The Return of Ask Cryptic! [Archive]

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:25 PM

Yes I have a question.
For many reasons, I was wondering if there is any way you could changed the consequence for death. The main reason why I ask this is because many people like to solo, but when we die, how are we supposed to live when no one wants to party, and we have no stars? Is there any way we could get that changed? Like we have like 1.5 stars after so many deaths so that we don't die every second lol. Just a slight difference in the amount of stars we lose could make a difference for us solo players :)

From what I understand there are several NPCs that accept 'donations'. Those give you stars back for a cost.
I write 'from what I understand', because I've never done this, not having died for any pve reason in this game, ever (outside of lairs.)

Back on topic...

Ask Cryptic:

I guess I'll be the first to ask:
Can your subscribers get an idea of what the Cryptic management considers "part of the $15 subscription fee" and what is considered outside that scope.

I think many of us would have thought additional content that includes the 1-40 level span existing at launch 4months ago would be considered part of that fee.
Seeing as we were all wrong, some more insight might be welcome to avoid any future... unpleasant surprises.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:25 PM

Are vehicle travel powers still on the table?

Will melee ever be "fixed"?

Any plans to merge some of the STO engine upgrades into CO? Waypoint controlled NPC sidekicks for instance?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:26 PM

What are the next three updates?
Seconded. Don't care about when or how much. I just want a general overview of the immediate, near, and distant future of Champions Online. Like how frequently can we look forward to new zones and content of that significance?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:30 PM

Because someone had to do it. The hard facts and the tough questions.

We see the SGs dying. We see the shard numbers falling and the players per shard falling too. There is rarely more than 1600-1700 online at even the highest of peak times. We see you guys post "Everything is fine", but with each release of news and patches more of our players and friends are driven away. Many of us have been down this road that we seem to be headed down before and are getting nervous. Those of us with lifetime subs see the writing on the wall and need some reassurance that you guys are looking out for our entertainment dollar and not just taking it from our wallets.

I want you to know that many of us are not posting out of spite, hate or anger but concern for our investment and concern for a game that we really do enjoy. You have a good product and we want to see its potential realized.

Here are my questions:

1. What are Cryptic's plans to address the bad press of late, to address the loss of players, and to address the reasons we all know people are leaving? Your reputation as of late is far too questionable to attract new customers and bring old ones back.

2. What is Cryptic doing, or even planning behind the scenes to rebuild good faith in the company and this product that many of us paid the lifetime subs for? Regret is a word that you really don't need associated with the product and frankly there isn't much faith to be had in, "Here, look what you can buy!"

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:30 PM

As a role player and a person who enjoyed the table top version of champions I looked forward to the announcement of Super Group bases. A bastion for role players and their organizations. As the Club Caprice and places like Carlo's Gym often become over crowded or "chat flooded" for role players. Is there any information available on the possibility of super-group bases being in development or being planned. Originally it was stated such content would be added, however nothing has been spoken of this feature since. Right now a large base of this game is being pushed by role players at this point, in the interest of role players and the like what is Cryptic's plan for incorporating more role play oriented things such as Emotes,Improved Walk Animations, Role Play Venues (Club Caprice, Carlo's Gym, Sherera's Bar(sp)) and player designed bases of operations such as Super Group bases.

While it may be my personal opinion stated as the following. I feel that a large base of the current people playing this game are role players in some way. Much like we enjoy customizing our characters, giving us more chances to customize and change the very world around us may be a possible way to improve our enjoyment of the game. As well, if venue adjustments and super bases are not in the near future. Could Cryptic possibly look into making the current venues like Club Caprice more expanded, and able to hold more individuals as well as be large enough to avoid suffering as much chat spam. I hate making this reference, however ... perhaps if it were more like the size of the club in City of Heroes... it would be a far more pleasant experience.

Looking forward to your Response - Marcus Ravenheart (David Denmore, Der Doppleganger, Project Darkhorse)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:30 PM

I have a few questions as well.

1. Will we be able to color weapons individually for each hand? (left, right handed weapons)

2. Will we be able to have more powers added in each powerset? :

3. Is there a double handed weapon powerset being developed? :D

4. Will we be able to select more animations per power? :

5. Will we be able to walk around with weapons drawn out of combat? :D

6 will be get to use Vehicle travel powers? (bikes, planes, animals etc..) :D

and the last question:

7 will we get access to super, cool, mega, ultra, tier 4 kick ass powers per set? :eek:

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:31 PM

How big will Vibora Bay be? Will there just be enough content to go from 37-40 or can we expect it to be something substantial?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:33 PM

Whats the meaning of life?
Is The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog really that mean?
Does wearing underpants over your tights give you superpowers?
Or wearing a cape enables you fly?

Thats about it, thanks.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:35 PM

Are there any plans to eventually include more non-seasonal content as part of a free update, or will you be focusing the revenues from monthly subscriptions on bugfixes and otherwise upgrading the game's core, while relying on microtransactions for added content?

(update: we have an answer for the first question)
We have plans to add more free content to the game very soon, not seasonal stuff, and we'll be talking about that shortly. (Sorry gang, you're not getting a Valentine's Day Event, but we do still love you.)

Does your stance on microtransactions not giving in-game benefits mean that the rewards from playing paid missions/lairs will not outshine those from free content?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:36 PM

1. This question has already been asked but... will there ever be a weapon preview in the tailor?

2. How many subsribers does Champions Online currently have?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:40 PM

Since no one asked the obvious question, I'll go ahead:

Are there any plans to eventually include more non-seasonal content as part of a free update, or will you be focusing the revenues from monthly subscriptions on bugfixes and otherwise upgrading the game's core, while relying on microtransactions for added content?

This is clearly the number one question that must be answered. Is CO going to be P2P, while charging for additional content as if it were F2P?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:41 PM

Outside of recycling already seen content (flashbacks, Blood Moon, Crossover Missions), why do you feel a player should dedicate themselves and their monthly subscription to this game in the long term? What are you adding in the way of new content that we don't have to additionally play for that will entice a player or group of players to commit to this game in the long term (more than 6 months)?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:41 PM

Will Vibora Bay be a Millennium City sized zone and will the expansion also raise the level cap?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:42 PM

When are the changes to offensive passives going to take place?
I remember it being said in many places quite some time ago that offensive passives were going to be changed to be on par with and actually be able to compete with defensive passives.

Secondly, will we ever be able to change poses for travel powers?
Like that of run and fly animations specifically.

And last, it was once said by Bill Roper that black and white would be added to the color spectrum to further customize the color of powers.
When will these be implemented?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:42 PM

I've got a couple questions!

1. When is the melee rebalancing coming? You've talked a lot about it, but I've seen nothing that wasn't a nerfy baseball bat to the face when it comes to melee. It's by far the most underwhelming, underpowered set in the game. So yeah, what's your timetable for that fix? EDIT: When is Momentum going to be looked into as well?

2. I know it's been asked already, but what do you consider part of the monthly subscription fee and what do you consider above and beyond? Namely, what's up with paying for Vibora Bay?

3. Are we ever going to be able to see weapons in the tailor? Already been asked, I know.

4. When are we going to get our super cool SG bases? Because, uh, I know Cryptic has lot of its roleplaying community because no one wants to address this right now.

5. Are you going to increase the size of Club Caprice? 30 people seems so underwhelming.

6. What are you doing as a company that's going to make me not want to leave the game? AKA, what super cool content are you looking into/when are we going to get all the bugs from Beta finally smoothed out?

Okay, that was more than two. Sorreh.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:44 PM

1. Will weapons visible in tailor ever be added?
2. Will a new running stance option for super speed and acrobatic be offered ever?
3. Will Claws ever get new costume pieces such as actual wolverine type claws (the type from CoX would work)?
4. Will Melee ever be fixed?
5.Will we ever get new bows?
6. Are new power sets in the works or are you planning on balancing what we have now before making a new set?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:49 PM

4. When are we going to get our super cool SG bases? Because, uh, I know Cryptic has lot of its roleplaying community because no one wants to address this right now.

6. What are you doing as a company that's going to make me not want to leave the game? AKA, what super cool content are you looking into/when are we going to get all the bugs from Beta finally smoothed out? [/B]
Sorreh.

These are my questions as well... The game seems so deserted lately that I worry about the future of CO. When I enter Millennium City I should be bombarded by Chat fodder, not silence.

Why should we stick with this game?

Is there any less grindy content in store?

Are individual or SG bases in the cards for the near future (i.e. before the end of the year)?

Is being able to play as a villain in the cards (i.e. in development)?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:53 PM

1.) Will there be any additional hero games in the future?

2.) Will there be an increase in level cap with a new zone like moon base?

3.) Will there be additional powers like tier 4 powers or power sets?

4.) As a leader of a supergroup, I'm wondering if it would be possible to have supergroup leaders create additional ranks within the supergroup as well as having supergroup lairs/instances, hq's and supergroup nemesis.

5.) Where is Statesman from City of Heroes? He said he was going to be here.

6.) Are we ever going to fight Dr. Destroyer?

7.) Will be there additional emotes like the wide variety that City of Heroes had?

That is it for now, I've asked some of my supergroup to see what questions I should ask so I do apologize for several questions but these are quite viable I believe.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:54 PM

How do you think a lifetime subscriber should feel about being asked to pay for content less than 6 months into the game's release?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 05:59 PM

Firstly, thank you for taking my suggestion. Hopefully, the others are in the works. Now on to the questions.

First Question.
Is the adventure pack systems made to be liken to a pnp source book, to add flavor to a core game but not to be needed or seen at all?

Second Question.
While this one will use Vipora Bay as an example(I am using this as a template for all adventure pack interactions). Seeing as my cosmic hero has little to do with the mystical side of things, my friend Silverspear, the she wolf lady, does. If she wanted to team with me and do a mission that was too hard for her alone, will the "Guest Staring" aspects of going there for the single mission chain be allowed or will we both need the expansion in order to play together, further sectioning off players?

Third Question:
Will all future expansions, speaking in the idea of a new zone as well as new mechanics, be paid content or are only MAPs (mega adventure packs) flavor aspects, such as magic, space, or something to that effect? Is the vigilantism of Dark Champions a MAP or is it going to be a true free expansion such as the "Issues" of your former MMO project now owned my NC soft.

Fourth Question:
Are Omega Stats still in the works? If so what are they?

Fifth Question:
Will you all be posting a bug log (with the various bugs categorized for fixed, working on, and high/low priority) on the old cryptic blog site as I suggested?

thank you for your time.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:01 PM

At this point I only have one question:

1) Why do you feel it's justified for us to pay for Vibora Bay when there is such a huge lack of content in the game and most other major MMOs release something similar to this, at around this time, for free?

Such an addition that needs to be paid for will cause greater problems for those looking to group, as they won't be able to join team members working in this area if they haven't bought the pack.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:01 PM

There's been complaints of lack of levelling paths, content holes, and almost no end-game. Why are you trying to charge for Vibora Bay?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:01 PM

I'm curious if there is any plans in the near future to add substantial addition content at the early to mid levels to allow for multiple paths of progression as currently you are required to completely nearly every quest with a character to level up and thus every character is following an identical path. This effect adds to the feel of grinding and quickly removes the fun associated with trying out a new character/build.

Are there any plans in the near future to add some quality of life fixes to chat/sg systems such as a last logged on listing to the SG list, this allows officers to actually manage SGs better and to know when to contact players or drop abandoned characters if necessary. Also actual member lists to the global chat channels so one can see who is online.

Also are there any plans for a free content expansion of any kind or is the Viboria Bay pack that's been mentioned the only content in the works, and if so what is the pricing likely to be.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:05 PM

How will the game be evolving with regard to customizing the cosmetic appearance of powers? The current system of having one specifically themed appearance for powers seems to indicate a future of both duplicated functionality in new frameworks to fit their cosmetic theme and a restriction of the possible themes a character can realize.

Specifically for one type of power, travel powers, is there any chance that the fundamental concept behind crafted travel powers will be rethought? Even aside from the implications of what is required to get a single new additional cosmetic option in a game with customizing appearance as a priority and strength, the scale of return seems almost incomprehensible: it isn't a new ability to fly or run quickly you get as a return, simply one more cosmetic option alongside the ability to pick a different cosmetic option of the same ability. This seems to attach a significant burden of chore work to what the game would seem to be best served by making as accessible as possible, shackling a strength to repetitive tedium.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:07 PM

Can we expect the percentage of instanced missions to increase, or will public missions continue to make up the large majority of the content?

Would the Devs be willing to give us a monthly update on the number of current subscriptions as well as the average number of players online?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:08 PM

I cannot, in good conscience, support Cryptic.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:09 PM

WoW has continually upped the level cap on it's MMO, are there any plans to eventually do the same thing here? 41-50 is almost a given, what about 51-60? 61-70? so on and so on.

Power Replacement is such a horrible mechanic at the moment(opinion). We give up so much functionality for so little return. Any plans to separate Power Replacement and Primary Offense and make Power Replacement a function of it's own?

Teleportation is considerd an over powered travel power. I am firmly in the opposite camp, I feel that it is not as powerful as everyone states. In that respect, what considerations have been tossed around in regards to these opinions?

Travel Powers. I feel that they are truly lacking in the super department. Many superheroes have TRULY super travel powers....Flash=Superspeed that does MORE than just move fast. He strikes multiple times, runs up walls and across water. Creates sonic booms and whirlwinds. Nightcrawler=Teleportation that allows for AoE attacks. Constant, INSTANTANEOUS travel. Teleport attacks and Teleport Carrys....Flight, why is it we can't run into NPCs yet stil collide witha structure? Acrobatics<Free-Running/Parkour. Perhaps the greatest Video game mode of movement and it is ignored here. Any Plans on expanding travel functionality beyond the mundane movement from A to B?

Vibora Bay...what will make it worth paying for? Just how big will it truly be? Any new mechanics involved in it's implantation?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:09 PM

How long before melee gets an overhaul? Everyone knows it needs one and is massively disadvantaged about 70% of the time to anyone who is even the slightest bit competent with ranged powers.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:10 PM

Will we be able to sort out our character list?

Is there free zones planned for future of Champions Online's development instead of only paid ones?

Will there be another cooperative PvP mode type similar to Zombie Apocalypse?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:17 PM

How confident are you that Champions Online can succeed considering its current lackluster performance and in lieu of upcoming competition? What have you learned, what are your short term considerations and long term goals?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:20 PM

Do you plan on creating and implementing additional powersets? If so, what time-frame (rough estimate is more than fine) can we expect to see them in? While the Celestial set isn't entirely my cup of tea I was genuinely impressed at how different the visual effects were from other sets and would like to see more of this.

Also, would we be able to get some blocky robotic parts? I'm not a fan of the skeletal robotic look and while you can make some nice, sleek robotic costume at the moment I'd also like to make something thick, clunky and with edges.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:21 PM

I'm going to skip some obvious questions, as well as any in obvious ones already asked by others.

Chat focus stealing

Done by NPC mission givers such as the dreaded 'Help a Citizen' mission carriers, as well as by hapless teammates when they share missions to you, nothing but nothing is more annoying than suddenly finding oneself either running/flying forward madly, with every random window open obscuring your view, or crashed to the desktop from madly openning and closing said windows, when all you were doing was typing.

Almost as annoying is when you are interacting with one NPC, such as trying to select a quest reward, and reading things, and suddenly your window changes and the NPC ReQuester has ver taken your current window, disableing your previous one.

Least annoying is how they [and the ones who want to say thanks constantly] literally bombard you if you should by chance attempt to stand around and roleplay in a quiet hub, or go to the tailor.

Why is anything at all able to steal me from the chatline while I am typing?

Lesser but related question, Why don't we have a toggle to turn on/off NPC thankers?

Small Note. This is not about the entertaining and possibly insane community member Chat, this is about the Chat line used from within the game.

Crafting, Items, gear, and Stats.

Now that the Diminishing returns is fully in place not only on Stats in terms of Damage buff per super stat, but also for how much said stats can gain towards Defense Passives [And I'm sure all the other passives are next in line], why oh why is there still a need to tie the various stats down into specific gear slots?

There is no longer any real benefit to be gained from over stacking a stat, indeed it is currently more powerful and versatile to round a character out in a third forth and possibly fifth stat somewhat rather than only focusing on two, as was previous, and this is a good thing.

So, why are some stat combinations artificially harder to use together than others, such as Con/Pre [both mainly on Defense slots], Dex/Str/ Rec [mainly on Offense slots], and End/Int/Ego [All in Utility slots].

Why is there still specific artificial restrictions on stat placement in gear, now that diminishing returns makes it worthless to overstack any one or two stats anyhow?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:24 PM

Being a fan of PnP Champions, I'm confused as to why Vibora Bay needs to be a high-level expansion pack. It may not be the size of Millennium City, but it's still pretty big. It's a mystical power site, so I saw Vibora Bay as an excellent alternative to MC. Why can't it have content for more than 4 levels of power?

Why is it when STO or CO crashes, the other game will inevitable follow?

Why can't you put basic patch notes on the small patches after a crash? Even something as simple as minor bug fix, or performance fix, or just *something*?

When are you going to address all of the concerns that have been building up?

What is the schedule for power re-balancing? I don't feel like you need to say January is this power set, and March is this one (though it would be really really nice), but at least some kind of idea of this power set is next and after that one is that power set.

You may have noticed that trust seems awfully broken between Cryptic and the players. How are you going to rebuild that?

Do you have plans to become more transparent with us with plans? Quite frankly, I don't think any of us like feeling left in the dark about where our game is going.

Are we going to see full sets in the C-Store again, or are we going to be limited to bit pieces?

When, oh when, do you plan to fix the broken Raptr functionality so that Raptr can accurately get and show Perks?

Thank you for your time.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:24 PM

Are we ever going to see a revamp of the builds and/or roles system? Builds have limited use when you can't even fill a single skill bar, and roles are often not useful for the tasks they're made for.

For example, Protector's threat increase from presence is half the value other roles get as reduction and there's no innate threat increase for using it. This means a "tank" type that is protecting other players gets little benefit from it (with or without presence), while others get a HP boost with little or no negative effect.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:27 PM

First of all this is a great way of making us feel wanted, loved and like we matter once again.

Do you feel left out in the cold and unloved?

Yeah understatement, but seriously here I go.

Questions:

What was the main idea of putting PVP in the game?

I normally don't PVP but I was intrigued and when I took my melee in there and I got wiped countless times before taking out a single person, I began entering less and less. Personally, I think it would have been better suited to when/if we got a Dark Champions/Nemesis expansion/free update instead.

When can we see more emanation points for our powers or at the very least why are certain powers limited to only one default one?

Not every hero is a super powered freak of nature, I know batman couldn't very well run across MC on foot to try to catch the baddies, so I too, would like to know about vehicles as a travel power? (vehichles, bikes, jets, etc.)

I like that citizens give me missions, it makes the city seem like a living place. Just why do they take over anything I am doing? I would say make it so that the Crime Computer gets updated with a new mission for us or make the citizens wait for us to respond to them instead of us getting interrupted by them, how rude of those big city citizens lol.

