Hard mode alternative

[...]

Just a thought that an alternative way to add challenge or hard mode content to the game is to restrict the number of heroes or villains on a team.

 

As in a TF locked at a maximum of 3 or 4 players. 

Yes, I'm aware that players can do this voluntarily. But having a mode or TF balanced around small team sizes might allow for interesting mechanics that aren't otherwise possible.

 

At the very least, it would cut down on Barrier spam. 

 

May shift the meta somewhat toward ATs that currently aren't favorites. Maybe. 

 

EDIT:

 

See below for discussion, but basically this is a dumb idea and won't work. 

 

Edited 16 hours ago by ...

[Glacier Peak]

What is the problem this is trying to address that can't already be done?

[Ghost]

And why have the devs work on it when, as you said, the team can be recruited to be smaller?

[shortguy on indom]

• MAYBE A RE-WORK OF SOME KIND WOULD BE NEEDED IF THIS WAS A THING.
• INTERESTING IDEA.  +1

[Rudra]

36 minutes ago, ... said:

But having a mode or TF balanced around small team sizes might allow for interesting mechanics that aren't otherwise possible.

Summer Blockbuster and Dr. Kane's House of Horror. These trials are balanced around a team of 4 players already. Asking for more of these? Okay, sure. However, seeing as most TFs/SFs can be soloed by players these days, adding an option to limit team size isn't going to do anything. And as you said and @Ghost pointed out, players can already limit their team sizes for anything they choose to run.

[srmalloy]

1 hour ago, Ghost said:

And why have the devs work on it when, as you said, the team can be recruited to be smaller?

Exactly. Just recruit a smaller team and set difficulty to max team size.

[...]

2 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

What is the problem this is trying to address that can't already be done?

 

Barrier cycling. Smaller teams = less barriers. 

[...]

2 hours ago, Rudra said:

most TFs/SFs can be soloed by players these days

 

Are people soloing 4* Lord Aeon SF?

 

That's the kind of small group content I'm trying to suggest. Doesn't currently exist in game, and variety is the spice of life they say. 

Edited 17 hours ago by ...

[...]

2 hours ago, Ghost said:

And why have the devs work on it when, as you said, the team can be recruited to be smaller?

 

There's no reward other than personal satisfaction for making smaller teams. 

 

Designing content for small team sizes would allow the devs to proportionally reward players (D-syncs, aethers) for the increased difficulty. 

Edited 17 hours ago by ...

[Rudra]

28 minutes ago, ... said:

 

Are people soloing 4* Lord Aeon SF?

 

That's the kind of small group content I'm trying to suggest. Doesn't currently exist in game, and variety is the spice of life they say. 

I have no clue. I know I've duo'ed a 1-star Dr. Aeon Strike Force. (I think we may have even done a 2-star.) And I've duo'ed a 2-star Imperious Task Force. (Not worth the extra time to duo compared to a 1-star in my opinion.) I sincerely doubt 4-stars are being solo'ed. (Or duo'ed for that matter.) I wouldn't be surprised if players were already clearing the 4-stars with smaller teams though. And players are currently already able to try if they so desire.

 

Here's the thing. If you want the TFs/SFs to have a Hard Mode option tailored for smaller teams? You will either increase the likelihood those TFs/SFs can and will be solo'ed, or you will further reduce the ATs allowed on teams to tackle them. And this is on top of increasing the amount of work the devs have to invest in updating the TFs and SFs beyond their already stated goal of updating the other TFs and SFs that lack Advanced Mode (Hard Mode) to having an Advanced Mode for players to try.

 

29 minutes ago, ... said:

3 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

What is the problem this is trying to address that can't already be done?

 

Barrier cycling. Smaller teams = less barriers. 

Incorrect. Setting up the TFs and SFs to have a limited team size setting as advanced difficulty will add more barriers as players decide they have less spaces available to burn on "charity picks".

 

Edit:

  

25 minutes ago, ... said:

2 hours ago, Ghost said:

And why have the devs work on it when, as you said, the team can be recruited to be smaller?

 

There's no reward other than personal satisfaction for making smaller teams. 

