Bagheera_68

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No, I am not a hardcore farmer.

Use the status flags in the team search window.
Send a broadcast or request message.
Start and lead your own teams.

I still consider it rude behavior to send unsolicited tells to people already on teams.

Let's just agree to disagree.

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I'm afraid i will have to agree to disagree with you as well.

If I just logged in, I may have missed any number of broadcasts for "team looking for more". I may not be showing up on someone's search; this sometimes happens to me. A team may have given up looking for more players. Etc.

There are any number of reasons why a team that might perform better with my archetype might not be actively looking for me the second I'm ready to team. A politely query complete with relevant information is never rude.

(One caveat; I'll generally only do so a limited number of times, because it's possible that all the greys on my search list are all on the same team. More than one query sent in ignorance to the same team MIGHT be considered rude.)

In reverse: Often I will try to assemble a team, and once the list of people who are flagged as LFT as exhausted, i will send concise /tells to unpartnered players of appropriate levels. Yes, I'm aware of the flagging process. I'm also aware that it is not used as often as it should be; witness the number of players who jump at the chance to join a team even though they're not flagged as LFT, and inversely, the number of people who decline team invites (or are AFK) even though they are flagged as "looking for anything". Sometimes, you gotta ask. It's an MMO. Communication is key, although I will never ask someone who has taken to time to flag themselves specifically as "rejecting all invitations" (or who say they're looking for a specific task in their comments that I am not doing).

edited to add: When anyone sends me a tell, if i can't aoccomodate I always try to send a response saying "no thanks. Good luck." If I send a tell and the answer is no, I always thank them for responding. Polite feedback is always appreciated.

Calibre2,

Hear hear.

I have heard echoes of similar sentiments in forums from other games; that players who want more content, improved gameplay, specific issues dealt with, are somehow ungrateful wretches. Picture the outraged response to Oliver Twists's outstretched, empty bowl: "Calibre2 has asked for more!"

Vote with your wallet, and, in doing so, let those in power know what it is you want. It seems fair to me.

What is unfair to me is doing what some people seem to imply; don't complain, don't say what you'd like to see in your game, don't make suggestions or rock the boat. How would the developers know what direction the players want to take if everyone just shut up and played? And if the game collapsed in on itself because another game introduced features that players wanted but didn't talk about, who would be to blame?

I'm not certain i agree with the tone of this post, but I confess having had reservations about a couple of issues raised, specifically:

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When I choose a magick origin hero or villain, then I certainly do not expect to see a blatant tech device circling my head or any other myriad jarring incompatibilities I could list out here to everyone's boredom and impatience.

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I have long since thought that a hero's origin should have some impact on play besides determining where you shop. The uniformity of power appearances spoils a lot of the flavor that (I think) origins was supposed to impart. Even allowing for the fact that (for example) only magic heroes can use magic enhancements which encouraged magic heroes to confront magical opponents. . . now the origin of the hero matters less, because the ultimate expression of his ability will come through IO enhancements which is independent of his origin. So what's the point of origins?

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...customizing my costume, while awesome, isn't nearly enough to counter-balance the fact that I can't fully express my superhero concept via powers, weaknesses, alter-egos, disadvantages and so on.


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Yeah. I hear you. Although I knew when I bought the game that the name on the box said "City of Heroes" and not "Champions MMO", and therefore I can forgive Cryptic for not including all that, while lamenting the lack of those elements (alter-egos! Lois Lane type NPC's I have to rescue occasionally! personal arch-nemesis!) that are so vital to classic superhero mythology.

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The 'Enhancement System' is basically cloned from Anarchy Online and has, as of the last installments of 'purples', transformed CoH into a crafter's game. Nothing about any of this is superhero anymore, IMO.

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I want to disagree with this, because being able to craft is kind of fun. But I have to agree that it seems very incongruous to have this kind of crafting system in the game. It further blurs the already nearly-nonexistent line between origins and turns heroes into farmers; in a nutshell, it's a fun MMO mechanic that doesn't seem to fit easily into a "superheroic" MMO

This may not be the most useful post, because while I've been able to highlights those parts of CoX that leave me vaguely dissatisfied, I'm not certain I have any concrete solutions or suggestions to those issues.

Maybe someone else does. . .

And for the record; BAB, thanks for the detailed post explaining why one of the things highest on my wishlist is very unlikely to be implemented. I shall be patient, and enjoy what superheroic goodness is there (and there is much).

First things first: Congratulations to all the winners. There was some very good material to be chosen from, and all three entries that won were excellent.

(You know now that the gratz are accomplished, there's gonna be a 'but', right?)

