Khanon

Interestingly enough, I use what I call "original cliches" as my inspirations for characters.

Huh??

Basically, I think of what would probably be a cliche superhero origin base and develop it, but not one that I've personally read about before. You know...something that sounds like it'd be thoroughly cliche and straight out of a pulp comic, but one you might not ever be able to say "oh! that's just like x comic!"

Original Cliche.

I don't draw from any real world or comic inspirations and try to at least partially actively seek to steer clear of stories I've read.

Funny, but true, right after CoH came out, I made a kat/regen scrapper. An albino mutation that some called a "tall elf" who aged slowly, could regenerate, and so on...took up the katana and fought off vampiric 5th Column during WW II and afterwards. I'd not ever really heard of, or watched/read the Blade comics and movies until after I'd made and played Bladewraith. After I did...? I stopped playing the character. I felt like I was somehow butchering his story, in a way...

At any rate...there it is...

Name: Darius Kainan
AKA: Khanon
Age: Corporeal form - 20 at present
Height: 5'8"
Weight: 180 lbs.
Origin: Mutant (magic-infused)
AT: Dark Melee - Regen Scrapper

Threads: none yet - in the works

Parents: Marcie (died in childbirth) and David (committed suicide when Darius was age 14)

General Appearance: Stockily built for his age, Khanon is fair complected with silver-white eyes. His hair is naturally light silver-grey with darker tints; thick and shaggy, but not long. Relatives have said of him that he's built "like a brick slaughterhouse", whatever that means...

His most notable features, however, are the bony demonic wings sprouting from his shoulder blades...

Background: Darius' parents were just average Jane and John Doe citizens of Paragon City. They always avoided "trouble" whenever possible, and left it up to the PPD or local heroes when they couldn't avoid it. Marcie worked in records at the medical center in Atlas Park, the Ph.D. in business sciences felt like it was going to waste. But she was finally up for a promotion...

Dave had been a mechanic since he was a child, as far as he could remember at any rate. His father was a mechanic, his 2 older brothers were mechanics. All three of his uncles were... Being a mechanic was almost an inherited trait of the men of the Kainan family. Dave was sure that such would be the case for his son, Darius, from the moment he could pick up a wrench.

Some dreams just aren't meant to come true...

Marcie worked late one evening, as she sometimes needed to do when there'd been a high rate of heroes through the medi-ports on a busy Saturday afternoon. She hated having to come home so late, but it just couldn't be helped. If she wanted to get the promotion, she had to prove she was willing to do the work everyone else avoided by leaving at 6 o'clock in the evening. She was a scant 4 weeks from going on maternity leave, so there was no room for error. She'd hear about whether or not the new position as the Head of Records for the hospital was hers upon her return from having her baby.

Dave had come home early. He knew Saturdays were rough on Marcie so he'd left the garage in the able hands of his brother, Christopher. The flowers looked nice as the centerpiece on the small oak dinette table. He'd set out their best dishes and glassware, and actually cooked the steaks and potatoes himself. Yes, the salad was from a "bag" salad, but he was sure that Marcie wouldn't care. She'd be tired and just happy to not have to make the dinner herself.

She never arrived...

The two PPD officers at the door looked dejected as they related the story to Dave, standing on the front porch of their townhouse a block from the Tram in King's Row. "One damned block!" he kept screaming to himself over and over, partially drowning out what the officers were telling him.

His heart sank as their story unfolded.

Marcie had just crossed the street and was about to round the corner when she was taken by force by several Guardians from the Circle of Thorns. Astonished witnesses said they just shouted, almost gleefully, "she's the one!" as she was drug off to the empty lot around the corner. A mage from the Circle had scrawled a strange and cryptic symbol into the hard dirt below her allowing the mage to channel the dark magicks between them and hold her suspended in mid-air. Strange energies coalesced and a faint...thing...was seen beginning to be drawn into their world from...somewhere beyond.

