New efforts!

[AlienOne]

We really need like and dislike buttons for individual replies. . .


Are we there yet?

there's a "report" function.... But, the "like" system is a Facebook inherent way of looking at things... The way forums were designed was to voice your opinion--including specifically stating what you didn't like about someone else's opinion.

A like/dislike feature is more like the crowds in rome who gave a thumbs down to have someone killed just based on popular opinion. Forums aren't a popularity contest--they're more like a moderated debate hall. People who like to know how many people "approve" of them belong on Facebook. People who want to state their opinion, but don't really want to stick around for what other people have to say write blogs/op-ed pieces. People who like back-and-forth discourse from people who may or may not be like-minded to themselves post in fiorums.

[Aggelakis]

Speaking of what City did right. . . .  Someone had a HUGE list on here at one point of stuff that City did that was unique and right to it.  Anyone know where that list is?

http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php/topic,5754.0.html

[hejtmane]

This. I have been thinking about this very scenario. City of Heroes did moderately well even at its peak, and without any real competition for its particular genre. What will happen now that there will be multiple superhero MMOs out at roughly the same time?  Granted, with the popularity of the Marvel and now DC movies, we have seen a pretty substantial increase in the general populations interest in all things heroic. Will that help?

COh at it's peak hit 200k subs part of the problem back then was Hami was the only real endgame no IO's to farm etc they stayed at about 100-150k subs for a long time we had the sub numbers back when NCSoft reported it in the quarterly reports for a long time. Then it eventually went Free to play.

In fact when I started playing I had never heard of it and I was an MMO vet having played UO, DAOC and Horizons and some other stuff so I tracked the market most I played with only talked about WOW some friends of mine from work that we played Horizons together found COH and I borrowed there login and I got hooked back in I2 and bought the game.

Their initial marketing was terrible

[Neutrio]

I think getting the message out would be the most important part, and advertising the games virtues as well.  It should be advertised that the game actually had a lot of variety in how to actually play it, which was the true beauty of it.  It wasn't a game that severely punished you for not playing one of the three trinity builds and there was no best way to play it.  It should be mentioned that the game does make you feel like the hero and it does so in a good way.  It should be mentioned the game is for the most part a very very balanced game that doesn't punish you for not going a true fotm build all the time.  It's a game that became ahead of it's time.

I am probably going to regret posting this however I've had a long-time problem with MMOs (nay games in general & not just software types) when it comes to "balance".  Now, I do understand what the word means & what most developers intend.  It shouldn't be a cake-walk nor should it be something you need to be a "leet" just to squeak by.  I agree (mostly) with that.

<begin rant>

My main "peev" revolves around two issues:  a) PvP & b) the notion that "it isn't real/difficult enough, etc."

PvP:
It seems to me that many times a game gets "balanced" (nerfed, etc.) because PvP players complain that X or Y or whatever isn't fair & then the game is beaten by the nerf bat to "balance" the powers/ATs/etc. for PvP play.  Perhaps that is because they are the only ones who are vocal about something & so perhaps the devs could be led to believe that this is the opinion of the entire player base.  I'm not dev-bashing here.  To me, the PvP crowd seems to be vastly smaller while the PvE crowd seems to be an overwhelming majority.  The PvE folks seem pretty much happy with the ATs & powers that they were originally given & aren't really complaining about them at all yet they later get pancake-slapped with "balances" for the sake of PvP.

Regarding the posts above about the lack of anyone in the PvP zones, that should have been a good clue that the player base of CoX did not find PvP to be something they were interested in.  I really don't care for PvP myself.  My experience of it in CoX was ruined by the original Stalkers.  One-shot kills (then nearly-one-shot kills mixed with a mez followed immediately by a low-powered attack = hospital time). Oh, and griefer groups who nail you right as you come out of the hospital.

I am not advocating against PvP.  I would prefer a game that uses one set of rules/algorithms/etc. for PvE & a different set for PvP.  When you enter PvP, your "PvP build/etc." is loaded & when you enter PvE, the "PvE build/etc." is loaded.  That way, the PvE folks are not contending with things meant to be "balanced" for PvP and vice versa.  I realize that is like building 2 different games.  Well, to me, they are separate.  PvP really IS different than PvE.  They have different goals & objectives.

