essay EXP gains should be shared to all players in a particular neighborhood

[Rudra]

10 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

In addition, an auto-team-up mechanic would prevent randos from stealing your exp.

Not if your team is full and the rando shows up and T9 nukes or Judgements everything. Hells, the team doesn't even have to be full.

 

11 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Since street sweeping does not grant rewards on par with missions, if they are to be considered a valid form of content then the rewards for street sweeping teams should be increased. Ideally, not to the same level as missions, as it's not good to upset the entire balance of the game. Doing as such is like messing with an ecosystem, and we all know what happens when you bring cats to Australia or whatever. Not a good plan. So, ideally, they should grant rewards that are about 80% as valuable as missions and raids and such - currently, I'd estimate they're much lower than that.

And what would trigger this bonus reward and how often would it trigger?

[gabrilend]

22 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Not if your team is full and the rando shows up and T9 nukes or Judgements everything. Hells, the team doesn't even have to be full.

 

In that case, your team would be one of several in that neighborhood. And the exp gains from that kill would be distributed to you according to the algorithm presented earlier, where 50% of the exp is granted to those present and 50% is divided amongst others in the zone.

 

22 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And what would trigger this bonus reward and how often would it trigger?

 

See my conversation with Luminara and McSpazz earlier in this thread:

 

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McSpazz:

 

The first is that I feel like before this can be made into a satisfying and fun experience, zones themselves first need to be improved. Specifically related to enemy placement and a sense of a zone having purpose. If you look at the zones released or modified towards the end of the game's lifespan and compare it to its older maps, you can see what I mean, but I think a more direct comparison between Echo: Atlas and modern Atlas can paint a more stark picture. In the modern iteration, it doesn't feel like enemies are literally in control of the city and ruling the streets. Different parts of the city have different issues that need to be addressed. Older maps in Paragon and to a somewhat lesser extent in the Rogue Isles, the zones feel far more like spaces for you to move through between missions with enemies peppered throughout. Newer zones also have something that would be vital to making this feel at all rewarding: something the street sweeping is building up to. Something akin to Homecoming changing things so that Scrapyarder defeats can spawn Scrapyard. Each zone where you implemented zonewide shared exp would need something like that to justify people doing this rather than just running through a mission and getting an immediate burst of feedback.

 

Gabrilend:

 

I think this is absolutely a wonderful idea. Having an increased threat monster arise due to the presence of heroes, or maybe an archvillain shows up to stomp on all the lesser villains, something to that effect.

 

Perhaps there's a hidden counter or meter that fills up as players fight monsters in the zone, and when a certain amount have been defeated a hero/archvillain is spawned that is thematically appropriate for that level range. That's a decent reward, but I believe it's a little similar to the Giant Monster mechanic. Perhaps an additional twist is necessary...!

 

What if this archvillain/hero that spawns is of the opposite alignment to the zone. So, for example, if you're in Paragon City, an archvillain would spawn who was hostile to the players *and* the normal enemies present. So a neighborhood in Atlas Park for example which is mostly populated by Hellions would have an archvillain spawn who was drawn to the fighting for some reason and wanders around much like a player does fighting both heroes and Hellions. I believe that would encourage players to fight them, because not only would they be worth a lot of exp and infamy/influence, they also would be reducing the potential targets for their street sweeping patrol.

 

There's currently already a large group of NPC costumes created for the bank heist missions. Perhaps after (100 * number of players in zone) enemy units are slain / arrested / beaten down, it spawns a hero/archvillain in a random neighborhood? Ideally, without any proclamation or explanation of their presence. That way players would have to hunt them down.

 

Basically mirroring the players and using the same behavior they're using, but for the opposite side.

 

Gabrilend:

 

Perhaps when defeating these archvillains/heroes, you're given a reward merit? Would that be sufficient reward / motivation to engage with this kind of content, for the reward-oriented players in our midst?

 

[megaericzero]

1 hour ago, gabrilend said:

Since street sweeping does not grant rewards on par with missions, if they are to be considered a valid form of content then the rewards for street sweeping teams should be increased.

The thread is too TLDR for me so my bad if this has been asked/suggested already:

If this is the goal, why not make the Security Chiefs of each zone into repeatable street-sweeping contacts, then? Have them offer the same three "hunt [group]" missions per zone, give their phones on first conversation or first mission complete, and adjust the number of foes to defeat and the completion reward to whatever compensation per time you think is fair for street sweeping.

[wjrasmussen]

Share all exp earn over all the servers and all the characters, be they online, off line, parked for namesake, etc.

[Oubliette_Red]

23 hours ago, Krimson said:

Don't oppose this because it might be similar to farming. Oppose it because the effort to make it happen isn't worth the result. Not enough players will use it to make it worthwhile.

 

QFT

[gabrilend]

19 minutes ago, megaericzero said:

The thread is too TLDR for me so my bad if this has been asked/suggested already:

If this is the goal, why not make the Security Chiefs of each zone into repeatable street-sweeping contacts, then? Have them offer the same three "hunt [group]" missions per zone, give their phones on first conversation or first mission complete, and adjust the number of foes to defeat and the completion reward to whatever compensation per time you think is fair for street sweeping.

 

 

That would be nice, but at the end of the day it's not really a fundamentally different playstyle. Which is what is being proposed - take an inert piece of content (the entire massive open world) and provide the structure to encourage engagement in a different way than what other types of content provide, while also providing rewards that make it enticing for players who care about that kind of thing.

 

My vision is a city of heroes where you can wander where you please, fighting mobs as you see them, and playing with friends around you. There should be no compulsion to stick together like glue, you are wandering superheroes on patrol. You should spread out and cover the whole area. I believe the proposed mechanics create space for that fantasy, and I think the suggested structure is neat, easy to play, and easy to implement. The downsides suggested thus far seem to be either addressable, or just like... not that big of a deal.

 

22 minutes ago, Oubliette_Red said:

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Don't oppose this because it might be similar to farming. Oppose it because the effort to make it happen isn't worth the result. Not enough players will use it to make it worthwhile.

QFT

 

My understanding is that players "won't use it" because they currently don't do street sweeping. And they don't currently do street sweeping because there's minimal rewards for it. However, by providing rewards, I believe players would be enticed to engage with this content. I do not believe their current lack of engagement with the open world is due to an inherent distaste for it, but rather simply an issue of rewards.

 

And while a simpler solution could be implemented, most simple solutions do not offer anything compelling and new. I believe the proposed idea would offer compelling and new gameplay, and again I believe it would utilize existing assets and not require anything more than a few systems implemented in code.

[Greycat]

22 hours ago, Rudra said:

This was already tried. To summon Paladin in King's Row I believe. It was so hated and ignored, the change got rolled back to the original summons method.

 

The Shining Stars/hunt the ... whatever they were called was bugged and they couldn't get it unbugged.

[Greycat]

So, if I walk through the parking lot of a stadium while a baseball game is going on, am I suddenly a better baseball player?

 

If I walk through a university's halls while classes are in session, am I absorbing all this knowledge about law or paleontology or chemistry or whatever I'm walking by?

 

Why should I get any XP for just being in the area of a fight - even ignoring the leaching/KS/farm questions (and the fact some groups are already a PITA to find - see Council/5th column killing each other?) I've done nothing to contribute.

 

You want people involved in the zones themselves, create *interesting* events - not "oh, yawn, another invasion" or "oh, gee, another giant bag of XP (GMs.)"

[gabrilend]

8 minutes ago, Greycat said:

So, if I walk through the parking lot of a stadium while a baseball game is going on, am I suddenly a better baseball player?

 

If I walk through a university's halls while classes are in session, am I absorbing all this knowledge about law or paleontology or chemistry or whatever I'm walking by?

 

Why should I get any XP for just being in the area of a fight - even ignoring the leaching/KS/farm questions (and the fact some groups are already a PITA to find - see Council/5th column killing each other?) I've done nothing to contribute.

 

You want people involved in the zones themselves, create *interesting* events - not "oh, yawn, another invasion" or "oh, gee, another giant bag of XP (GMs.)"

 

Yes exactly! Which is why the anti-afk mechanics proposed here:

 

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Gabrilend:

 

First it should be ensured that players cannot AFK while mobs throw themselves at them.

 

Luminara:

 

You can set up macros (computer macros, not game macros) with any halfway decent keyboard or mouse software, and even low-end input devices come with that kind of software these days.  It's bundled with the drivers.  And for those with bottom shelf crap that's just doing basic input, there's freeware that does this.  And the game can't distinguish between a person pressing a key/button and a computer sending keyboard/mouse input to the game via macros.

 

It's impossible to create any anti-AFK measure that a simple macro program can't defeat because it's impossible for the game to distinguish between macro input and manual input.

 

Gabrilend:

 

The type of AFK detection I'm advocating for is pretty simple, basically if a player hasn't defeated a monster in the past minute then they don't get distributed EXP rewards. That's pretty much it. I'll explain how I'd implement the architecture:

 

Whenever a player enters a zone, they get added to a list. When they leave, they are removed from that list.

