Samuel_Tow

I've seen it happen a lot, but I always attributed it to just packet loss. I'm pretty sure that if it's been reproducible the whole time, it's been a bug.

Yes, there's that, and that will always be a problem. I don't need to be able to clear a whole room by belching real hard, I just need to see a storyline that's dignified and puts my character over strong, win or lose. Fighting prisoners and civilians just doesn't seem like it.

I agree completely. Sticking to just adding new content and never completing old things they started is one of the big problems I have with our current development priorities. Bugs (like the broken conversation in the last mission for Keith Nancy) still persist, old story angles (like Blood of the Black Stream) still dangle and, as you mention, old mission collections like Tips have never been added to. I really wish there would be more work done on legacy stuff to make it better, even if it's something as simple as what happened to the Hollows. That change took what was a garbage zone and turned it into something worth playing, even if Melissa went overboard with the zillions of enemy groups in there.

I completely disagree. Vehemently, in fact. I don't mean about holding a competition, that's a good idea. I mean the notion that "speak with person" is the making of a good mission. On the contrary, I find this to be one of the most annoying things to stick into a mission, especially for no reason. It's right there with protection objectives and escorts for no reason. Just because you CAN have me converse with a computer through three text screens of made-up ridiculous text interface doesn't mean you SHOULD.

This is kind of why I'm apprehensive about messing with old content. Yes, old content has a lot of wasteful time sinks, but it's also much more true to the game's mechanics and a much more pure gaming experience that doesn't yank me out of the experience by the collar so I can read some more text boxes. Mission designers of today seem to have no sense of flow and stick lengthy conversations and cutscenes in the middle of what would otherwise be a smooth, flowing experience. They overcomplicate mechanics and put me through very inflexible, tight scripted sequences so that I can retrace their intended steps and supposedly go through a more interesting experience.

The big irony of the situation is that the more you untie my hands and let me solve the situation in my own way, the more accomplished I'll feel. Some of the most intense and cinematic experiences I've gone through haven't been the result of strict scripting, they have been the result of a collision of chance. Because the old content is so simple and so uncontrolled, unpredictable things happen if you don't approach everything with clinical precision, and THAT is what's cool about them. The new content is so complex that the only way to solve it is the way the mission designers planned for you, right down mission-specific enemies not spawning if you haven't spoken with the person following you. The hell? Isn't it assumed that if the person is following me and helping me, we already spoke off-camera?\

As far as I'm concerned, our mission designers shouldn't be trying to top players by cramming their missions full of needlessly complex scripting to the point where sneezing the wrong way will break something. They should learn from players in how to make good missions WITHOUT having to resort to complex scripting. The worst thing that can happen to old content is for it to be "fixed" to be more complicated. If anything, new content should be simplified so I don't spend more time speaking with people than shooting people in the face. This is not a point-and-click adventure game.

I won't deny this, honestly. As many times as I've seen movies talk about "the president of the EU" as though Europe is a confederacy or represent nations via their national stereotypes, there IS reason to worry. And that's not a jab at Americans, by the way. I think almost everyone does it. I think the problem, when it occurs, stems from trying to hammer home the point that you're in a particular country.

Why set your mission in France if you'll pick a section of Paris that looks like just a modern European city? You may as well set it in London for all that matters. No, if you set your mission in France, it has to include the Eiffel tower, mimes and baguettes. How else can you tell you're in France, after all?

I find this in itself to be a fallacy that's easily avoided, however. For instance, look at Half-Life 2. One of the Valve developers actually is Bulgarian, and much of City 17 looks A LOT like Sofia, my own capital city. I've been to the capital many times, and the first time I saw the city, I had to point my finger and go "I recognise this place!" Everything from the architecture to some city layouts, to the old Sovier era concrete panel blocks of flats to the early 20th century Bulgarian buildings is there. I recognise the location without having to have anything iconic with the country shoved into it. If you make a location faithful enough to its real life inspiration in at least theme, you don't have to shove stereotypes in it.

The change to the Patriot badge was shortly followed by a poster on the forums making a big stink about there being no 9.11 event in the game, insisting that this was a slap in the face of America and a sign that the game was not patriotic enough. It goes both ways.

For what it's worth, I myself didn't have THAT big a problem with the original Patriot badge. I just felt it was in poor taste for an international audience, but my judgement was not entirely objective at the time. I had recently been insulted for suggesting that the game offer the option to measure distance in Metrics, told that this is an AMERICAN game set in AMERICA for AMERICANS and that if I didn't like it, I should go back to Europe. And that's before there even was a European version of the game, so yeah - I argued against it.

