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Please 4 the love of this games PvE, Increase the difficulty!
honestresearcher
Posts: 657 Arc User
Iv talked about this before but ill simply add to it to improve my point:
Even since launch we have been able to breeze through content and use a single power to 1-shot entire mobs, such has always been the case that normal enemies are absolutely pointless except for Vibora Bay mobs that drop costume pieces. This has lead people to believe that we are doing too much DPS, which is not the case as you may see in PvP Dueling, people are having pretty lengthy fights (apart from obviously the stealth passive of death which breaks the game) and are able to survive quite a beating even if theyre being hit with over 3K dps they can still stay alive for quite some time with no specific healer assisting them.
The only threatening (non-boss) mob in the game to someone who knows how to play is a Viper 'Brickbuster'. Because of its special ability to neutralise all of your defenses with a Debuff attack.
This is one of the big things that needs to improve in CO....Status changes are there because they are supposed to be threatening...a bleed that does 1 damage per tick is NOT threatening, and too many other status changes in the game are absolutely pointless to the extent that they shouldnt even bother applying.
To actually make things an actual battle, i do believe players powers do NOT need to be nerfed but, enemies need simply more health:
100% Enemy HP Normal mode
+1000% Enemy HP +50% Damage Very Hard mode
+3000% Enemy HP +100% Damage Elite mode
didnt mention Difficult or Hard because those difficulties are, and always have been pointless, and never used.
Enemies are not alive long enough to make attacks.
A single person who knows how to play decent can survive a LOT of beating (some can even shrug off 5k DPS like it is nothing), as well as heal themselves very good, AND players can easily these days accomplish over 4k DPS, able to solo Elite 5 man content (which isnt that hard these days to do...unfortunately)
So for example in Elite mode using the above health boosts, a normal 1000 HP mob would have 30,000 Hp (taking 1 person 7.5 seconds of 4k dps to kill) and a 15,000 HP Mastervillain would have 450,000 HP (should take a full team approx 40 seconds). Maybe then the team would have something that doesnt just die near enough instantly, AND the enemy might actually be alive long enough to become theatening to players!
THIS would make the fight more interesting. Teams would actually enjoy a battle and maybe have to strategise more, not a steam-roll which is all we do these days is steam-roll the content and never feel like replaying it, because its not fun or challenging.
More HP means more time an enemy has to attack you, so rather someone blazing 5 man content on their own, 5 people would actually be a wiser choice, which means people would be teaming up and running content as it was made to be done, not on your own!
i WANT to team up with my friends! but they and i both know and ask the same thing....why currently, should i bring a second person? they arent needed because of the easy difficulty which me personally, blame on lack of enemy HP.
Imagine you have a Supertank running CON Pre/Int who does this:
Defiance
IDF (rank 3)
Sigils of Weakness (rank 3)
Ebon Void Shield (Rank 3 + Extra rank)
Any Challenging Strikes power
Bite (for bleeds)
Devour Essence (Phlabotomist + Crippling Challenge)
Resurgent Reiki (dodge gear)
Conviction (rank 3)
...and just like that you have an unkillable PvE character that can do anything in the game ON ITS OWN.
That's making it super easy on yourself, theres plenty of builds that can do more damage than this at the same time.
lets drag it out even more and say you DO grab a teammate who happens to be a healer and sports Aura of Radiant Protection....PvE is made a fool out of, nothing able to scratch you because it's too weak.
Solo, i (and a lot of you!) can kill Vikorin in about 3 Minutes (and i bet you could do it faster than that)
isnt he supposed to need a full team? cmon!
Stop joking around with players and give them a challenge. This is one of the big reasons people are leaving. besides a lack of content there is NO willingness to replay content due its lack of challenge creating a boredom effect.
Why do something if its too easy?
Why team up if if its too easy?
Why bother if its too easy....
Even since launch we have been able to breeze through content and use a single power to 1-shot entire mobs, such has always been the case that normal enemies are absolutely pointless except for Vibora Bay mobs that drop costume pieces. This has lead people to believe that we are doing too much DPS, which is not the case as you may see in PvP Dueling, people are having pretty lengthy fights (apart from obviously the stealth passive of death which breaks the game) and are able to survive quite a beating even if theyre being hit with over 3K dps they can still stay alive for quite some time with no specific healer assisting them.
