JamieB

OK, I think I get your original post on this now, and I even sort of agree, but I fear you've got more chance of getting a temp Rularuu the Ravager pet than getting 1K tickets in lieu of the Jackpot badge.

Thinking about it, JD, you're in the right on this one (I was trying to think of something, well, anything that compares with the time it takes to get "Unbreakable".)

My feeling is not dissimilar to yours on the issue; badges unobtainable within a reasonable amount of play-time should at least be non-requirements for accolades (and yes, people would still farm for the top-tier ones for completeness' sake, but I've no problem with that, not particularly having a horse in the 'must get all badges' race.)

I'm dumb today, JD, so not entirely following your logic there

If you put up an MA arc and went on holiday for a fortnight, during which 999 people five-starred your mish, wouldn't you also have soared through the ticket cap and got the entire Windfall->Jackpot line, or did that line only award for tickets in one's salvage inventory?

If the former is the case, surely that's reward for absolutely zero risk? If the latter, then yeah, inasmuch as I can understand your point, I think it's valid.

Sadly, even a cursory glance at the MA indicates that the process of clearing the Augean stables is, indeed, going to be Herculean; there are still plenty of obvious farm missions, "Rikti Dolls", etc.

I dunno though, seems a lot of people were expecting MA to come out perfect first time. I couldn't even get lasagna to do that, much less a user-generated content system :P

With a full team, the Illusionist hunt takes, what, an hour? An hour and a half? Still within the bounds of sanity, IMO. And, ultimately, still plausible to get via standard play, as long as one is running numerous Carnies missions (though it might help to have a Carnies-heavy TF in place; a good deal of the other multi-defeat badges can be gotten via TFs, after all).

I've got no problem with some of the more time-intensive badges, even the hard-to-get ones like the BP Masks etc., but anything that pretty specifically requires grinding — the 10 million damage taken one needed for the redside Born in Battle accolade, for example, which I'm not convinced any player has ever got in the "intended" way — should also be revisited, IMO.

(I'm more thinking of lowering the BiB requirements there, really. If people want that damage-taken badge enough to leave their puters on for however long getting hit by CoT archers, let 'em have the badge, says I.)

Good. Another two-hundred-plus tedious AE badge-farm missions gone, further narrowing down the pool of AE missions to those made with at least a modicum of effort and thought.

Couldn't care less about losing badges I had; if anything I'm glad to get shot of the need to beg other people to play my arcs so I can get whatever badge. And pretty much insta-accolade for the toons I've put a bit of badging effort in on.

In summary, then: Good.

Bronze rolls are all Pool A, so no Miracle +Recovery for you that way, I'm afraid; that particular unique is in Pool C, and furthermore only available between levels 20-40 (so if you roll on a 45-50 recipe, you WILL NOT have a chance to get it).

You could try merits (20 a throw for random, a fair few more to save up & buy direct), gold rolls, or —*I believe — Pool Cs now have a very small chance to drop from Bosses and EBs, but you'd presumably need to be fighting one of level 40 or below (and be in the right level range to get a drop) to stand a chance.

The absolute quickest way I could think of getting Miracle +Rec, without farming or blowing Inf on it, would be to run through the Shadow Shard TFs (with a decent team, 2-3 hours each) - half a day to a day's play will net you 111 (Dr Quaterfield) + 63 (Sara Moore) + 24 (Justin Augustine) + 73 (Faathim) = 271 merits total, enough for Miracle and (I think) one random roll.

Of course, you'd want to buy the Miracle +Rec proc at the lowest level possible (20) and slot it in the first slot in Health (assuming you don't also have Numina's Regen/Rec). This will keep it useful even when exemplared (a 20 one will be working even in Bloody Bay), and as the enhancement value of Miracle +Rec doesn't change, makes no difference to slotting it at level 50.

Your Hero designer has helped immeasurably in-game and *ahame* kept me busy for a fair few hours otherwise. Sincere thanks for all your hard work!

Highlight and right-click the text - you'll get a dropdown with colour selection as one of the options*. It's all in HTML so if you know the relevant code, you can do it that way, too.

*IIRC you can only change colours in certain bits, e.g. the mission sendoff text.

Same thing happened to me, MZ - nothing even with 50+ ratings, then suddenly, got badges 1-4 from the 53rd (tyvm Player 53, whoever you are!).

The VERY cool thing about Body Armour is that it's an "always on" power, so when you get mezzed - and deity knows, you'll get mezzed - you're still getting the resist from BA.

Of course you also get any set or unique bonuses too — this is crucial, because BA is ideal for slotting things like + Status Resistance, everyone's fave Steadfast Protection +Res/3% Def, and any of the -KB uniques.

The less cool thing is that BA offers less resistance than any other power, and will not save your [censored] if you grab too much aggro (though not many of the other APPs will, either).

I was a bit gutted when Ci3 dropped from five to four stars on the basis of one, presumably zero, rating, but these days I've come to understand that four stars and a few plays is a vastly more reliable indicator of quality than five stars and two or three plays, and as such, I tend to search for four-starred missions if I feel like rocking some MA content.

