Suggestion: Reward Merit Re-Evaluation v1.0

[SupaFreak]

Since the recent License Agreement with NC Soft announcement, I've found myself trying to look at City of Heroes from a new player's perspective and not so much as a 13-year veteran of the game.  I find myself evaluating the existing core systems of the game and where the glaring flaws are that the Homecoming team inherited and have yet to address.  I ask myself what is going to get newcomers here and wanting to stay and what can be done on the development side with minimum effort for maximum results.

 

And that's what has led me to this suggestion that's been on my mind since Live...

 

Suggestion: Reward Merit Re-Evaluation

Some of you had to know something along these lines was coming from me since I've been posting the data on my current "W.I.P. Feedback on Merit Distribution through Flashback" thread.

 

Giant Monsters post 27 page 7

I feel the changes made were a great step in the right direction here.  Lusca got the proper treatment for time invested and the overall experience for Monster Hunting teams just got the boost it needed to be a viable option for something rewarding to do from time to time.

 

 

 

Part 1: Set Clear Standard Guidelines for Base Reward Merits

The following would result in Reward Merits for some existing Story Arcs to go down, others up.  This part of the Suggestion I hope most would agree would be for the betterment of the game.

 

The Perceived Current Problem 

Right now there are arcs we can speed run and earn over 90 Merits an hour on, while there are others we can't earn a single Merit on. 

 

My speculation of what the Paragon Studios originally had in mind during Issue 13 when Reward Merits were introduced vs where they ended up at Sunset appear to be spot on.  They got lazy and players experiencing Praetoria got hit the worst by the flat "9 Merits per Arc no matter how long they take to complete" approach.

 

And honestly as much as I'm proud of the Homecoming team, I am concerned the flat "20 Merits per Arc no matter how long they take to complete" is a band-aid to a problem that I perceive as long overdue for re-evaluation.

 

It's in my belief based on research of numbers that the original design goal was based on solo Speed+Stealth+Damage characters to top out at "60 Merits per Hour" for speed runs of any given Story Arc.  A simple max value of 1 Merit per Minute.  There's a handful right now that would need the Reward Merit nerf hammer brought down on them.  However, there's actually more that would have the nerf air compressor *clap clap* pump them up!

 

1-A) Possible Guidelines - Data Mined for fastest runs if possible.

Story Arcs -------> 1 Merit per Minute ( based on solo play ) <--- what it appears they were originally designed to be.

TFs / SFs --------> 1.5 Merits per Minute ( based on teams of 4+ ) <--- what most approximately are currently.

Incarnate TFs ---> 2.5 Merits per Minute ( based on teams of 4+ )  <--- what they currently are (Apex / Tin Mage).

 

1-B) End Results Possibilities & Examples:

Low Level Arcs -----> A good chunk would go up 4 or more Reward Merits per Arc.

Praetorian Arcs -----> A good chunk would go up 5 or more Reward Merits per Arc.

Hero Arcs -----------> Some would reduce Reward Merits, some would increase.

Villain Arcs ----------> Few would reduce Reward Merits, most would increase.

 

1-C) ***** Low Levels vs High Levels *****

In my opinion, with this game's ability to Exemplar down on Task/Strike Forces, Story Arcs, etc. there's no reason why a level 45+ (non-Incarnate) Miss Liberty TF should be more Reward Merit attractive than a level 8+ Positron TF.  Same sentiment goes for Story Arcs.  Level is just a number.... plus powers.

 

 

 

Part 2: Consider Adding Reward Merit Distribution to Pick-Up Groups doing Certain Content.

Note this suggestion may seem a bit radical at first, but please evaluate what the end result might be before passing harsh judgment. 

 

The Perceived Current Problem 

This is an MMO and aside from Badges for those who pursue those, there's little to no current in-game method to incentivize players into joining a player leveling up on their story arcs, doing Alignment Tip Missions or Safeguard/Mayhem Missions.  In my opinion, there should be a way to cater to the casual / non-speed crowd in some capacity that can't be exploited and/or abused by power gamers.

