Greyed

Awesome examples, Soulie. I was truly stunned to see how exceptional your costumes looked.

I just wanted to add something for people who are trying to think of alternate costumes. I'd provide examples but haven't figured out how to easily screenshot from the tailor screen.

My first costume is often the "When I was young" look. I don't try to go overboard, try for something unique and fitting the character but simple. For example Ice Magenta is almost a street look even though she's an Ice/Kin controller. Jacket, normal shirt, bandana, long hair, normal boots. She came on her powers from a science experiment gone awry so that first costume is when she got them and had only her closet to go by. Second costume was typical '90s post-Miller Batman comic kitsch, leather/latex, mask, cape, dark colors. Third costume was the typical minimalist tights with creative holes. Difference was her skin was now the color her costume normally was previously (purple).

I carry the street clothes idea on my other heroes normally as their second outfit. Just something you'd see any joe wearing while walking down the street.

Kitsume, my claws/sr scrapper ended up having a tarted out costume for her first one. Nothing excessively revealing; in fact she's almost completely covered. Her second costume was a departure from "Street clothes" since her first costume was street-ish. She's a cyborg and while her first outfit shows nothing of that except for her claws I decided to make her second outfit "battle-damaged". Robot arms, armored legs with strappy shoes to make it look like her skin comes right out of the metal of the legs. Plate on her head. All the metal parts the same bluish-grey color. Any time she dies and has debt I put on that costume until the debt is gone.

Finally sometimes I just look elsewhere for inspiration. I know there was a problem early on with clones but sometimes I just can't resist looking at some hero and while not copying them in name or powers (no claws/regen scrapper named wuf'r'een here, thanks) I do tend to look at an outfit and wonder "Huh, can I make something in that similar style in the costume designer?"
That even extends to CoX's own styles sometimes.

For example, my latest character, a Fire/DA Brute named Mortigi, has a short bio. She's a former unwilling participant in the 5th Column's experiments to create a new super soldier. Figured fire from, uh, some 5th Column (or was Longbow blurring in there) for offense and DA from the dark influence of the vampires. Her first costume would be what she appropriated when she escaped, a 5th Column uniform. It's not a perfect match since I stylized it a tad for a short female (none of those in the ubermencsh) super-soldier. However when I ran into the 5th Column in the Orobouros(sp!) missions I was pleased with how she compared to her far larger and squishier predecessors. Her second outfit was a street outfit that showed off her vampire side a tad more. Third outfit was inspired by another nazi + female vampire character.

Anyway, long post but to sum up, when going for those second/third/forth costumes try thinking of how your character would look in other times, other situations or imagined in different ways. In the above I've got homage looks, street looks, throw-back to previous eras in comicdom and looks to denote a character's current status. The costume designer is wonderful in how expressive one can be with it while still being dead simple to use. I think the only way to get something with more freedom would be to start getting into Poser and hand-designing everything.

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Well, as someone who sometimes plays a thermal, there are people who yell at us for buffing them as well.

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Not sure what a thermal could do that would get me to not asking but.... maybe this is just my peeve....

Mr. I snort CRANK for BREAKFAST! - Any kin who insists on speedboosting everyone in the group at all times! You're a melee with a narrow cone attack (DM & Fire, I'm looking at you) too bad! You're solo-attacking everyone at WARPSPEED! Why? Because I can buff you and you can't toggle it off, Bwa-hahhahahahahaaaaa!

Great, I can run to my standing spot faster, great, thanks. Yeah, I know I get more end but, y'know, I'm slotted so I don't need outside end to function. It's nice but know what's nicer? Not running 1/2 the map when I tap a key!

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I'm with Culach on travel powers. Most of my villains waited untill they were 30 before they got travel powers

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I think that this is backwards thinking esp. with mal/exemp and now the I11 time travel. Both scale powers back to what you had at that level. Furthermore the paper/scanner powers are temporary which means anyone doing a no-temp run pre-30 on one of these builds is now running everywhere.

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The real truth about mods...

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Was nowhere present in your post.

All of this anti-modding talk ignores the 800lb gorilla in the corner.

WoW... encourages... modding.

Blizzard embedded the LUA programming language into the client and wrote an API so the Addon authors are able to do some amazing things. By controlling the interface they are able to control what is done with the interface. Sure, there were complaints when 2.0 came out and broke a slew of addons because they tightened up the API to disallow a lot of dubious actions but by and large it has not been a support nightmare for them at all. Why? Simple, since they provided the interface and the API they went on to further state that they do not support or endorse any addon. Their answer is to turn it off. It is up to the individual addon authors to support their addon, period.

