Beggly

I'm not fond of this twitter/facebook thing. I've seen evidence that both social media locations are a fine place to get a wyrm or virus, and I'm just not comfortable posting to either site. I do hope that you don't intend to post things only via social media outlets. I like the forums here and don't have much interest in joining twitter... I'm already on facebook, a membership I ignore except when one of my friends has a birthday or something really interesting to say.

I know Facebook opens you up to virus attacks. I had to change my passwords and other information earlier this year when they "misplaced" my data and it got into the hands of a hacker.

Interesting how this string was warped out of the original discussion by my questions.

Back on topic, I do hope Freebie Fridays return, and I hope people enjoy the offerings. I know I did, even the ones I didn't think I would actually want, but got anyway.

I'm just wondering if it is truly random or if it's a fudged random? Is it possible to get really expensive stuff, or is it all cheap stuff? Or a midling range with some extreme kickers, essentially a bell curve? I'm just curious. I noted that for the most part, the stuff that was showing up was stuff I would never actually pay hard cash for. Except the costume pieces. Those I pay hard cash for, and they are the most worthless item from a power level point of view. Except vanity pets.

Another question I had that is totally off topic here. Why did the devs make the vanity pets all the same slot summoning wise? Why not allow more than one? I had fun running around with three vanity pets at a time. I miss being able to do that.

I forgot to subscribe to my above message, so I'm posting this and subscribing to it, LOL.

Are you seriously considering raising the level cap? That is the worse idea I have ever heard. I consider the level cap escalation to be the primary reason why Everquest is screwed up today. Once you get on that treadmill you have to keep creating more and more content for the people who pet at the max level, and they will demand you raise the level cap again to accomodate them and then you will have to create more content for them and they will demand you raise the level cap again.

Meanwhile, all the players who are not into power gaming (such as myself) feel more and more alienated and left out, eventually quitting simply because the game morphs into something they can't deal with and don't want to bother with.

For a very long time I have been talking up CoH as a game people who hate level cap escalation can play and not be part of that endless grind. Don't make me out a liar, please.

I notice that since the Market opened there have been several new powersets offered. I do wish that things had progressed this fast before the market, but, to invoke the spirit of Adam Smith, market forces do drive commodity availability. As least now we are getting some new power sets, LOL.

I do notice a similarity of creation. Until the new Beastmaster power set, most of them have been variations on a theme, weapons mostly. I love the new sets, but guys, superheroes are about more than weapons! They are even about more than time based attacks and dark manipulation attacks! I wonder if you are ever going to give a try at doing some traditional comic book powers like Stretching, Shrinking, Growing, and shape change. Admitted, these would be graphic intensive power sets, but I don't see why this can't be handled!

Anyway, thanks for what you have done, and I'll continue to enjoy whatever I get! Particularly, thanks for the Beastmaster. I have not played it yet, but I know I'm going to enjoy it!

I was wondering if the Arachnos Soldier was required to have the spider arms? I've been trying to do a soldier which is not a crab spider and I keep getting stuck with the spider arms. Even if I don't select the power options that would require them. What am I doing wrong?

I actually have a problem with this. Admitted, it's a personal one, but still a problem. Several years ago, my brother died. He was an avid CoH player. I'm not sure I'm comfortable with you guys reactivating his account forever. I was OK with reactivation for a short time, but forever? What if somebody hacks in and finds his account and it's information? Am I likely to see his characters running around? What guarantees can you make that nothing so annoying will happen?

Admitted, this is a very rare (at least, I hope it is) concern, but it's one that I have in the back of my mind and I'm just not sure I like having it.

I'm most likely just being paranoid, but I feel this way, however irrational it might be.

I'd like all the ghosts of the past to stay at rest.

My room mate installed the new installer and has an strange problem with it. It seems to want to send him to the test server. He also has problems getting to his ncsoft account, as opposed to into the game. It keeps telling him that the computer he is on isn't authorized to go to his game account information. Life was simpler before the new patcher. Personally, I am going to avoid installing it until forced to by circumstances beyond my control, like NCSoft requiring it....

