Is changing the power levels power creep?

[Wavicle]

If Fulcrum Shift and Blaster/Corr/Def Nukes weren't so OP this wouldn't be an issue at all.

[Yaliw]

14 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

If Fulcrum Shift and Blaster/Corr/Def Nukes weren't so OP this wouldn't be an issue at all.

I actually think you're hitting the nail on the head with the argument.

 

For the sake of brevity, that's what this 'is this powercreep' thing is all about- the few strong powers that warp the game are now obtained earlier.

 

Nobody is crying that crab spiders are getting their spiderlings faster or that a tanker is getting Headsplitter sooner.

 

It's all about blaster nukes and the other handful of abilities that are strong.

 

Maybe this says more about how busted nukes are in this game than these powers being available earlier and that should be the REAL discussion.

[Sirius.Games]

17 minutes ago, Yaliw said:

I actually think you're hitting the nail on the head with the argument.

 

For the sake of brevity, that's what this 'is this powercreep' thing is all about- the few strong powers that warp the game are now obtained earlier.

 

Nobody is crying that crab spiders are getting their spiderlings faster or that a tanker is getting Headsplitter sooner.

 

It's all about blaster nukes and the other handful of abilities that are strong.

 

Maybe this says more about how busted nukes are in this game than these powers being available earlier and that should be the REAL discussion.

Nukes were designed to be strong but with the cost of all the enemies focusing you (played a lot of blasters i4 on). With soft capped defense this breaks it but mostly in the exempting situation when a billion inf buys you the survival to come come out without a scratch. The elephant in the room is that blasters no longer have the crash after. Every other crash remains and /mental on blasters was busted on love because you could recover through the crash and not detoggle.

 

I understand why the crash was removed but not having a crash made blasters that much stronger. Along with the recovery abilities blasters have gotten much stronger.

 

I still think buffing enemies is the better way to go than nerfing around the byproduct of updates from 3 games and 20+ major patches.

[Seed22]

1 minute ago, Sirius.Games said:

I still think buffing enemies is the better way to go than nerfing around the byproduct of updates from 3 games and 20+ major patches

All buffing enemies would do is make this worse imo. The level changes means OPTIONS, not necessarily that you’ll be grossly OP at X level. Remember, slots plus IO’s already act as a level check, insofar as if I’m not Y level I cant slot Z IO. Trust me, that goes a LONG way in power curving.

 

*Grumbles about not being able to slot my snipe set early in Moonbeam*

[Rudra]

If you just want the lower levels to be harder, then play gold side. Several of those missions are excessive. My contention with the OP is the assumption that players fall into two categories: Grueling Challenge and Fair Playground. Never mind that players more often fall in between those two extremes.

 

I hope I'm reading the OP wrong, but it feels like the author wants the game to be "Nintendo Hard" until you max out and everyone that thinks otherwise should just skip to 50 and be done. And there is a place that comes to mind where that kind of thinking can be dumped. We already have the option of going +4/x8 right out the gate, so there is your lower levels be Nintendo Hard mode. Or are the lower levels somehow so powerful that they are clearing that difficulty level on autopilot somehow?

 

Edit: Just for clarification, by Fair Playground I mean a kid playground at like the state fair.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Rudra

[Yomo Kimyata]

1 hour ago, Perfidy said:

They can't imagine why I'd spend 30 minutes trying to find a fit for the name Militia Etheridge. I can't seem to make the right character for it. The name's available, have at it. No charge. 
 

 

Solid.

[_NOPE_]

37 minutes ago, Rudra said:

I hope I'm reading the OP wrong, but it feels like the author wants the game to be "Nintendo Hard" until you max out and everyone that thinks otherwise should just skip to 50 and be done.

Yes, you're reading it wrong.

[Rudra]

Then please explain what you mean.

[_NOPE_]

5 hours ago, The Philotic Knight said:

You just want to skip the early levels where you didn't have access to Flight, and you're tired of the Dr. V storyline? BOOM, done, skip those few.

I want people to be able to go to precisely the level that they want to, to precisely the power(s) they want to have.

[Arc-Mage]

I really can’t believe no one has pointed this out yet.
 

The game is 17 years old. For the first 5+ years on live, it was really difficult at lower levels. I would guess most people playing today also played on live and experienced the grind of those days. It took me a year and a half to solo my main to lvl 50. I also distinctly remember running across the Hollows just to die at the door of the mish, thus being forced to respawn in AP hospital only to have to run the breadth of the Hollows again. 
 