So the modding community supports its own product. They are the ones who shoulder the burden, not Blizzard. Blizzard's response when the client doesn't start is to turn off all addons. If the client starts then, not their problem.

Take a look at some of the exceptionally large addon sites for WoW and you see an thriving community with tons of support.

Contrast that with the first MMO I ever saw modded. Asheron's Call. Granted this is well before modding MMOs became commonplace but the different is striking. Asheron's Call's behavior was modified through the reverse engineering of the protocol in a utility called Decal. Decal allowed a ton of mods to be added. However since Turbine did not directly control the API they were unable to restrict the API to limited calls. As a result while there were tons of useful, benign mods for AC there were also some bad ones; completely autonomous bots which were able to fight/loot on their own. Amazing pieces of code, really, but detrimental to the game as a whole. Turbine's policy was that the Decal cat was out of the bag and instead of restricting its use entirely it restricted any active, AFK fighting while leaving many of the useful benign portions alone.

To me modding, esp. the controlled modding as evident by Blizzard's embedding of LUA, is a good thing for the MMO community at large. It allows the community itself to scratch itches that the developers simply don't have time for. It increases the quality of life dramatically. When I poke at MMOs other than WoW I am constantly dismayed at how horrible the UI is or at the missing features that could be addressed by a lively modding community.

Does it come with its own set of problems? Of course, anything does. Is it the bain of all gaming? Hardly. Is it appropriate for all games or in an unrestricted manner? Nope.

Anyone who is afraid of modding out of ignorance of some of the stellar community examples really has no place to judge. It can be done poorly, granted. But when done properly it is simply head and shoulders above the competition.

As stated controlling and channeling the modding community is becoming the dominant model in MMOs. In fact there are some MMOs which are going so far as to tap that large potential to help the developers provide content. Neverwinter Nights and it's successors are ample evidence of that trend. I don't recall the MMO which is going to do that as a matter of policy but I know there is one out there in development. I believe Ryzom (Sp?) is another that encourages development of content by players.

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Long time player, 7th time poster. Call me crazy, but when I think of Super Heroes/Villains, the last thing on my mind is what kind of 'weapon' they can wield.

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While you may not others do. Quite a few of the classic comic book heroes have specific weapons. Just to name one if you think Elektra you think Sai. Not daggers, katanas, short swords, rapiers or other pointy, stabby, stabby type weapons. Sai.

Now understand that for many of us the characters we think of exist independent of the character designer. What we get in the character designer will be, at best, a close approximation of the specific look in our heads. That includes the specific weapon.

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This is not D&D, WoW, etc.

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You're right. In the online versions of those games we have no choice as to how our character looks or what weapons they wield.

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Read what I wrote, I said you had no legitimate expectation of this based on law or general business custom.

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I did. I suggest you now read what I wrote instead of seeing my name and pontificating. I have at no time indicated that I have a legal right to anything. I know that.

However, I have stated that it is good customer service. Customer service is often what goes above and beyond what is legally required of a business. Furthermore you claim it is against "general business custom" and yet I have pointed out that there are several examples, some of which I was personally involved in, where I feel it is a business custom and that neither of our opinions is the general case.

So we have no issue about the legal ramifications and we're having a matter of difference on the opinion portion. That somehow makes me unreasonable and you reasonable? Not likely.

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Don't want a response - don't post. It's been like that since the dawn of the BBS era.

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Don't like what other people have to say, don't live here. Freedom of expression, been like that since the dawn of the nation. I'm sorry you don't like my opinion. I'm not going to censor myself for you nor will I not call you, and others, out on your rude behavior.

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I don't agree you're out anything. You bought something. Somebody else got that same something for free. Oh well. That happens occassionally.

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The person I was replying to did. I used their terms that I was "out 5 bucks."

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No what you're asking for is for them to make a change in their payment system for you. That's unreasonable. It seems reasonable to you because you're only thinking of yourself. You aren't thinking of how difficult this might be to accomplish or how it sets a bad precedent.

