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Newsroom
Champions Online : Launch Day Patch Stirs Uproar
Posted Sep 01, 2009 by Michael Bitton
Break out the bubbly! Champions Online has launched today, and all is totally awesome, right? Not entirely.
)
Like many MMOGs, Champions Online launched with a patch, and today's patch brought with it some significant changes to the game, as outlined in a special launch day State of the Game letter.
As it would turn out, some of the changes appear to be a bit controversial, with many on the official forums up in arms over the changes. So what's stirring up all the ruckus?
Well, for one, a number of balance changes were made today. The changes made were far reaching and affected just about everyone in the community. Many abilities were hit hard in effectiveness, and henchmen level critters were boosted in strength so as to be less trivial. This was all done in response to player feedback that the game may have just been a bit too easy.
As a result of this, many players are finding themselves frustrated with the new changes, and due to the fact respec costs have been bugged for awhile now, they are unable to make necessary changes.
Now, if you've just read the letter, you'll note the mentioning of the fix to the aforementioned respec cost issue. Apparently, it is still bugged, and so many headstart players are feeling hung out to dry and wondering why a free respec was not issued today to give players the opportunity to re-evaluate their power choices in light of today's changes. I'm going to speculate here, and venture a guess that had the respec cost fix actually worked today, it probably wouldn't entirely necessitate a free full respec.
Not all is doom and gloom however! There were some much welcomed changes in today's patch. Sorcery players have reason to rejoice as their sorcery power selections should now count towards power requirements in the different sorcery sub-specialization branches. Sorcery players were also granted a free respec due to this fix.
Also, drop rates were increased up to four fold today. So players should find tons more loot to use, trade, or even deconstruct.
Lastly, a mention of the game's first big content patch was teased in the letter. The game update will be called "Blood Moon", but no further details are known at this time.
We're seeking comment from Cryptic Studios on the more controversial bits of today's changes, and we'll update the story if we get something, so stay tuned!
Daeke of Cryptic Studios' Online Community Team took a moment to respond to some of the feedback:
Hey guys,
So, I've finally sat down at my desk for the first time since I got here today. I've been spending the entirety of the morning tracking down all of the developers and asking tons of questions to make sure I've got the latest information on what's going on behind-the-scenes.
Right now, we've got the designers tracking the data for the changes that were made in this morning's patch. What will help us the most right now is for you to go and play the game. I understand that you're upset over the changes that were made, but in order for us to figure out what the issue is, we want to gather hard data to support your feedback, and we can only do that with your help.
Your points have been noted. There is clear dissent amongst the ranks about the changes that were made. The feedback has come through loud and clear. So please, hop into the game and play for a while so that we can get the hard evidence for our next step.
Thanks,
Daeke
How have today's changes affected you? Do you welcome the new difficulty? Are you trapped in a gimped build? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
Good thing many players didnt buy a life time subscription, devs make extreme changes, god knows whats next.... ow wait :p xD
Anyhow, wish the champ players much game fun ^^
I'm sure it will all sort itself out soon enough and this will be soon forgotten.
Its just a game, who cares if your build is gimped for a bit until respec's become available.
Not even a FFA PVP aspect to it so I don't see it as a big issue.
Oh noes!!!!111!! A patch on launch day, with nerfs and changes (cuz THAT'S never happened before in PC gaming)!!! The NERVE of them to try to balance and fix things and not satisfy absolutely everyone!
I don't think I can manage much more sarcasm than that.
The only people that should have suffered any ill effects from this would be the Early Start folks who prepaid, and they've only been able to build on their characters since Friday. So.....seriously? You're going to get in a whinge over characters you've only been able to develop for 4 days? I could see if you were able to retain your beta characters that you might have a knot in your knickers over this, but they were wiped when Beta ended, so....what's the big deal? If it's that much of a big deal, build a new toon and start fresh.
I think this is much ado about nothing.
its changes that should have been tested during closed beta.
everyone expects some tweaking to prevent Fotm builds and to clean up xp mega gains and such.... but huge sweeping changes on the launch day is a really really stupid move.
You let people "open" beta test a product.... i say "open" because it clearly wasnt open to all..... and on the day the product they decided to preorder goes live you make signifigant changes.
I was a huge fan of cryptic. i was going to play CO after greatly enjoying CoH... but poor choice and treatment of the game kept me from buying it. now each announcement i see is further proof that keeping my cash in pocket was a better plan.
I was in beta test for this game. Stopped when it went to Open Beta. And a lot of what it looks like they changed was stuff I was screaming about in beta test. And they just would not listen to me... I knew they would have to change it eventually. Just a shame they wait till the day of release to do it... *rolls eyes*
I think there were quite a few of us that were talking about some of this stuff, shame they didn't listen to their testers.
only have one thing to say about this....
LOL
I believe there are just as many posting they like the changes as those hating the changes.
After reading through some of the posts ( all day mind you ) it seems the big issue are with those who have characters already in the 20-30 lvl range. Since they are that high in so short a time I would tend to agree that SOME type of change to the system was warranted.
Howerver, Like I said there. If someone wants to make the FOTW uba-build and levle to the end game and PvP the whole time. Let them. I like more of the variations that are currently available and do not necessarily like to be the same cookie cutter build everyone else uses as the best of the best.