The only threatening (non-boss) mob in the game to someone who knows how to play is a Viper 'Brickbuster'. Because of its special ability to neutralise all of your defenses with a Debuff attack.
This is one of the big things that needs to improve in CO....Status changes are there because they are supposed to be threatening...a bleed that does 1 damage per tick is NOT threatening, and too many other status changes in the game are absolutely pointless to the extent that they shouldnt even bother applying.
To actually make things an actual battle, i do believe players powers do NOT need to be nerfed but, enemies need simply more health:
100% Enemy HP Normal mode
+1000% Enemy HP +50% Damage Very Hard mode
+3000% Enemy HP +100% Damage Elite mode
didnt mention Difficult or Hard because those difficulties are, and always have been pointless, and never used.
Enemies are not alive long enough to make attacks.
A single person who knows how to play decent can survive a LOT of beating (some can even shrug off 5k DPS like it is nothing), as well as heal themselves very good, AND players can easily these days accomplish over 4k DPS, able to solo Elite 5 man content (which isnt that hard these days to do...unfortunately)
So for example in Elite mode using the above health boosts, a normal 1000 HP mob would have 30,000 Hp (taking 1 person 7.5 seconds of 4k dps to kill) and a 15,000 HP Mastervillain would have 450,000 HP (should take a full team approx 40 seconds). Maybe then the team would have something that doesnt just die near enough instantly, AND the enemy might actually be alive long enough to become theatening to players!
THIS would make the fight more interesting. Teams would actually enjoy a battle and maybe have to strategise more, not a steam-roll which is all we do these days is steam-roll the content and never feel like replaying it, because its not fun or challenging.
More HP means more time an enemy has to attack you, so rather someone blazing 5 man content on their own, 5 people would actually be a wiser choice, which means people would be teaming up and running content as it was made to be done, not on your own!
i WANT to team up with my friends! but they and i both know and ask the same thing....why currently, should i bring a second person? they arent needed because of the easy difficulty which me personally, blame on lack of enemy HP.
Imagine you have a Supertank running CON Pre/Int who does this:
Defiance
IDF (rank 3)
Sigils of Weakness (rank 3)
Ebon Void Shield (Rank 3 + Extra rank)
Any Challenging Strikes power
Bite (for bleeds)
Devour Essence (Phlabotomist + Crippling Challenge)
Resurgent Reiki (dodge gear)
Conviction (rank 3)
...and just like that you have an unkillable PvE character that can do anything in the game ON ITS OWN.
That's making it super easy on yourself, theres plenty of builds that can do more damage than this at the same time.
lets drag it out even more and say you DO grab a teammate who happens to be a healer and sports Aura of Radiant Protection....PvE is made a fool out of, nothing able to scratch you because it's too weak.
Solo, i (and a lot of you!) can kill Vikorin in about 3 Minutes (and i bet you could do it faster than that)
isnt he supposed to need a full team? cmon!
Stop joking around with players and give them a challenge. This is one of the big reasons people are leaving. besides a lack of content there is NO willingness to replay content due its lack of challenge creating a boredom effect.
Why do something if its too easy?
Why team up if if its too easy?
Why bother if its too easy....
Post edited by honestresearcher on
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The reason PvP fights can last so long is because everyone and their mother in this game can self-heal to full HP in a matter of seconds. We DO have too much DPS in this game, and too much heals as well, and too much mitigation. We have too much of EVERYTHING, which leads to a cycle of dependency where we need to have more, and More and MORE because the only way to overcome ridiculous numbers is to have even more ridiculous numbers, so it never ends.
That's the reason we have Gravitar and her ridiculous one shooting balls of doom--only way to kill a toon in this game is to have an even more ridiculous adversaries that can one shot them. Otherwise they heal themselves back to full health in seconds and its like nothing ever happen. But of course, then you have your ubber tanks that can take even Gravitars ubber balls of death, and its back to the endless cycle of numbers again. You either have too much or not enough, there's no middle ground. That's what excessive numbers bring into the game.
I agree that difficulty in this game is negligible but I'm not sure throwing more numbers to it is the answer. Everything needs to be toned tha hell down.
That wasnt a good time for co..
Gravitar, Teliosaurus, Qwijibo, and Kigatiliks 4 Frost Hounds being of only a few good examples of any kind of challenge, is a terrible excuse to say for the whole game we already have a challenge...