After 17 years of development the game has naturally evolved. Times have changed, the game has changed. If you don’t like the grind now turn down your difficulty if you live for the grind turn it up. 
 

Those of us who have been here for a good portion of live have experienced the low level difficulty. By now we have our system of leveling down and for most of us it works despite the changes made. 
 

Been there done that. I and I assume others play now for their favorite content and or play style. Difficulty by this point in the games history is lower down on the list of reasons to play CoH. 
 

my2cents.

[Yomo Kimyata]

1 hour ago, Rudra said:

If you just want the lower levels to be harder, then play gold side. Several of those missions are excessive. My contention with the OP is the assumption that players fall into two categories: Grueling Challenge and Fair Playground. Never mind that players more often fall in between those two extremes.

 

 

I'm not the OP, but my observational bias is that players fall into three categories:  Grueling Challenge, Fair Playground, and Easy Peasy.  I think there is room for all of these.  But I don't think the Gruelers are clamoring that everyone has to play +4/x8 from Outbreak onwards, but it seems to me the Easy Peasers ARE clamoring that everyone has to get nukes at level 1 because how else are you going to beat that Skulls LT?

 

Again, just my opinion and I accept I have observational bias.

[Rudra]

26 minutes ago, The Philotic Knight said:

I want people to be able to go to precisely the level that they want to, to precisely the power(s) they want to have.

What does that have to do with the biggest section of the OP? Literally the first 9 paragraphs of the OP go on about game difficulty. If I ignore the biggest part of the OP and just focus on the proposed solution? Then it is about either jumping straight to 50 or bypassing content players may not want to do again. And if they want to level straight to 50? They can already power level in farms. If they want to skip content? They can skip that content. There is no mandate to do the TFs/SFs. There is no mandate to do the story arcs. There is no mandate for players to deal with any part of the game they don't want to. And the parts they don't want to do are skippable.

 

 

[Rudra]

5 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

 

I'm not the OP, but my observational bias is that players fall into three categories:  Grueling Challenge, Fair Playground, and Easy Peasy.  I think there is room for all of these.  But I don't think the Gruelers are clamoring that everyone has to play +4/x8 from Outbreak onwards, but it seems to me the Easy Peasers ARE clamoring that everyone has to get nukes at level 1 because how else are you going to beat that Skulls LT?

 

Again, just my opinion and I accept I have observational bias.

I'm as against the nukes and other high priority acquisition powers being moved to earlier levels as anybody else. The game should not be made any easier than it is.

 

However, neither should it have to be any harder. We already have the means to play a more difficult game with the difficulty settings. And the fully developed characters have been given the means to play on even more challenging difficulties which are being proliferated.

 

Edit: I believe that if players are categorized, you have the Grueling Challenge players clamoring for Nintendo Hard, the Challenge players that want difficult fights but not to be wiped out repeatedly because game RNG hoses them, Casual players that just want to have fun, and Fair Playground players that make me wonder about them. And there are likely other types of players too, including players that move between categories depending on mood, AT, and friends.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Rudra

[El D]

50 minutes ago, The Philotic Knight said:

I want people to be able to go to precisely the level that they want to, to precisely the power(s) they want to have.

 

That's literally still how the game works. It's still a tiered leveling system when the player chooses exactly which powers they want. Someone wants to stop leveling at 25-30 to play a street-tier character? They can do that. They don't think the character should have access to their Tier 7 through 9 powers by that point? That's now a decision that player gets to make for themselves by not taking those powers until they do want them, rather than having the game decide for them and offer no alternative. With this change, folks who do want to take these powers earlier are able to do so and folks who want them at the original level ranges can still level up that way if they so choose. It patches the dead levels in character progression and provides enhanced choice to the playerbase without removing any prior progression options. This seems like an unequivocal example of 'Homecoming should let players play their own way!'

Edited October 6, 2022 by El D

[Yomo Kimyata]

4 minutes ago, Rudra said:

 

 

However, neither should it have to be any harder. We already have the means to play a more difficult game with the difficulty settings. And the fully developed characters have been given the means to play on even more challenging difficulties which are being proliferated.

