Helping with Patron Power Unlock Mission Should Give Unlock

[Katharos]

Today I did Black Scorpion's arc and got up to the final mission, Defeat Dr Quatrexin, which grants the Stinger badge, which then unlocks all patron pools. I went into Looking For Group and invited anyone who wanted a patron pool unlock to come join me for the mission. We do it, and lo and behold, they don't get credit, which means I've wasted their time, and I look like an idiot.

If anyone does the final patron pool unlock mission, regardless of whose mission it is, they deserve to get the badge and the unlock. Please reward forming teams and helping people. I'm a redside native; I want to help other members of my endangered species have fun, and when I can help people get the badge early, I save them the trouble of having to respec when they can't take the power they want at 35.

It's basic sense.

[Redlynne]

If anyone does the final patron pool unlock mission, regardless of whose mission it is, they deserve to get the badge and the unlock.

I would disagree on the grounds that the Patron Unlock is the entire Patron Story Arc, not just merely the last mission in that arc.
Not sure what the "under the hood" coding is, but I can easily imagine it being one where each of the missions in the arc needs to be completed as a prerequisite to achieving the Patron unlock reward.

Over a decade ago back on the Virtue Server, I remember running all 4 Patron Arcs on a single character in order to unlock each Patron Pool "just in case" I ever wanted to respec into an alternate build using powers from a different Patron.

I'm a redside native; I want to help other members of my endangered species have fun, and when I can help people get the badge early, I save them the trouble of having to respec when they can't take the power they want at 35.

The simplest solution to that particular problem (the respec part) would be to make the Patron Arcs available to be run @ Level 34 ... not 35.
The powers that completion unlocks remain 35+ as normal, but the opportunity to unlock them is made available starting at Level 34. That way you can run your Patron Arc and achieve the unlock "in time" for advancing to Level 35 and you can choose a power from your Patron Pool without needing to respec for it.

[Joshex]

I've had this issue with some other content from missions or story arcs too.

I refer to it as the Vanguard Badge Situation, as that's one of the easiest examples, you cannot be granted the vanguard recruit dayjob badge until you are Lv35, but you may earn progress towards it before then. For my character captain shock in example under badges>dayjobs the badge's logoff time meter was full (504) before I was 35, but it was granted as soon as I ticked over 35. I don't remember if it was at levelup or at train, I'd be tempted to say it was at levelup that the badge was earned. even if not, that would be a better solution than changing the level you need to train to to get a badge. instead have the badge be granted when you level to the given level rather than after you train.

If you want to confirm what's necessary for the badge, you'll need to fast track a villain to 35 and complete the first mission in any patron arc then check your Collect window and look for badges>category, then see what it says or what the meter shows, you can also add it to the badge monitor to see if it does change per mission. if so, then yes people need to stay along for the whole arc. Again even if they do the whole arc the badge will not be granted till Lv35.

and again changing that from "grant after Train to Lv35" to "Grant after untrained level passes 35" would solve said issue.

the content I had issues with were temp powers, they are only granted to the leader. this could be how it's set for the patron badges as well.

Patron pool badges NEED to be at Lv35+ or it will likely cause a conflict in the game's code!it's simple logic:
1: the badge unlocks patron pools during level up
2: the first patron power unlocks at 35
3: cannot have a new pool set as available with no available powers and no claimed powers in it!!!

I honestly have no idea how the game would react to that. I'd suspect one of the following:
1: the level 35 power is selectable at a lower level the badge was earned at, but on select and confirm nothing happens (you train up but don't get a power) because you don't meet the level requirements.
2: the level 35 power is selectable at a lower level you earned the badge at, but on select and confirm you get a nameless (#01$&@#^%*435901add more special characters) glitched power which is something else entirely and probably does nothing.
3: the level 35 power is available at a lower level the badge was earned at, but on select and confirm it crashes the game client.
or the worst case scenario for the player:
4: the epic pools selection is visible though none of it's powers are available causing the a glitch which wont let you train up no matter what you select, if it even lets you select anything! it may just display "error".
or the worst case for the server:
5: the epic pools selection is visible though none of the powers are available, causing a "corrupted" data log which crashes the server.

so, these are just guesses, I just know CoH is really temperamental when it comes to things that don't add up or don't fit in some preset code bend, causing an exception.

thinking about my suggested fix now after the fact, it'll need a third condition:

"Character Trained to Lv34, and Character's untrained level is 35+, and has completed a patron arc" = grant patron badge

Might also need a fourth condition: "Player Alignment is Villain or Rogue before badge will grant." this is necessary if we are allowing progress for the badge ahead of time, because a player could easily complete the arc with a lv35 lead at Lv20 turn off XP, then do rogue then hero tips and become a hero at level 20 and stay hero till 35. but then a hero is being granted a Villain Badge While actually a Hero, that could cause errors. Otherwise it might cause conflicts with other hero and villain specific badges. So they'll have to do vigilante tips and then villain tips till they are a villain at 35+ so it grants the badge then rouge and hero tips to get back to hero.

