The Officially Unofficial Weekly Discussion #74: What QoL change would you rollback and which is the biggest QoL improvement?

[DougGraves]

QoL - everyone gets stamina, upgrade button for enhancements, AH access everywhere, etc

 

Which one would you rollback because it made the game worse some how?

 

And which one was the biggest improvement in QoL?

[Lunar Ronin]

I'm sticking strictly with changes made from 2013 on.

 

I'd rollback veteran levels.

 

Best quality of life improvement?  SO enhancements available at level two.  Upgrade button is a close second.

[NotsoevilDM]

XP boost - I find that I level toons way too quickly and feel like I outlevel zones in a blink of an eye. I know I can turn it off, but I would prefer to cruise to 50 rather than sprint.

[cranebump]

I don’t care for any of the incarnate system or story associated with it, but I’m not sure it’s necessarily “bad for the game” since no one HAS to go that route.

 

The ubiquity of free and cheap zone TP options has the downside that a lot of the city never gets seen by new players, since they’re mainly doing door travel (if they’re teaming). Mentioned this before, but I enjoy seeing teams go by, each using their various modes of personal travel (esp with the floating disks, hoverboards, and different run stances we have now).

 

On the other hand, the addition of explore badge tips popping up in each zone (once you get one on your own from said zone) encourages exploration, since you can grab a few merits just for running/jumping/flying around.  For my lowbie chars with fly, I'll often zoom around zones collecting the explore badges between mishes, or when waiting for "TF Forming" messages. It's easy merits, and there actually are a few things I had not seen. As an AE author, I also find the explore badge blurbs to be great for inspiring new story ideas.  I like this add a lot.

Edited April 12 by cranebump

[UltraAlt]

9 hours ago, DougGraves said:

Which one would you rollback because it made the game worse some how?

 

I think all of these were supposed to be QoL changes.

 

1) Directing new players to go to Twinshot or Haberdash (or whatever his name is) instead of origin arcs (is funnelling content a QoL change?)

 

2) Getting rid of Galaxy City.  (is funnelling content a QoL change?)

 

3) Making Dark Astoria an end-game zone.

Dark Astoria was added to the game for Heroes and Villains in Issue 22. Prior to Issue 22, Dark Astoria was a hero-only zone and had enemies levels 21-29.

 

 

 

9 hours ago, DougGraves said:

And which one was the biggest improvement in QoL?

 

The auction house and invention system.

These were released at the same time, and it seems that they are obviously grouped together.

They both tremendously changed my City gaming experience.

 

I fear I spend more time Market PvPing then actually running adventures these days.

 

[Seed22]

I’d roll back none of the changes. People have lives outside of this game(putting it nicely) and a lot of these changes acknowledge that. And the great part? All of em are optional. 
 

I’d say the best thing added was the P2W  vendor in general. Very useful and acts as a loot filter for CoH which is very cool!

 

 

[Frostbiter]

Biggest QoL improvement? Personal Super Groups and bases. Yes, I had one on Live but I had to pay several strangers to help me start it and it took me forever to earn the prestige to flesh it out solo.

 

Biggest change I'd rollback is Galaxy City. I miss having that second starting location for Blueside. Atlas Park is too busy visually and occupancy-wise.

[Ukase]

This is a difficult question - mainly because I haven't thought about it. 

I don't even know if you can call it a QoL change. There were some changes in HC since the first day they opened up the doors to everyone. And it's tough to remember what was something that HC specifically did, or it was done prior to the public opening and it just carried over. 

Most of the things on my list - as I think about them - are more about the game's economy than anything else. 

The seeding of salvage comes to mind. 
The change of the exchange rate of VG merits to reward merits. 
The lack of charging influence for trading reward merits for converters, and the generous exchange rate.
The Find Contact and the Teleport to contact option.
The LFG teleport to contact option. 
The LRTP. 

