Tokens, the once nice feature, but got no reason now

[__________Lucid Flow]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Msag: "Isnt it enough with the higher mob difficulty?"

No, at the moment we don't think so. Sorry

Theres wonderful logic if I ever heard it. Not only make mobs harder then they were before (which in itself should equate to higher risk of death and more difficulty) but allow them to have insane high HP and AC making them not only hit you harder, but you hit them less and it takes you a lot longer to kill them.

I guess that is why most professions in this game cannot kill greens-yellows past level 100. Gee, who'da thunk? Only every person who has ever PLAYED the game; yet Funcom in their infinite wisdom thinks it's too easy, and keeps making mobs harder.

You guys are a joke at this point.

[Myga]

Originally posted by Dangereoz
YO. a reply for mr Salabim.


U got to take the tokenboard up to reconsideration.

Again....

Why does the 1000 board add to nano programing and concealment. ?????????????????

...

Actually despite playing an agent I like the 210 nano programming. It means that once I hit 150+ and get some spare ip, I can make ql 200 implants for myself and my other chars. Its not that easy to find someone willing to go through the pain of changing to ql 200 nanoprogramming implants etc to make a few implants. With the +210 modifier it wont cost more than around 150k ip either to get 1000+ despite it beeing a dark blue skill for me.

[Steelbuns]

*bump*

[JimSalabim]

Quote Lucid: "The Dev team is a joke. Instead of coming up with completely RANDOM "solutions" to problems, actually listen to what has been said and make missions smaller."

Firstly, the increased time limit was not presented as a "solution", but as one little step in helping the situation.

Secondly, there might be more solutions than just "making missions smaller". I understand that just making them smaller might seem easy/harmless/fast/balanced etc. to you, but it ain't necassarily so. As designers, a part of our job is to always try coming up with more than just one alternative to solutions. The most obvious or most popular solution isn't always the best.

Maybe you would like to come up with some alternative solutions yourself, to help casual players doing missions at higher levels - or perhaps suggest alternative ways to earn tokens and money?

Looking forward to read your constructive feedback.

When it comes to high level monster difficulty; You might not want to believe this, but we have actually not touched them since release.

[Myga]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
When it comes to high level monster difficulty; You might not want to believe this, but we have actually not touched them since release.

Actually you have, they didnt cast at release, this has a huge impact on most human mobs. Casting doc mobs at 140+ are almost impossible to solo if they cast slow then stack 2 dots (they do sometimes, I have a little over 3k hp and end up with rapid palsy, all consuming toxin and cellular decomposition at times, taking 700dmg from dots every 3-6sec as well as getting shot). Only a pet class can handle that AFAIK. You also fixed alot of bugs with mobs that have changed difficulty in practice, for instance it was obviously alot easier when half the mobs would just get stuck for some reason or another. The gamed seemed more balanced back then IMO, we havent been compansated for NPCs casting more powerful nanos than we can at same level, they still have 5x our hp.

[Tetra]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
- And: Terminals in the Artery Valleys - I'll ask if that's something we want to place out there. I guess there's a gameplay or story reason for them not being present there today.

1250x2370 in south artery valley beside an NPC named Marvin is a set of neutral mission terminals. A save terminal could easily be implanted beside it

[JimSalabim]

Ah, you talk about the "chain casting" monsters? They started doing that in 13.6 because of a fix to their scripts. They should have "casted" that much all the time according to those, but it was far too much, so we calmed them down again in 13.7.

Monsters have been running nano programs since, what is it, 11.0 or something?

The problem with soloing at higher level today is mostly connected to breed type monsters - "human" monsters. They have a lot more AC than they should have, hence you do little damage to them. This bug has been there since release, and it's getting fixed in 13.8.

If you claim soloing is still impossibly hard after 13.8 I'll try getting more test cases run with high level characters.

[Morpheo]

OY.

Reply to MSag.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You said:

Actually despite playing an agent I like the 210 nano programming. It means that once I hit 150+ and get some spare ip, I can make ql 200 implants for myself and my other chars. Its not that easy to find someone willing to go through the pain of changing to ql 200 nanoprogramming implants etc to make a few implants. With the +210 modifier it wont cost more than around 150k ip either to get 1000+ despite it beeing a dark blue skill for me.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ok. i can c it can be nice with +210 in NP, but i still think alot of people have a hard time understanding what they need +140 in concealment for, if they dont play an agent or use aimed shot with another prof.

I would also like some kind of feedback from mr. Salabim on this one....


cyall...............................

[JimSalabim]

Nano Programming should generally be useful, but I agree that Concealment might be of little use to most. I frankly do not know why it's put there, but it's not something we want to use resources on changing now. The other modifiers are still good.

We will possibly be expanding on the idea of token boards at a later stage - like making profession based or specialization based boards.

[Myga]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Ah, you talk about the "chain casting" monsters? They started doing that in 13.6 because of a fix to their scripts. They should have "casted" that much all the time according to those, but it was far too much, so we calmed them down again in 13.7.

Monsters have been running nano programs since, what is it, 11.0 or something?

...

