Lord Mayhem

Yeah it's really annoying - both of my arcs have bloated past 100% too. One of them was published at 99.87% and has bloated up to 137%, the other at 89% and is just past 100% now. The only thing I want to tweak is to add SFMA to the descriptions of both, but I can't face having to re-edit the whole arc to be able to do that so atm I'm leaving them unchanged.

Honestly this bloating bug is one of the things putting me off writing a third arc. I hope the devs get it sorted soon.

Both of my arcs have slid from being 5 star ratings early on to being 4 stars now, but I don't find it demoralising, even though there are tons of arcs with 5 stars that I feel are barely worth 2-3 stars based on the story and the writing and gameplay in them.

Why? Because it's the comments I get from people who have played my arcs and enjoyed them that makes writing them worthwhile. The "best arc I've played so far in MA" comments have meant more to me than any number of stars (admittedly I don't care about the badges). I don't care about mainstream/community popularity as long as some people have got enjoyment from my efforts.

The only thing that worries me about reduced ratings is whether people will have trouble finding my arc to play - but I'm hoping word of mouth will prove superior to the ratings. Besides I almost exclusively go off recommendations myself now, or if I don't have any for a certain level range I tend to search for 3-4 star arcs (often using SFMA in my search terms) as that's where a lot of the quality lies.

I would love to edit "SFMA" into my arc descriptions as I've recently found it a useful search term for finding great quality arcs (most of which are at 4 stars as well, ironically enough), but sadly my arcs have now both bloated past the 100% and I don't want to gut them of content just to fit them back in so I can republish (considering how much tweaking and testing it took to get them "just right").

Honestly I wish the rating system was more focused - just 3 ratings - bad, average and good (for 0, 1 or 2 stars respectively) to really iron out the effect that individuals can have on ratings at the start (when a malicious 0 or 1 star rating can really drag down an arc that has several 4-5 star ratings).

These made me smile:

Nemesis gets lamped!

I don't know what disturbs me more - that he needs the monitor for something, or that it still works while not plugged in to a PC nor a mains supply...

Oh and the massed Longbow Eagle ambushes in mayhem missions always make me smile.

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To Valdamar: 2 billion's very impressive! Would you spend your marketeering time finding various IOs to craft and sell back for profit, or did you usually deal with the common IOs?

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I never touch commons - I have a friend that used to memorise, craft and sell commons, but the overall profits were too low with too much upkeep for my liking. I only have two characters among my 13 L50s and 7 characters at other levels that have IOs memorised - in both cases endmod/endrdx at L20ish - because they were such end-heavy builds and I memorised them just through normal gameplay.

I have dabbled with making and selling purples, tempted by the wide margins that sometimes open up, but they can be quite risky redside (due to large capital investment and rapid price fluctuations due to desirability and low supply) and the traffic isn't that high except on the attack sets, so they can sit in a slot for several days (during which you could make better profits moving yellow/orange IOs every day). Purples work better on blueside I find (but only because margins are so hard to find blueside on yellow/orange recipes and purples move faster with the higher population).

Generally I stick to buying orange recipes, and occasionally yellows, make them up and list the IO. I try to find anything with a nice wide margin between the cost of the recipe+salvage+fees and the price that the IO is selling for (note: total fees for listing plus selling always total 10% of the final selling price, so you can estimate fees on a stable niche very easily) - and I look for a stable selling price, as unstable niches with frequent fluctuations can leave you sat on stock for days. I have several niches I work repeatedly, because I recognise cycles in the price fluctuations now and know when to get out and let the niche rest.

A few hints - watch the IO price for a few days to be sure it's stable and at/near equilibrium price before you invest in that niche. Check the costs of the salvage before you buy the recipe. Be patient with bids - the prices of most things during US primetime are generally lower than during EU primetime, so bid below equilibrium, and for salvage at a price you're willing to pay, and let those bids sit overnight (I used to be able to buy all salvage instantly, but with the spikes lately you just end up paying through the nose for it).