 

 

I totally agree.  But the only changes that have been made to make it harder are optional, and then everyone still goes crazy about how they don't want things to be harder but that they want the rewards associated with hard mode anyway, but not so hard please.

 

And 95% of the changes made/proposed in the past two years are to make the game simpler.  Again, I don't mind those changes if you need them, but make it opt-in instead of mandatory.  It's insulting to assume that we all are so terrible that we really want to be buffed all the time, or that we can't figure out how geometry works.

 

And, again, it would be nice for someone in "control" to make a statement like, "We are going to actively discourage AFK farming, and that's why we are doing the following things."  Or "We hate brutes" or whatever.  (I don't think they hate brutes).  For example.  And lots of people would wring their hands and some would quit and we would move on.

[Rudra]

1 hour ago, El D said:

 

That's literally still how the game works. It's still a tiered leveling system when the player chooses exactly which powers they want. Someone wants to stop leveling at 25-30 to play a street-tier character? They can do that. They don't think the character should have access to their Tier 7 through 9 powers by that point? That's now a decision that player gets to make for themselves by not taking those powers until they do want them, rather than having the game decide for them and offer no alternative. With this change, folks who do want to take these powers earlier are able to do so and folks who want them at the original level ranges can still level up that way if they so choose. It patches the dead levels in character progression and provides enhanced choice to the playerbase without removing any prior progression options. This seems like an unequivocal example of 'Homecoming should let players play their own way!'

Players always have choices. Powers from their AT's primary or secondary that they skipped and pool powers. The whole point of the leveling based powers acquisition is to show progression. The character progressively learns how to use his/her powers in more effective, powerful, or expansive ways. Even CO has requirements to access powers, with the nukes and other high end powers requiring several powers from the set to unlock. Which puts them behind two walls, the level requirement to have that many powers and the set requirement of prerequisite powers. CoX only has the level requirement. Each primary and secondary set for non-epic ATs only have 9 powers. With the freedom to improve the character from available pools to either increase survival, effectiveness, or increase available options for play such as stealth powers, heals, and so forth. Why the rush to get the key powers from a set earlier?

 

Edit: If you really want the powers earlier, then we can go the CO route. Each power in a set requires the character have the tier-2 in powers from the set to get. So your T1 and 2 powers are available. Tier 3 requires 1 power from the set. Tier 9 requires 7 powers from the set. There you go. No more level requirements.

 

Edit again: One of many things I hated about CO was that they changed power order. I've been forced to respec a character twice in one month because power order was changed. So yes, I am strongly biased against changing power order/levels.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Rudra

[golstat2003]

7 hours ago, Shadeknight said:

Personally, my lack of care towards power creep comes from the fact - at any day this could disappear. This isn't the live service game - it's a private server run by volunteer devs who have a vision that may or may not be decipherable.

 

 

Qt'd and bolded for the truth.

[golstat2003]

I don't agree with the idea that the 20s and 30s should be a slog. With the increase in power leveling on HC, I'd argue many others don't either.

 

Anything that can be done to make those level areas more fun is fine to me. Other than creating more content in those ranges faster so that we are not doing the same old missions for the 1000th time (which isn't happening since this isn't a paid dev team and they have lives outside of this) I think smoothing out how and when you get powers is a good thing.

 

Other's mileage will vary.

 

EDIT: Also after the instant pvp lvl 50s release, suggestions were made for instant 50s in PVE again. It got many arguing against it. I wish the OP luck on that, and flame retardant pants. He will need both.

[Wavicle]

THIS IS POWER CREEP!
POWER CREEP!
IT'S POWER CREEPY!

(to the tune of Super Freak, by Rick James)

[El D]

10 hours ago, Rudra said:

Players always have choices. Powers from their AT's primary or secondary that they skipped and pool powers. The whole point of the leveling based powers acquisition is to show progression. The character progressively learns how to use his/her powers in more effective, powerful, or expansive ways. Even CO has requirements to access powers, with the nukes and other high end powers requiring several powers from the set to unlock. Which puts them behind two walls, the level requirement to have that many powers and the set requirement of prerequisite powers. CoX only has the level requirement. Each primary and secondary set for non-epic ATs only have 9 powers. With the freedom to improve the character from available pools to either increase survival, effectiveness, or increase available options for play such as stealth powers, heals, and so forth. Why the rush to get the key powers from a set earlier?

