Melancton

Heck yes. Get this over to the Ask A Stupid Question thread where it belongs!

Example: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showp...postcount=9473

Add to the thread: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showt...89#post2194889

This question has been a staple for years.

The Misty Woods has a narrow bottleneck in the north of it, and as you say, what counts is where they fall over. I typically have to "pull" Red Caps "over the border" into the Misty Woods every time I get the mission. You have to irritate them enough to chase you, and not get too far ahead of them or they will return to their spawn points.

The main problem is in realizing WHY it does not count when you whack a member of the target class. "Oh, when it says 'in New Connaugh' it has to be in the border of... d'oh!"

Of course it always happens that PI is overrun with with Strongmen saying, "Darlings, we cannot let anyone pass!" whenever I am looking for Fake Nems instead of Carnies. (Although +4 Master Illusionists seem in plentiful supply when I DO have a Carnie hunt. )

This is all sort of a Rite of Passage, I suppose... like trying to enter the Exit in the train, etc.

Save me a seat, NT, I am with you guys. Late game starts at 40.

I am at lvl 49 with what will be my 8th lvl 50, and once you hit 45, it gets tough to find enough folks to make a decent team, and the Push to 50 really slogs down. If, however, you have a good group of folks you can regularly team with, it flashes past in an instant.

Of course, having 8 50s after 4 1/2 years makes me a total piker; there are folks who have been playing a month who have 30 of them.

Oddly, I have two TA/Arch Defenders (on different servers) and a Storm/Ice Defender and although I usually play Controllers, I have no /TA controllers.

I have teamed with /TA Controllers and it DOES leverage up the controls, so I see the attraction, but I have never done it. But I did take a /FF Controller to 50. I still take him out and play him, and I have the various shields bound into my numberpad for easy buffing. I have not, however, had any impulse to play most Defenders such as Emp, Rad, FF or Kin.

It is surely true that what appeals to folks differs a lot!

Pretty good stuff, Aett, but it looks like this is getting serious!

*lights the Steelclaw Beacon*

Me always... ahem, I have always enjoyed the Trolls and their Bizarro-speak.

Brilliant material all the way through. *applause*

You know, as I was writing my original post, I wondered if it was Obligatory to note that EM Pulse is the correct name and EMP Pulse (which is the given name of the power by the Devs) would mean Electro-Magnetic Pulse Pulse.

The reason that thought occurred was that I watched "Mickey Blue Eyes" with the lovely Mrs. Melancton this weekend and noted this dialogue:

Michael : Well at least tell me what (your father's) restaurant is called, then I can sneak in, in a beard or something.
Gina : It's called The La Trattoria.
Michael : You mean La Trattoria.
Gina : No.
Michael : The La Trattoria means The The Trattoria.
Gina : I know.
Michael : Interesting. Look I have to go to the La Bathroom, and I'll be back in a sec.

Given the responses noted above, yep, it was Obligatory. My bad for failing to note that!

'Tis an odd one. About a month ago, I was asking about the same thing here: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=143174

I don't know that there are any better answers out there now.

I subsequently ran the Kaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahn! TF again about 10 days ago and the leader called for everyone to shoot Reichsie once at some point toward the end. I do not know if he had triggered some power like the Paragon Protectors do and that was signal to shoot him or if it even had any effect at all on him. About 7 minutes later, Reichsie was down and that was that. We had a /Kin AND a /Rad, and that may have had more to do with it than the temp power.

Sure would be nice if a redname could clarify this.

There just does not seem to be a way to nudge someone to help folks out without knowing for certain you won't offend or cause a ruckus, which is too bad. I have 02 Boost bound into my numberpad just for such situations. If someone is staggering around stunned, they cannot do their job... which may be keeping the heat off of YOU. I don't use 02 a lot, but it is VERY handy to have.

So I guess where I come down in this is that I don't mind it as much that folks don't take powers that are typically very helpful, it is when they HAVE them and NEVER USE THEM. So, to use the most famous example, if a Kin does not want to take Speed Boost, okay... get something else you WILL use, like a Leadership pool power or something. Just don't take SB and never use it, because that is, as Local said, frustrating.

I will often 02 the whole team heading into an encounter where there will likely be a Sapper or two, but that is about the only time I "buff" with 02 like that. Usually it is a la carte to unstun/unsleep/keep someone from death, as I am able. Controls and storm goodness come first... and Freezing Rain is very high on the list. It is just great.

To the OP's point: I would chime in and suggest waiting until you can re-color Freezing Rain. The debuffs are fantastic, and the baddies falling is a bonus. Just call it "Volcanic Ash" or something: you cause a shower of volcanic ash and embers to fall, causing the baddies to lose footing in the fine, slippery ash as it accumulates. You COULD skip FR, but it is so good, you really ought not to. If you cannot bear to take it, meh, it is just a game... play and enjoy.

I had the same reaction.

"Dang, Marge, lookit all them Rikti and heroes fightin' and dyin'!!"

"Drive through, Bert, we can't be late again!"

*honks horn angrily as he passes through the mayhem*

The Paragon commuters are nothing if not punctual.

Let me chime in: Steelclaw deserves every jot of positive rep he has gotten.

That said, thanks to all for affirming that there is no "official" explanation and for offering their own theories.

It may be as simple as going to another shade once you have five buttons. Or it may be a Nemesis plot!