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Quite the contrary they are perfectly capable of issuing subscription credit. It has happened in the past in day increments. Furthermore I am not only thinking of myself. I have clearly indicated that anyone within a reasonable time frame should also be accorded the same credit. I cited 30-60 days as a possible range. So no, I'm not asking for anything that hasn't already been done and I'm not only thinking of my specific case. My specific case just happens to be the example I am most familiar with.

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Your request is unreasonable and unjustified, because you have no legitimate expectation of a refund based on the law or even general business custom.

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Again you're wrong. As other people have cited here Apple did much the same thing when they lowered the price on the iPhone by $100. Furthermore there are many other examples companies offering some sort of compensation where a fundamental change in the price structure of a product could be taken by customers as shafting them out of something.

Does it happen 100% of the time? No.

Does it not happen 100% of the time? No.

It is up to the individual businesses. However if you think it never happens you're flat out wrong. I've worked for several companies who did just that because they were doing right by the small segment of customers during that transition who could feel slighted. That is good customer relations. It is by no means mandatory but in spite of what you and your mean-spirited compatriots think it is not unreasonable by any stretch of the imagination.

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You opinion about what is a reasonable response doesn't seem to based in reason, only in your emotional attachment to $5.

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Nope, it is based on past experiences with other companies, other cites in this very topic and my own personal experiences being on the business end of the transitional process. Every single one of those is based on reason surrounding the principle of the transaction and not the attachment to the money. If it were about the attachment to the money I would've threatened to or have already quit. I have not. I have offered a reasonable set of parameters, a simple way to redress the issue and have done so in a reasonable, logical manner. If you want to see emotion look at the replies to my messages.

I'm aware of how much it is. If you had read my posts I even gave material to it, 5-pieces off the Arby's 5-for-5 menu.

The point is that, yes, I am out $5. It doesn't matter if it is $5 or $5,000,000, the issue is that it is money that I am out.

Now, did you read what I was asking for? Did you read my suggestion?

7-10 days tacked on to my subscription.

I'm not asking for the moon and stars. I am simply asking for the $5 that even you admit I am "out" to be converted to an equal amount of time as if I had paid for it... because I did pay for it!

I'm not asking for a refund. I'm not asking for another whole month for that $5. I'm asking an amount of time that the $5 would have gotten me if I had been able to make such minimal payments. At $15/month, that's 1/3rd a month or... 7-10 days depending on which month you choose to pick (Feb 7, most others 10). I'm not even demanding that they pro-rate it at any of the more economical rates one gets for prepaying for months/a year in advance.

I fail to see how that is in any way unreasonable or unjustified given the specific circumstances. So far I have been given unreasonable responses.

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The issue is solely the 72-96 hours from my purchase of CoV to it being given out for free. That's a pretty expensive 72-96 hours compared to the rest of the time. I do not think it is beyond the pale for NCSoft to look at that small segment (say within 30-60 days of the activation) and addressing those users accordingly. That is just good solid customer service.

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No, it's somebody trying to scam something for free that they don't deserve.

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Say what? How do you figure?

Here's the sequence.

I *LEFT* CoH when CoV came out. I went to other games.

Less than a week ago I decided, "Hm, wonder what's going on with CoH, I miss it." I poke at the site, decide to pick up CoV so I can have a lot of new content to play with. 3-4 days later CoV would have been free to me.

How is that a scam? I'm a returning customer who decided to purchase the game right before an unknown event that would have saved me money.

Am I asking for all the Veteran Awards from the years between the time that I stopped my sub for CoH and I restarted for CoV? Nope.

Am I upset that they have given out the prestige power dash from beta to everyone as a veterean award? Nope.

Am I someone who bought CoV months/years ago who wants to get free time while ignoring the fact I got to play the game for several months/years in the meantime? Nope.

I am a returning customer who was 3-4 days on the wrong side of a major announcement. Like I said, I don't think that it is beyond the pale that NCSoft address that admittedly small segment. That's not a scam, that's an honest, tempered concern.

What's beyond the pale and certainly not tempered is the responses from people such as yourself.

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Or you could just look at it as you have lost nothing. Some other people just gained something that they weren't expecting.

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Uh, how have I not lost something. If a few nights ago in a fit of nostalgia I didn't purchase CoV to play it in my spare time and, instead, waited a few days I would have spent $5 less. That is not nothing. That's 5 flippin' items at Arby's if you want to put material to it.

Look, I agree with the people who got CoV months ago. They got all that play time in between. Heck, I didn't complain when Core Combat was bundled into Planetside for everyone. that's not the issue.

