People will complain regardless, the trick is trying to find figure out a good middle ground.
Though I'm not fond of the firewall phase, primarily because it seems that the blocks are treated as objects so the characters who don't have rec as a prim/secondary seem to have a hard time regaining energy. Then the being one shotted even with the buff during the final fight is kind of annoying. The simon says portion of it is only mildly annoying due to how my camera and controls reach to moving around.
To those saying he doesn't knock back with people in melee range, either it is bugged or he does in fact knock the melee away from him as it has happened to me.
This guy is on the right track.
Finding a middle ground in CO is problematic due to widely varying levels of effectiveness. Even if you did balance out every power in the game and ensure everyone has some open ended synergies, you'd still want to shoot low in order to allow ATs and low end freeforms to be competitive, and as such you'd have the same people you see here complaining it's too easy as a result.
With that said, out of all the options we have, the middle ground or something just a bit below it IS the best option. Balancing things around the higher end, which is what we have now, is a horrid idea. Before one can even try to fix this by aiming for the middle ground, what needs to happen first, is there needs to be an actual middle ground... Which is easier said than done.
As for being knocked out of melee range, he's not supposed to knock you out of melee range, but like everything in CO there's between a half second to two seconds of lag before things are accepted by the game, due to any number of things I can't entirely place my finger on. I know one of them has to do with activation times, and some of it is due to latency and/or server processes on their end, but it can be rather extreme in places. According to trail turtle, there's also some weird behavior involving the game making checks for these things, so there's that too.
More or less, you probably were entering melee range, and the check for this or whatever lagged behind and you got punted away despite this. I've seen that happen a few times as well (amusingly, mostly to other people), though it's more rare than the buff pillars just deciding you didn't stand in them long enough.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
Gimmicky mechanic that is more or less ruined by the usual lag. Admittedly it's not quite as bad because the squares aren't MOVING AROUND, however it's really nice when you can stand in the pillar of colored light for a solid second and not get the buff.
Strips your travel powers away, rather than designing the stage around them.
One shotting. I don't think I need to say more.
Gigantic bag of HP that's designed around the idea that everyone's going to be running the kinds of DPS people on the PTS can output. Y'know, completely forgetting that someone might want to run a character that's using powers currently behind the curve.
Apparently lets sub level 40s in? I didn't notice this, but holy crap if that's the case...
After a couple wipes, the room locked up completely and no one could get in.
Oh, and as usual, the mission itself is a drastic bump up in difficulty from the missions leading up to it, presenting a brick wall difficulty ramp up so vertical you can be impaled on it if you're not already expecting it.
Cryptic, when will you learn.
This right here ^^^^^
If'n y'all remember, I made my objections heard about the Cyberlord portion of this series:
So I tried this today, and was bitterly disappointed.
1. Another "You must have a team to do content" entry into the series. This was the most disappointing thing about this finale...I'm supposed to be a great hero damnit! I shouldn't need a group of other people to defeat a punk like Cybermind. He's a Class C or D villian, certainly not a Dr. Destroyer or Menton.
2. The color coding aspect of the fight didn't bother me, except when lag kicked in.
3. The one-shotting, was ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. And it seemed to always hit our healer.
4. It cost me 10g to attempt this today. 8 attempts, 0 wins, no stars left, and at 2g a star...you get the picture.
Overall, this entire series was disappointing for me. Too much "required superteamup" action, too many utterly undefeatable bosses, and generally just disappointing. The first content to come out in a while, that didn't involve space aliens or space gladiators or fish men or whatever, and it can't be done.
I know I'll get razzed for the complaining, and the anti-social attitude, but frankly I don't care.
This is my opinion. You are free to agree or disagree as much as you like.
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
Cryptic should just stop focusing so much on churning out new alerts and actually release a new AP. APs have a reasonable min level of entry, have a reasonable learning curve, cater to both people who want to solo and those who want to do them in teams and have more decent rewards especially that of questionite. Middle-ground met.
They should also stop releasing content designed for the full level ranges when it's been established that they aren't good at doing it. Either level-gate them or have different versions of the alert to accommodate low, mid and high level ranges.
B: Close the gap between thematic freeforms and ATs a bit more
and
C: Actually churn out AP/CS issues at a reasonable rate
...Proliferating the AP design philosophy and story progression across all the content in the game and aiming for a level of difficulty around pre-On Alert Resistance would be the way to go. Resistance, Whiteout, Aftershock... These APs are (or at least were) way, way above pretty much everything else in terms of... Well, everything.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
Friend of mine got the AF today, twice, and a different friend got the bracers. He still drops stuff, don't worry.
Aside: No, this it not "gimmicky". These are boss mechanics. Other MMOs have them. I applaud their addition to this game, as it gives us stuff to do aside from stand around slinging projectiles back and forth. "Move or you die" is not new. Yes, the timing is strict, but certainly doable.
I also encourage explaining the mechanics to new folks and, if necessary, having them stay close to you so they know what to do. More people understanding what to do = less ragequitting. Less ragequits = more happy players.
And for the love of Glob, level gate this, please!