. . . But. . . nothing for The Stuff of Dreams? In my opinion that was superlative work. Funny, but in a way that made sense when you got to the second last page and suddenly, light dawns. It injected actual life into Paragon City (and Paragon City needs life). All those people walking around like automatons in the game have been given faces, names and relationships. . . which in turn gives heroes more incentive to BE heroes. After reading "The Stuff of Dreams" I had an immediate and visceral reaction, once the laughs died down; I wanted to log into my hero and go patrol Paragon City in case these kids needed rescuing from the Tsoo, or the Hellions.

Dag nabbit. I demand Stuff of Dreams be recognized!

I was also hoping for an award for Tales of Paragon. That exuded heroism with a capital H, and was a classy, well-told origin story with heart (also capital H).

Hmph. I remember posting that if The Stuff of Dreams didn't win, I'd be canceling my account. Well, I've already canceled it prior to the contest (financial and time reasons) so at least now I don't have to go back on my word. . .

This is what I get for not reading the forums enough! Grrr! :-)

Personally I'd prefer a free copy of the Comic Book Creator software. The only reason I haven't ordered it yet is because I'm hoping the judges all have a simultaneous cerebral hemorrhage (mild only) and declare me the winner before they come to their senses. :-)

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We can all do our own "honorable mention" right now among peers- please go look at each others' work, give it some praise, or even use the "blog" tool right there to call attention to something you saw as neat.

I've been trying to leave comments as I read them... wish hypercomics had a way for me to easily backtrack through my commented pages, since some people have responded& I misss the remarks

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Most of the best entries got a shout out in the original Comic Book Creator Contest Forum. I've already expressed my opinions on some of the ones that excelled. The best one (in my opinion) isn't even hosted on the Hypercomics web site ... check out Liberty Comics for a primer in excellence (just edit the url to see all the jpg's from Liberty_Comics-001.jpg through Liberty_Comics-009.jpg)

Most can be found here: http://www.hypercomics.com/browse/term/374

My opinion:

energy blade and electric hammer would be best integrated into the psionic weaponry powerset. better to have one versatile powerset than two one-dimensional sets.

Ball and chain could be a versatile powerset as well, with powers within the set that could include damage (standard "hit em with the heavy end"), entangle, PbAoE, ranged entangle, etc.

For defence: I like the notion of shield defence. As someone pointed out, this fits a whole range of archetypes.

It's official (as official as my declarations get, which is NOT AT ALL). We have a new leader.

Liberty Comics "The Stuff of Dreams" is funny, plenty of action, the screenshots rock, the dialogue fits (overblown where it's supposed to be, natural and flowing when the action winds down) and best of all in my opinion... it breathes LIFE into the non-superheroic citizens of Paragon City.

The antics of villains and heroes shouldn't happen in a vacuum; if there's no innocents to protect, no bureaucrats to rail at, no normals to make the heroes more awesome and the villains more terrifying, the great struggle between good and evil loses any meaning and becomes little more than a high stakes version of pro-wrestling. And suddenly, here comes the Stuff of Dreams as a reminder, without being preachy or melodramatic, to tap heroes on the shoulder and say "Hey. This is why you're battling evil."

I bow down, Sparky. If this entry doesn't win I will stop playing City of Heroes for 10 minutes, at least.

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UH OH, The Lure just took the lead...

GREAT work there.

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I can't argue with you on the quality of the work; it's fantastic. But I'm still favoring I Saw It on sheer originality.

Oooh. Another awesome entry. I'll put The Lure in contender's spot with I Saw It and Paragon City Stories for Best Overall. The Lure may get the nod ahead of Paragon City Stories based on story, but just barely. I Saw It may be the one to beat.

Because I'm insane and can't leave well enough alone: the revised version of The Archangel's Song for your perusal.

You haven't submitted it yet? Why not? it's not like it needs revising. I honestly couldn't find anything to critique.

(Okay, there is maybe one panel where the action wasn't totally clear. I think.)

I could have revised mine every day and not been happy... and then starting wondering what I'd do if my computer went down.... or the Internet had some hiccup that wound up delaying my entry e-mail by 24 hours... and then I decided I'd give myself a bigger window of opportunity, and submitted the darn thing already.

I, um, didn't actually read any comics to prep mine, because I didn't really have any suitable ones handy. I haven't bought off the shelf comics in years, though I've got some graphic novels and a few Elementals comic books. But the radio chatter progression was something I'm pretty sure I remember Frank Miller/Lynn Varley using in the Dark Knight Returns... and that would have been the books I used to crib from IF THE PERSON I LOANED THEM TO HAD RETURNED THEM BY NOW! <straightens tie, wipes froth from mouth>

I'll have to look up Desolation Jones. That's one I've never heard of.

