Doctor Roswell

Eh. Not really my point. My point is, I feel like I'm being a bother to people by asking them to do something for me instead of doing it myself, and I hate that. Especially with strangers; I don't like the idea that their first (only?) impression of me will be my begging them for something. Even if they don't mind, and it doesn't really cost them anything, and they'll forget about it a few minutes later. I doubt anyone's ever going to /ignore me or give me a one-star rating with the note "asked for an Ouro portal, the jerk," but it still feels like begging to me: "could someone drop an Ouro portal by the Talos train station and also give me some inf and also PL MEH!!!?"

Oddly, while I feel like that when I have to ask, I never perceive it that way when someone else asks; often, I'll go out of my way to find them and drop the portal.

Is it really anyone's problem but mine? No. But I'm still not a fan; it'd be nice it were easier to get around level 14 without relying on the charity of others.

A lot of my best ones would be more amazing if not for the Virtue Name Watch thread; that's where most of my names come from. It's rare that I come up with a name on my own and find it free, and sometimes characters I really want to play get shelved for months or years because I can't find a decent name (thanks, guy who played for a month seven years ago and hasn't been back since!).

However, just by plugging random names into the search, I've recently come across Great Wall of China, Krakatua, Star-Spangled Banner, Actual Size, Archenemy, and Blast From the Past, all on Virtue. So it's not all bad. Basically, these days I start with an available name and figure out what to make of it from there, instead of coming up with a concept and then trying to find a name for it -- that's pretty much a lost cause.

I've participated in exactly one Nemesis zone invasion so far, across approximately 20 characters I've logged in over the time they've been running. Otherwise, all they've done is forced me to go inside when using the auction house via /ah instead of doing it as soon as I exit my missions.

I don't know if it's just my perception, though, but are Rikti invasions happening a little more often this week? I remember for a while they were happening constantly (even after the event that introduced them ended), and they were scaled back to almost nothing... I always thought maybe the devs over-corrected a bit and should maybe find some middle ground. More than they've been for the last few months, less than they were when they were new. But then, Rikti invasions have a point, a goal to work toward -- the accolade associated with them. Nemesis? Feh. Give me something to drive for and I'll be more interested.

I always hated having to ask someone else to open a portal for me. It feels like begging.

From a testing standpoint, making this week's item something typical of what will usually appear provides more meaningful data than something spectacular. Sure, Paragon could have given away something huge like a powerset, but what would that really tell them? That a lot of people will log on for a free powerset? Duh. What they want to know is how many people will log on for something comparatively minor like a free XP booster.

Also, free stuff! Yay!

While I'm not one to complain about free stuff (I mean, really, people?), I'm not expecting a whole lot here; I figure the free item will be about one Super Booster card's worth. A temp power, a team inspiration, a number of reward merits, maybe an enhancement.

Otherwise, what if people already have the item being given away? I mean, a free costume piece is great and all, but if I* already have that costume item, you're going to hear about it here on the forums when I complain about both "not getting anything" and having been "ripped off" by having paid for the item in the past that everyone else got for free.

*not me specifically, just some hypothetical person I made up for this example.

I'd personally rather see PvP IOs on the market than regular purples; regular purples I can get without participating in an anemic, unbalanced and forgotten part of the game that even the devs don't care about anymore.

Plus, one of the reasons a lot of people aren't PvPing in the first place is the perception that everyone else in the zone will be fully kitted out with PvP IOs and if you're not, there's no hope of winning. And if you can't win, you can't get your own PvP IOs, so you can't win, so you can't get your own PvP IOs, so you can't win, so you can't get your own PvP IOs... putting a few out there for the unwashed masses might give zone PvP a shot in the arm.

Of course, then the whole "pay to win" argument actually becomes credible*, even if only a little, so I can see why it's not happening.

*not that all store-bought IO sets don't help some in PvP, but who actually PvPs?

I love it when people wax nostalgic about some imagined golden age... a simpler time, when developers cared about their games, and did things the way they did because those methods were objectively better and certainly not because other methods simply hadn't been conceived of yet. Oh, for those halcyon days of yore, the period stretching roughly from 2002-2009... these kids playing today will never understand how wrong they are for considering what's normal now "normal" instead of what was "normal" for that very specific time period, which is obviously the real normal.

I'm not sure why people seem to think "pay to win" is so much worse than "farm to win," but whatever. Some people have more money than time, some people have more time than money. Both groups want purples.

Either way, I like this approach. Not so much because "now I can buy purples" (though that's nice too, I guess), but because it's something "new" on the market without forcing the studio to rush truly new new material like costume sets or powers or even vanity pets in order to meet that "something new on the market every Tuesday" promise. One or two "new to the game" things a month, with the intervening weeks getting "new to the market but not to the game" items, means more time, effort and money can be thrown at development of new market items, and we'll probably see higher quality in the long run.

All that said, I'm a little disappointed to not see the retro sci-fi costume set. Oh well... maybe next week.

The President has been kidnapped by ninjas. Are you a bad enough dude to save the President?

I like it. It's not a must-have by any means, though. If you've reached that point where you're standing there at the trainer staring at all the available powers and not really wanting any of them, you could do a lot worse than Afterburner. It's better speed, no "drift" like with normal Fly (it handles like Hover and turns on a dime), a place to stick another LotG global recharge IO, so it's hard to complain, though the value of the added defense from it is questionable since the "only affecting self" aspect makes it largely useless in a fight.

My bots/traps MM loves Cognitive as it is. The chaos it creates is simply glorious.