The issue is solely the 72-96 hours from my purchase of CoV to it being given out for free. That's a pretty expensive 72-96 hours compared to the rest of the time. I do not think it is beyond the pale for NCSoft to look at that small segment (say within 30-60 days of the activation) and addressing those users accordingly. That is just good solid customer service.

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People who are complaining about everybody having CoH and CoV... stop complaining. You got one month of playtime with purchase of CoV. Overall, it's good news. Perhaps villainside will get some more exposure with the people who only got City of Heroes, and didn't get Villains. Villainside is mostly neglected, while on hero side, I can find a team at any level range...


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Agree


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Disagree. For people who bought CoV when it came out, or even 6 months ago, I agree. But for people who bought CoV less than a week ago (Yes, ME) the end result is that this month is costing me $20 instead of $15. I would hope that NCSoft would include something for recent adopters of CoV so they don't feel shafted out a couple bucks. Tack on 10 days on our subscription or something.

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an added $0-$5/month is worth the money and the problem becomes, "How will I find time to burn through doubled content updates?"

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Nice hyperbole. Hate to break it to you but for both I3, I4 and now I5 I have been sitting... for months.... waiting for the next issue for more content. At the same time my play time has dropped dramatically. If you think that double the content at the current snails pace is going to overwhelm someone you're sorely mistaken. Go play AC with monthly content updates to see how fast content comes out and how little people get overwhelmed with content coming that fast. Simply put unless CoH and CoV both went to monthly updates with the releases staggered every 2 weeks your proposed problem will not be releazed by the majority of players.

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Anyway, I scored: 19 out of 21
Which is surprising since I'm not here for the comic book culture.

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Which only proves how iconic a basic color pattern can be.

20/21 here.

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And durability. meh.

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Any MMORPG which has tradable equipment without durability is, by design, flawed. This is because the "good" equipment is rarely, if ever, removed from the collective inventory pool of the players. Because of this there is an ever slipping slope of what is considered good. It directly feeds the bigger-badder syndrome which has been the bane of RPGs since Gygax wrote the original D&D.

For example I remember when I started out on AC that I scraped and borrowed and worked hard for a set of store bought yoroi armor. Loved that armor. Loved the look, the protection. 4 years later when I went back to AC after an extended hiatus I didn't have to work hard for a set of yoroi armor. Nope. Found an ex-vassal and she handed me a nice magical shield I could activate, a mattie coat (of which she had about 20), reedshark leggings (again, maybe about 20), and a selection of weapons which put any store bought or low-level looted stuff to shame. That set of weapons and armor lasted me 20 levels. Of course most people if they were out hunting and looting would have just simply left anything comparable to it to rot because it was also all considered worthless.

The trick, and one that WoW achieved (at least in beta and in the 20 or so levels I saw) was that the item durability does not reduce the item's usefulness for the primary wearer until well after they would have reasonably moved on to a better set. This allows someone to wear a set of armor and hand it down to someone who could wear it, hand it down to someone who would be glad to get it but know it would wear out. 1-2 passdowns then gone. Keeps the above from happening and keeps the item economy as a whole viable.

CoH, on the other hand, takes a different approach. Our items, enc and insp, are non-transferable. Yes, I can give some newb a level 50 enc, he can't use it. I can use it but then I can't transfer it. There is simply no hand-downs, at all.

Both systems have their merits and flaws. WoW's "flaw" is you have to repair your armor and equipment every now and again. To me that isn't a flaw, esp. since they made it simple. Click on the blacksmith, hit "repair everything." Done.

CoH's flaw is that a popular portion of MMORPGs, the forraging/looting aspect, is completely removed. Come level 30-35 one simply doesn't care what one gets, it's all just a source of inf for their next set of enc when they level high enough. This I do consider a flaw because post-40 CoH felt like a grind more than AC ever did even though AC's levels were farther between. It's because in AC I could log in, go to a favorite dungeon, smack mobs around and poke through the loot generated. I might get something neat, I might not. But it entertained me and I honestly wasn't watching the XP bar because I was interested in the tactics of smacking mobs down and sorting through the loot they generated. In CoH after you've read the story-lines and learned (or dreaded) the tactics employed there's nothing left but to eye the XP bar.

So given my druthers I would rather have an equipment system with durability. On the other hand I far prefer the customization of our toons as it stands and would loathe to have to have my character's look change every time he switched equipment. Invariably they'd all look the same.