It is mostly the PvP types that use the FOTW builds and that keeps it balanced for them cuase they are all usin the same crap!
wait i dont quite follow. If they addressed the issues you were talking about during beta at launch then that would mean they have indeed listened to the testers. So why are you upset for them not listening when in fact they did? Sure the change didn't come right when you were screaming about it, but a lot of these things take time to iron out.
It's better late than never and launch seems like a good way to throw in a big change atleast. It would be far worse if this change came out like 3 weeks in or hell months in when people are well adjusted.
WoW has like monthly nerf-fests and it isn't necessarily a bad thing.
Wasn't nice of them not to give free respecs because of the changes though.
I really think people see this as a much bigger deal than it is.. I myself am playing and I have to say some of the nerfs were really needed.. As another dev stated (sorry, I really can't cba looking up the post, if you're interested I'm sure you can find it on their forums) people having certain powers or powersets took on TWICE the amount of mobs intended and just mowed through the game.
Personally, I agree though, that they - with that huge amount of change - should've given people free respecs, but at the same time I don't feel the changes that much. Regardless, some of them were needed and like ANY game this game will have powers getting nerfed, buffed and looked over a great number of times. Balancing is never done.
I still have a lifetime sub, and I still don't regret it. My only issue with this game is the lag I experience, and I guess that'll be fixed eventually as well.
LOL... Jack and his nerf bat. Champions is running into a problem they should have foreseen from the start; You can't balance power sets when you give players the option to pick and choose.
Sure, a lot of games go through cycles where one class seems better than the others and the players, the ones not playing said class, complain until the devs nerf it. But here we are faced with a problem; How do you keep individual powers balanced, yet unique at the same time? Without just making all powers in a given tier exactly the same with a different skin to them, which would make the whole 'classless' idea a joke since it'd be basically limiting you to a single class, it's a technical impossibility to keep the playing field level.
With a class system you can, somewhat, keep classes balanced by advantages and disadvantages. Heavy damage dealers generally have less hit points, tanks can survive a long time but do little damage, healers suffer from both disadvantages but make up for it by being able to keep themselves and their team alive... with of course hybrids of each.
With a classless system somebody is going to number crunch and find out exactly what the best powers are for PvE and PvP. That in itself would be fine. Sure, people who keep getting their butts handed to them in PvP will complain, but the 'real' PvPers will already be using the 'template'. In PvE generally nobody cares about the numbers quite as much... UNTIL you raise the difficulty of the enemies. Then the differences become much more noticeable, like night and day. Toss that whole 'freedom to be who you want to be' thing out the window.
I can only imagine what their forums must look like.
Unfortunately it's a cycle that this game will never be free of.
But hey! Full respecs now on sale at the Cryptic store for only $5! Can't beat that with a stick...
I'm glad I didn't buy this game now. I guess there's always DC Universe Online, but that's from Sony. Are we doomed to never have a good super hero game? Cause even the first super hero game, City of Heroes sucked. Maybe Sony might surprise us with DCUO or Disney might surprise us with a Marvel game(Lol.).
The changes aren't even remotely major for the most part. There was a lot of rebalancing if different things that ended up cancelling each other out. There were bigger changes every couple of days during OB.
Still, the respec costs bug needs to be sorted out. It's not gamebreaking (you can level up a new toon in about a week of casual gameplay, so just delete+reroll) but it's a quality of life issue.
The changes are only an issue because you basically screwed the ppl who pre ordered to get the head start. Now with such wide reaching changes, people want to fix there builds. The respec system as it is is still broken (cost) and I really have an issue with paying more and more the farther back you want to change a power. Using a power on a test dummy does not equate to using it on an actual npc or player.
They should drastically lower the cost to respec, make it a single fee to change your entire build and offer a free respec to all pre-order people immediately. The longer they delay in at least fixing the cost associated with respeccing means I have to wait until I can afford it, which means im still levelling up, which means those powers are going further back in the build and getting more expensive, that respec system really stinks.
Another failed launch of a MMO game... When will they ever learn....
What is beta for ? ????
Another game playing balancing God right after launch... I remember two games that are in free fall now because of poor balance at start... AOC and WAR... Took them like 6 months to get some balance and by then everyone had left for 1000 other reasons ....
Have to say the power builds now act like they should. I could handle +6 level and not sweat it. Now I can handle +3 level and have a hard time. If I aggro another group I am dead. So its good to have a game be a good game. Although Close Combat now really sucks. They need to fix that. Plain and simple.
The changes arent as bad as people are whining about. I play the game, and the difficulty was set on "Trivial". Now, its a tiny bit more difficult. Its difficulty is easily on par with other MMOs now since now its not possible to jump into a swarm of even level mobs and not take a scratch of damage.
Loving all the whiners. I pre-ordered, open beta'd, early started and played all day today. Heard very little complaining in-game and a lot of excitement because drops are working properly now.
Fighting is a little more difficult and as a result the game feels a little less light-weight. Where I was clearing group missions solo, maybe now I'll stop to create a team.
As for PVPers bitching, they've been in-game three days. Powersets like fashions will come and go, a good player will usually win through.
I didn't plan to stay with the game past Aeon going live, but I am enjoying it and think maybe Aeon might have to wait. It's a lot of fun.
i'm noticing a trend here
Taking a shot gun...
to their feet
Even though we beta tested, and head start-ed
Champions Online
Your just planing a epic fail
((sung to Still Alive))
Increasing trivial mob damage?
