than your own proposal.  You have every right to feel disappointed, you have every right to ask that another path be taken. 

 

But at the end of the day, if the HC devs choose to nerf it, it's their call. Not mine, not yours, not @Twisted Toon's.

[golstat2003]

1 minute ago, MTeague said:

I would say rather, if the people who are running this game have already made the decision to look at Titan Weapons and adjust it in a manner that they see fit... this evaluating has already been done by the available coders, and they have chosen a path closer to that laid out by @Twisted Toon than your own proposal.  You have every right to feel disappointed, you have every right to ask that another path be taken. 

 

But at the end of the day, if the HC devs choose to nerf it, it's their call. Not mine, not yours, not @Twisted Toon's.

QFT. I think they've already made the decision to look at the outliers and not take the literal YEARS it would take to buff up everything else.

 

I think some posters on these forums have completely balls to the walls unrealistic expectations from a fully volunteer dev team.

 

Let's keep it real folks.

[Chrome]

1 minute ago, MTeague said:

I would say rather, if the people who are running this game have already made the decision to look at Titan Weapons and adjust it in a manner that they see fit... this evaluating has already been done by the available coders, and they have chosen a path closer to that laid out by @Twisted Toon than your own proposal.  You have every right to feel disappointed, you have every right to ask that another path be taken. 

 

But at the end of the day, if the HC devs choose to nerf it, it's their call. Not mine, not yours, not @Twisted Toon's.

fair enough but maybe what i have to say would change some minds or maybe i am just talking without anybody listening...either way my thoughts are out there and as you said it is not my place to claim wether or not the devs are going to do anything at all

[Chrome]

1 minute ago, golstat2003 said:

QFT. I think they've already made the decision to look at the outliers and not take the literal YEARS it would take to buff up everything else.

 

I think some posters on these forums have completely balls to the walls unrealistic expectations from a fully volunteer dev team.

 

Let's keep it real folks.

why wouldnt we want to talk about long term life of the game...

[Luminara]

44 minutes ago, JnEricsonx said:

Assuming Momentum isn't a option, I'll look at my char's times directly:

Defensive Sweep- 2.2 seconds

Crushing Blow-2 seconds

Titan Sweep-2.4 seconds

Rend Armor-2.3 seconds

Whirling Smash/Followthrough-1 second, but those are Momentum Powers

Arc of Destruction-2.7 seconds

 

Yeah... too fast for the damage output indicated in this thread.  Reduced scale values wouldn't be unjustified.

[JnEricsonx]

I'd rather them drop the damage by 10-15% than to slow down the attacks IMHO.

[Without_Pause]

7 minutes ago, Chrome said:

why wouldnt we want to talk about long term life of the game...

There's zero guarantee this game has a long term life. Even if it did, it is far easier to fix one set versus a number of them. This game now is horribly balanced when it comes to Incarnates versus non-Incarnate content. There's no real motivation to buff sets up to TW levels. 

[Chrome]

6 minutes ago, Without_Pause said:

There's zero guarantee this game has a long term life. Even if it did, it is far easier to fix one set versus a number of them. This game now is horribly balanced when it comes to Incarnates versus non-Incarnate content. There's no real motivation to buff sets up to TW levels. 

i guess i am in the minority then.  i see no reason not to assume that this will continue for a long time as the code is "in the wind" as they say.  that being said, maybe you are right and i should forget about posting ideas and get back to playing this might be the last day after all...

[MTeague]

CoH is unlikely to forever vanish, given that the code is on the web, and a number of people have squirrelled away copies of it for safekeeping. 

 

Me personally, I can only allow myself to play here, and only because Homecoming is trying to become legit, in talks with NCSoft. If those talks fall through, I have a serious moral quandry to deal with.  I am a programmer. I make bank because of copyright and intellectual property.  I can justify playing here to myself because Homecoming has NOT received a cease and desist, and telling myself (and talking very very fast as I do....) that as long as the talks are ongoing, it's aboveboard enough.

 

If they failed... by principle I'd have to stop playing. 

I don't know I'd be able to follow through on that.  And I hope I never have to find out.  I'm really really really hoping the talks either succeed or remain in limbo for at least a few more years.

