CoH to be shut down

[Redgiant]

I don't remember having to group for quests in CoH.

He is referencing some of the uber instances and taskforce (raid) quests.  Which weren't hard to join at all.  Ya know, since it wasn't the trinity.

And the fact that you wanted to group because it made things better, not because you had to group.

This.

When MMO soloing is as rewarding as grouping, most go solo - esp. the way modern MMO audiences are now conditioned. CoH gave you soloing and nice scaling instances and outdoor missions, but they also made sure group activities were more involved and epic, so you would choose them over soloing on your own. It was much more fun and hectic to scale up missions for fuller groups rather than solo them, and the xp flowed more consistently. And um, we'll ignore certain MA maps that somewhat overkilled this concept.

Having roles like Holy Trinity and designing content for role mixes isn't the problem; that creates interesing and varied content. It isn't the need for a tank or healer role, it's the fault of having a very specific class necessary to provide it. The key is to allow any class choices to effectively supply different overlapping roles quickly (RIFT and CoH both did this well, with CoH imo being more flexible with its awesome power set selections). GW2 went overboard in axing the roles themselves.

And when you do group, if it is so passive that you never say a word and can't remember one person you grouped with all day long, that says something too. Btw while I see some benefits to Dynamic Event virtual grouping, it also erodes even further any awareness of others. But it's great for soloers.

It is no conicidence that the games I vividly recall and remember player names and details of how they played, were all group-focused games with lots of typing and Vent communication, and none of them would be termed solo-friendly. And they have all lasted 6+ years. And of course all were sub games then, still enjoying the bachelor's life before being dragged to a shotgun wedding with f2p.

I remember many players and their details from early EQ, DAoC, CoH, LOTRO, yet almost nothing from Aion, AoC, WAR, SWTOR or GW2 (played for one week; which btw will end up like SWTOR but hide it better since its already f2p).

[pohsyb]

I believe this was because (and pohsyb can tell us different) CoV didn't hit its sales targets, NCsoft was shoving all its resources towards Tabula Rasa and suddenly Cryptic had to deal with a large resourcing cut. It was around this time CoV's lead Zeb Cook left and CoH/V's full-time development team dropped to about 15 people. It was also likely around this time that Cryptic realised what kind of publisher that NCsoft was and probably started thinking about its next project (which eventually became Marvel Universe Online, then Champions Online).

Pohsyb, if you can, what are your opinions of Jack Emmert?

I checked the timeline and that was around when "City of Hero" was release in Korea.  We had to do a ton of silly work for Korea  (Art had to redo lots of effects, they had to make the boy-girl looking faces and allow the body type to be more slender.  Also there were changes to targeting, movement, UI, etc.  We had to make the game playable with one hand since apparently all Koreans smoke while they play.  There were no other projects besides CoV and CoH at the time.

As for Jack...I am not a fan, lets leave it at that.

[Lantyssa]

I guess this is now the bug pohsyb thread.

The biggest argument before we started working on it was rewards.  The designers wanted it to be full simulation so there would be no rewards, just a tool for RPGers.  I was adamant that no one would use it if that were the case and constantly had to fight for it giving out rewards, farming be damned.

A good call on your part.  People like rewards, even if they're simple.

Kinda sad I never got around to Mary Sue-ing my tanker, Jersey Girl's, crusade against the 'sinister' plots of Hero Burger.

[koro]

I guess this is now the bug pohsyb thread.

Well he did ask for it. 

I'm also curious about the thought processes behind and the feelings around the office regarding Enhancement Diversification back in the day. It was such a huge deal back then, but it seems like the live team's walked back from it pretty much every issue since, starting with the introduction of Inventions.

[raydeen]

Well, all I can say is that CoH holds some of my fondest MMO memories next to EQ, not the least of which was the awesome final night of beta. And you devs went out of your way on occasion to make sure the game was playable for the vast majority even when you didn't have to. I remember there was some weird texturing bug (well, it was more like the texturing just wasn't geared for older GPUs) that turned most of the world and mobs into shadow/wireframe figures. Some enterprising individual in the community came up with a solution, submitted it to Cryptic and you guys worked with him and over the course of a month or two, those of us with some fairly poor laptop GPUs were playing and having almost as good an experience as those on desktops. I had both laptop and desktop so I wasn't out in the cold, but it was very cool that you all took the time to extend the minimum graphics range of the game. Five stars in my book. I've never had the feeling that any other MMO devs had that much kindness in their hearts.

