Great_Cthulhu

"The Winter Olympic Spirit burns bright here in Canada as we are once again reminded that every participant is a winner, and there will be no luge-ers."


If I am a winner, I permit NC Interactive, Inc. and NCsoft Europe Limited to use my name, likeness, photograph, hometown, and any comments that I may make about myself or this contest that I provide for advertising and promotional activities. I also certify that I am at least 13 years of age and am eligible to participate in this contest.

Thanks so much! Great work!

I just wanted to say that I'm still working my way through all the stories listed here and that I write down every ID# people send my way after playing my arc. I've seen some great missions. Keep up the good work, and thanks for all of the feedback!

First: I'd like to say thanks for everyone's feedback, both positive and negative. Every comment delivered in a constructive fashion helps make a better story.

Second: I want to address some of the critiques and suggestions, as many of them pertain to things I also wanted to improve upon.

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I disagree. Not only was there a surprise AV/EB (necro/illusion on extreme to boot; really nasty), but the plot suffered from a serious lack of common sense. Not that did didn't make any sense, but it felt like I'd suddenly entered brainless-town where the only solution to any problem was to smash it until it stopped moving.

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As to the above, I had been planning to insert some dialogue that suggests you may need help on the last mission. A busy schedule had prevented me from doing so, but it is in place now. The boss, however, has neither powerset tagged at extreme.

Suggestions that make the story more clear would be welcome, or at least a pointer to what parts are confusing so I can take a look.

As for the "smash it until it stopped moving" part; my original goal was to rescue the boss npc and lead her back to the glowie, but it proved problematic to implement.

Sultana: the "second character" was simply the guy letting you into the storeroom, as described in the intro. I do have a costume layout for him, however, if you think the mission would be more fun with help. Unfortunately, the map specifications were changed after Beta and it was no longer possible to include a "rescue" objective so that you could join up with him as I had originally planned. So, the poor professor currently remains as flavor text only.

As for Muffy, she has always been set to spawn at the back of the map. Sorry you got her at the start, it must be a bug.

Extra dialogue would be good. I'm near the memory limit, but I'll see what I can do.

Once again, thanks everyone. I'll keep working at it, so let me know what's good and what can be better. Send me a PM or comment in game so as not to clutter up this conversation.

I look forward to checking out the stories listed here. My poor arc has been languishing in the land of neglect for a week or more, so any attention people can throw its way is appreciated. Constructive comments are definitly welcome.

School Spirit #89349

"The National Cheerleading Competition is coming up and the girls of Paragon City University are determined to bring home the trophy. Their best chance of success, however, hinges upon convincing a former teammate to rejoin the squad."

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The known issues list is kind of in unknown territory.

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I think that's one of my favorite statements ever.

What's the time limit before the market eats your stuff? I don't want to leave a character "working" offline to get a badge or cool power just to log back in and discover I've gone bankrupt.

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In the interview it says base salvage is going away, but that it can be converted to Invention Salvage.

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That brings up a question that I've been wondering about: Why not just make the conversion process work both ways instead of eliminating the base salvage altogether? I like getting drops from the baddies, and don't mind whether it's something for the base or an invention component. If I could transmute one into the other depending on need it would be even better.

From an in-game perspective, when a Hellion leaves behind a Hex it adds a bit of depth to the npc group. I like the little descriptions that accompany each item. For a hero it's like saying "good thing I confiscated this, who knows what those Hellions were planning!" Or from the villain point of view "ha, now your power is mine!"

Ahoy, ye landlubbers! Turn yer spyglasses this way and set yer sights on Captain Cadaverous. Like any worthy Cap'n, he went down with his ship. After all the splashin' and drownin' had passed, however, he decided that he wasn't quite ready to take up residence in ol' Davy's Locker.

http://i393.photobucket.com/albums/p...0-23-53-48.jpg

So, now that actual powers can come in the boosters, maybe they can go back and add a long recharge placate effect to the wedding pack throw rice and confetti animations. It'd be a load of fun to use on a ninja themed character.

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I'sd like to take a step back here and address my main concern when creating a character. CONCEPT. This Veteran pool of powers should be an assortment of powers a Veteran can use to polish their character's concept. Does he have a Ray Gun? a Scabard for his sword, a Bow and arrows, a Sword?

It would be terrific if we were worried a little more about Concept and not so much about Min-Maxing.

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I agree! I mentioned the same thing just last page. Previous post

I try to pick the rewards that further my character's theme, and I hope we continue to get more variety in our choices, not repeats of items that didn't fit my concept the first time around.

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Whta I've suggested in the past is that the devs make a "veteran melee power pool" and a "veteran ranged power pool" and add powers to each as necessary. Make the veteran rewards grant one choice from the appropriate pool. So if they decide to add some new snazzy veteran attack, newer players will still have a shot at them before they grow old and die. The advantage older players will have is that they will have more *selections* but not necessarily a better set of selections which means there is less of a problem adding overly interesting veteran attacks.

