Determining if the Game is Too Easy

[Dr. Saturn]

I like the ideas of making the late game more difficult. What if one replaced all the minions and LTs with bosses, and replaced bosses with super-bosses in a mission? Or be more bold, keep the 3 tier system and take minion->boss, LT->super-boss, boss->AV. What if a +5, +6, +7, +8, etc notoriety was created? What if there were enemies that bypass some forms of buffs/debuffs? Enemies that always hit you at set damage? The game can be made more difficult imo with those methods, but I don't know how hard it would be to program.

[America's Angel]

10 hours ago, Galaxy Brain said:

So there is a spectrum of players that cannot as easily be defined as casual/try hard. In HC, you can "casually" get Incarnates by just playing and never touching the market, allowing you to get lvl shift / destiny / judgement powers. Would such a player who never looked into guides outside of eyeballing and slapping stuff they saw in their trays and thus get to be +1 with nukes be a casual? Would somebody with a "bad" IO build be a min maxxer since they went beyond the game to figure out mids and whip something up?

 

Yeah, there's three levels of play in CoH:

• Casual
• Intermediate
• Try-Hard Min/Maxer

Try Hard Min/Maxers are your speed runner types who chain inspirations from their emails and uses the meta power combos to wipe stuff out quickly. You usually find them playing fire/fire blasters, fire/cold, fire/sonic corruptors, and an assortment of scrappers They use WASD and spacebar when fighting. They tend to speed missions.

 

Intermediates are the vast majority of players with IO builds. They don't always play the meta sets. They don't chain inspirations. They don't always use WASD and the spacebar when fighting. They tend to do "kill all" when in missions.

 

Casuals are everyone else.

 

Now, in terms of optimal play, Casuals and Intermediates are largely indistinguishable. Which is why I lumped them together.

 

[GraspingVileTerror]

I've been periodically watching this thread, and I think it's done a better job than many at addressing some important issues.

But I still notice some talking in circles and broad assumptions on certain points, and plenty of evidence of many people using the same words but having wildly different perspectives.

 

I would like to encourage anyone who has ever felt that something "should" be a certain way to carefully re-examine how they got to that belief.

If they happen to realize a personal preference is at work anywhere in that process, then I also recommend carefully examining where that preference came from, what it means to that individual's personal play experience, and then (very importantly in an MMO, especially City, for a number of reasons) consider if there's even a remote possibility that such an assumption runs contrary to the personal experience of others. 

And I stress this part:  Not what one -assumes- the personal experience of others to be, but the actual personal experience of those other people.

Therein lies the biggest challenge, I think.  So many people seem so utterly confident that they have "the other guy" pegged, and I'm sitting here thinking "you two* aren't talking to one another.  You are talking -past- one another."

 

I think it's great that the community is wrestling with these big ideas.  It'll help immensely when we start to work toward sustainable development.

Please, just remember that what City -means- to people here is incredibly different.  

It is not EVER "just a game," even if some players want it to be.

[Galaxy Brain]

55 minutes ago, America's Angel said:

Now, in terms of optimal play, Casuals and Intermediates are largely indistinguishable. Which is why I lumped them together.

 

 

This is where I think some confusion seeps in. At the absolute pinnacle of play, yeah there are the folks who do all you describe and then everyone else (generalized). In terms of impact however, those folks are generally rather insular and a rarity "in the wild" compared to the step below which could be seen as the "upper intermediary": folks who are not the best of the best of the best, but are rocking IOs + incarnates + good combos. They are not generally part of a "competitive" team or the like, but you can tell they make waves when you are teamed with one and you are not one yourself. In a team setting where players in the Upper portion are in the mix can zoom ahead at blow stuff up with ease and safety (like my blaster can), it means that there is less things to do as another player who cannot outpace or at the very least match the pace of said player. Whether it be it actually getting to fight, or more esoteric things like "welp, my controls / support abilities don't do anything...", the game allows you to have more agency than other players due to power scales and that is disheartening to many.

 

To be fair, you do not see this everywhere, but towards the end game it can get silly and something that many folks have gone on record avoiding purposefully. This is of course expanded upon by what some others have mentioned with end game arcs, but still. 

 

 

 

I guess if we are looping all the way back around to the main question though of "is the game too easy?",  I would say it actually is not, but you get copious amounts of tools to make it so which is a very weird grey area. The abilities of players can quickly outpace the content the abilities were made for, but if they do not lean into that the players can still be in a good balance vs each other and the content. 

 

 

[Myrmidon]

4 hours ago, BZRKR said:

While I think "Is the game too easy" is a different question than "Is the game balanced", there's no need to die on that hill. We have had Cobalt Arachne drop by and let us know that the Devs have built and are testing new ways to provide us with more challenging content without taking anything away from what is currently available. That makes me happy to be patient, and excited to test what makes it to the Beta server.

