Arctic_Princess

Yay for OOC threads!

Right, composing myself for the next round of misunderstanding and bloody carnange. It is very dark and with two shadowy figures plus a temporal distortion it could get interesting.

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these VEATs you may have to use toggles choosingly at times depending on your build.

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Or team with at least one Kineticist

I've been running a low level team as a Soldier (hoping to be a Crabby as I spent 1-50 as a Stalker and realised eventually that I don't like them all that much) and enjoyed teaming with different archetypes. Teaming. In City of Villains. I thought I'd never say it! (Apart from the dash from 40-50 which was just team team team for me)

I think a team of all-Soldiers/Widows could be fun - but lacks the metal-crunching, fast-pacedness of say a Stalker, a Corrupter, a Brute, a Domi and an MM plus to very useful skills of a Soldier and/or Widow. Of course, team them up with Heroes on co-ops and you're well away.

Personally I don't see the point of nerfing the defence - purely because this is an EPIC archetype. The damage is 'okay' for VEATs to compensate for some very handy secondaries and they will provide some much-needed survivability that, hopefully, will encourage teams and therefore keep Villains going longer (theoretically the more people teaming, the quicker to 50, people have more scope to try other ATs - that's my take on it anyway).

Wow. Truly amazing work.
And original music you say? Does this qualify for a Creative Genius award?

It happened last night...

Thank you to all who helped me shift my... self from 44 to 50 in the past week. Special mentions to Diamhair, Stuka September, Kaotic, Wild Red, Premius and Rosalina.

Special thanks too to The Tempest Villain Group, without whom I doubt I would have even played past level 32 and also to Hatesman for an above average Thorn Respec Trial many moons ago.

I've already been playing some VEATs and, gosh, they're really rather spiffing! At least now I might be able to find a team at the lower levels!

Venom Grenade FTW!

((And to follow on, I feel I need to tie things up from my end))

Kata reported in to the Boomtown Security Office at the War Wall gate in Steel.

"Anything unusual Ms Bromovich?" One of the officers enquired.

"No Charles, nothing more out of the ordinary than is usual for Baumton. Clockwork activity seems down. The Council are keeping a low profile. No arrests from me tonight."

"Heh, I dunno how you does it. Some of them gangers are real superpowered types."

Kata gave him a wan smile and headed for the Green Line station. Her arms ached like crazy from climbing the derelict walls that littered the old suburb of Baumton and she cursed the fact that she had opted to leave her anti-grav gadgets at home.

But it had been a fairly quick patrol because the matter of the Freak attack was still firmly at the front of her mind, burning all other things away. She knew of a compound in Crey's Folly where some of the 'smarter' Freaks liked to hang out - often they were the ones who had survived longer than their comrades in battle and had gleaned the best bits of cybernetics for themselves.

Coming out of Brickstown station, Kata made her way to the Folly's security office, looking for signs of Freak activity in the alleyways as she kept her eye on the landmark of the hospital which sat adjacent to her destination.

She stopped at the corner of a piece of parkland for a moment, eyeing a cluster of buildings nearby with some suspicion. Breathing in there was a strong scent of oil and something else... Blood? A coppery tang in the air mixed with motor oil. Her eyes darted about the scene, searching for a clue - bingo! Very feint traces by the roadside of oil which when followed... a sewer access hatch. Kata's heart rate rose as she decided there and then that the sewers were going to be the place where she'd find answers.

Kata opened the barred gate to the sewer, drew the blade from its sheath hanging by her side and ventured into the gloom below.

Kata looked a little pale after the abrupt conversation on her mobile: A woman's voice followed by a crashing sound and then the call had disconnected. And was it a threat? Could it have been the mysterious man on the rooftop? It was easy enough to rig up a voice masker. More questions and no answers. Typical.

Kata was heading for the door when she spotted activity in the cafeteria. The guy sitting at the table was the professor! Excellent, perhaps now there might be some real progress.

***

The metal fragment - could it be from a hard disk? Possibly. Was the information on it worth a thousand dollars? Probably not.

