Merits: How to drum up redside activity

[RageRaptor]

I think the Homecoming developers should give serious consideration to just removing the mechanical portion of heroes/vigilante/rogue/villian alignment. Just make every quest, trial, task force and area open to every character. 

 

At this point who cares? 99% of players play as rogue or vigilante anyway. I think the biggest reason most people play blueside is just flat out convince, if you want the option of grouping easily you are going to hang out in blue side. If you could do red stories and get invites to blue groups without several zone transitions or vice versa you see a massive increase in redside activity. 

[Coyotedancer]

3 hours ago, Apparition said:

 

No thank you.  While I play red side exclusively, you literally could not pay me to play on Everlasting.

 

Aw, come on over... We don't bite. Much. 😝

[Wavicle]

1 hour ago, RageRaptor said:

I think the Homecoming developers should give serious consideration to just removing the mechanical portion of heroes/vigilante/rogue/villian alignment. Just make every quest, trial, task force and area open to every character. 

 

At this point who cares? 99% of players play as rogue or vigilante anyway. I think the biggest reason most people play blueside is just flat out convince, if you want the option of grouping easily you are going to hang out in blue side. If you could do red stories and get invites to blue groups without several zone transitions or vice versa you see a massive increase in redside activity. 

This ^

[VulnaviaPhibes]

4 hours ago, ZemX said:

 

I find that hard to believe, or else you have a different definition of "quickly" than I do.  I am also on Everlasting.

 

I was just on a Renault SF last night during prime-time evening central US hours that failed to fill the team.  And it's the WST!   We went with 5 and did fine, but the point is, we didn't fill the team and even getting five wasn't "quick".  Some of us were practically begging in LFG before we just gave up and ran.  I think there might have been a MSR and/or Hamidon going on at the time, but regardless, multiple DFBs and fire farms and other blueside TF teams scrolled by, filled, and launched as well while we tried to fill ours.

 

There's just no comparing how easy it is to join OR launch your own team blueside vs. redside.  Even on Everlasting.  Just take a few minutes to watch LFG and count the number of blue team adverts vs. red team adverts some time.  The population might be as much as 1/4 villains on this server, but the number of team adverts is easily ten-to-one blueside, if not more.

"Just join everlasting" was a pretty silly/dumb "solution" for me to propose lol. But I do think that Everlasting's villain population makes forming paper, mayhem, and strike force teams very easy. They just need to advertise more aggressively and be more fun and quirky to get people's attention, since you're competing with good single player content as well as other team content. (I was on that Renault SF as well, as Cervina Dolorosa, and I must say the LFG messages were a bit tepid).

 

I know I was a bit dismissive of the whole argument, and that's not fair, but I do think that it means something that the unofficial RP server also has the highest % of Villain and Praetorian characters. The draw of the Rogue Isles is not rolling through bland missions with huge teams, and Praetoria even less so. Homecoming has a fraction of live's player-base, Redside has a fraction of that, and most of those players are not jumping from big team to big team like blueside players often are. So yes, big teams will form slower, but that's in part due to the nature of the game and the way it's designed, I think.

 

2 hours ago, RageRaptor said:

I think the Homecoming developers should give serious consideration to just removing the mechanical portion of heroes/vigilante/rogue/villian alignment. Just make every quest, trial, task force and area open to every character. 

 

At this point who cares? 99% of players play as rogue or vigilante anyway. I think the biggest reason most people play blueside is just flat out convince, if you want the option of grouping easily you are going to hang out in blue side. If you could do red stories and get invites to blue groups without several zone transitions or vice versa you see a massive increase in redside activity. 

 

I like this idea because it opens up a lot of conceptual space. Your morally grey types, amoral mad scientists and revolutionary freedom fighters and stuff like that, can play the content that makes the most sense for them without having to change their alignments back and forth to get access to it.

 

However I'm not sure it would actually fix the problem of it being hard to find a redside group on most servers. If 99% of players are already rogues or vigilantes, and alignment can be changed instantly in the pocket D, and TUNNEL/bases allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere, then the main mechanical obstacle to redside grouping is already gone. I'm not sure how much more this would do.

 

I think people who've posted about players in most RPGs finding evil content unfun or unpleasant in itself might be hitting the nail on the head, actually. Redside content is fun and well-written and enjoyable, but it's only to the taste of a limited number of players who really love the vibe or really get into character, and that would explain why it's most popular on the rp server, I think.

Edited June 2, 2021 by VulnaviaPhibes

[RageRaptor]

45 minutes ago, VulnaviaPhibes said:

Revoionary freedom fighters and stuff like that, can play the content that makes the most sense for them without having to change their alignments back and forth to get access to it.

