Memphis_Bill

NO species will be alive on this planet at that point. The planet will be dead because the sun will have died at 4.5 billion years, and will have expanded as it burns its fuel to the point where the planet is roasted, if not drawn into the sun, before that. Various models looking at the sun's increase in luminosity suggest it may be too hot in *1* billion years for water - and life - to exist on Earth.

You obviously did not notice the *specific* mention of horseshoe crabs - not "crabs" in general but one specific sort - and Great Whites, right? You know, the *specific* creature? One which has existed for 16 million years of the general type's 420 million (compared to our specific 150-200,000 years,) the other which is up to 400 million years?

And that I pointed out the *exact same thing* when listing those - the point being that *nothing* has lived long enough to say a creature *can't* exist that long without minimal evolutionary changes, thanks to the various extinction events that have hit the planet - but that I doubt we would anyway, between our own evolution and our self-destructive behaviour?

Current run for us as a species - 150-200k years.

Dinosaurs (no, not one species, I know) - 160 million years.
Sharks (again, not one species) -420 million years. Great whiltes are (arguably) 16 million years old.
Horseshoe crabs - around 400 million years, pretty much unchanged.
Various simpler animals (sponges and the like) can stretch back to 800 million years or so.

The problem with saying yes (or no) to us living 4-6 billion years is that the planet itself is barely that old (4.5 billion years or so.) There's a series of extinction events that the various animals that DID live during them had no means of detecting, understanding or altering. We have no proof one way or another that an animal species can *live* that long. (That aside from the sun dying in about 5 billion years - which, avoiding other catastrophes, we or our descendants would *have* to find a way to survive.)

Yes, I'd agree that if there's a "humanity" at that point, it'll be different from us. It's a safe assumption. We'll have to change from environmental pressure, if nothing else. Likely brought on by our own actions most strongly, and changes in solar radiation and brightness (with its affects on our temperature) as well.

Then again, I don't think we'll be around, evolution notwithstanding. We'll probably have someone cause mass extinction in the name of some religion or other, making room for something *else* to have a go at things.

You've been gone a while. I've been in a contractural "Disagree with Evilgeko" for a while.

And by the way, he's wrong.

/edits to change Emphatic to Lymphatic.

>.>

Welcome to the *essence* of Golden Girl's posting. Which is why she's been on ignore for quite a while.

As far as in-game... yeah, I can't think of the last time I had anyone ask gender, and I play characters of both. The times it has come up (and I think it's been maybe... three? times since I started playing,) the conversation has typically gone like this:

Person: "r u a boy or girl?"
Me: "Yes."
Person: "Huh?" (Or sometimes "Lol, ok.")

The only time I've had to make a *point* about gender was on my first 50 (character was female.) The people I was playing with long-term on this and getting to know fairly well had apparently... well, forgotten (even though I'd talked about my wife (at the time) some time earlier,) which led to two rather... awkward conversations. (Well, one awkward, one "lol, I don't believe I forgot that - you'd better remind him, though.") I didn't "play the character as a girl," I was just consistent enough with the character that they got used to her "personality" and had managed to forget it wasn't *me.* (But the character did actually do some good in other ways.)

I don't know, we had so many arguments.... >.>

Before or after i13?

And who are you to say this?

Zones: Were planned from the beginning, as they were introduced with COV.
Mini-games: Were planned as part of the zones. No new ones, in arena or zone, were ever floated.
Rewards: Are the only thing that HAS changed since the introduction of PVP, with the introduction of PVP IOs (and regular drops.)

So that's one out of three. And you forgot there's one LESS place to PVP, with the removal of base raids from the game. Name one other area that has had that big of a chunk of content removed. Bonus points if it was removed and presented as a "gift" for someone else (Base raids being shut down = no need to worry about pathing, base builders, put stuff wherever you want! And I'm not saying that to put down base builders.)


PVP IOs led primarily to farming as they were introduced after I13. And then there's I13 itself... which was certainly not met with indifference, any more than coming out to your car with the tires stolen, windows smashed and graffiti sprayed everywhere on it would. They've had plenty of time to see how badly I13 screwed things up.

You're welcome to your opinion, but I strongly question the basis on which you've formed it.

I'd support it solely to see what it would be named.