Speaking of citizens, can we expect to see more citizens in distress types in the future? Things like

Trapped In A Burning Building
Kittens stuck up a tree
My friend got kidnapped
Held hostage on top of buildings (time limit?)
Trapped on a bus/train/boat with a bomb on it
Taken hostage by Nemesis

One more thing with citizens, why does every crime take place in a sewer/lab/warehouse and how do they learn about it first?

Will we be getting customizable super bases? If so when?

What other types of "user generated content" do you have in the pipe? Currently, we can design our own costumes, power colours and nemesis'

When will we be able to get black and white added to the colour spectrum of colours for powers?

Do you have any "new" free content coming our way, or is it all C-store merch for us?

Thanks for listening and sorry for the repeats, but my thought is that if people repeat others requests, that just means more than one person wants it.

XGC

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:32 PM

I swear this is not supposed to come off so negatively and I appologize if it sounds that way but here are my questions...

1. What is the actual purpose of the PTS since it seems(in the majority of cases), not only to myself, that a patch hits it, is broken, bugs are reported, most of them are ignored, and a week later a patch hits Live with some minor changes which never hit PTS and the majority of the reported bugs not addressed?

2. In the last few months I have made multiple petitions and bug reports which have gone months without being read. Even worse, I have made the same two petitions on multiple occasions since the PTS BM Event and had them be ignored for a very long amount of time and when they are answered it's as if the CSR didn't even read it and just hit the "Canned reply" button. Also, sometimes the created dates are adjusted from months to hours to make it look like it was handled in a speedier manner. So the question is what's the deal with CSR/BIlling/GMs in this game being almost nonexistant and do you plan to address it in the near future?

3. There's been alot of rage about Vibora Bay but here's the main issue I have with it. I could honestly care less what's in it or how much it costs, I'll consider the purchase when the time comes and I have all the information. The main problem, IMHO, with this whole deal is that the core game itself(not balance, PvP, PvE, and the hard stuff but the little things and the actual content) has the same, and in some cases more, holes in it than it did at launch. Before you look too far towards the future, are there plans to actually complete/repair the core? In case I'm not completely clear let me break it down into smaller bits to give a better gist of what I'm talking about.
-Enough Unity missions to go 2 weeks without a repeat in regular and special missions?
-Those Unity missions actually working to the point where they can be completed in one night?
-Enough Nemesis missions so that that you don't do the 1st 2 nemesis and then you've seen them all.
-I know it's been a work in progress but those 2-4 untargetable zombies in Canada have been calling friends and now there's like 50 of them. How about giving them their final walking papers?
-How about some more "Story Arc" style mission chains in places like Desert for example. I simply love how Telious Tower and MI Crisis seem to work together with the story of Dr. Telious and how you see people like Viper-X and Ripper in the Crisis as well. I would love to see each zone have a kind of ending which chains into future appearances and such in other zone. You have the whole "pop culture humor schtick" down...now let's use the Champions IP more.
-There are tons of costume parts in the game which we cannot get and more than enough in the C-store currently. How about giving us ways to unlock items like the Engraved Bracers(Official Site Screenshots), Stronghold Prisoner Gloves, Fishbowl Helm, and the other Viper Helm(Hunting lodge MI)?
-How about completing the basics in the Creator and knocking down the gender walls on pieces that make no sense for there to be one in the 1st place? There are also weird items combos that do not work like how the hockey mask's only top option is the celestial part which makes no sense? Just break down the walls between the genders when it comes to the basics of costume pieces please.

It's just my opinion that if the Core was more complete and in better working order than people wouldn't think twice about shelling out for your expansions and other stuff...within reason. I have more questions, of course, but I'll stop for now and try again the next time around.

P.S. Please let there be a next time around. This is a step in the right direction. :D

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:32 PM

Hi thank you for bringing this back and showing that you actually care about your players. My question is sort of two fold. First I have wondered if one of the things that is down the pipeline is a base or HQ set up for our heroes? Second, I had posted an idea for a base system in one of the suggestion threads got much positive response so I wanted to know if the idea was compatiable with the tech. Essentially my idea was each player gets there own base to customize that their toons share and any toon not in use acts as an npc. The hope was that you would have a sort of "danger room" in the base where you could do a mish aided by one of your own toons or battle one head to head as a test for pvp. This would be a way of bring the players own creations into the champions universe even when they weren't under the players direct control.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:33 PM

Well been reading through these and have a few questions. Sorry if to harsh but I am way beyond upset at the way the game is currently running.

1. When will you fix your patching mistakes quickly? This game got worse after the Kitchen Sink patch!

2. Are you trying to kill this game by ignoring players bug reports and general concerns?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:37 PM

I'll do my best to remain civil, but every day of silence from you guys just added another layer of rancor.

What are you going to do to draw back people that have gotten completely fed up with your past (we hope) shenanigans? I've given this game two chances separated by months to impress me, and I love the underlying gameplay (energy builders/blocking is a lively and fun thing); but each time the devs themselves have driven me away, more so than any bug. Hell, my wife has damn near banned your game in our house, and there's no way I could ever get her, an avid gamer, to purchase it now that she's seen your past actions. Watching you guys blithely fiddle while Millennium City burns does not make anyone want to support the game in any way, shape, or form. MMOs are built upon players being invested in their characters, in the game itself. The Vibora Pay fiasco (and don't fool yourself, it is a complete disaster) has shaken what tiny amount of faith people had left, if not obliterated it entirely. The new attempt at communication is appreciated, but if it's just you explicitly saying "we're going to get cash out of you any way we can" (rather than impilcitly) then I don't think you are going to satisfy the majority of us.

Please understand this, and make sure your supervisors do as well: you will never ever get away with charging fees for the same content other MMOs give their customers for free. Ever. The key question with that is: how do you expect to compete against other MMOs when you offer far less for the same price?

Please, give me a reason to be invested in your survival. Give me a reason to renew my subscription.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:41 PM

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:46 PM

1. When do you guys plan to address some of the major game issues like the untargetable zombies in the canada map.

2. I recall you guys mention forcefield will get something (icon) that shows how much FF we have left, when will that be address?

3. Is there any new nemesis content or expansion of the nemesis system coming soon.. Soon as in 1-3mos.

4. Do you guys know what players are **** off at, on these forums? name the top 6 so we can compare list.

5. If this game closes down 18 mos after the game release in 2009, will Lifetime subscribers be compensated and how?

6. Why is there such a HUGH disconnect between what the powers do and their description? [Compare to when I played City of Heroes from release for 2-3 yrs, that game was just done better.]

7. I think the game (during release) was more fun. Will we see a rollback?

8. Why should we pay for the Bay content when the rest of the game is mess up right now?

9. When do you guys plan to address the Power Replacers to make them all work right? (like the Qularr Mini-gun which i have been holding in the bank forever and cannot use)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:52 PM

Where do you see Champions Online in a years time?

Will there be any more PvP content added in the near future? (new maps, custom PvP games, team duels)

Is there a detailed explanation for us having to pay for Vibora Bay? If so what is it?

Supergroup Vs Supergroup content, i see it might encourage people to join or create a new Supergroup. Is this something you have thought about? Don't spare any details!

Which of the two is a higher priority at Cryptic at the current time:
a. Fixing current bugs.
b. Providing new content.

Is there any players that Devs avoid responding to for whatever reason? (no need for names)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 06:57 PM

Are two-handed weapons going to become available and if so can we have a time frame of when they are going to make their way into the game?

In general, what new power pools are you working on for the future?

Thank you.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:05 PM

ahh so many things ran through my head when i saw the upcoming devchat.

!. Leveling up Power Replacers? Would love level 40 gatling pistols.

2. New zone.... why isn't it free? Seriously only 37-40? Why would i pay when the level cap doesn't go up?

3. Tier 4 powers.... what about new tier 1, 2, and 3 powers....

4. Can we get some sort of time table on updates... personally i have a bunch of 40s, getting kinda bored running the same content, lairs, nemcons all the time.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:18 PM

Are we going to get official support for the Xbox 360 controller, or even a firm unofficial commitment not to "break" these controls?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:28 PM

Why is the level range for Vibora Bay only 37-40? As far as I can understand VB is a HUGE city in Champions Lore. The newest Black Mask is a total noob, and VB is her base of operation. It doesn't really make sense to have a zone that is home to so many heroes in the lore be only for 3 levels at the end of the game.

Are you planning on adding a great deal of 40+ content (endgame)? I would hope so.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:32 PM

You said that an Earth Powerset would be available after launch.. Do you have any idea when it will be ready? And furthermore, will we have to pay for it?

Also, When will the LITTLE things be fixed? For example, seeing our weapons in the CC? Crossing over some Gender Specific costumes? Adding Black&White tint for powers, etc... These things may not seem like top priority to you, but as the saying goes, it's the little things that count.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:42 PM

Avoiding the obvious Vibora Bay fiasco which hopefully by now should be clear to everyone concerned in the decision making:

How do you intend to stop players leaving and encourage new ones to join, so that my LTS will last longer than the 6 month one?

When will you listen to players bug reports, both in PTS and live and why do you keep adding more bugs than you fix?

Are there plans to allow for at least 2 paths to 40, ie double the current quests and if so by when and what % of them will be via free updates?

Can we please have 2 energy builders as an option, or better yet an energy builder similar to hunters in Bloodmoon that allows for melee and ranged. Maybe add a 2pt upgrade option?

When will see melee powers fixed? Simple and quick one would to cancel self root for now and a more in depth one later.

Are all the staff who went to help launch STO coming back and if so when? Will they be poached for your next MMO and if so can we expect the same level of inadequate support as we have had recently?

Been said but please allow weapons to be visible at tailor?

Been said but when will level cap be raised?

Been said, but what kind of content will you be adding as part of our subscription, ie compared to Bloodmoon and frequency?

When will crafting be made worthwhile? Currently, most items serve no purpose as they are usually inferior to what drops. Making them scale level via crafting an upgrade would help at least.

When will power replacers be worth equipping? Could we not just get a slot that we can equip them over and above are other slots? That way we could customise our powers even better.

Most importantly, when will get answers to these question? Don't take too long as it will only make matters worse.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 07:53 PM

Any chance of adding dependent NPCs? Parents/friends/spouse whom could get wrapped up with your Nemesis or something else sinister?

Has there been any thought to deeper original customization of characters? By which I mean flavor things like choosing an origin type (yes like CoX) or something like age range, that could effect how NPCs respond and treat you?

Same for Nemesis's. It's weird seeing my Demon Lord nemesis-es stealing robots and hacking computers instead of doing dark rituals or other mystical nonsense. Are there any plans to add things to Nemesis creation? Maybe choices for their Origin, or their motives in why they hate you.

Not to copy CoX, but has there been any thought to a architect-like system for player created mission arcs?

Last time I remember a dev commenting on Dark Champions, it was said that it was something you were thinking of but not very seriously (at least at this point). Is this still the same now?

Is there still an alter-ego system in the works? And if so can you give us any info on how it might work?

When developers are coming up with new ideas for the game, are ideas that would only serve for roleplay purposes considered? Or must everything have a gameplay purpose?

Oh and, what are your favorite super-hero comics? if any?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:02 PM

I feel like this is currently happening to me when I play champions:
I create a new character and I go through the same exact missions over and over, in 1 of only 2 places I can go to out of the tutorial. ALSO once I do get out of those crisis places there is only one place I feel I am able to go to continue leveling.

My questions:
1)Would it be possible to add better vairation of quests or story arcs so that we don't have to play the same missions over and over?
2) Will there be any more large instance maps that we can look forward to exploring or is this going to be it?
3) Are you planning on expanding on the current maps to add more content?

I would also like to note that there needs to be more powers I feel like a lot of my characters tend to at least have one or two powers in common because I feel like I have to get certain powers or my character will not be very playable.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:08 PM

Remember those golden days, when developers would actually listen to you and respond to your questions? Do you feel left out in the cold and unloved? It's time to change all that! We're bringing back the regular Ask Cryptic feature which has fallen by the wayside for far too long. The rules are simple:

Any topic is fair game.
Questions must be written in a respectful tone.

So, what questions do you have for us? We'll pick a bunch out of this forum thread and answer them for you right here on the website, for all to see. Ready? Set? Go!

1) Why do we have "golden days" to look back fondly on? You make it sound as if this game is years old and this "feature" was dropped LONG AGO but it has only been 5 months since release???! F I V E measly months, that's it. Why did you stop responding to your community (you know, the ones paying your bills) so quickly?

2) You have known for a good 8+ months now that melee has been the serious underdog to your golden child, ranged and their "run and gun" mechanic.......why has it taken you so long to address this huge disparity and are you really going to put forth forth the effort necessary to fix it?

3) Could you share any details at all on the direction you are going to take melee to bring it up to the level of ranged?

4) Why are singular melee powers in otherwise ranged sets ( like Chainsaw or Ego Blades for instance) clearly superior to powers from pure melee sets like all of MA (and especially Unarmed) Should not the pure melee sets be better? :confused:

5) A thread to discuss fixing Supernatural was set up over three months ago.......are you planning a much needed overhaul to this set or are you only going to do minor tweaks to various powers like Archery? Can you give us some idea of what changes you are going to make to this set?

6) Why have you been so slow when responding to legitimate outcries of power abuse and exploitation? It took forever to have STC and MR addressed but there have been even bigger elephants in the room like; blatant debuff stacking, WTKs massive damage, the use of powers like TBL+ Smoke Grenades to render yourself invisible and untargetable in both PvE and PvP, people using broken power combinations to do 5k, 10k and up to as much as 100k damage with a single shot, and Teleportation being used as effectively as a passive defense and 3x more difficult to counter than any other travel power. That should be a good start :)

Do you have plans to fix these and other exploits to make PvE challenging and PvP fun and more importantly fair?

6) The PnP version of the Champions (or more to the point the Hero System) always rewarded the character for having a cohesive concept but the exact opposite seems to be happening in CO. Why are theme builds almost universally weaker to cherry picking builds?

7) Why did you state:

Dodge and Avoidance are now on a diminishing returns model. Lower values of Dexterity generate significantly greater benefit than previously, but very high values will result in less benefit.

yet it has been proven repeatedly that "lower values of Dexterity" have most clearly NOT generated a greater benefit and done just the opposite. In fact almost all LR users have reported a loss of about 20% of their defense.

Case in point I have two LR toons, lvl 17 and 29. The lvl 17 toon with 106 DEX went from a 60% dodge to a 48% while the lvl 28 toon with 163 DEX went from a 71% to a 58%???

I can understand how someone with over 300 DEX deserves a diminishing return but a 160 or a mere 106 needed a performance hit???! :confused:

Is this what was intended with this "fix" (to pretty much cripple the average LR user) or was a mistake made?

You know what the sad part of all this is? We cannot force Cryptic to answer ALL the reasonable questions and all they will do is cherry pick the easy ones and never respond to the ones that truly count. :(

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:08 PM

1) are you working on anything to encourage teaming? Right now I have seen little reason, and roles don't seem to be fully rewarded for their effort, especially in Open missions.

2) What are the plans to give us more variety in creatures we face? right now going from one mob to the next doesn't seem to be a lot of difference in the ways they act/fight.

3) Any plans to fix travel powers like tunneling? So we don't have to go around boxes and go up stairs to go under a hill.

4) any plans to give us different animations for thinks like Superspeed/Acrobatics?

5) Any plans to make being defeated in the game actual mean something? Some form of consequence to actually discourage people from just mindlessly tossing themselves at an encounter til they win. (the lose of a star is not a very meaningful lose)

6) Any plans to give more variety to the nemesis missions? Why does a savage brute care about mind controlling people via television..

7) Can we get capes for chest wear that don't sit 6' away from the body? Not every character who wears armor needs a Spawn-like cape. How about some full leg armor rather then just some pieces.

8) better interactions with the environment and npcs? How many times do we have to see an npc commenting on the qularr invasion or why i''m not a Champion. (too many repeats in the dialog department.)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:14 PM

Ok i have a really important one, is CO going to stay in the same old fire, ice, lighting power roles or are you guys going to try to be the more "wow thats a new one" sort of thing, what i mean is when are you guys going to release more original powers like probability manipulation, Duplication, light control. Now im not saying they HAVE to be those but really give us heroes some variety!

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:14 PM

What are your plans for the "...and the Kitchen Sink", "the Big One", the patch where you rework melee? What's the developers' perception of melee's weaknesses, and what ideas are being kicked around as possible solutions? When can we expect to see these coming to the PTS?
There is the expectation that future content will be added to increase the play life of Champions Online so that lifetime subscribers can continue to come back and enjoy the game. What plans are in the works for expanding Millenium City or filling in that vacant lot in The Desert, adding additional instances and lairs, or adding a new zone for all subscribing players?
The forum community in general, and the PvP community in particular, has been very vocal in expressing their suggestions for balance, and concerns regarding the intended functionality of certain game mechanics. Sometimes communication has been great (http://forums.champions-online.com/showpost.php?p=1440274&postcount=11), but often it is lacking. Outside of Ask Cryptic, can we expect more regular interactivity on the forums with developers in the near future?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:15 PM

You also said that Wall Cling would be coming to Acrobatics, what's the ETA on that? (Ditto for Wall Running on Superspeed)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:22 PM

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:37 PM

First Question:
Is the team considering anything other than combat in their game design? Is there any look into activities to entertain that are going to be outside the realm of simply headbashing and button-mashing? Mini-Games for door-breaking, or lock-cracking, or investigation, or chemistry, or crafting, or 'break the magical ritual', or even just 'bar games' like darts, pool, or even chess that players can set onto to play in the gameworld... Anything at all other than combat?

Second Question:
Any look at expanding the Crafting System to include options at L40, for those themely powers that some of us are stuck with L35 enhancements of, like the modular recipes?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:39 PM

Why is every non free to play mmo $14.99 a month USD? Is there price collusion between MMO companies? I would think $9.99 or $5.99 would allow a larger a player base and if large enough more income. So is there any chance for a reduced monthly fee? Or a reduced fee if someone plays both CO and STO? Maybe something like if you play both it is $9.99 each per month each.

Will there please be more high end (level 35-40) team missions?

None of the MMO Devs would dare tackle this question honestly and only respond with double talk, toss some charts and graphs at you and then dazzle you with data mining info. In the end they would feel they have justified why the charge what they do but never truly answer your question.

The answer though is quite simple..........It's not a matter of collusion but more a matter of sheep mentality. What I mean by this is, as new MMOs join the "herd", it is easy to just charge what everyone else is, citing what other MMOs are currently charging as justification. The problem right now though is no one has been willing to cross that boundary to a higher price bracket.

To further simplify the idea.........if an 800 lb Gorilla like WoW hasn't raised their prices then no one else dares to. It is going to take both a revolutionary new MMO and a company with some balls to charge more than 15 bucks a month.

