What are my options for challenging content?

[LaconicLemur]

8 hours ago, Illy said:

to really deck out a base required a feat of social engineering (it was more of an MMO endeavour, not a single-player-RPG endeavour, in the way IO's or badge collecting is). 

 

I could say my standard for difficulty comes from playing EVE online, but really it comes from the boardgames I played as a kid, which I always had a chance of losing. From my experience, you really can't lose in City of Heroes. If that's your kind of game, then cool, I didn't make the thread to deride anyone for that.

 

Ok. I'm going to ignore the weirdly emotional turn of events since I last posted and focus on the additional info you gave us.  If I hear you correctly (odd turn of phrase, that), you want something where you can really "lose". For example, if there was some content that if you died, you would lose one slotted enhancement which takes a year to replace. Or; the classic example of "Leeroyyyy Jenkins". 

 

I don't think, even with everything posted on this thread, that there is such a challenge in CoH currently. I"d really have to rack my brain to think of one. It's not a game built for that in its current form. I see the open-world MMO survival games as more in line with that kind of challenge rather than this one.

 

It's interesting how you say it comes from playing board games as a kid. Because I can see how as a kid, one doesn't really look past the end of the current game. Encouraging feelings of risk like that is a bit of a contradiction in how the (developed) world operates now in general when it comes to entertainment, and to some extent society as a whole.

 

Edited August 11, 2019 by LaconicLemur

[Illy]

1 hour ago, LaconicLemur said:

 

 

It's interesting how you say it comes from playing board games as a kid. Because I can see how as a kid, one doesn't really look past the end of the current game. Encouraging feelings of risk like that is a bit of a contradiction in how the (developed) world operates now in general when it comes to entertainment, and to some extent society as a whole.

 

Personally I disagree with your social commentary-- If we use MMO's as a metric for the general attitude of society then that would be true, but that assumes that MMO's are popular enough to serve as that metric, when in fact they're nowhere near the most popular video game genre, which has to be handed off to PvP shooters like Battlefield, Overwatch, Fortnite etc..

 

All "hardcore pvp games" compared to your average MMO. In my opinion, if you want to discern the most common attitude toward challenge, and challenge as it presents itself in video games, these popular shooter games seem to indicate the opposite point: that people want to compete. 

[_NOPE_]

I'd say more people REALLY want to shoot each other and get away with it, repeatedly. 

[nihilii]

So, Illy, are you going to solo a STF?

Sophistry threads can be fun, but only if there is an actual attempt to handwave answers away. You're not even addressing the suggestions, just running away from them...

Examples of answers to help you out:
"the STF doesn't have an explicit fail state"
"i consider running a TF with less than the maximum team members nerfing myself"

Either example is easily countered.
- explicit fail states are not needed to make a task impossible and therefore a failure (as one has to quit the task force, ergo fail)
- a team of other players is not an extension of yourself therefore cannot be considered nerfing yourself; and TFs can be started with one person.

So you'll have to come up with something better. There's your forum challenge, if you're still shying away from ingame challenges. 😉

[LaconicLemur]

1 hour ago, Illy said:

Personally I disagree with your social commentary-- If we use MMO's as a metric for the general attitude of society then that would be true, but that assumes that MMO's are popular enough to serve as that metric, when in fact they're nowhere near the most popular video game genre, which has to be handed off to PvP shooters like Battlefield, Overwatch, Fortnite etc..

 

All "hardcore pvp games" compared to your average MMO. In my opinion, if you want to discern the most common attitude toward challenge, and challenge as it presents itself in video games, these popular shooter games seem to indicate the opposite point: that people want to compete. 

My fault for bringing something in out of topic. But my social commentary about is risk, not challenge. Challenge is how difficult something is. Risk is the consequence of failure. You can see by how we word our comments that we are talking about two different things. I opine you really mean risk rather than challenge in your OP.

[Illy]

1 hour ago, LaconicLemur said:

My fault for bringing something in out of topic. But my social commentary about is risk, not challenge. Challenge is how difficult something is. Risk is the consequence of failure. You can see by how we word our comments that we are talking about two different things. I opine you really mean risk rather than challenge in your OP.

