Incentivize playing a villian

[DSorrow]

I think having increased XP gains redside would not be a completely problem free solution to the population imbalance. When it comes to picking a side, I genuinely enjoy the hero side content and zones more, plus I prefer heroic/vigilante character concepts to villains. However, because I'm a min/maxer at heart I would play most of my new characters redside if XP rates were noticeably better, but move back to heroside instantly if the rates were rolled back after an influx of redside population.

 

While I can't speak for anyone but myself, I'd imagine a lot of other people feel the same way and then it would be a pick between content you prefer or content with substantially better rewards.

 

 

[justicebeliever]

I don’t thing throwing incentives onto Villain content would encourage more players to play Villain side. It would encourage some players to switch just enough to do that particular content, and nothing else. Then what? Put incentives on all Villain content? Then it feels like a disadvantage to play Hero side and balance still isn’t met. As others have said, Hero side has had the high population since day 1, for probably a variety of reasons. And it’s never balanced equally dispute how easy it is to switch. Even now, when you can change at level 1 just by walking to Pocket D and talking to a seagull, you still find a disparity in the numbers.

 

Well to be fair, Hero side came out first so of course it started with higher populations.

 

I think we need to be clear on the problem here:

• is it we need more villains for the sake of have more villains to satisfy some esoteric need for cosmic balance?
  
• Or is it to provide a larger population of people in the redside for teaming purposes?
  

 

I suspect the latter.  So if boosting XP rewards causing more people to flock redside just for the XP bonus, then problem solved.  It won’t matter why the characters go to the redside, what matters is that they are there and able to be teamed with.  It won’t matter if they stay, because their next alt or someone else will come along for the bonus.

 

And the nice thing about an XP boost, is that if it gets out of hand or causes unforeseen consequences, we can just course correct, since it’s just a number and not wasted new content or story arcs.

 

And we need to get over the idea of XP balance.  It won’t hurt anyone on the hero side if villains level faster (if anything it’ll alleviate some of the problems that people rail against - less crowding in Atlas Park).  Full transparency - there is nothing you can do to get me to set foot on redside.  I don’t like the idea of playing a villain, never have.

[_NOPE_]

/JRanger

 

I see no need to incentivize villain play.

[Ry]

You want incentive to play as a villain?

 

 

 

Frenzy

 

Villain Alignment Power

You drive yourself into a blind rage to strike down your foes! Upon activating this power you will increase your recharge rate. All Hero Archetypes, Masterminds, Corruptors and Soldiers of Arachnos will receive a high damage increase, Dominators will have their Domination bar filled, Brutes will have their Rage bar filled and Stalkers will be put into a hidden state and receive a minor damage buff.

 

Recharge 6 minutes

Effects Self +Recharge, +Special

+30% Recharge for 20s

Brute: +100% Fury

Dominator: +100% Domination

Stalker: Hide, +40% Damage(All) for 20s

All Others: +60% Damage(All) for 20s

 

 

[senseichen]

Ry, that's absolutely why I want to play Redside!  There's no other good way to prime the Perma-Dom pump!

 

But it would be nice to be able to get groups while playing with the power. :)  If there was some way for blueside to get Frenzy, or for Redside to keep Frenzy if they went Rogue/Vigilante to groups with Blue, I'd be happy.  Maybe a Null the Gull option to choose your alignment power?  But losing Frenzy and having to wait 7 days to get it back runs counter to the changes to make faction swapping for groups easier.

[Rikis]

Absolutely not, if someone wants Frenzy, they should be a villain.

 

If there was a way to get about 25% of the blueside population to the Rogue Isles, heroes would still outnumber villains by a significant margin. But even a 15-20% shift in population would do wonders for the isles (that really probably wouldn't do well with a population like Paragon City). I do like the ideas of an increased exp rate for Villains/Rogues (a temp solution but a formidable one) or increasing Merit Rewards for Rogue Isles content (a more permanent solution but weaker one).

[ed_anger]

You can switch whenever you want, the dynamics of group think will always create an overbalanced side.

[n00baka]

I'm glad this thread popped back up to the top again, because I've been thinking about it lately. I don't think an incentive for playing one side over the other is the way to go. Those who enjoy the side that doesn't get the bonus xp or inf or whatever the incentive is will see it as being punished for not playing the "correct" way. Instead of trying to force players to play one side over the other, I think the solution could be removing what makes the two sides (or three, if you want to count Preatoria) different.