[pohsyb]

I'm also curious about the thought processes behind and the feelings around the office regarding Enhancement Diversification back in the day. It was such a huge deal back then, but it seems like the live team's walked back from it pretty much every issue since, starting with the introduction of Inventions.

Before release it was obvious to anyone mathematically minded that the enhancement escalation was insane.  To be able to take one aspect of a power (say damage) and multiply it by three was so broken...Oh you enhanced that slow into a root, 100% damage resistance, 100% defense,  Perma-whatever.  Not to mention the incredible jumps in power ability.  This might've been mitigated had SO and DO remained drop-only (as was originally intended) because no one would be able to reliably 6-slot a power until 50 (actually 40 at the time).  However, Jack threw DO's and SO's into the stores as a last minute decision.


Adding diminishing returns was the only way to smooth the power level, and Inventions just improved on that by adding gradually increasing enhancements for every level.  Even with Inventions you cannot boost powers to the extremes allowed pre-ED.

Side note: the first player to Max level was an AR/Dev Blaster.  At the time superspeed had a 95% defense bonus and -95% accuracy penalty, the designers were worried you'd go so fast you'd run into mobs and be killed accidentally.  However, powers that actually cast invisible pets (Burn Patch, caltrops, etc) did not suffer the penalty.  So this guy enhances caltrops (which is auto-hit) with slows such that it becomes a big AE root.  Then he enhances burn-patch, also auto-hit, which 6 slotted would kill a boss if every tick hit (Burn patch did so much damage because the mobs would instantly flee it, so they'd usually only get hit for 1 or two ticks of damage).  Then he ran around, invincible with superspeed, throwing down caltrops and burn patch on every encounter he crossed.  He did not even need to wait around for them to die because there was unlimited range for kill credits.

[Ingmar]

ED, despite the whining, was one of the best/most justified needs I've ever seen in an MMO.

[koro]

ED, despite the whining, was one of the best/most justified needs I've ever seen in an MMO.

I definitely agree, even though between it and I5's global defense nerf, my old main (Broad Sword/Invuln Scrapper) was knocked down enough pegs that I never really played him anymore.

[Morat20]

I was gonna try to log in and have a last hurrah, but not only cannot I not recall my account information -- you can't even download the client anymore.

Oh well. Lord Monochrome shall rest in piece.

[UnSub]

I'm going to keep asking questions until Pohsyb says stop. 

What was the separation of Cryptic and Paragoin Studios like? Was it public knowledge internally that such a deal was being struck, or was it a surprise one day that you are offered to either stay with NCsoft or go with Cryptic?

Why did powersets go from "too expensive and time intensive for new ones" for so long, only to start being released en masse (comparatively) even before I20? Was there a technical bottleneck that was overcome, more people added, just a focus on the F2P transition that needed more powersets, or something else?

From the outside, it seemed that CoH/V had a number of potentially great systems that just fell short, but no-one went back to refine them (e.g. Gladiator combat, base building, a number of zones left hanging). Was this due to that pet project effect, or did management lack focus or get stuck in a mode where they were fighting fires all the time and not planning things out very well? (Not looking for blame here, just interested about things like introducing a construction site in Steel Canyon that never went anywhere else.)

[koro]

Also, I'll leave this here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRsj2DtLCQs

And someone wanted me to say:

This is a composite video featuring all the heroes of the players who showed up in a sign of support for Paragon Studios and CoH last weekend. It may not change anything, but it was done for all the devs, past and present as a thank you, as much as anything. So this is for you, pohsyb.

[pohsyb]

What was the separation of Cryptic and Paragoin Studios like? Was it public knowledge internally that such a deal was being struck, or was it a surprise one day that you are offered to either stay with NCsoft or go with Cryptic?

Why did powersets go from "too expensive and time intensive for new ones" for so long, only to start being released en masse (comparatively) even before I20? Was there a technical bottleneck that was overcome, more people added, just a focus on the F2P transition that needed more powersets, or something else?

From the outside, it seemed that CoH/V had a number of potentially great systems that just fell short, but no-one went back to refine them (e.g. Gladiator combat, base building, a number of zones left hanging). Was this due to that pet project effect, or did management lack focus or get stuck in a mode where they were fighting fires all the time and not planning things out very well? (Not looking for blame here, just interested about things like introducing a construction site in Steel Canyon that never went anywhere else.)

