The Pretty Good AE Debate

[Darmian]

Am I actually in a minority here?  I use AE all the time, but not to farm.  Just to run player made stories.

 

I feel like I'm wandering out of my room to find two sets of people fighting in the hallway, about nothing to do with me but jebus they're noisy.

[Bill Z Bubba]

5 minutes ago, Darmian said:

Am I actually in a minority here?  I use AE all the time, but not to farm.  Just to run player made stories.

 

I feel like I'm wandering out of my room to find two sets of people fighting in the hallway, about nothing to do with me but jebus they're noisy.

 

One of the camps wants to remove all rewards from you while you run those stories.

The other camp doesn't.

 

I suspect you're either in one of the camps or truly don't care.

[Darmian]

5 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

 

One of the camps wants to remove all rewards from you while you run those stories.

The other camp doesn't.

 

I suspect you're either in one of the camps or truly don't care.

Well, I'm probably in the "truly don't care" section I suppose.  If the Emp -> Reward Merits conversion is removed then that bothers me not.  Mind you, if it stays then that doesn't really affect me either, since I never use that anyway.

 

Oh well.  Back inside and close the door.  Maybe I should call the cops about noise levels or something.

[Bill Z Bubba]

3 minutes ago, Darmian said:

Well, I'm probably in the "truly don't care" section I suppose.  If the Emp -> Reward Merits conversion is removed then that bothers me not.  Mind you, if it stays then that doesn't really affect me either, since I never use that anyway.

 

Oh well.  Back inside and close the door.  Maybe I should call the cops about noise levels or something.

 

I'm actually in agreement with the no emp to reward merit conversion but I'm forced to ask ya, will you continue not to care if ALL rewards are removed/nerfed into oblivion? Meaning, when you run the story arcs you enjoy, you get no xp, no inf, or drastically reduced amounts? Are you ambivalent on that front as well?

[Coyotedancer]

A little "data" for you guys, for whatever it's worth.

 

Ironhorse (DB/Rad Brute) + door sitter side-kick Skyrunner (DB/WP Scrap), who had a 2xXP buff running

Both maps were run at +4/x8 with bosses

 

One hour on Wolf World Old School PI farm map (One full clear plus about 60% of a second run)...

16.1m INF after drops were sold. 1 Grav Anchor kept. 1 Catalyst kept.

Sky got from lvl 35.7 to lvl 38.1

 

One hour in Humble's S/L Space farm map (Two full rounds and about half of a third before my hour was up-)

19.6m INF after drops were sold. 1 Hecca kept, 1 Panacea kept.

Sky went from lvl 38.1 to lvl 40,2

 

So, yes. That farm was a little more efficient for the hour spent than Wolf World was, which has pretty much everything to do with the groups being closer together and more numerous in the farm than on the large, open mission map. (I was able to Taunt them in from the center of the map, and that saved quite a bit of time spent finding wolves rather than dicing them into kibble.) 

 

"Risk"-wise? Honestly, the farm critters were more of a hazard for Horse than the wolves were. I used his heal a lot more often in there, due pretty much entirely to the density of the goons, It wasn't unusual to look at what was in melee with him and find multiple EBs who had survived longer than the rest of the group they had come in with. That "flock of tough guys" situation never happened with the wolves. 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 7, 2022 by Coyotedancer

[Darmian]

19 minutes ago, Bill Z Bubba said:

will you continue not to care if ALL rewards are removed/nerfed into oblivion? Meaning, when you run the story arcs you enjoy, you get no xp, no inf, or drastically reduced amounts? Are you ambivalent on that front as well?

Is this being suggested though?  I see nothing to signify that in the patch notes.  There's a lot of talk going on about such a thing but nothing beyond what's in the notes.

 

Outside of Dev Choices I already get lower XP/drops per story.  If it reverted back to tickets only for that then that's fine too, for me.  But I'm just me and one person's drink is another's poison. 

[Ukase]

7 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

 

Thumbs up on this part.

 

 

How has the "design philosophy" changed to support farming?

"Player expectations" haven't changed. They are still exploiting the AE for gains greater than outside of the AE for both influence and power-leveling. That is why the did it to begin with, and that's why they are still doing it.

 

 

People won't farm if they weren't getting disproportionately greater returns. That's the whole reason they started doing and the whole reason they continue to do it.

