Devs Please Look 1001 Ideas To Improve Game-play Mechanics

This is a thread with game-play and mechanics ideas that may help to improve the game and make it more fun for players.

Most players and developers have played multiple games in our experiences.

Many of the games we have played may have had some fun qualities which is why we enjoyed playing them.

This thread is to try and rekindle that sense of what we could do to make the game DCUO better.

Also I think it may be good to know what ideas work well in other games that DCUO could learn from or improve on.

Ok I will start:


Idea 1
Change The Content Relevancy

Problem
Usually Devs add (Combat Rating +10) With Each DLC which if great but after players get a few pieces of gear the fun is over and the feeling of geting more powerful and getting something new for ones character is gone. The result is getting bored after loot drops max out. Players have very few options as to how they can continue to gain levels of new power for their characters.

Solution
Difficulty Meter
Creating a system not based on a single DLC making top tier content but rather making all content top tier.
Each tier would be locked until players finished content of the previous tier and attained stats, xp level needed to gain entry into the next tier.

Create a new leveling system that is based on a tier leveling system that can be applied to all content.
This could be achieved by giving players a difficulty meter 1-1000
Yes I know 1000 is really high but it needs to be high so developers don't need to keep moving the goalpost and players can always improve their characters.
Like queuing up players can choose what level they want to play at.

Idea 2
Finding Stuff In Walk Ins/Dungeons
With each level all kinds of random benefits can be found by the players.
Finding new random stuff is fun!
Players can have fun finding xp, finding new powers, unlocking new abilities, gaining good and bad renown through actions, enhancing new skill trees, styles, auras, personality types, and finding new gear. etc etc
Players can find all of the above by farming walk ins and defeating random bosses.

For example each tiered level would double the chance of cash earned and xp earned and give players higher chances of finding legendary powers and items that can make their characters more powerful.

Idea 3
More Randomness!
Random Maps (map generator)
Random Bosses (boss generator)
Random Enemy Adds
Random Fight Mechanics
Random Missions
Random Objectives
Random Encounters
Random Traps
Random Content In Every Walk In/Instance
Random Loot
Random Powers
etc

For Example:
The random loot generator needs a boost meaning everything needs to be more random.
Getting the same numbers over and over is boring but getting a new number is exciting because you got lucky!
If we apply this randomness to the things players find in their adventurers such as powers and loot found this makes players want to optimize their drops.
Each level would have random abilities in some type of legendary gear and each type of legendary gear would have special powers unique to the gear.

Idea 4
Put powers and styles together
A flaming sword should have some game play effect!
An ice aura should freeze things!

For example:
A player finds a power during his adventure!
For example when you get a level 1 legendary aura power it does between 5,000-15,000 damage and grants you an aura that does continuous lightning damage. The damage is a set amount.
Depending on your luck with the random loot generator you get an aura that does 890 dmg per second.
You then find the same aura later on level 1 and it does 1280 dmg or higher or lower depending on your luck. This gives players the thrill to play more and get luckier drops from various types of items and powers.

Level 2 items would have the next tier of item levels maybe double that of the previous so 10,000-30,000
The tiers would continue and players would keep on finding new abilities and gear depending on what level they played.

This is all great ideas but for them to leave the game this bad for so long after the stats revamp. I think everyones hopes are gone. stats revamp took the fun right out of the game. artifacts help alittle to add fun to the game but did we really need to kill the fun from pvp and pve just to later make up for it with artifacts. Im not sure this game can continue with stats revamp it left a dirty taste in everyone's mouth. A full relaunch is necessary the game needs a new start. they completely killed it off with stats revamp and then killed it even more with artifacts.

Please don't speak on behalf of others. I had no issue and still have no issue with the stats revamp. So don't speak for me.
And for the millionth time they are not going to relaunch the game.

My hopes aren't gone. I do wish people would stop trying to change everything. There are plenty of us that like the game (mostly) as is. I won't speak for them but I know I would prefer they just concentrate on dlcs for awhile.

PVE + Stats Revamp = Good
PVP + Stats Revamp = Bad

That's how i see it.

Yeah to be blunt I agree with Zoe. I've been here for just shy of 8 years now and this - while not perfect - is definitely the most varied, approachable, and balanced form of the game that's ever existed.

Shades of WM, AM, and even pre-36 fighting styles all exist comfortably, while there are still a few build outliers that need some fine tuning (Gadgets comes to mind and even that I wouldn't tweak much) almost anything can be built to be functional, and even successful. They even fixed the problem where Controllers are literally only batteries - it's actually possible to run multiple BUILDS of Controller. That was NEVER a thing before.

My only personal complaint is that some Abilities in Mental underperform when set next to their peers in other Powersets and rest assured, I'll bring lots of info and testing to the table when I come back to make a case for which ones.

Artifacts may be a bit over the top, but I think they could become less oppressive if people wouldn't crawl out of the woodwork every ten minutes to defend the system in its current relatively unapproachable state, vis a vis cost reduction or an approach to making them account bound. That said, there's a lot of variety there and I rather enjoy the variety so...

As for the Stats Revamp?

