Fernandes

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...that the AE building in the RWZ seems really out of place? I mean, it's a freaking war zone.

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We had Burger Kings, Pizza Huts, and Baskin Robbins in Iraq. (The busiest Burger King in the world in 2003 was the one at Baghdad airport.) What's so unbelievable about Vanguard troops kicking back and playing a little AE in their off-duty hours?

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Hmm... the man has a point!

My mistake, its been a while!

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My position has always been:

Stop making AV/EB encounters nothing but hacking away at a massive number of hitpoints.

Countess Crey is a normal human, not some psi blaster. Make encounters that make sense. Yes...Recluse and Statesman are tough and powerful physically and take a lot of damage to bring down...that makes sense. It doesn't with a lot of the foes we fight.

When this comes up...I always go back to my super hero game standard: Freedom Force. Lots of the foes you fought in that game weren't uber tough...and if they were...the environment they were in had interesting ways to bring them down to size.

When all our EB/AV encounters are reduced to pounding on something for however long it takes to drop it's hitpoints and nothing else...it just screams boring and unrealistic(even in a game sense).

If I'm going to take down Countess Crey...I'd expect her to taunt me...then run and hide behind some kind of forcefield while filling the room with special Crey Troops from her personal guard.

Most of the time...big brain villains will set up traps and other 'inescapable' scenarios that heroes have to fight their way around or figure out. It's never always about force on force and/or zerging. That's what lends a comic/epic feel to fights.

I loved fighting Deja Vu in Freedom Force. He was wussy...but one hit from his giant clone cannon would create a duplicate of your hero that you would need to deal with. Plus he was always cloning himself. FUN scenarios make the EB/AV equation less annoying for me. Because I simply stop thinking about them as such...and think about the game and having fun instead.

YMMV.

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Quoted for Truth!

Much as huge damage and hit point numbers are an obvious and effective way to make an enemy badass and extremelly challenging, they're probably not the most interesting ones.

Recent AV fights seem to lean heavily towarsd involving lower class mobs as ambushes and such things, but there is a certain uniformity to all CoH fights (AV and otherwise) that gets old after a while.

AE has helped this a lot, allowing for mobs and AV/EBs wiht truly powerful effects not seen before in mobs. But some really unique effects would be interesting.

Ironically, I suspect that would be hard to balance to fit all comers. For instnace, a unique challenge for me as an illusionist might be a boss that ignroes taunt effects, so that his agro will transfer to me if I am out-damaging my decoys. Since I would have to fight without being able to hide behind my pets (which essentially the whole point of the illusion set) that would be a very difficult fight for me and a tactical challenge I've never before had to face (outside of PvP where your enemies, as a rule, can both deal and sustain considerably less damage). But then, for a tank that would be horrible - essentially making him completly useless - and his blaster team-mates probably wouldn't appreciate it either.

Trying to find unique things for bad guys to do to you that won't be unbeatable to certain characters but insignficiant to others would be the major hurdle of this sort of thing aside from actually programming it.

Still, all that being said, I whole-heatedly agree with you. I'd love to see some more variety injected into boss fights too. I just dont think making the bosses whimpier is the way to do it.

You seem to have tremendous knowledge of what the developers do and do not intend. Assuming you're not relying on some marvelous telepathic gift, would you like to provide links, by any chance, to the articles or other locations where members of the development team have explicitly stated these intentions?

Building a really high end character requires more than selecting the right powersets. Finessing every last microscopic ounce of performance out of a build is quite a time consuming endeavor - I rolled my first controller years ago, and I've never stopped coming up with minor alterations to try out to perfect it. And thats before you get into the time it takes to actually acquire all the necessary gear. I like hobbies that are time consuming and difficult - if you're as good as you're ever going to be in the first month, then really, whats the point after that? That said, are certain combinations much better than others from the get-go? Undeniably they are. I still don't see anything wrong with that. Anyone who wnts the same performance can create a character using the same sets; its not as if they're being unfairly denied access to it somehow. And despite your analogy, it is not an exploit.

At the end of the day, this is an old dichotomy in any RPG. Obviously, all builds are not equal, and if they were the game would be boring in a hurry. But what constitutes an acceptable margin between the least powerful and the most powerful of characters? Personally I have very little sympathy for people who choose to play sub-optimal characters and then complain that there are some things in the game that they can't do, but obviously the game can't be complelty unplayable to the FF/Elec defender anymore than it can be completly devoid of challenge for the Ill/Rad controller. Its all a quesiton of where you draw the line. Obviously, I feel the line on top tier performance should be higher than you do.

