Miladys_Knight

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Please use this thread to discuss the following announcement.

Issue 12: Midnight Hour, the next free expansion for City of Heroes includes a number of refinements for the game. Among those improvements is a streamlined Character Creator including additional power information and easy costume selection.

Click here to read all the details!

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Does this by any chance include a fix to the wing colors + super group mode bug?

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I don't think we can really call the BM broke. Its the lesser pop on Villainside causing the disparity between the WW and BM.

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A single person with a single account can put a strangle hold on what ever item strikes their fancy on the red side and that isn't broken? That would be the definition of broken to me or at the very least the definition of exploit.

If there is no way to fix the red side market with out causing it to take for ever, waste a lot of dev time, or create all new problems and exploits.... except for a merger.

A merger smoothes out and balances out all the existing market disparities. It also solves some of the coop problems that exist specifically because the devs don't want to allow things to transfer from side to side. Remove the barrier and viola' these things remedy them selves.

Heros can give wakies and break frees to villians and vice versa. Problem solved because there is no longer a need to have a ridiculous barrier in place to keep identical items in 2 games seperate especially when content is all ready NOT separate.

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LONG 2 Part Question warning!

any idea on how long this takes?

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It takes a few seconds. I don't know the exact numbers but if you are using super speed and real numbers display your threat level is a 0.00. When stealth supresses your threat level becomes 1.00. When Stealth reapplies threat level returns to 0.00. That is what I use to tell me when it's safe to move again.

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also, how does the stealth IO factor into this? If matched with the cloak AND super speed, does it negate the need for the grenade? what about with like say jumping stealth IO + cloak. anyhow, i do like the grenade, but was wondering about how folks did it old school and how they have adjusted to now.


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A stealth IO gives the exact same amount of stealth that the power does. It gives it to you with out any extra endurance costs than running the power that it is slotted in and it persists for 120 seconds after the power is turned off or detoggled. If you use a stealth IO, Cloaking Device and Super Speed then you have stealth triple layered in PvE and double layered in PvP (Super Speed does not provide any stealth bonuses in PvP). The mobs that can see through stealth +Super Speed can still see well enough to see through all of that stacked together at the range you need to close to, to drop a time bomb so it is pretty redundant to do so.

As far as adjusting from before to now. Before you needed 2 power picks, Cloaking Device and Super Speed or Cloaking Device and Smoke grenade. Now you can do it with a single slot for the stealth IO in Super Speed thereby saving your self a power pick and the .26 end per seconds that Cloaking Device took or the delay for Stealth to kick back in after using Smoke Grenade.

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with that said, i saw a guy who was playing a AR/dev and with set bonus' he could almost SOLO a family farm set for 6. he had munitions for a epic and would start off droping a time bomb every other group..after it went off, he fired his LRM, then used his cones and auto turret. It was a thing of beauty. while he couldnt keep up with a fire/kin, he allowed me to leapfrog groups. Could this sort of thing be done with a archery/dev/munition guy? while we dont have but one cone, we do have explosive arrow and RoA's. (and be able to go at a reasonable pace...not a set up multiple trip mine pace..)
???

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I do the same with my Archery/Dev/Munitions. RoA and Aim are up every spawn, LRM and Time Bomb are up every other. Each spawn gets a double nuke and melted and I go on to the next.

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Whats the best way to be able to drop trip mines and time bombs without being noticed? do you have to be stealthed somehow on top of being stealthed? (like cloaking device plus a stealth IO?) if that is the case, how did people use time bomb before IO's came out?

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In PvE Super Speed grants an amount of stealth that is equivalent to the stealth granted by Cloaking Device or Stealth from the concealment pool (Super Speed stacks with either Cloaking Device or Stealth. Cloaking Device and Stealth can not be used together. If you turn one on it turns the other off just like Hover and Fly, and Combat Jumping and Super Leap). This is enough stealth in PvE to be invisible to all mobs except those with increased perception (like Rikti drones and snipers).