Will I ever get dev choice? I dunno; I submit it for review and tweak based on said reviews, and hope eventually that someone will truly love it. Mebbe they will, mebbe they won't, mebbe I'll write another, better arc (though if I can do better than @Twoflower's great arcs, I'll be darn pleased with myself).

They're veteran rewards, Hidden:-

12 months: Wall-mounted weapon displays

24 months: City of Heroes comic covers (16 total, IIRC)

30 months: "Trophies" —*Hero: Scirocco's Sword, Ghost Widow's Cape, Black Scorpion's Armor, Captain Mako's Tooth, Lord Recluse's Helm, Hamidon Goo. Villain: Positron's Helmet, Synapse’s Goggles, Numina's Cape, Sister Psyche's Belt, Citadel's Brain, Manticore's Bow, Statesman's Faceplate.

36 months: Longbow Chaser or Arachnos Flyer

That's all the unlockables via Veteran rewards to date, and they're all re-usable, so as soon as you hit 36 months, any toon you have can add them to any SG base they want (as long as they're a member, obv.) They can be re-added should you change SG.

Sorry, that was me, I shouldn't really have posted.

"Paragon Studios can't win, they are pretty much damned if they do something and damned if they don't."

^^ this

I've sunk a melon-farming fortune into my Widow, and regret nothing, not even the eye-watering cost of 5 x LOTG 7.5%s, purples, etc etc.

I would suggest that if you're aiming to get Mind Link perma without Hasten, —*which is do-able alongside softcapping positionals — the kind of recharge speed you can get sucks your end down PDQ, so you'll be wanting probably the full monty of Numina's + Reg/ + Rec, Miracle +Rec and the Performance Shifter +End chance into Stamina, too.

That's the loadout I'm running atm, anyways, and it STILL isn't enough Endurance for protracted fights... but that's why we got Elude, I guess.

(It should be noted that with a purpled-up Widow, protracted fights are not very common, unless soloing AVs is your bag. EBs, on the other hand, are like Pringles to Night Widows - you pop one and you can't stop.)

We're all good, Scarlet; I think these fora are currently experiencing enough drama without me adding another scene

In fairness, Scarlet, I was aiming to help with the requirements as laid out in the first post - "I'm not into melee". I've nothing against Blappers — I need Vengeance targets as much as the next guy ;P

1. Roll a blaster
2. AoE fun
3. ?????
4. PROFIT!!!

A less silly answer - Blasters sound like what you're after. It's quite plausible to go ranged-only, using (for example) pretty much anything combined with the Energy Manipulation secondary —*that has the awesome Boost Range click-power in it, making your cone attacks go that extra mile (or few feet, as the case may be).

In terms of primaries, Energy might again be a good choice due to its very high "wow" factor - there's nothing like blasting the hell out of a mob and seeing them fly off with the knockback that Energy does - but alas, that same knockback can put people off teaming with you if you don't know how to best leverage it.

The other blaster primaries all have interesting secondary effects which I urge you to check out.

Blasters also get possibly the most "wow factor" power in the game — the Nuke —*but this (a) isn't til level 32 and (b) again varies by secondary —*specifically, Archery (Targeted AoE) and Assault Rifle (Cone) nukes do less damage than the others, but are available on a much shorter timer and don't cause the loss of all your Endurance (IIRC all the other nukes do).

You should note that blasters have it pretty easy at first, but start getting hit pretty hard in the 30s onwards, as their lack of defense leads to them getting hit a lot, and hit hard (not much resistance either). They also lack much in the way of Mez protection.

However, the changes to the blaster 'inherent', Defiance, mean you can now shoot off tier 1 and 2 powers from your primary, and tier 1 from your secondary, even while mezzed.

In summary: roll a blaster already :P

...Entirely plausible.

S F M A: Story Focused Mission Arc - this was put in by players wanting to differentiate from farms, and will presumably fall out of use over time.

B H M A: Badge Hunter Mission Arc - from what I can see on the US fora, this was created for the badge hunters to identify each others' arcs and five-star them (for the star-related MA badges). It doesn't seem to have worked as intended, per the first post in this thread.

Is this The Coming Storm?

I view titles as of paramount importance - they are, after all, pretty much the first (and frequently only) bit of a mission you'll see in the MA 1.0 interface.

In terms of composition, I think of them no differently than I would, say, an issue of a comic (if I wrote them) - even more so for back in the day, when you'd have story titles on the front.

What I look for (and try to write) is a title that encompasses the gist of the story arc - eg "Cancelled in Three"; there are different levels of abstraction within that (my other arc, with Praet alternates of Crimson and Indigo, is "Opposite Ends of the Spectrum")

What tends to put me off is overly literal titles ("Kill Teh Rikti", "Rescue X"), because if MA creator X can't be bothered to think of a good title, what are the chances that the arc's particularly creative?

In terms of suggestions - "Five Times the Hero"? You could play on any of the elements of the arc, really - the time-travel, the 'five ages' aspect, heroism, what-have-you...

Sorry, was pretty much all I could think of to help.