Officially Unofficial Weekly Discussion #43: Things You Wish You Knew When You Started

[SeraphimKensai]

Welcome back to another weekly discussion. Sorry I got delayed a bit this week due to Hurricane Idalia, but it ended up being pretty minor in my area (hopefully it ended up not causing any damage/loss of life for those of you also over in the SE).

 

Over the last few weeks I've noticed an uptick in new or newer players (welcome by the way), so I thought this week's topic could be a means for players to provide tips that they think will help out any potential new players.

 

Here's a couple to get started:

 

• It's not a race to max level. Take your time. Enjoy the stories along the way, as it will give you a lot of insight into the game's lore and direct you how to access particular areas of the game.

 

• Buying enhancements even SO's gets pretty spendy for a new player. You can usually get lvl 25-30 range generic IOs on the market for the price of SO enhancements. These never go red and give you a reasonable enhancement value all the way to 50, where you can save up for other enhancements you decide to buy. If you replace them via a respec when you slot out a character at lvl 50, you can save these generic IOs for an alt that you make later.

 

As always thanks.

[cranebump]

(1) You can build your own base, and invite your other characters to share it by using /altinvite. Great for passing along multiple items without having to send 1 attachment per email.

 

(2) At L1, BEFORE DFBing or even running a mish: get the explore badges from AP every single time (you WILL need the free jump back from the P2W vendor to get 3 of them). Then either save them, or exchange for enhancement converters to sell for new toon seed money (if you need it). Do the same thing in Echo: Galaxy, once you get an Ouro portal. That's 10 merits that, if converted, will give you at least 1.5M when sold (usually more). Purchase the empowerment buffs from P2W vendor, 8 hours for each one. At L1, they're cheap. Not so much after a few levels.

 

(3) Finally (and maybe a little reluctantly?)...I don't normally crap on anyone, but, since we're talking about new players, and since I've had unpleasant experiences with this same person at least 3 different times a word or two of advice: Avoid any team with a leader whose toon name alludes to reading (like "Reading is Fundamental," or "Why not read?" etc, {They also use other names that dis the whole "fast play" experience, but the reading aspect seems most common). These belong to a player who, while they run default content (which is greatly appreciated, and why I joined them more than once) they manage to ruin the experience by bossing the entire team around, to the point where they'll PM you "advice" you haven't asked for (didn't happen to me; a second player attested to this, after we both quit the same team mid-run and compared notes). Honestly, they've got the worst social skills I've ever seen in this game (they're so bad, I thought maybe I was dealing with a person with a diagnosis, so I tried to cut some slack - now I think they're just a congenital, mannerless douche bag who was intially on some quest to prop up old school play, but, in actuality thinks there is such a thing as badwrongfun/one way to play).

 

Now, why did it take me, like, 3 run-ins with them to finally get their global, so I could avoid them altogether? 'Cause Jesus says turn the other cheek. And I'm an idiot. You, however, will not be. (Hint: You'll know it's them if anyone enters the mish before they do [which is followed closely by a sincerely flabbergasted "Why are people inside the mission?"]). [Seriously-they'll ruin the experience for you. RUN! RUN AWAY!...why aren't you running...]

Edited August 31, 2023 by cranebump

[Without_Pause]

RTFM and play the tutorial. As a 10 or whatever year vet, I gave up buying 2x XP boosters and found I enjoyed my characters more.  You aren't learning the game by being a sitter. 

 

Learn how to navigate between zones, You get a lot of options now. The previously mention base is a good thing to use. I group my teleporters levels roughly 1-19, 20-29, 30-39, 40-50, Red side, and Co-Op.

 

Take that character to 50. T4 them out. You will by default have a decent amount of currency on hand, and the next character will be even easier.  Learn how to use the Market even on a low level. Do this and you'll never be poor. 

 

Play as many ATs as you feel like doing. They play differently. Some ATs play differently even within the powersets they are given for a certain AT. 

 

Download Mid's and learn to build. Grab your ATOs, and the one slot wonders, and go from there. Look at builds people are making and take notes on common things done to them. I tend to do five passes on a build before I call it good. One of the most recent ones has had more changes then any other build I have done. It's okay to make a bad build even in game. You get a free respect every ten levels. Just because a build looks good on paper doesn't mean it plays to your style of gaming or is the right one in the end.

[pawstruck]

"The entire game is on farm."