Reducing defenses?
"Cryptic Studios. Taking the Super out of Super Hero since 2004."
I mean seriously. I already felt like a weak stand-in for a super hero in the last beta phase. Which is the reason I didn't buy the game. I'm even more glad I didn't buy it now.
Seems like Cryptic forgot about 3 months ago that they were making a super hero game.
I must have forgot the issues of Spider Man where 3 henchmen beat him up so badly he had to retreat.
Or where Punisher almost got killed by one of Ma Gnucci's sons 1 on 1.
Or the part in Super Man where he had to team up with 5 other super heroes to stop Lex Luthor.
Ah well.
Community: "ZOMG The game is TOO EASY!! Like I'm nearly level 40 already!!!"
Devs: "Alright we will make it harder"
Community: "ZOMG WTF is going on!?!? Its too hard!!!"
^ This
Frankly, I could care less about a few nerfs here and there. Plenty of the defensive powers should have been nerfed to begin with (Invuln, Regen, Personal Force Field), but the others were fine. Besides, 66% is still a lot and not much of a difference from 75%.
All great games do SOME sort of balancing. Champions is a great game and should be respected! At least they are'nt introducing a SW:G NGE move. Now THAT would be a real excuse to complain.
City of Villains FTW. Did you know their dev team has tripled or more since NCSoft acquired it? Power customization is in it now, too.
You should check out the SUper Sidekicking feature of i16 that makes teaming so much easier and less stressful, and thus fun :D
Two things here for me:
1. The overall difficulty level increase is nice and I enjoy that it is a bit harder to kill mobs.
2. The fact that they didn't correct the respec prices on launch day makes me angry.
Super Sidekicking is what CO has already. No need to wait or anything!
#2 is the only thing thats got me concerned.
Yeah it was too easy, but if you do so much at once, at least give a free respec so you can adjust to the changes.
From what I heard, there were alot fo lvl 38-40 before the end of the Head Start program. I know I saw several level 35, level 38 around MC.
I think the issue isn't the nerf/buff changes as much as people who paid extra for something special (head-start) feel like they've lost out a bit because without the free-respec, which is generally accepted in the mmo-verse where applicable when major changes occur, they feel the head-start was a waste of time.
Fortunately, I've learned my lesson the hard way previously: Never pre-order, don't waste money on collector's editions, don't play til the game is 6 months old, and don't play a game without a free-trial.
Launching an MMO is just too much of a massive undertaking to be a part of unless you've got money and time to waste AND you don't care that you've wasted time and money.
Head-start access came with pre-ordering the game, which costs nothing.
Who paid extra for the head-start?
Head-start access came with pre-ordering the game, which costs nothing.
Who paid extra for the head-start?
Well they went out of their way to pre-order. The point is the same. These people went out of their way to get something and because of the way the patch was handled, feel like they've lost out on what they went out of their way to get.
All I'll say is that I made a themed character and stuck to that theme when choosing my powers.
I logged in today and every single power I had was nerfed to hell and back. Some took cuts of up to 66%, rendering them effectively useless.
I have "dps" powers that now deal less damage than my endurance builder
My passive defense dropped from 50% mitigation to less than 30%
My active defense has no measurable effect.
My travel power is slow.
Pet AI is still completely broken
No respec possible
I was going to pick up my pre-order from Gamestop today. I called and canceled instead.
Well they went out of their way to pre-order. The point is the same. These people went out of their way to get something and because of the way the patch was handled, feel like they've lost out on what they went out of their way to get.
Not everyone who pre-ordered went out of their way. And anyone who did play in the head start, no matter how bad they feel their character got nerfed, got to enjoy 4 extra days of playing.
I was in beta for six months and during that time they were constantly messing with mob difficulty. (I expect that to continue ad nauseum.) Beta testing was two days a week, except for on two occasions where they left the servers up all weekend. I've played hundreds of different power combinations and completed most of the content. (By the way, the Nemesis content is largely untested and buggy.)
Power balancing should have occurred a month or more ago, but Cryptic has only been concerned about rushing the game out so they can get more money to sink into the development of STO. They kept transferring people away from CO development to STO development leaving CO with a skeleton crew of devs to try and get it 'passable' for launch.
What really impresses me (*Sarcasm*) is that they already have a planned expansion in the works. I can only imagine that it'll be the Moon zone we were told about early on, but never saw the light of day, and a couple of costume pieces and that's about it. Don't expect anything free to be added this game, it's not going to be like CoH where you get a free issue upgrade every couple months.
Even a casual gamer can get to max level in 2 weeks, then what? The Omega system? LOL!
After STO comes out Cryptic won't waste development staff on CO, but by that time nobody will be playing it anyway.
that which they have nerfed they will buff in a few weeks or months.
it takes time to balance everything out.
Its not the Moon (space) content.
Its called Blood Moon and from what I'm seeing its something for Halloween (btw its a Free Update).
www.champions-online.com/promo/bloodmoon/bloodmoon.html
* Explore the new Celestial Powerset. Use the power of the Seraphim to heal and strengthen your allies, or release the fury of the Nephilim in a battle against evil.
