Arc_Salvo

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Hey Arc_Salvo, ever read "The Comedy Bible" by Judy Carter? Excellent analytical tool about comedy writing that you might enjoy reading. I did, and I'm not the slightest bit funny.

Anyway, you're correct that in a professional setting Mighty Storm's guide could use a polishing re-write, tightening up a few spots. But in this venue it works great. Overall I found the piece to be quite amusing, with some wonderfully-worded lines. Seems more reminiscent of Douglas Adams than Kaufman or Monty Python IMHO.

I only wish the url was short enough I could more easily recommend it in-game. Good job Mighty Storm.

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I agree that in retrospect, it is suitable for this venue. People here aren't professionals, and they don't usually have time to tighten things up even if they're inclined to do so. Busy lives and such. As it is, sometimes I find myself spending a little (okay, a -lot-) more time than I originally intended polishing what was supposed to be an "improv" humorous post off the top of my head, and so know how long writing posts like this "guide" can drag on if you don't pull yourself away. Even still, I get the feeling that Mighty Storm will revise this again, and publish a newer, improved version.

Unless he doesn't feel like it.

And thanks for the heads-up, I think I might just read that book, and then ignore all the advice and continue to not be funny, as I am not right now.

Anyway, I hope M.S. adds a note about how the true purpose of teh h34lar is to flip out and kill people, because dead enemies can't hurt your team, and also because it's sooo awesome to flip out and chop off heads all the time and not even think twice about it. And the best h33l0rs are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time. Just like all good Tankers, Defenders, and Controllers according to my many unfunny, incoherent posts on the subject.

Yep, everyone's supposed to flip out, and kill entire towns because some guy dropped a spoon, and uppercut people just because they open windows... except Blasters and Tankers, who are instead supposed to meditate all day to pursue the path of inner peace and possibly enlightenment... then take the medicine pool and use it on all the Defenders, Controller, and Tankers who are flipping out and killing people.

Because that's REAL ULTIMATE POWER !!!!

A good philosphy to have, Mighty Storm. Best not to get worked up over stuff that you can't do much good about, imho too. Anyhow, having realized that I'd stopped reading at Chapter 4 with two more to go, I decided to finish up your guide, and found Chapters 5 and 6 to be more directly ironic and therefore funny to me. Key word being -me- of course. Everyone has a different sense of humor, and knowing this: I, like you, write what's funny to me and hope at least one other person will find what I write funny as well. From your responses, I'd say that you've succeeded in this goal.

Anyhow, I found this tidbit in your credits funniest of all:

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I'd also like to thank Avonlea who actually *did* help. Unlike the people who I claimed helped above. The people above actually helped in the same way a Kheldian 'helps'

"OMG! Galaxy! Plz save me!! *runsaway*"


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The most accurate portrayal of Kheldian "helping" I've seen.
'nuff said.

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I appreciate your time and effort, but I think you're rejecting some great comedy work from the likes of Andy Koffman (who I can't stand) and Monty Python (Who I think are great). Running a fine line between seriousness and overt humor let the audience play with the absurd nature of reality itself.

and anyway, I don't think of myself as a comedian. I was just trying to be wry. *really* wry. Picture me wringing out a washcloth.


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I see. Well, I guess that style of humor works better if performed live, where you can add the nuances of vocal inflection, facial expressions, body language, etc. to the mix. I think, at least.

If you were trying to be wry and not funny, you've succeeded. Anyhow, I don't know much about Andy Kauffman, but Monty Python's movies at least are very funny to me.

Well, if your guide is working as intended, cool. Can't say much more than that. It is very wry, and the concepts are very funny.

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You know what's worse than a stuffed-shirt humor critic?

um, nothing.

Christ on a bike, I can't believe you wrote that much trivial uselessness.

Cheers


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Geez, Zapata, I was just trying to give a fellow amateur comedian (or so it seemed at the time) some tips and constructive criticism. If it seemed stuffed shirt to you, I'm sorry, but I really was just trying to help. I don't consider myself a humor critic, I'm only an amateur at trying to make people laugh myself. But note that I am at heart just a guy that thinks people are too serious, and tries to make them laugh, and so tries to help out fellow people who are just trying to make people laugh occaisonally.

If you're going to take offense at my well-intentioned analysis, fine, but at least read the post on the thread in my sig and the followup on the last page of that thread and read some of my less serious posts across the forums before you jump to the conclusion that I'm an over-serious humor-critic.

I only talk about the rule of 9's because I've noticed that it applies to me especially. 9 times out of 10, my attempts at humor suck, and I'll be the first to admit it. But the 10th time, when it works, I make people laugh, and that makes me feel good, and it makes the other failures worthwhile.

