Please return to new episodes every 3 months

Thanks for the offer BUT i don't need any help. It works FINE for me just the way it is.

BOTTOM LINE: this is MY TAG BTW so don't get used to it. LOL.

you do need help though. don't let your ego get in the way of accepting needed help

That may be YOUR OPINION.

BOTTOM LINE: If I EVER think i may NEED HELP i will SEEK PROFESSIONAL help THANKS.

I get what you're saying, but IMO you're - sadly - dead wrong on the "more players around now". The people that burn out and drop out of the rat race are mostly gone for good, while back then the people were just waiting to return, and some of them even without unsubbing.

We need to move DCUO away from gear progression. The main complaints people come up with here regulary are:

- repetitive
- grind
- content skipping
- missing this or that content part per story arc (no raids in X, no open world content in Y, no solo instance in Z etc.)
- feats/skill points not worth grinding
- character customization poor

So we have atm 20k players - maybe 30k - who keep up with the rat race on all 4 servers combined, and the tendency of that number is: declining. Which means that in half a year there may be just a few players left who have an incentive to buy the new content when it comes out.

All that can be reduced to the basic approach the game is following for quite a while now: new content players have to run over and over in order to advance - instead of new content players want to run over and over because it's a fun way to kill time (or it's challenging for other types of content). We need a complete different layout in content to get away from that and in turn, allow even noobs to enter it dircetly after reaching level 30 - which would increase the number of sold episodes greatly. We also need a different idea of "elite" version than what we have now: higher numbers in damage output and defense and HP for the bosses.

For example, an elite version of a raid could degrade your toon step by step on getting killed if not picked up in time: enter as your toon, get killed and respawn as Nightwing, get killed again and respawn as Robin, get killed again and respawn as generic STAR Labs security dude. To do so, of course, Legends would have to be updated to be on par with the "normal" game engine when it comes to numbers - currently, the game is divided contentwise when it comes to mechanics (Legends, PvE and PvP - with PvP suffering from PvE mechanics entering without being balanced for PvP). Done right however, this sort of content could provide a challenge that deserves being called "epic". Right now, the elite versions have devolved into being a normal part of the gear progression.

Remember, this game has a blockbuster license, so it's one of the games that doesn't have to sunset because there is a constant stream of new fans trying the game. It's a matter of designing the game in a way that represents the lore in a solid way in the first place, not repeating mechanics that have been done - and will be done - in other MMOs over and over already. It really doesn't matter if content comes every month, every month with a pause period or every 3 month etc. If it's just "grinded away" to be top of the foot chain again, it does not have what it needs in games like this: longevity and a high fun factor. If content cannot come up with these, it will just be grinded away by the number chasers - and that will keep the devs in a rat race, too.

no it's not really an opinion. it's a fact.

Things really are no different under the 1 month releases than they were on the 3 month schedule. The only thing different is the gamer psychology, which is real in ways that can't be qualified. It's hard to gather data and then create a sustainable plan to monetize gamer psych.

My take is that we hit a speed bump in gamer psych, not unlike the Paradox Wave speed bump a few years ago. Whereas the former speed bump was content difficulty (which still lingers in some pockets of DCUO), the latest one is a gear drop speed bump.

In a competitive gaming market, it's too easy to take a "break" from one game to play another when you hit a bump in gamer morale. Then when you're ready to hit it again after a couple weeks, you feel a little more behind (even if you aren't) which is like trying to re-accelerate through another bump.

A big part of this, imho, comes from CR level being related to damage out in new content. And not just because PuG's yawn, shrug, and even go as far as to write off players with CR's that are less than three off of maximum.

More so, again back to gamer psych, even in league play where friendly competitions around DPS in raids get shoe-strung into CR races where the fortunate few are placed much higher on the bell curve after only a couple of runs. Not only are they less likely to want to re-run with players getting less drops, the players with worse gear have some of the fun sucked out of it because they can't compete at the same level. The scaling just feels off when one dps of similar skill is doubling another one of similar skill just because one received four drops over two weeks and the other received one drop.

Multiply that by anyone that takes a family vacation or a week off to play, say Fallout IV, and when you do get back you end up feeling all that much more behind the pack.

It occurs to me that the primary issue with the new monthly content release is not the game but the approach to the game.

Player A:

DCUO goes from 3 month DLCs to monthly DLCs, so now instead of having 3 months to gear up, you only have 1 month. You have difficulty with the pace and get understandably frustrated.

Player B:

With the same scenario of change in content release, you still have 3 months to gear up. It's just that the 3 month content has a staggered release. You don't have to have all of Episode 18 gear before Episode 19 releases. You get what you can, then pick up the new content, drop some of the older content in the relevancy band, and keep farming. Likewise, when Episode 20 releases, you pick that up, and drop some older content. At any given moment, you are essentially working on 3 monthly DLCs simultaneously. Basically, you are still on a 3 month cycle, but with rolling content release.

That said, the first trio of DLCs messed this concept up, because the elite gear replaced the rare gear from the previous month. That's fixed now, so going forward, each monthly release will have a 3 month gear longevity (i.e., Episode 18 gear won't be replaced until Episode 21). You, therefore, have 3 months to farm that gear. No reason to do it in 1.

Can folks come around to the Player B approach? Maybe. Maybe not. Just putting it out there.

