Dysmal

I have no comment on the article really, but what did I see when I opened the article?

An add for a WoW trial.

Unfortunate!

Edit. WoW trial adds on both pages!

Well played!

Both are great additions. The costume set menu will be great for people when they get their Samurai veteran rewards, for example.

The seeing numbers on powers you're going to pick is a great idea. However, please add this to the Villain Patron Pool Info Plaques so people can see the info before choosing a patron.

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Heroes
Illusion Control

Empathy

Archery

Broadsword

Katana

Ice Melee

Ice Armor

Devices
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Villains

Energy Aura

Ninjutsu

Ninja Blade

Electric Armor

Electric Melee

Traps

Poison



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Fixed

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Thanks for catching those, Big Soto

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A pretty good post, but really, Ninja Blade and Katana are the same set, NB is just Katana adapted to the Stalker template. Neither count as "exclusive" powersets IMO.

Awesome. And I didn't even have to click on a game-zone web page to get the info thanks to our European friends. After the bait and switch tactic yesterday, I really didn't want to generate any ad-views for them, so its a win all around I guess.

Seriously guys, this is the internet in 2008 selling exclusives to websites in different countries without making sure they both get it out at the same time is silly.

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If Dr. Brainstorm appeared in the game, I wonder what his Strike Force would be like...

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Permadeath for all characters who attempt it and fail. And, of course, the good Doctor would turn out to be a robot duplicate anyway.

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Actually, I expect him to turn out to be Bunsen Honeydew in disguise. Most of Dr. Brainstorm's research seems to come straight out of Muppet Labs.

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Does this make Castle Beaker?

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New powersets being added should not be part of the in-game canon. What if my plant controller existed before I12? Powersets being added is OOC, not IC. Don't blur the lines.

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Perhaps a more rational approach to a roleplaying game coming up with an easily ignorable story would be to... ignore it? Really, nothing is stopping you from making a plant controller that has been around since before I12. You don't need to follow the CoX story to the letter to play this game.

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Yeah, I really wouldnt be at all concerned about any of the fluff in the article ever showing up in the game. And if its not in the game, or say, one of the novels, its hardly canon.

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Please use this thread to discuss the below announcement.

An exclusive broadcast recounts a massive explosion and the details behind it from none other than Dr. Brainstorm! Read the fiction behind one of the most anticipated features of Issue 12: Midnight Hour, the next free expansion to City of Heroes and City of Villains!

Click here to read the full article.

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I thought we were supposed to be getting actual information today.

Play around with your flavour stuff if you must, but if you say you're going to provide information on a date, provide the information. Today's article tells us nothing about I12. Separating the information from the flavour text as was done today is both annoying, and cheaply manipulative of your playerbase in my opinion.

Saying that you will provide more information about I12 today, and failing to actually provide any information about concrete in-game facts today simply degrades the value of NCSoft's word, and erodes player faith and goodwill for no good reason.

This could have been handled so much better by announcing that the real information would come tomorrow, and presenting today's bit of flavour text as a bonus article. That way it would have seemed like a cool extra, instead of a cheap bait and switch tactic.

As it was handled today, you may as well have posted "Your Princess is in Another Castle" and left it at that.

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Just a head's up for everyone, we're going to be buckling down to get Issue 12 done...so you may see a lull in redname activity on the forums for a bit. Might not get as many immediate responses to PMs...mailboxes will probably fill up...posts demanding immediate answers will undoubtedly go unanswered

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Meanwhile, the world's seals, left alone by the busy devs, are able to multiply in record numbers. The massive seal population becomes emboldened, and starts encroaching on cities across the globe with newfound confidence. Soon seals take over the planet and become the dominant life-form, eclipsing mankind. Humanity becomes extinct, and a rain of seals is visited upon the earth the likes of which has not been seen since the early 1800s.

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Don't worry too much. The yearly seal hunt just started in Newfoundland.

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I just want to say how glad we are to have Blue Steel on the forums.