Kata gave the student beside her an odd look then decided on a course of action that, ultimately, pleased her own sense of drama. She took a small plastic wallet from her inside jacket pocket and, discreetly, flipped it open at the girl, revealing her Hero ID and her Omega Security badge in one. Luckily the crowd of students was such that it couldn;t readily be seen, although the girl's jaw dropped so far that Kata thought she might have to take her to the infirmary in case it needed popping back into place.

"I have my contacts thank you."

The girl stuttered and before she was able to tell the others gathered that she'd just met a registered hero, Kata had quietly slipped away and was making her way to the library to inform Manny that no further enquiries would be necessary.

So, the gas was used by some Freak called Shad00w and, in the confusion, the canister made its way on to the street. Very little was taken...

Kata was lost in thought all the way home to her apartment by Silver Lake in Steel Canyon. Of course, the obvious thing to do would be to ask around the Freak 'community', if you could call it that. But it was early evening by now, a stomach needed filling and then a power nap before patrolling was in order. Chances were in this city that Kata'd find the next set of answers when she was least expecting them...

I do like the composition - I can see the Spider-Man influence but, heck, you won't be the first or last to do it and your character is different enough.

My only criticism is the background colouring - as the character is a collection of blacks, greys and whites, I think he needs some contrast in the background. The royal blue of CoH fits many heroes but the darker ones benefit from a bit of architecture. Have a play with some backgrounds - could be fun just imposing him on a rooftop gargoyle or, for giggles, a beach

Aside from that minor point - great work and keep it coming

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I would sort of agree with the post about blasters.

After 3yrs of being a scrapper, I'm finding I'm enjoying being a blaster more. The problem is now scrapper is just SO easy, easpecailly with IOs. Playing a blaster adds a lot more insta-faceplant spice to the mix.
Plus once you've hit a 6 slotted AIM + BU + FC'd nova, there's nothing on a scrapper to compare.

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I agree with this. Now I've gotten a scrapper (and lovely as she was, especially during the 'Tank taunts, controllers and defenders lock, blasters and scrappers do their thing' Praetorian arc) to 50, I find her quite dull. I think it's why I respec'd into Dark Mastery - as you can actually hold and immobilise foes, and use some tactics.

Having said that, my fire/fire scrapper is an absolute scream. She tears through mobs a lot. Okay, all she can do is burn things (at the moment, but even then not much else , if I'm honest, after level 26 or so) but it's fun to BURN!

Oh and 'Scrapperlock' applies to anyone, not just scrappers. I've done it before and seen it before on defenders, controllers, stalkers, dominators...

It's funny the first time when you faceplant (or the team wipes) - after that, not so much

When Villains went live and then sometime after when I was actually running AP through the Praetorian arc I came up with the following 'alternate' characters:

Sista Dista - Mind/Psi Dom - she was a Hollywood starlet gone mad from the chemical implants (tiny frame with chest slider to 11)

Zombie Senator - SS/Inv Brute - The result of what happened to Statesman after a particularly eventful encounter with the Banished Pantheon and the Circle of Thorns. His F10 battle cry was 'Mmmm... brains'

Maybetron - Rad/Rad Corruptor - an inept scientist crippled by his inability to make decisions. He joined with other villains to get his revenge on...yada yada yada

Sinclair C5 - Ninjas/TA MM - Playboy about town, Justin Sinclair, spent all of his inheritance on developing a ridiculous nuclear-powered car, which never sold, and so took to a life of crime in order to pay back his creditors.

On the flip side, I never made him but Mister Popularity was going to be Lord Recluse (Illusion/FF Controller - he had a lonely childhood and so made some imaginary friends to play with which, through the power of magic, became real. Or at least illusionary...)

His girlfriend, Emo Grrl (Dark/Dark Defender) was Ghost Widow. She just liked wearing black and white a lot.

It was, as you may have already guessed, a very long and bored weekend. It's a shame I didn't keep the screenies.

***

Yes, still sharing - my current two favourites are:

Queen Bea and her son, Beetle Boy. Yes they are insect themed!