No reason to apologize at all, it was a good point and seems natural to discuss in this thread. I am actually talking about challenge-- my ideal game has both challenge and risk (which is why I play EVE),  but I know CoH to have no risk mechanics (I don't count debt as a serious consequence), so it wasn't worth me bringing it up, imo. And I'm also familiar with the risk-averse playerbase in CoH so it would be tantamount to heresy to suggest we incur significant losses everytime we die, for example. 

[GM Tempest]

To be honest, I would recommend trying power combinations that arn't in the 'meta'. Try an AR/Devices blaster! Or a Mercs MM! People talk about these things not being very viable in end-game content, but I took a Dual Pistols/Regen Sentinel well into the far reaches of endgame content with the help of some fantastic people and have had a blast with it. Try new things!

[THEDarkTyger]

10 hours ago, justicebeliever said:

It's hyperbole, because nowhere was anyone asking for the best of the best content out there...

....that has nothing to do with hyperbole.

[jubakumbi]

Every single 'challenge' I see listed is simply a 'punitive mistake system' from my PoV.

No challenge, no brain work, just finger presses in the right order, over and over and over.

Lots of tedium only challenges our ability to stay awake.

 

I have yet to see an example of the mythical 'challenge' that is desired...

[THEDarkTyger]

11 hours ago, justicebeliever said:

It's hyperbole, because nowhere was anyone asking for the best of the best content out there...

 

Better content, better challenges <> "best of the best"...

 

The OP doesn't sound elitist...he sounds like most of the veteran incarnates who post on the forums...so more challenges would benefit most of them, not one of them...

 

Here's the run down: OP is apparently so min-maxxed, the content isn't challenging to him. He flat out rejects suggestions such as soloing the hardest TFs on max notoriety settings, playing through tough content with a weaker build, and other such self imposed challenges as he refuses to "gimp" himself to find challenge. In fact, his reaction to such suggestions is snide condescension.  Like doing so would be beneath him. ( Which is where I got irked at him, not the fact he was looking for challenge as was his grossly misrepresented strawman of my responses )

 

Thus, the only logical conclusion is his ideal would be content geared toward players like him, with bleeding edge min/maxxed builds. ie, "the best of the best". That is only a tiny minority of the players. So, kindly show me where the hyperbole is when I'm drawing logical conclusions from his own statements and reactions.

[_NOPE_]

Illy still hasn't defined "challenge" in this context yet, so any more speculation or suggestions... Won't go anywhere. 

Edited August 11, 2019 by The Philotic Knight

[jubakumbi]

11 minutes ago, THEDarkTyger said:

 

Here's the run down: OP is apparently so min-maxxed, the content isn't challenging to him. He flat out rejects suggestions such as soloing the hardest TFs on max notoriety settings, playing through tough content with a weaker build, and other such self imposed challenges as he refuses to "gimp" himself to find challenge. In fact, his reaction to such suggestions is snide condescension.  Like doing so would be beneath him. ( Which is where I got irked at him, not the fact he was looking for challenge as was his grossly misrepresented strawman of my responses )

 

Thus, the only logical conclusion is his ideal would be content geared toward players like him, with bleeding edge min/maxxed builds. ie, "the best of the best". That is only a tiny minority of the players. So, kindly show me where the hyperbole is when I'm drawing logical conclusions from his own statements and reactions.

I agree with this assement.

 

While posed as an innocent question, the fact is this thread was opened with a post that says ''I'm too sexy for your game, it was never really sexy".

Then when it is explained that is WAI, challenge in on the inside, not the outside, we get comments like "well, it that's the way you want to play" - a lot like the comment from my father when my mother told him she was pregnent with me - "well, if that's what you want" - totally passive agressive condemnation.

 

It is fashionable on the Internet to tell everyone else how good you are to tlet them know how bad they are at a game, as if mastering a game, especially an MMO, is anything to really be proud of - it is just a video game.

 

Some gamers allow thier competitive side to override thier empathy, IME, and try to use game familiarity as some sort of club to beat other gamers with...

