Pauper

When I got back into the game at the start of the year, I jumped into Praetoria with both feet, but having lost touch with the game, chose a particularly poor leveling combo for Praetorian content (a Dual Pistols/Thermal defender).

I like the Praetorian content and wouldn't have an issue running it again (and again!), but my problem is that I don't really have a plan for my current Praetorian characters after level 20. First Ward seems much better suited for a Primal hero than for a Praetorian character to run, and the moral ambiguity of Praetoria, which I find cool, makes it hard sometimes to figure out where the character fits in the more binary morality of CoH/V.

As for red-side, I've got about half-a-dozen redside characters, and I find it hard to log into any of them once they've completed the Dr. Graves arc -- there doesn't seem to be anything else red-side with that level of interest for me (though one of my old Praetorian toons is now high enough to run the Vincent Ross arc, which I have high hopes for).

There just seem to be so many more options for early leveling on blueside that redside just doesn't hold my interest. Run the Habashy/Thierry arcs? Do DfB? Do the Shining Stars arcs? Skip them all and just street-hunt? (And at low level, especially in Atlas/Kings Row, street-hunting and radio missions are a viable way to get from 1-8 in a decent-length play session.)

I won't say I've given up on Praetoria and red-side, but I've got to have a reason to start there -- if I'm just creating a new toon for the heck of it, it's likely as not to be blueside.

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Pauper

Thought it might be interesting to go through the thread and tally up all the votes.

Notes:

- If you voted for one set, I marked a vote for that set. If you voted for multiple sets, I marked a vote for each set. If you voted 'X or Y', then I randomly chose one of the two to get your vote.

- I tried not to mark multiple votes for the same set from the same poster, but I can't be 100% sure I succeeded -- this isn't like voting for Congress, after all.

- If I couldn't identify the powerset you were referring to by checking the Meek Hero Browser, I identified the closest one that I could find in MHB (for instance, someone's vote of "Umbral Blast" became "Dark Blast" - it was the only vote for either, so not a huge deal in that case). If I could find multiple possible meanings for your vote that seemed equally viable, I didn't record that vote at all (so the guy who voted "Energy" for Blaster powerset didn't get a vote, since I wasn't sure if he was talking about Energy Blast, Energy Melee, or both).

So with all the caveats out of the way, the winners are:

Electrical Blast - 11
Trick Arrow - 11

And it wasn't even close:

Dual Pistols - 6
Ice Control - 6
Force Field - 6

Mercenaries - 5
Sonic Resonance - 5

Devices - 4
Energy Melee - 4
Kinetic Melee - 4
Stone Armor - 4

Beast Mastery - 3
Electricity Assault - 3
Poison - 3
Regeneration - 3
Spines - 3
Stone Armor - 3
Super Reflexes - 3
Titan Weapons - 3

Beam Rifle - 2
Cold Domination - 2
Dual Blades - 2
Empathy - 2
Ice Blast - 2
Ice Control - 2
Ice Melee - 2
Illusion Control - 2
Mind Control - 2
Ninjas - 2
Psychic Blast - 2
Shield Defense - 2

Battle Axe - 1
Charge Mastery - 1
Claws - 1
Dark Blast - 1
Demon Summoning - 1
Electric Control - 1
Electricity Manipulation - 1
Fiery Aura - 1
Gravity Control - 1
Ice Armor - 1
Icy Assault - 1
Martial Arts - 1
Necromancy - 1
Pain Domination - 1
Stone Melee - 1
Thermal Radiation - 1

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Pauper

I'd consider putting the proc in Bonfire, but there's no way I can scrape up enough enhancement slots on my Fire/Energy/Fire blaster to six-slot Bonfire for the full enhancement set.

Subtle disadvantages like this make me think the devs are way ahead of us all.

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Pauper

Also, keep in mind that 'street hunting' (just running around the zone defeating enemies that are standing in the street) is a perfectly viable way to get XP if you've got a specific target in mind -- level 8 is a great time to street hunt in Kings Row. It's particularly effective if you have 'rest XP' up -- the blue in your XP bar that accumulates when you're logged out or hit the Experienced power (if you have the latter).

The nice thing about street hunting is that rescuing civilians will net you extra shots of Influence -- not a ton, but enough so that picking up an Enhancement or two from a vendor won't seem like a waste. Plus it's a great way to feel like a hero.

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Pauper

Nethergoat,

Have you done the switch to VIP that you mentioned in your first post, or have you found that 'freemium' status is good enough, given the veteran awards you built up during your previous play?

