New Player Experience Leveling

So I've been leveling a new character, which I haven't done in quite a number of years. I was thinking of making her my level skip, but I decided to have fun leveling her. I do have a few complaints about the leveling process, but I also have a few things that I wanted to praise. I'm not to 30 yet, but I'm almost there.

So it to not end on a sour note, I'll start with the negatives. Please note, I know what I'm doing as I've played this game since free to play. I've leveled many characters since. Just not in a long time. So don't @me about being a noob or something. I'm looking at this as a player who might be new.

• There is no clear instructions on how to handle your journal tab. You can easily get lost. No seriously, the journal tab is way worse than it was when I started the game. There are too many things that steal the focus on what to do and where to go. Some of it is due to new features added to try and give the player the ability to benefit from it. Like the free DLC mark. Some of it is because there is no explanation on how to go back to the one you are working on. It's funny, I remember how they streamlined it to work better with the launch of the PS4 to a linear progression, but I feel that they may have stepped it too far and it's conflicting with actual progression.
• The difficulty of enemies just were not balanced correctly. I may not have problems not dying, but I can see a new player could end up getting the wrong inclination when they fight an enemy that dies in 2 hits then go into the next area that doesn't and hits 3x harder. It's like they thought of only the 0-10 quest and gave up in the teens.
• This leads to the next one, the objective counts are skewed weirdly. I can definitely know that they lowered the counts on a lot of objectives, but oddly, some don't. It's weird. I can only have to do like 3-5 things in one mission, then go to another mission and it's suddenly 15 things, then back to 3-5. Like wut? That's just cruel.
• Event & DLC quests. I'm not sure if it's somewhere I can't see, but the only way to get into the current Event or DLC's area is to use your warp. Which is fine, to an extent, but definitely confusing for a new player. Also, eventhough I could go to the House of Legends, I could actually NOT interact with the Orrey. Everytime I got close enough to press E on it, I got teleported back to the Foyer. I just couldn't help but laugh and I wonder if the problem I have when I get that on my main is not due to collision lag, but CR lag. When you reach the Orrey, it can't tell what CR you are and sends you back.
• The linear progression is actually hindering some of the storylines that the leveling gives you. Like, this game was lush with storylines, it's too narrow. This was a negative that I gave out back when GU30(?) I think was being done.
• Loot that comes from box/boss choices don't help you in leveling, since the better piece could be the support role. This isn't a problem with the clamp, but is a problem with leveling. So there is a lot of luck there. It teaches the wrong kind of gameplay.

Here are the positive stuff:

• The return of extra XP from outside sources. This is something that I missed when they changed to linear progression. Doing Event and DLC quests actually give a good amount of XP for turning them in. My character is level 28 and I should be level 21/23 based on my journal. (Just finished Riddler/Deathstroke quest.) I like this a lot. It feels good to get gains from this.
• Loot outside of your questline rewards scale to CR. Which is actually good. I know I mentioned above about the choices issue, but this is also a good thing too. You can get some good gear fresh out of the level 30 box that can help you when you are going into higher content. (Though it's all clamped now, but still, your role benefits.)
• The amount of content a new player can do, even before they are at EEG, is actually significant and I definitely appreciate that. Especially when events that give gear are active, like the Anniversary Event. It's sad there isn't more. I mean, this game wants you to play it, right? More is better.

Here are just some stuff that can be good or bad as final thoughts:

• Leveling the player I get a better feel of freedom when doing stuff. I'm not worried about rotations, meta artifacts, etc. I chose using my weapon and forward and backflip attacks. It helps thematically to my character and I'm really enjoying it. It's sad that once you step into the End Game scene, that all changes. You have to think about how much damage you can do or how your support role works. This is a superpower themed game based on DC Comics lore, but I think that freshness was lost along the way.
• I lament of how our DLC structure is. We used to have content that had so much story to them, but now they are very limited and short. I don't know if it really had to do with the lack of Creative Director or just the changes to player wants, but the game was definitely a more lush story driven game.
• I wish things that we have in end game was more accessible.
  • Augments don't come into the picture until you are almost level 30.
  • The armory system doesn't come until after you get your lair.
  • The lair system is costly for a lot of the themes/locations, which I get thematically why, but really serves no true purpose.
  • The lair generator system is just a mess and really a new player wouldn't even know what to do with it.
  • Artifacts happen when you can go to the HoL, but holy heck they are not worth touching being so costly. The pittance they give you free to start would be a bad choice and don't get me started on the ones that you choose to start with. Only one is "okay" for a solo player. 2 of the choices are for a buff controller.
  • Allies should be given right after your first mission off the ship. No seriously, this is something that I think should be integrated in your leveling quests, not when you are way higher and trying to figure out where to go next. Having Oracle as your ally would give some help while leveling and thematically enjoy it.

