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Thread: Soloing and Cooperation

  1. #1

    Soloing and Cooperation

    Please use this thread to reply to and discuss the recent article on soloing and cooperation. Enjoy!

    The article can be found here:
    http://community.anarchy-online.com/...articles/2000L
    Earn free game time and play with your friends[/b]

    Anarchy Online Community Representative

  2. #2
    I want to know the reason by the very limited amounts of buffs engineers have. I mean, we got AC buffs. They are not as spectacular as everyone says, and other classes got similar ones. Aside from our shields, we got no actual buffs which are useful in combat. The Auras are so spammy that few people actually wants them.
    *poof*


    Finally free from this nightmare!

  3. #3

    Post Team Missions

    The one thing you said about team missions getting a "boss" in the end sounds great. That way, you would make team missions more attractive...(at least for me, but I guess some others feel it that way too)

    And about the "every class should get their own unique thing to add" thing woud also be a good improvement. As it is today, tanks (pets) and healers are the only thing that matters... Though I haven't got any clue on how you should proceed to make this improvement, I would very much like to see it in one way or the other... =)

  4. #4
    "Do you meet monsters that require skill and tactics to fight other than in the static dungeons?"

    No, we meet monsters with 30k HPs and insta-kill with 5k nukes. You took away insta-kill in PvP, but why are we being insta-killed by NPCs?

    "Down-time"? What is this a joke? Do you know how often people LD in your game? That's all the downtime we need.

    Gaute, please do us a favor and yourself up to 100+ with an MA, Adv, Soldier, or an NT, and see how you like it. Your article sounds like it's from a lvl 30 character complaining about how easy things are. From lvl 10 to 80, I was mopping the floor with Red MOBs. At one point, I could take on two full Reds at the same time. Now at lvl 138, it takes me 5 minutes to take down a Yellow.

    Please look at the higher lvl game in AO. Only professions that can solo past lvl 100 are MPs and Engies. Do a poll if you don't believe me. It's great that you're trying to cater to the lower lvls, but do you know what higher lvl players are doing? They're all hanging out in Broken Shores so that can do "solo" missions in teams for descent experience. And don't say that this isn't a leveling game, because you're always thinking, "I can put on my armor my next level" or "I can get my next nano in two more levels."

    A lot of peole I used to team with have quit already, and more are quitting every day. Don't expect high level players to reroll a new character because the high level game is boring and tedious. They'll most likely quit.

  5. #5
    Let me stress again that this should in no way change the way you solo, or your ability to solo. Those aspects should remain as good as they are today.
    This is the extent that you mention soloing? The article should be entitled "Cooperation and Teaming and Grouping and Team Missions and a small mention of soloing"

    I've petitioned many times about the ability of my higher level NT to solo. I've sent in bug reports and feedback in this regard.

    It is almost impossible to solo as a NT at higher levels. Nuff said.

  6. #6

    Crowd Control

    As a crat, I have often found my crowd control capabilities to be hindered. My charms haven't be useful in 10 levels, because everything I fight beats the pychic check, and I can't use a new nano for 5 levels. In addition, my mez nanos usually just draw an agro on me. Fear works, but when I target just one of the scared MOBs, the entire group agroes on me. Also, my roots tend to break way to easy. The group root has been effective, but it too breaks a little easy, although not as easy as my single root. Overall then, right now the crowd controlling crat has become an exp-buffing man, with decent DD nanos, and a pet to tank so the crat doesn't die. It can work, but I feel our abilities in game do not match our vision.
    Tomas "Gazneth" Dalaet
    Blade Corp.
    "Leading mercenary corporation in the Galaxy"
    Position - CFO

  7. #7

    Talking

    I love the invitation from FC to discuss the very fabric of AO Why are we logging on each night after work to play our three hours before sleep!? For me, there are only two things that keep me playing right now:

    1. Chatting with my clan, helping them all to succeed in getting a fun gaming experience.

    2. Leveling - getting boring as an MA; doing 60% solo missions or playing the "Healing Bruce Lee" in team hunts.

    I would love more unpredictability: more chaotic caves, bigger spread in mob levels, better loot, being able to hit for more than min dmg with my fearsome fists of death ...whatever really! Give the game a soul or I'll too stop playing/paying.