Just as the ghostly wings of the creature had begun to emerge from seeming nothingness at the same point of space-time as Marcie's womb, he struck. His movements were so quick that the witnesses couldn't tell at the time what was happening. They saw the bodies of the guardians, then the mage himself, crumple to the ground in rapid succession. As the bodies of the Circle members fell, the witnesses heard an other-worldly roar of what they could only describe as utter agony pierce the night air. As the last of them fell, they saw the ghostly creature fade back into nothingness.

The dark-clad hero known only as "Void" to the residents of King's Row gently picked Marcie up from the ground and rushed her to the local hospital, then notified the PPD of the incident. As he related the incident to the medical staff, they ran a series of vitals to see if she could even be saved from the ordeal.

Dave arrived at the hospital in time to hold Marcie's hand and hear her final words: "Protect Darius, my love...protect him..." They'd not decided on a name yet, but it seemed that in those last few minutes she had chosen one.

The doctors sedated her and prepared her for emergency C-Section. The baby would live, if they could deliver him quickly.

Marcie never regained consciousness, but her son seemed to be almost too healthy when he was delivered. He was still 4 weeks or so early, but he appeared almost as a month old child. His Apgar score was perfect, even with the oddities.

The whole Kainan Clan was in the waiting room. They comforted Dave in his time simultaneous joy and sorrow. The nurse had brought his baby son, Darius, to him to hold and to help comfort him in his time of loss.

No one could explain the silver-grey hair and eyes, and no one knew why there were two bony projections from his shoulder blades. They seemed to cause no discomfort for the child, but there was a look of knowing in the eyes of the family as they looked at each other, then the baby once more.

**********

Darius screamed for his father, the pain in his back almost too excruciating to think in anything but broken cries for help. His father rushed into the room where he lay on the floor, writhing and clutching at his back over his shoulders. Dave gasped almost in horror as he saw the great, bone and leathery skinned wings begin to rip through the flesh of his son's back. He rushed to the hall bathroom for a wet towel to help stem the flow of blood as his stomach retched at the horrific scene before him.

Suddenly, Darius went completely still and quiet. Dave's face had gone the pallor of death itself, as his son's form went limp for a moment in his hands, then every muscle in the youth's body went completely stiff. A faint glow emanated from under the towel, and Darius finally breathed once more; a sigh and shudder of relief made him visibly quake a bit. As Dave pulled the towel away to check the wounds, the large wings flapped out and almost knocked the large man over. He then looked, once more astonished, at Darius' unblemished back. Where once were two gaping gashes through the muscles and skin, there was no longer a mark on his body, save for the abominable wings themselves.

Darius glanced over to the mirror above his dresser, then fell to his bed and sobbed uncontrollably for what seemed an interminable time. Dave quietly closed the door behind him as he left his son to come to grips with what he was.

That was the last Darius ever saw his father alive. He still remembers, to this day, how his father choked back his own horror to help ease his son's injuries and pain. He preferred to remember that than remember how he found his father two hours later, shot with his own pistol while he still clutched a picture of his and Marcie's wedding day.

Darius still carries that photo, folded up, in a compartment of his belt...

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The question I asked Statesman via PM (sent January 13):

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Quick question about the status of skills, since it came up on the forums again...are they still under development or permanently shelved?

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His reply:

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Shelved.

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I remembered, Ned.

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I don't remember Ned...who's that??

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Skills are shelved.

Inventions? :-)

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Cool Beans.

...not that it wasn't obvious, anyway... lol

The Dev Digest does wonders to answer questions like this...

I was trying to reply during the title change... lol

I love it...

I'm not going to use quotes here, because it is unnecessary.

I was used to pre I4...I came back to the game with a great many changes, not the least of which are these much-maligned I5, I6, and ED changes. Next comes the reference the the boiling frog analogy. I came in to a much changed game and have been able to easily adapt to the changes, going forward, and finding more fun, unlike those who sat through the heat being slowly turned up and noticed it much more, seemingly. Again, reverse of the boiling frog analogy, which is odd in itself.