* Beware the Zombie Apocalypse rising in Canada! Battle against zombies in PVP, but no matter what, do not fall there. Should you die, you shall return as one of the undead horde, bound to fight in Takofanes’ name.
* Fight off ravenous werewolf packs, but be careful lest you get bitten and infected with their dark magic.
* Stand against undead heroes who once fought in the Battle of Detroit, and do your best to free their souls from Takofanes’ necromancy.
* Challenge Takofanes to drive him from our land, but beware – you must fight the dark sorcerers who serve him before you have any chance of facing the Undying Lord.
I like how their community team member Daeke told everyone basically 'I know your pissed off, play the game anyway.'
I simply don't understand why they throw these last minute changes in. They could have easily tested them in beta. Oh well, I didn't bother with the game anyway.
The way Cryptic has been going lately, players wont waste their time on STO.
Personally I tried CO and thought it was pretty shitty, it just totally lacks the fun that coh/v had. The combat was boring as hell not long after playing. The game also ran like crap on my fairly decent pc, not to mention for the ob, it took me 24 hours just to get the patch to get in cuz cryptik screwed up the actual installer and made it place files in the wrong places. Eventully they fixed it but the damage was done, and many people cancelled their pre-orders. I planned to buy CO till I actually played it and relized how bad the game was. Now I am glad I saved my money since it seems cryptic still doesn't have their act together.
You have to pay to respec your character? what type of joke game is this, i already pay a monthly fee and the box cost. It seems they can change the pwers so much and then people will have to pay a respec cost to compensate for the nerf. I wont play this game past the free month
Those are the exact changes that need to happen. Almost all of the passive defense abilities and regeneration abilities where way to stacked to make OP toons. Solid changes for the game, most people will agree with them if the tried the pvp portion of the game
This is what ticks me off. Why make a massive change like this to a game which is mainly a PvE game? I could care less about the PvPers and their constant whining about how OP powerset X/Y/Z is.
They didn't just change the Passive Defense Abilities (which I have none so I could care less), they upped the damage across the board for all mobs and nerfed most attack powers. Powers that didn't have cooldowns now have between 10 to 25 seconds cooldowns...this for a game that was supposed to have almost ZERO Powers with cooldowns.
My biggest complaint is the loose UI. I couldn't seem to keep any kind of control over the camera, and I couldn't find any way in the options to reduce the sensitivity of the controls. When I'm in the game, it feels like I'm skating on greased teflon =(
Oh I see it's an event not necessarily an expansion. When I heard someone refer to it as an expansion I just assumed it was a content expansion.
So they are finally adding a healing centric set? Not bad. I still hate the gameplay and have nothing positive to say about it, but maybe they will straighten it out eventually.
Not to wise to pull something like that on game launch. I would say they just defeted themselves. I wont lift a penny to the game now. too bad. First it was an early cut off to lifetime subs which i was considering but Soooooooooooo Thankfull they cut it off before I paid. All down hill from here.
Open Beta, headstart, 6-month subscriber. I'm seeing a lot of moaning, but seriously I'm not that bothered. I'm still enjoying the game, I just die a bit more often
It always amuses me how much rage there are on forums for a game, such as Age of Conan at launch, whereas the people in the game are quite happy. I'm very very bored of all moaning I'm seeing, some it's justified, but most of it isn't
"Balanced" systems for skill based systems have been developed. The problem lies in the design of the systems themselves. What you are describing is the same basic problem several other games had. If the developers are going to for a tank, melee dps, ranged dps, etc type setup then enough skills must be required to fill individual roles without allowing access to other role skills. Enough skills needs to be required so the someone cannot get everything, at least not everything important. Skill unlocking is also often used. It isn't a bad setup. It allows the rigid traditional extremes, the traditional classes, and the hybrids which are the shades of grey. Then the balancing act becomes one of making sure the grey areas are still attractive (which there are many ways of accomplishing this such as opening up unique desirable skills for them).
broad defense nerf because some said the game was too easy? Not every class was too easy..might toon I have at level 20 eas too easy..dual blades toon level 17 dies constantly with heal and fully leveled defense buff..now he is very frustrating to even play. Believe this to be a clumsy fix to just do a sweeping change to entire game at realease instead of fine tunning certain builds or powers. I like the game..but feel I will to wait and come back to it.
This.
The bleating of angry nerds and gloating forum-crawlers hasn't done anything to diminish my enjoyment of the game so far. But then this was never going to be a game I sink my whole life into (none are) so I find it's a lot easier and less stressful not to have an aneurism every time the devs rebalance a game.
Of all the MMOs out there, it was pretty obvious from the start that this one more than most was going to go through a helluva lot of tweaking and nerfing for the first few months as they try to find balance with such a huge amount of options. If that ruins your day, just don't play the game. Simple.
I thought about pre-ordering this game, but then changed my mind at the last minute. Gonna wait to see what happens.
I went to the forum and saw 96 pages of people complaining about the patch. WOW
LINK
One of the unfortunate side effects of the patch was my character lost all her powers.. in the middle of the tutorial zone (Sorcery based char). GM replied to my ticket stating there was no workaround and I'd have to delete the character. Might not sound a big deal but I also apparently lose the chars name, one which I've used in many previous games (and part of the reason I joined up for headstart, to reserve my favourite char names :-( ).