This list iterates through all the players in the zone one step per second (or other interval as determined by the capabilities of the server and the number of players in the zone).

It checks the timestamp for when the player last defeated an enemy, and if it's greater than 1 minute then a boolean is flipped on their character's record in the list. This boolean is used to determine which heroes to distribute EXP rewards to. Next time they defeat a foe, the boolean flips back (or perhaps the next time the list iteration rolls past them).

 

I believe this is a simple enough solution that should handle most AFK issues. Combined with the limitation that mobs cannot spawn at a certain spawn point while a player or their minions are within the aggro radius (both of the mob and the "aggressive" pet aggro distance) I think that AFKers should be mostly defeated. What do you think? Am I missing any situations that might apply?

 

And just to clarify, this limitation only applies to the NEW source of exp distribution. The default means of acquiring EXP, perhaps from your friends fighting things nearby for you, should still be in effect. Albeit at a reduced rate, as 50% of their EXP is being distributed to the neighborhood...

 

... would address that concern. You wouldn't be able to just "walk through a parking lot and get EXP", you'd need to do at least a little fighting. And maybe that little bit that you did was enough for the other people who are doing more of the fighting to share some tips with you about how to fight this particular enemy - essentially, knowledge for free. Well, free because you were in the right place at the right time and you contributed a modicum of effort. I guess that's all you need.

 

Besides, if everyone's sitting, then the farmers won't be helping them that much. If AFKers are as much of a concern as you expect, then there will be proportionally a much lower rate of experience awarded to them. Essentially, if you don't fight, then any other method of farming exp would be faster for you.

 

And, if the opt-in mechanics as suggested here:

 

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Rudra:

 

Players already have to turn off xp to do all content, so let's just make them have to turn off xp while outside of instance missions so they don't outlevel the content they are already doing just for being in the game? Pass.

Gabrilend:

 

I see what you mean. Perhaps this would be an "opt-in" system, like the auto-generated groups I suggested which (as proposed) are only applied when the player marks themselves as "looking for patrol team" in the team finder interface.

 

... would allow you to disengage from this form of content if you believe that the AFKers are leeching and not actually contributing.

 

Since the spirit of this suggestion is to facilitate coordination among wandering heroes, it makes sense that one of the justifications for the thematic implementation of the mechanical effects would be based on communication. So, to reiterate: EXP is shared because your fellow heroes are sharing tips with you about how to defeat this particular foe. Once you've learned all you can from them and outleveled the zone, there's nothing more you can do, so you move on individually. To a villain, perhaps fellow Destined Ones are sharing tips about how to survive in the Hellscape that Lord Recluse has created? Or if cooperation isn't in their nature, then perhaps the act of clearing a zone of enemies has made the new ones that wandered in proportionally weaker (as they do not possess as much experience as those who came before) and so you, the villain, feels more powerful (as reflected in the distributed experience) and thus can defeat them more easily.

[Rudra]

This:

2 hours ago, gabrilend said:

To a villain, perhaps fellow Destined Ones are sharing tips about how to survive in the Hellscape that Lord Recluse has created? Or if cooperation isn't in their nature, then perhaps the act of clearing a zone of enemies has made the new ones that wandered in proportionally weaker (as they do not possess as much experience as those who came before) and so you, the villain, feels more powerful (as reflected in the distributed experience) and thus can defeat them more easily.

makes no sense. Mechanically, that would mean that lower level villains/mobs would be spawning across the zone as the team/league wipes out the existing ones. Which would be counterproductive. Thematically, villains, even Destined Ones in the game, don't share anything just because another villain happens to be in the area. Even heroes don't just share information with each other even when they encounter each other. They share information within their SG, yes. They share information while working together on a task, but typically only about that task. Even when Spiderman was 'instructing' Miguel as a Spiderman, he didn't offer any tips or advice on the enemies. He shared things like "You have 24 hours" spoken ominously, but otherwise nothing about how to fight anyone. (Edit yet again: *tries to imagine Superman or Wonder Woman listening to Batman as he tries to explain to them how to take down Jokers or other faction members while in Gotham*)

 

Setting that aside, what about when a player has a street sweep mission but must take down specific enemies in a specific area of the zone? Like taking down Trolls on the Red River in the Hollows. Player A just wants to get his/her/their mission done, isn't interested in joining a street sweep team in zone, and the street sweep team is obliterating the Trolls in the Red River neighborhood of the Hollows. Player A requests street sweep team to leave the Trolls alone so (s)he/they can do their mission, and is instead met with a team invite, which they decline because Player A doesn't want to be on a street sweep team or is already on a small team of friends that just want to play together and not part of some zone street sweeping league or team. Trolls in the Red River neighborhood are pretty good XP for the zone itself, and only Trolls defeated in the Red River neighborhood count for the mission. A rather niche example, yes, but also a rather possible one. This can be expanded to any other mission that instead of suggesting zone neighborhoods for likely location of target mobs for the street sweep mission, actually requires mobs to be defeated in that neighborhood. Which is rather common in Striga Isle and I believe can be found in Brickstown and Founder's Falls as well.

 

Edit: Look, from what I've read so far, the only way for this to work that is practical and can be used by all without stepping on others is the repeatable contact giving only street sweep missions in each zone. And if you make it so that those missions when turned in reward a mission completion reward like instanced missions do, then you are more likely to find street sweep teams, and do so without stepping on others just trying to enjoy themselves and get things done without all the required mental gymnastics your responses have required so far. (Edit again: And so no one thinks I'm stealing ideas, this was mentioned by someone else earlier in the thread and has been mentioned multiple previous times in other threads about street sweeping in the game.)

Edited April 21 by Rudra

[gabrilend]

18 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

To a villain, perhaps fellow Destined Ones are sharing tips about how to survive in the Hellscape that Lord Recluse has created? Or if cooperation isn't in their nature, then perhaps the act of clearing a zone of enemies has made the new ones that wandered in proportionally weaker (as they do not possess as much experience as those who came before) and so you, the villain, feels more powerful (as reflected in the distributed experience) and thus can defeat them more easily.

Rudra:

 

makes no sense. Mechanically, that would mean that lower level villains/mobs would be spawning across the zone as the team/league wipes out the existing ones. Which would be counterproductive.

 

You're right, it's a bit of a contrivance. However if you want to develop certain mechanics, then you need an explanation thematically for them. Similarly, if you want to develop a certain theme, then you utilize mechanics that affect that theme for the player to experience. It's quite rare that they are one and the same, and usually mechanics like that are a core part of the gameplay loop which means the entire game is probably built around them. So, yeah you're right. It's a bit of a stretch, but can you think of any other thematic justifications for the mechanics as presented? Or can you think of any mechanics that replace a proposed mechanic that would bring forth the theme more successfully?

 

22 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Thematically, villains, even Destined Ones in the game, don't share anything just because another villain happens to be in the area. Even heroes don't just share information with each other even when they encounter each other. They share information within their SG, yes. They share information while working together on a task, but typically only about that task. Even when Spiderman was 'instructing' Miguel as a Spiderman, he didn't offer any tips or advice on the enemies. He shared things like "You have 24 hours" spoken ominously, but otherwise nothing about how to fight anyone.

 

Hmmm, that's fair. Alright, how about this instead:

 

I know the game is supposed to be set in 2004, so maybe this wouldn't work, but player characters have emotes where they use smartphones, so they exist in-universe.

 

What if the civilians who may-or-may-not be present take pictures and videos and such and post them on the internet? Then, later, when your character is at their day job, they check out what people are saying about them, and get the experience then by observing the mistakes they made. Which, by the way, wouldn't conflict with the original idea I had where the heroes / villains were talking directly to one another.

 

I'm open to suggestions for better ideas...

 

26 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Setting that aside, what about when a player has a street sweep mission but must take down specific enemies in a specific area of the zone? Like taking down Trolls on the Red River in the Hollows. Player A just wants to get his/her/their mission done, isn't interested in joining a street sweep team in zone, and the street sweep team is obliterating the Trolls in the Red River neighborhood of the Hollows. Player A requests street sweep team to leave the Trolls alone so (s)he/they can do their mission, and is instead met with a team invite, which they decline because Player A doesn't want to be on a street sweep team or is already on a small team of friends that just want to play together and not part of some zone street sweeping league or team. Trolls in the Red River neighborhood are pretty good XP for the zone itself, and only Trolls defeated in the Red River neighborhood count for the mission. A rather niche example, yes, but also a rather possible one. This can be expanded to any other mission that instead of suggesting zone neighborhoods for likely location of target mobs for the street sweep mission, actually requires mobs to be defeated in that neighborhood. Which is rather common in Striga Isle and I believe can be found in Brickstown and Founder's Falls as well.

