Freelancer

[ QUOTE ]
Heh.

Oh and I was trying to figure out what kind of video card a JCB card was.

[/ QUOTE ]

Was trying to work out why they were ditching support for earth moving equipment. Faultline isn't going to rebuild itself!

[ QUOTE ]
Repulsion bomb hasn't worked that way for 2 years

[/ QUOTE ]

I only found this out today.

I have been avoiding this power for years because I thought it worked off of an ally.

Some may say if I've been playing for that long, perhaps I should have known this. Should I? Should I really have to scour the Patch Notes for changes like this, or diligently follow the forums when I could be using my limited free time actually playing? Should new players be required to read every past patch note and cross-check against the in-game information for discrepancies?

Shouldn't I be able to rely on the in-game description of a power being at least reasonably accurate?

Frankly, I think this is more than a simple text bug. It's a disgrace. Players should NEVER have to rely on out-of-game sources for such basic and fundamental information, especially in the absence of an accurate and up-to-date game manual. Forum guides and external websites are certainly useful, but they should never be the only source for something this important.

That is the situation, yes. I hope you're luckier than I was.

[ QUOTE ]
...we had a remaining group of Support Tickets left over from that process that we have as of today fully investigated and resolved.

[/ QUOTE ]

While it is great to finally see a comment on this matter, I consider the use of the word 'resolved' here to smell slightly of weasel. I think most people would take it that if a problem is 'resolved' then a solution has been found. This is not the case. Apparently you are employing the definition 'to make a firm decision about', which is certainly a valid definition in the dictionary, and is certainly what has been done by saying 'you will not be reimbursed, and that is that'.

I can understand that it may well be the case that any data supporting my petition, and those of the others here, has been lost in the incident, and that there is simply no hard evidence to support our claims. That's fair enough. These things happen. However, no-one has actually explained the reason behind this summary decision, and when you make a statement in this way without even apologising for the problem, you're implying that you simply don't believe us. Perhaps it's just me, but I don't take kindly to that. If that's not the case then simply say so, frankly and openly, so we can put this to rest.

Well, I got a response to my petition today:

[ QUOTE ]
Hello,

Thank you for your reply.

We certainly appreciate your patience and assure you that the Development Team has gone through great efforts to try and restore all of the items and influence that were lost as a result of the Consignment House rollback.

We understand that this affects a large number of our players, and we apologize to those who were affected. Unfortunately, the support staff is unable to make additional reimbursements for any losses caused by this issue and the restoration process is considered to be complete at this time.

Please let us know if you have any further questions or concerns.

[/ QUOTE ]

My emphasis. I chose to highlight the red part particularly because that was the part of the message that made me see red. Restoration 'complete' my $%£*! I'm out 15m influence. Maybe that's small change to some people, but not to me.

This complete failure to resolve the issue is without a doubt the single worst incident I have experienced in this game, and yet are we seeing even a mention in public that the Grand Reimbursement Plan was in fact a slight balls-up? NO.

The GM invited correspondence if I had further concerns. Well, I have a concern, but not one they will be able to answer. My concern is this: what assurance can we be given that this sort of thing will not happen again? Right now I have very little faith in the consignment house and it would be nice to at the very least see some sort of official acknowledgement that things did not quite go as planned instead of ignoring those of us left in this thread and fobbing us off with a private copy & paste response (note the 'thank you for your reply' - I never 'replied' to anything as I was never asked for any additional info beyond my original ticket).

Like many of you I've been with this game a while. During that time I've brought a few friends into the fold, extolling the virtues of CoH over other MMO's. If this is how things are going to be from now on, I won't be doing any more of that for a while.

Just checked my only char that lost stuff, and I've had nothing back, so I'm down 15m in bids. Time to go raise that petition I guess...

Nope.

Read back a couple of posts. The Koreans just seem to be really into altering demofiles to produce wierd screenshots. You can produce all sorts of wacky scenarios this way and it's not that hard to do. Nothing new or exciting about that, it just seems to be much more popular in the Korean CoH community than it is here.

[ QUOTE ]
Theres also a picture of TWO actual statesman costumes, a guy has a leg robe, and when did behemoths get the lava rock armor? i know in CoH beta there were pics of DE rampaging in Atlas but with special powers?