    The best thing with the original post from Gaute is that we get to know that FC cares! We (the gaming community) wants status updates, discussions, ETA's, ...again whatever, but MORE FREQUENTLY PLEASE!!!

    "I'm having fun breaking toothpicks"

    /Sormlam
    Leader of the Northern Shadowrunners
    http://ns-sweden.clanpages.com

  8. #8
    Other than that, here is my 25c:
    Do the professions with an adequate number of hit-points to "tank" (survive with monsters bashing them) have enough ways to keep the monsters focused on them? (As in viable "Aggression Enhancers" and Nano Programs?) Are you able to do your job?
    Yes, I believe the tanks have great ability to aggro. Problem is: Not all tanks care to use or raise their ability to aggro. I would like to see it easier to raise skill points to put into aggro.
    Do the professions that heal (Doctors, Martial Artists and Adventurers) have any use / purpose in the team? Do you really need a healer when the monsters drop in 5-10 seconds?
    You obviously haven't played a higher level character. After 100+, unless you have a pet profession, doctors are a must.
    Imagine going to the mines in Mutant Domains or Lush Fields to fight monsters. Suddenly, larger and tougher monsters spawn among its fellow "cannonfodder" friends. It would have more hit-points, higher damage output, and a higher chance of unique item-drops (Loot). Would that be fun, or a pain in the ...?
    Funfactor = Funfactor + 1 i.e. Lifebleeder in NW lush.
    Make more interesting monster camps.
    Can anyone say Shades?
    Give monsters a more complex AI when you meet them with a team. Let them pick dangerous opponents, basically be "nastier", more challenging... (More fun?)
    If this means Mob goes after Doctor first, then...No.
    If this means when HP<10% and Mob runs, then Yes.
    Go through each profession and make sure it has something unique, or at least very good, to contribute to a team in a fight.
    I do believe that NTs have good damage, but their HE has ALOT to be desired still. It really should be increased.
    Include different team-missions. Finally turn on the team-mission booths and give them tougher monsters, more of them, better loot and several levels. Maybe with a boss at the end? + Multiple reward and tokens
    Stop it, your making me cry. I will actually have to un-cancel my account.

  9. #9

    Thumbs up

    First answer: YES please! all of it!

    Some very good suggestion there!!

    AI: I want mobs to use nanos in a more creative way. This includes adding nanos to non-human mobs. This will make the mobs more in unique then they are today and thats always good. Also most mobs dont require any special tactic... just go up and bash it in the head...boring

    Boss-mob spawn: Oh yeah!! instead of waiting for the next group of mobs to spawn a boss spawns (or mobs under attack long enough, or random). This will make the world much more complex. and it won't in any way diminish a PC soloing.

    GUI: What would be really nice where we could see who was aggrod by a mob. That would make it so much more easy for the tanks to see that a support char has been attacked. oh, instead of the blue blob on the left side in the team windows, please show the class specific icon there. makes it easier to see whos the doc... (esp good for pickup teams) Also there is a real need for the chat window to be split in two, one for battle messages and one for normal chat.

    NCU: Major problem, most classes can fill their NCU just with their own buffs, aka no room for team nanos at all. What usually happens is that something has to go. (ex Enfraams for NTs) For example, at lvl80-90 the best buff from most classes take up 20-30NCU, for a team of 6 thats 120-180NCU if they buff you with just one of them. (I have a full set of Cyborg armour just for teaming due to the bonus in NCU)

    Soloing: please go through all the classes and add or change them so they can solo all the way.

    "nastier": hehe yeah, please do. that would make teaming a lot of fun. Not as it's today, the only way to play high level due to lack soloability or xp/sec.
    Dhur the Ninja Pirate NT!

  10. #10
    One of the most innovative and refreshing points you snuck in there, Gaute, was the check for an excessively fast death-cycle.

