Aett_Thorn

1) If we talked about the bad sites, they'd change their names, and then someone would have to get scammed before anyone knew if it was a good or a bad site. By then, it could be 6 months to a year before anyone actually got their credit card information sold and used. So the "bad" site would have plenty of credit cards on file to sell. How do you handle that? And how many "good" sites are out there doing something that is at the very least immoral (at worst illegal)?

Any site doing it now is inherently a "bad" company. If the Devs opened it up and said that you can sell influence for profit for their game, there are a number of consequences to that, besides the argument above.

1.1) The IRS could tax influence gains in the game, as it is potential profit. And they could base the taxable rate on the going rate for the sales.

1.2) Again, more people would use a "legal" service than one that isn't legal, which would affect the in-game economy. Either that, ot to counter the influx of influence in the game, the Devs would have to adjust influence gains for everyone, lessening the ability of normal players to make money, especially free and premium players.

2) Complicity in a crime is not stupid to assume. If people are getting ripped off, they want their money back, and the FBI can investigate those who provide even relatively safe harbor for those responsible. This is NOT a far off possibility.

3) Your light analogy is a bad one, again, because a) it's not the same, and b) you don't take into account any other potential harms of the light to people trying to sleep, etc., and c) you don't take into account the fact that the criminals would just change alleys, leaving the population to deal with all of the negatives, without creating any positive outcomes.


In summary, by the time you could tell if a site is bad or good, it's much, MUCH too late. Then there are other possible outcomes to consider, many of them with negative connotations for the average player and Devs. There is no logical reason for the Devs to do what you're suggesting versus leaving it the way it is.

It's not an incorrect analogy. There have been studies done where people have said that they would rob a bank if it wasn't illegal. Basically, the only thing stopping a decent amount of people from robbing banks is the fact that it's illegal. The same has been done for some recreational drugs, with similar results.

As such, removing the ban-worthyness of using goldfarmers means that it is very likely that more people would use them. This would in turn mean that there is more influence in the game just by virtue of having more goldfarmers doing nothing but trying to earn influence and selling it. And this would drive up prices for everyone, meaning that more and more people would believe that the only way to compete is to buy gold, such that they either leave or begin to use the services themselves.


But this is a fairly pointless discussion, because even if the Devs did consider doing this, they'd have their whole legal team shouting back at them telling them that they can't do this, and that they HAVE to take the position that it's against the TOS. I'm sorry if you think that's wrong, but it's really not. It is in the best interest of NCSoft, Paragon Studios, you and me to have the use of goldfarmers be against the TOS and EULA.

And why would they? Copyrights need to be protected. If NCSoft were to say that one aspect of its game is free-use, then what's to stop other people from coming in and saying that other parts of it should be free-use as well?

Additionally, if the act of credit card fraud is illegal (which it is), and the Devs know exactly how people will exploit their game to enable credit card fraud, then why would the parent company allow for that act to happen?

This isn't alcohol or drugs we're talking about.

This is like telling someone that robbing banks is fine, just frowned upon and the government isn't responsible for what the bank does.

OF COURSE more people would rob banks if they weren't afraid of the police.


Also, allowing people to violate copyright laws gets you to the point of companies not wanting to make products. That's why those laws exist, to allow the companies to feel safe that they can make a profit off of them.

I don't think you fully understand the consequences of what you're asking for. It would likely have some of the effects that you say, and then have far more negative repercussions.

I bet you that if Ebay and Craiglist were made aware of scammers on their sites, despite them warning people about scammers in general, that if they didn't do anything to stop those people, they would be held liable.

That is why EBay and Craiglist both ban accounts that they know to be scamming people or doing things that are against the TOS. Similarly, CoH could get in trouble if they did not do anything to prevent known criminal activity in their game. And that is what this is, whatever you choose to call it.

Goldfarmers break the law by selling someone else's intellectual property without their permission. That is illegal, and if they were doing it from anywhere but China, they'd be prosecuted. But China chooses not to follow international law in these matters.