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
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i actually love this alert. i like the mechanics. but the colors for the last stage of the boss form (where cybermind becomes huge) confused me sometimes.
i can't tell what the color is bcause sometimes its mixed with other player power/debuff colors, usually the blue and the yellow. that is all.. all in all a fun alert, i guess
ATLANTIS (EAST)
D E N O M I N A T O R (R.I.P) D E F E N D E R (LIVE!)
I don't get it guys. Why am I having such an easy time beating this with pugs and the rest of you aren't? I see lag mentioned a lot... that's not Cryptic's fault, call your ISP. If you have poor FPS and that's getting you killed, upgrade your GPU. They can't just keep making the game easy because people's hardware can't keep up.
See, that's the main issue for me here, and why I keep disagreeing with you guys. I see this laundry list of reasons people give why the alert is bad and unplayable... but then I go in game, que up, and play the thing over and over and have a blast with it. All the forum essays in the world can't counter the fact of that experience.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
I see lag mentioned a lot... that's not Cryptic's fault, call your ISP.
Sorry, no dice. This is a Cryptic thing, even if you're not perceptive enough to notice it, lucky enough to not be effected by it or otherwise are working around it. Sure as hell can't blame my ISP. 3 years of compression blast Pyroing, months of time landing grapples on people in SMNC, and a variety of first person shooters and more recently fighting games go to show that my connection is perfectly fine.
In fact, I've played Pyro on EU servers with over 100 ping and had smoother gameplay than anything I've seen in Champs. I can play Skullgirls against my friend in finland and land all my combos if I adjust my timings by a fraction of a second, I can even get my tic throw setups on him, and the gameplay is butter smooth. Heck, years ago, back when I was on comcast and WAS suffering from constant packet loss, NOTHING I played back then was ANYWHERE as bad as Champs.
I suppose its your right to be in denial, but I'm not the first, last or only one to complain about this, and in fact I recently had a bit of a laugh at "craptic" when another player watched me die on top of Cybermind's square, at his feet, despite having the buff. I do find it cute that people like you are willing to somehow believe that despite numerous complaints scattered across all types of players, going back years, somehow the problem is on the end of all these people with otherwise fine connections.
If you have poor FPS and that's getting you killed, upgrade your GPU. They can't just keep making the game easy because people's hardware can't keep up.
Oh, this is cute. Forgetting my GPU is more than powerful enough to handle this game, Champs is horridly optimized too, and always has been. I guess you weren't around for the whole thing with people complaining about the performance of the game despite being way above recommended specs at launch, huh? Even back when the game had less graphical clutter and the recommended GPU was an 8800GTX people running at the time top of the line GPUs in SLI with 8 gigs of RAM i7s were complaining of bad performance.
Y'know, this game's track record isn't exactly a secret. Everything you're in denial about here perfectly follows everything an informed person would expect from Cryptic and CO.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
I don't get it guys. Why am I having such an easy time beating this with pugs and the rest of you aren't? I see lag mentioned a lot... that's not Cryptic's fault, call your ISP. If you have poor FPS and that's getting you killed, upgrade your GPU. They can't just keep making the game easy because people's hardware can't keep up.
Last time I ran a speed test on my connection, it was 33.3Mbps Down / 5.9Mbps Up.
I run this game on an Alienware M17x with an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560m Video Card.
Yet, apparently its my ISP and my computer? It's not like I'm trying to run Champions Online (which is hardly a tour de force in terms of graphics) on a 486 with a 56.6k modem. I run much higher end graphical games (like Age of Conan) with no issue. Yet, in this game, the random lag spikes are ridiculous and occur often, generally in combat. I've optimized my video settings, I've tweaked my graphical settings, Ive tried playing with reduced settings, yet still nothing seems to fix the issue.
How is this my fault again?
Meanwhile...
In terms of gameplay, I don't mind mechanics. I do mind however...
a) One Shot attacks that can't be defended.
b) Mechanics that are deadly due to lag spikes out of my control.
c) HP Sack bosses. That's not a mechanic, having 2 Million HP. It's a copout.
d) New content being locked up behind group requirements.
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
How can this be a Cryptic thing? I can dodge Grav's bubbles fine, and I can consistently score the correct buff and move to safety in the Alert we're discussing. Moreover, Cybermind consistently never Detonates when I play my melee heroes unless I'm dealing with the probes.
There is the possibility you're getting bottlenecked somewhere when you play. Have you tried to trace your connection?
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
If you feel like wasting some time, go ahead and run some net monitors and snooping programs and proceed to shake your head as that doesn't turn up anything either.
Or don't as others have and uh... Well, you know what they say about trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
It's also worth noting that travel powers would also open up the door for some more funky interactions -- just like with the rings in the race, the buff cylinders and the blocks only check for overlap every so often (albeit many times per second). This may reduce mobility, but it also makes it less likely for anyone to speed through the cylinder without getting the buff.
^ This so much. Think logically about the travel powers out there like super speed or jet pack flight. Players would zoom into a cylinder and back to the square and may not pick up buff OR jump from buff to square too soon and 2 secs before storm stops they are wiped by 2 ticks of damage as buff has run out.