Mob casting started pretty late, later than 11.0. I remember it well because one of my friends quit after he couldnt kill a mob that chainhealed forever after that patch. Think it was after 12.0 even.

And I am not talking chain casting here, even before 13.6 mobs would stack the nanos I mentioned. Its not new, 13.6/13.7 only made it worse in those cases where you have rapid chaincasting. Its very powerful nanos, more powerful than I expect from players of that level. All consuming toxin requires 754bio met, 684 mat crea. Rapid palsy also need 740 psy mod. Yet 130ish doctor NPCs cast it, I do not think a 130 doctor player can get all those nanoskills that high without MP or trader help. Its all about luck, if they dont cast I usually win, if they cast those I simply cannot win. My chance of resisting their nanos seem about zero even high resist plunders from NPC traders (and yes I have spent a ton of ip on nano resist with no visible results).

Its my opinion that the nanos mobs are casting at a given lvl are to high QL, especially if solo is gonna be a viable alternative. Mobs have 5times my hp, but yet agent NPCs green to me cast dots like greater mysterious causes requiring 687 mat met and 615 bio met. I can inform you that at 143 my capped bio met is around 530-540 with capped int. Mat met I havent capped but judging from the bar it wont cap much higher than bio met., I have no chance in hell to cast that nano wihtout MP buffs or fully implant otherwise useless nano skills to cast that one nano. I've also had trader mobs plunder and divest all my offensive/nano skills down 400+, or drain my acs by over 2k by stacking 2 debuffs.

My solution so far been small grey caves where mobs usually dont cast, but after 13.6 I have been unable to roll missions to those repeatedly. I get a small cave at a spot 1 time, when I come back for another mission its suddenly a huge brown cave.

[___________Manchilde]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Quote Lucid: "The Dev team is a joke. Instead of coming up with completely RANDOM "solutions" to problems, actually listen to what has been said and make missions smaller."

Jim,

Please be careful with making missions smaller. I know you must attempt to pacify the majority of the player base (pwr gamers to casual players), but making all missions smaller is not the solution. For some reason since 13.6, 75% of the missions in BS City of Home have gotten much shorter and smaller. This would be great for soling, on this I agree. But, as a full team, this really puts a huge kink into our downtime as we run through 3 missions in like 30-40 mins, and then spend the next 10-15 sitting around in Lagsville waiting on someone to return with more missions.

The point I am trying to make is please implement one of two solutions:

1) get team missions fixed and make sure these are larger more challenging missions (could be fun...=)

2)Enable a "mission size" slider bar on the mission terminal. This would allow us to take very large missions if we were in a team, or very small missions for solo play

[__________Lucid Flow]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Quote Lucid: "The Dev team is a joke. Instead of coming up with completely RANDOM "solutions" to problems, actually listen to what has been said and make missions smaller."

Firstly, the increased time limit was not presented as a "solution", but as one little step in helping the situation.

Secondly, there might be more solutions than just "making missions smaller". I understand that just making them smaller might seem easy/harmless/fast/balanced etc. to you, but it ain't necassarily so. As designers, a part of our job is to always try coming up with more than just one alternative to solutions. The most obvious or most popular solution isn't always the best.

Maybe you would like to come up with some alternative solutions yourself, to help casual players doing missions at higher levels - or perhaps suggest alternative ways to earn tokens and money?

Looking forward to read your constructive feedback.

1) Add a mission sliders that are reletive to what the mission actually does. I've exentisively tested this and while sometimes you may be able to reproduce types of missions, the only things that really change are items as reward and types of missions (i.e. kill or find item). One slider could be mission depth (not size). Mission DEPTH would mean only partially to size but it would also involve how deep the mission actually gets. Make it so the higher the depth of the mission, the more of a reward you would get only if you happen to receive a token for killing monsters. In all honesty, in team missions you sometimes WANT the huge unending missions because it creates for great exp when at high levels you already HAVE everything.

2) Mission Distance Slider. With the way the economy is working right now, at a certain point you can run a mission for a high level Nova Flow or Nano and get 5m for it and wham, you have a Yalmaha. But that doesn't come for most of the game. Playing the game is hell if you only have an hour and a half to go run a mission or something and it takes you 45 minutes just to run there.

Those are just 2 example of the hundreds that have been posted before. There HAS to be a problem in your game design when the only types of missions people take is "find item" and the others are virtually untouched. There has to be a problem in game design when an equal value token is easier by leaps and bounds to get at level 7 then at level 107. Missions should be random. Size should NOT be dependant on level, at least not as much as it is.

[/b]When it comes to high level monster difficulty; You might not want to believe this, but we have actually not touched them since release. [/B]

This is a LIE!!

You may seem to forget Jim, but in recent patches you added Humanoid NPCs the ability to buff themselves, to buff others and you HAVE adjusted HP. I don't know what you calssify as "difficulty" but when you fight a Very Tough Enforcer with Leviathan cast on himself (or some crap) another Damage Shield that not only REALLY hurts you but add more to his life, and god forbid a Soldier be in the next room because now that Enforcer has a 30% defelction shield on him, you are talking about some insanely high HP enforcer that has more AC then you could ever imagine, more life then god himself and sheilds diamond couldn't pierce. Don't forget mob HEALING. Gee, that doesn't make things insanely harder.