[Luminara]

Increasing the mouse scroll speed in Options doesn't increase the speed at which the camera zooms out.  Could've turned that on two decades ago and saved myself a shit-ton of scrolling.

 

/suppressclosefx 1

/suppressclosefxdist 17

 

/bind button4 "stuff"

/bind button5 "stuff"

 

Rotating binds and /bindloadfilesilent.

 

Archetypes are suggestions, not walls.

 

Even comparatively weak sets can perform extremely well when paired with complementary sets (TA/Dark was pure gold back in the day).

 

Sometimes matched sets are the worst (TA/A is still crap).

 

Saving those inspirations "just in case" is stupid, the game practically shoves them into your lap anyway.

 

Proper endurance management begins with clicks, not toggles.

 

There's no shame in face-planting.

 

Poop.  Pee.  Eat.  Pet the cat.  Smell a flower.  Look at a tree.  Talk to someone you care about.  Deal with a medical problem.  The mission can wait, life shouldn't.

[MrAxe]

Back on live (before jet and jump packs) don't take super speed on your first toon. Oh the nightmare of Terra Volta *shivers*.

[Without_Pause]

6 minutes ago, MrAxe said:

Back on live (before jet and jump packs) don't take super speed on your first toon. Oh the nightmare of Terra Volta *shivers*.

Try Boomtown.

[Snarky]

Redside is, was, always will be dead.  But it has some of the best story arcs in the game.  You sorta need a real dark sense of humor though.  And you solo.

 

Gold is dead and hardmode.  Do NOT start there.

 

Blue is busy and team friendly. Going Vigilante through Null the Gull in Pocket D will get you the most flexible alignment in the game.

 

Oh, yeah, see Null for various good things, and a badge. Null the Gull - Unofficial Homecoming Wiki

 

Hop on a busy server.  Excelsior is hopping, so is Everlasting, maybe a little less but hardcore RP  

 

Never go down a dark alley with a vampire.

 

 

[Lazarillo]

So here's one that I didn't know, kinda turned out for the best, but damn, if I'd known the sheer ripple effect it was going to create... Anyway, the item itself is under spoiler text, but there's a whole story to it.  For full effect, maybe don't read the spoiler of what it was until after the rest of the post?

Spoiler

You only get one global rename.

 

Started the game in...mid 2005, I think it was (I do remember it was, just by coincidence, like, the day after i5 first launched, and man were people pissed...I digress, but the date is important). Created a really basic character, Fire/Ice Tank, and named him "Paradox".  Couldn't believe that it was an available name, but I wasn't about to complain.  I log in, play the tutorial, wow, this is amazing!  Only I get near the end of the tutorial, and realize I got the name 'cause I misspelled.  He's "Paraodx".  D'oh!  No problem, delete, come up with a new name, try again (I forget what I picked at the time, though I do have the character remade on Homecoming with a name I'm sure isn't what I used then).

 

Over the next few days, made a few other characters, to try all the other ATs, including a Sonic Blaster named "Upset Vibration" (a rock-n-roll-er parody), a Dark Scrapper named "Dark History" (a deliberately silly edgy character who became my first 50), an Illusion Controller, "Lazarillo", (a carry-over from a TTRPG I made for a game with some friends at the time), and a Rad/Rad Defender whose name I don't recall.  I'm going around, and someone explains global channels to me, and I join Protector Watch.  Oh, but the name it lists for me is that first character I made, with the misspelled name.  I don't want to be "Paraodx", so I figure, hey, I'm on my controller, I'll use that in chat so people will know which character I'm on.

 

Now go back and read the spoiler if you didn't already.

 

18 years later, and my accidentally locking myself to the name of that one character in-game, I start using it on the official CoH forums, and then in other places, and then others.  And now, I'm like, "Lazarillo" (or something very close) almost everywhere as an online handle.  All because I wanted to chat with the alt I was using at the time.

 

If only I'd known when I'd started, I was gonna have to commit to that changed name.

[Greycat]

12 hours ago, cranebump said:

(2) At L1, BEFORE DFBing or even running a mish: get the explore badges from AP every single time

 

 

... as a side note, at level 1, you won't get XP from the explore badges.

 

Sadly the stuff I wish I knew when I started... some's not as relevant. Like, oh, the old Hollows, where "The fastest path to the mission is not always a straight line." (Now you just mission-teleport. Ah well.)

 

Still... general stuff?

- Yeah. No need to rush to 50. Yes, you can get 2xp! (and no INF.) If you haven't played before, or played much? Skip it. Visit the contacts and play arcs. Look around.