Learn to recognise patterned/tagged bids for recipes - this will indicate other marketeers working that niche who you will have to compete with if you want to work it - this means bidding slightly more than them on recipes and listing your IO for less than you think they are listing at (of course you have no way of knowing - you might want to test the water with just one IO overnight, or do as I sometimes do and increment-bid to buy an IO in that niche to find approximately their listing level). Or you may wish to avoid competition, but all the most profitable niches will have it.

You may wish to devote some of your market slots to buying recipes, while devoting the majority to selling IOs - or you may wish to buy a lot of stock one night and devote the next night entirely to selling - do what works for you. But try to have every slot being busy every night. But check the market every day/night at the same time so you have a constant timeframe to build your knowledge around.

Until you're very confident in a niche remaining stable don't buy too many recipes in it, as if the niche turns on you then you'll end up holding loads of stock that could be hard to store (without making it up and sticking it in base storage, if you trust your SG mates - thankfully I'm in a 2-person SG on both sides and implicitly trust my friend) or be forced to sell at a loss just to make space. I haven't had to sell at a loss yet but I have sold IOs for next to no profit just to clear space. When I started out I never bought more than 2-3 IOs of a specific type - nowadays I tend to buy in 5s and 10s just for convenience sake, as it doesn't matter if I lose what I spent on all of them as I've already made that amount hundreds of times over.

Dealing in bulk purchases makes it easier to get the salvage too, as you have fewer different recipes to worry about getting salvage for, so it speeds up your market upkeep time a lot. But when you're starting out just start small and work your way up - you may wish to just start with a few slots until you're more comfortable with it. Be prepared to abandon a niche as soon as the price gets too twitchy for your liking (either for the recipe or the IO). What takes the most time is researching new niches, which is why few marketeers will say which ones they're working.

Working 6-9 niches at once will spread your risk when you get comfortable with marketeering and let you work out which niches are the most profitable and stable, then you can move up to dealing with less niches (the most profitable ones) but selling more IOs in those niches, like I do now (I don't tend to work more than 3-4 niches at a time now, but buy/hold 5-10 in each niche at a time so I can keep them stable and rolling). But still watch the niches you previously worked but no longer are - you may wish to move back into them if they widen or if your current niches collapse.

Oh and because marketeering can/will tie up all your slots its best to use a character you're not actively levelling (as they tend to need market slots to sell what drops for them and to offload salvage) - level 50s you aren't playing much will be best for marketeering - they have the market slots and empty inventories to devote to it.

I'm very happy making 3-5 million cleared profit per market slot, per night, but you have good days and bad days. My most profitable overnight performance was 190.05 million inf cleared profit out of my 18 market slots, but I've made less than 10mill a few times as well. Average performance would probably be 25-50million per night as you can't always devote all your slots to selling. Generally I'm just happy if I log in and see "bought" or "sold" on every single slot.

Keeping stock moving is what makes the inf roll in, so only deal in niches that have high traffic (i.e. popular recipes/IOs that lots of archetypes/powersets can and will use).

Steel Canyon and Cap au Diable are probably the best places to marketeer for closeness of university to the BM/WW.

And don't think of yourself as a parasite like the flippers - you're providing a service to folks with lots of inf who are too lazy to make their own IOs It may not be true, but keep telling yourself that anyway - it makes you feel less evil

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lmao should i be scared?

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I guess that depends on how you feel about being "noob busted" and whatever that entails

"I say we take off and nuke the producer from orbit. It's the only way to be sure!"

/Ripley

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Negative publicity is publicity, the huge ammount of posts around the MA and posi's speech got things sturred up alot, while they could continue the FMV and the website.

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Yeah I did wonder if there was an element of that. Stirring up the community with so many reversals has happened in the past here too (new powersets in I5, but also global def nerfs, then CoV announcement, then ED and CoV launch), and I always wonder if it's intentional controversy to get people talking about the game. CoH/V has certainly had a lot of presence on MMO sites like Massively and MMORPG.com lately and even in more mainstream videogame sites too.

