Dr_MechanoEU

Hmm seems that it is roughly every three hours now.

Major Zombie Invasions at 9:30pm, 12:30pm and now 3:30am on Union.

Guessing whatever had been borked has been fixed.

I can now see why the invasions are every three hours compared to the Rikti invasions two hours, it's taking nearly an hour for all the zones to be attacked, they seem to come in clumps instead of all at once.

from Lighthouse:
[ QUOTE ]
For anyone who may have not been seeing Zombie Apocalypse events as frequently as they would have liked, we uncovered and corrected an issue with the event today, Monday, that was causing the event to not spawn at correct intervals on several servers.

If you have further concerns about the event, please be sure to use the in-game /petition command or post your thoughts here in the discussion thread.

[/ QUOTE ]

So that probably means we'll get the tweak on a Tuesday unless it's the one that was already applied to Defiant.

Edward sighed, "look I'm not here for a hero fight right now...I'm here to show some upstart villain that he can't just muscle in on my territory and get away with it...so you'd rather let innocent people die, as that maniac will kill them and you know, to get me into jail or would you rather save innocent lives and have me get away..."

Edward looked to Pious, shaking his head, "can't we settle this AFTER we deal with this nutjob anyway?"

going to ask a favor of people since I wont be up all of tonight.

Could anyone who is up throughout the night post the time of any Zombie Invasions that do turn up, so we can see if there's a timed pattern or it is a lot more random and thus appearing to be triggered.

Edit: Bah GR has already confirmed they are timed and also less frequent than Rikti invasions (apparently there is also a hidden trigger, knowing what that trigger is would be nice).

GR could you please confirm what the length of the timer is just so people know, the Rikti invasions it's (if I remembere correctly) every 2 hours during Invasion week so what exactly are the timers for the Zombie invasion and have you thought about tweaking them? As of right now I personally feel that the timer is way too long if it's over 4 hours.

The robots raised their weapons at Pious before Edward raised his hand to stop them firing.

"Father Michael...well...this certainly is awkward...erm...how are you, long time no see and all that..."

Edward shrugged his shoulders and sighed, "look we're probably both after the same thing and I'm still doing the Lords work so lets just call a truce for now and sort out this nutjob and then we can settle our differences...agreed?"

Edward smiled, "anyway...can't stop and chat too long, Kids, roll out..."

Edward begun following the corridors, his mechanical minions of mayhem following after him.

hmm...

The problem is I'm trying to establish if something triggers them or it's random because during the quiet hours of the morning and from 20:00 to roughly 07:00 (as I said, not being able to sleep is a pain) without any sign of an invasion on Union, though I have logged off at points I have come back on able to ask people that have been around for my time I've been logged off to see if there was any sign of an invasion, each time it was a no.

It seems that from late evening (20:00) until probably around 10:00am-ish the Invasions simply don't spawn, yeah I know most sensible people are in bed but one at 10pm or 11pm wouldn't hurt.

Or for the fact that they spawned at 4am when initially turned on and some of us were waiting around until 9am and still saw nothing, that's a five hour gap.

Ed touched down on the ground, switching off his rocket boots as the bots clanked down behind him. He flexed his new cybernetic arm, far less cumbersome than his original and glowered at the building.

"If there's something I hate...it's a copy cat...steal my Modus Operandi will he?! I cannot stand for this, yes it may be a different approach a more injection of fear rather than the sowing of chaos but still Kings Row is MY patch and it's from there my plans of chaos all stem. What good is having a secret lair within the city if this nutjob brings all the heroes down on the area like a ton of bricks looking for a warehouse and mistake his for my own little haven?!"

Edward cracked his knuckles, "kids...fire in the hole..."

The robots opened fire at the side of the warehouse, Edward was making his own entrance into this place, rockets, plasma blasts and one focused bolt of energy blew a large hole into the side of the warehouse, the hunks of concrete and steel showering anything unfortunate enough to be caught in the blast area.

Edward turned to his assembled team of bots, "alright...no doubt there's going to be some kind of booby traps, hired goons and death machines, I mean it's what I would do if I was a more classically inclinded villain, use hostages and lure the heroes into their slow, inevitable defeat...so, weapons primed, shoot anything that moves..."

"So what do we do about this guy?"