No, he said explain how it's a *better* solution. Again, you're bricking the garage door up because the car won't start. That doesn't fix anything, and makes other things worse, quite frankly (IE, removes an option to deal with the problem with AI that led to him using Walk in the first place, as well as removes the option for *me,* as I mentioned above, to do things like... well... walking up to somoene I've just encased in ice and hitting them with a mallet... y'know, using an RP power for a bit of RP.)

"Better" would be:
- Allow the combination of inspirations while walk is active.
- Fix the bloody AI so it actually can follow decently (and give the NPCs the speed to keep up.)
- Fix the pathfinding for the same reason.

Of course, the last two - singularly or together - would likely take more development time than letting people detoggle the power when stunned. Just on the basis of them not managing to fix it *yet.* Following has always been problematic since I've started playing (and yet players can target someone and hit "F" just fine.)

Depending on how bad it is, first look here. If it's just someone being a nitwit, it's not stalking, but some of the info could still be handy.

Second, is the person harassing *you* or your *character?* (IE, if you log on Blue Ice Maiden, the person starts up, but if you log in Beefy Shield Guy, he doesn't = character.) These will pretty much determine the steps to take.

Some are going to be the same no matter what.
1. Tell the person very plainly, "I'm not interested, leave me alone, don't bother me again."

2. Get their character name and global, write down the time, etc. (While you're at it, right click them, or click their name, and go to Add/Edit Note (near the bottom.) One star, write the same info down as "harrassment.")

3. If they start again with the same character, /petition them. Title "Harassment," in the body give the global, the character name, and give the info you wrote down before about when you told them to stop (and that it's happened before.) (Having chat logs on can help - but whether you have them on or not doesn't matter, support will have access to their own.)

4. Then /ignore @global them. Nothing they do will get through to you - no tells, no emails, regardless of character. You won't see them on globals. nada.

5. If they're in a supergroup with you, it's a little more involved - get ahold of one of the leaders and let them know what's going on. What they do determines what you do - if they take action, great. if not, you may want to clean out your stuff and leave the supergroup. You don't want this person interacting with you, after all.

If you let friends know, DO NOT get them to "Gang up on" the person, spread rumors or anything. Just make the harasser a non-entity. Though if they see him (assuming him) spreading other tales about you - well, add it to the email after the /petition.

Harassment *is* against the terms of service.

As far as the "Female only server," well... not going to happen. It's just not enforcable in the least, given parents paying for accounts, families sharing accounts, and just plain old false information.

Just take advantage of the tools you have available to you, play with the people you're comfortable with - you'll be fine.

Yet your stance was that if PVP was so great, it wouldn't have kept needing fixes. The game *as a whole* kept needing fixes. Still does. So your statement should hold true for the entire thing.

Which it sounds like you disagree with.

Which way would you like to argue?

Again - "hardcore, always in there," perhaps. "Max percentage of the population that was in the zones over a day," perhaps. But I'm quite willing to bet that there was *more than 10%* of the population that was involved in PVP (prior to Issue 13) total - that goes from hardcore to "every once in a while" to "Stuck a toe in with a new character maybe once a month."

There's a *wide* range of "PVP activity." And from the number of new faces I used to see going through the zones, 10% being involved to some degree with PVP - and yes, I'm ignoring those who just went in for shivans - sounds very low.

What does this even mean? That's a non-answer. Certainly meaning nothing in response to my statement that I played on low pop servers and still *used to* (pre-I13) be able to get into a pretty good fight. Not just 1v1 or 2v2 or 2v3 or whatnot, but multi-team vs multi-team fighting back and forth across the zone for *hours.*

And it didn't MATTER which server I was on.

As for "Zones" - they were in ALL the PVP zones. I could go from one group in BB to another group in SC to another in WB to yet another in RV and see mostly different people - in one night.

Post-I13? Yes, the population concentrated on Freedom, for the most part. Because it *drove away* so many.

There's a difference from (say) Aion, where you learn how a power works - and it works the same way whether you're fighting a player vs an NPC - and here. Here, a new player who gets interested in PVP has to learn the ropes *from scratch* TWICE. That does not help grow, or even maintain, the PVP community. They have to learn what their character does in PVE, then find out "Oh, it doesn't work *anything* like that" in PVP.