My actual final thoughts. I have been having fun. Something I haven't done in a long time. New content is enjoyable, but I really do see why I had a lot of friends that would level a character to 30, delete them, and start over again.

NOOB!!!!!

Speaking on the Journal not being super clear. I remember when I leveled my very first toon (late 2011) I got to a point where I didn't have any new missions and it seemed like i couldn't progress any further. I mean all the missions in my journal were green now and not gray...that means they are complete...right? Let me click one...well son of a...

The content to levelling up is not so bad, i really enjoy it and used to do it often to the point i knew the entire questlines, where to go next and instead of going to police stations i would go to base and teleport from there. The one thing that always did make me think though is "What if i was a new player. Would i have struggled here?"

The content itself does not need to change, its the way information is given to the player. A simple "Guide Book" option in a menu somewhere that has key points and mechanics of the game. An example could be power interactions

Click menu > Guide log > Power Interaction:

"Power interactions can help improve damage by applying power related status effects to the target. Enemies effected by specific power interactions related to your chosen power will take increased damage from various skills".

Another thing that could be added is a more indepth power description. in the past i have suggested to remake the descritpions of the powers and instead put meaningful info into the bar instead of describing what a power does. Example being:

Arc lighting:
Cast an arc of electricity into your target. If more targets are within range, the bolt will also arc to them dealing damage.
Casting Arc Lightning will heal you. If you are stood near the target, Electricity will arc to you, healing you once more.

Base Damage: 50
Base Healing: 20
Power cost: 200

[Stun]
[Applies (Power interaction)]
[Deals increased damage to targets efflicted by (Power interaction)]

I agree with most of this as I too recently leveled a new toon.

For the artifact though...
If you have 10 marks when doing that mission, pick one of the three he gives you but dont level it for the rest of the artifact mission. Instead, buy one from him in HoL, and use the stuff he gave you to level the one you bought, and it still completes that mission.

Tell me about it. It actually gets worse now, but there is a lot less missions, I guess.

Adding more information available wont help a new player if they don't know what that information means.

Also, they already have a bit more information in the power tooltips than they did originally post revamp. So, there is that. More information there helps more knowledgable and experienced players, doesn't help a new player. This also doesn't really touch on post End Game, when you really should learn your role. In a way, Stats Revamp kinda hit this even worse, since there are no longer pre level 30 alerts. Originally, you gained access to alerts when you hit level 10, now you have to wait until post 30. (Save the event instances, which technically don't count since they are stripped down player boosted versions of content.)

From memory, I don't even think it sends you to the watchtower anymore while leveling, right, despite the fact there's technically missions in there.

Those old centres feel more and more redundant since HOL, perhaps it's time to move everything and delete them.

The artifacts are ideal to demotivate to create new characters, to start all over again that in addition to having to remount the same ones the 3/4 of the time, that does not give any more desire to make new characters or only has farm objective.
I will always repeat that it should be linked to the account, not by an illusionist system, but linked to the account, in order to find a real way to end this and not discourage players from rerolls which is sometimes necessary to have when most of the players are not there at the end of DLC.
Artifact Allies and Collection should be linked to accounts for the simple reason that real money is used in this and one should not have to repeat one's purchases/levelling!

What I didn't mention is that I had an artifact cache from an alt that I used to get NVB to rank up. lol But you are right, I could have wasted marks on that. Instead I used them to buy Krypto. He's such a good boy. Way better use of marks leveling.

Yeah, they removed the faction HQs. You go to the HoL now instead. I actually think retiring them might not be a bad thing as well. They could reuse those maps for something else. Like maybe a quest giver shared space for a DLC or something. Similar to how they did Kahndaq for the current DLC. I don't mind reused maps for new content. I mind reused or bland stories with way too simple content as new content.

I thought about doing this a while ago, but decided against it as the LAST toon I leveled properly, I remember being very disappointed in how easy it was vs when I first played and leveled 9 or 10 times through 1-30, back when I only had 1 DLC and premium access to keep me busy. Yes, a few toons were created, leveled and deleted, in favor of choosing a different faction or mentor just to see how things played out in that run through....something I don't ever see doing again.

Almost all the changes we've seen in the leveling, some of which you point out above, shorter mission goals, bonus piles of XP from event/seasonals, the ability to avoid huge pieces of storyline, CR skips for zod's sake...all are due to the 'new meta' of getting people to endgame as soon as possible, even though it A) generally produces poorer players (for a while at least) and B) detracts from the overall experience on someone's 1st experience in game. Why? Well, because there is no reason to spend money at 1-30, or even up to 250-300 or so. Yeah you CAN spend money to gear up, but there is no reason too. Artis, augs, allies, SP for the most part are NOT needed till you hit endgame, and all those low levels do is remind me it feels like you are a sheep, being funneled through the gates to the eventual 'sheering' at the end.