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/signed

Defintely a better system than we have now IMO

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As has been posted in rebuttal many, many times, such a "pick your vet reward from a pool" system is not a good idea. Just to recap a few objections:

1) This front-loads the best vet rewards, making the rest of the rewards less anticipated over time, effectively providing a declining incentive to stick around.

2) Balance concerns: Should everyone get the nemesis staff at only three months? There's probably a solid game balance reason behind why some vet rewards take a long time to get.

3) Vet rewards are a visual indicator of vet status. Boxing costume? That player must have been around at least 39 months. A self-buff pet? They've been around at least 48 months. A pick-your-own system removes all status from the visual cue, since any reward can be picked up as early as 3 months.

4) Newer vet rewards would be decreased in effectiveness, not made better, under such a system, since the devs would not want really good vet rewards flooding the game environment as early as 3 months after the new really good vet power is introduced.

Let's pretend as an example that the devs might decide to give out a jetpack "temp" power at 57 months, and aren't worried that it will affect the game too much since few would have it.

But under a "pick your own" system the devs would just give out some junk power like a snowball instead, and a jetpack power would NEVER be added as a vet reward because then everyone would have the option of skipping travel powers entirely after playing the game for only 3 months.

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While I understand the logic and sentiment behind your arguement, not all of it really works in practice. The main request that I've seen is for a "melee pool" and a "ranged pool".

The first opportunity to pick from the melee choices wouldn't occur until 12 months, thus preserving a sense of something for which to strive. Nobody would be grabbing an extra atack at only the 3 month mark.

In a similar fashion, the first choice of ranged items would not happen until 33 months.

Costume parts and a hypothetical jetpack are neither melee or ranged attacks. They ought to remain on the existing schedule (along with TP powers and all the other neat stuff), which would keep the sense of status you mentioned intact.

New reward powers don't necessarily have to be "really good", they just have to be "equally good" to what has already been provided. In fact, I'd pick stuff that might be "less good" than what I have already, as long as the power fit the concept of my character.

I'm actually less impressed by the fact that my forthcoming option will be to select something that I already chose to ignore. I don't have that sense of "hey cool, i can't wait to earn that!" (and my personal wish is that they'd give me a holy shotgun instead ). If they did choose to provide a "really good" item, then I wouldn't mind if it had a crazy long recharge to keep it from being abused. Maybe the nictus or nullifier guns would be fun to have.

Anyway, just my thoughts.

GC

Can it count as a "crafting" everytime I combine three inspirations?

I'm generally happy to run any new special event activities multiple times and tend to have lots of fun in the process, however, I'm not impressed with this year's new stuff.

Reason 1: The Atlas and Mercy contacts don't appear on your list until you find them, at which point they are listed as being in Pocket D. That's sloppy.

Reason 2: The location for the missions don't make sense. Why does Arachnos have a warehouse in Atlas, and why would the heroes store their gifts in Mercy? It would have been more logical to travel to the opposing faction's territory, or at least provide enough text to give the illusion of actually doing so.

Reason 3: There's not even a souvenir for completing the tasks, let alone a badge to commemorate the event. Sure marriage is supposed to be a one-time deal, but all they'd have to do was make it a badge mission and add it to Ouroboros somehow. It would have been cool for heroes to get something like Best Man/Maid of Honor and villains Wedding Crasher.

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This is all fantastic, but the one thing missing now is being able to see the change in these numbers _before_ you slot enhancement, in the popup alongside the %ages.

Then finally people might stop slotting hover and combat jumping for defence

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I agree. Forget defense, it's much more fun to stash them full of unique global bonuses, especially for ATs that don't have many powers of their own that can slot them.

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Although it's a momentary inconvenience for defeat tasks, it always struck me odd that enemy NPCs just chatted it up while the Rikti rained down around them. This will add some immersion to the event, IMO.

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Not really, I have some cool screenshots of an Ancestor Spirit flying after a dropship trying to pummel it. To me, that was immersion. I actually saw the other denizens of the city trying to do their part to save it, even if they were the "bad guys." Plus, nothing beats seeing a lone Carny in PI get nuked by the big double laser cannon.

What if the story arc reward pool could also be tied to SafeGuards and Mayhems? It takes 4 - 6 missions to complete the process and requires a key enemy to be defeated, so the effort would be somewhat like doing an arc. Or would it be too farmable by teaming with lower level players?

I may have missed a post here or there on the thread, but has anyone mentioned the restaurants? Back when I lived in Vegas there was actually a Supermex down the street from my apartment. 24 hour mexican food, how I miss thee... Also, the Up-n-Away Burger is a mock of In-n-out Burger, some of the best cheeseburgers and shakes you'll find in Nevada and California.