"We tell him to take his business out of Kings Row, I don't care where he takes it, he could take it to the Nazi's on the Moon for all I care but not in MY neighbourhood, especially this close to MY Paragonian lair..."

Edward raised his shields and stepped through the breach, his robotic 'children' following close behind him.

A) Not being able to sleep when you really want to is nasty...

b) I was deeply peeved that the Zombie Apocalypse timers seemed to be waaay off..a full zone invasion seemingly every 5-6 hours just took the mickey (and his brother Jeff) and I originally assumed this was intented...

However...

Apparently this isn't meant to happen, the timers appear to be borked with regards to when the Zombie apocalpyse is suppose to spawn according to several posters on the US side.

They ARE suppose to work like the Rikti invasions, three random zones each side, every 2 hours or so, not a mass invasion all at once but with a huge waiting period inbetween.

Hopefully something gets sorted out because waiting four to five hours and not seeing anything really is stupid.

Though no doubt that it'll actually be sorted come Monday morning when the poor SOB that had to come in on their weekend off at 4am on a Sunday to flick the switch on sees what's happening and changes it.

Short Answer: Was planned for ingame Ads, got dropped.

Long Answer: This was originally going to be part of the Optional ingame ads...infact it was a big thing that convinced people that ingame ads wouldn't be such a bad thing.

However it got dropped quietly and without much notice just before the Ads went live...

Something about not enough manpower to sort it out (especially now thanks to the cutbacks), so I doubt we'll be seeing this any time soon, the devs just kind of gave up on the idea, to me it was quite a big pull.

Same...been online since about 5am and no sign of a Zombie invasion...

actually we do have some new information on the merit system due to someone accidently posting their suggestion in the wrong forum, the training room one and not the Beta test one.

Basically it's saying that you can only earn merits from the same task force once every 24 hours and the guy suggesting badges should grant merits as well.

check out the topic in the US training room before it gets nuked.

seeing a Deathsurge and thinking, "Wow...only purple and no level...I've taken out a purple con lt can't be THAT much harder can it?" and then proceeded to get smacked down faster than I could blink.

"hmm...maybe they're tougher than normal mobs..."

nope they affect Arena, Base raids and Zonal all at the same time I believe, I think they've introduced a PvP 'flag' as it were which switches on whenever you go into an Arena/enemy base/zone since Castle a while ago made mention that 'yes the mobs in PvP zones would be harder because of the changes' or something to that effect.

movement speed is supressed by healing for 4 seconds when receiving a friendly heal and if you spam the heals it will give them the heal resistance debuff meaning the healer-damage team slows to a crawl and the healers heals are next to useless.

so yeah...you can grief you own side in Sirens/BB/RV now...that's just opening a whole new can of worms...

to be honest I'm, as already noted, a very casual PvPer and even I'm mildly stunned by the 'being attack' movement supressing, yes it's great for melee but then surely though mez resistance things solves that along with the -75% range debuff in taunt.

Don't all melee ATs have an APP/PPP mez option?

Scrappers have the Dark Mastery Path which, as mentioned, provides a hold an an immobilize, or Weapons Mastery for Caltrops to stop them getting away and (until the change) webnade. Almost all the tanker APPs (except Energy Mastery) give a hold and an immobilize.

All Brute PPPs contain an immobilize.

Despite it does get annoying when someone bunny hops away from me as does happen I actually liked the thrill of the chase.

Yes they're not great especially since they wont hold an enemy for very long (especially now since it seems that scrappers/brutes/tankers default to 2 seconds).

I actually enjoyed my fights with Globey, sure I didn't win but it was the fact that I got a 'good fight' from someone made me feel proud I'd atleast tried. That and the fact his Fortunata, while keeping me held, still couldn't defeat me with Instant healing running (just made me chuckle).

Here's an interesting question for all you hardcore PvPers.

Does Dark Mastery for scrappers, with the mez changes, become substantially better?

A Hold and an Immobilize in one set seems like with these changes would benefit a scrapper muchly.

So would the best APP for a DM/Regen scrapper be to go DM/Regen/Dark instead of Body/Weapons for FA (which something tells me will be getting a substantial nerf)?

I've tried dark Mastery in PvP before and the immobilize was useful since I could stack it with Midnight Grasp to pin a target down for a short length of time but Petrifying gaze was damned useless and it didn't seem to hold anyone.