I am pretty sure this would annoy players even more.
if it is meant to be a challenge, then why are level 6 archetypes allowed to join?
View it as another level of challenge for players who cannot think ahead to the potential dangers of PUG's. If you want to pass this alert then pick up a premade team and suit up and win.
On Friday I got a team together 4 lvl 40s and one level 20 (Squall AT) and we blazed through the alert. TWICE. Before maintenance hit.
However. I will say I am surprised that this was not gated to level 40s only. I would say that it was possibly considered but there are players out there who like to alt a lot and would be left out if level 40 was the requirement to enter.
I still can't tell what part of him I'm supposed to look at for the color indicator in phase 3. his aura cycles through all three colors every second or so.
I have said this before: Look at his legs. When his body floats up you will see him change from normal clothing to circuit board like costume which is either yellow, red or blue. It should be clear from the time he starts growing what colour of Viral Empowerment he is using.
The only time this did not work for me was when I did the mission on the PTS for the first time and had no idea what I was doing.
Ever since it has worked consistently. Even with Pet Army Toons, Infernals and millions of status affects on him.
Observance is the key. I get that people don't like change, not many people liked Gravitar at first and she was apparently impossible.
So what happened? Did they nerf Gravitar? No.
Players continued to play, test builds and come up with sure fire strategies which work against her so success was an option. I reckon the same will/has happened with Cybermind.
I love the alert the way it is, even if it kills me sometimes, which would be in the situation where I haven't paid any attention what so ever.
In terms of gameplay, I don't mind mechanics. I do mind however...
a) One Shot attacks that can't be defended.
b) Mechanics that are deadly due to lag spikes out of my control.
c) HP Sack bosses. That's not a mechanic, having 2 Million HP. It's a copout.
d) New content being locked up behind group requirements.
I will say this:
1) Viral Storm is a particle damage based attack. Having Electric Form Passive as well as another buff can dampen how much damage it can do to you. Unless you are running into the alert with less than 4k HP, it will likely two shot you.
2) Understandable, personally I have never had an issue with lagging whilst playing Cybermind but you never know.
3) I do think Cybermind's HP is pretty excessive for a 5 man team. But provided all five members are actively contributing to DPS it can be done (the entire alert) in less than 10 minutes.
4) Do you mean the fact that pre-made groupings are an issue for you? Or that you are forced to team with other players? If the first one, then go for PUGs, sometimes you get lucky and have a good team other times you are the only lvl 40 with a bunch of level 6s. If you don't like being forced to team with other players. Simply go for a PUG and watch your team wipe and solo Cybermind. Group content is more fun I think, also it means that taking along (in my experience) a certain toon like Alara my healer or Mentella my Telepath, I can actually aid against the boss mechanics by healing my allies or slowing down the boss attacks.
Sorry, no dice. This is a Cryptic thing, even if you're not perceptive enough to notice it, lucky enough to not be effected by it or otherwise are working around it. Sure as hell can't blame my ISP. 3 years of compression blast Pyroing, months of time landing grapples on people in SMNC, and a variety of first person shooters and more recently fighting games go to show that my connection is perfectly fine.
In fact, I've played Pyro on EU servers with over 100 ping and had smoother gameplay than anything I've seen in Champs. I can play Skullgirls against my friend in finland and land all my combos if I adjust my timings by a fraction of a second, I can even get my tic throw setups on him, and the gameplay is butter smooth. Heck, years ago, back when I was on comcast and WAS suffering from constant packet loss, NOTHING I played back then was ANYWHERE as bad as Champs.
I suppose its your right to be in denial, but I'm not the first, last or only one to complain about this, and in fact I recently had a bit of a laugh at "craptic" when another player watched me die on top of Cybermind's square, at his feet, despite having the buff. I do find it cute that people like you are willing to somehow believe that despite numerous complaints scattered across all types of players, going back years, somehow the problem is on the end of all these people with otherwise fine connections.
Oh, this is cute. Forgetting my GPU is more than powerful enough to handle this game, Champs is horridly optimized too, and always has been. I guess you weren't around for the whole thing with people complaining about the performance of the game despite being way above recommended specs at launch, huh? Even back when the game had less graphical clutter and the recommended GPU was an 8800GTX people running at the time top of the line GPUs in SLI with 8 gigs of RAM i7s were complaining of bad performance.
Y'know, this game's track record isn't exactly a secret. Everything you're in denial about here perfectly follows everything an informed person would expect from Cryptic and CO.
Last time I ran a speed test on my connection, it was 33.3Mbps Down / 5.9Mbps Up.
I run this game on an Alienware M17x with an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560m Video Card.
Yet, apparently its my ISP and my computer? It's not like I'm trying to run Champions Online (which is hardly a tour de force in terms of graphics) on a 486 with a 56.6k modem. I run much higher end graphical games (like Age of Conan) with no issue. Yet, in this game, the random lag spikes are ridiculous and occur often, generally in combat. I've optimized my video settings, I've tweaked my graphical settings, Ive tried playing with reduced settings, yet still nothing seems to fix the issue.
