Chad Gulzow-Man

RAAAAH! Coo coo kajoo!

*eyeball twitch, shudder*

There is no G in "whine," and you NEVER leave the E on a verb that ends with it when conjugating it for present participle (that is to say, adding ING to the end).

Did you open the Paragon Market? Yes? Well then, it served its purpose.

A) It's a free gift. Don't be that guy.

B) Giving a free gift worth $1.50 out to 100,000 people isn't generous? Weekly Task Force, man, you watch too much Oprah.

They never said "account wide," they said account based. As in, you can claim it once per account.

I'll agree that the wording was not phrased as best it could have been. But this is just the first run beta test of the program; it certainly doesn't mean that there won't be account-wide items offered in the future, such as emotes or individual costume pieces.

(Though I do so adore that there are some out there who hold out hope that they'll give away a $10 power set to the entire playerbase for free. It's like when you catch a puppy tearing up a roll of toilet paper--you want to yell at them, but it's just so damn adorable.)

Reminds me of the time a friend of mine ordered a veggie burger and it was delivered with bacon on it. (Really, restaurant people, you didn't stop to think that the person ordering the veggie burger might not want to eat meat? -_-)

Incorrect.

FREE XP Booster

THAT is all.

Nope, nothing stops you from buying a costume bundle just because you've already got one of the individual pieces.

It probably goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway: you will NOT get any further discount on the costume set just because you already own part of it.

What's stopping you from bringing along some friends to even the odds?

Actually, I thought it was because the store interface is actually licensed from a completely external development studio, so the Paragon developers couldn't really tinker with it if they wanted to.

ONE HUNDRED BILLION! MUHUHWAHAHAHA!

Dude, why you gotta make this so complicated?

Just log in any time within 24 hours of when the promotion started, access the store, and put the free item in your cart. Done.

Yeah, it's not technically Friday everywhere just because it's Friday where the devs are in California, but don't blame them for running events on their schedule just because it might inconvenience someone else. -_-

And that is pretty much the entire point of this experiment.

PVP is like an infinity-edged sword at this point; WHEN (not if) they start messing with it again, it's going to cut everybody involved.

Also, I'm pretty sure the marketing and community guys that run the store and website and put Freebie Friday together are far from qualified to start messing around with how powers work and stuff. Likewise, the power development team and the coders who actually make things work inside the game probably had no reason to touch Freebie Friday at all (and therefore didn't).

And finally, whether you use the freebie or not, I guarantee you that you absolutely can use it. They're not giving us an "everybody but kburd doohickey" (where doohickey is obviously intended to be substituted for whatever the free item we're all getting in 14:30 will be). Maybe it's a free XP Booster that you can use to level up a new character faster, maybe it's some Dual/Team/Dual-Team Inspirations that can help you through a tough spot, or maybe it's a Super Pack and you get 5 random things for opening it.

If you don't want to use it, that's on you, not them.

Fair enough. I did, too, and I was freaking terrified when they first made the CoH:Freedom announcement. Then, of course, the shock wore off, and I spent the next few months absorbing absolutely every bit of Freedom info I could get my virtual hands on.

As it stands now, I really don't think being a VIP subscriber now is that functionally different from being a regular pre-Freedom subscriber. I absolutely do like that we have way more options for upgrading our accounts beyond "regular subscriber" than we used to. But options are, by definition, optional, so it's up to you whether or not you apply your personal resources to them.



(Seriously, didn't I say an hour ago I was going to bed? What the pancake is wrong with me?)

Pretty much because they hired extra people to get them cranked out at a higher priority, since "not enough new power sets" was one of the biggest reasons that players kept irregular subscriptions. Lack of endgame content was another such reason, and... oh look, that's been a huge priority in the last few issues as well.

(Seriously, straight up no comment on PVP stuff though. Not something I want to get into at 4:00 AM, nor does it have anything at all to do with Freedom.)


