CoV Live: Reminiscing the "Grind"

[Monty Haull]

I started out playing CoV way back when it was released.  I remember how much fun it was playing and, I remember how much I hated the grind.  Those middle levels where your IOs were going soft and you were not high enough to buy into the next series.  I was a poor struggling Mastermind with Mercenaries and Dark Miasma.   (I had no idea I picked basically the worst primary)

 

I remember walking the streets in fear.  One eye would cycle through the enemies always on the look out for a red or worse a purple.  Another eye my Mercs because they just love to do you something stupid like roll through a pack of reds and tick them off.  I have been face-planted so many times that I still have PTSD going through sharkhead.

And the snakes......why did have to be snakes!

 

But, even with all that, I still made it to 50, dragging the Mercs kicking and screaming the entire way.  While I love the new vision of HC, sometimes...sometimes, I miss the grind and the excitement of leveling up after a long haull.  Heh, I remember the absolute joy if thinking YES!  only one more bar to go!  

 

So, what's you tale of the "Grind" from live?

[MoonSheep]

wandering peregrine island destroying the portals that rikti comms officers used to spawn - back in the day they used to reward good XP

 

i don’t know if the game genuinely was grindier back then or whether i was just awful at playing it, used to do a lot more street sweeping

[Glacier Peak]

In before "hover across the Hollows" or "sneak to the tailor in steel canyon"... 😁

 

Circa 2004

I enjoyed street sweeping immensely and was most impressed with Perez Park (the ambience, the sound effects, getting lost in the maze of trees, the enemies hidden throughout the zone, and the booger monster himself, Kraken). I was a wee Level 4, having acquired Flurry from the Speed Travel Pool, and thought myself capable of handling the hazards of Perez Park; when I finally loaded through the War Wall Security Gate, I saw more Hellions than my computer could render slowly following a Tanker. It was at this moment I knew I needed to make another character and ever since then I have enjoyed grinding via street sweeping.

Edited December 31, 2022 by Glacier Peak

[catsi563]

From red side. my First stalker Ninja B;lade Ninja sneaking her way to 50 

 

her ninja poison MM version being part of the first ever all MM SF on red side and watching 30+ minions roll through caves in a traffic snarling induced nighmare

 

so much fun

[Greycat]

4 hours ago, MoonSheep said:

i don’t know if the game genuinely was grindier back then or whether i was just awful at playing it, used to do a lot more street sweeping

 

There was less content and (depending on when you're referring to) more debt, so yeah, there were definite grind points. My first 50 was an elec/elec blaster. Hitting the old debt cap and running out of my own contacts - and a friend's - in the late 30s? SLOOOOOW last few levels to hit 40 and get contacts again.

[MoonSheep]

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

 

There was less content and (depending on when you're referring to) more debt, so yeah, there were definite grind points. My first 50 was an elec/elec blaster. Hitting the old debt cap and running out of my own contacts - and a friend's - in the late 30s? SLOOOOOW last few levels to hit 40 and get contacts again.

 

the late 30’s and early 40’s were quite painful - though i have positive memories of being part of great teams in FF with kin support and incredible looking grav controllers 

 

the respec TFs used to be a lot harder too, sometimes you would fail them no matter how hard you tried

[rizlazz]

1 hour ago, Greycat said:

I tried to combine Circle and DE, but all I got were garden variety evil mages.

ignore me, just sitting here chuckling at your sig...

 

As far as old school, a level 6 running alllll the way across The Hollows to get to the mission and hoping like hell you don't mistime a jump and end up in a ravine full of red-con igneous was always a fun time. Then you would get out of the mission and pray that a Taxi-Bot was on duty at the gate so you didn't have to do it all the way back again.

 

[Nyghtmaire]

I started in CoV after bodyguard was added to masterminds (forgetting the issue and not inclined to look it up). My strongest memory is taking the ferry to St. Marital instead of Port Oakes as a wee Necro/dark (on Justice) and immediately was smushed by some purple crab spiders. And then trying to run from the hospital back to the ferry. And trying again. And again. My first debt!!

 

The grind did get intense in the late 30s. But there was a pretty fair number of small random groups to make it more lucrative for the villainy (err… enjoyable). Really appreciated 3-5 person teams.