My point, though, is I just don't think it was necessary. A fictional nation with its own flag is a "safe" thing to pledge allegiance to as that just carries no real-world connotations. Having this be a real-life nation, even a fictional representation of one, just made it uncomfortable for me. Considering the solution was very simple and it's pretty much the only such concession I can think of off-hand, I don't see it as a problem.

Honestly, though, I'd probably have had a problem with it even if this were a fictional nation. For instance, if I'm asked to pledge my services to the Praetorian Government or to Arachnos... No! Hell no! Most of the characters I make don't identify themselves with any one nation. As the Anthem from the musical Chess, made even more famous by Jai McDowall's performance of it say: "My land's only borders lie around my heart."

For the length of the actual Praetorian content from Nova Praetoria to Imperial City to Neutropolis, they break down a bit like this:

Resistance Wardens: Idealists and dreamers.
Resistance Crusaders: ********.
Loyalist Responsibility: Jaded jerks.
Loyalist Power: "You magnificent ******* I read your book!"

After that, in First Ward, they tend to break down like this:

Resistance Wardens: MIA.
Resistance Crusaders: ********.
Loyalists Responsibility: MIA.
Loyalist Power: MIA.

Essentially, in the original Praetorian content, the Wardens are the good guys and everyone else is the bad guy, and in First Ward, everyone is the bad guy, including the player, ultimately.

Are you referring to how particles tend to "float up?" I suspect there's more going on there than just gravity, as these particles should be ejected with some initial velocity, and even with flipped gravity, they should still describe some kind of arc and interact with items on the way up in at least some fashion. I also assume that they should experience some gravitational acceleration. None of this happens. They spawn in their start points with no inertia, completely stationary, then they float up at a steady, very slow speed and pass through all objects on the way up. It feels to me like these particles aren't experiencing any physics calculations at all and are merely subject to whatever force makes the bodies of Tsoo Ancestor Spirits float up as they disappear.

That's just inference from observation, of course. I hope that they kept the phone numbers for the guys who programmed City of Heroes' physics, because this really, REALLY needs to get fixed. It's made the game look much older than it needs to be. Especially since I know how much better it was before this "upgrade."

Again, that's not the fault of the technology, not entirely, at least. Much as I'll probably toss people under the bus who don't deserve it, the artists are at fault here. They dropped the ball on the faces. Yes, I agree, the new faces are hideous. That's because they're the faces of hideous people. With or without normal mapping, those are still horrible faces that I'd never, ever use. But that doesn't mean GOOD faces can't do well with better technology.

Or a non-angular neck.

If anything at all "gets" to me, it's usually this, and I don't mean this in a hostile manner. It just presumes a patronising approach where a cooperative one would be much more appreciated.

That's a good point to bring up, actually. I live in Bulgaria, but the only time I ever see a Bulgarian flag up anywhere is on government buildings, and don't think I've seen the coat of arms... Anywhere within living memory. Well, I think it's embroidered on military uniforms, but I can't say for sure as I missed the mandatory draft by a few years. In fact, most of the "flag-waving" people around here are usually seen as extreme nationalists and rebel-rousers that few want to directly associate with.

That said, I really don't mind the American flag being present in movies and games. Hell, the Nostalgia Critic held the Spider-Man movies accountable for shoving huge American flags everywhere, and I never really noticed. It takes place in the US, so when Spider-Man hops onto a municipal building and there's a large national flag waving in the wind... It makes sense that it'd be there. What bugs me is the "warship" of the flag, especially when I end up having to do it, and even then it doesn't bother me all that much. Again - the original "Patriot" badge bugged me, but I didn't care enough to complain (and for me, that's saying something).

This actually extends over "Patriotic" heroes, as well, and this may be part of why I'm not that interested in the Statesman. Like his name, he is a statesman, a representative of his nation who apparently once wore the American flag as his cape. I've seen a fair number of "red white and blue" tights super heroes and I fail to connect with them in a similar fashion. There just isn't anything in it for me. It's not my cause they're fighting for, just because for me, "patriotism" would point in a different direction for geographical and cultural reasons. I do have a "red white and blue" tights hero of my own, ironically enough, but him I made more as a super hero cliché collection than anything else, and that's just what pops into my head.

Again, I don't say any of this to be mean or attack Americans for staying true for their country. That's actually quite admirable. I just tend to have an easier time getting into stories and characters when they don't presume a very specific nationality and cultural background that I just don't share, and instead focus on broader themes of heroism or villainy. I've found that alien invaders are a very good unifying thematic just because... Well, they want us all dead and we all don't want to die, right?