Wait? Whaaaa..?
This ^ Cant really add much to this it says all that needs to be said.
Also some people like being able to do elite solo. Some people dont want to team.
And before people start BLAH BLAH BLAH thinking I am a fan of soloing...I aint ask any of secret or the forumites I run teams with them all the freaking time. BUT I respect the fact people like steamrolling stuff solo it makes them feel like Superman..and isnt that the point of this game?
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
Normal mode, or Very hard if youre group is good.
Freeformers are bored mostly because of Archetypes complaining in the wrong territory. By all means try to convince me otherwise but shouldnt Elite mode cater towards a 5 man team of Freeform and Normal cater towards a 5 man team of Archetype or casual players?
Not if they nerf heals. Then eventually someone's gonna have to die. All I'm saying is that throwing numbers at it becames a vicious circle where enemies eventally have to do ubber, Gravitar balls of death damage just to kill a PC cuz eventally that becomes the only way to kill them. Which is where we're at now.
Elite mode should cater to the lowest common denominator cuz that's what the meaning of the word "elite" has always been about.
/Sarc
You should be able to chew your way through minions but a mixed group can sometimes present a challenge. Essentially the texture is correct.
I'm currently more concerned about the Research side of the game, which seems to be all over the place.
A Prootwaddle is one of the weirder player-character races in "The Fantasy Trip", Steve Jackson's first published role-playing game.
Only easy for Gold these days.................................
Weak this, weak that. OP this, OP that................. I think I heard enough of this............
Let make things clear to make sure that extra health is okay and some of the players conditions
1. Not all people is free to wait for teammates, and plus picky on what they wants (Usually rush on things)
2. Few is ragers, blame this and that on their team then rage quit (But end up the opposite for their teammates)
3. One mistake can lead to fail, as long as the players have fun everything is fine (Right?)
4. People have different mind, so some like your suggestion and some don't (found this problem a lot)
5. Freedom to solo something is everything for light mind players or some people that need encourage (Most game require mostly on team so no freedom there)
Well that some info I got but back to my thought. I like the idea of mobs health increase or anything just not the wrong mobs. Since some mobs will be insanely OP if people don't took them down quickly and I don't want to see an other mistake for a good game to be left out because of small problem.
So it's going to be a while until these kind of idea is settle
make a demo_record movie of "blazing through five man content solo".
Then come back and erase your whole OP and admit that you are full of guano.
Try not playing like a chump, grows some balls, take on a whole room at a time
for a change, instead of one meager mob at once.
Try removing your leveled gear and using something less Mary Sue.
I'm running around at level 30+ with my level 14 items still on, game is plenty
challenging, I'm bleeding everywhere.
You want the game to be harder for you, then you have to take action and make it more difficult yourself.
Is that too hard?
It kinda feels like that's what you want. Gotta say, I disagree. Difficulty =/= enemies hitting harder and being more durable. Difficulty = smarter enemies who can pile on debuffs to bring a hero down. There's a reason people hate Brickbusters, and if every enemy group started tossing out debuffs that would eventually bring a hero to their knees in a longer fight then there'd be some proper challenge.
Say, if a Brickbuster shot someone with their Brickbuster Gun and a Squad Leader started a charge 'attack' that gives 10,000 threat to the person just shot by the Brickbuster and every other Soldier in the group shoots the weakened hero. This gives the hero who was shot time to block or run, and this gives the hero's allies a chance to bring up defenses for said hero, kill the Squad Leader before he directs the lethal assault, or attempt to grab aggro back.
Manimals coating their weapons in dehabilitating, slow-acting poison that stacks to make affected targets slower and weaker that can be healed off by any typical not-self heal (or it'll wear off on its own) and give Manimal Master Villains and above a way to 'rupture' the poison stacks for a massive debuff. Use a stim device or get healed by a healer or wait the debuff out to cure the poison. (because adding in powers JUST to cure poison would be a huge pain)
ARGENT soldiers timing their taser strikes and gas bombs to completely drain a hero of energy. Countered by blocking or just having great energy management.
Hunter Patriots gaining an 'expose weakness' debuff that wears down defenses that every Hunter Patriot in the group can take advantage of due to the telepathic link they share. However, every time you down a Hunter Patriot they feel empathic pain and lose focus, taking off a few stacks of 'expose weakness.'