I thought of another:

Origin would matter. Not to you as the player, but to the enemies. Certain groups would be more apt to attack players of certain origins -- in other words, each origin would generate more threat than normal against some enemy groups. Hellions would be more aggressive against magic-origin characters, hoping to recover an artifact or tome from them. Primal Clockwork, constantly searching for metal, would be much more eager to take it from technology-origin characters. Warriors would seek to challenge natural-origin characters. And so on.

EDIT: And! AND!!! If they defeat you, they'd actually TAKE salvage from you. Something appropriate -- Hellions would take something arcane, for example.

So for example, a team with a magic tank and a science blaster might find fighting Crey (whose scientific curiosity would provide them a threat bonus against science characters) a little more complicated than other groups, as the blaster's origin might cause him to outstrip the tank's ability to hold aggro more often than he otherwise would.

Some of these, I'm sure, would generate more heat than others...

• AoEs would affect everyone in their area of effect, not just enemies. Allies, civilians, everyone. You throw an exploding ball of fire into a crowd, you're not only going to hit the people who don't like you. Need to escort someone out of a mission? If the stalker has to turn of Hide, the fire tank has to turn off his damage aura. And the Titan Weapons brute needs to watch where he swings that thing.
• Heroes should fight villains, and vice-versa. Thus, in my CoH, everyone could go everywhere, regardless of alignment. But if you were in a zone you shouldn't be in (a villain in a hero zone, for example), people who are "native" to that zone (heroes and vigilantes) could freely attack you like you were in a PvP zone. Only characters who were "allowed" to be in a zone could start fights; the interloper could fight back if and only if he or someone on his team were attacked, and only against the attacker or members of the attacker's team. Vigilantes and rogues would be considered "safe" in any zones (except PvP zones, obviously), but could only start fights in hero or villain zones, as appropriate.
  
  Being defeated by another player (not a critter) in a "wrong side" zone would send you to jail, not the hospital. At this point you could choose to bust out of your cell, or "do your time" by waiting 30 minutes (real-world minutes, not in-game minutes, so logging out would be an option).
  
  I'd remove certain features from zones on both sides to "encourage" (read: force) people to go into zones where they aren't welcome. Say, pull quartermasters from most redside zones so villains have to come to Paragon to do their shopping, and shut down Wentworth's in blueside zones so that heroes who want to trade have to visit the black market in the Isles.
  
  I'd also introduce a "secret identity" system that would allow characters to enter opposite-side zones unmolested -- an extra costume slot with vastly-reduced options (similar to Arachnos costumes, only all normal clothes) attached to a toggle power otherwise identical to Walk except that it wouldn't shut off "always on" powers or Brawl. And while it would prevent other players from being able to attack you, it wouldn't prevent critters from doing so. So if you toggle it off to use your powers to defend yourself from those Hellions that tried to mug you, you're now fair game to other players. Secret Identity would have a lockout preventing players from activating it while in the middle of a fight (maybe if you've attacked or been attacked by anything in the last sixty seconds, something like that) -- which means busting out of jail would leave you open to attack from other players again as you trashed the police station and fought your way through PPD.
• Experience debt would be applied when you're defeated, then applied again if you went to the hospital -- medical care is expensive! Being rezzed by any other means (including your SG base) would remain "free." However, debt would all be the same again, whether you're in an instanced mission or not.
• I'd apply the "giant monster code" to every enemy in a city or hazard zone. Maybe instanced missions, too, maybe not. Either way, under me there'd be no such thing as a "level 20-30 zone," only a "+0 - +2 zone" or a "-2 - +0 zone." Civilians walk around on the streets of Peregrine Island without dying -- why shouldn't a level 3 superhero be able to as well?
  
  Nothing would ever con grey, so theoretically, even stopping an Atlas Park purse-snatching would be "worth the time" for a level 50+3 incarnate.
• Tips would only drop outside of instanced missions, and would always be specific to the zone in which they dropped, not only in terms of where the mission door would be, but in the sense that certain tip missions would only be available in certain zones (so maybe a Council-based tip would only drop in zones where Council normally spawn).
• Speaking of drops, salvage would be enemy-specific. Want a Ritki Alloy? You'll only get it by fighting Rikti, and maybe Lost. Need a Mu Vestment? Find some Arachnos and take out the guys wearing them (so, Mu specifically, not crabs or widows or tarantulas). Looking for an Improvised Cybernetic? Those Freakshow over there are probably the guys to take one from.
  
  Combined with my "everyone can go everywhere" pseudo-PvP system, this could be especially interesting; maybe a villain is trying to get a specific kind of salvage by street-sweeping a type of enemy that only appears in a hero zone, and a hero shows up to thwart his nefarious scheme. ("I only need a few more rubies to build my death ray... what's that? Heroes, come to foil my plan!")
• Knockback would cause additional "falling" damage based on the distance the target was knocked back. Powers with knockback would not have their damage scaled back to compensate. Thus, powers that do knockback, and Knockback enhancements, would be much more attractive choices, and enemies would be flying all over the place.
• There'd be bigger differences between alignments, and not just in tip missions. Characters with different alignments would actually play the game differently. Heroes, being altruistic and more concerned with preventing a robbery or rescuing a kidnapped civilian, would see a larger reward at the end of each mission, but a smaller reward for defeating enemies within that mission. So clearing a map wouldn't be as good an idea as simply moving on to the next mission. Vigilantes, being more concerned with bringing the criminals to justice, would receive a smaller end-of-mission reward, but a larger reward for each enemy they defeat within the mission.