Egos_Shadow

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If they don't require their own rooms however, there is simply no reason you couldn't fit all of them into a base on the 8x8 plot. It may require some redecorating... But that would be about it.

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Assuming they set up another "giant wad of free prestige on test server" situation when I7 drops, this will be easy to test, at least. It'll probably be the single easiest aspect of all this to test, since it's binary. Throw together a "2x2 maze" base. Does everything fit? Y/N. If we get the prestige boost, I'll be taking a long lunch break the day I7 drops on test. A loooong lunch break...

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Because they have not given any indications otherwise, and in fact, by posting those picture, have proven the very opposite by advertizing large rooms.

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Oh, c'mon. Let's not have another round of the "in your bedroom" thing.

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Positron has said, over and over, that these additions are going to be for small SGs. It's just ludicrous to come up with something like 'so the station is cheap but OMG what if you have to buy a big room to put it in!!!! Then small SGs won't be able to afford it!!!!'

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I'm kind of surprised at this attitude.

It's entirely possible for a design to fail in implementation, and this is one of the potential failures we might see show up in play. If the empowerment stations are really only useful if you have minimal travel time (ie, a fully set up base w/ telepads), then it's entirely on topic to wonder if maybe they're not really such a big buff for small SGs after all. That's before you even get into the question of fitting everything on the basic plot.

Also, if you're trying for the "ad hominem" route, you should replace !!!! with !!!1eleventyone!!. It gets across what you're aiming for much more effectively.

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CAN WE PLEASE BE SO RECKLESS AS TO ASSUME THAT WHEN THE DEVS SAY THEY ARE DOING THIS FOR SMALL SGS, THEY KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING.

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I for one would like to live in a world where design intentions and functional implementation were one and the same. It would be a better place, I think.

However, we do not live in such a place, and pointing out potential flaws in an idea, especially flaws which can be extrapolated from how similar features were implemented in the past, is entirely valid criticism.

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We know they can make all buffs go away on entrance to a zone - it happens by bug often enough. So if they can't make just the Empowerment buff go away, they could just make entrance to a PvP zone remove all buffs. You can reapply them in the 25 second leeway or restart your toggles etc.

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If they cleared off all clicky buffs on entering a PvP zone, this would also fix the weirdness of people entering SC with Unstoppable, MoG or AB on.

As it stands, the "small SG buffs" are actually more useful for a PvP SG than they are for the people the buffs were intended to help. Die in PvP zone, rez in base, buff yourself, zone right back - even the "drop in the middle of the zone" isn't an issue, since that just gets you closer to the action! Instead of wasting half the buff running around, you essentially get full use, since you only zone once while buffed, and jump right back in the action.

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As stated, you're looking at having to franticaly run back to your mission, hoping to make it across two zones, and then all the way through a mission map to the hard part inside 15 minutes. Imagine having a mission at the very back of Crey's Folly, and trying to run back and forth between there and the Brickstown base portal. Also, it's not very fair to people who decide not to take travel powers.

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If the teleporters were fixed (access to all non-PvP zones through beacons, teleporting after rez puts you at the mission door), then it would be more reasonable to use. Hit a tough fight, die, power up and return. But then - hey, you do have a 1m+ Prestige base to afford all that, right?

For a truly small SG, Empowerment of less than 30min duration is probably astonishingly pointless when you factor in travel time. Most people will exhaust the buff just running around - and unless it's a truly astounding buff, realizing you need it, running back to get it, and running back *again* to use it wastes a lot of time.

The inherent problem of course with flat duration-limited buffs is that if it lasts too long, you'll get large SGs essentially running them for hours on end in PvP zones. Most likely the buffs will have to remain uselessly inconvenient in PvE so that they don't become godly in PvP.

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Empowerment station buffs are currently set at 15 minute durations (far longer than any other non-toggle buff in the game). They are bestowed on you as soon as you craft them, and last 15 minutes from there. The idea is to have enough time to get you past that sticky part of a mission that was giving you trouble.

