SablePhoenix

Hey... how did you get Liv Tyler to model for you?

Really gorgeous piece.

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Would I have preferred it to be a bit heavier on content? Sure. I bought it at least partly to encourage NCSoft to create more such packs.

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This is exactly what we do not want to do.

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I don't mind that they are charging for the pack since it is just (rather niche) fluff that won't offer any gameplay benefits (well, outside of roleplaying weddingaholics, I guess).

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Tuxedo w/tails is for more than just wedding-a-holics. I've been wanting such a costume piece for quite some time now and despite not having much interest in wedding stuff, I gotta get this pack for the tuxedo with tails.

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This is exactly what they were counting on when they decided to release it as a for-pay item. Saying that they wouldn't add a badge to it for this reason is extremely disingenuous; there are at least as many people who play this game for the costumes as the badges, and most likely far more.

It's very underhanded to make people pay for costume options.

Okay, this is good, but there's a problem.

It doesn't show you the power numbers BEFORE you take the power. You have to spend the time to get to the power and take it before you know what it does. I believe this is the main problem that people had with the former policy of not revealing the numbers (I know it was mine), namely that you made power choices blindly. Unfortunately, even though the game shows you numbers, you are still making power choices blindly.

The real numbers for the powers themselves ought to be visible in the power description at character creation and during level up in order to make this complete number revelation.

Charging for the "wedding pack" is disgusting. Micropurchases are a horrid trend in games lately and it's beyond disappointing that COX is falling prey to them.

I hope enough of the community expresses displeasure that this is the last one.

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I'm assuming from what they've said that a lot of the weapons will involve getting badges to unlock.

So defeat family bosses for a tommy gun, defeat red caps for a red cap dagger.... defeat vanguard for their awesome weapons....

spidermonster.

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They better not.

The worst decisions the devs have made so far involve tying things everybody wants to some sort of 'accomplishment' (so called), even if that accomplishment is simply subscribing for a long time. This type of thing needs to be available from the creation screen.

Doing the same with this would just be another stain on the character customization.

No, you don't need to log in to the character every 90 days as long as the whole account is active.

Only if your entire account is inactive for 90 days will characters below level 6 be switched to unreserved. The character's name will not actually change unless someone else takes the name.

All I can say is, it's about time they re-instituted this. Names are getting really scarce.

Just have to say that the mission design in the Rikti War Zone is the best in the game. The plot twists were unexpected and actually elicited some emotion for the first time in all the years I've played (especially for a certain Longbow agent). Missions are finally reaching the level of, say, Guild Wars, and they're quite refreshing.

The plane sequence was great. Unfortunately the movie would've been better if they'd just stopped it right afterwards.

"That's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Okay, hand me the bomb."

I was thinking the same thing, Sparrowhawk.

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Art is communication. Communication is by its very nature objective. Just like spoken or written language, nothing can be communicated if the communication is subjective. I can say "Bandangle dondo floo," and while it may mean something to me, it's not communication because nobody else understands it. Likewise for visual art. If nothing is communicated, the piece fails; it is bad art.

For example. Mondrian? Not art.

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Hilariously simplistic. Especially the part where something is bad art because Joe Shmoe off the street doesn't "get it."
This definition might be ok if we were talking about illustration.
There are many different school's of thought where communication per se is not the goal (eg. surrealism, Brechtian alienation effect, Russian Formalist Art criticism).

There is no single definition of art. There are many different theories spanning different cultures and time periods. The most important thing is context.

Mondrian was a significant artist during his time. And because he was significant then, his art will be preserved in a museum due to it's historical relevance. Someone putting a bunch of lines and squares on a page probably won't be taken seriously now because the moment when that statement was culturally relevant is over. It's not just a question of art/nonart. Time and place are also factors.

Going back to the question of subjectivity, a reaction can be subjective and still be ignorant or just plain stupid. An intelligent, informed opinion is a subjective reaction that takes into account many objective factors.

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Just because something is simplistic does not invalidate it. When discussing something as complex as art, simplification is necessary. There's no way to discuss every permutation.

The point stands.

Art is not subjective.

Art is communication. Communication is by its very nature objective. Just like spoken or written language, nothing can be communicated if the communication is subjective. I can say "Bandangle dondo floo," and while it may mean something to me, it's not communication because nobody else understands it. Likewise for visual art. If nothing is communicated, the piece fails; it is bad art.

For example. Mondrian? Not art.

Now, the whole phenomenon where people treat non-art as if it were art is a different subject entirely. Just remember, most of the time, if someone says, "That is deep art," it's because the art is not communicating anything and they don't understand it. They're just afraid of admitting it, under the mistaken impression that it's their fault rather than the artist's.

The chest logo is fantastic, what is it? Definitely not one of the standard options, am I right?

There are no such things as good PvP moments. PvP is a blight, a haven for immaturity and one-upmanship and the self-proclaimed "1337".

The original post illustrates exactly the kind of crap that makes PvP such an unmitigatedly joyful experience for all involved. Most of the rest just reinforce it; the highlights seem to consist of pounding people into the ground who are not able to actually contend with the person doing the pounding.

