Stat Clamp Choice

Don't forget, loot costs Daybreak money, feats do not. Also I'm not suggesting 1 shotting bosses, as that was never really the case. Old content elite feats were still very often tough as nails to get before the clamp. And the idea of getting stronger to be able to accomplish and conquer those feats from older content, was always fun in many player's eyes.

Considering they already have both types already created, it kind of is. Bring back the old system, and incorporate the new one, but optional with the click of a button.

Perfect example.

"Sealioning
Sealioning is a type of trolling or harassment that consists of pursuing people with persistent requests for evidence or repeated questions, while maintaining a pretense of civility and sincerity. It may take the form of "incessant, bad-faith invitations to engage in debate". The term originated with a 2014 strip of the webcomic Wondermark by David Malki.

*agree but had to say below*


Well I must be pretty smart because I read/comprehend your posts allll by myself lol

I understand what you mean. Sometimes I like the idea of ​​not having the stat clamp, sometimes not. When I didn't have the stat clamp it was good, but after a while it was boring. Too easy.

I don't know if removing the stat clamp would make the Omnibus better. But I don't play using Omnibus because I don't have time to wait for someone to play. I only play to win the marks weekly, sometimes not.

One major issue is there are plenty of feats gated by content that no one does. Unless the devs increase the incentive to actually play older, outdated instances, a large portion of the player base will not even bother touching it because they know getting a group together timely is a fruitless and time consuming endeavor.

Again, how is this efficient or enjoyable for the average (casual) gamer which happens to be thr bulk of the people who play? Saying that people are not investing enough time or not doing enough to get a competent group together is a joke and a lame cop out.

The average/casual player doesn’t need or want to achieve 100% of feats, in my opinion. That’s where I think we differ in opinion. Being a completionist and being casual are different in my mind. If you want 100% of feats, you’re willing to bang your head on a wall to achieve them all.

How does loot cost Daybreak money exactly?

Not quite. I think you're selling the average player a bit short.

I see plenty of people calling for help and groups in LFG for older content and that leads me two guess why:

1 They are actually interested in the content and the storylines
2 They want to get styles, investigations/briefings and collections and yes, feats

Problem is they usually end up giving up because they either don't get enough interest or the group ends up abandoning (it's happened to me).

Now if I had the option to just do it solo as I am presently it would greatly increase my desire to play older content and even help out others too.

But with the current version of the clamp it ain't gonna happen how the devs envisioned it to play out.

I asked in LFG once what people thought about the clamp. Small sampling but most that responded said it should be optional and not forced. It keeps them from wanting to do older content. Take this with a grain of salt but I would safely assume if DCUO took a poll, the majority of players would be in favor of an optional clamp than what it is in its current state.

I understand. It could be a path, but I don't totally agree because it makes the game very easy. Who has more SP does more damage than the other, even with the stat clamp. Same goes for the other items, right? Perhaps they should increase this difference. But a player doing a solo raid doesn't make sense.

I answered before reading your answer. Seeing this way it can be a good idea, you can do the game content yourself because you don't have someone to play with. I've been through that. I didn't play a lot of old content because I had stopped playing years ago. I tried to make the episode of Batman Who Laughs and I couldn't find anyone to do it.

There were more than a few complaints before clamping that there was no reason to go back and run old content, and "no Marks" was a frequently cited complaint. On top of that there were frustrations expressed by parts of the player base that they were stuck only being able to run three episodes of content to gain Marks.

Had the clamp not been put in place, endgame players would still be stuck in the latest three episodes for Marks and I personally would probably be limited to Riddled with Crime, Earth-3 and Deluge (with Death of Superman maybe still available to me) to get Marks for progression and other things.

We got Marks added back into all content. The whole game was opened up for play as a result. And best of all, we didn't see an increase in prices for aspects of the game/gear that requires Marks as the currency.

Whether or not it moves the needle or you think it moves the needle, those are all universal benefits that came with the clamp. And they very likely wouldn't have come without the clamp because the devs made it clear repeatedly that they did not want to reward players with Marks for running content that was absolutely and totally irrelevant to them in terms of challenge.

Ten years ago I would totally agree with you. But now, the landscape of MMOs has changed so much and still continues to evolve and cater more to solo play and the casual gamer.

I think I can safely say that when people in general think of top/popular MMOs, DCUO isn't going to be in the top 3 (or 5) that's mentioned, so what is DCUO doing to be creative and innovative, especially for a 10 year old game that's more akin to old school MMO philosophy (timesink = good MMO)?