[/ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Admittedly it's from an altered demofile

[/ QUOTE ]
All of these things are possible by altering a saved demofile and playing it back. Hell, I've got a screenshot here of Statesman saluting one of my characters inside City Hall, and I remember last year there was a demo on the boards of a bunch of the sugnature heroes on top of City Hall playing Rock Paper Scissors while a Rikti warship hovered in the background.

Changing the flag using this method, however, is not, as far as I know.

[ QUOTE ]
Glad you liked it! Be sure to let everyone on the boards know that there will be absolutely no difference between the Korean version and the US/EU version of the game.

[/ QUOTE ]

O RLY?

Maybe no big differences, but there is at least one cosmetic difference. This screenshot is on the Korean site, presumably from the beta if it hasn't launched yet. Admittedly it's from an altered demofile, but there is clearly a blue flag on top of Atlas instead of the US flag.

CONSPIRACY!!!!!!111eleventyone!!

For those who haven't checked the Dev Digest today, Positron hath spoken thusly:

[ QUOTE ]
We have NOT been recording SG mode since ANY issue. I will also confirm that NO datamining will be happening

[/ QUOTE ]
Also, on the CoH Stratics Chat last night (full transcript available here with an 'official' version coming soon hopefully), Lord Recluse said the following in response to 2 questions:

[ QUOTE ]
Bases are paid for with Prestige which belongs to your supergroup. You'll need it to place items and then pay upkeep. Right now that's 2 times a month. Size has a big affect on upkeep, because it's calculated off the cost of your base and other stuff... You earn it by defeating foes similar to earning influence. However, you have to be in SG mode to gain it.

And yes, we're looking at allowing you to turn off your SG emblem for those folks who don't want to ruin a costume.

One thing about Prestige is as you get higher, it becomes a trade-off betwee Prestige or Influence. As you get more of the first, you get less of the second. So there are times you'll want to change to or from SG mode instead of being in it all the time.

[/ QUOTE ]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Geko and I were both surprised to find out that the powers system already DID this

[/ QUOTE ]

I realize that CoH's direction has gotten me touchy and paranoid these last few months, but....

Anyone else bothered by that phrase?

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm more bothered by what immediately followed...

[ QUOTE ]
If it involved engineering, we would have found a different solution.

[/ QUOTE ]

Could that account for why they decided to nerf powers (mostly consisting of decreasing a stat's base value in a database) instead of improving mob AI (actual coding/work involved) in order to bring "challenge" to the game?

It does make one wonder...

[/ QUOTE ]
Beat me to it. I can only hope that this is just poor phrasing, because it does strongly imply that the preferred Dev solution to a problem is the easiest solution, not the best solution. Sometimes those two are the same, but it's rare.

[ QUOTE ]
Another perfectly valid reason for capping SG sizes is to crush Uberguilds. Remove any incentive for a guild to try to get so large that it dominates a server.

[/ QUOTE ]
Perhaps, but anyone with such a goal is going to manage it anyway just by creating endless divisions. Ask any veteran Victory player about the Goon Squad SGs - at one point they were so prevalent you couldn't spit without hitting a Goon member.

OK, since more than one person has called me out on this:

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
SG need more room. LOTS more room. Yes, the majority of SGs may be smaller, but some of the most loyal groups in this game are simply too big to fit in one SG. Our alts should all be contributing to the same base, not 4 different bases because of the arbitrarily low limit of 75 per SG. Never have I seen a good technical (or any other) reason why 75 must be the limit. Raise the limit, preferably by a factor of at least 5, or even abolish it altogether. This is major obstacle to Prestige being a workable system.

[/ QUOTE ]
Um, the SG versus SG has been stated succinctly as the reason for the 75 (ie 150 toon limit for gigantic battles.)

[/ QUOTE ]
Yes, that is a reason for the 75 limit. However, in my opinion, it's not a good reason. That implies that SG size is being limited purely for PvP reasons; only a minority of the game's players care about PvP, and I refuse to believe that it is impossible to limit the size of SG battles without limiting the size of the SG itself. It may be easier and more convenient to do it that way, but that doesn't mean it must be so.

Just wanted to comment on a couple of things you've said Malcolm_McCallum...