Cut the rewards to 1/4 of what they are now, and you will see far less farmers.

 

 

The DEVs said the would ban people that exploited the AE before it came out. Then almost immediately caved when it came out because they would have lots of accounts that were exploiting the system and many of them had not bothered to read the warning in the forums.

 

But yes, I agree, it should have been nipped in the bud instead of allowed to fester.

But I think at the time, it turned into a cash cow for NCSoft Corporate (It was luring in F2P players that became microtransaction P2P players) so they told NCSoft Austin to let it happen. I have a feeling that NCSoft was behind some of the gold farming as well, and gold farmer definitely profited off of AE farming.

So, the part in bold is a really interesting theory! 

I know nothing about "design philosophy". I'm not real sure I could define it. 

It's semantics, but AE is not an exploit. Is it being used the way Paragon Studios imagined it would be used? Yes, it is being used in the exact way they imagined it would be. 
That said, it's also being used to "farm". What a term, "farm". 
Farming in real life is traditionally meant to invest resource in the hopes of getting far more return. Plant seeds, harvest. Feed pigs, breed pigs, slaughter the fattest ones. 

With the way we refer to farming, many of you are unaware of the time it takes for a new player to make a character that can do this. It's almost idiot proof now, granted. Copy one of the many builds, market a bit, or play for merits as you need to, or simply work you way into the build you're looking for. Either way, you're investing your time and energy to make a character that can withstand what most non-farmers cannot. 

It really doesn't matter what Paragon Studio developers said, or were aiming for. They are not here. They no longer have skin in the game. We are a fraction of the size of the old CoH player base. It makes sense to me to not even consider the original plans that NCSoft and Paragon Studios had in mind. It's an apples and oranges player base. It's not a pay to win model. It's not a subscription model. It's a rogue server that is emulating a darn good, if slow (because of the volunteer status) developer studio. 

AE and farming are an integral part of CoH. The influence that a farmer earns really shouldn't matter to anyone. Why? Because all that influence does is help drive down the costs of IOs. All that influence they have is spent on alts, I suspect, or stashed in unobtainable bids or email. Or maybe they're having a costume contest every now and then. 

All of these habits farmers have - stashing inf, or spending it, they don't hurt the casual player in any way. They have no impact on their game play. And I cannot fathom how anyone sane can consider AE farming an exploit. An exploit is doing something that generates an advantage. It's not an advantage if anyone can do the same thing. 

I do understand that some of you would retort that if they did the same thing, we'd have "City of Farmers". Newsflash - we have had City of Farmers since the Fire tank was born. The only difference now is that because HC is free to play, anyone can make multiple accounts without paying an extra $15 per month. That's the only real reason why there are so many folks with extra accounts that have farmers. Because we can. It's even encouraged, because Jimmy himself has stated that farmers are good for the gaming community. What he did question was the AFK-farmer. 

Again, it's not an exploit to use AE to farm. It's perfectly reasonable, and hurts nobody. If it weren't for the folks to lazy or to ignorant to make their own second account and farm themselves, 90% of you against farming would be blissfully unaware of them. 

I do not see how farming harms anyone. 

I do understand that someone getting PL'd and knowing nothing about the game...yeah, what that player ends up in a team I'm on, it's a sad situation. But that's not really on the farmer, that's on the player that has so little knowledge of what they're doing, they are genuinely unaware that they don't know what they're doing. 

But, again, farming is not exploitative. Anyone can do it. Just because you don't want to...that's sounds like a personal problem. 

I understand that some folks have this ideal way that they think the game should be played. Folks join together, team up for a common goal, and everyone shares the proceeds automatically. Some folks crack jokes, folks get to know each other and laugh and have a fun experience. 

But not everyone is going to find that pursuit so ideal. Some folks want to speed through. Some folks want to kill 'em all. Some folks want to farm. If you're not on the team, it has nothing to do with you, doesn't impact you at all. 

When someone runs 6 hami raids, back to back and alts out and scores 480 merits in about 90 minutes, nobody's fussing about that. Sure, they coordinated and got the job done, so there was a slightly higher degree of risk. But not by much, really. 50 folks buffing up with incarnate buffs and zerging hami in 60 seconds isn't hardly a risk these days. But it goes on routinely. And it should! Let these folks make their loot if that's how they want to! 