The question, as you point out, is what the developers consider acceptable, and I don't know that any more than you do. I do know that it has been possible to solo archvillains since the day the game hit retail and that no change made in all the years since has altered that. The fact that nothing has been done about it in all that time leads me to suspect that the developers dont have quite such a problem with people recieving that particular reward as you seem to want to believe.

Ultimately it comes down to what sort of playstyle you prefer. I enjoy the challenge and sense (however illusory it may be) of accomplishment that comes with building a character to the highest standards achievable, and accomplishing the most difficult tasks available, and I do not feel week in comparison to any existing content outside of raids (which I think we all agree are, and probably should continue to be, beyond the ability of anyone at all to solo). I therefor oppose your suggestion because I believe it will lower the bar of many encounters, making the game less challenging to play, and decreasing my special-ness compared to others. You (based on what you've said above) feel that the current highest tiers of builds are too powerful and should be either reduced in power or ignored, and tha this will allow things to be more fun for you and others who feel out-classed by current high level content.

As I've said, I have no particular sympathy for your position, but I dont expect you to hav any for mine either (Im starting to sound rather objectivist here - its a little scary). I am fairly sure that Paragon Studios will continue doing whatever they feel will strike the best balance between use of their resources and market appeal. I have hardly done exhaustive market research on the subject, but as I say the fact that almsot all games seem to follow the current CoH model (some more so), where-as no game I am aware of uses a model similar to the one you propose for end-game content leads me to suspect that the current AV/EB system probably has a long and healthy future.

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...that the AE building in the RWZ seems really out of place? I mean, it's a freaking war zone. Not the best place to set up a new business, you know? It also looks like a sore thumb, being all shiny and new compared the the rest of the zone, which is supposed to be a bombed-out wreck.

I can understand that some players would want to join heroes and villains together in AE missions, but couldn't we, say, hide the facility under the Vanguard base? Just take an elevator down there's the AE stuff you need.

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Very much so. It makes no sense at all from an in-character purspective.

That said I am glad it exists and would hate for it to be removed since it allows heroes and villains to play together in AE missions.

I sometimes wonder if adding AE terminals to some part of Pocket D would not make more sense and allow the same thing to occur, but I suppose the building in RWZ is easier since it does not require any new scenery to be created; just copy/paste the same building as for everywhere else.

Also, I like the fact that there are AE buildings in every zone. Its very conveniant, and make sit possible to find a building thats not swamped with a million other players so as to make my graphics card cry.

Im sorry to hear abou your friend. My deapest sympathies and prayers will be with you, and with him.

No it isnt, but its the investment of time that matters. My point is that in any hobby if you do not put in the necessary time and effort, then you will not be at the highest tier of play. Making sure that anyone at all can do anything not only cheapens the efforts of those who work harder; it also ensures that the game holds no challenge for anyone above the minimum standard. That is a recipee for failure.

And yes, selecting powers and powersets that work well together is a strategic excercise. If you chose to play that Earth/FF controller, you cannot reasonably cry foul when your ability to solo things is eclipsed by an ill/rad controller. That build will make up for that in other areas, particularly on a team, but not all builds are equally good at all things - if they were, what would be the point of having different builds at all?

I thought we were done wiht this debate years ago! Ahh well...

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AVs do not overshadow my brute!

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This. I have yet to meet an archvillain I cant solo. Ussually with jsut the powers at my disposal. On rare occasions (multiple AVs at once - AVs with massive resistance to my damage, AVs who summon endless haords of bosses), I may need to summon a shivan, or otherwise dip into my bag of tricks a bit to make the fight end in a reasonable amount of time (under 10 minutes or so). In point of fact, Ive aced a few GMs solo as well. I dont feel the need for Statesman to be nerfed lest he overshadow me - he doesn't overshadow me. My character is already more powerful/skilled than he is, and I can kick his [censored] if necessary to prove it.

This is a VERY easy game. It does not need to be made any easier. It might expand this fellow's e-peen to knock AVs down to EB status, but it would put me to sleep.

But wait you say, not everyone plays an illusion/radiation controller with a 3 billion influence build. Not everyone can solo archvillains.