 

This problem doesn't seem to be much of an issue for other MMOs, I'm thinking specifically of World of Warcraft. That game has regular expansions, and during the launch of an expansion the issue you're describing (overcrowded questing zones) is certainly present, and so they developed a lot of tech for ameliorating the problem through zoning, increased spawn rates, etc. However, it's only a problem for the first couple weeks of each expansion, after which the players are more evenly dispersed throughout the leveling zones, thus giving people easier access to the quest mobs they need to level up. Frankly I don't think it'd be a big problem in City of Heroes, where there's very very few missions like the ones you've described. And I have faith in the community of Homecoming, I believe that we'd quickly learn which mobs are important to avoid fighting excessively, especially when someone is trying to do a mission there. We're a kind group of people, and we wouldn't want to step on anyone's toes, so honestly I truly believe that we are too honorable to do something like that out of spite. At least, not on a massive scale. I'm sure it'll happen sometimes, especially before people learn. But we'd learn.

 

And if it truly ends up being such a big problem, then perhaps the combined solutions presented earlier for:

1. increasing the spawn rates for critical mobs depending on the number of players in the zone

2. decreasing the minimum distance a player must be from a spawn point that is attempting to spawn, but can't because of player proximity (no closer than the aggro radius, of course, which can also be reduced with higher numbers of players) and

3. potentially granting kill credit for specific quests to people with those specific quests when those mobs are killed by non-team members in the immediate vicinity. I'm thinking no more than 50 yards away.

 

Those three solutions I believe when applied to varying degrees (the third one is the least desirable, I believe) should address the concerns you have with open-world mobs. Do you have any ideas for other ways to address that issue? Can you find any flaws with these three solutions?

 

34 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Edit: Look, from what I've read so far, the only way for this to work that is practical and can be used by all without stepping on others is the repeatable contact giving only street sweep missions in each zone. And if you make it so that those missions when turned in reward a mission completion reward like instanced missions do, then you are more likely to find street sweep teams, and do so without stepping on others just trying to enjoy themselves and get things done without all the required mental gymnastics your responses have required so far. (Edit again: And so no one thinks I'm stealing ideas, this was mentioned by someone else earlier in the thread and has been mentioned multiple previous times in other threads about street sweeping in the game.)

 

I disagree, I believe I've adequately addressed all the concerns raised in this thread. And those that remain are significantly less harmful than the positive benefits brought from the implementation of such a system. I understand posts like this can be difficult to read through, especially when I write SO MUCH but I put the "essay" tag on this post for a reason... I need the words in order to express myself clearly, honestly, and diligently.

 

The street sweep mission idea is nice, but like I said it's insufficient for the goals of this post. Specifically, the goals are:

1. to make patrolling the open world more desirable through increased street sweeping rewards

2. to encourage players to group up in an ad-hoc and decentralized way through the auto-team joining mechanic

3. to provide a massive increase in the amount of content for players to engage with through minimal systems development

4. to bring the community together by fostering a sense of mutual aid and contribution as players help one another, even if they don't know one another

5. to encourage a new style of gameplay that is unique and not present in the game -> namely, the dispersal of teammates throughout a zone, rather than their concentration

 

I believe these 5 goals are valid, and I've offered methods of achieving them with comparatively minimal effort. Well, adjusting spaghetti is always monumental, but I do believe that most of the work can be building upon the spaghetti, like a garnish of parmesan or a meatball, rather than attempting to untangle it. There are no alterations proposed, rather only system additions, and I think that's probably easier.

[Rudra]

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

1. to make patrolling the open world more desirable through increased street sweeping rewards

That would be easier to achieve with a mission completion reward for repeatable street sweep missions from an appropriate zone contact.

 

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

2. to encourage players to group up in an ad-hoc and decentralized way through the auto-team joining mechanic

Which fails if the opt-in system you agreed to earlier is implemented. Forming radio teams in PI for instance is a very ad hoc team formation, but it works because players can choose to join and run missions with that team rather than be auto-joined just because they happen to be going after the same targets in zone. And auto-forcing players to join teams, especially if they are already on a team of their own, is not something I will ever agree with. Ad hoc team formation? Sure. Automatic team formation? No.

 

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

3. to provide a massive increase in the amount of content for players to engage with through minimal systems development

Can be done using a zone contact granting repeatable street sweep missions. No new mechanics need to be created. The contacts will already stop granting missions when the player/team out-levels the zone. And there are street sweep missions that can be copied from existing contacts to populate the new contact. And even if new missions are instead preferred, it is a set of repeatable street sweep missions, so no need for any time creating a story arc around the missions, or need to figure out what maps to use and what objectives to populate the missions with. Everything needed already exists or takes minimal time to add.

 

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

4. to bring the community together by fostering a sense of mutual aid and contribution as players help one another, even if they don't know one another

Which can be accomplished just as easily from the players' point of view and much more easily from the developers' point of view if a contact giving street sweep missions that actually awards mission completion rewards is added to the zones.

 

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

5. to encourage a new style of gameplay that is unique and not present in the game -> namely, the dispersal of teammates throughout a zone, rather than their concentration

Which already happens on teams I've seen when street sweep missions come up in the story arcs. The team scatters across the zone to hunt down the target mobs more expeditiously. So the OP fails to create something new in this regard because it already happens. (Edit: The times the teams I've seen/been on stayed concentrated for street sweep missions was when the target mobs were required to be in a specific neighborhood of the zone or if they were most common in that neighborhood.)

 

 

Edited April 21 by Rudra
Edited to add "is added to the zones".

[gabrilend]

41 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

1. to make patrolling the open world more desirable through increased street sweeping rewards  

Rudra:

 

That would be easier to achieve with a mission completion reward for repeatable street sweep missions from an appropriate zone contact.

 

True. It would be easier to achieve with repeatable street sweep missions.

 

42 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

2. to encourage players to group up in an ad-hoc and decentralized way through the auto-team joining mechanic

Rudra:

 

Which fails if the opt-in system you agreed to earlier is implemented. Forming radio teams in PI for instance is a very ad hoc team formation, but it works because players can choose to join and run missions with that team rather than be auto-joined just because they happen to be going after the same targets in zone. And auto-forcing players to join teams, especially if they are already on a team of their own, is not something I will ever agree with. Ad hoc team formation? Sure. Automatic team formation? No.

 

Just to clarify, as mentioned earlier in the thread this should be an opt-in system, potentially by utilizing the "looking for patrol" option in the team finder, which currently is essentially unused.

 

There would never be any auto-forced team joining, it would be completely consensual. Can you explain more about why you believe an opt-in system would fail to encourage ad-hoc and decentralized teams? To me, it seems like a clear and explicit result of the proposed auto-team mechanic. I mean... It forms teams, automatically, on the fly, without any centralized authority organizing it.

 

43 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

3. to provide a massive increase in the amount of content for players to engage with through minimal systems development

 

Rudra:

 

Can be done using a zone contact granting repeatable street sweep missions. No new mechanics need to be created. The contacts will already stop granting missions when the player/team out-levels the zone. And there are street sweep missions that can be copied from existing contacts to populate the new contact. And even if new missions are instead preferred, it is a set of repeatable street sweep missions, so no need for any time creating a story arc around the missions, or need to figure out what maps to use and what objectives to populate the missions with. Everything needed already exists or takes minimal time to add.

 

True again. Street sweeping missions would accomplish this goal.

 

44 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

4. to bring the community together by fostering a sense of mutual aid and contribution as players help one another, even if they don't know one another

 

Rudra:

 

Which can be accomplished just as easily from the players' point of view and much more easily from the developers' point of view if a contact giving street sweep missions that actually awards mission completion rewards is added to the zones.

 

I disagree, I don't think that street sweeping missions will bring the community together any more than the current mission system currently does. At the end of the day, they're both missions, and they both are engaged with by the players in similar fashions. The proposed system offers a radically new gameplay style that is an alternative to the current systems, however street-sweeping missions feel more like an extension of the current systems.

 

And besides, if you need to manually form a street-sweeping team, then you are forced to introduce yourself to others. Which defeats the thematic purpose as well of wandering around a city populated by heroes who do battle with the thugs and goons who contest the civilians attempting to live their lives in peace. Or, alternatively, the thematic purpose of wandering the rogue isles, looking for weaklings to punish for the audacity of being slightly-less-evil than you, alongside other super-powered individuals who want to show off. Or maybe compete with you. Or perhaps who want to join up and be stronger. Whatever their motivations may be... Street sweeping missions do not accomplish this thematic goal because they are intentional, not random. They are focused, not dispersed. They do not bring attention to the neighborhoods of the city, thus highlighting the world design, but rather focus on zooming about as fast as possible hunting down specific types of mobs and ignoring everything else. I do not believe street sweeping missions will accomplish the desired thematic elements as proposed in the OP.

 

45 minutes ago, Rudra said:

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Gabrilend:

 

5. to encourage a new style of gameplay that is unique and not present in the game -> namely, the dispersal of teammates throughout a zone, rather than their concentration

Rudra:

 

Which already happens on teams I've seen when street sweep missions come up in the story arcs. The team scatters across the zone to hunt down the target mobs more expeditiously. So the OP fails to create something new in this regard because it already happens. (Edit: The times the teams I've seen/been on stayed concentrated for street sweep missions was when the target mobs were required to be in a specific neighborhood of the zone or if they were most common in that neighborhood.)