Smoke Grenade gives the targets it hits a -90% to their perception. Using Smoke Grenade in combination with Cloaking Device also works to get you close enough to drop Time Bomb with out being detected. Firing Smoke grenade suppresses stealth however, so you have to fire it and wait for stealth to unsuppres before moving in to plant the Bomb.

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Oh, also...will cloaking device prevent the mobs from aggroing until after the 4 second firing animation from RoA is complete? or will they still start scattering the minute you point your bow at the roof?

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RoA already works that way, unless you're within perception range when you begin the animation. You receive no aggro, at all, until the RoA pet spawns, and the pet doesn't spawn until the "point your bow at the roof" animation has ended.

I spent a good few weeks just flying around Brickstown after I got my Archery/Energy to 34 (and RoA fully slotted), doing nothing but using RoA on spawns, and I never pulled aggro on any of the spawns until the RoA animation was over. And by the time the spawns reacted, they were all defeated and I typically took only one or two hits, if any at all. Works exactly the same in missions, spawns just don't aggro until the animation is over.

The exact moment of aggro is immediately after the player animation ("point bow at roof") ends and just before the arrows come falling out of the sky.

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Luminara, some observations I have made that you may wish to check or may all ready be aware of:

Sometimes when the pet spawns you can see a small flame where the center of your targetting reticle was. When the flame appears that is when the pet spawns and the aggro occurs.

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Correct, with a clarification. The flame that you're seeing is a buff on you transferring to the RoA pet. I'm guessing that you're seeing... Hasten. If you were running Assault, you'd see the Assault graphic on the RoA pet.

The RoA pet itself is totally invisible, but buff transference gives you a visible graphic telling you exactly where and what size the pet is.

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If you are both out of all the Mobs aggro radius AND out of their line of sight they won't move at all after they aggro because the ROA pseudo pet isn't attackable.

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It's entirely random. The AI typically picks one of four options - attack, run toward player, obey Avoid (from the RoA pet), stare at player/pet. But I honestly haven't paid that much attention to how critters react when I'm using RoA... I'm watching them fall over in tidy piles for the janitor to deal with, or making little burbly noises as the pretty arrows come thudding down.

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They will move if you did enough damage to get the run AI to kick in but didn't finish them off with the RoA but the direction seems to be random.

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That's the Avoid in RoA, as well as the "I'm hurt, I should run" part of the AI.

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They will aggro on you if you step into their line of sight even after your threat level drops (or your stealth unsupresses).

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That's just how aggro works. It's exactly the same as if you Brawled one critter, then ran away. The critter will chase you until your Threat decays to 0 and/or the AI tells the critter to go back to its original spawn point.

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Well as another note I was recently doing the carnie arc with my Archery/Dev/Munitions blaster and I could go in drop a time bomb, run around a corner, drop caltrops, Aim + RoA at the time of the time bomb.

If I was far enough away the surviving mobs (like a phased Illusionist) would not aggro at all. Once just to test it I stayed where I was an fired RoA again still no movement, again and the spawn was wiped. Once I noticed this behavior I used it more often as a tactic.

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Oh, also...will cloaking device prevent the mobs from aggroing until after the 4 second firing animation from RoA is complete? or will they still start scattering the minute you point your bow at the roof?

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RoA already works that way, unless you're within perception range when you begin the animation. You receive no aggro, at all, until the RoA pet spawns, and the pet doesn't spawn until the "point your bow at the roof" animation has ended.

I spent a good few weeks just flying around Brickstown after I got my Archery/Energy to 34 (and RoA fully slotted), doing nothing but using RoA on spawns, and I never pulled aggro on any of the spawns until the RoA animation was over. And by the time the spawns reacted, they were all defeated and I typically took only one or two hits, if any at all. Works exactly the same in missions, spawns just don't aggro until the animation is over.

The exact moment of aggro is immediately after the player animation ("point bow at roof") ends and just before the arrows come falling out of the sky.

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Luminara, some observations I have made that you may wish to check or may all ready be aware of:

Sometimes when the pet spawns you can see a small flame where the center of your targetting reticle was. When the flame appears that is when the pet spawns and the aggro occurs.