Paragon Studios might be teasing Cryptic as well - I wonder how they reacted to the announcement, so soon on the heels of MA

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(Vald could i see a build of your Widow dude, i created mine on monday, really need to find a nice build, he's my next project but i'm unsure on softcapping etc, sorry to go of topic btw.)

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Linky

Edit - this should work pretty well as a levelling build - I have levelled taking powers in that order and sticking to the number of slots on that build, though I have been frankenslotting with cheap IO sets as I said. I have had some end issues, but nowhere near as bad as my Mace/SR brute (which is L31 currently).

I'm posting this build here mainly so I can link it in another topic (where Devans has requested sight of it), but without derailing that topic.

This build is expensive - 2.3billion inf spent recently, mainly on the purples, though I had a lot of the uniques/procs/HOs in my base storage anyway - probably well north of 2.5billion in total even with patient bidding (and I am a patient bidder - I like bargains!). Normally I'd consider anyone mad for spending this kind of inf on a build - but with recent price rises on the BM driving me into marketeering, and then finding out how easy it is to make oodles of inf, I decided to spoil myself and make a ludicrously powerful build that could solo AVs, do the RWZ Challenge and solo a Rikti pylon - and perhaps even manage to survive facing some of the overpowered custom critters littering the MA

Just don't ask me how this build plays yet - my Widow is currently L42, frankenslotted with cheap sets, but since L35 I've known the Widow playstyle suited me and that I wanted to make the best of her. I do have all of the IOs for this build either slotted already or in base storage waiting until she hits 50 (sometime in the next few weeks). Yes I am probably insane, but I'll let the build speak for itself


Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.401
http://www.cohplanner.com/

[u]Click this DataLink to open the build![u]

Mistress Distress: Level 50 Natural Arachnos Widow
Primary Power Set: Night Widow Training
Secondary Power Set: Widow Teamwork
Power Pool: Fitness
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Leaping
Power Pool: Medicine

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Poison Dart -- Apoc-Dmg/Rchg(A), Apoc-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(3), Apoc-Acc/Rchg(3), Apoc-Dmg/EndRdx(17), Apoc-Dam%(17)
Level 1: Combat Training: Defensive -- GftotA-Run+(A), GftotA-Def(11), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(11), LkGmblr-Rchg+(46)
Level 2: Strike -- C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(5), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(5), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(31), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(31), T'Death-Dam%(31)
Level 4: Tactical Training: Maneuvers -- GftotA-Def/EndRdx(A), GftotA-Def(7), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(7), LkGmblr-Rchg+(46)
Level 6: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 8: Follow Up -- Hectmb-Dmg/Rchg(A), Hectmb-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(9), Hectmb-Acc/Rchg(9), Hectmb-Dmg/EndRdx(34), Hectmb-Dam%(34), GSFC-Build%(34)
Level 10: Indomitable Will -- S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(A)
Level 12: Lunge -- C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(13), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(13), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(33), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(33), T'Death-Dam%(33)
Level 14: Spin -- Armgdn-Dmg/Rchg(A), Armgdn-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(15), Armgdn-Acc/Rchg(15), Armgdn-Dmg/EndRdx(21), Armgdn-Dam%(21), Erad-%Dam(29)
Level 16: Health -- Mrcl-Rcvry+(A), Mrcl-Heal(45), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(45), Numna-Heal(45)
Level 18: Slash -- C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx(A), C'ngImp-Dmg/Rchg(19), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(19), C'ngImp-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(36), C'ngImp-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(36), T'Death-Dam%(36)
Level 20: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod(A), P'Shift-EndMod/Rchg(23), P'Shift-EndMod/Acc(23), P'Shift-End%(29)
Level 22: Foresight -- GftotA-Run+(A), GftotA-Def(25), LkGmblr-Def(25), LkGmblr-Rchg+(46)
Level 24: Mind Link -- HO:Membr(A), HO:Membr(40), HO:Membr(40), LkGmblr-Rchg+(50)
Level 26: Eviscerate -- Oblit-Dmg(A), Oblit-Acc/Rchg(27), Oblit-Dmg/Rchg(27), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(37), Oblit-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(37), Oblit-%Dam(37)
Level 28: Dart Burst -- Ragnrk-Dmg/Rchg(A), Ragnrk-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(39), Ragnrk-Acc/Rchg(39), Ragnrk-Dmg/EndRdx(39), Ragnrk-Knock%(43)
Level 30: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(43), RechRdx-I(43)
Level 32: Combat Jumping -- Ksmt-ToHit+(A)
Level 35: Super Speed -- Winter-ResSlow(A), Zephyr-Travel(42), Zephyr-Travel/EndRdx(42)
Level 38: Mask Presence -- GftotA-Run+(A), GftotA-Def/EndRdx(40), LkGmblr-Def/EndRdx(42), LkGmblr-Rchg+(50)
Level 41: Mental Training -- Run-I(A)
Level 44: Aid Other -- Heal-I(A)
Level 47: Aid Self -- Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx(A), Dct'dW-EndRdx/Rchg(48), Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(48), Dct'dW-Heal(48), Dct'dW-Rchg(50)
Level 49: Tactical Training: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A)
------------
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- ULeap-Stlth(A)
Level 2: Rest -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 1: Conditioning
------------

