Why are we putting opinions above fun?

DISCLAIMER: THIS THREAD IS IN NO WAY MEANT TO INVALIDATE WHATEVER OPINION YOU HAVE ABOUT THE GAME NOR TO SAY THAT YOU CAN'T VOICE WHAT YOU THINK. YOU ARE FULLY ENTITLED TO YOUR OPINION AND I AM NOBODY TO TELL YOU OTHERWISE

Hi, how are you?

First of all, I'm not here to defend the devs. This isn't about taking sides, specially because I agree with most criticism I have seen here, specially Proxystar's posts. But one thing worries me, one thing that I constantly see people saying:

"I enjoyed the game stats revamp, but I don't agree with the new time capsules".

Now, let's review this sentence, specially the second part:

"I don't agree with the new time capsules".

Okay. That's valid. You disagree with Time Capsules. The guy who worked on Champions Online came to DCUO and brought the exact same thing that peeved the heck out of me when I played CO, but didn't influence me enough to stop playing it. I just ignored the lockboxes, how they are called there, altogether.

Now, let's review what I just said, specially the last half:

"the exact same thing that peeved the heck out of me when I played CO, but didn't influence me enough to stop playing it. I just ignored the lockboxes, how they are called there, altogether. "

Here at DCUO I'm a bit more tolerant with the Time Capsules, mostly because the first TCs brought lantern icons, and I was able to actually chase them. Now that I have the red lantern emblem I don't care about them at all (although I spend my DB cash on them because I don't have much to buy with them, so they are labelled as leftovers). But even if I didn't have the free cash to use them, I wouldn't still bother.

Why?

Because I have fun playing the game. That's the number 1 reason I play: because I enjoy playing. I mean, really. I have fun playing it. The idea that there is always a new DLC and the endgame is always expanded is what keeps me hooked. It's that simple.

"Oh, but I'm putting my money into this game, yadda yadda yadda".

So am I. And before you say anything, I live off my money and have two jobs, so it's not like Mama Wallachia is giving me her money or free stuff so I can invest on the game. I actually have to push my work a bit more to make the extra money I pay for the subs.

Tho my point isn't about investing money in itself, please ask yourself: would you have more fun if you unlocked or bought certain features you wanted?

No? You already have them? Okay.

But do you still play? Why not?

"The time capsules ruin my fun!"

"I don't agree with the politics of the company, that necessarily ruins my fun!"

"I don't like the way they are going with the game, this obviously prevents me from enjoying the gameplay!"

Timmy, give me the megaphone here. Let me say this loud and clear.

B U L L S H I T

Personal views, personal opinions and this mother complex many people develop towards something or someone because they believe their life is in actual jeopardy because they attach their emotions to something too hard SHOULD NOT outweight the positive parts. Regardless of time capsules, their adiminstration, their politics or the fact that I have seen Mepps picture and he seems unhealthly skinny, JUST ENJOY THE GAME. All those three statements are exaggerated versions of MY OWN OPINIONS, but then I get into the game, see my toon as an authentic Red Lantern, get to play, enjoy the gameplay, do something else, try to hunt a feat or two (I only have 105 SP, so you can guess that my feat hunting never goes well...), and when I get bored I get off the game and do something else. Why? BECAUSE IT'S NATURAL. I forget about the bad when I enjoy the good.

Are you married or at least not single for more than one year? Then you know your relationship has gone through the bad and the worse, and you are still together. Same logic: the good must always outweight the bad, and must have a value of 10 to 1 when it comes to measuring it. Because, in the end of the day, you will lay down together and all will be fine. This should apply to your game whatsoever. Increase the positive aspects of the game tenfold, then measure them against the bad. Do your opinions make you SO FREAKING UNABLE to get on and enjoy the game? Go to do your favourite thing when online. Are you still so peeved?

Don't take me wrong here. I know that many of the players who left sincerely fail to enjoy the game. They try to have fun but the fun isn't there. That's fine. That's normal. That's acceptable. But then I see A LOT of players, and I mean it, around 80% of the players saying that they left simply OVER MERE DISAGREEMENT.