Thought that ws pretty clear. "That changes what?" That changes how big of a barrier to entry there is for PVP, which directly affects interest and effort. More people are going to give up on it - as we can see from the now-usually-empty zones and arenas on most servers - when they have to re-learn everything.


And your estimate comes from what? And you're defining the PVP community as? Without any of that, your estimate means nothing. You'll note I *do* end up specifying.

Honestly, no. I went through that. And you know what? Anyone in the zone dealign with that would soon find most of the *rest* of the people in zone working to get rid of the truly obnoxious player. Being able to pick out "trash talk" from being a jerk. The impression on the boards here was "OMG, Everyone was like that!" - from one or two very distinct parts of the community, and a very few *loud* folks from those as well. The badgers were the same way, quite bluntly. Id' say the behaviour I saw from some of them was far more consistent (and consistently *bad*) than what I saw from the PVP community as a whole. (And yes, I know not all badgers are like that either. Which is part of the point. But I saw it more often from that side. )

Read prior response to that. You miss the point that they *don't* have to learn them just once. And that is a detriment to PVP.

Um... no, they don't.

If you buy a set of level 30 thunderstrikes, they maintain level 30 values. (Making up numbers, if they're 20% acc/20% damage at level 27 when you slot them, they'll still be 20%/20% at level 50. They don't increase in effect, they just don't expire.)

These, if you slot at 30, give level 30 values from what I'm reading - then level 31 when you go up a level, level 32 values after that, etc. They're getting more powerful as you level.

(Unless you're talking external store, in which case I still doubt it unless there are specific 'character bound' ones as well when you DO buy them from there. Have we had specific (and non-beta-NDA'd) word on that?)

So COH itself was never great? Most of the fixes prior to I13 were, frankly, small adjustments, or adjustments made specifically for PVP.

Incorrect. Prior to I13, while smallish, the PVP community was fairly healthy. I tend to play primarily on Victory and Pinnacle - neither one a "large population" server - and could typically count on a fight in BB, Siren's or Warburg within (at worst) a few minutes. Or at least someone showing up. That is not "atrophy." That, like badging, like base building, like RP is a healthy subset of the community - that, frankly, could have kept going.

I13 did kill PVP. And if it were a series of good changes, well, after this long I should see somewhat similar population in the zones getting used to the massive changes between it and PVE. Yet I go in and... crickets.


Wow. Massive leap there.

If "There are bugs that were never addressed" means "PVP never worked right," then COH as a whole has never worked right by your logic.

Y'know how people pick on je_saist for "being wrong?" You're giving his reputation a run for his money with this set of responses so far.

... which is why they devoted time to come up with PVP IOs, PVP zones, and time - though misguided - in I13. They've spent more time working on PVP than they have with AE.

Some people DID play this for a different PVP experience, like it or not.

And don't typically have to learn a *completely different set* of mechanics for stepping into another zone, as they do NOW with post-I13 PVP. Such as travel suppression for taking an inspiration, or powers not doing as much damage, or mez protection NOT giving mez protection (yay, tanks getting mezzed on the first hit!) or hold times getting absolutely gutted - and those AREN'T the more complex mechanics.

Seriously, if Croatoa suddenly had your character working *completely differently* (and not in a positive way) just for stepping into the zone, do you think you'd want to go there? Or do you think it'd be a zone that's completely avoided?

Please provide the source for your numbers - specifically "PVE players THAT WANT NOTHING TO DO with PVP." I'll agree that less than 10% were hardcore PVPers. But most of the people I saw in the zones were like me - mostly PVE that went into the PVP zones for something different to do. That's a FAR harder number to come up with.

Similarly, give me the numbers for the *hardcore PVEers* who - without the I13 mechanics changes - would never, ever touch a PVP zone. Yes, I do know they exist. Want to bet they're ALSO under 10%?

Most of the population falls somewhere in between those two extremes - at least until they learn that stepping into a PVP situation *radically* changes your powers, which turns OFF the casual player. That I *can* say with certainty, just from observation of the zones and my own decrease in PVP activity.

As it is, your response had *zero* to do with his statement that there are vets who have been here from launch who are still baffled by the current PVP system - again, such massive (and generally negative) changes to how powers work will tend to *dis*courage people from using the feature.