Since release, you have nerfed weapon types left and right. You KNOW there is a flaw in your game when the only weapons used are high crit slow weapons and people ONLY fight with MAs, not because of their damage but because of their crit buff.

Do you see anybody using pistols anymore? No? Really? Gee what a surprise! Why isn't anybody using an OT Windchaser M06? No Sleekblaster Minors? What is the POINT of a Ninja Katana? Why did you even invent the Nano Charged Stun Glove? Or what about all the other types of Assault Rifles nobody uses?

Why not just REMOVE all these weapons? These weapons cannot get past the high ac/min damage barrier, they have no insane high criticals to compensate.... why?

Do you think that makes mobs harder? Do you think that encourages cookie cutters?

Since release, you have nerfed countless things and yet you say Mob difficulty has not been changed. What? You realize that nerfing ANYTHING directly involves the difficulty of mobs? What about poor crats that how have INSANE Psychic checks on their charm nanos, yet Atrox get Da Tauner with almost NO reqs and nice damage? Don't you think you should lower the psychic checks on Fear and Charm nano lines?

Do you guys think things through at all? Jim, do you say things without thinking about them? Mobs difficulty hasn't changed?

Ha, now there's a joke if I ever heard one. April Fools

[Platy]

I posted this in another thread, but it works here:

------------------------------------
Man oh man.

What it comes down to is a simple choice.

Tokens, or level ups.


I started playing AO two weeks ago. So far I've tried 4 different characters, and settled with my Atrox Enforcer.

I have chosen to get 1000 tokens, then to level up. So far I'm at 125 tokens at level 8 (I accidentally levelled up twice) after 12 days. I can usually get a token every 15-25 mins, on average 3 per hour.

It's simply a choice, I have made mine, you have made yours, live with the benefits and disadvantages of them. I won't get good stuff for ages (nor am I able to gain benefits of tokens for a long time due to title requirements), you won't get tokens awards - unless you are *<insane> and are willing to spend 2-3 hours per token later.

And you people would burn me like a witch for this?


*Only my personal opinion, you may not actually be insane.
------------------------------------

I would like to add something though:
I would start to level up and get tokens if this system was implemented; 1 token awarded per title level. So a level 100 person would receive 4 tokens per mission, where as little farmer me would only get 1.. Sounds fairer to higher people, but us token farmers still have a point.. Less of a point, but still a point.

[XtroXtreme]

Originally posted by JimSalabim

Maybe you would like to come up with some alternative solutions yourself, to help casual players doing missions at higher levels - or perhaps suggest alternative ways to earn tokens and money?

Looking forward to read your constructive feedback.

It may come as a big shock to you, BUT we HAVE suggested both DISTANCE slider and SIZE slider.
Just check the forum and you will find a lot of suggestions.

It is not as these problems are new.

[______________Dareus]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Secondly, there might be more solutions than just "making missions smaller". I understand that just making them smaller might seem easy/harmless/fast/balanced etc. to you, but it ain't necassarily so. As designers, a part of our job is to always try coming up with more than just one alternative to solutions. The most obvious or most popular solution isn't always the best.

KISS (the acronym not the action). Solo missions take too long to complete at level 100+. Bring back the medium sized missions with say about 20-30 rooms (no more of this multi-monster rooms either). This is a solo mission, many professions have no way to do any crowd control.

Use a slider, 3 settings, 1 short (10 rooms or so, no token rewards), 1 medium (30-40 rooms token possible), and 1 the current 60+ rooms for exp.

Maybe you would like to come up with some alternative solutions yourself, to help casual players doing missions at higher levels - or perhaps suggest alternative ways to earn tokens and money?

Prostitution. No, not needed, missions are just boring too long, need to be shorter and possible for more professions solo.

When it comes to high level monster difficulty; You might not want to believe this, but we have actually not touched them since release.

Sorry Jim but that's not quite true. Shortly after release you increased the HP's of all mobs by quite a lot I might add. Add in all the additional accidental mob buffs and you have quite alot of modifications since release. Lets not forget the other side of the coin. Player nerfs. Nerfs on a player indirectly increase the monster difficulty.

Funcoms arguement was "Mobs hit for low damage (not quite true anymore) and have alot of hps. PC's hit for high damage and have few hps."

[Isgrimnur]

Originally posted by JimSalabim
Nano Programming should generally be useful, but I agree that Concealment might be of little use to most. I frankly do not know why it's put there, but it's not something we want to use resources on changing now. The other modifiers are still good.

We will possibly be expanding on the idea of token boards at a later stage - like making profession based or specialization based boards.

Jim I think expanding the idea of token boards OR other kinds of modifiers to wear around the neck would be a VERY VERY VERY worthwhile investment of the programmers time. Not everyone can do 1k tokens. There should be other kinds of rewards we can wear, especially in the storyline - roleplaying. For example, I am omni and there is a RP event, I take a bullet for a high ranking omni official. Instead of giving me 1 lame token, they give me a medal which has some bonus etc. And if i use it everyone can see it. Stuff like that would definately add to the RP element of this game.