You won't fool me here. I know you like the game. You are FORCING yourself to quit because of your disagreement. What I'm trying to say here is for your own good. Fun makes life more enjoyable.

Put your hand on your conscience. Do not deprive yourself from something you like because of your opinions. They are your opinions, correct. But they shouldn't dictate your actions. Many people use Nike shoes even if the company alledgedly employ child slavery in asian countries, I know I would if my foot wasn't ******* 14 1/2 (47 in Euro/Brazil) and I didn't have such freaking hard time getting new shoes. I KNOW you wouldn't stop yourself from getting your favourite ice cream because the company that makes it is killing innocent chipmunks in the nearest park.

Don't do this to yourself. Just breathe. Put your fun above your opinions.

Cheers.

On a heap of ninja unskills I've managed to hit tab, spacebar and enter at lightning speed, so if you saw an incomplete post, my bad.

I still enjoy the game. It's the feats attached to TC, or paid feats, that I don't care for. I never really change my dudes outfit, so none of the styles bother me. If the feats were not tied to transactions and the crazy high vendor prices added, I'd be good. But we have all that and then some. Plus, this is the second time in a month or so that they've had to back track on greed. AoJ prices were dropped to head off a possible mass exodus one month after a 9month revamp.

I have fun playing the game, but not at end game. I've spent more time this last two weeks on my villain alt and another alt. Lower CR and just running content. That's fun. End game, there is no content. Dailies, two duos, and alert done in 30min. I don't even spend my replays on content. I buff my alts skill points to make them stronger.

Enjoying playing is one thing. Enjoying being "F" is another.

I got half way through the original post and read enough to get the gist.

I find trying to get all the feats fun, that's why my character is in the top 100 on the EU server. So hiding feats away behind a load of crap in a vendor and forcing me to either wait months and months or pay through the nose (not happening) really ticks me off. How can I have fun if I am being forced to pay a fortune or wait months on end to fulfil my gaming goals?

Then focus on what you enjoy the most, friend.

You enjoy levelling your alts more than anything? Then make one alt, level it as you please until it stops being fun, then do it all over again. In Champions Online there was no endgame whatsoever. This changed slightly in the latest years but the endgame is still very little. Whenever we reached max level (gold accounts only) we got a free extra slot to make an alt. There was this guy who got an alt to max level then erased it and started another alt. By doing that he gathered 116 character slots, and we only begun with 9.

Forget meta. Forget feat hunting. Forget endgame. Go for alt levelling until it's not fun anymore!

my subs upon the 4th. i'm done.

the revamp broke all my characters. i feel like the dev team spent the past year following me around, took note of everything i enjoyed doing in game and decided to with the stats revamp take it all out. mental sucks. ice sucks. quantum sucks. nature healing sucks. controlling sucks. its all one big crapfest of sucktitide. everything i was looking forward to and hoping for did not happen. they took all the fun out of the game.

if i could i would take sj and mepps heads and bang them together like cymbals with avair in the middle.

Maybe because fun is subjective to ones opinions?

The revamp killed it for me.
I have always been against stat clamping, and although it's not a"clamp" in the truest sense of the term, it did the same thing.
It made us less powerful/effective in older content.
I played the game at level the 1st time around. I don't want to do so again.
For many, many people, the revamp fixed nothing, but broke a great deal.
It is no longer fun.

Perhaps, but not bound to it. I have a lot of fun in the game even with all the criticisms I've showed in my post. Why would I need to overlook the fun I have because I dislike most of what's been done to the game?

Ofc you have your opnion, but fun is different for everybody. Some guys fun concept is playing the game to be top 1, others is just to see friends, others like to play because they have nothing else to do. But when you make a p2w system like capsules, it starts destroying the builds of the game, then everything else falls. How will someone play with friends if they all left the game? How can someone have fun trying to get top 1 when he knows all someone has to do is spend $ to get it?
One of my favorites aspects of this game is the challenge and mechanics required to play a raid, and the grind to get SP, to get better etc. Everything the devs did was change the challenge to easy mode replay spam raids without mechanics, and the grind to: Spend $500 if you want to get a skill point.
Again, you can have fun just relaxing, many others do, but some of us like to play the game and learn it, get better, experience hard raids with friends, and when they start destroying this things, everything else in the game falls, including your relaxing moments in dcuo, when you see the server a ghost town.

