High level enemy group revamps

[Eiko-chan]

32 minutes ago, Rudra said:

It's seems less that they are setting a higher difficulty than they are comfortable with and more an expectation that everything should be able to solo everything at +4/x8 without any (noticeable) difficulty.

I never play at +4. Higher level enemies just aren't worth the extra effort. I sometimes push up the level adjustment after I get my Rare Alpha and sometimes push it a bit higher in DA when I get the other Incarnate shifts, but that's not really playing at "+4". 

But let me restate, very, very, very, very clearly: This is not about difficulty settings. If it was about difficulty settings, I wouldn't be singling out a single enemy group.

At the same level, with the same settings, this character did just fine against UPA, IDF, and Arachnos. I didn't have huge issues with the Circle, though I'm not sure at what level their revamp really comes into play. 

 

It think the problem may mostly boil down to the fact that the Council changes come into play too early in level. They were tuned against 50s and Incarnates, and they should be facing 50s and Incarnates.

[Rudra]

1 minute ago, Eiko-chan said:

I never play at +4. Higher level enemies just aren't worth the extra effort. I sometimes push up the level adjustment after I get my Rare Alpha and sometimes push it a bit higher in DA when I get the other Incarnate shifts, but that's not really playing at "+4".

I wasn't specifically referring to you, otherwise I would have specifically called you out.

 

2 minutes ago, Eiko-chan said:

But let me restate, very, very, very, very clearly: This is not about difficulty settings. If it was about difficulty settings, I wouldn't be singling out a single enemy group.

But you keep presenting it as one.

 

2 minutes ago, Eiko-chan said:

It think the problem may mostly boil down to the fact that the Council changes come into play too early in level. They were tuned against 50s and Incarnates, and they should be facing 50s and Incarnates.

And this is not what you were saying. You were saying they need to be tuned down.

[tidge]

1 minute ago, Eiko-chan said:

But let me restate, very, very, very, very clearly: This is not about difficulty settings. If it was about difficulty settings, I wouldn't be singling out a single enemy group.

At the same level, with the same settings, this character did just fine against UPA, IDF, and Arachnos. I didn't have huge issues with the Circle, though I'm not sure at what level their revamp really comes into play.

 

What is the difficulty setting (team size and level) you have for the Council content you are struggling with, and what is the content (and level) at which you are having this trouble?

[Eiko-chan]

4 minutes ago, Rudra said:

And this is not what you were saying. You were saying they need to be tuned down.

 

Edited May 25 by Eiko-chan
Wrong link.

[Eiko-chan]

5 minutes ago, tidge said:

 

What is the difficulty setting (team size and level) you have for the Council content you are struggling with, and what is the content (and level) at which you are having this trouble?

It was the New Praetorians arc from Provost Marchand in the mid-high 30s. I did everything up to and including this at +0x8, except for the "fight the Archvillains" missions where you have to protect Pendragon and Riptide, which I turned down to x1 to make sure I could get the badges. 

[tidge]

Did you have teammates? Running at 0x8 is turning up the difficulty.

[PeregrineFalcon]

1 hour ago, Eiko-chan said:

I never play at +4. Higher level enemies just aren't worth the extra effort.

 

Wait, what?

 

On 5/8/2024 at 3:03 PM, Eiko-chan said:

But this isn't an issue of skill. I have builds that solo AVs and +4/x8.

 

So which one is it?

 

On 5/9/2024 at 6:44 AM, Eiko-chan said:

This is factually incorrect. I solo /x8 with almost all my characters, because that is what I build for.

 

Ok, well Council or not you should at least get your story straight before posting on the forums.

[Luminara]

2 hours ago, tidge said:

I encounter enough players in-game who quickly admit that they have bitten off more than they can chew,

 

[Eiko-chan]

30 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

So which one is it?

I should have said that can solo at +4/x8. I could do it. I choose not to. 

[PeregrineFalcon]

2 minutes ago, Eiko-chan said:

I should have said that can solo at +4/x8. I could do it. I choose not to. 

But how do you know that you can if you never do?

[Eiko-chan]

Just now, PeregrineFalcon said:

But how do you know that you can if you never do?

Because I did it, went "okay, that was way more work than I want to be doing", and stopped?

