+5 Level 34+ Blue Side Respec Trial

[Apparition]

The last time that the respec trials were the WSTs, I led a +4 level 34+ blue side respec trial.  While in the reactor room, some of the mobs went up to +6.  So it got me thinking.

 

There is a bug in the game where if you set a level 49 or below mission to +4x9999 (or actually any team size number greater than eight), the game will get confused and make all of the mobs +5.  What happens if the level 34+ blue side respec trial is ran at +5?  Will some of the mobs go up to +7?

 

I led one tonight.  I had eight people, half of which were PUGs.  We were all level 43, and the Freakshow in the first two missions were all level 48 or 49.  That’s right, +6.  When it came time for the last mission, the mobs ranged from level 48 to level 50.  That’s right, +7. 
 

Here is the thing though…  It actually wasn’t difficult.  During the whole trial, we only had three deaths.  One was me because I was completely drained of endurance by a couple of Super Stunners.  There was little amount of  tactics, even against +7s.  It was just a slog as the mobs took forever to be kill… defeated, especially the level 50 Freakshow bosses.

 

So for those who have been clamoring for +5 or +6… It’s possible in game now.  Even +7.  But all it is is a slog, not difficult nor a challenge.  It’s not the way to go.  Challenge will and must come from new mechanics and better use of powers by mobs.

 

 

 

 

 

[Lens Perchance]

How do you set the team size higher than 8?

[Apparition]

4 hours ago, Lens Perchance said:

How do you set the team size higher than 8?

 

/setdifficultyteamsize x

 

X being in this case 9999 but, as I said, any number of 9 or greater will do the trick.

[TheZag]

And then the fire farmers all started making lvl 49 fire farm missions.

[Apparition]

13 minutes ago, TheZag said:

And then the fire farmers all started making lvl 49 fire farm missions.

 

 

😄  Nah.  That was the hot craze back in 2019 and early 2020, but those days are over now that double INF while malefactored is gone.  It just wouldn't be worth it.  Like I said, it was a slog, and farming is about easy rewards.  The extra time investment in defeating +5s isn't worth it.  I was just crazy and wanted to see if getting +7s was possible.  Turns out that it is!

[Yomo Kimyata]

Is there a similar command to set relative difficulty level (e.g., -1 or +3)?

 

[Apparition]

6 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

Is there a similar command to set relative difficulty level (e.g., -1 or +3)?

 

 

 

/setdifficultylevel x

 

X can be -1, 0, 1, 2, 3, or 4.

[Doomguide2005]

23 hours ago, Apparition said:

The last time that the respec trials were the WSTs, I led a +4 level 34+ blue side respec trial.  While in the reactor room, some of the mobs went up to +6.  So it got me thinking.

 

There is a bug in the game where if you set a level 49 or below mission to +4x9999 (or actually any team size number greater than eight), the game will get confused and make all of the mobs +5.  What happens if the level 34+ blue side respec trial is ran at +5?  Will some of the mobs go up to +7?

 

I led one tonight.  I had eight people, half of which were PUGs.  We were all level 43, and the Freakshow in the first two missions were all level 48 or 49.  That’s right, +6.  When it came time for the last mission, the mobs ranged from level 48 to level 50.  That’s right, +7. 
 

Here is the thing though…  It actually wasn’t difficult.  During the whole trial, we only had three deaths.  One was me because I was completely drained of endurance by a couple of Super Stunners.  There was little amount of  tactics, even against +7s.  It was just a slog as the mobs took forever to be kill… defeated, especially the level 50 Freakshow bosses.

 

So for those who have been clamoring for +5 or +6… It’s possible in game now.  Even +7.  But all it is is a slog, not difficult nor a challenge.  It’s not the way to go.  Challenge will and must come from new mechanics and better use of powers by mobs.

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, a +7 hits a harder but has less of a to hit buff than an Incarnate foe.   The accuracy bonus hits 1.5 vs +5's but then no longer increases so +7's are still 1.5×.  Mostly the Purple Patch destroys your damage output and increasingly trivializes debuffs so it takes a lot longer to defeat even a minion, nevermind a boss.  So even a +7 incarnate boss is still going to face a softcapped Tanker who still has the his resistance capped at 90% and might make him get colorful compared to normal but nothing that can't be handled.  But what has happened is the purple patch means instead of 48% of your damage the +4 would take the +7 only takes 8% (or 1000 -> 480 vs 1000 -> 80).  That's roughly 6 times longer.