 

They may be dispersed, but their motivations are entirely personal. They want to hunt down specific mobs, and only those specific mobs. The contact giving the street sweeping mission couldn't care less about the citizens who are being terrorized, and they have no connection to the strokes of opportunistic fate that give a wandering villain a chance to strike at an unsuspecting foe. They are just throwing anyone who'll listen at a wall of baddies that is constantly respawning. There's no purpose in it, there's no honor or glory. It's just... "Greetings adventurer, please go kill 5 boars in the forest. I'll give you a new dagger or a pair of shiny boots as a reward, and maybe point you to my friend who has another task for you." I don't like it. It feels unauthentic and antithetical to CoX and the unique design that has sustained it through these past 20 years.

[Rudra]

3 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Just to clarify, as mentioned earlier in the thread this should be an opt-in system, potentially by utilizing the "looking for patrol" option in the team finder, which currently is essentially unused.

The looking for patrol function is essentially unused because there is very little reason to do just do street sweeping. Street sweeping by itself does not lend itself to team forming. Outside of hazard zones, spawns are all small enough for single characters to take down (for a reason). Adding a contact that provides just patrol missions, with those patrol missions doing something current patrol missions don't do, granting mission completion rewards, would give a reason for players to use the looking for patrol function. It still wouldn't likely be used just like most players I know that go looking for teams don't turn on their looking for team tag, they just advertise in broadcast. Which is a much faster way to get noticed and picked up than turning on a flag on a window I keep forgetting even exists. (Now I'm curious how many players use that window to find team members.)

 

8 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Can you explain more about why you believe an opt-in system would fail to encourage ad-hoc and decentralized teams?

Because those teams already form as evidenced by paper/radio mission teams and how quickly they tend to cycle through members for starters. And because street sweep missions tend to be skipped by most players I've met as being boring and tedious from the repetition, secondly. And because players that just want to get their street sweep out of the way and move back to instanced missions will not opt-in while being in competition with the street sweep team thirdly. (I just don't see players scrambling to join this if implemented. Even players that choose to just level by street sweeping. For instance, on my characters I'm leveling through just street sweeping? I'm hunting specific targets of specific tiers. Like just Red Cap bosses in Croatoa. And even though I'm out in zone street sweeping, I would have no intention of joining a street sweep team in zone because they won't limit themselves to my chosen targets. So even other players that are doing street sweeping by choice may choose to not opt-in for their own reasons.)

 

16 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

And besides, if you need to manually form a street-sweeping team, then you are forced to introduce yourself to others. Which defeats the thematic purpose as well of wandering around a city populated by heroes who do battle with the thugs and goons who contest the civilians attempting to live their lives in peace.

How much introduction does it take to say "I'm here in zone and doing street sweep missions. Give a shout in broadcast if you want in."? Or to respond with "Me."? As for the thematic of wandering heroes doing battle with the thugs and goons harassing the citizens? Even in comics that isn't a shared venture. If two or more characters are doing their patrols and they encounter each other? If they don't know each other, you get the tense stand off moment. If they know each other, they ignore each other as they continue their personal patrols. Otherwise, they patrol different parts of the city as their staked territory and nothing is shared between them still.

 

19 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Or, alternatively, the thematic purpose of wandering the rogue isles, looking for weaklings to punish for the audacity of being slightly-less-evil than you, alongside other super-powered individuals who want to show off.

That is a serious stretch. You may find petty criminals doing that, but a named super? Not likely at all. That interferes with whatever plans they may have. Even if they lack any plans and just want to run around smashing everything they see.

 

21 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Or perhaps who want to join up and be stronger.

Again, not likely for villains. Even in comics like with the Legion of Doom. It is usually a dominant personality gathering underlings without letting the others know that is all they are to the founder or activities by heroes are forcing villains to band together, but only as much as they have to. The exceptions are cults and other organizations like HYDRA or AIM, but even there the bulk of the villains are faceless nobodies, not named supers.

 

23 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Street sweeping missions do not accomplish this thematic goal because they are intentional, not random.

And your suggestion would still be intentional, not random. There is no way to form a team to do anything that isn't intentional. That's why teams form, to intentionally do something. In this case, street sweeping/patrol. Regardless of whether it is a contact given mission or just the team moving around wiping out everything they come across. There is intention in doing so.

 

25 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

They do not bring attention to the neighborhoods of the city, thus highlighting the world design, but rather focus on zooming about as fast as possible hunting down specific types of mobs and ignoring everything else.

Then you are missing a part of the street sweep and patrol missions the contacts give. Their purpose is specifically to expose the player to different parts of the city and the factions that can be found there.

 

27 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

They may be dispersed, but their motivations are entirely personal. They want to hunt down specific mobs, and only those specific mobs. The contact giving the street sweeping mission couldn't care less about the citizens who are being terrorized, and they have no connection to the strokes of opportunistic fate that give a wandering villain a chance to strike at an unsuspecting foe.

Then again you are missing the point of several street sweep missions as given in the game. Most evidenced by the Atlas Park missions and King's Row missions. Also to an extent by the Perez Park missions. Where your character is specifically told to go take down Hellions in Atlas Park because they are robbing the people or have caused a fire around a building. Or your character is specifically told to check the roof tops of King's Row for Circle of Thorns who are sacrificing people. Or to go into the woods of Perez Park to stop the Circle of Thorns from sacrificing people. While those missions are very few, there are street sweep missions that specifically tell the player character that there are people in danger and sends the player character to street sweep for the problem and put an end to it.

 

31 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

I'll give you a new dagger or a pair of shiny boots as a reward, and maybe point you to my friend who has another task for you." I don't like it. It feels unauthentic and antithetical to CoX and the unique design that has sustained it through these past 20 years.

Thank you. This is the part of your response that makes sense to me. That you don't like the street sweep missions as they predominantly are portrayed. To that end, the devs can make street sweep missions from the new contact be more organic in nature, but also require a higher defeat count to balance it out. "People are in trouble in this neighborhood, go arrest 100 criminals." for instance. And when those 100 criminals of any type are rounded up, the player or team gets their mission accomplishment reward.

[gabrilend]

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

The looking for patrol function is essentially unused because there is very little reason to do just do street sweeping. Street sweeping by itself does not lend itself to team forming. Outside of hazard zones, spawns are all small enough for single characters to take down (for a reason). Adding a contact that provides just patrol missions, with those patrol missions doing something current patrol missions don't do, granting mission completion rewards, would give a reason for players to use the looking for patrol function. It still wouldn't likely be used just like most players I know that go looking for teams don't turn on their looking for team tag, they just advertise in broadcast. Which is a much faster way to get noticed and picked up than turning on a flag on a window I keep forgetting even exists. (Now I'm curious how many players use that window to find team members.)

 

I agree with what you're saying here. The proposed design does offer a reason to do street sweeping, just as street sweeping contact missions would, so I believe that we can assume that people would use the team finder if it unlocked some new functionality for them. Specifically, the ability to join teams related to street sweeping, which it *technically* does now, but like you said nobody uses it so it *functionally* does not operate as intended.

 

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

Can you explain more about why you believe an opt-in system would fail to encourage ad-hoc and decentralized teams?

 

Rudra:

 

Because those teams already form as evidenced by paper/radio mission teams and how quickly they tend to cycle through members for starters. And because street sweep missions tend to be skipped by most players I've met as being boring and tedious from the repetition, secondly. And because players that just want to get their street sweep out of the way and move back to instanced missions will not opt-in while being in competition with the street sweep team thirdly. (I just don't see players scrambling to join this if implemented. Even players that choose to just level by street sweeping. For instance, on my characters I'm leveling through just street sweeping? I'm hunting specific targets of specific tiers. Like just Red Cap bosses in Croatoa. And even though I'm out in zone street sweeping, I would have no intention of joining a street sweep team in zone because they won't limit themselves to my chosen targets. So even other players that are doing street sweeping by choice may choose to not opt-in for their own reasons.)

 

So to rephrase what you're saying into an easily addressable format, you're saying:

1. paper/radio mission teams cycle through members quickly

2. street sweep missions are considered to be an unwanted diversion from missions by mission teams

3. mission teams doing street sweep missions will compete with dedicated street sweeper teams

4. street sweepers won't join these teams because they won't be able to fight the mobs they want to fight

 

I believe I can address all four of these concerns.

 

1. It seems to me that rapid cycling of team members lends itself well to the proposed design of auto-generated teams. Since there's so little emphasis placed on who's joining your team, why not automate the friction away? And if there's no leader determining who joins which team and such, then they are by definition decentralized. Perhaps radio/paper mission teams could benefit from such a system, as well...

 

2. I believe that street sweeping missions were added to story arcs in order to break up the monotony of doing just missions over and over again. However in this enlightened era of 2024 we've seen that players actually *like* that kind of monotony, or at least the kinds of players that you're referring to do. So to me that sounds like an issue with the story arcs, not the proposed design idea. In addition, it makes sense to me that players who gravitate to missions would prefer to do missions. Is it so strange to believe that players who gravitate to street sweeping would prefer to do street sweeping? I understand that currently there aren't very many players who street sweep, but I believe that changes such as those proposed in this thread could "till the ground" as it were, for the planting of seeds that may one day blossom into more dedicated street sweeping patrollers.