[WuTang]

I guess this is my newbness shining through, since I only started playing back in January or February; and, didn't know how to level, it was months before I had a 50. All that being said, I don't really remember these mobs being ROFLstomp easy. BUT, if they are too difficult don't solo at +4/8. If you are soloing ain't nobody gonna know but you that you can't handle max level. Also, the complaining sounds more like hurt pride than anything else. Sort of like that dude in the gym that just failed to bench 225 then hops up explaining to anyone that'll listen how just last week he rep'd it out.

If you prefer rolling solo and find you're in over your head just dial it back to ROFLstomp +2/6 and come out the other side and regale us all with the tale of how you bravely faced the unfaceable at +4/8. Ain't nobody gonna call you on it...well, I mean....we might now that we know you can't.

Also, the game is pretty awesome.

Now go out there and smash some heads!

Edited May 25 by WuTang

[Bionic_Flea]

Since the topic title is "High Level Enemy Group Revamps" not just nuCouncil, let me submit a rant for nuCoT.

 

I've been running some tests in an AE arc I made and one of the missions has high level CoT.  OMG.  One Death Mage is pretty bad and can quickly drop your tohit where you are missing the majority of the time, which makes it difficult to get rid of them and stop the debuffs, especially on melee characters.  If you get more than one, and it happens more than i think it should, you now have hit chances in the teens or single digits.  At that point you have to run or have a counter for -tohit . . . or die . . . especially on dark melee who needs to hit to get the benefits of [Soul Drain].  Being a stubborn bug, I died a few times before I started running and trying to split up the mages so that I didn't have stacking overlapping [Chill of the Night] auras, which I think are auto hit.  And sometimes you get whole groups of ghosts, although they didn't seem to be as problematic as boss Death Mages.  (Anyone know how much a +4 Death Mage boss's Chill will do?  I think base it's -30 tohit)

 

And yes, I was playing at +4/x8 and I know that I can turn it down, or get Ageless, or have different inspirations, or get teammates.  But none of that is the point.  The point is that I could solo them at +4/x8 previously on these same characters and now I can't or have to work a lot harder for it.  Some folks like that old stuff is getting harder.  I don't. 

 

Make new stuff as hard as you like but please stop making me change the way I've been playing for years and years.  I'm old, stubborn, and crotchety.  I don't want to learn new tricks, or respec, or whatever to run the same stuff I've been running for 20 years.  I think you are more likely to lose me for changing too much than changing too little.  I am all for more hardmode/advanced mode content and adding the TF/Ouro difficulty settings to regular arcs (with reasonable increased rewards).  But please, leave the old stuff alone.

[Rudra]

25 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Since the topic title is "High Level Enemy Group Revamps" not just nuCouncil, let me submit a rant for nuCoT.

 

I've been running some tests in an AE arc I made and one of the missions has high level CoT.  OMG.  One Death Mage is pretty bad and can quickly drop your tohit where you are missing the majority of the time, which makes it difficult to get rid of them and stop the debuffs, especially on melee characters.  If you get more than one, and it happens more than i think it should, you now have hit chances in the teens or single digits.  At that point you have to run or have a counter for -tohit . . . or die . . . especially on dark melee who needs to hit to get the benefits of [Soul Drain].  Being a stubborn bug, I died a few times before I started running and trying to split up the mages so that I didn't have stacking overlapping [Chill of the Night] auras, which I think are auto hit.  And sometimes you get whole groups of ghosts, although they didn't seem to be as problematic as boss Death Mages.  (Anyone know how much a +4 Death Mage boss's Chill will do?  I think base it's -30 tohit)

 

And yes, I was playing at +4/x8 and I know that I can turn it down, or get Ageless, or have different inspirations, or get teammates.  But none of that is the point.  The point is that I could solo them at +4/x8 previously on these same characters and now I can't or have to work a lot harder for it.  Some folks like that old stuff is getting harder.  I don't. 

 

Make new stuff as hard as you like but please stop making me change the way I've been playing for years and years.  I'm old, stubborn, and crotchety.  I don't want to learn new tricks, or respec, or whatever to run the same stuff I've been running for 20 years.  I think you are more likely to lose me for changing too much than changing too little.  I am all for more hardmode/advanced mode content and adding the TF/Ouro difficulty settings to regular arcs (with reasonable increased rewards).  But please, leave the old stuff alone.

https://cod.uberguy.net/html/power.html?power=circleofthorns.circle_death_ranged.chill_of_the_night

[Luminara]

1 hour ago, Bionic_Flea said:

I've been running some tests in an AE arc I made and one of the missions has high level CoT.  OMG.  One Death Mage is pretty bad and can quickly drop your tohit where you are missing the majority of the time, which makes it difficult to get rid of them and stop the debuffs, especially on melee characters.  If you get more than one, and it happens more than i think it should, you now have hit chances in the teens or single digits.