Whoo Hoo!!

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Oh snap, another catgirl.

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I like power customization, I like the idea that you have stated the problem and also a thesis saying it can be done but with alot of work.

You stated before that Power Customization was up there with one of the top requests.

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Not quite. As I posted above, he's mentioned that there are least half a dozen other features requested more often. So, yeah, its in the top-10 probably, but its around number seven on the list of most requested things.

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OK so I get why PC is hard to do, but I don't quite understand whether you are going to try it or not. I read the F.A.Q. but it seems like you said no it's not gonna happen, then you said we are trying to figure out how to do it then you said no again. Please clarify: is it ever going to happen or no?

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Here's what BaB said in an earlier thread in the Suggestions forum:

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Actually, the time required to implement it stays exactly the same. There's will eventually be more people available to actually do that work but that still doesn't mean it's the best investment of resources. Where as it was completely impossible before, and may be possible now, it's still not a given that it's the best thing for the game.

I'd also have to refute the claims that this is the most often requested feature. It's not. It's high up there, but there are still a half dozen things that are suggested quite a bit more and would actually have more of an impact on the game.

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Its an easy interpretation from all the explanations the developers have given time after time that while they would like to do power customization, its both an enormous amount of work, and not the top request of the playerbase.

They aren't likely to say "no we'll never ever do it", but its pretty clear this is a "maybe sometime in the distant future when we have more resources to work with".

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... to places you've been wanting to go, but thought not possible.

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Moon Zone please.

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Underwater Zone please.

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Underwater Moon Zone please.

Er, Zombie, he's talking about the Synapse TF, not Positron.

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However, our highest priority is to ensure that the quality of all new content being brought to the game meets and exceeds your expectations.

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Was just there for filler then

I think you're just going to have to wait and see before you doomy doomy doom. Or we can just presume the devs are lazy

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That's my point though... As basically the Top-Level of Operations-Management, it should be this guy's job to make sure that the direction they're going in is actually what the Customers want and is an efficient use of those resources. And here they have the most direct way of accessing that information but also a real history of failing to coordinate it efficiently. It sets off a red flag or two when they talk about it being their first Priority but give no details on how they'll actually do it or what they will do differently to ensure we don't have 4 more years of the same old failures.

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Well, it is pre-election season for the States. Vague promises with no real plans are the hot thing at the moment right?

I appreciate the communication from the higher levels of the NCNC Org chart, but this doesn't actually tell us well, anything. I think this might have been a good place to tell us a little something about I12, even if it was "we plan to have I12 in closed beta testing in <insert timeframe>"

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The volume of free content over the past year has been staggering

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Stop drinking the kool aid.

There has NEVER been free content added to CoX. We are paying $15 a month for constantly updated content.

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That's a matter of debate. The User Agreement doesn't say anywhere in there that NCSoft is required to give us any additional content; it states that our $15 is for access to the game as is. Therefore, anything they do give us is above and beyond their contractual obligation; they don't have to do it. Which means that, in a sense, it's free.

Now, as a practical matter, no company that stuck to that kind of philosophy would stay in business for long. People expect more value for their money. Therefore, as a practical matter, the updates are something that NCSoft has to provide.

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While perhaps not legally binding, the Knowledge Base article explaining monthly fees specifically includes regular updates the game as part of what you're paying for. It doesn't say anything about the scope or content of those updates, but it is there.

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How dare you scum of the earth charge for extra content.

I wnt free itamz!

Frequent content updates, game access, 8 slots per server and such just aren't enough for my hard earned $15/month.

I wouldn't even use the emotes/pieces if I had them, but I demand that my outrage over the $9.99 optional price be heard!

PS: I also demand that I am named Lethborge.

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The bold part makes me laugh.. 8?

What is that??? People nowadays have 12 slots per server.... LOL @ 8!

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I suppose if you had a CoH or CoV account that was inactive when the free grant of the other game was made, you would still only have 8 slots. Or if you bought a non-GvE edition version of either game now.