 

3. This is true. I think it's okay to compete, though. If there's too much competition in an area, then the dedicated street sweeping team will move on, and it only takes a minute or three for mobs to respawn. So there wouldn't be much delay for the mission team, I believe. I also mentioned earlier how I think that the community will collectively learn that certain types of enemies should be avoided because they are in high demand for mission teams.

 

4. One of the primary purposes of distributing EXP across a neighborhood is precisely so that players *will* be able to fight the mobs they want to fight. If your street sweeping team isn't fighting Red Cap bosses, but you'd like to, then you are more than able to fight them yourself. The EXP earned by you will distribute to your team, and the EXP they earn will distribute to you. Thus improving both of your experience, as you feel like you're contributing to a team even if you aren't in the same area. And, should they wander across your path, they'll be able to help you, and you'll all gain *even more* experience, as the distributed portion of exp is less than the earned portion of exp.

 

I hope those responses addressed your concerns.

 

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

How much introduction does it take to say "I'm here in zone and doing street sweep missions. Give a shout in broadcast if you want in."? Or to respond with "Me."? As for the thematic of wandering heroes doing battle with the thugs and goons harassing the citizens? Even in comics that isn't a shared venture. If two or more characters are doing their patrols and they encounter each other? If they don't know each other, you get the tense stand off moment. If they know each other, they ignore each other as they continue their personal patrols. Otherwise, they patrol different parts of the city as their staked territory and nothing is shared between them still.

 

You're right, the friction isn't significant.

 

I would like to point out though that the cities portrayed in comic books are significantly different than those in City of Heroes. In a comic, there are usually only a handful of named supers. In City of Heroes, there are *thousands*. To add onto that, the threats that we face, the gangs, the criminal organizations, the monsters, the ghosts and undead, even Arachnos... All of it is significantly more present than in the comics. For example, in Gotham, 99% of people who live there are regular average people just going about their day. Batman's fight takes place in the shadows, because he's one of like what, 5 superheroes at any one time? Very few are operational and wandering around beating up baddies. And the baddies do not control the streets, they are ever-present in alleyways and whatnot but they don't own turf to such a degree as they do in Paragon City. However, when you compare the ratio of baddies to citizens wandering the streets, you'll see that they're roughly equal. In lower level zones, there are more civilians, and in higher level zones it's common to see very few. And hazard zones have none at all! That is a stark departure from the cities depicted in comic books, and one of the truly unique things about CoX that should be highlighted, rather than lampshaded.

 

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

Or, alternatively, the thematic purpose of wandering the rogue isles, looking for weaklings to punish for the audacity of being slightly-less-evil than you, alongside other super-powered individuals who want to show off.

Rudra:

 

That is a serious stretch. You may find petty criminals doing that, but a named super? Not likely at all. That interferes with whatever plans they may have. Even if they lack any plans and just want to run around smashing everything they see.

 

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

Or perhaps who want to join up and be stronger.

Rudra:

 

Again, not likely for villains. Even in comics like with the Legion of Doom. It is usually a dominant personality gathering underlings without letting the others know that is all they are to the founder or activities by heroes are forcing villains to band together, but only as much as they have to. The exceptions are cults and other organizations like HYDRA or AIM, but even there the bulk of the villains are faceless nobodies, not named supers.

 

Well, can you think of a better generic explanation for why a group of supervillains would team up together? Especially lower-level ones. "Big fishes in small ponds", as it were.

 

Seriously, why would villains ever team up? Gold, glory, and bloodshed. Those are the three reasons that come to mind for me. A feeling of superiority, perhaps, or a chance to flex, but that falls under glory so yeah.

 

Villains typically strive for power, and what better way to usurp power in a neighborhood than to team up with a bunch of others and clear out the area from all the lesser minions and lieutenants? Once you've beaten the snot out of enough of them, you can consider the area "beneath you", and move on, after installing your own minions and lieutenants of course. Who will then be defeated in turn by the lower leveled noobs coming up from below you. Sounds like a decent enough explanation to me...

 

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

Street sweeping missions do not accomplish this thematic goal because they are intentional, not random.

Rudra:

 

And your suggestion would still be intentional, not random. There is no way to form a team to do anything that isn't intentional. That's why teams form, to intentionally do something. In this case, street sweeping/patrol. Regardless of whether it is a contact given mission or just the team moving around wiping out everything they come across. There is intention in doing so.

 

Well, yes you're correct in-so-far as opting in to be placed on a team is intentional. And just as these teams would be formed randomly based on geographic proximity, so too are mission teams organized pseudo-randomly when the leader invites whoever messages them first. I'm not sure I see the issue here? Both forms of teams are intentional, both are random, however I was attempting to highlight a contrast between them to differentiate them for rhetoric.

 

12 hours ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

They do not bring attention to the neighborhoods of the city, thus highlighting the world design, but rather focus on zooming about as fast as possible hunting down specific types of mobs and ignoring everything else.

Rudra:

 

Then you are missing a part of the street sweep and patrol missions the contacts give. Their purpose is specifically to expose the player to different parts of the city and the factions that can be found there.

 

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

They may be dispersed, but their motivations are entirely personal. They want to hunt down specific mobs, and only those specific mobs. The contact giving the street sweeping mission couldn't care less about the citizens who are being terrorized, and they have no connection to the strokes of opportunistic fate that give a wandering villain a chance to strike at an unsuspecting foe.

Rudra:

 

Then again you are missing the point of several street sweep missions as given in the game. Most evidenced by the Atlas Park missions and King's Row missions. Also to an extent by the Perez Park missions. Where your character is specifically told to go take down Hellions in Atlas Park because they are robbing the people or have caused a fire around a building. Or your character is specifically told to check the roof tops of King's Row for Circle of Thorns who are sacrificing people. Or to go into the woods of Perez Park to stop the Circle of Thorns from sacrificing people. While those missions are very few, there are street sweep missions that specifically tell the player character that there are people in danger and sends the player character to street sweep for the problem and put an end to it.

 

The player shouldn't need to be told to check roof tops in King's Row. They shouldn't need a motivation to hunt down the Circle of Thorns cultists who are sacrificing people in the woods. They are supers, they are drawn to the fight. Heroes will strive to protect the citizenry, and villains will strive for power and domination.

 

At first I thought street sweeping missions as proposed would be a nice addition to the idea as presented in the OP, but the more I think about it the more I think they would conflict rather than work in tandem. I'll explain why:

 

street sweeping missions are intended to draw players to a particular area. Let's assume that there's a mission in Atlas Park to defeat 100 Hellions in Hyperion Way, on the east side of town. If a player moves to the north and enters The Promenade, then they will no longer be able to get credit for fighting Hellions in Hyperion Way. But they just crossed the street, why should that matter...?

 

So the solution would be to expand the scope of the mission to Atlas Park the zone, rather than a specific neighborhood in Atlas park. Or perhaps even removing the scope entirely and telling the player to "defeat 100 Hellions" which works against the goals as presented earlier in the post, specifically the goal to highlight the unique character of individual neighborhoods.

 

Now, if both ideas were implemented in tandem, they would conflict. Say a player is in a group and crosses the threshold to another neighborhood - suddenly, their mission changes! If they had 5 Hellions left to go in Hyperion Way, but then crossed the street to The Promenade, not only would their mission change to "defeat 30 Clockwork in The Promenade" thus invalidating their progress, but if they walked back across the street and re-joined their old group, then there's a chance someone would have killed 5 hellions and completed the mission, depriving them of the mission reward. Not ideal.

 

So, I don't believe they would work very well in tandem. I also think that street sweeping missions encourage players to hunt down specific types of mobs to the exclusion of all others, which is not ideal when the goal is to make the streets safer / more open to your own influence.

 

13 hours ago, Rudra said:

Thank you. This is the part of your response that makes sense to me. That you don't like the street sweep missions as they predominantly are portrayed. To that end, the devs can make street sweep missions from the new contact be more organic in nature, but also require a higher defeat count to balance it out. "People are in trouble in this neighborhood, go arrest 100 criminals." for instance. And when those 100 criminals of any type are rounded up, the player or team gets their mission accomplishment reward.

 

While I appreciate the abstraction away from specific enemy types, I think this contributes the same value to the design as the summoned archvillains/heroes to fight - namely, a periodic burst reward that acts as both an inflection point of intensity, and a stopping point for players to switch to a different activity. And idk, I think fighting a super every once in a while is more interesting than turning in a mission every 10 minutes.

[Rudra]

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

4. One of the primary purposes of distributing EXP across a neighborhood is precisely so that players *will* be able to fight the mobs they want to fight. If your street sweeping team isn't fighting Red Cap bosses, but you'd like to, then you are more than able to fight them yourself. The EXP earned by you will distribute to your team, and the EXP they earn will distribute to you. Thus improving both of your experience, as you feel like you're contributing to a team even if you aren't in the same area. And, should they wander across your path, they'll be able to help you, and you'll all gain *even more* experience, as the distributed portion of exp is less than the earned portion of exp.