I was on the Marvel Project (which turned into Champions) at the time, but it was so awful I had been asking to go back to CoH. I was actually job seeking at the time, because I sensed the impending fail.  My boss just kept saying, we'll see because he knew the negotiations were pending.  Since they knew I wanted to jump projects, NCSoft had an offer ready for me.  Cryptic and NCSoft had a 50/50 split on the CoH IP which made doing things...hard.  So Cryptic offered either to buy it all or sell their share.  NCSoft decided to buy.  The timing was crazy because a week later Microsoft decided to pull the plug on the Marvel project.

Animators are the biggest bottle neck on powers.  Usually there was a new villain group in the works which would take the bulk of the animation time.

As for abandoned projects, probably a mixture of abandonment and the stigma of failure.  No one wanted to work on something that was not successful.  The arena was a failure, so it was hard to justify spending resources to improve it, same for SG bases.  Revisiting zones was a big investment, I think some of the construction bits artists did on free time.

Koro, Leandro is awesome, he helped me find a ton of bugs.

[UnSub]

Thanks Pohsyb.

Since you brought it up, I have to ask: in your opinion, what went so wrong on MUO / ChampO?

[Koyasha]

As for abandoned projects, probably a mixture of abandonment and the stigma of failure.  No one wanted to work on something that was not successful.  The arena was a failure, so it was hard to justify spending resources to improve it, same for SG bases.  Revisiting zones was a big investment, I think some of the construction bits artists did on free time.

To hear that supergroup bases were considered a failure surprises me; I always thought they were one of the most awesome parts of the game.  Very, very fiddly to get them looking right, and I always wondered why it was never revisited to make the construction interface better, but even with the difficulties I've seen some really amazing layouts and bases people put together.  Many of the people I knew definitely put a lot of effort into the bases and enjoyed them greatly.

[UnSub]

Bases did have massive potential and customability (iirc, someone crashed their base only after putting in 16 000+ separate objects) but the design decision about how to charge for base items through prestige put such things out of most people's reach. So it was a great system that was never fully adopted by players.

[koro]

I think most of the stigma of "failure" for bases may've been centered around the whole raiding concept and the Items of Power and all that jazz, which never panned out.

[UnSub]

True, that whole "base raid" thing never worked out.

I do remember Emmert coming out at one point talking about bases saying that it was the thing they'd spent the most time on with CoV and it was something players didn't take up. But that view seemed to ignore that rent costs were extortionate for all but the most active SGs.

[Kageru]

On my last revisit to CoH a while ago bases were pointless because, I was informed, almost everyone was in a personal super-group to get more storage. Though I missed the period at which they were even trying to make them a raid target.

They had some nice settings though, it was fun walking around the one I had access to for an evening.

[UnSub]

At one point there was some kind of base raiding for items of power put in, but it was horribly exploitable or broke something, so it was pulled iirc.

[pohsyb]

What went so wrong on MUO

- First the feel was just off.  Moving around in the world, targeting, using powers felt clunky.   That combined with bad performance at the time made testing/debugging a chore rather than a joy. 
- The art direction took a turn that I hated (that super shiny plasticy look).
- I didn't have any respect for the designers working on the project.
- The above could've been fixed, but the bigger problems was that there was no long term sight, it was all about cobbling together a facade for the next milestone review, 80% of my time was spent rushing on some feature that was likely throw-away.  (I figured it was only a matter of time before Mircosoft realized this)

[pohsyb]

On bases (to the best of my memory):
If you built a base, then put down the required items in the base, you would gain access to a Rularuu raid.
Supergroups could raid Rularuu to get an item of power, but this could only be acquired once a week.  The item of power would give buff to every member of the supergroup.
Once you acquired an item of power, your base could be raided and the item of power could be stolen.
A max size base could only hold 3 items of power, and they would only last for a month.
One problem with supergroup raids was scheduling (what happens if no one is on?), this meant there was complicated UI were you could set when your allowed raiding hours were.

I think it was a failure for two reasons.  There was a large barrier to entry so your typical player could not participate.  The original rent system meant that you couldn't even earn prestige over time, you had to keep earning it. Also, this is partly my fault, the UI to build a base was confusing.  In general, map editing is convoluted and our implementation wasn't great.  There were a lot of rules in the original editor that were there to prevent raid exploits (which never even mattered).