[Snarky]

Trying hard to get to level 10 so I can do the Winter event but stopping experience to do every contact for all content.   F-ing running aroun Port Oakes to get 200 presents.   Oh…that was today.  
 

Um…on live?   So happy they came out with Willpower.  I ran so many SS/Invul Brutes pre inherent fitness on SOs I am surprised I am still here lol

Edited December 31, 2022 by Snarky

[Greycat]

3 hours ago, MoonSheep said:

the respec TFs used to be a lot harder too, sometimes you would fail them no matter how hard you tried

 

When you actually needed the respec... yeah. On more than one team that all piled out the door dead in the olden days.

[Monty Haull]

2 hours ago, Greycat said:

 

When you actually needed the respec... yeah. On more than one team that all piled out the door dead in the olden days.

You just brought back a terrible memory.  I so desperately needed a respec and we died soo many times we had to abandon it.

[Clave Dark 5]

15 hours ago, Rugor said:

I remember walking the streets in fear.  One eye would cycle through the enemies always on the look out for a red or worse a purple.  ...  I have been face-planted so many times that I still have PTSD going through Sharkhead.

This is why I loved my stalker back in the day.  😃

[SteelRat70]

Whilst there were parts of the grind that were.. sub optimal, I think it was a necessary evil and I actually miss it.  That's not because of the grind itself, but the situations that arose because of it.  The Hollows was always a full zone.  Teaming up just to do contact missions was kinda necessary to deal with the grind in a much nicer way.

I logged in last night for the first time in ages and joined up with a team to run through the Hollows missions, culminating in Frosty.  On the one hand, that last mission was notably easier than it was back on live, on the other there was a lot of great team chat and banter while we were sliding around on the icey bits of that map.  Very reminiscent of live, and from my personal experience, seeming to be the exception now, rather than the rule.

I'm not here to tell people how to play, but I do feel that since the introduction of AE and DFB, CoH lost the thing that made it great.

[Doomguide2005]

     Mine is more about how it finally ended with the push over the edge from 49 to 50.  Finished the mission at level 49.  Stepped out of the mission door into Grandville and the lovely color and sounds greeting me as the mission complete bonus was triggered and I hit 50!

[InvaderStych]

On 12/31/2022 at 3:13 PM, Snarky said:

 I ran so many SS/Invul Brutes pre inherent fitness on SOs I am surprised I am still here lol

 

My first toon was a BS/Dark Scrapper, Issue 0. I can relate.

[nihilii]

I came to CoH from korean MMOs, so the leveling process here never felt like a grind even all the way back.

 

But I remember fondly my perception of The Hollows as this mysterious post-apocalyptic zone where death lurked everywhere.

 

I joined in I3, so the pacing went like, start in Atlas and do this hero-themed city stuff from level 1 to 5-6 or so... Then boom, you're thrown into this large open zone where the police is barely holding an outpost, with superpowered criminals and trolls and mystics, and all the terrain collapsed in the middle.

No travel powers before 14, leveling speed being slow enough (*and* the desire to alt), the zone itself lasting until lvl 15ish... All made for a great combo to be hooked in.

I don't know if this was purposeful, but as someone who is not into superhero culture and tried CoH as one of many other games, The Hollows is what secured my interest. It's got that mashup of fantasy and sci-fi energy, everything is familiar yet bizarre, and you're too busy being in survival mode to wonder if you're into this or not. You want to discover more about this world. Newbie pickup groups tales of Frostfire and Atta fueled a level of social lore beyond the game lore as well. It was an awesome experience.

Edited January 2, 2023 by nihilii

[DoctorHugh]

On 1/1/2023 at 3:57 AM, SteelRat70 said:

I'm not here to tell people how to play, but I do feel that since the introduction of AE and DFB, CoH lost the thing that made it great.

 

Lots of great nostalgia in this thread, esp. the reference to a pile of bodies being tossed out the respec trial doors! Some funny (and frustrating) memories there. And taxibots! Man, I appreciated those so much some days...

 

Looking back on some of what we had to do to get by "back in the day", I'm feeling less opposed to that one threads idea of a "less easy mode" server. I'm enjoying my time on Homecoming but I do feel that with all the new updates, options, and QoL improvements ... it's kind of easy mode compared to live.