But it would be the right choice for me to make. 

 

Anything else really stretches any plausible "How can I earn a living as a programmer and still justify this?" too far.

Edited June 8, 2020 by MTeague

[golstat2003]

38 minutes ago, Chrome said:

why wouldnt we want to talk about long term life of the game...

We can talk about it. I'm just saying keep expectations realistic.

[Twisted Toon]

4 hours ago, Chrome said:

look i am not a coder and i am really sick of people stating developer time as a reason not to do things...

I have had coding experience.

I'm not a professional coder.

I know enough to know that what these guys do is, by no means, easy.

Especially with the 8 year (or 15 year) old spaghetti code that they inherited.

 

What you are suggesting is essentially a complete re-write of the entire game.

I don't think I ever mentioned time in any of my responses to this idea.

I mentioned difficulty, feasibility, and return on investment.

You might assume that RoI would be a time issue. But, you'd be wrong.

RoI could easily be the difficulty of buffing 99% of the power-sets and re-balancing the entire game to the new norm as opposed to the difficulty of a downward adjustment of a single (or a couple) of power-sets.

 

4 hours ago, Chrome said:

Also im going to mention the last few sets that were "OP" and were nerfed, then you can telll me if those were good changes or overnerfs that went way to far:

 

Super Strength

Kinetic Melee

Energy Melee

 

Now as another thought Buffs that the homecoming team has done to improve things:

 

MM pet AI

Tanker Changes

Behind the scene DB changes

 

so with this in mind, and i am certain i am missing something and you will definitely point them out, i want you to think about what they have done so far and how quickly it has been done

Did you ever think that there was a middle ground that the Devs are balancing around?

The sets that perform above that threshold are adjusted downwards.

The sets that perform under that threshold the adjust upwards.

The NPCs that perform over or under that threshold get adjusted accordingly.

 

The Devs have all the data and the game plan for what they're wanting the game to look like.

they know where the adjustments should be made for the game to line up with their plan.

[Sir Myshkin]

11 hours ago, MTeague said:

I'll gladly play games with a one-and-done cost, or with a monthly subscription, or with a donation model. But never microtransactions.

To point out, because the idea of Titan Weapons being a money grab has been brought up several times, the team was forced into a "Free to Play" model as that was the direction the industry had been going at the time, but they still offered a "subscription" option that essentially provided all the content as expected just as they had been for years beforehand. For those who were long-term CoH players, most stayed on this and just continued their monthly support to play the game irregardless. The only situation where TW became a "micro transaction" was for F2P folks who wanted in on the set, and even then it was a minor offset cost (I don't recall, like $5-$8?).

 

Given the direction that the "P2W culture" has gone since then, I personally feel Paragon Studios did a good job at balancing the options to never be greater in value than if you did actually subscribe, and there really aren't many companies that could say the same, nor more than a handful that still operate their game platforms in a similar manner. I'd sooner say that the nature of how the F2P system was designed for CoH it was more like discount options instead of subscription costs.

[MTeague]

1 hour ago, Sir Myshkin said:

To point out, because the idea of Titan Weapons being a money grab has been brought up several times, the team was forced into a "Free to Play" model as that was the direction the industry had been going at the time, but they still offered a "subscription" option that essentially provided all the content as expected just as they had been for years beforehand. For those who were long-term CoH players, most stayed on this and just continued their monthly support to play the game irregardless. The only situation where TW became a "micro transaction" was for F2P folks who wanted in on the set, and even then it was a minor offset cost (I don't recall, like $5-$8?).

 

Given the direction that the "P2W culture" has gone since then, I personally feel Paragon Studios did a good job at balancing the options to never be greater in value than if you did actually subscribe, and there really aren't many companies that could say the same, nor more than a handful that still operate their game platforms in a similar manner. I'd sooner say that the nature of how the F2P system was designed for CoH it was more like discount options instead of subscription costs.

That's a fair point.  I don't like what the wider industry has done with them. 

But Paragon Studios did maintain the subscription option the whole way through. 

[Without_Pause]

7 hours ago, Chrome said:

look i am not a coder and i am really sick of people stating developer time as a reason not to do things...