Not Real Enough:
To me, if you want realism, go out into the actual, real world & experience whatever "it" is that isn't real enough in the game.  Most games are not designed to be simulators used to train you for doing whatever "it" is in the real world.

<end rant>

Granted some games start off unbalanced (as the posts above regarding CO imply -- it's either a cake-walk OR it's a PITA) & do need a fundamental reworking.  For me, playing a game is about having fun & escaping actual reality for a short while.  If the game becomes a chore/work, then it is no longer fun.  The closer the game gets to simulating actual reality, the less I'm able to escape said actual reality.

An example comes to mind regarding our beloved CoH:

What was so wrong with say a fire tank aggro'ing the entire map & AoE'ing everything while inside the dumpster?  Who was being harmed by that & why?

Maybe I ask that because I never got the chance to do that (a good possibility).  I just think that it sounded like a lot of fun.  I get concerned that some things get changed/nerfed because a relatively small(er) number of people don't find it challenging enough, realistic enough, etc. & the rest of us suffer for their ... well ... leet skillz

Perhaps there is a list of all of the nerfs WITH explanations of why these had to be done.  I didn't care for ED or an aggro limit of 16 (?) though I learned to accept & live with them.  Neither made me feel more leet & both caused me to have less fun than before.

I do think that CoX did a wonderful job of handling at least the "not challenging enough" part by allowing you to raise the difficulty.  I also liked that you could lower the difficulty for those who had more squishy ATs/builds.  I haven't seen that in a game since.

So, my plea:  Be careful where & WHY you swing that nerf bat.

[Goddangit]

I'm not even sure what issue it was when I discovered CoH and joined up.  I know there was no CoV and scrappers got an extra bar related to their "blood lust" for want of a better term.  The higher it went the more damage they could do.  I don't think there were any Khelds or possibly they were very new -- I'm not sure.  I guess that must put me about Issue 2 to 4?  Anyone have any notion where that fits in the scheme of things?

[Neutrio]

... Hami was the only real endgame no IO's to farm etc ...

I really miss the old Hami raid.  The new one seemed more contrived & not as much fun.

[Aggelakis]

I have literally never heard of this alternate Scrapper inherent you're talking about.

Maybe you're thinking of original Blaster Defiance?? You lost health, which filled up your defiance bar, the lower your health, the higher the bar, the more damage you did?

[Goddangit]

Defiance.  That must have been it.  Been so long since it was ingame I'd forgotten.  I guess I must be about issue 5 then...

[Nyx Nought Nothing]

I'm not even sure what issue it was when I discovered CoH and joined up.  I know there was no CoV and scrappers got an extra bar related to their "blood lust" for want of a better term.  The higher it went the more damage they could do.  I don't think there were any Khelds or possibly they were very new -- I'm not sure.  I guess that must put me about Issue 2 to 4?  Anyone have any notion where that fits in the scheme of things?

i played since late May 2004 and do not recall ever seeing a bar for "Scrapper bloodlust" or even anything vaguely similar. (Brutes' Fury bar in the CoV beta was the first time i can recall seeing anything like that.) Maybe it was in the CoH beta?

I really miss the old Hami raid.  The new one seemed more contrived & not as much fun.

Having done both versions at least forty times each i preferred the revamped raid. ^(;,;)^

[Goddangit]

i played since late May 2004 and do not recall ever seeing a bar for "Scrapper bloodlust" or even anything vaguely similar. (Brutes' Fury bar in the CoV beta was the first time i can recall seeing anything like that.) Maybe it was in the CoH beta? ^(;,;)^

I was thinking it was scrapper but it sounds like Defiance the way Aggelakis describes it.  I only looked at it briefly when I was a noob and got absorbed playing a tank and a controller and never got back to it before that disappeared from the game mechanics.

[Nyx Nought Nothing]

I was thinking it was scrapper but it sounds like Defiance the way Aggelakis describes it.  I only looked at it briefly when I was a noob and got absorbed playing a tank and a controller and never got back to it before that disappeared from the game mechanics.

Well i'd forgotten that Blasters even had an indicator bar for Defiance other than the Blaster's health bar, but then i wasn't playing Blasters much during the original Defiance period. During that period the closest i generally came to playing Blasters were my Defenders and their Negligence special ability had no UI indicator.