I've used the following names which may or may not now be in use:

Psionara - Any Mind Control/Psychic character

Toxic Sally - A very tall woman: Toxic (Rad, Poison etc). Sally = Long Tall Sally: a clothes shop for women akin to High and Mighty for men.

Ionos - I'm actually thinking of reviving him. He was my first proper hero. Similar names could be Stratos, Tropos, Exos, Mesos, Thermos - all shortened from terms used to describe the layers of Earth's atmosphere.

I have a current scrapper called Flambelle who was born out of my Midnight Rose: Skulls story (shameless plug! ) who, thanks to issue 12, is Fire/Fire. Photon Girl from the same story is a FF/Energy defender.

That is all

Kata continued to listen, filtering out the references to beer and 'chicks' - really, had society not moved on? Perhaps she was getting a little older, further removed from the teenage years? And I'm thankful never to have to go through those years again she thought.

A few things she overheard were confirmed: The sniper was the main point. The gas was worrying but, as had happened before, firefights between heroes and villains could often endanger civilians. At least the police seemed to be a little more proactive in their investigations these days.

The conversation ended as a bell rang signalling the start of a new class and the students made their way out of the hall.

"Kata, you really should look in a mirror before venturing outside."

Kata turned and found the wrinkled face of her friend, Manny (AKA Whirling Dervish), beaming up at her.

"Oh this?" she touched her hair briefly and turned the collar of her jacket down. "I was doing a little... reconnaissance."

"In the University? Has the war on drugs found its way to University dorms now? I hear the frat parties can get pretty wild." Manny chuckled.

"Don't tease. Just a couple of undergraduates: they were talking about the attack," Kata suddenly remembered something, "You spoke to this Time-Skip guy?"

"Oh yes, an interesting fellow as you said. I gave him your message. I still don't understand why you're insisting on all of this cloak and dagger approach though."

"Manny, it's..." Kata lowered her voice considerably, "It's because of Ellie's involvement. I've been digging around and I think I've finally found out some things, for myself, about her past."

Manny's nose wrinkled, "So you're protecting her?"

"For want of a better word, yes. Look, I trust you Manny. And I know that you've had your demons in the past to contend with. Well, from what I've found, from the records at Portal Corp and the PPD... if Ellie were to go dark again.."

Manny nodded, reflecting for a moment on her own troubled life. That was all behind her and if Kata wanted to protect someone, especially someone as powerful as Ellie, from experiencing the worst of it then she felt she must go along with it.

"So, what's next Kata?"

"Well, I wanted to see if I could borrow some equipment from the lab? And I'll need some time alone in the library." Manny looked unsure, "For a fragment of metal I found on the scene. Part of it looks dissolved and the other half must have escaped the effects. It's a perfect specimen for analysis."

"I didn't know you were a scientist now, Kata." Manny smirked.

"I'm not and that's precisely why I need to have some alone time in the library." Kata produced a folded piece of paper from her jacket and showed it to Manny. "This professor - he's currently under police protection. I'm going to see if I can pull a few strings and get some time with him. The University library is as good a place as any to meet with him."

Manny nodded and handed the paper back to her friend. "I'll get to work on it right away. Any more errands you wish me to run?"

"If you do manage to make it to the statue again, speak to Time-Skip. And this time, do it directly. That magic trick of yours-"

Kata's mobile rang - the number was unfamiliar. Tentatively, Kata pressed the accept call button and raised the phone to her ear...

Kata had learnt how to listen in on conversations without actually appearing to do so from her time spent in the CIA. It was a matter of relaxing and trying to fit in with the crowd and, this being a university, her first thought was to make herself less presentable and therefore less conspicuous.

She made a beeline for a stand of bookshelves and, making quite sure no one could see her, untucked her shirt, smeared her make-up a little and ruffled her hair. Kata then turned the corner of her jacket collar up and checked her appearance in a compact. She winced a little, not entirely approving of looking such a state in public but the conversation seemed a little more involved than simply two students discussing biochemistry lab. Kata checked the dictaphone in her pocket, pressed the record button and headed back into the main hall, looking purposefully vague. For good measure she hunched her shoulders a little and stared at a couple of posters for local rock bands, waiting for her companion and hoping that the two students might elaborate on the scientific jargon.