That really, truly, deeply impresses me with your superiority... yes it does.

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Night Widows are probably my favorite creations, with the possible exception of Jack in Irons. geko designed them, and I built their powers. (Jack was a big team effort, I just love the way he looks.)

The majority of their defense come from their Precognitive abilities. The Stealth doesn't add anymore than three slotted Stealth would for a player. The Smoke Grenade, on the other hand, is brutal if you are lower level than they are.

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Their smoke grenades are freaking overpowered no matter what level you are and need a serious nerf. They're not fun, they're frustrating.

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Whirlwind has always done knock up, now it is doing knockback. I did not see any patch notes on this change. I do recall some discussion about the changes being made to the way knockdown works because of ragdoll physics but understand it was suppose to be reversed. Is this an unnoted patch change or a bug?

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Yes, the change was done purposefully. No, a patch note was not generated -- my fault, sorry! I simply forgot to note the change down.

Why? There was a PVE exploit involved with it, and this fix takes care of 90% of the issue.

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Point me to the people using Whirlwind to solo AVs or gain levels twice as fast as somebody who doesn't have it. Hell, point me to the people who even have Whirlwind in the first place. It would take quite a bit of searching.

Exploit my @$$.

Is a power effective? No matter how marginal that effectiveness may be, it must be nerfed!

It's getting real old.

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AND now...we're changing the way Archvillains spawn. A ton of forum goers disliked adding so many AV's into missions a while back...so we've come up with a solution. If the team size and mission difficulty are ABOVE a certain level, an Archvillain spawns. Below that, players will face only an Elite Boss. If the mission is set on the first two levels of difficulty, it takes 4 heroes or more to spawn an Arch Villain. On the third level, 3 heroes or more. On the fourth level, 2 heroes. On the highest (Invincible), a solo hero will spawn an AV. Note this works in BOTH City of Heroes and Villains.

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Wow. You're finally doing something right. I'm shocked. And it's actually an elegant solution that makes sense. Nice work.

All I can say is, it's about time.

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In order to incentivize larger teams, Positron is going to add a bonus to AV rewards!

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No reward, no matter how large, could make me go through the AV pain.

And when this happens, defense sets will overshadow resistance sets. An SR scrapper will make a better tank than an Invulnerability tanker. Defense inspirations will become even more effective, and resistance inspirations proportionately even more useless.

Unless resistance levels will get a buff to match...

... but I wouldn't count on it.

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Although as addicts they have an illness, it is hard to feel sympathetic to a rampaging, green-skinned, muscle-bound junkie.

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Addiction is not an illness, it's a choice.

If there are going to be contacts that require badges to unlock (a horrendously stupid idea in and of itself), then they should be made so that you NEVER outlevel them.

I despise badges anyway. I don't even know which badges unlock which contacts or where, and I'm sure as heck not going to be bothered to find out and farm the badges for a contact I'll probably have outleveled by that time anyway. Thanks for the inacessible new content, guys.

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Overall, my position is still the same: I do not feel like I should be forced to purchase a particular powerset. And I believe 90% of the City of Hero veterens will claim that Stamina is a must for a successful and enjoyable high-level character.

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Very accurate. Stamina is not any less necessary. It is still required for the vast majority of builds.

I have to disagree with your first sentence though. The Endurance discount does NOT help. Since we can only 3 slot Stamina now, it doesn't even let us break even to where we were before. The Endurance discount needs to be something like 50% instead of a measly 13% in order to actually mean anything. If it were that much, then maybe it truly would make Stamina less necessary. I'm glad the discount is there, don't get me wrong; we'll take what we can get after the hack-job that was ED. But it doesn't go far enough.

Can we get a fix so perps will no longer jump out of Caltrop patches, either?

Yes, they STILL do this if they're next to a wall or staircase. Wouldn't I love to be able to duplicate this ability.

Once again this is a case of the numbers on the spreadsheet not bearing out in actual gameplay.

I won't dispute that you're correct about 13% being the same number. Functionally, however, it is most definitely not the same. I too will repeat something I said before; when you hit the bottom of your endurance bar (and you will), unless a power costs 0 Endurance to use it doesn't matter if that power now costs 13% less to cast than it used to. It doesn't matter if it costs 50% less, or 90% less. All that matters is how fast you can get Endurance back. Functionally, improved Endurance regeneration is always better than improved Endurance usage because it allows you to function longer with higher usage than a simple discount off the top of the power, and to function more effectively and rapidly when you're at the bottom of your bar. Otherwise the loss of those three SOs in Stamina wouldn't be so noticeable. And trust me, it's noticeable.

The "use Rest" doesn't hold water either. Yes, it recharges faster than it used to, but it still doesn't recharge fast enough to be ready between every fight. Not to mention that there are certain classes who are designed to constantly be in action, like, say, Brutes. Even with a full Fury bar, by the time you've Rested it will be gone. "Just use Rest" doesn't work.

I wish all the dev team was like Castle.