ChakatStreak

NA PPD Hardsuit GET!

Well, RL plans got in the way so I won't be able to join this week after all. Maybe another time.

If you don't mind a sidekick, I wouldn't mind running some with you guys as my 18 FF/Elec Defender, Howlback, tomorrow night. Officially, she's the PPD Liaison to the KGB Special Section 8, but it'd be fun to run with some other officers for a change.

I can't be there from the beginning owing to the vagaries of public transportation, but I'll bring her on as early as I can. If you want to add her to your Server Friends list so you can see when I get on and send an invite, that'd be cool.

I'll try to log her in tonight and bring all her enhancements up to date, maybe level her a little bit.

May be a bit late, but I believe at least one of the KGB SS8's trio of Decepti-cats will show up. Probably Glit, so be watching his Twitter account later! http://twitter.com/KGBKittehDoc

I regret that I was unable to attend, for work duties (and tending the Deceptikitten) kept me out of game. But I am certain it was epic!

(QR)

I used to be a member of the Young Rogues (http://www.guildportal.com/Guild.asp...&TabID=1075875) but they seem to have fallen prey to altitis on the part of their founders.

It didn't help that the group they were originally founded to oppose, the Young Phalanx, was composed of largely the same players. >.>

After Going Rogue comes out and I reroll Diabolesse as a demon summoner (yes, I could do it Wednesday, but I want to start her on Praetoria), we may see about forming a new incarnation....

I can be found as @ChakatSilver... I also have a somewhat neglected RP-only account for my evil counterpart, @MUSilverspot

[QR] Someone else may have asked this, but... if Granite was changed to an overlay akin to the rest of Stone Armor, would that solve the problems that currently make Stone and Claws mutually exclusive? I vaguely recall it was Granite that was causing those problems.

I'm already in favor of making it an overlay, and making all the different stone toggles come together to form a complete suit of armor. If it fixes the incompatibility with Claws, even better!

QR; someone might have said this already, I haven't read all 10 pages.

Whoooo! Congratulations on bringing the new little Communist into the world!

And I second Moggie's advice: sleep now while you still can, because for the next 6 months or so, you won't get ANY.

A small handful of my characters already have Praetorians, or are the Praetorians of Rikmach's characters. Though not all of them follow the usual "mirror" dichotomy - that is, I have a hero who is the Praetorian alternate of one of Rikmach's heroes, and he has a villain who is the Praetorian alternate of one of my villains. They just came into their powers and their use of them by different circumstances.

Tygara = War Cat
Our original pair. I had intended to make War Cat a villain (created her before CoV release to reserve the name), but as I played her she became truly heroic in her own right.

EarthShade = ShadeBorne
Tygara & War Cat's villainous sisters. Again, different circumstances behind how they gained their powers and turned evil, though in both cases, their hero sister was indirectly responsible.

Necril = Diabolesse
Di had actually been named "Abyssal" or something similar to that in CoV Beta, and that was a name I had really wanted for Necril in the first place... ironically, "Necril" would fit Diabolesse better, since she's a zombie summoner. Though with the release of Going Rogue and the Demon Summoning primary, she'll be getting rerolled.

Chakat Streak = Chakamil Silverspot
Streak's full name is "Chakat Silverstreak," as shi has silver tiger stripes. Hir mirror counterpart, Silverspot, is lynx-patterned in black with silver spots. The Chakat/Chakamil dichotomy is two separate subspecies of the same genetically engineered race: the Chakamil are the more aggressive, military-focused variant.

I play entirely too many felines.

On Virtue alone, out of 16 characters I have there (and believe me, there's more on other servers), eleven are felines of some form or other, including two of my three level 50s.

Of those, four are male.

And none of them really acts like the catgirl stereotype.

But it's really the wolf who has the more interesting story, considering that she's ex-5th Column, was supposed to be infused with a Nictus but resisted to the point that she just ended up a WarWolf instead, and eventually bonded with a reformed Nictus and became a WarShade.

You can, however, purchase the Architect Edition on Steam, and then apply the serial code from it to your existing game account. This will link the game to your Steam account, and get you an additional month of play time and your choice of super booster for about $5 less than purchasing them separately ($20 for Architect Edition, vs. $15 for a month's play and $10 for a super booster totaling $25).