 

Merits have become a core and essential part of many players building their arsenal of characters and I'm simply trying to come up with alternatives for newcomers and veterans alike in leveling up their characters to acquire those sought after Reward Merits.  As it stands right now, the mission holder gets the Merits - everyone else on the team gets squat as far as Merits.  Not a great design from where I'm sitting.

 

As it stands, I can see how newcomers might feel strong-armed and bottle-necked into having to do TFs/SFs to get the most bang for their buck or they can succumb to the seductive lure of A/E farms to fund their builds.  Then they soon get burnt out and disheartened by the lack of a plethora of options to cleanse their reward-seeking palettes and move on to other ventures not titled 'City of Heroes'.

 

Story Arcs (non-Flashback)

Remove Reward Merits awarded at the end for the mission holder, keep that strictly for dedicated soloists or teams doing Flashbacks.  So, yea... this means 2 versions of each arc in a sense - or at least a toggle for the system to determine if Flashback is on or off.  Would that be complicated to do?  *shrug*  If it's easy enough, I truly believe this would help newcomers a massive amount.  (see 2-B & 2-C below)

 

Alignment/Morality Missions

Remove the 40 Reward Merits upon completion of 10 Alignment + 1 Morality mission.  Replace with 7 Reward Merits.  (see 2-B & 2-D below)

 

Safeguard/Mayhem Missions

A tad complicated but would grant the ability to earn between 3-5 Reward Merits per low-level banks up to 8 per high level banks. (see 2-B & 2-E below)

 

2-A) Possible Guideline - not designed for nor based on speed - encourage casual play.

Door / Tip / Bank Missions -----> 0.75 Merit per Minute

Keep in mind - players can join and drop out as they wish at any time on these and are not committed long-term as they are in Part 1.

 

2-B) How it could work for Door Missions for each player on the team via System Check:

1. System Check Requirement: Flashback or Task/Strike Force ( includes A/E ) = False
2. System Check Requirement: Repeatable Mission ( Newspaper, Radio, Dark Astoria, etc ) = False
3. Eligibility for Reward Merit upon Completion = True

 

How team members are awarded upon door Mission Complete:

1. If player present 180 seconds or more = True, award 3 Reward Merits / if False, go to next check (3 minutes or greater)
2. If player present 90 to 179 seconds = True, award 2 Reward Merits / if False, go to next check (1.5 minutes to 3 minutes)
3. If player present 30 to 89 seconds = True, award 1 Reward Merit / If False, award 0 Reward Merits.  (0.5 to 1.5 minutes)

 

2-C) ***** Story Arcs *****

I've already checked the results against 278 Arcs (all pre-50) and if those are properly balanced for time and Reward Merits, then this method would never match doing the flashback version.  Flashback version factors in travel time, cut-scenes, "fed-ex"s, zone hunts, etc.  This only factors in Door Missions.

 

The only cases where it can surpass Flashback is if you slow-play a single badge mission arc.   If you want to take 3 minutes to get 3 Merits on something that can be sped for 2 Merits in under 2 minutes... go for it.  It's still 1 Merit per Minute either way.  However, Flashbacks can be repeated, your contact only offers it to you once. 

 

As mentioned earlier - there would be no Merits awarded for completing Hunts, Talk to NPCs, Zone Clicks/Glowies or anything non-door (instance) related.  If need be, I believe a system similar to Astral vs Empyrean for Reward Merits would be have to be implemented and don't want to dabble in that Suggestion at this time because it's either a new "currency" or rebranding one currently underused.  ( Jeez, that's vague *cough* Brainstorm and you'll figure it out. *cough* )

 

2-D) ***** Alignment/Morality Tip Missions *****

Currently you need to do 10 Alignment + 1 Morality to get the 40 Reward Merits.