Highlights include:[*]perma-hasten for a total of 192.5% global recharge, [*]soft-capped defence to all positions with perma Mind Link (and to melee without it) but with enough surplus defence to take several -def debuffs without noticing,[*]60% resist to speed debuffs (I really hate Caltrops...), [*]+22% global damage but can potentially keep Follow-Up triple-stacked for +112% dmg total with an ongoing +36% ToHit (including the Kismet),[*]3.82 end/sec recovery less 0.99 end/sec toggle cost in combat (will recover more end/sec than my /WP brute/scrapper).

My only doubt was whether to go with the GSFC proc or a damage proc in FU, but the Build Up proc seemed like more fun - it will have lots of chances to fire and this build can fit its entire single target attack chain into 5.25 seconds easily (into 4.1secs actually, according to Mids, but with my poor connection I doubt it will match that in practice, even using power-queuing as I do).

It's a dps build of course, built for taking down hard targets - if I want better burst damage then I have my Bane and if I want to kill spawns faster then I have his Crab build - though at L42 with just cheap frankenslotting this Widow build minces spawns pretty handily too (if slower than my Bane/Crab does, but they can't survive or kill tough targets quite so well as this build should).

As soon as she hits 50 and slots everything my first action will be attempting the RWZ challenge (L54 Rikti spawn, 3 bosses, no insps/temps, no disengaging/pulling/splitting) then maybe a Pylon (my Bane has duo'd a pylon pretty quickly with my friend's Night Widow). I watched my friend's L50 Night Widow do the RWZ Challenge, but so far I've only tried it with my En/Elec Brute (succeeded, but it was a close run thing) and my Bane (failed many times - his build needs Aid Self to be capable of it, but I'd struggle to fit Aid Other and Aid Self in without compromising what I like about his build).

Comments welcome.

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I can't remember the last time I actually bothered walking to a games store. They're so 90s.

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Ditto. Admittedly we don't actually have any dedicated games stores here, nor comics stores, and CDs/DVDs are so overpriced in shops here, so Amazon caters to all of my book/game/DVD/CD needs. Been using them consistently over the last 10 years and never had a single cause to complain about any aspect of their service (though they did send me an extra book by mistake once - they told me to keep it, as returning it would cost them more in admin time than it was worth ).