From the sound of it, he had probably fought his way through and cleared to there. I know if it's a hostage mission I'm not 100% sure isn't a "Just rescue, no escort" (like Dr. Francois in Striga) I'd do the same. Also,
so it doesn't sound like he was going "Oh, I don't have to worry about that" and had detoggled it to deal with other ambushes (assuming that wasn't the first in the mission.)

Really, it sounds like someone who's had to deal with the bad AI in the game and had worked out a way they'd use to deal with it that just got jumped on this time.

Possibly, reading through what the OP has said.... create a breakfree to NOT be mezzed?

Well, 11.6 would crash on me badly regardless of what I was doing.

Unfortunately, I just had a crash going to a new tab in the auction house... so I'm rolling back to 11.5 to make sure it's the driver, as opposed to the patch. (*sigh* Time to turn down the settings in C&C again. Eh, I play this more, and AA doesn't have as big an effect there.)

Then perhaps they should actually improve the AI (or at least the following routines) so that sort of thing isn't needed. A simple "follow me" is one of the most irritating things to deal with in this game.

"Oh, look, a shallow incline! I must run back and forth repeatedly, spin in place like a drunken top, then run backwards 500 feet... Player? Player, I've lost you!"

"OK, Fine, I'll follow - at drag-myself-forward-with-my-toes speed, stopping every five feet. If you're lucky."

Besides, with other toggles, at least you can combine inspirations. Having that ability with walk (go ahead and check - it's greyed out - double checked the OP) would work as well. Even if you can't use other powers because of animation issues, there's zero reason for that to be greyed out. About the only thing more idiotic would be not being able to use chat at the same time.

And re: Verene: I don't know about the OP, but I've had the same stupid AI inability to follow in regular missions. In something like sewers, I can halfway understand it. In, oh, lab maps with lots of nice, straight hallways... nto so much. And don't get me started on the broken Rikti portal room and SHard instance maps with the magical disappearing rocks, platforms and (untargetable when glitched by the map) NPCs.

Frankly, stun, hold, whatever - nothing should prevent you from *de*toggling toggle powers. That little limitation is ridiculous.

Not until they fix the AI it isn't. There's a good reason - listed in a few posts now - where people ARE using walk inside a mission.

The problem would be solved by ... allowing it to be detoggled while stunned. Seriously, there is absolutely no good reason for that restriction. Zero. And that includes "Well, it's an RP power."

Edit: Especially because I've gotten more "Ooh, that's cool" when my characters, say, stick a hold on someone, toggle walk to saunter casually on over to what's held, then toggle it off to slam it with a mallet or other big hit to finish it off. The regular sprint we do (even without Sprint) doesn't have anywhere near the same effect.

The OP's not asking to turn ON toggles while stunned. He wants to turn one OFF. Your "problem solved" is akin to bricking up the garage because the car won't start.

And that list is useless for finding an actual, good supergroup. (See prior comments.)

There's still no *game mechanic* that requires that.

And there's even *less* reason for it in the SG list.
You're right, prestige itself isn't. It's a number. However, the attitudes it engenders in others certainly tend to lean that way. Removing the listing is a good way for people to actually *investigate* a SG and see if it fits instead of just finding a "top 100 SG" and making assumptions - or having the people inside assume it makes them better than someone else.

And on the flip side, it allows people like me to actually be able to help when asked. Or, if I see a problem (like the mid-20s tanker who kept getting stunned) to mention something like "You may want to look into your status protection power next so you don't keep getting stunned."

Most of the "elitists" (and I use that term VERY loosely with these people, as it's mostly their own perception) are the ones who won't invite X AT/powerset because it doesn't "meet a metric."

... and you think being able to *de*toggle this while stunned is bad ... how again? Given you're still stunned and having to deal with that?

I'm (appropriately) stunned that this would (a) go to live this way and (b) anyone would argue that "yes, not only should you stay stunned, but you shouldn't be able to detoggle the power."

That's ridiculous. And the arguments I'm seeing against it are rather *thin.* I still think, quite frankly, that it's a bug that you can't detoggle it when stunned. "RP purpose" or not. If you're thinking punitively ("It's your fault you used it!" - which isn't always the case, as I've misclicked it on before) you're already adding time to detoggle it. And the argument's rather petty.

Seriously. This should be fixed if a bug, or changed if not.