James_Bonnell

I made it! I almost didn't remember it at all, b/c I *picked up my new gaming computer* from Fedex just before... but since I was on anyway...

Dominic Black, mastermind (yes, yes, poor choice in retrospect, pet lag, etc etc)... but eh whatever. I watched the action more!

A HUGE thank you to Arcanaville and the other good folks who put this on, and major thanks also to Samuraiko for recording!

I was up pretty late for this, but it was worth it!

Thanks to the devs for the game and for everyone who attended for helping to make it a terrifically memorable finale!



And, since I died a LOT... thanks for all the rezzes!

You did good, and I hope you can continue the art endeavors in other media.

I'm kind of doing a tour of my characters this week (on beta, finally, once I realized I could... couple months late but eh, well, better late than never)...

Your farewell video inspired me. Rather than just letting things fade, I'm screenshotting and playing my characters one last time or two. And probably going to do that hoping-against-hope character extract thingy. Why not.

So... cheers!

Jeez. I thought I was all done even thinking about the closure, then I watched Samuraiko's farewell.

It's pretty impressive what could be done with the capture function in this game.

... and now I'm even inspired to do at least one last tour of the game, before it goes.

So that's something.

/dusty in here.

I'll miss you Arcana!

I may head over to the Titan forums after the shutdown, we'll see. I always loved reading your posts and seeing what rationality and analysis you brought to all of your posts. I'd probably enjoy working with you in real life, although I'm not quite the numbers person you are... (SQL, now, that I can do in spades).

Just wanted to say thank you!

You have DEFINITELY helped make this community what it has been for the past X years.

Honestly for me, the two biggest problems were ED and travel power suppression.

I remember utterly LOVING the mobility that Super Speed gave, then, with travel power suppression, it became zip...jerk...slow...zip...

If there were anything early on that made me want to quit, it was travel power suppression. I *still* miss the zip-zip-zip.

However... I played enough that I did pretty much everything I wanted to.

Argh!

Since I missed re-subbing before the announcement of closure, I'd be willing to get Beta VIP unlocked (and move the characters I want to screenshot over there).

But when i connect, and try the store, it says the Beta store is not available.

Guess I'll try again later...

I'm not going to miss "find 20 glowies in Oranbega" missions.

I'm not going to miss "find glowy" door missions anywhere.

Um.

How awful the following AI was for rescued folks.

The Incarnate system (not that I tried it at all, really).

I'm sure there are others but those are what come to mind.

I don't know about favorite, as there were a LOT (my first 50 took *500* hours).

But back in the old days of herding werewolves into dumpsters (yeah, I know...) ... before Fulcrum Shift was nerfed (again and again)...

... dumpster diving on a kin/dark defender while the tank had all the critters, fulcrum shifting, and nuking. Werewolves fall down go boom.

THAT was fun.

Scrappers. Scrapperlock. Brutes. SMASH. Defenders (and oh, the board fights about what a defender was supposed to do!).

All-defender teams.

All-traps teams! I wish I'd gotten my trapster to 50.

The old Ring of Shadows / Infinity One crew.

Oh, don't get me wrong - I will certainly hope for a rescue.

It was just interesting earlier today - I picked one of my toons (first to 50 in ... yarg... 500 hours! back in 2004) to log in as a free player... and at 50, the character's done. It was kinda fun to run around for a few minutes, but there wasn't really anything I wanted to do with her - I've always been more of a leveler, so a maxed toon isn't that interesting to me.

I also NEVER got into the whole Incarnate thing.

I have done most of what I wanted to do with the game, but it was coming to the forums again - where I spent a HUGE amount of time - that really made me a lot more emotional.

It's the forum community I'll miss more than anything else, I think, although the folks I played with for several years on Infinity also deserve respect - Ravlin, Ruhe, Sorak, Groundzero, Statesman's Cat, Ichigo Milk, EqualOportunity, Kokoro, Law Dog, LadyShade - you guys were fun and I miss you all!

Just wanted to mention - in all the years I read and posted to these boards - you *always* impressed me with your willingness and ability to figure things out, Arcanaville. I just wanted to mention that, while the boards are still here...

As I told my wife today via email after I heard the news... I has a sad. I'll miss this place.

I will miss this game - but even more, I will miss the forum community. I was with it from launch until last year - didn't resub, no particular reason, but I'd done about everything I wanted to do.

Still, this news hit me hard - only saw it on Fark.com today, and had to come check it out.