 

Edited August 11, 2019 by jubakumbi

[Zumberge]

Ultimately, OP, you are asking for something that neither we, nor the game, can satisfactorily offer you.  What you want will have to be found elsewhere, in either single-player games, or other MMOs which take design cues from earlier ages.  Unfortunate, but so it goes.

[nihilii]

1 hour ago, jubakumbi said:

No challenge, no brain work, just finger presses in the right order, over and over and over.

I don't think there is any build in this game that could solo the STF by standing still and running through their attack chain. Even the cheesiest builds for the task at hand would require significantly more positioning and strategy.

This is a game filled with force multipliers. The power gulf between a 8 man zerg and a single character is... vast.

You could play dumb and grab shivans, warburg nukes, every temp power in the sun, load yourself with Ultimates and amplifiers; and I'm willing to bet Recluse would hand you your ass if you sat there and spammed 1 2 3 1 2 4 during the tower phase.



 

Edited August 11, 2019 by nihilii

[jubakumbi]

7 minutes ago, nihilii said:

I don't think there is any build in this game that could solo the STF by standing still and running through their attack chain. Even the cheesiest builds for the task at hand would require significantly more positioning and strategy.

This is a game filled with force multipliers. The power gulf between a 8 man zerg and a single character is... vast.

You could play dumb and grab shivans, warburg nukes, every temp power in the sun, load yourself with Ultimates and amplifiers; and I'm willing to bet Recluse would hand you your ass if you sat there and spammed 1 2 3 1 2 4 during the tower phase.



 

The challenge there is in the brain power used before entering the ring, to insure you have the tools to win, like a collectable card game.

The formulas are all already know, all strategies are already worked out...

 

Dancing around and hitting the keys in the right order after you have built the deck...that's what we do...that's all we do, other than herd the cats.

 

IME, the people that pine away for challenges in this channel (gaming) are still trying to get life-meaning out of the games.

They want feedback from the game to let them feel like they have grown from overcoming some sort of life-challenge.

 

It's a video game.

 

Once you know the formulas, which are pubished and followed to create the meta, it's just learning the dance - time comsuming repetitve taks to learn muscle memerory is just not a challenge to me, it is a time investment. 

 

To make real challenges in this game, you as a player have to participate in the creation of those challenges.

Posters like the OP IME seem to be looking for a higher power to give them direction rather than realizing "it's all inside".

[Eva Destruction]

7 hours ago, Illy said:

All "hardcore pvp games" compared to your average MMO. In my opinion, if you want to discern the most common attitude toward challenge, and challenge as it presents itself in video games, these popular shooter games seem to indicate the opposite point: that people want to compete. 

Well those people who want to compete should go play those games then.  CoH was never a game for people who want to compete.  There was no PvP at all at launch, and even after it was implemented it was never very popular; in fact, there was, and still is, a significant portion of the playerbase that refuses to ever participate in PvP, some of whom refuse to even enter PvP zones to do the PvE content there.  The same goes for player-created PvE competitions; a very small portion of the playerbase participates.

[Yomo Kimyata]

You want a challenge?  Start a new alt and from the moment of creation change your settings to +4/x8.  Level to 50 without teaming.  The first 10 levels are brutal.

[jubakumbi]

Just now, Yomo Kimyata said:

You want a challenge?  Start a new alt and from the moment of creation change your settings to +4/x8.  Level to 50 without teaming.  The first 10 levels are brutal.

But what you describe is just a punitive punishment for missteps, or just relying on luck to get you through.

How is this 'challenging' for anything other than personal patience?

[Yomo Kimyata]

5 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

But what you describe is just a punitive punishment for missteps, or just relying on luck to get you through.

How is this 'challenging' for anything other than personal patience?

You're kidding me, right?  This is 'challenging,' or 'arousing competitive interest, thought, or action' because it is possible, yet extremely difficult, with a lot of strategy and planning.  You can't just zerg.

 

You can easily do it by street sweeping, but that would be tedious.  

[jubakumbi]

3 minutes ago, Yomo Kimyata said:

You're kidding me, right?  This is 'challenging,' or 'arousing competitive interest, thought, or action' because it is possible, yet extremely difficult, with a lot of strategy and planning.  You can't just zerg.

