Jophiel

I've been an advocate for a name purge for some time, especially names still not tied to a global (i.e. haven't been touched in years). But a lot of people returned for Going Rogue so I can accept that a purge prior to that could have turned off a fair amount of returning players. I could see waiting a month or so and then justifying a purge of non-global tied names since if they haven't come back by now, I don't see where they're likely to come back at all and should be tying up names.

While playing a new Praetorian level 3 Fire/Fire Dom last night, I remembered that I already had a level 3 Fire/Fire Dom Praetorian alt on that server.

I blame part of it on the thrill of finding a "good" (subjective opinion) unclaimed name on Virtue. Whenever it happens, I feel compelled to crouch over it protectively and hiss at people who come near me even if I don't have an immediate character concept.

Got it in one.

Not a comic, but back in the 90's there was a series of books called Necroscope. One of the main characters, Harry (the titular "Necroscope"), was a guy who could talk to the dead. The dead were so happy to have someone to speak to and loved Harry so much that they would rise from the grave to assist him if he was threatened or needed their help.

Such a concept could be adapted to a heroic zombie mastermind.

I think part of it was to group starting players together (ironically, by adding another starting zone). Brand new players have to start in Praetoria for their first character but that's probably better than starting in the barren wilderness of Galaxy City because you made a blind newbie choice. Essentially, they seem to be trying to remake the low level game.

Last time, I moved a couple old favorites from Victory to Virtue and they lost their names. I never felt like the new names "clicked" and fell away from playing them but held out hope for a name wipe before Going Rogue (both names predate global names). That didn't happen so I moved them both back to Victory where they can have their identities back.

As for the name wipe, I suppose not doing it was the "right" thing given the number of people returning to try the expansion so I don't fault the Powers That Be for that call.

Nope, most of the faces were replaced with more stern or hostile versions of their old selves. The closest I can come to my original face is this one (Face 11) which isn't very close at all:



That one at least has sort of the same mouth although the eyes are different in both shape and color. Most mouths don't have any smile to them at all any more unless it's some huge toothy grin.

In Primal Earth, Anja Holownia's mother was unknowingly pregnant with Anja when she was examining a piece of Nazi experimental equipment. The decayed shielding on it broke and the resulting radiation leak infected Anja's mother, killing her and leaving Anja mutated. Anja used her radiation powers to become Polish Princess and wage a war against Nazi remnants found in the 5th Column. She's a Rad/Rad defender and is the essence of a traditional hero with tights & cape and fighting for Good.

In Praetorian Earth, the shielding remained intact. When the Hamidon wars occurred, Anja's mother took the gear and wound up in Praetoria with her daughter. She used the technology to devise a suit for Anja which would allow her to fire radioactive blasts and manipulate the radioactive energy (Rad/Elec Blaster, colored green). Anja dreamed of her mother's homeland which she lost in the wars and has become Polish Eagle, hoping to one day carve out an empire of Nowy Polska. With her ability to travel to Primal Earth, she thinks that it might just be easier to seize the existing Polish nation there and form it into an empire with her powers rather than risk the inevitable fight with Cole.

Personally, I think of it as examining my characters' stories, finding a moment in there and tweaking it. Instead of fighting the muggers, she ran away. Instead of the experiment being a failure, he found a mistake in his notes and corrected them making it a success. Some characters might end up with a radically different personality, some might just be a little different and some would never become heroes/villains at all.

Congratulations, winners!

There's also stuff that just isn't suitable for player character models for other technical reasons. Such as the Carnival ball gowns or Circle of Thorns full length robes.

I'm out of whatever for tonight. Too much baby-room prep to get accomplished.

16

Scarlet Finch

Now I'm just narrowing down what changes to her history led her down the path of being a DP/Traps Corruptor rather than a Trick Arrow/Archery Defender like Tally-Ho.

Please bring back the old faces. I was going to make a Praetorian version of an old character today and there's no getting close.

Old Face #1:



New Face #1:



Yikes No wonder I keep using the same small handful of faces these days.

Is Paragon Studios and Zam.com forming some mutual interest society? Between the City of Heroes laptop give-away, the interview with free jetpack codes and now being asked to check out some review, that's more interest than Zam.com has shown in CoX than the previous six years combined.

I'm wondering if this is some new era in game site outreach and advertising.

39

I only played a couple of the "random" Jenkins AV missions (the ones you get after completing the arc) and nothing was timed. In the first one, Marauder was ganked by his own minions while I was still on the other side of the map which I'm assuming was a bug. Made for an easy mission though!

My gripe, and it's not a big one, is that I wish there was some variety in the first handful of missions. If I have to rescue those stupid cops from those stupid tunnels again and go through the rose thing with Cleopatra, someone's gonna get smacked.

Once I get past that, it's all golden.

Just for laughs, my "Oops!" moment in Praetoria so far has been running to the vendors on the far ends of Nova Praetoria and dodging purple con Destroyers to sell my lvl 2 enhancements... because I somehow missed the vendor right in the middle of the city plaza.

Actually, 7/8 prizes (six mice & a laptop) were awarded randomly as long as you at least cranked out a crude MS Paint image. Only the 8th (grand prize) looks like it was determined by artistic merit.

Whether or not the 8th should have been is another question. I'm pretty sure the rules said all the prizes would be determined randomly but I also wondered why NCSoft would want to make you a plaque for randomly selected "Super Tractor-Tread Frog-Face Girl" when said 'character' obviously doesn't exist in City of Heroes and was just submitted to win a prize. I think it was another case of whoever wrote the rules not having a clue and then the rules not really being followed because they conflicted with what the client wanted.