There is even evidence to support this.......before WoW came out most MMOs charged around 12-13 bucks a month but shortly after WoW announced their pricing model nearly all of the other current MMOs mysteriously started raising their rates to MATCH WoW's, citing things like increasing upkeep costs, inflation and the like. If this truly was the case though why has no other MMO (WoW included) raised their rates recently? It have been OVER 6 years since WoW and yet no increasing costs......for SIX years? :rolleyes:

It all boils down to one thing.......charging what the market will bear.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:39 PM

HA! And you guys said they didn't listen!!

Well, here's my question. As an avid, and probably overly stubborn, tunneler I want to know when this travel power is going to get looked at. It has by far the most problems out of all the travels and I'd say out of any of the powers ingame. If you don't believe me here are the problems I've seen while playing throughout beta since last April.....none of these problems have EVER been addressed.

1) Can't see glowies while underground. This includes doors, crafting nodes, mission clickables, etc.

2) Falling damage. There is absolutely no reason why a hero should be flying through the air (invisible) and hit the ground...while still in the ground...when tunneling. If anything when one comes to the edge of a cliff the hero should fly out the side and dive back in to the ground below.

3) Curbs. WE'RE UNDERGROUND for cryin' out loud! There is absolutely no explanation as to why a hero must go around a car that is completely ABOVE ground.

4) Animation is way too long. A big problem here is that when health starts to get low you can't just dive into the ground to get away or you'll end up taking too much damage and die. Either this needs to be replaced with a new animation or once the power is activated it nulls damage or at least reduces it significantly. I propose becoming more of a muddy substance and 'melting' into the ground.

5) Hills. When traveling the amount of vertical ability of Tunneling is underwhelming. Extreme cliffs are obviously not going to be tunneled up (though it's still possible from a RP standpoint) but long hills are quite annoying for the tunneler. What's most annoying is that it's not the angle of the hill but the length. If the hill hasn't become steeper why are we not allowed to keep tunneling up. Just silly. Also, I think we should be able to dig through some of the steeper hills regardless.

6) Combat is slow. This falls primarily under the animation concern but I thought it deserved it's own spot too. Because it takes so long to dive into the ground going from mob to mob when grinding becomes slow and tedious. You want to get over there real quick but it takes almost as long to get in the ground as it does to just run there. Mighty Leep & Lunge do help with this issue but they have recharge timers on them and isn't always there for use.

7) BOO!! The flashing in and out of ground is a fairly new problem. Actually if you have your auto attack on you can agro mobs as well while tunneling. That's fun. Another problem I just recently discovered is that when I got underwater while tunneling I can agro mobs as well.....and this was before the popping in and out of ground bug.

8) Can't heal. If I've got a baddie selected and I'm still underground there are times where I will never heal no matter how far away I get. I'm still considered to be in combat. There have also been times where I've unselected my auto-attack and still have been considered to be in combat while tunneling.

9) Killed underground. I guess this one sort of makes sense but there are a few AoEs that will kill you while tunneling. I honestly can't think of which ones or I'd tell you but there have been times where I died even after damage from diving into the ground should've stopped once I was actually in the ground.

So yeah, please fix my travel! Roxstar is broken without it.

.
.
.

If that's too big of a question for ya how about an estimated timeline for Earth powers!? :D When can I shoot a blast of pebbles at someone? Or encase someone in stone?

Thanx for your time. :)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:39 PM

After feeling disturbed about almost everything else in my life, I looked to the forums and watched yet another way to relieve stress starting to crumble. I am holding on and I plan on staying with this (Lifetime subs will do that) but I am asking for a couple of things in return and I realize you want questions, but I will give suggestions as well.:

Foremost

Please answer these posts fast and frequently. Or you will shatter what little good will you have left (which is based off "we paid them money, this isn't intentional, right?" thoughts) and grind the pieces under foot like Manimals carrying Crafted Travel Power Drops, the dust left to blow away on the winds of time. I say Good Will, because I think Faith has succumbed to a fast tactical strike by Viper.

Next. With everything else going on, I will not be talking about free expansions. I have never been in an MMO when they had the free phase of an expansion. Every time I joined one it was either in place for a while already, or happened after I left.

BUT...

... if the level cap isn't going up, we NEED interesting benefits to being level 40. Like complicated missions for a free ret con or a free name change or something. A mission arc where you maybe retcon back to energy builder and one attack thanks to your nemesis or something and go through the arc installing new powers (or reclaiming old ones) and end it with a confrontation with your nemesis in your new identity (Name, costume, powers) or as yourself with some minor changes. This will allow players to get used to the build they're going for instead of trying to use the nice, but limited resources at the Powerhouse when Retconning. And if you decide you can't desl with that method? Drop all the missions, talk to the special mission person at Powerhouse have your regular powers restored and carry on.

As well as the fact I would LOVE to see the level cap raised. But that would require a MASSIVE amount of reworking enemies and drops.
Instead, how about a Timetable of when the level cap would be raised?

Also, when making an important post, try to give more than tidbits. As you well know the communication issues are the BIGGEST problem you will have retaining players.

Next up, PVP related ideas and questions:
I saw a post earlier about making more cooperative PvP like Zombie Apoc. That would be awesome, but how about some really challenging Cooperative PvE instances.

Like a PVE Zombie apocalypse instance open to up to 20 players at a time, along the same lines as PvE (auto level to higest bracket) with scaling and all that Jazz. There HAS to be scaling. This is an action game, not a "wait for 40 people to get together and HOPE there are no idiots" which is what drove me away from raids in WoW and has made me leery about Super Groups/Guilds, considering the practices those guilds HAD to put in place to get a fair distribution system. Maybe a survival event with a final boss to fight if you DO survive. Also different environments. Lava platforms for us retro gamers, maybe an underwater section to make it frantic (above and below) Or have an instance event that times the party and rewards them based on ratio to highest Dev team time in addition to the set rewards that drop normally. With unique rewards for busting the limits.

Now, this is a thought and a LOW priority thought at that: Maybe there can be a tier system for PvP queues. Like put the people who get the crap beat outta them in a different room then OmniBlast the Omniblastificent. This way you get the kind of battles from 10-20 which were action packed and usually rather close.

Read these posts. I have seen many good ideas, and MANY questions that need to be answered. I don't regret the Lifetime Sub. But don't let the "First Action MMO" die. This is far more fast paced than any other MMO I have seen. I LOVE it. You are the first of your kind. That means you have a LOT of pressure and expectations. You know this. I know this. I think the entire fanbase knows this* and we want you to succeed, because that means more fun for us. When you have these problems fixed send an apologetic re-invite e-mail to the ones who left. Offer your players who stayed a pro rated month or two for loyalty, and offer the ones who come back a discount that is less than the loyalty bonus but still a sign of good will.

You need to do something for the consumers or they will do nothing for you. Also, maybe have an experience cache for level 40s who want to keep doing missions but gain no benefit except for drops and resources. What is the point of having experience on some missions if we have to wait for a level cap boost to make the mission worth more than bunk?

*(Except my buddy, Geist. He is lost somewhere in Desert Crisis, has been since September and will probabaly be there when my friend who bought the game last Friday hits lvl 40)

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:40 PM

As of right now, how likely is it we will be seeing a Nemesis Online? If it is likely, do you have any unique ideas for ways the players/settings from the two games will interact? Would one be able to start as a Hero and become a villain, or vice versa?

They said before that IF they do Nemisis Online, it will be a fully new game, not like CoV. Dark Champions is more likely.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:49 PM

Sorry if this has been asked before, but i didn't want to scroll through all the pages. Are you going to do anything about the civilians in M City constantly harrassing us with mission requests. I've been knocked out of mission reward screens, auction house, stores, you name it... It's very frustrating.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:51 PM

Oh, And the Auction House User Interface... please for the love of cat girls everywhere, kill it. And build a new one.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:54 PM

1. What percentage of designers and developers enjoy reading Super Hero comic books on a weekly basis? How many collected comics growing up?

2. Have you ever thought about using actual comic book writers to help with mission creation?

3. It seems that many players are complaining about the amount of missions that are centered around "grinding". What would you define as a "fun" mission? What do you think are players concerns regarding the quality of missions in Champions Online?

4. The Nemesis system is by far my favourite feature of this game. I feel like you're really on to something great with it but it's very underwhelming.

a. On a scale of 1-10 (10 being the highest) how important, in your opinion, is the Nemesis System to the future of Champions? Do you feel that you've given the Nemesis System the appropriate amount of attention it deserves? What are your thoughts about its current state?

b. What changes/additions can we expect to the Nemesis System?

5. A player suggested on the forums during the Winter event that holidays could benefit from M.I./Lemuria style Crisis Events. Will we see any more Crisis Events added both in regular game and during holidays?

6. I'd like to see every question that's been asked about Vibora Bay answered. What can I say, there are a lot of good questions.

7. I was unimpressed with how CO was put on the back burner during STO's development and release. Cryptic is apparently working on a third MMO. Will we see a change in developers and shuffling of resources again? Can you understand player's concerns when this is done?

8. I believe I read a dev remark that he was unimpressed with crafting in CO. Will we see any changes to the crafting system?

Thanks

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:57 PM

OK here is the questions I have been wanting to know...

1. Will it EVER be possible to be a Minion Master type character and not take over half your life in damage damage while summoning pets and waiting for them to appear?

2. Will you ever be able to take your pets with you instead of summoning them all the time?

3. Will Zombies ever be made to last longer then 2 min even with the talent? In extended fights they just disappear and you have to waist time to re-summon during the fight!.

4. Why do certain pets have to stay in a circle? In CoH/CoV we NEVER had that limitation.

5. Are you going to create new power sets like Plants for example?

6. Are you going to make an On/Off sound option for powers (such as Ego-Form or Shadow Form)?

7. Are you going to add more stuns and movement de-buffs to melee to make them more viable?

8. Are you going to reduce the CRAZY attack rate of mobs to something comparable of players (it's REALLY deterring to die from mobs 2 levels lower than you cuz they can shoot faster than you)?

9. Are you going to add Super Bases like in CoV/CoH and make them able to be raided for SG vs. SG matches?

10. Are you going to make the Tailor Option to veiw and edit weapons in Tailor mode?

11. Can you add an additional Build type to buff pets for those of us who want to play Minion-Masters? (Or just possible say that Aura of Ebon Destruction effects pets as well.)

12. Are you going to make the Tooltips able to be disabled completely?

Thanx

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 08:59 PM

Power Replacers, will they ever get their own slot?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:11 PM

After you've addressed all the above, please answer my simple questions:)

Do you have plans to rework the inventory system? The current system is wonky in that the information can only be seen by rolling the mouse over. I am not a super hardcore player that can know by sight and name of item what it does. The system needs sorting options and multiple display options as well, this applies to the auction house. Do you plan on adding actual bidding to items in the auction house?

Content is definitely a problem. Even though I am what would be called a casual player I have managed to raise 2 toons to 40th level and now have started a 3rd but to be honest the lack of content has made it a bit underwhelming, sort of like watching a re-run several times. When is it being added and how much?

For the casual players it would be a great addition to have more information regarding what stats do what to this skill or that. Coming from the world of D&D (way back in the early 80's) this system is a bit confusing and I believe non-rpg folks would be turned off by the lack of info. I am not for dumbing down the game, just clarifying what might be obvious to many, but not all. Any plans to make the game more friendly to us not so versed in the numbers and stats of CO?

Please, do everything you can to keep this game going. Lots of folks are obviously angry and frustrated but I'd really hate to see CO disappear or die a slow death. I am weary of the whole fantasy dungeon crawl thing. It's a blast playing CO.

Thanks for looking at my ramblings (it's late....:))

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:21 PM

Why create an entire new zone (Vibora Bay) for a level range (37-40) that is already covered by two existing zones? Why not tweak the NPC/quest level upward slightly and raise the level cap to 45?

What was the rationale behind making Fire Flight a standard Travel Power, and Electric Flight and Sorcerous Flight crafted Devices, when both of the latter Travel Powers are just as suitable for existing power trees as Fire Flight is to the Fire tree, when the Arms Crafted Travel Power is not related to a specific tree? Why not make Electric and Sorcerous Flight into standard Travel Powers and make all three Crafted Travel Powers into unique, non-tree-specific abilities?

Why is the Lasso Device still a 10-minute cooldown for a special FX Iron Lariat effect?

Are Device Powers that are also appropriate for Power Trees, such as Magician's Dust for Martial Arts and Taser Gun for Munitions, ever going to become selectable PC powers, or will they remain (usually charged) Devices? Obviously some would need rebalancing, but incorporating already-existing powers from Devices would add more variety to existing power trees, and thus, characters.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:24 PM

Lessee lessee..

How is work going on the Bestial Heads: Will they ever get full animations? Will we ever see things like goggles and hats on them?

Are there any plans to add more emotes into the game?

With regards to travel powers, are there any plans to allow us to adjust the point of origin on a travel power (I.E. Have the Jet Boots graphic originate from a jet-pack or rocket strapped to a player's back)?

What's the development process for making a boss fight like?

Would Cryptic ever consider tapping into the great resource that is our community to design a boss fight / instance and implement the top-voted concept into the game?

Will we ever get a perk for riding the nuclear bomb in the Desert as it goes off?

How kind are you guys to your interns?

And Lastly...
Edit: There's enough Vibora Bay inquiries. Lets try a different question..

What community-requested feature are you guys looking forward to implementing the most?
~ Koma'in / Veran

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:26 PM

1. Are there any plans to make powers more visually customizable? Specifically, to be able to turn off or at least reduce the visual "noise" of some powers such as Ego Form? Or, for that matter, be able to change the look of weapons such as the chainsaw, ego blades and laser swords?

2. Are there plans to expand current power sets by giving them new powers? Or to add entirely new power sets?

3. Is there any possibility of passive abilities becoming "unlinked" to certain stats? Such as how regeneration is based on recovery while invulnerability is based on both strength and constitution? Would there be a possibility of making these instead based on the player's characteristic focus, as to not "force" a player to choose either a passive based on their focus or have to try to pick up the slack?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:26 PM

You've said you'd be better at communication, in light of this, what do you have planned to regain the trust that you lost with your playerbase? How do you plan on changing the way you speak to us when you do?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:44 PM

1: Multiple Advantages, will we ever see them? upgrading a power to be stronger is great, but it'd be neat if every character running the same powerset could be a little variant. ie: AOE variants, hold variants, ect...

2: multiple limbs: Grond think puny 2-armed heroes look puny. Grond not think real hero have just 2 puny arms.

3: Will wings ever actually be on the back of characters instead of weidly around their shoulders?

4: can I have a cookie?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 09:56 PM

Forty-two.

Lol, I see I'm not the only one who constantly carries a towel around. I do get some strange looks. ;)

I have to say, after playing WoW for 5+ years I Love this game!!
I tried Conan, and it was great, till you left the starting island that is, by level 70 I'd had it. Went back for the freebie, didn't see anything to keep me., so haven't been back.
Was thrilled to hear about the new content, bought a 6 month sub for that reason.

Question: Do you feel the current game core is sufficient and any further content will be paid DLC, or are there plans to expand/finish the core content as well?

There seems to be a lot of partialy finished content. The desert for example, other then the Cowboy gulch, there is no feeder quest to send you to Area 51, or the prision. I'm currently leveling a number of toons, with all but one I was pretty much able to do "red" quests if I had to so stuck to MC and Canada. Finally went exploring the desert out of frustration with the one "sucky" toon (Single Blade/Darkness) and what did I find? All sorts of quests I never knew about, or had a NPC send me to. :confused:
As well as I travelled to these new quests, I saw an oasis with a whole bunch of "brothers" and "sisters" that seem to be there for nothing more then window dressing. Like I said, not all spit and polish I'm afraid. :(

Question: What recourse if any do you have planned if you can't maintain a profitable subscription level for people who aren't doing month to month? Are we simply going to be SoL, or will any time remaining in our subscription, be refunded or transferable to another game?

Even after buying a few of the DLC with my cryptic points, I'm becoming concerend that I might be sending good money after bad and wish now I hadn't gone for the 6 months. As well I can see why the lifers might be really concerend.
It almost looks like your cryptic point DLC is a major part of your revenue model, and your regular subscription rate isn't enough for the game to be viable long term. In fact making players pay for new content this early in a games life cycle doesn't look good, and I'm scared all the nickle and dimeing might start driving (more?) players away.

I Love this game! Please don't kill it before it's had a chance to develop a strong player base.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 10:13 PM

Why is there a PTS server?

Why are we being charged for Vibora Bay?

What is the justification for charging the same monthly fee as much bigger and more fleshed out games?

Will we ever see Stretching / PermaGrowth / Shrinking (Microman is in the game!) / Invisibility ?

What do the developers feel are the strengths of this game?

Do any of you regularly play Champions Online?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 10:13 PM

I got a few questions on my mind;

Will the werewolf claw powers and pounce ever see their way back into the Supernatural powerset? Chronomancer's statement seems to convfuse the fact that the players want the powers, not the event itself. I want to be able to make my werewolf able to use claw attacks, not half-ss it, as it were, using another powerset like martial arts claws or might powers pretending they are natural claws. The ability to slash and ravage liek an animal would just aobut put the final icing on the cake for my character.

Will team sizes ever be expanded to raid/task force size for Open Mission and cosmic boss encounters? Currnetly there are four cosmic level boss encounters that drop loot, not in the standard Open Mission style, but as personal loot, but it's randomly distributed to onyl one team, thus this can leave a lot of people out of the final draw. This can be fixed much better if we can form 15 or even 20 man sized raid/task force groups for this, and opens up for more open area style encounters in the future, say, like a galactus style event map that requries such large groups (but not a raid dungeon that requries hours and hours of time to waste away in).

What is exactly going into the Sueprnatural and Melee pass? Back to first question, a lot of people really want the werewolf attacks from teh Bite! event put into sueprnatural, with maybe a couple of new powers to help expand it. And melee does need some help and it would be nice to know exactly what the current plan is, with no defined yes or no on how it will happen. Just something to give us a direction.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:04 PM

One thing I liked about City of Heroes was the free web comics that you had up to entertain myself when I wasn't playing the game. Will Champions Online get comics like those soon, or at all?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:04 PM

Hi Cryptic :)

Is there any super group's content scheduled ? Like missions, extra feature or super group HQ ?

Thanks.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:10 PM

Will we be seeing any high-level Gadroon story content in the future?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:14 PM

Is there any chance of player housing of some kind, so that the characters can have homes, lairs, or bases? Most of the zones (city, desert, jungle, etc) would be good settings for them and there are plenty of spots for clicky doors already.