Player C: You have 1 month to get all the gear from the current month episode before it becomes irrelevant in the general pugging community. Therefore you replay the content until you get all the gear necessary and then repeat the next month.

Player C is usually why player A gets frustrated and player B gets left behind.

It's a discussion worth having, but we should keep it in one thread..
This is current and Mepps has commented in it
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dc...return-to-new-episodes-every-3-months.264004/

For interest, I posted this a couple weeks ago.
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dcuo/index.php?threads/8-month-cycle-bring-back-the-lull.263625/

Actually, no. That's just Player A from different perspectives. One Player A doing his Player A thing due to perceived pressures from another Player A.

If CR flattering wasn't as severe on Statistics for overall Damage Out & other Role abilities.

If mods raised CR like before to make up for lower CR gear.

If mods were Stronger.

If SP wasn't stagnant making those +5 Precs and other non-percentage stats mean little to nothing as we enter in higher Tiers/Gear were are Gear, Mods, and CR flattering completely overshadow the bonus of Skill Points.

Then people wouldn't feel so inclined of needs to have the best dropping gear; grinding each month out even while knowing the gear will be outdated a month later.

Gotta agree with Cane, CR being king, pug community has become a game of looking for CR instead of players.

And since the game now spins around the CR, all other activities, like farming exos, making mods and gaining SP have become irrelevant, especially when one lucky drop can outweight all of that, heck, even saving those painfully relevancy restricted marks is pointless, since the gear you can buy with them is easily outclassed by a lucky drop.

Player D: Go premium for 3 months & catch up in 1 week with replays given for re-subbing. <----me

It's much more player friendly to do gear the way it is being handled now and much more engaging, too. There's actually a reason to log in every month now, because there's some new content and new rewards to chase.

Instead of depending on 1 or 2 raids from which to obtain all 15 pieces of gear, including a weapon from which 11 different weapons could drop, these drops are now split up, over the course of 3 months and remain relevant for 3 full months after they're released. Which is exactly the same length as their relevancy in the quarterly DLC model.

The Alert, which resets daily, also drops the best gear, too, which previously didn't happen and only 4 pieces, which makes it much easier to manage.

With R&D gear, there's a reason to log in daily, too and as more of the end game becomes part of the R&D gear system, the "things to do" list will only increase.

I'd pick what we have today over the horrible, disengaging system we had before.

3 months to get 4 pieces. 36 drops to get 4 pieces. Not to mention R&D gear. I'm really hoping devs don't do something unnecessary because people cannot understand the process. Unfortunately, a good portion of the community has a grude against the devs that blocks their ability to reason.

I agree, i don't like monthly content but what hurts more on it is the intese gear farming without rest made by GU47 that takes away all the pleasure to farm feats,exos, etc making we have just 2 relevant content to run because the others are just to upgrade our home turf things.

That is a good point in the monthly system for the players that don't like raids.
But the monthly system just came alongside the bad updates, maybe this is why i don't like it,not sure yet,too many bad things.

That's exactly what I think did it for me. When I am done with my solos/duos, there is almost no raid/alert from previous DLCs that are being run through LFG. The small amount of people that are still around run with each other because that's the only thing that is keeping them around still, they clamp on to each other for dear life. So when I'm done with those solos and duos grind, I'm kind of like: might as well just sign off because I'm wasting time waiting for a group in LFG because there are other fun games out there that I could be playing without dead time. Naturally, joining a random PUG group for the latest raid is more of a risk these days. On the 3-month cycle, you could wait 3 weeks for everybody to learn the raid mechanics and gear up enough to compensate for their lack of skills, but now after that fourth week, nobody is going to run the raid anymore. So you are basically stuck in limbo of wasting time in 2 out of the 3 months. The only thing that is safe to run is the alert, but you can only run that in the month it's relevant.

Bottom line. Can somewhile who is premium and no replays get all the gear from the raids in 1 month? Right now people feel the devs are catering to the people who spend money on replays forgetting about the poeple who actually play the game but can't afford the replays.

Think about how many runs it takes to get the gear with the drop rates.
No replays means and 1 month of gear means:

• Can only run the raid 4 times so unless they have TREMENDOUS luck, no gear there so 130/Elite gear is out of the question.
• Can run the Alerts 30 times but again, Drop rates says they might get mainly the 122/126 gear only and maybe not a complete set.
• Can run Duos 30 times for chance to get 122/126 gear, better chance, but still not highest level.
• 30 alerts at 5 marks is 150 Marks, and 4 Raids at 10 Marks is 40 Marks, and 30 Duos at 2 each is only 60. Thats 250 Marks Total.
  • 150+40+60=250 Marks total.
  • Chest is 60 Marks
  • Legs is 60
  • Back is 40
  • Waist is 45
  • 60+60+45+40=205 Marks
  • More than enough to get all 4 Vendor 128 Gear.

So Unless you spend replays, you may not be able to get full set of 130 or Elite gear from raids, but you can get all the 128 gear.

BTW, those numbers are only if your running ONLY the highest level alerts/duos. Not counting previous relevant content. So that would increase the number of marks they would get.

I've always found that changes are made because of the people who shout the loudest instead of what makes sense. Listening to your player base is nice, but I would always put making a good game (product) first.