I will admit Ed is fairly uber.

He's a DM/Regen, they're notoriously tough and about to come tougher mechanicswise with the new Issue 13 changes but that's PvP and in PvP Ashley and Walter both took him down (damn you vomiting hold!). He fought a Purple IO'd up Lea tanker to a stand-still (neither could hurt one another), beat a BS/regen scrapper and managed to beat Walter once by getting the jump on him and a few lucky resists. That, however, is PvP, none of that was IC infact Ed has only had three IC fights in his entire career and two were against Battle Unit Omega and once agains a Kat/SR scrapper (who sadly I have forgotten the name of).

Edward actually would rather not go toe-to-toe with Cass, IC wise he knows Cass outmatches him pound for pound on the strength case, Ed can take the pummelling though.

He is, however, vulnerable.

Psychic powers can get in and screw with his head, they did deep enough and find his true name...he's toast. Soaring Horizon has Ed worried because she has experience fighting Demons, which means she would know various binding spells, containment spells and probably could research his true name given enough time.

All the damage Ed recieved in the 'thrive by chaos' thread was physically based, swords, grenades and fists, however is Soaring Horizon had been given enough time to let off a spell Ed would have been buggered.

Only two people know Eds true name, both of which have no interest in him any more.

Oddly Ed is a character of duality despite being the same person he is two different powersets and ATs.

When he's using his robots as a Mastermind Ed is quite easy to slap around if caught with his pants down. The reason for this was that I knew if I combined the two, a DM/Regen scrapper with the offensive power of Bots and the defensive power of Forcefields, he would be so overpowered he would be godly.

Mastermind Ed = Original Ed or Doctor Mechano, he's a frail old man who has a very weak bladder and if he has no bots or forcefields to protect him, he's going to be toast. However he does have mass firepower on his side and high levels of protection if he's well prepared.

DM/Regen Ed = Main fighting Ed, If Ed is going to get into a fight with another superpowered being, this is the form he'll take simply because Mastermind Ed would get pummelled to hell and back.

I've always thought of it as changes of focus, when using the bots, Ed doesn't see the need for his non-dark powers (he still has the dark powers from the Ghost Widow PP) and his forcefields will provide ample protection so he gets cocky, lets his gaurd down because the bots are doing most of the work and in day to day life most EB's (even some Archvillains) can be breezed through like a wet towel thanks to his gadgetry, he grows complacent and that's why if you break those defenses he's completely unprepared for it.

Scrapper Ed, meanwhile, means he knows he's going to get into trouble, he's focusing all of the nether energy he can muster and knows that he's got to use his fists and his regeneration because he doesn't have the mass firepower around to back him up.

Ed however, is a mad scientist, he gets his money through Necrotech Industries selling the Walkie-Talkie toaster and now offering the 'create a dream partner' service for the few that ask for it.

Of course the fact that most of his dream partner clients aren't actually after love dolls but getting him to create super-powered beings they can control means he gets paid top money to stop asking questions like, "so...you must like to play rough if you want them THIS tough...seriously, you know softer skin really would be better for this kind of investment..." and so on.

By now the walkie-talkie toaster industry has probably begun to fail due to his return to villainy and his products have probably been removed from all US store shelves, doesn't stop them being popular elsewhere though.

One of Ed's old claims is that he went 'toe to toe' with Statesman.

Mind you that claim is followed up by, "I saw a fist coming towards me, I blacked out and woke up in the Recluse's victory Arachnos mediports..." This coming from an incident where I was flying around RV at night without pets and accidently aggroed the RV Statesman who proceeded to one shot me but for a split second, I was toe to toe with him.

The question is, how do we guage power because certain sets and ATs are far more powerful at taking on the big hitter targets than others.

Rad/Sonic is known for being an AV killer (though having craptastic AoE capabilities). Does that make any Rad/Sonic simply more powerful than any other hero?

Edward and another Mastermind with the help of some heavies managed to duo all but the Statesman in RV and almost solo'd BaB in RV (was very close, he managed to destroy my heavy before it could get the final hit on him) does that make Edward a match for most of the Freedom Phalanx when going one on one...probably not.

