MaestroMavius

The only one here advocating removal of CC's has been in Dio's head.
Please actually read the thread before responding.

We're attempting to discuss the unforseen repercussions of certain activites and or long held traditions, not advocating it's removal...

If anything, the discussion should provide alternative ways to prevent things being an issue.

Free accounts being dolled up trials is fodder for discussion if you'd like. Nothing changed due to trials before because they were simply that. A peek at the game, a taste before buying. Since the trials were more limited in scope and use nothing had to change within the community. As they would become part of said community upon end of trial period.

With the new hybrid model, free/premium players are going to become a large, if not the largest, percentage of our population. There for it will no longer be considered 'Our' game. This is why I feel certain things need to be re-examined before they sneak up on us.

Indeed. Having the ambush start before I've read the 'twist of the knife' is kind of jarring.

Neither, if I'm being honest. All my villains have individual motives for why they do what they do but none could be seen as glamourous or disgusting.

My villainous Blaster only kills when he has to, stealthing past all the minions as they are beneath him and he wouldn't even bother, dispatching the boss to achieve stated goals. In his particular case, it's acquiring as much Coral as possible to further augment his powers and allow him to return home and destroy the entire Powers Division.

My Necro/Dark MM on the other hand, is more a malicious villain. Suppose on some level he could be considered disgusting. He was a dark magician in Victorian times that was killed. He became trapped in the underworld and there he used his magic to trap demons within himself. Once he was strong enough he broke free and returned to the world of the living. Using dark magic to bring back his gang to assist in his goal. Gaining enough magic via artifacts or spells or anything. Killing is beneath him as well, choosing to let his minions do the dirty work. His MO is to plot the eventual release of Rularuu, as only then would he achieve freedom from all existence.

I create a basic concept and look/name but then I allow the time played to shape the character. As I'm a hero at heart, I've found playing truly disgusting villains to be not that easy to get into. So most of mine have taken a more middle ground approach.

As for the tutorial and the brewha over that...

For me, the text and various things ingame are very flexible. It's easy to feel like your nothing but a lackey to Arachno's if you go strictly by the dialogue. It's also very simple to read what you want to into it. If a contact was talking down to my near god like villain, I'd just alter it in my head to make sense.
I'm letting them 'think' they are in control, to make it easier to stab them later. OR You may have info I need but I won't hesitate taking it by force if you don't cooperate so spill, kinda internal dialogue. Helps to flesh out the characters story if you aren't so rigidly held to what's presented in text.

It's not bashing a particular group because they are in the minority. It's pointing out the fact that, from the companies view, The manpower/hours and resources would be more profitable being spent on other areas.

They are the only ones with actual numbers concerning this. They are the only ones who can decide if it's worth it. Since they haven't it becomes apparent that you are, in fact, such a small percentage that it's a non-issue to them. I'm sorry if that hurts your feelings. Being left out is never fun.

Point of fact. Nobody in this thread has been negative towards those that like PvP. That's a kneejerk reaction based on your perception. The PvP crowd is shunned in most areas of the forums, so you assume anytime it's mentioned it's negative. Re-read the thread and you'll see most of us in support of the suggestion, while offering up alternatives and laying our facts about the history of PvP in this game. View that as bashing if you want, that's your call.

Before any work is done creating an entire new zone for PvP, you'd need an active PvP population/ interest in, which we do not have.

Before any work is done creating an entire new zone for PvP, they'd need to either revert to pre-i13 rules or come up with something new entirely.

PvP was never popular in this game. I joined a week before Issue 4 introduced Arena's. One of the things that drew me to this game over others was the fact that it had no PvP. Once it was added it was strictly created as being optional for that very reason, a large chunk of us didn't care for it and would've rioted if forced to do so.

After CoV launched, we started getting a serious PvP crowd. All the same, on most servers Siren's and Warburg were desolate zones. My namesake Blaster spent his entire 24 - 28 levels running the repeat missions in Siren's for the extra bonus they (at the time) gave. In the months I flew around the zone I only saw 2 villains. Ever. It was a blast being chased all over the place by a Stalker that was hunting me for a few days, He'd gank me coming out a mission door. I'd then stealth stalk him and wait for my chance. We had the entire zone to ourselves, during primetime, for days...

PvP is dead. No interest from us means no interest from the Dev's. Fact is, something would have been done by now if the PvP crowd was large enough to warrant it. Since PvP is all but ignored by the Dev's we must infer this to mean the vocal PvP crowd is insignificant to the big picture and would thus be a waste of valuable resources.

As an aside, I'd be in favor of turning one of the existing hazard zones into a FFA before I'd ask for an entire new zone dedicated to a small select group of players. Take Boomtown and have it be infected with a toxin that makes everyone go nuts and attack friend and foe alike, but you have to risk it to do X.