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:28 PM

When is a serious look at PvP going to be taken? With the combination of defensive moves and healing being too powerful, people are nearly forced to resort to "Flavor of the Month" combos just to even kill anyone. End-game UTC PvP matches are rare due to lack of faith with the system and the few that happen usually end in stalemate. Can we expect a proper retooling of power balance that is sorely needed to save PvP in the near future?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:35 PM

First of all, when can we see an alternative to the Desert/Canada Crises? Or more simply, when can we see new ANYTHING that isn't for ONLY HIGH LEVEL PLAYERS? I have played through the crises so often I hate them now. You have to do a crisis, hang out five more levels, then come back ten levels later. They are cramped with too many things, and many of them tend to go off theme. In Canada you can fight terrorists, aliens, zombies, rabid animals, VIPER, etc. In the Desert you fight Hulk-copies, ghosts, cowboy robots, escaped prisoners, more VIPER, etc. It's like you tried to get too much content in one zone.

Secondly, where are the customization options that weren't included, but have been promised. Black/White power selections, weapons visible in the tailor, more stances and expressions, and more costume pieces in general. I'm not talking about C-Store content, but things like the recently added costume pack (with the guitars and weapon pieces). Power-specific animation options (like allowing the fire framework to use the animations from celestial) too.

When are you going to complete the costume issues? Namely the missing female pieces, the incomplete sets (missing patterns and stuff), more weapon models, auras, NORMAL CHEST WEAR CAPES, glow on matching pieces (art deco hip wear not glowing, most other pieces do), and more fleshed out options?

How are you going to communicate with the community in the future? Preferably in a more open manner than a comment buried in the forums. How can you explain the lapse of communication these past two months? It seems that you were paying attention, but rather than reply and fix things, you waited for two months before ANYTHING. I mean, I understand there was a vacation, but since when is it good business to let EVERYONE off at the SAME TIME.

When can we see many of the options available in your older MMO, City of Heroes/Villains, in CO? Auras, Costume Change E-Motes, Team-Travel Powers, Asymmetrical weapon selections, Bases, and also, the alignment options? (I know CoX is a NCSoft product now, but still)

Why are travel powers seemingly such an issue that you have to restrict them so heavily? I understand that the intent was to counter the cheap tactics players can use involving travel powers, but in the end, they are almost identical to CoX's solutions. (Aka, you take damage, you slow down). Restricting the number of travel powers is senseless, as is the level to gain a new one. Also, the crafted ones are insane.

Why are there restrictions in place that prevent me from choosing higher tier powers from a framework that I am not heavily invested in? It accomplishes nothing, forces concept breaks, and (due to the stat specializations for each framework being different) has diminished effectiveness. For instance, my dual swordsman wants wolves, available at 8 to a sorcerer, but 17 for me. And since I'm not heavily invested in INT or PRE, they are weak. Furthermore, there aren't enough powers in a single framework to prevent me from HAVING to do this. Eventually, I'll just run out of dual-blade powers!

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:37 PM

I have a couple of issues I would like to ask about that I'm a little surprised haven't come up yet.

1) As things stand with the game at the moment, there seems to be little reason to form a group other than to beat a small handful of "lairs". In my experience, when I get a "lair" mission, I tend to try to find or form a group, we do the lair, and then the team disbands faster than you can type "goodbye". Other than these few occurrences, Groups just seem to be cumbersome and ineffective with little ability to find any real group content. I.E. a reason to stay grouped for more than a single specific mission. This seems to me to be contrary to the point of playing an MMO. Do you have any plans to address group playability?

2) Along those same lines is the issue of Super Groups. Other than the free costume slot for joining, and the SG bank box, what are they for? Is there any plan in motion to expand on Super Groups, and if so, when might we expect to hear about it?

Other than that, most of my questions would echo other sentiments already posted before me, so I wont bother to reiterate them, but I would like to say, as a lifer here, I'm trying to maintain my high hopes for the future of this game, though I'll admit that of late my confidence is slipping. I want very much for this game to succeed and have the chance to blossom into the full potential it has, but in order for that to happen, I feel that it will require more communication between the Dev's and the players, and a sincere commitment to address these concerns that we, the players, have. I think that this thread is definitely a step in the right direction and I hope that you can build some good will. Unfortunately that seems to be in short supply around here at the moment.

Good Luck

Dr. Grendel

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:38 PM

11 pages are a lot of post to read so i hope this has not been asked before.

About translations.

Are there plans of traslating the game to more languages? (spanish here :D)
Why do F2P games translate into lot of languages while P2P games are only translated (when translated) only to a few?

About regional servers.

I know the game is based in the 'only one server' idea, but are there plans for better supporting non-US players?, like specific shards for Eurasia o something like that...

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:40 PM

Are there plans for SG bases and SG nemesis's?

Archived Post

02-01-2010, 11:40 PM

Although this may be an irrelevant question to ask compared to the majority on here, I guess i'll put in my two-cents worth of a question x]

Are there future plans for powers/power sets such as Extra limbs similar to Doc Ocs from the classic Spiderman, and is a reward system similar to the Veteran's badge system in City of Heroes/Villains being considered as well?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:20 AM

As I am sure you are all aware of the mass concern recently on the forums regarding the Vibora Bay paid expansion, whilst since launch the game's lack of content has been a major issue.

1) Are you aware of the game's lack of content? And if so, why do you feel that people should have to pay extra for additional content whilst this content issue still stands?

2) What are the plans for extra content in the future as far as paid and unpaid content? Will extra zones always be paided for extra?

3) As you are probably aware, a lot of people have lost a lot of faith in Cryptic over this recent VB issue, feeling they are being charged for content that should be already in the game since lauch. How do you intend to re-gain this trust from these people?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:20 AM

My top ten questions. I don't really expect to see them ALL answered, though if you could manage three I'd be delighted.

1.) Are there any current or future plans to make widen leveling paths via free content, so that it takes more than one leveling to forty to experience all available content in the game?

2.) Does Cryptic have any plans to partially or fully refund lifetime subscriptions to those lifers unhappy with the performance of the game thus far? If so, how much can these members expect to recieve in compensation?

3.) Given that Bloodmoon has become a monthly event, are there any plans to replace it with another Samhain event?

4.) What is Cryptic's stance on providing a standalone character creator within the game, to prevent inprogress skins from being lost due to disconnect, and to allow more indepth planning on skins.

5.) Was the membership backlash and subsequent exodus by some members a surprise to Cryptic?

6.) Are there, or are there not giant robot lobsters in this game's future?

7.) Are there any plans to sell tights sets in the C store? Worm Armor?

8.) What specific costume pieces currently used in the game, will not be released for general use by members? For instance, I assume Foxbat's distinctive mask will remain his exclusive property, wheras his insignia may not....

9.) How long do you feel it will take to finish balancing passes on the powersets, and do you forsee working on new powersets after that? Would these powersets be unlocked ingame, available at start, or be exclusive to C store content.

10.) Are there any plans to release costume reset tokens in the C store? I have several costumes I'd just as soon replace without a 15 G cost involved...

Thanks for your time Devs, any informaiton you can provide on these subjects would be most useful :)

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:26 AM

Could you communicate on the number of active subscription to champions online ?
Don't you fear that releasing a paying extension this early in your mmo's life will prevent new players from being drawn into the game ?
I don't mean this question to be offensive but I know it will sound. Anyway, don't you fear that trying to get cash in from all sides is going to have a negative impact on your image, as well as being counter-productive on the long-run ? I ask this question as a enthusiast player who is worried about the future of this game, and I feel many players feel this way. Which leads me to my last question :
More and more older players and early enthusiast supporters of champions online, who have supported you through waves of grudges and negative critics, seems to be getting disenchanted by your recent announcement and decisions. What is your regard on these players and what do you plan to do about that ?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:29 AM

Why is there a PTS server?

I would like to ask a follow-up question to that one:

"No, seriously, why is there a PTS server?"

And in addition to that, I have these questions:

How do you justify subscription + microtransaction for a game that's in poorer shape with thinner content than its competitors? And no, "five years head start" don't count.
What is the long-term (6 months, 1 year, 2 years) roadmap of the development of Champions Online?
What is the short-term bug fix schedule? What bugs have the highest priority?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:05 AM

I don't know if my last list would make this one not seen,due to it being checked off the, so I am posting again with a single specific question: When will Cryptic Points be earn able in game? I remember vividly that this is part of the plan for Cryptic games, and a sound one.
Allow the player to earn the ability to gain Cryptic points via in game, without ever having to pay an extra cent in the C-Store. This is unless an individual does not want to wait. Any MAPs give you money coming in either way-subs or micro. Great idea, however, that tech has not been seen at all yet.
Is it in the works, and if so what is the eta?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:15 AM

when can we get a full list of elemental powers, because i really want some air water and earth (might is not earth) characters and the only true element that you have is fire don't get me wrong I love force, ice and electricity is awesome but we need new powers

I am on a games development coerce

so i understand that the animation modelling coding music ect.. is a reel pain in the neck but come on we need these powers

also (if) when you decide to or are making new powers can you post a time table of when they are likely to come out

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:37 AM

About PVP:

Are there any plans to set up a tiered PVP system, or setting? As it stands, PVP (at least at high levels) can go from fun and interesting to when there's a reasonably balanced team, to completely and utterly unplayable for a non-optimized character when the other team consists of people with nothing but <insert flavor of the month power here>.

Something like a 'wins/losses' tracking system that sets the people who rack up kills like mad all against one-another, and those who don't do quite so well against those who ALSO don't do quite so well would make things much more interesting.

Also interesting to see would be a filter - I imagine PURE MELEE PVP matches would become immensely popular.

Aditionally: Are there any more plans for a cooperative PVP setting like Zombie Apocalypse (which has eaten days of my time, it's an absolute blast), such as, say, a Snowball Fight event for Winter months?

As far as Super Groups and PVP, are there any plans for an 'open pvp' setting where Super Groups can slug it out with other Super Groups they just don't get along with?

And I know it's been asked many times already, but I'm not one to avoid the common questions:

When are we going to be able to see our weaponry in the tailor?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:41 AM

hi there

I was wondering, will at soem point new maps or modes be added to pvp?

also perhaps mors customisation options for pvp?

thanks

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:46 AM

hi there also one more thing, is there any plan/chance to increase the max size of teams?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:46 AM

1) Secret identities have been mentioned; any chance of some more info?

2) Supergroup bases! In the works?

3) JETPACKS. And vehicles; Sprocket needs his retro-copter. Any plans?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:52 AM

hey i was wondering what the level details are meaning what do i get at level 17 or 20 or 30 because i cant find where i can get that information from i'm currently level 17 could you tell me what i get from all levels please? or post a link for me to get the info from?

thanks love the game heaps

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:53 AM

For cryptic :

What is the atmosphere like in the workplace?

About the game :

Are there plans to add more mini-game like content like PVE only version of Zombie Apocalypse or more open missions?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:00 AM

I would like to know how you plan on addressing the content issue. There's simply not enough quests in game to bring you from 5-40 without having to replay the EXACT same content over and over and over. Vibora Bay hardly counts as content filler, as it only covers three levels, 37-40, and it must be paid for seperately from the monthly fee and the box, and forcing people to pay for leveling content for a game that you're already asking a sub for comes across as very greedy.

EDIT: And I want to know HOW you're adressing it, not 'We're working on it we have a lot of content, it's very exciting!" or "We have a bunch of mid-level missions coming up!" I want to know what areas are being addressed a ball park number on missions, how many new zones you want to try and release and any alternate leveling content you have in mind [Nemesis, PvP, randomly generated instances, etc.] I want to be assured that I'm not just throwing my money away and that what you're releasing is going to be the quality expected from a subscription game with optional paid content.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:28 AM

What are you planning to address immersion? When I first started I was hoping for more voice acting, more interaction with the environment, I found animations 'too jerky', music feels just as sparse as it does in CoH, instances are really small. I actually like the public quests like the Mayor one and would like them to take a step up as far as what the crowd does during the whole event, environmental destruction, maybe change up the villain that shows up by rotating through 3 different ones.

I like that we can pick up objects but as far as animations, picking up a trashcan does not feel much different than picking up a semi. Can you do anything to give them more 'weight'?

I like exploring and would love to go into certain buildings but again MMOs are lacking and passing through a city seems more like looking at wallpaper. It is nice to look at but you can't do anything with it. At least add phone booths, newspaper stands, donut and coffee shops where you can actually go do something non-combat related. Why not be stopped by one of the citizens and instead of always leading to a mission, it is a reporter who asks a series of questions so the next time I go to a newsstand I can read an article about myself. These would change as you level and complete certain missions. This would go a ways into helping players think they are really a part of the world.

Going back to an old argument when I talked to a dev at Comic-Con when asking about destructible environments. That dev and reading forums the answer is always "the players will level the entire city and you would never see a complete building". Why so shortsighted in how you implement it? For example, buildings could have a set amount of damage they can take before, another CoH reference, a Police Drone comes in and zaps the player to jail, rehab or a hospital. Or use your star system and take it to the extreme where the player's effectiveness is majorly reduced the more damage he causes. You cannot deny a lot of environmental damage is not a staple of super hero fights and it is sorely missing in MMOs(only single player Freedom Force offered it). I thought this would be more of a lag issue than anything and I wish that someone would just say that because trying to blame the state of environment on players with no self-control indicates to me it is possible.

Why so strict on MMO mechanics and available gameplay? Why can't you add more variety by just adding things that are fun such as maybe adding boat races out in the bay? I look at the tubes and how tall the buildings are in MC and all I could think of was "this would be a killer water slide ride". Not super hero related? Who cares, it would just be fun and different.

Why can't you make up more super heroic moments in missions? Sorry again for the CoH reference but I always thought it would be cool when taking the tram from zone to zone, you had an option where you could actually view yourself sitting there while waiting for it to arrive at its destination. At this point you could have random muggings or something. And for petes sake when do we get to rescue a kitten from a tree? LOL, seriously why don't you have those randomly peppered throughout the city?

Another thought as far as super hero moments that I would expand gameplay and allow for more varied powers is a set of protection powers. Why can't I be a Sue Storm and throw a forcefield around a family to protect them from a collapsing building? Or I would like to be a Colussus and my job is take a lot of damage blocking a doorway while office workers escape during a super villain attack. Why can't I use super-strength to punch a hole in a wall to drain a flooding room before everyone drowns? Yes, these missions would be very specific to powers you pick but wouldn't that increase re-playability by a TON, where players know depending on powers picked they will get alternate mission paths?

I bought a lifetime subscription but have found I have not logged in for over a month. Feel free to break the traditional MMO mold at anytime. Looking forward to secret identity non-combat play(if implemented well I would definitely pay for that).

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:48 AM

Is the Xbox 360 version of the game canceled. If not, could you give us an idea as to when the game will be released for the Xbox 360?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:54 AM

Here are my questions:

Will we see new powersets anytime soon? If so what, and when? Will there be earth, gravity, plant, wind, water, 2 hand weapon fighting?

Will there be the ability to create a different animation for summons to help fidderentiate them from others?

Is anyone from the Hellgate London franchise in your marketing, design, development, or financial departments? If so do they have enuff influence on decsicions to make this game fail epicly as well?

Will you please add a feature to the C-store that flags purchases already made to the account, or already unlocked fully via perks? This way as the store gets more items we know what we have already bought?

Do you have an official Quality Control team? Do they do actualy regression test, or is it all ad-hoc? Does your company follow a true development cycle? Do you have design docs, or is programming considered all powerful, and they code on the fly?

Lastly, as the cryptic store seems to be tied between CO and STO, will there ever be items bought that will span both games? Like if purchased they will unlock something in CO and STO?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:55 AM

nice topic

i have some not very important questions, but it makes the game better for me and other demo users

i've said before: i cant afford monthly fees as i live now, if i can in the future, i like to do so
to make this game better until then, i could play with demo in the crisis areas and practice all basic stuff
and believe me, flying is awesome, i thought: finally a non-dbz game which has flying ability in it, but the tutorial wont let me, and thats good, cuz there's not much to fly there

however, the crisis areas are bigger, and can be used to fly (seen desert crisis with my 10 days invitation and on sorudo's pc) and more skills
thats 2 things which may have me play in those 2 areas

but thats not all !! i can upgrade my stats, even before lvl 15, which is max for demo users

so, can you tell me whether you (cryptic) still is planning on add the crisis areas to the demo, and if so, will it be soon, or will it take long? cuz its not very important, i guess

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:03 AM

Any chance of getting custom bows at tailor for archery ie color and types?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:04 AM

Do you have a schedule of updates for the year, and what proportion of these will be paid for as opposed to free?

Considering the 'Kitchen Sink' patch caused a great many issues after it was applied, do you intend to change the way that future patches are tested?

What areas of CO are you intending to change/add to with the developments made to the game engine via STO?

For the areas still due a 'balancing pass' (melee, pets, etc.) Do you have a timescale or order for these?

The C-Store has recently had more costume items added, whilst 'free' costume items are being removed from the tailor. What are your intention regarding costumes and adding free costumes?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:10 AM

What, in all your actions and communication since this game's release, do you feel has truly lead players to believe that Cryptic has long term (2+ years) plans for this game?

I really... Just think 90% of the interviews and posts are about what you guys have already done for the game. The rest was Blood Moon, Celestial, Winter Event, and some cheap use of vague terms like legendary and massive.

Also, going forward do you plan to clearly state what content will be included in our monthly fee and what will come at a price additional to our monthly fee? Notice I don't use the word free here.

What do you feel 15 dollars a month nets a player in terms of content, production, etc.?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:10 AM

-superbases and some kind of "open pvp" on the future?

-play as a villain in future?

-cost of the first expansion? euros/dolar

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:25 AM

Why did the patch note "ATI multi-sampling has been improved..." get attached to a patch that disabled it entirely, and when are you going to fix that, or at least acknowledge it?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 03:27 AM

1. Explosive Arrow: the "Where's the Kaboom" advantage adds piercing damage and puts a delay on the fire damage. However, the advantage also causes full fire damage to apply on tap. Is this working as intended, or is charge still supposed to scale the fire damage?

2. Miniaturization Drive: the description seems to specify that it applies a damage debuff, and the corresponding buff in the "Reciprocating Gizmo" applies a damage buff to self. But the actual effect to target is an enormous damage resistance debuff. Is this working as intended, or is it supposed to apply a damage debuff to target.

3. There are energy cost-mitigation minor enhancements in each crafting tier, (the Science one is called a Catalyst). These give a .50 (33%) reduction in energy cost. That seems unusually high for a minor enhancement, especially one dealing with a power balancing effect like energy cost. It allows you to use chainsaw for 50% longer, for example. For comparison, the crit bonus minor enhancement is .05 (5%) - for toons that crit often, that's a 5% bonus on 20% of attacks. Is this working as intended, or are they supposed to be major enhancements/less bonus? Note: Antiproton indicated on 1/22 that he might check on this with Balseraph, but has not posted again in the thread.

4. Can we get something indicating what the desired balance is for knockback effects? Both STR and the KB resist items do not seem to do much vs even common KB. Multiple players have observed that this was changed recently, without notes.

5. Can we get something indicating what the desired balance is for stealth? This is related to rk 3 smokebomb. Multiple PvP players have reported that it allows the opponent to attack without being targetable, regardless of perception gear.

