Zone Travel Updates in Issue 27

[carroto]

I'm still waiting to see how I settle into this new game world.  So far I'm finding myself hesitating to go places or do things that I would have before because it would use up one of my fast travel options, put it on cooldown.  Too many times already I've done that and then when I need to go somewhere else, none of the options are charged.  Maybe I'll adjust, find better and more efficient ways to use the options available.  I suspect that instead I'll adjust my play style to be less free.  To do less.

 

If someone is advertising a GM is up and wants help taking it down, well that will take one 10-minute cooldown to get there, and another to return.  After that I'm out of most good options for getting around for 10 minutes.  Might not be worth it.  Same if someone is asking for help taking down a tough AV.  Sorry buddy but if I help you I'll be hoofing it out of there after.  I've got my own business to handle.

 

I don't have tens of millions of inf to grant to each of my alts to gain all the fast travel options, so they'll probably just get the 1 million ones.  That means mission TP at 30 minute cooldown, and base TP at 10 minute cooldown.  Plus LRT that's two options per 10 minutes.

[Wavicle]

14 minutes ago, carroto said:

I'm still waiting to see how I settle into this new game world.  So far I'm finding myself hesitating to go places or do things that I would have before because it would use up one of my fast travel options, put it on cooldown.  Too many times already I've done that and then when I need to go somewhere else, none of the options are charged.  Maybe I'll adjust, find better and more efficient ways to use the options available.  I suspect that instead I'll adjust my play style to be less free.  To do less.

 

If someone is advertising a GM is up and wants help taking it down, well that will take one 10-minute cooldown to get there, and another to return.  After that I'm out of most good options for getting around for 10 minutes.  Might not be worth it.  Same if someone is asking for help taking down a tough AV.  Sorry buddy but if I help you I'll be hoofing it out of there after.  I've got my own business to handle.

 

I don't have tens of millions of inf to grant to each of my alts to gain all the fast travel options, so they'll probably just get the 1 million ones.  That means mission TP at 30 minute cooldown, and base TP at 10 minute cooldown.  Plus LRT that's two options per 10 minutes.

You forgot the day job badge portals. You can have more options.

 

plus the zones you’re going to have portals in them. Just go to them.

Edited December 1, 2020 by Wavicle

[Megajoule]

1 hour ago, Wavicle said:

You forgot the day job badge portals. You can have more options.

 

plus the zones you’re going to have portals in them. Just go to them.

but those are all the way over therrrrre...

[carroto]

2 hours ago, Wavicle said:

You forgot the day job badge portals.

As was pointed out up-thread when this was offered as a solution, using the day job portals as a regular solution means logging out in an appropriate location to charge them up after every play session, excluding progress on all other day jobs.  I guess it's a good solution if you don't care about that.

[Wavicle]

Just now, carroto said:

As was pointed out up-thread when this was offered as a solution, using the day job portals as a regular solution means logging out in an appropriate location to charge them up after every play session, excluding progress on all other day jobs.  I guess it's a good solution if you don't care about that.

That’s a silly exaggeration. That assumes that you’re going to use up All your charges all the time. I play a LOT and I have yet to find a point at which I don’t have some option available or a Base Portal, TUNNEL, train, ferry, or some other easy hub nearby.

[carroto]

4 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

I have yet to find a point at which I don’t have some option available

It has certainly happened to me but as I said originally, maybe I just need to adjust to the new way of things and I'll reach this point as well.  So far it's not looking good.  There may be be a bit of psychology at play here, I'm not sure.  It may be that with some smart micro-management it's possible to have play sessions that are as free from restriction as before.  However when I think of a limited number of charges given the amount of jumping around I used to do, I don't see any way they could bring it back.

 

Maybe it comes down to a hoarder mentality.  I remember discussions on the original boards about how many people struggled against themselves to use inspirations.  They wouldn't want to use them now because "I might need them later."  Maybe they'd use a few, but then they'd achieve an optimal load and wouldn't want to mess it up.  I suspect that these are the same people who don't find the idea of limited transport charges to be comforting.  Maybe that's a factor, or maybe some of us just move around more than you do.