 

However I'm not sure it would actually fix the problem of it being hard to find a redside group on most servers. If 99% of players are already rogues or vigilantes, and alignment can be changed instantly in the pocket D, and TUNNEL/bases allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere, then the main mechanical obstacle to redside grouping is already gone. I'm not sure how much more this would do.

 

I think people who've posted about players in most RPGs finding evil content unfun or unpleasant in itself might be hitting the nail on the head, actually. Redside content is fun and well-written and enjoyable, but it's only to the taste of a limited number of players who really love the vibe or really get into character, and that would explain why it's most popular on the rp server, I think.

The problem with it is its not that easy or convenient when a group you actually want to run pops up. You saying "alignment can be changed instantly in the pocket D, and TUNNEL/bases allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere" is completely disingenuous, because it takes minutes to do these things. Most people don't want to ask 7 other people to wait as they:

>leave the mission

>walk to a portal

>teleport to blue side

 

 

All to just to be able to accept to the invite. Sure this isn't a ton of work, but it takes awhile. Awhile for absolutely no reason whatsoever I might add. The reason Red side is so empty all the time is 95% of the player base doesn't level on red side. A huge reason that being invited to a group just takes awhile. This is what I mean by convivence. 

 

A lot of people not liking the content is probably true. However, I think a lot of people realize that choosing to play red is basically choosing to be completely unable to interact with the majority of players. 

[Snarky]

new perspective.  please do not play redside.  us villains like to be left alone in our misery and torment.

[Hew]

I was told "hey, advertise!" so I spent 30 minutes advertising a Mr G mish that involved killing 2 of the new praetorians. Several attempts to solo it failed. Noone even suggested any interest, in all of 30 minutes.

 

In the end, I had to wait for some gfriends to log on to join me.

 

😐

 

(3-330 pm EST for the curious)

Edited June 2, 2021 by Hew

[Apparition]

27 minutes ago, Hew said:

I was told "hey, advertise!" so I spent 30 minutes advertising a Mr G mish that involved killing 2 of the new praetorians. Several attempts to solo it failed. Noone even suggested any interest, in all of 30 minutes.

 

In the end, I had to wait for some gfriends to log on to join me.

 

😐

 

(3-330 pm EST for the curious)

 

 

Out of curiosity, did you state that you needed help with it?  I know that I am a weirdo, but as I said before, I don't join mission arc teams unless someone needs help with it.  I doubt that I am the only one.

[tidge]

1 hour ago, Snarky said:

new perspective.  please do not play redside.  us villains like to be left alone in our misery and torment.

 

This is pretty much how I feel at this point.

[Snarky]

50 minutes ago, Hew said:

I was told "hey, advertise!" so I spent 30 minutes advertising a Mr G mish that involved killing 2 of the new praetorians. Several attempts to solo it failed. Noone even suggested any interest, in all of 30 minutes.

 

In the end, I had to wait for some gfriends to log on to join me.

 

😐

 

(3-330 pm EST for the curious)

I suggest next time you go to Help channel and ask something like "Can someone please help with a boss I keep failing on?"  On Excelsior I answer these type of requests regularly and there are usually 2-5 other people that show up as well.

 

Asking for Help is viewed differently than asking if anyone is interested in running X content for no merits and usually little experience (by and large only primary team leader gets reward merits if any)  Asking for Help will get...Help.

[Hew]

11 hours ago, Snarky said:

I suggest next time you go to Help channel and ask something like "Can someone please help with a boss I keep failing on?"  On Excelsior I answer these type of requests regularly and there are usually 2-5 other people that show up as well.

 

Asking for Help is viewed differently than asking if anyone is interested in running X content for no merits and usually little experience (by and large only primary team leader gets reward merits if any)  Asking for Help will get...Help.

 

Hm, I can see the point about asking on /help, but my intent was to continue through the arc as well, and I felt that asking for help on a single mish would have been disingenuous, as the arc continues with some hard targets. Had it just been one mish, that would have been different and definitely been a /help, but I would not have felt right saying "hey, i need help with the remnants of this arc because lots of hard targets", figuring I would have been directed to lfg as being more appropriate.

 

Plus, we (gfriends+) ended up running red content that had nothing to do with the arc anyway, so lfg(mates) was really what I was after, if that makes sense. 