Thank you

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02-02-2010, 03:34 AM

I hope you will address out concerns over Vibora Bay and Pay vs Free Content.

On a second note, we have heard Nothing at all about the OMEGA System.

Where does it stand? If we are at this imposed level cap for 6 months to a year, I would like to hope your end game mechanic would be availible to us.

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02-02-2010, 03:34 AM

Hi there, completely understand that Cryptic are very busy with CO & STO.... BUT, why does it take you so long to reply to a ticket? Especially a billing enquiry ticket? I believe my ticket is not far off a month old now (and past tickets took well over a month for a reply) and as much as i enjoy playing the CO game if the customer support is not there i will stop playing.

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02-02-2010, 03:57 AM

How does Cryptic feel about the opinion that Champions Online features enough the same amount of content and overall experience of a single player game, and that the game does not justify a monthly subscription?

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02-02-2010, 04:14 AM

Will you release shinguards in the near future (I.E. in the next three months)?

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02-02-2010, 04:22 AM

Apparently, it was some bug allowing us to gain xp from critters more than 5 levels below our current one.

Personally, I feel you should ALWAYS gain xp from any critter you defeat. By limiting our options of who to fight, you limit the games scope. So what if someone wants to farm some level 15 Black Aces when he/she is level 35? Let us do that. The current way just keeps forcing us down a narrower path. And, that reduces the FUN.

Which seems to be what you are doing with nerfing so many powers all of the time. By making them less and less desirable/viable, you reduce the choices (again). Enough with NERFS all of the time. Sure, I understand these are supposed to be BALANCES. But you constantly ignore the forever UNDER-PERFORMING powers and seem to fixate on the "over" performers. The ones that are "must haves" for PvP. Bring UP the under-performers. Make that your mission.

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02-02-2010, 04:38 AM

1. Will Power Replacers ever become viable enough to keep equipped?

2. Will Cryptic Studios take a break from developing new MMOs and focus on the ones they have out NOW?

3. Does Cryptic Studios really have a vision for Champions Online, or has this always been about the money?

4. Will most of the questions asked in this thread actually be ANSWERED?!

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02-02-2010, 04:52 AM

1. Can we expect to see our characters polished up to remove a lot of the clipping issues and the horrible mesh seams (waistline, underarm, etc.)?

2. What's the ETA on costume pieces being back in the selection lists that were removed? Spiked halo, the bug head, etc.

3. When should we expect tweaks/fixes/enhancements to the RMC feature on the website that went postal last week?

4. Are there plans to address travel powers being more dangerous than helpful during combat? (flight being slower than walking, super/rocket jump dropping you to your death, issues with tunneling, slow speed buildup on jet boots, etc.)

5. How do you propose to make events/open missions more worthwhile for support/healer/tank/non-dps builds?

6. Why have you chosen to place some focus on expansion content when we still have many bugs and issues from beta still rampant in the game that need to be resolved?

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02-02-2010, 04:56 AM

Will we be allowed to use all the top/side/eye/mouth options for all types of head any time soon.
Will we be given access to the many costume pieces that NPCs wear that are not unique character specific.

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02-02-2010, 05:00 AM

I am very glad to see this mode of player-developer communication revived. I might suggest that you try to answer one question every day... and have one day a week (or whenever there is maintenance down time) where you answer ten questions.

Most of the questions here are in the form of "When will X feature be implemented?" or "When will Y bug be fixed?" These are all valid and worthwhile questions. I look forward to the answers.

My questions are less about your product than your process: How do you go about creating new content (e.g. missions, lairs, events) and powers (e.g. Celestial)? How do you determine the mechanics and encounters?

As a concrete example: lairs such as Andrith and Nemesis Confrontation end with bosses with frustrating and tedious gimmicks. What creative and decision processes went into the development of these fights?

Another example: newer missions (e.g. bounty missions) and changes to crafting (e.g. craftable travel powers) have strongly emphasized grinding. What creative and decision processes gave rise to these kinds of game additions instead of narrative additions?

And then finally, how will your lessons learned and player feedback shape your future creative processes?

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02-02-2010, 05:01 AM

Can we get some new powers like the other elements like water, earth, and wind?
Also can you get some powers like stretching or elastic powers, i just feel i dont in a box with the powers we have? Also when we have beast walking why cant we really walk like beast like the ice hounds. These little things will improve the game. Also can you stop the game from freezing up:)

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02-02-2010, 05:01 AM

The very fact that 'Ask Cryptic' has made a return is indicative that you are open to listening to the community, my questions to you are;

# Subscription content Vs Paid for content (all mixed along with microtransactions) - Your thoughts?, and after witnessing the catastrophic fallout of the Vibora Bay announcement - your intentions on what the balance will be for the future.

# Cryptic must be - Are Atari aware of just how unpopular this business model appears to subscribers and what they could do to be more appealing to subscribers in that department?

# Please could you finally squash the rumour that CO is the runt of the litter and test-bed for STO.
Please state your intentions on Dev team size, your thoughts the new content release curve and how it is seen to be behind what CoH's was.

# Your thoughts please on assumptions that Champions-Online 'updates' were inevitably going to be, and are compared to CoH's 'Issues'.

#Your commitment to the Champions-Online title as a product to compete against CoH, DCUO and MUO.
Are you ready and up for the challenge?

# When are you going to fix the many glaring omissions in the game such as the Invalid critter name descriptions being blank?.

Thankyou.:)

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02-02-2010, 05:02 AM

Echoing a vote for "Are we going to get supergroup bases, and if so when?"
There's so much more to go with that, i'm almost scared to ask if SG bases will be a "premium member" thing IE we have to pay to have a base. If it came down to that I would, but eh...

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02-02-2010, 05:05 AM

Oh and another one:

Are we ever going to get Staff (Bo) fighting? Pweeeeeaaaaaassseeee??

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02-02-2010, 05:16 AM

Will auction lots ever expire and allow movement on the market place for items with less demand?

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02-02-2010, 05:27 AM

What is the big long term goal that is way down the line that you all have been kicking around?

You know the big one...

SG bases?

We I mean I wont hold you to it.

A list would be nice like:

1. Yes this will happen soon
2: yes this is in the plans
3. Talked about this dont know yet
4. We are trying to decided to go either this way or that way...what do you the players think.
5. This is on the back burner

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:32 AM

Let me first off say that i luv this game...When I am done with school I am coming!!!
Now back to the question.

1) Have the negative "hype" about the game's performance affected you as a dev house?

2) Do you see a raised level cap that continues on the path of unforced customization or have concerns of broken powers in pvp made you rethink your stance?

3) How has pvp in general changed/ modifed your original conception of the game?

4) What do you feel is your biggest challenge for CO in 2010?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:33 AM

1. Will we ever see a fair type of contribution calculation? Right now, anything but DPS in its purest form is considered useless for public missions and the like, partly responsible for the massive disaster that was the Clarence fight. When will tanking, buffing/debuffing, crowd control and healing actually be treated as the useful elements they are?

2. With the new content expansion, will there be an actual reason to buy it? 37-40 are grind-heavy levels, but this couldve been fixed by fleshing out some of the MI or Lemuria arcs, since some feel rather thin in some places. Instead, we are given an entire new zone, which is nice, but may end up being a bit small considering it spans merely 3 levels worth of content, content that shouldve been there to begin with. I have no issues buying an expansion adding 10 more levels and a new zone or two, but a content fix I just dont see myself paying for, especially since my main reached 39 already, and the way up to 37 is the exact same every time anyways. My advice? Either add more content to MI and Lemuria and include VB in a BIG actual expansion, OR release VB for free and THEN bring out a big actual expansion

3. Are the melee fixes going to fix the actual broken mechanics involved (range issues, enemies kiting you, unable to see charge-up attacks on big foes, charge attacks being worthless, low surviveability based on melee principles), or will you simply give a handful of abilities 5% higher damage and call it a day?

4. What is the state of the game? There probably wont be an answer to it, but is CO actually subject to any long time plans, or has the decline of players triggered the response to just let it die and focus on STO instead? Like many others, Im sorry but I cant help noticing the gameworld becoming more and more empty, and for MI / Lemuria, there sometimes is merely a single shard open anymore.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:34 AM

My shot at all this would be...

Will there ever be a grappling dynamic to the game. (I.E. Grabbing enemies and throwing, flying, dropping them. As well as Grabbing allies that normally can't fly and flying them up stairs or onto rooftops, etc.)

Will there be Villains? Either in the form of an unlockable Villain slot, an expansion or just an update.

Finally.. Any new powers in the works?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:36 AM

Will there be any of these? This is my first MMO, so I am not sure if these can work. I am referring to the kind of large scale stories you might find in PC games like ICEWIND DALE or perhaps DRAGON AGE: ORIGINS. This would involve perhaps mystery and action elements that players have piece together themselves as the story progresses. Perhaps this is already in COL and I haven't played long enough.

I am a COL fan and I do not see how players can want more! more! more! and not expect Cryptic to charge for it. If you want more and you want it fast and bug free, Cryptic still has to do the work, possibly hire more people. To get the best people, they have to pay good salaries, etc. This is not corporate greed from my point of view, but just business. I am willing to pay for expansions, etc., as long as the quality is good. You buy the books of your favorite authors so that they can keep writing. You pay to see the movies you like so that such movies will continue to be made. I don't see how that is any different here.

P.S. No, I do not work for Cryptic.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:44 AM

1) Why can't we have the journal window and the large map window open at the same time?

2) Can you please add sort and search functions to the journal window, specifically the "completed" missions tab. It is impossible to find a specific completed mission. There are multiple headings for each zone, with no discernible pattern to them.
Suggestions would be to sort by:
complete list alphabetically
by zone
by level
by type (normal, citizen, nemesis, etc)
by giver

3) Can you give some love to keyboard users and give us a way to look up/down without having to tap the key continually?

4) Are there plans to separate the pet control bar for each type of pet in the Gadgeteer line? Additionally can we control pets individually? Having to dismiss all just to recreate one is ridiculous.

5) Can we get our pets to follow us, reasonably, while we're flying/using travel powers? When teaming, even with just one other person, I find myself constantly either saying, "wait a minute while I get my pets up" or just watching him kill everything while I am creating them.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 05:55 AM

As a Spread Sheet Horizontally by zone to better review accomplished mission
The Present system starts getting unruly at the 200 mission mark.

Please Review and return Content to the Game that involves our collecting Perks

Hikers Horror - For Mother Natures Real
and Hi PAn.. please change the name if you must but return another Villain in this range for early action.

Please continue the fine updates to Nemesis Locations and Lair variety.
I would recommend a total come as you are Lair Mechanic as STO has for arriving on scene and being included in a open mission if you are teamed or not.

Do Please Consider a Sidekick PET - A Bat without a Robin inconceivable.. in the form we create a Nemesis
what if we could convert them back to the force of good as a Sidekick.? With reasonable level limiters this could be done without unbalancing and lock them out for Arena pvp if they are too good?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:10 AM

Many questions.

1. Will we ever see a Teleport friend power that can be bought (or built) easily? This would go a long way to team playing

2. Are they any plan to honestly make the game customizable? I mean drop the idea of having powers/talents/super-movements as unique categories and instead just give us points each level to spend as we will?

3. Why can't we put all our 'Advantage' points in one power? So what if I want to be a one trick pony, that makes the game fun for me, being able to do what I want.

4. When can we completely skip the intro turtioal? I know that right now we can skip into the Crisis zones but when can we just skip out of those. I ask this mainly because my nephew plays and it is hard for him to get through the crisis zones.

5. Why aren't there advantages to just
a. Decrease End cost?
b. Increase Range?
c. Increase number of targets effected?

6. Can we get a simpler loot all feature? Something like where you just pick up junk when you get near it? When I play my tank and have over 5 mobs aggroed it is hard to pick up loot with my auto attack on (and I need that one if I am to survive the battle). It would also help with the giant monsters where everyone has to run over to the corpse to see if loot was dropped but is hidden by the body.

7. MORE TOGGLES!!! Can we please see an option to buy passive slotted powers and then take and advantage to turn them into toggles (short term with cool downs, or upped end cost for all powers or minus to damage when on) This would go a long way to giving us more build options.

8. Will we see a better pet interface? What we have is better than where CoH started but still not as good as when CoV launched. Also the stupid thing that happens when you summon wolves and use the frenzy ability where you can't resummon then till timer on frenzy dies down. And how about how when you have pets out that you have to desummon them to resummon a new group if one of the pets die (The turrets and wolves as two examples)

9. Level cap and content questions of course as well as the Dark side to champions

That is all I can think of for now

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:14 AM

Howdy,

HUGE fan of this game, been playing it passionately since it came out (Been taking breaks here and there cuz of my work sadly, which is why i got lifetime. I needed to be able to sneak in as much time as i could, whenever i could, without feeling pressured by a monthly)

My problem is pretty simple. After the Kitchen Sink patch ... I pretty much just couldn't play the game anymore. My frame rate when standing still was okay, but if i tried to move, or worse yet, fight, i stuttered so badly i was slaughtered easily.

Is this issue going to be addressed in a future patch? I have heard of other players with such a problem.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:23 AM

People have already asked main question in various ways - i.e. what new content will subs be getting for their subscription fee, as opposed to having to pay extra for? So...

What is the status of the fix for the issue with the UI not reliably activating block and not reliably activating/charging powers? This was acknowledged by two Devs in the start of October as a repeatable issue that would be a challenge to fix but was of the "highest prioroty". We've gone 4 months without even a status, let alone a fix.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:29 AM

1) When you will add more free +40 content ?
2) When we'll get more Unity mission ?
3) When we'll get more new nemesis mission ?
4) When the support will stop to send Bot message ?
5) When the broken's perks will be fix ?
6) When mission like Hiker's Horror, Deathray,ect.... will be fix ?
7) Can i have a good salary to be a beta tester on PTS ?
8) When we'll see the Omega system/craft ?
9) Any plans for revamp that crappy craft system ?
10) When the weapon will be fix to the tailor shop ?
11) Bill ? Do you like Tacos and Burritos ?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:30 AM

What i would like to see is more supergroup options, like being able to see when the last time a person has logged on, this makes it easier for leaders to keep a check on acitve and non active members. Also maybe an increase in how many people can be in a supergroup. Also what about an alliance with other sgs.

Im not a fan of the all zone chats either, ive noticed a great increase in harrasment. Maybe it could be replaced by a LFG channel that spans all zones.

I would also like to see changes to nem con. The last persons nemesis always ends up on the spikes and if your lucky a couple of people may see the nemesis before hes gone. Having the ability to email globals to another character would also be welcome.

I would also like the abiity to zoom out further with my character because even at full zoom its very diffiicult to see some of the cosmics "freem" and other area attacks.

That will do for the time being :)

Thanks.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:38 AM

Will we see Tier 4 powers in the current power sets?

Will there be new free costume parts, like upper part robes and half skirts, that people have been wanting for months! :D

Will we see more customization when it comes to powers, and it's emination points\colour and maybe even change what our power comes from, say i want my magic spells to come out of a gun. Any chance this would ever be possible?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:46 AM

hi there,

will there ever be the chance to get size-changing powers? i'd love to play a giant robot or something like that; it would be cool if one of my characters could shrink, too.
i'm kind of a newbie to MMORPGs, but i think it could be quite easy to introduce such powers in the game, both technically and playability-wise: for example, by getting big one could earn strenght but lose defense, and so on.

i'd like to see more love to the unarmed martial artist power set, too :D

thank you in advance for your time!

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:48 AM

While most of my questions have been asked by others (if I missed something and repeated it, my apologies)...

1) There is a perception, fueled both by developer statements and the perceived lack of progress in CO over the last few months, that some developers were moved to STO from CO. With that assumption, will developers be moved back to CO once STO launches, or will this game have to (continue to) get by with fewer resources?

2) Will developer resources from CO be shifted to the new title (whatever it is) in the coming months?

3) Does Cryptic Studios consider the current amount of content in CO to be all that the box price and subscription fee warrants? (This is not a rehash of the "Will you add more content?" questions, instead, I am asking you to speak to your corporate culture's view on value for money.)

4) Does Cryptic Studios consider the kill/drop grind quests added after launch to be permanent content, or were these implemented as a temporary fix to address the content gaps? In other words, do you intend to replace these (boring) missions with missions that present a story and require more than a few lines of code to implement?

5) Are there any plans to modify the "DPS only" meters in open missions or events?

6) Is the developers' vision about how combat plays out in CO in discussion, or are you completely happy with the way combat works?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:51 AM

I will try not to repeat what has already been stated here or in my last post (http://forums.champions-online.com/showthread.php?t=98734&highlight=psigar) but to add a couple of things I would like to see:

Any chance of cloud travel as a separate travel power?

Any chance that a fix is in the works for Teleport? (Remember teleportation is the ability to travel from point a to point b without crossing the area in between). This is not the case with TP as it exists now. Perfect example Project Greenskin; if you are inside PG, you can see other players outside - thru a pane of glass, yet you can't teleport to the other side of the glass. Huh? Now you could argue that since its a high-security complex that the glass is resistant to TP. O.K., let's try another example then, the 3 ft high wrought iron fence in Burnside – again, it's an obstacle that you have to go over or around when you should be able to tp through it.
A possible solution would be to have the player choose where they want to teleport to then they would simply blank out and then reappear at that spot (similar to TP in CoH) - but with a difference, if the player just activated TP without first making his destination point, then that player would TP to his last destination point. In that case TP would work like a Word of Recall (in DnD terms). Just a thought.

As far as content, you've made the entire country of Canada the same size as Millennium City(Detroit)? Now I know you included a lot of the content from the Champions of the North sourcebook, but there was so much more. I wonder how Canadian players feel that their country is the same size as the Motor City?

Hmm, how about salvaging for costume parts? You've just defeated (fill in the blank – villain or henchie it doesn't matter), and you really like the helmet that they wear. So before they do a fade out(I'm assuming they don't die, as superheroes do not kill, as a norm, they are teleported to a prison infirmary), you could run up and salvage them and get a costume piece from them, in this case a helmet. You could even make it a random item assuming pieces would get damaged in combat.

A one – time shot at guest nemeses? Let me explain, you are minding your own business patrolling the city and you are attacked by your nemesis henchies (which, some villains don't have henchies, that should be an option when creating nemeses). While engaged in combat, Wombat Boy sees your peril and just jumps in to help. The henchies defeated, they get word to your Nemesis and mentions Wombat Boy. So your Nemesis plays a one-shot random appearance to Wombat Boy at some time in the future when he least expects it.

A question – Has any of the people at Cryptic ever played the Champions rpg?

A note to all CO players that have never played the rpg. Please visit your local gaming shop and have a look at the sourcebooks. There is a killer amount of content that would be awesome to see included in CO.

Speaking of which, how come Gale Force doesn't have a British accent?

If we no longer get xp for being too high a level (a bad idea imo), the why have a limit cap of level 15 on demo accounts (they'll never reach it)?