Over the past couple of days, Kata Bromovich (AKA Arctic Princess) had been making enquiries in Galaxy City. Her instincts told her that what she had seen was not the only thing to be seen and a chance encounter with a hero called Time-Skip confirmed it.

He was a temporal manipulator whose special watch device could record events as it saw them. A mysterious man in black had been seen firing from a nearby rooftop and causing the collapse of the building. He didn't look like Crey, Council or Nemesis - so who was he?

Time-Skip had mentioned that he couldn't get to the area as if it was time-locked.

Then Kata had met a hero who had managed to make it to the rumble: Molly Longstaff had identified one of the glowing figures as Ellie. She had 'gone dark' and Kata thought she knew what that meant, even if the consequences were unappealing. Ellie had, by all accounts, shown a tremendous force - perhaps she'd over-exerted herself? Did Kheldian energy have that kind of upper limit? Kata's brain needed more than just oxygen to compute the information and so she headed to Steel Canyon University's library to ask her companion, Whirling Dervish, if she might 'borrow' some equipment.

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What is it that most other MMO's have atm (amongst many things) that CoX doesnt have?! Mounts!!

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What does CoX have that no other MMOs have? Travel Powers, do you really think that given a choice between Super Speed or a fast camel anyone would bother with a fast camel?

I love my fast grey ram in WoW, but I'd bathe in its blood and sacrifice all the dwarven babies for super jump.

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Im not suggesting a Camel, Ram, War Tigers, Elekks or any other animal .. As i said im suggesting to Ride the sidekick!!! What travelpower the SK chooses is up to them!

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That would be an awsome idea but i would be looking only for tall blonde with baywatch proportions sidekicks to travel around.

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David Hasselhoff and a bottle of Harpic? He could ride around on his motorcycle with kittens stored in the glove box at the back.

It's 3am. I do apologise.

Oh oh! I just remembered! One of the 'fronts' my SG has is as a delivery company. They don't claim to be the fastest in the City or anything even remotely 'super', just a normal delivery company who use motorcycle couriers and who operate out of Skyway City.

I will however, pending my pc not crashing and only working now at 3.30 in the morning, get in contact with Lea/Kanto2.

Okay, I have manay characters - but within that murky pool are a couple of characters who are my 'bit part' characters - i.e. not Arctic Princess

They are also in my SG - Titan Vanguard. Therefore I'd love to extend a hand of coalition - the things the 'group' does aren't always strictly down the straight and narrow (even AP, who is a member and who works for the government doesn't always err on the side of convention, but she is a hero who would not kill as would the others).

Just to give an idea of the SG - it's basically me on the RP side of things, although my SG partner has allowed the clever (!) use of his characters as plot monkeys, reference points etc. Think of it as an SG full of plot monkeys and Arctic Princess. So, yes, I'd be up for a coalition.

Now RP-wise and availability - I'm irregular in many if not all senses of the word. I am also doing a spot of RP over on Defiant at the mo but that's mainly at the weekends. The recent Freak Out open RP thread has caught my attention so Kata is busy investigating that, but her colleagues can always be brought on to take down giant octopi, ancient gods, recover magical talismans and the like.

((Arctic Princess (Kata) has already been enquiring about the incident over at the statue (posting there after this with what she's found, according to another hero called Time-Skip)

AP is level 50, her background can be found on the Union RP Wiki - can't find the link at the minute (I am lazy :P) - she's a non-meta, government type ))

Manny relaxed, glad that there was far more power here that was far more capable of dealing with situations like this.

"You did good, Manny." Kata touched her companion on the shoulder and headed back to the motorcycle.

"Kata?" Manny turned with a strange expression on her face

"Yes? Before you ask, of course I'm going to have to investigate this further. It's my job."

The older woman sighed and bowed her head. "I will stay, if you don't mind? I think the paramedics may need some help moving all the rubble."

Kata nodded and got back on the bike, pausing for a moment to reflect on what she had seen: Some sort of purple energy, a gas bomb, a wrecked building and a gang of Freaks. Crazier things had happened, she was sure, but there were still some pieces of the puzzle to be found.