Have to say, from a UK perspective, I've not had much fun in CO over the last few weeks what with unplayable lag / frame rate issues and small things like this - the game is only playable for me a few hours a day due to the packet loss issue (see multiple threads on cryptics technical forum).. and those hours don't include evenings UK time.
I was really looking forward to this game and almost bought the lifetime sub - now I'm not even sure I'll continue beyond the free month. I'll keep checking in to see if things improve over the coming weeks (the problem with the lag for non-US customers is looking to be out of my ISPs and Cryptic's control to a certain extent which doesn't bode well for me and many other UK users). Shame - there looks to be a good game under the juddery headache inducing screen stutter somewhere but the addicitve, must login in and play factor that I get from other mmos has already evaporated due to the frustration:-(.
S.
I must be crazy because I am enjoying my butt off. I like this game. I really do. I like that it is more challenging now. I like that a lot of people exploited their butts off and are nerfed now. I feel fine. My builds are solid. I am functioning well and getting through content solo and in a small team when I feel like it. Nothing is world shatteringly broken. You just can't roll certain builds and plow through the game. What is wrong with that?
What I do not like is what happened to some of the people like the poor person above me. Completely losing your powers? WTH!>?!?!
I had heard that they just awarded you the base set and sent you on your merry way to have to pay a respec fee with you left the tutorial, but it appears they didn't. That is messed up. Have you posted on the official forums? Also if you were in the tutorial did you save you costume? I save every one before entering the game. That way you could delete the character and hope right in. Also they have a unique naming system that attaches a unique tag to your username. (IE there can be 15 bulverines because they are bulverine@someguy and bulverine@someotherguy to prevent just that from happening!) Did you try to reroll? That is messed up.
If you delete your character why couldn't you just just remake him/her with the same name?
I just tried it, and it works fine.
You do know people can have the same character names is CO, everything is based of you global name.
So you don't have to worry about someone taking it.
Tomorrow wwe will hear about the NGE..lmao
When I reached this line, "stuff I was screaming about in beta test...", I was thinking, 'yeah, you and about 75% of the rest of us beta testers'. However, I see that for the most part you touched upon that in your last line.
I stated within a post in another CO thread that toward the end of testing, this game still didn't feel even close to being ready for release in my eyes. It appears that a lot of those that were beta testers felt the same and stayed away from this game accordingly.
Any game is going to have it's share of items that need improvement. That much is obvious. However, having said that, the trouble with games releasing far before they are ready, is that we as a society have become so fickle and unforgiving, that the game in question gets tarnished early on to the point that the harm caused is almost irreversible. No matter how far the game has come since that point, no matter what changes or significant improvements are made, the game is ultimately doomed, unfortunately.
To the above poster, I tried creating the same character directly after deleting it and it wouldn't let me use the name - hmm maybe there is a short delay before you can - thanks for the tip, I'll give it a try again.
S.
I'm going to have to respectfully disagree on that point. Could you please sum up why in your opinion the game didn't feel even close to being ready for release? Which particular factors did it for you?
I had a great time playing the Beta, and it made me enthusiastic about buying the game. And buy it I did
So CO had a couple skills that were clearly broken in the way to powerfull direction. Allowing players to essentially never die by blocking and healing etc.
Now many players from beta saw this and thought "Man these skill is so overpowered and broken I should design my character around them"
CO then fixes those way too overpowered skills and the players who could clearly tell they were broken but designed their character around them are now bitching that what they knew was broken finally got fixed.
That about sum up what happened?
Im guessing people are whining because they've had their OP'ness flushed away from them.
I've pre-ordered the game, and i dont regret it, i'm still looking forward to the game and i'm hoping to have a blast
People are blowing the changes way out of proportion. The changes aren't that bad. The numbers on paper look a lot worse than they are. And the outcry? No worse than what you see with every patch on the WoW forums. In fact, I'd go as far as to say significantly less than that. The trolls are just having their field day. They expected "superheor" meant "godmode" and are mad to see they were wrong.
Anyone who bought the game now, let alone a lifetime sub, has zero compassion from me. There was enough info from beta testers all over to be sure that CO would undergo many changes after release. Building a char now which you can respec over and over is not really what I want to do in a MMO.
And they are announcing expansion content! Good riddance, maybe they work on the existing issues first! Its like they had nothng else to do than integrate Twitter and winamp in the late beta instead of working on the core of the game. Cryptic SO has no clue. I can understand people are desperate from the maby mediocre and bad MMOs published in the last years, but I have no understand towards people who want to sell this half baked piece of crap as a cool game. Unless you really have low expectations, of course.
What a scam. I would be highly surprised if this game lives another year.
Only thing I was upset about was the Zone chat became a QQ and whine chat. Non-stop! It was driving me crazy
The game is good. The people bitching are the same people that bitch about anything and everything in any game.
Sure I wish they had given them a full respec, but you know what? They would bitch about something else!
I have several chars, 1 is like level 30, and does have some problems, but i made another. To get to level 6 is like 20 mins, another 15 mins to get to level 8. I cant, but people made level 40 in under 3 days! Level 40 is the level cap for the game!
The game is A bit harder and it does take a bit more tactical skill now. You cant just waltz in and kill 10 mobs your level and live with full life like you did in Open Beta. But thats good. If the game was too easy theyd be no challange at all and it would get boring FAST!