I think they are going to get my $10, but gosh, it's not like I have a ton of characters I am itching to make... sigh

Green Lama was my first character, though the original Green Lama was deleted when I found I didn't like the power combo. I recreated Green Lama as a blaster (Assault Rifle)/gadgets and found it to be more enjoyable. GL is currently L40ish and resides on Liberty.

Hometown Girl, also on Liberty is a L50 SS/Invul tank. Never had a bit of trouble with that design, however, in the mid levels it was a bit stodgy without Haste.

First Villain was General Gray, still around, about L43ish. Robot Mastermind with traps.

My highest level villain (and next oldest) is Plazmus, a Sonic/Thermal that I consider a healer.

Both of these villains are on Infinity.

I recently added 3 characters to Champion, but they are all under L25.

In order:

Faultline
Croatoa
Striga

Red Side:

No favorites, though I seem to do the missions in Sharkhead Isle a lot. The Task Force in Cape Diablo is nice.

Honorable Mention would go to the reworked Hollows.

I noticed (how could I miss it) that whenever I zoned, my pets would stand around at the zone-in location and do nothing. They would not follow instruction. The only way to get them back was to zone back to the zone I left, where they would then obey, but if I zoned out again, the same problem would occur. The only way to avoid this is to dismiss the pets and resummon in the new zone.

I know this has been fixed on the normal servers, but it would be nice to see the fix on the test server, as this is an annoyance.

I know, the test server is not supposed to be necessarilly up to date, it's not considered a high priority unless there is a test going on, but I like to pop in and do a bit with the characters I have over there once in a while, and judging by the other people I see other there, I am not the only one, though in recent months people have been fewer than I ever remember... maybe because it's not been up to day bug fix wise? LOL.

In many ways I wish the test server over here were as dynamic as the test server for EQ back when I played there. There were players who exclusively played the test server, who gave feedback all the time. I never transfered characters to it, I developed characters on it. I would like to do the same here, leaving room for testing new archetypes, of course...

Why am I saying this here?

In hopes that others in the community will see what I have said, and a ground swell of requests to update the test server's bug status will occur. Call me a natural born optimist, but I like to think that we can request something and see something done about it. This is COH, after all, not EQ or WOW, LOL.

I have been working on getting the crafting badges, and I notices that no matter how many times I make the 15 & 20 accuracy recipes, the slider never advances past 11 of the 13 needed. Am I doing something wrong, or is there a bug in the badge advancement program?

I have some of the 25 & 30 done, and all the L10 done. Is there something I'm missing?

Controllers and Dominators got Mace Mastery? Really? Isn't that a Brute and Tanker ability?

No wonder it wasn't working right. LOL.

I don't think anyone really approaches this from the standpoint of an actor playing a role. I've known players who approached method acting in their role playing, however, they are few and far between, and really, for good reason. Method Acting in an RPG puts a lot of pressure on the more casual players and gm's and makes their job a lot harder, LOL. While the great thespian is busy having his histrionics, the rest of the group is sitting around toying with the dice... or ignoring him while beating the heck out of the arch villian....

The fact of the matter is, the story you create behind your hero is only important to you. 99.9999% of the other players in the game will never know or care what it is. Heck, most players don't even read the minibio that you can write, and a whole heck of a lot of players don't bother with doing one in the first place. (I usually do, and I try to make it interesting if anyone does want to read it... usually either classically superheroic or humorous.. I do a lot of humorous characters... Fluffy Seigebot, Animala, Jack Frostinstein...)

I disagree with some people's assumption that you can't do an amoral character in this game. I have a L50 character who, until L40, was basically amoral. He didn't say anything, really, except "plop-fizz-glurp-slop-squlorch", walked through missions with teams (I tried not to solo him if at all possible), any team communications that were necessary were done in (parentetic comments), and I spent a lot of time using third person in other communications... "Plazmus seems to be in pain" and "Plazmus screams in rage as he is struck". Players enjoyed Plazmus, and I spent a lot of time figuring out creative ways to imply he didn't have much in the way of smarts... Around L40 I changed his origin to reflect the fact that I needed to be more communicative on more complex missions and gave him a brain... I never regretted doing that, and I still do a lot of the old plop plop fizz fizz stuff, just for fun, after all, he's supposed to be a big bag of chemical ooze sort of like Chemo.