You are misunderstanding, so let me attempt to clarify. Using just myself as an example because I can't speak for others, the reason why I would not join a street sweeping team on my street sweeping only characters is because I do not want anything other than my chosen targets. My Croatoa street sweeper for example, which no longer does so for having out-leveled the zone, would only take down Red Cap bosses. And that was the only mobs I wanted to be involved in my character's progression. No minions. No lieutenants. No Cabal. (Though I was hunting Tuatha and Firbolg until I was high enough level to go after the Red Caps.) Because of my character's focus, I did not want any xp or inf' coming from other sources. I did this on another character where I was explicitly hunting Family bosses in Independence Port. Or a red sider that only hunted Longbow in Nerva Archipelago. Don't want anything from other sources. Yes, this is extremely niche. However, it is just one example of why a street sweeping character could choose to not join a street sweeping team. Because now their theme is out the window as the other team members go after what they prefer, even if that preference is everything within render distance.

 

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

And the baddies do not control the streets, they are ever-present in alleyways and whatnot but they don't own turf to such a degree as they do in Paragon City.

Poor example. I get your point, but poor example, because in Gotham, the city is very much divided up into specific gang controlled territories. They just don't spend as much time visibly shaking down the citizenry as in CoX. Most of their crimes are hidden in the back alley shadows, boardrooms, and political offices.

 

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Well, can you think of a better generic explanation for why a group of supervillains would team up together? Especially lower-level ones. "Big fishes in small ponds", as it were.

 

Seriously, why would villains ever team up? Gold, glory, and bloodshed. Those are the three reasons that come to mind for me. A feeling of superiority, perhaps, or a chance to flex, but that falls under glory so yeah.

In comics, villains most often band together to be able to defeat the heroes they know are going to come after them during their heists, but only after the heroes have previously prevented those criminals from successfully completing their crimes multiple times. Or they share an ideology, other belief system, or shared trait; so they band together into a set villain group. They don't band together just because. And often, their encounters with each other, at least during their crimes, are violent as they view each other as a threat to their own goals. That's part of the problem. While a patrol works well from a heroic stand point, it all but fails under a villainous one. The only times I can recall where villains did 'patrols' was when they were a villain organization, and those patrols were done by the faceless nobodies that formed their ranks.

 

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Well, yes you're correct in-so-far as opting in to be placed on a team is intentional. And just as these teams would be formed randomly based on geographic proximity, so too are mission teams organized pseudo-randomly when the leader invites whoever messages them first. I'm not sure I see the issue here? Both forms of teams are intentional, both are random, however I was attempting to highlight a contrast between them to differentiate them for rhetoric.

That was my issue/point. That there is no difference.

 

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

The player shouldn't need to be told to check roof tops in King's Row. They shouldn't need a motivation to hunt down the Circle of Thorns cultists who are sacrificing people in the woods. They are supers, they are drawn to the fight. Heroes will strive to protect the citizenry, and villains will strive for power and domination.

Because the story is told in the instanced missions, and because instanced missions give better rewards for giving mission completion rewards whereas just moving around a zone smacking down down random mobs doesn't, if the devs want players to spend time out and about in the various zones, they need to include street sweep missions. Players are going to gravitate to rewards. That reward can be discovered lore about the game, it can be xp and inf', it can be whatever. I believe the reason why street sweeping is so unpopular is because it lacks a reward system. You can't just award bonus rewards if there isn't a trigger to award those bonus rewards. So instanced missions get mission completion rewards. (Which means street sweep missions should too, but they don't.) Delving through the missions and reading the clues, briefings, debriefings, and enemy chatter reveals a massive story behind the game, which is itself also a reward. Just moving around a zone and randomly smacking down various mobs can't do that, though at least we do have explores that also give game lore. Because of that, yes, players need to be told to go to King's Row and search the roof tops and back alleys because the CoT are sacrificing people. Because otherwise there is no real incentive to do so. The rewards are found in the instanced missions.

 

Now from a lore/comic perspective? You're correct, supers should be out there patrolling their home turf for multiple reasons. PR being one. Home security being another. (Bear in mind though, that from a realism point of view, most of those criminals the patrolling hero is beating up to save the day? Are just down on their luck regular people trying to get something to live on. Not a concern in something Like CoX where everyone mugging someone is a gang member running wild, but if you were to get down to it, at least in comics, that's what your patrolling heroes have to confront. That not everyone committing a crime does so because they are evil.)

 

48 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Now, if both ideas were implemented in tandem, they would conflict. Say a player is in a group and crosses the threshold to another neighborhood - suddenly, their mission changes! If they had 5 Hellions left to go in Hyperion Way, but then crossed the street to The Promenade, not only would their mission change to "defeat 30 Clockwork in The Promenade" thus invalidating their progress, but if they walked back across the street and re-joined their old group, then there's a chance someone would have killed 5 hellions and completed the mission, depriving them of the mission reward. Not ideal.

Why would the player's mission change just because they crossed the street into a different neighborhood? Using your example, the player is in a group hunting Hellions in Hyperion Way with only 5 more to go until the mission is complete. The player now finds himself/herself/themselves in a different neighborhood. They would still have their Defeat Hellions in Hyperion Way mission with only 5 left. It would not suddenly change to Defeat 30 Clockwork in Argosy Industrial and negate previous progress on the Hellions in Hyperion Way mission. The player should then know to move back into Hyperion Way to resume progress unless the team finishes defeating the last 5 Hellions and completes the mission. At which point that player is still also flagged as having completed the mission for being on that team.

 

Edited April 21 by Rudra
Edited to correct "crosses" to "crossed".

[Laucianna]

I honestly like the idea but only if it wasn't a league thing like leagues are atm, where one person is herding cats in order for it to work properly. But if it was a sort of "Passive" league where you share xp with those in the same neighbourhood I think it would be an amazing idea ❤️ just the thought of running through the open world and seeing people fighting there rather then all of them being within Pocket D in separate zones locked away from others. 

To prevent it becoming farmable however you could always have a set mob cap in each neighbourhood so it doesn't end up like Mapserver or Trick or Treat levels of mobs so even if you have a full league killing mobs the shared xp isn't that good compared to if it was like 10 players, encouraging people to go to other neighbour hoods to fight instead. 🙂 

[gabrilend]

17 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

4. One of the primary purposes of distributing EXP across a neighborhood is precisely so that players *will* be able to fight the mobs they want to fight. If your street sweeping team isn't fighting Red Cap bosses, but you'd like to, then you are more than able to fight them yourself. The EXP earned by you will distribute to your team, and the EXP they earn will distribute to you. Thus improving both of your experience, as you feel like you're contributing to a team even if you aren't in the same area. And, should they wander across your path, they'll be able to help you, and you'll all gain *even more* experience, as the distributed portion of exp is less than the earned portion of exp.

 

Rudra:

 

You are misunderstanding, so let me attempt to clarify. Using just myself as an example because I can't speak for others, the reason why I would not join a street sweeping team on my street sweeping only characters is because I do not want anything other than my chosen targets. My Croatoa street sweeper for example, which no longer does so for having out-leveled the zone, would only take down Red Cap bosses. And that was the only mobs I wanted to be involved in my character's progression. No minions. No lieutenants. No Cabal. (Though I was hunting Tuatha and Firbolg until I was high enough level to go after the Red Caps.) Because of my character's focus, I did not want any xp or inf' coming from other sources. I did this on another character where I was explicitly hunting Family bosses in Independence Port. Or a red sider that only hunted Longbow in Nerva Archipelago. Don't want anything from other sources. Yes, this is extremely niche. However, it is just one example of why a street sweeping character could choose to not join a street sweeping team. Because now their theme is out the window as the other team members go after what they prefer, even if that preference is everything within render distance.

 

I see. Well, the benefit to an opt-in system is that players who have needs like yours would be able to opt-out by not opting in. So all you'd have to do is refrain from selecting the "looking for patrol" option in the team finder and you would not be placed on these teams and you would not receive the distributed EXP gains.

 

20 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

And the baddies do not control the streets, they are ever-present in alleyways and whatnot but they don't own turf to such a degree as they do in Paragon City.

 

Rudra:

 

Poor example. I get your point, but poor example, because in Gotham, the city is very much divided up into specific gang controlled territories. They just don't spend as much time visibly shaking down the citizenry as in CoX. Most of their crimes are hidden in the back alley shadows, boardrooms, and political offices.

 

In comics, villains most often band together to be able to defeat the heroes they know are going to come after them during their heists, but only after the heroes have previously prevented those criminals from successfully completing their crimes multiple times. Or they share an ideology, other belief system, or shared trait; so they band together into a set villain group. They don't band together just because. And often, their encounters with each other, at least during their crimes, are violent as they view each other as a threat to their own goals. That's part of the problem. While a patrol works well from a heroic stand point, it all but fails under a villainous one.