 

I would propose removing the restriction for forming teams between the sides all together, and allow all alignments access to all zones. Yes, that would mean Heroes in the Rogue Isles, and Villains in Paragon. This would remove the need for Null Gull to switch and allow players to basically "pick the alignment power they want" and not restrict where they can play. This reduces the team search problem away from "are they accessible" and into the realm of "are they around the right level". But how to get players from one side to the other? Right now there's only a few ways; Midnighter's Club (behind a badge) and Pocket D.

 

In addition, I suggest adding a transport in each zone near that zone's Train or Ferry (just one if the zone has two or more) that can act as a one way path to the "opposing" side. A standard helicopter with an NPC standing outside it as the "door" you click on would be ideal. This one way transport would, when clicked, provide a list of possible zones to travel to, much as if you clicked on a train or entered a ferry, but only for the opposing side. Go to the helicopter in Mercy? You get a list of zones in Paragon you can end up in. The reason I'd want it as a separate option instead of the current train, ferry, or portal (in select zones) is to reduce the size of the list as well as limit it to one side of transport.

 

I know there's a bit of flavor break in this, as there has always been a solid line between Hero / Villain interaction in the past, so I understand and welcome push back on this. This could be an opportunity to address the reduction in players in an in-game way. Give the NPC door a line or two explaining that "with the sudden disappearance of Heroes and / or Destined Ones, we have agreed to work with Paragon / the Rogue Isles to stabilize the situation. Officially at least. We know rogue agents exist and Ms Liberty / Recluse can't be trusted to keep their word, so be alert."

 

I personally feel that opening up all parts of the game to all characters is more beneficial than attempting to provide an incentive to play one side over the other.

[TheBlindGirl]

My understanding is that Null Gull had to be employed for alignment switching because there is something hard-coded that prevents villains or heroes from even entering one another's zones, so an NPC in a neutral zone had to be added who could allow characters to swap back and forth.

 

Even if true, this would just mean that the NPCs standing next to ferries/trains would also have to switch a character's alignment when transporting them. That is slightly inconvenient, but still fundamentally works. I would favor completely giving up on integrating this blatantly mechanical change into the lore, however. Instead, use Null Gull. He's already a vaguely aligned trickster god with fourth-wall related reality warping powers. Let him perch near train stations and ferries in addition to Pocket D. To characters who don't want to interact with him, he's just a seagull.

[OEM61]

To get more people playing red-side, we need to understand WHY people don't play as much on the villain side.

 

The answer is "because more people want to be the good guy than the bad guy".

 

Works for me.

 

I enjoy being a hero.

Not to get into self-psychoanalysis or anything, but maybe that's why I joined the military.  Maybe that's why I enjoyed work as a security guard, even if the pay wasn't good enough to keep me there.

 

Playing as a villain just doesn't do it for me.

And I tried back when the game was live.

 

Maybe, one day, if this sticks around long enough, I will try again.

 

But my mains will always be heroes.

 

 

But keep in mind, even on the Blue side with 5 Atlas Parks and 3 Talos Islands and 2 PIs... the Hollows will never again see the likes of the Taxibot service. Sure you can get people to go out and do Frostfire, but I've not been able to get a Transcendence Trial going since we've started back and the zone is essentially empty. Perez Park... wow I remember herding the blobs back in the day... usually only as 2 or 3 people in the whole zone. I've sat chatting in Croatoa for 20 mins on the broadcast channel and never gotten a reply.

 

That's just the way things are right now.

As an aside, I can not recall seeing anyone trying to assemble a Caverns of Transcendence on the team channel except maybe one time.

 

I guess that I am as guilty as the next guy, in that I have unlocked it on a couple of toons but haven't tried to get a team together myself, but if I saw someone advertising (and wasn't in the middle of something else) I would certainly be willing to join.

 

 

It might help.  We had double XP when the Homecoming servers first started up, we could give all villain content XP+1/2 and that would help draw some people over.  Heck, my toons would probably be split 50/50 between red and blueside if I thought I could ever find anyone redside.  My experiences so far were like what I was seeing on a low pop server just before shut down.  At 3 am.  Which is exactly when I'm likely to be playing.

 

But say if someone's standing about in Steel Canyon "35 MM blue LFG, please anybody" and someone pops up to say "Redside team looking for 35ish members", and that someone knows they can get xp+1/2 from that?  People just might join.

 

The XP bonus seems popular, but would it really help?

 

I think maybe you end up with people playing redside to get to 50 faster, doing the same old things that they are doing now to level up as quickly as possible, and then talking to Null and going blue because "that's where everybody is".

 

If people choose their sides based upon how many people are on that side, and if there is an in-game way to change sides, then you either alter perception or one side will tend to run at a deficit forever.