Check my sig. The Stats Revamp ended up being both functionally and in some respects EXACTLY identical to the proposal I wrote regarding percentage based SP from a million years ago. I will probably NEVER complain about it.

But no, relaunching a game with ten years of investment on the behalf of its players to appease the fact that you miss Hard Light Jump Canceling spam is a non-starter.

A lot of the ideas on the OP's list are also non-starters, but for different reasons, and I'm not going to tell anyone to stay away from the table with an idea (even if it isn't entirely feasible) when they approach in a positive manner.

There are no bad ideas, but don't you still owe us 979 other ideas from your last thread?
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dc...-for-owners-and-make-the-game-awesome.312807/

Maybe 101 next time?

That statement is the furthest from the truth that can be described without becoming disrespectful. How do you think this is the most varied and balanced form the game has ever been when you have nearly every single might power lacking so much in single target and ranged aoe that movement mode and iconic powers are 100% mandatory? Heat Vision is used on nearly every power except 3 or 4, freezing breath is used on nearly every power for ranged aoe, Nature & Rage are SO bad at single target they are switching to acrobatics just to use grapple line and zip tie attack because they have nothing else to use. Gadgets that you mentioned? the only thing keeping that looking like pre-gu 36 is the turret jump clip, take that away and it drastically changes the powerset, just like how no other powersets have similar clipping abilities. Also gadgets uses Cyclone Push & Tornado Pull from the superspeed movements in this best rotations, not to mention nearly every single might power uses Wirrling Dervish because its stronger than any melee alternative. DPS is in a disgusting state of meta since stats revamp because stats revamp took away entire playstyles.

Controllers not being batteries? how has that even changed lol you mention multiple builds? you mean only because artifacts like claw-tetra-rao or the gimmicky BOP Commlink came out, you are still doing the exact same rotations and powers it just they get to do different things because of artifacts not stats revamp. Stats revamp destroyed the controller role. Breakout profiles are horrendous, the actual skill in the controller role was ripped away in double and triple tick potting to where now controllers can't even control their own pot its a auto passive because players can't be trusted to be good enough to but POT every 25 seconds.

We must have been playing a completely different DCUO from eachother for the past 8+ years.........

to be honest pvp was dead waaaaay before stats revamp lol

Elements of pre gu36, where lol??

I remember pre-36 when Jumping Canceling Hard Light was the only game in town; even running a decent Mental DPS build in that era was essentially pointless if you had a HL in your group. That was the same era where Controllers were essentially just batteries and there was no real building your way out of the limitations of whatever your current Powerset was. Iconic Powers were essentially a joke, all the way around, and "what you see is what you get". The meta was HL JC and that's it.

A little later we end up at GU 36, WM, and people complaining nonstop for literally the next six years because OMG Jump Cancelling No Longer Makes A Tiny Handful Of Things Completely OP. That wasn't good enough for people either, because *gestures broadly* - even though it essentially dropped a reliable DPS output format in *everyone's* hands and gave people an option for Power flow maintenance that wasn't limited purely to Controller Batteries. Then people started complaining that the Controller no longer had a purpose and it didn't "feel" like a Superhero game because you couldn't *just* spam Abilities and call it a day.

AM Happens, WM is essentially nerfed into worthlessness. All of a sudden the glaring imbalances between Powersets are front-and-center, and the output formats for everything are basically 1-2-3-4 1-2-3-4 1-2-3-4. A couple of useful and a couple of horrible mechanics persisted from this era afterwards, but for the most part the only "cool" thing that happens was the fact that certain Powersets were no longer pigeonholed into Support use only because of an imbalanced DPS output meta. People still complained about Controllers, because people will always complain about Controllers. Hell, you did it yourself ten seconds ago.

CR Differential happens during this era, and while it's hilarious for some reasons (like 28 million damage single hit output in low CR content) it's also absolutely horrible for the actual playability of the game. Things are almost impossible until you can finally do them, then become ridiculously, laughably easy minutes after that point, which only exacerbates how wildly varied Powerset output is.

All of which was exacerbated by "New Powerset Comes Out and Is Immediately OP Until the Next New Thing Happens".

Today isn't perfect, no. You're not wrong there.

Artifacts are a less-than-ideal system for altering character functionality and output, there's no arguing that. Some things are leveling the playing field - a lot - I build a lot of things around Strat/ Trans combo simply because the only thing those two items do is ramp up your output; what you build with that output is up to you and how you apply what you build actually matters now.

I don't think every Powerset NEEDS an identical output option for every situation either. Rage and Earth become special to see in action because it's borderline suicidal to fight at Melee range in late game content; Electric finally follows through on its promise of "what happens when you stand in a thunderstorm". Even busted-*** Mental still shines, if you polish it a little - and I do it without your Breath or Heat Vision, thanks all the same.

As for Controllers, well, you can survive with or without them now - and even gimmicky multiple options are still more options than the way-back-when, where your options were EVEN MORE limited than they are now. Two whole POT providers, one of which you were required to have, a Burst Power move that does nothing else, a Supercharge Shield, and three debuffs. If you're still using that loadout, that's on you.