How is this my fault again?
Meanwhile...
In terms of gameplay, I don't mind mechanics. I do mind however...
a) One Shot attacks that can't be defended.
b) Mechanics that are deadly due to lag spikes out of my control.
c) HP Sack bosses. That's not a mechanic, having 2 Million HP. It's a copout.
d) New content being locked up behind group requirements.
More forum essays... but still, all I have to do to counter your entire argument is go into the game and actually play the alert; I'll have fun, and that's all that matters.
So, it's not your ISP, it's not your hardware. Maybe the problem is happening somewhere between your chair and the keyboard? Not calling you a noob, just calling you a grump who's being grumpy for the sake of being grumpy.
It's okay to change your mind you know, no one's gonna tease you over it.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
I don't care if the team knows what it's doing or not. The point is it's not worth doing in the first place. Costume pieces and non-combat pets aren't worth trying to out-DPS 3 million HPs with gimmicks and handicaps.
Well, I guess if you don't care about the team you are with you aren't going to enjoy the alert or the instance.
"Trying to out-DPS 3 million HPs with gimmicks and handicaps"
What? Since when does Cybermind DPS? The only thing you need to do is run to a damn pillar and hop on a square. Not hard. (I do sympathize with colour-blind players out there however).
The only handicap you face in this alert is the exact same as you would in PvP when under the effects of NTTG. Which is for good reason as previously mentioned by TrailTurtle, myself and others.
If you don't want to run this alert for the chance to get costume pieces and AFs then that is up to you. I know a large number of people who would.
The only handicap you face in this alert is the exact same as you would in PvP when under the effects of NTTG. Which is for good reason as previously mentioned by TrailTurtle, myself and others.
There's stuff in PVP that can drop you from 7K+ HP to zero without warning?
Because that's happened all three times I ran this thing, and the only reason I ran it three times is because the first two, it bugged out so much I couldn't get credit for the associated quest.
There's stuff in PVP that can drop you from 7K+ HP to zero without warning?
Because that's happened all three times I ran this thing, and the only reason I ran it three times is because the first two, it bugged out so much I couldn't get credit for the associated quest.
In PvP? Hell yes. They are called players with elite or high experience/specialised PvP builds. They can rip you to shreds in a matter of seconds, quicker or slightly slower than Cybermind does. Shadow Strike can one shot people and Strafing Run criticals can ruin you in one click/charge.
I have entered PvP with 11k HP toons and been sent back in separate pieces by encountering other players.
Cybermind at least has a reasonable period where SOCRATES enables anti cybermind measures. It is YOUR job to activate them.
There's stuff in PVP that can drop you from 7K+ HP to zero without warning?
Because that's happened all three times I ran this thing, and the only reason I ran it three times is because the first two, it bugged out so much I couldn't get credit for the associated quest.
Are you watching the colored plates on the ground? When they change color, do you run to the corresponding beam to get your buff, then return to the colored plate?
If yes, then there is NOTHING in the alert that can one-shot anything.
If you are colorblind and unable to tell that the plates are changing color (or any of the other color related parts of the mission), I'm sorry to hear that; the mission will be significantly more difficult for you.
_________________________________________________ @flamingbunnyman in game. Formerly @Roderick in City of Heroes.
There's stuff in PVP that can drop you from 7K+ HP to zero without warning?
Yep. Our devs are apparently from bizarro world, as when they saw people complaining about how much they hate being killed instantly in PvP they took that as a sign they should port that experience over to PvE.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
Except Cybermind gives you plenty of warning. The panels light up. His storm has a tell. And during the third phase, you can see which color he is going to change into.
I'm getting the sense you don't want this game to be challenging. That you want our fights to be pure tank-and-spanks with the outcome assured because the odds are decidedly on the players' side. And you will continue to crusade against content that tests our builds and tasks players with paying attention because then you will be left out.
This alert makes you do more than simply tank-and-spank, and other than the bugs that are inevitable with new content, it is fine. It doesn't hold your hand, and it is completely doable without travel powers/lunges/reverse lunges. It's a breath of fresh air after fighting with the kiddie gloves on for so long, and more stuff like this is good for the game.
I'm finished debating this. You won't adapt your tactics to suit this alert, and you won't listen when people offer reasonable suggestions. I will happily continue running it, and implore Cryptic not to nerf it. This Alert doesn't need the kiddie-glove treatment the rest of the Alerts are plagued by.
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
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Except Cybermind gives you plenty of warning. The panels light up. His storm has a tell. And during the third phase, you can see which color he is going to change into.
Panels lighting up is only good if you can get to the buffzone and back before you die. I never saw a tell for the storm. And the transform of his is only good, again, if you can get to the buffzone and back before dying.
One time, I used a heal-to-full rez item and died again literally before the animation for the rez completed!
Panels lighting up is only good if you can get to the buffzone and back before you die. I never saw a tell for the storm.
The tell is the panels lighting up. There's plenty of time between the panels activating and the rain starting to get to the buff zone and back, as long as you're standing somewhere more or less between the three pillars of light.