 

 

The horse is out of the barn, but I think faction-specific ATs were maybe the best weapon the villains had to try and fight the imbalance.

 

 

[Rikis]

The idea of an increased bonus for red side is not my favorite, for the reasons already stated (just get to 50 then switch) and personally, because I love redside content and outleveling arcs is a bummer. I already don't play with double exp because I don't want to keep turning on and off experience.

 

Increasing merits for redside content though, is another matter. This would allow people who are even vigilantes to partake. It could even include doing a Villain or Rogue morality mission, for example give 60 merits for doing either Villain or Rogue, keep it at 40 for heroes and vigilantes. Merits are nice yes, but with the efficiency of fire farms for inf, increasing merits for one side wouldn't be such a hindrance to the other. I think an overall 50% increase in merits for all red side content would be good.

 

They could also create Strike Forces for the missing level ranges, without having to create equivalent blue side content. For example, levels 10-15 is missing a Strike Force, while blues already have Positron. Likewise for range 30-35, while they already have Manticore. And though there isn't a specific 40-45 TF for blues, they do have the entirety of the Shadow Shard, so creating a single 40-45 Strike Force would be sufficient.

[TheBlindGirl]

The best way to get more people to do red content is for there to be more and better red content to do - provided it's feasible. How many programmer-hours would it take to code in a new SF? Has anything like that been done since sunset? I know some new content has been added to the game, but how unfinished was it when the current devs got their hands on it? Did they build that new content, or just turn the lights on? If the latter, are they refraining from building new content because it's not feasible with a volunteer dev team, or just because so far they don't want to?

[jack_nomind]

How many programmer-hours would it take to code in a new SF? Has anything like that been done since sunset?

 

Market Crash, yes.

 

I know some new content has been added to the game, but how unfinished was it when the current devs got their hands on it? Did they build that new content, or just turn the lights on?

 

It varies.  I don't know of any brand-new new visual assets the score or homecoming teams added, but they've upcycled like pros with some of the costume elements and base items.  Similarly, nothing they added power-wise has been "brand new" the way e.g. Absorb was a new mechanic, but they significantly exceeded the scope of just minor tweaking in things like Sentinel set proliferation.

 

The main things slowing them are the small team size, the specific skills of the team, and a desire not to rocket vastly away from Live content.  Adding powers is significantly less work than adding story arcs or doing some of the other kinds of changes suggested in this forum.

[EggKookoo]

I enjoy being a hero.

 

This thread reminds me of something I said years back when discussing how in WoW, little kids and older players played Alliance, and teenagers played Horde. It related to SW.

 

When I was a kid, I thought SW was about Luke, Leia, and Han because they were the good guys. When I was a teenager, I thought SW was about Vader and Boba Fett because they were edgy and stuff. Now that I'm old, SW is about Luke, Leia, and Han because they're the good guys.

 

CoH appeals mostly to older players, and maybe their kids.

[Ghost49X]

Always on xp rewards would further deter me from playing villain side. I have issues with the base xp rate (xp rate without the booster) being too high even on the hero side, that I feel like I'm skipping content. XP rate should more or less match content, if need be options to boost can be present.

 

Aside from that several things motivates me to play blue rather than red most times, and they both have to do with content.

 

In no particular order:

• Blue side is much cleaner, red I'm getting the impression of being in a slum all the time, this is a very minor point that nonetheless affects my mindset and one I don't expect anything done about it.
  
• More importantly, playing a villain doesn't feel like playing a villain for most missions. It at best feels like playing an anti-hero or a low key criminal. Sometimes it feels like you're a lackey doing menial labour. Villain missions should be the sort that make me think "I wish a hero was here to stop this, mwuahaha!". Maybe the alignment choice could affect the style of mission you get.
  
• Also the heroes that show up to counter bank missions are ridiculously under powered to take on a team of Super Villains. There should be at least an equal number of heroes to villains and they should work with each other in some way. Maybe give the players some sort of input as to who their "nemesis" is so they tend to be reoccurring during those missions, ideally characters should have a "rogue gallery" so they can grow on us yet be different if we switch characters as to not bore us too much.
  

[Ghost49X]

I'm pretty sure I'm in the minority here, but I actually thought it worked better when AT's and Powersets were restricted by hero/villain. I liked that there was something to differentiate them.

I generally agree but most powersets should be accessible on ATs from both sides. Currently only Illusion and the Dominator secondaries aren't available on opposite sides.