- You don't need to cap-this, perma-that. The game's not that hard. Doing so is optional.

- Nothing wrong with playing at something *other* than +4x8. It's a game. And the difficulty's not set in stone. Move it around a bit if the mission or enemy group calls for it.

- There's more to life than the Council.

- Some zones with a self-contained story, such as Croatoa, will give a merit bonus when completing all the arcs. More reason not to rush past and get farmed to 50...

- No, your power combination is not "wrong." They all work. Some work together better than others, sure.

- Try all the gameplay-adjacent stuff. Build bases. Waste INF in the costume editor. Write AE stories. Write bad ones. Write good ones. Run a SG. RP.

 

 

[A Cat]

One thing that I wish I knew going back into this game was how to make Inf to begin with. There's making it the old fashioned way, just straight up earning inf from missions and mobs, but there's always the different meta ways of making money with your merits. It would be useful at least to know the very simple and easy route of merits>convertors and selling them for ~60k-70k per.

[Owl Girl]

i wish someone had told me that the tabs for the Super Group chat and the Looking For Group chat are very, very similar and You should double check before pressing enter!!

[Hyperstrike]

15 hours ago, SeraphimKensai said:

Welcome back to another weekly discussion. Sorry I got delayed a bit this week due to Hurricane Idalia, but it ended up being pretty minor in my area (hopefully it ended up not causing any damage/loss of life for those of you also over in the SE).

 

Over the last few weeks I've noticed an uptick in new or newer players (welcome by the way), so I thought this week's topic could be a means for players to provide tips that they think will help out any potential new players.

 

Here's a couple to get started:

 

• It's not a race to max level. Take your time. Enjoy the stories along the way, as it will give you a lot of insight into the game's lore and direct you how to access particular areas of the game.

 

• Buying enhancements even SO's gets pretty spendy for a new player. You can usually get lvl 25-30 range generic IOs on the market for the price of SO enhancements. These never go red and give you a reasonable enhancement value all the way to 50, where you can save up for other enhancements you decide to buy. If you replace them via a respec when you slot out a character at lvl 50, you can save these generic IOs for an alt that you make later.

 

As always thanks.

Wish I'd known to pay closer attention to the tutorials.
I kinda breezed them.

This is how Hyperstrike made it into the high teens TOTALLY unenhanced (pain, LOTS OF PAIN!) and I didn't understand ED right at first and my first Terra Volta trial was MORE PAIN!  LOTS OF MORE PAIN!

[Clave Dark 5]

9 hours ago, Snarky said:

Redside is, was, always will be dead.  

Wasn't always .  I never really played blue side once I went red on Live until near the very end when first Incarnate content piled up the population in Pocket D, and then after the game was cancelled but not offline yet.

 

But today?   Yes, Always, will be.

[Without_Pause]

5 hours ago, A Cat said:

One thing that I wish I knew going back into this game was how to make Inf to begin with. There's making it the old fashioned way, just straight up earning inf from missions and mobs, but there's always the different meta ways of making money with your merits. It would be useful at least to know the very simple and easy route of merits>convertors and selling them for ~60k-70k per.

If you are simply selling convertors for 60k-70k and not suing them to convert actual IOs, you aren't profiting like you should be.

[InvaderStych]

During Retail:

 

Don't Pair Broadsword with Dark Armor before Inherent Fitness.

 

During Homecoming:

 

Don't waste merits on ATOs, they are dramatically cheaper on the market. Did this on the first toon I ran through to 50 a couple weeks after finding Homecoming in early 2020. Never did it again.

 

 

18 hours ago, Luminara said:

/bind button4 "stuff"

/bind button5 "stuff"

 

18 hours ago, Luminara said:

Proper endurance management begins with clicks, not toggles.

 

Quoting these pro-tips for emphasis. Button4 and button5 will correspond to extra buttons on your mouse. On my 10 year old Death Adder they are the two thumb buttons.

 

A little EndRdxz in a toggles on a toggle-heavy toon does help, marginally, but don't over-do it because the returns are too small. It's the rotation of clicks that will burn your blue bar the fastest. EndRdx in your most expensive clicks - or just all of them really - is a more efficient use of slotting by far.

