Ironik

Look down, Alt Alphabet. Like Obscure Blade, I don't do TFs much. I've done more this past summer than in the past 5 years combined, and that's only because VexXxa has been organizing them and those guys are inordinately tolerant of my constant disconnects. I do the tips, pretty much just running missions now in order to get the tips, then doing all of them. I haven't noticed any amazing financial or merit gains from tip missions, though.

Also, on that 89 million guy, I gave a ton of Influence away to new players to help get them started. I think he probably had 220 million before I did that. Just one of the ways I like to be a good ambassador for this game. I also take the time to explain things to new players. I don't even know how many times I've done that, but it must be hundreds of hours by now.

The first season of Human Target was awesome. As long as the new show-runner (who's from Chuck) keeps Guerrero and Winston, I'm sure season 2 will be equally as good.

Smallville has always felt to me like the lesser Republic serials from back in the day: reliance on the same story each week, dragging out the plot with an anticlimactic finish at the end of the build-up, subplots which don't really amount to much.

Well, I won't be doing that, either. I think the richest of my toons has something like 89 million.

I really am starting to think that farming is the only way to actually get ahead in this game, because just playing it the regular way isn't getting my characters anywhere near these uber levels people speak of. Of all of my toons, only one has a full set of IOs. Not purples, just IOs. Everyone else above 32 has some generic IOs and maybe two or three partial IO sets with a lot of SOs slotted in there.

He is. He's just getting his butt modded, just like the rest of us. (Hiya 12!)

Ever hear the phrase "trick question"? Jeez, you kids, so literal these days.

It's apparently the only way I can participate in the Incarnate stuff, so yes. I'd say "annoyed" rather than "worked up," because it's not like this is a huge deal in my life. I mean, when the phlebotomist drew my blood today, it was nearly black. I know that means going back into the hospital next week, so in the grand scheme of things this is not a big deal. But yes, I'm irked by it because it cuts into how I have fun. You have fun in different ways and that's cool, but this is my way.

But they could be. I've seen the movies. A guy with a book, a cross and a vial of water went toe-to-toe with a demon inhabiting a little girl who vomited pea soup at him. Natural versus Demon, right there. Every week on Supernatural Sam and Dean take on all manner of magical baddies, and all they have is guns, guts and a kickin' Chevy.

What are you talking about? I just said that I am ignoring the Incarnate stuff the same way I'm ignoring the other stuff. (Not for all characters; for some of my characters the in-game story is fine. But for at least 3/4 my characters -- everyone who isn't Magic-themed or whose backstory isn't built upon the CoH lore -- I have to ignore that junk because it is, in a word, stupid.)

Because one is a game mechanic and the other is a ridiculous addition to the game story which constrains my creativity. As I said in the other thread, the Origin of Power story from Percy Winkley cheeses me off because it instantly invalidated nearly all of my characters. For some, such as my 117-year-old Mutant, it was right in his face when they said all Mutants originated in 1939. So suddenly my guy -- who existed *before* OoPs -- was rendered non-canon. And when Positron-NPC went on about Power Proliferation for no apparent reason, that notion suddenly made every single character some kind of ridiculous meld of magicky-techy mumbo-jumbo, completely altering our chosen origins. Even though the game doesn't actually support our Origins, some of us enjoy working with those while building characters. Having those characters invalidated because the Devs felt the bizarre need to explain a game mechanic -- and that's *all* Power proliferation is, you don't need a dang rationale for it -- is irksome.

I would prefer that they simply removed the idiocy of OoPs and PP because it's just that: idiotic. As I said in the other thread, there's no need to tell us that some characters share animations because we all were trained by the same guy. That kind of thing limits our creativity because suddenly your space alien, my boxer-turned-streetfighter and Joe Blow's time-traveling medieval ninja were somehow all trained by the same dude next to the bowling alley on 14th and Broad. The actual *reason* characters share animations is because of time and budget constraints while making the game. There's no need to explain it in the game world. That's an exact analogy to Powerset Proliferation. And now the Incarnate explanation.

Just let us be better and leave the explanations to us, mmkay?

As I said... sigh... I *do*.

I just wish I didn't have to.

I haven't gotten the newsletter in ages, but have had it turned on since Day One. (Well, Day One minus 60 days, technically.) I just assumed they weren't doing it any more for whatever reason.

Also haven't been invited to any betas since CoV, which I assume isn't a coincidence. (Those with long memories for trivia may recall why.)

Which IOs do these guys have slotted?

Let's do this, shall we? You play your way, I'll play mine.

My Natural guy does NOT run at 40 mph. That's a game mechanic which I ignore. He does NOT get a boost from IOs, he's in top physical condition. Now, in Paragon City, people are more fit than they are here on our world, but my guy is still Natural. Shoving a Magic suppository up his bum isn't going to happen: the Incarnate stuff is just going to be him firing on all cylinders and having a better-than-usual day, end of story.

Watch this: here's what people can do in OUR world. See this video, too: despite the one "running on water" thing which was a fake video by a shoe company, that's an example of the Natural origin. There are dozens of such videos of incredible athletic abilities people have. Look up Cirque du Soleil or Billy's Balls (ping pong ball tricks) or business card throwing... there are all sorts of gifts people have.

So yeah, my Natural guy can go head-to-head with demons and gods because he's just that good. That's how I play, and it's not wrong.

That's fine... for you. I don't see it that way.

Well, Christie Brinkley is coming to the end of her contract with Ol' Scratch, so he needed fresh blood.

At the grocery store I overheard one of the stupidest conversations ever not long ago:

Woman looking at Brinkley on a magazine: "It says she's 55! How does she look so good at 55?!"
Second woman: "And how do I get to look like her?"

Ladies, she looks so good at 55 for the same reason she looked good at 45, 35, 25, 15 and 5: good freakin' genes.

Game lore says so.

...and rian made a joke tangentially related to your post. That whooshing noise you hear is the joke sailing over your head.

You mean in addition to trading them like Feycat advises you also have to pay a fee? And a hefty one at that? My level 39 Scrapper (dinged yesterday) only has a touch over 8 million now.

Okay, but do you know WHY the Issues are named the way they are and from which literary/pop culture sources they spring?

That doesn't work for me. That will never work for me.

A regular guy getting a shot of magic? He becomes magic, period.

Therefore, some of my characters will have to completely ignore Incarnate stuff, just as they ignore the Origin of Power stuff, the Power Proliferation nonsense and the backstories behind the Patron Power Pools of CoV.

In the beta thread, it says you get knocked down to level 46 without the Alpha slot. So you'd be facing enemies that are +8 to you. Perhaps those guys were having a bit of fun with those of us not in the beta, but on the face of it that sounds pretty lame.

Auntie Proton is better, anyway.