Devs, please explain why you are nerfing one of the most popular activities on Homecoming

[dms]

Please communicate why the changes to farming are necessary.

 

 

[Luminara]

[Nurvus]

They've communicated that it's just a coincidence and a side effect of fixing bugs/improving powersets, but if you're not terminally online you may have missed the posts and got the wrong impression.

[Glacier Peak]

Hey anyone notice how awesome it is to farm the new ToT Elite Bosses! x5 xp and x5 inf, wow the Homecoming team sure loves letting the player base farm phat loot!

Edited October 20, 2022 by Glacier Peak
Phat loot

[Sneakers]

3 minutes ago, Nurvus said:

They've communicated that it's just a coincidence and a side effect of fixing bugs/improving powersets, but if you're not terminally online you may have missed the posts and got the wrong impression.

 

I think most of us are silent on this because we enjoy playing COH for free.

 

Also that many are silently thinking wtf.

 

While I'm not overly concerned about the topic, I do find it interesting.

I don't believe for a second it's a coincidence.

 

[Luminara]

18 minutes ago, Sneakers said:

 

I think most of us are silent on this because we enjoy playing COH for free.

 

Also that many are silently thinking wtf.

 

While I'm not overly concerned about the topic, I do find it interesting.

I don't believe for a second it's a coincidence.

 

 

Really?  I thought most of us realized that infrequent, sporadic updates with a narrowly targeted focus of destroying one highly specific approach to playing the game by making game-wide changes intended to disguise the real purpose and drag the process out over the course of years, while continually being thwarted by players making minute adjustments, would be an incredibly poor and unnecessarily complex way to accomplish such a goal, not to mention a monumental waste of what little spare time the development team has to work on the game.

 

But okay, maybe the HC team really is that incompetent, inefficient and insidious, and we're all completely blind to it... except the farmers, who see the truth as clearly as the noses on their faces.

 

[Snarky]

i'm uncharacteristically silent

 

1) i hate to farm

2) the only reason i did it was to PL myself.  how many 50s i need?

[Sneakers]

1 hour ago, Luminara said:

 

Really?  I thought most of us realized that infrequent, sporadic updates with a narrowly targeted focus of destroying one highly specific approach to playing the game by making game-wide changes intended to disguise the real purpose and drag the process out over the course of years, while continually being thwarted by players making minute adjustments, would be an incredibly poor and unnecessarily complex way to accomplish such a goal, not to mention a monumental waste of what little spare time the development team has to work on the game.

 

But okay, maybe the HC team really is that incompetent, inefficient and insidious, and we're all completely blind to it... except the farmers, who see the truth as clearly as the noses on their faces.

 

 

Right, removing AE from atlas is a coincidence.

Changing the fire armor set around is a coincidence.

Changing how fire melee enemies work is a coincidence.

Removing the extra exp buff in AE is a coincidence.

 

Sorry I wasn't drinking your coolaid.

[Ghost]

1 hour ago, Sneakers said:

 

Right, removing AE from atlas is a coincidence.

Changing the fire armor set around is a coincidence.

Changing how fire melee enemies work is a coincidence.

Removing the extra exp buff in AE is a coincidence.

 

Sorry I wasn't drinking your coolaid.

I think you may misunderstand what Luminara is saying.

[Sneakers]

9 minutes ago, Ghost said:

I think you may misunderstand what Luminara is saying.

 

Well if I did then that's my mistake.

[Sanguinesun]

4 hours ago, dms said:

Please communicate why the changes to farming are necessary.

 

 

 

There's been multiple threads for the last couple of months discussing the changes and how to adapt and improve builds as well as ways to improve farm missions, and missions made by others that address the "changes".

 

But above all else, don't let it/them discourage you.   Instead, farm more and more often.  Take full compliments of 7 folks with you.  Teach others to farm and encourage them to do the same. Let this all motivate you.

[lemming]

I'm liking the buff to my fire melee tank.   I'll get around to modifying my fire farm at some point, but so far I haven't been prevented from farming.  Granted, it's a little slower than before, but still quicker than running missions outside AE.

