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Inauro
Village Dweller
Joined: 03 Oct 2005
Posts: 9
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| City of Heroes: Enhancement Diversification @ Official Site |
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<a href="http://www.evilavatar.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6016" target="_blank">Evil Avatar</a> points us in the direction of an official <a href="http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=Dev&Number=3826972&bodyprev=#Post3826972" target="_blank">announcement</a> over at the City of Heroes forums detailing forthcoming changes to the enhancement system.<blockquote><em>This is a new system being implemented into City of Villains and City of Heroes (when City of Villains launches) to promote the use of more different types of Enhancements in powers. Using a system of diminishing returns, when slotting the same type of Enhancement into a power, you will begin to see less effect of that Enhancement when the bonus reaches a certain threshold. The effectiveness of Enhancements you are slotting in can now be seen in the Enhancement Slotting screen.
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<br>What does this mean? Simply, if you are slotting Enhancements and your bonus to a single attribute reaches 70% through Enhancements, you will begin to see a drop in the amount each Enhancement should be giving you. If you exceed 100% bonus, then the drop will be more severe. We have added to the Enhancement Slotting screen a display of how much bonus you are getting from your Enhancements. When you are adding in Enhancements that will be reduced in effectiveness you will be able to tell.</em></blockquote>Cue cries of outrage and nerfing... |
Mon Oct 10, 2005 11:01 am |
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Guest
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| How the Mighty Have Fallen |
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This is the whole concept they are aiming for wrapped up in a nutshell. Enjoy. Cause I'm not.
Even disregarding the fact the Devs have lied to us AGAIN about their intentions. They tried to stealth this in on the CoV boards so that the normal COH crowd wouldn't know. Some very brave souls who risked their NDA tried to warn the populace and they didn't have a choice but to post this on the COH forums too.
This is how it breaks down. Only a small portion of the community of this game even bothers to read the boards. Which means this will strike most players from out of the blue and cause ungodly havoc. I STILL know people who haven't completely compensated from the I5 nerfs because they had NO idea what had been [censored] or how to un[censored] it.
Now this comes in on the heels of the I5 nerfs and were going from bad to insanely worse. This new Enhancement Diversification doesn't not reward players it punishes them for finding optimum builds.
I'm a min/max'r. I admit it. I try and squeeze every last drop of potential out of my toons so that I can be the most effective player I can be. Does that make me a bad person worthy of jeers and personal scorn from the Devs and the community? I like to think not. It most cases in society people are REWARDED and praised for their ingenuity to discover the best way to solve problems and or optimize a system. Here we are actually being punished.
This game has totally changed and in most cases for the worse since it's initial launch. Have their been improvements. Why of course. The Devs have done a wonderful job in many respects to increase the fun and the durability of the game. But I think the blinding factour which has slowly started to decay this game into the typical "Balance is achieved when everyone sucks" mantra is Statesman's ludicrous 3 minions = 1 hero philosphy.
I have talked to friends of mine who have been playing every conceivable MMO out there for over 9 years. People who have seen one great games that were played with great frequency and were tons of fun reduced to a pale shadow of their former glory. They see COH sharply heading down this path. What most people loved about COH and that seperated it from the host of 'other' MMOs was the fact for the first time in a massive multiplayer enviornment you could be a SUPERHERO! Wear a cape and shoot blazing beams of pure energy from your hands. Unsheath a giant sword and fell a giant rock creature with your compatriots close by pouring on their own unique talents to help save the day. Times were good and people were happy.
But along comes Mr. Jack Emmeret with his handheld gameboy and a copy of MegaMan X. He gets the idea that taking 15 min to defeat a boss than shrieking at the top of his lungs in an airplane of his glorious victory is how everyone should play and enjoy. That has got to be the most asinine mentality I have ever heard of. If you place game in front of 10 people and 6 of them enjoy it and praise you for it but 4 politely decline. What do you do? You accept the adjulation you receive from those you have pleased and endevour to create an even more rewarding and fun game. You DON'T proceed to take the game they loved and strip it of all the qualities that attracted them in the first place and hide behind the cloak of "This will make it more fun now". Congratulations you just pissed off the very people that were backing you.