Some player named Blapperella  was running an Ouro Positron AGAIN today. I swear I see them forming up for that once a week, at least. It's merits, and they're probably pretty quick at it. Good for them. Is there risk? Maybe. But not much, once you get your team composition squared away. 

All these players make influence and merits their own way. And, if I'm not on their team, it's none of my business. Let 'em do them. 
So, with regards to farming, I just wish all of you who are against it would realize what I do: 

It hurts nobody. If anything, it helps the community by having more items in the AH for folks to buy. 

I'm sure I'm coming off as obtuse, and I suppose that's fair. But I don't see the harm. In what specific way does a farmer hurt the community? The game? 

I keep reading, "If farming didn't give a ridiculous amount more rewards, nobody would do it." 
That may be true. And to that comment, I reply, "Then it's a good thing it offers more rewards. We need to incentivize farming! Without farmers, the cost of IOs is going to go up! 

And that's fine by me. I'll be quite alright. But you do realize, I hope, that there are players that think 20 million influence is unobtainable! They are level 20 or so, have maybe 100K influence and know nothing about the market, know nothing about how to make influence - but they've heard about the LotG 7.5%. They know these are a favorable enhancement to have. If you guys have your way, these poor folks are going to be blowing their merits on recipes instead of simply buying one for 6M (going price now). If farming is reduced, that price point goes up, guaranteed. 

I say this to be helpful. You do not want to reduce farming. I can see the case for reducing or eliminating AFK farming, although I think the case is weak. But active farming? It's not an exploit at all. It's no more risky than folks in a radio mission in PI, folks in an MSR, or folks in a hami raid, or folks running an itf. 
And the rewards for active farming might give more influence due to the density of the mobs, but farmers don't get reward merits, so it's pretty much a wash. 

[Ukase]

8 hours ago, UltraAlt said:

 

An exploit is never using the existing game code to do what it was not meant to do.

That is why it is called an exploit.

So, I fixed that for you. The way you had it was completely wrong. And even my corrected form is wrong. 
Using game code is simply playing the game. Just because some folks think outside of the box, that's not an exploit. That's value-added unintended bonus. 

A better example of an exploit would be if I discovered that killing a -3 lieutenant sniper on a roof of a building in PI gave me a very rare recipe every 2nd time I defeated him and proceeded to let him respawn hundreds of times to do just that. That would be exploiting a flaw in the rng recipe drop code. 

The AE system, when you create the npcs to defeat, there are sliders to make them super tough for more xp, or not so tough for less xp. There's no flaw at all. No exploit. It's by design. 
 

[Bionic_Flea]

None of the HC Team have stated they want to eliminate farming, or eliminate AE.  They have made some adjustments in the past and have proposed making a change in the next update.  It's not the end of the world, or the end of farming, or the end of AE.  It's all going to be OK.

Edited August 7, 2022 by Bionic_Flea

[Marbing]

38 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

None of the HC Team have stated they want to eliminate farming, or eliminate AE.  They have made some adjustments in the past and have proposed making a change in the next update.  It's not the end of the world, or the end of farming, or the end of AE.  It's all going to be OK.

This has been said several times, but somehow always falls on deaf ears. But I appreciate you reiterating it.

[Coyotedancer]

I suspect there's some worry that the Powers That Be will eventually cave in to the pearl-clutching over how terrible it is letting people play "the wrong way"... 

[roleki]

1 hour ago, Darmian said:

Is this being suggested though?  I see nothing to signify that in the patch notes.  There's a lot of talk going on about such a thing but nothing beyond what's in the notes.

 

Outside of Dev Choices I already get lower XP/drops per story.  If it reverted back to tickets only for that then that's fine too, for me.  But I'm just me and one person's drink is another's poison. 

If you look back at the history of anti-AE whining on the forum, they whined for AE changes and we wound up with less rewards in AE.  They whined some more and no-XP was removed.  They kept whining and they almost got vet rewards removed, but instead they got Emp-> Merits removed.  Every time someone whines about AE, it's directly converted into a solid "fuck you" to a very large portion of the playerbase.  
 

So yeah, I get a little pissed because every time the devs bring whine-infused changes to the game, the game gets shittier for one pool of players, and not one whit better for any other pool of players.

