I think this is a real winner. The idea partly spawned from a debate in this thread here: https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dc...ear-marks-and-older-content-relevancy.260727/ Apologies if this has been posted before but I didn't see anything quite exactly like it. The idea is simple...Take each piece of queued content and measure the min set of stats required to run it. When a player queues for that content, the instance queue dynamically adjusts the number of players required based on the aggregate stats instead of a fixed number of players. Let's take Hive Moon Base Expert alert as an example. The min cr required to queue for it is 43, and we have a rough idea the amount of Might/Prec/Dom/Health/etc stats a cr 43 player would have. That means to minimally run the alert you would need 4 x min Might/Prec/Dom/Health/etc.. Now let's say a cr125 player wanted to run it and their personal stats meets or exceeds the 4 x min Might/Prec/Dom/Health/etc. The game would queue that player into the alert solo. Now let's say a cr72 player tried the same queue and they didn't have enough personal stats to run solo, the queue would dynamically wait until either one other person queued to make up the stat difference or two lower tier players that make up the difference combined. Here's the problems this solves. 1. No more on-going requests for walk-in terminals 2. All queues pop much faster 3. No more facerolling issues as the aggregate group is always just right for the content difficulty 4. Massively extends the relevancy window of content Honestly don't see much of a down side. Thoughts?
Forgot to add there would need to be two adjustments. 1. Minimal queue numbers for content that has a multi-person physical mechanic. Khandaq comes to mind where you need to activate the three gear boxes at the same time for the sub-bosses 2. For folks that are higher level but don't want to run it solo, make this feature an option in settings that could be turned on or off.
Would have to modify the CR scalar. Because you still do more damage with high CR. Either way it is still a form of stat clamping.
Couple of downsides: 1) HUGE undertaking from a development stand point. All at a cost for something which won't be monetised. Wouldn't resolve the issues of boredom, either. I'm not bored because LOA is easy now. 2) "Extends content relevancy window" - assumption made that by running content in this way, you're therefore granting players a reward they can use in their current tier? If so, then not going to happen as it would kill the need to spend replay badges on earning marks and it'd damage any possibility of ever moving away from random drops as the best reward. I'd rather Oan Sciencells alert be easy than spend any more time using the disengaging RNG loot distribution system. I do like the idea of being able to walk into anything, though, but honestly, they could just make that an option from the On Duty menu, really. Doesn't need anything as elaborate as this. I also like how it protects new players, too, or at least seems to. New players are being carried to readily by established players and not only is it getting people without the relevant skill into content they aren't ready for, but it's also most likely disrupting the players enjoyment level, too. Contrary to popular belief, most people play games to be challenged, not be carried to the best rewards/stats in unchallenging content.
Actually I'm not sure about that since we're basing the queue on stats rather than cr, it would be a significantly different measurement.
One portal in the watchtower with the sole purpose of soloing possible content relative to how many cr lvls u have above the required cr. The higher ur cr the more content becomes available for u to try and solo it. Click on the portal once and it'll have the categories: duo's, alerts, and raids, and again for relevant content withing that category, click on that content and your in. (with some content omitted due to it being unable to finish because 2 or more are required due to mechanics) Problem Solved...?
I think this is too complicated, too many adjustments and calculations are needed by the system to make it work. I once suggested that the storylines should be organized, so that they are easier to follow, by adding a tab in our journal that arranges them thematically and timeline. I thought it was an easy thing to do. Although the idea was liked, it can't be done right now because the limitations of hardware; either through the dev side or ps3 I don't know. Teleporters would do the same thing you are suggesting and seems easier like tiempo suggested.
The reason many of us run the older content is for old styles or feats etc. I really do not want to spend more time than I have to unless of course the rare styles that I am going for are no longer rare.
The problem with the portal approach is scale. Eventually, the destination list will get too long that it becomes unwieldy and the list would need to intelligently adjust every time for every user to account for DLC/Episode entitlement...may be at the point of unusability right now.
See my prior response to Inferno about the teleporter limitation. To your point about organization through tabs, that does address keeping content grouped logically but does nothing to address the facerolling problem which is the primary driver of the OP.
Understood, and this approach would actually reduce your time spent by reducing queue times. Again, there is absolutely NO clamping or stat adjusting going on here. Another way to put it is the queue would reduce the number of people required to queue based on how powerful you are. Again using the HIVE alert as an example, if you queue for the alert the system will look at you and say "Oh, Ariyana2015 is super OP for this alert, so pop them in solo". You'd enter the content immediately! If you were not quite OP enough to run it solo, the system would say "Oh, Ariyana2015 is pretty high but she needs one more person for this", and as soon as one other person queues in your placed into the content immediately....effectively turning HIVE into a duo. The most amount of time you would spend would be the same as running the content with your gear and stats at T3 for HIVE. The key difference is the queue system adjusts to get you into the content as fast as possible.
That actually sounds alright. As long as there is no clamping and it speeds up the time for me to enter than I am fine with that. But the one flaw I see is what about those that sort of need us higher levels because there aren't enough of them? Also would it take in account instances that require 4 people to do the toggles? Most of the time I run the lower tier instances I am with people 130 plus which indicates there aren't a whole lot of low levels playing. I mean I think you have a good idea here but I also don't want it to go back to the point the low level players are stuck and quit. However, I also like the idea of upping my chances of obtaining a piece of rare gear because I am running the content solo. It is quite annoying when a low level and I need the same piece, yes I only need the style and they NEED it as gear, but it still takes my time to run the content.
They could make a portal for each tier or every two tiers and place them in the watchtower? Or they could allow us to check a box and solo queue?
Yep and yep, the reply immediately added after the OP explains these points. If somebody needs help, you would turn this feature off in your setting...something like "disable dynamic queues" and just do it the old fashioned way. The other point is exactly right, for those instances requiring a physical mechanic, the queue would require that minimum number of people...nothing could be done about that.
Scale also works against you here. What happens when you get to tier 14 or tier 17. Eventually you're going to start to run out of room, and the teleporters would still have to have the added intelligence of knowing what tiers you purchased and adjust the lists every single time.
For your second point, the comment about extending the content relevancy window was only to describe how content is still "interesting" for a longer period on a player's progression journey. Wasn't really thinking about using it as a means to reinstate marks for lower tiers. However, if the content relevancy is greatly extended to upper tiers there may be an opportunity for side benefits. Thinking out loud, Devs could add feats like beat Trigon's Prison alert solo, as an example. For monetization, this model would work really well for all the other threads going on right now about putting the best gear on the vendor which puts the player's focus on Marks instead of mission drops. In a Mark-focused environment, players will likely spend RB on lower tier content to fill their virtual wallets as fast and easy as possible.