Picked up my own CE preorder at Gamestop today... yup, no Ghost Widow. Hope this gets resolved soon and they can just send us our missing Widows.

((Mindora))

Veteran of the Psychic Wars – Blue Oyster Cult from the albums Fire of Unknown Origin and Heavy Metal (Soundtrack)

Note: This takes place shortly after Issue 4 came out… around the time I stopped playing Mindora regularly (she was my main, up until then). OOCly, the reason I stopped playing her is because she was Level 31, had finished the Striga Island content, and I didn’t want to outlevel Croatoa, which was a mere rumor at the time for Issue 5 with a projected level range of 30-40. Of course, now it’s here and she’s already outleveled the first half of it… c’est la vie. And now, the reason for her absence, through her own eyes… I’ll be cutting out the first chorus for the purpose of the flow of the story as it parallels the song, but other than that, the song is unedited.

Disclaimer: Pokémon and all related names and characters are owned by Nintendo, Game Freak, 4Kids, and whoever else. If my use of references to this copyrighted world, on which Mindora is loosely based (loosely meaning she’s not a pre-existing character from that world, but is sort of a species of that world modified to fit into CoH) disqualify me from Heroic Harmonies, so be it. But Mindy’s the only character I have a theme song for, so ahead I go….

You see me now a veteran of a thousand psychic wars
I’ve been living on the edge so long
Where the winds of limbo roar
And I’m young enough to look at
And far too old to see
All the scars are on the inside
I’m not sure if there’s anything left of me

Old.

Mindora felt so old, lately. And she shouldn’t: she was decanted less than one year ago, in a secret Crey facility known only as Laboratory R-395. Even her genetic “parents,” whose thoughts her mind had been plagued with psychic echoes of, were young; her “mother” had been a girl of maybe ten years when she died, probably less, and her “father,” a clone like herself, had been no older than she was now at the point the memories end.

And yet….

And yet it seemed that, for all their lives, Mindora and her father had been fighting their own separate wars for freedom. Rocket, Crey… they all blended together in Mindy’s mind now. The constant battles, the rebellion against the fate that seemed to have been determined for them from before they were created… she wasn’t even sure, anymore, how much of the fight was hers and how much was her father’s.

You ask me why I’m weary, why I can’t speak to you
You blame me for my silence
Say it’s time I changed and grew
But the war’s still going on dear
And there’s no end that I know
And I can’t say if we’re ever...
I can’t say if we’re ever gonna to be free

Shadeburn had been hounding her for weeks. “What has gotten into you, Mindy?! There’s no reason for you to be so damned morose! We’ve had it good. We’re recognized heroes, we’ve put several archvillains in jail…”

“We’re living in a Rattata hole; Thunder Mouse is STILL missing, probably DEAD by now, and for all my telepathic abilities I can’t find a single gorram lead on her location… and Crey knows where I am now.”

Shadeburn rolled her eyes. “Oh, for Moltres’ sake, Mindy, we’ve had this argument before… they were after Lauren, not you.”

“At the time, yes. But they’ve been hunting me ever since I escaped, Shadey. Why do you think I was still in hiding for a month after you got your hero license? You just don’t get it. They’re finished with you. You were a test subject, a freaking guinea pig. They proved what they wanted with you and tossed you aside! But I was always intended to be their weapon. Just like I was intended to be Giovanni’s weapon before. As long as Crey exists, they will never stop hunting me… I’ll never be free. Not until they’re stopped for good…”

Shadeburn just looked at her funny. “… like Mewtwo was intended to be Giovanni’s weapon, you mean.”

Mindora blinked in surprise. “That’s… what I said, isn’t it?” At Shadeburn’s shake of her head, she cringed. The echoes were becoming stronger… she wasn’t sure where Mewtwo ended and she began, anymore. And it scared her.

Don’t let these shakes go on
It’s time we had a break from it
It’s time we had some leave
We’ve been living in the flames
We’ve been eating out our brains
Oh, please don’t let theses shakes go on

You see me now a veteran of a thousand psychic wars
My energy’s spent at last
And my armor is destroyed
I have used up all my weapons and I’m helpless and bereaved
Wounds are all I’m made of
Did I hear you say that this is victory?