One time, I used a heal-to-full rez item and died again literally before the animation for the rez completed!
The only way that should be possible is if you tried to rez during the rain. If you did, that was your own fault.
_________________________________________________ @flamingbunnyman in game. Formerly @Roderick in City of Heroes.
Very good vid, Kaiserin, explains what to do and shoots down the folks claiming there isn't enough time.
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
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Excellent video, Kaiserin. I only see three minor things:
1. It is possible, randomly, for the buff to not apply. I have, personally, encountered this once every 3-5 runs.
2. If you have to rebuff(change colors) to fight the drones then it is possible to have the wrong color and no way to get rid of it in time to get the right color....and get facemelted.
3. I have no idea what causes this but it's an old bug from Therakiel's Temple. There's something which can randomly(had this happen about 3 times so far overall, so it's still somewhat rare) send your camera into non-stop spinning mode...which leads to being facemelted because you cannot move to the buff zones.
Overall only mildly annoying things which can be countered with a Servitor's Serum. The key is to NOT use it when the floor panel colors are up. Just wait for them to switch off, get up, and get back into the fray. :biggrin:
Oh, **** me! I keep trying to bash my head into him, but I keep losing a life! This game is a poorly programmed piece garbage! Who the hell thought this was a smart idea?
Actually Cybermind drops an item named [Fun]. Not sure if you ever heard of it.
I have fun running regular Alerts, missions, packs/series, etc. Cybermind's fight isn't fun. It's tedious and filled with random instant death for petty non-obvious mistakes (which might be the products of bugs or engine limitations anyway).
If I didn't think the game was worth playing I would have stopped paying for it long ago.
I have fun running regular Alerts, missions, packs/series, etc. Cybermind's fight isn't fun. It's tedious and filled with random instant death for petty non-obvious mistakes (which might be the products of bugs or engine limitations anyway).
If I didn't think the game was worth playing I would have stopped paying for it long ago.
If you solve color puzzle, there are no instant death even AT or any kind of build.
(But you have to have at least one self heal.)
I did this too much and now my player's concentration becoming dead. 92 run so far and 91 success so nearly 99% win.
But still just 2 drop.
The horrid drop rate is the only problem I have with this whole event. That and the rage I feel when I queue into PUGs. Which is entirely my fault since I know better as to team with other 40s and not the fault of lowbies who jump into Bowser, game over after game over.
The horrid drop rate is the only problem I have with this whole event. That and the rage I feel when I queue into PUGs. Which is entirely my fault since I know better as to team with other 40s and not the fault of lowbies who jump into Bowser, game over after game over.
Yes, yes it's terrible. I finished 5000 virus kill in my main toon so started leveling my Lv.28 toon in Cybermind.
5k HP is enough to do this if we know how to do. xD
Also, additional information from one of the devs: If you're having trouble with the firewalls, make sure you're disabling their heals. When one of the walls is red/vulnerable, if it doesn't get attacked, it starts to heal the other walls. This is shut down for a couple seconds whenever someone attacks the wall -- just make sure that someone's always hitting the red wall, even if everyone else needs to focus the minions.
I was not aware of this. So keeping someone on all the walls does have a good effect.
THX for good info. I never noticed this. Epidemic!! xD
Yet another reason it is OPidemic. :P
I'll have to remember that next time I run it.
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[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
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I finally tried cybermind for the second time and managed to defeat him this time with a team. The fight was extraordinarily frustrating as I seemed to be taking damage from some unknown source and couldn't rez my team mates. Also running towards the colors was terrible because the toggle on my energy builder kept me targeted and when the camera angle switches I change the direction I'm running.
Over all I prefer Gravitar to this and the reward of 30 000 really isn't enough for me to keep plugging away. I'm sure the costume drops for this and Gravitar would be about the same . . . meaning I'll never get one anyways.
Comments
This guy is on the right track.
Finding a middle ground in CO is problematic due to widely varying levels of effectiveness. Even if you did balance out every power in the game and ensure everyone has some open ended synergies, you'd still want to shoot low in order to allow ATs and low end freeforms to be competitive, and as such you'd have the same people you see here complaining it's too easy as a result.
With that said, out of all the options we have, the middle ground or something just a bit below it IS the best option. Balancing things around the higher end, which is what we have now, is a horrid idea. Before one can even try to fix this by aiming for the middle ground, what needs to happen first, is there needs to be an actual middle ground... Which is easier said than done.
As for being knocked out of melee range, he's not supposed to knock you out of melee range, but like everything in CO there's between a half second to two seconds of lag before things are accepted by the game, due to any number of things I can't entirely place my finger on. I know one of them has to do with activation times, and some of it is due to latency and/or server processes on their end, but it can be rather extreme in places. According to trail turtle, there's also some weird behavior involving the game making checks for these things, so there's that too.
More or less, you probably were entering melee range, and the check for this or whatever lagged behind and you got punted away despite this. I've seen that happen a few times as well (amusingly, mostly to other people), though it's more rare than the buff pillars just deciding you didn't stand in them long enough.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
This right here ^^^^^
If'n y'all remember, I made my objections heard about the Cyberlord portion of this series:
http://co-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=236401
So I tried this today, and was bitterly disappointed.