 

edit: Didn't notice @Apparition's post, but this is in line with part of my problem. I am exclusively running arcs redside, to, you know, enjoy the content, and I bet from responses on lfg, this is a common stance. These are, after all, not Tinamac or MJ mishs where you get a tangible reward (accolade) for killing a ton of AVs.

Edited June 3, 2021 by Hew

[Snarky]

25 minutes ago, Hew said:

 

Hm, I can see the point about asking on /help, but my intent was to continue through the arc as well, and I felt that asking for help on a single mish would have been disingenuous, as the arc continues with some hard targets. Had it just been one mish, that would have been different and definitely been a /help, but I would not have felt right saying "hey, i need help with the remnants of this arc because lots of hard targets", figuring I would have been directed to lfg as being more appropriate.

 

Plus, we (gfriends+) ended up running red content that had nothing to do with the arc anyway, so lfg(mates) was really what I was after, if that makes sense. 

 

edit: Didn't notice @Apparition's post, but this is in line with part of my problem. I am exclusively running arcs redside, to, you know, enjoy the content, and I bet from responses on lfg, this is a common stance. These are, after all, not Tinamac or MJ mishs where you get a tangible reward (accolade) for killing a ton of AVs.

then i would have taken a shot at asking for Help with that "tough arc i cannot solo, 5 missions to go,, any help available?"  If I was in game and not otherwise occupied I might jump in.  Same with other veterans.  Asking for what you need (exactly what you need) increases the likelihood of getting it.  

 

Redside has and always will be less populated.  Dealing with it as such is a heck of  lot smarter than coming to the forums with nebulous possible solutions the Devs might use, as most of this thread seems to be...errrr focused? on.  

 

One of the tools we have as a community is the global communications.  Learning to use it effectively and clearly, while not a Panacea I/O, can change the situation for the better.

[BZRKR]

13 hours ago, Snarky said:

new perspective.  please do not play redside.  us villains like to be left alone in our misery and torment.

Logged in to thumbsup this 🙂

Next week, could you post this as a new "Thread in the General Discussion section that folks chase each other around their circular arguments for several pages" topic?

[ZemX]

15 hours ago, VulnaviaPhibes said:

However I'm not sure it would actually fix the problem of it being hard to find a redside group on most servers. If 99% of players are already rogues or vigilantes, and alignment can be changed instantly in the pocket D, and TUNNEL/bases allow you to teleport anywhere from anywhere, then the main mechanical obstacle to redside grouping is already gone. I'm not sure how much more this would do.

 

Have you played a Rogue much?  It doesn't take me more than a day as a Rogue trying to team blueside to run into "I can't invite you" problems even when I am already in a blue zone.  Even people running ITFs (which is a co-op zone) say it's more convenient to be blueside and invite blue-siders because they don't run into issues inviting them as they make their way to Cimerora.

 

These might seem like little things, but when they keep happening, they convince people, "Well... why don't I just be a vigilante instead if it's less annoying?"

 

There is also the idea that it would benefit redside to have more people able to run contacts there whenever the mood strikes.  Not having to visit Null to do that just makes it easier and therefore more likely to happen.

 

It's by no means going to completely balance the sides.  But any improvement would be nice.

[Snarky]

21 minutes ago, ZemX said:

 

Have you played a Rogue much?  It doesn't take me more than a day as a Rogue trying to team blueside to run into "I can't invite you" problems even when I am already in a blue zone.  Even people running ITFs (which is a co-op zone) say it's more convenient to be blueside and invite blue-siders because they don't run into issues inviting them as they make their way to Cimerora.

 

These might seem like little things, but when they keep happening, they convince people, "Well... why don't I just be a vigilante instead if it's less annoying?"

 

There is also the idea that it would benefit redside to have more people able to run contacts there whenever the mood strikes.  Not having to visit Null to do that just makes it easier and therefore more likely to happen.

 

It's by no means going to completely balance the sides.  But any improvement would be nice.

This is a real issue.  Not that lack of Redside activity is not a real issue...to some people.  

 

Let me preface my response with a statement.  This applies to almost everything I say on the boards as well.  I am ignorant about the details I am addressing.  These are my opinions.  They are colored by my experiences and my feelings.  I am just a person reflecting on my situation and what I think might be going on.

 

This game was build as two similar but separate platforms.  Heroes, Villains.  Then a third was added, because we needed politics evidently.  The Going Rogue code was laid over these two creaky codebases as best as could be done.  It...it ain't perfect.  Most of the zones are written at different times by different people, copying, modifying, or creating new parts to make what they needed.  Looking at you Cim.  For whatever reason Rogues get a crappy run on team invites.  I encounter it ALL THE TIME.  And I miss teaming/League opportunities regularly due to this.  Grrrr.

