CoyoteShaman

PK,

Now THAT'S an answer.

I have always hated the star with a passion, but you're likely right. I'm probably going to have to get over that and just start pushing it. I'll have to make my toon concept one that is more forceful so s/he'll (I haven't decided the gender yet) motivate me to take charge.

Beautiful. I'm glad I asked that question. Maybe I'll switch p/s choices too... Now you've got me motivated.

Thanks!

Robin

The other post is beautiful, PK. Very nice.

But as far as answering the question, the answer you seem to be giving is either "Because you're an emotional masochist" or "don't play either, play a blaster instead."

Did something change since Issue (whenever Croatoa came out)? Defenders were sought after! You could easily guarantee yourself to begged to join a team by playing a defender. You couldn't stand still for two minutes without fighting off a throng of people asking you to join their team. Sure, there was the occasional "RU H33lR?" crap, but even aside from that you couldn't be on a team that didn't say "we need a defender!"

What changed? Attitudes? ED? Containment? As soon as I get the chance (I'm at work now and tonight is date night with the wife) I'm rolling a Kin/Elec. I'm naming him "Sapper's Nightmare" (nobody steal that on Pinnacle if it's not already taken). And I'm going to try to find a team to whom I can be a Hero.

But I still don't know why, from a practical standpoint, I'm going to do that instead of rolling an Earth/Kin (I already have a Fire/Kin at 50 and an Ill/rad at 43 or so).

Blue-side, there is not another archetype which exists purely as the combination of two other ATs. Red-side Brutes and Stalkers have similar primary/secondary purposes but they've been nuanced so greatly by the inherent powers and the stalker oddities that they fill completely different roles (and some would say even then that stalkers are unnecessary).

Honestly, if they'd just give Defenders an inherent that keyed off from number of teammates (The more wards I have, the more Vigilant I must be!) even that would be something to really set them apart.

While I do appreciate you having responded, that's a reason to take a particular build and since it's based on the premise of a secondary which is a blaster power, it really doesn't go towards suggesting one should want to play a defender rather than a controller. Especially since it talks only about one particular debuff.

Here's something my old def used to say: "Let the others be heroes to the citizens of this city. I will be a hero to heroes!"

I want to believe that being a hero to heroes means being a defender and not a controller. I'm hoping someone give me a reason to believe that.

Robin

Let me say right off that one of my first 'toons was an Emp/Elec def and it was great while it lasted. 'Round about level 35 I stopped teaming with my regulars and at about 39 they introduced Croatoa. The Tuatha de Dannon completely destroyed his concept so in frustration I deleted him.

I've played a few defs since then, but nothing I focused on for any amount of time for various reasons. My personality, however, runs far more towards support than direct action so my favorite ATs are 'Trollers and MMs. That wasn't the case back then. I don't want it to be the case any more.

I want my love for defenders back.

I'm hoping folks here can supply me with some answers to a basic question. Why would someone play a Defender instead of a Controller? You all know the argument people have for the other way around.

Thanks in advance.

Robin

I have to say I like the original version of this the best. It follows over to Villains and Rogue perfectly without modification and has the simplest, most direct implementation. Kudos to the OP.

I seriously dig Sam's additional idea, though, as well. That's a completely different thing that deserves it's own Kudos.

Here's to you both!

/signed x2

Robin

I have to say I like the original version of this the best. It follows over to Villains and Rogue perfectly without modification and has the simplest, most direct implementation. Kudos to the OP.

I seriously dig Sam's additional idea, though, as well. That's a completely different thing that deserves it's own Kudos.

Here's to you both!

/signed x2

Robin

See? We knew there was a reason we had the Forum Cartel around! These guys actually have some useful information.

I gotta make note of those times...

I've been annoyed by this since the new boards came up, but I just noticed something...

There already is a pin icon on all of the sticky threads. It's just on the right instead of the left. I don't think that's better, especially since it's small and, for the hero boards at least, almost matches the background color.

I certainly think the thread icon for sticky threads should be replaced with a pin and the word "Sticky" should be removed. PHP is pretty customizable.

Robin

Say I've looked over the threads on the first page and moved on to the threads on the second page (yes, sometimes good threads still go down the line). I'm going to skip over the part where the stickies are repeated on every page for now.

Now say I go in to read one of the threads on the third page. I finish reading what I want, and go to the top of the page to click back to "Suggestions and Ideas" (or whatever forum I'm reading). Instead of returning to the third page of threads, I'm back again on the first page. I know it's not hard to re-click on the little "3", but why? I know for a fact that vBulletin is PHP based and the code to remember what page you're on is not difficult (I haven't dealt with a ton of PHP based packages, but after two or three CMSs, a couple Forums and a couple Blogs, you pick up a few things). It would wind up being a couple lines of code in each of a couple files. That is assuming it isn't already a setting in admin. Can we please have someone check into that?