Anyhow, I was trying to encourage Mighty Storm, not discourage him, just so you know, because I've met many an amatuer writer/comedian that are way too hard on themselves because they expect themselves to be really good all the time. And when I shared how even professional stand-up comedians and writers admitted that the rule of 9's applied to them too, that encouraged them, so I figured I'd share it here.

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If someone asks R U H34L3R? you never say "no"... you simply tell them what you are.

Ex: "I'm a defender."

(Or, if you're an empath, say "I'm an empath." Don't call yourself a healer or let them call you a healer, you'll give the word power.)

Often, they will just leave you at that, especially if you actually can heal. Use O2 boost once or twice to save yourself from a kick and then do your thing. After all, if you do a good job they won't need heals.


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Good advice, but believe it or not, only the most obnoxious teams (that I've found I don't want to join anyway) kick me for not being a he33l0r. Most teams accept that I'm a buffer/debuffer and surprisingly enough, DO stay in Steamy Mist and wait for Freezing Rain, try not to kill the snowstorm anchor, etc. etc. al.

It was shocking to me how many pickup teams were cool with adapting to playing with a Storm defender... and it was more shocking to me how that didn't help in many missions due to the fact that soo many people had their slider set to invincible for 8 man missions. Ugh, let me say for the record that I hate purple Vahz. zOMG, I hate them with a passion!

I don't know, I found this guide's humor to be a bit long winded and roundabout.

It's funny in concept, but in execution, I found myself taking too long mentally to reach the ironic/ludicrous parts to be tickled enough to laugh.

Brevity is the soul of wit?

Plus the narrative tone was a bit mild and "informative" sounding, which kind of made the outrageous statements not as fun. Especially since the statements being made weren't being said in as ludicrous a fashion as they could've been.

This humorous guide does have a lot of ironic statements, but they're delivered so slowly and straightforwardly that they don't surprise you. You can see them coming, and when they arrive they're not so exceptionally ludicrous or well delivered that they're worth the wait.

Not to say that this "guide" wasn't an interesting read, just that it honestly didn't make me laugh. It's a nice idea for ironic posting, but could use some work if you want it to be uproariously funny for a wider audience. Also, I think that some people might have 1-starred your guide because the tone seems very critical of non-defenders, and some people might have taken those parts too seriously. Possibly because you didn't make fun of those non-defenders to an outrageous enough extent to where it was obvious that you were making fun of them in a light-hearted way. The too-serious tone of the writing (which I believe is supposed to add to the irony/comedic effect, but doesn't imho) also doesn't help, because some actually bitter people (which I'm definitely sure you're not one of) do snipe at other classes in a very similar style of writing.

Anyhow, the idea by itself is classic.

Party Leader: r U h33l0r?

Lord Stormhawk(me): No.. I'm Storm/, I'm a buffer/deb-

<kick>

Lord Stormhawk: $#@$$!!!!
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Anyhow, don't take this criticism the wrong way. I'm just trying to help you improve this guide. Comedians, like all writers, operate under the "Rule of 9's" I think, unless they're exceptionally talented. Basically this unofficial "Rule" says 9 out of 10 ideas a writer (usually a comedian) will think of for a joke are going to be bad. Any writer/comedian, even the good ones. And the way that you think up a lot of good jokes/gags is by thinking up say.. 100, and keeping 10, or thinking up rough material and revising and editing it until it's polished to a high sheen.

Okay, it's not -always- 9 out of 10 that are bad, but the point is: more often than not, the average writer is likely to think up something less funny than more funny. So only continual effort without giving up/getting discouraged is the only real way (or secret) to writing funny material consistently.

Hope this helps.

Defiance is good vs Greens and Blues up until a suprisingly high level... buuut those are the cons you don't need defiance for. Buildup/Aim (or both) or any one of a number of /Devices tricks work just fine vs them.

Sure defiance would be useful if it kicked in at 99% or less hp (or 79% or less if we want to be -reasonable-... pfeh), but I'd much prefer the inherent power "Spite".

Spite: When the Tank goes down and all the aggro on the map goes on you because your Blastvoke hits many more targets than their Taunt at range, and your hitpoints are falling faster than a termite-gutted house wired with explosives that's on fire during an earthquake... your see the end coming as your life starts flashing before your eyes (and it's chock full of faceplants) and decide to go out in a blaze of glory. If you're going to die, you're sure as blazes going to take them all with you.

When your hitpoints reach 0 or less, you are given 10 seconds of total invulnerability to get into position before you explode in an enormous pbaoe burst of power that deals damage equal to your set's Nuke... at the damage cap.