 

And still, not one person has been able to show me proof that farming affects them in any way, other than "Farmers have more stuff than I do."  

[Grouchybeast]

1 hour ago, Bionic_Flea said:

None of the HC Team have stated they want to eliminate farming, or eliminate AE.  They have made some adjustments in the past and have proposed making a change in the next update.  It's not the end of the world, or the end of farming, or the end of AE.  It's all going to be OK.

Yesterday I unfolded the blanket on the sofa so that it covered the whole sofa instead of just the left-hand end, and my cat responded like it was THE WORST BETRAYAL EVER.  She could NEVER SLEEP ON THE SOFA AGAIN.  She spent most of the evening dramatically flopping onto other potential sleeping spaces but they were also THE LITERAL WORST and obviously she was soon going to DIE FROM LACK OF NAPS.

 

This evening she's fast asleep on the blanket in the exact centre of the sofa, so I guess THE GREAT SOFA DISASTER OF AUGUST 2022 has somehow been survived.

[Bionic_Flea]

It was . . . a catastrophe!

 

[Coyotedancer]

Ouch.

[Troo]

1 hour ago, roleki said:

And still, not one person has been able to show me proof that farming affects them in any way, other than "Farmers have more stuff than I do." 

 

The result of some farming is changes that impact lots of folks. <-- has been stated before

 

The actions of some end up affecting others. It gets old seeing "show me proof that farming affects them in any way,"

Is it all farming that is an issue, no. Is the farming you are doing affecting other, probably not.

But you leave no room for the possibility that SOME farming is problematic and ends up impacting others when changes have to be made.

[ForeverLaxx]

4 hours ago, Neiska said:

Fair, but I don't run trials

To be clear, I mean "trial" in a scientific sense, not specifically to refer to an iTrial. Yes, I realize I should have used a different word considering the game has content literally called a trial. That's my mistake.

[ivanhedgehog]

9 hours ago, Neiska said:

 

So its too much to ask for people to actually know something before having an opinion on it, or before discussing removing something? 😆 

No, I was asking why anyone would think that kneecapping everyone to a lowest common denominator of rewards was some kind of good idea? City of standing around bored? I farm sometimes and I dont make anywhere near what people are claiming I do. Maybe if people concentrated on having fun in a game and not how big a piece of pie everyone else got, this game might still be here next year. People trying to micromanage other people experience in a very dated pirated game is beyond stupid.

[ivanhedgehog]

7 hours ago, Neiska said:

 

That's precisely my point. AE balanced to "What?" Should it be balanced to Street Patrolling? PI farming? Trials? What activity should it be "equal" to? And without those numbers, its more or less a shot in the dark balance-wise. How much inf or experience/hour should people be capable of? 

that is exactly what I am asking. There are a lot of big assumptions about farming that are taken at face value but should be questioned.

[ShardWarrior]

7 hours ago, ForeverLaxx said:

Problem is, no one seems interested in running these tests that they demand be made, and the one time someone did run one, it's immediately ignored because it's just "one sample size."

 

The fact of the matter is, everyone here has already made up their mind. Any data that's provided which doesn't jive with their established opinion is going to be discarded. Even if everyone on the forum ran a test and it roughly matched Flea's quick-and-dirty attempt, would you still be satisfied? I mean, people that use the forum are such a small group compared to the rest of the playerbase, after all. Frankly, if you or anyone else is so concerned about data, maybe run some trials on your own and come to your own conclusions instead of hoping that someone else's efforts will match your conclusions.

 

Sorry, but I disagree that one test is representative of the entire results.  Taking one set of results and saying that is absolute proof of anything is specious.  I did not say it should be ignored, rather it is just a solitary result.  This would be akin to a team speed running an ITF in under eight minutes and saying that is how long it takes for every team to complete it.  We know it is not the case as median averages are used.  I am certainly open to seeing if there really is such a huge disparity between reward gains AE and non-AE content.  If it is true, I have no issue admitting it.  However, I am skeptical of the claim that AE is the best source of all rewards in the game as there are many different rewards. 

 

Sure, I can run tests of my own.  I am already fairly certain what the results would be though as results are highly dependent on what rewards are to be measured.  XP and influence are not the only rewards in the game.  Testing criteria needs to be determined so results can be analyzed properly and measured as equally as possible.