If you are both out of all the Mobs aggro radius AND out of their line of sight they won't move at all after they aggro because the ROA pseudo pet isn't attackable.

They will move if you did enough damage to get the run AI to kick in but didn't finish them off with the RoA but the direction seems to be random.

They will aggro on you if you step into their line of sight even after your threat level drops (or your stealth unsupresses).

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(QR) Stepped out of the live event to leave room for others, but I'm a little disappointed in the community expectations on this one.

LIVE EVENTS are always a challenge on MMO's. You rarely, if ever, can afford to make it reach even a fraction of the community. Many games make their start/end totally random events (so the crowds don't compete for lines) and are very short-term (so by the time the message gets out that it's going on and the crowds get too big, it's all over). They even use lower wage actors... not the actual developers... to minimize costs.

Those events reach even fewer people. They give an "allure" to the game- the chance that you MIGHT encounter one, but few ever have... yet people love them.


This one:
<ul type="square">[*]...was announced specifically to maximize availability.[*] ...included extra activities to try to make other fun options for those that couldn't get in. [*] ...included the actual game developers in their signature roles. Heck, some of the vows came right from Manticore's real wedding.[/list]
It might not have been perfect, folks, but it's a whole lot more than most MMO live events.

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Thanks Chase,

It is difficult and I have been involved in all types of MMO themed Live Events. For all the chaos it is worth the fun, and ultimately the negative sides to doing things like this.

For those of you that don't know Sean Fish, Manticore, has been a major influence for the City of Heroes &amp; Villains stories. He explained to me recently that he and his wife Jen, Sister Psyche, have found a new way each year to renew their vows.

This year we were able to help them attain this romantic tradition in a virtual space.

Was there chaos? Yes
Were there disconnects? Yes
Did everyone get to see the event? No
Did everyone have fun???

So with all that, we still did the event for even the small amount of people we could accommodate, knowing that we would have to respond to all the above where the answers should have been opposite or equal.

We are passionate about this game, we play the game, we have fun, and we can only hope that you can say the same.

Thanks again to all the Community members that helped out today, I know I'll miss folks so I won't try to name y'all because there were between 15-20 people that came forward and jumped in to help keep things running smoothly on the sidelines. Lighthouse has a motto, and it is one that I fully support, he always says, "Let's keep the party rolling!" So we'll continue to do what we can, but sometimes we are going to need help from y'all to give it a little push.

Happy Valentines Day, now I have to see about a girl!

Ex

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I have a possible solution for you in the future with this type of thing.

Sell Raffle tickets on the AH - 1,000,000 inf per ticket and each account can buy only 1.

Have the RNG pick out the lucky 100 winners per instance that will be played out.

Set up the training room so that only the accounts that won the raffles can enter (just like it is set up for closed betas) and send an email to let them know.

Have the NCNC staff demo-record the event and post it later here on the forums for those of us that couldn't get in or didn't wish to get involved in the "virtual stampede"

Yes all the most recent changes to the game have converted it to City of Farmers,

1) purple recipes tied to mob defeats = best way to get them = farm or PL
2) XP smoothing = reduced the number of drops per level = farm oro to get stuff.
3) XP smoothing = sweeping hazard zones are the best place to level (again, we've come full circle on this one) and while you are sweeping you get to farm.

Lotta really bad ideas here that all point to skipping content and merely farming as the "most efficient way to play the game"

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Fess up; you made an assumption about the post before you even did more than glance at it.

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Nope. I read a well thought-out post, contianing a lot of creative ideas ... one of which is one I think should never, under any circumstances, happen: being PvP-immune in a PvP zone. In response to that - as I do any time the idea is brought up, no matter by who - I popped out that standard response.

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Just because you've been around here long enough to have seen most everything doesn't mean that someone still won't occasionally surprise you.

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... was that ... a post-count or registration-date based attack? O_O For shame!