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Yeah it's the Grav set which was bought when i dropped my first Hecatomb on a LGTF I picked up 3 gravs for 15mill each last week, an was given the hold

I have the numina an regenerative tissue but they we're only 35mill each aswell

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Yeah you can get some real bargains if you're patient. I used to spread-bid on uniques I used a lot, such as the Unbounded Leap Stealth (still have 4 left in my base - never paid more than 500k for the recipe), Kismet ToHit (never paid more than 5m for one, until recently when I stuck 15m down for one as I wanted it fast) and Steadfast Res/+Def (got most of those for 5m as well, iirc).

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Crushing impacts, possitrons etc we're dropped with tickets, and i think the devastation an impervium armours we're what cost me the most. Oh an i dropped an LOTG +recharge with merits xD from ITF.

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Yeah tickets must help a lot - I haven't rolled any of mine yet, but then my MA experiences have been spread over the four characters I'm levelling currently and a couple of my L50s. I rolled nearly 400 merits when I14 hit and got 3 Numi +Regen/Recov, and loads of nice non-uniques and procs I use a lot. It all helps.

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i probably spent 600mill on him, but i got everything cheap as i say, he's worth over a bill though, MA made the recipes dirt cheap, an with salvage easily bought with tickets it was great.

Prices of recipes an rare salvage is rising again though, an white salvage is settling down thank god

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Yeah its hard to estimate "worth" of a build with prices spiking up and down so much, especially redside where the smaller volume makes the BM really vulnerable to trends. I just mention what the build actually cost me at the time, and I guess the Widow has had 2.3billion spent on her, most of it on the purples which have been much higher price lately than usual - but that doesn't include some of the stuff I'd already bought/looted a while ago and had in base storage (including 3 Membranes, Kismet ToHit, +end and ToD procs, all of the Zephyrs and the Winter's Gift, Steadfast +def, plus the aforementioned Numi unique from merit rolls).

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(Vald could i see a build of your Widow dude, i created mine on monday, really need to find a nice build, he's my next project but i'm unsure on softcapping etc, sorry to go of topic btw.)

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Sure. Rather than derail I'll post it in the Soldiers forum then come back and link it here.

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Is it not about time we got a bit of a update on i15 maybe some sneak peaks of the new costume sets or something

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I think we'll just get I15 very soon, perhaps with no beta or a very short one. There's not a lot to reveal about it or test in it ...

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I don't buy an sell on the market, it's too time intensive, but since i14 it's even easier to slot charachters now especially vill side.

My last project a ss/elec took 2 weeks to fully slot including one set of purps, lotgs numinas etc, without swapping money from other toons onto it.

I'm not farming, just buying an selling what i drop, an i'm on my way to a full completion "quasi perma godmode" on him.

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You're not farming or playing the markets and it took you 2 weeks to fully purple out a brute Red Side?

The RNG must love you

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To be fair Devans just said one set of purples - it might be the immobilise set in the patron immob (seen brutes doing that a few times) - that's not too pricy - you could afford that from selling a single Armageddon, Apocalypse or Hecatomb dropped in normal gameplay - and my L50s tend to loot at least 1 purple levelling from 46 to 50, sometimes 2. Devans didn't specify uniques either when mentioning LotGs and Numinas - my Axe/WP has tons of Numinas slotted, just not the unique (tbh it would be expensive overkill for him - he never runs low on end/hp anyway).

My post-I9 L50s have easily made 100-150m inf each from normal levelling by the time they hit 47-50 (when I spend it all on their final build), despite spending on IOs as they levelled (usually a full set at L25, maybe upgrade some of those in late 30s or early 40s, before using all that inf for the full re-slot for set bonuses at L47-50). The only "help" I tend to give them is 5m at L12 so they have no inf worries at low level. Admittedly I do keep all uniques that drop for me on any character in my base storage and use for whichever characters need them.

