The Central Nexus Blog

26 Apr, 2009

AE -- Life on the Farm

Posted by Omnitron 23:36 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City of Heroes

The Architect system has its ups and downs. There are some real dud missions -- overpowered, or with bugs in the scripting that take away from the fun of the adventure. Others are full of really dumb enemies and items that just don't make sense. But that isn't really what the system is being used for.

There are three types of adventures out there now when you get down to it. Realistic ones -- much like existing non-AE arcs. Exploit ones -- usually trying to render as many badges as possible with as little effort as possible. These are easy to tell because enemies are usually marked "Destroy Me" or "Rescue Me", rather than an actual name. Some large maps are FILLED with items to click, destroy, or people to rescue. The third type is Farm ones. These are missions usually geared to have LOTS of high level enemies guaranteed to generate lots of XP. Many of these pick one or two city maps, and have you work your way up and back, killing everything in sight.

This weekend I tried to do this. Starting a new virtue character in little over a single day, running just a handful of runs through such a farming mission, he advanced all the way to nearly level 29. That is unheard of unless you find some Peregrine Island Portal teams. The advantage here is that the mission doesn't expire usually, and can always be re-ran. Not so with a non-AE mission. Since many such Farm missions automatically adjust levels up to a minimum level, there is no need for sidekicks. Such missions also generate thousands of tickets per run. Since 540 of these can get you rare salvage that can be traded for around 500K influence, getting influence to support such a fast-rising character is not a problem. My test character has 8 million, 4000+ tickets, and has already got a set of Halloween salvage, and is decked out in Single origin enhancements. I have seen characters quickly advanced before in the history of this game, but it usually left you with a broke, under enhanced character that could barely do anything, and had to get a fund transfer to be able to continue. The AE method of farming gets past that.

So what is happening? MANY players are taking the FAST route to 50. Calls for AE Farm teams are near constant in Atlas Park. And there are a number of less than efficient high level players out there.

I don't see the missions stay up for long however. Now with mission numbers nearing 100K, I have to assume that there are several missions being put in to play and then taken out, back and forth. Now if some of them are being reported and pulled, it is hard to tell. But I suspect that there are going to be some changes on AE missions. Some players have been theorizing a percentage drop on experience, or a cap. We'll see. I don't think it is broke, but is being misused. I'm also concerned with the effects on the market -- If rare salvage can be easily bought from ticket vendors, than it is going to drop in cost eventually on the market. Rare won't be "rare".

At any rate, I'd expect an update of some kind to the AE system, more than likely fairly soon.

(More)

22 Apr, 2009

Celebrating Five years

Posted by Omnitron 20:20 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City of Heroes

I got involved on a "photo-shoot" on the Test Server yesterday.

The actual anniversary is on the 28th, but that is less than a week away.

(More)

22 Apr, 2009

Screenshot of the Day 04/22

Posted by Omnitron 04:18 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City (General)

Between FLAG, American Legion, and other Patriotic groups there have been a LOT of Patriot types around.

(More)

21 Apr, 2009

Screenshot of the Day 04/21

Posted by Omnitron 22:52 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City (General)

Reminds me of my warshade on Virtue

20 Apr, 2009

Screenshot of the Day 04/20

Posted by Omnitron 11:41 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City (General)

I have to admit -- I'm enjoying this. I've tried several characters in this. Flagborn has received around 30 badges for his work, playing,testing and publishing a mission. The variety of missions is what gets me -- the ability after so many years to so OFTEN see new content, new villain groups so often is a big plus. EVERY day since launch the AE floor has been filled with people.

Flagborn has hit a variety of missions, some that can be a bit too challenging. I've noticed a big change, since created characters can have villain side powers. I myself made a Lt. level stalker that was tough to beat one on one -- when they came as a pair, they were almost unstoppable. Flagborn has also met up with signature villains like Lord Recluse, and seen wild post-holocaust zones.

The interesting thing is how some people are advertising their missions -- One person made a character that had a name of PLAY ARC #####, with notes on the mission in the character background. Others are pushing their missions via broadcast and request chat channels. An AEVirtue global channel has already popped up. And several sites are popping up to allow people to advertise or comment on arcs. See City of Guides for instance.

I've heard some numbers mentioned anywhere from 7000 to 20000 missions have been made in a week -- if a fraction of them are any good, that still means hundreds of new missions to try. Not all are good, and some people insist on making impossible missions with custom groups that have multiple high-level characters in them. Depending upon distribution, this can make some missions all but impossible, especially if you are soloing.

AE Missions can be profitable. Since I've been unlocking costumes, characters and maps on Flagborn, that means that most of my other characters playing AE missions don't have to. That means they can spend it on other things. A NEW character I made in part to test AE as a method of leveling up proved to be most successful in that regard. He tested several missions solo despite being a defender, and was able to get into an arc team that found a mission, "Rikti Dolls" I believe it was called", that proved to be like a portal farming mission. He went from level 11 to just shy of 15 on that one mission. He was able to earn around 600 tickets, which he bought one invention salvage after checking Wentworth prices. Thus he was able to get 1.1 million influence as well for his efforts. NOT bad for less than a couple hours worth of effort.

There have been a few problems. I've noticed a few missions that allow you to take them, but didn't adjust you're level -- so everything is purple. Once yesterday I stopped getting tickets and got salvage in an AE mission -- that's not supposed to happen. At least once I updated a mission, and it showed my update, but the original content still occurred when the mission was played. I'd expect a few bugs to be worked out along the way still, but all in all, its still a good experience.

If you haven't visited the city lately be prepared for a lot of new terminology with regards to the AE stuff. Architect slang is already starting to develop and evolve.

Side notes: The Magic Pack (Costumes, powers, emotes) released yesterday for $9.99 . I attempted to download it when I got home, but couldn't get into the store because it was SLAMMED, and the connection kept timing out. I suspect that several of my characters may get a remake after this. In 5 days I should get the 60 month vet badge, which will mean some characters will be respected to make use of the extra slot. Of course a few days after THAT comes the big 5 year anniversary of the game, and I would expect something beyond a badge to be happening then, even if it is just player events. I for one am hoping to see some developers, probably at some Pocket D party , and possibly get some yellow temp titles. Of course something like that will probably be staggered as they visit every sever -- I'd keep an eye on the forums for announcements of such possible events. Of course BIG SGs will probably have their own parties, so it should be an active time over the next few weeks.

15 Apr, 2009

Screenshot of the Day 04/15

Posted by Omnitron 06:42 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City of Heroes

Another golden age look -- very classic.

07 Apr, 2009

Issue 14 -- Tomorrow

Posted by Omnitron 23:27 |

Permalink |

comments (0) |

Trackbacks (0) | City (General)

It looks like we'll have early morning downtime, probably for hours. The latest update is "Starting at 6:00 AM CST - 11:00 AM CST all US, European, and testing shards for City of Heroes will be brought down for maintenance and publish of Issue 14: Architect. We expect the downtime to last the entire 5 hours but please allow for early release or an extension as necessary. "

When they bring the servers back up, expect some lag as everyone tries to download the new Issue. Also, you can probably expect some higher-than-normal load levels on most if not all servers as a lot of players return to the game to check out this Issue. I'd expect Virtue and Freedom to hit max users over the next couple days, and some other servers to get moderate to heavy loads for a change. Lag and load levels usually taper off after the first weekend, if not the first week.

Are you ready?