The game isnt for everyone, that why theres WoW. This is a fun, fast paced game you can get in and have fun right away. If youd really want to have fun, get a teammate or join a supergroup to team up with other people. Although you can usally get on /zone chat and get a group.
The game will last another year easy, no worries on that.
Dax
Was in the last month of Closed Beta, Open Beta, and Head Start. Bought the lifetime subscription and I have no complaintes about this patch.
It did make the game harder but that was badly needed. Solo I still mow through groups of foes at my level with no downtime and and can take on up two two groups of lv +2 at once but it is now a hard fight with real risk that requires me to think about what I'm doing.
While the freeform character system means there are going to be some builds that suffer worse then others--and they should offer a full respec--overall the patch was a good thing.
Also the amount of complaining in game is much, much, much less then it is on the forms and almost totally focused on the high cost of retcon. The biggest difference I see is that more people are forming groups. I'm a solo player by nature but so far in CO I've been able to quickly join a group of random heroes about my level and kick ass--it has been so painless and fun that I find myself looking forward to being in a group for the first time ever in an MMO.
For what it's worth, I've been playing CO since closed beta and have seen the game come a long way. The most recent updates at launch were better made now than a week from now when even more people were accustomed to being over-powered. It seems to me, the devs are really trying to polish the game experience. They really do care. And that's gotta count for something.
Sure I seem to be dying more often as I patrol Snake Gulch. Sure I think more fine-tuning is in order. But overall, the game is blast to play and the game world is colorful and interesting. Even so, let the ranters and doom-sayers protest and fill forum threads from here to doorsteps of Hell. The response is invaluable. Feedback is always nice for developers, even if it is a little overblown. And when they make the next round of 'nerfs' it'll be fun to watch the panic happen all over again.
It's very interesting how a few people are expressing such rage in the forums. Can you think of an MMO launch that didn't start tweaking game balance and other elements right out of the gate? I've participated in quite a few, and I can't think of a single instance where there weren't multiple patches within the first six weeks. So why the rage? Let 'em know what you think needs more work and move on.
MMO's change. Isn't that the fun of persistent world games? I know that's why I keep coming back for more. If I wanted my game experience to stay constant, I'd still be playing Pong.
Honestly, the only people in an uproar are those that already had something against the game before it launched, and their attitude only got louder and worse, and the best way they have decided to deal with this problem is to scream at the people still playing, and rage in every other gaming community.
The response is actually disgusting.
The response is being met by Cryptic giving refunds to lifetimers and 6month subs if they call customer service and request it. Anyone unhappy enough with the game should pursue those means and let them know why you are cancelling.
More like..they knew a few abilities were overpowered..so rather than nerfing those abilities..they tweaked the base numbers in the spreadsheets that govern the numbers for ALL powers in the game, and since they never bothered writing software tools to monitor changes , this had a side effect of cascading down to a bunch of unrelated powers and Cryptic themself has no idea what did or didnt change and have admitted as much.
That about sums it up.
People that have no issue with this patch (So much) are all saying the same thing... we need a respec.. I say why? because your gimp now? Because your "build" doesn't work as effectivly? Why is that?
See my point, I shouldn't have to respec shit if it ain't broke, guess what, it's broke. I don't want to respec to be some awsome build, I want to play as I did before for the spec I picked was the one I deemed the most fun, not the one that will be the winner for the game.
Their own adverstiment says "Creat the hero YOU want" I say what does that mean? I can't now because my build (The hero i want) isn't viable. That says it all.
Well theres so many things that are still messed up. but..
"Also, drop rates were increased up to four fold today. So players should find tons more loot to use, trade, or even deconstruct."
LOL.. 4 levels later.. ONE DROP. ONE. I just read this and just posted a bug telling them .. 4 levels and only ONE drop. Why am I playing? Crafting is the easiest .. its just not fun at all. And yes drops help ALOT.. lmao.. but ONE in 4 levels.. and that was TONS of grinding to just get drops.
Its just small. 100 people max in a instance.. yes the whole thing is all instances. You cant join a server . there is none.. maybe one. Theres like 20 instancs going from 25-99 people in them.. So not many playing.. its been getting less and less.
But dont try it yet.. it really needs time. Master villains are easy.. and villains ..some.. its just strange.. are like God mode. Just today my one power.. shoots blanks.. Well I keep trying to use it.. 15times one after the other and did nothing.. so yes one patch fixed something but broke something like that.
Here is a list of the patch changes that happened on launch day as compiled by players since Cryptic won't release the details.
Props to Goryus on for compiling these on the main forums here:
http://forums.champions-online.com/showthread.php?t=49491
Patch Changes.
- All Offensive passives reduced in effectiveness by 66% (+115% -> +45%)
- All Offensive passives defense 66% (24% -> 8%)
- All Offensive actives changed to apply cool-downs to other actives
- All Offensive actives effectiveness increased by 12% (48% -> 60%)
- Nanobot Swarms reduced in effectiveness by 66% (-90sec -> -30sec)
- Field drones heal drastically reduced (appears to be on cool down timer)
- Field drones energy cost increased
- Eyebeams damage drastically reduced (100-300 damage -> 60-80)
- Field surge graphic no longer plays if you have PFF
- Mini-guns teflon coating no longer stacks
- Incisive wit advantage for Kinetic Darts now puts Ego Surge on cool down
- Ego Choke has added 15 sec cool down
- Pyre endurance cost increased
- Ego Stom damage dropped 33% and energy cost increased 100% (15/tic -> 30/tic)
- Arc Lighting damage dropped 50% (700max -> 350max)
- Bonus quest experience for completing higher level quests removed
- Overall quest experience dropped
- Overall mob experience raised
- Healing items had their effectiveness dropped by approximately 66%
- Probably a bunch more that have yet to be discovered.