 

“Lies. Deceit. Creating mistrust are his ways now.”

 

Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Edited July 13, 2021 by Myrmidon

[ForeverLaxx]

I'm not going to read the entire 12 page thread (as of this post), so apologies if I end up repeating what some others might have said.

 

Without getting into another debate between the "hardcores," the "casuals," and why certain people think they're better at the game (and other players) than they really are, I'm just going to mention that much of the reason behind people who seem to think the game is too easy overall is because they're tackling content that has little difficulty to start with. Yeah, they might be running +4/x8, but they're only doing so against Council and are intentionally avoiding Carnies, Nemesis, and refuse to step foot into the Shadow Shard unless Dr. Q is the featured Task Force for double merits.

 

That's the real issue, in my opinion. We have options to make things more difficult, but players are not incentivized to do it since all mobs have roughly the same EXP reward for their level regardless of how challenging certain enemy types are to a general player. When players were essentially locked into Hami-Os as the "top end" of slotting options, it made more sense to keep things more even as certain powersets could handle the "tough" enemies like Carnies better than others and giving those powersets a boost in EXP simply because they come with more Psi defense/resistance wasn't fair. The game doesn't really work this way anymore, though, and that's coming from someone who still uses only basic IOs and hasn't broken level 40 in two years of being on the server.

 

It may be worth keeping rewards the same so as to not move the Standard SO/Generic IO balance off, but I'm also not against increased EXP reward for enemy types that are typically more difficult for the majority of powersets. If someone wants to make a build that specifically targets these enemies in order to "more efficiently farm," then let them do it. It's not any different than someone building for a Fire Farm and players, as I've been told many times, can get to the level cap within a day or two already.

 

Just to reiterate, I think the real issue isn't that CoH is too easy, but rather, that CoH doesn't have real incentive to do anything difficult in the first place. The imbalance of IO Set Builds is likely to stay so I think starting with the reward structure is a good first step if one needs to be taken at all.

[Triumphant]

My personal experience has been this...

 

Solo Play:  Challenging from lvl 1 to Incarnate, because I can dial notoriety and number of enemies up and down until I hit the "sweet" spot.  Almost every archetype is fun to play.

 

Team Play:  At lower levels it's not bad, if a bit frenzied.  At high levels, melee toons will often only get a hit or two in (and this is after combat teleporting directly to the target) before powerful ranged characters nuke all the mobs.  I find this to be pointless and incredibly boring.

 

My solution:  I only play blasters now, so I actually get to have some fun during team play.

 

Am I satisfied with this solution?:  Not really.

 

What to do about it?:  I have no idea.  🤷‍♂️ 

[PeregrineFalcon]

13 minutes ago, Triumphant said:

What to do about it?:  I have no idea.  🤷‍♂️ 

Here's a couple of serious suggestions:

1. Play in smaller teams. 3-5 instead of 8.
2. Play Task Forces and split the team in two and race to see who can complete the mission first.
3. Do Hamidon Raids, Rikti Mothership Raids, Incarnate Raids.

[Triumphant]

15 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Here's a couple of serious suggestions:

1. Play in smaller teams. 3-5 instead of 8.
2. Play Task Forces and split the team in two and race to see who can complete the mission first.
3. Do Hamidon Raids, Rikti Mothership Raids, Incarnate Raids.

 

#1 is a pretty good suggestion, actually, if I can find players willing to team with that limitation.

Not wild about #2, as I'm more of an RP'er that also enjoys challenging combat on teams.

I find Hamidon and Rikti Raids both incredibly boring.  Rote, easy, no strategy apart from "attack the things in this order".

 

I wish there were more SF/TF designed like Imperious Task Force (though, perhaps not quite so LONG. lol).  ITF's are a good mix of interesting foes with different capabilities, tough enough and in sufficient quantities that a team of very powerful characters can have a good time and be reasonably challenged, with everyone having something fun/interesting to do.

 

Anyway, thanks for the suggestions.  I really DO like #1 quite a lot.  Not sure if I can find other interested parties, but it seems like a viable way of dealing with the problem if I can work it out. 👍

[Doomguide2005]

6 hours ago, Dr. Saturn said:

I like the ideas of making the late game more difficult. What if one replaced all the minions and LTs with bosses, and replaced bosses with super-bosses in a mission? Or be more bold, keep the 3 tier system and take minion->boss, LT->super-boss, boss->AV. What if a +5, +6, +7, +8, etc notoriety was created? What if there were enemies that bypass some forms of buffs/debuffs? Enemies that always hit you at set damage? The game can be made more difficult imo with those methods, but I don't know how hard it would be to program.