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I have to disagree with you Pax. I think it's a brilliant idea and it solves a bunch of problems with out creating new ones. If I read it correctly there will be no more PvP zones. There would instead be 4 more new PvE zones that players could flag themselves as available for PvP. The brilliant part is that for the PvP crowd nothing changes. The PvE crowd can now come in the door where they can be introduced to PvP at their own speed and with out the bad first experience that puts many players off of PvP permanently. Which is the perfect solution to increasing the population of the PvP zones and getting the word out and interest in that portion of the game dramatically increased.

The only people that lose are the "gank squads" that lie in wait for the poor pencil necked bespectacled badge hunter. Which is what puts lots of people off of PvP in the first place and you get a circular problem. From my perspective ganking the unprepared and uninitiated isn't PvP it's just an unjustifiable mugging.

Kudos on the hard work and excellent thought put forth here.

The only PvP I do is base raids and arena matches. If the effort was put forth to do everything (no half measures please) you have suggested I would be happy to enter the PvP zones as all the reasons I avoid them would have been eliminated.

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MoG is a fantastic power, even the way it is now. Despite limitations as described above, if you have any trouble with PvE as a regen then the problem is with you and your tactics, not the powerset.

Epistropheus 50 DM/Regen

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But, I will give you credit for finally omitting the false claim that MoG goes against the regen set.

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I find arguments like this as disturbing as folks who think "Illegal" aliens should be allowed to obtain "legal" drivers licenses. I do not see the logic in it. MoG is to Regen as Hair is to a Lizard.

It is a twist, a reverse, I can think of no other set in CoX that offers such a situation so as to totally throw your toon into a complete opposite. Whoever thought this up must have been gifted with wry humor, on drugs, or was asked to design a power in a complete vacuum.

MoG lasts too long since I4. If it ever offered PSI protection, I do not know... that has been an argument for as long as I recall, however, it was made clear a few issues ago that it did not. All I know is that it is very situational, a pain in the neck for teams, and cannot help but cause folks to grimace as they click it.

I have re-selected it for 2 reasons. One is to add I/Os for regeration. The second is... I cannot think of one. Too many villains late game use Psionics. That means I use it very very little. Other tier 9 powers have more function than this.

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Fire tank's Burn is similar. The mobs run when you activate it instead of being taunted by gauntlet. Burn is anti- tanking like MoG is anti-regen.

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I thought that it was discussed in the WW/BM tutorial?

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Bah, Who reads tutorials......

Perhaps one that is in the middle of the country so that no one has to go all the way East, all the way West, All the way South or all the way North.... Say Des Moines, IA....

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Have fun Ex. I was trying to think of something fun you could do in Utah...but it's Utah.

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I'm going hiking, I have a 13k foot mountain that I have history with and I haven't visited in a long time.

Otherwise my parents have me booked with painting and cleaning for the new place they just got. So no rest for the wicked, literally!

If you have never been to Utah, there are 6 National Parks there, so beauty is inherent, even if the beer is watered down, but that is what Idaho, Nevada, and Wyoming are good for, anyway I'm driving so I can pack an ice chest!

Utah is unique that is for sure not the most interesting place I have lived, but certainly one that will get me to return.


Peace,

Ex

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Ah so you are one of the natives that actually know how to pronounce Tooele, Timpanogos, Wasatch, and Uintah.

Did the folks in CA laugh at your Utah accent? You know where you leave the T's out of the middle of the words?



Have fun spending time with your family!!!

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I'm seriously hoping this doesn't result in more gold farmer solicitations.

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perhaps they are hoping to entrap them.

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If Only.

Ah you missed my favorite lazy build..

Ice/FF controller

bubble every 4 minutes and drop ice slick when ever its ready FTW!

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I'm not trying to start anything here but they probably won't apologize until they know what went wrong and if they can entirely fix it.

Just saying sorry now does nothing but raise the ire of people who just want their stuff back.

But, that's how I see it............

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Hey give em a break. Data base problems aren't easy to deal with especially when the amount of data is huge. Oh, and not to burst your immersion bubble but "your stuff" is just electrons stored on "their" silicon wafers....