[BlackSpectre]

I missed the thread that discussed proposed changes to make in builds to adjust to the game changes... can anyone post a link please?

[Vanden]

2 hours ago, Sneakers said:

Right, removing AE from atlas is a coincidence.

Changing the fire armor set around is a coincidence.

Changing how fire melee enemies work is a coincidence.

Removing the extra exp buff in AE is a coincidence.

 

Sorry I wasn't drinking your coolaid.

 

lol, imagine thinking the devs are really this dumb

 

"The farmers love the AE in Atlas! We'll remove it!"

 

"No good, the farmers just moved to one of the other 16 AE locations!"

 

"Damn, foiled again!"

 

Or

 

"If we put defense debuffs in the Fire Sword attacks, the critters will be too strong to farm!"

 

"No go, they're just making critters without the sword attacks that still give 100% XP!"

 

"Damn those wily farmers!"

 

What a clown

[Ruin Mage]

Notably, any change done to Fire Armor and Fiery Melee will affect AE.

But guess what? This is the same for every powerset thats in AE.

[Snarky]

59 minutes ago, Shadeknight said:

Notably, any change done to Fire Armor and Fiery Melee will affect AE.

But guess what? This is the same for every powerset thats in AE.

Wait!  Thats ALL powersets.  They were planning it all along!!!

[Grouchybeast]

8 hours ago, Sneakers said:

 

Well if I did then that's my mistake.

 

I think what Luminara is saying is that if HC wanted to get rid of AE farming, it would be easy for them to...just do exactly that.  They don't have any board or shareholder meetings to justify themselves to, they don't have a sales and marketing department telling them what kind of subscriber retention they need.  They only thing that matters to them is their own vision for the development of the game.  They could, for example, remove all XP and drops from AE outside of dev choice arcs.  Done.

 

The devs have explicitly said that they're fine with AE farming, or any other kind of farming.  They just don't want any one single piece of gameplay, including AE farming, to be overwhelmingly the best way to gain all in-game rewards.  That's it.  There is no secret plot to stealthily drive out AE farmers because, again, why would they need one?  For one thing, I'm sure that it would be more pleasant for them to rip off the band aid and kill off AE farming in one go, rather than to go through endless rounds of 'the devs are destroying the game!' every time they make any change that even glances against AE.

[shatterpoint]

CoH is entertainment. FREE entertainment. If you are not entertained there are always other things to do.

[Sovera]

2 hours ago, Grouchybeast said:

 

I think what Luminara is saying is that if HC wanted to get rid of AE farming, it would be easy for them to...just do exactly that.  They don't have any board or shareholder meetings to justify themselves to, they don't have a sales and marketing department telling them what kind of subscriber retention they need.  They only thing that matters to them is their own vision for the development of the game.  They could, for example, remove all XP and drops from AE outside of dev choice arcs.  Done.

 

The devs have explicitly said that they're fine with AE farming, or any other kind of farming.  They just don't want any one single piece of gameplay, including AE farming, to be overwhelmingly the best way to gain all in-game rewards.  That's it.  There is no secret plot to stealthily drive out AE farmers because, again, why would they need one?  For one thing, I'm sure that it would be more pleasant for them to rip off the band aid and kill off AE farming in one go, rather than to go through endless rounds of 'the devs are destroying the game!' every time they make any change that even glances against AE.

 

 

No no no, it's definitely the devs being super incompetent at nerfing farms and players being high IQ and changing two powers to nullify the farming nerfing attempt.

[Luminara]

11 hours ago, Sneakers said:

Right, removing AE from atlas is a coincidence.

 

OH NO!  You have to spend 28 extra seconds to get to the Architect building in Kings Row!  That's a 0.00156% increase in the time it takes to race to 50 in 5 hours!

 

 

12 hours ago, Sneakers said:

Changing the fire armor set around is a coincidence.

Changing how fire melee enemies work is a coincidence.

