Talen Lee

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Evil has to win, time to time, otherwise there's no compelling reason to be good. If evil is guaranteed to fail then the efforts of good become meaningless.

I wonder why if it's superheated, pressurised steam, it deals energy damage.

Ah, okay, so one device that we don't analyse in depth vs all the other ones.

I know full well that when an engineer - and in this context, Babs fits the bill - says something is difficult or impossible, they mean 'with caveats.' Simply swapping one animation to another yes, probably quite easy.

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The only things that are for sure powered by steam are the guns, the Warhulks, the Jaegers, the Fake Nemeses, and the Nemesis Staves.

[/ QUOTE ]Merely everything of his we've been able to analyse. I can't imagine how people find a trend there.

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Quoting a developer who left literally years ago when we have much more up-to-date consensus from someone who has been very transparent about the work he can and can't do on this game is just chasing misinformation to support your point.

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I should point out that as much respect as I have for BaBs, quoting an animator as contradicting a powers data designer over what the programmers can do is a bit quixotic.

[/ QUOTE ]Since it's an animation-based issue, I'd say quoting Geko is actually far more odd. It's an animation effort so it'd fall to him, and yes, programming would have to get involved but it doesn't change the fact that it's a cosmetic change to a single power's animation, and therefore in BABs' Bailiwick.

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I don't think I've ever called him "retarded" though.

[/ QUOTE ]I had no intent to put words in your mouth. My observations of the things that Geko thought were good ideas lend me to think of him quite poorly in hindsight. 'Retarded' is my opinion, not yours.

Power supply blew up on my computer. Posting from our pseudo-TV. D: No arc reviews for a little while, which is annoying. Before I gallavant onwards, though, I wanted to offer up something I've noticed from the arcs I've been reviewing lately.

The best arcs, the best written arcs, are the ones who grip the neck of the character and actually assume on them. The arcs that presume a player has some character, presumes on them a little, are the ones where the author has a handle to work with. Some arcs - like Small Fears - try to be as player-agnostic as possible. This is doable, but if you remember, 90% of CoV presumes agnosticism on the part of the player and contact: "Do this to further my ends and I will give you rewards." is a very simple approach and doesn't paint much there.

While I don't like the Noir style, Kiss Hello Goodbye makes an assumption, effectively hijacking the player's internal narrative. While I think KHG might have gone too far (might, and it has some other problems, review forthcoming when I can double-check the arc on someone who doesn't exist to deal smashing damage), its willingness to do that gives the author a space they can paint the player. Trying to make an arc completely appropriate for all characters seems to be a guaranteed pitfall.

Don't be afraid, authors, to put something on the player. It's not unreasonable to make a few assumptions. If they don't work for some characters, that's honestly, a more forgiveable thing in my mind than the way the game already presumes.

Be bold!

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But why the need to act so superior about it?

[/ QUOTE ]Well, if people keep treating him like he's a big deal... But I simply understood Venture's common 'I don't have time,' to mean that he's saying he doesn't have time to address everything in this thread that needs, in his mind, addressing.

Purely as a curiosity, in lower pressures, water boils at a much lower temperature. That's what kills you when you fall into space - the fluid in your tissues boil. Just something of which I was reminded by this thread which I thought was incidentally cool.

I have conceived a directive for Nemesis that I appreciate and can use, if I was ever possessed of a need to deal with it. I have also a fe plot holes that are driving me bonkers. The Rikti invasion telepathy thing, for example. On the other hand, he apparently has a steam-powered weather controlling device and a steam-powered force field and phase tech, so what the [censored] ever.

The thing is, the canon says that these things do exist. Venture seems to be arguing against the idea that they should - and {i]I[/i] argue against it because I feel that it was a sutpid idea. But this game is built on stupid ideas written by mediocre writers who hold up the banner of 'It's a comic book universe, it doesn't have to make sense.' They then claim that 'it's okay because it's cool,' completely failing to grasp that their bad explanations made a potentially cool thing less cool to those people who actually analyse things.

There's a burden of ignorance, really. I know a friend who cannot enjoy CSI at all, because she's actually in the field of forensic investigation. She says it's frustrating that they take advanced, messy, confusing information and make it super-simple. I know it drives Fox, my wife, nuts when someone 'enhances' an image to produce something that very clearly wasn't in the image to begin with. It bothers me when I deal with people who talk about evolution and biology and indicate they don't get it. Our ability to handle this information gracefully is useful. It's actually very vexing to me to see mutation handled so readily, but I'm willing to accept it, willing to sidestep it. When someone claims to be 'a mutant' and develop, say, nineteen different powers off that one mutation, however, it bothers me. Why? I could argue about that for days, but this is a point of thematic barriers, the limits that we as individual writers and readers have.