 

Edit: If you really want the powers earlier, then we can go the CO route. Each power in a set requires the character have the tier-2 in powers from the set to get. So your T1 and 2 powers are available. Tier 3 requires 1 power from the set. Tier 9 requires 7 powers from the set. There you go. No more level requirements.

 

Edit again: One of many things I hated about CO was that they changed power order. I've been forced to respec a character twice in one month because power order was changed. So yes, I am strongly biased against changing power order/levels.

 

I think the core issue of this thread is seeing powers as a reward for leveling up. They're not - powers are the means by which the player gains levels. Powers in CoH aren't a benefit of progression, powers are the progression. They're not like badges, or merits, or Incarnate rewards; the game doesn't give out powers if a player 'does well' or accomplishes a certain task (temp. powers notwithstanding). The Primary/Secondary sets are not a reward for playing the game, they are the game for the character that picked those sets.

 

As for respecing, you genuinely don't have to unless you intend to actively play that character or play them in auto-exemplar content. Heck, even if you don't respec the character and still play them, outside of PvP I can't imagine a noticeable difference in gameplay. I know someone who, back on Live, had a Scrapper he never respeced from before Fitness was inherent - never had any problems. It's not like this change makes the content any harder, just more fun to play through.

 

3 hours ago, Wavicle said:

THIS IS POWER CREEP!
POWER CREEP!
IT'S POWER CREEPY!

(to the tune of Super Freak, by Rick James

 

Would have also accepted 'This is Halloween' from the Nightmare Before Christmas.

 

FORUMITES OF EVERY AGE

WOULDN'T YOU LIKE A NICE QUALITY CHANGE?

LOG RIGHT IN AND YOU WILL SEE

THIS NEW TALE OF POWER CREEP

THIS IS POWER CREEP!

THIS IS POWER CREEP!

PLAYERS CLAIM IN THE DEAD OF NIGHT!

Edited October 6, 2022 by El D

[Greycat]

15 hours ago, gameboy1234 said:

 

If it were up to me, I'd make things even easier at level 1.  A problem with the basic game design in CoH imo is you have to grind before you get a decent power chain.  This led to "cheap" powers like the origin based powers and brawl so players could have something to mash.  I think a better solution would be let players have their first three primary and first two secondary powers right at level one.  This would give most ATs a decent attack chain and a bit more, just so that the earliest levels aren't a drag to play.  This isn't a power creep issue, it's a fun issue.

 

 

Except those first few levels, even without XP boosters and the like, *fly* by, and the enemies you face aren't exactly giant bags of HP.

 

Besides, what would you do in their place? "Earn" nothing? Put the other power picks even earlier still? Should we be firing off nukes at 20? (Level picked randomly.)

 

And, as a general feedback note:

As I've been trying out other power sets and such... yes, this *has* felt very off. It feels like I'm being told YOU MUST PICK THESE POWERS NOW! versus "Hey... there's a break in the order now. How about looking into a pool power, or maybe catching something you wanted but skipped earlier?"  They're highlighted in a way that just doesn't give a break that encourages exploring.

 

Not everyone uses MIDS and plans down to the last picosecond every hundredth of  a percent of everything in advance. I feel like this change is going to impact the "I just want to hop on and play" player's experience, frankly. Hell, I've played since I3 and this is impacting my experience.

[gameboy1234]

40 minutes ago, Greycat said:

Besides, what would you do in their place? "Earn" nothing? Put the other power picks even earlier still? Should we be firing off nukes at 20? (Level picked randomly.)

 

I'd probably slide all the tiers down so they can be picked in order as new levels come up naturally.  Then I'd move Fitness back to a power pool except for Stamina, which should stay inherent.  That removes exactly three powers, the same as what you got extra at level 1.  Then I'd add a couple of powers to Fitness to round it out and stop there.  So your "nukes at level 20" is three extra power pool picks, and you can have the same set of powers as you have now if you like, or you can pick new ones.  Personally my builds are always kind of tight and I'd like to have three extra powers to chose.

 

I'd probably increase base movement, running and jumping, somewhat to make Swift and Hurdle not needed so much, but I'd probably turn those two powers into a near-travel power if you take them.  Like a Parkour travel power or something, maybe add some "wall climbing" inherent in those two powers to increase vertical movement a bit.  Fitness Health is still valuable for the slots it can take.  Dunno what the other two powers should be.