I've been following the thread, but it's gotten pretty long -- I don't recall a specific moment where you transitioned to a new account type, but I may well have forgotten.

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Pauper

That's cool info to hear. Hard to imagine any problems with using the LotR soundtrack to inspire something epic.

Personally, I find that the final DA battle also works when played to AC/DC's "Let There Be Rock", especially if you can time the transition between map sections to the pauses in the song.

Be really curious, Dr. Aeon, what you'd come up with for the LotR soundtrack tune "The Steward of Gondor".

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Pauper

I like the origin story/background. Don't see why you wouldn't go with something like:

Dr. Aetherium

If you don't plan to use that one, I just might.

Also, the list of fictional elements on Wikipedia can be useful to spark ideas.

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Pauper

Probably easier just to get rid of the arrows and put a readme into the directory.

Old-school, I know, but less chance for confusion that way.

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Pauper

Two more things I've picked up:

- The Weekly Task Force/Strike Force offers an automatic drop of a Notice of the Well Incarnate Component the first time you complete it that week. This can be helpful in getting up to Tier 3 or Tier 4 Alpha (tier 4 because Notices of the Well can be combined to form a Favor of the Well), but Notices and Favors of the Well are part of the shard-based recipes and aren't that helpful with the thread-based recipes of the other slots. (Though ParagonWiki has it that it's now possible to break a Favor of the Well into 100 threads, so there's that.)

- If the RNG really seems to hate you, you can upgrade combinations of Common/Uncommon components to get Rares -- for instance, one of my Incarnates recently took 100 threads, plus one each of the Uncommon thread-based components and upgraded to the specific Rare component she needed to build her Tier 3 Alpha. YMMV, but I figured it was worth it for the level shift.

Good hunting!

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Pauper

Agree wholeheartedly.

It's much easier to get a handle on what your whole team is doing when that team is smaller. Even an 8-player team can just get too 'busy' with effects to really understand what's going on.

I've actually participated in a few 4-person DfB runs, and they can be extremely fun with the right group, which pretty much matches the ideal group you note for the Summer Event -- two DPS-types, a tank, and a defender.

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Pauper

I agree with much that's been said already, but I'm going to posit one more factor:

The community here is 'better' (for whatever value of 'better' is being discussed) because the game is targeted to the casual player, as opposed to the 'hardcore' player.

The 'hardcore' player is the one who'll sit for hours at a time grinding out XP and levels to eventually be able to participate in the 'endgame' content and shoot for phat lewtz. He's the one who plays and re-plays the PvP content in order to max out his PvP gear to be able to annihilate all comers. He's the one whose enjoyment of the game is likely based, to some degree, on having stuff that other people don't have.

The casual player doesn't have the time to sit and grind out XP and levels to get to an 'endgame' that offers little more than hours of additional grind -- and thus is attracted to City of Heroes, which for much of its life didn't even have an endgame. She's either uninterested in PvP, or she realizes that to even try to do PvP in this game, she's got to work with other players to create a workable framework within the game's existing PvP structure, so the PvP environment is already far different from any other game in that respect, meaning that the PvPers here aren't the same as in other games. And, as noted by others, nothing she has can't be gotten by another character -- and in fact, she may well feel some sense of accomplishment in helping those other characters get those things she has (badges, costume pieces, etc.).

This is not to say that there aren't people who play CoX like a 'hardcore' gamer would, but my guess is that those folks often burn-out, head out, and come back later on a rotating schedule, which means they appreciate the game more when they do play it. So even that works to make for a better community.

Casual may not make a company rich, but it makes for a great game.

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Pauper

Brickstown.

Apologies if this has come up a lot and I've just missed it, but it seems that most recent zone revamp requests have focused on lower-level zones like King's Row and Perez Park. Not to say that those zones couldn't use some love, but Brickstown should be a prime candidate for a zone revamp for a number of reasons:

- It's right at the start of the 'content dead zone' for levels 30-40.

If you're a new player, there's more and better content 1-30, and especially 1-20, then there's ever been, what with Death from Below, the Shining Stars arcs, the revamped Atlas Park intro arcs with Matt Habashy, and the re-worked Positron Task Force. If you're really new, you can run the Praetorian starting zones from 1-20. Add in the Penny Yin Task Force and the Roy Cooling and FBSA arcs in Talos Island from 20-30, not to mention the option to head off to First Ward, and you've got solid content options there, too.