I like to make machinma music videos (http://www.youtube.com/teamgodslayer). I would love to to see musical instrument emotes (with real instruments not the "air instruments" of Guild Wars fame). Any chance of these or an observer mode in the works?

Any possibility of a character once they max out in one particular crafting area, they could then add a second area of expertise (without losing the first), and so on, so eventually they could become a "Jack-of-all-trades"?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:51 AM

Got a few questions that I would like answered if you would please.

1. Will we be getting more animal heads, specificly birds and/or other mammels.

2. Is the craft system going to be revamped? (It isnt very useful as is)

3. Is the general way of "balancing" powers to Nerf them? I ask this in all seriousness since I see it happening more often than not. I don't mean to make the game completely easy but we are super heroes..shouldn't we sort of feel like it?

4. Any chances of adding any more powersets to the game?

Of all the questions I would like answered it would have to be #1.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:52 AM

First i'd just like to say... thank you for doing this. I really hope you take this seriously and try to answer a lot of our questions. If you do this right, I think it'll help restore a fair bit of our faith in the Cryptic company.

Now on to the questions

1. Will you consider letting us in on your patching/fixing plans ahead of time? What I mean is - give us a tentative schedule of powers and/or fixes that you plan on looking at it and the order that you intend on looking at them.

2. Many of us were annoyed by the "kitchen sink" patch, feeling that we would much have preferred several smaller patches over time rather than one giant patch. So my question is, will you consider breaking larger patches down into smaller weekly patches?

3. Would you consider creating a large poll that would enable players to vote on the powers/fixes that they would most like to have looked at first? You occasionally seem to fix things that people end up not caring about, and if you did such a poll it would enable you to include a few of these "top" things in every patch, ensuring that we get something that we're interested in fixed.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 06:55 AM

In regards to "First Paid Expansion" Vibora Bay:

Question:
-Exactly how many contacts?

-Exactly how many missions?

-Exactly how many new lairs and what Boss's are in them?

-Exactly how many Open World Missions with Bossfights?

-Exactly how many hours of gameplay?

-Exactly how many new PvP maps can we expect for both solo PvP players as well as teams?

-HAVE YOU REVISED YOUR DECISION TO CHARGE FOR IT?

In regards to the current state of the game 2010:

Question:
-What has happened to keyboard and camera controls since the "sink" patch?
Asked Because: -They have become erratic in function and cripple gameplay(forward becoming backward, camera spins uncontrollably, etc) and they no longer corner as responsively, especially indoors.

Question:
-What has happenned to crafting since the "sink" patch?
Asked Because:
-The crafting tables will consume your materials but no item appears in your inventory.

Question:-What has happened to connectivity and latency/rubberbanding issues since the "sink" patch?
Asked Because: -What prior to the patch was only common in lemuria has now spread to all zones and maps and it is without question on your end.

Question:-What has happened to the Nemesis Confrontation since the "sink" patch?
Asked Because:
-When fighting Shadow Destroyer, the Shadow Spheres that appear when he phases into his shadow form are not visible and make it quite difficult to target and destroy them before he is healed substantially.

Question:-Exactly what changes have been made to all powers?
Asked Beacause: -We deserve to know in detail what changes you have planned to make for powers prior to implementing those changes. In fact we deserve to know all changes to the game prior to them being implemented, no matter what they are.

Question:-How important is the PvP portions of your game to developers and what level of priority is going into balancing power sets against other players in combat?
Asked Because:
-OBVIOUS

In regards to customer service and in game support.

Question:
-How many people do you have on staff to support the communities in game help tickets?
Asked Because:
-Response to my own help tickets has been non-existent if at all? A predispositioned automated response is not a resolution to a help ticket. I do not expect a personailized response to all of them, but certain categories of tickets should require a specific response form a support person or in game private chat message from a GM.

Question:
-Is the "Ask Cryptic" forum function now a permanent feature of the Champions Online website?
Asked Because:
-This is the obvious reason to have a forum for your game at all lolz.

I have many more questions, but answers to these questions would be an excellent start.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:05 AM

As I don't have a problem paying for new content if priced resonably...

My question is:

Why do obvious bugs and critical issues found by the player base in the PTS iterations still find thier way to the live server? Also why does the game seem to have more bugs than it did during the Pre-Launch headstart?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:18 AM

I have no problem repeating someone else's question because it shows how many people are really thinking about it.

Do you think charging for the new zone is going to bring people back?

Do you think for the long term health of the game, lifetime subscriptions should be scrapped?

Is there going to be a real, ranged targeted AoE crippling challenge power that can be ranked up, force the NPCs to charge the taunter, pull a PvPer off an allied toon for a brief sec, and the target gets a minor confuse and enrage? To me a taunt/crippling challenge is a distraction causing the target to lose focus and point all aggression to the person going, "Nee neer boo boo." (Personally, I think this would fix a lot of melee issues when you can pull the aggro and a group of NPCs to you, and in PvP, force the target's reticle and direction onto the taunter for a second.)

I have read this question before, so I will ask again because I too would like to know the answer: is the monthly fee going to decrease and/or a discount for having a monthly to both CO and STO?

Is this Question Answer session really going to make a difference, or is it simply to appease us?

Is the reason for so much delays in CO fixes due to more resources being pooled into the STO launch, and are those resources back to focusing on CO? (I ask because I have worked in this type of environment before and assume that is why there has been a delay in a lot of needed upgrades and fixes.)

Is there going to be a graphics option to run through my GPU, or is it going to continue to tax my CPU? (I have a decent series 9 Nvidia which works great with other games.)

Again, do you think charging for the new zone is going to bring people back, and not drive away some?

Is the new zone going to focus on level 40 content or just another gap filler for levelling content?

Is there a plan to expand the use of a super base? For example, a travel portal/vehicle that has to be earned via exploration Perk like spawn points on a map so champions could use the subs by Silverback's north hologram on Monster Island as a super group portal. A civil war type system where super group can battle super group (even if it is one person and his super group alts controller by NPC system versus another person's super group and his super group's alts controlled by the NPC system).

Are passive powers going to be improved?

Is the team engine ever going to be implemented where instant content is scalable to team, level, and difficulty? For example, go to Socrates and see a list of missions. The team lead/champion is 40, and selects a mission: the ! reticle is displayed on all maps, mission is set to champions level, mobs spawn to match team size and difficult setting (the 1 or 2 you are introducing), and maybe a two or three mission story line.

Are there plans to expand zones so there is level 40 content, and high ranking instant missions in every zone. (I do like to hang out in Canada.)

Will there be more multi player Nemesis missions, or the ability to have instant Nemesis content story lines for teams? For example, a team of 5 pick an instant mission "Foxbat's New Super Villain Group," and each map is fighting the Nemesis and minions of each player per map till the last map is Foxbat.

Once more, do you REALLY think charging for the new zone is going to bring people back, and not drive away some?

Is there a plan to link Cryptic Points to veteran rewards?

Will there be better, more customizable blue prints and enhacements in the future? (I prefer to craft with the enhancements to better fit my toons needs.)

When is anyone going to address my billing ticket? It's been sitting in your billing cue for over a week. A WEEK! Do you think that is suitable customer support?

Will there be a Nemesis expansion where we play and grow our Nemesis? Or a Dark Champions expansion, which I assume will have to do for a villain system even thought Dark Champion is a immoral hero in the Champion lore.

Will a certain collection of perks ever unlock certain powers, bonuses?

Will each major contact in a zone have a major story arc of instant, lair, and open missions with a rare drops like dragon core from the NPC's, and vary rare blueprints for completion?

Will there be more toggle powers in other sets that buff powers, self and/or group, and debuff enemies?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:34 AM

Question: Is there some sort of fix underway to improve server stability? Particularly in regard of logging in.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:48 AM

I have two Questions, with Champions having such a rich history, there is alot of content and Ideas that you can use to add more content to the game, you are already adding Vibroa Bay, so are you going to add Hudson City and New York as well or give us heroes a place where we can choose a city to protect, or a zone to protect?.

Also I see the sonics in the game with the Birdmen on Monster Island which gives me the Idea that their are new powers down the pipe line so what can we expect in the form of new powers?

Also when will we see such villains as Gravitar, Valek the Destroyer, the Ultimates, Ravenwood Academy and other characters in the Universe on the game?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:50 AM

Can we get a web poll which contains some of the biggest problems with CO like

Balancing Effectiveness of Melee
Teaming Mechanism / Suitable Teaming Content
Content Progression

This way you can see the things that we believe are the biggest issues.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:50 AM

The "Where's the Kaboom" advantage on exploding arrow has been causing a lot of problems in PvP lately. Apparently it is doing the same amount of damage on tap as it does on full charge.

After buffs and debuffs, individual hits are being reported as high as 2-3k and players can stack 3 or 4 of these at a time. Is this working as intended?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 07:51 AM

We have a test server and periodically we are asked to go there to test things before they go live. The number of *huge* bugs that get through to live is astonishing.

Do too few people go to the test server to help out in a meaningful way or...
is insufficient time allocated to fix problems that are found on test or...
is the test server just a tick in the box thing who's feedback is ignored?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:05 AM

When do you plan on fixing perk issues? There are still quite a few perks that flat out doubt work.

Also, do you planning on making any upgrades to the perk system and their stores?

When are we going to get more info about the bonuses PTS players are supposed to be getting according to Daeke?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:07 AM

This might have been asked before, it might not have, but anyway...

What is being done to try to draw more players into the game? Given the recent circumstances, there seems to have been more people leaving the game than there are coming in with new subscriptions, and I was wondering what approach Cryptic is planning on using to "fill the seats." Recent announcements such as the paid content Vibora Bay seem to have generated bad press for them, and has caused what seems like a larger exodus of people. That, coupled with the somewhat long "patch to fix problems" time has driven people away more than it has drawn them in, and as a lifetime subscriber I have started to worry a bit about the life of the game. Thanks.

(Sorry for the long question, I'm sure when you do the chat thing if it's picked you can snip it shorter so you get the key points.)

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:10 AM

A while ago, there was apparently a change to the chat server that causes all instances of a zone to share the same channel. At the time, a Goldname posted on the forums that this was a bug and would be fixed shortly. That was almost two months ago. Is this still considered a bug, or has it become a "feature?" If it is a permanent change, do you have any plans to address the fact that many people, including myself, have turned zone chat off entirely rather than deal with it in its current form?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:10 AM

just a few questions

-are you guy's only planning on selling stuff or is this greed we feel unjustified?

-are there plans on expanding millennium city?

-how long does it take till they can expand the demo? (it will only a benefit)

-will they make this game feel more like a comic, especially the known ones?

-any word about earth assault?(it was promised in an interview somewhere:()

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:30 AM

My questions are all regarding power balance. I ask because there are powers that appear to be clearly imbalanced, and knowing your vision of balance may help us better understand and communicate with you regarding “numbers balance” vs. “game play balance” / “developer balance” vs. “player balance”. With that said:

What is your current template design to Balance Powers?

1. Are powers balanced within frameworks (i.e. Ice powers are balanced based on Ice as a whole)?
-----If yes, what measure do you have in place to balance this with an open pick platform (i.e. cherry picking the best powers from each framework)?

2. Are power balanced within tiers (i.e. laser sword is balanced with room sweeper, ice blast with force bolt, etc.)?
-----If yes, what measures do you have in place to ensure that bottom tier powers are still useful (i.e. why even have any other attack once you get force cascade/gigabolt/haymaker)?

3. How are advantages balanced in this game (i.e. how is Aversion from Strafe balanced compared to Ice Impaler from Ice Shards or how is Particle Acceleration from Laser Sword balanced compared to Feror Venenum from Bite or how is Where’s the Kaboom from Explosive Arrow balanced compared to Tungsten Rounds from Sniper Rifle or Flourish from Reaper Embrace)?

4. What is your balance design for the Melee vs. Ranged relationship?

5. What is your balance design for AoE vs. Single Target and why are powers like force cascade categorized under single target when they do AoE damage and how is this balanced under your balance vision?

6. What is your balance design for damage/damage resistance debuffs (many people feel these need a cap and are quite over powered)?

Important categories relating to balance I would like to see acknowledged in any answer:

How is Damage per Activation Weighted?
How is Damage per Energy Weighted?
How is Front loaded/Burst/Spike damage weighted vs. sustained damage?
How is Damage over Time Weighted?
How is AoE damage weighted in comparison to Single Target damage?

Of course once you answer these, you should expect a full run down of how powers are not balanced within your balance framework from the player base. Nonetheless, I think that this discussion is necessary and will help to point out imbalances that seem to escape developer attention and hopefully lead to fixes.

Thanks,

66

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:30 AM

What do you plan to do to make each and every power in the game worth using? (e.g. currently all the energy builders are pretty much the same, and the advantages on most do nothing. and at level 40 you generally have one t3 ranged aoe power and 1 single target power and don't really need to use anything else.. where's the need/ incentive to use everything? When this game was first described I thought every single power choice would be compelling, at this point all thats compelling is getting one that sort of works.)
When are there going to be multiple leveling paths and ways to level and alt? we are all damn tired of the same zones in succession, and it would be pretty awesome if you could level all the way to 30 at least in each zone without leaving or had multiple pathways to take (sort of like the exp curve was in beta)
Where's x y z fix thats been promised or mentioned since beta? there's numerous problems and fixes that have been mentioned int he past months that have never surfaced again
When are PR's going to be worth using? at this point the only really ones in the game are the munitions ones and even those are too narrow to use all the time. And PRs that = a weak proc are NOT a Power Replacer, they are a weak proc.
When's the melee vs. ranged issue going to be address, even if you have to give us a big long multi staged chart I'd like to know
Where's the content? I'm lifetime cause I saw potential, right now this game is more like a college drop out living in its parents basement than the successful mmo I know it could be, what are you doing to improve the game to at least be on par with the current competition? (Heck I play SP torchlight more than CO currently)
Where are the Devs? I feel like not a whole lot of communication has happened between the player base and devs lately since the end of december.. and every game I've played (WOW, WAR, AoC) when that happened especially when there's a lack of communication over PTS issues it means the game is either dead-ending or the devs have decided to ignore the stakeholders.. so whats the deal with the PTS stuff now? and where is the dev communication? hire an intern to do nothing but interview devs all day long and post it all I'd don't care I'd just like to see some semblance of progress
What's with the kitchen sink patch? not much changed, more bugs were introduced, and it not a massive improvement to the game in fact its pretty weak, if this is the massive announcement for 1st quarter 2010 , I have an issue with false advertising.

I like the game, I just wish I didn't run out of stuff to do within 5 seconds of getting past the char generator.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:47 AM

Thank you for bringing this back. I'm asking all of the questions that I have. If any are repeated, then obviously others want to know the answers as much as I do.

- What changes or additions are in the works to encourage teaming and the formation of Super Groups for team activities? Currently there is not much of a reason to do either.

- What are your thoughts on fixing the ranking issues in Open Missions? Currently, only DPS will work to do well on the scoring system which leaves tanks, healers, and support out in the cold.

- You must be aware that content is spread very thin across the the 40 levels currently available in the game. What plans are there to increase options for leveling paths to help replayability?

- There is currently very little reason to play a level 40 character. What sort of end game content can we expect to see down the road to encourage us to play our level 40 characters more? Do you have any plans for large group support and if so what are your plans in that respect?

- The Nemesis system is one of the stronger parts of this game currently. What plans do you have to expand on content here? Will there be multiple story arcs for a Nemesis to take up instead of the death ray arc every single time?

- What can we expect to see down the road in respect to free content that is included in our subscription fees instead of only available by purchase? What can we expect to see in regards to paid content?

- Please give us the granular details about what is going to be included in the Vibora Bay paid content patch and (assuming it does not become free) how much this will cost. Will this sort of content addition be par for the course over the life of the game?

- What are your plans for level 41-50 and the Omega System?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 08:53 AM

What is your specific plan to facilitate casual grouping in CO?

I should be able to push a button or two and automatically group up with other players. But I can't.

The manual looking for group system is worthless (at least last I checked) because the information it returns is mainly false. I click on a person to invite them (like in City of Heroes) and I'm told they aren't online.

What I would like is a queue system like for PvP. Let me push a button and automatically be placed in a group of five players and given an instanced mission.

I like to play with other players, whether in PvP or PvE. But I'm a casual player and don't play at set times for hours on end, so super groups don't help me. I would like the option to jump into a group and play. My work around is hunting in Zone chat for a group that is doing anything...I sidekick to their level and tag along. (Thanks, by the way, for the mission sharing, multi-zone chat, and sidekicking system that make that possible). It shouldn't be that hard.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:02 AM

I have noticed quite a few people have mentioned Super Group bases. After making your post here I ask that people interested in Super Group bases visit the following forum post and make a post with their ideas and desires in such an implementation. Thank you for your Time.

http://forums.champions-online.com/showthread.php?p=1460646#post1460646

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:04 AM

Here is one of the most frequently asked questions:

Why do you feel it's justified for us to pay for Vibora Bay when there is such a huge lack of content in the game and most other major MMOs release something similar to this, at around this time, for free?

To me, it is just not very competitive in this age of MMOs to make such a "customer unfriendly" decision. This game is still unpolished and needs more content, bug fixes, power adjustments, etc....

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:04 AM

I have a question;

Many years ago when I use to play Champions with PnP, I had a toon that was energy based. Doing my role playing one night my toon got mad at some bad guy, who I can't remember now. So before I attacked as a display of anger I had my toon hands start to glow. My DM at the time thought it was cool, and let me continue with it. But I think that would be a good idea for this game, as allot of us played old school Champions, and did thing like. Hell from time to time, I even used that trick as a way to light up dark places that our DM would put us in.

Just my thoughts. :D

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:05 AM

What was the thought process behind asking for money for content that was needed in the game?

Why are you treating this like a console single-player game?

For all the disgruntled Lifetime Subscribers out there, are you willing to give a refund of sorts, where played time money a little more is kept by Cryptic and the rest is returned to the customer?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:05 AM

Are you planning on implementing more team vs team pvp areas in the future?

Playing through one team based pvp zone from 6-21 is exceptionally boring and feels like a horrible grind sometimes. Zombie apocalypse doesn't count being as you start off all on one team and kill npcs until somebody dies, although I think it's a refreshing addition to the pvp queues, but not a substitute for another real pvp level.

UTC Cage Match
UTC High Tech Arena
Lava Temple
Apocalypse Stronghold
thas it

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:09 AM

Where do we stand on melee? Have you guys made any internal changes that are looking good or are you still scratching your heads looking at the melee feedback forum?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:12 AM

With the narrow leveling path, and people complaining about not enough content to keep alts interesting, Why is Flashing Back on the horizon? It seems like doing the same mission with the same toon might be more redundant then doing the same mission with a differant toon.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 09:30 AM

Level 50, Be able to REALLY make your own Items, specifically. like focus on the attributes you want to. And it would be nice to make your own weapons, even if your not a weapons class, and enchant it, Like after level 40 you could make your own power set, like for example I quite like Thor from the marvel series, it would be cool to make your own enchanted hammer which is a power set, so its linked to your own powers.