    DAoC tried to address the problem of 'spawn-camping' by adding
    'bring-a-friend' code. Basically, a group of six sits in a spot and pulls an extremely difficult monster for one person and the group of six slaughters it with little-to-no-risk for great benefit. What BAF (bring-a-friend) did was to have the 'pulled' monster drag along some of his buddies if the person that attacked him was in a group of more than two. This was supposed to bring the challenge back to where it should be for the group. The problem was that the difficulty increase was exponential rather than linear with each added MOB. Two 'purple' monsters was not twice as difficult as one. It was four times as difficult. With a group of six, that monster would often bring along three or four monsters of his same level leading to group wipeout. BAF was a failure.

    I am excited about your idea of 'Momma Monster' coming along if she senses her children are being systematically slaughtered by a group that is essentially 'working an XP machine'. You have the luxury of 'popping' a Boss Monster that has a linear difficulty increase proportional to the group that is slaughtering the drones. While the group may have been easily killing a monster of 1X difficulty, you can subsequently spawn a monster of 1.5X or 2X difficulty that, while not a group wipe-out situation, represents a true challenge to the group (with appropriate rewards) and adds the benefits of mixing things up (less monotony) and to a defineable degree deterring the behavior of sitting in one place for hours on end killing the same MOB over and over and over and over. You and your game designers get the luxury of being able to adjust the 'code' on-the-fly via a simple multiplier that can be set in a database as to how much more difficult 'Momma MOB' is when she pops (1.2X, 1.5X, 2X, ...).

    I think this is a unique MOB spawn behavior that you should investigate and deploy in a few selected locations. I would not hesitate to have your coders develop the spawn code as it would invariably come of use in certain situations. Picture the group of lvl150+ characters who are spawn camping Neleb in the Steps of Madness. The 'normal' players have no way to get them out of there. If they knew that Neleb would spawn at lvl100 instead of 60 if they continue their camping, they might consider leaving and doing what lvl150's are 'supposed' to be doing. Risk vs. Reward, right?

  11. #11
    I see some shouts for some love to the soldier coming here. We are supposed to be damage dealers which can only be obtained with severe twinking.

    With my experience of teaming as a solider i find myself getting quite distressed to see this so called damage dealer class getting out gunned by almost every other class.

    Ok so we twink to hell to do some damage but then what happens..the mob turns on us and here come the maxed out hits and you dropping to the ground faster than buttered bread.

    Our hitpoint buffs pathetic..Heal buffs..sheesh whats a heal buff..oh you mean One More Hit Healing..well thats unsuable to half the soldiers playing this game.

    Without a Good doc on team or a nice MP were screwed...Oh there is the Total Mirror Shield but what average lvl soldier has enough IP around to get into a worthwhile MK..ofcourse after that your gimped for two minutes and all your nano's gone coz someone had the bright idea to nerf the best armor we had.."Tank"

    So whats the role for the "Damage Dealing" Soldier..guess one with sense would get his arse behind a desk where its safe and do MIA reports for his fallen comrades instead.

    Rant over..(Apoligies but ive been needing to have a good rant for along time on this)

    With regard to ideas like unique mobs spawning on campers i think it would be a great idea to brake the linear hunt....Its quite amusing to watch a team go flying past you for the nearest cover when they have bitten off more than they can chew.

    Missions with unique monsters is also a great idea. Missions get very tedious after awhile...enter door..get nailed a few times..slowly work through mission..collect reward and repeat. To have the element of not knowing what you might find at the end would be great
    Last edited by Riflez; Jan 22nd, 2002 at 16:51:57.

  12. #12

    Team missions.

    I think the idea of bosses in missions is good, makes it more interesting... but I envision a different kind of team mission, one that I dont know if it can be implemented, but bear with me...

    Books and movies use a lot the "team of specialists" model. You assemble a team that mixes people with completly different skills, everyone is absolutely needed cause there is something she or he can do and nobody else can do (the driver, the thief, the silent killer commando).