This is in addition to things that could be considered part of the 'announced' changes:
- Regen no longer crits
- Healing on regen cut in half (272 -> 145)
- Defensive boost from items cut in half
- PFF dropped 40% health, lost 50% recharge rate
- Invuln boost cut in half
- Defiance boost cut in half
- Resurgance dropped by 66% (2000 -> 800)
- Lightning Reflexes weakened (no numbers available)
- Masterful Dodge cut similarly (270% -> 190%)
Meanwhile, the single biggest problem in gameplay (chaining knockbacks or holds to keep mobs from ever doing anything, or other players in PvP) has still not been addressed. Even though people have been complaining about it for months. Also, Skarn's Bane and Telepathic Reverberation still don't do anything, and mindful reinforcement still doesn't actually stop any damage.
End of Patch Notes.
Several powers are still totally broken and do nothing at all. The Field Drones mentioned above do not scale as you level (meaning that the amount of healing they do at level 1 is all they will ever do from level 1 to 40).
It's not a complete list but there are no official patch notes for what went live on launch day. Cryptic didn't think it was important to release the patch notes to players, which is one of the main reasons a lot of players are peeved.
LOL
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Have fun with that.
It's part of the balancing process.
While I don't agree with dropping that hefty of a patch immediately into game (Should have been a test server first), it was a very necessary patch.
As to that.
I didn't realize you expected them to fix every bug in the game on day 1.
For MMORPG that started not even a week ago is incredibly stable and bug free. And it is (at least for me, my no1 is still of course WoW, but I love to play also Aoc, War, Lotro, ....) incredibly addictive and fun. One can design separately even single eye or any limb of his superhero.
Of course ... there are many problems to address, maybe on top list I would put unability to respec all powers and this for **normal** ammount of currency. Then pets would be much better if would be automatically dismissed in flight and then automatically resummoned. As nearly in any game I have played playing with pets is not fluid. Sometimes they just stay and not react, etc.
All in all ... im not sorry for single euro I have payed for client + 30 days free included. I'm not rich ... but I can not understand people making from this money problem as if they were buying new computer for 1000$.
Hmm ... not that is addictive and fun only because of design. :-))) Fun is playing, powers are fun, quests are good, environment, feeling in game, ....
Okay let me put it simply, I logged on before the day one patch early morning, my char NOT a power build, not the strongest i'd been playing fine for a week in early start, maybe abit too easy and abit too much xp, i was still dying btw.
Then I log on after the patch, all of my abilities nerfed AND all of the mobs/npc's harder so lets say they increast mobs difficulty by 50% and reduced my powers by 50% that caused a 100% difference.
That is why people were so angry
I am no longer a champion its now civilians online
I was in the closed beta for months too.
Let me assure everyone that all beta testers went on about balancing issues all the time (and other issues). Many, including myself stopped testing all together.
Cryptic had the attitude that they are going to make it the way the wanted it and that it would be all right on release. Their argument to testers was that "they saw everything" and players only saw what they wanted to see.
I know its no "city of heroes" but the game play is so different, so linear and boring that I doubt i'd ever buy it anyway.
I would guess that the vast majority of paying players joined the game after the Open Beta had ended. So to them the game is just the way it is.
When I was in Open Beta the game was fun, I'm now a paying customer, and the game is still fun. I think it was a solid launch. It's an unfortunate situation that MMO's always seem to get launched with a bag full of problems. But the industry is slowly learning. The number of times the servers have gone down unannounced, or I've had issues logging in, or been kicked from the game I can count on one hand. And that seems to be a general feeling from those who play the game. Other than a few mission bugs and the whole retcon issue, things are not too bad in my opinion (or maybe I'm just a bit easier-going!)
If people are complaining about gaps in content only a few days after go-live I'd suggest it's the wrong MMO for them, and ask what they actually expected in that short amount of time. If people have that much time on their hands (40-50 hours to level Cap in 6 days since Euro launch) this is not the game for them.
It's not really acceptable launching a huge patch on Day 1, as it just smacks of being poorly conceived and a knee jerk reaction - but it wasn't game breaking, and one thing is for sure - things will change again.
To those on the fence with this game I would definitely keep an eye on it - it has the potential to become something extremely fun if you get out of that Everquest/WoW mind set - this is not a hardcore MMO in the sense that there are few rewards for Raiding etc, and unlike WoW the game does not begin at level Cap (which does raise the question of longevity, but I'm sure that will be addressed in time). Those who love to grind for Epic gear will be disappointed. What you'll find in CO is similar to CoX, it's as deep as you want it to be (up to a point) and fun to dip in and out of. It seems like the devs can get on with adding content and further improving the experience rather than firefighting server/shard/usual launch issues.
I haven't purchased this game... Being the UBER fanboi of gaming in general that i am i have been traveling across the US hitting cons/ect. Today i'm home and celebrating my birthday and i read this...