 

Heh... humans: we struggle to make life less of a struggle, and then we miss the "good ol' days" when life was more of a challenge.

Edited January 3, 2023 by DoctorHugh

[DoctorHugh]

On 1/2/2023 at 6:11 AM, nihilii said:

I joined in I3, so the pacing went like, start in Atlas and do this hero-themed city stuff from level 1 to 5-6 or so... Then boom, you're thrown into this large open zone where the police is barely holding an outpost, with superpowered criminals and trolls and mystics, and all the terrain collapsed in the middle.

No travel powers before 14, leveling speed being slow enough (*and* the desire to alt), the zone itself lasting until lvl 15ish... All made for a great combo to be hooked in.

 

Yeah come to think of it, that was pretty much the hook for me, also. There was definitely a "barely holding the line" feel to the Hollows. It may not be possible to go back to that kind of feel, but that was where I caught the CoH bug.

 

Some of that difference is internal, of course. Hollows doesn't feel quite the same after you've fought Hamidon or the Rikti Mothership. And with what we know now, any content will be easier simply because we're not rookies anymore. 

Edited January 3, 2023 by DoctorHugh

[SteelRat70]

2 hours ago, DoctorHugh said:

 

Heh... humans: we struggle to make life less of a struggle, and then we miss the "good ol' days" when life was more of a challenge.

 

I've read that "The Struggle" is what keeps us sane.  We thrive on having problems to fix and difficulties to overcome.  There are some thinkers who believe that not only is a problem free utopia the worst kind of hell for us humans, but that our world is nowhere near as messed up as the media et al would have us believe, it's just there are so many serious problems we've fixed we're actually trying to find new things to put right just to keep our sanity.

[SteelRat70]

2 hours ago, DoctorHugh said:

Hollows doesn't feel quite the same after you've fought Hamidon or the Rikti Mothership. And with what we know now, any content will be easier simply because we're not rookies anymore. 

 

Whilst that is true, after playing the Hollows on the power crept "easy mode" we now have and suddenly reverting to a server that was running, say i6 code, I wonder how much of a culture shock there would be and how much re learning would be required?

[lemming]

Ugh.  I just remember the buggy portions and some of the pointless grind.  And the lack of a lot that is in the current version.

 

There were a lot of cool things as they were uncovered, but I don't want to repeat it and 90% of it can be still be done if you want to.  I still use Superjump to cross Steel Canyon being careful to bounce off buildings without hitting the street.  (without the double jump)

[TalynDerre]

I don't know about grind, per se - I remember basically going straight from Brickstown / St. Martial to the Rikti War Zone and never looking back because the War Zone arcs were so good - but I definitely remember the game being a lot harder at low levels.  I think we forget just how much inherent Fitness gives us, and being able to get your 'good' travel power at level 4 means that you can now just run or fly away from anything that you can't fight.

 

The Hollows wasn't so bad, but Perez Park and even northern King's Row were both deathtraps.  You felt fear when you got a door mission to go up there at level 8.

[PLVRIZR]

I completely remember the grind of Steel.  Between lvls 10 and 14 (travel power) were the worst.  Most of my toons were Mutant origin, so the store was the closest to the train.  Hitting 12 and heading for those oh-so-powerful lvl 15 DOs was just so gratifying 😆.  Once 14, with a travel power, the game really opened up.

 

While today's game has lost almost all "grind", do recall it was the original devs job to drag things out, to keep everyone on the subscription hook.  I will *never* take HC for granted and am eternally grateful, for this volunteer team, to "keep the dream alive".

[Black Zot]

The only thing I will ever say to grind being removed/reduced is "good fucking riddance".  Being able to fight the bad guys instead of the system is Homecoming's best selling point.

[Crazyleo]

Getting my FF/Energy Defender from 40 to 50 was very rough. Took me about a month or so of constant teaming farming missions (this was way before AE farming was a thing). Still; I'd buff the tanker and the nukers. The Tanker will start corralling the entire map at the same time the nukers go dumpster diving. Then the tanker dives in with the entire map following him; into nuclear hellfire. 

 

Then we quit the mission and reset it to do it all over again.