You're right. ANd nor should they be able to. The Freedom Phalanx, and the leaders of Arachnos, and their assorted playmates are the most skilled, most powerful, msot dangerous heroes on Earth. They're the best. If you want to take them on, then you SHOULD have to be the best as well. Not every villain in the DC universe can go one on one with superman. Similarly, not every villain can go toe to toe with Statesmen. The best of the best can; the rest bring their friends. But that level of power IS attainable to the player characters, assuming you put a lot of effort into it.

Some may cry that any noob who just hit 50 this minute shiuld be able to ace Lord Recluse alone, and that you shoudln't ahve to put a lot of time and effort into a fake virtual game, but to them I say (when I dont just insult them) that gaming is like any other hobby; if you want to be the best, it takes effort. That guy you golf with some time who shoots about 20 under-par and always finsihes any given hole in half the time you do? He spends a lot of time at the driving range,a nd at putting practice, and probably at some cheap public courses perfecting his technique. If you want to get good at golf and beat him, you have to do the same. If you want to get good enough at gaming to run with teh really big dogs of the setting, that takes time too. Thats not a failure of the developers; thats how it SHOULD work. If the entire game is easy enough for anyone, using any build, of any level of experience, to solo all of it, then there's nothing at all to challenge or interest people who are better than that (except PvP, and conveniantly enough, CoH has some of the most broken and least relevant PvP dynamics of any game on the market). That may be a game you want to play, but its not one that interests me. Judging by the fact that pretty much every succesful MMO ever is predicated on the idea that to get to the top tiers of performance and face the top tier challenges you need to invest a great deal of time and effort, the people who produce these sorts of games seem to have reached the conclusion that thats the dynamic that appeals to the majority of players as well.

But just in case the above arguments ahven't convinced anyone to embrace online elitism in all its glories, consider also that the problem of unsoloable bad guys who make you feel week was solved a long time ago by the invention of Elite Bosses. If your force-field/electricity defender doesn't quite do enough damage to beat an archvillain, turn your difficulty down and he will spawn as an elite boss, which any half competant player should be able to flatten like a pancake wiht the right tray of inspirations. On large teams they still spawn as archvillains, tahts true, but that is for balance reasons. A team of 8 against an elite boss (or even several elite bosses) is a cake-walk of epic purportions, as anyone who's ever run the ITF can attest. Making them tougher than the average player individually make make low-med builds feel like they dont measure up, but making them so easy any one member fo the team could kill them alone would lead to archvillain battles that lasted about 7 seconds, and left no one feeling as if they had accomplished anything remotely significant. If Tyrant is really that big a whimp, who cares that you just defeated him. I know, you say, there will be many EBs in a battle agains thte tema, thus making it balanced, but I maintain that even if you spawn an EB per player, a good team will mow through them. Ebs just dont have the massive damage, or survivability to really threaten a well-put-together team. Ironicaly, this suggestion would be most likely to hurt large but less optimal teams, making it harder for non-optimized groups to complete high end content, rather than easier, where-as for the real Min/Maxers it may pose a slight atleration of tactics, but no significant obstacle.

Finally, assuming that that argument too ahs failed, consider this: implimenting this system would require alterning hundreds - probably thousands of exisitng misions in massive ways to justify the inclusion of additional Elite-Bosses in high level fights and to actually code said edition into the mission. Additionally ti would require teh creation of new programming in the game to automatically change the numbe of elite-bosses in final encounters depending on the size of the team and difficulty settings. Never say never, and all that, but given that recent issues have featured a consistant (and welcome, at leat to people like me) trend towards tougher and tougher archvillain battles, it seems highly unlikely that such a large amount of resources will be put into nulifying that work and implementing this suggestion instead.

And no, I havent read any of the posts between the first one and now. I dont plan to either.

Stone. Technically fire doesnt give any Defence at all, to the extent that defence is a specific in-game mechanic and fire's shield is based on another in-game mechanic called Resistance.

On a lesss nitpicky note, however, the defence based shield is generally of greater value because it applies to any attack that uses enough of that damage type to have that discripter, and also because it will aply to any mezz effect that has that descriptor. Also this defence based shield will stack with the small +def to everything bonuses you recieve from powers such as Hover, Combat Leaping, and Maneuvers.

Also, Earth has Earth's Embrace, which is easilly the most powerful self-heal available to controllers and also can easilly raise your hit points to the cap (around 1600 or so) while it lasts.

Finally, Earth has Fissure, which knocks down enemies and deals them a stun (which stacks with the stun from Flashfire), and also Seismic Smash, which can hold a boss in a single application - it thereby increases the amount of damage you mitigate actively by way of control.