 

One extra factor that may cause my experience to be different I just thought of.  I play mostly red-side.  I switch to rogue early on so I can join blue-side teams.  However they usually can't invite me unless I'm in a blue zone.  So if someone advertises for a blue TF or other team, I usually tend to head to the appropriate zone before messaging for an invite.  Sometimes the team will fill before I get there.  Oh well, it happens, I'll just go back to what I was doing.  Except that's two trips right there in seconds that uses two fast travel options.  So now I have to weigh that in.  If the team is already almost full, maybe I won't bother.  Yes I know I could message them first to reserve my spot, but a lot of people who play exclusively blue side don't seem to understand how that works, why they can't invite me and it becomes a whole thing having to explain why it's failing.  Much easier to zone in first and then it just works.

 

You are free to believe that I and others "shouldn't" be bothered by the new status because for you it's fine.  It's only now that things have changed again that I've started to become fully aware of how /EBFP changed things for me.  Travel has always been a low-level annoyance for me.  Like most people, I avoid things I find unpleasant.  It may not be something that I consciously think about, but on some level there's an implicit cost-benefit analysis.  If there's something going on over there I might like to do, the enjoyment I would get from doing it gets weighed against the annoyance of getting there and back.  /EBFP tipped the scales for me.  It caused things to be much more open and free.  I ended up doing more, joining more.  Now I feel myself drifting back to my old way of thinking about things.  I've got to really want it or I don't want to risk ending up with no good way to get somewhere.

 

 

[Wavicle]

the devs datamining showed that three portals in 10 minutes would cover 95% of usages. So between LRT, Base Transporter, and Supergroup Portal, that’s what they’ve given us. It’s possible that you might be in that 5%.

[carroto]

28 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

the devs datamining showed that three portals in 10 minutes would cover 95% of usages.

If that's so then I have to wonder what the argument is against lowering the recharge on those powers.  It wouldn't have any effect on 95% of people.  Were those 5% up to something nefarious?  I did admit that I play mostly red-side, so maybe this was intentional.

[Wavicle]

All these questions have been asked and answered multiple times. If you search on here for the dev Faultline you can find the answers to these questions. I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with victimizing red side players.

[Luminara]

13 minutes ago, carroto said:

Maybe it comes down to a hoarder mentality.  I remember discussions on the original boards about how many people struggled against themselves to use inspirations.  They wouldn't want to use them now because "I might need them later."  Maybe they'd use a few, but then they'd achieve an optimal load and wouldn't want to mess it up.  I suspect that these are the same people who don't find the idea of limited transport charges to be comforting.  Maybe that's a factor, or maybe some of us just move around more than you do.

 

*raises hand*

 

I know how readily inspirations drop.  I have an e-mail box stuffed with tier 3 inspirations.  I have inf* coming out of my orifices, so I can afford more inspirations if I have to buy them.  And when I do use them, it's grudgingly and with great dissatisfaction.

 

I don't have the same mentality regarding the LRT or Ouroboros portal.  I know those are going to recharge, I know they're conveniences, I know using them isn't skewing my perception of my characters' performance or ability, I know the game is less irritating when I don't have to hoof it from the ass end of Boomtown/Crey's Folly/wherever to the nearest transit location, and I know I'm not going to finish missions in such a short time that I'll need more than those two.  I'm fine with both the way they are, and fine with using them.

 

I can't address the effect of day job base portals with charges.  I don't have a base, nor any inclination to use anyone else's base, so I haven't made those a priority.  I have one character accumulating time toward that day job so I can use it a few times to see what it does, but it won't impact my play in any way because it's not relevant or useful to me.  Same applies to the P2W powers, which I've only taken on one character and immediately revoked after reading the full description and power info because they didn't fulfill any of my particular needs.

[Ironblade]

4 hours ago, carroto said:

If someone is advertising a GM is up and wants help taking it down, well that will take one 10-minute cooldown to get there, and another to return.  After that I'm out of most good options for getting around for 10 minutes.  Might not be worth it.  Same if someone is asking for help taking down a tough AV.  Sorry buddy but if I help you I'll be hoofing it out of there after.  I've got my own business to handle.

In all of your posts addressing this, you seem to forget the existence of the Ouroboros Portal, which has a cooldown of FIVE minutes.

Due to the shorter cooldown, that's usually MY first choice when I need to go somewhere.

[macskull]

1 hour ago, Ironblade said:

In all of your posts addressing this, you seem to forget the existence of the Ouroboros Portal, which has a cooldown of FIVE minutes.