As someone who is a software developer for one of the biggest names in the biz, the coding isn't the issue. You want to give a default buff to MA and EM for stalkers? Add in their AoE. Not to say they are balanced as EM would need more than just that, and it is only for one AT. What takes time? Deciding HOW to buff a set. Do you simply straight up copy TW's numbers? What if they have a different number of AoE and ST attacks? What are the end costs? Recharges? Base damage? DoT? What's fair? How is each set suppose to feel? SS, Claws, Savage, Ice, and KM feel different, but how are they balanced? Claws has ranged attacks so maybe it does lower damage, but how much lower? Ice gets a power for AoE mitigation with no damage. How do you balance that even against a set which has a ST mitigation attack, ie Psy? Honestly, how does one define balanced as that's multiple meetings right there. Now try doing this for all of the sets lower than TW versus simply fixing TW. Moving a base number of damage from 7 to 10 is easy. Knowing that's what you are suppose to do is the hard part. This says nothing of testing those changes. A developer can easily spend 80% of their time not coding. Trust me, balancing all of the sets is going to lead to way more meetings, theory crafting, and testing than straight coding. I've honestly lost count the amount of times a fix in a game for balance issues had an unexpected outcome once it hit live. Even if it only went to beta, the DM changes were deemed too good once they got in the hands of players. 

Edited June 9, 2020 by Without_Pause

[Wobegone]

13 hours ago, Chrome said:

My sugesstion is this: Leave nerfs for the toy section in Walmart, buff the sets that are underperforming to TW levels and institute a +5 difficulty level via notoriety, and begin work on introducing new story content for incarnates and beyond.

I reject this.  We already have a power creep problem with IO sets and incarnates.  End game is trivial now, and this attitude only contributes to this.  Hell, at this point, it's not even end game that's trivial.  The ability to slot Attuned IO sets, especially ATOs and purples have made even lower level content trivial.  I occasionaly find a task force that struggles to finish individual missions.  It's becoming more and more rare these days.  The notion that we shouldn't balance sets and instead buff everything else is Ludacris.

[Chrome]

i guess i hope that TW doesnt become the next super strength or EM because ...apparently i am the only one hre that believes that the devs can do what i suggssted...i was brought up on if it is worth doing it is worth doing right ...apparently the majority say if it is easier do it and damn the consequences ...

 

2 hours ago, Ignatz the Insane said:

I reject this.  We already have a power creep problem with IO sets and incarnates.  End game is trivial now, and this attitude only contributes to this.  Hell, at this point, it's not even end game that's trivial.  The ability to slot Attuned IO sets, especially ATOs and purples have made even lower level content trivial.  I occasionaly find a task force that struggles to finish individual missions.  It's becoming more and more rare these days.  The notion that we shouldn't balance sets and instead buff everything else is Ludacris.

 this is another thing i have a problem with , people who dont care to read before responding, i literally addressed this power creep within the sentence you quoted, and it is exactly why i said what i said...adding higher difficulty settings and more incarnate content would bring back the difficulty you want.  This is why nerfing TW doesnt change anything... but the majority  does not want to change what really needs changing as it would take TOO much work or not enough return on investment...also since no cash is changing hands that investment is purely time...

 

i have been beaten by the majority, and i am wondering why suggesstion forums even exist if its too difficult to do any of them

[Without_Pause]

Adding in +5 diff setting will limit teams as people will have to look for builds which can handle it. There are already teams which run level 50 content with whoever or with level 35+. Now you might start to get teams looking for level 50s only. Also, it will have to be something else the HC team needs to balance. Case in point, I have been on level 50 teams running +4 when I am sked. That means I'm -5, and to be honest hitting things can be an issue. Now you want players to be facing mobs while -6? Add in some mobs can mop up certain teams at +4. +5 is only going to make that a bigger issue. 

[Heraclea]

8 hours ago, Chrome said:

i guess i hope that TW doesnt become the next super strength or EM because ...apparently i am the only one hre that believes that the devs can do what i suggssted...i was brought up on if it is worth doing it is worth doing right ...apparently the majority say if it is easier do it and damn the consequences ...

