Suggested QoL change - Pool Power Standardization

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, battlewraith said:

Egads you're confused. Really and sadly confused. And apparently trying to get this thread locked.

 

That you're incapable of seeing how constant compromise towards power creep ends up with a product that's just an I Win button says everything we need to know.

[battlewraith]

59 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

As for this: how many folks have stopped playing because it's all too easy? There's 1300 people online right now. What was the population count on a Saturday night back before the snap at its highest point?

 

Change is fine. Making the ridiculously easy even easier isn't. Might as well just grant that clear map button usable once an hour.

 

Or people are playing something new. How many people leave because it's the same old thing for years? You can't look at the population numbers and just assume it's whatever you want.

[Bill Z Bubba]

Just now, battlewraith said:

Or people are playing something new. How many people leave because it's the same old thing for years? You can't look at the population numbers and just assume it's whatever you want.

 

Just as you can't know how many leave due to fighting against power creep making it a "stagnant museum piece until the remnants of the player base wither away." What we DO know is this:

 

[Ghost]

Make the game easier, less challenging - there will be less incentive to stick around.

 

Bill and Rudra are right.  Ask to pick whichever pool power you want now, next you’ll ask to pick whichever t2-t9 with no regards for what comes before it.  Then what?  Incarnates at lvl2?  You may say “that’s ridiculous”. But it’s not.  The ask never ends.  

People always want what they want until they get it.  Then they complain it’s too easy.

 

Edited July 10, 2022 by Ghost

[battlewraith]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

That you're incapable of seeing how constant compromise towards power creep ends up with a product that's just an I Win button says everything we need to know.

The game is easy. It has been easy for a long time. People were complaining about it being easy back on live. They did everything they could to make it city of soloists. Which is something you liked because you fancy soloing ITFs no?

 

Why don't you make you're rollback suggestion in another thread and see how it goes over? Everyone can lose their early travel powers and all of their Iwin buttons and it will all be great again right? You are fixated on a pipe dream. And the idea that it needs to be harder is farfetched when the hard content they introduced doesn't seem to be that popular. Some people like to farm, some like to build, some roleplay, etc. 

[Ghost]

So if it’s easy, why make it even easier?

[battlewraith]

1 hour ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

Just as you can't know how many leave due to fighting against power creep making it a "stagnant museum piece until the remnants of the player base wither away." What we DO know is this:

 

 

Yeah, it's declining. Wonder if it has anything to do with the game being from 2004? hmmm. Better make it MORE like it was in 2004. That's the ticket.

[Bill Z Bubba]

Just now, Ghost said:

So if it’s easy, why make it even easier?

 

Cuz power creep don't matter. He's already stated that and expounded upon it fully. It doesn't matter so let's do it all.

 

2 minutes ago, battlewraith said:

Why don't you make you're rollback suggestion in another thread and see how it goes over? Everyone can lose their early travel powers and all of their Iwin buttons and it will all be great again right? You are fixated on a pipe dream. And the idea that it needs to be harder is farfetched when the hard content they introduced doesn't seem to be that popular. Some people like to farm, some like to build, some roleplay, etc. 

 

Because I'm making it in this thread while simultaneously making the other suggestions on the other side of the spectrum showing how ridiculous it all is, has been and continues to be. Look at those population numbers. Power creep ain't helping, and NO, the new Aeon TF diff levels didn't help either.

 

So if power creep and escalated difficulty are both failing to retain players, perhaps MORE power creep and MORE escalated difficulty Aren't The Correct Fucking Answer.

[battlewraith]

59 minutes ago, Ghost said:

So if it’s easy, why make it even easier?

 

I don't think it would be substantially easier. I don't think it would really make that much different to be honest. I think people just go full blown Chicken Little over the idea of change. When you factor in power choices for mules and whatnot, minor changes. But could be interesting.

[Ghost]

3 minutes ago, battlewraith said:

 

I don't think it would be substantially easier. I don't think it would really make that much different to be honest. I think people just go full blown Chicken Little over the idea of change. When you factor in power choices for mules and whatnot, minor changes. But could be interesting.

No offense, but I’m personally struggling to see how it wouldn’t make things easier.
Even if only to a small degree, is that really what an already easy game needs? 
Shouldn’t we be trying to find subtle ways to add a little challenge to it?

[battlewraith]

58 minutes ago, Ghost said:

No offense, but I’m personally struggling to see how it wouldn’t make things easier.
Even if only to a small degree, is that really what an already easy game needs? 
Shouldn’t we be trying to find subtle ways to add a little challenge to it?

 

They just added tough content meant to be challenging. It hasn't been a resounding success. 

If challenge is what you want, you can set your own parameters--impose your own limitations if you want.