And so on and so forth. These debuffs should only apply in Elite (or Very Hard and above) instances and makes mobs more challenging while giving a good counter to each.
I also feel that the game's difficulty could be ramped up significantly if everyone could revive fallen players and res powers went the way of the dodo. Every time a player resses you, you lose a star, and when you're out of stars you can still be picked up but you'll have a two minute 'res sickness' debuff that just makes you about 25% weaker.
I would very much like to see some more challenging end-game type content. Whenever they add something harder like Gravitar or Warlord, there is a surprising amount of whining about it being too hard. Can't please everyone.
"Without data, you're just another person with an opinion." -- W. Edwards Deming
Im going to put my actions where my mouth is, and show you like a man. (like i have to everytime to prove people, especially fanboys wrong)
I can do that easy WITHOUT A TEAM REQUIRED, and here...heres a video of me walking through not 1, but all rooms AT ONCE of a 5-man instance in Elite.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WhtV32AdWA
It is such a joke...every enemy takes a go at me, nothing happens. They are so NOT A THREAT IN ANY SINGLE WAY that i dont even need to fight anything.
This build btw, is simple, no matter how much you throw nerfs at players, the problem exists because enemies dont do jack to you, theyre as dangerous as friendly critters.
How many videos does it take to convince you? I dont care they'll keep coming.
if you dont want higher difficulty and want to plow through mobs like pieces of paper then STAY IN NORMAL MODE AND QUIT DRAGGING THIS GAME INTO THE GRAVE just so you can feel good about being in elite mode...
I noticed that you did get down pretty low on HP when you stopped blocking to destroy the power generator thingies. Just imagine what a nightmare it'd be if an enemy tossed a block-breaker your way... ;D
I don't see enemies having more health being the proper step forward. It could just make fights unnecessarily longer hence draggy if player builds are already excelling in survivability and damage output.
Yeah just imagine, i might actually have to get Conviction or Masterful Dodge with Resurgent Reiki...oh no!
Dude ill do it without blocking just as easy, i aint making a video of that cos its just a plain waste of my time.
Fact is, i prooved i was right, and that enemies are too weak, not that players need a nerf.
You are right, they SHOULD get crippling! That'd make it more interesting. but they need more. They need MUCH more! Im just 1 character, these enemies need to face 5! Thats why im calling for DRASTIC increases in elite mode.
Another idea I floated a while back on PTS was mobs that spawn behind the player(s) in "cleared" areas and then home in on em from perhaps unexpected directions. Something to make em keep an eye on their six.
Snakebitewildlife (a long time ago) proposed equipping enemies other than henchmen with passives. It would surely make a difference. Some with better attacks and some harder to kill.
Just a thought but...
Devour Essence is a f**king crutch for poor players who can't hack it without their precious get better attack blah blah I can do lev 30 content at lev 11. Walk the walk without your crutch. Hell nuke the whole of Supernatural Infernal...
Sigh a little unkind and yes it's eminently possible to solo elite 5 man content without it but I do dislike that power intensely. While there are a few that is a few very dark superhero types I have never read a comic that featured this capability in the main character.
Currently venting steam.
Cheez just saw vid... Soooo go thru content without actually fighting the enemy. Well why bother playing? No sense of grandeur, no overcoming tremendous odds oh let's just speed run thru anything that might lay me out if i stopped to tussle with em.
WTF is the point of making enemies harder if you're just gonna go past em?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The one who can't shut up formerly known as 4rksakes
About the @handle - it's a long story.
Profound quote.. "I'm not a complete idiot - several parts are missing."
Yeah i understand on DE, it was actually just a rush build whilst i was farming for the device, i could have used Ego Weaponry or tonnes of other things, i dont favor the thing myself.
Yeah passives left and right on enemies would definitely help, but that'd probably be only concerning to 1 player, the game needs to cope with 5.
Then give them 5 passives!!!111!!!!!
...sorry.
The Doctor on the PDB
Fahrenheit on the PDB
The OP's video did not prove anything except that CO has a freeform system, in which players can build characters that layer defenses, heals and buffs. Block-flying through an instance and not fighting back is not "taking mobs on."