Scion...Yes, I referred to it as whining. I've seen you and/or others here in this thread casting base insults at others ranging from "moron" to "stupid" and worse... Note, I said you and others (such as Neko), not strictly you. So please don't presume to be on any moral high ground here. Additional to that, I'm seeing ad nasueum opining for the "good ol days" of 6 slotting single powers and how that was somehow more diverse than needing to slot different things now, or just slot less? How is that not more diverse? Honestly. Because you choose to stick with min/max builds for certain effects doesn't mean there isn't mroe diversity. As someone who wasn't around through the changes, I am greatly noting the obvious diversity in the game. For one, I'd like to point out that everyone and their brother isn't a Fire/Dev Blaster, Fire/Fire Blaster, or Burn or Inv Tanker. I swear, you couldn't jump down from the tram platform when I stopped playing without tripping over a half-dozen of one of the "Big 3" FotM's... Nowadays, I see far more Defenders and Controllers than ever before, without a really noticeable lack of scrappers, blasters, or tankers. All seem to be easily had for groups when needed.

I'm also seeing far more variety in primary and secondary power sets being taken, as opposed to the "if you're a blaster and you aren't Energy or Fire, you ain't [censored]" attitude that used to pervade the game. Now, other power sets seem to not only be more viable, but chosen more.

This is all, again, my observations since starting to play again a couple weeks ago.

To the person that said that concept builds were nerfed into non-existence, I call pure and unadulterated [censored] on... Every one of my builds is a concept build. Hell, my current MA/Regen scrapper, almost 40, still has only 3 powers from his primary set. Tonms of pool powers taken to taste for his concept. He's got a backstory written to explain his powers, and all that. My wife can't understand how I seem to survive so well going into VERY ugly missions on (forgive me for not having the names memorized yet, the difficulty slider I'm still trying to get used to) level 4 above Heroic... Without IH. Without Resilience. With Integration only 3 slotted. With Qucik Recovery 2 slotted. With Health and Stamina 3 slotted. With Fast Healing 6 slotted.

Why yes, he chews through inspirations. So? Isn't that the point of having them? Seriously, to have an inspiration and act upon it in a time of need during a particularly tough battle seems to be just how the superheroes of comic, cartoons, and tv work. That's how I view them...to be used, not horded unless fighting an AV. I see my contacts and save helpless citizens in my search for inspirations constantly.

I dunno...I find the game far more fun than it was, originally. All of the things added, since then, far outweigh any "normalization" of powers (things others see as nerfs) over that period.

Blasters and scrappers nerfed into non-existence? Talk about gross hyperbole. Nah...not even that. Just a pure lie. In fact, it's nice that there isn't just 6 scrappers or blasters on a team.

Again, scrappers nerfed into non-existence? Well my 48 (at the time) unrespecced kat/regen scrapper's [censored] was TANKING Rudalak on the Sarah Miller TF set on (again, forgive the point that I don't have slider names memorized) 3rd highest setting... We started with 7 people. We ended with...4? But, it was awesome that I was the only melee left when we got to Rudalak and I got to tank him. Fun times.

I would submit that, while some of the detractors here have adapted insofar as they have changed the slotting on their powers, they refuse to mentally adapt to the changes. Perhaps I should have been more specific in my use of that term in my prior post. However, I didn't think that it would be necessary, as the reference was fairly obvious.

And yes, Scion...this whole thread, you've been very "Drama Queen"-esque... Righteous indignation towards the changes, coupled with base insults of those who disagree with your stance. Not just you, but many of those who are in agreement with you have been attempting such character, intelligence, and personality assassinations. I could quote them, but they are hardly necessary.

I just find that the atmosphere of this thread is wholely hostile and hardly constructive. It's, mostly, a giant and overexaggerated rant about the changes, especially with terms such as "ruined" (it didn't), "nerfed into non-existence (the aren't), and the like.