 

You can easily do it by street sweeping, but that would be tedious.  

"You can't just zerg" does not immediately imply a challange.

The OP is asking for real challenge.

What you describe just means moving more slowly and fighting more 1v1 fights, using some basic tactics that any gamer can master in a couple minutes.

Not really a challenge.

Edited August 11, 2019 by jubakumbi

[nihilii]

2 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

Once you know the formulas, which are pubished and followed to create the meta, it's just learning the dance - time comsuming repetitve taks to learn muscle memerory is just not a challenge to me, it is a time investment.  

At this point we're running in circles, but let me reiterate I wholeheartedly disagree with your take.

This is why specifics matter.
You can get away soloing most lvl 50 AVs and even lvl 54 AVs with the right build, the right strategy and autopilot muscle memory.
But it's extremely unlikely to me you would get away soloing the STF with autopilot muscle memory, no matter how right your build and how right your strategy.

There's simply a level of execution required to deal with the pseudo randomness that arises from all the things you face at once, in the context of a solo STF.

This is a closed deterministic system, so hypothetically, you could faceroll your way through any PvE content if you have the sufficient stats on paper. In theory. And with enough tries, you would succeed.

But raise the stakes enough, and this "enough tries" becomes impossibly large to the point it's not realistic to rely on muscle memory + luck alone.

You're simply going to have to think on your feet and react to the different ways the fight can play out (really, even an enemy attack hitting at a different time and in a different pattern can result in drastically different outcomes in solo attempts).

It's like how you could say there's a combination of finger presses that could make you an overnight millionaire trading on the stock market. Yeah, OK... But is that realistic? There's a combination of words that could get you any romantic partner you might desire. But is this likely to happen?

(But once we deal with people, we get into deterministic vs free will questions which are a little too emotionally charged, so probably not the best analogies for an argument. 😉 )

Take chess then. The system is closed and deterministic. The strategies are known. Is playing chess well merely a result of "time consuming repetitive tasks to learn muscle memory"? If so, isn't it strange some people have widely different skill levels despite a similar investment of time?

In chess or in CoH, for that matter.

I think it's too easy to look at the low-hanging fruit of repetition to dismiss challenge. By nature, any activity that is challenging enough will have an overall high degree of repetition, else it wouldn't be a challenge.

i.e., if I'm shooting three-pointers to train, it doesn't mean the NBA Three-Point Contest is not a challenge.

At some point we can argue semantics until the end of times as to what constitutes a challenge. You've got muscle memory, preplanning and handicaps pegged as "not a challenge". You could very well add "execution is not a challenge either". Why not. But words lose their meaning when personal definitions are used in public debate.

Two accepted public definitions of Challenge:
- a task or situation that tests someone's abilities
- an attempt to win a contest or championship in a sport

Either works for me. Muscle memory, preplanning, handicaps and execution all fit in there.

YMMV.

[Yomo Kimyata]

19 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

"You can't just zerg" does not immediately imply a challange.

The OP is asking for real challenge.

What you describe just means moving more slowly and fighting more 1v1 fights, using some basic tactics that any gamer can master in a couple minutes.

Not really a challenge.

And climbing Mt. Everest means just taking one step at a time.  A toddler could master that in a couple of minutes.

 

It sounds like to me, according to you, that the OP is going to need to rely on some sort of PvP in order to be 'challenged'.

[jubakumbi]

9 minutes ago, nihilii said:

At some point we can argue semantics until the end of times as to what constitutes a challenge. You've got muscle memory, preplanning and handicaps pegged as "not a challenge". You could very well add "execution is not a challenge either". Why not. But words lose their meaning when personal definitions are used in public debate.

Two accepted public definitions of Challenge:
- a task or situation that tests someone's abilities
- an attempt to win a contest or championship in a sport

Either works for me. Muscle memory, preplanning, handicaps and execution all fit in there.

YMMV.

Bingo.

 

Challenge is the challenge to define here. 🙂

 

The whole point is that you can set things on -1/x1 or +4/x8.

You can run solo or grouped.

You can play TFs or streetsweep.

 

It is up the Player to find the challenge within the game, it is all based around the Player being challenged.