[ QUOTE ]
You have enough people to form 4 75 person SGs. One of those will become your main SG and will have MAXIMUM BASE SIZE. 75 pers is the biggest that you can have. Its the fastest way to get prestige. Your base will be built as fast and as completely as the developers think any base should be able to be put together.

Yet you want more without even knowing if that will be big and fast enough for your liking.

[/ QUOTE ]
Maybe the 'main' group (if you have one) has a good 75, but the extra SGs may not be as full to the brim (many multi-SG groups create divisions with room to expand) - members in those SGs won't get as spiffy a base even though they are in the same group as the other members, even if not the same actual SG.

[ QUOTE ]
Maybe the solution is that every Supergroup can have 'reserve' team of 300 or so.... The reserve team is where you put inactive characters.

[/ QUOTE ]
I don't have a single inactive character. I have 5 chars that I play regularly. My SG has probably a few dozen people with similar numbers of active chars plus as many more with only 1 char - and we simply can't get all of those characters in a single 'active' group. The reserve team idea doesn't solve our problem. Maybe it would work for some SGs, but not for us.

There are other compelling reasons to increase SG size as I see it, and as has been pointed out, some technical reasons not to (though they could be worked around as I see it), however, this is not the place for a full discussion on this. I really just wanted to point out why the SG size could be a problem for the proposed Prestige system. As I see it, it could create further unneccesary divides within large groups.

Well since we have an 18-page thread that I have made sure to read as much of as possible, there isn't much I can do but add my agreement to much of what's already been said, but in doing so hopefully something can be done about this situation. It looks like some people have partly beat me to it while I was spending my quality game time composing this, but here goes anyway.

A few people here have recalled an old statistic the game used to gather that counted how much time you've been in SG mode, and since the actual data gathering code was never removed, just never used, obviously some bright spark decided it would be a great idea to resurrect this and use it to fund bases.

Why do they think this is a good idea? Well, when you think about it, the Devs think they are killing several Rikti with one Nova here, but their method is flawed. I’ve always been a proponent of not complaining about a problem without thinking of a way to fix it, so here's why I think this is bad and how I would do it instead:

<ul type="square">[*]Dev Goal #1: To encourage people to use SG mode more. Many have said here their SG rarely uses it Problem: The real reason people don't use SG mode more is that it kinda sucks.

The SG mode itself ruins many costumes and many people will not want to use it. It replaces any bandoliers, straps, and concept-specific logos with a very restricted subset of the normal chest logos. It should be obvious by now how much players value their costumes - even if they dont use the SG colours, forcing a logo onto a costume that looks better without one spoils things a lot. Also, by doing this, they are turning SG-mode from a 'don't care about' thing into an 'absolute must do all the time' thing; I don't want to have to bully my SG members into SG mode to afford our base. Forcing it on people is, in my opinion, worse than having people never use it.

Alternative to achieve Dev Goal #1: Make the SG mode more fun Samuel_Tow is absolutely spot on when he says "Somebody once said that if you want more people to use a certain piece of content more, make an effort to make that piece more fun, rather than trying to force people into using it." Give SG mode some features that people want to use. How about a trial (or a range of trials) to unlock SG-mode only costume pieces? And how about finally letting us change the colours and logo?
[*]Dev Goal #2: To give new players and old players an equal chance to have bases - hence not using influence as base currency. Problem: While the concept of a separate currency is fairly good IMO, the implementation does not create an equal or even fair footing.

My SG has been around since beta and has always, ALWAYS, encouraged SG teams first and foremost, yet since we use SG mode so rarely we will be worse off than a much newer, less active SG that sues SG mode all the time. Our SG prides itself on diversity of character and culture; why should we be penalised because we don't have an in-game theme or colour-coordinated wardrobes? On top of that, the highly-themed SGs, with SG uniforms, don't necessarily use SG mode either so now they are penalised too.

Alternative to achieve Dev Goal #2: Calculate prestige on XP earned while teamed with another SG member. After all, playing the game together is first and foremost what a SuperGroup should be about! Yes Devs, you will have to code it from scratch, but frankly, I don’t care. If you want to create something fair, be prepared to put the work in. We the players will thank you. Reusing an old stat that seems to fit the bill is an easy way out and WILL create problems.
[*]Dev Goal #3: Datamine the stats to give something to long-running SGs. Problem: Nobody ever thought time spent in SG mode would mean anything, so the reward you are datamining is based on highly arbitrary data.