[UltraAlt]

21 hours ago, SeraphimKensai said:

Buying enhancements even SO's gets pretty spendy for a new player. You can usually get lvl 25-30 range generic IOs on the market for the price of SO enhancements. These never go red and give you a reasonable enhancement value all the way to 50, where you can save up for other enhancements you decide to buy. If you replace them via a respec when you slot out a character at lvl 50, you can save these generic IOs for an alt that you make later.

 

 

21 hours ago, SeraphimKensai said:

this week's topic could be a means for players to provide tips that they think will help out any potential new players.

 

You have to decide why you came to THE CITY.

 

Did you come here to be a superhero, supervillain, someone caught in a dystopian reality, or did you come here to mini-max and farm your game time away?

 

I love comic books, and I love creating. 

This game is full of the potential to create. 

 

If you don't want to be creative, there is still place for you here.

But if you want to be creative, you can make practically any kind of character you want to here, but it's going to take time to learn all the systems.

 

I strongly suggest starting on the Hero side. Play the tutorial (it will teach you much of what you need to know to get started). If you are a hero, go into City Hall and go down into the basement and find your origin contact and run their missions. Each of the origins will take you on a different path to fight against different enemy groups. 

 

If you follow the contacts the game currently gives you, it will lead you into funneling content. Content set-up to condense the lower-level characters into the same content and away from the origin paths. The game will currently route you into First ward and Night Ward, which is also funnelling in from Hero, Villain, and the Praetorian side. 

On the heroside there is plenty of content you will miss if you follow the funneling path, but you can always make another character or 5 or 10 or  ... well, 100's if you really want to feel creative or just want to have a bunch of characters.

There are side zones on the Hero side that you can miss and outlevel if you don't know about them, but, then, you can alway make another character and plan to run through it with them.

 

From my point of view, to get the most fun out of THE CITY, you have to use your creativity and make the kind of characters you want to explore the world with and use their characteristics and traits to explore the world through that character's point of view.

 

There are plenty of us here that are ready to help. Don't fear to use the /help channel. You will find that on most of the servers, that this isn't like the /help channel other games.

Don't be scared to ask questions. But https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Main_Page is a great source of information as well.

 

If you want people to team up with you, just ask on the /lfg (looking for group) channel. Click on a name in the chat window and it will give you a list of options that include inviting them to your team.

 

You can make your own supergroup and build your own base https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Supergroup_Base (starting at level 10, I think), but you can enter a base at any level through a base portal https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Base_Portal as long as you are on a team with someone that has an open base or if you use a passcode. At the bottom of https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Supergroup_Base there is a list of servers. Pick the server you are playing on and it will give a list of open bases with passcodes. The main thing that you have access to in most bases (other than simply going in and exploring) is the teleporters to different zones (you can also travel to different zones by trams, ships, etc.)

 

You can even create your own stories in the AE (https://homecoming.wiki/wiki/Architect_Entertainment), but it's probably best to enjoy the game for a while first.

 

There is simply so much to explore in THE CITY that it can be overwhelming, so just take your time. There is no rush.

 

And, if you want some extra free stuff, talk to the nearest P2W vendor. People will direct you if you ask, just use the /help channel.

 

[Seed22]

Try your best to get training IOs over SOs.

 

Get a 50. You can get altitis later, get a 50 now so you have a money maker in your roster. Don't have 50 million alts lying around without at least ONE of said alts to fund them.

Use attuned IOs when you get the chance, get Mids and play around with builds if you can't find one on the forums(but do be careful with forum builds, some of them can be outdated/not fit your playstyle). Get a farmer, you'll want one for whenever you want to just skip the grind to 50, and for when you want some inf/drops.

 

Learn to play the market, you don't have to do it often, but its' best if you at least know how to do it.

 

Oh, and ATs aren't squishy. BUILDS are squishy if you go too far into offense and no defense. You can and will do ridiculous things within your AT if you build right. If you don't? You and the floor will be friends for life.

[A Cat]

6 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

If you are simply selling convertors for 60k-70k and not suing them to convert actual IOs, you aren't profiting like you should be.

True, but it would be hard for a new guy to learn the prices of things, and different conversion strategies (buying at certain level ranges to target specific sets) etc. 

[GastlyGibus]

8 hours ago, Without_Pause said:

If you are simply selling convertors for 60k-70k and not suing them to convert actual IOs, you aren't profiting like you should be.

I always use the converter method for some good starter cash on a new character. Recipes don't start dropping until level 10, and even then, crafting them can be costly if you don't have the money for salvage, so on new toons I usually run most of the starter arcs (Habashy, Twinshot, et al.) to get some easy merits, turn those merits into converters, sell those for a cool 1-3 million, and there's my starter cash for future endeavors.