This is why most of my pre-I13 builds cost 100-150m - they mostly paid their own way. But they still have pretty nice builds despite not using purples - plenty of Positrons, Numinas, LotGs, etc. Heck, my Crab build uses 5 Positron sets and I got all 25 Posi IOs plus salvage to make them for 75m with patient bidding - I remember because the same day I got the last few someone complained on one of the global channels that a single set of 5 pre-made Posis had cost them 50m. That's the difference between patient bidding and "buy it now" recklessness.

Admittedly my Widow build is so ludicrous it would have taken longer than 2 weeks to afford even non-stop farming (which is too time-intensive for me). Cost-wise there's a big difference between using one purple set and having a fully purpled monster (I'm hoping there is performance-wise too or I've probably wasted 2-3billion inf ). Heck my Mind/Psi permadom uses two purple sets but he's hardly uber. Ok he's only perma-dom with the empowerment buff, but he's still permadom solo and his build only cost around 100m.

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Did anyone else's jaw just hit the floor?

So THAT's what all those extra Developers have been doing!

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My jaw has been on the floor the last 4 hours

I'm certainly glad to see that all those extra Devs, extra funding and precisely worded commitments to the future of this game by both NCSoft and Paragon Studios have finally crystallised into something of tangible worth to the playerbase. I just hope this expansion has content for all levels, including a starting zone where any archetype can begin.

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Word is they're not checking EU ones. Not that I know anythiing about it.

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You must have a source though, unless you pulled that out of thin air (or somewhere darker and smellier).

How could they possibly tell the difference between EU ones and US ones in the MA? The MA browser is global across EU and US servers (just like the BM and the WW). On the G4 interview Positron simply stated he used certain search criteria inside the MA browser to find arcs to play.

Unless of course the mission in question was written in, say, French - then if the Dev doesn't understand that language you could hardly criticise them for not playing it, as they wouldn't have a clue what to do. Even then it couldn't be called anti-EU discrimination because a French mission could easily have been written by a French Canadian.

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I wouldn't read too much into the timing. NCsoft as a whole had a huge month in April, with anniversaries and announcements and new product releases. In some ways it made sense to wait to announce Going Rogue in order to separate it out and not have it be fighting for attention with other things.

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Yeah, you know better than us what it's like, having been on the inside. There were probably lots of factors that we, as players, just couldn't even begin to imagine.

Though having worked for large multinational companies myself I know how difficult it can be to coordinate things sometimes, especially when you have customers and offices in several regions (with different legal jurisdictions) and a head office in a completely different country again. Even to get the simplest of tasks accomplished can take ages, as you need approvals from so many departments in so many different offices.

Heck, just getting a minor PC issue fixed at work, that I could probably fix myself if I was allowed, means a phone call to our helpline in Bangalore, which then escalates your problem (if it is deemed to not be user error) to our global tech support in Chicago (who need to track all IT problems globally in our company), which then escalates to our regional head office in London, which then notifies our IT department in our own building here that they can come and assist us.

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Brilliant timing!

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It's a Praetorian plot.

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A Praetorian Nemesis plot, surely?

Most triple-A p2p MMOs release a boxed paid-for expansion every 6-18 months (from the prolific SOE end of the spectrum, to the slower Blizzard end), on top of free content additions. I don't think we can criticise NCSoft for asking us to pay for an optional huge new addition to the game (which I expect this will be) just because they've been so generous at releasing free content in the past. Nobody has any right to feel gypped if you compare CoH/V to other major western MMOs.

Honestly I don't think you can start raining on NCSoft's parade until we have more details. It just looks like cynicism for the sake of being overly pessimistic. And hey, I'm usually pessimistic and cynical, but you can't attack a company for something they might fail to deliver just based on gut feelings and no proof/facts - that way lies the path of the troll. Lets wait and see.

As this will be a full expansion and not an issue I'm betting it will be turned into a full relaunch of the game to get store-shelf presence again. Considering NCSoft's re-investment into the game this would be the most sensible course of action to get the game to new players.

I'll certainly want a boxed version of it, if one is available.

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Just yesterday i had to bite my tongue while one of my managers complained about there son being antisocial because he was always up in his room playing xbox with people hundreds of miles away.