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Some Highlights.

PvP.


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And because of it the PvE suffers. I gave it a spin on one of their beta weekends and left it after an hour utterly unimpressed with the PvE. I simply couldn't just strike out in a direction and see what was out there. The land was funneling me to where they wanted me to go, always. There was 0 exploration. In that regard it resembled Dugeon Siege more than anything else and, frankly, DS did it better, sooner.

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P.S. There are other missions that can and are being herded btw. Just as good as wolves. Hate to break your heart, but there is no reason you can't enjoy the game anyways. Herders aren't hurting you at all. Looks like a good compromise the devs made.

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You're sure about that? This has been demonstraitably proven throughout the MMORPG genre's history as false.

Herders hit the cap first. What do they do? Ask for high level content. Since there's a finite number of developer hours they can either ignore those people, which is a bad business practice, or devote hours to them which is less hours from people who didn't take the cheap route out.

And before you bring up the "But you get that content, too" argument two things. First, they skip the content and just cheat their way up again to repeat the cycle. Second, time and again in pretty much every MMORPG I've played (and it's hard to name one I haven't played) loads of content, some of the best content, comes out for the lower to middle levels where the developers have had time to figure out what is and isn't reasonably possible for the players to do and push the players to the limit.

Want proof of that? I can do it in 5 words:

Shadow Shard vs. Striga Isle.

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Do you folks have any idea of how cool PvP can be?!!!11!

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Yes, I can. That would be why I enjoy Counter-Strike, Counter-Strike:Source, Day of Defeat, Natural Selection, World War II Online, Planetside and a plethora of other games specifically designed for PvP.

However every instance where PvP has been introduced into an MMORPG that I have participated in (Asheron's Call, Anarchy Online, Shadowbane, Star Wars Galaxies) the result has been pathetic and often ended in nothing but unending problems for the PvE aspect.

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Really. Battling wits with other players is SO much more fun than playing against AI.

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Agreed. But MMORPGs have nothing of the sort. PvP in MMORPGs boils down to 3 types of conflict.

a: the high-low gank. AKA, "My character is much higher than yours, instant win!"
b: the multi-gank. AKA, roving gangs (2-5) against lone members.
c: the lagfest. AKA, 100-200 participants in a single location where it all boils down to luck.

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And, yes, it needs to be well designed -- and this is hard. For example, I have no idea how they will solve the problem of flyers vs. melee, and how Taunt will work.

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That's just it, some designs simply do not work. No amount of engineering will alter that fact. I, and many others, firmly believe that PvP in MMORPGs is one of those concepts which is completely flawed at the onset.

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But a well-designed, optional PvP with the right reward/punishment structure can be so, so, cool.

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Such a system would never survive contact with the playing public. Even systems designed with PvP in mind (Shadowbane, WWIIOL, Planetside) rarely live up to the potential they have because they have to interact with the playing population and the worst behavior of those individuals.

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Let me take issue three as an example. Stiga island is very cool and well built zone(which I will NOT say for the hollows) BUT after the stiga specfic mission, which you have to play through all the other lv 20-30 missions AGAIN to get to, its the same ole door mission, in the same ole buildings with the same ole objectives.

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Uh, have you actually played on Striga or are you just saying that having passed it and only looked at Striga?

Striga introduced several variants of the Ship layout.
Striga introduced a new cavern layout.
Striga introduced a new mob generator.

So far that is what I have found and I'm not done with Striga yet. Furthermore you don't have to play through all the 20-30 missions to get to it. You need to get your level 20 contacts, find the one that sends you to your first Striga contact and that's it. Since then I have been doing nothing but Striga missions. 20-24, pure Striga, no other missions. Only exception was a Sister Psyche Task Force (24-25) because I had accumulated enough debt to prevent me from being 25 when I needed to start up my third contact.

As an example of what is wrong with I3 Striga is the worst example to take.

A better example would be the Global Chat which does not in any way address the problem of multi-SG chat in a simple to use and automatic way. We asked for and were promised one thing and got something, while technically superior, is far harder to use and not what we expected, were promised or wanted.

Regardless, add me to the chorus of disappointed messages. SSOCS pushed back again in favor of PvP? Please. PvP isn't end game. PvP is nothing more than one large "mine's bigger" contest. I have never, never seen PvP in a western MMORPG do well. If anyone thinks PvP is some godsend to western MMORPGs and worthy of anything other than a nice way to filter out the jerks of the game I'll ask this simple question:

Why is Shadowbane near dead instead of the top selling western MMORPG?

