Knight_Errant

I was trying to avoid reading the spoilers in this thread, however temptation overwhelmed willpower and now I'm glad I peeked.
Despite loving the visuals that were circulating before the release I shall not be seeing this movie. Frankly I don't go the the cinema to get depressed, and that ending certainly would depress me.

Of course now we see the price will be our global names.

Not happy about this, not happy at all.
We get robbed of our global identities because of something we have no choice in? Thanks alot!

We get access 11 extra servers in exchange for the confirmation that we've effectively had second class accounts since launch and our history of loyalty to the game means frak all. Way to make a player feel valued!

Personally I'd rather ditch access those 11 servers than lose My Name.

As for the US account holders saying it's no big deal. Try considering it from our point of view, what if you were the one losing a global handle you'd had for the last 5+ years?

Back when I created Steampunkette in 2005, she was based on the concept of a lost kid surviving in a crime ridden city. The mental image I formed was based on a slightly older Dakota Fanning (she's always been a couple of years younger than Steam'). As the character developed in fanfic (and the ability to change character height arrived in-game and allowed me to catch her up some missing years of growth!) I've had to search around for a better match. So, now the nearest match I've found is Emma Watson (Abbie Cornish sadly being too old).

Unless it has been expressely stated by DC elsewhere, I expect Batman Beyond to be purely a future for the Animated Series that ran before it. It's part of what was the DCAU and a separate continuity. Trying to tie it into the comic continuity (currently running the Batman Inc. story arc) really doesn't fit.
The DCU Terry McGinnis in Batman #700 may well not end up with the same story as the DCAU spawned version, key characters would be different due to chronology.

I'm going to stick to comic imagery rather than delve into old storylines and silver age bat/writer/superdickery.

Why does the idealised female figure regularly used in comics (and likely originating as far back as ancient Greece and classical sculpture) get called sexist? Comic book characters being generally stylised and usually "larger than life", is such a portrayal of a female figure wrong? Is it not more a matter of the interpretation rather than the image itself that is "sexist" or applies such a label?
I've seen arguments in previous threads that the female character model in this game is "sexist" because it is not realistic. Is that a fair accusation? Is it obliged to be realistic simply so avoid offending real women who do not look like that? If so is the post-processing of female models in fashion magazines and the like sexist for protraying the unachievable?

Is "Sexist" being misapplied due to false expectation such as, "I can never look like that, it is therefore over-idealised and must be sexist"?

Personally I can't help thinking that in many cases of claimed sexism in comic book protrayal of the female form it is being misapplied, often due to the claimant's own insecurity or in an attempt to garner some measure of exposure and notoriety.

I'm hoping this will be as good as it looks. My feeling is that, like Avatar was with Pandora, it will be more about showcasing the world "Babydoll" has imagined that the actual plot, which I do not expect to be particularly deep.

What does strike me as odd is how Amber, Sweetpea, Blondie and Rocket have this burlesque theme in their oufits but Babydoll, the main protagonist, is completely "Japanese Schoolgirl" stereotype in style. Maybe it's a metaphor thing for the character's innoscence with similar affectations for the personalities of the other women (Sweetpea's hood, Amber's partial uniform etc.).

Now I'm left worried that there may be more depth to this film than it can actually communicate. =/

Essentially it's identical to Katana but slightly slower in animation and slightly higher in spike damage. The attacks are direct and lack the frills of most other scrapper primaries. However each attack will do serious and immediate damage when it hits, no waiting for dots, or multi-packet hits (see dual blade). For the most part it's just: Swing > Whack!
At 26 and 32 you get heavy hitting attacks that have an additional crowd control effect in Knock Up and Knock Back (Down if unbuffed), great for restricting incomming damage while handing out a load of hurt.

The def debuff inherent in the attacks means you can potentially mitigate some of the resistance issue with the Achilles Heel Proc IO, if it's included in one of the more frequently used attacks (e.g. Hack).

Parry will serve you well as an addition to the melee defence provided by Shield if you need to turtle through a brawl. With Parry slotted for defence rather than damage I can soft cap my BS/Regen scrapper's melee defence by using it every other attack. This is very handy when soloing melee based EBs.

Well, that's me inspired for running my Tri-Form through another respec. Great guide Bill.

One thing I noticed playing a Tri-Form was that aggressively dancing through forms can throw out an aweful lot of damage when you're on a small team. For the majority of my time levelling I duoed with a Tank and it was alot of fun just going ballistic on mobs without much in the way of retaliation. The ability to play almost a jack-of-all-trades, is also alot of fun.

Even as a Tri-Form with limited slots, Nova can do some scarey damage. I frequently had situations where my Build Up buffed alpha of aoe attacks would kill of all the minions and leave just the few tougher mobs to mop up. If I timed the cone attack just right the momentum of a flying charge would carry me into the middle of the fight a split second after the attack landed allowing me to swap to human and flatten something with Incandescent Strike.

