DCUO: The Wing Armor Problem
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History
At launch, there were 3 objective types for the Wing Armor daily mission:
- Standalone Wing Armor = 1pt
- Standalone Vine = 1pt
- Combo with a Wing Armor and Vine with Cog = 3pts
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Shortly after that, they increased the spawn rate of the vines to 40s (this will be important for the tips I go over). They also tried various fixes to return the Wing Armors, including increasing the spawn rate (twice), creating more nodes, making them 2pts and grounding them... none of those fixes have worked.
July 1 Patch: Since nothing else has worked, the devs updated the mission to 8pts total instead of the launch 20pts. This does make the mission more than 2x faster than the bugged version at 20 and it gets people out of the zone faster. However, it didn't actually fix the technical issues, so all of the tips in this article still apply!
The Cause
The actual cause is not the spawn rate. The first clue on that is because the spawns completely stop... ignoring the spawn rate. So as the devs keep changing the spawn rate, no matter what it is, is actually 0. From what I have observed, the population is what causes the mission to break or recover.- Low population phases from 9-15 will have them if they hold that size for around 10 minutes.
- Phase 1 on USPC and any retaining a large size (so almost all phases in primetime hours) will not spawn them correctly at all.
- There will be outliers to the above 2 cases as some phases fluctuate over time, it may take some time for them to recover (or break).
- The breaking/recovery point seems to be around 9-11 people (but holding that size)
Working nodes are inversely proportional to the number of players in a phase. When people leave a large phase, it starts to recover. And when a phase fills, they stop working. There are phases that have some, but not all nodes working due to phase size fluctuation.
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Tips & Workarounds
Choosing a Phase: Obviously you'll want to pick a low population phase for the highest chance of this working. And you'll want to choose a higher phase number, either last or 2nd to last because if a phase was just created, it will have the spawns. The ones at the end also have a higher chance of population decrease & retention.Keep it Small Stupid: The 40s spawn time for the vines is very important to consider. Most players will traverse the entire quest area, trying to hit every node. This is not necessary and wastes travel time. circling 1 block, if you notice no one else is doing the same will be faster as the ones you hit first will respawn by the time you circle back.
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Augments: The level 12 bonus is especially important with this issue persisting. Each augment will give you a 25% roll for 1 extra point. That means up to 3pts per vine and 4pts per Wing Armor. Before going max for the feats, get 2 augments to 12. I've even moved my lower alts ahead of maxxing my mains. Also keep in mind that level 12 on the pre-419 augments take a lot less XP.
Move Away: If you see other players, move in the opposite direction. If you trail someone you'll just lose to them at the next node. You can also speed ahead to 2-3 nodes in front of them. If you compete for the same ones, you have a chance of losing it and losing time you could have spent for a sure point.
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Time of Day: This may not be realistic for many, but adjusting your real life schedule is the most effective remedy. On USPC more phases will be working early in the morning ~5-8am EDT. During this period, phases on a non-reset day will be around 9-11 people only. By contrast, during primetime, when most phases are close to soft cap, none will work except ones that just create/start.
Reset Day: On reset day, the phases will be front loaded with full 1-3 and about 11-15 in the others. This compresses as it gets closer to 9am EDT. Phase 1 will almost always not work. 2 & 3 will fluctuate the most and not maintain a steady small or large population.
Multitask: Plan it so you overlap one or both of the other missions so that you're getting points for those as other players are battling for vines. In other words don't do 1 mission to completion before starting another. You're losing minutes that way.
Priority: If you were lucky enough to find a working phase, prioritize the 2pt Wing Armors over the vines. Many players have gotten into the habit of connecting the white dots that they forget to go for the reds when they are working!
Catch 22
The irony of this article is the more people that follow the tips, the less it will work (see the cause)! |
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Happy hunting!
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