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At that level of inconvenience, the buff had better make me glow like a tiny sun, max out whatever stat it's effecting, make pedestrians "/em praise" as I pass and cause the background music to start with the Super Mario Bros invincibility theme.

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Heh. I have to say, at least two of those three sound much more interesting if you read them the way GoodHumorMan does.

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"Have you ever wished you could throw together some powerful instant buffs to prep for battle in your bedroom?"

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Read again...

"Have you ever wished you could throw together some powerful instant buffs to prep for battle in your deadly lair?"

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This is why they never tell us anything.

Look, you have to be IN your base to USE the crafting tables that are located IN your base.

It doesn't necessarily mean that's where the battle is going to take place.

For the "small SG buffs" to be PvP only would go beyond bad design and enter the realm of sublime anti-logic.

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I'd say they'd be annoying to the point of being semi to mostly useless.

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Well, yes, that's the other potential concern.

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That remains to be seen. The talk I've heard about this stuff before has been along the lines of temp powers, not limited timed buffs.

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The two statements aren't necessarily exclusive. We can look at the other two sources of temporary powers for insight. Siren's Call, for example, has some nice self buffs, but they're timed from when you acquire them.

Another possibility of course would be the buff temps that you could buy in Pocket D during the latest Event (which, if you think about it, would have been an ideal time to datamine something along the lines of what the empowerment stations provide).

If the empowerment stations provide temp buffs or other effects that have a set number of charges or set "in use" duration, that's cool. If they're timed from the point at which you build them, that's a lot more annoying.

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This should be IMO setup so it requires very little other then ploping the new items into any room, that you got space in.

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If they don't require power or control, then hopefully the empowerment stations at least could be dropped in the workrooms, or ideally right in the entry room so you waste as little as possible of what will almost certainly be a restrictively timed buff.

I suspect that the storage items requiring their own room is close to certain, though.

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What was done in beta was geared towards mid to large sized SG's. These items are geared towards smaller SG's, so how things worked in beta doesn't reall mean much.

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I'm going to have to invoke "show me the money" on this one. We only have information on how things work now, and information from beta, to compare with a general statement of intent.

Requiring multiple new room types and a plot upgrade is a legitimate, if as yet potential, concern.

Given that the entire gist of this discussion is "yes, you SAY they're geared towards small SGs, but will small SGs ACTUALLY BE ABLE to afford them", it's quite reasonable to point that concern out.

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Mid sized SG's on the lower end, ones that have filled up a 8x8 plot may have trouble fitting everything new into their base, without changing things. But considering what you can fit into a 8x8 plot, there should be no need to upgrade.

You may need to change your base layout some, but there shouldn't be a need to upgrade.

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It depends a great deal on the specific implementation. If you've designed conservatively, you'll probably be okay. But "shouldn't" and "won't" are miles apart.

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These items are geared towards small SG's that will quite likely never be able to pay for the first plot upgrade period.

So the idea that they'll require special rooms, that require a plot upgrade is quite far fetched. Until something like that is even so much as hinted at (which it hasn't been yet.) there's no reason to assume such a thing.

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Actually, in beta, there was a specific class of room (iirc, with the same footprint progression as most other functionality rooms) called Storage that was removed prior to release.

Secondly, all of the existing rooms have a "x number of functional items" restriction in them. This seems unlikely to be altered.

Those two facts indicate that the likelihood that storage items at least, if not necessarily empowerment stations, will require their own rooms, and potentially force plot upgrades for small SGs.

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Nope, we are have a fully functional PvE base with two 3x4 rooms (workshop and tp). In a perfect world, they'd let me add these new toys to the HUGE room I already have.

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Oh. Well, that'll teach you to stray from the power build. The "2x2 maze" left a slot free specifically for future room options.

Since the first plot upgrade is stupidly expensive, you've kind of designed yourself into a corner.

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Because if they made it so they could just be bought, someone would have said "Why can't we make them with our useless salvage? Why must be buy them". That's why, silly...

