Beggly

"Personally, the more I go about the game, the more I realise what bothers me in Praetoria - it's not actually a middle ground, not in the way I expected it to be. Not in the way a middle ground should be."

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You know, this guy has a point! I was hoping to see some middle ground options as well. I was somewhat disappointed that Pretoria only went up to L20. I was hoping for some higher level missions and zones with some options not offered to villains and heroes. Maybe an elemental zone or collection of zones, which don't deal with protecting or destroying, but simply surviving. A world where you fight for personal issues chosen by yourself, perhaps offering contacts who run the deck from good to evil to total chaos. Want to fight to train yourself to be all you can be? Talk to Bruce. Want to fight for the glory of fighting? Talk to Hogarth. Want to save kittens from trees and help old ladies across the street? Talk to Melvin.

Want to do all three randomly? I don't see why you couldn't!

Anyway, the Neutral Zone would be an option for those who don't want to make any political or moral choices if they don't want to, or who want to just shake things up and try some weird stuff.

I thnk that would be fun. Really.

Personally, I agree with you in general, but not in specific.

I would love a few more choices as well, but the reality is, you can't be given some choices. The game simply won't support it. You gotta have conflict, and there can't be an infinite number of options given for how that conflict will work.

I didn't like feeding the guys to the monsters, so I didn't. I abandoned that mission and went off to find teams to work with that were doing different missions. Eventually, I got too high a level and just went to Atlas Park rather than mess with the whole thing. At least with one character.

I've got 2 others, one resistance, and one loyalist, who would feed people to ghouls with gusto. I just made two evil dastards so I could check out the negative mission arcs. Got a couple of boy scout characters doing good guy arcs.

Some better choices would be nice, but I'm not going to spend a lot of time worrying about when we will get them. LOL.

I've published a new AE story arc for general enjoyment, not a Pharm arc, but a story arc centered around Halloween and ghostly doings.

I'd love to get some play on it and some feedback from people, good or bad. Oh, and don't be shy about pointing out mispellings and such, I'm notoriously spelling challenged.

The Arc number is 453928 and is under @Greenlama. Thanks very much in advance for being willing to try this out.

It has the potential for big bosses and an archvillian at the end, so a party would be best, I really can't call the whole thing solo friendly. I tried to solo it a couple of times and ran into some problems with a Robot Mastermind of L25. Haven't tried it with any other characters yet, but I suspect it's going to be rough for some character types solo.

*******Alert*******

Reposting this to the correct forum. Sorry for the inconvenience.

:0)

Thanks for all the suggestions, and gosh, sorry about mispelling Lone Ranger.... Very funny, really, I liked it.


I know others have proposed this, but most of the other posts I've read seemed to think you had to have full mastermind level passle of pets. I don't think this is necessary or desirable. Heroes usually have one sidekick, the number of heroes with multiple sidekicks is very small...like fingers of one hand small. LOL.

OK, since this is a "for fun" section, and includes discussion of general City of Heroes issues, I thought I would take my shot.

I love Masterminds. Really. I can see why you don't want to create hero masterminds, the list of precident characters who fit this catagory in comics is amazingly small, and only gets a smidge bigger if you include low power groups. Basically, you have The Shadow, Doc Savage, Nick Fury, The Shield and the Newsboy Legion, and then you have to toss in things like Challengers of the Unknown, Blackhawks, Sgt. Rock, and the Sea Devils. And all of the later additions are really, as I said, just very low power superhero teams.

So, no real precident for superhero masterminds.

However, there is a LOT of precident for superhero sidekicks. Generally only 1 sidekick, and generally significantly less powerful than the hero (though not always). Superman and Krypto, Dr. Midnight and Hootie, The Thunderbolt and Johnny Thunder, The Red Bee and his Bees, Shining Knight and his Pegasus, Kazaar and his sabertooth, Loan Ranger and Tonto, Chamelion Boy and Proty, Supergirl and Streaky or Comet, The Falcon and Redwing, Catwoman and her cat, Princess Python and her Python, Gene Autry and his horse, Roy Rogers and Trigger, Green Hornet and Kato, Judge Dredd and his robot, etc.

How about working up a sidekick power set? Would not even have to be a major power set, it could be a minor power set, though I would love it to be a major power set. All the powers could be geared toward improving the sidekick, possibly a series of choices... ranged or not ranged, running or flight, type of damage (elemental, mental, dark, etc.), animal sidekick vs human sidekick vs robot sidekick, with choices closing off if you elected for that option. (I do not claim any rights to this idea, it's all City of Heroes proprietary, so far as I'm concerned.)

Anyway, give it a thought, will you, I think it would quiet people down who are always asking for Mastermind Heroes. And you could use it for villains as well. Oh, and I'd allow sidekicks for every archetype except Masterminds. They got all the sidekicks they need.

Stan Lee knows about CoH because the winner of the second So you Want to Be a Superhero reality show was a player of CoH. Gee, you guys don't know your own game history.... it was in the forums..... LOL.

People are generally of 2 minds about bank missions, but the impression I get is that bank missions on the villain side are more fun. Will we ever get something like a Mayhem Mission for the heroes to berserk out on?