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First off, this post is *NOT* a precursor of any particular impending change. The topic is strictly informative and for discussion.

I'd like to know about breakpoints for To Hit and Defense and how you, the players, think it should work. I'm not talking about mechanics -- I'm talking about the expectations you have in a fight.

1) You have the default To Hit value (ie no buffs), your target has no Defense value. How often do you WANT to hit him? Conversely, as the defender, how often do you expect to be missed?
2) You have the maximum possible To Hit value, and your target has no defense value. How often do you WANT to hit him? Conversely, as the defender, how often do you expect to be missed?
3) You have the default To Hit value, and your target has the maximum possible defense value. How often do you WANT to hit him? Conversely, as the defender, how often do you expect to be missed?
4) You have the maximum possible To Hit value, and your target has the maximum possible defense value. How often do you WANT to hit him? Conversely, as the defender, how often do you expect to be missed?

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Hi _Castle_ and fellow forum goers.

Let me throw you and everyone in the forums a monkey wrench on this and try to paint a word picture of what I would expect. I’m going to break it down a bit on a couple of things and after that you can all flame on me.

Ok here comes your word picture:

Melee attack example

1) In answer to your first question, let us say I am a normal human that has never, ever, thrown a punch before but have seen other people do so (no hit bonuses). I am standing next to a card board box (no defense against me at all) that is my size and I decide to take a swing at it. I would expect to hit it EVERY time I swung at it unless I slipped or was off balance. How much I actually damaged it would depend on how well and how hard I hit it. If I got all my weight behind my swing and hit right in the center of the box I would expect to punch a hole through it. If I got all my weight behind the swing but hit it a glancing blow or hit the corner of the box I would not expect to punch a hole in the box but would perhaps look for a dent in the card board or a crumpled spot.

2) I am a prize fighter and I know every thing there is to know about prize fighting (max possible to hit value) I am up against our card board box again (no defense) I would expect to hit the box EVERY time I swung at it and even hit it if I were off balance. I would expect to put a hole in the box, no matter where I hit it, provided I put all my strength behind it, every time I swung.

3) I am a normal person (no to hit bonuses) and I am up against the same prize fighter as above (maximum defense) for a demonstration of defense. I expect to hit where I aim almost 100% of the time (say I slip or am off balance 1% of the time, I therefore hit 99% of the time). I also expect that one of 2 things would happen; the first being that my opponent is no longer where I was aiming and my blow misses or, the second is that my opponent is still standing where he was when I swung but he has batted my pitiful attempt at hitting him away. Heaven help me if he should decide to take a swing at me.

4) Now it is time for the prize fighter (maximum to hit bonuses) to take a few swings at the person who is contending for his title (maximum defense bonuses). I would expect that the prize fighter would be up against his equal in this situation. The prize fighter would hit where he aimed 100% of the time but his opponent would duck or dodge completely perhaps 10-15% of the time, get his gloves in the way and block 50-60% of the time and use a combination of dodging and blocking that would still cause him to be hit 15-20% of the time but only take a little bit of damage (a glancing blow). The rest of the time (25-5% in this case) I would expect to see a nice solid blow land that would do some decent damage the more solid the blow the more damage I would expect. I would also expect a fight of this type to last for several 3 minute rounds….

Ranged attack example

1) In this example, let us say I am a normal human that has never, ever, used a bow and arrow before but have been given a demonstration of the proper techniques to use (no hit bonuses). I am standing 3 feet from an archery target (no defense against me at all) that is my size and I fire off a shot. I would expect to hit it EVERY time I shot. How much I actually damaged it would depend on how good my pull was. If I used my full strength each and every pull I would expect the arrow to penetrate to the same depth every time. How often I missed AND how much damage I did would depend more on how far away the target was. Just for the sake of argument and to put numbers on it lets say that every 1 foot away we move the target I lose 1% on my accuracy and on my damage so that at 50 feet away I am only hitting the target 50% of the time and the arrow that does hit only goes in half as far.