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To be fair, people have been asking for more useful things to build with salvage.

Of course, the cost in salvage is pretty much a non-issue. It's all about the Prestige.

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But, just so you know, unless these items can go into existing rooms supported by the 8x8 plot it WILL cost 1.65M + new room + item. I'm just saying...

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If you've stuck with the "lots of 2x2 rooms, all alike" model for a small PvE base, you should have a spare place to plunk down a 2x2 room for the storage items.

Assuming that there is a 2x2 room for storage items, and that they haven't been designed on the same items per size progression as the workrooms.

Cautious optimism, man. Cautious optimism.

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I'd note how easy it would have been for Positron to strengthen his position simply by *listing* the low costs of these items to refute Lektrik's suspicions, but that wasn't done here.

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That's not exactly fair. Until it's on test, it's safe to assume these features are still probably under development. Since any explicit numbers or data that's revealed will be instantly subjected to brutal analysis, one can see why they wouldn't cough any up before they're sure.

Also, this is Cryptic, so, you know, numbers are scary and bad.

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And frankly? I wouldn't put it past the devs to do one or all three of the above. Given how astronomical base costs are and how little anyone seems to care about raiding, I don't think they're quite in touch with what people want out of bases. I'm HOPING Issue 7 is them grounding themselves in reality and lowering costs, offering things like these stations, etc... but I'll wait until we get an official response before I get my hopes up.

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AOL.

Today's discussion was brought to you by the words "cautious" and "optimism".

I have no doubt that these things are going to be cool (they certainly look extremely shiny) but eventually it's not enough to just be cool, it's got to be accessible as well.

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Dark armors would totally fuzz out a character so you couldn't see the costume.. now, if I am correct, they pulse and the costume is much more viewable.

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Some of us liked Form Of A Dustbunny!

You people and your... your wanting to see your costume!

Dark and Fire armors were like a buff that made you never have to spend influence at Icon.

If you don't care about damage at *all*? Controller. Anything but Fire.

If you don't have someone available to "pimp out" your character with full enhancements, you might want to try Empathy instead of Kinetics. While Kinetics is in some ways more powerful than Empathy, Kinetics powers have to *hit*, which means that you're not only having to slot for effect, and slot for recharge, but you've got to put some accuracy in there as well, and if you miss or pick the wrong target, nothing happens and everyone dies. This requires you to keep your enhancements up to speed, and reduces your effectiveness against +cons.

Empathy does what it does, all the time, reliably. The only thing you have to worry about is running out of endurance. Empathy can be hard to play (though you learn a lot about multitasking) but it's easy to build the character. Your build is basically: Are there empathy powers available to take that you haven't taken? Take them. Have any slots you don't need for attacks? Slot some of your empathy powers. Go forth, level up, repeat the process.

With my luck, the base teleporter would have set the spawn point at dead center of the Hamigoo.

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Recluse's Victory in Issue 7 is a level 45 to 50 PvP Zone.

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Does this mean someone changed their minds about cutting PvP zone missions off when you hit 50?

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I just think that small bases won't be good for the game IMO.

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Really, the only thing that can be said is this: most people are unlikely to change their social arrangements just to take advantage of a game feature. People who like big guilds are already in one and don't really need further encouragement, people who don't like big guilds are never likely to join one regardless of the reward for doing so.

Making more things that can be done with smaller bases just means that the system will better accomodate how people are actually playing. A base on the smallest plot is reachable for even a small SG, but there's not a lot you can do in it that justifies keeping the lights turned on right now. Unless you've drunk the PvP koolaid, there isn't even much benefit to having a full SG in terms of base building right now.

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Okay, I just created my SG and want to build a base. The sticky says that "you can be the only member if you want, but this will place severe size and functionality limits on your base." What exactly does that mean ? Will my base be just like a studio apt ? Will it get bigger as more members join ?

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Kenja described the situation accurately. There's no code that magically restricts things due to low membership, but it will be difficult to manage the level of prestige income that will allow you to build and maintain a decent base.