Just a thought

And also be able to carry weapons on your back or holster or watever. (customise holding weapons/ powersets)

and to have more adantage points would be nice

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 10:02 AM

The accusation: Champions doesn't contain enough leveling content and Cryptic hasn't demonstrated enough urgency correcting this shortcoming. Vibora Bay details do not matter - Cryptic should not talk paid-for content when they've failed to provide the content we expect from our initial purchase and ongoing subscription.

How do you respond?

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

Note: I did try to make this less blunt sounding. But we need to see some answers for blunt questions or this communication-thing is meaningless. If "where's the content" isn't cleared up I predict another round of uproar when the Vibora Bay pricing is announced.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 10:33 AM

Many of my questions/concerns have been addressed, but I wanted to reiterate a couple:

1- I'd like to see some sort of open PvP, whether it be a zone, opt-in, SG vs SG factions, something...anything? maybe?

2- As a lifetimer, what is the threshold where Crytic/Atari just shuts the game down? is it a paid sub vs time ratio or is there a hard date where if X dollars are not coming in, lights out? I ask because I enjoy the game, but play very irregularly, but I want the game to still be here if I feel like playing next year.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 10:52 AM

Yes hi there Cryptic..I have some questions that I'd like answers for:

1: Just why did you guys decided to make Vibra Bay levels 37-40 only...when its very very clear from the complaints on the forums, that there is a serious lack of content..not to mention that just about every one wants a completely different leveling path to 40, being that alot of people don't like Lumeria. Wouldn't it have just been better to make the content in Vibra Bay levels 10 and above?

2: Just when can we expect to see more personalities, as well as story lines that suit and go with said personalities, put into the Nemesis system?

3: In a recent interview, it was said that a Secert Identity system was in the works, Can you give us a rough guess on when we might see this system put into the game..or when you might be able to tell us more about it?

4: This seems to be a popular question, and all of us have been asking for it since Open Beta, are there still plans to put in Vehicles as a travel power?

5: Can you confirm or deny that the level cap will be eventually be raised to level 50..and if it is true..can you give us an idea of when it might actually happen?

That's all I can think of to ask..I hope that all of them get answered. Thank you for your time!

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02-02-2010, 11:14 AM

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02-02-2010, 11:18 AM

To those who are unaware of how this works, we let this sit for a few days, we gather questions and answer them internally, and then we post all the responses on the website. We don't actually respond to questions in this thread.

what about a new topic, pinned, and it has posts with lists of answers? and closed of course, so that only devs can update it
that would do on the forums

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 11:32 AM

When you do the Slotted Passive balancing pass, will the Offensive Passives get some base resistances so they don’t auto-squish?

When you do the Slotted Passive balancing pass, will the Roles get rebalanced too?
(In Defense Role currently one can solo/level, and PVP, and group… why not, you get an hp bonus in every situation.)
(In Offense Role, one can NOT solo/level, or PVP, or group… unless grouped with a tank specifically specced to hold aggro.)

Why do some Slotted Passives scale on TWO stats, some on ONE stat, and some on NO stats?
(I do believe the non-stat-scaling passives are considered the weakest.)
(I do believe some players lil frustrated with the two-staters, cause they feel they have not much choice on their two Super Stats…)

When you do the Slotted Passive balancing pass, will the suggested Framework stats be reconsidered?
(Like, this one must obviously be a boo-boo: Ice Framework has DEX & REC for suggested stats, but Ice Form scales on DEX & END… )

Will the Passive balancing pass be incoming with the Melee balancing fix? Have an ETA on either?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 11:36 AM

1. Why do you think we should pay for additional content (not to mention a monthly fee) when the initial content is *still* not working properly, bugs around since before "launch" are still prevalent, and functionality that has gone missing since Alpha/Beta has yet to be restored?

2. Why do you think that a game which relies on post 40 content being "make a new character" is compelling and worth subscribing to when there is only one single solitary path to 40? Other MMOs have SEVERAL paths to max level at launch, in case your team hasn't played or worked on any other (successful) MMO's before... which seems likely/obvious/probable at this point. The single path to max didn't work for Bill Roper's previous endeavor. Who was the person naive enough to believe it would somehow work here, and why are they not fired (or are they?)

3. Is the intent to charge for Vibora Bay: 1. a decision by Atari, 2. against the recommendations of Cryptic management, or 3. are all of you on board with this being a good idea? Pick all that apply.

4. If you're not going to listen to your testers, why have a test server?

5. Just how many people are still subscribed to this game? Please break it down to lifers, 6 monthers, and monthly subscribers.

I know you guys don't have the stones to address any of these questions so I'm not sure why I am bothering, really.

-----------
Lifetime Victim/Fool/Chump

Edited for "respectfullness" and clarity. Ptthbttt.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 11:38 AM

I have asked this before :).

Could you PLEASE remove the suppression effect from travel powers (PVE only)? I understand why it is there for PVP but it just doesn't feel heroic in PVE.

Or as a compromise: Have you charge up to full speed THEN as long as you don't make an attack it will stay at that speed, even if mobs hit you but you don't hit back.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 11:42 AM

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02-02-2010, 11:45 AM

what about a new topic, pinned, and it has posts with lists of answers? and closed of course, so that only devs can update it
that would do on the forums

Good thought :)

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:03 PM

Since many of the team at Cryptic worked on City of Heroes, my question is this. Why did Champions Online not launch with many features that City of Heroes had that were known to be popular? Examples of this range from "Flashback missions" and Mission Difficulty sliders that have been announced, to Super group bases, something that was a highly requested and popular feature in City of Heroes/Villians? Was it limitations of development, demographic data that claimed these features were not high priority, or merely that the plan is to release these features as additions to the game?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:09 PM

Stop asking ******** or sarcastic questions (i.e. When will you stop sucking or something like that). I mean, really, people have serious questions, you post just takes up more space and makes the thread harder to look through.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:16 PM

Is the new game you're working on Call of Cthulhu Online?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:25 PM

Are all of the roles' stats in game correct?

I'm not sure if the Protector role is giving enough of a buff to any passive defense power to allow tanking, and if the Avenger role gives enough offense to allow fast kills for a defense. Sentinel and Guardian seem to be working fine, but the defense and offense stats for Avenger and Protector seem off to me.
(Edit: I have read a couple other posts addressing the Avenger role giving passives that are worse than defensive passives.)

It'd be great to know about this, Thanks! =)

Edit: Didn't notice that I posted 20 pages in... O.o Anyway, I have more questions to ask;

1. Will elemental melee powers be brought in soon? (Plus, if this 'melee damage is super low' stuff is true, that would be why I blamed defense for not working, because it was my offense and I was too oblivious to see that. ><)

2. Will we be able to customize our Nemesis' minions? It'd make the customizable end of CO better.

3. Will two handed or heavy weapons powers be implemented sometime? I think sword attacks other than ninja/samurai-esque powers would be good also. For example: Broadswords, Claymores, ... Knight-ish weapons??? That, or, just add more powers to single blade... four isn't enough compared to might.

4. Plans for more powers or more power sets in the future? Plus, what areas are you planning to implement soon? Personally, I'd like to see Asia and more of Millennium city in CO. (the buildings across cross the highway to the north of City Hall)

Thanks much!

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:34 PM

I also have one of the most important question tha has not been answered yet:

HOW AND WHEN ARE YOU GUYS GOING TO RESPOND TO ALL THESE QUESTIONS?:confused:

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:45 PM

I also have one of the most important question tha has not been answered yet:

HOW AND WHEN ARE YOU GUYS GOING TO RESPOND TO ALL THESE QUESTIONS?:confused:

Deake said they would go over all the posts in a few days, make a list of the questions and the answers for us and then post it. So theres no need to shout...or even ask that question really.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 12:56 PM

Can we have arms like thos grondlings and grond. I mean we should be allowed stuff like that.:eek:

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02-02-2010, 01:06 PM

Do you have any plans for after level 40? Like, mission-wise and plot?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:14 PM

Question:
While we have been told Vibora Bay is a paid update, will there be updates in the near future that will not be pay and have a significant impact (not just a handful of missions, one lair, etc) that will put a dent in the lack of content (only one leveling path, pretty much nothing to do at 40, etc)?

Question:
Can you give us a picture of what is planned in the future of CO? I'm not talking specifics like Vibora Bay on X month, Moon X months after, etc, but in general terms like new paid zone in next update, thorough review of powers coming up, after power review addition of paid power set, etc.

Question:
What is the business model being used for CO? Is it the traditional MMO system like WoW / EQ where we buy the game, pay a subscription and then later pay for expansion packs while being provided with free significant content updates between xpacs? Or is CO using a different model? If so, please elaborate. Currently it feels like we're being double taxed with box + subscription fee along with trivial and non-trivial micro-transaction fees.

Question:
Why was there a large silence gap the last couple of months in CO? What happened? Where did the dev chats go? The State of the Game? Updates in terms of content? How did communication get allowed to break down so badly and what steps are being taken so it doesn't help again?

Question:
The population in this game has declined drastically, more so than normal for a new MMO. While subscription numbers may still be "relatively ok", the low concurrent population in game is also a sign that people have lost interest in this game. What steps are being taken to remedy this? Asking players for what they want is one thing, I would like to hear the plans of the developers on where they are taking this game knowing what they know now.

Question:
While the future of a MMO is the players, a MMO can't go anywhere without a strong vision from a dev. I'd like to see what the vision for the game is from the devs now that we are nearing the half year anniversary of CO. CO is obviously not a big MMO, but that also means more leeway on what can and cannot be done. Please keep it realistic, keeping in my mind things like "Legendary" really doesn't describe how players are feeling about anything going on in-game right now.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:17 PM

(i am sure these have been asked already, but I will throw my hat on the pile)

1. Vibora bay, what's up with the fee? Why should we want to shell out more $$?

2. When can we see weapons (munitions, blades, etc) in the character creator and tailor? Furthermore, can we display them while out of combat in the near future?

3. When can we expect T4 powers and/or incentive to make a thematic Champion?

4. Where is Cryptic going with CO? A projected time-line of additional content/features and more clarity regarding the fees or (preferably) lack there of really would ease a lot of Life-time subscribers current tension regarding the investment we made in your game.

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 01:32 PM

A few have been asked before but they are important to me.

Will we have alternate leveling paths for free? Or any alternate path lower level zones even if they're pay? This is an alt friendly game that has alts retreading our mains quests.

Will we get super group quality of life improvements soon? Last logged on is a big necessity, super group events like SG pvp or raid level quests, bases, etc... Would be great improvements.

When can we expect improved tailor that shows the weapon skins, even if its a separate menu that just shows the weapon itself.

What order are the power overviews being done in? When will the melee rebuild go live, or even to the PTS? Supernatural was on the forums for two months before we got a response.

When can we expect new power sets? Any hints on what they will be?

How are you planning on fixing open events so tanks and healers can get credit as well as dps?

Archived Post

02-02-2010, 02:06 PM

Would you every consider a bonus of some sort to "Pure Blood" builds that stick to one framework?

Nemcon stands out as one of the things that was the most fun to do at level 40. Any chance of fixing it(scaling back the difficulty) to where it was before?

I do not have a healer, but still feel that they should be rewarded more then they are. Any ideas being tossed around for the support tunes, like exp or points from healing similar to how we get exp and points from damaging?

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02-02-2010, 02:22 PM

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02-02-2010, 02:34 PM

So far, the game is pretty solo-able. Are there any intentions of motivating players more to work together in-game?

Has the idea of Super Group HQs ever been considered?

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02-02-2010, 02:51 PM

:eek: For all that stuff you guys were talkin on the forum last week .... you have asked almost nothing what u been griping about...wow.. is this rhetoric.... im seeing.... by the players... no im niot saying be rude .. not at all as but.. dont whuss out

There have been questions related to Vibora Bay already asked here and there's already an 86-page thread that makes it clear they need to answer some of those questions. They'll either answer or they won't, regardless of whether everyone asks the same question or not.

So, what does it hurt to ask other questions, too? I can't ask a couple questions here because I adopted a "wait and see" stance until I know more about this "expansion"? I've been concerned with the horrible state of roles and builds since I started playing and have seen no information on it; VB is something I'll find out more about eventually, like it or not. Thanks for the criticism, but I'd rather ask about something that may not come up otherwise.

Instead of criticising everyone else, you could have used your post to ask about VB yourself. You had ten posts of complaints in the State of the Game thread, but now you have no questions?

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02-02-2010, 03:01 PM

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02-02-2010, 03:06 PM

WELL.. FIRST OF ALL THEY HAVEN'T ANSWERED ANY QUESTIONS ... THAT WERE ALREADY ASKED..

THIS IS THEIR MOMENT LIKE IN THE TWIXX COMMERCIAL.. CHEWING THE TWIXX AND THINKING SO THEY ARE GAGGING AT THE THREAD... AND WANT U TO ASK AGAIN .... SAYING TO US .. SAAAY WHATT!!!:eek:

SINCE.. A LOT OF YOU AREN'T GOING TO ASK..

I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW BOTTOM LINE AND STRAIGHT TO THE POINT .... HOW CAN U GUY ASK US TO PAY FOR AN EXPANSION FOR AN INCOMPLETE GAME AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO PROMOTE THE GAME TO GET MORE PLAYERS BECAUSE THE COMMUNITY IS DIMINISHING DAILY....

Stop asking ******** or sarcastic questions (i.e. When will you stop sucking or something like that). I mean, really, people have serious questions, you post just takes up more space and makes the thread harder to look through.

And, for God's sakes, turn off the Caps Lock key, you moron.

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02-02-2010, 03:11 PM

WELL.. FIRST OF ALL THEY HAVEN'T ANSWERED ANY QUESTIONS ... THAT WERE ALREADY ASKED..

This was already addressed a couple pages back, though I doubt most people are reading the entire thread to see it. Quoted as follows:

To those who are unaware of how this works, we let this sit for a few days, we gather questions and answer them internally, and then we post all the responses on the website. We don't actually respond to questions in this thread.

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02-02-2010, 03:12 PM

:eek: For all that stuff you guys were talkin on the forum last week .... you have asked almost nothing what u been griping about...wow.. is this rhetoric.... im seeing.... by the players... no im niot saying be rude .. not at all as but.. dont whuss out

Um...how many times can we ask about paying for V-Bay? Or what V-bay contains, or the lack of leveling paths and content as that was what caused most of the uproar.

I already asked these questions on this thread, commented on MMO competition and moved on. Not going to keep harping on the same questions once i posted them. they want the questions and we're giving them questions.

Extra commentary (Like this post) will just clog up the thread! :D

Now, if we ask these questions and there is no response to the "Big Topics" then you will see ungodly fire rain down once again!

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02-02-2010, 03:13 PM

SINCE.. A LOT OF YOU AREN'T GOING TO ASK..

I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW BOTTOM LINE AND STRAIGHT TO THE POINT .... HOW CAN U GUY ASK US TO PAY FOR AN EXPANSION FOR AN INCOMPLETE GAME AND WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO PROMOTE THE GAME TO GET MORE PLAYERS BECAUSE THE COMMUNITY IS DIMINISHING DAILY....

have you even read the posts in this thread? Better people only think your a fool, then to type in caps and prove it...

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02-02-2010, 03:19 PM

I think that's quite enough troll-feeding.

But seriously, are we ever going to see an expansion on the scale of Vibora Bay that will not cost extra?

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02-02-2010, 03:37 PM

Well, my last question was deleted by some mod or something, so I suppose I'll try again.

Whose decision was it to make Vibora Bay a paid expansion, Cryptic's or Atari's?

Will there be any sort of deal for lifetime subscribers with regards to the Vibora Bay expansion? We already paid a great deal of money into the game, and now are being made to pay more to get content that the game is sorely lacking. I, for one, am feeling a bit betrayed.

What changes are in the works to fix melee powersets as compared to ranged? We have been hearing that a fix is in the works, but no details. I am very curious as to how that fix is going to work.

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02-02-2010, 03:41 PM

Blocking and button lag (I cant think of a better name for it)

Is there anything you all can do to make blocking and button pushing after blocking a little better?

I will have no lag at all in game but when I push the block button sometimes it doesn't go off and I get blasted OR it goes off and the attack I use after the block doesn't respond without me doing it twice. I would think it has something to do with block since I don't have any trouble at all with any powers other than when they are grouped around block.

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02-02-2010, 04:33 PM

I'm going to throw my hat in on asking for more solid information on the Vibora Bay expansion. Mostly I am interested in exactly how much content are we talking about and the approximate price (if we can't have solid numbers that's fine, but knowing the general price range would go a long way).

Also, I'd like to know if there are any free expansions planned as well, of what extent, and how long should we expect to wait to see them? Will we see alternate levelling paths arise in the future?

Finally, how long we can expect to wait before the level cap is raised? I still haven't hit it, but I'm getting close...

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02-02-2010, 04:42 PM

Do you have plans for a universal subscription plan in the future?

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02-02-2010, 05:05 PM

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02-02-2010, 05:11 PM

Aside from all the smarmy and sarcastic responses, I would like to ask if there will be a return of Champion's Lore, as I was particularly fond of the "Prince and the Showgirl" story along with the Iron Clad Origins.

I second this question and also want to ask if there's any chance stories of that nature will appear in a form that's readable in-game.

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02-02-2010, 05:22 PM

Question:

Why don't we have many options when creating super heroes with tights?

It's hard to make a good-looking hero without reusing parts that I've used on other heroes. Why is there hardly any tights with skin patterns? Tights with skin usually ends up being Skin and Loose Clothing. I'm not a big fan of kitchen-sink-heroes who have bandoleers and knives and guns and huge shoulderpads all over themselves. You've got us covered on that end. How about adding some tights patterns to the game? Those are probably the easiest costume pieces to make, and you could bang out new pieces weekly. Hell, add partial masks to that list. There's hardly any of those, either.

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02-02-2010, 05:30 PM

Question:
What efforts are being made to encourage a viable economy.

Question:
This goes with the first question somewhat but, when can we expect an auction house that closely emulates those we've used in successful MMO's.

Question:
What will be the distribution of development and test staff on CO now that STO has been released. Can we expect to see resources finally devoted to fixing very visible issues in this game or will it continue to suffer from lack of staffing.

Question:
Has any thought been given to additional item slots, additional passives, ect. This to further encourage variety and loot/power addiction among players, thus hopefully drawing back disenchanted subscribers.

Question:
What are you doing to address quality control of patches? It has to be embarrassing from a management perspective to have both an in house paid test staff and a FREE test staff yet still manage to completely hose patch after patch. Has anyone at Cryptic even heard of Six Sigma?

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02-02-2010, 05:35 PM

In STO you have what I consider to be a very clever mission system in the "Episode" system.

