Collaborative Completion

[Perfidy]

For those of you that solo more often than not, or lead teams frequently, this is likely not an issue for you. I am usually in the former group, rather than the latter. I solo quite a bit. Because of this, I tend to do story arcs and get a fair number of reward merits. Usually about 250-400 reward merits, depending on how many TFs I might do while leveling. 

This new patch has me playing a dom. The dom reaches domination faster in a group. I do not know why, but it does. And a dom's damage, particularly in the early levels is fairly low, at least compared to the brutes and blasters I normally play. So, there may be some perception bias on my part, fair enough. 

In any event, yesterday, after a DFB got me to level 7, I found myself in The Hollows, accepting an outrageous invite for a +4 frostfire. Turns out, the team was still doing Wincott's arc, and hadn't even gotten to Flux yet. By the time we finished Frostfire, I was level 19. 

And, normally, I'd use reward merits for converters to change the unsavory recipes into enhancements and into better enhancements. Well...hmm...I don't have any reward merits because I was riding on someone else's team. Nothing to stop me from talking to Wincott, except the team I was on would have had to repeat a mission. They're not an sg, no idea how well that might have gone over, but I could have asked, for sure. But I didn't. 

Collaborative completion is an awesome feature, because it allows for each player to get the merits at the end of a story arc. And yet, as far as I know, very few people take advantage of this. Perhaps most folks are unaware it even exists. 

Before I made a suggestion for HC to promote it's use, figured I'd just ask here first - is the juice of collaborative completion worth the squeeze? Imagine having to redo a mission or two to get someone joining your team after you've started so they can get paid as well. Is this something you're okay with? Would it just depend on what level you are, what the contact is, what the mission is, etc? 

I'm just curious. With the way explorations are giving out patrol xp instead of xp, it's causing me to slow down on the explorations, so it's limiting my ability to do things the same way I'd normally do them. So, I guess I'll have to learn more patience and wait to form my own teams and explain to people how to get to Kings Row from Atlas. and how to get to Pocked D from Imperial City and that kind of thing. I'd rather not, but it looks like I'm going to have to do that, unless I can find a way to collaboratively complete story arcs with pugs. 

[Lunar Ronin]

This is just me, but the way I've looked at the game since live is:  Missions and story arcs are for soloing.  Task Forces, Strike Forces, and Trials are for teaming.  Everyone gets reward merits on TFs/SFs/Trials, while only mission holders do on story arcs and as you've pointed out, trying to align everyone on a team for story arcs is just messy.  Too messy to be worth it, IMO.  If a friend of mine asks me to join him or her on a story arc, I will, but that's pretty rare as I think they view the game similarly.

[cohRock]

I'll just add that Flashback missions (usually started in Ouroborus) are collaborative by nature. Even though your team may be running Flux' arc, it will be doing so in a TF envelope, and everyone on the team gets mission holder rewards.

[Perfidy]

24 minutes ago, cohRock said:

I'll just add that Flashback missions (usually started in Ouroborus) are collaborative by nature. Even though your team may be running Flux' arc, it will be doing so in a TF envelope, and everyone on the team gets mission holder rewards.

<doh> Why didn't I think of that? 
Thanks!

[cohRock]

1 hour ago, Perfidy said:

I'm just curious. With the way explorations are giving out patrol xp instead of xp, it's causing me to slow down on the explorations, so it's limiting my ability to do things the same way I'd normally do them.

I see this change as a very good thing, tying into my day job compulsion.  Even outside of that, patrol xp can be thought of as delayed xp, raising the amount of XP you get from defeating foes and mission completions.

 

Secondly, there are two quite useful day jobs that my guys strive to get, Monitor Duty Teleporter (MDT) and Rapid Response Portal (RRP).  The former simply allows yourself the opportunity to go to your base or any other accessible base.  It is straightforward to get, simply stand near a base portal before logging out.  After 100 hours of logged out time (likely in multiple segments), you gain it.  The second involves the tie to patrol xp.  When you have that hundred hours of Monitor Duty (logged out near base portal) AND gain the Crimimal (villain/rogue) or Patroller (hero/vigilante) badge by using up 100 segments of patrol XP, your capability improves by being able to build RRP charges -- also by standing near a base portal while logged out.  This allows you to drop a base portal anywhere, which anyone can use.  During countless TFs, I see people drop an Ouro portal between missions (eg, help everyone to move from Kings Row to a hunt in Crey's Folly).  That's very inefficient.  By the time I get my base portal dropped for almost direct access to CF, almost everyone has saundered off via Ouro or the train, not being used to the idea of someone dropping a base portal anywhere.

 

One gains the RRP badge via patrol XP, and gaining patrol XP was tricky before, because it involved being both logged out and logged in. time  Now with exploration badges earning patrol XP, you can gain RRP with mostly logged-in hours.  No more playing another character simply to get some logged out time on your guy.

 

By the way, some time in the past 2 years, a quality of life change was made to earning RRP charges.  If your guy built up 30 charges of MDT (6 days total logged out near base portal) without having the Criminal/Patroller badge, you would need to ANOTHER 6 days to build up 30 RRP charges.  That was adjusted so  if you already have MDT charges and  log out near a base portal for an hour or so, the RRP charges build up quickly to match how many MDT charges you had -- so in only an hour or so you might get a fully charged RRP.

[Perfidy]

44 minutes ago, cohRock said:

I see this change as a very good thing, tying into my day job compulsion.  Even outside of that, patrol xp can be thought of as delayed xp, raising the amount of XP you get from defeating foes and mission completions.

 

I just use the base teleporter, and if that's not recharged, the sg portal. I can't think of any circumstance where I needed access to my base and one or the other wasn't up. I can honestly say, that other than my badgers, I've never pursued these, as they aren't useful to me. I already have access to my base with the press of a button. 

The patrol xp in lieu of regular xp would be okay, except it tapers off as you level, when you'd want it the most - at level 50, pursuing the vet levels. The juice isn't worth the squeeze, in my opinion. At least, not just for that. But since the reward merits are still there, it'll have to do. Not a fan of the change myself. 

[Coyotedancer]

The one big issue with individuals on a team trying to run their copy of an arc in parallel with their teammates is the random order in which some contacts present those missions... Stephanie Peebles in Striga is probably the most infamous example of that, but she's not the only one who does it. It can take quite a bit of patience and mission abandon-and-retake shenanigans to get everyone on the same mission at the same time.

 

That's fine when you have two or three on a team who are willing to take the time to get everyone "one the same page", but it would get ridiculous fast on an 8-member PUG.... and everyone having the same mission at the same time would be a requirement for any kind of "complete your copy of the arc as your team does" scheme. 

 

Now, if we could get rid of "random order" issue and talk Steph and her kind into giving out missions in a regular, non-randomized order? That would be helpful... But for some reason there are always people loudly opposed to that whenever it's been suggested.