Since some of those have less to do with QoL than others, I think as much as I want to bring attention to converters and seeded salvage, I think the LRTP is probably the biggest QoL improvement for me. Sure, I have base teleport, and the SG portal I could use, but the lrtp is faster - saves me a load time. 
I know some folks are thinking, "what's the rush", but if you're after the prismatics (or the monstrous aethers that convert into them) or even the merits, then you'll recognize that if other folks are also after those things, then sometimes, Babbage is defeated before you get there. 

I use the lrtp and even though I'm on the opposite side of the map, I can generally get there in time. 
Having to port into my base, and then port from my base to Skyway, I've lost out on merits because of the 30-45 second delay. (the biggest delay is usually my finally noticing the broadcast, honestly) 

I did not like the instant base tp being taken away, but the solution to that was manageable, and I've kind of forgotten about that great convenience. 

 

It's really hard to pick on this new way of trying to make things easier for the new player. Part of me thinks it can only help, but my inner curmudgeon wants them to suffer as I did, having to hover over The Hollows just to reach the mission alive. But those changes weren't from HC - they happened prior to the shut down. 

I thought the pvp recipes dropping in pve was insane, but I really like it. I never enjoyed loading my alts in and killing it repeatedly in hopes of getting a drop. Granted, it made a ton of inf back on "live", but it wasn't really fun. Just something I felt like I had to do to make enough inf to slot my characters. 

I think the one thing that impacts QoL a lot is influence. And the removal of NoXP/2xInf had an impact on a lot of players. When it was implemented, I'd already amassed a sizable stack of influence. But, I still think this was an over-reaction and completely unnecessary. Just making afk-farming more difficult or even improbable would have been a better course of action to achieve the desired result. Leave the active farmers alone. Let them make 2xInf if they want. They're only going to put it back into the economy, fund more costume contests and make more alts. 
And yes -I recognize that opinions vary strongly about this. You have a right to yours, just as I have a right to mine. We can disagree and still share a joke, I would hope. 

And, the thing is, every now and then, I see a new-ish player, level 30-something who's asking if they have an option to turn off xp and double influence. I mean, for them, it was an innocent question - as they figured if they could double xp and lose inf, they ought to be able to double inf and lose xp. 

But, for reasons which I still don't agree with, we can't do this anymore. So, for me, that's the biggest one that I'd like to roll back. 

[ZorkNemesis]

I can't think of any QoL changes I would revert since nearly everything is beneficial and I can choose not to use them.  The only one that really bothers me is the ease of access to team teleport, as stupid as that sounds.  I'm accustomed to older MMOs where long travel was part of the experience (Final Fantasy XI comes to mind).  I prefer to hoof it to the next mission most of the time, you'll see me hitting Long Range Teleport before someone calls for a charter flight if I know where to go next.

 

As for best QoL change, for me it's probably the improvements to Day Jobs and that they are much faster to earn the associated badges.  Four days in change is way better than the twenty-one days required back on live, it really helps my badge addictions.

[kelika2]

I would add more to vet levels to try and stop everyone from speeding and rushing task forces

Regular merits, prismatics.  maybe 1 hour worth of the boosters you get from the start vendor

other things like more storage of various types

 

im not doing the math but can add astral merits past lvl11 or something.

 

id rollback the titan weapons changes a bit.  they went from being everywhere to no where real quick

[AlwaysAPrice]

I have a lot of these tbh, but the one that really sticks in my craw: Null the Gull alignment changes. If it was a thing you could only use before level 20, when Tips to make the shift properly become available, and didn't grant the badges/temp power, or even if it could just be used once per character without any other restriction, I'd be fine with it (though I suspect the badges part is a "has to be this way" for the game to recognize your alignment/function correctly when you do real alignment missions later). As it is, it's just a cheat/test feature that belongs on beta only. There's 161 alignment & morality missions that are all more engaging and usually worth more XP than any radio (and mostly speedable when you do just want quick alignment progress, for which the 5/day restriction is long gone), why disincentivize some of the best PUG content in the game?
   (that said? 100% grateful for the option whenever Halloween and now April Fool's roll around)

As for the biggest improvement, gotta second the earlier mention of SOs from level 2. Massive game changer. That coupled with the earlier availability of primary and secondary powers has truly reinvigorated the early game for me: I'm playing ATs I'd never given a fair shake or only grudgingly endured before. That performance boost against an early game still balanced for TOs and DOs just plain feels good and lets me get a feel for the actual oomph of my powers early on, something I used to have to slog to 22 at half power for a real taste of. I've never run into the significant difficulty with Praetorian content I've often heard about but I imagine this has been a godsend for Praetorian lowbies too.

