PuWuRad

Hi folks,

I've recently started playing again with a shelved toon, and once again found the love for it!

I thought it might be a fun idea to get together a group of mind 'trollers, get out there and mess with the bad guys minds

Nothing 'serious' about it, I think it would be a bit of fun.

Could do it with a tank for ease or without for a bigger challange (not sure how much of a challange it would be tbh)

My toon for the event would be a lvl 50 mind/kin troller, anything mind/? is wlecome.

I'll develop the idea further if there's any interest, maybe an ITF would be cool but certainly open to other options.

I'd be equally happy to do higher lvl tf's, or even lower lvl if that would suit other players better.

PWR

One thing I agree with above all else mentioned here, is Knockback should be Knockdawn

Just seems crazy to make PB so team dependant to get the best out of it, and give one of its' best powers (IMO) horrendous KB (Solar Flare) making PBs almost universally hated in teams.

Well overstating a bit maybe but ya get my drift.

Was teaming with a PB recently who LED every attack into mobs with this, no matter how many times I asked him to at least wait till I had applied holds (playing with plant troller)

Not only was it annoying, I reckon in his career he's damaged the cause of PBs endlessly!

Please devs, pretty please, no matter how much we love you for recent Kheld changes, do this one last thing for us and we'll love you for ever and will offer you our first born

Hi,

Are there known issues with packet loss since the new patch?

LAg has been awful for me, and previously no real major concerns.

Checked using Pingplotter, and there are a total of 11 hops inclusive from my PC to Neesoft server, up to hop , pings are averaging 30, at hop 9 (PairTenGigabitEthernet)it leaps to 133, hop 10 reports 100% packet loss and is un-nanmed, with hop 11 being the Neesoft server, ping 135.

All router settings are the same as before the patch, with appropriate ports opened/forwarded.

Anyone else having these issues?

I seem to recall from previous issues where lag was problematic that the identified server is one that Neesoft use, ie not part of my ISP chain?

Gratefully awaiting replies,

Michael

Belated happy burpday

nice one Doc, outta curiosity, what did you use, Painter? Paint Shop?

Hi, nice pic I liked it, a suggestion tho, not familiar with paint shop pro but i assume it has layers? If so, try drawing the white lines on a seperate layer and reducing the opacity by a goodish amount, should have the effect you are looking for

I forget where I got the inspiration for this toon from now...

Anyhoo hope you enjoy

http://img140.imageshack.us/img140/2724/indysr7.jpg

Thanx guys, have done a nother edit, see up above

Also did a beginners guide in Player Guides, cheers again

PWR

For some reason just couldn't do anything I liked with my main toon, Pu Wu Rad, I tried literally almost half a dozen times, (I have the patience of a two year old) and here its is, Pu Wu Rad in all his glory...

http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/5562/pw3mw5.jpg

Edit, I knew summat was missing...

http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/6678/pw3oy0.jpg

An undoubted strength of CoX is the ability to make your character truly your own, due to the extensive use of characterisation options via the tailor.

This, to my mind, helps players 'bond' with your avater, so why not have a bash at letting your character into the big wide world, maybe residing as a desktop picture, a poster on your wall, the options are as endless as the costumes

Preliminaries: first things first, if you are purely taking a non action based screenshot, go into settings and turn the resolution as high as you can, ditto with graphical effects etc. You may wish to turn down Bloom and particle effects if they are distracting to how you want your character to be portrayed, ie glows added from doing bank missions and gaining temporary powers etc.

Speaking of which, a lot of powers will give an aura to your character, decide if you will want this in your final picture, turn off those toggles before taking the shot.

Bind a key to take a screenshot, default is Prt Sc (printscreen) funnily enough, personally I found it easier to take rapid shots with another key, ease of use depends on your own keyboard.

Saved screenshots are in your CoH folder> Screenshots

Location: lighting levels are variable, and this will effect the contrast/hue/saturation etc of your shot, mid-day generally gives the most neuteral light and clearest definition, you may have to wait a bit to get this right, or pop into a shop with neon lights

If your intention is to isolate your character from the background for use in an art package, have a look for a neuteral coloured wall or similar, this will make the use of magic wand type tools in art packages MUCH easier to use. Try and avoid lots of lines/shapes/tones as part of your background.

If you want part of Paragon City as the background, try and pick somewhere that has again a plain neuteral section, as this will make your character stand out more, and a bit of time spent sight-seeing will pay dividends here, do bear in mind that most of the recognisable Sights are fairly huge in comparison to player characters, if you want Atlas to be recognisable, it may mean your character won't be!