[ QUOTE ]
I rocketed away from the destroyed compound. Giovanni’s hold on me had finally been shattered, the armor he claimed focused my powers falling apart around me as I flew off, symbolic of his bonds on me that had been broken. I went to the only other place I knew, the island of my birth… no, my creation. I was not born a Pokémon, I was created. And there, I collapsed. Weakened. I had used most of my power to destroy Giovanni’s fortress, and it was all I could do to keep my presence from being discovered. I was hurt, tired. I needed to rest before I could rebuild… before I could enact my revenge on the humans who had made me to be a slave…

[/ QUOTE ]

Mindora’s eyes snapped open. The dream again… the dream that she was her father, that she was living his life….

Quietly, she slipped out of bed, careful not to disturb Shadeburn’s sleep. She scrawled a brief note, leaving it beside the bed. Hovering over to the window of their King’s Row apartment, she silently opened it and flew out into the night….

Don’t let these shakes go on
It’s time we had a break from it
Send me to the rear
Where the tides of madness swell
And been sliding into hell
Oh, please don’t let shakes go on
Don’t let these shakes go on
Don’t let these shakes go on

“’I can’t go on like this,’” Shadeburn read aloud. “’The constant running and fighting, the strain I’ve been putting on my powers… it’s slowly eating away at my mind, driving me mad. My father’s mind-echoes are slowly taking over. I need to leave Paragon… to get away for awhile. To find someone who can help me find myself again.

“’I don’t know how long I’ll be gone. But I will be back, once I am myself again. Don’t worry about me, Shadey… and don’t wait up.’”

Clutching the note to her chest, Shadeburn stared out the still-open window. A single teardrop escaped her eye. “Oh, Mindy…” she murmured. “Be careful out there, will you?” She knew Mindora couldn’t hear her… and yet, maybe she could sense her thoughts.

It would have to do.

You know, I always thought the point of Fiery Aura was "The best defense is a good offense." As many have said, it traded off defensive ability, by its lower resists, for the ability to cause more damage with Blazing Aura and Burn, thus defeating the mobs before they could hurt you too badly.

I could take the nerfs to Burn's damage and recharge (though I'd prefer a slightly less drastic recharge increase)... if they had been coupled with Issue 4 levels of Fear. As it is? Burn is now useless to me. The only time I have ever gotten any actual use out of it since I5 hit was when fighting an AV, specifically the Envoy of Shadows. And I think he only stayed in it because he's fire-resistant and knew it wouldn't kill him. :P And even he kept running away to ANOTHER LEVEL of the map.

I took my Fire/Axe tank, Necril, Paragon Protector hunting in Eden with her SG-mate Back Yard Boom, who is an Invuln/Energy Melee tank, one level higher than her: she's 36, he was 37 at the time. We only ever took on a single Crey spawn (along with any Nemesis or Devouring Earth they may have been fighting) at a time. Logically, since Fiery Aura is supposed to be an offensive set, I should have been defeating enemies faster, but getting pounded on more.

Boomer tended to take out two to three enemies in the time it took me to finish a single one off. And I'm not talking about Mob Specialists and Vigilants, I'm talking about Paragon Protectors, Juggernauts, Tanks, and Eliminators. Lieuts and bosses. Why? Because any time I laid down a Burn patch, everything would run away from me and stay out. They wouldn't even yo-yo in and out like they did in I4, they just vamoosed. My Blazing Aura, which has a single Taunt enhancement in it because in I3 and I4 it helped me keep enough hate to keep some (NOT ALL!) enemies that were aggroed on me in a Burn patch, was now drawing so much aggro that I was getting destroyed and Boomer was powerless to taunt them off of me, but still not keeping ANYONE close enough for Burn to be even MARGINALLY effective.