 

I am 99.9% sure the Devs know the issue well.  I am 99.8% sure they would fix it if it was easy.  I am 85% sure this might involve detailed line by line parsing of code to figure out what in the snarl is causing the issue. They ain't paid.

 

I still choose Rogue.  I coose a Dark/Dark Blaster not because it is the 'best sets', for me I do not think they are.  But they are the perfect sets for my concept.  Same with Alignment.  I would prefer villain, but I nod to the fact this is an MMORPG and try to team.

[ZemX]

15 minutes ago, Snarky said:

I am 99.9% sure the Devs know the issue well.  I am 99.8% sure they would fix it if it was easy. 

 

Wouldn't surprise me.  Just the fact you don't always get booted from a blue team for visiting Ouro or your base means it's less of an intended behavior and more of a bug that depends on whatever corner case of team-makeup, current objective, or phase of the moon causes the game to say "you're outta here!" when it really shouldn't.  The only time I avoid issues is when I am in the same zone as the leader.  But if it's a PI radio team, even if I am standing in PI when I ask to be invited, it can fail if the leader is in a mission map off of PI.

 

The "slap a band-aid on it" solution I thought of was to essentially make Null the Gull's rogue/vigilante swapping automatic when you travel between red and blue zones, but it's a bit ugly since it would constantly be swapping some of your badges too.  You like to think of yourself as Positron's Betrayer because that guy is just a sappy hero right? Then you visit Steel Canyon and everyone is saying, "There goes Snarky, I hear he's Positron's Ally!"

 

But it might be neat if it could be added as another Null option.  "Automatic side switching for Viliglantes and Rogues".

[Apparition]

100% of my characters from level 35+ on are Rogue.  The ones who aren't Rogue below level 35 are gold side.  I don't team for regular missions, but I have had very few game-related issues whatsoever teaming for TFs/SFs/Trials.  When I form a TF/SF/Trial, I ask for whoever wants an invite to let me know when he or she enters the zone I am in, and then I'll invite.  Some people don't understand why I won't invite them right away, so I explain that I am a villain and he or she is a dirty hero.  I've had I think two or three people in the past two years not accept that explanation and demand an invite before getting into the zone.  So I just invited someone else instead, as he or she was obviously not worth playing with to begin with.  For TFs/SFs/Trials that I didn't lead, I always explain to the team leader that I am a villain and will be there in a minute.  I think I've also had two or three people in the past two years not accept that, so I just put the person on global ignore and went about my day.

[ZemX]

5 minutes ago, Apparition said:

I have had very few game-related issues whatsoever teaming for TFs/SFs/Trials

 

Yeah, because you're doing a bunch of things no one playing blueside joining blue teams has to worry about.  I already do this too.   I don't even bother to message the team leader until I am in the same zone they are.  Even if it means missing the team, it's more convenient for them not to have to deal with my issues when they'd rather just right click and punch "invite" to all the incoming tells.   I also already avoid going to my base or Ouro when everyone else on the team is using that as a means to get to the next door faster. 

 

That's the entire point of this suggestion.  Remove those last few annoyances so rogues don't have to tip-toe through a minefield to team blueside and maybe more people would consider playing rogues and thus be running more redside teams on occasion too.  And it's no skin off the backs of anyone who doesn't care about cross-teaming or doesn't like playing redside because it doesn't affect them.

[RageRaptor]

47 minutes ago, ZemX said:

 

Yeah, because you're doing a bunch of things no one playing blueside joining blue teams has to worry about.  I already do this too.   I don't even bother to message the team leader until I am in the same zone they are.  Even if it means missing the team, it's more convenient for them not to have to deal with my issues when they'd rather just right click and punch "invite" to all the incoming tells.   I also already avoid going to my base or Ouro when everyone else on the team is using that as a means to get to the next door faster. 

 

That's the entire point of this suggestion.  Remove those last few annoyances so rogues don't have to tip-toe through a minefield to team blueside and maybe more people would consider playing rogues and thus be running more redside teams on occasion too.  And it's no skin off the backs of anyone who doesn't care about cross-teaming or doesn't like playing redside because it doesn't affect them.

 

Thank you for further explaining this. At the end of the day we can posite a million reasons as to why red side is so underpopulated.

 

Astetic

Personal morality

Self propagating population on blue side

Nostalgia

 

But its completely inarguable to say that unreliable and inconvenient mechanics play a large role in this. These mechanics only exist because NCSoft originally wanted two monthly fees, realized people wouldn't double pay, and tried to make a fix out hopes and spit.