I also did a character who was very amoralish, again, I tended to speak in the third person a lot, this time Animala... She was supposed to be an innoscent, with no real sence of good or evil, an animal like character with near human intellegence. She spoke of "doing the dance of hurting and slashing" and "doing the dance of dodging and jumping" and did a lot of very theatrical moves around the battle, aided by being a claw scrapper. I maxed out fitness and spent a lot of time just jumping and hopping round while doing the aoe claw move in order to simulate dancing.

Again, Animala was fairly popular with other players in that once they got used to the idea of my speaking in third person, "Animala doesn't understand why we are doing what we are doing, but she'll do whatever you say, because you smell nice" as an example, and that I was always jumping and hopping round. After they got into the spirit of things, I got a lot of comments directed my way about dance techniques, animal noises ( Animala growled a lot), and nature children. Very much fun. Even the sarcastic players were clever. I still play Animala as a nature child, although a somewhat more refined one... she's over L40, after all, approaching L50, there has to be some growth of character.

My point is, if you are a role player, you'll find a way. Though the new Pretorian zones are challenging. It's a lot easier to choose to be Gung Ho for Cole or Viva la Revolution, Cast Down the Oppressors than it is to be your own person. I'm working on finding a way, however.

I got an evil dastard who always attacks protestors... he's Gung Ho For Cole. I got an evil dastard who took relish in feeding cops to the ghouls... he hero worships Hatchet. I got another one who always stood up for the little guys (responsibility loyalist) and another who didn't particularly like several of the resistance guys, but felt that as bad as the resistance was, the cops were worse (protective resistance). There does not seem to be much room for middle ground, but I'm still thinking about the problem.


A little help from the Devs with some less black and white choices would be nice.

From ClawsandEffect:

"Saying "But I don't WANT to do that." is the same thing as an actor declining a role because he disagrees with the character's morals"

---

I can understand your point very well. The other day I watched an episode of Law and Order LA where one of the Baldwin brothers was playing a bad guy. I happen to know that that brother is a born again Christian who lectures on ethics on TV all around the country. He didn't let his personal beliefs stand in the way of his role on TV, and you should not either, as a role player. In face to face games, I play a lot of roles, as a GM I might play a crazed murderer or a deranged world defeating madman (I run superhero rpg's). As a player I might play a gung ho patriotic captain america clone or a gay healer or a Wiccan defender of the Earth Mother. None of those roles are me. I have played essentially myself before, mind you, but very seldom. After all, I role play to escape from my life, not to relive it.

Your character need not have the same goals, morals, or phylosophy as yourself. In fact, it shows great role playing mastery to play out of your comfort zone.

Of course, in MMORPG's you are limited by what the devs envision as possible roles and choices within the game. As stated elsewhere, I personally would love a Neutral Path in the game, one that consisted of a series of arcs dedicated to just improving your character or finding wrongs and righting them reguardless of whether Longbow or Arachnos cares one way or the other. Or Emporer Cole, for that matter.

In the case of Arachnos, mayhap you are an Equal Op crasher of parties, just as likely to kick Arachnos butt as Longbow butt, and bedamned the consequences, or maybe you never attack the good guys or Arachnos, but always go after the other bad guys...

In Pretoria maybe you fight both the resistance and the loyalists, only going after the truly bad ones, or whatever. There should be a way to make a few contacts who can set up missions like this without being part of the entrenched powers that be... and also not entrenching themselves! LOL.

I've been working on a new story arc mission based around Halloween with a horror action adventure theme. I'd love to get some help and critique testing it, and would like to welcome anyone who wishes to to try it out.

The Arc Number is 453928

This story line is not fully solo compatable, though I would love to tweak it into being more compatable. Right now I'm 1 for 2 on not dying in the first part of the arc. I am going to lower the difficulty of the Boss encounter to Medium and change the location to be further away from the final fight, that should help a lot. The time I died was when I encountered the Boss in the same room with the final fight and simply got overwhelmed.

Good Luck, and feel free to contact me in game with a tell @greenlama! I'm always willing to chat assuming I'm not in the middle of a mission!

Due to being Spelling Challenged, I welcome corrections if you notice any.

Thanks in advance! Good Gaming!