And also, whether you like it or not, Paragon Studios is working on a new, second project unrelated to City of Heroes, and the Freedom revenue is helping them develop that. I will admit to being less than happy that I'm specifically funding something they won't tell us anything about except that it is absolutely NOT superhero-related... But they're still dropping serious coin on getting cool new stuff put in CoH faster, which means I have more to do, which makes me spend more money on the game, so they're obviously doing something right.

Fair enough. If it bothers you, it bothers you. I think that's largely inoffensive (and actually pretty funny), and I know it's absolutely NOT the case in real life, but I do understand how someone might be offended that they're making light of the funds that players are giving them.

I can't say I understand how you think Freedom is shifting focus away from the game, though, since we're getting access to more stuff than ever added to the game (7 new costume sets [2 free to VIPs] and 7 new power sets [2 free to VIPs] that are like 80% awesome at least, not to mention the other stuff like new travel powers and pets). I do realize that you think all that stuff should be included in your subscription cost, but A) costumes have been available for real money since before your forum account was registered, so this is by no means a new thing, and B) we'd maybe have gotten those 2 VIP power sets added in, with the the others being saved for another $50 box expansion (if we ever got them at all).

Being bothered about the store is fine and all, but don't expect them to change their minds and start giving you all the store items for free when the overwhelming player response has been, "Sure, it's fair to pay a few extra bucks here and there for cool new stuff."

And you'd be remiss if you failed to take into account that the monthly Paragon Point stipend is effectively a cumulative $5 gift card you get for free every month to spend on whatever you want in their store (be it power sets or costumes or super packs or literally any of the 1200 items in there). That was NOT there before Freedom--the ONLY option for getting the bonus costume items was to drop extra cash, there was no option to wait a month or two to pick something up with bonus gift cards.



And as far as not liking the Freebie Fridays thing, dude... you're complaining about getting free stuff. Not "I'm paying $15 a month and getting a Paragon Reward Token and 400 Paragon Points" free. LITERALLY, COMPLETELY free. People who aren't paying a VIP subscription get the free stuff too.

You DO realize that there is absolutely no way you're going to look good complaining about getting something for free, right?

Totes what I do on the Paragon Market discussion thread and spreadsheet linked in my sig.

(I also just list everything in Pacific and make everyone else convert the time for themselves... including me, since I'm in the Eastern time zone.)




And since I just said "totes" instead of "totally," I should probably go to bed.

Depends on whether that free stuff is NEW or not. I might just throw it at the top of the regular sale spreadsheet with some dividers. Maybe I'll start a new sheet altogether so people can track what's been offered for free in the past. Or I might just ignore it altogether when it comes to the spreadsheet, since it's only on the store for 1 day a week.

(Who am I kidding, I'm way too OCD to do that last one.)

That's nice. Not that it's required, but perhaps it'd be nice if you provided reasons why you think so (since that's how one, y'know, presents their side of an argument).

But at least this way, the worst anyone can think is that you're the equivalent of a three year old pouting and saying "I don't like X!" despite the fact that he's been eating X for months with no complaint thus far. Which basically means we shrug and say "whatever" instead of thinking you're like a terrible person or something, so maybe you've got the right idea after all.


RE: NOOB--the unofficial CoH profanity placeholder is "pancake." Get with the times, dude.

PS, And Zwil is actually pretty awesome. He's very passionate about the game as both a player and an employee, and he's just a really nice guy all around. Sorry if you've got a beef with him, but I'm guessing that's based either on a misunderstanding or something that his superiors made him say.

And either way, making insults directly at another community member can be punishable by having your post moderated up to actually banning your account. Maybe don't do that anymore?

No sweat dude. Time zones are crazy confusing. Just ask the community team every time they post an announcement about a scheduled event. >_>

That's because it doesn't go live for another 17 hours. You're probably gonna need to check back, like, tomorrow before school.

Except that it won't be random (this time), and everybody will be getting the exact same freebie, so there's no element of chance whatsoever.

(Unless the freebie is a/some Super Pack(s), in which case, yeah, there's actually some chance involved.)