If the plan is to eventually shelve it for DCUO 2.0 a few years down the road then they should make as much of this game as enjoyable and <i>accessible</i> as they can in my opinion. Because if they do, who does it really harm? In the end, they attract and retain players ultimately holding their bottom-line steady which is not their overall care for the well-being of the gamer but profit and revenue.To think otherwise is not just unrealistic but naive, bordering ignorance.

Yeah it's definitely a damned if you do, damned if you don't position the devs find themselves in.

I played DCUO during the beta, all through launch and stopped in 2013. I came back this Oct and had to start from scratch so my perspective is definitely skewed towards new and returning players versus someone who's been at endgame since launch. Perhaps that is the disconnect with the clamp and why there will never be balance because what seems sensible to one isn't for another.

With that in mind, I go back to my previous suggestion -make the clamp optional. Play clamped it's exactly as it is today. Toggle clamp off nothing but investigations/briefings, collections, chests (for styles), and feats. Nothing else. No loot from bosses and most certainly no source marks.

To me this seems like the most practicable solution.

I think maybe give the clamp a little more time to produce results before demanding a reversion back to the prior system be partially implemented, thereby undermining the manifestation of those results. We've operated without a stat clamp for almost 11 years now. I think we can give it more than 3 months to establish itself as a system, and let some of those other factors of awareness sink in to the playerbase at large.

One of the big complaints right now is Feats - how will we get Feats if we can't steamroll old content? You'll get them the old fashioned way - people will have to learn mechanics and you're not gonna be solo-carrying an entire Raid based on your CR anymore. If you know how it works, you're gonna have to teach people how it works. USB keyboard is 12 bucks at Walmart. You have a mic.

For everyone here who ever bitched about the floating pool of end-game CR players with 15 SP and the functional collective direction of housecats on PCP, THIS IS HOW WE MAKE THEM BETTER. Now they actually have to run it right.

And even with that, I still haven't seen any of the real horrorshow stuff happen - no 3 hour uptime in a Raid with 40 names in the list or any of the old indicators of "First time Raid participants" we used to have back in the day.

So I'm not concerned about it. About the only concession I WOULD suggest is walk-ins for everything, and even at that? I'm low-key okay with the idea of keeping those clamped too.

I have played since launch. I stopped and came back several times, I really like the game and I don't think it's bad. Now making the game easier won't please everyone either.

Because they want you to purchase replay badges, usually.

Edit: I forgot all that crap is free now for older content but still makes more sense to have to be clamped to earn the loot.

A simple solution would be to add a teleporter where 1-8 players can walk into any old content unclamped.

IDK. when i play a lot of the stuff clamped it just takes a tad longer but isn't difficult. I am noticing that when I queue up, it seems the quick ones pop first.

And if all the feats that were out there were 1 time, 'skill' based feats, I'd be onboard with you. However, many are not, and these are the feats that suck under the clamp....not the 'skill' ones. It takes no skill to complete 'Artifact finder', or the 250 bottle duos or 500 CC bounties, or at some point...the 'Rouges Round Robin'...when it goes clamped. What it takes is time....time to make a group...time to queue...time to run. And that's the thing I take objection with when looking at it from a 'new' player perspective. Getting LnW 'one pieced' is not a challenge even after the clamp....as long as you build a group. Getting 'omega-omega' is no more a challenge than when we were unlcamped...(a bit harder I suppose by virtue of NOT being able to solo it if too many fall to the beam)...AS LONG AS YOU BUILD A GROUP. You want feats removed from an unclamped run....but why on unskilled feats? You think 250 bottle duos are 'earned' weather it takes 8 min per run vs 3 min? Yep...big challenge, sure worth the 2 star reward to spend hours upon hours chasing just that one feat. Again, I go to 'artifact finder' as a prime example. That checklist might take 10-20 or 50 runs to complete and requires 0 'skill' just participation...so why shouldn't someone be able to complete it unclamped? Oh, because WE had to spend 20-50 30 min runs...so should everyone, right? 50 2 man walkins would take enough time that many wouldn't get it done....much less 30 min fail fests in Omni groups or 50 put together walk-ins.

What if they could get a 'skill' based feat list (they could check with you and me for a definitions...right?)....and 'skill' based feats were left out of optional un-clamped runs...leaving only the 'participation' type feats? How about that compromise? And I realize that's just total speculation...but 'what if'? Would that offend you less? You know...as you are the arbiter of what's 'earning' a feat and what's not.

BTW...on that last bit about the vets dwindling, you are correct. And yes, at some point I'd guess no one will know that feats were once 'easy' (to use your words) unclamped. I'd guess around that time we'll see the era of 'feat packs' being sold where the truly daunting ones will be packaged up and sold. So yea?!