 

Ah my bad, sorry. I don't really read comics, they never really grabbed me. And the marvel and D/C movies weren't my jam either. I think the reason CoX appeals to me so much is because of the inherent collectivist spirit in it? It's essentially the only non-American superhero piece of media that I can think of, and while American culture is very individualistic and I like it for what it is, I don't much like the idea of individualist supers because it glorifies the concept of centralizing power within a few choice individuals. I mean, Batman is literally a billionaire, there can only be so many of him.

 

CoX however is different. In this world, anyone who works hard enough can be a superhero (see the "Origin of Power" contact mission chain in Cap au Diable when playing a natural character) and not only that, but there are SO MANY of them! They all work together for the common good of protecting Paragon City, and the villains are given the interesting moral choice of working for or against Arachnos, which is so much more interesting to me than deciding to be "good" or "evil". My characters tend to lean more toward "Kickass" and less "spandex", but that's just a personal preference.

 

Also lots of magic and robots, because robots can be built and magic can be learned.

 

But I digress. My point was that I don't know enough about comics to be able to tell.

 

8 hours ago, Rudra said:

The only times I can recall where villains did 'patrols' was when they were a villain organization, and those patrols were done by the faceless nobodies that formed their ranks.

 

Oh, you mean like... Arachnos? We are "Destined Ones", after all. 😉

 

But not every hero wants to work with Arachnos. I usually don't. However, I do often team up with other villains. What in-game explanation currently exists for that behavior? Whatever it is, it would apply equally to mission teams as to street sweeping, I believe.

 

8 hours ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

The player shouldn't need to be told to check roof tops in King's Row. They shouldn't need a motivation to hunt down the Circle of Thorns cultists who are sacrificing people in the woods. They are supers, they are drawn to the fight. Heroes will strive to protect the citizenry, and villains will strive for power and domination.

Rudra:

 

Because the story is told in the instanced missions, and because instanced missions give better rewards for giving mission completion rewards whereas just moving around a zone smacking down down random mobs doesn't, if the devs want players to spend time out and about in the various zones, they need to include street sweep missions. Players are going to gravitate to rewards. That reward can be discovered lore about the game, it can be xp and inf', it can be whatever. I believe the reason why street sweeping is so unpopular is because it lacks a reward system. You can't just award bonus rewards if there isn't a trigger to award those bonus rewards. So instanced missions get mission completion rewards. (Which means street sweep missions should too, but they don't.) Delving through the missions and reading the clues, briefings, debriefings, and enemy chatter reveals a massive story behind the game, which is itself also a reward. Just moving around a zone and randomly smacking down various mobs can't do that, though at least we do have explores that also give game lore. Because of that, yes, players need to be told to go to King's Row and search the roof tops and back alleys because the CoT are sacrificing people. Because otherwise there is no real incentive to do so. The rewards are found in the instanced missions.

 

Now from a lore/comic perspective? You're correct, supers should be out there patrolling their home turf for multiple reasons. PR being one. Home security being another. (Bear in mind though, that from a realism point of view, most of those criminals the patrolling hero is beating up to save the day? Are just down on their luck regular people trying to get something to live on. Not a concern in something Like CoX where everyone mugging someone is a gang member running wild, but if you were to get down to it, at least in comics, that's what your patrolling heroes have to confront. That not everyone committing a crime does so because they are evil.)

 

I don't think they *need* to include street sweeping missions, they only need to include street sweeping *rewards*. And, as already suggested, the rewards could be a single reward merit after defeating an archvillain/hero that spawns every ~100 kills (per hero). I believe this would be enough of a reward for people to seek to engage with the content.

 

It seems like your concern here is primarily about the lore that is unread when players don't do contact missions. Well, I think street sweeping has always attracted the kinds of players who value creating their own story over reading the story of others. I mean I'm clearly a huge advocate of street sweeping, and I don't even read comics! Part of what pulls me to City of Heroes is the idea that these criminals we're fighting actually *are* evil. I wouldn't really want to play a game set in a modern day city because yeah, you're right, most petty criminals are just people trying to get by. They don't deserve to be beaten into a paste by "superheroes". However, in CoX, the enemies you fight are overwhelmingly members of organized gangs that take over territory and oppress and harass the people who live there. They are violent and cruel and the closest thing to evil that a human can be, in this century. That's the only reason I can stomach fighting them.

 

I like playing villains though because people live on the Rogue Isles too, and I'd never hurt them. If the territory was in my hands, they'd be safe from harm. At least, until I moved on of course, but what can you do, I'm playing a villain teehee >: )

 

9 hours ago, Rudra said:

Why would the player's mission change just because they crossed the street into a different neighborhood? Using your example, the player is in a group hunting Hellions in Hyperion Way with only 5 more to go until the mission is complete. The player now finds himself/herself/themselves in a different neighborhood. They would still have their Defeat Hellions in Hyperion Way mission with only 5 left. It would not suddenly change to Defeat 30 Clockwork in Argosy Industrial and negate previous progress on the Hellions in Hyperion Way mission. The player should then know to move back into Hyperion Way to resume progress unless the team finishes defeating the last 5 Hellions and completes the mission. At which point that player is still also flagged as having completed the mission for being on that team.

 

Missions are chosen by the team leader and are active for all members of the team. When hunting Hellions in Hyperion Way, the player is on the "Hyperion Way" team. When they cross the street, they are removed from the Hyperion Way team and placed on the Promenade team, which has a different mission active. Therefore, they can no longer gain progress on the old mission which was attached to the team, not the player.

 

Check out this comment for more discussion on the motivations behind the auto-generated team system.

[gabrilend]

3 hours ago, Laucianna said:

I honestly like the idea but only if it wasn't a league thing like leagues are atm, where one person is herding cats in order for it to work properly. But if it was a sort of "Passive" league where you share xp with those in the same neighbourhood I think it would be an amazing idea ❤️ just the thought of running through the open world and seeing people fighting there rather then all of them being within Pocket D in separate zones locked away from others. 

To prevent it becoming farmable however you could always have a set mob cap in each neighbourhood so it doesn't end up like Mapserver or Trick or Treat levels of mobs so even if you have a full league killing mobs the shared xp isn't that good compared to if it was like 10 players, encouraging people to go to other neighbour hoods to fight instead. 🙂 

 

Yes exactly! A "passive league" is a decent way to think about it. Though for most neighborhoods it'd never grow larger than a team, as there's seldom more than 8 players in one area at a time.

 

I'm not sure if we should prevent it from being farmable. I mean, farming is the entire point of grinding mobs! However, if there's a large amount of players in an area and they *are* placed in a league, the current mechanics of the game already reduces the EXP gained. Perhaps that would be sufficient, perhaps not, I don't know... If not, then we can come up with another solution ^_^

[Rudra]

27 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Oh, you mean like... Arachnos? We are "Destined Ones", after all. 😉

Here's the thing about Arachnos and Destined Ones. While there are lots of Destined Ones, that is because Kalinda cannot narrow down who the actual Destined One is to a single person, just to a group of potentials. And even at that, none of the Destined Ones, whether PC or NPC, is a faceless nobody in Arachnos. They are cast adrift and watched to see which can actually ascend to being the Destined One, but they aren't Arachnos minions. Even Bane Spider Ruben makes a point of telling you that. As does Marshall Brass and a few other Arachnos contacts. They highlight that your character is not part of Arachnos, is not subject to Arachnos commands (outside of an Arbiter), and holds no authority over Arachnos forces. So your counter-argument fails. (Though I do understand you are just playing.)

 

27 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

However, I do often team up with other villains. What in-game explanation currently exists for that behavior? Whatever it is, it would apply equally to mission teams as to street sweeping, I believe.

There is no in-game explanation. There is an out of game explanation: humans are social animals and typically prefer to be with others. In game though? Playing a villain? There is no attempt to explain it because from a villain point of view, it doesn't work. Which is part of my point. You're spending an awful lot of effort to explain in game why heroes and villains would form street sweep teams, and it isn't necessary. With many such reasons requiring lots of mental gymnastics and sideways squinting for the reason to make any sense. If you want a street sweep thing? You don't need to pitch an in game reason for it. Reasons that would work for heroes won't for villains.

 

27 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

It seems like your concern here is primarily about the lore that is unread when players don't do contact missions.

Not really, no. My point there is that the opportunity to learn the lore is one of the rewards players get for doing instance missions. It is just one of the rewards though. And no rewards are currently available for street sweeping, which is why players don't typically do it. Add rewards to street sweeping and it becomes more enticing to players.

 

27 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

Missions are chosen by the team leader and are active for all members of the team. When hunting Hellions in Hyperion Way, the player is on the "Hyperion Way" team. When they cross the street, they are removed from the Hyperion Way team and placed on the Promenade team, which has a different mission active. Therefore, they can no longer gain progress on the old mission which was attached to the team, not the player.