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Yeah I've encountered this at work too and even from family - 99% of the time the critic is someone who spends most of their own spare time sat in front of a television, not socialising or interacting with anyone. The irony of that is totally lost on them, because TV is more socially acceptable and easily understood by the masses.

Plus it gives them something to talk about around the watercooler with their peers - that's where the social interaction of their "hobby" happens - in short snippets, after the fact. I know someone at work who doesn't even like soap operas or reality TV that much, but watches them just so they can join in the conversations at work and conform to the norm. Sadly my department are all soap and reality TV fans - I think I'd fit in better with our IT guys or accountants - they're gamers and watch the few TV shows I like

Things change in time. Consoles are just going mainstream now with the Wii/PS3/Xbox360 being the breakthrough generation and consoles are starting to get more MMOs. 5-10 years and MMOs will be mainstream (sorry Dreamweaver!).

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I hit the 2 billion infamy cap...

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No Top Hat? No Monocle? No /e evillaughter? Pffft.


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I thought that was just a US thing

We don't even have a market forum...

Spent most of that 2 billion already and besides a top hat and tuxedo would look rubbish with crab arms

Tbh I wish the market would stabilise and that prices would go back to pre-I13 levels so I wouldn't feel the need to do this, at least not on this scale. For one thing it annoys me when one of my lowbies levels up and it takes longer than 5 mins to buy the 2-3 cheap yellow set IOs I need to frankenslot in the new slots, because pre-I13 that was easy. Now, with shortages and spiking prices, I often have to wait for overnight bids to go through (or weekly in the case of some uniques/purples) - or pay stupidly high prices, which I was unwilling to do even with 2 billion inf in the kitty - I'm not going to feed ridiculous greed in others and never overprice anything I sell.

I was shocked how easy it was to make inf once I applied myself to it, though. And people need to pay attention to their bidding increments - I lose track of how many times I get paid 5-10m more than an item is listed for. Other people's impatience pays well.

Maybe I am an ebil marketeer as far as motivation goes - it could be worse though - at least I'm not a farmer corrupting newbies

I9 changed a lot about this game, not all for the better, and I13 & I14 even moreso, but MMOs change and MMO players need to learn to adapt to those changes or fall by the wayside. Such is life.

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...also merging red/blue would probably be good. I can't stand the blue colours, so I stick to the red version, but that means any "internal" links sends me packing to blue side and a re-log or some fancy(?) editing of the URL.

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I'd veto that as it's removing choice/options. Oddly enough I prefer the blue/CoH colour scheme on the EU forums, but prefer the red/CoV colour scheme on the US forums.

I started marketeering on 25 February 2009 on redside, mainly because I was frustrated at not being able to afford the yellow/orange IO'd builds (i.e. best IOs I could get without using purples or LotG/Numi/Miracle uniques) which I'd grown used to having pre-I13. Those builds had cost me 100-125m per character back then, but cost more than I could afford in the wake of the post-I13 and post-I14 price rises. Pre-I13 I funded my builds mainly by levelling normally, crafting then selling my drops (purples especially), with some minor arbitrage on the side from time to time (buying surplus L50 recipes to vendor, across 2-3 characters, for 5m or so cleared profit per day).

I don't enjoy marketeering as much as levelling, but it takes up less than 10-20% of my playing time per night (about the same as arbitrage took me, but for considerably higher profits with more risk, and it's more interesting too). I didn't want to start farming as I know that is more time intensive (and might burn me out to playing the game normally - lack of variety... blech!), and I didn't like the attitudes of a lot of the farmers I ran into pre-I13 and didn't want to be counted as part of that group. I consider marketeering a necessary and worthwhile "evil" to get the builds I want to make, and I don't need the assistance of others to do it.

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I think that it is harder to strike it rich on the red side. Not that I have trouble earning enough to get my SO's and even the not to expensive IO's for my characters. So if you like the challenge, I would suggest to get red.

