Power Creep

[Lazy]

unfortunately i don't have any endgame toons yet (rolled my fixer in 06 and she's still only lvl 100... i predict i'll finally get my doc to tl6 by the time 2012 rolls around) so i can't comment on the difficulty of the raids, but i'll take your word for it. if it's too easy it definately needs to be harder. however coding AI in this 9 yearold game might be a bit of a stretch especially with the upcoming engine changes... maybe with the new engine we'll also get smarter AI and that'll solve that problem. only time will tell, i guess...

speaking of changes, seems like with the Great Rebalancing most professions are getting a nerfbat to the face so raids might get harder because of that (healing nanos cost increasing, enfos HP decreasing, duration reduction on roots/snares, etc)

[Iamkama]

actually, this is a really good idea. like, ideally, you could get to ado hecks and even if you had only enough money for stims, you could kill ado hecks for a few levels and outfit yourself with a few pieces of QL 210+/- 25% gear.

It would be really nice if you could build crepuscule armour, for example, with items that dropped off ado hecks at a frequency which was conducive to actually getting a few pieces of armour before you outleveled them.

Doing something like this would make it a lot easier to stay moderately well equipped during leveling. It's not like hecks are all that easy to kill solo, and they are high level mobs compared to other mobs in the playfield. to have them dropping their QL armour pieces would/ should set up people for the next area they get to.

Now that I think of it, one of the main problems AO has always had is that you can't equip yourself in the same place as you level. You can't get symbs in the same place as you level. you can't get twink items in the same place as you level, and you can't do any of these things at the same place as any of the others.

Which means that it's an excrutiatingly difficult task to outfit yourself if youre only kind of interested in playing thru.

Indeed, loot tables could use a tweak where the majority of people spend their time. Even places like tinker tower, or world mobs could use an update. Catacombs need a serious overhaul too. They are out of control considering the loot available. I'd venture to say I've NEVER done the catacombs in any PF without the aid of an endgame orgmate and duel logging a TL7 alt.

Tone down the difficulty and HP of the mobs in every catacomb, bolster the loot tables a bit, and people might be able to go there, kill a few mobs, get some XP, get some armour, get a twink item and carry on. Catacombs are also sooo far out of the way. things in SL are so retardedly hard to get to.. makes me crazy, it's no wonder no-one goes to these things. Not to mention the glaringly obvious, which is that by the time you can actually kill the mobs there, you've already totally outleveled the usefulness of anythign you can get there.

I was thinking something along the lines of, say, Bounty type items?

Say your on Rubi-Ka, kill some Omni-Tek/Clan mobs, they will drop a "Weapon/Armor/Implant Special Order" (sheet of paper), to which they have to return to a certain NPC in OA/Tir, Newland/Bor, Omni-Trade/Rome R/G/B. Since they'll have to head back to their respective cities to put the Armor/Weapon(s)/Implant(s) on anyways, it'll be right there, along with people for buffs etc.

In SL, have some decent SL weapons with some cool effects on it (weird fun effects on the target, maybe morph them into something [doesnt have to be useful all the time]) and Armor (as suggested, Crepescule and maybe some new armors) and um, I don't think Symbs would be right to just loot unless maybe it was a boss that required a full team setup that would be challenging to take down, and even then it would only drop 1 Symb to which if the team were to keep farming, even after awhile they're only going to get so many Symbs, so it's not like they'll be fully gearing their toons right away, they will have to work for it.

Thoughts?

Edit : Grammar and Punctuation because I'm an in the closet Grammar Nazi, and just an overall spellcheck.

[Ciex]

Mitaar and DB1 are nice tries where brute force and ZOMGZ ITS OVER 9000 dpm isnt the key to sucess. Unfortunately mitar failed and its usually done with only 2 people.

[Ownsauce]

I agree that there needs to be more difficult things in the game, however, I don't believe that this is the way to make it happen. These are my reasons:

1.) Everyone in the team your with would have to be the same amount of gear. If we use your suggestion and make a epeen check, then if it checks vs the super uber geared person the entire team could die and basically make it impossible for them to kill anything.

2.) people could wear crap gear and go out and solo higher mobs for max xp without fear of dying because the epeen check would lower the mobs difficulty...IE level 2's soloing the nasc LOTV with crappy noob island weapons.

3.) There would most likely be more instanced stuff due to this which we all know kills a lot of aspects to the game.

My suggestion is to just make more difficult mobs in situations where you can't just go and tank n spank...something fun, but not set up stupid (like Mitaar or Db2 [sorry guys, but DB 2 sucks...])

[McKnuckleSamwich]

1. probably the best equipped guys in the team would be tanking, no? But, even still, the point of this suggestion is that if you're overgeared for the confrontation, the mob gains the Epeen. Like, if for example, your'e 150, geared in full 225 CM, and all up to date symbs/ implants, and proper IP distribution, I really don't think that is over geared. That would be near the top of what was acceptable to the heck on the Epeen scale. If you're 165 and wearing 264 CM, however, the mob would definitly go into Epeen mode.

But, the best example of epeen mode is a 220 Enf/Doc OSTing in full endgame gear, for a crowd of nubs. In that case, the heck *should* get masive adrenaline injections and wtf HULK SMASH some 220/70/30 MvP. I want to see a fight!

2. you wouldn't have lvl 2 nab island guys soloing lotv, cuz what I suggested was only a bonus of -10% to the skill of the mob.

I suggested the mobs would only vary by +/- 10% skill overall. that would be like LotV hitting for 5.4k instead of 6k. I don't think too many newbs would last long vs that.


3. not sure what you mean. But, I think you're applying #2 to instances, but, clearly, this wouldn't be an issue, you're extrapolating way too far. It should only extrapolate up, not down. It could be Slightly easy to kill mobs if you don't have decent gear, get good bonuses to killing mobs in well powered to appropriate gear, and have the mob go a bit Epeen if youre coming after him after ubertwinking.

For example, if I go after a 210 heck with my QL 275/265/300 armour on my 170, he's definitly goign to make a fuss. Think about how you react when you decide to take a duel challenge, and you do inspect and find the dude is wearing stuff you only thought was a myth. You'd be like, wuf, I'm pulling out all the stops. right?

[Grind42]

I think it is a reasonable idea but GL getting FC to code anything as complicated as this...

It is fooking impossible more like implausable. I would prefer they spent thier time on easier fixes.
I think basically it would require the system to have each characters information imprinted on it & updated regularily. Then when you enter combat the mob would adjust to that *skill level*

No way could it automatically read it every fight.....

So people would land up Unequiping all gear & logging off, then *System updates* they logon equip stuff & get there -10% advantage till the system updated again.
Even if the system took updates when you login you would still have the same scenario.

I still think the one Idea that people had for Hollow Island would be a good option for all raids... provide a Easy Medium or Hard option & scale the loot/mobs to that.

Perhaps have the RI leader create the RI & he/she needs to enter the pf 1st & selects what difficulty level the instance will have.

[Burgly]

ga4 used to be end-game armor. nowadays it's easy at 150.

Its even doable at 70 ish