I did an inventory of my female characters in CoX and only four have "with skin" type costumes, invariably these are due to theme (eg. Wonder Woman or Psylocke styled). All my female characters have the bust slider in the left third of the bar (default looks to big to me).

Curiously of the five female players I've teamed with in the past, three regularly went max-size on their toon's busts. One of those had toons with costumes that are invariably skimpy.

I suppose some of the views posted earlier regarding assumptions go back to the old saying, "This is teh internet! Where men are real men, women are real men, and kids are FBI agents."

In closing: That green haired 36HH/22/36 in the bikini that you see next to Ms Liberty might be played by Comic store guy from The Simpsons but it could easily be a lady having a bit of fun. Either way, just be polite.

I've had a "wannabe hero" kicking around the Rogue Isles since GR was confirmed. The trick I've used is to avoid going too deeply into the actual CoV plot and do neutral/heroic architect content. All I need now is GR to go live and a ticket for a more heroic name.

Another +1 for Black Lagoon. I'd rate it a close second to SAC. The second barrage has some tense and chilling plot to it.

Ghost in the Shell SAC: What can I say that hasn't already been posted? Nothing so +1

Chobits: This is one I think you either love or hate. The letchery of Hideki gets a bit annoying at times but for the most part it's fairly light hearted and easy to watch. I like it, so +1.
Interestingly it's a follow on from the Manga/Anime series Angelic Layer.

Mobile Suit Gundam Wing: "Epic" pretty much describes this mecha series with a strong anti-war message. Even if you only ever watch it once, watch it all the same. +1

Bleach: This started off well but annoyingly turned into something of a DBZ clone once the first story arc finished. After that I lost interest, a pity really. -1

Claymore: Girls with swords (or should that be nuns with swords?). Much as I want to like this anime series there's something about it that just doesn't work for me. It's not bad, but it's nothing special either. +0

Cowboy Bebop: Another exemplary anime. +1

Akira: This was the film that truely introduced me to anime and change my viewing landscape. 15 years later it still stands apart from everything except SAC Gig1. +1

We have to, otherwise they blockade their ports and it jams up all our roads with freight lorries that are waiting to cross the Channel.
But that's entent cordial for you. We get to grin and be sarcastic to each other while saying Agincourt and Waterloo (English) or Patay and Castillon (French) under our breaths.

Bots/FF MM here. I've never had any complaints about KB, then again not much survives their withering fire.
The OP needs to remember he's not the only person on the team, the mobs and aggro is not his alone just because he's got a cheap and cheerful version of Gauntlet.

You're always going to get a few MMs that don't know how to control or direct their pets properly but some of us actually know what we're doing.

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its clearly done something right or it wouldn't be the monster that it is.

[/ QUOTE ]Yeah, it's called a well supported and relentless marketing campaign covering TV, internet and printed media. Only EvE rivals them on the internet marketing and almost matches them in the printed media, nobody matches them by having a TV advert.
You can bet that these days the most common first sight of an MMO is WoW.

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I fail to see how having a good marketing campaign is a bad thing? seems to be a very good decision but i suspect there's more to WoW success than simple marketing

[/ QUOTE ]I didn't say it was a bad thing. I'd be overjoyed if CoX had half the coverage WoW does. But it doesn't, that's why WoW is a "monster" and CoX is an also ran. Even the likes of the BBC use WoW screenshots for generic MMO news articles. In the mainstream printed PC games media it's rare for an issue not to have something on or about WoW (at least one full page advert is a guarantee regardless), when was the last time you saw a CoX advert or an article that wasn't about a new issue release? Have you ever seen a CoX advertising banner on a website?

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its clearly done something right or it wouldn't be the monster that it is.

[/ QUOTE ]Yeah, it's called a well supported and relentless marketing campaign covering TV, internet and printed media. Only EvE rivals them on the internet marketing and almost matches them in the printed media, nobody matches them by having a TV advert.
You can bet that these days the most common first sight of an MMO is WoW.

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CCS?

I was of the same mind about CoX vs CO.

I'll be sticking with CoX.

[/ QUOTE ]I think you're expecting too much too soon of CO. If it's as bad as you keep implying then it may fall on its face but we'll have to see.

With the way things are with the current run of MMOs you can never expect a new one to put in a performance close to one that has been around for 5 years (Maybe SWTOR will buck that trend but Bioware are special).
The key thing will be how the developers react after the maelstrom of lauch has died down. In the case of Funcom and AoC it took a whole year and a change of director before they got their butts in gear and started hauling the game towards it's potential. They have a ways to go yet but it does look promising.
If you're going to compare CO with CoX then do it with CoX when it was at the same publication age.

I'm seeing a distinct absence of black in one of the power colour palettes. Check the photo of the red psi attack.