You may as well randomly assign Prestige. I'm not even kidding here.

Alternative to achieve Dev Goal #3: Calculate the datamined Prestige on how much time each character has been in the SG. It's still not a fair system by a long shot, principally because it penalises SGs with alt groups that people swap in and out of, but for a one-shot thing it would be fairer than the current proposal. Just to be clear on this, in no way am I suggesting this method should be used for calculating Prestige normally.[/list]

While I'm at it, there is 1 more point I would like to make that I think are important if a Prestige system is to work:

SG need more room. LOTS more room. Yes, the majority of SGs may be smaller, but some of the most loyal groups in this game are simply too big to fit in one SG. Our alts should all be contributing to the same base, not 4 different bases because of the arbitrarily low limit of 75 per SG. Never have I seen a good technical (or any other) reason why 75 must be the limit. Raise the limit, preferably by a factor of at least 5, or even abolish it altogether. This is major obstacle to Prestige being a workable system.

Sophie X, Victory

Full-body shot
Action shot
Close up, post body scaling

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
You will get SG bases without CoV. Just wont be able to participate in raids. Quite a generous offer from the Devs in my opinion.


[/ QUOTE ]

We haven't officially announced ANYTHING about how content from CoV will be shared with CoH.

[/ QUOTE ]
We're just going by what CuppaJo told us...

(yes I know she said 'as far as I know' blah blah... but she's a redname! Rednames are always right!!)

Back on page 14 I suggested making the /ghide command work on a per-character basis, so you could just leave some chars permanently hidden from Global Chat (/ghide still leaves you visible on the /search window; that is still controlled by /hide, so you are not completely hidden).

I think what I suggested would achieve the same thing you are after Grudge, just implemented differently. Whichever way it's done, I agree.

Every time I zone a complete list of which players I have on Global Ignore is printed in the System channel. This is distracting and completely unneccesary given that we have a full Global Ignore tab available to us on the Friends window. When I ignore someone I want to forget they exist. I don't need to be reminded how annoying they were every time I zone. Is there any good reason for this verbosity? If not, I for one would like to see it gone.

Name: EuroCore

Website: http://www.eurocore.eu.tt

Recruiting Officers: See up to date list here

Preferred method of contact: via Website (above). Click the Join Us link at the top of the page, or send a /tell to a Recruiting Officer in-game.

SG Description: The EuroCore SG is a group consisting mostly of people living in Europe (GMT or GMT+1 timezones). Our aim has always been to maintain an active SG for players online during European peak hours, to make it easier for European players on Victory to engage with other players. We are very active with many of our players online nightly, with characters covering all level ranges. Most of our members are not RPers but anyone who does RP is more than welcome.

Due to the expanding size and popularity of the group we run 4 SGs side by side (2 SGs for main chars and 2 for alts) with our in-game chat going through a single Global Chat channel covering all 4 groups. We also have a couple of small groups of themed and RP characters who meet weekly.

The EuroCore community also covers other MMORPGs as well, with many of our players belonging to EuroCore guilds in more than 1 game.

[ QUOTE ]
Has anyone else noticed that the game seems to lag more since GC went live?

[/ QUOTE ]
Can't say I have, and lag was at the forefront of my mind this evening. The only lag I get is when travelling near stations in busy zones and when my DSL occasionally goes funky.

[ QUOTE ]
After CoV... The only logical step would be City of Morally Neutral Super-Powered People.

[/ QUOTE ]
Morally Neutral Super-Powered People? Already done. We have quite a few people from Sweden in our SG.

If anyone can get a copy of the file to me I'll start a BitTorrent for it and link to the seed here... it might take a while to get going but once a few people have it we should be able to get it distributed without killing anyone's hosting bandwidth.

Alternatively, if anyone who already has it wants to start the torrent, I'll happily keep my client up for a week or so once I have it to let people get it too.

Global Chat seems to be working again, at least for the time being.

For some reason though, all my channels were removed from the tabs I added them too, so I've had to add them all again. Other people in my SG have had the same problem. So if it looks like it isn't working... check that the channel is actually being displayed somewhere!