It all boils down to this. BEFORE this terrible idea of Enhancement Diversification people ALWAYS had the option to slot any power the way they wanted. You could play the game the way YOU wanted to. The system in place allowed you to change your character in a plethora of different combinations allowing you to play as well or as bad as you liked. The only limitation was the players imagination. I know plenty of people who don't bother with Hasten or Stamina. I know of many blasters who slot and use ONLY their primary powers and don't even bother with their secondaries. I know some people who (IMO foolishly) over slotted their secondaries and ignored their primaries for a more thematic playing experience. Does this mean they were all wrong. Of course not. But they were playing the way THEY wanted to play based on their personal taste.
Then you have the min/max'ers of the game. That see only potential and weakness in each power and optimize their toon to squeeze all the potential they can from every available power.
The first thing I look at when building a character is. What is the best primary set. To do that I look at each power in the set and analyze what is it's primary function and what are the secondary effects. Baring in mind that most secondary effects in this game a miniscule in nature and don't really impact gameplay that much. After I analyze the primaries I than proceed to scan the secondaries and in my mind mesh what secondary powerset BEST meshes with the primary to create the most potent combinations of attack chains/ hold chains/ buff chains etc.
For armours I slot for Defense or Resistance as the case may warrant.
For attacks I slot for Damage and Accuracy as the case may warrant.
For healing powers I slot for Health and Recharge/Accuracy as the case may warrant.
Because you see in my mind before I slot a power I say to myself "Okay. What is the primary function of this ability? This power I have called Stun. What does it DO more than anything. What is it's purpose. It's to STUN the enemy. So the best course of action is to slot with power with Stun enhancers and accuracy for good measure"
That's how I slot that's how I think. Now does that make my style of gameplay the best. Does it make it the most UBER and 1337. Of course not. This is just ONE path that a player can follow and it doesn't make the other paths any less diverse or thoughtless. I'll be the first to admit that I have picked up quite a few ideas from players on different ways to slot powers or how to enhance them. About 2 issues ago I use to overslot for debuffs for instance. People use to think I was crazy but I liked to play on contingency and tried to make myself self sufficient so if my comrades fell I could survive long enough for them to return and aid me. But friends taught me that there was no sense in over slotting for debuffs. If something is going to kill you that fast that you shouldn't be doing it alone anyway. You SHOULD have back up and shouldn't try and John Wayne it. They were right and I redesigned my character based on their suggestions and I'm very happy with the result.
What does this post mean then in the long run. Simple. The option for diversification in gameplay and character design has always been there for the players. Just many have figured out what the BEST way to slot their character is based on the rules and boundaries set by the GAME itself. It's just the Devs don't like the idea that many HAVE figured out how to slot properly for maximized results. Were getting too big for our boots. Even with the horrific I5 nerfs we are still thriving and having fun. Aak yourselves. After I5 was anyone REALLY complaining that Ice was too powerful. That the group energy blasters was killing to fast? That the empath defender was healing for too much? That having a 5 man team of al scrappers versus the Enjoy of Shadows was just too damn easy? (I've got the debt on that one to prove to you otherwise ) No. Everyone was still reeling and trying to recover from the freight train that was I5. Little did we know their was a B-29 with an atom bomb strapped to it right behind that train.
Do you know what this Enhancement Diversification really does? I'll tell you.
It punishes you for putting in most cases more than 3 of the same type of enhancement in a power. It actually FORCES you to reslot and re-enhance your powers based on THEIR idea of fun not YOURS. (They can hide behind the cloak of 'You can still slot for all damage or all heals. Were not stopping you." But we know better. We know this is just a guise for "But if you do we WILL punish you for it. You WILL have diminished returns and therefore are wasting slots".
By instituting this Enhancement Diversification they also will slow down the leveling and the pace of the game. This buys them time to create new content and gives them further time to ponder on how else they can 'change' the game to make it more 'fun'. It also for those who care strikes ANOTHER blow to powerleveling and makes the DIFFICULT task of doing so nearing almost impossible. But I'm sure this how nothing to do with their decisions.
This will actually promote MORE 'cookie cutter' builds because it will force most players to adopt a uniform slotting and enhancement arrangement in order to do what they can to survive the total gutting of the current incarnation of their character.
No one has considered at least not that I can tell that the Devs have said NOTHING about the enemy powers in the game. Will they also be affected by this 'power crash' as we would be or is their resistances and powers untouched? This will make hard mobs now even HARDER and clearing a map or defeating a AV and extremely long and ardious task.
So what does this all mean. Well I can't speak for others but in my eyes this further makes the game even more difficult and promotes forced grouping. Can you see how soloing will be affected by this? I have a pretty good idea. Will you STILL be able to solo? More than likely. But you've just gone from sloth pace to SNAIL pace and forget about setting it higher than Heroic.