"Ageia(TM) PhysX(TM) support" only determines whether or not the game recognises and uses the Ageia physics card specifically, but controls nothing to do with visual quality. You can run particle physics completely by software, or via any nVidia card of the last two years, and that option is simply disabled.

The option I'm referring to is "Particle Physics Quality" which I have currently set to "Very Hight (Not Recommended Without PPU). It just so happens that aside from the Ageia card and a few other exotic software bits that I ran across when researching Ageia PhysX, there really aren't any notable PPUs out there in general circulation, at least none that I've ever heard of.

Technically, I shouldn't need a PPU because my GeForce GTX 580 should be more than capable of handling physics calculations on top of rendering graphics, as it used to be prior to I21. Even the new Atlas Park doesn't manage to drop me below ~45 FPS. There's nothing about these things that has meaningfully impacted my performance since some time in 2009. Really, it should be up to the players as to whether they want to use a specific option even if it induces graphics slowdown, as that's what the options are for. After all, I can still set my Ambient Occlusion to ultra high quality and ram my FSAA as high as it will go and choke a super computer from the future down to the ground, but that's still an option.

My point is, unless the game somehow entirely lost support for physics - which I doubt - there's no reason to pretty much take them out of the game. I realise the same happened to 3D sound on Sound Blaster cards (I used to be able to run it on mine, now I can't), but that had something to do with loss of support for it when switching... Something. I sincerely hope we haven't lost the physics engine that more or less constituted half of CoV's selling point.

It's not necessary, is what I'm saying. The way they shuffled them around is just about equivalent without being as specific.

Easy example - if you replace the old "painted-on clothes" with actual textures, you kill my ability to swap my skin texture underneath them. Yes, the game doesn't exactly support this at the moment, but I'd like it to. As one of the people who would complain if my pieces were taken away from me and replaced with something I may not like as much for various reasons, I see nothing to be gained by removing these pieces from the editor. Clutter shouldn't be a problem now that we can wheel-scroll through drop-down lists of options.

I remember back in the day when the developers introduced the "Patriot" badge, where you had to stand next to the American flag on the roof of City Hall. That... Didn't go over well, and to be fair, I wasn't a big fan of it, myself. I generally have a problem with American heroes and leadership automatically being expanded as being heroes and leaders "of the free world."

The badge in question was changed to say that the flag at the top of City Hall wasn't just an American flag, but the Statesman's old cape, and by standing next to it, we are honouring his good deeds. To be fair, the man has indeed done a lot of good, and I personally don't have a problem with the badge. The old "Patriot" badge was moved indoors, next to the statue of some heroine who was made a citizen of every nation in the world, therefore by being a patriot, you're being a patriot for the entire world. It's a very obvious compromise, but it's well-handled.

Four years of my animations not playing, really. I had to peace it together sooner or later

Honestly, I'd like to see the developers at least admit that they know about this, because I get the impression QA just doesn't believe me when I submit these reports. Maybe I haven't been clear enough in my reconstruction instructions, but I offered to show this, I even made videos. Nothing happened.

Yes, I got a post of mine moderated, but that was one Forum mod's opinion on the matter. BABs was on vacation at the time, I believe. The mod offered to pass on the message, but either that didn't happen or BABs ignored it.

I just want to know it's known.

That's only if you consider every mission you do to be part of your character's storyline. I can see how you might, but I strongly disagree. I don't consider any of my characters to be members of the midnight squad, but I want access to Comerora, so I run the mission on all of them.

Which is not what I said. Involving him in storylines in the game doesn't mean involving him in YOUR storyline, or mine or anybody else's. There's enough room in the game for us to tell our own stories and the writers to tell their own alongside.

This is a very, very good idea. That's actually what I do when I end up writing overpowered Mary Sue characters, myself. Samuel Tow, my namesake, is probably the worst example of the bunch, to the point where I generally use him as a deus ex machina and not much else. Storylines I involve him with revolve around why Sam can't intervene and solve everyone's problems by himself. Maybe he's trapped in another dimension, maybe he's locked inside his own mind, maybe he's feeling emo at the time and just doesn't feel like it, but the point is he CAN'T, and the story is either about finding a way to get him to help out or otherwise find an alternative.