At least i can post in all-access... since my sub lapsed and they're not letting us be VIPs now (hey, I'd *give* you a couple months worth of sub time!) ... this'll have to do.

Re-reading the forums after a long absence was like seeing old friends - Arcanaville, evilgeko, nethergoat, Fulmens, to name a VERY few - who I hadn't been around in a while. I always was more of a reader than poster...

And it's sad, knowing that all too soon, this too will fade.

Er... IIRC you get to the Cavern contact just by doing all the Hollows arcs, not based on your origin... doesn't matter if you're Natural and the contact is magic.

Your origin contact(s) only matter until about level 5 or you leave Atlas park.

Eh no. IMO Do NOT take Pummel or Bayonet if you go Wolf/Bane, or as I call my VEAT, Bane With A Gun. I tried the Huntsman, and found something was missing.

Massive striking-from-the-shadows Executioner's Strikes to be specific.

I ended up with: all the melee attacks, Mace Beam, Poisonous Ray, Buildup and from the gun side Venom Grenade, Heavy Burst, and Frag Grenade. Not many of the VEAT Leaderships, though and yes I took TT:M, I'm not crazed.

Solo, I may fire off Buildup/gun attacks on small groups, then finish with mace; teamed, I may serve as fire support, or I might go for boss-killer with Executioner's Strike. I can switch back and forth depending on what else is on the team.

I say avoid both Pummel and Bayonet simply because, if you have the mace anyway... while Bayonet gets the benefit of Cloaked +dmg... it's nothing compared to Shatter. I also avoided the rifle single-target blasts because, well, MB and TR are good enough for me, and don't force a redraw.

Other than my present lack of Stamina making teams a bit dicy without a pocket kin, my Bane With A Gun pretty much rocks the house solo.

I do try to avoid switching back and forth too often, but with even one other AOE user (fire corr, crab, etc)... Buildup (even with shiny mace draw) + Gun attacks is VERY worth it.

Yeah... Dev's Choice. I hadn't checked in a while to know that Dev Choice missions didn't give tickets... or I just didn't remember that until I saw it in another thread.

Nah, I played through whacking pretty much all the mobs, the one arc I did last night - Twoflower's "Moon Base" mission on villain side.

I remember Twoflower from his NWN mission-designer days, so getting to see his creation in CoV was pretty sweet.

Soo... yeah, mystery solved. I was just all "um, what"?

I didn't remember seeing the arc flagged as Dev's Choice, so... yeah.

Ah hah. Was wondering what was going on with no tickets.

Huh. I did an arc and got NO tickets. ???

Cool. So my dream of an all-boss (one per spawn point) mission for efficient-boss-killer type characters can come true!

Whee.

Impressive work as usual Arcanaville!

One wonders if whoever named them Aspects and Attributes was a fan of Zelazny's Lord of Light.

Wow, no questions, but I've been a fan of Hero Games since Champions first started!

I was like wow! BRUCE HARLICK!

Yep, that Bruce Harlick. Cool!

Nice to have you aboard!

QR

Helmets get a shrug from me, but so do most costume options.

54... on the one hand, meh. Stuff I already have or don't want anyway.

BUT... silver lining? Now every character can have the Ghost Slaying Axe and have a better chance of dealing with those *(8%$8 CoT spectrals.

I usually go Sands and then Staff/Wand based on origin, once 54 hits I can grab Axe for anyone who has trouble with spectrals.

Lethal damage, negative damage... etc etc.

That said, hey free stuff... but something different would have been better.

Like some have said, maybe the Gabriel's Hammer or pistol temp powers.

I recently re-re-rebuilt my kat/regen scrapper. I've had Hasten and I've taken it out. I've usually used it only versus bosses or to get Instant Healing and Dull Pain back more quickly.

At present, I don't have it, and I don't really miss it.

The guide's quite good.

I have a few additional suggestions.

1) Knockdown is good. Soaring Dragon and Golden Dragonfly are great attacks. You can make SotW and GC into similar attacks via the Kinetic Combat chance for KD proc. It's not super-cheap, but it's not terribly expensive either.

2) Virtually every attack does -def. The -def sets have some nice IO bonuses, but also, offer some nice doubles, like recharge/end reduction.

The Achilles Heel -res proc and Touch of Lady Grey damage proc are also handy. Personally, I put Achilles Heel in GC and the Lady Grey proc in Lotus Drops.

Other than that, while you made some choices I didn't, the guide's nicely done!

Ah, that brings back memories.