This Enhancement Diversification endevours to just make the game harder and harder and actaully punish it's players for being DIVERSE in a way not APPROVED by the Devs. Oh they want diversity and varitey alright. As long as it's THEIR idea of diversity and variety. Truly astounding.
Dear reader I've been playing this game since Christ was a corporal and while having an absolute fantastic time I've been losing my interest for about 6-7 months now. Why? Lack of content, friends leaving, sick of spandex. Nah. I look forward to logging on EVERY night. When I'm at work I run scenarios through my head 'What are we doing tonight. What fun can we get into. Maybe do the Eden Trial. Maybe head to monkey island and get that badge I keep putting off. Maybe do a all controller team in the positron TF.' The list was endless and fun was ALWAYS sure to follow. But what I and my friends as well as MANY of the forum goers have come to realize is that the game we have loved so much is slowly changing into a whole different beast. A burden and a continual uphill battle that while instead of expanding it's content and broadening it's options is actually seeking to bottle neck it's customers and coerce them into decisions and course of action.
It was another forum goer who said it best when they said:
It probably depends on your definition of "diversity" here. Is diversity when you make more things available, without losing the option of your original choice? Or is it when you remove the original choice as an option, and essentially force people to choose other things?
Truer words were never spoken. This totally sums up the new cross they are asking us to bear. Frankly I'm sick of it. The Devs have actually made it that I no logner want to log in anymore because my character keeps getting weaker and weaker until they are no longer recognizable. Does this mean I'm 'quitting'. My departure is contingent on the Devs and their flexibility. If they institute this new form of punishment then yes I'm gone. Why? Because I refuse to have to keep redisigning my characters every issue and between to try and repair the damage that the Devs seem fit to thrust upon us. But the biggest reason why I would leave. Is the duplicity of the Devs and in particular Statesman. I'm just so tired of his contridicting statements that I think he should be the Incarnate of Janus. The god with two faces. He doesn't know what one mouth is saying from the other.
We get "Done with the nerfs in I5 that should be it for now" Then about a month later we get "Oh wait. Still not done yet. Heres another one"
One thing I do applaud the Devs on with this Enhancement Diversification is it's an across the board nerf. No single AT can cry wolf on this one. The Regens, the Stone, the Ice, the everything is affected. I've heard from friends that "Oh my guy won't be affected by this". The answer is. Yeah he will. Because of one simple reason. Enhancements are the the foundation on which all AT's are laid. The heart and soul of every toon is the enhancement process and how it impacts on their toon development. This nerf fundamentaliy changes the entire structure of the game on a massive scale. The I5 Def nerf was situational because there are several AT's and powersets that do and don't benefit from Defense in either direction so other's were hit harder on different terms. This however completely changes resistances, defense, damage output, recharge times, endurance recovery, team make up, enemy strategy. It's almost an entire retconing of the basic underlining principles of the game. Truly monumentality impacting and will echo through every AT and every powerset if it goes live. Time will tell. But my money is on the Devs going through it. We'll see and I suppose so will I.
All the Issue 4 and 5 balance adjustments were done with this system in place internally here at Cryptic. All playtests, QA checks, difficulty adjustments and balances have been done with Enhancement Diversification in mind since March 2005.
I don't btw believe this for one second. Let's take a look at this angle by angle.
Issue 5: Forest of Dread
Powers - Global Defense Decrease
In order to facilitate a more balanced game for the higher level characters (Level 25 and up), the defensive abilities of several powersets has been adjusted so that they are more in line with one another. Lieutenant, Boss, and Elite Boss villains have had their To Hit values reduced accordingly to work with these defensive changes.
* Reduced all Archetypes’ base ability with Damage Resistance and Defense powers.
* Reduced Defense rating of Force Field powers (Deflection Shield, Insulation Shield and Dispersion Bubble).
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Concealment/Stealth. Defense bonus suppresses if you attack.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Flight/Hover (and Kheldian Combat Flight).
* Reduced Damage Resistance bonus from Pool/Fighting/Tough. Increased its Endurance Cost.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Fighting/Weave. Increased its Endurance Cost.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Leadership/Maneuvers.
* Reduced Defense bonus from Pool/Leaping/Combat Jumping.
* Increased the Recharge Time and Decreased the duration of Pool/Presence/Invoke Panic.