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I know recluse would have a fit. being forced to grant a villain scouts badge to a dropout villain scout who joined the hero scouts for progress they made in their hero scout level. "like [expletive!] I'll give that [expletive, adjective and shaming pronoun] a badge! send it, but fill it with explosives triggered by sunlight, laced with this virus in the mail instead! and add in this computer virus to infect all their mail systems in transit"

Watch your language lord recluse!
"I'll say what I damn well please!"
Ok then!

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and freedom phalanx would likely have good cop bad cop questions to ask when that badge gets awarded through their system. "it says here you've been a hero for 15 levels after clearing your record as a villain at level 20, but we just got a message you were awarded a villain badge 1 level ago, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt to explain this" after you explain it "now listen here you! I don't buy that story! if you told me this badge was a mistake and someone was trying to frame you, I would have believed you! we know you've been working with the villains recently to get this badge as it's only awarded for completing a patron arc which can only be done at Lv35! so spill the beans, Who have you been in contact with?!"

Sheesh Manticore calm down! what if it's like they say it is?
"fine.. but I'm revoking their hero registration while we investigate this, you are forbidden from continuing work as a hero till we get to the bottom of this! and if this is a villain trick it'll be your registration on the chopping block along with theirs!"

but back to reality, yeah the game will likely have issues with this change if all the right things are not done. So to recap to allow the player to earn progress ahead of time, the badge should not grant until (all the following are true):
1: the character has trained to Lv34
2: the character achieves/has an untrained level of 35+
3: the character is Villain or Rogue.

from there you can take it where you want it.

[Katharos]

I would disagree on the grounds that the Patron Unlock is the entire Patron Story Arc, not just merely the last mission in that arc.
Not sure what the "under the hood" coding is, but I can easily imagine it being one where each of the missions in the arc needs to be completed as a prerequisite to achieving the Patron unlock reward.

Over a decade ago back on the Virtue Server, I remember running all 4 Patron Arcs on a single character in order to unlock each Patron Pool "just in case" I ever wanted to respec into an alternate build using powers from a different Patron.

An MMO is a team game. Teams should get rewards for playing together. All the rewards. This just entrenches redside's existing population problem.

And having to run all four patron arcs sucked. It wasn't fun, it made the game worse and miserable. This is also a bad status quo that should be changed to make things more accessible and welcoming to everyone. Being against it is being against accessibility.

It's imminently possible because it's a feature enabled on other servers.

I want to help my other redsiders. Let me help my other redsiders by letting them get patron unlocks when they're on a team with me.

[Redlynne]

In the long run, "gimmie all the good stuff for minimal effort on my part!" rarely improves Player retention rates.
The less effort it takes to accomplish something, the less value it has to start with and the less value it will retain over time.

There's a reason why "boosting" garners less respect than actually doing the work (and P2W garners even less).

[Katharos]

In the long run, "gimmie all the good stuff for minimal effort on my part!" rarely improves Player retention rates.
The less effort it takes to accomplish something, the less value it has to start with and the less value it will retain over time.

There's a reason why "boosting" garners less respect than actually doing the work (and P2W garners even less).

You must not play redside very often. Just FYI, beating Dr Q is an entire mission villains have to do, and he can scale up from an EB to an AV with a full team! Obviously, this being a massively multiplayer game, every person who joins a team and contributes should get full rewards for their contributions. Otherwise, there's no incentive to team up at all, and we native redside players would really like to team up more.

As far as player retention rates go, after that problem I encountered with patron unlocks, I actually went from playing weekly to not playing for several months, as did most of my friends. Which is why I stopped looking at this thread for a while. So even if you think missions shouldn't reward your teammates for helping you and consider team rewards to be a matter of "boosting," you're advocating for something that has at least once convinced less people to play on Rebirth. But maybe that's intentional.

Realistically, people play on their own terms, or they don't play at all. If a person only has fun at level 50 but can't realistically expect to reach level 50 within a reasonable amount of time, they won't sigh and suck it up. They just won't play at all. They'll find a different game to play that they find that's more accommodating for them. For a massively multiplayer game, that's unfortunate, because a diversity of playstyles and players makes for a healthy population for long term sustainability.

But, again, that has essentially nothing to do with my OP, because as explained, we do have to work for patron unlocks. I think every redsider gets badges from mayhem missions from enabling AVs and rushing the vault, and that's a great system that makes people love doing mayhem missions. Well, besides the fact that mayhem missions are riotous fun in their own right.

[Joshex]

Again the solution is to allow players to earn progress towards the patron badge before 35, but the badge grants when their untrained level hits 35. so in example someone who ticks over Lv35 with mission complete of the last mission in the arc, should be immediately granted the badge.

this is so they don't need to respec at 35. they can just get the badge then level to 35 and select from patron pools.