I have already started prepping my TW/WP scrapper for retirement and exile, and levelled a new character to take her place in my roster.  Nobody's coming after Psi Melee any time soon.

[MTeague]

9 hours ago, Chrome said:

i have been beaten by the majority, and i am wondering why suggesstion forums even exist if its too difficult to do any of them

Virtually anything that can be suggested is technically possible, given enough time.

The devs will choose what to act on, and what not, based on what they think is the best use of their time, AND, based on what they think is the best direction of the game, AND, how long it takes the changes to happen is impacted in no small portion by thier own real life demands on thier time as well.

 

For what it's worth, you've made your stance very clear, and IF the devs agree with you, you've clearly articulated what you want and what you don't want.  

 

I think what you're asking for is a gargantuan lift.  Perhaps I'm wrong. 

I don't have the code, and I'd likely need weeks at a minimum (more likely months) to get up to speed with it even if I did.

 

But I do think @Without_Pause is spot on with the issues for adding a +5 difficulty.  And honestly, just cranking up the numbers on existing enemies to make them more "bullet spongy", to me, is a Boring As Hell way to increase difficulty.  What I prefer is something like First Ward / Night Ward.  Where enemies have access to many more powers, and many more effects to ruin my day, and where I need to actually be strategic in how I handle them, and careful not to grab too many at once. 

 

I personally would LOVE to see most mobs get First Ward / Night Ward treatment.

So that you'd think twice and three times about charging into a big pile of Crey or Circle of Thorns or Council. 

 

But that, I also think, would be a gargantuan lift.  Rewriting all the enemy mobs to have access to more powers, keeping a thematic feel, and still making it possible to beat them with good tactics would require tons of meetings, tons of discussions, tons of testing, etc.  I want it to happen. But I don't expect it to happen.  So when asking for things on that scale, I label them accordingly. 

Edited June 9, 2020 by MTeague

[drbuzzard]

4 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

Adding in +5 diff setting will limit teams as people will have to look for builds which can handle it. There are already teams which run level 50 content with whoever or with level 35+. Now you might start to get teams looking for level 50s only. Also, it will have to be something else the HC team needs to balance. Case in point, I have been on level 50 teams running +4 when I am sked. That means I'm -5, and to be honest hitting things can be an issue. Now you want players to be facing mobs while -6? Add in some mobs can mop up certain teams at +4. +5 is only going to make that a bigger issue. 

It's even worse than that. Anyone SKed to a team fighitng +5s would be a damned good approximation of useless since they would be fighting +6s and that's were the purple patch goes wild. You can see this one live fairly easily if you end up on a team below 50 fighting +4s since as is, you will encounter things which are the difficulty you set and +1 more than that value (so if you're on a 45+4 team, there will be 50s encountered). At +6 every drops off drastically (though it is pretty bad at +5 for that matter) to 1/2 of what you do at +5. 

Edited June 9, 2020 by drbuzzard

[Peacemoon]

I’ve had some fun with enhanced difficulty recently. I tend to run all my TFs as either +2 or +3, and it doesn’t always go down as well as it could. Some people would rather do a quick 30 min Yin TF at +0 with zero challenge, then take an hour to do at +3 with a bit more effort. 
 

Also I was on a Synapse run last weekend where when the leader asked for the difficulty setting, someone shouted out -1 because they just wanted to get it done as quick as possible. I think we ended up at +2.

 

So the difficulty settings argument is one I’ve pushed myself @Chrome, but since I’ve already seen pushback from the limited difficulty we can set already in game, I have a hard time seeing even higher difficulty ever used unless it gives some special badge, or some really big rewards. (For anyone who played WoW, it would be like M+ dungeon runs without the extra rewards..)

 

Also I’ve teamed with a lot more ‘interesting’ players recently, and It’s reminded me of how varied the skill level of the playerbase actually is 😉

 

Back on topic.. I think people should try to relax about nerfs. People do get way too emotional about it. If it’s done properly it will just be some number changes that people will barely notice. TW I am sure will always be one of the strongest sets, it just won’t be quite as strong as before. But your characters will still be very powerful if they already are. So let’s just relax.