2) I am Robin Hood (max possible to hit value) I am up against our man sized archery target again (no defense) I would expect to hit the target EVERY time I shot at it. I would again expect the arrow to penetrate based on how good my pull was which should be maximum. I would now expect to hit my target between 1 and 100 feet every time I pull. I would also again expect the amount of damage to decrease with range.

3) I am a normal person (no to hit bonuses) with my bow and I am up against a fully armored knight of old (maximum defense) standing 3 feet from me. I expect to hit the knight 100% of the time. I also expect that one of 3 things would happen; the first is that I manage through shear luck (1% of the time) to actually have the good fortune to get my arrow into a joint in the armor or between 2 of the armor plates and actually do the maximum damage possible, the second being that my arrow glances off his armor (50% of the time), the third one is that I manage to hit his armor straight on (49% of the time), the arrow will still bounce off but I would expect him to bruise a bit underneath. The farther away the knight is the less often I would expect to hit him and the less damage I would do if I got that lucky shot in (see 1 above).

4) Now Robin Hood (maximum to hit bonuses) is up against our knight from antiquity (maximum defense bonuses). I would expect Robin Hood to get a shot between the armor or into the joints from 3 feet 95% of the time that he fired. 2.5% of the time the arrow would bounce harmlessly aside the other 2.5% of the time the arrow would hit straight on but would bounce off causing a bruise to the knight. Every foot farther that the knight was away Robin’s chance of getting an arrow into the joints would go down 1% and glance and bounce would increase .5% each.

This is getting a bit long but the last really important point about to Hit would be…

Area effects:

If it really affects the area it should ALWAYS hit every thing in the area. A spherical explosion for example should hit every thing that is inside the sphere, whether or not it takes damage should be based on its level of armoring or shielding. I don’t care how agile a fellow is, if he’s inside the explosion when it occurs, no amount of contorting is going to save him from the damage (jumping out before it explodes is another matter entirely). Armor or shielding will reduce the amount of damage he takes but he still gets hit.

Other quick points:

Cones – the center and up close are where the damage is the closer to the edge and the farther away the less damage. Like other area of effects if you are in the cone when it goes off you get hit.

Damage over time– if you hit someone with flaming oil they will catch fire and continue to burn, but if your first punch with shadow maul misses that doesn’t mean that the rest should miss too. Each swing should be checked separately.

There’s more but you see where I am getting……

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Yeah, I specifically went for an example that most people wouldn't think of as PvP. "Pedantic" is, I suppose, deserved.

As for how it is PvP, say you are selling "Progenitor Goo Mk XII" for 800 Quatlu's and I have one I want to sell. I am going to price my item based off not only what the 'market' says it should go for, but also based off of what others are selling for AT THIS MOMENT. So, if I think you're selling too low, I could buy yours, then try to sell both at a higher price. Or, if I think you're selling too high, I can undercut you, reducing your chance of selling. Either way, my actions will effect you, and your actions will effect me. Thus, "PvP."

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Quatlus?

/e takes out his original Star Trek hand phaser and fires a warning shot across _Castle_'s bow.

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And as a side note I haven't seen Lucy in several weeks though I have checked about every other day.


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My bad. I meant Sally in Croatoa.

[See it's been so long since I've seen her I forgot her name]

I recently ran into a double spawn of Paladin in KR. Not 2 paladins in separate places but both Paladins in the same place. Side by side. 3 - 8 player teams were repeatedly wiped and yes there were 2 rads debuffing.....

And as a side note I haven't seen Lucy in several weeks though I have checked about every other day.

My 2 cents and then I'll leave it alone and this may have been said over and over again adinfinitum....

What kind of a REGEN power is something that gives you minus regen? Duh

I want the MoG that Paragon Protectors have. It works way better than mine.

Easy fix.... scrap the current MoG and make it a MOMENT of Glory. Make it a better version of dull pain. Bump max hit points 25% and then fill the green bar all the way up. That only takes a MOMENT. Regen time on the power could be long enough to make it balance.