Adeon Hawkwood

Basically it's three changes:
1. You get them once a month instead of once every three plus a bonus reward for every year
2. You can opt to advance more quickly by making purchases in the paragon store
3. You have a limited ability to change the order around

EDIT: Added yearly bonus, thanks Photonstorm

84 month vets 35 points. That's enough to buy everything through Tier8 and two of the three Tier 9 VIP options. Add in the point that they will get from their next month of subscription and anyone who is an 84 month vet will have all of the permanent bonuses the month after launch. They can then opt to spend future PRP on the Tier 9 repeatables.

Huh?

The character is an elementalist, and as such I really want powers to represent all four of the classical elements (water and air sort of get combined with powers like Sleet and Ice Storm). Additionally I want the powers associated with the element to tie into the general theme of the elements. I like Earth Control since it ties in well with Earth (solid and reliable, using terrain to hinder your foes). Fire I associate with rage and aggression so I want that for my primary attack powers. That means Air/Water as the third set.

In the case of a Controller that lends itself to Earth/Cold/Fire or Earth/Storm/Fire but for a Dominator it leads more towards Earth/Fire/Ice. The alternative combos of Ice/Stone/Fire or Earth/Ice/Fire just don't work as well thematically.

If you look at the table and compare it to the current veteran rewards for any veteran rewards level then it should be possible for you to spend your paragon points in a way that gets you all of your current rewards. You could (potentially) spend some of your points on different rewards but that is your choice. Now there is one slight caveat to this, I THINK that Tier 1 is "free" for all accounts which hasn't been specified (it's free for free accounts but is it free for VIPs?). If it is not free then vets with less than 12 months do get slightly screwed.

Now if that is true, lets look at how the current Vet Rewards map onto the table:


Tier 1 is free to all (I think)

Tier 2 corresponds to the 3 Month Vet Reward. 3 Month Vets will have 1 PRP to unlcok it with.

Tier 3 corresponds to the 6/9/12 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 2/3/5 points allowing them to spend 1 on T2 and the rest on their current items from T3. 12 month vets can also purchase one bonus reward.

Tier 4 corresponds to the 15/18/21 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 6/7/8 points allowing them to spend 4 on Tiers 2 and 3, purchase their current unlocks from Tier 4 and 1 bonus unlock.

Tier 5 corresponds to the 24/27/30/33/36 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 10/11/12/13/15 points allowing them to spend 7 on Tiers 2-4, purchase their current unlocks from Tier 5 and 2 bonus unlocks (36 month vets will get 3 bonus unlocks).

Tier 6 corresponds to the 39/42/45/48/51/54/57 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 16/17/18/20/21/22/23 points allowing them to spend 12 on Tiers 2-5, purchase their current unlocks from Tier 6 and 3 or 4 bonus unlocks.

Tier 7 corresponds to the 60/63/66/69/72/75/78 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 25/26/27/28/30/31/32 points allowing them to spend 19 on Tiers 2-6, purchase their current unlocks from Tier 7 and 5 or 6 bonus unlocks.

Tier 8 corresponds to the 81/84 Month Vet Rewards. Those Vets will have 33/35 points allowing them to spend 26 on Tiers 2-7, purchase their current unlocks from Tier 8 and 6 or 7 bonus unlocks.

Does that reassure you?

Well, Arachnos Wolf Spiders have a number of melee attacks using their Assault Rifle so those could probably be repurposed for Assault Rifle Assault.

That being said I'd still prefer a "Sword and Pistol" style Assault set to an Assault Rifle Assault set.

Pretty much. You have to purchase all items in a tier before you can progress to the next tier but you can choose what order you purchase items within a given tier.

For example consider the following schematic (which shows the major items in each tier):


Your first point will go in Tier 1 and your second point will go in Tier 2 (since each of those have one item). At that point you have unlocked Tier 3. Now Tier 3 has three different purchases:
Greek Symbols
Skirts and Kilts
Veteran Melee Powers and Sprints

You will end up spending your 3rd, 4th and 5th Paragon Reward Points purchasing those three items but can choose what order you purchase them in. Once you have purchased all three of those options you will have unlocked Tier 4 and your 6th paragon reward point will be spent on one of the items there.

Now for a veteran conversion example. When Freedom goes live I will, probably, be a 30 month veteran. Based on Positron's comments I will have 12 Paragon Reward Points to spend (X/3 + X/12). Eight of those points will be spent unlocking Tiers 1 through 4 leaving me with 4 points to spend on Tier 5. Since Tier 5 has 5 items in it I will be able to purchase all but 1 immediately.

I hate to say it but GG is correct. According to the Side-By-Side comparison of the different account types all account levels will have access to the First Ward but only VIP players will automatically have access to the missions there. Free/Premium players will have to purchase access.
http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/fre...r_choices.html

They aren't. They are, however, still invaders. They are coming to the Rogue Isles with the intent of overthrowing the government which is pretty much the definition of invasion.

Slight clarification, if you use the "claim all inf" button (or whatever it's called) that will claim items that send you over the 2billion cap causing you to lose the excess.

That's your right. And I would take the same approach who think it's funny to risk wasting people's time by failing a trial: I'll add a player note not to team with you again.

Sure, Defender only TFs are some of the easiest teams I've ever run. There is no content where a particular AT is required although there are a few situations where certain ATs/Powers make everything a whole lot easier but they are not that common.

