Messages

31

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Inventive Inf Dumps

« on: August 30, 2021, 02:44:35 pm »

D'Spite was suggesting some purely "cosmetic" influence dumps that come with bragging rights that I like the sound of.  Things like:
NPC Praise: & Player Statues:

• Pay to have a prominent NPC (Say Miss Liberty) sing your praises for some period of time so that all of the other supers will know of your greatness
• A statue of your likeness erected somewhere for some period of time.

32

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: August 30, 2021, 02:07:59 pm »

1: very rare attuned enhancements are any Rare or Very Rare enhancement that has been attuned with an Enhancement catalyst.

At least on Rebirth right now, enhancement catalysts can only be used on ATOs and the Winter Sets.  Very Rare attuned enhancements are a possible reward from super packs on test.  Right now they only differ from standard Purple enhancements in that they can't be boosted.

4: On live, I can confirm PVP recipes did in fact drop from normal enemies and missions, both in PVP zones and out. heck even on rebirth I've already gotten a few low level PVP recipes and haven't even done PVP at all.

Hmm, that would have been a bug on live and on Rebirth.  They are only intended to drop during PvP (paragon wiki provided as it's a snapshot from live at shutdown): https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/PvP_IO_Sets.  I know several of the other servers have made changes so that PvP recipes drop in other content, but that shouldn't be happening on Rebirth.

33

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: August 27, 2021, 04:57:51 am »

I would also like to address your false assumption that being a Vigilante is necessarily any kind of advantage. Many times I log on there are fewer than 10 people on red-side. If I'm playing a Vigilante the only things I can initiate (as far as I know... and please... correct me if there are other things a Vig/Rog can initiate on the other side) are paper missions, tip mission, and AE missions. That's it... all of which I could just do blue-side.

I play a vigilante explicitly so I can help out on red side content (join in on an LRSF or other task force, team up with a low level villain) and see it as taking a hit because I lose out on the ability to get hero merits.  It's worth mentioning that vigilantes also have the ability to initiate villain side TFs (something I should probably do more of).  If alignments were unlocked from content, I would probably switch back to being a hero.  From a purely selfish perspective I like that rogues and vigilantes are getting more parity with purchasing power so that it feels like less of a hit going Vigilante.  This may actually help the imbalance that you see red side if more heroes are able to go vigilante without feeling like they're taking such a significant hit.  However, and I know we disagree here, I think for the system to have meaning there still needs to be some impact from making the decision.  Gating existing content is definitely not a beneficial way to make that adjustment though.  I've just been pondering what might be doable to feel significant without feeling necessary.

In the brainstorming category to see if anything sticks: If we were to entirely open up content, like Kismet suggests, what about giving heroes and villains a small buff when running content native to their side?  Initially I was thinking that you could give heroes and villains a buff when running TFs that are alignment locked and Rogues/Vigilantes a buff when running co-op TFs but that seems unfair since co-op TFS are so much more common at high levels.  So then I was thinking, give everyone a Kheldian style power, where heroes and villains get a buff for every hero or villain on their team.  And rogues and Vigilantes get a buff from everyone who's not a hero or villain on their team.  Obviously, this would have to be a tiny tiny power no not break things, and practicality may be non existent (although maybe the warmth of prometheus could be used to figure out how to do it?)  I especially like how thematic that feels.  I suggest you treat these as the family feud model of brainstorming (Category: "Things you find in the ocean", Answer: "Hot Dogs", Family: "Good Answer, Good Answer, I'm sure it'll be up there")

Hero/Villain - Better alignment powers, Better pricing on Hero/Villain Super packs, Access to slightly more stuff (have to double check if those made it in).

I had not notice before that there was any difference in what could be purchased, but I think that's the sort of modest benefit that would be useful in making the pure alignments not feel purely like an RP choice.

34

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: August 23, 2021, 07:51:03 pm »

Alignment Merits Overhaul
"What gameplay reason would anyone have to stay a Hero / Villain now?"

I think this is the fundamental question.  Vigilantes and Rogues already get access to a whole other game of content which has actual game play advantages (patron power pools for heroes that switch, easier to earn merits from hero TFs for villains that switch, in addition to just generally more content available, and on our small server that means easier access to teams).  If you choose not have this dual access, you were rewarded with hero/villain merits which were 1) more efficient, and 2) had access to rewards with those merits that Rogues and Vigilantes didn't to compensate.  That reward is now being removed, so all Heroes and Villains get for remaining a hero or villain is access to less content.

This seems problematic.  Just having different but equal parity rewards for Rogues/Vigilantes and Heroes/Villains still doesn't compensate for the effective penalty that Heroes and Villains have.  The only reason to stay a Villain/Hero now is a character one and making that decision doesn't provide any compensation.