1. Another "You must have a team to do content" entry into the series. This was the most disappointing thing about this finale...I'm supposed to be a great hero damnit! I shouldn't need a group of other people to defeat a punk like Cybermind. He's a Class C or D villian, certainly not a Dr. Destroyer or Menton.
2. The color coding aspect of the fight didn't bother me, except when lag kicked in.
3. The one-shotting, was ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous. And it seemed to always hit our healer.
4. It cost me 10g to attempt this today. 8 attempts, 0 wins, no stars left, and at 2g a star...you get the picture.
Overall, this entire series was disappointing for me. Too much "required superteamup" action, too many utterly undefeatable bosses, and generally just disappointing. The first content to come out in a while, that didn't involve space aliens or space gladiators or fish men or whatever, and it can't be done.
I know I'll get razzed for the complaining, and the anti-social attitude, but frankly I don't care.
This is my opinion. You are free to agree or disagree as much as you like.
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
They should also stop releasing content designed for the full level ranges when it's been established that they aren't good at doing it. Either level-gate them or have different versions of the alert to accommodate low, mid and high level ranges.
A: Close the gap between powers a bit better
B: Close the gap between thematic freeforms and ATs a bit more
and
C: Actually churn out AP/CS issues at a reasonable rate
...Proliferating the AP design philosophy and story progression across all the content in the game and aiming for a level of difficulty around pre-On Alert Resistance would be the way to go. Resistance, Whiteout, Aftershock... These APs are (or at least were) way, way above pretty much everything else in terms of... Well, everything.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
I feel they removed everything with 'Belt'.
Aside: No, this it not "gimmicky". These are boss mechanics. Other MMOs have them. I applaud their addition to this game, as it gives us stuff to do aside from stand around slinging projectiles back and forth. "Move or you die" is not new. Yes, the timing is strict, but certainly doable.
I also encourage explaining the mechanics to new folks and, if necessary, having them stay close to you so they know what to do. More people understanding what to do = less ragequitting. Less ragequits = more happy players.
And for the love of Glob, level gate this, please!
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
i can't tell what the color is bcause sometimes its mixed with other player power/debuff colors, usually the blue and the yellow. that is all.. all in all a fun alert, i guess
D E N O M I N A T O R (R.I.P)
D E F E N D E R (LIVE!)
INDUCTION ID: 1900138G040407036004540S3f2fb2
The gameplay in that game looks incredibly pathetic, especially for something based off Starwars. Glad I never bothered with it.
If that's "boss mechanics" we could surely do better without.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
See, that's the main issue for me here, and why I keep disagreeing with you guys. I see this laundry list of reasons people give why the alert is bad and unplayable... but then I go in game, que up, and play the thing over and over and have a blast with it. All the forum essays in the world can't counter the fact of that experience.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
In fact, I've played Pyro on EU servers with over 100 ping and had smoother gameplay than anything I've seen in Champs. I can play Skullgirls against my friend in finland and land all my combos if I adjust my timings by a fraction of a second, I can even get my tic throw setups on him, and the gameplay is butter smooth. Heck, years ago, back when I was on comcast and WAS suffering from constant packet loss, NOTHING I played back then was ANYWHERE as bad as Champs.
I suppose its your right to be in denial, but I'm not the first, last or only one to complain about this, and in fact I recently had a bit of a laugh at "craptic" when another player watched me die on top of Cybermind's square, at his feet, despite having the buff. I do find it cute that people like you are willing to somehow believe that despite numerous complaints scattered across all types of players, going back years, somehow the problem is on the end of all these people with otherwise fine connections.
Oh, this is cute. Forgetting my GPU is more than powerful enough to handle this game, Champs is horridly optimized too, and always has been. I guess you weren't around for the whole thing with people complaining about the performance of the game despite being way above recommended specs at launch, huh? Even back when the game had less graphical clutter and the recommended GPU was an 8800GTX people running at the time top of the line GPUs in SLI with 8 gigs of RAM i7s were complaining of bad performance.
Y'know, this game's track record isn't exactly a secret. Everything you're in denial about here perfectly follows everything an informed person would expect from Cryptic and CO.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
Last time I ran a speed test on my connection, it was 33.3Mbps Down / 5.9Mbps Up.
I run this game on an Alienware M17x with an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560m Video Card.
Yet, apparently its my ISP and my computer? It's not like I'm trying to run Champions Online (which is hardly a tour de force in terms of graphics) on a 486 with a 56.6k modem. I run much higher end graphical games (like Age of Conan) with no issue. Yet, in this game, the random lag spikes are ridiculous and occur often, generally in combat. I've optimized my video settings, I've tweaked my graphical settings, Ive tried playing with reduced settings, yet still nothing seems to fix the issue.
How is this my fault again?
Meanwhile...
