LittleDavid

126 costumes so far. I think I spend half as much time playing with the costume editor as I do playing City of Heroes.

Yeah, I know they're already customizable and have been for years, but I've got some things I'd like to see regardless. These are suggestions I'd want to see applied to Masterminds as much as I would Blasters, Corruptors, and Defenders.

1. Give the different rifle/pistol types their own unique sounds/attack animations (where applicable).

We can get Council, Family, and Nemesis rifles in the game, but when they're in our hands, they don't behave like they would in the hands of their original owners. I haven't been around Vanguard soldiers enough to see if this also applies to the Vanguard Redding Rifle(s).

Regardless, I'd love it if each pistol and rifle type had its own sounds and effects, matching either whatever weapons they're based on in real life, or whatever they would do in the hands of the enemy group that uses them.

To illustrate what I mean ... the Legacy Assault Rifle (and its color tintable version) could retain its sound and behavior set as the "baseline," except extend those same sounds to Masterminds with a Mercenaries powerset, when they're using a Legacy Assault Rifle.

The sounds used for Burst/Slug/M30 in a Mastermind's Mercenaries powerset could then be applied to one of the other gun models. Maybe the Military Assault Rifle model?

For the Tommy Gun, it would have the same sounds as the Tommy Guns used by the Family, where applicable of course.

Same with the Council Assault Weapons, except have a Council Assault Weapon in a player's hands also use the laser blast sound effect and the laser beam effect for the Sniper Rifle power. (Mind you, I'm only talking about the graphical/audible effects here, not the game mechanics of it!)

And of course, same with Nemesis rifles--in the hands of a player, have them make the same sounds and graphical effects of a rifle in the hands of a Nemesis soldier.

2. Add Praetorian Resistance rifles and pistols to powerset customization.

While also giving them the same treatment as mentioned above--having them graphically and audibly behave as they would in the hands of Resistance NPCs.

You could even use the Praetorian Clockwork's plasma spray effect to replace the regular AR's flamethrower!

What I'd like to see? Make it so that if you craft a temp power you already have, it adds additional uses.

I don't know how common this problem is for anyone else, but it's driven me up a wall.

For some reason, you can still make bids at a market (Wentworth's/Black Market/Trading House/Underground Market) even if your market inventory is already full. This normally wouldn't be so much of a problem, except that if you do buy an item with that bid, you're told your inventory is full and you can't get the item.

... And you also are not allowed to re-bid on the same item even if you do clear up inventory space and try again. Your bid will show up on the list, but even if it's the exact same item you were trying to buy for the same price and no one else has bidded on it, the system will act as if your bid isn't there.

You either have to wait a while before the system recognizes your bid, relog, or both. And by that time, whatever it was you could have bought has likely already been bought by someone else, at least for the price you were bidding.

The problem is, at least for me, it's really easy to forget your auction inventory is full. I've also had a few cases where, attempting to place a bid on an object, a duplicate bid is made that causes the auction inventory to fill up and thus prevent me from actually getting the item.

It would be nice that if your auction inventory is full, the "Bidding" tab goes red and won't let you place any more bids until you free up inventory slot. It'd be much less annoying than forgetting your inventory is full and getting denied the ability to bid on an item you want or need.

I don't play AE all that much, and when it comes to making AE arcs ... I've toyed with it, but never published anything. After seeing how sophisticated Praetorian story arcs are, I've been left wanting that same level of control over mission events in AE. I'd love to have NPCs to interact with, or the ability to have specify exactly what I want to have where.

Heck, I've played so few AE arcs, and mostly only the ones that seem like involving stories, that I'm not even really sure what constitutes AE farming. Though reading through a few pages of this, I do agree that the system needs some updating. Something should really be done to separate the farms from missions that actually try to tell a story, however silly or serious it might be. That'd be the first major step, I think.

The devs probably didn't want AE to turn into a farm, but the majority of MMO players pick the path of least resistance, and focus on efficiency. So, if the farmers are given a way to filter out anything that isn't a farm from the get-go, maybe it will stop them from downvoting anything that isn't a farm.

One thing I'd want to see is slightly less restrictions on what can and can't be worn with certain clothing combinations. Some clothing options disallow other costume pieces on principle, even when certain options wouldn't cause clipping.

For example, if you've chosen to make your Trench Coat sleeves short (or have none at all), why can't you then pick from the whole gamut of gloves? (Come to think of it, I'd like to see a short non-tattered trench coat sleeve, too.)

Things like that.

I could totally see some Golden Age-style pulp Vanguard vs. Rikti comics!

First off, let me say: The Pratorian Surge invason was REALLY fun. Probably the best part was being able to talk smack with the Praetors.

Though during the invasion, there was something I noticed ...



... Life as usual went on in Paragon City and Rogue Isles during the invasions. An army of Goliath War Walkers wasn't enough to convnce the street gangs and citizens to run for cover.

That got me thinking: Now that Emperor Cole is on the war path, why not introduce random Praetorian Invasion zone events, like Rikti Invasions? Use similar protocol to make citizens and enemy groups run for cover, sound the alarms. Then the portals open, like they did during the Surge, and the invasion begins!

The military vehicles I've seen in Praetorian warehouses could be used in these! Drop ships could be replaced with fighter jets that bomb and strafe targets not under cover. Instead of hunting defective bombs, attack helicopters could provide the IDF close air support. War Walkers and Goliath War Walkers could replace the Rikti Heavy Assault Suits that show up when a certain threshold of destruction is achieved.

As far as rewards, given these are Praetorians and a lot of Incarnate content involves Praetorian stuff, it could be a great way to provide alternate sources of Incarnate XP and drops. An accolade power and badge set would always be awesome, too, though I'm not sure what would be good. (I will say that, especially for my low level characters, Elusive Mind has been REALLY good at surviving psionic enemies like Madness Mages, Fortunatas, and the Lost.)

What do you guys think?

I don't know how much my opinion will be worth considering I don't have any 50's (despite how long I've played!) and won't be seeing Incarnate stuff for a long while, but I will admit hearing about this problem intimidates me considering that the vast majority of my characters deal Smash/Lethal damage and would be excluded from Master of Lambda trials.

Setting wise, is Marauder supposed to be Praetorian Earth's unbeatable champion at Smash/Lethal fighting? Like, he eats armor-piercing rounds for breakfast while throwing tanks around in a game of horsehoes?

The reason I ask is because--if that's so--the devs probably won't be keen on nerfing him to let the Smash/Lethal guys have a shot at him.

But what if Master of Lambda's requirements were changed so that there was an objective that would be best handled by a Smash/Lethal damage type character without making it exclusively vulnerable to that damage type?

Modify it so that everyone has an optimally useful role in the trial, without necessarily making any of it easier?

(I have absolutely no idea what Lambda Sector involves other than hearing that Marauder is completely invulnerable to Smash/Lethal damage. I realize I've probably put my foot in my mouth here.)

I wonder how my 8800GT will hold up. With City of Heroes, I play it with almost all the settings turned up high, save for the resolution--I keep that at 1024x768. Saves on screenshot file sizes (I take THOUSANDS of them. No lie!).

I'll be doing the same thing with Ultra Mode, depending on how badly my computer takes a hit. I've got a single Intel Kentsfield Quadcore Q6600 and 4 GB of RAM ... Hopefully I can still run the game well. I know Left 4 Dead 2 plays great, at least!