 

[Rudra]

3 hours ago, El D said:

 

I think the core issue of this thread is seeing powers as a reward for leveling up. They're not - powers are the means by which the player gains levels. Powers in CoH aren't a benefit of progression, powers are the progression. They're not like badges, or merits, or Incarnate rewards; the game doesn't give out powers if a player 'does well' or accomplishes a certain task (temp. powers notwithstanding). The Primary/Secondary sets are not a reward for playing the game, they are the game for the character that picked those sets.

 

As for respecing, you genuinely don't have to unless you intend to actively play that character or play them in auto-exemplar content. Heck, even if you don't respec the character and still play them, outside of PvP I can't imagine a noticeable difference in gameplay. I know someone who, back on Live, had a Scrapper he never respeced from before Fitness was inherent - never had any problems. It's not like this change makes the content any harder, just more fun to play through.

I partially agree and I partially disagree. Powers are how you level, but those new powers are the progression of said leveling. From a super point of view, it is the character gaining enough experience to improve his/her current abilities. That is not a RP thing, that is a character development thing. As for dead spots in progression, there are what, two of them? A whole two points in the character's progression until level 41 where no new primary or secondary powers are made available? Most likely with already unselected powers from those sets.

 

Also, I'm not saying CoX will force a respec because I have no way of knowing how CoX will handle a level change or progression order for AT powers. I'm saying because I was constantly being forced to respec by CO, I am very much opposed to these kinds of changes. (CO would immediately put you in the respec screen upon login with your character as a new character routinely because a power's level got and prerequisites got changed or it was moved to another point in the set's order.)

 

And @Greycat is right. When you level up and the new power is highlighted, it tells me "This is your new power. Take it." It's those dead spots that tell me it's time to either dip into a power pool or having dipped into a pool, go back and grab a power I postponed earlier to grab those pool powers. Yes, I am capable of making my own decisions and not relying on the game's cues for when to do what. Pretty much because I use Mids. Those signals are still there though.

[Rudra]

2 hours ago, gameboy1234 said:

 

I'd probably slide all the tiers down so they can be picked in order as new levels come up naturally.  Then I'd move Fitness back to a power pool except for Stamina, which should stay inherent.  That removes exactly three powers, the same as what you got extra at level 1.  Then I'd add a couple of powers to Fitness to round it out and stop there.  So your "nukes at level 20" is three extra power pool picks, and you can have the same set of powers as you have now if you like, or you can pick new ones.  Personally my builds are always kind of tight and I'd like to have three extra powers to chose.

 

I'd probably increase base movement, running and jumping, somewhat to make Swift and Hurdle not needed so much, but I'd probably turn those two powers into a near-travel power if you take them.  Like a Parkour travel power or something, maybe add some "wall climbing" inherent in those two powers to increase vertical movement a bit.  Fitness Health is still valuable for the slots it can take.  Dunno what the other two powers should be.

 

We always started with Brawl and our starting attack. The origin powers were added because players thought that was not enough of a chain to take down enemies that possessed a single attack, usually Brawl.

 

And if you want to revert the Fitness pool back to being a power pool? Then all of it gets reverted. Further, reverting the Fitness inherent to a power pool will free up exactly 0 powers for your build. Fitness was made inherent without taking away any power slots. So Fitness being made a pool again would grant that many power slots.

 

Edit: CoX and other games have attempted to make Wall Climbing. I'm not aware of any games as old as CoX pulling it off. And I don't get the reasoning for removing Swift and Hurdle as inherents to simply re-add them without the names into the character's base move. So I'm opposed to your suggestion on several counts.

Edited October 6, 2022 by Rudra

[Brutal Justice]

The Superman issue is with his power level.  When he’s there, there is no reason for the rest  for the justice league to be there.  

 

The inverse is also an issue.  If the rest of the league can handle the situation, there is no reason for Superman to be there.  

 

This is already an issue with exemplared toons joining your missions or TFs.  Lowering the availability level of the top tier powers compounds this issue when somebody exempts down and joins your team.  That one person joins the fight and now you feel pointless.  It makes for bad story telling.  It makes for not fun games.  

 

If they follow through with this, which I am sure they will, they need to remove the +5 from exemplaring.  I want to be Batman.  I don’t want to be Batman on a team with Superman.