Seeing all the new heroes when *everything* was fresh... hordes of heroes in Perez Park, no Hollows yet... running the Valor Bridge with a fire tank...

Seeing some... well, probably "inappropriate" characters like Duke Nukem clones, and one I still remember, The Flulk (Flash-Hulk). It was pretty neat even then to see what the costume creator could do.

That first time with a new travel power. Superspeed's stealth added a whole new aspect of gameplay, Super Jump was just fun, and Fly was... slow. Really, really freaking slow.

The first time on my kin def I hit Siphon Speed, and zipped around Atlas like a kid in a candy store. (Later, realizing that it sucked as a travel power in higher zones... and ONLY added to run speed at that point... made me respec out of it once I could. Then later the +recharge made it a no-brainer to put it back).

Heh. Hovering the entire length of Steel Canyon on a level 8 defender, because I didn't realize the two trams were NOT CONNECTED at all... both north AND south... THAT took a while. Mind you, completely unslotted.

Not understanding how slotting worked ... at all. THAT part, I don't mind that it didn't last that long.

I've had ups and downs... travel power suppression STILL irks me to this day. GDN and ED... meh. Don't like 'em but what can you do. Pre-IOs... I was starting to get REALLY bored with the game... while my sub has been essentially unbroken, there've been months where I didn't log in at all.

Presently... I log in daily, again.

Write our own content? Reeeeallly? Just like NWN and NWN2?

That's AWESOME!

Thanks Pos!

Also... wow, we spend a LOT of time on here...

Cool.

I never did buy myself a second account... and now I'm glad. I'm not into two-boxing anyway... now I won't have to.

And 6 free slots when I12 hits, rock. That'll keep me set for a while...

Of the children of Statesman and the Children of the Spider, there are some who are different from the rest, the users of devices and traps, or as some might say, Gadgets.

This is a tale of the Children of Blaster, and of Corruptor and Mastermind. (And the odd Scrapper and Stalker.)

In the beginning, the Statesman founded the great Hero Supply Company, manufacturer of personal defense Devices. (Why the ordinary citizens of Paragon do not shop there, remains unknown to this day.)

Scrapper, Tanker, Controller, and Defender would browse, but never buy anything. What need had they for tasers or invisibility cloaks when they could wield fire, ice, or electricity?

Blaster saw what was available, and spent time pondering, and wandering the hills behind the City, thinking. At last he said to the Statesman, "Many of my children, inspired by The Black Bat, and the Skull-Chested Man, do not want raw power to smite their enemies. They want to defeat their enemies with their own Gadgets. I want to give my children unlimited access to the Hero Supply Company's wares." And the Statesman agreed, seeing the truth in Blaster's words.

(Later, some of the children of Scrapper, after seeing the ways of the evil Knives of Artemis, would also get limited access to the Hero Supply Company. But this was much, much later.)

And the Children of Blaster did use the Caltrop and the Trip Mine, and did blow their enemies into tiny bits, and saw that it was good, and Blaster smiled.

(The Hero Supply Company has had a few scandals and ups and downs since the beginning, but remains a fixture in Paragon City to this day.)


The Spider looked on, and wanted to give his own Children even more power than the Children of Statesman. Thus, the Spider ordered the founding of the Villain Supply Company, yet another dark mirror of Statesman's own creations.

And the Spider said to his Children: "We will take the best of what they have, and I will give you even greater Gadgets to defeat your foes! Who wants this boon I offer?"

And Corruptor spoke up first, ever the dark mirror of Blaster and Defender: "I want it my lord!" For Corruptor remembered the demented and murderous Clown who often fought the Black Bat, and wanted to emulate him.

Mastermind spoke up, "I want it as well!" For Mastermind remembered the Bald Man, and how his genius and inventions would torment and bedevil the Man of Red and Blue, and wanted to emulate him.

Brute and Dominator ignored the Spider. Just as Tanker and Controller before them, they had no need for Gadgets.

Of the Children of Stalker, only Ninja spoke up... but very, very quietly, as was the nature of Stalker. (And this is why even today Ninja has the fewest Gadgets.)


And sometimes, the Childen of the Cities did ask, "But why do Corruptor and Mastermind get a Force Field Generator and Acid Mortar and Poison Trap, while Blaster gets an Autoturret and Smoke Grenade and Targeting Drone?"

"Some mysteries are unknown to even the wise. Perhaps it is just that the Spider had more imagination... or experience... than the Statesman, going second and all. But you didn't hear that from me."

And that is the story of Dev and Trap.