 

Designing content for small team sizes would allow the devs to proportionally reward players (D-syncs, aethers) for the increased difficulty. 

Edited 15 minutes ago by ...

You will only get D-Syncs from doing Dr. Aeon Strike Force runs (or buying them from other players on the AH). And you are already guaranteed Prismatic Aethers for doing Advanced Mode content. Adding an alternative Advanced Mode won't change that. And players can already get those prismatics guaranteed on smaller teams by simply not trying to do the 4-star versions. Like I said, I've duo'ed 2-star ITFs. (Not worth the effort though. Just do the 1-star and run it more frequently. Though a 4-player team would probably make the 2-star version worth running for the prismatics.)

 

Edited 17 hours ago by Rudra

[Projector]

@Rudra is correct. Making the teams smaller would only further limit which ATs and powersets get brought.

It's also worth pointing out that you can currently do any of the 4Star content any way you want, so long as you are hitting certain stat minimums regularly. I've seen teams of all Dominators complete 4Star ITF, all Masterminds complete Aeon and LGTF, and I know of one group that has done Barrierless runs of LGTF, Aeon, and ITF, and each with less than 10 deaths. The LGTF was 30:11 with only 1 death, the ASF was 52:54 with 4 deaths. The comp even includes a Dark Miasma Controller (because of Fade + debuffs). Also, the only deathless LGTF I am aware of was done with all Defenders.

I've completed 4Star TFs with 6 people because of DCs, as well. It just largely depend on which roles DC lol. Honestly, if I have 6 Meta characters on the team, I can bring literally whatever for the last two slots and it would be exactly the same, just slower. That's really the only difference the added challenges give: It's slower. 

If you want to challenge yourself further in hard mode content, the means to do so are already there, you just have to dream up some crazy team comps. Happy to help you with defense/resist thresholds if you need!

Proof of barrierless LGTF and Aeon is below, names blurred out for obvious reasons. The Widow was also the tank for both runs.

If you want to do something different, no one is stopping you, just like no one stopped these teams 🙂


 

[...]

@Rudra @Projector

 

I hear your points. 

 

All I'm saying is that there is more than one way to make things more challenging, and in an 8 player team with 6+ barriers, there are a lot of ATs that don't have a spot other than as a charity pick. 

 

On the other hand, if you had a small group with an encounter that specifically required other Destiny Slot abilities (Incandescence or Clarion for example) then maybe, just maybe, we could shift the meta to include a few other ATs. 

 

Or to put it another way, bigger defence and tohit numbers aren't the only way to make things interesting.

[Rudra]

18 minutes ago, ... said:

All I'm saying is that there is more than one way to make things more challenging, and in an 8 player team with 6+ barriers, there are a lot of ATs that don't have a spot other than as a charity pick.

Barrier is not a requirement to complete 4-star Advanced Mode content. It is just the best means players have currently discovered. Players are free to explore other avenues to completing them, and I encourage them to do so.

 

18 minutes ago, ... said:

that specifically required other Destiny Slot abilities

The problem I have with this is like I said, Barrier is not a requirement and imposing such requirements limits players' ability to explore options to dealing with a task. I support player freedom to explore and play how they want, not having to use specific builds because the game requires it of us. (Edit: That's why I am so vocal in my opposition to make more of the game fall in line with the current meta.)

 

18 minutes ago, ... said:

Or to put it another way, bigger defence and tohit numbers aren't the only way to make things interesting.

Agreed. So run your teams using alternative approaches to the content being played. The choice is wholly yours, or your team leader's if you aren't the team leader.

 

Edited 16 hours ago by Rudra

[Projector]

8 minutes ago, ... said:

@Rudra @Projector

 

I hear your points. 

 

All I'm saying is that there is more than one way to make things more challenging, and in an 8 player team with 6+ barriers, there are a lot of ATs that don't have a spot other than as a charity pick. 

 

On the other hand, if you had a small group with an encounter that specifically required other Destiny Slot abilities (Incandescence or Clarion for example) then maybe, just maybe, we could shift the meta to include a few other ATs. 

 

Or to put it another way, bigger defence and tohit numbers aren't the only way to make things interesting.