The freeform system is the source of the issue. Mobs are plenty effective if you don't do that layering. Eliminate freeform and the game will be plenty hard, especially on Elite. But wait, people who have freeform will hate that idea. Almost as much as I hate the idea of giving mobs 10-30 times the health.
There have been several ideas in this thread that might actually work, but just adding numbers is not one of them.
I been a long time leaving but I'm going to be a long time gone.
Willie Nelson
T.U.F.K.A.S. (the user formerly known as Scarlyng)
Wrong on the CO forums since November, 2008
That does reek of telling people to play how YOU want them to play. I am all for an extra difficulty level. Im not for telling people "yew thar yew like easy games stay offa mah lawn!". Seriously this thread comes across as you telling casual players to go away and never come back.
CO is a casual mmo it will never be to hard for a very simple reason.
Its a Superhero game. A lot of 12 year old children will want to play it. Hard games make children cry and break stuff ( I'ma parent I know this $h!t to be true ). Hench CO will never be a hard game.
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
Default difficulty is Normal, im not telling Casual players to leave im telling them to quit asking for nerfs to difficulty and player power which diminish the freeform experience and make experienced players....quit.
Ok here's the current pattern:
New player makes a character in Silver, and cant seem to beat a 5man instance alone....SO!..new player finds a team OR:
new player becomes gold or buys a freeform character.
new player slowly finds out more about synergies and starts to work on his/her own builds.
New player becomes a more experienced builder.
The player starts to see how easy everything has become.
The player loses interest and quits.
When new people become experienced in freeform, they too start seeing the easy difficulty, and its their turn to walk out the door.
The game caters to new players and silvers quite well, but when people pay for gold or a freeform slot, that money has only weakened their experience....where is the next stage of challenge? Its not there and it should be! Freeform groups have been waiting for years.
Dude look in zone enough players find the early Kevin Poe mish a problem and you want to make it harder for them.
And people call me a villain XD
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
This is a MMO not a single player XP , people are subscribing or paying for Z points or more!
I strongly agree. Also enemies that are capable one-hit-kills through a block are a bit much.
Yes... That's only one way and not the one I would put first. The first way to make better difficulty is better AI. AI that behaves like a team of players would.
Most foes in this game charge at you and that's pretty much it.
A smarter AI would do this:
So? So what? This proves nothing useful.
Furthermore, you're distracting from the issue that you're making a bad suggestion to increase difficulty. More HP doesn't make challenge. More damage does necessarily make for more difficulty either.
It's all in the AI, and how the enemies "work as team". Currently the foes in this game play like they have an IQ of 10. And the only faction I've seen make use of healers are the Elder Worms, and it's pitifully weak at that.
Wiping out large numbers of foes feels a bit more epic too. Also would give better chances of getting drops because of quantity. One of the largest swarms I can think of in the game is the last phase of the last battle between you and your nemesis in the Volcanic Lair on Monster Island (phase 2 of Death Ray Demolition).
Finally, to everyone. The problem with Elite is that loot isn't increased to make it worth doing. Mod drop chances aren't increased. Costume drop chances aren't increased (in fact they've been GREATLY reduced as of late). And the bonus resources on Elite is so tiny as to be hardly noticeable (oooh 41 resources instead of 35! Really? That's it?)
Epic Challenges, Epic Rewards.
Everybody should be able to play the game for fun, and if it errors on the side of being too easy that's probably fitting for a "superheroes" game.
However, Elite mode should provide a REAL challenge.
I feel to do that, you need this:
Elite mode should be designed a bit more with thinking of it as having one or two freeforms on the team, and designed for teamplay. Encourage teamplay. Encourage build diversity.
Normal mode should be a cake walk.
Elite mode USED TO have better drop chances, they removed that (with a few specific exceptions that don't even matter) on account of all the people complaining on the forums that it was "unfair" that Elite had better drop chances. If you ask me that was a mistake.
But the suggestions in the opening post are even worse, and would make the game unfun for most people in the game. We DO NOT want this to happen. Fun is more important.
You're not the one to make the sacrifice play. Yes it's a MMO, but your problem is more that the game doesn't encourage teamplay (in fact it discourages it often with things like the annoying messages from Lockboxes and having to split up the loot). You're kind of missing the point, and just pumping up all foes with more HP, damage resist, and/or damage is going to create problems and kill the fun for a number of people.