Later the item of power idea got dropped and they were gonna have simple SG vs. SG challenge raids that would create a map with both bases on it and the doors linked.  The backend work was done for that, I'm not sure why it was never released.

One pet idea I kept pushing was to have a SG vs. NPC raid.  It would play out like a tower defense game.  

[Lantyssa]

On my last revisit to CoH a while ago bases were pointless because, I was informed, almost everyone was in a personal super-group to get more storage. Though I missed the period at which they were even trying to make them a raid target.

I ended up using mine that way, but it had been 1000+ days since anyone else in the SG logged in, and storage was SO bloody limited for crafting.  I'd rather they had a slot system like GW2 so I could just stash everything.

I ended up with rows upon rows of crates, plus a couple of IO tables...

[Tyrnan]

Also, I'll leave this here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRsj2DtLCQs

And someone wanted me to say:

This is a composite video featuring all the heroes of the players who showed up in a sign of support for Paragon Studios and CoH last weekend. It may not change anything, but it was done for all the devs, past and present as a thank you, as much as anything. So this is for you, pohsyb.

*sheds a few tears* 

Still can't believe it's going away. A huge thank you to pohsyb and all the other great devs who worked on it over the years and let me fulfill my spandex-clad fantasies. No, the other ones.

[Kageru]

One pet idea I kept pushing was to have a SG vs. NPC raid.  It would play out like a tower defense game.  

This one seemed such an obvious and good idea. All those turrets and no dumb NPC's to shoot. And those attacks the defenders could trigger to avoid time-zone wars and player work-arounds for the limits of turret AI.

[koro]

On bases (to the best of my memory):
If you built a base, then put down the required items in the base, you would gain access to a Rularuu raid.
Supergroups could raid Rularuu to get an item of power, but this could only be acquired once a week.  The item of power would give buff to every member of the supergroup.
Once you acquired an item of power, your base could be raided and the item of power could be stolen.
A max size base could only hold 3 items of power, and they would only last for a month.
One problem with supergroup raids was scheduling (what happens if no one is on?), this meant there was complicated UI were you could set when your allowed raiding hours were.

Another problem was that there were, I believe, only a very tiny handful of IoPs per server. Some ridiculously small number like three or five.

[HaemishM]

There was a big disconnect between the Korean idea of an MMO and an American.  (CoH was released in Korea and bombed).   They gave us a presentation once on what they thought made a MMO more MMOey.  It basically came down to being able to grief someone.  My favorite section was when they were asked about Farmville, they said it wasn't a MMO, but would be a lot closer if you could go to other peoples farms and burn them down.

Remember my maxim - Koreans are literally fucking insane.

[Trippy]

pohsyb, can you shed any light on why Back Alley Brawler was let go?

[HaemishM]

What went so wrong on MUO

- First the feel was just off.  Moving around in the world, targeting, using powers felt clunky.   That combined with bad performance at the time made testing/debugging a chore rather than a joy. 
- The art direction took a turn that I hated (that super shiny plasticy look).

Those are both criticisms I've had for Champions Online.

[pohsyb]

pohsyb, can you shed any light on why Back Alley Brawler was let go?

Yeah, after they cancelled the new project and said we were going F2P, the studio head invited everyone for a 1 on 1 meeting.  Even though I thought investing more in CoH was stupid way to go, I put on a happy face and said, "Sounds great boss, I can't wait!".  From what I hear, BAB did not.

A short time later we had a round of layoffs.  The layoffs seemed to be either anyone not on board with the new F2P vision or with enough seniority to be expensive.  The department leads (art, tech, design) were not consulted.  As part of tech, we lost every server-end programmer.  BAB at the time knew more about the animation and powers system than anyone else there.  Knowledge of the game engine was lost when he left.

[Trippy]

Thanks. That makes sense now but was very shocking at the time.

[pohsyb]

Also he looks like Haemish's avatar IRL.  Every time I see Haemish I think that.

[Nevermore]

That's actually Haemish in his avatar iirc.

[pohsyb]

[UnSub]

Pohsyb, was there a turning point in either your time at Cryptic or Paragon where things could have gone differently if only another path was taken? Something that would have seen player numbers increase or CoH/V recapture public attention rather than the constant decline the game saw?

Right now CoH/V is gettnig a lot of love with the news that it is being shuttered, but it comes from people who previously played the game but haven't been recently.

[Hutch]

Is he dual-wielding nerf sticks there?