AquaJAWS

Welcome to the game!

This game is mostly about the journey than about the end game, so there are usually many players at all levels, and not a huge rush to get to the end game. Some people think the end game is a bit lacking, but there are several raids and task forces to go and experience once you get there, plus we have a 'flashback' system where you can go back and do or re-do content that you missed on the way up there, which you most likely won't be able to complete all of it before some of it is out-leveled. Many players also have dozens of regularly played characters at all levels, which many call alt-itis.

The developers have mentioned that they are working on developing new end-game systems at this point so chances are more is going to be added soon. But if you're just starting out, unless you race to get to level 50, there will be more than enough for you to do. I've been playing for nearly 3 years and still haven't done all of the missions on both the hero and villain side. Soon there will also be the Going Rogue expansion with even more content and things to do.

The game is very very team friendly and most players are very welcoming of new players. I will say the game is heavily instanced so you may not see a ton of people out in the main maps because they are all in instanced missions, but there are still ways to find them.

As far as server populations, Freedom and Virtue are the most populated, with Virtue being the 'unofficial' role-playing server (meaning more people on there tend to get into the role-playing side of it). Infinity (where I play mostly) is pretty good as well. When you log in, the servers are listed with your most recently played server on top, then in the order from lightest load up top to the heaviest load at the bottom.

Don't currently have the links on me, but in the forums there are several collections of things to do at different levels and, as said before, most of the player base is very friendly and more than willing to help you out if asked.

However it sounds as though Praetornains can become either heroic or villainous. 'Praetorian' has less to do with the morality and more to do where the toon started (at least from the information that we know so far). Who knows what the full implications of switching morality or starting a currently heroic or villainous AT in Praetoria will be, so it might make a difference.

So maybe Praetorian vs Earthling
Current Std Hero ATs can start off Praetorian or Earthling, and Earthlings have to start in Paragon.
Current Std Villain ATs can start off Praetorian or Earthling, and Earthlings have to start off in Rogue Isles.
Epics can only be Earthling, Current Hero Epics start in Paragon, Current Villain Epics start in Rogue Isles.
All ATs, regardless of Dimensional Origin or Current morality can change between Heroic, Vigilante, Rogue, and Villainous morality somehow.

Though I'm probably spending too much time thinking about it.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're referring to the tanker-like character as the anchor, basically the point man. 'Anchor' has (before super side kicking) had many meanings and many people use it differently. I've seen it used referring to needing padders for the team, or as an aspirant for a lower level toon on a team farming, to name a few, so just wanted to be clear.

If you're looking for 'the' correct strategy for teams, I'm affraid you're not going to get a single 'right' answer. Its completely variant based on the enemies being faced and skills, powers, enhancements, and level of the other players. Sometimes a team is fine with everyone just charging in and stomping the opposition. Sometimes a little more strategy is needed that may involve a ranged toon pulling a few mobs away from a larger group to make the group easier before moving on, or sometimes having a character herd the mobs around a corner to the rest of the team where the stomping occurs, or many other strategies that your and/or your teammates think could work.

The best is if you're unclear which strategy to use on a group, communicate with your point man with how they want the team to proceed. If you are the point man, express your desired strategy to the rest of your team and go from there. Sometimes a more experienced player may have a better idea if you're running point. Sometimes you'll have to teach a less experienced player.

Someone also seems to bubble up to take the leader role (not always the point person) on long running teams. The biggest problem I've seen is when you get a team with 2-3 players wanting to take the 'leader' role and disagreeing and not cooperating, which usually leads to team wipes and issues. Listen and communicate (politely) to your teammates as you play and work with eachother. Don't let any 'I wanna be leader' ego mentalities get in the way. After all its only a game.

EDIT

Nevermind, I see now from other replies that you're calling the mob that gets the toggle mez. What StormDevil says is good advice there.

Excluding epics (Arachnos and Kheldians). Arachnos have to start villain and convert to heroes. Kheldians have to start heroes and convert to villains. The rest of the ATs, you can start off with a currently hero AT as a Hero or as a Praetorian, and the currently villain ATs can start off as a Villain or as a Praetorian. Praetorians, as they level they will gain a classification of a hero or villain (or rogue/vigilante).

Sounds like the AT classifications need to start changing from just Hero and Villain to Paragon Citizen, Rogue Isles Citizen, and Praetorian with a morality of Heroic, Villainous, Vigilante, or Rogue.

If you enter the base through the normal portal, thats what happens because the day job is technically around the portal, not actually in the base.

I believe the way day jobs work is wherever you spawn when you log back in, it just takes the time since your last logout and applies it to whatever day job is there for the location you spawn in.

If you log out in an instance like a mission or a base, you spawn at whatever point you entered the instance at.

So if you use the base teleporter from someplace, like the market, or the university, or the middle of the oceans, you log back in on the spot that you used the teleporter (since that is where you entered the base instance) and whatever day job is at that spot is the one you get credit for.