 

Personally I think Dominator Secondaries would work for Defenders. I'd love to have some melee powers as a defender secondary (of the type that you get from dom secondaries) especially pairing Nature Affinity with Savage or Thorny Assault. It might take a new AT to make this work though. Perhaps Defender primary with Dom secondary or a melee / range hybrid with dom secondary and defensive powerset.

[SwitchFade]

Here's why, to several posts in this thread,

 

- villain side is drab and flat. No variety, few zones and the content is unengaging. Arachnos are a groan enducing Grindy pain slog to fight, continuously. And, snakes? I'm fighting stupid man-snakes, over and over? Sweet tea, couldn't you think of ANYTHING else?

 

- villain AT's have their interesting points, but by and large lack vibrance, depth or dynamism. While they are fun, they aren't as multi-faceted as hero AT

 

- Perez park, hollows, croatoa,... All were very popular before the devs originally began to try and make everything easier... Easier, faster easier. It was a normal thing to have to go to hollows, then on the faultline maybe or steel, then off you go to croatoa or bricks... Now, the "play your way" precedent has emptied zones that yield sub-optimal results for many. Then, new players only know what they see, and they never see those zones because "zomg dfb, LFM!," And "dib, come get your super xp!" Granted, croatoa and hollows are sloggy at times.

 

- Perez park never had any real meaning, and let's be honest, the goddamn Forrest is a pain. But still necessary, because it's different.

 

- boomtown is just sad.

 

In the end, villain side suffers from lack of material attention and innovation. Zones like croatoa, hollows, striga and hollows suffer from the devs continually trying to serve cries for instant gratification. Put back some guiderails, and blue zones will repopulate. Make certain goodies villain side only, to attain, and people will go. Add depth to villains, and more will stay.

 

Don't even get me started on Pretoria. Great idea, but game coders are often not good story tellers.

 

Edit: as another thought, villain side is all about how Lorde recluse, stupid name, wants to rule all. And you have to kinda be in that world. Blue side you're just a hero in a world that's fighting back and working.... In a bunch of ways. No required path. I'm pretty sure if blue side were all about how statesman had a grand scheme to rule all, and you had to be in his army, it would be repulsive. Villain side should have been a reverse mirror of blue, where you're the antagonist and you're just working to... do what you want. As it is, you're basically subjected to arachnos will, over and over. Represive.

[EggKookoo]

Great idea, but game coders are often not good story tellers.

 

Amen.

[Leogunner]

Here's why, to several posts in this thread,

 

- villain side is drab and flat. No variety, few zones and the content is unengaging. Arachnos are a groan enducing Grindy pain slog to fight, continuously. And, snakes? I'm fighting stupid man-snakes, over and over? Sweet tea, couldn't you think of ANYTHING else?

 

I hear these arguments a lot and while I do loathe how often we fight Arachnos on Villain side, I think the rest is just perpetuated over-exaggeration.

 

So villain side is drab, flat and samey?  How about those Hero-side areas?  While I can tell the difference between specific parts of the city, you'd be hard pressed to define Skyway, Steel Canyon, IP and Atlas without the specific landmark structures that define them.  Other decent zones like Salamanca and Founders' have flavor but end up being empty while soulless areas like PI and Talos have much more traffic.  Ultimately, most zones in Paragon are both drab (but BRIGHT  ;D), samey AND serve little to no purpose...and then there are those Hazard Zones...

 

- villain AT's have their interesting points, but by and large lack vibrance, depth or dynamism. While they are fun, they aren't as multi-faceted as hero AT

 

This is an argument I've not heard before.  Perhaps you're being sarcastic?

 

What makes the ATs are the powersets and the inherent (and how it interacts with the powersets).  IIRC, one hero AT's inherent had to be redesigned so many times, I bet some players currently don't know all it does now; another hero inherent is bland milk-toast and wholly passive in use and the other 3 have had to be redubbed to either not be broken or to be noticeable at all.  With that knowledge, I'd argue the hero ATs are the MOST flawed and lack even MORE depth than the Villain ATs who have had their inherents rebalanced some but usually in the same ballpark of what it's suppose to have been (see shifting damage from Domination, crits outside of Hide).  In fact, I'd go so far as to assume the reason the Hero ATs had to be changed is because the Villain ATs' designs were so good, they outclassed the old heroes in both interactibility and concept.