Kata watched in horror as the canister exploded and she had to cover her ears unless she wanted to wake up for the next year with the sounds of Freakshow screaming.

Behind her, Manny had seen the explosion too but it took her a moment to switch targets. She managed to 'lift' a large block of concrete, letting some of the smaller bits of rubble fall back down to Earth and allowing herself a smile as one piece thunked a Tank on the back of the head. The large concrete slab hovered over the burning car and then, very subtly, it began to dissolve over the wreck until it had covered the flames in sand. Manny's fingers twitched and lightning discharged across her body as the magical energy flowed.

A siren blared a few streets away and although it sounded like a regular cop car come to control the crowd, it was in fact attached to a quaint motorcycle and sidecar.

"Can you still sense movement, Manny?"

A slender woman, wearing full motorcycle leather and a sleek crash helmet looked down at her companion in the sidecar, a frail-looking woman with long pepperpot hair.

"Yes Kata. Although with all the noise, I am surprised you can't."

The motorcycle came to a halt roughly two blocks from the disturbance. The two figures alighted and stared at the sky, dust and flames flickering.

"Are you sure you're up to this Manny?" Kata removed the crash helmet, placed it in the sidecar and removed a long, thin package from the bike.

"I may be an old woman, Kata, but I've still got some uses. I just hope the bill for damages isn't as high as last time." The old woman's eyes gleamed in the dusk-light.

A couple of heroes appeared to be hovering above the scene, one large building was virtually destroyed although there was less rubble than the two women expected. The Freaks seemed to be everywhere and some of them didn't look like regular flavour.
Kata nodded to her companion and the old woman raised her hands as if conducting an orchestra. As Manny murmured under her breath, the ground shook ever so slightly and some of the rubble near the building began to tidy itself up, much to the bewilderment of a small group of Freaks who had not long ago been flattened by a blast of fire from on high.

As Manny went into her trance, Kata eyed the scene again. She thought she caught a glimpse of a white creature hovering and some sort of red beast. A pink-clad hero zipped overhead, making a pass to come back round for another shot at the Freaks.

Then the military training kicked in as Kata heard a nasty plink plink coming from the building. She hastily removed her trusty blade from the packaging and shouted as loud as possible "Everyone! DOWN!"...

What about tonight? 9pm? It is a Bank Holiday after all.

Brother Psyche is so far my favourite

Any plans to colour these? I agree with Golden Girl: colour will bring them to life.

Having said that the poses are very dramatic. Keep up the good work.

Argh!

The connection issues which have seemingly been plaguing people in the game over the weekend have landed at my door. I was looking forward to it but I got the whole 'Map Server Disconnected' thing when I was zoning to the battle arena.

What a pain.

Well, I hope the rest of you had a good battle. I'm off to RP over MSN now as the blasted client won't let me back in.

Sure, sounds good to me. To be honest I posted yesterday afternoon and then totally forgot about it!

Okay, here goes.
It looked much nicer on paper, before it was scanned in and went all 'funny'.

Here is a new character of mine, Winterstrike. She's a Deviant and this is her fresh-out-of-the-box costume.

I know that her right arm is way too long and her legs could do with trimming down a bit. Apart from that though, I'm quite pleased with my efforts as this was all 'from my head' as opposed to using an existing picture. I hope to add more, including AP herself, in the near future.

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Incorrect. Hazard zones have a level requirement to enter, and it's always mention in game as being a security level requirement, not a combat level. Unless you're a registered hero, you're not going to HAVE a security level are you? If you have no security level, and no hero registration, there's no ID for the guards at the gates to verify, so you won't be permitted to enter.

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Yes, but FFM these are the known flaws of the game mechanics because the security gates are designed, as far as I have interpreted them, as:

a) sealing off parts of the city so that there is some progression in the game of visiting new places - if there were no security gates/hazard zones then arguably people would just rush straight from Atlas to Peregrine (but don't get me started on that - as we're all aware some people do that regardless, that's just human nature for you);

and b) once in the hazard zone, the 'content' there (i.e. mobs and certain types of mission) is of sufficiently high level to keep the player interested.