Purple Patch

Look up the Purple Patch in the HCwiki for why those hypothetical settings are more about tedious than anything really resembling greater difficulty especially for an endgame team.

Edited July 13, 2021 by Doomguide2005

[oedipus_tex]

For situational awareness, the number 180 is a good one to know as a benchmark. It's about number of seconds required to lunch two Judgments. It also happens that a decent benchmark for most long Recharge powers on a pretty good build is a x3 reduction in Recharge which brings a 145 Recharge power to about 48 Recharge. That fits almost cleanly into 4 "true" nukes per 2 Judgment cycles.

 

All of that averages out to a bit under 6 nukes launched in 180 seconds, or a nuke every 30 seconds. This is also the same rate a tip top tier Ice Dominator can place Ice Slick. 😄 *

 

 

[  *Of course that Dominator can actually drop 6 Ice Slicks over 180 seconds, and also launch 2 Judgments, so its not an entirely fair comparison. Used to illustrate how fast nukes are firing. ]

Edited July 13, 2021 by oedipus_tex

[Ghost]

4 hours ago, Triumphant said:

 

#1 is a pretty good suggestion, actually, if I can find players willing to team with that limitation.

 

 

Anyway, thanks for the suggestions.  I really DO like #1 quite a lot.  Not sure if I can find other interested parties, but it seems like a viable way of dealing with the problem if I can work it out. 👍

 

Not as difficult to put together as you might think

 

I very stupidly, and very easily put together a 4 person, +4x8 Posi 1 late at night.

It was a disaster, but surprisingly no one left.  Ended up lowering the difficulty so we could finish it, and promised to never put one together again 🙂    

 

 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Ghost

[SwitchFade]

12 pages later...

 

Answer time. The game is too easy. Also, it's too hard. And! And! It's fine.

 

You see? Solved.

 

 

[Triumphant]

5 minutes ago, SwitchFade said:

12 pages later...

 

Answer time. The game is too easy. Also, it's too hard. And! And! It's fine.

 

You see? Solved.

 

 

 

Maybe.  Maybe not.  I'll get back to you.

[SwitchFade]

Just now, Triumphant said:

 

Maybe.  Maybe not.  I'll get back to you.

I await your response. I think. Perhaps.

[Sunsette]

7 hours ago, Triumphant said:

 

#1 is a pretty good suggestion, actually, if I can find players willing to team with that limitation.

Not wild about #2, as I'm more of an RP'er that also enjoys challenging combat on teams.

I find Hamidon and Rikti Raids both incredibly boring.  Rote, easy, no strategy apart from "attack the things in this order".

 

I wish there were more SF/TF designed like Imperious Task Force (though, perhaps not quite so LONG. lol).  ITF's are a good mix of interesting foes with different capabilities, tough enough and in sufficient quantities that a team of very powerful characters can have a good time and be reasonably challenged, with everyone having something fun/interesting to do.

 

Anyway, thanks for the suggestions.  I really DO like #1 quite a lot.  Not sure if I can find other interested parties, but it seems like a viable way of dealing with the problem if I can work it out. 👍

 

I'm with you on ITF, though I think Apex and TIn Mage have the best overall task force design I've seen; short and sweet, not a lot of filler fights, you need to think a reasonable amount unless people are way overgeared (though at this point overgearing is a bit too common). Market Crash is also nicely done if a bit too easy. 

Edited July 14, 2021 by Sunsette

[Llewellyn Blackwell]

22 hours ago, Ghost said:

Everything doesnt have to be so serious, ALL THE TIME

A hero must never waver in their commitment to stand between the innocent and the wicked. A hero must always be of the most serious of minds, never failing to take into account every single thing around them. Batman does not get called a hero because he is not taking it seriously, and lets a thug fire off a shot that kills some bystander. Superman is not a hero if he does not prevent 100% of all collateral damage caused during his fights, because if he fails to, he literally has failed to be superman.

 

If the most noble of men attempts to invoke great power in the name of good, but it unleashes a great cataclysm that he failed to foresee he is no less the hand that wrought all that pain and violence.

 

A mortal man like Baron Zemo within the context of the MCU is entirely justified and empowered by the right of blood debt to invoke all that he must use to defend the mortals of Earth from the would be gawds that now walk his world. In the eyes of every human, every META in MCU has because of the events of Ultron alone become justified and empowered to carry out genocide upon any and all META beings as an act of premeditated self defense.

 

This is one of the things long established in the nerd circles of Marvel. There is a reason they retconned Jean Grey not being the actual physical being the dark pheonix during her world killing. There is a reason they end up killing off Prof X, who was always inherently wrong. Both humans and Magneto are right. For humans mutant kind can only be a threat, and for mutants humans only ever be lesser beings unfit to be seen as peers and potentially a threat if gathered in mass.