Arenas. *spiit* Take the development time for that and put it into a decent multi-SG chat, get the SSOCS out and push Arena back to "never". CoH will be a far better game for it.

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Hmm..... last time I checked Windows XP upgrade cost $89..... so with that $99 you could buy the actual operating system, have NO compatibility issues and still have enough money for 10 Frostee's at Wendy's! Now why would I want to pay for this program?

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Operative word, upgrade. You have to upgrade from an existing version of Windows. IIRC specific versions at that. It also leaves you with a non-working coaster if you ever fry your entire HD. A complete version is far more than $89.

BTW, the main reason XP shall never taint my HD. I make 3 changes to my machine and I have to call Microsoft for a reactivation code. Let's see, in the past year I've upgraded my video card, CPU, RAM, botherboard, case, went from a CD-R to a DVD-R/CD-RW and switched between my external sound card and the mobo's on board sound card about 6 times. I'm thinkin' there's at least 2 calls to Microsoft in there somewhere, if not 3. Of course all of that is avoidable if I fork out the money for XP Pro.

Ooooor I can run Linux, have an OS that does what I want it to do instead of tell me what it thinks I should do and support Transgaming with the overall money and time I save.

Of course I am still having problems getting CoH running. >.<

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By contract, Buffs from the same caster and the same power on the same target do not stack. However, ALL buffs on one target, will stack if they come from a different caster, or from the same caster but a different power.

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Does this mean I should bug Siphon Power?

It is the same buff from the same caster yet it will stack with itsenf for about 2s. And yes, I have confirmed it with damage numbers as well as the graphics. For 2 attacks after the 2nd Siphon Power they will do more damage than the rest of the attacks which have only one Siphon Power applied which, in turn, has more than the base attack.

Grey and Phaedra's Screenies. Stuff in there going back to beta.

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I like what they did with Update 2, Yes launch day was a little rocky. I'm still feeling the sting of it. but everything seams to be working now.

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Wow, you'd think that was the first patch day anyone had ever been through.

And if it has, here's a word of advice.

No matter what company does it.
No matter what MMOG it is for.
No matter what their past record is at patching.
Never play on patch day!
If you do, never complain about problems on patch day.

No matter how much testing gets put into a patch there's always, always, always going to be something missed. Sometimes it's something minor which can sit until the next patch day. Sometimes, though, it is something major that causes loads of people problems and needs drastic measures to fix, like a rollback or some such. Playing on patch day is silent assent that all play (dispise people who call it work, if it's work, quit the game already, we're here to play not work!) on that day can disappear.

I've seen it with AC too many times to count and Turbine is one of the best people running an MMORPG out right now. They've committed to monthly updates and while 90%+ of them go of without a hitch there have been some doozie patch days.

Same thing with Funcom, SOE, and others though I don't hold them in as high esteem as Turbine.

Trust me, as a major patch goes Issue 2 was sweet. As a patch day goes the day I2 went live was one of the smoother releases. Typical Cryptic style.

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From a player's point of view, leveling up to be able to fight the same amount of minions / same cons is a stalemate and not progress.

Even if they are aliens with plasma weapons instead of punks with baseball bats. We take "that" increase in power for granted.

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What a load of bull. Seriously. Let's have a nice comparative reality check here, ok? Remember the ol' debt wars when people would say "And this is how it is!" yet were blown out of the water when CoH was compared to other games? Here goes.

EQ - Even con ment 1 mob, maybe 2 if you were extremely lucky on the low end. As far as I got in that game (which, admittedly, wasn't that far) it was still 1 even con mob was a decent fight and 2 was pushing it. You wanted to take on more, you got more people though they tended to do the dumb thing and instead of taking on mass of whites took on an orange or red.

AO - 1 Even con was an even fight against a player. It was that way at level 1 and was that way when I quit my MA in her 50s and was that way when I quit my doc about a year after release in her 70s. It was still that way when I gave it another month when my doc was in her 80s.

Shadowbane - Even con was a tough fight for a player. Was that way at level 1. Was that way 3 months later when I quit in my 50s with a soft level cap of 60.

Horizons - Even con was a tough fight for a player. Was that way at level 1. Was that way 2 months later when I quit in my 40s of the then level 100 cap.