I guess eventually some redname will clear it all up for us. Or Lord Nemesis will.

Words fail me in expressing agreement with the sentiment and praise for the beauty and economy of words in its expression.

"Levels happen. Enjoy the game."

Excellent post.

Well, there you go.

It was a literal Laugh Out Loud moment when running Tobias' arc in Striga and we rescued the first unfortunate victim (being roasted in the green flame prior to our arrival) who then proclaimed, "I am never walking through the Bog again!"

I mean, the Bog is only a swamp out in the middle of nowhere populated by zombies, vampires and werewolves, and accessible (unless you can fly) by crossing through other inhospitable areas ALSO chock-full of of the above as well as homicidal Council soldiers. I realize that this sounds like The Dream Of A Lifetime Place To Stroll, but actually, you are likely to be accosted and dispatched in horrible ways by the aforementioned Evil Beings.

But there seems to be no shortage of folks who just LOVE to take a constitutional through the Bog. To quote that Noted Philosopher, Strother Martin: "Morons! I have morons on my team!"

Tut tut, Local, Fire Imps should be right at home and they run, too. That is what you get for being logical about it!

Of course, if you are doing AE missions exclusively like so many now do, problem solved. Your Oil Slick will NEVER LIGHT!

I don't know the hierarchy nor rhyme nor reason for fixing bugs, but I sure wish that instead of restoring "Intended" Knockback or slowing down the rate of fire of Lightning Storm that they could have solved the Oil Slick problems. *Heavy Sigh*

Fine points about the depiction of Statesman in the comics.

While it is obvious that Fish and Miller love the characters, their execution of dialogue and tempo in the plot was problematic in many places. I do give them high marks for the cameo by Ascendant in any case; well done. The overall effort had its highlights but also many drawbacks.

Troy Hickman, however, was very adept at pacing, dialogue and the overall plot. The "Nightmare Sequence" in particular gave a tremendous amount of poignant insight into all of the characters. I think he had the best handle on Statesman of any of the authors and produced a fine arc. To cut to the chase, there is an excellent reason there is a statue in Kings Row by the train station.

The canon says that Statesman was able to lead 1,000 heroes into near-certain death during the Alpha/Omega Gambit, and indeed, some 800 of them died. Hickman's Statesman could have possibly inspired 1,000 heroes to follow, but I doubt many would have followed the irritating fellow in other depictions.

It really does not honk my horn one way or the other, though. I enjoy CoH regardless of whether Statesman is "officially" a jerk or not.

Which explains why now it is ME that is last flying to the mish whenever I team with Alyiah.

What is impressive is that in CoH, there are many ways to accomplish what you want to do. In any given situation, one way might do better than another, but it is rare that there is an "only" way to do things.

I personally like Fly, and I generally use Hover for Blasters, Defenders and Controllers. (If I want to launch Stalagmites, I land, stomp and take off again for my Earth Controllers, no biggie.) Hover is not the wonderful Knockback protection it once was, but it still helps a lot, so I am fine with it.

I take Air Superiority if I am likely to be in close contact with the baddies anyway, such as with Fire Controllers. I often respec out of it in the 40s if there is another, more useful, power that I would rather have. But landing a Boss on their keister instead of having them pummel me is a great thing.

And it is interesting to hear how other folks take different powers and pools, and indeed, swear by them. I would not take Boxing, etc, but apparently it works out fine for those that do.

Alyiah is a very, very good player. She is smart about aggro and power use. And she can use Super Jump and its ilk and not get frustrated to death, whereas I cannot. Lord knows, I tried, but I kept catching the edge of buildings or landing short on the docks (Spuh-loosh!) or bouncing under a low roof like a super ball in a length of pipe. Additionally, I always found a way to aggro anyone nearby when I hit the ground and bounded off, and in higher level zones, it had deadly results in mid-air. So Super Jump and I parted company.

So I can say without hesitation that her excellence of skills allows her to make some power choices successful that I would not pick in the first place. So it is interesting to see other power choices that folks appear to be getting to work. All points to what a fine game CoH is.

It may just be missions, period, although I cannot say I recall exactly. I just remember being unable to claim the Vet Reward because I was in a mission. Once I exited, I was able to claim the reward.

There is also the General Wonkiness that is going on with Vet Rewards in general, although I had always heard that all characters were getting them too early or (in my case this last time) getting them too late. But I have not yet heard of it being hit or miss for the characters in an account.

So I would give claiming them a whirl again, but be standing on the street when you do.

Since we can now put images in our posts, I will use the opportunity to show off the souvenir of Sister Flame's arc that I took, as well as have the happy effect of returning this post to the top of the list.

Link to Utterly Humongous and Wildly Out of Place Imbedded in Post Image:

http://img7.imageshack.us/img7/5316/...andsisterf.jpg

Yes, it does. Even if the first VG pulse misses, there are so many that come during the life of the "Oil Slick Target" that you are assured it will go off. I have a SG mate who is Earth/TA and teams with my TA/Arch. Baddies get flambeed very nicely.

But be aware that currently there is an "issue" with Oil Slick in AE missions. The "Oil Slick Target" is conning "friendly," which means that NONE of your attacks can affect it... so the Oil Slick NEVER ignites, unless a baddie triggers Rain of Fire or some AoE that accidently sets it off.

That one really is. The old one is ironic, but this is just goofy.