Aliana Blue

je_saist is a master of digging. You don't even have to hand him a shovel, he just goes at it every time he opens his mouth.

"Why did you make maps that could be exploited to begin with." It's likely he still hasn't understood what the changes are, after nearly 200 posts.

Thanks for the cookie! Next time try getting past the first phrase of the posts. Reading does the body good.

We'll leave the part about understanding what is posted for after you manage such momentous feat. Baby steps.

I don't have a cookie to offer you, but I heard someone posted somewhere in the forums about upgrading to Windows 7. Off you go, the public needs you!

I very much doubt the devs will remove all rewards from AE any time soon. It seems like some people want the rewards removed so that they can say "ah, I told you so!" when nobody uses it, as if it validated their reasoning that AE is used only for powerleveling farms.

Fact is, given a game with two systems, one of which offers rewards and one of which doesn't, the players will choose the one that does. "The way it was meant to be used" and all that is a load of horseshit, the system is there to create story arcs in the game, and the game includes rewards. There's nothing wrong with wanting rewards when playing, no matter what those who for whatever reason want the AE dead say.

Emphasis mine. I'm pointing out that it should most definitely do (so far fixes like this have a tendency of lingering for a very long time). And the custom selections XP hasn't been addressed yet.

No, not really.

I don't expect a single solution that will make all players happy, I'm not even sure why you think I presume that. I expect a solution that the developers will agree is a good long-term strategy. A.k.a., not a stopgap.

I'm talking, again, specifically about the issues that have been named as stopgap solutions. That is, solutions that are not good and are overly heavy and in need of a more specific and detailed fix that the developers haven't had time to create and implement. It has nothing to do with new additions to AE.

Call it long term strategy if fix doesn't do it for you, but the idea is that these stopgaps, which are far too heavy handed and not very specific, should not be there when Going Rogue comes. I haven't said anything about new exploits not being addressed, I've specifically talked about the quick fixes. These can be permanently hammered down with a change in the system that, sure, may need specific tweaks later on. Same way powersets are tweaked from time to time, but the powerset system remains.

Example: Selecting custom powers can reduce the XP of a mob to zero if you unselect a key power. Possible solution: Have each power selected give an individual weight to the final XP (so that just missing the lowest attack may not remove all XP if the rest of the powerset of the custom is selected). Final solution? Yes. Sure, later on someone may find a specific combination that makes weak critters that give lots of XP, that can be fixed by addressing those individual powers and not just hammering everything.

This is just an example, since this isn't the thread to make suggestions for something the devs have probably hashed out to death already internally. Point is: You can do a change in the system that will be pretty final even if it may require small specific tweaks later on.

You don't need to tell me that, specially as I've never asked for such a chimera. I'm asking for specific systems that don't rely on these heavy handed stopgaps. That is, exactly what Doc Aeon said:

"This was a stopgap fix that we had to put out until we could come up with a more permanent solution."

And what I'm saying is: this "more permanent solution" should be there before or when GR hits.

Clear now?

I've been known to take Hover and Air Superiority together, just because the two handed hammer down animation while floating looks awesome (and Fly doesn't quite do it due to end cost and inertia).

As far as wackiness, Ice/Fire blapper with no Stamina and near-capped defenses /flex.

Team Teleport 6-slotted on a scrapper, back when ED didn't exist (So. Much. Fun.)

Can't think of anything else noteworthy, other than soloing the ITF with a DM/Inv scrapper (without resorting to the non-fluffy Rommy trick, all AVs at once!). Lost the record of most AVs defeated at once (Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan! I mean, Nihiliiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii! )

Thanks for the review! I'm going to have to put bios for the stock mobs I guess, I left them as default as a wink and a nod to Ed's penchant for re-using stock footage and stealing random props from television studios (same reason as to why there's so many random mobs in Act III), but apparently my audience wants bios everywhere!

I can tone down the ambushes too, other than line delivery they're not really that vital, though I like to have a couple of rough spots in my arcs to make the player use them inspirations. Act II is the biggest offender in this respect only because medium+ is the best way to give the Hydra Tentacles a chance to spawn (which, when it works, seems to be the most effective gag in the arc; I mean, if someone sends you as feedback "I got tentacle ***** in mission 2 because I couldn't stop laughing " you know you're doing something right.) Hydra tentacles are not spawning lately, I've poked Doc Aeon about it but while he said he'll look into it, I'm guessing he's got more pressing matters at the moment

^_^

#61013 The Invasion of the Bikini-Clad Samurai Vampiresses from Outer Space! 95.68%
#1345 Jumping in Feet First 56.83%
#1589 Of Mentors and Legacy 75.58%
(Unpublished) Dimension U-1192 65.14%
(Unpublished) The Golden Deva 53.20%

Hm, not really skirting the file limit in general. And none really need any more stuff. Well, adding a couple of vampiresses with different powersets may add a bit to the variety, which is good, but that's about it.

The same thing that's fun about fighting 7 AVs at once in a test mode MA mission that gives no rewards whatsoever. Some of us simply find it fun to see if we can actually do it.

Someone, somewhere, will make a mission for their SG that involves something from their backstory, a GM, a monkey, and a handful of custom mobs. And they'll love it.

+3/x8/Bosses/NoAvs. I figured you'd want big battles for the screenies

Some of your mobs were quite tough! The Elec armor baddies in particular were pretty harsh on my Elec/ scrapper (thank goodness for Shield Charge), I faceplanted a total of three times, which all things considered I think is a pretty good going

(I ran like the coward I am from the stealthy mobs after a couple of encounters, hah! ).

This may be a bit Pavlovian, but sometimes I wonder if this isn't, in some small part, the fault of those that "stayed loyal" (I didn't, I took a long break between issues 5 and 10, and another longish one later on). Let me explain:

I think Cryptic learned the wrong lessons from City of Heroes. If you look at it, it started with a very "standard" MMOG development cycle. Initial release, issues with extra content, probably a lot of work involved in them. After the initial peak of suscribers, the numbers went down noticeably, but afterwards were pretty stable.

Enter City of Villains. Again, a large spike in sales and extra income, then the suscriptions stabilized. They did a ROI analysis and decided to put CoH/V on life support for a while and move on to greener pastures. But, to their surprise... The numbers stayed. Little new "woah!" content and noticeably less effort to support the game, but the suscriptions stayed.

So the equation was simple: Box release + skeleton crew = (Big bucks, quick ROI). Why bother making free content and work hard to put improvements in the game? Their previous experience told them it wasn't that important, after all.

In CO they're testing just how much they can get away with THAT. Then, since they already have the initial box release money (plus those that got suckered into the long suscriptions), why not throw Microtransactions into the mix? After all, what happens to the suscriber numbers in between box releases isn't very important, when you're spending very little money on maintaining it and the main investment/return is all around the boxed sets. And everyone's doing it anyway. Faster expansions? Hardly surprising, it's all about getting those shiny new boxes and looking at the money roll in.

Penny: Rikti! Rikti everywhere! Help!

Rikti Soldier: Imperative order: Silence! Your powers: Essential. Your voice: Irritating!

Penny (thinking): Gosh, what are they doing, what do they want!

Penny activated the Telepathic Broadcast power.

Penny: Help! Ohmygosh help! Please Clockwork King, help! A bunch of Rikti have kidnapped me and...

Female Voice: Sorry, the mind you are trying to reach is not available. This is typically a temporary issue, please try again in a few minutes. If you continue to experience problems, please refer to the nearest Life Fulfillment center. Thank you for using the Mother Mayhem's Psychic Friend Network. We are in your thoughts, protecting you from yourself.

Penny: ...