In short, when the cost of having fun is increasingly impacted by development choices, I think this is the rub some players are having...

For example:

Membership was all you needed at one point in time to enjoy playing the game and get the full experience... (or DLC purchases)

Then it was membership + replay badges, because we all want our toons to be the best they can be as soon as possible....

Then it became membership + replay badges + time capsules.... hiding feats in purchases instead of making them available while actually playing the game.

In short, I'm not really having any more fun than I initially was having when I started playing this game, but the overall cost for me to do so, keeps creeping up. Add to that we are still receiving around the same amount of content, yet all of us are paying more and playing less... True I could ignore replaying, I could ignore gaining those skill points...

Another example would be the increase in gear vendor pricing (prior to this DLC) is a prime example of trying to force players to spend more while chasing the same level of fun.

Make sense?

Wally I get what you're trying to say, but sometimes you can no longer call it "fun" if your patience wears so thin it becomes non existent. For some people, fun it's trying to keep on top of feats and SP, when they look at capsules and see how much they have to spend, where does the line get drawn for being "fun" and overly obsessive? Most of the people threatening to quit are players that chase feats, getting fed up with feats being put behind an RnG paywall. Back in my day we actually played the game to obtain feats, not the lottery.

That's why people are fed up, despite the stats revamp. Me personally, I'm just over the greed and feeling like I need to invest a huge chunk of my paycheck to obtain something I want.

It's to the point I look at how much I'd spend playing other games and it's actually cheaper then dcuo.

When the fun gets sucked out by dollar signs and progression attached to RNG.

I see your point. However, many decisions and choices people make involve their personal ethics. You choose to wear Nikes but there are others who refuse for the reason you stated. The same goes for a great many things in everyday life. Me? I quit SWTOR for several reasons, one of which was their cash shop and gambling box overload. I quit WildStar because every event in the game required you to purchase keys to open gambling boxes to maybe get the special rewards.

I got "free" currency in both games. In SWTOR, I generated thousands of cartel coins a month from the referral program. I farmed hundreds of OmniBits in WS. It wasn't the cost. It was the principle. I'm right there again with this game.

I really, really enjoy the revamp. However, I hate the insane grind for mods. I hate the insane grind for gear. I ******* DESPISE time capsules and this new vendor currency. I'm playing out my current sub (just renewed for the next month) and will decide whether or not to quit for good I the next few weeks. This time, I will be liquidating my assets and gifting everything to my leaguemates if I go because I won't be returning.

Simply put, the max sp chase was a huge part of the fun in progressing your character, because you knew one day all the work WOULD pay off, there was an end in sight. Now that a huge chunk of those SP are behind an extortionate rng paywall I know for a fact I will never try to reach max SP because I'm not a gambling addict, so all other feats are now meaningless to me. Why would I sit in an elite raid all night trying to get 25-50 feat points when people can essentially buy far more than that? I have enough sp to max my trees.

Stats revamp made combat fun again, combat. But that won't be enough to sustain people especially with the recycled hot garbage we get for most content. I used to be hardcore constantly playing the game working on skill points, now I'm a full on casual who cancels my sub for 6 months at a time when I'm fed up with the rehash. A major part of the FUN has been sucked out.

I still have fun, but the bugs in the game drive me nuts. Where are the Paradox Reaper drops from Central City? Why do we get permanently locked out against Chang Tzu in Oolong if we wipe? Why are treasure chests empty in the Tier 2 Bottle duos? Why does the rock in Kahndaq become invulnerable when it's replaced after a failure?

Tl; dr?

"Don't worry, be happy".

I thought it was FWEEEEM!

Don't worry, be FWEEEEM!