I like the idea of involving signature characters of great power in earlier arcs, myself. That way, you can tell arcs of a much bigger story than characters of that level really deserve, because a signature character is being used as deus ex machina to handle most of the heavy lifting, yet still not overshadow player characters because said signature character is too hard-pressed to do much else. Posi struggling to keep the Terra Volta reactor from blowing up and us having to protect HIM as opposed to the reactor is so inspired I'm actually jealous for not thinking of it, myself.

The bottom line is that we need more interaction with these characters from an earlier level.

That's really the biggest mistake, I think. In the original game, the Statesman is actually nowhere in it. He shows up all of ONE time, he's a level 54 Archvillain who "helps" you by one-shotting everything for 5000+ points of damage per punch, and he comes off more like a myth than a man. I'm sure Jack Emmert's original vision for the Statesman was just that - he's so powerful and magnificent that he has to be "saved" such that people would feel it's "special" when they finally meet him right at the end of the game. But all this does is turn a man into an icon, and begs the question - how am I supposed to care when he dies?

Not showing up much is great build-up for a villain. The more you use a villain, the less threatening he becomes, so saving your big villains until right at the end is a good idea. This makes them feel stranger, more menacing and more important. You've fought so many bad people, but you hear the big bad is stronger and much worse. But you don't know, because you have never seen him. Until that one time you do, and you don't know what to expect because you've never fought anything like him. You haven't had the chance to learn about any of his weaknesses. That's why, to this day, Recluse still works as a big bad, and also why none of the Praetorian AVs do. When you're exposed to their petty bickering since level 1 and have already shown most of them up by level 20 (and in the case of Maelstron, kicked his shapely *** countless times and reduced him into a joke), they lose their threat and intimidation qualities. They become the quirky miniboss squad of goons the heroes consistently and soundly best from time to time.

That said, this kind of exclusivity and reclusivity may be good for a villain, but it's NOT good for a hero. Villains we're supposed to respect. Heroes we're supposed to like, and for a hero to be likeable, he needs to be familiar to us. We need to know that this hero cares, that this hero will help us, that every time we're in need, this hero will help out. This is why Sefu Tendaji is so likeable: Not only is he a really nice guy, he actually does a lot to help us in our missions. He provides information on multiple occasions, helps us in combat and even when he's forced to oppose us, he still does so with dignity and respect. He's likeable because we know him. And we know jack squat about the Statesman, other than he took a nuke to the back of the head that one time. It's impossible to care about such a person who does nothing, shows up nowhere, says nothing and we only know he exists because he's on the box art.

And then there's this. One of the reasons people hate the Statesman is because not only is he "the greatest" hero of our whole world, the multiverse is full of his clones and his boyfriends. Reichsman, Imperious and Tyrant are some of our premier bad guys, and they're all Statesman clones, and while Recluse isn't his clone, he spends so much time obsessing over the Statesman I get the impression he wants to get into his pants. It's all about the Statesman, and that really gets tiring after a while. Everything in the late game - that is to say, all of the biggest stuff - has to do with the Statesman, at least by proxy. I wouldn't be surprised if it's revealed Marcus inherited the Sharingan at some point.

The ability to completely and utterly override all animation rooting for all of my powers doesn't sound like a major concern to you?

That's a big part of it, too. I still remember Matt Miller's "in-character" explanation for why Positron just stands idly by and watches newbeis getting their ***** kicked in his square: "All that crap's grey to me. No XP." To the man's credit, it was witty and it was the best he could do with the game's limited engine of interaction, but that sort of feeling like we're not worth the bother for the signature NPCs even when we're fighting for our lives at their feet is a big problem. I get that the game is limited in what it can do, but this is where involving these guys in storylines would have been nice. And I mean storylines that don't end up with them dead, depowered or humiliated.

I assume it's because it's somewhat difficult to track down the reason for it. It took me around three years of experiencing this to realise what was happening, largely because the "fake combat mode" isn't entirely obvious. The thing, though, is I've been reporting this for a long time now, even offering characters that it's happening to and no-one's done anything. Does this have to become an epidemic of people skipping animations like what happened with Whirlwind before anyone does anything?

I think what bugs me about this is this particular bug is infinitely reproducible. Literally. I can replicate this bug every single time, and for that particular character, I can replicate it with every single power. Also, the "fake combat mode" bug has been pretty well documented for years, as well. Another player explained it to be I think over a couple of years ago, and it's incredibly easy to replicate - don't be in combat mode, then use Build Up. That's it. Do that and you're bugged.

I could see if this were a small thing, like some of the mistinings on Titan Weapons, but this bug has the potential to be very abusable, and the only reason it's not is enough people don't know about it.