    Team missions in AO should be similar; there should be a reason why you need a particular profession in your team. Lets say we have multi-level missions (that would be a plus):

    On getting the mission you will know that you need an Engineer of skill X to be able to fix the elevator to the lower level, where
    a Nanomage is required to reprogram a nano-powered machine so it would be able to elaborate a particular kind of one shot weapon that only a Soldier can use to
    kill a otherwise impossible to kill robot.

    Thats my 2 cents.

    Steward of the Ranger Prime Breogan
    Clan Eye of the Nexus

  13. #13

    Adventurers

    Crowd control, perhaps root for adventurers would be great. Right now, my adventurer is useless in teams even though he's doing great on his own. Why ? Adventurers are stuck with fast low-damage weapons. 1he, pistols, etc. Fix the way they work, and I'll be useful in teams

    What sometimes seems to be forgotten is the fact that a full team fights monsters twice their level. Many weapons or nano's are ineffective against such monsters.

  14. #14

    Angry Insane

    I have a lvl 57 Soldier, I'm NEVER needed in a group...I'm trying to be an uber-twink just to solo greens and yellows....It's not happening. Needing multiple doctors is insane as well, its hard enough just to get one and you want to make it so we need two? I went to the steps of madness out of curiosity, a bunch of greys beat the holy hell out me(i saw a team of 70-80's getting there ass handed to them). It was like trying to solo a group of life-bleeders. I'm supposed to have some point to the group by doing loads of damage, I'm out-damaged by all traders/mp's/engy's/enforcers(no complaint) around my level. If you want to even things out give us some Soldier only weapons and make Heavy Weapons a useful skill, i can't think of a soldier who put points into heavy weapons and was happy they did so.


    My 2 Cents

  15. #15

    Some team ideas

    A few of us were discussing the issue of what would make teaming better just the other day. One thing there was definitely a concensus on was that it would be nice to be able to form larger teams sometimes, say 8 members, and also be able to link teams together for events, such as big battles or player-lead events.



    Speaking as an engineer, I'd like the guard command to be targettable to friendly characters, so you could set your pet to guard either the group, or an important member of it. Sometimes my pet proudly comes back to me after killing a mob while a second one attacks the rest of the group. Vital seconds can be lost targetting, issuing the order to attack and then reaching the target. Needless to say this doesn't win you any prizes in the popularity stakes
    Last edited by Tatterjack; Jan 22nd, 2002 at 17:24:30.

  16. #16

    uhm well

    It would be really great to go through all professions at all lvl since past 100 some are really...useless... to team with, and fix some bugs like the mobs gettin agro on the doc cuz he heals (or thats AI related ??).
    Still, if you wanna improve teamplay why nerfin all NPC that were great to fight with a team ie Funguspore in Pleasant Meadows that just got nerfed to 5kdmg/hit, why is that ?

    nuff said

  17. #17
    I think you guys should re-invent PVM. Give them full player abilites down to dimach, specials, nukes the whole kit and kaboodle. Give them the same HPs and stats as REAL PLAYERS in their range. Make them give 50-60% of the current exp they give.

    Now make 2 TIMES AS MANY of them everywhere, missions, outdoors, everywhere.

    Now make them SMART. Improve their pathing, so they can find their way through missions, make them stop getting stuck in walls, fooled by furnature, and pathed well enough so that when we make them our pets and tell them to kill their own kind they don't get stuck in walls.

    Now make them even smarter and let perception checks go through walls so if they hear their buddies in a fight in the next room or several rooms they come to help.

    This will make PVM very interesting.

    More blood and gore to please. Can we get a blood switch or a gore control please?

  18. #18

    Re: Team missions.

    Originally posted by Breogan
    On getting the mission you will know that you need an Engineer of skill X to be able to fix the elevator to the lower level, where
    a Nanomage is required to reprogram a nano-powered machine so it would be able to elaborate a particular kind of one shot weapon that only a Soldier can use to kill a otherwise impossible to kill robot.
    Good, no great idea, but they've already mentioned they don't have the capabilities (programmaticly or time) to implement that kinda scheme. Remember: AO is kill, kill, kill. Risk vs. Reward.