 

- Perez park, hollows, croatoa,... All were very popular before the devs originally began to try and make everything easier... Easier, faster easier. It was a normal thing to have to go to hollows, then on the faultline maybe or steel, then off you go to croatoa or bricks... Now, the "play your way" precedent has emptied zones that yield sub-optimal results for many. Then, new players only know what they see, and they never see those zones because "zomg dfb, LFM!," And "dib, come get your super xp!" Granted, croatoa and hollows are sloggy at times.[/quotes]

 

Could also be a product of the crazy design of the contacts sending you across multiple zones, having trams only take you to certain zones combined with the sadistic size of those zones.  People complained, the devs made changes, sacrifices were made, here's your cake....you want to eat it too?  :D

 

- Perez park never had any real meaning, and let's be honest, the goddamn Forrest is a pain. But still necessary, because it's different.

 

- boomtown is just sad.

 

In the end, villain side suffers from lack of material attention and innovation. Zones like croatoa, hollows, striga and hollows suffer from the devs continually trying to serve cries for instant gratification. Put back some guiderails, and blue zones will repopulate. Make certain goodies villain side only, to attain, and people will go. Add depth to villains, and more will stay.

 

Don't even get me started on Pretoria. Great idea, but game coders are often not good story tellers.

 

You point to lack of innovation yet point to Preatoria.  So if villain side innovated in the manner of Praetoria, it would somehow make it better?

 

Maybe I'm just easy to please but the stories in Prea are more compelling than Heroside. 

[Rikis]

I am surprised at the idea that all villain zones are "samey". The moment I'm in any of the isles, I know exactly which one I'm at because of how different they are from each other. I cannot say the same about Paragon City, that to me, is the "samey" zones over and over again. I cannot fathom how the red ATs lack "depth" while the hero ones don't, when it is the red ones that have the subtle nuances that make them great.

 

Well, I'll stop now, I'm effectively reiterating what Leogunner has said in a less elegant way.

 

In the end there will be people who are blue only no matter what, and like me, who are red only no matter what (there are DOZENS of us!). We aren't trying to attract those people, we are trying to attract the ones that aren't attached and need a carrot to step over the pond, as it were. Even if it is transitory.

[OEM61]

What makes the ATs are the powersets and the inherent (and how it interacts with the powersets).  IIRC, one hero AT's inherent had to be redesigned so many times, I bet some players currently don't know all it does now; another hero inherent is bland milk-toast and wholly passive in use and the other 3 have had to be redubbed to either not be broken or to be noticeable at all.  With that knowledge, I'd argue the hero ATs are the MOST flawed and lack even MORE depth than the Villain ATs who have had their inherents rebalanced some but usually in the same ballpark of what it's suppose to have been (see shifting damage from Domination, crits outside of Hide).  In fact, I'd go so far as to assume the reason the Hero ATs had to be changed is because the Villain ATs' designs were so good, they outclassed the old heroes in both interactibility and concept.

 

Not arguing the point, and it's really going to be subjective, but to be fair here the villain ATs were designed with the inherent ability in mind, while it was added to the hero ATs.

 

The villain inherents should have felt smoother and more a part of the AT because they were designed that way.

 

The hero inherents were going to feel tacked on because they literally were.

 

But again, whatever advantage that may have given the villains in terms of drawing people to play redside disappeared when all of the ATs became available to play as either a hero or a villain.

 

I would be interested in seeing how many/what percentage of primarily redside players are playing one of the old hero ATs compared to how many/what percentage of primarily blueside players are playing one of the old villain ATs.

[Catgoyle]

I would be interested in seeing how many/what percentage of primarily redside players are playing one of the old hero ATs compared to how many/what percentage of primarily blueside players are playing one of the old villain ATs.

I know I see a lot of MM's on hero side, even demons, which imho is a bit odd for a hero.

I'm probably one of the rare ones that's running a hero AT (scrapper) red side.

 

[Rikis]

I would be interested in seeing how many/what percentage of primarily redside players are playing one of the old hero ATs compared to how many/what percentage of primarily blueside players are playing one of the old villain ATs.

I know I see a lot of MM's on hero side, even demons, which imho is a bit odd for a hero.

I'm probably one of the rare ones that's running a hero AT (scrapper) red side.

 

My main on Homecoming is actually a Scrapper, entirely on red side. Likewise, I'm now running a Controller through, although that is being much more problematic.

[EggKookoo]

I know I see a lot of MM's on hero side, even demons, which imho is a bit odd for a hero.

 

Within the fiction of the game, what's the difference between a MM and, well, just a team?

 

Could Reed Richards be a MM, with Sue, Johnny, and Ben his minions?

[Catgoyle]

Within the fiction of the game, what's the difference between a MM and, well, just a team?

 

Could Reed Richards be a MM, with Sue, Johnny, and Ben his minions?

Demons are the odd bit to me, not the MM part.  My Bots/Traps is a military surplus catbot on Hero side.