Edit: First post of page 160. Um, yay? Still, i'm almost embarrassed to admit that i'd doubted this thread would hit 150 pages by August.
Edit the Second: Coincidentally it's also my 250th post.
Edit the Third: Not so coincidentally this is my third edit of this post.

[Goddangit]

Well i'd forgotten that Blasters even had an indicator bar for Defiance other than the Blaster's health bar, but then i wasn't playing Blasters much during the original Defiance period. During that period the closest i generally came to playing Blasters were my Defenders and their Negligence special ability had no UI indicator.

Edit: First post of page 160. Um, yay? Still, i'm almost embarrassed to admit that i'd doubted this thread would hit 150 pages by August.

My memory is pretty faulty at the best of times, so I'm not surprised I'm foggy about the details.  I made various alts just to look at them, deleted them and went back to my tank.

and with the posts per page I'm set for I show 398 pages.  I hope we have good news before 500. (!)

Still holding out hope for Christmas in the Chalet...

edit: ooh, and I'm at 99 posts.  I will resist the urge to do a gratuitous post to hit 100.  At least not until tomorrow. 

edit redux: and thank you Aggelakis and Nyx for the input!

[NegativeIQ]

I think getting the message out would be the most important part, and advertising the games virtues as well.  It should be advertised that the game actually had a lot of variety in how to actually play it, which was the true beauty of it.  It wasn't a game that severely punished you for not playing one of the three trinity builds and there was no best way to play it.  It should be mentioned that the game does make you feel like the hero and it does so in a good way.  It should be mentioned the game is for the most part a very very balanced game that doesn't punish you for not going a true fotm build all the time.  It's a game that became ahead of it's time.

I completely agree. The more I think about and remember City of Heroes the more it occurs to me how to me how restrictive a lot of other MMOs are. In CoH there were a million different ways to make my character unique. The origin, the skills, obviously the costume customization, how you chose to advance through the game, how you slot your character, what roll they play on a team etc. In CoH the setting and the Universe of the game (which I loved) was given to me. However the character was completely and totally my own and so was the way that I interacted with the CoH Universe. Idk some of you guys might think "yeah dude these are kind of the obvious things" but these are the first things that come to mind concerning what I loved most about the game and in my opinion what CoH did the best.

[Super Firebug]

I'm not even sure what issue it was when I discovered CoH and joined up.  I know there was no CoV and scrappers got an extra bar related to their "blood lust" for want of a better term.  The higher it went the more damage they could do.  I don't think there were any Khelds or possibly they were very new -- I'm not sure.  I guess that must put me about Issue 2 to 4?  Anyone have any notion where that fits in the scheme of things?

If you still have old email backed up somewhere, have you tried looking through it? Thanks to my reluctance to delete anything informational, I was able to go back, and found that my "account activated" message is dated January 18, 2007, which would be between Issues 8 and 9, according to the Issues list on the CoH Wikipedia page.

[Solitaire]

I have literally never heard of this alternate Scrapper inherent you're talking about.

Maybe you're thinking of original Blaster Defiance?? You lost health, which filled up your defiance bar, the lower your health, the higher the bar, the more damage you did?

Happy Birthday Aggelakis

The only inherent power the scrapper had was to make quick work of any mobs in it's way 

[amrobinson]

I chuckled at this.

Quote

Ah, Champions Online. My pity flows out toward thee, you unbeloved runt of the Cryptic family. Ignored, belittled, and criminally underdeveloped, Champions hasn't even received the same quality of free-to-play adaptation that its other family members have. It also hasn't received a player creation content system that the other titles have with the Foundry. Oh, sure, it's been talked about, but considering that the Champs team most likely consists of one part-timer, a cardboard cutout of Leonardo DiCaprio, and a terribly depressed hamster, I wouldn't hold your breath.

Source

Hey! I was never ever part time, so I must have been the depressed hamster.

http://www.amazon.com/Primus-Demon-Organization-Book-Champions/dp/B000ZG7C3W

[Burnt Toast]

You do realize that pvp did NOT affect pve in coH right? The "nerfs" to powers in CoH in pve context were for pve context. In pvp powers behaved differently than they did in pve (and received multiple nerfs themselves).