35

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: August 20, 2021, 05:33:28 pm »

As the discussion continues to progress on discord I think a lot of good points have been made. In particular, trying to make Purple IOs abundant enough that they end up on the market may prove challenging since people have such a potential to hoard them. This makes the goal seem that it may prove difficult to achieve without accidentally trivializing Purple IOs.

We have also had several players speak up to say that they are not opposed to purple drop rate on live and that adding easier and different ways for people to earn purples makes the drop rate less relevant, and that we should wait and see the impact of this easier access to purples before modifying the drop rate.  I have more thoughts on the purple drop rate, but for this post at least will focus on earning rate through merits at itrials.

We typically run two hours of itrials every night on Rebirth, so typically two hours of itrials seems like a good baseline to look at.  Originally the rate was 0.1 purple/night (6 merits per night for a 60 empyrean recipe).  Then in Ri1 it became 0.2 purples/night (6 merits for a 30 empyrean recipe).  As I mentioned in my edit to my previous post the current change is a jump to 0.8 purples/night (6/12 empyreans = 0.5 + 30/90 astrals = 0.33 = 0.83).  I think almost everyone would agree that the Ri1 change did not feel like it fundamentally changed the way players thought about and used purple recipes, so clearly there is room to increase the earn rate without fundamentally altering the game.  A 4x increase still feels significant, although it will be hard to gauge the impact until a month after ri2 drops, I suspect.  (I think no one knew lowering the cost to 30 emps would feel so minor).

I'm going to do some brainstorming here just to try to hash out some ideas:If we wanted to limit the change to another 2x change, for 0.4 purples/night, what might that look like?  I think we definitely want to make their empyrean cost cheaper.  If we made them 20 empyreans, then we'd have to make purples cost 300 astrals to hit that target which feels too large (6/20+30/300 = 0.4), but any less of a reduction to emp cost feels like lip service.  So If we were willing to up the earn rate to 0.5 purples/night we could keep purples at 20 empyreans, and astrals would only need to go up to 150.  Alternatively a 20/90 emp/astral cost (keeping the astral cost where it is on test), would be 0.63 purple/night a 3x increase, but now you make more progress towards purples with astrals (0.33) every night than you do with emps (0.3), which seems incorrect.  Another possibility, at least worth considering, is to not add an astral cost, and then we could lower to 12 or 15 emps without needing to worry about the additional astral earn rate.  I do like having an astral earn rate though to make those astrals more useful.

This has me liking the 20/150 split, which makes empyreans 7.5x more valuable than astrals. and a 2.5x increase from what's currently on live.  If a player attends all 5 weeknight itrials, they'll now get 2.5 purples instead of 1.  That's a change that, to me, feels impactful without feeling radical.  There's room to further reduce costs in future issues but seems unlikely to be so severe that we'll want to roll it back.  This also makes Purple Recipes cheaper to earn for players not doing itrials (who will also have the added benefit of getting more emps for rewards than they used to from other Ri2 changes.)

36

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: August 18, 2021, 06:20:40 pm »

Alright, more of the economy rework is now available on the test server.  Some thoughts on purple recipe availability in particular:

As I look at the changes coming through to progression for RI2, I am starting to get concerned.  I think many of us play on rebirth because we want and appreciate a slower rate of progression where fully enhancing your character is something that takes time and that you work towards.  Not something that can just be accomplished in a week and the character thrown on the pile of alts you'll never revisist.

Obviously things are still being adjusted and the new purple drop rate is far from final.  Everyone seems to agree that a drop rate of 1 purple every 5 minutes is too extreme.  However, not having a clear explanation of what the goal is, I'm left uncertain if I should be arguing about the goal or whether the implementation meets the goal.

One thing that I like about the current implementation of purple drops on the live server is that they're rare enough that people get excited about getting one.  I was recently talking to a Rebirther who had taken a hiatus on Homecoming, and noted that there purples were so common no one ever remarked on getting a purple recipe.  I think keeping a sense of excitement to purple recipes is valuable.  I think that there is definitely room to increase the drop rate (and access) from the current rate (where a player may go months without seeing a purple drop) and still keep a sense of excitement about purples.  That would be my goal if I were selecting a criteria: Increase the purple drop rate and accessibility while still keeping excitement over getting a purple recipe.

Aside from increasing the drop rate, purples have also just become easier to obtain on the test server.  They've been added to super packs, had their cost drastically decreased for empyrean merits (more on this later), had an option added for astral merits, been added as a reward option to the very rare incarnate component table, have the chance to drop for lvl 50 characters when exemplared, and are a reward for an Masters of Run.  The impact of all of these changes on the purple supply is going to be virtually impossible to gauge on the test server.  I therefore would caution strongly towards making more minor changes that can be increased if the desired effect is not achieved, rather than sweeping changes that potentially break things and need to be rolled back.