In terms of gameplay, I don't mind mechanics. I do mind however...
a) One Shot attacks that can't be defended.
b) Mechanics that are deadly due to lag spikes out of my control.
c) HP Sack bosses. That's not a mechanic, having 2 Million HP. It's a copout.
d) New content being locked up behind group requirements.
"You shoot him, I shoot you, I leave both your bodies here and go out for a late night snack.
I'm thinking maybe pancakes." ~ John Casey
There is the possibility you're getting bottlenecked somewhere when you play. Have you tried to trace your connection?
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
Simple: It's probably not.
If you feel like wasting some time, go ahead and run some net monitors and snooping programs and proceed to shake your head as that doesn't turn up anything either.
Or don't as others have and uh... Well, you know what they say about trying the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
^ This so much. Think logically about the travel powers out there like super speed or jet pack flight. Players would zoom into a cylinder and back to the square and may not pick up buff OR jump from buff to square too soon and 2 secs before storm stops they are wiped by 2 ticks of damage as buff has run out.
I am pretty sure this would annoy players even more.
View it as another level of challenge for players who cannot think ahead to the potential dangers of PUG's. If you want to pass this alert then pick up a premade team and suit up and win.
On Friday I got a team together 4 lvl 40s and one level 20 (Squall AT) and we blazed through the alert. TWICE. Before maintenance hit.
However. I will say I am surprised that this was not gated to level 40s only. I would say that it was possibly considered but there are players out there who like to alt a lot and would be left out if level 40 was the requirement to enter.
I have said this before: Look at his legs. When his body floats up you will see him change from normal clothing to circuit board like costume which is either yellow, red or blue. It should be clear from the time he starts growing what colour of Viral Empowerment he is using.
The only time this did not work for me was when I did the mission on the PTS for the first time and had no idea what I was doing.
Ever since it has worked consistently. Even with Pet Army Toons, Infernals and millions of status affects on him.
Observance is the key. I get that people don't like change, not many people liked Gravitar at first and she was apparently impossible.
So what happened? Did they nerf Gravitar? No.
Players continued to play, test builds and come up with sure fire strategies which work against her so success was an option. I reckon the same will/has happened with Cybermind.
I love the alert the way it is, even if it kills me sometimes, which would be in the situation where I haven't paid any attention what so ever.
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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I will say this:
1) Viral Storm is a particle damage based attack. Having Electric Form Passive as well as another buff can dampen how much damage it can do to you. Unless you are running into the alert with less than 4k HP, it will likely two shot you.
2) Understandable, personally I have never had an issue with lagging whilst playing Cybermind but you never know.
3) I do think Cybermind's HP is pretty excessive for a 5 man team. But provided all five members are actively contributing to DPS it can be done (the entire alert) in less than 10 minutes.
4) Do you mean the fact that pre-made groupings are an issue for you? Or that you are forced to team with other players? If the first one, then go for PUGs, sometimes you get lucky and have a good team other times you are the only lvl 40 with a bunch of level 6s. If you don't like being forced to team with other players. Simply go for a PUG and watch your team wipe and solo Cybermind. Group content is more fun I think, also it means that taking along (in my experience) a certain toon like Alara my healer or Mentella my Telepath, I can actually aid against the boss mechanics by healing my allies or slowing down the boss attacks.
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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More forum essays... but still, all I have to do to counter your entire argument is go into the game and actually play the alert; I'll have fun, and that's all that matters.
So, it's not your ISP, it's not your hardware. Maybe the problem is happening somewhere between your chair and the keyboard? Not calling you a noob, just calling you a grump who's being grumpy for the sake of being grumpy.
It's okay to change your mind you know, no one's gonna tease you over it.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
Well, I guess if you don't care about the team you are with you aren't going to enjoy the alert or the instance.
"Trying to out-DPS 3 million HPs with gimmicks and handicaps"
What? Since when does Cybermind DPS? The only thing you need to do is run to a damn pillar and hop on a square. Not hard. (I do sympathize with colour-blind players out there however).
The only handicap you face in this alert is the exact same as you would in PvP when under the effects of NTTG. Which is for good reason as previously mentioned by TrailTurtle, myself and others.
If you don't want to run this alert for the chance to get costume pieces and AFs then that is up to you. I know a large number of people who would.
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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There's stuff in PVP that can drop you from 7K+ HP to zero without warning?
Because that's happened all three times I ran this thing, and the only reason I ran it three times is because the first two, it bugged out so much I couldn't get credit for the associated quest.
In PvP? Hell yes. They are called players with elite or high experience/specialised PvP builds. They can rip you to shreds in a matter of seconds, quicker or slightly slower than Cybermind does. Shadow Strike can one shot people and Strafing Run criticals can ruin you in one click/charge.
I have entered PvP with 11k HP toons and been sent back in separate pieces by encountering other players.
Cybermind at least has a reasonable period where SOCRATES enables anti cybermind measures. It is YOUR job to activate them.
Bugs aside this alert is doable.
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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Are you watching the colored plates on the ground? When they change color, do you run to the corresponding beam to get your buff, then return to the colored plate?
If yes, then there is NOTHING in the alert that can one-shot anything.