 

That's not new behavior.  You could get up to 4 Death Mages at */x8 in regular content before.

 

 

 

Those are from 9/9/2022.

[Bionic_Flea]

Did they always have the same suite of powers then as now?  Do the Masters of Death have better, stronger powers?

[Luminara]

7 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Did they always have the same suite of powers then as now?  Do the Masters of Death have better, stronger powers?

 

Master of Death had Tar Patch, Blackstar, Dark Embrace and Resistance added.

[Bionic_Flea]

Maybe it was the -tohit combined with all the negative resistance.  Even when I got a lucky hit on my dark melee, it was just a tickle to the Master.

[Rudra]

7 minutes ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Maybe it was the -tohit combined with all the negative resistance.  Even when I got a lucky hit on my dark melee, it was just a tickle to the Master.

Probably. One of the reasons why I always prioritize the spectrals among the CoT when they start showing up is because just a few of them can shut down a player's ability to hit anything.

[Triumphant]

Yeah, those spectral demons can be a pain.  Definitely pays to take them out as soon as possible.

[Eiko-chan]

11 hours ago, Bionic_Flea said:

Maybe it was the -tohit combined with all the negative resistance.  Even when I got a lucky hit on my dark melee, it was just a tickle to the Master.

The -50 to hit from their Blackstar could be contributing as well.

[tidge]

Some of us have been pointing out that the CoT had also gotten "harder", yet I think it is very telling that it has been the Council that got most of the attention. Again, I suspect it is because the Council spawns were the preferred easy punching bags prior to their updates.

 

Similar to the Council's powers... the CoT updates make sense to my head canon. Their new tricks are IMO essentially a doubling-down of tricks that the CoT use at low levels: debuffing players. Anyone who has played lower level content (e.g. a Positron, Synapse or Penny Yin task force) at a +4 setting realizes how important "ToHiT" (via Accuracy slotting, +ToHit, whatever) is important to clearing spawns. I have the feeling that some fraction of players don't always keep this in mind... writing only for myself, once I have some set bonuses, I occasionally don't pay attention to that sort of thing myself.

[Sanguinesun]

In the recent Original Devs Q&A, Phil "Synapse" Zeleski was asked:

 

For anyone who's interested in answering, be it gameplay, story, etc: What parts of Homecoming's development of City of Heroes do you approve of? Which do you not, or would do differently if it was you in charge?

 

And regarding the revamps to the mobs, he mirrored my thoughts on all this perfectly:

 

• I think the only parts of Homecoming that I am not a big fan of are the revamps of some of the endgame enemy groups. The Council and Circle of Thorns really stand out as just annoying to fight. They aren't tricky or require counterplay, they just take longer to defeat due to resistances, revives and debuffs.

[shortguy on indom]

HA!!!

[Triumphant]

2 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

In the recent Original Devs Q&A, Phil "Synapse" Zeleski was asked:

 

For anyone who's interested in answering, be it gameplay, story, etc: What parts of Homecoming's development of City of Heroes do you approve of? Which do you not, or would do differently if it was you in charge?

 

And regarding the revamps to the mobs, he mirrored my thoughts on all this perfectly:

 

• I think the only parts of Homecoming that I am not a big fan of are the revamps of some of the endgame enemy groups. The Council and Circle of Thorns really stand out as just annoying to fight. They aren't tricky or require counterplay, they just take longer to defeat due to resistances, revives and debuffs.

Well, in all fairness, the mobs are never going to be "tricky", because the mobs A.I. is dumb as a brick.  If you don't increase resistances, controls, debuffs, etc. how do you make them tougher?  More hps?  Hard combat AT's chew through those like a buzzsaw.  Give the mobs a massive to-hit and damage boost?  Maybe, but the players that like squishy AT's would moan about this.

 

I mean, I'm no Dev, so I'm talking out of my wazoo to a large extent here, but it seems to me that you've got  a limited number of tools to work with, unless  you just want to leave the mobs as the ridiculously easy faceroll that they have been- which for endgame play, seems completely unsatisfying to me, personally.  I know people say they want to feel "super" and yeah, I get that.  But there's (IMO) a qualitative difference between being super (sure, gimme some of that) and an automatic "I win" button (no thank you).