 

In this scenario, if you casually play the 10, you will get 30 Merits max.  Casually do the Morality and get another 3 Merits + the completion bonus of 7 Bonus Merits and your journey of 11 door missions grants you the same 40 as before.  Speed through them, you'll get less.

 

As a plus, this method would allow a Vigilante (for example) to join a Hero or Villain on their Tips and still be rewarded without being committed to changing their Morality.

 

Casual Play Example:
Vigilante casually does 10 tips at 3 minutes apiece per door for a total of 30 minutes.  They still burn up an additional 10 minutes traveling door to door and investigating their tips for a total of 40 minutes for 30 Merits.  That's 0.75 Merits/Minute casually playing... in theory.

 

Speed Play Example:

Vigilante speeds 10 tips at 1 minute apiece per door for a total of 10 minutes.  They still burn up an additional 10 minutes traveling door to door and investigating their tips for a total of 20 minutes for 10 Merits.  That's 0.5 Merits/Minute speed playing... in theory.

 

2-E) ***** Bank Missions *****

Safeguard & Mayhem Bank Completion = 1 Reward Merit

 

Safeguards - 1 Merit Objectives

Prevent Jailbreak / Prevent Break-In / Prevent Arms Deal 

Safeguards - 2 Merit Objectives

Prevent Bombing / Prevent Arson

 

Mayhems - 1 Merit Objectives

Break-Out / Raid / Smash & Grab: Vault

Mayhems - 2 Merit Objectives

Kidnapping / Arson

 

I ran a few level 50 Bank Missions on standard settings and timed myself with my phone's stopwatch.
I'd venture to say even the best builds would be super hard-pressed to do Bank + 5 Side Missions in under 8 minutes.

Fastest I got was 8:10 in multiple runs with my Incarnate Stalker fully IO'd.

Keep in mind - you can't speed up the Glowie timer and you can't Kidnap faster than the NPC can run.

 

Note: I am aware of the Contacts that give repeatable Bank Missions using the same door once Badge is acquired - so the argument could be made that travel time between missions doing this over and over seems very exploitable, right?   Well, there's a little Arc in Ouroboros called "The 5th Column Overthrow" (Level 39) I can already easily do the same thing with where the "Mission Door" is the same one 4x in a row.  16-17 minutes for 17 Merits as it stands right now... so not really all that different.  But it gets old doing that after a while IMO.

 

2-F) ***** Why not allow Repeatable Missions? *****

Peregrine Island level 54 radio teams is the short and simple answer.  Dark Astoria and the Cimerora are others.  The ability to never have to change zones and plow through simple small map missions with no complex mechanics over and over have their purpose -> XP with minimal downtime.  

 

Part of the goal of this Suggestion is to reward casual players for playing through the regular progression of the game, not give more incentive to ignore them.

 

I originally debated leaving Tip Missions out of this and keeping it confined to Story Arcs, but figured they already have Reward Merits tied to them plus you have to wait for a Tip to drop.  Not only that but a handful of them have advanced mechanics which cannot easily be sped through and they're not all guaranteed to be in the same zone you investigate them in.  So, I left them in the suggestion.

 

And I personally love Safeguards & Mayhems and wish people ran them on LFG... like... EVER.  There's simply no incentive to once you get the badges and that makes me Supa sad.  *frowny face with fake tears*  The time someone put into creating those only to be reduced to oblivion.  *sniff*  They were all the rage once upon a time.

 

 

 

Part 3: Consider Allowing Reward Merits to Purchase Unique Temporary Powers at ATM (aka Merit Sinks)

If Parts 1 & 2 of this Suggestion ever come into fruition, it's in my strong belief that we need something desirable and repeatable to spend them on.  Heck, we probably need that right now regardless.  

 

The Perceived Current Problem 

As someone with a stable of 50+3s I enjoy playing over and over with no desire to earn more INF through purchasing items and placing them on Auction House or building yet another 50 that I'll rarely play - there's little to nothing the ATM offers me that I desire in exchange for the multitude of Merits I've accumulated over the 5 years.