I'm still jealous that you squeezed a really good story into 8 pages. Darn you to heck. The story in mine finished pretty much where I wanted it to, but I'm vaguely uneasy about not having a COMPLETE story in those pages. It's all well and good to have the cutesy "back in issue#2" captions and "to be continued" banners at the end; they can add to the verisimilitude of that comic book feel, but they can also cover up the fact that, well, the story doesn't have an ending.

So now I'm contemplating doing the next part in the series. Like the angst over this one wasn't enough :-)

I think I'm obsessing.

I submitted my e-mail entry, so my revision and re-revision mania is done (although I probably could revise it again as long as I made sure the URL stays the same, but who wants to take a chance on breaking the link or something silly and invalidating their entry? NOT ME!!!) So now instead of wasting countless hours over the exact positioning of a screenshot or the exact wording of a phrase (and I'm still not entirely happy), I'm wasting countless hours looking at all the entries to see what's good.

I know we still have three days till the contest closes... but if I were a judge, I'd definitely have the entries as finalists for SOMETHING:

SG-AEGIS featuring Chance Meeting
Fun read with great dialogue and humor.

Baelzebozo
Another humorous entry that puts a different spin on the question "What the scoop on all those sword/axe/gun weilding heroes?"

Cross Line
A darker story. Nicely laid out, great atmosphere (although the ending is a little weak).

Tales From the Debt Brigade
Another one that is laugh out loud funny. "Serenity now. Serenity now." And loved the ending.

Kallisti Gold's Wardrobe Malfunction
What? Umm. . . I was just rereading it again for the, um, dialogue! yeah that's it. Quit looking at me that way.

IMHO the following lead the pack for Best Overall.

Paragon City Stories
Action. Clean layout. Not a lot of dialogue, but what there is feels real. It brings Paragon alive. Very dramatic screenshots. A serious contender for the triple crown: Overall, Story but ESPECIALLY Action.

I Saw It!
This one is a serious, serious contender in a very darkly humorous way. If I bought this at a comic book shop, I would not feel like I'd wasted my money. A COMPLETE story in an of itself, disturbing and funny all at the same time. A gem. Best Overall and Best Story Contender

They should have a Best Screenshot Effects category for The Ivory Figurine: Awakening
OMG. It looks like it was hand drawn, and the screenshots themselves were well chosen to showcase the effect. Plus the storyline and action aren't bad. How'd they DO that?


Of course I think The Archangel's Song should sweep all three categories. <koff, koff>

Anyone have thoughts on front runners?

So I was re-editing my entry for only the 320,122nd time, when I had this uneasy feeling. It took me a while to narrow it down... and then it occurred to me:

In an exchange, one character refers to another as a 'Nazi in a Boba Fett costume."

Possible violation of EULA? Referring to a copyrighted entity?

Star Wars is such a pop culture fixture by now it doesn't SEEM like it should be a big deal. But I think i'm going to edit that exchange... just to be on the safe side.

In the meantime... IS there a violation if characters mention pop culture in our comics? Kleenex? Coke? MTV? Chewbacca? Enquiring minds want to know.

Not to mention: the hypercomics.com site says:

"The Grand Prize package is valued at over $1000, and publication in a Top Cow City of Heroes/City of Villains Comic!"

I checked the rules on City of Heroes, and it doesn't mention anything about publication. Is this a benny that hypercomics is tossing in, or something that had to be dropeed as an award at the last minute?

Thanks, Phoenyx. But I actually quite liked yours. It's clean, uncluttered, and as an origin story it is complete in and of itself.

There are several excellent entries presently hosted on Hypercomics. As the contest completion date approaches it will be interesting to see how the quality of entries increases as the super-perfectionists grudgingly submit their finally-finished works.

Good luck to all.

Although the idea of giving the competition a peek at your work kinda appalls me, enough people have previewed their submissions on the board that I think it's only fair to show mine.

Not to mention, I wouldn't mind getting some feedback.

My take on my own work; decent, but overly wordy perhaps. and the font doesn't look as good once published because of the small type. I may have to redo the whole thing and edit ferociously.

I echo the sentiments of some of the earlier posters. (ONLY EIGHT FREAKING PAGES?).
LOL

http://www.hypercomics.com/comicbook...gels_song_3737

Love to have your feedback.

And to those poor Canadian/Australian/etc souls who are not eligible... you can still get in on future contests. You don't have to be a US citizen, just a resident. So now all you have to do is move here... ;-)

NOTE: The URL above has been edited to reflected the edited version. The orignal was just too cramped, and the small font did not publish well. The newer version edits out the monologue at the begnning (about Atlas, God and irony) in favor of an introduction to the character. Not as dramatic, maybe, but better overall comprehension of the character.