Cipher

I like eating breakfast at Seer 925's restaurant. She always knows what I want.

Alternate joke:

Why are you skipping breakfast? Don't you know how hard I worked to cook that meal just for you? MOTHER LOVES YOU.

I've been pretty clear where my sympathies rest. I'm no great fan of either faction, because even the moderates of those factions allow the extremists to thrive.

However, by personal philosophy, I tend more towards the Resistance. Having avidly read a great many of the loyalist/resistance debates since GR, I find myself looking towards the extremists in my own faction and cringing in response.

So to the extent that I consider myself an out-of-game member of the Resistance (a Forum Warden, if you will), I wish to distance myself from those who can only be identified with Forum Crusaders. Our distaste for the regime may be similar, but that's where the likeness ends.

Fallacies of relevance do not support our cause. And simply IGNORING compelling arguments is just embarrassing. Some of these posts are every bit as cringe-worthy as Ricochet's nadsat speak.

It's interesting, because no matter where my characters begin (ideologically) in Praetoria, they tend to wind up in the same position, which is effectively Atlas Shrugged.

I'm not leaving for Primal to pave the way for the invasion or to extend the hand of diplomacy. I'm leaving because I want OUT of that madhouse, and once I'm through that portal, to hell with showboating Powers, enabling Responsibility, insane Crusaders, and complicit Wardens.

Like the henchman said, "Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus!"

Interesting. Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

I'm a little confused as to the objectives of this project and was hoping someone here could enlighten me.

Lohenien was discussing it on Guardian and when I inquired, I was informed that the goal was "to act as a delation force on the market." Then it became that a group of market people would be destroying 300 billion to do "the same thing." I then wandered into this thread, and when I raised the issue, Lohenien suggested that he (or she) was acting to deflate the market, while everyone else (presumably this thread) was just acting to infuriate the role-playing crowd on Virtue.

So, at any rate, I don't really understand the goal of this project and would appreciate a little insight. If it is just trolling, well, not really my thing, but that's at least comprehensible to me. If there's an economic force behind it, I'd definitely enjoy more explanation.

Well, and the other thing that seems so random about it as an explanation is that as a thematic element, it's already IN THE GAME. Jezebel Jones. It's clearly not as taboo as the urban legendeers would have us believe.

That's really what I'm suggesting. The "pimp issue" (for want of a better phrase) is simply one of those CoX urban legends. Everyone can recite it but no one can just CITE it.

The legal arguments (such as they are) underpinning it are nonsensical at best. People say "it's a legal issue," and I say "under what theory?" No one has ever been able to offer one in response (it is this tort, it is negligence, it falls afoul of this criminal statute, etc).

The Praetoria arcs are railroading, sure, but at least they present SOME choice. That puts them vastly ahead of most of the arcs on Primal Earth in my book (once again, looking at you, Ghost Widow arc!).

No prayers needed, as always SCIENCE! will save the day. Break out the old weather machine and let's ramp that badboy up to a Category 5 before we force it to make landfall in Paragon.

Why stop at Category 5? Saffir and Simpson were like cave slugs - slimy and without vision. They called me mad when I proposed Category 6! Said it was impossible, that no storm could ever be that powerful. But when I looked at the Great Red Spot of Jupiter I knew it could be done! They said my Non-Euclidian Astraoscillator Interface went too far, but I'll show them, I'll show them all!

Once again, Pretoria is located in South Africa.

Praetoria is in an alternate dimension, somewhere over the ruins of America.

I think the Malta arcs really have potential. One of the great things about Praetoria is the pull that different factions have on you. You have your handlers wanting you to do one thing and the opposite faction trying you to go deep cover and sometimes those goals align and sometimes you're just being set up for the fall... That's what the Malta arcs should be -- these people will stop at nothing to control you, and if you want to help Indigo and Crimson fight them, how far are you willing to go? Would you let a bus of schoolchildren go over a cliff if it meant stopping them from completing a Kronos Titan? Because they'd sure be willing to put the schoolchildren there to get you out of the way. Would you let a gunslinger walk free if he threatened to kill a hostage? That's what I think it should be -- Malta forcing you into situations where you have to make the call, and then dealing with the fallout from that, plus having to work around whatever shady tactics are in the game due to the Color Coded Spy Agency.

A lot of the villain arcs need work -- so many of them are constructed with the concept of your character as the thug or the hired muscle. That's great, except what we're seeing now is that's really the province of the Rogue, not the Villain. The cloning factory was a great start. Even though I didn't have many choices to make in that arc, the fact that I was assembling my own factory was a pleasant change. I've always wanted more of that... let me rally my Legion of Discourtesy and ransom the moon! (I initially got into a long discussion here on the problems with the alignment system/tip missions now, but excised it for focus.)

Since CoV launched, I've maintained that my absolute least-favorite remains Hardcase. He's an example of the worst railroading tendencies of the game. I realize that not every mission can offer me KOTOR choices, but... I still feel like I went to CoV promised a more "active" (as opposed to heroic "reactive") role, and I really just got "go flunky for me." I think I could actually ENJOY Hardcase if I were subverting his work in the Praetorian mode. While he's trying to quell the demon's, I'm secretly working to get them even more riled up, and his efforts get increasingly desperate as nothing works, culminating in me... I don't know, forcing him into a binding circle and getting him dragged down to You-Know-Where to meet all his old foes. That would be a VERY welcome change. I imagine some people would feel the same way about subverting Phipps. Or Kelly Uqua (because, really, who is falling for that act?).

Ghost Widow has already come up, too, and that was one of the most disappointing arcs for me -- I was enjoying everything about it and then comes authorial fiat and now I have no choice but to enforce the status quo. I remember discussing the frustration of this arc with Samuel_Tow back in Issue 7, and my disagreements with it remain. I think most of the patrons suffer from the inherent problem of CoV's setting -- it can never decide if you're just gunning to sit next to Recluse at the grown-up's table or if you yourself are trying to RULE THE WORLD.

And then the VEAT arcs. The first VEAT I made, I did a mission for Alan Desslock and enjoyed it. One mission and then... come back at level 5? I waited six issues FOR THIS? And that summed up the entirety the VEAT storyline. I really wanted to like it but (and I do not say this lightly) every moment of that story felt phoned in and perfunctory.

I would also like to see "hunt" missions replaced with the new Praetorian badge mechanic. If you're dead sent on it, have us hunt 20 "points" worth of Lost, where minions count as 1 and bosses as 3. Personally, I'd rather do away with hunts entirely, or at least give us the opportunity to handle them in a scanner/paper mission.