 

This highlights the warped perspective I refer to in my previous post, and others I've made recently.  The AE building does not contain or consist of the entirety of the content in the game.  There are story arcs, *Fs, Trials, Giant Monsters, events, badge missions, one-off missions, tip and morality missions and an endless supply of scanner/paper missions, but when anything is changed, people with this perspective leap straight to the conclusion that the one thing, the only thing, that the change was for was to "nerf farming", as though farming was the only thing that this game existed for, the only purpose of the set or power to be in the game at all.  You don't see a change to the game, you see an attack on farmers which the developers are trying to hide by also changing in the rest of the game.

 

Megalomaniacal much?

 

12 hours ago, Sneakers said:

Removing the extra exp buff in AE is a coincidence.

 

Should one activity be the single best activity for everything?  Wouldn't that imply that there is a "right way to play", and everyone who isn't doing it is "doing it wrong"?  Making AE content rewards equivalent to standard content is fair and right, as it ensures that no one play style stands so far above every other than it becomes the "right way to play".  You do not "deserve" a higher reward rate than other players simply because you engage in your preferred activity.  You aren't "owed" triple XP, or 2.1x inf*, or two extra chances for drops on every defeat, just for being a farmer, or a role-player, or a story arc runner, or a *F speed-runner, or anything else.  You get what everyone else gets.  That's equality.  If you can't handle being equal to others, stick to single-player games.

[Neiska]

1 hour ago, Grouchybeast said:

The devs have explicitly said that they're fine with AE farming, or any other kind of farming.

 

Have to disagree with this statement, because it suggests that all devs have all said the same things, which they have not either ingame, in the discord, or here in the forums. Some most certainly want to see it gone. Others seem more to live and let live. Going by the changes a sort of compromise has been reached that made afk farming more difficult (but not impossible to do, but certainly slower) but has mixed results with active or multibox farming. But to say that all devs are fine with all farming is a bit disingenuous, but given the passion around the topic itself from both sides it can certainly be excused.

 

Speaking personally, the more changes they make, the less enjoyment I find myself having.

 

1. The roleplay scene has certainly stagnated and a good chunk of the role-players have been driven away or left for greener pastures. I am not saying this is the fault of the devs or any of the changes, only the state of affairs. But to some people here on the forums who shall remain nameless who were quite publicly outspoken against roleplay in the past, I imagine they are celebrating.

 

2. The more changes are made, the less "play your way" environment it becomes. Some builds, playstyles, or activities are artificially "encouraged" either by dangling extra rewards, or flat out reducing others in order to seem like certain activities are more lucrative. I disagree with this, because at the heart of the matter is it goes against the soul of the game, "play your way." Well, I keep finding my own favored at's, powers, playstyles, and activities penalized/reduced more and more as time goes on. And if I don't like or enjoy an activity, I won't be bribed into doing it with a carrot on a stick, and it feels like a punishment for seeing my own favored activities rewards reduced less and less. And if that is the case, it makes me ponder just how "play your way" that Homecoming is. I have always said that HC is not COH, it's a different ship with a different crew and a different adventure in mind, and that is fair. However, at this point it is starting to feel there is so little meat of CoH left its nothing but bones, that HC is then using for their own vision, and its one I find myself enjoying less and less. Moreover, it makes me wonder just how truly popular a certain activity really was, if they have to effectively bribe players into doing it.

 

3. Lastly, the forums itself. From where I sit it is becoming largely two sides on any given issue, and often its the same groups of people as well. The "for" and "against" groups if you will. And more and more the "for" groups seem to "win" in any given context, and as a result more of the "against" people are simply leaving. I personally know 7 people who quit the game after this latest round of changes. Now that is a drop in the bucket some may say, which is true. But how many "drops" will it take for people to look around and go "where did everyone go?" Because the day will come when they wont make their donation goals, or they have to merge servers, or people will begin having difficulties filling teams. And the time to fix that is "now," not later "when that happens" because once a game is floundering it can be difficult to bring people back. But to one group of people, they seem to actually "want" that as they certainly seem rather keen to remove/punish any element or playstyle they don't personally enjoy.

 

My musings on the matter.

[Sovera]

14 minutes ago, Luminara said:

13 hours ago, Sneakers said:

Removing the extra exp buff in AE is a coincidence.

(...)