Boomtown and Dark Astoria would be my choice for zones next up on the revamp table.

As for maps I'd have to say remove the layer cake cave entirely. Then destroy the code for it. Only time I'd advocate removing content.

Also, I wouldn't mind if the Council vampyre water chamber map was reworked a bit.

With Freedom comes numerous changes. Change in the form of F2P/Hybrid. Change in the form of microtrans. Change in the form of content delivered and on and on.

What I'd like to discuss here is the unseen changes. The small little things that have to be amended now. In the way we view the game, it's community and the way we play. First up is one I've brought up elsewhere.

Blind invites being rude/not a team worth playing with.

This might be an easy adjustment to make, then again it may prove to be such an ingrained idea for the vets that we don't shake it that quickly. Fact is though, come Freedom, blind invites will be the only way to roll for the majority of players. Free players won't be able to communicate with us and vice versa. It ceases to be 'rude' when it's the only option.

Costume Contests could be considered rude.

This might be a stretch, but considering that, with Freedom comes a division in the game population we must also consider the impact that will have in our 'festive' activities. Since the free players can't win anything, by virtue of not being able to trade or e-mail, they won't be able to participate by default. So sometime down the line, just as blind invites eventually became rude, it may turnout that announcing a CC gets you heckled in local. This in turn will mean it stops being a fun activity and starts to feed into the Us vs Them mentality. Even leading to CC's being griefed all the time. Hypothetical as this is, I think it merits some discussion.

So, what else can we think of that will need to change? Am I wrong in thinking long held mindsets will take time to alter? Do they even need to?

Personally I can't stand to solo scrappers. Past level 22 it becomes a snorefest very quickly for me. The only exception I've found has been Regen, with it's reactive nature keeping me on my toes.
All the other sets with good defenses end up leaving me bored.
Half way through a mission and I'm just click click click, next. Click click click, next as I'm in no danger of dying I have no need to pay attention.

Ultimate boredom.

I hate soloing scrappers. I really love playing scrappers on teams though as the added company and increased spawns makes it interesting.

But yeah, roll any scrapper and get some SO's. You won't be faceplanting that often past that.
(provided your a decent player)

Noted. I'll add, I wouldn't be oppossed to the option to show them, more options are always a plus. Would also be helpful for those occasions when the last few on map glitches and still don't show up.

I'll pass. The cinematic was cool but just not really feeling it from the gameplay.

It doesn't bother me anymore. Before they added the feature to make the last few on a map appear it would occasionally annoy me but that was only due to backtracking up and down floors.
In fact, I kind of appreciate the 'Find and seek' parts of some missions. Otherwise they'd be really monotonous after 7 years. As it stands I have 90% of the maps fairly well memorized and it's only the abstract placement of objectives that break it up.

That said,
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I wouldn't bother making this suggestion. The entire 1st paragraph of your post lets me know you already have an idea what would happen if you did. Hopefully you'll find with the replies in this one (and I fully expect I'll be the only one to use your --- idea) that your in the minority on being bothered by the hunt and seek. As an aside, the drawn out warning and insistence that everyone 'Play by your rules or else' never ends well. You might as well be giving everyone an invitation to flame you long before they even get to the suggestion. Suggestions around these parts are always going to be heated, trying to do an endrun around the trolls only alerts them to your fear.
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Agreed.

Just last night I had this 'problem' strike me. I was on a team that was steamrolling along. We'd been fighting the visual bug all night but I wasn't paying much attention to the team window since I wasn't on a support toon.

So we exit the mission and I'm just standing there waiting for the next one to be set. Noticed in chatter that the original leader asked for the star back to invite and started messing with my enhancements. Few seconds later I see that a small problem seems to be brewing as the leader was still asking for the star and starting to get frustrated. I flipped some channels on the TV. That's when I got a /Tell from one of the other guys on the team.

/Tell - You do know you have the star right?

>_<

Not to add insult to injury and all but...

You do know that the Celestial Armor is time limited. They plan on rotating out the pieces at that tier. So while it is possible it'll come back around eventually, it's still an unknown.

In other words, I wouldn't get overly excited about it just yet.

I guess it's just hard for some of us to fathom that it's a good thing.
We picture how we would react in such a situation and assume that's how your feeling.

If I had to actually delete all my characters?! Even the thought of it makes me sick to my stomach. I have the same issue about level 50 as you though. Which is why I only have 3 and it took 6+ years to even get one.

That's game over, no growth left. I'm all about the journey too, so I make TONS of alts. But I can't delete something I've created and given life to. Eventually, I tell myself, eventually I'll get back to them...