* Pool/Speed/Hasten no longer buffs Defense.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Frozen Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Wet Ice Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Glacial Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Ice Armor/Energy Absorption Defense Bonus and set its max number of affected targets to 14. Added an Endurance Buff to the Caster for each affected target.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Temporary Invulnerability Damage resistance bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Physical Damage resistance bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Elements Damage resistance bonus. Added resistance to Toxic.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Resist Energies Damage resistance bonus.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Unyielding Damage resistance bonus. Increased its Defense debuff.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Invincibility Defense and Accuracy bonus. Increased its max number of affected targets to 14.
* Reduced Invulnerability/Tough Hide Defense bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Rock Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Brimstone Armor Damage Resistance.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Crystal Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Stone Armor/Mineral Armor Defense Bonus.
* Reduced Dark Armor/Cloak of Darkness Defense bonus.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Focused Fighting Defense buff.
* Reduced Super Reflexes/Focused Senses Defense buff.
* Reduced Dark Miasma/Shadow Fall defense bonus.
* Reduced Storm Summoning/Steamy Mist Defense Bonus.
* Set some of Illusion Control/Superior Invisibility Defense bonus to suppress if you attack. Reduced its overall Defense bonus.
* Reduced defense bonus of Illusion Control/Group Invisibility.
* Increased Ancillary Pool/Force Mastery/Force of Nature recharge time.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Psionic Mastery/Mind Over Body damage resistance.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Electric Mastery/Charged Armor damage resistance.
* Reduced Ancillary Pool/Munitions Mastery/Body Armor damage resistance.
* Reduced Umbral Aura/Absorption damage resistance.
* Reduced Umbral Aura/Shadow Cloak Defense bonus.
* Reduced Luminous Aura/Incandescence damage resistance.
* Reduced Defense and Damage Resistance values of defensive Temporary Powers appropriately based on above changes.
So you mean to tell me with all these nerfs to the current powersets which requires additional slotting to compensate in such cases that additional slotting is possible this ED system was taken into account? So what your saying is just for layman's terms. (with random numbers)
I have 90% DEF with 24 slots invested.
I am nerfed so that to attain that 90% I now have to devote 32 slots.
1 month later in ADDITION to the nerf I am now nerfed AGAIN so that those 32 slots which help me attain that 90% is
actually detremental to my character and slotting to do so
is actually counterproductive. Therefore I can no longer
reach that 90% in any way shape or form because the enhancements which are the foundation for the accumaltion of Defense has been penalized.
I hope that makes sense to you because it makes sense to me. When boiled down. One nerf to create balance is then preceeded by yet another nerf to further reduce the already cut powers. Your saying that when you tested this on your servers for 7 months you were playing with both nerfs firmly in place and you found absolutely no change in playstyle or strategy. That leveling wasn't affected in anyway? That you could still do without respecing the same amount of damage/killing/team synergy that you previously did. If you say yes then your a damn liar.
Statesman specificaly told us that mob Acc was being decreased and XP was being boosted to compensate for the ADMITTED nerfs to all the AT's and powersets because they felt it only fair. Your saying in addition to that nerf to which a boost was granted you have another set of nerfs riding shotgun that was always meant to be implemented and your just NOW revealing this. Lovely. I was wrong. Their reputation is not that of France. It's about as good as Saddam, Hitler, Mussolini, and the Boston Strangler at a humanitarian award. |
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Mon Oct 10, 2005 11:04 am |
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LordBronco
Guest
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Well, just wanted to chime in...
You are correct, these nerfs are so arrogant and supercillous as to be like a Divine Comedy.
My more succinct review appears on Gamespot, but it basically says that the proposed nerfs takes an already tedious playing experience and amps up the levels of tedium.
My God, man, I played the game for two months 8 hours a day...and now it would take, ohh 4-8 months. And it *forces* you to *team* more, thus experiencing the repetitive *missions*-ALL FIVE MAPS OF THEM... 
Thanks for your post 
Bump!
Lord Bronco |
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Sun Oct 16, 2005 9:44 am |
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adamskydancer
Village Dweller
Joined: 13 Oct 2005
Posts: 20
Location: FUZHOU |
Well, just chime in too...
Those professional point of view reaching in a deep level of the whole game designing. I appriciate all the efforts you've made. But just an advise.. if you can break all the points into simple peaces..and shall to all player..so that the player could understand and give you some more advice.
of Course, only if you have time.
_________________
Do you wanna play drift?
I'll teach you .......if I can.
HAHA |
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Tue Oct 18, 2005 6:10 am |
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