I am also concerned about the drastically reduced empyrean cost of purple recipes.  A typical night (2 hours) of running incarnate trials awards ~6 empyrean merits and ~30 astrals. So on the test server that's a guaranteed 1.66 purple recipes a night (combined with increased chance of a recipe dropping during the trial and a chance to claim one as a VR reward).  This is compared with the current rate of 0.2/night (30 emps for a purple would take 5 nights).  An increase of 8x on that front feels pretty extreme and again would be hard to judge the impact it would have on itrial attendance. (Does this drive more interest because purples are much easier to get this way than any other way in the game, or less interest because it takes fewer itrials for players to accomplish their goals?).  Although I'm not opposed to making purples cheaper, an order of magnitude change whose impact really can't be tested seems ill advised.

Edit: merits prices just got updated so a night of itrials now nets you: 0.83 Purples (6/12 emps and 30/90 astrals) so still a 4x increase although less drastic than before

37

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: July 31, 2021, 08:46:13 pm »

Reward Choices for completing Incarnate content now offers a choice for a random Purple Recipe instead of Super Inspirations when receiving a Very Rare reward. This means if a new lvl 50 runs through all the incarnate arcs, then they would have the opportunity for 8 purple recipes (six, belladonna, heather, mu, duncan, solaris, dream doc x2)?

This may just be if you choose the incarnate component and get the very rare roll table? If someone tests this, report back (I'm waiting for the inspiration crash fix)

38

General Suggestions and Feedback / Re: Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: July 30, 2021, 12:14:32 pm »

I'm waiting for the inspiration bug to be fixed before digging into things in more detail, but some initial thoughts which may change with testing:

• The enhancement purchasing influence sinks aren't great, but they're the only ones we have at the moment.  Hopefully there are other sinks being added, but otherwise I'm wary of removing them since inflation was a very serious problem on live.  Our smaller and friendlier player base appears to have saved us from this issue initially but I think it is important to have more ways to take inf out of the economy.  I can only give away so much to new players who might not come back.
• going off Psycho Cop's post on discord, the influence costs are no longer round numbers: 28,125,000; 16,750,000.  I think here ease of use should trump exact balancing.  At least an even million, or better yet just keep it a multiple of 5 and call those 30 and 15.
• The cost reduction for purple IOs from empyrean merits feels too extreme.  It's effectively setting the rate at 1/night from itrials, which is maybe the intention.  But I liked that they were something that you had to work for.  I'm not sure where that sweet spot is, may be1/2 nights, so make them 12 and 15? I would be interested in knowing what the desired earn rate is of the rebalance.  I recognize my play style is quite a bit different from most, but I would like a reason to keep playing a character as long as possible, and the grind of completing multiple builds was one way to prolong the sense of progress on a character.  I would also mention that although you can always further lower prices, it can be very hard to raise them without drawing anger from the player base so I would caution, at least on live, starting with a smaller step and then increasing if it's deemed insufficient, rather than starting with a large one that is regretted later. (Obviously on the test server, you can start with the extreme step to get a reaction and then scale it back)
• I'm not entirely clear on what: "Reward Choices for completing Incarnate content now offers a choice for a random Purple Recipe instead of Super Inspirations when receiving a Very Rare reward."  Does this mean that instead of a VR salvage from an itrial I can choose a Purple recipe, because that's an awesome change!  (I would fully support rolling this out to the other reward tables as well maybe gold/silver/bronze roll for rare, uncommon, common?).  Does this also apply to the reward tables at the end of DA arcs?  Haven't run them often enough to know how this work, or what the rarity break down is.
• the 4x increase in PvP IOs I hope is relative to the 1% at shutdown, not the 6% currently on Rebirth. Because at 24%, I could get a PvP IO every 5 minutes on my farm rotation which feels a little too easy.
• love the idea of gladiator merits! (As well as awarding gladiator merits for completing the zone mini games, I think it would also be good for the mini game rewards to be purchasable with gladiator merits)  Would be nice if defeating the RV AVs, or capturing a pillbox/defeating a turret also awarded merits.  Maybe a small chance for merits to drop from PvE enemies in PvP zones as well, or from running PvP missions
• I'm also unclear on what Very Rare attuned enhancement are, but I guess I will figure that out on test.  If it hasn't been done, probably a good idea to award everyone on test super packs to test these things.
• I understand the desire to encourage PvP, and agree that PvP IOs should be easier to earn through PvP than other methods, but the cost through other resources feel too high, especially compared with the dramatic reduction in Purple prices.  (If the astral/emp costs are raised, then at least the differential between the two won't feel as massive). Given how opposed much of the player base tends to be to PvP, I think there ought to be a more reasonable non PvP path.  If gladiator merits are added to some of the PvP zone missions, maybe that helps reduce some of the issue by allowing some people to PvE in a PvP impactful way.