So, when I hear about you forcing yourself to do another reboot. I imagine how I'd feel, then I urge you to reconsider because I don't want you to get so frustrated that you leave. Now that we know it only creates new adventures and you don't get that down over it. More power to you!

Blueside is always going to have more activity regardless of server, sad to say.

That said, if your wanting to RP being bad, Virtue is the safest bet.

Great idea for a thread. Not sure if I can narrow it down to just one influtential player though.

My 1st creation was my main Energy/Energy Blaster. I knew nothing about MMO's though and it was quite the learning curve. Around level 24 I was just about ready to give up and quit. I came to the forums seeking advice and discovered an entire world of answers.

I was doing it wrong.

SnipeFu, without knowing it, kept me playing for 7 years.

It was his original Eng/Eng guide that taught me how to properly play a Blaster. That I wasn't supposed to stand my ground and fight like a tank.
In my head, Heroes don't run. So I played my Blaster like that...
I learned from his guide and others on here about LoS and tactical retreat etc etc.

Temp_Extremes was a prolific poster back in 2005. I was more of a lurker back then though. One night I was running through Steel canyon and just happened to see one of his alts. I recognized the name from his forum sig.
I sent a tell saying "Hi Temp!" and he asked if I knew him. After I explained that I didn't really I saw the trade window appear. I had never traded anything at this point so I was totally lost. Next thing I know he'd gifted me $200,000 and vanished. Back in '05 this was a fortune! I was so broke I couldn't even afford DO's on that toon. I ran straight to the store and pimped him out fully!
To this day I haven't forgotten his generosity and have continued to 'pay it forward' with interest to anyone in need/ cool look/ new player etc etc.

Finally, while not a person per se, a giant influence for me was the SG
Paragon City Search and Rescue.
My 3rd day playing I was sent to The Hollows. Armed with my trusty sprint I attempted to make it to my mission 4 or 5 times, each time getting a little closer before dying. On my 6th run back from Atlas I was getting pretty ticked off. My anger led me to a swift death in the hills though.

I layed there for a few moments, trying to decide if I should hit the hosp. button yet again or just turn the game off. Then this bright orange Hero appears over me and raised their arms. I was lifted off my feet and brought back to life! The NPC conveyed the PCSAR greeting and offered further help if needed. I was amazed that the game designers thought to put a Paramedic service for Heroes in the game! Then the Hero landed and I realized it was an actual player! They proceeded to TP me to my mission door and buff me up. They informed me to send a tell when I finished to be TP'd back to the gate and then flew off. I stood there staring into the sky amazed. Sure enough, when I finished she quickly TP'd me back to the gate and before I could even mumble a thanks she zoomed off to rez another fallen Hero. The thought that other players would take the time to help others instead of actually playing the game changed everything.

It was then that I realized this game had so much more potential than just beating up bad guys! When I was actually recruited into PCSAR years later... I'm still honored by it.

Those would be the 3 biggest influences for me.

What I'm still confused about is;

Do you have a rule that states you have to create new characters at certain intervals?
If not, the level variation between your characters would be the only stumbling block when new rewards like merits are released.

Couldn't you just make it a rule that you can't use merits? I mean, for me they might as well not exist. I don't think I've ever actually used them...


You list being able to choose Epic powers early as being another condition for the reset. Wouldn't it be just as easy to pretend that change is never made and continue to 'unlock' them at 41?

I mean, I can see total reset being applicable in previous issues, but this time around the reboot is confusing. Even more so given the DxP and 2 level 40+'s. Everything that is being added is optional. Just choose not to use any of it.

Guess it's all moot now though, deed has been done.

Perhaps I'm just far to attached to my characters. I still haven't deleted the 2nd toon I made 7 years ago and I've never even logged back in to him...


Admit it Steel, you really didn't 'have' to reset this time around, you just really 'wanted' to didn't ya?
I always knew you were a glutten for punishment.

Honest answer, outside of PLing...

Whichever one you enjoy playing the most.


As an aside, my choice for fastest leveling solo would be MM Necro/Dark (other combo's felt slower before SO's) or Brute's.
But that was just for me, I'm sure others will say Dominators or Stalkers based on their personal experiences.

So, whichever one will get you to log on the most and play just a bit longer each time.

This sounds very cool.

If this occurs after Freedom launches I'll be in. Otherwise I'll just have to watch as I refused to pay that much for the party pack.

But even you have to agree, when looking at the overall picture from 1-50 Fire wins out.

Sure if you only focus on the 35+ game with Procs and all avail extras the other sets equal out or even outperform but that doesn't change the fact that Fire is an AoE monster from level 4 on...