Exploration badge tips are also just. Really good. Both from the QoL aspect of de-Easter-Egging the badges into a little piece of flavor-rich casual game content that encourages you to look around at the game world, and for the effort and quality that went into writing up each zone's guide concept and interesting mission text for each individual badge. Actually kind of makes me regret when I grab a badge out of chance or habit because now that's a tip I'm not going to get to read til the next character.

[Snarky]

I love the improvement of the game over the years. I cannot think of anything i would reverse.  
 

Well, some people call nerfing Brutes three times and giving them the worst ATO proc in the game QOL improvements.  I would reverse those decisions…

 

The best improvement is easier rapid travel. Which helps teams immensely 

[DoctorDitko]

Roll back? The 0XP/2xInf tradeoff. It grates against my sense of symmetry. Just say it only works outside of AE and call it a day.

 

Best QoL improvement? By far -- by lightyears -- it's the shift from profit-driven to fun-driven game design choices!

 

The original game had plenty of time-wasters, things you needed to check back on in a few days, and things designed to keep you subscribed. Want more characters? Pay for another account! And keep paying, or they're gone!

 

Then, when it went "free" to "play" (note irony quotes) even more clocksuckers appeared -- but now, for a low, low fee you could skip to the stuff you really wanted to do.

 

Honorable mention goes to: seeding and pooling stuff on the AH, streamlining travel options, ditching arbitrary level barriers, adding the Notoriety menu, /ah and /respec commands, easy server jumping...

 

Let's just say I'm a fan.

 

 

 

Edited April 13 by DoctorDitko
Journalism major

[Techwright]

It's hard for me to come up with anything worth considering as roll-back material.  I suppose one thing I might state (and I'm sure this will be unpopular) is the abundant travel methods between zones now.  Yes, it does facilitate putting teams together quickly, but I kind of miss the days of exploring out routes and racing team members to the next destination.  I especially miss the warm comradery of the Taxi-bot players facilitating travel for low levels. 

[MrPengy]

One of the biggest QoL improvements for me is being able to actually take more powers that I want. A few changes have made it so every character basically gained 4 new power choices, since you no longer have to take Hurdle, Health, and Stamina, and you can take a travel power with out taking the (potentially useless) requisite power before it. So on my blaster for example, halfway through Live I would have Hurdle, Health, Stamina, Hover, and Fly. Five power selections. In the current game I get the entire Fitness pool free, and could take Fly with out taking Hover. If I really wanted I could even use any of the numerous other travel options and skip Fly, effectively granting me a whopping five extra power choices.

 

The ability to actually make the character I have in mind, instead of feeling locked into certain powers because I "need to" is incredible.

[laudwic]

The only one I would roll back is I would make you actually have a 50 to access any of the four Epic Archetypes.  (Peacebringer, Warshade, Soldier and Widow).  Getting a character to level 50 is not difficult so this would not be a major hurdle and would give a players some experience with the game before starting a more complicated archtype.

 

Favorite QOL, the Exploration Badge Tips.  They are well done, fit the theme, and see the reality of people being able to look up the locations anyways.

[wjrasmussen]

QoL.  A way to organize inspirations in the AH so I don't have to scroll so much along with a get feature that you can provide a number of the inspirations to get.  Hell, I would like to have a "go bag" of inspirations so when I get to Hami is just push the swap button and the inspiration tray swaps.  A second bag for raids would be nice as well.

Getting old now and my eyesight is bad.  I would like to see thicker lines/buttons to adjust/push.  Trying to adjust some UI elements is frustrating.

When trying to do badge hunting, something to help out to find what is missing or how many more X I need.  Don't want to hear about addons and crap like that.