Now -that- is an inherent power that I'd like. I know this is an inherent ability that's been suggested by other Blasters before, but I thought I'd throw it out again. Sure this power would have to be balanced so that it wasn't so overpowered for the early game, but other than that, it seems pretty suitable for the way blasters -are- played, as opposed to what the vision is for the way they're supposed to be played.

Guys, guys. I don't think you all are giving the Devs the respect they deserve. Especially considering the fact that they have REAL ULTIMATE POWER!!!!

Hi, this post is all about devs, REAL DEVS. This post is awesome. My name is Salvo and I can't stop thinking about devs. These guys are cool; and by cool, I mean totally sweet.

Here as some facts about devs:

1. Developers are mammals.

2. Developers fight ALL the time.

3. The purpose of the developer is to flip out and nerf people.

Developers can nerf anyone they want! Developers gimp up powers ALL the time and don't even think twice about it. These guys are so crazy and awesome that they flip out ALL the time.

So again: If you don't believe that devs have REAL Ultimate Power you better get a life right now or they will nerf your head off!!! (It's an easy choice, if you ask me...)

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If any answers are of the "soon", or "I can't say much" or "we haven't decided yet" variety.........I WILL shoot someone.

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Don't worry, he's only using Nerf Arrows

I do think that the developer *should* be able to answer a question in this manner, however, they should also answer an additional question for each vague answer given, so we get at least six answers with substance. I would prefer to see a 'I can't say much about that just now' rather than assume they avoided the question or did not think it worthy of answering.

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I agree. 6 Substantial answers would be nice. I've got some questions right now for the devs: why haven't they implemented some of my t3h aW3sum 1D34z, like l1ek "Leader Kick" (an emote that allows you to use a kick animation against any starred team leader o supergroup lieutenant/captain/founder - the higher the rank the more awesome the kick animation... as opposed to that useless suggestion to allow supergroups to kick their idle captains who are just taking space) or... or... the ability to pick up and wield/throw sticks in combat from glowie piles randomly spawned outside, huh?

Just kidding.

Anyhow, lots of people misunderstand Geko, calling him cruel or evil and such. That's just plainly not true. Like all mammals, Geko can be mean OR totally awesome.

I heard that once Geko was eating at a diner. And when some dude dropped a spoon Geko nerfed the whole town. My friend Mark said that he saw Geko totally uppercut-nerf some player just because the player opened a window.

And that's what I call REAL Ultimate Power!!!

If you don't believe that Geko has REAL Ultimate Power you better get a life right now or he will nerf-chop your head off!!! It's an easy choice, if you ask me.

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I've seen more than a few people crying for Ice Tankers to have their own place to give feedback. And since we've already planned to change Unyielding some, a few think we're ignoring Ice in favor of Invulnerabilty. So I wanted to start this thread.

Here's a couple of changes coming that I think will help:

Reduced Accuracy of Minion level Turrets from 75% to 58%.
Reduced Accuracy of Lieutenant level Turrets from 94% to 65%.
Reduced Accuracy of Boss level Turrets from 113% to 75%.
Reduced Accuracy of Snipers from 75% to 65%.
Reduced Accuracy of Archvillains from 90% to 75%.
Reduced Accuracy of Giant Monsters from 90% to 75%.
Reduced Accuracy of Monument Minions from 75% to 58%.
Reduced Accuracy of Rularuu Bosses from 90% to 75%.


BIG thanks to Circeus, for his tireless devotion to all that is Ice Tankerish. Hip hip hooray!

PLEASE keep the discussion limited to Ice Tankers. Anything else will be removed.

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I'd just like to say: Thank you Statesman. That will help not only Ice Tankers, but /SR scrappers a -lot-.

Definitely a step in the right direction towards making sure defense only as a damage mitigator isn't completely overcome by eveyrthing with high accuracy and his brother. Now, could you and your team look at stackable defense debuffs? Those can hurt as much as overly high accuracy in a lot of cases. Also, howabout adding a small amount of resist % (even a -tiny- amount) to all the /Ice (and maybe even /SR) powers. Because when a defense only's defense is overcome: full damage is taken.

And even with those numbers, unless the way the resistances of the resist-based damage mitigation sets are tweaked so that they work differently, Defense will always scale worse than Resist (and even Regen, in scrapperville) when you fight +con mobs. Because against +con mobs, accuracy AND damage will increase, as well as villain survivability. So a defense-only type will not only get hit more (to the point that they may get hit almost as much or as much as a resist only type), but they'll get hit with full damage.