It should come as NO SURPRISE that OPENING DAY had a patch that "fix't stuff"
As for the comment "whats open beta for" its to make sure the game will stand up, NOT BE PROLIFIC OUT OF THE BOX!!! if that was the case there would be tons more hits and tons less misses...
no MMo can pul that off... there is just too many builds out there. unless they beta test every system and you just cant do that. from what iv gathered these changes were mecahnic based - fair enough- bad form on cryptics end on not awarding points back for builds... even the evil empire WoW does that they they start oogling your class goodies too much!
I have a lot of hope for this game... one of them was that maybe the QQ would stay in another game i guess somethings will never change... If you dont like it dont subscribe, call up the company let htem know how displeased you are with your purchase and im sure theyll be happy to return your money - the games less than a week old.
The problem with gamers is if they like a game they will play it. If that game discovers a cure for cancer, the population that doesn't have cancer will be QQing because the game didn't discover a cure for (insert illness or issue here).
Never seen an mmo that did not have problems of some kind at launch from big to small, it is a brand new game, it will have some gowing pains, all games do, after fixes the next big complaint will be not enough end game content, thats always in there in about a month.. Thats why I never rush out to be the first on any mmo...if your new to the mmo world if you can't get use to change mmo's might not be for you... :) Expect many patches tweaks to game play and balance passes in the first 6 months to a year depends on the dev's..
Smoothest launce is probably Lotro (but I don't how the older games faired), and this patch would of probably been welcomed if a simple free respec was issued aswell. Unfortunatly for me this games need more than just a balance upgrade for it to warrent a buy as it just wasn't the game I thought is was going to be.
Anyway, I hope Cryptic can pull this off and let the game be a success (by that I mean actually making a profit) because I'm not sure if the box sells are that great. Anyway hopefully the 360 version will be more fun playing with a controler but even then the game still needs to improve on content.
I'd like to issue a challenge to all the whiners who claim their build is no longer viable. Let's see em, post your specs so the community can judge whether or not you're full of crap. All the above people who have cried like Cryptic stole your wallets, lets see your specs so the rest of us can see just how 'gimped' you are. Playing alot of these builds I haven't seen anything that's gimped. I see builds that cannot tear through the game at lightning speed. I'm assuming by gimped you're just mad that you can no longer solo the game in 3 or 4 days. So lets see em. Post those gimped specs that no longer allow you to kill a single thing if you have the guts or at least tell us why you feel gimped. Like the internets said, pictures or it didn't happen.
Generally speaking, the launch day patch mostly affected those who leaned heavily on their passive powers. It used to be that all you had to do was take a passive defense, maybe advantage it up a little, and now you can pretty reliably tank about a half-dozen to a dozen foes without much fear of death. Now, if you want to tank, you need to take more than one power to do it with.
I've had some pretty lengthy discussions with the people on the Chmpions Online forum, and those who were in an Uproar were generally the minority, and were basically hung up on self-destructive thought processes that once something has been put in the game it will never change. Which, of course, is totally wrong if you have any idea of how MMORPGs are built: they are perpetual works in progress in which anything can change, and this is what makes them interesting and worth $15/mo.
So, the people who were lost by this launch day patch were largely a lost cause and the developers sure aren't going to miss them because apparently these people were hoping to strangle the game to death from stagnation.
See you later, chumps - have fun strangling Aion to death. Oh, and a little tip: you guys should probably stick to single player, non-subscription-based games if you want ones tha never change.
There is such a thing as going too far - changing the game so radically that it plays nothing like it did before. See: Star Wars Galaxies NGE. However, simply making the game a little harder is very far from that.
Never played it. Never will.
From Daeke: So please, hop into the game and play for a while so that we can get the hard evidence for our next step.
Nice idea, except of course people whose toons were badly affected by this couldn't hop onto the game and play it because the second they stuck their now defenceless head out of the door, a newly heavily buffed enemy lopped it off with a single swipe. My only option was to delete and start over. It rendered the early start completely wasted. And they're not done yet, there are more nerfs coming.
I haven't yet decided if it's best to avoid levelling toons to high levels for now so they can be deleted without too much time wasted or just go for it and hope they fix the respec system so it's affordable.
This is so true. I played the game in beta and I am loving the game once it’s live. Tell me a game where I can kill an elite/master villain NPC and 2+ adds/BaFs/henchmen without CC or Healing. I can do this after the so called “nerf” the game makes you fill like a super hero. Seems everyone wants the “I hit 2 buttons so everything should die.” For my play style this game is a sign of relief.
Hehe... I am reading this, and...I smile.
I will never accept any nerf to my characters, period. So, it is a good thing I am not playing yet.
See, why I am playing a game where I INVEST thousands of hours on 1 character, always advancing this character, if this advancement is subject to constant changements based by the whim of the devs? If you want to nerf and change rules, why bother with levels in the first place? Remove the grind completely or enforce and support your rules, once and for all, either way totally, but not both.
For me it is time Cryptic answer this basic questions: Levels and rigidity, or game rules change which may alter the game completely and no grind at all. Those walking in the middle of the road, they get slammed.
You have to reach a point where there is a choice, levels/grind or nerfs/majorgamechanges. Changing the rules AFTER player grinds is a slap in the face of those players, it is a: we don't care about your FUN.