Example: You use your base teleporter from inside a university. You log out while in your base. When you log back in, you spawn in the university
and get day job credit applied to the university day job, not for the base day job.

Even better, the endmod only IO from the set with the proc, a common endmod IO, and the proc. Same effect plus a bit of movement bonus from the set.

Assuming you're using OSX on the iMac, I would recommend just to download the mac installer and let it install normally. There may be a way to get the windows files over to OSX with a smaller download, but considering its a different OS, you might just be better off downloading the normal way.

Now, if you're running windows on your iMac, sure, that'll work just fine.

I'm not extremely familiar where that graphics card is in the overall rankings, but the rest of the specs sound as if they should be more than enough for CoX.

It would be hard to get a new computer nowadays that can't play the game on the lower settings. From what I could tell on my quick search online, I wouldn't expect high frame-rates on the higher graphics settings, but it should be able to run the game to be playable on reasonable settings. No telling what the min settings for Going Rogue will require, but I wouldn't expect too big of a jump.

Worst case though, a few months ago I got a GeForce GTS 250 (I think) for $150 at best buy that will run the game under most conditions at 30 fps on max settings. Even cheaper and better cards will surely be out soon. Its not expensive to get a card that will run this game very well.

A better place to ask would be in the tech help section of the forums (http://boards.cityofheroes.com/forumdisplay.php?f=578). They have more knowledge of all of that stuff.

Vacations may or may not be a week a person, but doesn't mean they all take off at the same exact time. Plus they could be longer than just a week, mine was. At this point, they've got a stable game going. No huge game-breaking bugs that haven't been there for a while now. They are about (presumably) to start a big new expansion beta. If I were the managers for the game, I wouldn't push anything new out either right now. With the lowered manpower of december and the holiday season, why put more things on the plates of the devs and risk breaking the game with a patch if you know you're going to be short on time soon. If beta truly is about to start up for Going Rogue, I'm sure they are all busy wrapping up major projects for that before its out in the open.

This could be considered the first full work week in 2-3 weeks between the vacations, kids being out of school, holiday parties, shopping, etc, etc, etc. I'll bet we'll here something as far as news within the next 2 weeks once everyone is back and settled, maybe as early as this week. Be patient and go play with the game that is out there...I hear its pretty fun.

Just to note, this may not be entirely a OS issue as a mouse hardware issue. I'm on XP at work and using a Logitech MX Revolution mouse that's about 2-3 years old or so and recently, if I don't click on a certain part of the button, the mouse will register two clicks instead of on single click. Think its just getting worn out (I'm a computer programmer so it gets used a decent amount and has for 2 years). Basically, try a different mouse and see if the double-click issue goes away.

More on topic with the thread...I upgraded to windows 7 from XP on my home machine a month or two ago and LOVE it. One thing is it is prettier to look at if you have the Aero stuff going on, and that does make a big difference when you're staring at a computer screen all day. Also there are a few little UI changes that I appreciate and makes my life easier at times. Also like the way the new task bar works...much more like OSXs dock which I liked better. Over all though, I'm glad I upgraded, but if you're not finding yourself needing anything in particular in windows 7 (like added security for some reason) other than you want the latest and greatest there, and XP is working fine for what you're doing, there isn't a good reason to upgrade an existing PC. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. But if you got the money to burn on it and the time to spend upgrading (its a full install from XP, and would recommend doing a clean install from vista), which is like getting a whole new computer, go for it.

Now if you are on Vista, and not XP, upgrade! Upgrade yesterday! Vista is awful compared to 7. 7 is what Vista should have been. Vista is a case where it is broke, so you should fix it.

Ah...I never knew that. Always assumed they were just aliens that didn't like us. Then I would expect that there aren't alternate 'Praetorian Rikti' since they are already from an alternate dimension.
Blown up alternate Earth? Or just another alternate dimension and/or section of the multiverse that is made up of lots of asteroids that somehow maintain a form of atmosphere for heroes and villains to survive.

They changed the rules to get into hazard zones along with the super-side-kick change. Anyone of any level can get into the shadow shard blue-side now if you can get to the portal in PI. I have several under-40 toons with the Dimensional Explorer day job badge.

More on the topic of the thread...while I wouldn't mind a speed increase to the flight powers, I honestly don't have any need to go faster while flying. I actually like that it takes a minute to get there while flying...fly up, hit auto run, go grab a drink and take a bio break, maybe grab a cig, I come back and 9 times outta 10 I've flown past the target. Even from the ferry to thorn island in cap flying, it takes what, 1-2 minutes flying and you're there. Still takes about a minute swimming with super-speed. Nice change, yes, but rather have them work on other balancing issues first, though this one I can't imagine would take more than changing the value of a decimal variable, but I could t be wrong.