Except the meta runs already include Clarion and Incandescence, and the Barrierless runs I just referenced use Rebirth and even Ageless Radial. KM 4Star ITF runs sometimes use Ageless Radial. Meta Aeon runs swap to Clarion Radial during the last mission for the range boost, and Corrupted runs, which are a type of run where you only use Corruptors, Tanks/Scrapper-tank, and Blasters, but don't allow Kin, Nature, or Cold, utilize Ageless Core as well.

Not really sure what you're looking for at this point, because if your issue is cookie cutter teams that all use Barrier, I've just given you a ton of examples that didn't use barrier, have varying ATs, with even a widow tanking instead of a tank, and hell, I've tanked it with a toggle-less tank that only uses Brawl.

And any change that would make "bigger defense and to hit numbers" irrelevant would be a change that would likely affect full 8-man teams. Regardless, it's been consistently true throughout the majority of this game's history as far as I know that the smaller you make the teams, the more restrictive the team comps get. That even applies to iTrials (for some master of attempts).

You say they are Charity ATs...but with the way the game is designed makes it so that in your scenario, the stuff that is currently considered meta would only be even stronger. One example: the reason we don't need Dominators or Controllers in Lady Grey is because every AT has access to holds, and it's just a fact that other ATs also offer more damage.

In LGTF, if you hold Dragon, his stats drop considerably. Turns out though, that it's just faster to DPS him outright than it is to try and keep him held the entire fight. The DPS you lose trying to keep him held is worse than the reduced DPS you do when he isn't held.

Same is true in ITF--if you hold the Emerald barrier nova, it becomes unkillable and Romulus' Regen drops to 0, making him easier and quicker to kill....except that you lose more investing resources in trying to keep that nova held than you do by just, again, outright DPSing and debuffing Romulus manually. 

The mechanics exist to do everything you're describing and to open up and encourage different strategies...the issue you moreso have is that most people don't want to spend hours doing one thing when they could spend one hour doing multiple things...so the speedier tactics seem to win the day when it comes to hard mode content, and as someone who leads them regularly and teaches people them constantly, I am in that camp. Leading these things is straight up exhausting, and doubling or tripling the amount of time I have to spend leading them is a prospect I dread lol

The problem is moreso in how the power sets have been developed and how the proliferation via patron/epic pools impact that as well. 

As I said, you can basically do whatever you want. Just have to be creative with the team. 

[...]

@Rudra @Projector Alright alright 

[Seed22]

I’m glad to see HM 4 being done by some different comps. That’s always been an issue of mine, the lack of variety in teams. I always figured different teams would take 3+ hrs to get through it without barrier cycling, glad to know that’s not true.

 

I still have a major hangup with HM in the form of it leaning too much into stat based difficulty, making trash mobs “difficult”(not really) at the expense of mechanical depth. To date, HM LGTF is the most mechanically demanding(relative to only CoH) HM in game. 
 

I hope for the next HM, it approaches FF14 levels of mechanical depth. Not exactly reaching it, but showing that’s where they’re headed, so they can slack on what I consider artificial difficulty with over reliance on stats, which are largely ignored in support meta teams(mostly corrs and fenders), or barrier cycling(common meta practice) 

 

 

Smaller teams won’t add anything of note, as others have said.

[Snarky]

The devs should really spend some tome reworking the content so only one player is allowed on a TF/SF/Trial.  

[shortguy on indom]

• IF THIS IS STILL VALID, WHEN RUNNING A TF, ENEMY SPAWN SIZE DIFFERS WITH THE # OF FOLKS ON A TEAM...
• SO THAT WOULD BE THE ONLY THING THAT WOULD NEED CHANGING, I GUESS?
• HOW BIG OF A DEAL IS IT?

https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/Task_Force
From the wiki:

• As of 2008-03-05 Task Forces will always spawn according to the number of members associated with the team, no matter if they are online or not. If 4 people start the Synapse Task Force, and one logs out, the groups will still spawn as if there were 4 people on the team. If the person instead quits the task force, then the spawns will scale for 3 people.
• On a "signature" Task Force, enemies will spawn based on the task force's maximum level (and the leader's notoriety setting) regardless of the team's composition. Therefore Signature Task Forces are usually done by characters at (or above) the top of the level range. The majority of Task Forces are considered signature.
• A Non-signature Task Force spawns according to the highest level person on the team (and the leader's notoriety setting). These include: Moonfire, Hess, Imperious and all four of the Shadow Shard task forces.
• In the table below, signature Task Forces are in bold, while non-signature Task Forces are in italics.