For those that don't know, most of the missions in STO are arranged into "Episodes". These episodes usually consist of about 5 "chapters" (missions) that link together in a story arc. Once you finish the first chapter you have the option to automatically go on to the second chapter, then the third, and so on. You get XP along the way as usual, and then upon completing the final chapter you get an Episode bonus for completing the whole Episode. I feel that it gives the individual missions more flavor and adds a sense of continuity and story telling to the game.

Is there any chance of seeing "episodic" type missions here in CO?

Dr. Grendel

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02-02-2010, 05:42 PM

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02-02-2010, 05:48 PM

My question is....

Some of us believe that the teaming mechanic within this product needs work. Do you agree?

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02-02-2010, 06:28 PM

I know you guys are probably undermanned and overwhelmed and all, but curiosity is stalking the cat...

Questions:

1. Why did you decide to go with set powers instead of implementing fully customizable powers with abilities in each field being tiered.

This is to say, why not give the player the ability to choose the type of damage, range, AoE effects, special damage/debuff effects,projectile type, casting animations, and then make a set of rules governing the amount of damage and energy costs associated with said powers.
Damage types can have multipliers associated with them for amount of damage,energy cost, casting speed etc...and if you're really creative, tier'd levels of damage from the damage type: i.e. fire section could have fire/plasma/nova to represent intensity of that damage type(with different multipliers, ofc).
Different range options, aoe types, and debuff effects can be tiered in their own options section. And of course, visuals can all be changed at the tailor.

2. Why isn't there fire/ice/force/earth/electricity _melee_ powers in the game?

3. Since you can see completed buildings outside the boundaries of Millennium City, are there plans to expand the boundaries of the city at a later date?

4. Why aren't there dual purpose energy builders? In the bloodmoon event, the lycan hunters had a pistol/sword energy builder that would change depending on whether you're in melee range or not. As an example, current martial arts powers could use throwing stars as their ranged energy builder.

5. Why are there powers in this game that get interrupted on damage? With as much AoE flying around, this makes these powers highly undesirable

That's about all I can think of, thanks for listening and keep your heads up

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02-02-2010, 06:28 PM

To those who are unaware of how this works, we let this sit for a few days, we gather questions and answer them internally, and then we post all the responses on the website. We don't actually respond to questions in this thread.

Will that be before or after we get the feedback from the Winter Event internal discussion?

One of our biggest problems communication wise is you guys always talk about taking these questions and talking about them internally, but you don't follow through with giving us the results.

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02-02-2010, 07:12 PM

Q1. What was the reasoining behind making Munitions power replacers actually replace certain powers, while all other power replacers only have a chance to grant their effects?
Was there ever a thought to have power replacers that add a small amount of damage to powers, instead of a chance to cause a burst?

Q2. Are there any plans to implement any new frameworks, or add powers to existing frameworks?
I ask as there are large gaps in current sets, such as a lack of ranged powers in Telekinesis; minimal directly offensive powers in Ice and Gadgets; no block enhancement for Fire or Celestial; few Lunge powers; and an overall abscence of Toxic, Sonic and Particle-based powers.

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02-02-2010, 07:18 PM

My question is simple.

What are your plans to keep me and other players coming back in the next month, 3 months, 6 months, year and beyond?

I am a casual player, I take my time and try to enjoy the game and not rush to see how fast I can reach the level cap, I also suffer from a bad case of alt-itus. But doing so has given me many hours of gaming enjoyment through the years on many MMOs. However, CO is already starting to bore me and my highest toon is only lvl 26.

My list of issues with this game is huge, and everyone has been addressed in this thread already. All I ask is please don't make me regret buying my life sub, this game has sooooo much potential, and with a few good patches and updates it could be so much more than it is today.

A lot of good could come from this, I just hope that what the CO community has posted on this thread and all the other threads does not fall on deaf ears.

Thanks for what you have done so far, I appreciate your hard work. Now lets see what you can do to turn this game around and make it something to remember, in a positive manner.

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02-03-2010, 12:07 AM

What happens when a blood moon occurs on a lunar/solar eclipse?
How will the winter event be implemented for year-round use?

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02-03-2010, 12:17 AM

How will the winter event be implemented for year-round use?

Hopefully it wont

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02-03-2010, 01:00 AM

Will customer support response times improve, or does Cryptic feel that getting an answer inside of a few weeks is adequate customer support?

Does cryptic feel it would be good business practice to reimburse people for lost playtime from when a ticket was filed with customer support and until the problem was resolved, when the issue was the complete inabillity to run the game? Or does Cryptic think that as long as someone keeps paying, it doesnt matter if they get anything in return?

Will cryptic give the 6-month subscribers at least 6 months warning before pulling the plug on the game, so we can cancel our subs in time, or should we just change it to 1-month subs while we wait to see if the game survives?

Is there a plan to increase playerbase? It was a complete coincidence I ever heard about the game, so if you guys actually plan to continue the game, do you have a plan to increase awareness of the game among potential new players, or are you hoping for word of mouth to spread via your satisfied customers, if any?

Dont you think that perhaps you are milking the cash cow a little to hard, what with every new thing costing money and 'being accesible from the C-shop', or do you really think that some bugged bug-fixing is all we want in return for our monthly subs?

I am fast running out of new stuff to do, and once I DO run out of stuff to do, I will stop and think very very hard if I want to keep pouring money into the game, so if I get the impression that the only way the game will grow for me, is if I keep buying more content in addition to my subscription, I will probably just discontinue my sub. So do you have a plan to give us additional free content, or perhaps to dazzle us to such a degree with your new fantastic creations, that we will practically BEG us to take our monies?

Will there ever be increased subscription fees associated with additional content?

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02-03-2010, 02:55 AM

Having seen Action Figures like EVE and the G-Mech, and the classic rocket punch used by some destroids, I'm guessing someone over at Cryptic Studios is a big fan of the Super Robot genre. Who is it, and what is their favorite series?

On a related note, is there any chance of ever getting that rocket punch power for my robot character?

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02-03-2010, 04:35 AM

One of my key complaints is lack of reason to group. Like why be in a super group at all. There is no real reason to be in one. Unlike other MMOs like EVE you almost have to have a reason to be in a guild type of environment. In champions there isn't such a thing. Should be reasons for people to want to play this game. Because it is a good game. But the customer support lack of real content and reason to work as a group hold a great game back from dominating this genre in MMOs. I mean look at Age Of Conan they had a horrible launch. And now they have listened to the players. I mean actually listened and worked to make the game better. I mean open super group vs super group would be great. I mean I love this game and still play it even after I get bored because there is something to do at times. But when you look at the vast majority of the quests pvp system and things. Really no reason to call it an MMO if you cannot group with a real reason beside oh I just need another dude for this quest. There is always a reason to do something. And that I hope this is taken into context even through the rambling. But would love Supergroup Bases and PVP against one another. That would really be fun and interesting and bring grouping to another level!!!

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02-03-2010, 05:41 AM

Have you ever considered multi-stage missions?
Such as one mission that took you into an instance that had three different parts, which the players had to beat.
For example, the first part of the mission is a villian, which we will call Mr. Mean, has set off a bomb, and the citizens are in trouble and have to be rescued from the rubble before time runs out, but mr. means minions are going to harrass the heros at the same time. Part two would have the player storming Mr. means base trying to find him, but in the end they fall into his trap. Part three the players have to defeat the enormous robot that Mr. mean designed to kill them, then they have to hunt down and defeat Mr. mean himself.
This type of mission I think would capture the feel of comics a bit more than the current set of mission that we end of playing all the time.
Oh, and I can't wait for the difficulty levels, one of the problems with the game is that depending on how you build your character the game can go from really easy to sort of hard.

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02-03-2010, 06:32 AM

Why was there no warning about loss of AA with ATI cards and when will this be fixed!?? I have had no reply to the ticket I submitted, an update would be nice. I hate playing with a game that looks like it was made out of lego :(

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02-03-2010, 06:42 AM

Here is my response to a debate elsewhere. My question... answer my response.

Personally I think it's great that they are to the point where they can start working on content and expansions.

Also there is no rule that Cryptic can not make a bit of profit while doing so; except in narrow minded peoples minds.

And that's my opinion.

M.

Here is where I respectfully disagree. Personally, I DO NOT think they are to the point where the can start working on paid expansions. This game is far from having a stable foundation from which they can then expand from. There are bugs, balance issues, content issues, etc.

For an analogy, it is a mistake to pay your contractor to add a new wing to your home, when this same contractor has yet to finish the house this wing will be added to. Especially, when you have pointed out serious construction flaws in the basic house only to have your contractor tell you to be patient because he or she has been accessing this and is planning to get around to it, this is if your concerns are even acknowledged at all.

While I agree that there is no rule that Cryptic can not make a profit, I whole heartily disagree that what they are current doing will be profitable in the long run. I WANT Cryptic to make a profit! This is good for them and us! Nonetheless, a business model that skips QUALITY WORK and instead opts to do a quantity of poor work and then pouring out more quantities of poor work to cover this will not be profitable in the long run. Sure it will make a profit in the short term, but the model is doomed to fail and when it does the companies reputation will go will it.

The model I think Cryptic should make a profit on: REALEASE A QUALITY PRODUCT AND ONCE THAT IS COMPLETED TO A HIGH STANDARD, EXPAND THAT WITH THE SAME QUALITY! I know this sounds crazy it today’s bait and switch economy… but it would be successful! The top heads are looking at a profit model that appears successful, due to their greed creating a myopic focus that only sees the short term money. Yet when the myopic greed dust settles we see the long term effects of this business tactic. This has been true throughout history.

Quality = steady long term profit.
Quantity = burst profit, collapse and having to start over but with a different name or company because your reputation is shot.

Wake up Cryptic!

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02-03-2010, 07:11 AM

As a really slow end-game leveller I've just got my main characters to 40. I'd like to know what's ahead for them.
I know about the daily UNITY missions, but other than those and NemCon it doesn't seem there is much to do.
Any chance of letting us get rewards for the unfinished missions we have left (instead of resources and useless experience), or some UNITY outdoor stuff so I can at least enjoy zone chat?
How about daily (weekly?) Nemesis missions, like UNITY ones, with a random Nemesis?
Is there a game-begins-at-40 that I'm missing out on? Perhaps my question should be: What do you (Cryptic) want to see the end-game consisting of?

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02-03-2010, 07:28 AM

Instead of asking Cryptic a question, can I make a suggestion, instead?

As far as helping to get players more involved in the game as well as creating new continuous content:

How about having more events happen daily throughout the different zones? Nothing engages a player when they log into the game and see themselves in the middle of a firefight or crisis.

In Millennium City, we can have daily events where players are pitted against invading aliens, out of control robots, giant monsters attacking the city IN ADDITION to the existing random missions given to them by bystanders.

What about disasters? Random fires could spread (perhaps at the hands of arsonists) through apartment buildings, high rises, etc. Players could use their powers to use their ice powers to put out the flames while flying heroes can save civilians that are out of reach of other heroes. Underground creatures could erupt from the streets and collapse roads, trapping civilians and giving the creatures a way to invade the city.

Giant monster? A large gathering of heroes can be great to engage a stomping giant T-rex, for example. However, what about collateral damage? The fire breathing T-rex can set fires, collapse buildings, etc. Heroes could use their powers (however limited) to save civilians from the collateral damage being done by the rampaging monster(s).

Gang war? Street skirmishes and all out gang wars in the streets between different groups like the Purple Gang and the Maniacs, for example. Heroes could be instantly notified of the events taking place and could respond before the police do and save civilians from being hurt by being in the crossfire.

Us vs Them Meter? In all zones you could include a meter measuring how well heroes are performing in keeping things under control. When heroes fail to foil some of these random events discussed above, the meter falls in favor of 'the bad guys'.

All of these events and crises can be included in a patch update so it would make for easy integration into the game as it currently is. Champions Online has the potential to be 10X better than any other superhero game out there.

Why not make it more engaging to players and build from that point with expansions?

Thanks for your time and I hope this helps make CO a better game!

-Eric

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02-03-2010, 07:56 AM

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02-03-2010, 08:16 AM

Often it seems like Cryptic/Atari does not communicate things well (if at all). For example: This "2010 Surprise" should have been met with cheers. The lack of details in it wasn't bad at first, until about 4 posts into the forum we are basically told: Btw, this is going to cost you extra.

My questions:

1. The cost of content...why would you even consider doing that at this point and why roll it out so haphazardly?

2. How are you going to develop a better and more respectful relationship with us, the gamers?

Edit: When I say "Respectful" I do know it works both ways, but it seems the ball is in your court at this point.

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02-03-2010, 08:40 AM

Power Replacers are absolutely useless right now (save for one or two). Is there any chance that we'll be getting a new slot for them? Also, Account wide perks, Will we ever see them mainstream?

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02-03-2010, 08:43 AM

What does Cryptic think about having Alpha Strike Powers? What I mean is: Powerful abilities which, perhaps, have a recharge, or use a lot of Endurance.

A lot of the power sets don't have that epic power that you are working toward at the end of the set (a la CoH). Any plans to add these?

I'd love to see some combat abilities that work with the chosen travel powers.

Lastly: Are we ever going to see ideas for what might have been, with regards to the secret identity system? That was something I was really looking forward to seeing in CO.

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02-03-2010, 08:56 AM

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02-03-2010, 10:09 AM

Will this game ever call the subscriber base names like exploiters again when there was no content but repeating PQs other than street hunting available?

Talk about respectful. That was totally lacking respect.

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02-03-2010, 10:12 AM

3 days, tons of questions... I just have one question:
When are we going to start seeing some of the answers :)

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02-03-2010, 10:27 AM

In STO, playing on the same rig and the same connection as I play CO, I do not experience lag. In fleet actions with lots of players and lots of enemy ships, beams, cannons and torpedoes all over the screen, ships blowing up, shields flaring, power animations displaying, no lag. None, whatsoever, once the game went to headstart. In CO, just about every zone lags like crazy, and instances (i.e., lairs) are all but unplayable Why is that? And what is Cryptic going to do to end the lag?

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02-03-2010, 11:16 AM

About Lairs and end content in general.

1. Of the 3 L40 Lairs 2 have had major bugs in the end encounters since Launch. (I'm referrring to the Lava ward item no doing much in andrith and the add spawn in the end encounter not stopping in the last fight.) Making the final encounters very hard to complete with out using some exploit to finish. Are these known bugs and when are they going to get addressed?

2. How did the devs envision players should approch Boss/Cosmic encounters as a team? (ie passing aggro around, or seperated in to Tank, Healer, DPS roles.)

3. Given the various nerfs to defense, Have these Encounters been rebalanced Or are you planning to look at rebalancing them?

ps- I would love to see a push to reexamine how these encounters work in this game. Cuz Constantly getting One Shot because the ui does not seem responsive enough to recognise split second block timing and haveing to somtimes respawn from the begging of a lair and go through 2 or 3 load screens to get back to the fight over and over again seems like not the way i would have designed it.

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02-03-2010, 11:34 AM

1. Can you provide a policy guidance as to what can be expected to be paid for content (through C-store or other mechanics) and what can be expected to be included in the subscription fee?
( I am aware of that it is rare among MMO games in general to be upfront with what customers get for their fees in subscription-based games, but I am hopeful that this may change some day)

2. What ways are you mainly considering for expanding content - horisontally or vertically? I.e. add more content for existing levels (a la City of VIllains/Heroes) or add more levels (a la a number of other MMOs)?

3. Who do you consider your main target audience? Has this changed over the course of development and release?

4. Any additional plans on expanding the game outside the game itself (i.e. you have started with the various social interfaces, iPhone app, Mashon etc)

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02-03-2010, 11:38 AM

Thanks for bringing back "Ask Cryptic".

I'm really excited to see what comes from it. Communication like this means a lot and is appreciated.

Thanks!

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02-03-2010, 11:56 AM

Endless Exploration - The battle against evil in Champions Online rages across the world into outer space and alternate dimensions. No other MMOG offers players the chance to explore such diverse realms — from the shining skyscrapers of Millennium City and the frozen wastes of Canada to the interstellar gladiatorial arena on the moon, the hidden underwater city of Lemuria and the foul mystical dimension known as Qliphotic.

I recently was chatting to a friendly soul in-game who was kind enough to email me regarding a comment i made recently on the forums. I stated i was looking forward to the Qliphotic zone and the Moonbase as-per the game description. They kindly let me know that legally Cryptic have technically already delivered both Qliphotic content and outer space / moonbase content as;

# The Nemesis Confrontation (leaving for Serenity station * ( but hold on a minute.... the tp is rerouted by your Nemesis isn't it?, which is why you end up in a dungeon ) - does that count ?*

# The Qliphotic realm, well, technically aren't you pulled into it briefly in the Nemesis Confrontation finale?

My question is.. "Are we going to see a Qliphotic realm zone and an Outer Space Moonzone 'Serenity station / Gateway Station'? - or.... Is that it ?, have we seen all you intended (re: those zones) described in the game launch information ?".

Looking forward to the definitive answer. :)

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02-03-2010, 12:03 PM

A lot of new things, mostly costume sets, are going into the C-Store. I could be wrong, but wasn't there going to be or IS there a way to gain C-Store Credits by playing the game and not from buying them?

All these "Pay for" options which include V-Bay seem to be doing more harm then good. So with DCUO coming out soon, are you going to be thinking more competitively to not lose players to a game that offers the F2P option?

At this point wouldn't it be better to promote new features without a price tag attached to them?

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02-03-2010, 01:37 PM

What is up for the 360 version?

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02-03-2010, 01:47 PM

what do you think of the recent bad publicity, regardless of its extension and what are you planning to do about it.

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02-03-2010, 02:00 PM

How many subscribers do you currently have, after everyone cancelled due to your poor service?

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02-03-2010, 02:27 PM

are you going to bring back some powersets from coh and cov, i would like plant and earth control powers

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02-03-2010, 02:40 PM

I have been playing a couple mmo'es for now.. even CoX.
I enjoyed the concept though I felt the animations were too stif.. but enough of that.
Two of my friends and I actually consider starting gaming CO.. but the more I read about the game at the forum the more sceptical I get.
First of all it seems like you are just throwing bones into the mass when they reach the boiling points instead of actually taking an action here.

The Ask Cryptic seems broken, sorry but that is what I see, cause you have already tons of questions and so far no answers.. yeah I went through all 25? pages and saw many Q'es who were alike.

How can it be that you haven't answered the Q'es?

Are we even gonna see a SG-HQ? (I loved it in CoX tbh but could use some more options and actually some real functions)

Planing on prolong the demo so you actually can try setting your point in some powers instead of just spamming two powers? You could add teaming or /w but only between trial acc (to avoid GF-spam)

Are you actually going to step into action or will you keep on throwing bones to the mass just to buy subscibtion time?

Kind Regards Ji

ps. The only reason that I write is because I want waste money on another broken game tbh.. you got the potentiel but lack the sight to see it tbh. ohh a side-note Realese the G""" D""" Xbox version already.. You claim that it is ready to go, which I doubt since compared to the info I get from the Q'es and other forum posts says you are not even finished with this version, but need approval from Microsoft?? Really??