Improved AI, give a bonus for playing on the hardest difficulty with a full team, and fix some of the bugs like the lockbox messages on Need or Greed that actually, actively discourage teamplay.
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
a time soloing through my missions. I wish they had some
auto-team ups for general missions so I wouldn't have to solo
everything however. CO needs to steal the good features from
CoX at this point.
And be like CoX?
That sure worked didnt it. Where is CoX btw?
That was uncalled for. While I also ocassionally roll my eyes at the refugees who have 'new and intelligent' suggestions to make CO better, which have been made a 1000 times already, they dont know that.
The Doctor on the PDB
Fahrenheit on the PDB
This just makes fights longer not harder. I think take a lesson from STO. The hardest enemies in the game don't have scaled up hit points, they have more dangerous powers. And I'm not talking borg adaptation here, I mean things like the borg's domination/assimilation that turns you against your allies (not just confuse that swaps ally/enemy flags you actually lose control of your character), defense turrets that require multiple players acting in unison to overcome with summoned barriers that are immune to damage so you have to keep maneuvering to even be able to attack it.
Breen with their transphasic attacks that penetrate shields (ignores dodge/avoid/defense in CO terms) for a percentage of the hit (in some case up to 80% like being ground zero when an enemy ship explodes, but mostly in the 20% range). Power Drains, slows and holds.
They also did a neat balancing act with slows and holds where you have short-term powers (equivalent of active defenses/offenses) that make you resistant but not in a binary on/off way like CO does. A hold is just a really strong slow. Getting out isn't a matter of bashing Z over and over. If you're fast enough a weak slow might not register at all, or if you only are hit by one, pop an active defense and you can turn to fight them. It makes controls useful (and dangerous when the enemy has them) and makes positioning important.
Harder fights happen when the enemy has dangerous tools.
Grindy non-fun fights happen when the enemy has more hit points.
Lame one-shot fests happen when the enemy hits harder.
Longer than 1 shotting...hmmm...sounds good!
Rather fight something, than ya know, NOT fight it, isnt that what heroes do?
Oh goodie, I can pull this image out of storage again:
The first version of the Keyes trial
The Underground trial
The MoM trial
The decision to take away Emp merits from BAF and Lambda
You have no clue what you're talking about.
EDIT: Forgot the biggie: Enhancement Diversification
This is a mmo and it can be a single player experience if said players wishes it so.
AND WHY THE HELL AM I ARGUING WITH HAL 9000! .... I'va had enough of yew ima phoning mah pal Dave.
Dave its gone all dark grim Dave..DAVE XD
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
you know if you asked me 4 months ago for a increase in diff. id say no. however today. yes today is a much different day. we need to increase the overall difficulity by 25%.
No thanks, I'm gonna have to thumbs down this one for the same reasons I thumbs downed the last one. Actually, more, because inflated numbers don't make things more interesting, at least some of the previous hairbrained threads on this topic focused on other more dynamic ways to increase difficulty, as foolish as faith in such a thing being possible is.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
- David Brin, "Those Eyes"
Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
What is with this hate of the old Tele farmers? Which includes me... Most of us are gone but the few that are left or the fewer that pop in-game from time to time are not ****-holes. The OP is my friend and I don't l know what the hell you problem was with us, but you have to agree that we(this includes you too because you are a really good player as well) need Awesome Insanity Difficulty to challenge us. The way to go about this is uber debatable, but that you bring this one sided beef over the old tele mones, or whatever we did to you, should not come into play.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
This was awesome while it lasted
_______________________________________________
However, whenever I see ideas like "Oh, lets raise the mobs hit points by 5000%" I sort of feel like the individual making that suggestion is missing the point. Buffing mob hit points and damage merely requires you to build a build that can handle those higher numbers. This doesn't really make the game more fun, it just limits your build options, which is not only something I don't like the idea of, but also runs counter to the whole point of the games freeform system. Also, the other effect it has is reinforcing the tank/dps/heal mechanic, which I think is just about the last thing this game needs more of.
Difficulty means mechanics that require you to react, plan ahead, change tactics on the fly, pay attention to your surroundings. To sum up, difficulty means making the fights more active, and less about standing there spamming your powers. I want fights to be more interesting, more engaging. If I succeed in the encounter, I want to feel like I succeeded because of the actions I took, not because of the build that I joined with.
