Criticism/Thoughts on the current progression

[Yikes]

I want to get all my thoughts concise so i posted this in coxg and I'll put it here too, but it might be slightly out of context since it was originally directed towards brain and the coxg community, but most of it applies here

 

"multi part post because of length and im continuing to write it:

I wanna bring up the issue of progression in i25 cause, while I know brain wants to go back to i24, I also remember him mentioning his own changes he wants to make and I don't agree at all with changing any of the core gameplay progression

 

I'm being switzerland here cause I play on both homecoming and coxg and more than anything I want to play the game like it was at sunset. I don't want any progression changes that weren't explicitly planned by the developers themselves, because to me that would be an illegitimate experience. I dont mind new ATs and power sets and costume pieces and even story arcs, but my issue lies with any changes to the way the game is played at its core, and the structure of its progression/events.

 

Right now I'm focused heavily on incarnate rewards and incarnate trials. and I'll mostly just copy what I've messaged tempest and the homecoming/core normie discords

"getting incarnate rewards outside of trials just means fewer people will be running trials, and it cheapens the rewards of completing them

so I'm gonna have fewer opportunities to even play trials, and people who dont run trials are gonna get incarnate rewards even faster

the entire dynamic of the endgame content changes.

 

Currently you cant even disable getting incarnate XP outside of the trials, or even at all. so i had to quit mid-manticore TF when i leveled to 50 cause i immediately started filling my alpha slot

 

idk, like the incarnate system was supposed to be its own self contained thing, like the ouroboros stuff, you go to do incarnate stuff specifically for the incarnate rewards.

it would be like putting reward merits in radio missions. why run task forces for anything but badges at that point? or why run TFs more than once?"

this would be fixed by going back to i24, so no big deal there with the coxg server.

 

My concern lies in the fact that the coxg server will probably never have a sufficient enough population for incarnate trials to be run frequently/nonstop. Like it or not, as it stands homecoming is the major core of the CoH community. love them or hate them, they have massive capacity servers with tons of active players willing to do content, so these are concerns that should be brought up with them regardless. It's likely that any fractured communities and smaller servers and followup servers will follow suit with whatever they do at this point in time, so if you hate the current progression changes and want them reverted, PLEASE let them know how you feel. Personally, I've been waiting 7 years to do nonstop incarnate trials once I hit 50, and on either server this is not an option because of the changes leandro made and the population of coxg's server."

 

TL;DR, if you have problems with the current progression changes (incarnate XP for all content, null the gull, etc.) BRING IT UP WITH HOMECOMING. I don't understand why I'm the only person fronting this issue, because it's such a MASSIVE change to how CoX is played.

 

also please keep in mind I'm not picking sides here. I've been paying attention to both servers and communities because both are valid alternatives to one another, and both are opportunities for diverging potential. I'm switzerland. I just want to bring up pertinent gameplay issues that deserve to be addressed and talked about.

 

imo, veteran levels should be removed and the original post-50 levels should be reinstated as they were with the original incarnate system. but that's merely one take.

 

It could be plausible for the systems to be on a per-shard basis. just having one shard be the 'vanilla' shard and giving everyone a couple transfers to go to whatever server suits them best would be very elegant. one server for vanilla, one for i25-core, one for RP, one for PVP. I recognize transfers dont yet work, but having a vanilla server regardless would be excellent, and I would personally nominate TB since that was the first server up and probably where all the OG players started,

 

(some of the info about incarnate system might be inaccurate in this post, it's been a while.)

 

 

[Burnt Toast]

As an OG player I will reply:

 

I have yet to get any character to 50 - my highest is 36. Regarding Incarnate experience and iTrials.

I don't have a problem with the awarding of iexp outside of incarnate content. Why? Why not. Once enough of the player base is 50 there will be numerous instances of all the itrials going. Right now I would venture a guess that MAYBE 10%-15% of the population has a level 50 character. And what are they doing with them... probably farming missions to help bankroll their build and their future toons/lowbies.

 

I am very much looking forward to doing all (ok most) of the itrials, BUT I need to get to 50 and I would like to have a decent build going in to them beforehand. Going into BAF or Lambda with my Alpha slot already will be a nice change of pace.

 

I really think that once more people get to 50, slot their builds, etc... there will be a noticeable increase in icontent being played.

 

The servers haven't even been up a month - a little too soon to start freaking about late game content. I do think if after a month or so there is a definite lack of icontent being played that maybe the ixp should be lessened etc.

 

 

[Jon]

Nah.

 

I think wanting to revert to an I24 build because it feels "more legitimate" than I25 is completely misinformed and would be a huge disservice to a lot of the really great changes that I25 brought. Almost all of the changes are focused on making more of the game accessible to more people than we saw on live: veteran levels help solo players participate in incarnate content without requiring huge trials that may otherwise gate out casual players (which was a HUGE criticism of the trials back on live, if you recall), base editing changes make bases more customizable than ever before, IOs can be very easily acquired through merits and enhancement converters, and more powerset proliferation across all the ATs means more new possibilities for everyone... and that's just a few of the bigger ones off the top of my head.

 

"There won't be people running trials because they can all unlock incarnates solo" is entirely the wrong way to look at things. Realistically, soloable incarnates just means more people will be able to incarnate more of their characters even easier, which means there will be more level 50 incarnates available to run trials overall (and any other 50 content). As more people hit 50, more people will be playing their level 50 characters through this content and I'm willing to bet it will be a complete non-issue - just look at all the people trying to get their old characters back to where they were on live! And regardless, why would we unlock incarnate powers if not to be badass powerful incarnates on the trials (those level shifts!) & in regular gameplay?

 

I know it may be hard to accept changes that occurred after the game was shut down, but the old devs were definitely not perfect. There was a lot they did that was improved upon with I25. Removing these QOL updates would be an extreme detriment to the experience of this game, if you ask me.

 

[EDIT]

 

Having a separate server with I24 is much better solution to this made-up problem than changing one of the already-existing I25 servers to I24. What would happen to people's characters that they've already been working on? How could you decide which server to reset everyone's progress on just to make that happen? That would be a huge mess for no reason at all.