This isn't a new game. Part of the reason it's so easy is that the majority of the playerbase are veterans who have been playing it for years. That familiarity and knowledge bleeds through everything . When I started, it took me months of steady playing to get my first 50. Looking back, I didn't understand the mechanics. Now you can get help and information and seasoned veterans are available to guide you through anything.

 

I don't think challenge is the issue for most players. People like being badass. The real issue imo is literally running variations on the same content for years. Eventually the novelty wears off. There are different types of players. I'm blase about the content, I'm probably more interested in building. Changes that open up build possibilities give me a reason to roll a new character. The people who moralize about this are out of touch. Really strong builds already exist. Maybe this change will make them easier somehow--so what? The players who want that kind of build already have it. They will have it regardless of whether a change like this goes forward or not. And maybe alternatives that don't currently exist will emerge. At least its something new under the sun. 

[Rudra]

Except this provides nothing new to the game. Just easier. You want new? Provide a suggestion for something new instead of easier.

[Ghost]

3 hours ago, battlewraith said:

 

They just added tough content meant to be challenging. It hasn't been a resounding success. 

If challenge is what you want, you can set your own parameters--impose your own limitations if you want.

This isn't a new game. Part of the reason it's so easy is that the majority of the playerbase are veterans who have been playing it for years. That familiarity and knowledge bleeds through everything . When I started, it took me months of steady playing to get my first 50. Looking back, I didn't understand the mechanics. Now you can get help and information and seasoned veterans are available to guide you through anything.

 

I don't think challenge is the issue for most players. People like being badass. The real issue imo is literally running variations on the same content for years. Eventually the novelty wears off. There are different types of players. I'm blase about the content, I'm probably more interested in building. Changes that open up build possibilities give me a reason to roll a new character. The people who moralize about this are out of touch. Really strong builds already exist. Maybe this change will make them easier somehow--so what? The players who want that kind of build already have it. They will have it regardless of whether a change like this goes forward or not. And maybe alternatives that don't currently exist will emerge. At least its something new under the sun. 

Just seems like strange reasoning (to me)

First off, I agree that it seems like the new challenging content may not be a huge success.  I think that may be that they went to far in what they were trying to do, and sounds like they made it too much of a grind.

But just because the first attempt didn't work, why give up and go the other direction?

 

Like I said in an earlier post, how long will this change make someone like you happy?  How long before you want other power tiers opened sooner?  When will it end?

I think you will always be searching for changes, until you realize that no change will make you completely satisficed with he game.  Then you will move on.  There's nothing wrong with that.  It happens.

 

Finally, I would think that pushing for new powersets or ATs would bring much more enjoyment for you, and last much longer that this.  Why not go that route?

 

At the end of the day, maybe the devs agree with you.  Maybe they don't.  

No one is wrong.  We all just have a different way of looking at this game, and want different things form it.

 

Edited July 10, 2022 by Ghost

[Zepp]

Let me throw this out there... (without reminding all y'all that I did amend the proposal so that the Fighting and Medicine pools would not see open the door for power creep)

There is a difference between difficult and frustrating. Adding HP beyond a certain point does not make the game more difficult, just more frustrating. Similarly, the way that intangibility currently works does not add difficulty, it adds frustration.

The goal should be to allow difficulty variation (because not everybody wants to play at l33+ level difficulty) while decreasing or mitigating frustration.

[battlewraith]

7 hours ago, Rudra said:

Except this provides nothing new to the game. Just easier. You want new? Provide a suggestion for something new instead of easier.

I know it makes me hypocritical, but the reason I remember that change happening was because I was so very glad it was no longer necessary to wait until level 14 for my winged characters to be able to fly.

 

Sad that your moment of self-awareness passed so quickly.

[battlewraith]

4 hours ago, Ghost said:

But just because the first attempt didn't work, why give up and go the other direction?

 

They shouldn't give up. But this change isn't "going in the other direction." Viewing this as making things easier is a lens that orthodox players use to view the issue. Don't like it? Don't do it. Is it making lower level content easier? Turn up your mission difficulty. The issue (for me) is that your obligated to a fee, in what are pretty standard builds, to take powers that are either trash or irrelevant to what you're trying to make. They did away with the fee in some pools and it didn't break the game. They could try it with the others and put it on test to see if it ruins everything.

 

5 hours ago, Ghost said:

Like I said in an earlier post, how long will this change make someone like you happy?  How long before you want other power tiers opened sooner?  When will it end?

I think you will always be searching for changes, until you realize that no change will make you completely satisficed with he game.  Then you will move on.  There's nothing wrong with that.  It happens.