[Xenosone]

Ive noticed with Best side sf's that the enemies start at the max level of the tf and go from there. Worstside tf's actually scale to your level then goes from there depending on your settings which is always +0 because blueside is weak.

[Snarky]

On 6/27/2021 at 11:19 PM, Apparition said:

 

 

So for those who have been clamoring for +5 or +6… It’s possible in game now.  Even +7.  But all it is is a slog, not difficult nor a challenge.  It’s not the way to go.  Challenge will and must come from new mechanics and better use of powers by mobs.

 

It is NOT a challenge.  Inviting me to a 50 Khan TF in LFG then telling me it is +4 after it starts.  Why the F do I want to spend 20-30 minutes on the last fight to satisfy your ego?  The only challenge is not killing someone in frustration afterward and draining the corpse of blood.  I can only hide so many bodies in one week!

 

You want a challenge?  Try to get a group of regulars to team on low level content using SOs.  Old school style.  Get that running for a few months.  THAT is a challenge.  Snaring people into a long fight against a giant Health Amoeba?  Pffft.  literally the definition of childish.

 

[Hedgefund]

I was putzing around with /setdifficultyteamsize recently, based on just discovering this thread, when I noticed something unusual, neither xp nor inf changed when I went from +4 to +5.

 

As luck would have it I happen to have a toon at 47 which allowed me to Ex down with a 50 and the higher level is still fully powered, with bonuses even from boosted (not attuned) non-VR sets.

 

At first I experimented with my AE fire farmer.  I had the 47 begin the AE arc with the lvl 50 farmer Exed to 47.  I kept the 47 on the team but out of the mission.  The farmer had no patrol xp.  The enemy mobs were level 52, +5 to the farmer.  I was unimpressed by the rewards, so I gave the star back to the farmer and restarted so the mission was at level 50 so I could compare rewards for +4s.  The rewards were exactly the same.  Here's what I noted, the value pairs represent (xp, influence).

 

minion - 4272, 5979
lt - 8544, 20504
boss - 25632, 64081
EB- 51265, 128,164

 

Curious if this was some sort of AE oddity I logged in an Elec/Elec tank so I could continue the experiment with the first mission of Market Crash trial.  This character had full patrol xp (5.6M) so the results will be different from the AE farmer but can easily be adjusted.  The main point though, is that both MC tests had full patrol xp so we've got apples vs apples.

 

50 vs 54
minion - 10254, 4784
lt - 20506, 16404

boss - 76897, 64081
 

47 vs 52
minion - 10794, 5036
lt - 21586, 17268
boss 76897, 64081
 

Note that there's a minor difference between the rewards for both minions and lieuts, but not for bosses.

 

So, my question to those of you that went about fighting +5s (and beyond) did you notice (and by notice I mean take note of) the difference in rewards for +4 mobs and those of higher levels?

 

Digging a little deeper, I couldn't find anything about xp based on mob level on the current Wiki.  I did find this via Googling

 

https://cityofheroes.fandom.com/wiki/Experience#Detailed_Breakdown

 

If you want to avoid clicking a fandom link, here's the relevant screen grab:

 

Hm, I wonder if the ratio of the multiplier for +5 and higher/+4 is the same as the discrepancies found for the minions and lieuts above.  *Punches Casio desk calculator furiously*.  Why, it is!  2/1.9 = 1.0526 which is spot on the same as 21586/20506 and 10794/10254.  Why didn't AE show this same discrepancy?  Dunno and frankly after this much time spent on this, I don't care.  There's a >0% chance I may have brushed aside minion/lt differences as insignificant and didn't properly note them.

 

Anyway, upthread the conclusion was, the effort wasn't worth it, the purple patch hit too hard even if you survive.  I'll add to that conclusion by saying the rewards absolutely make fighting +5s and higher completely a waste and only ever do this as some sort of stress-test.  

Edited September 22, 2021 by Hedgefund

[Hew]

It would be nice if the devs could give us a _real_ challenge that isnt hackage at +4 max.