I know that some people enjoy the "stand'n'spam" style of play, lord knows that those people are supporting the majority of the F2PMMO market, but I have to imagine that people playing a super hero game want some super heroic action at least once in a while.
I think a very telling aspect of what's wrong with the current design of encounters in regards to difficulty is that I can have a lot more fun fighting the "trash mobs" than I can fighting the boss. With the trash, I can pull crazy amounts and use knocks and stuns on them, position myself to use tunnel aoes on them, etc... But once we get to the boss, none of that stuff works or has any meaning anymore, and it's time for stand'n'spam.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
Agreed.
Adding health to mobs makes a fight more tedious, not more difficult.
A big part of the problem the OP is attempting to address is not the difficulty of the game but rather the genre and how the game approaches encounters.
A superhero SHOULD be able to mo w through groups of mooks, henchmen, whatever you wish to call them. What should challenge solo heroes are named supervillains (in the genre context of the word, not the CO specific meaning). What should challenge groups of heroes are groups of villains, or master villains (again the genre meaning of the word, not the CO specific).
Making generic goons harder to defeat would ruin the game's adherence to genre. Introducing more Villains and the like would be the better approach IMO.
Very well said.
'Caine, miss you bud. Fly high.
PS: And I actually consider myself to be a "casual" player, but not as much as the uber casuals that have take over CO.
EDIT: Also, I agree with everything that has been said about how mobs need to be smarter and have more options in terms of what kinds of abilities they have (including heals, blocks, buffs/de-buffs and crippling challenge) rather than just ever increasing amounts of health and damage output. And would like to see more variety of mobs like in CoX (yeah, I'm joining the expatriate CoXers in bringing up CoX as well :P), where they had a good mix of tank mobs, DPS mobs, healing mobs, support mobs, etc.
I agree with Smoo. @jonsills; yep, Mayans are right.
Seriously, though, the last paragraph epitomizes what is wrong with not just CO, but most of the MMO genre, boss fights in which damage, taunt and heal are the only things that work.
I been a long time leaving but I'm going to be a long time gone.
Willie Nelson
T.U.F.K.A.S. (the user formerly known as Scarlyng)
Wrong on the CO forums since November, 2008
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
This was awesome while it lasted
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But what is he researching? I think I have the answer! This would explain why we have lockboxes ...its all the OP's fault :O
Seriously I do laugh at people saying easy game = DOOOOOM!
Nepht and Dr Deflecto on primus
They all thought I was out of the game....But I'm holding all the lockboxes now..
I'll......FOAM FINGER YOUR BACK!
I understand that the game caters to casual gamers now, but the difficulty switch is there for a reason. What I want is as the OP suggests, is to make the top end difficulties actually difficult. Granted I have no idea how easy/hard that would be for the nonexistent phantom DEVs to implement, but there should be no change on normal difficulty for the sake of ATs/casual gamers. All free forms/ATs can take advantage of block running, it is a way to not die while farming for something at the end of the lair not a play-style.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
This was awesome while it lasted
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Okay, let's increase the difficulty. So we'll add a Super-Elite difficulty setting. But more difficulty means better loot, right? And then the OP of this thread comes back a month later complaining about the game's PvE. To save the PvE, make it harder! The game will fail! Okay, so the devs add Super-Ultra-Elite. And with the new difficulty, there has to be new loot!
A year down the line, we're now at Super-Ultra-Mega-Teddy-Bear-Osmosis-Cosmosis-Neo-Elite-Supercool-Shades-Wearing-X. New loot is added! The OP comes back to tell us that the game is still too easy. And so the cycle continues. Each added difficulty level pleases only a tiny, tiny minority and completely alienates the casuals who tend to be CO's bread-and-butter, especially in free to play with the rotating door policy. (Casuals can be replaced with more casuals.)
And then Champions Online gets shut down! It goes the same way as City of Heroes. Ther primary demographic were alienated just to please people who can't realise that the game would be difficult enough if they'd just stop using their broken builds and super sweet purple items.
Really: Make your own difficulty!
It's not that hard! Gimp yourself, pick weird powers, go for a fun character who isn't min-maxed. Use less good items, like yellows, greens, or even whites! The fact of the matter is is that the reason the game is so easy for you is because you're diving into all content with super sweet purple items with ridiculous numbers on them, and you have a ridiculously overpowered flavour of the month build.