You know the old saying 'it's not about the destination, it's the journey'? Well, not true anymore. This game has completely turned into a 'destination' game now. And hey...I'm there, so it is what it is, but for a new player? I can see issues, for sure.

Yeah, for most toons the 3 default choices are not great (buff trolls aside), so I make my choice, then buy one from Johnny C or crack open one of my many, MANY unused artifact caches I have in my storage and pick one to level for the mission complete. Honestly most times I have a bottled city laying around and will go straight to that one.

Wait for everyone to lose their collective panties when the old walkins are removed though, especially FOS3 》8D

That was actually one of the paths they wree going to choose.. but decided against it

Eh, it's not quite to the "destination" part yet. There is always new content. I do agree that they are pushing people up to where they can make money. New content is new content after all. And if a player is returning or just joining and wants to fight alongside Black Adam, you can't expect them to go through 6 tiers and 43 DLCs to do it. I really did like the event version for that purpose. I just wish it wasn't too hand holdy. The instances are so stripped down, it's kinda interesting. I'd also think they should treat it like they do SFF event. Where it is automatically clamped, but also make it the same exact mechanics as a regular, but I know that can be a bit much for new players.

Eh... If they are worried about that, they can put a catch all walk in portal in the HoL. Just have the group leader go in first and everyone else can follow. That or get rid of walk ins, they don't do them anymore anyways outside of a solo. (WV solos come to mind.)

Players are going to complain no matter what the devs do.

I was actually going to point that out. I don't really see the 'advantage' to tearing them down though....most days there are still a few phases of each older place with duelers and honestly, I'll be in there many times when I know I won't be turning in a mission to Steveo or using the Orrey....it's much quieter in the WT/HOL seeing as MOST of the people there are not the noobs and gold sellers.

Granted, my base is even quieter, but I still frequent the HOL from time to time.

BTW...that brings up a question. Are there faction vendors in the HOL? Like the ones we have in each wing of the old HQs? Never really looked for them, but as I had a toon max Wayne renown last week, I did go to WT to pick up the emblem to polish off that feat...wouldn't even know where to look in the Hall of hallways er Legends.

And if you really want to put a nail in the PvP coffin, get rid of those 2 locations with phase shifters...that'll do it.

I'll have to reread it deeper soon, but immediately that first bulletpoint stood out to me. I once got my dad to make a character and play around a bit just to share in something important to me (not expecting him to become a regular player or anything but just kinda "here's the game I'm always playing") and he was pretty confused by how the mentor missions were supposed to work or how to know what direction to go to get to stuff. I kept having to remind him that he's finished this bit and beat all the enemies it asks him to in that section and such and to go to the next bit and point out the minimap and the little arrow on it and that the little cone connected to the circle that represents where you are is an indicator of what direction you're facing and also occasionally that he'd need to open the journal and actually hit complete and such and it was kinda difficult trying to tell where and how much to step in and say something and where and how much to just let him struggle a bit and figure it out himself. Granted, part of this is that he hasn't played many video games or played them very often or for very long at a time since like.... YEARS ago, mostly because he simply doesn't get much chance or time to really sit down and play. He wants to, don't get me wrong, but it's not very practical for him unfortunately. And the last game I can remember him playing before then was like half a year or so ago and it was the Resident Evil 2 remake, so..... pretty wildly different games lmfao. So all of that definitely does contribute, but the game could still also definitely stand to make some things like that clearer to newcomers somehow. Doesn't need to be anything complicated, just some little touches to help remind newer players here and there. It does have those pop-up things but they really only show up once, so it could be helpful to have some gentle reminders here and there continually for if they just can't remember what it told them to press for a particular thing hours of gameplay ago. Not the big popups, though, more along the lines of the "press (whatever button it is for you) to open your journal and select your next mission" thing that shows on the side where the mission progress thing goes when you don't have a mission selected and active or you need to hit complete on one.

Everytime I level up a new character I ask myself would I even know this as a new player? The game is extremely confusing when you start out. My luck was I was introduced to the game by a friend, so he showed me what to do. There was a lot I had to discover on my own, too. It's Abit frustrating.

Not all the vendors are present, a heap of it is though, but they're also not necessarily the same vendor, so it can get confusing.

If they were to delete WT/HOD then there'd be work involved for sure.

I think I leveled my first toon up a lot in pvp.... I guess that ain't a thing no more

There is vendor behind the mentors on both sides of wing in HoL where you can buy all the styles. They sell the stuff for all three factions.