Garuta

Remind me to make a clown costume the next time he's slated to appear in-game Kidding, kidding. That does explain the situation rather well though.

I never target through other players, mostly because of how psychotic my playstyle is. I tend to switch to a new target the instant my current one dies, but not everyone is that swift, and on the occasions I've tried targeting through others there have been times where the other player will not find a new target for several moments, so that practice went kaput. Of course I've accidentally shot the next group over a few times because of this, but that usually only results in MY defeat

The way I see it, situations vary far too widely for there to be a concrete answer to this question - team members, enemy types, and so on. So my stance is that they all need to die as it is, so pick a target and fire away As long as no one does anything stupid this usually works.

Your 10 bucks also got you the Valkyrie costume set. Anyway, the teleporter being usable only once per session is kind of the POINT. It's a luxury item, if it recharged in 30 minutes it would trivialize travel time. Why take a travel power when you can POOF appear at missions and use Ninja Run for everywhere else? Not to mention the detrimental effect it'd have on teams - I just KNOW someone, somewhere would berate team members for not having and abusing this power. The state of your wallet should not have an (overly large, admittedly with the current boosters) effect on your gameplay experience.

Also, if this were going to happen, it probably would have by now. So I'm going to have to say no to this one.

This is a minor and completely aesthetic issue, but I was running around with my Katana Scrapper today and realized I like keeping my weapon out, it looks nice with Ninja Run. The only problem is that it goes away after a few moments unless you click an attack again.

So my idea is for some sort of toggle or option that keeps your weapon visible by default. Obviously this would have no other function besides letting players run around armed, using any other power would cause redraw as normal.

What does everyone think? And if there's already a way to do this in-game, let me know and I'll be on my merry way

Oh, I plan characters out, choose every power and slot all the way to 50 ahead of time. But I revise those plans constantly, moving slots when I need more or less than expected, removing powers that looked good on paper, and so forth. The plans are mostly there to keep me from making a stupid mistake that will eat up a respec

Oh for the love of--- I just had the carpet cleaned too!

I imagine that logic doesn't enter the situation for some people. Until I had a discussion similar to this with a friend, they saw putting a whole set into a power as an impetus. "Collect the whole set!" is such a common phrase after all.

This is still going?

I fully understand the importance of good grammar, but all this started over a single letter and a typo no less according to the OP. I am SO sorry I decided to call out Camper for what I felt was a little extreme.

Oh, and thanks for posting your global in your signature, Aggelakis.

True enough, but there is a time and a place for everything. In your example, you personally knew the person you were correcting. In Camper's case, he felt the need to come in and correct a complete stranger's grammar after their question was answered and the thread was effectively concluded. Sounds a little crass, doesn't it?

I come back from my computer problem-mandated hiatus, and you go on one at about the same time - funny how that works!

Sorry to hear about your comp death, hope things pick up for you, and everything else Godpants already said Also Caleb is displeased etc. etc.

You're describing it a little differently, but this does sound like the horrible choppiness I noticed back on test and are now suffering on the live servers. I can't play the game right now ^_^ way to go devs!

Welp, if there's still space, I'll be there.

That.... actually makes a lot of sense, Back_Blast. Part of Spybot Search & Destroy's "immunization" process is loading a megaton of websites set to 127.0.0.1 into the hosts file as a preventative measure. Something like 13,000 websites. I have removed those from the hosts file, let's see if that does anything. Thanks for the tip!

Necrothread WOO! Bit of an update.

Well, I figured out what exactly was causing the slowdown - the DNS Client service. Turning it back on brought back the occasional slowdown, and the svchost.exe that runs that service is the one that takes up all memory. I flushed the DNS cache to see if that will make a difference. This seems rather odd, does any of this sound familiar to anyone?

Thanks for the input guys. Sounds like it'll be pretty brutal on my new Demon/Poison. And thanks for pointing that out Adeon, I actually found that page and somehow missed that detail - lesson learned I guess

How long does it last once you've cast it on a pet? I can't seem to find a duration on either Mids' or City of Data.

Edit: Nevermind, I had the brilliant idea of actually searching the forums (hurr), and I found that little tidbit. 45 seconds. Seems kind of short.

Don't worry, Master-Blade, I don't think anyone's holding that against you. Then again, this IS an internet forum

Update! I put City on COMODO's exceptions list, and I disabled the following services:

DNS client (I couldn't find a website saying that disabling this was a bad idea, and doing so seems to have made my connection much faster. hmmm.)
Windows User-Mode Driver Framework (This is apparently a Vista service. What does it do? Why do I have it? Why was there two of it? Why were they set to automatic? Yeah, disabled in a heartbeat.)