The problem isn't with the game. The problem is with the player who doesn't understand that if they keep adding better loot, the game will always be too easy. The game is plenty difficult. Stop min/maxing, stop grinding. It's self-defeating. And Cryptic can't keep adjusting the game to suit self-defeating mindsets.
Very hard difficulty added better loot... but was false advertising because it was not Very Hard. Elite difficulty added some costumes drops but we where still all using the same Very Hard gear, that was kinda nice for the some time. Then they added awesome Acclaim Gear to Hero Games and we all farmed Zombies. On Alert added way better loot and made us all Uber Heroes instead of Super Heroes, but all the gear/stuff was tied to new currencies like Q/Recognition/Tokens that have nothing to do with the now easy Elite difficulty, so new and old casual players don't need to do anything on Elite to get those currencies. In fact they took most of the cool drops out from Lair Bosses/Cosmics, and have now added them as Legacy Devices and also added Legion gear. Elite difficulty is way behind in terms of how much better stuff/power synergies(toggles for all) have evolved. We don't need better loot with an increase to difficulty, we just need the same cool stuff we have now to drop from Uber Difficulty mode.
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This was awesome while it lasted
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I don't know if it's me or else.
My Disciple got utterly destroyed on the final fight with the Terror thing in Aftershock #2 with that VIPER guy alive and the two girl sidekick on.
On lv16, On lv32, then On lv40.
Yes, I know how to block and all these.
All I know is, this boss attacks, Captain down, another attack, sidekicks down, another attack, I got hit for thousands of damage. while the boss still has like 1/2 health left
and I'm playing on Normal.
I recently retrained this AT into freeform and I think I'll have a much bigger chance at beating this guy because of the heal and rebirth coming into play. And I suspect it'll be much easier, but still, please think of the slivers who cannot get freeforms. Outright increase the difficulty does nothing.
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...the ultimate Contrast Moe (or not).
Okay, I'll bite. How do I build my character so that the mobs behave more intelligently, have a more diverse list of abilities, and use interesting engaging mechanics? I'm not seeing a power set that does that... help me understand.
Also, you do realize that atm elite difficulty doesn't award better gear right? And Gravitar, who was supposed to be "challenging content" doesn't award any gear whatsoever? I think you're seeing power creep where there isn't any, and isn't going to be any.
The game should not be balanced around ATs. The game should be balanced around Freeforms. Sort of common sense... why balance the game for the freebies and leave the paying folks with a snorefest? Any gold player who decides to play an AT.... well, listen, you paid for the cruise ship, but decided to head into stormy weather in the free canoo... you knew what you were gettin' yourself into.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
I don't have a single character decked out on purple gear (I'm too lazy to farm and I hate grinding and find it boring as hell), and none of my character's are 100% min-maxed--they're all "optimized" concept builds (toons using some of the most effective powers that fit their concept)--and when I complain about roflstomping through content, I'm usually talking about content I do while leveling toons, where it is virtually impossible to have a character fully decked out with a 100% mix-maxed build on purple gear since you don't have your entire alotment of powers yet and getting purple gear you're going to outlevel would be pointless.
Fact of the matter is this game IS too easy. The problem isn't the players (other than the ones that keep trying to bury their heads in the sand and pretent that this game isnt laughably easy), its the game. And I'm not going to make believe that the problem is in me and channel the power of my mind or some nonsense to gimp my gameplay by leveling a toon using an energy building power only just to satisfy players than want to automatically beat content the moment they set foot on a map and pretent like this should be completely normal.
Last time I was on for more than a week I tried to build a valkyrie themed toon using Hurricane as one of her powers. It was a concept power, not a min-maxing selection. I wanted to play a toon with Wind powers and Hurricane was it. I also wanted her to have other attack powers, problem was that there was no point, because Hurricane is so laughably OP (a wide area power that does more damage than most single target or smaller area attacks) if you have it there is no other power you need.
THAT'S all you need to roflstomp through most regular content in this game. You DON'T need a fully purple geared min-maxed toon. You just need freaking Hurricane or Epidemic, and maybe a heal in case you take damage from something that doesn't just up and die at the sight of your mere presence. THAT's the real issue with this game.