Due to the shorter cooldown, that's usually MY first choice when I need to go somewhere.

Not only is it just five minutes, it's also affected by global recharge (which means it's sometimes more like half that) and if you use it to get to Talos it drops you on the hill right by the train, base portal, and Wentworths. You can also use Ouroboros to quick-travel to zones by starting an arc with a contact in a certain zone and then quitting the TF after teleporting to the contact (granted this only works when solo and not on a task force, but if you're on a team you should have enough people with base TP/mission TP powers where the cooldowns shouldn't be an issue).

Edited December 2, 2020 by macskull

[SwitchFade]

*blinks*

 

Hiya. Thank God for the portal changes and removal of the pseudo-exploit, good show!

 

On another tangent... Let's discuss economics.

 

*Giggle*

[Luminara]

5 hours ago, SwitchFade said:

On another tangent... Let's discuss economics.

 

Beat you to it!

 

 

 

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

[Grouchybeast]

On 11/30/2020 at 11:26 PM, Luminara said:

 

The biggest problem with both approaches, simply lowering the recharge time of LRT or allowing players to incrementally reduce it in various ways, is that it devalues the relevant P2W powers.  The P2W powers are necessary, and having players incentivized to purchase them is also necessary, for the HC team's inflationary control measures to succeed in the long term.  This is vital for the growth and future development of the game.  Without control, inflation will spiral right back up to the way it was on the original servers.

Having seen the numbers that were posted about how much was spent at the P2W vendor, it doesn't really seem worth worrying about.  It's absolutely trivial as far as the bigger picture is concerned.

[ivanhedgehog]

On 11/29/2020 at 8:13 AM, Flintlock Burnfur said:

I've always been a badge collector in this game, now and back on live.  And I honestly don't know why people think it's a grind, yet they don't complain about plowing through hordes of Council for hours on end.  Sure, I pretty much know where every badge is without Vidiotmaps help, but I still go to each and still get a memory sparked from getting to the southern most badge in Kings Row or the badge to the east of the Icon in Steel Canyon.  I have good memories of just finding badges from back on live, and I'm making new discoveries now that HC has brought it back.

 

And there's stuff here in Paragon and the Rogue Isles (and Praetoria, sure) that I have honestly missed back on Live, and I've run across it now.  It's like playing Skyrim for the umpteenth time, and discovering there was a quest in one location that throughout every other playthrough you've never done.  It's refreshing and brings new life to things.

 

I'm very much more of a casual player, and while I play casually, I still trick out my toons so they can survive and fight.  And I've done pretty darn well with my two level 50s (and three more who are quickly making the trek to that level cap).  Badge hunting is just a part of that entire gaming experience.  Atlas Park is a breeze to get all the badges for.  By the time you hit Kings Row, you should have a travel power.  Skyway City may be the more challenging of the zones to collect badges in, but I always collected them in Skyway as part of completing missions in that zone.  My mission's here at this door and there's two exploration badges and a plaque nearby, gonna pick 'em up.

 

The changes to the way we all teleport are entirely fine as far as I'm concerned.  I never used them that often unless I had to go through a base.  And any time I needed to go through a base during a mission sweep involved going to the base teleporter in the zone, not using the /ebfp command line.  I've said previously that I have used it, but that was to show off base construction.

 

There's a lotta things to see in this game, and just teleporting around without actually exploring tends to miss a lot.

How about it if they made you unlock it with pvp kills? would you understand people not wanting to have to do a game mode they dont enjoy that way?

[Lockpick]

21 minutes ago, ivanhedgehog said:

How about it if they made you unlock it with pvp kills? would you understand people not wanting to have to do a game mode they dont enjoy that way?

I thinking using travel and exploration to reduce the recharge of a travel power is pretty thematic.

 

I would also suggest that adding pvp gates to unlock pvp content would be thematic. 

 

For example, in order to unlock a pvp stealth power that can be purchased from the vendor you have to spend an hour in a pvp zone.  Just an example, I'm not suggesting this happen.

 

I would suggest using pvp gates to reduce the recharge of a travel power is not at all thematic.

 

In both cases, if someone wanted the reward they would have to earn it in game.  If they did not believe the reward was worth the effort they wouldn't do it.  Nothing unreasonable with that position.