Hit level 30 and...what? There's Night Ward, which is interesting but fairly insular in that much of what happens there is contained in its own lore that doesn't really connect to much of the larger game. There's Founders' Falls, which is a good zone...well, the Numina TF is kinda grindy in the middle and a lot of the other level 30-35 mission arcs date from the time period when 'fun' was defined as 'the sense of pleasure you feel when the game stops hitting you in the forehead'.

Until you realize that many arcs in Brickstown are just duplicates of arcs available in Founders' Falls -- remember doing the Unity Plague arc as offered by Jenny Firkins in FF? Now you can do the same arc on your next Science toon thanks to Lou Pastorelli in Brickstown! Did Library of Souls with Peter Stemitz in FF? Do it again with Allison King in Brickstown! (Note: much of this info comes from ParagonWiki, which I'm going to try to confirm with a couple of low 30s heroes over the next week or so. I don't see any reason to doubt ParagonWiki's info, though.)

Founders' Falls also has more other options -- more Task Forces start in Founders' Falls, it has more Signature Story Arc contacts (though this could change), it has access to the Rikti War Zone via a Vanguard office, and to Cimerora via a Midnighter entrance at the University. Brickstown is just behind in pretty much every way, content-wise.

- The zone design is frustrating and often actively hostile to new heroes journeying there.

If you've ever seen the loading screen hint that talks about 'if you can't find your mission entrance despite seeming to be right on top of it, look around to see if there's an entrance to an alternate level', then you've seen a hint suggested by someone adventuring in Brickstown. Numerous sewer mission entrances are located in areas with limited access, sometimes hundreds of feet from the actual mission entrance, and with enemies scattered along the entire path from area entrance to mission entrance. Stalkers might well enjoy this, but most ATs won't, especially if...

...you've been given a mission that takes you into a part of the zone far higher than your current Security Level! Actually, scratch that -- it's not just missions that get oddly assigned this way. One of my own recent characters who'd just leveled to 31 decided to head off to Brickstown to meet his only contact there -- Marisel Valenzuela -- who is squeezed between a warehouse and a chain-link fence right in the midst of a part of the zone filled with SL 34-35 enemies. Once I got there, I wondered if I should be accepting missions from her or escorting her to a womens' shelter. A quick check of VidiotMaps confirms that, of the four SL 30-35 contacts in this zone, one (Marisel) is in an area that spawns SL 33-35 enemies, while another (Lou Pasterelli) is in an area that spawns SL 36-38 enemies! Faceplant FTW!

- No zone event

Admittedly, this one is probably considered an advantage for players who don't care for zone events, but I happen to be of the opinion that zone events help add character to a zone, from the Troll raves in Skyway City to the fires in Steel Canyon, to the Ghost Ship appearances in Talos Island and Indy Port. Even the much-maligned Kings Row zone has the Clockwork Paladin event.

Now, one could argue that higher-level zones don't and shouldn't have zone events -- neither Founders' Falls nor Peregrine Island have zone events that are separate from global events like the Nemesis invasion, for instance. Yet of all the eventless zones in the game, Brickstown is the one with the most obvious hook for a zone event -- Jailbreak! Heroes, rogues, and vigilantes could interact with the game's signature villains here during a high-energy zone event, and it's not as though frequent breakouts from the Zig don't already form a significant part of the game's lore.

If done well, this event alone could make a Brickstown revamp worthwhile.

I could make a snarky comment about Swan being the best thing about the zone, but the reality is that Brickstown is actually a really good zone for NPC contacts -- you have the aforementioned Swan, plus Steven "Dr. Science" Sheridan. I had no idea that the police contacts -- named after characters from the old 'Barney Miller' TV show -- were actually modeled after folks who work at Paragon Studios. And Serafina is arguably the most interesting of the 'vendor contacts' in Brickstown and Founders' Falls (the other top candidate IMO would be Penny Preston in FF). I would definitely keep and even expand on the uniqueness of the contacts in Brickstown as part of any revamp.

Let's make this happen!

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Pauper

Yep -- for other Praetorians who may not know, you get to Pocket D through Studio 55 in Imperial City.

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Pauper

I'm on Victory, because that's where me and my friends played when my friends played this game.

I have to stay here, on the off-chance that one of them comes back.

Besides, it's where I keep all my stuff! (In the inherited SG base, of course.)

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Pauper

Followed the included instructions to install on a late 2007 model MacBook Pro running Snow Leopard and went without a hitch.

Thanks!

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Pauper