 

• A "non-signature" strike force spawns according to the highest level person on the team. The Imperious Task Force, Dr. Aeon and Mortimer Kal's Strike Force are the only non-signature strike forces at this time that are accessible for a Villain.

Edited 3 hours ago by shortguy on indom
added strike force info.

[Rudra]

53 minutes ago, shortguy on indom said:

• IF THIS IS STILL VALID, WHEN RUNNING A TF, ENEMY SPAWN SIZE DIFFERS WITH THE # OF FOLKS ON A TEAM...
• SO THAT WOULD BE THE ONLY THING THAT WOULD NEED CHANGING, I GUESS?
• HOW BIG OF A DEAL IS IT?

https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/Task_Force
From the wiki:

• As of 2008-03-05 Task Forces will always spawn according to the number of members associated with the team, no matter if they are online or not. If 4 people start the Synapse Task Force, and one logs out, the groups will still spawn as if there were 4 people on the team. If the person instead quits the task force, then the spawns will scale for 3 people.
• On a "signature" Task Force, enemies will spawn based on the task force's maximum level (and the leader's notoriety setting) regardless of the team's composition. Therefore Signature Task Forces are usually done by characters at (or above) the top of the level range. The majority of Task Forces are considered signature.
• A Non-signature Task Force spawns according to the highest level person on the team (and the leader's notoriety setting). These include: Moonfire, Hess, Imperious and all four of the Shadow Shard task forces.
• In the table below, signature Task Forces are in bold, while non-signature Task Forces are in italics.

 

• A "non-signature" strike force spawns according to the highest level person on the team. The Imperious Task Force, Dr. Aeon and Mortimer Kal's Strike Force are the only non-signature strike forces at this time that are accessible for a Villain.

Yes and no. While I can't attest to spawns not decreasing in size if team members aren't online, the TF/SF is not limited to team size. You can very much set your difficulty to a higher team size than you are running and get the full spawn. Below is a screen shot I just took of a test TF run by myself at x8 setting.

 

 

As you can see, that is not a single player spawn size, but a full team spawn size.

[shortguy on indom]

• MAYBE, BUT HOW WOULD YOU KNOW UNLESS YOU RAN THE SAME TF WITH MORE FOLKS?
• ARE THERE 16 OR 17 STANDING THERE?

[shortguy on indom]

• NOTERIETY SETTINGS DO HAVE AN IMPACT ON HARD MODE CONTENT...
• WHETHER THIS IS A BUG OR NOT, DONNO.
• NOT SURE ABOUT SPAWN SIZE, (BEEN AWHILE) BUT LEADER RUNNING SAY A 1* HM TF AT NOTERIETY +3 SETTINGS MAKES A DIFFERENCE.
• WOULD GUESS THE OTHER WAY AROUND AS WELL.

[Rudra]

41 minutes ago, shortguy on indom said:

• MAYBE, BUT HOW WOULD YOU KNOW UNLESS YOU RAN THE SAME TF WITH MORE FOLKS?
• ARE THERE 16 OR 17 STANDING THERE?

Here is the same group on that Positron TF at x1 setting:

 

 

The ramping up of spawn size is the same in a TF/SF as it is for any other content when you choose to increase your difficulty. And while I can't say it is the same as for a full team of players, it is supposed to be. Regardless, the point is that like has been pointed out earlier in the thread, a player can opt to form a smaller team and still run at full team difficulty even on TFs and SFs. And players already solo many TFs and SFs. Even at higher difficulty settings.

 

Edited 1 hour ago by Rudra
Edited to add missing "is".

[biostem]

What would be the rewards for these hypothetical "4-person only" TFs?  I'm trying to get the rationale behind devoting *any* dev time on such a proposal...