Thanks for your time.

Robin

Slikill's idea about the employer/contractor being the climax is dead-on.

Another reason to NEVER let an ambush include an AV (this also applies to EBs) is aggro-splash. Just because I happen to hit my trigger-number at the end of a lvl 45 mish doesn't mean I'm not in Steel Canyon at the time. A lot of bystanders could be easily ganked from the AV/EB AOE if not from just getting in his way.

Majorly awesome idea. Especially with the icon change part. That's both helpful and intuitive. This is pretty much a "Do'h!" kind of idea 'cuz until it's mentioned you never think of it but once it is you can't imagine why it wasn't like that to begin with. It's the simple ideas that help the most. Definitely has my support.

/Signed

Robin

As to Apple approving this for the iPhone, as was mentioned it wouldn't be necessary if were just an alternate presentation of the web site.

There are, however, already several iPhone apps that are site and/or company specific. It would be pretty easy to get an app for the forum approved. Getting it built, on the other hand, might be a major undertaking. So far most social networking apps aren't BBS/forum styles, at least not that I've seen. It really wouldn't have to be a full forum access, though. Who knows.

Robin

I'm not (I'd likely get fired for making that kind of a mistake since it's what I do for a living). There is a significant discrepancy, however, between what is being transfered and what could be transfered. Their focus on efficiency is primarily related to active, as opposed to passive, data. By that I mean things that go on during combat and communication. Building changes, character descriptions, event triggers and such that gets sent once and then is just indicated by a place-holder until a change is required are seldom optimized to the same degree. They really don't need to be for something like this. Even the note I made is pretty irrelevant except as a way to help players store more custom critter definition on the server.

To really notice the difference look at the huge compilation differences between the piggs and the character/MA files. Data that gets pushed once in a while stays bulk for ease of access/use because conversion time is more important than throughput while data that gets passed repeatedly and during massive traffic is more important to optimize for throughput than conversion. The idea is to offload as much of the processor intensive activity to the clients. It's the same in any EDI scenario.

Regardless of the details, I think we're saying the same thing about the point. It'd be a huge undertaking to change the basic method of compression and isn't likely to happen any time soon.

Robin

Even minions are purple at +4. After +5 things get tough and you're usually not getting any XP anyway. If you're SKing from 10 up to 40, +4 is going to be damn near impossible to hit, but if you're SKing from 35 up to 40 or 45 then +5s are about right. Especially if you're running a tank or 'troller. The problem, in my opinion, is that the basic idea assumes that everyone teams based on the philosophy of equality. That's just not been my experience. Most people team based on play-style (friends) or out of sheer boredom (pugs). In either case, you're either picking people within a particular level range or you're SK-/Ex-ing folks. You're not really worrying about equality and many people wouldn't want equality anyway.

Most importantly, the I16 challenge customization should fix this right up if it's being done the way I think it will be.

Robin.

From what I've gathered one of the main reasons for determining hit at the beginning of the attack rather than the end is because that way it can be done 100% on the server. That removes the possibility (to a much greater degree) of client-side code-hacks getting a much better chance of hitting. If you reverse the sequence then it's much easier for hackers to change things in their favor. That's also why there are certain other features, such as movement, which have a "server is always right" ruleset. It makes it much harder for hacks to give people an advantage.

Robin

I don't have 20 years (quite yet) but pretty close, and I agree completely. Hardcoding is done almost always when something has to go out NOW-NOW-NOW! and is very unfortunately whenever it happens. It does make it a problem later on, but not remotely an insurmountable problem. As Lothic mentioned, I16 is proof-positive that the number of data slots is liquid. Furthermore, there actually is a pretty simple fix that would cover all future modifications and vastly increase the available space for the AE files. Mind you, I said "simple", not "easy". It wouldn't be easy at all. In fact it would be a pretty major undertaking, but it is simple.

Right now the file data for all character descriptions are in essence xml files. They're ASCII text files with custom meta data detailing the fields (category name, sub-category name, field name, value). Since each value has a limited number of options, and there are a limited number of values, that could actually be done in a binary fashion so that each item is placed in a particular location and given a specific range of values. You'd wind up with something that looked like an extremely long GUID but with less than, for instance, 5k you could define any character this game could possible create.

Again, though, the problem is not complexity. The problem is difficulty. I'd be very surprised to hear that the developers hadn't already considered a change to a binary serialization of the character descriptions, especially during their brainstorming sessions for MA, but dismissed it due to how integral the current system is to everything they do.

As to the original idea, I agree with Lothic when she (assuming based on the avatar) suggests that it's likely this will come up in the future, but I wouldn't look for it any time soon.