  19. #19

    Post At Least We Now Know Why the NT Character Is Totally Ignored ...

    And it starts with Mr. Godager, the AO game director.

    /rant on

    I read the article three times trying to find a place for the NT to fit into Mr. Godager's "view" of cooperative play.

    NT's don't heal; NTs don't tank; NTs can provide some crowd control but other professions do it better.

    So, why does my NT character feel like the bastard son of a "proper" family? Totally ignored in the hopes that he will quietly go away?

    Not on your life, Mr. Godager! My noisy NT character is here to stay!

    I suggest you think about where the NT profession fits into AO and "cooperative gameplay", Mr. Godager. Think long and hard about our role in AO!

    As it stands now, I can see why nothing is being done about NT characters and their game-play problems because Mr. Godager does not see us as a viable profession.

    In fact, from his article, Mr. Godager does not "see" the NT profession at all nor does he "see" any of the caster professions.

    So now we know why AO has become so unbalanced in favor of the "shooter" professions. Thanks for nothing, Mr. Godager.

    /rant off

    I do most of my team hunting on the Test server, and the things most groups appreciate my NT character for are:

    1) Running HE (Humidity Effect) nanos on them to buff their nano pools.
    2) Running blind nanos to reduce an NPC's ability to "crit".
    3) Running stun nanos to reduce an NPC's ability to do damage.
    4) Running "calm" nanos to eliminate NPCs from a fight.
    5) Running AE (Area Effect) nanos on NPCs when the team is being overwhelmed by multiple NPCs.
    6) Running DD nanos whenever I am not doing one of the other five tasks.

    Any improvements in the five areas I listed would help the NT profession contribute to a group.

    As far as NPC balance is concerned, leave solo missions alone. If I pick a 50% difficulty mission, I should see nothing but greens and yellows in that mission area.

    The NPCs in Team Missions should have a greater range (green to orange) and the NPCs in static dungeons should have the greatest level range.

    After all, static dungeons should be the most difficult to conquer; however, make the NPCs more difficult to beat. Adding excessive HPs to NPCs (e.g., the SoM dungeon) is not the way to go, in my opinion. More socially active NPCs with appropriate HPs for their level is a better option for static dungeons.

    For example, if a team attacks a green NPC in one room, it could trigger his "big brothers" from several other rooms. I believe this is more in line with the "unexpected events" Mr. Godager describes in his article.

    Hope this helps ...
    Chynn
    Omni nano NT, Male, Level 200
    Council of Testers

  20. #20

    Unhappy High levels and grouping

    Well, as always Funcom doesn t seem to KNOW the problems...

    Ppl have been complaining for ages (since release for some) about bugs in the game that make it hard to group. IE MA minimal damage after lvl 80 or so, which makes it impossible to solo, and less than attractive in a group, and the list goes on and on and on and on....

    And Gaute comes here to ask... is there any problem with grouping??? Would you like more intelligent Mobs?

    Welll, i can say without ANY doubt that most players would be much more pleased to have their professions fixed!! And i am not writing about getting uber nanos or weapon... Just fix the bugs that have been there for monthes before adding new content!!! READ THE &|@""'([^ FORUMS IF YOU DON T KNOW WHAT THE PROBLEMS ARE!!!!!!!!

    Second problem here is the total lack of things to do above lvl 100. Soloing gets impossible, and grouping for exp is plain boring (no dungeon, no static missions, no nothing... Only 2 or 3 camps worth it in terms of exp. , not in terms of game content.
    If anything has to be done urgently, it is to fix Mobs above lvl 100...

    Sorry for the rant, but it tends to make me mad when Funcom asks questions as if everything was ok...
    Well it s not, and high lvls are bleeding out of Ao to DAoC... Fast. We love this game but if the fixes don t come soon, well...
    /camp
    Last edited by Steelfang; Jan 22nd, 2002 at 17:18:44.

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