The writer has to do their part, though. If a writer tells me 'He's a mutant, now shut up and stop thinking,' it makes me feel insulted. You need to lead me on a little. Lie to me sweetly, don't tell me to stop thinking.

Bumping this. Bloody useful little nicknack, this.

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The reason I , and I would imagine others, do not quote numbers when we make suggestions is it usually just fans the flames. Not to mention that when it comes down to it any numbers I suggest wouldnt be used anyway. If we can convince the devs that something needs to be done then great. They won't use our numbers anyway so I won't waste my breath.

[/ QUOTE ]If you can't prove there's a problem, then you won't convince the devs they need to fix it. If you somehow think producing math and evidence incites flame wars, you must be using some really spectacular math.

What madness is this? Tray 1's first four slots are for the attack pattern, the four above it for controls, and nothing but heresy lies on button 5. HERESY.

Very happy birthday, man!

... I like street hunting... D:

Don't bother with the long sentences, Rei.

If you want your dialogue to have any impact beyond a bunch of guys in a forum yakking at one another to no actual avail, then don't try and support yourself with the words of people who aren't there and aren't speaking.

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Sorry about the pacifier line, I couldn't help myself. It did give me a chuckle though.

In all reality, I think I do understand what you're trying to say. You think what is being discussed doesn't work, isn't feasible, and would ruin what you believe is a perfectly good set. Anybody who thinks there is an issue is off base and you're concerned that even talking about it could cause irreparable harm to Stone Armor if the dev's stopped to listen. Pretty much end of story unless I'm mistaken. Please, correct me if I'm wrong on that.

[/ QUOTE ]Massively wrong.

I think that the main reason I don't try Stone Armour is knowing that Granite is unrelated to the character I put in it. That's my reason for not giving the set more of a spin myself.

I also think that if there are real problems in the set, that need addressing and the attention of developers, that you need to approach the problem with something other than lots of people have said. That stance will not convince, that stance will not pull weight. You need to be more stringent in your arguments if you want them to be implemented.

I look at Stone armour, and it looks pretty balanced to me. I've not crunched the minute numbers, but I also think fire armour is fine and Burn works out alright - those are visceral feelings rather than hard proofs. I can't say to you that these sets are fine because then it's just my visceral feeling against your own visceral feeling. In essence, we'd be dealing with two meaningless uncomparable ideas. Instead, we need to find common ground, like numbers or actual play situations or the way the game works to understand one another.

That is why I take issue with 'lots of people have complaints.' Sure, lots of people do. Some people want a pony every time they log on.

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What about just giving them a scaling damage buff in the early levels. Much like the accuracy buff that becomes smaller and smaller the closer you get to SOs (or did they take that out?).

It would solve a lot of low level tank problems.

[/ QUOTE ]They have this. Before level 20, the damage scalars aren't behaving properly.

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A person with a brain and time travel wins...

...if there are no limitations on the time travel, time travel alters the One and Only Timeline, and they are the only people out there with brains and time travel.

Otherwise you end up in endless wars of "I killed your grandparents 'first'!"

[/ QUOTE ]That's what is known as the 'timey wimey ball.' And it's very stupid.

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Frankly, I'm of the opinion that if you can imagine it, there's a way to do it, and that's served me pretty well so far. Sadly, a great many people these days have awfully stifled imaginations.

[/ QUOTE ]Bad attitude to have as a writer. "Oh, my readers are too stupid."

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I never said that. Please don't put words in my mouth.

[/ QUOTE ]I wasn't. I was expressing a very similar opinion and demonstrating how it could be bad, from the perspective of a writer. As a writer, don't ever make it the audience's fault that something you did didn't work.

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I didn't even say 'my readers' have stifled imaginations. I said that most people do - which they do. I've lost count of just how many times I've been told at work that something is impossible only for my teammates and I to find a really simple way of doing it a few days later. Impossible my tail. If you can imagine it, there's a way to do it.