Fire is not about defence, its about damage. This is something it provides extremelly well. The quesiton is whether you need more damage on your character, or more survivability. If you are Fire/Kinetics, i tend to suspect the latter.

I suspect Stryphe is only teasing, but congratualtions - Im glad you got it worked out.

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It's just my judgment call. Frequency counts, not skill. I hadn't seen them at all in the PvP zones, so after reading what they did, I guessed that they were PvEers just zerging for amusement.

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I disagree but that's because I can play TF2 with folks who take months for breaks and come back pwning away like nobody's business. Skill > Frequency IMO. Though at the same time, skill can be irrelevant to a game that's PVP is imbalanced anyways. Now while CoX has the concept down, we know you can't just go out there do anything you want because you're 'usually' good at it otherwise.

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To repeat myself, I was not making a value/skill/morality/whatever judgment. When I call someone a PvPer (or a "real" PvPer), all I mean is that he PvPs fairly often. Period. That's all.

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Ironically, I think we've about covered the subject matter. I do undestand where you're coming from, it just strikes me that this definition (and similar ones) are a little subjective. If someone, like Stryphe above, feals that even if you PvP constantly, you're not really a PvPer unless you have a certain amount of skill, its rather difficult to come up with a rational argument for proving that your definition is better than theirs, don't you think?

On the subject of Ice Mastery, its a surpsiongly good damge set, and one that people often overlook in favor of the more famous Fire. Ice Storm and Frost Breath make a most effective combination (although as with any controlle build that does nto include kinetics no one will be mistaking you fire a fire blaster anytime soon). The shield has the same adavantage sf all defence based shields. Although following some unwritten rule on the subject it too is costume-destroyingly ugly. As for hibernate though... I prefer to use Hyper Phase as my panic button and I am always skeptical of using precious epic power slots on somethjing that duplicates the effect of an easily available temp power, only worse (you can still summon pets while hyper-phased).

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No, IW is not currently usable as a break free. Wish it was, because the mezzes always seem to hit after IW drops.


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CURRENTLY, no. This was in regards to a future patch allowing such powers to be used while mezzed. Mainly coming about because of shield tanks/scrappers having their mez in the form of click powers and being helpless when it wears off. Mainly in regards to tanks, but the problem/option is still being brought out because of this. And is a terrific idea.

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This.

Currenty ther are only 2 mezz protection powers you can use while mezzed. One is a breakfree inspiration (or one of its larger cousins). The other is Domination, the inherent power of Dominators. Hopefully Indomitable Will and other click-to-use duration based mezz shields will be added to that familly soon. It would significantly increase the utility of this power for builds that cannot achieve sufficient +rech to make it permanent.

On another Primal Forces related point, ENergy Torrent does not deal knockback. It does knockdown. If yhou find it doing knockback it is probalby because you have vast it during the duration of powerboost (which will raise its KB value above one).

Thats a fair point, but it moves me to wonder how often do you have to PvP to be a "PvPer" in this scheme. Obviously once or twice on a whim isnt good enough for you, but whats the minimum schedule. Once a week? Once every 2 days? Does it ahve ot occupy 90% of my time, or only 50%. Does skill matter - if I only PvP rarely for whatever reason but I kick [censored] at it (sort of hard to envision how that would come about, but its a hypothetical question) am I still a real PvPer? It makes you wonder how useful the label really is.

But what you and I do is not the issue we're arguing (debates have rules, and moderators). You're contention is that the people who've set this stunt up are somehow morally inferior as PvPers, or at least thats the impression I ahd from your comments, but my argument is tht they found a winning strategy, and that there's nothing wrong with that.

Of course, you could argue if it IS a winning strategy. As you correctly point out your skills dont improve much from a lopsided fight, and even the largest guild may not always be able to gaurantee numberical superiority under all circumstances. Still, the idea that "real PvPers are the ones who only do the things I do or approve of" is fecetious. Just like all other claims of "you're not a real [gamer of some type]"

My pleasure. Goodluck.

I undrstnad waht yuou're saying perfeclty, and I disagree. Most of the good PvP guilds Ive ever seen work as a team; they might fight a one on one duel as an E-peen enlarger, or risk an unequal battle if some important in-game objective were at stake and they had no choice, but all things being equal, they would never enter a PvP area without a team that they believed was superior tot he opposition they believed they would encounter. We call that good strategy.