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General Suggestions and Feedback / Feedback Thread for Economy Overhaul on Test Server

« on: July 30, 2021, 11:33:42 am »

This thread is to discuss the economy changes currently on the test server: https://forum.cityofheroesrebirth.com/index.php/topic,145.0.html

Note that this is only the first patch of the economy/grind overhaul and there are more changes coming.

40

Looking for Group / Re: Steel Canyon Firefighters

« on: July 22, 2021, 06:58:21 pm »

a couple thoughts:
1) Sadly there is no badge or other reward for saving the building, the only badges are the ones that you already listed
2) Any player can schedule an event with herald, so I would pick a time that works well for you (and doesn't conflict with itrials for best turnout): https://forum.cityofheroesrebirth.com/index.php/topic,81.0.html

41

Live Bug Reporting / Re: Damage for Defender and Corrupter

« on: June 30, 2021, 08:17:50 pm »

I guess the interesting question becomes what the correct number to show is.  The second damage number is indeed the additional damage from scourge which is getting added to the damage computation number for corruptors.  So that's accurate anytime scourge activates, and always correct below 10% health.  (I suppose you could add that as as 30% which would be the area in the plot on the scourge page, but that will still be misleading.  And I suspect it's a non trivial amount of work to get that number to be a special computation for Corruptors, so I think it's unlikely to get changed anytime soon, but I agree that the detailed numbers are misleading.

42

Tech Issues / Re: Game won't finish loading

« on: June 30, 2021, 01:52:56 pm »

Hey Chaotic, this was a while ago, so hopefully you got help!  If you're still having trouble, you can 1) ask in the #help-desk channel of the rebirth discord. 2) file a ticket by direct messaging PPD Drone on the discord.  We are definitely committed to getting everyone up and running (we just went several months without forums and still aren't used to having them again)

43

Live Bug Reporting / Re: Damage for Defender and Corrupter

« on: June 30, 2021, 01:45:31 pm »

Hey Tiojion, I'm trying to figure out what you're seeing in the character creator.
I looked at the overview and the power detail and those look correct to me (multipliers are different from what I listed above because we're sub lvl 20, but it still goes Defender < Corruptor < Blaster, see screenshots below)  So I suspect you're looking at something else?

Defender:


Corruptor:


Blaster

44

Live Bug Reporting / Re: Damage for Defender and Corrupter

« on: June 30, 2021, 02:26:39 am »

I do love getting mathy, so bear with me.
tldr: Everything is correct and corruptors can deal a lot more damage than defenders.
Note that the numbers I'm using are all above lvl 20, before level 20 there are slightly different multipliers.

Defender have a damage multiplier of 0.65 ranged (and 0.55 melee) while corruptors have a damage multiplier of 0.75 for ranged and melee.

The defender inherent vigilance (https://wiki.cityofheroesrebirth.com/wiki/Inherent_Powers#Vigilance) gives a defender a 30% damage bonus solo (20% with one teammate, 10% with two teammates, and 0% with three or more teammates).  Therefore a base attack for a defender when solo deals 0.65 * 1.3 = 0.845, which is higher than the corruptor's 0.75.

However, their base multiplier is still lower.  So let's suppose that a power were enhanced 100% (slightly above what you would get with 3 damage enhancements).  Then defenders would effectively deal (0.65 * 2.3) = 1.495 and corruptors would deal (0.75 * 2.0) = 1.5.  So at this point corruptors are already dealing more damage, albeit only slightly, but this will increase as there are more damage bonuses from buffs, set bonuses, eating a red inspiration, etc.  Of course, when teamed the defender falls to 1.3 (=0.65*2.0).

Furthermore, corruptors have a damage cap of 500% while defenders have a damage cap of 400%.  Therefore at the extreme (say capped due to Fulcrum Shift) corruptors can deal 5*0.75 = 3.75, while defenders can only deal 4*0.65 = 2.6.

Now add on top of that the corruptor inherent scourge (https://wiki.cityofheroesrebirth.com/wiki/Scourge) which means that once enemies are below 50% health they have a chance to deal double damage and their damage increases even further relative to defenders (at least against hard targets that are going to suffer more than a couple hits before defeat).

As someone who primarily plays defenders, I agree that they are strong and their stronger buffs/debuffs is why I prefer them over corruptors.  I think a lot of people don't realize that solo their damage output is comparable which is part of what leads to much higher number of corruptors than defenders.  But if the only thing you care about is damage, corruptors have the ability to deal a lot more than defenders and given the breakdown on the server, I would say most people feel that this more than makes up for their reduced buffs and debuffs.

45

AE/Mission Architect / Re: Donkyhotay's AE missions

« on: June 28, 2021, 03:13:25 am »

The portal tech was the one I could find.  I think on most outdoor maps positioning is ignored, but there might be some exceptions.