[/ QUOTE ]I can imagine a hamburger materialising in my hand, but it ain't happening. You are speaking like an engineer, though - which brings to my mind that when you say 'imagine' you mean what I guess I'd say as 'conceptualise,' as if you're trying to think up mechanisms and ways to handle things rather than just flat out imagining any old thing. Imagination doesn't have to make sense, for example.

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The problem is many of those people simply do not have the patience to try and speak over you. Make no mistake your the one spouting white noise.

[/ QUOTE ]Just because you don't understand things, nor want to understand things, does not make them noise. I offer the simple idea of making it so this thread can be productive, can offer information to the developers that will actually affect change, because just providing a forum thread of supposed-support and lots of 'this guy I know agrees with me' is going to do nothing to the developer's perspective. If they already think there's a problem with Stone Armour (and I can see no evidence to indicate they do), then a therad might fortuitously provide them with a useful tool to add to the game. On the other hand, if you want to convince the actual people who can effect change that there is a problem, you're going to need some of that pesky evidence thing. The plural of anecdote is anecdotes, not data.

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A talented writer could take what's presented in the story material and make a decent comic, cartoon or movie about this series... it could even included some of the silly stuff, but just strip the series down to it's basic core don't try to reference every bit of game jargon

[/ QUOTE ]I would never say that CoX's lore lacks for potential. That that potential lays unused in so many places is what frustrates.

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Post Deleted by Moderator_08

[/ QUOTE ]Not at all. You grade what is said on its merits. I repeat myself because you demonstrate that you don't actually understand what's being said. However, in this case you're just trying to clamber up Mount Cleverest and act as if you've somehow defeated the idea that you need a better claim than 'lots of people want changes' if you want to persuade the developers of this game.

You don't know from demeaning. No, I repeat myself because I am trying to help. If you want to actual create change in this game, you need to have some better rationale, some better proof that the change is necessary than 'lots of people want it.' Look at Starsman and Acemace. They provided information. They sorted through numbers. They checked and they tested and they used math. Provide a real incentive for the developers, and don't try and lie behind the Johnny Butane defence, because it's as empty as it ever is when he uses it.

Ah, and because you used your attempted quip at the end, your logic bears up perfectly?

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Technically the sky doesn't have a color.

And in other news, the world isn't flat either.

/popcorn

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Shame on you for throwing in logic!

[/ QUOTE ]It's also incorrect.

The atmosphere when separated from the world around it, viewed without a context, may have no discernable colour, but that's not 'the sky.' The sky is the name we give for the thing that hangs over our head, classically blue in colour during the day time. Ancient Greeks didn't actually think the sky was blue - because, apparently, they didn't have a word for 'blue', and instead referred to things by function rather than descriptor (which sounds suspiciously odd to me since it Plato means 'broad', indicating that some places they overlapped). Instead they called the sky a 'brass'. In turn, this was because they felt the daytime sky provided a distorted reflection, such as a brass mirror provided. And all of this stuff, while quite interesting, completely fails to grasp the point I was trying to make and which seems to be more and more readily discarded in favour of chasing nonsense:

Provide proof in the form of numbers rather than trying to spearhead unsubstantiable vocal support.

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And when you're a nobody who barely understands the game and barely understands game design, it's incredibly easy to say you'd do it 'right.'

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Except Babs hasn't got a reputation for being retarded, and Geko does.

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Good lord, is it possible for you to post without trying to insult someone?

[/ QUOTE ]Yes.

You make large claims that you cannot substantiate and impugn the ability and integrity of the developers of this game, people who you have demonstrated time and again have created something much more complicated than you understand it to be. Quoting a developer who left literally years ago when we have much more up-to-date consensus from someone who has been very transparent about the work he can and can't do on this game is just chasing misinformation to support your point.

Now, if I say you're intellectually lazy or don't understand something, that's not necessarily an insult. It's an insult if I mean it to be demeaningly, and I don't - I merely mean to point out that you don't understand what you're talking about and perhaps should consider taking a less arrogant stance. If I was trying to insult you, I don't doubt I could find all the fodder in the world, but I'm sure you could simply send a PM to Arcanaville asking about Geko's Greatest Failings and hear a tale or two.

In the end, you simply insist that the things you want must be easy or attainable or important enough to make a necessity, and yet, here we are, with a game that's operated for five years without your input or say so and without these seemingly-essential components. It might be unpleasant to consider, but maybe you should seek to learn before you seek to teach.