 

Just have everyone be a vigilante in the games code and change the red/rogue only missions to be vigilante missions.

 

I know this is a ton of work, but if the developers would seriously want to make red side more appealing this is it. 

 

 

Edited June 3, 2021 by RageRaptor

[Apparition]

54 minutes ago, RageRaptor said:

 

But its completely inarguable to say that unreliable and inconvenient mechanics play a large role in this. These mechanics only exist because NCSoft originally wanted two monthly fees, realized people wouldn't double pay, and tried to make a fix out hopes and spit.

 

 

Uhh…. You can justifiably say a lot of negative things about NCSoft, but they never ever charged separate subscription fees for City of Heroes and City of Villains.  They were each stand alone games, but only required one monthly subscription.

[golstat2003]

5 hours ago, Apparition said:

 

 

Uhh…. You can justifiably say a lot of negative things about NCSoft, but they never ever charged separate subscription fees for City of Heroes and City of Villains.  They were each stand alone games, but only required one monthly subscription.

 

Correct.

 

The move to start separating the divisions between the sides really started when the devs saw how futile it was to have separate markets, from what I recall.

 

I agree with others in this thread, just remove the final barriers and let everyone run what ever mission, tf, sf wherever they want and invite whoever the want.

 

We can keep the side icons for flavor.

[Bionic_Flea]

22 hours ago, Apparition said:

Out of curiosity, did you state that you needed help with it?  I know that I am a weirdo, but as I said before, I don't join mission arc teams unless someone needs help with it.  I doubt that I am the only one.

I agree with Apparition and Snarky.  I mostly solo because I work from home and have a family so I sometimes have to leave for a few minutes . . . sometimes more than a few.  So I don't impose my crazy schedule issues on anyone and run TFs and other stuff when I know I have a steady block of time. 

 

Therefore, I ignore most of the LFG chatter.  But if I see a request for help to defeat a boss/EB/AV or whatever and I have the time I will always offer to help.

 

Also: not all advertising is created equal.  

Edited June 3, 2021 by Bionic_Flea

[Naraka]

On 6/2/2021 at 3:17 PM, RageRaptor said:

I think the Homecoming developers should give serious consideration to just removing the mechanical portion of heroes/vigilante/rogue/villian alignment. Just make every quest, trial, task force and area open to every character. 

 

At this point who cares? 99% of players play as rogue or vigilante anyway. I think the biggest reason most people play blueside is just flat out convince, if you want the option of grouping easily you are going to hang out in blue side. If you could do red stories and get invites to blue groups without several zone transitions or vice versa you see a massive increase in redside activity. 

While I could see this as a means of "fixing" certain issues with team invites and participation in TF/SF, I think that would end up being pretty boring.

 

To amend your suggestion, I would like more content for all alignments sprinkled through every zone.  So you'd actually have villain contacts in Paragon and hero contacts in RI but the same would be for Rogues and Vigilantes with more of the type of mission context to reflect the setting.  

[siolfir]

On 6/1/2021 at 11:20 PM, Twisted Toon said:

You would probably need to make the CoV released ATs Redside start only again as well.

 

But then, I'd only be Redside for as long as it took me to morality mission my way Blueside.

Yeah, I mentioned that a few posts above this one. And to clarify my opinion on it, I wasn't suggesting it as a good idea, it was mostly a tongue-in-cheek response to the rest of the list (which I felt wouldn't really work, people already don't do WSTs redside) because it would be exactly like you say here: many people would simply look at it as a slog to get back to Paragon and wouldn't attempt anymore redside content than they had to. It was one step down from the next hyperbolic suggestion of "more people would play redside if all the tutorials except Breakout were disabled," which again, I am not advocating for (although it would, in conjunction with the other suggestions about disabling Null the Gull's instant alignment switch, would certainly boost the low-level villain population).

 

To respond to some of the newer posts, I do think that getting rid of alignment restrictions on teaming and all non-PvP zones across the board is a good idea, as is having more villain/rogue content in Paragon, and more hero/vigilante content in the Rogue Isles, either by new contacts (a lot of work), or even relocating some existing contacts that might fit in a different location (which would likely cause a riot). But getting rid of the alignments themselves? Nah, and not just because Frenzy is the best alignment power (I never use it - I run rogues mostly or heroes because I play MMOs to team); it's because that is supposed to represent that character, malleable though it may be. I also think Praetorians should be able to keep their alignments even if they come through the portal for Paragon or the Rogue Isles, although that would probably be a mess with the alignment-related tips and morality missions.