EvilDeathBee

One of the best reads I've seen on the boards yet.

Funny how so many players have absorbed your ideas before this was even posted....

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The "numbers" issue. I know there is a post around here somewhere where a dev says something about not providing #'s because we don't want it to be "City of Math" - I have seen some of the calculations required to get numbers and I have to say that my head a-sploded. Plus there is the maintenance of such a list - and well, you have seen how often the manual gets updated. (note on that - it is coming this month with I4 included) So I would also state that there are some resource constraints in that area. I doubt this will change.

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A couple of things here. First of all, I will be breathing a sigh of relief along with ten thousand others when the updated manual is released. I understand the cost of keeping it up to date is prohibitive.

However, I do think the information on changes might be connected better with the existing manual. At the moment you can download the original game manual and view "recent updates" going back to March, but the City of Heroes website currently has no information on changes between the game's release and this past March. As a result, I have seen arguments recently where an Inv tank defended his choice not to take Unyielding because he didn't like being rooted (changed in January) and another player called Adrenelin Boost a bad power because of the Disorient (removed I don't know when).

Would it be possible to have all changes since the manual's release made into a text file that we could download from the website and keep up-to-date? Or if there already is one there, could you put a link to it next to the link for downloading the manual? If the new manual is going to be up-to-date as of I4 release, you could start a fresh file listing changes since then and add to it until the next manual update. That would keep most of us happy.

If as you said there are "some resource constraints" in that area, I urge you and others to see about having those constraints reduced a bit. Seriously. A few people have mentioned the importance of trust here and you've said you and the devs do not try to mislead your customers. This is true, but having an inaccurate manual makes it easy to believe that you do. If players can't rely on the game information you release and have to use Flaming Troll Boy's Guide to How Powers Actually Work, they are more likely to believe Flaming Troll Boy when he starts a war with you over a change of some sort and says that you are lying about what the change will actually do. From a player's point of view, Flaming Troll Boy was honest with them and you weren't.

Again, I'm not saying you don't post changes properly, but that the changes become difficult to find out about once they get bumped down the list of recent changes and eventually get removed. If you can fix this, it will be better for all of us.

Lastly, as I said to Statesman the other day, keep up the good work.

For zones, don't forget:

KR = King's Row
IP = Independence Port
PI = Peregrine Island
FF= Founders Falls
PDP = Paragon Dance Party
CF = Crey's Folly
TV = Terra Volta

Also:

Herd = gather weak monsters together to kill in one blow
Runner = monster than runs away from the fight. One participant in a drug deal will always do this whether or not you attack him
Farm = generating the maximum possible XP from an encounter, such as by allowing a boss or lieutenant to spawn more minions (or resurrect defeated enemies) instead of killing him before he can do this.

You might also add:

XP = experience points
inf = influence
PL = 1. power level, power levelling, 2. invitation to flame
mish = mission, door mission

There are a few movie references in the Reapers' dialogues when menacing civilians.

"Brains!" comes from Steve Martin's "The Man With Two Brains". (And a good many other places too, I imagine.)

"The leg bone's connected to the knee bone" comes from an old children's show called "Readalong". It was sung by Mr. Bones.

"Think of it as an early organ donation". Descended in spirit from the Live Organ Transplant sketch in "The Meaning of Life".

"Fresh parts are always best." I believe this comes from Dylan Thomas' screenplay "The Doctor and the Devils". It has been made into a movie, but I prefer to think of it as a screenplay.

As for the Four Seasons in the Hollows, the 60s band was Frankie Valley and the Four Seasons.