You could also have multiple builds in CoH. So you could have a pve and a pvp build. CoH already has what you asked for... different rules in pve than pvp. That 30 second hold you have in pve...works for 2 seconds in pve etc etc....


Not sure what your rant was about regarding pvp since none of your rant applies to CoH aside from the part where you got defeated by a stalker. You can't expect to enter into the world of pvp with a pve build (hence multiple builds) and survive for very long. People complain about "only certain builds are good for pvp...." etc etc ... Yeah well not every build can solo an ITF..or a Rikti pylon... Not every build can tank hamidon... not every build can complete the Battle Maiden farm on +4X8 in 20 mins either. So the "uber" build is specific to the goal you are trying to achieve. I would never try to farm a demon farm with an Illusion/Radiation controller and complain that it took me too long.... So I don't understand when someone complains about being defeated in pvp with a mediocre pvp build..or their pve build.

I am probably going to regret posting this however I've had a long-time problem with MMOs (nay games in general & not just software types) when it comes to "balance".  Now, I do understand what the word means & what most developers intend.  It shouldn't be a cake-walk nor should it be something you need to be a "leet" just to squeak by.  I agree (mostly) with that.

<begin rant>

My main "peev" revolves around two issues:  a) PvP & b) the notion that "it isn't real/difficult enough, etc."

PvP:
It seems to me that many times a game gets "balanced" (nerfed, etc.) because PvP players complain that X or Y or whatever isn't fair & then the game is beaten by the nerf bat to "balance" the powers/ATs/etc. for PvP play.  Perhaps that is because they are the only ones who are vocal about something & so perhaps the devs could be led to believe that this is the opinion of the entire player base.  I'm not dev-bashing here.  To me, the PvP crowd seems to be vastly smaller while the PvE crowd seems to be an overwhelming majority.  The PvE folks seem pretty much happy with the ATs & powers that they were originally given & aren't really complaining about them at all yet they later get pancake-slapped with "balances" for the sake of PvP.

Regarding the posts above about the lack of anyone in the PvP zones, that should have been a good clue that the player base of CoX did not find PvP to be something they were interested in.  I really don't care for PvP myself.  My experience of it in CoX was ruined by the original Stalkers.  One-shot kills (then nearly-one-shot kills mixed with a mez followed immediately by a low-powered attack = hospital time). Oh, and griefer groups who nail you right as you come out of the hospital.

I am not advocating against PvP.  I would prefer a game that uses one set of rules/algorithms/etc. for PvE & a different set for PvP.  When you enter PvP, your "PvP build/etc." is loaded & when you enter PvE, the "PvE build/etc." is loaded.  That way, the PvE folks are not contending with things meant to be "balanced" for PvP and vice versa.  I realize that is like building 2 different games.  Well, to me, they are separate.  PvP really IS different than PvE.  They have different goals & objectives.

[parabola]

I can see the point about being careful about marketing the game specifically to female or mature players. However when I think about why I loved the game so much the diversity and maturity of the player base is definitely a major factor. I'm male and not all that old (certainly not all that mature!) but I really enjoyed joining pugs and meeting an interesting mix of people. Also who can forget all the heartwarming stories about how family friendly the game was? I really think this should be part of the message we put out to encourage people to play again.

[TonyV]

Wow, that was a good one - I am a Nemesis plot and never even knew it!

Well played Nemesis, well played.

Someone once accused me of secretly being in the employ of NCsoft and stepping up and posting about Save CoH and everything in a deliberate effort to distract the community and give them some outlet so that they wouldn't show up at the Seattle (or even Seoul) office with torches and pitchforks in hand to do any real damage.

Maybe not a plot of Nemesis proportions, but I was amused at the thought. (And in case you're wondering... No, not even remotely.)

[Everfreefire]

Someone once accused me of secretly being in the employ of NCsoft and stepping up and posting about Save CoH and everything in a deliberate effort to distract the community and give them some outlet so that they wouldn't show up at the Seattle (or even Seoul) office with torches and pitchforks in hand to do any real damage.

Maybe not a plot of Nemesis proportions, but I was amused at the thought. (And in case you're wondering... No, not even remotely.)

That is actually pretty funny.