Interestingly, with every scrapper, blaster, and defender I've ever made, I'm still finding the game a blast (pardon the pun). Hell, I've never even reslotted from pre I5 (when I took a 14mo break).

I find, in fact, some of the changes made in the interim, quite fun, interesting, and altogether more appealing. This is, of course, my opinion, such as it is.

All I can say is that this is the reverse effect, obviously, of the boiling frog analogy. In this case, it seems that those who didn't take a break are being far more juvenile and "drama queen"-esque over the changes over the course of the past year-ish than those of us who disappeared during that period of time and came back.

I find the game holds my attention far more than it ever did. I'm finally finding missions more than just a periodic challenge during AV missions. I'm finding the game, on the whole, far more appealing in nearly every aspect than pre I5, between cosmetic, content, and mechanics changes.

I'm actually finding myself creating (just to toy with, for now) more diverse builds. For example, as a regen scrapper, it was common for just about everyone... Fast Healing (3 heal slots), Integration (3 endredux/3 heal slots), IH (2 end redux/4 heal slots), DP, Swift or Hurdle, Health, Stamina, Hasten, and the rest just season to taste. Even I, a non power-gamer...a non min/maxer...knew this basic tennet of building a regen scrapper.

What do I do now? Oh, hell, I don't even run IH, since I forget to turn it on most times now that it's not a toggle, my current MA/Regen scrapper still doesn't have IH. I've 6-slotted QR, FH, Health, and Stamina, 3 slotted Integration for EndRedux, and I'm floating with almost 4 fully bought Power Pools.

There's more room for experimentation to find other combinations that work for how I like to play... Solo and taking on really...REALLY...absolutely stupid odds, such as 3 red Lt's and a Purple Boss in a single spawn...solo... I may not be the fastest leveller, but I'll be damned if I can't find a fun way to do it.

I've not found any crippling changes for my blasters or scrappers, and my Dark?Dark Defender is even more fun now that things are a real challenge. Hell, before I4, I soloed Baphomet with him in his non-outlevelled mission. That wa a fun 20 min fight. Frankly, I'm glad that isn't quite doable now.

Someone mentioned about the comic superheroes going at Arch-Villains solo. I'd like to beg to differ. Batman doesn't usually go it alone. Justice League takes on the Super-Villains. Let's not forget that rarely do the X-Men or Fantastic 4 go it alone. These are examples of what CoH is trying to represent, far moreso than the Superman type superhero. They face dastardly bosses alone, many times, but the biggies they often help each other to overcome. This is not to say that Wolverine, Batman, or Johnny don't occassionally go it alone, but usually have problems with minor "main" villains by themselves. Minions, they usually [BAM!] don't have [BAP!] any trouble dispatching [POW!] en masse. Often, as well, they deal with the bigger villains (with some problems) alone. But the Arch-Villains, or Super-Villains... These are the times we see the great teaming, through movies, cartoons, and comics hailing back to the "good ol' days".

There's no shame in admitting you need help. There is only shame in refusing to recognize when you need help.

Again, after all that's said and done, I find the changes have ultimately brought more diversity to feasibility of builds, and more variety of play. I notice that most of the people who are ranting ad nauseum about the changes are ones who refuse to adapt.

Darwin is probably smiling that, even in a video game, his precepts live (those who cannot adapt, die...though I'd add "wailing like banshees all the way down" )

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What you don't get is "working as intended" and "not working as intended" have always been the phrases used as an excuse to leave something alone or to nerf it.

The community would have more respect for the Devs if they just came out and said,

"When we added this, X power had to be adjusted because of this, this and that"
or

"Due to player ability to exploit/PL/whatever, we've had to adjust X power"

instead of saying

"It was never working as intended"

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This is where your argument falls apart. I get what the quoted statement here says. However, that's rarely the implication of the players complaining.