 

Stuff I wish I knew when I started? Craft all of your set IOs. Even if you personally cannot use them, just craft them. Not only does it count for badge credit towards the Field Crafter accolade, almost every set IO in the game sells for at least 100,000 INF, if not far more, and you can make yourself a decent chunk of change from just selling your unwanted recipes. I just rolled a new Blaster on redside, took her solo to level 20, and she already has a cool 20M just from selling random stuff that dropped while playing the game.

 

Also, use your merits. Stop hoarding merits. They're not hard to get and you can use them for all kinds of cool goodies, either to sell on the market for more cash, or for your own personal use. If you've got more than 100 merits in your inventory, go buy yourself something nice. That's what they're for, and they really are not hard to get. Just running one weekly task force usually gets you around 40-70 merits depending on what the target is. All giant monsters give 6 merits each, story arcs give merits upon completion. Simply playing the game and doing stuff will have you sitting on a pile of merits.

 

I used to be one of those players who felt like I was missing out because I wasn't filthy rich like every other player, but with merits in the game, you don't have to be rich at all. My main character, my Defender I run with the most, only has like 150M to his name, and yet I have him kitted out with purple sets, ATO enhancements (all superior with catalysts), and pretty much anything he could ever want, and I got it all by just... playing the game, using merits for stuff, selling recipes I didn't want, and all the rest. It's not difficult to build the character you want if you utilize all of the methods at your disposal.

Edited September 1, 2023 by GastlyGibus

[Without_Pause]

10 minutes ago, GastlyGibus said:

I always use the converter method for some good starter cash on a new character. Recipes don't start dropping until level 10, and even then, crafting them can be costly if you don't have the money for salvage, so on new toons I usually run most of the starter arcs (Habashy, Twinshot, et al.) to get some easy merits, turn those merits into converters, sell those for a cool 1-3 million, and there's my starter cash for future endeavors.

I vendor common salvage and IO recipes until I get to my starting point. Habashy, DFB, and first two Hollows contacts I think generates 84 Convertors. 42 conversions to rare with an average of 3 mill profit means I'm sitting at over 120 million. I'm like level 13 and have yet to touch the Posi TF for more Merits.

[Vic Raiden]

For me, it'd be the following:

1. Walking is a toggle, and you have to go out of the way to put it in your tray.
2. Reward Merits can be converted into Inf(luence/amy), not that I'm actually doing this.
3. XP gain can actually be turned off, and doing so is actually beneficial if you want to enjoy everything.
4. Tying into the above, contacts can be outlevelled, as I learned the hard way trying to get involved in Lieutenant Harris' questline.
5. It's possible to push the game's draw distance past the regular 200%, all the way up to 2000%, allowing for some truly spectacular screenshots... provided you have modified the skybox files so that the fog is gone.

[Hyperstrike]

On 9/1/2023 at 2:39 PM, Without_Pause said:

I vendor common salvage and IO recipes until I get to my starting point. Habashy, DFB, and first two Hollows contacts I think generates 84 Convertors. 42 conversions to rare with an average of 3 mill profit means I'm sitting at over 120 million. I'm like level 13 and have yet to touch the Posi TF for more Merits.

I generally twink myself our with a few million.
Then dump all commons and salvage up to 35.
After that common IOs and continue dumping salvage.

I hit Incarnates with about 90 million in Inf.  And, because I was pushing through all content, I was pulling in phat Merit action.
As such, the toon is ready for a "final" build.

[cranebump]

48 minutes ago, Luminara said:

There's no shame in face-planting.

+1,000. 

[Rinwen]

If you're maybe unsure of whether or not a particular archetype/power combo is worth the time... play it on Test for a bit.

 

I do this frequently. You can just set your level, give yourself any kind of Enhancements from DOs to IOs, as well as the most expensive uber godlike sets... and play a few Lv 50 missions, over-world "hunting," etc.

 

This can help you not only decide if X is worth your time, i.e. did you enjoy it, but can help you plan out a build as well.

 

I do this, but honestly, I also have a few characters, (pretty much just the ones I'm only "meh" on and don't like enough to really put effort into), that just "live" there because I don't play often enough to farm enough Inf, (and I can't be arsed to do all these fancy Inf earning things), so not having to worry about Inf is enjoyable for me.