If you are colorblind and unable to tell that the plates are changing color (or any of the other color related parts of the mission), I'm sorry to hear that; the mission will be significantly more difficult for you.
@flamingbunnyman in game. Formerly @Roderick in City of Heroes.
Yep. Our devs are apparently from bizarro world, as when they saw people complaining about how much they hate being killed instantly in PvP they took that as a sign they should port that experience over to PvE.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
I'm getting the sense you don't want this game to be challenging. That you want our fights to be pure tank-and-spanks with the outcome assured because the odds are decidedly on the players' side. And you will continue to crusade against content that tests our builds and tasks players with paying attention because then you will be left out.
This alert makes you do more than simply tank-and-spank, and other than the bugs that are inevitable with new content, it is fine. It doesn't hold your hand, and it is completely doable without travel powers/lunges/reverse lunges. It's a breath of fresh air after fighting with the kiddie gloves on for so long, and more stuff like this is good for the game.
I'm finished debating this. You won't adapt your tactics to suit this alert, and you won't listen when people offer reasonable suggestions. I will happily continue running it, and implore Cryptic not to nerf it. This Alert doesn't need the kiddie-glove treatment the rest of the Alerts are plagued by.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
Panels lighting up is only good if you can get to the buffzone and back before you die. I never saw a tell for the storm. And the transform of his is only good, again, if you can get to the buffzone and back before dying.
One time, I used a heal-to-full rez item and died again literally before the animation for the rez completed!
The tell is the panels lighting up. There's plenty of time between the panels activating and the rain starting to get to the buff zone and back, as long as you're standing somewhere more or less between the three pillars of light.
The only way that should be possible is if you tried to rez during the rain. If you did, that was your own fault.
@flamingbunnyman in game. Formerly @Roderick in City of Heroes.
It's the lack of Sesame Street, I tells ya.
Deliciously nutritious!
Or they could be taking lessons from this guy. He's in his 30s. I want you to keep that in mind when you watch that.
Semi Cybermind Tutorial
Fit perfectly. Also useful for those who don't know what to do.
Deliciously nutritious!
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
1. It is possible, randomly, for the buff to not apply. I have, personally, encountered this once every 3-5 runs.
2. If you have to rebuff(change colors) to fight the drones then it is possible to have the wrong color and no way to get rid of it in time to get the right color....and get facemelted.
3. I have no idea what causes this but it's an old bug from Therakiel's Temple. There's something which can randomly(had this happen about 3 times so far overall, so it's still somewhat rare) send your camera into non-stop spinning mode...which leads to being facemelted because you cannot move to the buff zones.
Overall only mildly annoying things which can be countered with a Servitor's Serum. The key is to NOT use it when the floor panel colors are up. Just wait for them to switch off, get up, and get back into the fray. :biggrin:
Join Date: Aug 2009 | Title: Devslayer
Oh well, another day and as always more of the same. Expectations are met, disappointment is had.
...I just recently realized something really disturbing. We're all eating Sodapop3's "humble pie."
Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
I have fun running regular Alerts, missions, packs/series, etc. Cybermind's fight isn't fun. It's tedious and filled with random instant death for petty non-obvious mistakes (which might be the products of bugs or engine limitations anyway).
If I didn't think the game was worth playing I would have stopped paying for it long ago.
So maybe it's time to give up?
'cause no matter how hard you try to convince me that I'm not having fun, it just keeps happening anyway.
Champions Online: Be the hero you wish you could be in a better game.
If you solve color puzzle, there are no instant death even AT or any kind of build.
(But you have to have at least one self heal.)
I did this too much and now my player's concentration becoming dead. 92 run so far and 91 success so nearly 99% win.
But still just 2 drop.
Nice video, I reckon you should have this in your signature OR make a thread on it...
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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Yes, yes it's terrible. I finished 5000 virus kill in my main toon so started leveling my Lv.28 toon in Cybermind.
5k HP is enough to do this if we know how to do. xD
But still 2 drops.
I was not aware of this. So keeping someone on all the walls does have a good effect.
My Characters on PRIMUS
[#]WeNeedHeroicFashion - <Aura Suggestions> - <CO Wiki (WIP)> - <Crowd Control Discussion> - <Telepathy in Champions Online> - How to review The Force Power Set - Join the Champions Online: On Alert Discord!
I am @RavenForce in game
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THX for good info. I never noticed this. Epidemic!! xD
Yet another reason it is OPidemic. :P
I'll have to remember that next time I run it.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
[thread=139701]My old, old guide for Ego Blades. Updated for On: Alert.[/thread]
[thread=154211]The Costume Contest Schedule. Stay up-to-date without having to log in![/thread]
Probably ppl using OPdemic, Pyre, Hurricane or Sparkstorm, didn't notice this.
AoE with no targeting necessary. Spam spam spam!
Our most strong enemy in Cyber Mind mission are mobs not Cyber Mind himself. xD
Over all I prefer Gravitar to this and the reward of 30 000 really isn't enough for me to keep plugging away. I'm sure the costume drops for this and Gravitar would be about the same . . . meaning I'll never get one anyways.