And that is a problem. That is why teams work the way they do. And even if your suggestion were to be implemented, you will want to maintain that team dynamic or you will wind up with a whole lot of angry players complaining about being 'punished' for doing the implemented street sweep content. The last thing you want is team members being arbitrarily dismissed from a given team they just joined by any means because they changed zones or neighborhoods. Look at the Bug Reports forum for some examples there from players complaining that going into their SG base while a Rogue hero side or a Vigilante villain side and finding themselves dismissed from their team automatically.

 

Edited April 22 by Rudra
Edited to remove unnecessary comma. And again to capitalize "It".

[gabrilend]

4 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Here's the thing about Arachnos and Destined Ones. While there are lots of Destined Ones, that is because Kalinda cannot narrow down who the actual Destined One is to a single person, just to a group of potentials. And even at that, none of the Destined Ones, whether PC or NPC, is a faceless nobody in Arachnos. They are cast adrift and watched to see which can actually ascend to being the Destined One, but they aren't Arachnos minions. Even Bane Spider Ruben makes a point of telling you that. As does Marshall Brass and a few other Arachnos contacts. They highlight that your character is not part of Arachnos, is not subject to Arachnos commands (outside of an Arbiter), and holds no authority over Arachnos forces. So your counter-argument fails. (Though I do understand you are just playing.)

 

There is no in-game explanation. There is an out of game explanation: humans are social animals and typically prefer to be with others. In game though? Playing a villain? There is no attempt to explain it because from a villain point of view, it doesn't work. Which is part of my point. You're spending an awful lot of effort to explain in game why heroes and villains would form street sweep teams, and it isn't necessary. With many such reasons requiring lots of mental gymnastics and sideways squinting for the reason to make any sense. If you want a street sweep thing? You don't need to pitch an in game reason for it. Reasons that would work for heroes won't for villains.

 

The very first task you have as a villain is to decide which path your future will take. Do you work with Kalinda, and align yourself with Arachnos, do you work with Burke, as a mercenary? Or will you strike out on your own and street sweep your way to Port Oakes, where you can start doing newspaper missions (if you want) and picking your battles more carefully, thus defining your story on your own terms.

 

I think that the first two options are for players who enjoy missions. The third option is for people who want to make their own story, and for that option the justification becomes more important. Because like you said, those who are working for Arachnos or Mercenaries probably wouldn't care about joining patrol teams.

 

But renegade villains might. Hence, why I offered a potential explanation. If you'd like to come up with other reasons why this type of villain might join a street sweeping mission, feel free, but there isn't really a point to arguing that Arachnos lackeys or Mercenary villains wouldn't street sweep. Because you're right, they wouldn't.

 

11 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

It seems like your concern here is primarily about the lore that is unread when players don't do contact missions.

Rudra:

 

 

Not really, no. My point there is that the opportunity to learn the lore is one of the rewards players get for doing instance missions. it is just one of the rewards though. And no rewards are currently available for street sweeping, which is why players don't typically do it. Add rewards to street sweeping and it becomes more enticing to players.

 

So... How do you feel about the proposed rewards that would be added to street sweeping? Specifically, awarding a reward merit for every defeated archvillain/hero which is hostile to both the players and the local mobs, which spawns every time (100 * number of players in zone) enemies are defeated in a neighborhood.

 

14 minutes ago, Rudra said:

Quote

Gabrilend:

 

Missions are chosen by the team leader and are active for all members of the team. When hunting Hellions in Hyperion Way, the player is on the "Hyperion Way" team. When they cross the street, they are removed from the Hyperion Way team and placed on the Promenade team, which has a different mission active. Therefore, they can no longer gain progress on the old mission which was attached to the team, not the player.

Rudra:

 

And that is a problem. That is why teams work the way they do. And even if your suggestion were to be implemented, you will want to maintain that team dynamic or you will wind up with a whole lot of angry players complaining about being 'punished' for doing the implemented street sweep content. The last thing you want is team members being arbitrarily dismissed from a given team they just joined by any means because they changed zones or neighborhoods. Look at the Bug Reports forum for some examples there from players complaining that going into their SG base while a Rogue hero side or a Vigilante villain side and finding themselves dismissed from their team automatically.

 

 

I think this is a clear demonstration of why it wouldn't be a good idea to implement both street sweeping missions *and* the proposed system changes. They would each accomplish certain goals in isolation, but in tandem they would conflict with one another.

 

And I believe that the proposed idea would be more successful at addressing more of the stated goals than street sweeping missions.

[Rudra]

12 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

The very first task you have as a villain is to decide which path your future will take. Do you work with Kalinda, and align yourself with Arachnos, do you work with Burke, as a mercenary? Or will you strike out on your own and street sweep your way to Port Oakes, where you can start doing newspaper missions (if you want) and picking your battles more carefully, thus defining your story on your own terms.

You are misunderstanding my posts and I am at a loss for how to clarify. From the villain player character's point of view, the character can choose to go with Arachnos via Operative Kuzmin or Kalinda, or the character can go a non-Arachnos route with Mathew Burke or just street sweep to level, or a combination of the above, yes. The interaction between Arachnos and the Destined Ones is as I described in my previous post. The player character is not part of Arachnos and Arachnos has no control over the character, even if the character does missions and story arcs for Arachnos. I am not trying to say that a player character by default is bound to interact with Arachnos, outside of the forces the character faces over the course of the character's career. I was responding to your statement about Arachnos and Destined Ones, and the fact that the way I read that post was the implication that the Destined Ones are faceless nobodies that form the body of Arachnos.

 

18 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

I think that the first two options are for players who enjoy missions. The third option is for people who want to make their own story, and for that option the justification becomes more important. Because like you said, those who are working for Arachnos or Mercenaries probably wouldn't care about joining patrol teams.

 

But renegade villains might. Hence, why I offered a potential explanation. If you'd like to come up with other reasons why this type of villain might join a street sweeping mission, feel free, but there isn't really a point to arguing that Arachnos lackeys or Mercenary villains wouldn't street sweep. Because you're right, they wouldn't.

And my point on that is that the reasons why a player character might do that will change from character to character, especially red side where such interactions makes less thematic sense, and trying to force a reason why they are doing so instead of just letting the individual players rationalize why their characters are doing so is hurting your argument.

 

20 minutes ago, gabrilend said:

So... How do you feel about the proposed rewards that would be added to street sweeping? Specifically, awarding a reward merit for every defeated archvillain/hero which is hostile to both the players and the local mobs, which spawns every time (100 * number of players in zone) enemies are defeated in a neighborhood.

If I'm being brutally honest, I don't really care, I just think the implementation method doesn't work. The best way to add a reward is to have an objective that triggers said reward. Instanced missions have the benefit of completing the mission being the trigger that grants the bulk of the non-mob defeat rewards instanced missions have. You completed the mission? Have X xp and inf' as reward. Setting up rewards for street sweeping would most easily be accomplished by a bounty system, which would basically be a street sweep mission from a contact that gives out street sweep missions, where completion of the accepted mission awards xp and inf' as if it were an instanced mission, unlike current street sweep missions which do not. The problem with spontaneously spawning an AV after every X defeats, is that unlike a GM, AVs can, and quite possibly will, be wiped out by someone not on the team if they happen to encounter said AV 1st. So if you want street sweeping to have rewards and entice players into joining patrol teams, then you most likely should limit said rewards to the team specifically. And the only way I know how to do that, is by it being a mission completion reward rather than a spawned anything that just appears in the zone.

[megaericzero]

1 hour ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

because even suggesting to people they don't need it all right now at once riles them up like a hornet's nest in their drawers.

Having agency over character progression is a sizeable chunk of the drive to play an RPG. Otherwise it's a trophy collection with extra steps.

 

EDIT: or a sandbox.

Edited April 22 by megaericzero

[Laucianna]

4 hours ago, gabrilend said:

 

Yes exactly! A "passive league" is a decent way to think about it. Though for most neighborhoods it'd never grow larger than a team, as there's seldom more than 8 players in one area at a time.

 

I'm not sure if we should prevent it from being farmable. I mean, farming is the entire point of grinding mobs! However, if there's a large amount of players in an area and they *are* placed in a league, the current mechanics of the game already reduces the EXP gained. Perhaps that would be sufficient, perhaps not, I don't know... If not, then we can come up with another solution ^_^

The reason I wouldn't want it farmable to the same extent is PI would become a null zone of lag, to the point if a MapServer event or Trick or Treat was taking place there the entire zone would be 1 frame a second if you are lucky 😄 I would be up for it giving more xp in the small contained groups of 10 at max, but anything above that will end up being less then farming.

[megaericzero]

1 hour ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

You say this in a community of people who badge.

Yup. I was speaking vaguely about progress as a whole. Leveling, badging, enhancing, incarnates. Completely severing effort from rewards will do the opposite of incentivizing engagement.

 

The issue with your suggestion as posted is the complete lockout of merit earning outside of a daily handout. The part I quoted was to respond to the assertion that people would be upset largely or solely because of instant gratification.

 

 

Oh, also: HC is free to sign up and play so people are just going to make infinite accounts and reap infinite merits under this proposed system.