Therefore, the Game cannot be expected to be challenging if the Player is not ready to define thier own view of what is challenging and then seeking that out in-game.

 

It takes the players imput, not just passive play, and the OP and many like the OP try to blame the game for which the blame lies elsewhere.

[justicebeliever]

1 hour ago, THEDarkTyger said:

 

Here's the run down: OP is apparently so min-maxxed, the content isn't challenging to him. He flat out rejects suggestions such as soloing the hardest TFs on max notoriety settings, playing through tough content with a weaker build, and other such self imposed challenges as he refuses to "gimp" himself to find challenge. In fact, his reaction to such suggestions is snide condescension.  Like doing so would be beneath him. ( Which is where I got irked at him, not the fact he was looking for challenge as was his grossly misrepresented strawman of my responses )

 

Thus, the only logical conclusion is his ideal would be content geared toward players like him, with bleeding edge min/maxxed builds. ie, "the best of the best". That is only a tiny minority of the players. So, kindly show me where the hyperbole is when I'm drawing logical conclusions from his own statements and reactions.

I just reread the whole thread to make sure I wasn't missing something...

 

I'll agree that we haven't heard from the OP if he has been soloing all of the TF/SF/Trials at +4/8, and I suspect the answer is "not all of them".  And I would agree that soloing those at max difficulty is not "nerfing" yourself...that's a real challenge...

 

Also, he hasn't commented on PvP either, which is much more like chess in that you are facing a real opponent, not an AI...

 

However, some of the other things (make a weaker build, master of badges, play a FF defender at all [just kidding PK, I have FF def and I love him]) are forms of "nerfing yourself" (let's call it what it is), but I haven't heard him refuse, he's just saying that's all that remains (which isn't true, unless he has done the above)

 

Regardless, he has not advocated for any change in the game

13 hours ago, Illy said:

I didn't even ask the developers to change the game on this thread, I literally just asked if there was any challenging content that I'm not aware of.

I however, would love to see more difficulty options in the game...does that make me part of .001%?  I really don't think so...There are countless threads on this board, about people who feel they have conquered all that there is...are they right?  Who knows...but the OP is not alone here in saying it...

 

As I mentioned, PvP caters to a small audience (probably close to 1%), so does redside (10%) and goldside (1%)...and I would advocate for all of those groups to get improvements as well.

 

More challenge <> dev's drop everything to reinvent the game around this....

 

For some, the game is just casual, for others it's a challenge, for other's it's found wanting...all are welcome here...

[justicebeliever]

10 minutes ago, jubakumbi said:

Bingo.

 

Challenge is the challenge to define here. 🙂

 

The whole point is that you can set things on -1/x1 or +4/x8.

You can run solo or grouped.

You can play TFs or streetsweep.

 

It is up the Player to find the challenge within the game, it is all based around the Player being challenged.

Therefore, the Game cannot be expected to be challenging if the Player is not ready to define thier own view of what is challenging and then seeking that out in-game.

 

It takes the players imput, not just passive play, and the OP and many like the OP try to blame the game for which the blame lies elsewhere.

Why do most adults outgrow Tic-Tac-Toe but not Scrabble?  Because they haven't defined what is challenging?

 

Why do most Spider Solitaire players do 2 suits, instead of 1? 

 

Because Tic-Tac-Toe and Single Suit Spider Solitaire represent games that can't be lost with a minimal effort...There is some objectiveness to challenge...

 

Now some people really like Solitaire because it engages the brain and is relaxing, but I don't because there is no challenge in Solitaire, it's almost 100% chance...

 

I'm not saying that the OP has met all the actual challenges in the game, he has been rather vague, but I don't hear any blame...I don't blame Tic-Tac-Toe or Solitaire, I just accept what is and move on...If I hadn't discovered the 2 suit challenge in Spider Solitaire, I would have moved on...

 

While I personally still have challenges in the game (like having one character run all the content, and badge hunting), PvE combat isn't really one of them (there are some exceptions) after lvl 40 for the most part, without nerfing yourself...I haven't done PvP, and I don't think I would be competent at it, so while it would be challenging, very few people like a challenge they would only lose at...