I don't have any particular interest in this Wedding Item Pack, but my feedback is this:

Considering this goes for the same price you sell the GvE Edition Item Pack for, and the relative content of both the packs, the Wedding pack seems over-priced.

However, the appearance of a new pack is encouraging in that you're pursuing more ways to let the playerbase give you money. Put some in-game item packs for the CoH and CoV Collector's edition together, and you'll have something some more folks will buy. Liquid-X will hate it, but I think he'll survive.

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Soo... is there ANY new on the new Marvel Universe Online game?! I can't wait for this to come out...!

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NCSoft has nothing to do with MUO at all.

Ask over on the Crytpic Studio Forums.

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Didn't they close their forums?

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I thought MUO was all but canceled? Might have to look for confirmation on that...

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There is no confirmation* about whats going on with MUO.

*My meaning of confirmation is "public statement from the companies involved" not "vague comments from anonymous sources which may or may not exist", just to clarify. Most gaming "news" sites tend to go with the later.

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Soo... is there ANY new on the new Marvel Universe Online game?! I can't wait for this to come out...!

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NCSoft has nothing to do with MUO at all.

Ask over on the Crytpic Studio Forums.

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Didn't they close their forums?

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We're going to introduce a lot of new services that will make it easier for people to start playing games right away and make them have easier connections to the people and friends that they play with.

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So, I wonder what this means, if anything for CoH? Is City Vault part of these "new services" Ability to access global chat from outside the game perhaps?

I sincerely hope one of these new services is a multi-game subscription model. While I'd like to give Tabula Rasa a shot, I don't see myself paying full price to subscriber to two MMOs at the same time. Give me a good discounted plan, and I'm in though.

I don't know why the interviewer assumed that the President couldn't give numbers for TR boxes sold. Seems like the interview may not be aware that NCSoft publically reports that kind of information in its reports to stockholders. Unless he was working from a "its too soon" point of view.

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Smoothing the XP Curve
One thing that we constantly examine is the rate of advancement in the game. In a future version, we intend to smooth out the leveling curve by changing how much experience is given out for defeating opponents. The intent is to smooth out the “bumps” where players typically get stuck leveling up their characters. Keep an eye on coming patch notes for specifics.

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Best thing ever.

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Real Numbers
As a general quality of life improvement we will be adding new functionality in a coming version of the game to display the “real” numbers behind your characters and their powers. This includes a user configurable display of important characteristics such as movement rate, regeneration rate, resistances and many more! Additionally, you will be able to see how those statistics are affected in real time by buffs and/or debuffs affecting your character.

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... NEW best thing ever.

OMG. Lighthouse. Devs. You are finally going to do this.

I may cry. I'm that happy.

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Seriously. The devs have tapped into a rich vein of awesome right here.

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As it should have. Giving Blasters Unstoppable is unforgivable.

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And yet some folks want to compound one error by duplicating it villanside ?

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And of course, Blasters don't have Unstopable. If they did, Force (Foce!) of Nature would give them mez protection. It doesn't.

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I'd prefer hazard zones in CoV over CoH simply becuase of Masterminds. I would actually be able to go in and clean up solo against large groups. Plus my high level characters generally like to do that anyway.

So what IS the main reason why the hazard zones are empty? Is it because they are essentially unsoloable (especially early on)? Is it because there's only a handful of missions there anyway so there's really nothing worth doing?

To say CoV zones are themselves hazard zones is just dishonest. A key aspect to hazard zones is the size of the spawns. In CoV, there may be a lot of enemies standing around on the street, but rarely in groups larger than 4. Which is no different than any other outside zone I've seen for CoH.

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There are areas in each CoV zone with larger than normal spawns IIRC.

And Hazard zones are empty because there is nothing to do in them. They have no contacts, and no interactivity. This is a in instanced mission-content focussed game and player base.

You don't want Hazard Zones. You want a Hollows-Faultline-Striga-Croatoa alternate advancement path.