After taking those steps, everything seems to be fine. Thanks for your input, everyone!

Post explosion this morning! Thanks for the input everyone! Now to go down the list---

Eislor, you are correct. I changed Hijack This's file name for just that reason at some point. as for COMODO, it does have antivirus, but it's been disabled as it's a little redundant with all my other protection. Superantispyware is also dormant until I feel the need to run it - all my protection except for Avast and Comodo is like that. Speaking of Avast, I did not know it came with a firewall, but I do not have it installed, so yeah

Texas Justice, thank you for that suggestion, I hadn't thought to put City on COMODO's (why is that in all caps anyway?) exceptions list, I will see if that helps any.

_Klaw_, Thank you for linking me to that website! I actually used said website a long time ago to disable a whole lot of services and lost track of it, now I have it bookmarked Looking through my services again I found a few redundant ones that I switched off.

I've made a few tweaks based on the comments I've received here, I'll see if that improves the situation anyway, thanks again!

*shrug* here you go.

Logfile of Trend Micro HijackThis v2.0.2
Scan saved at 9:59:20 PM, on 4/10/2010
Platform: Windows XP SP3 (WinNT 5.01.2600)
MSIE: Internet Explorer v6.00 SP3 (6.00.2900.5512)
Boot mode: Normal

Running processes:
C:\WINDOWS\System32\smss.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\winlogon.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\services.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\lsass.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\nvsvc32.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Security\cmdagent.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\svchost.exe
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\aswUpdSv.exe
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashServ.exe
C:\WINDOWS\Explorer.EXE
C:\WINDOWS\system32\Rundll32.exe
C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Security\cfp.exe
C:\PROGRA~1\ALWILS~1\Avast4\ashDisp.exe
C:\WINDOWS\system32\RUNDLL32.EXE
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashMaiSv.exe
C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashWebSv.exe
C:\Program Files\AIM95\aim.exe
C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe
C:\Program Files\that program.exe

R0 - HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Start Page = http://
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Page_URL = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=69157
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Default_Search_URL = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=54896
R1 - HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main,Search Page = http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=54896
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [P17Helper] Rundll32 P17.dll,P17Helper
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [COMODO Internet Security] "C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Security\cfp.exe" -h
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [avast!] C:\PROGRA~1\ALWILS~1\Avast4\ashDisp.exe
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [nwiz] nwiz.exe /installquiet
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [NvCplDaemon] RUNDLL32.EXE C:\WINDOWS\system32\NvCpl.dll,NvStartup
O4 - HKLM\..\Run: [NvMediaCenter] RUNDLL32.EXE C:\WINDOWS\system32\NvMcTray.dll,NvTaskbarInit
O9 - Extra button: AOL Instant Messenger (SM) - {AC9E2541-2814-11d5-BC6D-00B0D0A1DE45} - C:\Program Files\AIM95\aim.exe
O16 - DPF: {6414512B-B978-451D-A0D8-FCFDF33E833C} (WUWebControl Class) - http://update.microsoft.com/windowsu...?1268380069031
O20 - Winlogon Notify: !SASWinLogon - C:\Program Files\SUPERAntiSpyware\SASWINLO.dll
O23 - Service: avast! iAVS4 Control Service (aswUpdSv) - ALWIL Software - C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\aswUpdSv.exe
O23 - Service: avast! Antivirus - ALWIL Software - C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashServ.exe
O23 - Service: avast! Mail Scanner - ALWIL Software - C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashMaiSv.exe
O23 - Service: avast! Web Scanner - ALWIL Software - C:\Program Files\Alwil Software\Avast4\ashWebSv.exe
O23 - Service: COMODO Internet Security Helper Service (cmdAgent) - COMODO - C:\Program Files\COMODO\COMODO Internet Security\cmdagent.exe
O23 - Service: NVIDIA Display Driver Service (NVSvc) - NVIDIA Corporation - C:\WINDOWS\system32\nvsvc32.exe

For about the last week I've had an annoying little issue. Once or twice a session, the game will get some dramatic slowdown for about 10-30 seconds. Some investigation revealed that svchost.exe was taking up all the memory for that short period when that happens. So I did the usual - ran Avast antivirus, Avira, Malware Bytes, Superantispyware, Spybot, checked the registry, ran Process Explorer, and ran the game while Process Monitor was running (whew!) - nothing, and all Process Monitor told me was that it was accessing the hosts file, which has nothing suspicious.