 

3-A) ***** Possible Temporary Power Ideas *****

• Charges of (Echo) versions of Bank Mission Completion Temporary Powers.  Maybe 60 Merits for 60 minutes of Game Time each for example.  I really hate the inability to re-acquire these in some way, shape or form.
• Charges of Experienced.  100 Merits for 5 Charges.  ( Hey, I voted to allow Patrol XP to be disabled in the poll but damnit I love Patrol XP )  See Fact List below and I'd willingly pay 20 Merits (@4,000,000 AH value) for 1 charge of Experienced - which I've found to be the average of 2.5 per 10 packs of Super Packs on AH after purchasing about 500 packs.  I broke even on INF after sales, so not really an INF sink as much as it is a time sink.
• New Fast Travel Power - Direct Contact - Teleports you directly to the zone location of the NPC on your active mission list - 5 Merits for 10 charges (max 50 charges?)
• New Fast Travel Power - Mission Portal - Any Teammate can use - Click and get Transit pop-up with only the Active Mission on the list.  Customizable Magic or Tech theme - 100 Merits for 10 Charges (max 50 charges?)  Yea, I'll give AH value of 2,000,000 for 1 charge for instances on TF/SF runs where no one has TT recharged.  Time is valuable... for me AND the team!  You can click Back on browser to get rid of me.  These people are stuck with me for the duration of the Task Force!  Have mercy on them!  Won't someone please think of the Teammates?!
• Summon Random Paragon Hero (Overdrive, Flamebeaux, etc) for Heroes/Vigilantes or Random Rogue Isle Villains (Double Tap, Shock Treatment, etc) for Villains/Rogues - Ally Boss for 5 minutes (or so).  40 Merits for 10 Charges (max 50 charges) - Not something I'm crazy about, but hey - it's an option between Back-Up Radio and Signature Summon, right?  And it's something for the pet-less Support characters to use their buffs and heals on.
• Balanced Ideas I have yet to think of that offer nothing game-breaking. 

 

 

 

Part 4: Arguing with Replies on Why This Is A Horrible Idea

Come on... it's inevitable.

 

The Perceived Current Problem

I think my ideas are good and you don't.  Try and understand... in my mind... I'm right... this time... I think... maybe... I'm not sure... wait... yea I am... right?

 

Fact List

1. 1,000,000 INF converts to 1 Reward Merit at ATM
2. Current Auction House Value of Reward Merit = 200,000 - 220,000 INF ( based on Boosters, Unslotters and Winter Event IOs )
3. I can do a YouTube search for A/E farms for multiple videos proving players can earn 1,000,000 INF a minute on Homecoming.
4. Those YouTubers can go to Fact 1 of this list and get 1 Reward Merit for 1 Minute of their gameplay at reduced risk and travel time.

 

Possible Argument List

1. This Suggestion would break the economy.  See #3 on Fact List.  Break what again?
2. Everything is fine the way it is with Merits.  Says you.  If I agreed, I wouldn't be posting this.
3. This Suggestion won't keep newcomers from leaving.  Talking with players who have come and gone, I'll plead the FAFO amendment.
4. Your Suggestions hurt my brain.  Yea... brains, like feelings, are injured easily these days.  

 

Possible Agreement List

1. I like Part 1, Praetoria could really use the love as far as Merits go.  Indeed.  They're quite a few sandwiches short of a Merit picnic.
2. I like Part 2, more incentives for PUGs would be great.  Yea, I'd actually do non-TF teams more if they rewarded other than INF to do so.
3. I thought you were going to suggest something plumbing related with Merit Sinks, but I actually like Part 3.  Well, it is technically Drain-O... but for Merits, so you weren't totally wrong.
4. You had me at Hello.  Uhhh, I never said Hello... oh crap, now I have.