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It's much easier redside, I find. Potential profit margins are wider because of availability issues, especially when recipes are in shortage but you have IOs up for sale, forcing the "buy it now" players to buy your stock (I'm a patient bidder, personally). On blueside the market moves faster with lower prices due to more surplus and more buyers/sellers, but there are very few shortages to exploit so the price margins of IOs compared to their recipes is a lot tighter - this leaves a lot less room to make a profit by "buy, craft and sell" schemes (which is what I use, as I find flipping distasteful... and too risky and time-intensive) - and increases the risk of the IO price dipping below the recipe price, killing the margin and leaving you with loss-making stock on your hands.

It's easier to monopolise niches redside too of course, with the lower traffic, though I tend to list IOs quite a bit below going rate to ensure I move stock fast, so ultimately I end up destroying my own niches as I bring the IO prices down (and occasionally bring recipe prices up to meet them - depends on supply). But then I'll just let that niche "rest" and go looking for another.

With 100m initial capital on 25 Feb 2009 I hit the 2 billion infamy cap on 22 April 2009 (though I did pull out 100m at one point for an alt who needed inf, and sold two purple drops for 162m total as well during that time, and had a week off not doing much marketeering).

I started marketeering on blueside on 27 April 2009, again with 100m start-up. That same week I picked a different redside character with around 100m to start marketeering that side with again (as my double-billionaire was busy spending his infamy on IOs for my Widow). I've pulled 800m out of the redside character, and he has around 500m inf remaining now, so around 1300m earned in total - the bluesider just hit 700m with no withdrawals - that's not including the value of current stock (worth more on the redsider).

So, subtracting initial capital from both, in 2 weeks that's 1200m cleared profit earned redside and just 600m blueside, despite the fact they are operating in similar niches, with a similar strategy, and the bluesider is selling 2-3 times as many IOs and taking twice as much time per day to upkeep because of that (with narrower margins you have to go for quantity of sales on blueside).

In short the blueside character is making inf at half the rate of the redside one for more time invested. That's probably not such an issue in inf terms, as the buying power of influence is greater than infamy anyway, as most prices are much lower blueside (purples aside) - 600m influence spent on blueside's WW can go much further than 1200m infamy on redside's BM, depending what you buy.

I've been keeping records of my progress, but only on paper (admittedly using record sheets I made in Excel) - mainly to keep track of my niches and what it cost me to buy/make IOs to make sure I don't sell them for less than I paid for them if the price moves - and obviously I won't reveal my niches

Hopefully there's something of use in my experiences with both markets to help the OP decide on their best course of action.

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i use all combination of browsers and have had "form submitted not valid". and i havnt posted much.

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I've started using Google Chrome recently - maybe I've just been lucky, but I haven't had that error message at all since, but in IE7 I used to get it all the time.

As much as I like CoX (ahem) I tend to use CoH/V myself, or CoV/H just to be cheeky - but there are times when it's just easier to slip CoX in - sure it's not as satisfying, but it is much quicker! <cough>

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You have too much time on your hands to start a thread about this, spend it better by typing the full name to things, drop the acronyms and take 2 steps back.

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You probably use full words and refuse to use shorthand in SMS text messages too... just like me! And my friends call me the philistine!! Honestly the few extra seconds you spend typing words in full means time saved for your friends not having to decode gibberish, or text you back to ask what the heck you meant. Though I do slip into acronyms occasionally... tbh

Admittedly I type quite quickly - in EverQuest one of my real life friends (who never used PCs in his day job) was lucky if he could type more than 3-4 words per minute (not so much hunt & peck typing as "extensive search & cautious keypress" typing), while I was shooting out monologues between sword swings. We encouraged him to use l33t shorthand to type with, because having players think he was an immature kid was less discouraging than them thinking he was slow/retarded (which he got accused of a few times - I always had a few choice words to say to the person in question - well, quite a lot of words actually).