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As for the other things in the zones, those things were already in there when they were sealed.

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That doesn't explain away how, when defeated, the same enemy mobs reappear. Again, it's an example of game mechanics conflicting with immersion, something we all know has to happen in a game. If Grand Theft Auto had a finite number of cars, then after your attempts to steal/hijack/crush all of them you'd have to spend the rest of your game walking and running.

Ideally, if your character defeats a great number of one type of enemy mob within an area, then those mobs will take a lot longer to 'reappear' - which might suggest that the enemy mob in question has to spend longer to resource their numbers. Of course, the danger is ith that system too that for badge reward mobs, groups of players would start to camp out in zones preventing any other players from street-fighting so that they can get their badges quicker. As it stands currently however, no such system exists which is why you only have to travel about 300 yards or so (correct me if that's way out) after defeating a mob to have it respawn.

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Why are people so adamant people have to be registered anyway? There really is no mention of it being neccessay.


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Why are people so adamant about ignoring the game world we ALL have to work within? It makes zero sense to me to play within the game reality, and then throw everything about it away and do your own thing. All you do with that is make interaction with other characters fraught with potential problems.
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I'm not sure on both of these points. I try to work within the reasonable bounds of the game World when figuring out what a character is able to do. I have to fudge it whenever AP goes up against enemies that should, for all intents and purposes, fry her brains and stomp on her non-superpowered body. My lamest fudge to date is explaining that APs arms are very tired after going up against a legion of Malta's robots. So, she has to be skilled enough and quick enough to deliver short, sharp strikes to the hydraulics of these machines in order to disable them. She has no superhuman strength BUT she is the sort of person who would take on the challenge against a secret band of military types hellbent on wreaking political damage across the World. If a mechanism within the game allowed her to either don an armoured suit a la Aliens or sit outside in a van, directing an army of hero-aligned government bods using blue tooth then that's be brilliant. When the 'User-Created' stuff becomes available then she will be able to do that via me effectively writing an arc or a simple mission where that is the case.

I agree with Fans in the sense that, for heroes, there is no set way through the city/game/how you want to play your character: Some characters may be able to blend in with the shadows and avoid having to show any kind of security pass at hazard zones and the like. Others might be capable of running very fast, teleporting, very carefully scaling the War Walls or even plain flying over them. Just because the IG mechanics doesn't allow it for the obvious reasons, it doesn't mean your character can't.

On the other hand I think FFM has a valid point in that there is an awful lot of game lore and game World stuff that might fit better with what is trying to be achieved by 'not registering'. For example, and as has been stated before in this thread, the issue of 'International' heroes could lead to a consensus that there are other similar bodies capable of authorising the kind of activities that heroes enjoy - namely fighting crime and saving the day. I should imagine that the developers don't want to cause outcries by even attempting to depict what other countries may be like. Again, perhaps that's something we might be able to do when the User-Created stuff comes in. For those of you who've seen 'Independence Day' - didn't you feel slightly miffed that the World was saved by the good ole US of A with only fleeting images of other countries who could only look on with awe and dread as aliens attacked?
The Paragon Game World is changing - Midnight Squad, comprised mainly of non-US citizens seems to be taking a firmer control of the city in terms of defending against threats of a Global level. Vanguard are less concerned with who you are and more with what you can do to stop those Rikti.

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When I do missions IC, what's actually happening is rarely what's written on the mission text, else your effectively locking people into a very stale gameworld!

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But that's just doing what you said everyone else is doing - taking the gameworld and disregarding it for your own ends.

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Everything within the game world is constructed to work within its rules. There's nothing that says you HAVE to follow these rules, but you can't expect the game world to then work for you if you're going to break them. There is enormous scope for us to work within the rules of the world set down by the developers. I don't see why people feel the need to just disregard it and make up their own stuff; you might as well not bother playing at all.

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The first part makes sense. The last sentence is, perhaps, a little too harsh and prescriptive, in my opinion.

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Apologies for my inability to use the 'quote' system