I second that Emotion: there's a wide range of emotes available, so use them! Once again, time spent deciding how you want your character to be seen will give a much better result, once you have chosen your emote you may find it useful to bind it to a key, ie
/bind l flypose2
This makes it easy to trigger the chosen emote and capture the chosen frame, rather than typing it or using the chat box tool.

compare these two images...

http://img380.imageshack.us/img380/8...iehoverdl9.jpg

http://img379.imageshack.us/img379/7207/queeniemi4.jpg

Camera: experiment with different angles, zoom in and out, and mix and match with emotes or use of powers.

Summary so far: Lights, Camera, Action!

Now the bit that is fun and frustrating in equal measure. (well not for the people with actual talent of course, but if you are one of them you won't need this guide )

I refer to taking your character, and bringing them to life through use of an art package.

The examples here were all done with a trial version of Painter, although I would imagine that Photoshop or similar will give just as good results.

Screenshot: http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/6...2214065qt5.jpg

Portrait: http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/5562/pw3mw5.jpg

Screenshot: http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/8...2022413kq0.jpg

Portrait: http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/1856/taotetzuqv5.jpg
The FINAL version, well for now:

http://img440.imageshack.us/img440/6678/pw3oy0.jpg

It is beyond the scope of this guide to go into detail of how they were transformed, but basically through experimentation, my advice woul dbe to try it and see, you'll be amazed at what can be done with simply playing around

The last stage, is to pop over to the Creative section of these forums and let us all have a look at your handywork!

Feedback and addendums to this guide very welcome, I'm sure i've missed out some useful tips

PWR

One point may be worth considering, if you are taking a screenshot to do some further art etc to, up all your graphics options and resolution to the max, doesn't matter if you have a slideshow if all you want is a screenshot.

Of course if you are actually wanting 'in-game' action shots you may wish to not do this

http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/9220/queeniebq4.jpg

This character is my wife's alter-ego, an Empathy defender.

It is testament to the game that CoH is the only game my wife has ever played for more than a few minutes, even manging to get this to level 50!

No small achievement considering how little she knows about the game, (and how little I knew meant I couldn't offer any real help)

Queenie has healed Hero's for what seems an eternity, dealing as much damage as a snapping turtle with no teeth, she nonetheless solo'd her way through escapade and adventure, taking many a blow to her determined chin, she stands tall among here's not because she doesn't get knocked down, but because she won't stay down!

Excellent. Thank you

Not sure if this is the right place, but can anyone show me a complete idiots guide to placing a link in my sig, and making this clickable from text within the sig?

ie in my sig i would like to be able to click on one of the character names and have that link to a picture such as http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/1856/taotetzuqv5.jpg

what i dont want is that huge chunk of text visible in the sig!

Thanks in advance, PWR

[ QUOTE ]

Roll on a "Double XP week" sometime, I would say... for those who have work-etc commitments at the weekends! (perhaps around CoH Launch anniversary time, wink wink...)

[/ QUOTE ]

Second that!

I was working 12 hour shifts friday saturday and sunday, (I'm a nurse)has happened quite a few times on DXP weekends.

Maybe DXP tokens? I realise the devs want an 'event' feel that this could negate, but maybe even a half token, ie for those who miss th eevent, a 12 hour DXP token that is triggered when first logging on, (a 12 hour token could go a long way if someone played an hour a day etc)

Would take a bigger brain than mine to work out the details, but where there's a will there's a way?

PWR

Thanks for the quick feedback, got a demo of Painter X last night and wanted to try it out, was at the end of a 12 hour shift but the idea had been on my mind all day to do something, pleased with the result, have tidied up the second on a bit, and altered the pallete slightly.

I wanted to get a feel that he had suddenly come into vision (the toon is a stalker) and have some tension within it, hence the bluriness of some parts.

Day off today so more to come

Thanks again

http://img243.imageshack.us/img243/1856/taotetzuqv5.jpg

Gettin tired and losin the plot here!

feedback greatly appreciated

http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/7...otetzu3jv5.jpg

or

http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/2562/taotetzuks6.jpg

Excellent read, well written and may help some people get the ol' creative cells going.

A point that hasn't been mentioned, is that a good name can make a player form a closer 'bond' with their avatar, and when this happens, every battle, wether succesful or not, takes on a whole new edge and meaning.

I had a stlaker named Joking Jack, the concept being he would be throwing out quips one liners and put downs with every kill. It was... ok.

Took it to 20 and got a bit bored.

Day came i decided to rename him Tao Te Tzu (ninja/nin set), gave him a ninja outfit... and BOOM.. the character came alive for me, took it to 50 and thoroughly enjoyed the ride.

As has been mentioned, mythology always a good source, I have a rad/rad defnder named Nosos, after the form of Pestilence, one of theevils released into the world when Pandora opened the box.

My global, Pu Wu Rad, comes from chinese...

