Lady_Sadako

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Well, actually the end of the article mentions that the MAGI folks as well as the magic origin heroes are the descendants of Mu. The coven makes sense too, though.

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"The blood of Mu shall rise, and it shall wash across the ocean and the land. The power that lies dormant within these humble rocks cannot remain so forever."

Does that sound heroic to you?

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To this day, these pantheons and their followers—the Banished Pantheon, the Oranbegan’s Circle of Thorns, and the descendants of Hequat’s Mu—are in a deadly struggle for earthly preeminence and they will use any and all resources, even other villain groups, to achieve this end.

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Banished Pantheon - check.
Circle of Thorns - check.
Descendants of Hequat's Mu - hehehe, you thought we wouldn't notice, didn't you?

HEQUAT = HECATE, the Goddess of the Witches. The villain group associated with the descendants of Mu is the COVEN.

So, the arrival of Croatoa should be VERY interesting!

Rock on, Gilgamesh.

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I just hope we don't have an invasion by something worse than old Pumpkin Head (there are worse things in Mythology than that... things that make the Rikti look like cute cuddly shoulder-kitties)

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I am 99% certain that Eochai will turn up in Croatoa as a giant monster spawn, like the Kraken in PP, Babbage in Boomtown, Jurassik in Crey's Folly and Adamastor in DA.

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Basically, I'm EXTREMELY picky with mythology. Trust me on that.

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I love that about CoH. It explains why the Coven is a villain group instead of a bunch of persecuted Goddess worshippers.

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I assume a safeguard will be put in to prevent a SG from monopolizing a relic by simply NEVER being available to be raided. If these relics have any kind of benefit, a SG could just lock it away in their unraidable base.

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The way I read it, having a relic at all means you're available to be raided. It looks like the attackers say when they're going to be raiding (with, presumably, a minimum amount of notice) and if the defenders aren't there to meet them, then too bad.

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His evil Preatorian alternate, Ghost Falcon, was captured by Crey and brainwashed to be a good guy and now he's here giving us enhancements.

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Ooh, I wonder if Ghost Falcon and Ghost Widow are related?

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Seriously! I mean, Hero 1 was freaking British, people! But I've never seen anyone make a fish and chips joke! XD

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/em sillywalk

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And the talk of Scirocco being kind to her and on a quest that may or may-not involve her.

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I think that's just because she reminds him of Serafina.

Thanks Manticore! Love the teleport-kneel-shoot stunt.

Any chance of letting us know the villains' ATs too?

As someone else has pointed out, this was a Base Raid for an Object of Power!

The Mask of Serafina evidently has something to do with Serafina the genie in Brickstown. Her former master was Sirocco the Desert Wind, who I believe was killed in the Rikti war and is now back as a villain.

Joking apart, this is a really, really good idea.

It would give so much more personality and life to the signature heroes to have them do this. They don't even have to get off their pedestals. A simple ranged attack would do.

I mean, which would you rather we did - run to a lifeless chunk of hovering machinery when we get into trouble, or run to one of Paragon's legends?

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All that crap is grey to me, no XP.

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Now that's heroism!

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The only name that I have noticed that stays the same is Infernal. What's up with that?

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Short version: both Malaise and Infernal were originally bad guys who changed sides. So, their evil equivalents are just their unreformed, original selves.

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You are a 100% correct. We need to find a way to communicate the story better to the players (not just the mission holder).

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Well, here's one idea!

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Every issue we add new mission tech as well as new art. We aren't planning on changing that anytime soon!

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Could you please give some hints as to what new mission tech has been included in issue 4? I'd love to test it...

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Are there no interim patches anymore? Why would these arguably minor changes be saved for I5? Seems....odd.

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Possibly because they'll integrate with other changes coming for I5?

States, how will this change affect 'go hunt 10 skuls' missions? Those are just as challenging as mission maps and often need teams too, but if we get defeated on a hunt mission, will we still get full debt?

Of course, if you're removing hunting missions altogether and introducing new missions with new art and so forth, that would be fandiddlydangtastic..

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Rationalize all you like.

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You first. I haven't a clue what the heck you were trying to say.

This rocks. I think I can also infer an ulterior motive.

1) PLers will have to follow their PL people around, because of the 300 foot XP thing.
2) PLers will not be in missions. They will be in the streets.

Ergo

3) PLers will die a lot and get maximum debt.

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You're assumptions are wrong. you have psychic attacks. Do you know the huge advantage you already have, built into the game, over INV tankers/scrappers of all level ranges? No amount of HO's/Accolades/Skill will compensate for this.

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Tons of work has already been done to get the classes balanced for PvP. Some powers are being changed to make them balanced for PvP. Of *course* some classes have an edge over others IN CERTAIN AREAS - but *every* class has its advantages and its weaknesses. That's part of its design.