I get the opportunity to tinker without it tanking my ability to function in a group setting now, or - because the Powerset I main is no longer "feast or famine" OP functional or functionally broken - I can say **** it altogether and run multiple functional DPS builds instead. Variety actually exists now.

We're never going to get away from mix/max mindset builds, that's true. It's a game. There will always be people testing what things are currently doing and running comparisons to see what is the top-end "anything". That's half of what I do and literally THE ONE THING you do. ****, people ask questions and when the rest of us run out of answers we wait for you to show up. You might be suffering from looking at the minutiae a little too closely, but that's a different discussion.

Granted, is a game where 50% of all DPS builds include Solar Amp or Freezing Breath ideal? No.

But it's better than a world where your option is "Hammer Throw - > Arrow Storm - > TK Blast - > Repeat", or the world where "Watch me Mass Terror Everything Into Jelly While You Cry Into Your Keyboard" is the option, or "There's a Green Lantern, I guess I'll just stand in the corner and hand out donuts" is the option.

And note, I said "better than it was" and I stand by that - I don't say "perfect" because ****, I could take 5 hours, a calculator and a pencil and verify that it's not. And I've done that before. More than once. So have you.

But it could be - and frequently, if not generally - has been worse than it is right now. I'm not sure if I can pick a spot where it's been better, objectively.

And if you have a laundry list of what needs to be fixed, well, I'd say that's a roadmap for what to do next.

Haha LOL that thread is for marketplace items you would like to buy which you think may improve the game.
Yes I will come up with a few more idas in the future
However this thread is for improving the game in general dealing with mechanics and game play not so much marketplace items to buy and gain some tangible benefit for your cash spent.
Also I would not propose that I come up with all the ideas that is what a community forum is for, we share opinions and.
Just think if 1000 players each had an idea or 100 players had 10 the 1000 goal would be done in no time!

I haven't seen many player ideas as to what could be done to improve the game play or the mechanics.
Most input is rather negative, I understand that some may be upset, however I think sharing ideas on where we could possibly go in the future in a positive way would be great for developers to look at.


Anyways I will continue:

Idea 6
Give players the ability to customize their powers.

Problem
Developers cant seem to balance powers

Solution
Allow power customization.
For example:
Players should be able to change the color of their powers and also choose what type of effects the power uses or has.
Then apply whatever element to the power they wish.

A player would create a swirling quantum field similar to the cryo field or throw fire similar to arc lightning.
This would balance the game and make a lot of players happy to not have to be stuck with pre developed power sets.
Character customization is the key to making players happy and I don't see why developers cannot innovate around this obstacle in order to allow players more freedom to customize their abilities.

well, until it become too easy to abuse the jump-cancelling DW-> Flurry psycho was a good indicator of that. You can still use it, it's just not broken any more.

I still use weapon taps between Ability elements in two of my character's DPS Loadouts.

And there's always someone standing around Jump Canceling a Might Rotation because it gets you to the next Ability faster.

"lol"

suppressor turret is the only real pre gu36 esque clip, the rest besides maybe the other two options in the super speed tree, (which are clip utility only when used with prec) don’t hold a candle to pre gu36 clips, it’s completely different

And simple weapon taps between powers is not something that’s pre gu36 oriented, phantom triangles weren’t just a simple tap between power action, it didn’t work like that

And there’s no power besides gadgets that’s using a jump clip to make the rotation quicker, the only other effective jump clips are in the iconic tree, and those have the dovetails attached
Lol

you'd think i would take a moment out to rant about everything going on above, the revamp, mental, artifacts, imbalances but no.

i wish we didn't have so many pets.

void gazers, boos, astral healers, henchmen, sidekicks, spartoi warriors, amazons, paradox hulks, water elementals, tom bots, robot sidekicks and all the rest muck up the screen so much. i suspect these are a major reason we have so much lag.

realistically i know removing these things won't happen. with every new dlc we get a few new ones, some are given as gifts, some are purchased off the marketplace. i know that players love them...but they really make a mess of things.

Good suggestions. Any new ideas can only certainly liven up the game more.

Idea 7
Create new superhero/villain themed fighting styles similar to the injustice fighting game.
Players should be able to toggle old weapon styles or their new techniques.
There should also be a variety of different types of styles like ninja assassin or other fantasy themed combatants

Do you have the money to pay them to do all of this?

Also, literally changing the entire combat system is impossible at this point, and the whole idea is that DCUO has a unique combat system.

These ideas requires an entire revamp of the game, which can take time and resources. They could do DCUO 2 if they want to, but i personally think that this game has a unique and fluid combat system. Dont hate on me for having a opinion

I am sure I as well as many thousands or even millions of players wouldnt mind buying a fighting style or two if they were in the marketplace. That would pay for it and alot more!

Imagine a group of missions that unlocked new moves and abilities similar to injustice. Each character would have different missions to unlock and the devs could keep adding new moves as they updated DLCs.

I call that a win win.

As far as the combat system that we have it doesnt need to change at all, the new moves would just add onto what is already there not remove it.

I agree the combat system is great however being progressive and innovative could make players excited and happy.