I'll admit that defense scales -down- (to minus con mobs) better than any other damage mitigation types, because I've taken on 3 simultaneous spawn of greens with my MA/SR with no toggles running... but who fights down in this game? ... except idiots like me who like to finish off their outdated contacts' mission regardless of whether or not they're good xp/sec or not.

Anyhow, I'd like to see this issue of defense not scaling upwards as favorably as resists vs higher class (lt's and bosses) and higher level mobs addressed. And even with only 75% accuracy, AV's and Giant Monsters will be hitting Ice/ (and /SR) very often and for full damage to boot. So high resistance will be of more useful vs these enemies than high defenses.

At the very least, I'd like to hear that defense being the best vs even and negative cons, but the worst at +cons being "working as intended" even though that won't be a very encouraging message.

Although enemy accuracy has been nerfed, so have Ice Tanker (and /Sr and Pool) defenses, and many have pointed out that overall, /Ice Tankers (and /SR scrappers) have been nerfed overall to the point where they're worse off than ever! So proportionately, they're still worse than resist (and regen on the scrapper side) types.

I know it's hard to balance defense, because it's not as linear and predictable a progression as resistance. Make defense too low, and it won't be effective. Make it too high, and it's too "uber", a defense-only type won't get hit at all. However, I think the current plan has (understandably) went with trying to give too little as opposed to too much, and this is because defense-only as damage mitigation is a flawed concept to begin with. Defense is too unreliable a mitigator, and too hard of one to balance properly against resistance sets, and resistance + defense sets (like invul in particular) as it is. So sets that have defense only should be changed to have a small amount of resistance as a "backup" in my opinion. So that Ice/ and /Sr won't be one trick ponies who take hits the worst when their one trick fails them, and so that they'll have layered damage mitigation to help them in all other situations.

Take this idea into consideration, please. It may not fit into your vision/concept, but you can't deny that it makes sense and is possibly more workable in the game mechanics (as they are) than defense alone. But I'd take any change to make Ice/ (and /SR) more favorable compared to other sets. Not just the ones suggested by me.

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With all these changes and nerfs I think it would be only DECENT if you would post the corresponding numbers so we know exactly what the changes are and how much they will be affecting our heroes ?

Thanks

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I know. The devs -know- we players will just reverse engineer the information anyway. It's only a matter of time, and in the meantime, all that the lack of information we're faced with does is cause annoyance/irritation.

Might as well release the full numbers so we can cry fair or foul at them and test them thoroughly more quickly, and so get this test period over with rather than to drag things out by making us figure it out the hard way, and THEN provide our comments.

Defiance was great for my level 3 Archery/Ice and my level 5 Sonic/EN, but... was completely useless for my Level 25 AR/EN in Croatoa or anywhere else. At the low levels, where hits are infrequent and don't do as much damage, with a few lucks, you can use Defiance to save your life. I was able to take down a purple Fallen gunner that was +4 to me with defiance WHEN I finally hit.

I was also able to save myself from Vahz Mortificators, horde of corpses, the occaisional clockwork mob, etc...

...but at Level 25, all that happened if I actually -tried- to use defiance (even at the 39% health mark) was that I'd get one-shotted by a lieutenant, or salvo'ed to death by minions.

Basically, combined with the 'no debt 'till level 10' change, Defiance only teaches low level blasters to play recklessly, which is bad for them in the long run, and definitely bad for teams. Also, after a certain point (let's say level 20 or so), Defiance is /completely/ useless, and you're better off popping a green inspiration and use the high damage you do have, rather than risking death to get high damage that probably won't save you, and almost certainly will get you into death.

Like I've said before: Defiance won't help stupid players, because they'll die and get into debt trying to use it, and Defiance won't help smart players, because they'll keep themselves healed up to a point where they'll never see it.

Give defiance to Tankers or Scrappers to offset their immense proposed defense nerfs. They can certainly use it a lot more than we can.

EDIT:

If you want defiance to be useful as a damage buff, start it at 80% health, and lower the actual buff. Consistency is what makes a bonus worthwhile, and currently, Defiance doesn't have that. I personally just use the 10.5% base bonus from assault on my blaster on live, and it's definitely better than Defiance for damage-boosting potential even solo.

Also, why not have defiance give you a greater chance of a "breakfree" effect the more damage you take, AND increase your defense vs status effects? It'd sure be more useful throughout the whole game than pure damage would. By the time you get single origin damage enhancers, even if it did kick in at 79% health, defiance wouldn't be much of a buff anyhow. Status protection is a much better buff to blasters.

And if you won't give us that, at -least- add accuracy to defiance.