Robin

I normally try to find in any suggestion the part that I agree with and go from there, so that I can at least offer some form of constructive criticism, if not assistance. Either that or I just keep my trap shut. In this case, however, I'm unable to find any part of this I can even feel remotely comfortable about and find myself aggressively against this idea. I hope you'll forgive me, and please don't take this as a statement against you as a poster since I don't know you, but this particular suggestion would certainly destroy any sense of accomplishment or challenge for a large number of people who love to go against massive numbers of purples by having one person on the team set to invincible and then everyone else be another couple levels lower. It's not at all about power leveling and will, hopefully, be easier once the new challenge system comes out with I16, but it is something many of us love just for the thrill.

Robin

It might just be me, but the whole reason I don't start my toons in GC is because every damn origin there has Vahz missions. You can't start a toon there and do the normal contact set without getting puked on and that's seriously not my thing. If they wanted GC to get more active, all they'd have to do is make some of the contacts not have any Vahz missions. That's also why I don't play the starter contacts with any Science toons. Yick.

Can you tell I hate Vahz? I think I might have hinted at that...

I've been running W7 for quite a while now, using the RC build 7124, and I have to say it's refreshing to see MS get something right for once. Everything I've been doing has been running great. Oddly, CoH has been even faster (fps +10ish over previous OSs). Not sure how that works. Coming from Vista over to W7 is like waking up from a nightmare. I'm buying the Ultimate asap.

Technet, eh... Hmmm....

Normally new issue downloads will come after one logs off. I was on last night and nothing came when I logged off so either this isn't for I15 or they've changed their processes. I'm about 50/50 on my expectiations between those two right now. In any case, every server is down and there was nothing scheduled for this morning outside normal maintenance so there's definitely something unusual going on.

It's the Merc, and the drivers are the newest they have, as is the control app.

I actually found a work-around, though. By switching back to the board default and changing some of my keybinds, I was able to route around the numpad. It's not quite as smooth, but it'll do until W7 is out in retail and SteelSeries gets real drivers done.

I was loathe to give up W7. It's the first Windows OS I've really liked since 3.11. XP was nice once they got a couple SPs out for it, but this is truely sharp.

[ QUOTE ]
P.S. Don't go back to Vista

[/ QUOTE ]

I sure hope I don't have to. Oddly enough, under W7 CoX is playing much smoother and my FPS in Villains is now what it was in Heroes (noticeably faster). They certainly got it right in W7.

And no, I don't think it's a W7 problem per se. I think there's just something really goofy between W7 and the ZBoard.

The ZBoard has kind of a goofy numpad that doubles for the Home/End/Delete/etc. keys when Numlock is off. I expect that has something to do with it. I certainly wouldn't mind giving that up, since having no delete key while my numlock is on is very annoying. The 34 button, integrated game pad, however, is something I do not want to give up. I've gotten so used to being able to do two hands worth of controls with one hand and not having to even move the hand to hit all the keys... I've looked online, though, and it seems that only the Zboard has this good a gamepad. Oh well, I might just have to adapt. Or wait for W7 to come out in retail and hope SteelSeries puts out some W7 drivers that work.

I just upgraded Vista (yick) to Windows 7 RC1 (Yee-haw!! SO nice) but now I'm having some serious MasterMind problems. It seems that Windows 7 is taking my Z-Board's numpad keystrokes and turning them into regular qwerty number keystrokes. In other words, I have the 1 key bound to the first tray slot like normal, and the NUMPAD1 key bound to tell my pets to stand down. Under Windows 7 when I hit the NUMPAD1 key, however, the power in tray slot 1 goes off.

I've used this board for a couple years now under both XP and Vista and this has never happened before. I have all the latest drivers (the game board drivers are the same for XP and Vista). The company used to be Ideazon and now it's SteelSeries which no longer has a forum so I couldn't ask there. I did post to the Windows 7 boards but gotten no reply yet.

Here're my questions: Has anyone seen this problem? If so, could you help a fellow MM out and pass any fixes/thoughts/advice on? Also, for any of you who might be using Windows 7 with a good game board (one that has both a numpad and a game pad) that works, which one are you using? I like W7 so much I'd rather buy a new board than switch back to Vista (yick again).

Thanks.

Robin

Bill, when do you ever find time to actually play? Every time I've been on the boards for some time now, you're always the first person helping anyone out.

The MM boards. Why the heck didn't I think of that? Great idea. Thanks hugely.

Yeah, I posted to the Windows 7 forums as well. Oddly, the company that made Z-boards when I bought mine has been bought out or changed its name or something and now has no boards (It's like SteelSomethingorother now).

You could very well be right about the thread title, but as of yet I've only heard from two people saying theirs is fine, so I'm not sure it is only Z-board. If more people chime in saying it's not happening with their [whatever] keyboards, I'll do that. Good idea.

Robin