 

 

[SeraphimKensai]

I'd roll back PvP to pre i13. Taking it right back to its glory days.

 

QoL change that's been great I definitely like /ah as opposed to physically going to an Auction House.

[Scarlet Shocker]

On 4/12/2024 at 9:05 AM, NotsoevilDM said:

XP boost - I find that I level toons way too quickly and feel like I outlevel zones in a blink of an eye. I know I can turn it off, but I would prefer to cruise to 50 rather than sprint.

 

This is one of my bugbears and I would seriously nerf them, if I couldn't delete them from the game entirely.

 

I also have a big dislike of Vet levels, but that is more about the way it is presented than the actual recognition of the level.

[lintboy]

I would roll back the travel power suppression when you attack. The whole point of a super power is to use it. Would the Flash suddenly run slower because he punched someone? Would Nightcrawler be unable to teleport after punching someone? It’s stupid. I know it was added for PVP, and I don’t think it should have been added there, but it never should have been implemented in PVE. Worst change ever.

[mechahamham]

I don't really get the point behind the new 'Hide First Appearance' option. All it seems to do is hide character bios by default, which kinda stinks. Maybe I'm misunderstanding why it was put in or what its usecase looks like.

 

If I were going to absolutely nuke a game feature from orbit, it'd be Architect Entertainment. Mission Architect had the potential to brew up amazing player-created content, but was handled in a way that incentivized agriculture over gameplay. AFK farming should not ever be a thing, and it's one of the default leveling methods in CoH now.

 

The good: It creates a hungry market for enhancements I craft.

 

The bad: New players get sucked in a 'the game sucks at low levels' mentality. Existing players level a character without ever LEARNING that character or learning how to effectively team with that character. A significant number of players treat content outside AE as 'necessary evils' and want to coast through it without thought or difficulty. This is especially true of Task Force Commander TFs and other accolade-related arcs and missions. How many characters go into those TFs without even slotting dropped enhancements?

 

(As an aside, I recently did a Positron TF in which a Super Reflex character kept getting KO'd. They complained loudly that SR sucked. Without checking their level, I encouraged them to give it time because SR is a late-blooming set. I told them that once they got some enhancers and levels behind them, they'd feel like nothing could touch them. It turns out that they didn't have *any* enhancements slotted, despite being level 26.)

 

It would be next to impossible to remove AE from CoH at this point. Even if you attempted to re-engineer it so AFK farming and door-sitting weren't possible, you'd get people complaining loudly and making threatening statements like "If you want me to leave the game, this is how you do it."

[twozerofoxtrot]

Since it seems lile discussion has veered slightly from pure QoL features into items that mechanically affect the core gameplay loop, I'll say the ability to have any set attuned is probably the biggest for me.

 

Playing on other servers, I truly feel the lack of power at lower levels and after considering it for months I realized this was a core part of what made Homecoming enjoyable for me over those other places.

[MrPengy]

Also, I absolutely love the recent change that allows you to take the tier 2 power in your secondary at level 1, instead of being forced into the tier 1 power. I don't always want the tier 1, so it ends up being a wasted power choice on some characters. Being able to skip it is awesome. Especially on blasters. I never use the immobilize once I have the first few attacks, so for me it's a useless power after level 10. Not having to take it means I get more powers I actually want, and I get them sooner!

 

However I am not a huge fan of being able to take the later powers in a set earlier. I know this kind of contradicts my whole feeling of wanting more power choice options, and being able to take powers sooner means less "I guess I'm gonna take this power because I have no other choices" situations. It just makes those powers feel, I dunno, cheaper? Being able to get your best attack power at level 26 makes it feel less awesome than if you have to work up to it a bit more. I guess I'm just used to getting a great power unlocked at 26, my best (typically) power at 32, another awesome power at 35, and then my build's "final" power at 38.

 

I certainly wouldn't argue for them to roll that back. But that's how I feel about it. I've had quite a few characters now where I'm at the level up screen, looking at my tier 9 power, thinking "I could take it now...but it's early. But also if I can take it and don't, I'm gimping my character for no reason"