HOs are nothing but an advantage. Unlike my psychic attacks, which are inherently balanced (I can run to a target faster than my Mental Blast can, my Immob is unreliable, my stuns are low-mag and as a Def I have fewer hit points than a tank anyway), they have no compensating downside.

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Quotes are fun.

Curveball..

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I'm wearing boots of escaping!

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For one, the point when players get DO's. The first lvls of PvP will ahve distinct advantages given to players who have high lvl toons and loaded up their toons w/ Complete sets of DO's including the non power 10 enhances.

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An advantage, certainly, but hardly comparable to the advantage that HOs represent. They can buff up to three aspects of a power at once. Moreover, characters at that level are much more limited by the number of slots they have.

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Then for sure the lvl 22 crowd. Some players will have complete sets of SO's while new players to the game - quite possibly will not. This imbalance as you don't see it will go on for a few more lvls after that.

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It is an imbalance, it's just not anything like as bad as the HO one, and it's a lot easier to fix. With influence being gambled on games, a good player only has to win a few contests and they'll be able to afford all the DOs or SOs they need.

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What enemy have u faced so far in the game told you what all it's attributes were buffed up to?

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Every single enemy I've faced in the game has let me know what I was letting myself in for, simply by conning a given colour. If I'd attacked a white mob that suddenly proved to have +300% accuracy and +300% damage, I'd have been pretty surprised.

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Well , maybe u don't have the time to play any other char than your primary. But the game gives u 8 slots per server to hold chars. You aren't forced into anything w/ PvP.

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This isn't about being forced in, it's about being kept out.

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Why should battles in pvp stay the same from lvl's 1-50?


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The battles don't stay the same; the level of the enemies relative to your own level does.

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I wouldn't care, this point is irrelevant.

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No, it's about being able to choose your level of risk before you make an investment of time. Or, for that matter, Inf. (I like gambling.)

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You also gave me a thought that i'm suprised you missed out on being the first to mention. What if the game calculated the odds of you winning a match w/out telling each other what they have slotted and how. The devs could come up w/ a system to give up odds on your chances of winning against another player. Who's to say they haven't already done that......

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.... oooh, interesting.

I think gambling will have to be restricted to the actual participants. Put all your Inf into a pot, winner takes all.

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A lvl 1 w/ every inventory slot filled w/ hexs could kill a lvl 100 in one hit. THis game has no chance of that sort of imbalance occuring.

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... except in the 45-50 PvP arena, where the characters are technically supposed to be on an equal footing because of their level, but in PRACTICE are going to be wildly disparate in their abilities.

The difference between levels 15-44 and 45-50 is that in the former, you are automatically on an even footing, but in the latter, you will have to go kill a blob a lot if you want a *chance* of being on an even footing.

If anyone can explain why the 45-50 door in the Arena should have a big blob of jello in front of it while no other door does, I'll be very impressed.

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So by having HO's for the top 6 lvls, PvP becomes totally unplayable for you since all you have is one toon, and that toon happens to be a lvl 45+?

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Not 'totally unplayable', just totally unlike the other 44 levels in terms of balance. From levels 15-44, you can go up against an opponent of levels 15-44 and expect a fair fight, because it's built into the system. From 45 onwards, you could be fighting someone who was your approximate equal, or you could be fighting someone who had bought 40 HOs off fricking Ebay. That integral balance goes straight out of the window.

You see, we wouldn't be emphasising fairness and balance if the system wasn't already fair and balanced everywhere but the last five levels. For some reason, after level 45, it all goes to hell. So, we need some way to opt out of the whole HO mess, either by being able to see when our opponents have them, or turn them off and on.

I only have limited time to play in the day. I don't have time to waste on fights where the odds are stacked against me from the start, or where I can't see the odds in the first place. Sure, I might feel like a challenge sometimes, but if I'm going to make time to play in the Arena, I'd like to choose my level of risk. Up to level 44, the game takes care of that automatically. 45 and upwards, all bets are off.

Put it this way: how would you feel if someone else got to choose your reputation in PvE, and could determine how tough the enemies you faced would be, without you knowing?

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If you want a level playing field for PvP, an MMORPG is not the place to find it.

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This MMORPG is different from others. Do other MMORPGS adjust your combat level down to meet that of your opponent?

Honestly, if the system didn't already have that levelling mechanic in place, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

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The same logic applies, if it's not fun for some, it should be removed....

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But we're not SAYING HOs or Hami raiding should be removed. Stop with the straw man arguments.

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You'd have to create a whole new screen that made is so u could choose the attribute to keep on each and every HO.

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That's one way to do it, yes. Or you could just state that every HO of a given type defaults to a given attribute depending on where it is slotted. That would make for fewer HOed players wanting to fight with their enhancements off, but that's better than the alternative.