 

It's the slippery slope argument. The same argument can be used about pretty much any change. If you're going to change (x), what's next? When will it end? The answer to that question is that it will end when the developers want it to end. As to how long it would keep me happy, keep in mind that this is a global change that removes a pain in the ass from any build that uses pool powers. Almost all players are already benefitting from this change when it comes to travel powers. So if they add new powersets or ATs, those additions will benefit as well.

A more serious problem, IMO, is simply lack of change. Lack of development. I think that's a driving force in people leaving and it's aggravated by people who extremely change averse on the forums.

 

5 hours ago, Ghost said:

At the end of the day, maybe the devs agree with you.  Maybe they don't.  

No one is wrong.  We all just have a different way of looking at this game, and want different things form it.

 

Yep. Cheers.

[Naraka]

8 hours ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

 

 

I don't understand this chart at all.

 

So the left is shifting rightward and causing the center to get pushed further and further over? Who's perspective is this from? Someone at the center? Someone from the left? I don't get it...

[Bill Z Bubba]

25 minutes ago, Naraka said:

I don't understand this chart at all.

 

So the left is shifting rightward and causing the center to get pushed further and further over? Who's perspective is this from? Someone at the center? Someone from the left? I don't get it...

 

Game starts with a difficulty spread from 1 to 5. Power creep is added so the spread becomes 2-5 because 1 is so easy that people don't bother with it. Repeat, repeat, now the game is so easy that new systems and/or difficulty ranges have to be tacked on to the top as happened when CoH's difficulty system was changed, then with incarnate enemies and now with Aeon TF Relentless mode.

 

How many people do you know or play with that leave the diff on +0/x1 for a character's entire leveling life?

 

Further power creep just adds to the problem forcing the need for higher diff levels and content specifically due to all the calls from the playerbase that "the game's too easy."

 

Edit: I didn't consider the speed-running crowd when I posted that chart or with this post. So, yea, people are still running at +0 when the only goal is the TF reward but thanks to power creep, they're completing said TFs faster and faster.

Edited July 10, 2022 by Bill Z Bubba

[Parabola]

30 minutes ago, Naraka said:

 

I don't understand this chart at all.

 

So the left is shifting rightward and causing the center to get pushed further and further over? Who's perspective is this from? Someone at the center? Someone from the left? I don't get it...

I believe the illustration is more about the left being dragged rightwards by the right defining where they stand as being the centre and the whole landscape shifting with them. Whether you agree with this or not of course very much depends on where you are viewing from yourself. The entire problem revolves around the fact that most people consider themselves to be in the centre no matter how extreme their outlook. I find myself reminding people that if it looks to you as if everyone else is on the left or right then that may say more about where you are than where they all are. If you are standing on the north pole every direction is south.

[Completist]

11 hours ago, Ghost said:

Bill and Rudra are right.  Ask to pick whichever pool power you want now, next you’ll ask to pick whichever t2-t9 with no regards for what comes before it.  Then what?  Incarnates at lvl2?  You may say “that’s ridiculous”. But it’s not.  The ask never ends.  

People always want what they want until they get it.  Then they complain it’s too easy.

Comically, Incarnates at level 2 is one change I could get behind. It's hard to feel helpful while sidekicking up to 49, when the rest of the team is running at level 53. Of course I don't suggest changing any of the 50+ content so actually earning incarnate materials would remain end-game TF rewards.  The ability to earn end-game rewards through challenging play, throughout your career, would incentivize actually doing content instead of just grinding or AE farms.

But that's an aside. This whole thread has turned into the eternal power creep argument. The proposed change is too extreme to even consider. Right? Right.

[Rudra]

3 hours ago, battlewraith said:

 

 

 

Sad that your moment of self-awareness passed so quickly.

There is a difference in my comment(s) you seem to have missed. With the Fly pool as the example this time. I am perfectly happy with having to pick up Hover to get Fly. The change made me happy because I no longer had to wait until level 14 for my winged characters to fly. I only had to unlock the power. Starting at level 4.

 

So I am fine with the travel pools going back to the way the other pools are. Let the devs do that. There is the requested pool standardization. I just don't want to have to wait until level 14 to make use of something that is obviously a theme of the character. (Edit: And by obvious I mean any other person who even glances at that character knows that character can probably fly. Not just obvious to me, the person that made the character.)

 

Edit: The being hypocritical part is about my being happy the level requirement was reduced. Not about the the lack of prerequisite.

Edited July 10, 2022 by Rudra

[Naraka]

2 hours ago, Parabola said:

I believe the illustration is more about the left being dragged rightwards by the right defining where they stand as being the centre and the whole landscape shifting with them. Whether you agree with this or not of course very much depends on where you are viewing from yourself. The entire problem revolves around the fact that most people consider themselves to be in the centre no matter how extreme their outlook. I find myself reminding people that if it looks to you as if everyone else is on the left or right then that may say more about where you are than where they all are. If you are standing on the north pole every direction is south.