Fiery Aura already had useless or semi-useless powers. Temperature Protection gives automatic additional resistance against relatively uncommon types of damage. Fiery Embrace is only useful if you're Fire/Fire; it doesn't affect Burn's damage, so if your secondary ISN'T fire all it does is improve your Blazing Aura slightly. Rise of the Phoenix (which I have, by the way, and had to use FREQUENTLY during the aforementioned Paragon Protector hunt) is only usable when you're dead. A good tank shouldn't be dying, not this much, and especially not when teamed with another tank. And yet, there it is, and it gets a lot of use. Why? Because even though Fiery Aura's resistances weren't nerfed like every other defensive set, they're still not up to par; they've always been weak. But now we don't have the offensive ability to back it up like we used to. Fire tanks had survivability because they could defeat things quicker. They can't do that anymore.

I'm almost afraid to tank for my SG anymore. The way things used to be, I could effectively be the only tank on a team, but I wasn't the greatest at it; when we had another tank (and our SG has about 5 tanks in it, most of them Invuln), I was able to make an effective backup tank and provide enough damage to help defeat enemies faster.

When I was tanking the Envoy of Shadows, my teammates (an Empathy/Psychic Blast defender and an Energy/Energy blapper) died, frequently. We couldn't keep up enough damage on him to weaken him significantly, I couldn't hold his aggro well enough to keep him from killing my teammates, and I periodically lost him when he would jump to a higher level of the map. When another tank (Invuln/Superstrength) joined the team, exemplared to a lower level member of the team (I was the highest on the team, and I already had the aforementioned blapper sidekicked), deaths went way down, we were better able to hold his aggro, and we were finally able to do enough damage to finish the Envoy off.

If I didn't like the character's roleplay so much, I'd be tempted to delete her, because she's now far less enjoyable in missions. As it is, I'm seriously considering respeccing out Burn completely. It would only be useful now with the help of a Controller, an AT we have a severe lack of.

Please, devs, roll the fear effect on Burn back, at least a little. I don't expect Pre-I4 levels ever again; that would be foolish. But at least at I4 levels, it was still useful. Even with the I5 Recharge and Damage changes, Burn would still be useful if it ever hit anymore. As it is, this Fear change is like a damage nerf that reduces its damage to near-zero, because nothing takes more than maybe two or three ticks from it unless they're locked down. I don't want to have to lock down enemies to hurt them; YOU don't want us to be able to keep enemies permanently locked down. But as Burn is now, that seems to be my only option.

Ah, okay... War Cat was 15 when she tried to take on Atta, and this was maybe two weeks or so ago, so he'd already acquired Elite Boss status. Didn't have the problem of any of his minions aggroing: I did a superspeed hit-and-run, smacking him and drawing him off to the back of the room without anybody else noticing. But with my only defense being Reconstruction (1 Heal 1 Recharge, plus Hasten) and Fast Healing (1 Heal), well... x_x

Well, of my... *pauses to count* five Scrappers, War Cat (17 Claws/Regen) is the only one I've played enough to classify... but she's definitely a Feral type. Tends to either duo with another Scrapper (a Dark/Dark who also happens to be a frequent RP partner) or solo; her only large team experiences have been TF/Trial (and let me tell you, trying to go Feral through the Cavern of Transcendence just doesn't work too well), or sidekicked up to a level 50 to tag along on some AV missions.

By the way, big props on soloing Atta... War Cat tried it, and couldn't overcome his regeneration rate. Not to mention that he kept knocking her on her butt so much that she could neither heal nor get good, solid hits in.

[ QUOTE ]

As for activities, most of the trials have rather strict limits. A Cavern of Transcendence trial would be fun, if only because it's so new and such a royal pain in the [censored] to get that most folks mains will never have done it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Just as a note for those who didn't know, as of Issue 3 the Transcendence Trial is, effectively, a mini-Task Force of one mission. There's a strict level requirement (12 to 16). Exemplars can get in; however, sidekicks cannot, as they are too low to get into the Tunnels. And of course, a full eight-person team is required to get past the first part of the cavern itself, since eight objects have to be clicked simultaneously. If somebody loses exemplar beforehand due to either themselves or the person they RSKed to losing connection, for example, then it's blown. I ran the trial recently with Mindora, who had to exemplar to get into it, and while I didn't lose my exemp, our 20-something scrapper did. Fortunately, it didn't happen until after we'd handled the clickies and were fighting our way to the boss, so we were able to finish the trial without a full team. But it was still a pain.