Allowing goldsellers to be "okay" would ruin the in-game economy except for those people who used it. It would potentially flood the game with influence, allow the gold sellers to easily manipulate the market, and fill the game with spam.

Yeah, it's not just the credit card use that is bad here.

Also, if the game said that these services are legal, and only warns people that they might get ripped off, I'm sure that lawyers will find a way to say that NCSoft and Paragon Studios would be complicit in any lawsuits that would occur if someone's information got stolen. And since it's very tough to go after Chinese citizens with this kind of lawsuit, finding a U.S. or South Korean company complicit would make things a lot easier for lawyers and people who were too stupid to realize what they were doing was dumb.

However, if NCSoft and Paragon Studios says that these activities are explicitly forbidden in game, and takes steps to ban accounts that use them/that are gold sellers, they cannot be considered complicit in the activities.


So they're not going to change their stance for good reason.

International and Domestic copyright laws cover this, especially new ones that cover media in the digital age.

1) First, the first statement is complete horse hockey. Right now, the pets are seen as 1 complete object, which takes up a certain amount of space to transmit to your character. Whatever that space is, it's much lower than transmitting all of the character details about another player's character.

Basically, it's the difference between sending information like [Display Pet: Pyro] vs [Display character with Body Type = Huge, head = hat, hat = 3, detail 1 = 7, detail 2 = 0, face = 27, face detail = 4, etc.]. Characters are much more detailed than the rather static pets are.

I actually don't understand their reason on this, and you've pretty much got it right on. We already see a lot of this. In addition, you can be just as denigrating with a female character over male minions as you can the other way around.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

Having Defense over the softcap will help with Defense Debuffs, yes. However, not all enemies have Defense debuffs, or at least not enough to reduce Defense significantly. there are a few enemy groups where this is a concern (such as those greek yuppies). Enemies with significant +ToHit buffs, such as DE Quartz Eminators or the Rularuu eyeballs, will generally negate any Defense values you might have, with or without Overload (for instance, the DE Quartz eminators give out a +100% ToHit buff).

That +2 Boss will have the same chance to hit you at 45% Defense as he would at 90% Defense. It will be higher than 5%, but adding more Defense won't change that. +2 enemies, and higher-conning enemies like bosses, get Acc boosts, which factor in after the Defense part of the Tohit calculations.

So while yes, there are some advantages to going over the softcap, but not as many as you might think (and then you've got the Incarnate softcap, which having 3 minutes out of 16 at the softcap isn't going to be that useful overall - no more so than being able to completely ignore attacks for 45 seconds every 2 minutes).


So yes, cascade failures can happen. EA and Ice Armor deal with this in two different ways. EA can hit Overload, basically throwing more of the same at the problem, meaning that it takes longer for the cascades to factor in. Ice Armor waits the debuffs out, basically allowing you to reset the fight. I don't mind that they have two different ways of dealing with the problem.

Also, 0.8 x 1.2 = 0.96, not 1. And that's against only a single target. Luckily, it's not affected by the purple patch, exactly, as the target gives themselves the debuff.

You rarely if ever need to use Hibernation for the full time period, and on my Ice Tanker, the numbers of times I've lost aggro when I've needed to use this is are even fewer. Between the two aggro auras causing 13.5 second Taunt on enemies contantly, trust me, I have the aggro. Unless someone else Taunts the foes while I'm hibernating, they're good. And if they are Tauntint, then they can handle the aggro.

If you are soft-capped in your fight before popping Overload, unless you are fighting +6s (which you can't get solo), then Overload is only giving you the HP boost. You're gaining nothing from the Defense bonus.

Amazingly, you're trying to tell us that this change is needed based on SO-level survivablity differences between /EA and Ice/. Then you're talking about testing your limits in battle on what I would assume is a well IO-d out Brute, if you're that softcapped before Overload. And you're saying that my Ice Tanker will lose aggro but you're soloing on your Brute. If I'm soloing, and testing my limits, I don't need to worry about lost aggro, and while I may not be any stronger coming out of Hibernate than when I went in (debateable, depending on the enemy), I often find that I don't need Hibernate that much in the first place, meaning that usually I'm strong enough as it is.