 

Another example: There are 9 Hero accolade powers that can be earned.  I typically go for the 4 passives and do not go after the others because the effort vs. reward is not good for me.  It may be for others.  There is nothing unreasonable with that position.

 

	Power	Effect
	The Atlas Medallion	Auto: Self +5 Max Endurance
	Crey CBX-9 Pistol	Click: Ranged Moderate DoT(Cold) Foe: Immobilize -Speed -Recharge
	Elusive Mind	Click: Self +25% Defense(Psionic), +7.5% Resistance(Psionic)
	Eye of the Magus	Click: Self +Resistance(All but Psionics) +Defense(All but Psionics)
	Freedom Phalanx Reserve	Auto: +10% Max HP
	Geas of the Kind Ones	Click: Self +Recharge +Recovery +Accuracy -Defense
	Portable Workbench	Special (Summon Portable Workbench)
	Portal Jockey	Auto: Self +5% Max HP +5 Max Endurance
	Task Force Commander	Auto: Self +5% Max HP
	Vanguard Medal	Click: Self +Special(doubles Disorient, Hold, Immobilize, Fear, Confuse and Sleep effects)

 

 

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, Grouchybeast said:

Having seen the numbers that were posted about how much was spent at the P2W vendor, it doesn't really seem worth worrying about.  It's absolutely trivial as far as the bigger picture is concerned.

Since those numbers come from the devs and they have all the Other relevant numbers, I’m going to say you’re probably wrong on this.

[Darmian]

Are folk complaining about having to explore for badges to get ....really?  It's a WORLD.  Go play in it. 

[Darmian]

2 minutes ago, Krimson said:

What if we got rid of the open world altogether, and just had a text based lobby with instances? 😄

ROFLMAO

[Doc_Scorpion]

10 minutes ago, Krimson said:

What if we got rid of the open world altogether, and just had a text based lobby with instances?

Even back in the OG days, there seemed to me to be a significant number of people who thought that if you added an ICON, a trainer, and a Wentie's rep to Ouroboros...  that would be just about perfection.

[Flintlock Burnfur]

1 hour ago, ivanhedgehog said:

How about it if they made you unlock it with pvp kills? would you understand people not wanting to have to do a game mode they dont enjoy that way?

Comparing pvp with getting exploration badges are two very different time sinks.

 

What you're just explaining is that you're too lazy to get exploration badges.

[Luminara]

6 hours ago, Grouchybeast said:

Having seen the numbers that were posted about how much was spent at the P2W vendor, it doesn't really seem worth worrying about.  It's absolutely trivial as far as the bigger picture is concerned.

 

Those numbers were for a single server, not all five, and not for the entirety of the HC server group's existence.  It isn't trivial, and the longevity of the game is the bigger picture.  I'm sure @SwitchFade would be delighted to explain the benefits and methodology of controlling inflation, if you'd prefer to hear this from someone with a degree.

[Grouchybeast]

Just now, Luminara said:

 

Those numbers were for a single server, not all five, and not for the entirety of the HC server group's existence.  It isn't trivial, and the longevity of the game is the bigger picture.  I'm sure @SwitchFade would be delighted to explain the benefits and methodology of controlling inflation, if you'd prefer to hear this from someone with a degree.

I understand inflation.  I'm just saying that when fire brutes had farmed over twelve million hours at level 50 by March this year, that a trillion inf taken out of the economy here or there is not as big a deal as it sounds.  As Jimmy said, it's not nothing, but it's not huge.

 

Put it this way: if you say that fire farming generates a hundred thousand inf per minute, which is ten times less than the usual most conservative estimates I've seen, then a trillion inf would be 1.3% of the inf that fire brutes alone had generated by March.  Having inf sinks is important, but the P2W vendor is probably not what's keeping prices on the AH low at the moment. 

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, Grouchybeast said:

I understand inflation.  I'm just saying that when fire brutes had farmed over twelve million hours at level 50 by March this year, that a trillion inf taken out of the economy here or there is not as big a deal as it sounds.  As Jimmy said, it's not nothing, but it's not huge.

 

Put it this way: if you say that fire farming generates a hundred thousand inf per minute, which is ten times less than the usual most conservative estimates I've seen, then a trillion inf would be 1.3% of the inf that fire brutes alone had generated by March.  Having inf sinks is important, but the P2W vendor is probably not what's keeping prices on the AH low at the moment. 

It’s one tool among several. They work in concert.