Basilisk

So, I'm playing around with my tank last night, when I see red text coming up mentioning the GM spawns in Atlas. Huge crowds are there, everyone's having a good time, and we're all popping War Walkers like they're full of candy. Then I see *gasp* a misused apostrophe in one of Zwill's posts! Well, in the spirit of the evening, I decide to take a poke at him.



It passes and I don't see any acknowledgement of it, so I figure it's just been lost in the broadcast spam. I continue playing, eventually joining a team with a few of my friends. I'm just about to log off for the night, when one of them pipes up with, "How did you get that title?"

Now, I don't play with my personal player name up, so I hadn't the first clue what she was talking about. I pull it up to see this:



So, of course, I tell the story and everyone breaks out laughing.

Good one, Zwill. You got me.

Thanks, guys. That gives me a good place to start. I'm feeling like I may go ahead with something close to your build, streetlight, and then when I get villainside, I may establish something like Iggy's "discount" build for a second build.

Wow... Ok, high end, you weren't kidding. It's definitely something to aim for, and the "discount" version Iggy made isn't out of the realm of possibility. Something to work towards, I guess.

Would it be possible to get something relatively cheap that will cover enough of my bases that I can farm out the stuff that I need for the other to become my final build? Something that doesn't require me to change from being a hero to grab the epics would be ideal, as it would let me start building right away without having to work to becoming a villain before I could start building.

I've decided to dust off my old BS/Regen with the buffs coming in I21, and figured he could stand to have an IO build. The problem I'm finding so far is that I can't figure out where to go with it: +recharge or +def. Or somewhere in between.

Has anyone got a decent build for this? Mine is currently mostly SOs and I'd just as soon start from whole cloth. Given how prolific BS/Regens used to be, I have to imagine someone along the line has come up with something to turn them from "whirling death machine" to "ungodly whirling death machine."

Ultimately, as has been said, I think the animation requirements on this basically kills it. If "wheelchair movement" were available, it would likely have to be of the "no-powers usable" variety because otherwise every power in the game would need to be given an in-chair animation and I don't think the devs would be willing to commit that much work from their animation department for what it essentially a cosmetic change.

And since the argument is already being made that adding a wheelchair that doesn't allow you to use your powers is "too discriminatory" against the disabled community, I'd doubt they'd bother opening that can of worms at all.

It's not only a matter of not turning the sound up. For instance, my sound card died on me a few months ago and I haven't bothered to replace it in the meantime because I've got a good headset which is working fine. However, when I need to go let the dog out, I usually take it off completely and don't put it back on until he's in so I can hear if he's barking outside. Alternately, I sometimes play with it around my neck to I can carry on a conversation with my fiancee, and I'll get some sounds but not all of them there. So anything with a visual component would make for a better solution than a purely audible one.

When there's a Basilisk on your team, you get purple recipes. I don't get purple recipes, everyone else does. No, you can't join my team, I'm bitter enough about it as it is.

After seeing the thread here, it got me to thinking, "well, what about the opposite?"

Which powersets or ATs just don't click for you?

For me, while I love My Tanks and Brutes, I cannot stand Stone Armor. Phenomenal survivability just doesn't mean much to me when you're defeated by a 3" curb.

AT-wise, though, hands down my least favourite is Masterminds. It took me almost 6 years to get the one I had mad shortly after CoV launch to 50 and despite several powerset combo attempts, the AT simply didn't click for me. Worst was my Necromancy/FF that I got to 25 before deleting it in disgust.

I'm a huge fan of Brutes and Tankers. There's nothing quite like herding up a huge crowd of enemies and systematically ripping it apart. It's like building a snowman just to kick it over.

Within that, I don't really have a favourite powerset combo. I like Shield Defense a lot, but as far as a melee pairing to go with it, I just go with whatever I want and have some fun with the smashing.

I live just south of Toronto, and just felt something that was enough to make me go "I think we just had an earthquake." My puppy wasn't thrilled about the event, though.

Ultimately, I think the disgusting/glamourous question has to be more a matter of a spectrum than of two discrete points. Where a character falls on that spectrum then varies by the story being told. For instance, I would characterize Caesura, my Sonic/Traps corruptor, as pretty much the definition of a glamourous villain. He's a mercenary to the core, in it for the money. He gets all the cool gadgets, always gets the girl, has an awesome car, and is generally kind of bad-*** all around.


That said, I have written stories about him specifically to show that he is Not A Nice Guy. He is utterly amoral, and willing to stop at nothing to ensure that he gets his goal. He's often needlessly cruel, resorting often to torture and intimidation when he could as easily get what he wants by other means because he likes the way it makes him feel powerful. If I were to confine the entirety of his character to this aspect of his life and his personality, he would be pretty much the definition of the “disgusting” villain.


Conversely, I think a good example of the other end of the spectrum is the Joker from “The Dark Knight.” I don't think there's any question that he was an Absolute Monster. However, he had just enough purpose, flair, charisma, and dare I say, humour, to make the audience want to watch him just to see what awful thing he would do next.


Ultimately, I think the richest characters are the ones that walk that line between “awesome” and “absolute monster.” I try very hard with all of my villains to make them glamourous enough to be relatable, while remaining “disgusting” enough to be legitimately threatening. If you go too far one way, you end up with the kinds of villainy you get from young childrens' TV shows, where the villain is at worst kind of a jerk, whereas if you go too far in the other direction you get either the stereotypical moustache-twirling villain or you get the raging lunatic who wants to blow up the world for no reason other than the fact that the world needs blowing up. Either way, it tends to make for a rather flat character if all they're doing is acting as a walking talking set piece.


I took a class in dramatic narrative while I was in University and the third week in, the teacher said something that I think frames this perfectly. He said, “To make a good antagonist, the villain in your story is the hero of their own story. If your story is about going down to the corner store to get some beer only to be thwarted by the other guy fighting you for the last case, then you should be able to tell the story with the villain as just another guy who wanted beer and being confronted by you.” I think this comes back at least in part to why you feel the “lunatics” don't work for you, Sam, because it's very hard to convey that in a manner that is relatable.


Maybe Matt Damon said it best in “The Talented Mr. Ripley”: Well, whatever you do, however terrible, however hurtful, it all makes sense, doesn't it, in your head. You never meet anybody that thinks they're a bad person.

I wouldn't say I "abuse" them, but I tend to use the same few belts again and again, those being the "Standard" simple leather belt, the "Office" belt and the "Tactical 2" Belt. I also have a decent number of "civilian" costumes which use the trenchcoat.

Let's ask Mr. Horse!

I'm just starting to work on IOing out my Storm/DP defender, and noticed that Lightning Storm takes single target blast sets. Since I have a Decimation: Chance for hold in one of MY SG bins, I was thinking of slotting it there, since it would make for another level of protection.

However, I know that the use of procs in pet powers can sometimes be a bit strange, so I figured I'd ask: Does this work as you would expect — where the lightning storm's attacks get a chance to hold added — or do they just do nothing or worse?

Speaking of facepalms...

Tried for a good 15 minutes trying to upgrade my account with the code I was given. Turns out that the thing was defaulting me to the EU account codes for some reason. Which is doubly odd because my fiancée had no such troubles. So if things are going wonky with your attempt to upgrade, make sure you have the right code being given to you.

-edited to add- Yes, I was set to US English in my language. You can change the version you're given by clicking the little US flag in the bottom right of the gadget, though, you don't need to change your FB language settings.