 

For example, it is far faster to speed run a LRSF/MLTF for SHOs than to farm in AE for the inf to buy them, at least it is for me.  It takes far less time to run through SBB to get the Overwhelming Force IO drop.  Speed running TFs can yield much faster merit rewards as well, especially speed running the WSTs.

[ForeverLaxx]

2 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

Sure, I can run tests of my own.  I am already fairly certain what the results would be though as results are highly dependent on what rewards are to be measured.  XP and influence are not the only rewards in the game.  Testing criteria needs to be determined so results can be analyzed properly and measured as equally as possible.

Or, in other words, you can craft whatever data you want to sell the point you're trying to make.

 

So why did it matter if Flea did the test he was told to do if it ultimately doesn't matter and the requests for testing were merely facetious?

 

I don't care who does what. I don't farm. I don't care if others farm. What bothers me is when people demand proof that they'll immediately dismiss by moving goal posts. Either you want proof, or you don't, but don't pretend you can be swayed by evidence when there's no intention to actually consider it.

 

This is why I asked if it would even matter if evidence was presented. Everyone already has their own opinion. Threads don't reach 34+ pages when people can agree on something.

[ShardWarrior]

2 minutes ago, ForeverLaxx said:

Or, in other words, you can craft whatever data you want to sell the point you're trying to make.

 

Well no, that is not at all what I said nor what I suggested.  Here is what I did say -

 

8 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

XP and influence are not the only rewards in the game.  Testing criteria needs to be determined so results can be analyzed properly and measured as equally as possible.

 

I am specifically stating that criteria has to be defined so anyone testing knows what is being measured. 

 

You completely ignored the question of what rewards are going to be measured as there are many rewards in the game?  Is it just strictly XP and inf?  Or merits?  Is selling any drops taken into consideration?  What types of missions are being used to test?  Are speed runs and/or AFK farming acceptable to use cases?  Is testing limited to only certain ATs, power sets and enemy NPC types as some are much easier than others?

 

There are a lot of questions to be answered beforehand and testing criteria established.  This is how you avoid bias in the results which you are already blaming everyone of. 

[ForeverLaxx]

@ShardWarrior

 

My last post on this subject: I haven't skipped or ignored anything. Claiming I have doesn't make it true, just as pretending the goal posts aren't being shifted in order to continue running a narrative about "the data" doesn't mean I'm not aware that that's what is going on. Repeat yourself all you like; it doesn't particularly matter. No data will be sufficient until its data you personally agree with and I've been noticing that for a very long time with specific people I'm not going to name here.

 

With that said, I'm returning to lurking this thread. Watching everyone run in circles is way more entertaining than getting caught up in it yourself.

[ShardWarrior]

1 minute ago, ForeverLaxx said:

My last post on this subject: I haven't skipped or ignored anything. Claiming I have doesn't make it true, just as pretending the goal posts aren't being shifted in order to continue running a narrative about "the data" doesn't mean I'm not aware that that's what is going on. Repeat yourself all you like; it doesn't particularly matter. No data will be sufficient until its data you personally agree with and I've been noticing that for a very long time with specific people I'm not going to name here.

 

Repeatedly claiming one persons test is representative of the whole player base does not make anything true either.  Of course one test is not going to sway any opinions, nor should it.  Absolutely you have ignored the questions, that much is evident.  Asking for proper criteria so results can be measured properly with as little sample bias as possible is not shifting the goal posts either.

 

Yes, people are asking for data, so help define what data needs to be measured and how.  It is much more difficult to refute evidence when you know the criteria used to gather it and results are repeatable.

[MoonSheep]

13 minutes ago, ShardWarrior said:

 

Repeatedly claiming one persons test is representative of the whole player base does not make anything true either.  Of course one test is not going to sway any opinions, nor should it.  Absolutely you have ignored the questions, that much is evident.  Asking for proper criteria so results can be measured properly with as little sample bias as possible is not shifting the goal posts either.

 

Yes, people are asking for data, so help define what data needs to be measured and how.  It is much more difficult to refute evidence when you know the criteria used to gather it and results are repeatable.

 

think everyone is still waiting for you to show us the data mate

 

can you also provide stats on what percentage of the playerbase would leave if AE was removed and what price IOs would be? without evidence these are baseless claims and merely unproven hypothetical situations