Personally, I feel this way myself. Mostly because on the villain side you get to break things. I know that it's not heroic to break things as heroes, but I really wish the heroes could have something that equalled the fun of the Mayhem Bank Missions.

I've always been fond of letting us go after a series of villain bases where the primary purpose of the mission was to destroy equipment. This would make a lot of sence vs Council, 5th Column, Arachnos, Circle of Thorns, and The Family. Unlike the bank Mayhems, these would be underground or in buildings, and the type of stuff you would destroy would be Labs, computers, vehicles, supplies, and such.

If you are looking for a villain side mirror of this, it would be a defend the base mission... I'd do this a lot like the hero side bank mission, you enter an outside area, then hunt up all the heroic teams sent in the destroy the base. I personally would love to do something Mayhem like on the hero side. LOL.

A really large and sprawling base might include everything from submarines to tanks... it would be very much fun, I would think.

Thanks for the review.

Some of these are issues I've been working on but have not found what I think is a viable solution. I.E., Work in Progress. Some are ones I missed because of over familiarization. I know what I meant, but I didn't get it down on "paper". Thus the value of an intellegent reviewer or good editor.

One problem is that I've never found an adaquate first map. I wanted a small club like a casino, but when I do that, the mob distribution is never what I remember from playing those maps as done by the devs.

Cynicism in patron descriptions is a failing of mine. Unfortunately, CoH does not have a generic "ruffian" mix. A casino or dance club has to be patronaged by a number of different people. Not all Family or whatever.

I worked on this in the second arc, which is why I included patrols of several different villain groups in order to add differentiation to the mix of people you could encounter. Off duty Crey, Carnies out on the town, wandering Freaks, some Snakes trying to keep to the shadows. Here I ran into level difficulties. I wanted Warriors, Skulls, etc, but they only came in low level types.... sigh.

As I understand it now, I can have my Warriors, etc, and I may change out the custom group for the old favorites. If I do, I can maybe stage a few gang turf fights and such to further mix things up.

Part of my objective was to mix things up. I wanted to remind people that there are factions all over the place, and they have to interact sometimes. I didn't really succeed in this. Have to work on it. I also wanted to mix things up in a game sence, having a variety of mobs to fight, rather than having the same old thing in the entire adventure. That sometimes seems to me to be the weekness of CoH. You go into a location where there should be half a dozen potential enemies, and you find only Council or only Carnies. Only a few times are villain groups encountered in mixed bags, and that mostly in CoH early missions in Atlas, King's Row, etc...

I think I carry this off a bit better in part three with the various factions being called/hired to evaluate the magical dingus and possibly bid on it. I need to punch up the dialog in order to make that plot point clearer. Working on it.

Again, thanks very very much for your input.

I've already emplemented several changes, including dialog changes, and I'm looking for a better map for part one, either that or a less ambitious concept for part one. Also, looking at changing Maros out for somebody else. Maybe a custom guy or one more likely to want to be benevolent.

Old Time Fairy Tale Treasure Hunt MA# 149250

This is the story of high adventure, lost treasure, ancient artifacts, and underworld wheels and deals.

I am pretty sure I have all the bugs out, I've been working hard to put surprise twists in the story line and mix up the kind of foes you find. Come and give this a looksee. I think you might like what you find.

Global: @Green Lama
Gender: Male
Age: 53
Location: Mesa, Arizona
Height: 5'11"

Blue Side:
SG Affiliation: Heroes of Might and Magic
Most Recognizable Server Toon: Animala, Claw scrapper, & Granny Beggly, Stone/Stone Tank.

Red Side:
SG Affiliation: Villians of Might and Magic
Most Recognizable Server Toon: General Grey, L43 Robots/Traps & Plazmus, L50 FireHeal/Sonic

I also have characters on Liberty, Virtue, Freedom, and Guardian.

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Liberty: Hometown Girl L50 tank
Virtue: Kid Shalene L30 Thugs
Freedom: Herbie L34 scrapper
Guardian: El Cid Verde L15 Tank

I find that reassuring.

I put the comment here to get a feel for the general player feeling about level cap increase. From the tenor of your comments, I gather it's not a popular idea.

I've already sent feedback stating my personal dislike of level cap increases. I'd rather see almost any other possible alternative, really.

Thanks for letting me know that the CoX community is a responsible community.

I have heard no rumors to this effect, I don't know if this idea has any cashe with the Devs or not, but I wanted to come out four-square against any attempt to increase the level cap.

I have heard that you are all working hard on the End Game, on high level content. Please take this to heart: Raising the level cap can only lead to grief. Look at Everquest. I started playing EQ when the level cap was 50. Last I saw it was 80. All raising the level cap did for EQ was encourage players to demand escalating content.

It takes surprisingly few days, sometimes HOURS, for some players to attain the new level cap. As soon as one does, it seems that dozens do. They instantly begin demanding high level content to support their new level, and complaining that the old content isn't good enough for them. They begin pharming and power leveling others to the new level.