Gross over-reaction to redacted response, prompting a full apology four posts from now.

Sour milk makes great pancakes.

But that's not really a true analogy you're using. A better one might be that a hacksaw is better than a circular saw. Someone whole only ever needs the hacksaw may very well agree with you, while the person who only ever needs the circular saw will violently disagree.

The truth is that they're both useful for different things, much like Hibernate and Icey Bastion. Hibernate is a reactive tool for if you need it. Icey Bastion is a proactive tool for before you get hit, really. On a Stalker, Icey Bastion works to shore up holes. For Tankers, since they have much smaller holes, it becomes less useful, and a panic button is a better solution.

Also, since you're complaining about the down time of Hibernate, let me remind you that Overload is on a 1,000 second base recharge for 180 seconds of use (base 18% uptime), Icey Bastion is 300 seconds for 30 seconds of use (base 10% uptime) and Hibernate is 120 seconds for 45 seconds of potential use (base 37.5% uptime). So yeah, you're not going to win that argument.

Subjective opinion is subjective...


...not fact.

1) "Middle of the Road Set" means that it doesn't need improvements, really. It means that it functions well for most of the game. Improvements could bump it into "overpowered" and would likely result in nerfs to the rest of the set.

2) No, The Phase does not "draw away aggro." Any aggro that you had will remain. In fact, I have been able to hold aggro through a full Hibernation session if I need to. Any Ice Tanker worth his salt should be able to do this with two aggro auras.

3) So? that's SUPPOSED to be a hole in the set. And actually, it has more Fire resistance than it does Psychic Resistance (zero), and Icey Bastion wouldn't help with that.

4) 17% Base Def on its armors, plus 1% unenhanceable for Wet Ice means that slotted, an Ice Armor Tanker has roughly 27.5% Defense. If you're enemy saturated, you're getting another 10.36% Defense from EA. That's almost 38% Defense. You don't need IOs to reach the soft cap. Combat Jumping and Weave will do it.

Compare that to your EA Brute/Scrapper: 12.75% Def base (19.89 slotted), plus 3.75 base for Energy Cloak (5.85 slotted), plus 6.6 from a saturated Energy Drain = 32.34% Defense. Combat Jumping and Weave will not get you to the Soft Cap without IOs.

5) Fantastic. That's actually the ONLY reason they got a new power in the set. Tankers don't have that problem. Stalkers got a new power because otherwise they would have been able to choose the same power twice, which the Devs don't want you to do. Tankers can't do that, so there's no reason to change it on that account.

6) See response above for #5.

And let's make an accurate description of that fight, since you're leaving out several things that help the Tanker out, such as the -DMG/-RCH debuff from CE, the constant AoE damage from Icicles, and the fact that the Tanker gets a good deal of +HP from his heal (and yes, I know that Energize will give you some +Regen, which we'd need to account for as well).

That being said, my soft-capped permanently Ice Tanker would be taking the same amount of damage as your some-times capped /EA Brute. Except that when yours wears off, you die, and mine doesn't wear off. On top of that, I have hibernate in case I do take too much damage due to some lucky rolls.

There's a reason they call it soft-capped Defense. Using Overload on top of your armors only increases your suvivability so much (to about the same level as the Ice Tanker normally is at). So have fun believing that that would allow you to shrug off more hits than my Ice Tanker in this scenario.

Except that Tanker Ice Armor doesn't need it. It's fine as it is. Very easy to soft-cap Defense values for S/L/E/NE, even without using Energy Absorption. Then you've got a good self-heal/+HP power, and a -DMG/-RCH aura to further reduce damage.

So you're suggesting the replacement of a power, with no need, which would violate the cottage rule to heck and back. Show me a need for this, and maybe you'd have a case.


As a tenth, optional power? Sure. Removing a power that some players like just so that you can have a power you might prefer? No thanks.