You aren't "owed" triple XP, or 2.1x inf*, or two extra chances for drops on every defeat, just for being a farmer, or a role-player, or a story arc runner, or a *F speed-runner, or anything else.  You get what everyone else gets.  That's equality.  If you can't handle being equal to others, stick to single-player games.

 

Paraphrasing what someone said much better in another thread: there was a bug that gave more XP thanks to the double boosters, and you guys are advocating that the bug should have stayed since it had been that way for a long while. What if the bug was that you got less XP with the double booster? Would you be advocating to let the bug stay because it had been like this for a long time?

 

People need to be a little bit less hypocrites.

[Neiska]

1 minute ago, Sovera said:

 

Paraphrasing what someone said much better in another thread: there was a bug that gave more XP thanks to the double boosters, and you guys are advocating that the bug should have stayed since it had been that way for a long while. What if the bug was that you got less XP with the double booster? Would you be advocating to let the bug stay because it had been like this for a long time?

 

People need to be a little bit less hypocrites.

 

I will let you in on the conversations being had elsewhere Sovera. In some circles people have pointed out a few things -

1. The AE EXP has been adjusted prior to the change in reference here.

2. Some people believe that, well, that "it was a bug" is simply a fabrication. It's not as if they didn't have a look at the code before, and the question remains if it was set to the "original" value and then "fixed," or if the fix was implement after the EXP had already been reduced, which in effect would reduce it twice. And given the knee-jerk reactions here in the forums that some people have, that conversation has never really taken place. In fact I expect multiple "thumbs down" posts for even mentioning what other people are thinking.

 

I neither agree nor disagree with such notions, as I don't have access to the data myself. But there are some who believe it was just an excuse to further reduce farming exp, without it publicly seeming like a nerf, so the premise of "we aren't against farming" could remain.

 

Again for clarification, I don't agree or disagree with their assertations. I am only reporting what other people are suspecting.

[Sovera]

4 minutes ago, Neiska said:

 

I will let you in on the conversations being had elsewhere Sovera. In some circles people have pointed out a few things -

1. The AE EXP has been adjusted prior to the change in reference here.

2. Some people believe that, well, that "it was a bug" is simply a fabrication. It's not as if they didn't have a look at the code before, and the question remains if it was set to the "original" value and then "fixed," or if the fix was implement after the EXP had already been reduced, which in effect would reduce it twice. And given the knee-jerk reactions here in the forums that some people have, that conversation has never really taken place. In fact I expect multiple "thumbs down" posts for even mentioning what other people are thinking.

 

I neither agree nor disagree with such notions, as I don't have access to the data myself. But there are some who believe it was just an excuse to further reduce farming exp, without it publicly seeming like a nerf, so the premise of "we aren't against farming" could remain.

 

Again for clarification, I don't agree or disagree with their assertations. I am only reporting what other people are suspecting.

 

I see what you are saying and I bear you no ill will. I don't say this sarcastically but it needs repeating since text medium.

 

The problem with all of this is that it keeps on hitting the key that the devs are malicious entities who lie to their playerbase for ill defined reasons no one has given good cause for. It is not like they have to justify themselves, or that they need to hide things so we don't find out.

 

The rested XP being abused by the player base was an abuse and fixed. The double XP giving more XP than intended was a bug and fixed. Any other game that had such bugs (and we've had some interesting bugs in other games such as buying an item from a vendor and selling it back for a profit leading to millions in the bank) had them fixed presto, but here with a tiny team who half learns-as-they-go and does not have a large play testing base this bug fixing when found is considered nefarious.

 

Look at your example. People say that the devs tweaked the values of XP to have an excused to lower the XP so that they can say that they are ok with farming while lowering the value of farming. How flat earth level conspiracy theory is this? From game devs who do not need to appease shareholders and do not need to calm down players who pay a sub.

 

What they -do- want is to have people come out of the AE and play the rest of the game but there is no tweaking of rewards that can happen before the bugs are removed.

 

 

But this is just like arguing with a flat earther. Logic has no sway. 'Is that what you believe, SHEEPLE?', 'I don't drink that koolaid, BRO'.

[Neiska]

(sorry double post.)

Edited October 20, 2022 by Neiska
Double posted.