"Working as intended," nominally, means that the ability is, strangely, working as it's intended. I think what bothers players most is that they don't want to hear that it's working how they meant it to. What they want to hear is how, exactly, that is, because they can't seem to justify some of their anecdotal evidence.

I've often found that this is at the core of player complaints about that phrase...the core issue being that they don't know what was "intended" in the first place... It's quite common in the internet community to completely fabricate numbers and "evidence" in the absense of knowing what that "intended" was...

Each has its strengths and weaknesses. Not all are meant for pure, unadulterated damage.

In fact, I never take fire because I was solid single-target damage, and frankly I feel that fire/ single-target damage is second to dark/ defenders... It's great for AoE, but I don't like to AoE farm. Far more unknowns to that than there are with using tripmines.

Personally, I choose Ice as a secondary. I can solo mezzing Bosses (named non av's), such as the big orange meanies of The Lost and Rikti with that... Slotted duration, knockdown, and reuse, I keep fields of mobs +1, +2, and up flopping around on the ground ineffectually while I pick them off one by one.

But then, Ice has some of the worst as secondaries go...well...except the various ways to slow and incapacitate.

Same with /El. No appreciable damage, the end drain ability seems almost worthless, but the sheer amount of ways I have to lock down a mob and make them a non-issue works, for me.

If all the secondaries were meant to behave the same, there'd be no point to anything else.

Frankly, until the "nerfs", AR/Dev was so grossly overpowered it was sickening... Same for Burn Tankers. What some people can't seem to get over if the fact that they aren't gods among gods anymore. Seriously, everyone and their poor relation were fielding AR/Dev blasters and Fire/Fire tankers. Why? They were grossly overpowered.

Now, each gives up something to do something else. Perhaps you don't enjoy that something else. That's understandable. Fire/ may be considered the new god among god Blaster builds. I'll still build my blaster for my playstyle.

Guess what... Long after the FoTM'ers have switched because that build now "sucks [censored]", I'll still be playing what I enjoy playing, instead of playing whatever is considered the "best" at the time.

Each needs to have tradeoffs. If there's no downside to any one combination, that's the time to create one...

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Simply put "Working as Intended" usually isn't synonymous with "working the way the players think"...

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Yet whenever something is working fine, it's wasn't "working as intended" and gets nerfed.

Funny how that works.

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"Working fine" to a player, as has been evidenced here and in other games, is rarely the same as "working correctly".

I mean...players thought that burn tankers powering through a field of +10 purples to PL people was "working fine". Sure...but it still wasn't right.

Basically, as Phoenix said, he doesn't want "we think it's crap". That's not specific data.

He says, through all the posts here, that it's working "as intended". What does this mean? Perhaps that those who are trying to test it aren't fully aware of the minutae of the "intentions" of the ability. OIne suggestion was that, perhaps, it's not total health left, but damage taken, and further that said damage needs to be mob-generated...? Just a thought.

That QA response doesn't say what aprt of the player-done testing was incorrect testing procedure. Perhaps the way damage was taken to trigger it had something to do with it.

Just a thought.

I've noticed it working just fine on my 30's El/El Blaster, as well as my baby Ice/Ice Blaster. I levelled many characters before these things went in, so I'm not about to throw a temper tantrum if they don't work how I want them to, either. I play as if they aren't there, and am happy when they do kick in.

Simply put "Working as Intended" usually isn't synonymous with "working the way the players think"...

Revolver:

/Dev sucks? Really? I've done quite a few TF's since being back, including Rudalak, and the only Blasters with us were /dev... And they laid literal waste to things with their tripmines n such. It was a site to behold. The two of them would have most of the mobs dead before I could get a swing in... If that "sucks", I want some suckage.

Strato:

Yeah, that's what I actually think. Perhaps the bar for Defiance is buggy, depending on what you've done with your interface. I do notice that since I've set my UI size to 90%, the bar almost never moves, though I do see/"feel" anecdotal evidence that it's working just fine, such as when I get low on health, I'm suddenly missing almost never and they're dying faster...