 

Never forget Magneto was a holocaust survivor. He has seen loved ones marched to oblivion by humans no better than the most rabid animal. Nature gave him his place on the food chain, the world gave him the right to fight against any he deems a threat to him and his own kind, human kind is so stained with blood it has no right to challenge nor condemn a being like him. Yet he was often demonized while Prof X literally unleashed child soldiers to fight in his name.

 

The House of M, was about as close to utopia as a universe was ever imagined by comic writers, and it was because the actual living gods given to the world by nature took control, embraced their birthright, and everyone else took a knee to those they had no right to question nor challenge.

 

The final lesson Batman ever gave to superman in the Dark Knight Strikes Again, was making him finally understand he never was, never could be, and never should have tried to be as a human upon this Earth. To do what he really could do for humanity he would need to step away from it and become entirely the superman.

 

Spider Man is the joke he is because he is always joking.

[skoryy]

3 minutes ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

A hero must never waver in their commitment to stand between the innocent and the wicked.

 

Or, y'know, you can just stop taking the pretendy funtime game so seriously.

[Galaxy Brain]

 

Semi-related, but AA is going through some testing and noted that Incarnates had quite an effect on even a "procced to the gills" character.

[Wavicle]

3 hours ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

The House of M, was about as close to utopia as a universe was ever imagined by comic writers, and it was because the actual living gods given to the world by nature took control, embraced their birthright, and everyone else took a knee to those they had no right to question nor challenge.

 

I was sort of with you until you said this nonsense.

[Seed22]

3 hours ago, Llewellyn Blackwell said:

A hero must never waver in their commitment to stand between the innocent and the wicked. A hero must always be of the most serious of minds, never failing to take into account every single thing around them. Batman does not get called a hero because he is not taking it seriously, and lets a thug fire off a shot that kills some bystander. Superman is not a hero if he does not prevent 100% of all collateral damage caused during his fights, because if he fails to, he literally has failed to be superman.

 

If the most noble of men attempts to invoke great power in the name of good, but it unleashes a great cataclysm that he failed to foresee he is no less the hand that wrought all that pain and violence.

 

A mortal man like Baron Zemo within the context of the MCU is entirely justified and empowered by the right of blood debt to invoke all that he must use to defend the mortals of Earth from the would be gawds that now walk his world. In the eyes of every human, every META in MCU has because of the events of Ultron alone become justified and empowered to carry out genocide upon any and all META beings as an act of premeditated self defense.

 

This is one of the things long established in the nerd circles of Marvel. There is a reason they retconned Jean Grey not being the actual physical being the dark pheonix during her world killing. There is a reason they end up killing off Prof X, who was always inherently wrong. Both humans and Magneto are right. For humans mutant kind can only be a threat, and for mutants humans only ever be lesser beings unfit to be seen as peers and potentially a threat if gathered in mass.

 

Never forget Magneto was a holocaust survivor. He has seen loved ones marched to oblivion by humans no better than the most rabid animal. Nature gave him his place on the food chain, the world gave him the right to fight against any he deems a threat to him and his own kind, human kind is so stained with blood it has no right to challenge nor condemn a being like him. Yet he was often demonized while Prof X literally unleashed child soldiers to fight in his name.

 

The House of M, was about as close to utopia as a universe was ever imagined by comic writers, and it was because the actual living gods given to the world by nature took control, embraced their birthright, and everyone else took a knee to those they had no right to question nor challenge.

 

The final lesson Batman ever gave to superman in the Dark Knight Strikes Again, was making him finally understand he never was, never could be, and never should have tried to be as a human upon this Earth. To do what he really could do for humanity he would need to step away from it and become entirely the superman.

 

Spider Man is the joke he is because he is always joking.

Is this a meme or serious I cant tell

Edited July 14, 2021 by Seed22

[Seed22]

3 hours ago, skoryy said:

 

Or, y'know, you can just stop taking the pretendy funtime game so seriously.

I know this isn’t most people who read comics growing up but man, I see this and see why I generally avoided reading the mainstream ones/being a part of that fandom/community. Too much of srz biznuz instead of just enjoying the work.

[skoryy]

29 minutes ago, Seed22 said:

I know this isn’t most people who read comics growing up but man, I see this and see why I generally avoided reading the mainstream ones/being a part of that fandom/community. Too much of srz biznuz instead of just enjoying the work.

 

I've always been more of a Superfriends / TMNT / DCAU guy myself.

[Tachstar]

What we really need is more ways to OUTSMART our foes than to simply clobber them.

 

 

[SwitchFade]

What we need is more...

 

Adolescent Radioactive Black Belt Hamsters!