AC2 - Even con was a tough fight. Was that way from 1 to 14 or so when I quit.

EnB - same thing for the time I spent in it (a week).

The only MMORPG, only MMORPG where a solo "even" mob did not equal a player that I have personally played was Asheron's Call. AC had no "con". You looked at a mob and it had a level. That level determined if you got full xp or degraded xp as it's level went under yours. Even then some mobs were a tough fight at even level but lots weren't. You could take on 4-5, 10, 15 at a time. But you had to be stocked properly.

But here's the catch. In AC, depending on your build, the first few levels didn't really count. AC's system was wacky in that it rewarded melee players to minimize their endurance and thus their stamina and hp to maximize their offense and defense. So most melee players started off with the minimum and could literally be 1-shot by most mobs out there.

But get into the high single-digits and it started to even out. By the low teens (about level 4-5 on CoH) and the toons all hit their stride. They could take on about 4-5 mobs simultaniously if they were smart but no more than 6. More than that and they dropped. They could keep that same 6 engaged as long as their supplies lasted. Once it ran out, that was it.

So in the mid-teens it was 5-6 Banderlings or Mossies.
Late teens the entryway of the Lugian Citadels or the BSDs.
20s through 30s, the deep Citadels or the deep BSDs.
30s-35s, the OHN (old one)
35-50, the OHN and some of the Olthoi dungeons on ML
50-65 or so, the Evis. Lair or the Tusker dungeons on the monkey isle.
etc, etc, etc....

So the one example of multi-mob-on-single PC held to the same patter. There was a magic number, either you could take on 1 really rough mob (which normally wasn't worth it) or you could take on 4-5, maybe 6 "even" mobs at a time and survive. More than that, you're toast.

The mobs got harder. The heroes got tougher but the status quo pretty much was the same.

So please, spare me the "oh, gee, we should be able to fight more minions even though those minions are so much harder because that's what we expect". If you expect it it is because of the admited problem in post-22 (I'd say 24, 3 levels to get decked out in SOs on the combat powers) difficulty. According to published stats you should realize you're overpowered and by the mere fact that the support roles drop off around then in their usefulness to soloists should tell you a lot.

And don't give me that "forced grouping" load, either. I'm so sick of that bull. People are screaming that every time there's the slightest hint of having to actually come in contact with another player. AC was one of the most solo friendly MMORPGs out there, still is. Even so every time a quest dungeon came out, even ones which required 2 teams to flip physically separated switches, there wasn't this much whining and BS thrown at the devs. It was cool and fun and exciting. So what that you needed a decent group to do it. Those who got over their anti-social hangup got cool stuff. I hope CoH follows suit. Not everything should be soloable. Deal with it.

Don't give me that "other games don't do this." They do.

And finally, newsflash, the post-22 difficulty problem adversely affects tankers. You want the changes to come about. Why? Well not like tankers are blowing through the mobs now like the blasters and scrappers are. But they sure don't need you to take on the larger stuff but you do need them. Mull that over.

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3 even level minions shouldn't be a threat or even a challenge to a vetran lv 40 hero... maybe YOU don't get it.

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Oh, we do. Do you?

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or do you and the other fanboys expect me to belive that all the minons have been working out while my hero has been sitting on a couch eating bon-bons for 20 levels and not getting any stronger despite the hours I've put into him?

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Let me ask you, do you think the minions have been doing the same? Put a Crey Mob Specialist against.... hmmm, 20 levels? Against a Tsoo Eagle Enforcer. Which is going to win?

Crey Mob Specialist.

Why?

Because he's stronger than the Tsoo Eagle Enforcer.

Are you somhow laboring under the illision that "minion" means "level 5" until the end of time? That the different factions have different power ranges? That, my god man, could it be the minions of "now" are not the minions of "before".

How about making an apple on apple comparison here.

A Crey Mob Specialist at 40 and a Tsoo Eagle Enforcer at 20 might both say "minion" but they are not equal.

Tell me, how many Tsoo Eagle Enforcers could you take out in one swoop at 20? At 40? Is the amount at 40 more than the amount at 20? I'd bet cold hard cash it is.

So exactly in what warped world do you think that a level 40 minion is somehow comparable to a level 40 minion and that you should take out more even cons at 40 than you did at 20? What makes you think that stronger minions aren't just that... STRONGER.

As you so eloquently put it, and about the only value your post had...

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geeze why bother.

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