Some quick googling led to some posts saying that this was an issue of Windows automatic updates. Except I keep that service disabled until I do my weekly manual updates. It's merely annoying, but I don't know what's causing it and so it's been driving me up the wall! Here's my info from CoH Helper, any thoughts or help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

---System information gathered by CoH Helper version 0.1.1.8---

DxDiag gathered at April 10, 2010 19:36 (-06:00)
Operating System: Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3 (2600.xpsp_sp3_gdr.091208-2036)
System Manufacturer: System manufacturer
System Model: System Product Name
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Central Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3800+, MMX, 3DNow, ~2.4GHz
Memory: 2046MB
.Net Memory Report: 1508MB out of 2046MB available
Page File: 5441MB (544MB currently in use)
C Drive: (WDC WD3200AAKS-00VYA0) 253238MB out of 305234MB (82%) free
D Drive: (WDC WD800JD-00MSA1) 34953MB out of 76308MB (45%) free
E Drive: (SONY DVD-ROM DDU1615) zero-size drive
F Drive: (SONY DVD RW AW-Q170A) zero-size drive
Windows directory location: C:\WINDOWS
DirectX: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
DirectX Diag version: 5.03.2600.5512 (32-bit version)

Display Notes: No problems found.
Sound Notes: No problems found.
Input Notes: No problems found.

Monitor: SyncMaster 731B/731BF/731BA/730BA(Digital)
Monitor's Max Resolution: 1280,1024
Video Device Name: NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GS
Manufacturer / Chip: NVIDIA / GeForce 7600 GS
Video Memory: 512.0 MB
Driver Version: 6.14.0011.9621
Driver Date: 1/11/2010 10:03:33 PM
Driver Language: English

Sound Device Description: SB Live! 24-bit
Driver File: P17.sys
Driver Version: 5.12.0001.0514
Driver Date: 6/15/2007 2:47:26 AM


WMI Information
Motherboard Manufacturer: ASUSTeK Computer INC.
Motherboard Model: (empty)
Motherboard Product: M2N32-SLI DELUXE
Motherboard Version: 1.XX
BIOS Manufacturer: Phoenix Technologies, LTD
BIOS Name: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
BIOS Version: Nvidia - 42302e31
BIOS Release: 20060821000000.000000+000

Registry Information for Current User
Resolution: 1024x768
3D Resolution: 1024x768 (Not using renderscale)
Full Screen: Yes
Maximized: No
Screen Position: 0, 0
Refresh Rate: 60Hz
Vertical Sync Enabled: Yes

Physics Quality: None
Maximum Particles: 50000
Max Particle Fill? 10.000
Physics Card Enabled: No

Anti-aliasing: 2x
Anisotropic Filtering: 4x
Texture LOD Bias: Smooth
Water Effects: None
Bloom: 1.000 (turned off)
Depth of Field Enabled: No
Desaturation Effects (Sepia) Enabled: Yes
Shader Detail: Low (no world bumpmaps)

World Texture Level: Low
Character Texture Level: Very High
World Detail Level (Vis_Scale): 0.798
Entity Detail Level: 1.000
Shadows Enabled: Yes
Gamma Correction: 1.000
Geometry Buffers (VBOs) Enabled: Yes
Suppression of Extra Player FX Enabled: No
Suppression of FX When Camera Close Enabled: Yes
Close Suppression Range: 3.000
Show Advertisements: Yes

Audio Mode: Compatiblity
3D Audio: No
FX Sound Volume: 0.000
Music Sound Volume: 0.000

Show Advanced Graphics Options: Yes
Overall Graphics Quality: 0.300
Reverse Mouse Buttons: No
Save Login Username: Yes
Transfer Rate: Unknown bytes/second
Current Game Version: 1600.20100114.11T
Installation Directory: C:\Program Files\City of Heroes

Mod files in the Data directory
.\texture_library\MAPS\city has 1 file
.\texture_library\MAPS\Midnight_Squad has 1 file
.\texture_library\MAPS\Safeguard has 9 files
.\texture_library\MAPS\sewers has 44 files
.\texture_library\MAPS\static has 32 files
.\texture_library\V_MAPS\Outdoor_Missions has 9 files
.\texture_library\V_MAPS\Static has 16 files