Off the top of my head:

STF: Due to his high defense (prior to taking down the towers) it is easier to handle Recluse if you have a character with Confront or Taunt simply because they are auto hit although other methods do work.

LGTF: Taking down the green mitos without holds is technically possible but doing so really, really sucks. Obviously Controllers/Dominators are best here but other ATs have at least some options for holds so they aren't required.

Barracuda SF: Due to the AT specific temp powers a Defender or Mastermind makes this SF a whole lot easier.

Hamidon Raid: Regeneration is the only fully reliable form of damage mitigation in this raid so characters with those sort of powers (Empathy in particular) are always useful. That being said, the availability of the Rebirth Destiny helps a lot here.

Pretty much anything else can be done by a team of decent players regardless of AT.

Sure it is. Make an advert saying you are forming an iTrial and only want people who are competent. Anyone who replies is someone you don't want.

I know this argument has come up a number of times before. My opinion is that a "Natural" character doesn't cease being "Natural" just because they acquire some powers that are external to them. Their core powers are still Natural, they have simply acquired additional powers that allow them to transcend their previous limitations. However, this does not change who they fundamentally are, at the end of the day it's their skills, their gear and their attitude that make them a super the Well is just granting them a few new abilities. The analogy I like to use is a master swordsman (i.e. Broadsword Scrapper) who acquires a magical sword that shoots fireballs (Blaze Mastery). His primary method of defeating foes is still his natural ability to hit them with a bit of sharp metal (i.e. Natural) however he can now supplement this with the ability to shoot the occasional fireball at them as well.

Sometimes it's fun to play around with the concept a bit. For example with Adeon Hawkwood his Incarnate powers are a mix of tech and the Well. He has designed a multi-dimensional power relay which allows him to tap into the Well of the Furies to generate high temperature plasma on demand. He then uses this either to generate electricity (to power his suit and a healing nanite fabrication unit) or as a weapon (Pyronic Judgement, Reactive Interface and Robotic Drones). Is he an Incarnate? He'd tell you no, after all he hasn't opened himself to the Well, he's simply using it to generate power. Of course, the Well probably disagrees...

I did, I was making a generic comment.

PETLESS MM, therefore quite a bit squishier than the others. Also, I'll note that even with pets a Demons/Thermal is quite squishy in situations where he personally draws aggro, when I solo on mine, ambushes are my bane.

And the Emp had thermal shields. Ignoring external buffs (which both characters had) Corruptors and Defenders are about the same level of squishiness.


Honestly, I think it's one of two things either confirmation bias or alternatively you're moving onto another group before the ambush arrives causing them to target the thermal character since the other characters are at the aggro cap.

I've teamed a lot and never seen any consistent targeting of ambushes.

Yeah, but there are very few people who are supporting the shards -> threads conversion as a realistic method of post-alpha progression. You can do it but it's like banging your head against a wall.

Or how about shifting it from Trials to new, harder trials? The Keyes trial is at least a bit harder than BAF/Lambda and presumably as time goes on the newer trials will continue that trend. My theory is that when the next set of slots is released they will have a new set of currency to move people onto the newest trials which will be quite a bit harder than BAF/Lambda.

Essentially you end up with tiers. The first tier is level 50 TFs which allow you to make Alpha boosts. Tier 2 is BAF/Lambda/Keyes/Underground/Whatever which allows you to slot the first 5 abilities. Tier 3 is a new set of trials which allows you to slot the remaining 5 abilities.

Some of it they might do mechanically, the obvious option being to make the enemies in the trials all 54+2 so that you need to have at least 2 level shifts before you can do them although there are other options. One option (for example) would be that the Incarnate Shifts from Lore and Destiny do not work in the tier 3 trials. That has the notable advantage of leveling the playing field between people who have done the tier 2 trials and brand new players.

Personally I don't think we will. My theory is that we won't get new slots at all until the Praetorian story has played out and the next set of slots will be unlocked with new trials based on The Coming Storm. I figure we'll get four or five more Praetorian based trials which will have us taking out the major remaining threats (the Seers, Tyrant and Hamidon) and then the next round of trials will focus on The Coming Storm (sometime around Issue 24 or 25).

Really? So creating a new currency didn't stop people from using the level 50 TFs to create their post-Alpha abilities? Fascinating, I guess all of those "I don't want to be forced to trial" threads were a figment of my imagination.

The core effect of switching to a new currency was to make the new trials the only viable method of post-Alpha advancement. We can argue about whether or not that was a good thing but I'm fed up with people claiming that the primary effect was to slow people with stockpiled shards.

I'd be willing to bet that if you took the total supply of thread-based components that have been generated post I20 and compared that to the supply of shard based components that could have been created with existing shard stockpiles when I20 went live that the former would be at least an order of magnitude larger than the latter.

I am thoroughly convinced that the goal behind creating a new currency was primarily about limiting what content could be effectively used for the new abilities. If shards had been usable for the new abilities then people would have spent their time farming level 50 TFs for the new abilities which the devs apparently do not want.

Yeah, I consider that attitude to be very annoying. Healing is a valid form of damage mitigation and has the big advantage of working identically against almost all forms of damage (the exceptions are the few enemies that have a healing resistance debuff). Now admittedly with sufficient stacked buffs it's possible to make a team tough enough to not need healing but that's true of any form of damage mitigation, for example if a bunch of controllers are perma stunning enemies defense buffs don't do much. Healing just has the disadvantage of being heavily visible and the last form of damage mitigation to be applied which means that it's more obvious when it isn't needed.