Any way we could get a list of objective guides, instead of a list of personal bias pieces that use the word "gimp" when referring to anything they don't personally like more than they use the word "the"?

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Super quick question:

Could you please suggest an expansion to the Paragon Tram? It seems to be missing a key location...Founders Falls! The hub of commerce for half our hero origins!

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It's been discussed at length several times...

The results of the discussions?

The lazy want a tram everywhere... Those who love Founder's don't want the tram there.

The story behind it, if I'm not mistaken, is this is where the war walls are weakest, it's the oldest section of town, it's close to the only end-game raid zone, etc. etc. etc.

Historically, if I remember correctly, the Tram wasn't built until after Rikti War. Any Hazard Zone, or Rikti-populated zones, don't have trams.

This is what is funny about the destruction of Baumton, as noted by some...that it has ruined Tram lines...when it was destroyed before the Tram system was put in.

It's part of the story, plain and simple. I sure don't want to see one go in just to satisfy the lazy [censored] in this game...

BRILLIANT! BRILLIANT!

...gah! Every time I see that word, I get a flash flood of Guiness commercials inundating my head...

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Will the bad guys get these too?

Wouldn't that be fair?

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Not until we can root bosses can you talk about fair.

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I can root bosses. Hell, I can completely immobilize them. Sorry you're having problems...But Tenebrous Tentacles and Petrifying Gaze (Gaze not even slotted yet) do a bang-up job on completely neutralizing bosses. Hell, my pet, Smokey, still unslotted, can lock down AV's...

I was 5-starred...until I had over 250 posts...then I pissed off a whole group of people (dev blasters) and went downhill fast. lol

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Taunt doesn't always work.

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And you ALWAYS hit when you swing, right? *coughs*

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I fixed this problem long before you addressed it...

I took this nifty scrapper AND tanker power called "Taunt"... I have no idea why others had such a hard time figuring that one out.

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Because.... if you tell people you took taunt, the next word outta their mouths will be "GIMPED!!"



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Shhhh...yeah, don't tell anyone that I was so gimped I didn't have to chase down mobs...they came to me... Oh how gimped I was...AM! wait...Taunt? What? Gimped?

The only "gimped" I keep getting derided for is not taking Tough/Weave. Apparently, prelim testing says I'm a-ok without, and may be too good...

Apparently, those 8 green rikti monkeys thought I was so good...they killed me by doing more damage than I could heal on their alpha...

It's because of Taunt, isn't it...

I fixed this problem long before you addressed it...

I took this nifty scrapper AND tanker power called "Taunt"... I have no idea why others had such a hard time figuring that one out.

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The ONLY thing about Regeneration is that internal playtesting has shown that it MIGHT be a little too good. But that's an impression - there will be nothing immediate changed and there might be nothing at all. It's just on my list of things to look at, that's all.

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Could you have your internal playtesters use it WITHOUT Tough/Weave and go to places like RCS, TRY to tank even a blue con AV, etc... It's my experience, as a NON Tough/Weave regenner, that a group of green rikti monkies can kill you without those POOL Powers...and sure as shootin', we shouldn't be forced to take pool powers to survive...they are suppsoed to only enhance... *shrugs*

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Bases are in City of Villains.

Please, please, please, don't put suggestions or opinions in this thread - definitely post your ideas! - but just put questions here. I can read them and post answers much more quickly.

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How about suggestions in the form of a question for $500 Alex?

Ummm...Any chance of upping the desire to go to Rikti Crash Site such as making the Space Ship into a Task Force or Trial, or a portal from there to the Rikti Homeworld type of Trial? Just wondering if more desire to visit RCS will ever be implemented, other than "minor tweaks"...

ROFLOL!

*bows*

Glad to be of some service.

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Issue 3 is in internal test already. QA reports suggest that it is already better than sucktastic. Your mileage may vary.

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Okay...I never use what someone else says on a forum as a sig...but this is definitely sig-maker material! lol