But of course, most real PvP guilds play real PvP games where there is something meaningful (in an in-game sense; not necesarilly in a broader real-life sense) to be won and lost through PvP.

In CoH where the only thing you stnad to win or loose is bragging rights, I suppose I can see that it might be different, but even if all you're playing for is fun, I dont see the entertinment value in getting pwnt. Maybe Im just too competative or take my games too seriously, but I see no reasont o show up to a fight im likely to loose unless, as we've already dsicussed, there were something on the line it was worth taking even the slimmest chance to obtain/defend, and that sort of inducement simply does not exist in CoH (though it might one day in the catastrophically unlikely event they ever implement Items of Power properly).

Somewhere between 7 and 9 pm EST. They can sometimes continue until very late, running multiple raids.

Every Monday, and almost every Saturday, Sunday, and Friday as well.

Frequently. I ahve a theme song of my own, so it seems only fair.

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Yeah Syn, they brought 30 or so nubs out ALL at once to the PvP zones............and talked !%@%$ while camping the villian base.

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No wonder I haven't seen them. They aren't PvPers looking for fights, who would show up regardless of numbers; they're a zerg that only PvPs when they can get everyone together.

Still, I applaud your zerg. Do it more often.

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IM not much for the PvP in this game (more's the pitty), but showing up for a fight regardless of numbers or other gross strategic factors may make you a "real PvPer" in your book - to me, it make syou an idiot. In the immortal words of Harry Dresden, fair fights are for suckers.

Now of course, sometimes, when there's nothing of consequence on the line, a truly fair fight can be fun, and help you hone your skills. And heavens know there isn't a lot of material advantage to be won in PvP in this game (unless you count e-peen inflation). But zones never have been, and never will be places to go looking for a "fair" fight. Not in this game; not in any game ever made. If thats what you want then an Arena match is a better option.

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EDIT: Dax is leader of ducks??!? I quit

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I figured it was by default since most of them went on to greener pastures.

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Nice to see you to Grae

And yes I guess you can say it's semi by default that I run the ducks now, but lets face it I'm 1 of the only original members who is still around & active in PvP....so I can't just let the ducks die & I've been doing some mild recruiting for the group since someone asked me to start a PvP group.......my thoughts though are primarily a group to fight who??????
I already fight against the best PvP'ers on the server.....there my friends.....

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If thats so (and no just boasting) then perhaps that should be the point. That is, if ther is really no other player organization on the server to offer you serious comeptition, then perhaps you should see your supergroup not so much as a team to compete with other teams, as is traditioanlly the case for PvP guilds, but as a community of people to set up matches and events amongst themselves and/or their friends.

I vote for number 6. The world can always use more massive explosions. Or 8. The world can always use more of that too.

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I recently snagged the name Reichmaiden, she is going to be my Going Rogue character.. I was thrilled that I got this name!

Then I went to virtue verse and saw a rather well done, massive page to that name, and stopped short.

I mean, I got the name fair and square, but I feel like I'm stepping on another players toes by taking a name that they put alot of effort into, and in the event I make a VV for her, I don't want to nullify the hard work and dedication of the name holder before me...

Help?

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If the character does not exist then they have obviously nullified the work themselves. Contrary to what its promoters cliam the virtueverse is neither an authoritative source of canon, nor more importantly in this case, an authoritative arbiter of who has claim to what. If they wrote up a background but never created the character (or deleted the character, or moved the character to another server, or otherwise its just not around), then they have no claim whatsoever to represent that character in game anymore then writting my third grade essay on what I would do if I were president gives me the right to run the free world.

If you had stolen something from them - if you had plagerized the name or the backstory from their work for instnace - that would be different, but thats not the case here. You came up with it fair and square. So did they, but its not your fault that they never bothered to act on the concept they dreamed up and you did.

All that said, you might consider making some reference to this other person in your character description, or perhaps in your own Virtue Universe page if you create one. Aside from giving credit to this anonymous other person for their own creativity, it will also make certain that no one confuses your character for theirs in the event that they ever had one.

Finally, if your excessive gamer-guilt simply cannot get over the illusion that you owe this stranger anything, then perhaps you should contact them and ask what the sitaution is? I dont use the VirtueVerse (in fact, I make it a point not to) but if it is anything like most "Wiki" sites, then there is probably some way to contact the author of a particular article, either using a built-in messaging feature, or by email. If not knowing what the deal is with their character si going to drive you mad, then contact them and ask.