Edward did use to boast about the number of heroes he had defeated but they were all EB level so does that count or do we say they were holding back some of their power since it was only one lone criminal and they were feeling particularly cocky that day?

On the subject with player canon I always find saying 'defeated' in the traditional comicbook sense (they will be back to fight another day) is fine, after all most comic book villains will flee and lick their wounds only to pop back up later, the same with heroes (though there's involves some kind of deep heartfelt thought or chat with one of their friends, a training montage and them going back out to defeat the villain).

As pointed out earlier to say you 'killed' someone is a big no-no, the only time you can have claimed to killed anyone is generic enemies since they're all alike.

I do agree with the fact that Paragon has so many heroes that any kind of Marvel style threat (skrull invasion = Rikti Invasion, Galactacus would last ten minutes until people got enough rad/* defenders and controllers to drop his resistance to nothing and get him pounded) would be beaten down quickly.

Overall we ARE more powerful (at higher levels) than Spidermans of the Marvel world because the most they have to deal with on a normal (non-super powered villain around) day is thugs and bank robbers.

Paragon City heroes however have to deal with:

a) Ongoing second alien invasion.
b) A group of women who can drain souls.
c) A black ops group with GIANT FREAKING ROBOTS WITH LASERS!
d) Italian superpowered Faschists.
e) Highly powerful wizards and their demon friends.

And that would be just after breakfast...

The arm detonated harmlessly in the clear sky with a loud explosion.

Edward had already returned to Darwins Landing as was in the process of attaching his new arm.

"there...now...what to do next...it seems my old compatriots at the Unity Vigil are causing me the most trouble...they shall be my next target."

((dun dun DUUUUUUHH))

Edward saw the tangle he was in...he whistled to Steve, "well it's been fun but I'm clearly outmatched here.." he pressed several buttons on his arm bringing up his now familiar escape plan.

"See you some place in time ladies and gents..."

The Shivan took the battering with a grunt and a growl...however something kicked in, it's cybernetics whirred and flashed, the Shivan disappearing without a trace.

"I wont be risking my finest business partner to the likes of you people...now...since I wont be needing this arm anymore.." he pressed a few buttons and disconnected it...the arm fizzling and crackling as a countdown came up on a small LED display.

Edward stepped through the portal which closed behind him.

10...

9...

8...

7...

The arms countdown continued as the crackling of electricity and venting of pressure within it grew more intense...

Edward smiles, "oh we'll dance Cass, I've always wanted to see how tough you were..."

He turned to look at Horizon, "as for the rest of you...," he let out a sharp whistle and a manhole cover was pushed aside nearby, barely able to squeeze itself out of the sewers came a large, green, glowing Shivan.

"Steve, play time..."

A massive ball of radiation built up in Steve's claws as he held them above his head, hurling it down towards SH. Ed looked at Cass and dived forward, "let's see what you're afraid of..." he reached out to touch Cassandra's mind and bring her worst fears to the front of it.

Edward barely managed to avoid the flying pool table, "damn...I like a good game of pool but that's ridiculous..."

Edward looked down as he heard the clinking of the grenade on the floor and sighed, "oh for the love of....," the grenade went of before he could finish, hurling him backwards away from Horizon. He landed roughly on his back, coughing and spluttering as he slowly got to his feet, sharpnel dug into various parts of his skin, though looking only mildly phased by it.

"so..six on one..hardly heroic..."

She smiled, "Jess, name Jess...sometime protest only choice..." she gently patted The Chief on the shoulder, "you, good person, like you..."

Jess smiled and turned away...walking off slowly in the same direction as the truck had gone.

((being the walking away music))
((and topic done))

The ice finally shattered and Ed grinned, flexing his wings to flick the remaining Ice off them, "a valiant effort and I commend you humbly on it, no insult meant I assure you..." he gave a Japanese style bow, strangely quite low, a sign of respect.

"Still I do believe it is my turn..."

He reached out to see if the android Seven feared anything so that he could bring it to the surface, he had his doubts, such constructs are rational beings and he knew that fear was something they all seemed to lack.

((oh boy...Cass is there...that's going to make this interesting...))

Edward chuckled, "clever but still awful...don't be taking tips from her on witty one liners please my dear..."

The arrow struck home, Ed was not one for dodging things, he hand neither the reflexes or the intent to do such things. Edward was briefly incased in a block of ice.