The devs seem to always react by increasing the level cap again. After a while, it becomes an unending treadmill of increase and attainment, with people taking pride in how fast they can break the new content's level cap.

I don't think the level cap escalation would be as bad in CoH as it was in EQ. The economy is different, the levels work a bit differently, but I fear that if this gets started, players will find a way to cause meltdowns.

Find another way to assuage the need for high level content. Please. Don't go the EQ way and ruin the game for people. I don't play EQ any more. I love CoH with a passoin I have not felt since the early days of EQ, when I loved that game. Don't take CoH away from me. That would be a crime.

Good Job with everything else you've been doing. I really enjoy the changes made last year and look forward to Going Rogue.

Hey, I'd like to thank everyone for posting their ideas.

I had not known Freedom was going to be so popular with PVPers. Personally, I NEVER pvp, but that's just me. I've found it to be a very nice server with few problems.

Perhaps it's just the rose colored glasses of past vision, but I remember much better days on all the servers, where getting a team was a simple matter of saying you wanted one in any zone in the game and having several offers show up. Compared to when I started COH/COV, the current servers seem almost deserted.

I am hoping that these free transfers will pick things up.

I also wanted to free up some spaces for Going Rogue when it comes out, so again, this was handy. I hate trying to decide which toon to delete or trying to budget a new character slot. (I'm on disability and have a limited income for playing these silly games).

According to some silly artical I read, MMORPG's are destroying internet porn. Yay MMORPG's! (OK, that was non sequeter, but I had to mention it, I've been bursting ever since I read it. LOL.)

I decided to consolidate my toons on a few choice servers, rather than have a few tunes everywhere. As a result, I've got toons on Virtue, Freedom, Infinity, Guardian, and Liberty rather than all but one of the servers.

I keep thinking this is a nice opportunity to get a higher population on Virtue and Freedom (or some of the other servers) so that more people are available to team and in general have fun with. Some servers (like Liberty and Infinity) seem all but deserted.

(I stayed on Liberty and Infinity because they are my first two servers, and after filling up Virtue, Freedom, and Guardian, I didn't want to move what I had left there just to join another potentially low population server.)

So, where are people going? Are you staying there or going back? Any speculation on why they decided to give free server transfers? I think it's a great idea, naturally.

I'm in favor of the Sands of Mu. I take the axe for "in character' reasons only. The Sands of Mu I use at all levels from L1 to L50. For the lower levels it's an attack so they don't have to use a power slot for an attack, they can get a defense or support power instead, and at higher level, it's just another attack that does a ton of damage and might hit multiple targets. What's not to like.

I don't like the Axe because it's slow, 1 target, and does lower damage. On the other hand, for melee types based on armored weapons users and other concepts, it's perfect. I'd also take it if I were doing a ghost slayer type of character.

I just heard Dave Arneson died.

Way back in the beginnings of Gaming Fandom, Dave created The World of Greyhawk and worked with E. Gary Gygax on D&D. Without those two, I doubt City of Heroes would be anything like it is today. At best, it might more resemble a strategy game.

We owe an aweful lot to those early pioneers in roleplaying. From the world of miniature gaming and boardgaming, they fashioned an idea that had formerly lived only in the minds of psychiatrists and social workers.

They posited that role playing might be fun, and proceeded to created fantasy rules to go with that concept.

Don't let Dave's passing go unmarked. Say a little prayer for him, and maybe toss out a rememberance of a favorite role playing session in his honor. He was not only a giant contributor to all the fun we have all had over the years, but he was a heck of a nice guy, and the world is a dimmer place for his passing. I am lucky to have met the man a few times over the years while working for Flying Buffalo Games, and I can say that I'm not exagerating when I say this. He was one of the good ones.

He died of cancer, which had settled in his kidneys and had caused a bone infection. I have personally battled this demon, in the form of colon cancer, and can imagine a little of what he might have gone through.

As one person commented, the gaming group on the other side is rejoicing.

I have one peeve...

I don't like the limit on the storage units. Only 30 on the invention storage is a pain. In order to keep a reasonable amount of storage around to make what I need, I've been forced to build up to 27 invention storage bins, which is three rooms of my bases...

This is to small an amount of space. I feel even 50 storage would be better... unwieldy to look through, but better. 100 would be even better than that.

If you are loath to create such things for fear that they will be an exploit, then add advanced storage devices that must be crafted.

Me too, but it's not very likely, Arizona is a bit off the beaten track by the listing of where people are from.

Of course, if they had something in San Diego, it would be nice to go there... hehe.

Phoenix would be even better...

Oh, dear. I had not known that there could be so much animocity surrounding the rikti invasions. I personally have been enjoying them quite a lot. I consider them to be fairly well handled considering the mmorpg format. I noticed that there is new construction in many parts of the city and damaged old parts of the city... at least, I think these things happened since issue 10... could it be that you are just missing the more subtle events?

I wish the Rikti war zone could be accessed by lower level characters, I only have 1 character high enough to go toe to toe with the rikti. Maybe you could open a rikti skirmish zone? A lower, kinder zone for the L20 to 34 crowd?