 

So then it's inaccurately or unclearly describing the Overton Window.

 

I say inaccurate because just because the perception of what is left or right shifts, the actual political spectrum doesn't change, just what people feel is acceptable at the time. The marked out spots don't cease to exist or ignored. Slavery and child labor still exists even if either side agree that it's bad, it just is being ignored since it's not here or is of a different flavor.

[Bill Z Bubba]

My apologies to everyone for using it. Bad analogy is bad.

[Aracknight]

Zen and the art of tongue-in-cheek compromise.

 

I have created, for you, my friends, Power Choices Really Everyone Everywhere Picks.

 

We'll call it Power C.R.E.E.P. for short.

 

Since every post seems to tell me that if I'm not taking the following powers, I'm playing the game wrong, I've created the Power C.R.E.E.P. pool.  Here's what it includes:

1 Hasten
2 Combat Jumping
3 Aid Self
4 Tough
5 Weave

 

Here's some tips:

 

Hasten:  I have never taken this power, but I used to not understand why everyone took it.  While yes, I use SR primarily, there's plenty of set bonuses to build a good attack chain, so why aren't they?  I understand it now.  They either slot for nothing but Acc and Dam and rely on Hasten for their recharge instead of enhancements, or they're slotting for Acc and Procs for the same reason. 

 

Combat Jumping:  Never used it.  a little jumping, a little Def and Immobilize resistance.  Good for squishies I guess?  Or people who aren't taking full set bonuses to maximize their defenses because they are....chasing procs.

 

Aid Self:  Never taken, never used.  It's a self heal, I guess, and if you don't take it you're a noob of some sort.  Guess I'm a noob. 

 

Tough:  I need this power, I always take it and I never even turn it on.  It's a mule power for three IOs I generally need for my builds.  But hey, at least in this scenario I've custom created for myself, I still have to take other pancake I'll never use to get it!  Maybe if it Tough granted +Res to all instead of just smashing and lethal, similar to how Weave grants +Def to all, I'd be more likely to turn it on and slot it intentionally.  PS:  While the pool this power comes from is clearly named the Fighting pool and not the Self Defense Pool, I assure you, anywhere that isn't trying to take your money and convince you that their teacher is a deific being worthy of your eternal adoration (and financing!) will teach you defense first, usually through avoidance, and offense second.  

 

Weave:  What's awesome about this power, is that this pool power does something not even my SR toggles do.  It gives +Def to everything, and some Immobilize resistance too.  I know from my years and years of Kenpo and Capoeira training that you learn to avoid fire, negative, and psionic energy attacks between 7 and 9 on Mondays, Thursdays, and Saturday evenings.  

 

If I didn't have to take Boxing to get to Tough, I don't see where there would be a game breaking power creep from a one-slot wonder.  My attack chain is solid, even with Dragon's Tail and a generally superfluous Crane Kick that I generally use only when exemplaring:  I don't need hasten.  My defenses are solid, and Infiltration is awesome, I don't need more movement or defense.  Maybe I would add Flight instead of refueling jetpacks weekly?  I even have Warrior's Challenge.  Maybe take and move my Preventative Medicine: Chance to Absorb to Experimental Injection (I primarily solo or do Itrials or other raids for badges where you're buffed to the gills, so hurray for another power I'll never put in my bar or click to use) so I can eke out another 25.1 hit points and 8.7% regen?  I already have a taunt, so would a one slot epic power pool pet be something worthwhile? I mean, I even have Elude. I really can't understand how the sky falls over this request.

 

This is obviously written in a combination of jest and disgust.  It's never just an idea with some of you people.  It's a holy cause, and the infidels must die.  For pancake's sake, someone posted a political spectrum illustration to prove their point that Someone Was Wrong on the Internet.  I'm out, see you in the city.

 

Peace.
 

[Rudra]

Good post. Both entertaining and enlightening.

 

I was under the impression the Holy Quartet consisted of Hasten (which I never take), Combat Jumping (which my ground bound characters do take, but not the fliers or teleporters), Maneuvers (which I take on my Masterminds for obvious reasons), Tactics (which I also normally take on my Masterminds for obvious reasons), Assault (my Masterminds again), Tough, and Weave.

 

This is the first I've heard of Aid Self being a 'must pick or are noob' power. Still a valid point. Also, I guess that makes me a noob too.

 

I'm scared to ask if I'm one of the ones with the holy cause, so that probably means I am one.