Pu = The Uncarved Block, that which has the potential to be anything,

Wu = a negating conjunction

Rad = an old nickname of mine ( well before I had even heard of Rad powers in the game)

So Pu Wu Rad = I have the potential to be anything other than what i am

Other faves of mine are Hegemon, of course, a controller, Skuttle, a renegade crab soldier,
Fire Kin Hell (sorry!) a magician who made a deal with the Devil, (Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?)
and, well i guess i better stop here

Nice one, again

Haven't seen this mentioned, so an alternative tactic for you...

If you have a few ranged attacks, (not AoE tho) all target the same nictus and they can be defeated without pulling Rom.

Wouldn't have thought it possible until we did it last night

And without getting too defensive re stalkers, I was on mine and used snipe from mace set, was getting criticals for almost every hit (if not all) and with BU and hasten did some pretty decent dmg.

For the robot control part, myself and someone else (forget what AT sorry) concentrated FULLY on the control, even after robots spawned, there was a death or two, but then there has been most times i've done it with a variety of ATs, but mainly we destroyed it without TOO much grief.

I mentioned in a stalker thread, but I also went around and took out every Surgeon before the control while the team was fighting 1st spawn, needed retsu at one point tho, 6 surgeons in very close proximity, basically they all needed to be one shotted or the others would heal them instantly.

Hope someone finds that useful

Well i didnged 50 with Tao Te Tzu, 1st villian to do so

And absolutely, while AS undoubtedly is still an awesome attack, it's by no means the only attack of use.

Eddy asked for jints for stalkers, well have just done ITF, and found something very useful so will share, but please, any hints i give are aimed at less well informed players than the experts often on here, so no 'pffft we knew that already!'

Ok, on ITF, the surgeons can be a real pain in the bum, so I made a bind to target them, (/bind KEY targetcustomnext Surgeon)iirc

Then before each wave/melee, did a quick surgical strike.

In fact in the 3rd part where the most mobs are was able to take out every surgeon before we even went in properly. I believe it helped the team

I would say to choose caltrops and have it well slotted, that will help all the team, and i went for the mace epic pool, so the spiderlings there are nice for team too.

Once you get your 'God' power with high defence, combined with your mez protection, you can be pretty unstoppable without hide, so do your AS as 1st attack sure, but then just leap around like a wild thing attacking all and sundry and watch those crits light up the screen!

" nights ago on that TF, the team had gone ahead while i answered a phone call (I had told them I was afk a few mins, they said np we'll be fine) I think they had seriously underestimated my part in the affray, they weren't fine hehe

There were 2 survivors, staring grumpily at the mobs which nearly did a team wipe, novas, dwarfs etc

I felt bad about leaving for the call, so jested I would charge in and suffer the same as my team mates...

So with Retsu up, CJ, all toggles on, (no buffs from anyone but myself) I charged in and almost killed the lot before the survivors (who were having a laugh taking bets how long i would last) saw it was actually do-able, joined in, and we took a decent spawn out ourselves.

Now I ain't saying no other AT coulda done it, of course not, the point is a stalker DID.

Have also taken out a full spawn in a full team farming mish, just to see if i could, while team stood back and watched.

Again, of course most ATs could do that, but anyone who thinks stalkers aren't adding to the team really doesn't understand their potential imo.

Lastly, I never see someone wanting an invite in purely terms of 'what dmg/buffs/holds will this player give me, but as a fellow gamer sitting at their PC wanting to have some fun, ad if I get a polite request to join, they're in, and we'll just how to figure out how to use our abilities together, not doing so, will lead to all teams being full of non-individual FOTM toons, and if it came to that, I for one would feel something had been lost from the game.

PWR

Thanks for speedy reply!

Will be on union with Tao Te Tzu soon as severs back up, feel free to send me an inv/tell, in the meantime checking out your site below

Hi all, hope this is right place for this post

I have recently found the idea of doing some pvp appealing, but as a complete n00bie to it I think I will get my butt kicked from one end of RV to another, which while all well and jolly for those doing said butt-kicking, will probably just leave me dazed and confused and not much further forward.

Generally speaking I prefer team games, and expect this will be true in CoX PvP as well.

Am happy to use Ventrillo/teamspeak etc if need be.

Have a range of toons, a few in the 40+ range, including trollers, a tank, a PB and a stalker.

Mostly on defiant but happy to swap over to union.

Thanks in advance for taking time to read, even more thanks if i get some invites

Just wanted to add:

An excellent guide, informative, engaging writing style, and pitched to my personal preferance in guides, high on information/immersion low on number crunching 'City of statisticians' style.

Am currently playing a Ninja type stalker, lvl 35, the name of which may interest the OP 'Tao Te Tzu'.

Although I don't strictly RP my toons in the accepted sense, I like to 'get in character', I don't care if the stalker IS the weakest of sets in some ways, very few character type have 'drawn' me into the game and provided an equal measure of enjoyment.

Top marks OP

btw, care to have a bash at explaining my choice of global name? The Rad in this context is an old nickname i had and nothing to do with Rad powers