Samuel_Tow

We can still keep suggesting it nevertheless. Maybe one day they'll devote the resources to figuring out a way. That's really all that's left to add to the power customization system in terms of depth.

OK, I need to address this, so let me explain:

"Combat mode" as I'm going to define it in this post is just the state of taking up one of the many combat stances that your powers leave you in after they animate. Usually, that's the simple "left foot forward" stance, or "rifle out and up" or that weird wide stance you end up in after the Storm Kick. This is what I mean by combat mode. Usually, you'd enter combat mode as soon as you press an attack button on your tray or keyboard, even if you don't actually have anything to attack, and you would stay in this combat mode for I believe 10 seconds, before returning to the standard idle stance (/em idle, more specifically).

This doesn't happen for me from time to time, and I don't know why. Here's what I mean: I would activate an attack, and AS SOON AS the attack animation ends, my character would return to idle stance. Because of how rooting works, that would often be before my character is even done animating and definitely before returning to combat mode. Sometimes it would look like animations even get interrupted, such as with the baseball pitch alternative to Eagle's Claw.

I don't know why this happens, I don't know when it happens, because by the time I notice it, it's been going on for quite some time. I tend to chain attacks one after the other via attack queueing, so I never notice in time until I slow down for some reason and notice my character always returning to idle "just standing and looking around" mode, which is VERY inappropriate for in the middle of a battle. Activating powers doesn't help - he'll just do the attack and default back to idle mode. Being attacked doesn't help, as he'll snap to the animation for taking a hit, then snap back to idle.

The only thing that seems to help is drawing a weapon, I assume because a weapon somehow forces its own combat mode thanks to redraw. My solution is typically to draw the Ghost Slaying Axe. I don't even have to take a swing with it. Drawing it out once "fixes" my problem and my character becomes once more able to stay in combat mode. For a while, anyway. Before long, something happens and I stop being able to return to combat mode. And I don't know why.

Originally I thought this only happened to female characters, but I was wrong. It happens to Female and Male models, at least. The reason I thought that is because this is the most obvious with Martial Arts, where Storm Kick will leave you in this very cool, completely unique stance when it's done, and it's a stance I just like looking at. As both my Martial Artists are women, I only ever noticed it on women. However, now I'm beginning to notice it on my Kinetic Melee Brute, and he is most definitely a man. I haven't tried Huge, but given how intermittent this is, I wouldn't have any good way to test it.

All of this is to ask the following: Is anyone else seeing this and is anyone aware of a workaround to it that doesn't rely on a temporary fix after the fact?

*edit*
After posting this, I Tabbed back to the game to find myself dead, killed while I was posting. I resurrected (Awaken + Break Free) and immediately thereafter found myself dropping out of combat mode, despite having "fixed" that with the Ghost Slaying Axe before I Tabbed out to post this. Could dying have caused this?

Unfortunately, I don't think that's possible right now. From what BABs used to explain about how the animations system is hooked up, weapons come with their own stances and combat modes which doesn't seem like something which is currently rigged to change on the fly. Unless you want just one singular uncustomizable weapon as an option, which I don't think is what you're talking about, adding weapons to non-weapon sets and vice versa is not something the game can currently do.

Maybe in the future, though. Being able to use weapons for non-weapon sets and your bare hands instead of weapon sets (say like Techbot's ideas of arm wrist-mounted guns instead of an Assault Rifle) would be a major step forward in power customization.

What he needs is higher resolution textures and more detailing in his gauntlets, in my opinion. He's quite behind times.

I'm actually with the Goat on this one - I can see why they'd feel adding stuff instead of fixing stuff is superior. And like him, I also disagree. To put this in a different perspective:

Only adding new content is like how Neuron does things, whereas revamping old content is like how Anti-Matter does things. Everyone praises Neuron despite the fact that very little in the city actually works and everyone laughs at Anti-Matter despite the fact that all of Praetoria City functions squarely because of him.

I would argue that revamping old content is a positive change, in that non-revamped content is empty and void, and as such does not count. Look at Terra Volta. It's an empty shell - a zone with interesting geometry, but nothing to actually do in it, other than a mission door which may as well be on the other side of the War Wall. As it stands right now, Terra Volta could disappear from the game and few people will care. As it stands right now, Terra Volta does not count. Adding content to it is a positive addition, as you remove literally nothing yet add much.

Revamping missions is a little harder to argue, but not by much. Nostalgia notwithstanding, I would bet my metal-tipped tail that everyone will agree how utterly bad older blue-side missions are. Hell, we'd agreed on that by 2005. Yes, revamping those missions is tantamount to removing content and replacing it, equalling a neutral change. However, what is being removed is stuff no-one is going to miss, and I mean the state of writing, not the actual stories.

For instance, take Unai Kemen's To Save a Thousand Worlds arc. The bulk of that arc consists of "Go to dimensions 1, 2 and 3, click a few ruptures which look suspiciously like CoT altars and come back to me. So I can give you another mission like that." Unai has about 25 outdoor missions, spanning a pool of no more than 10 instance maps, so not only is the story pointless and boring, the gameplay is repetitive as you do and redo the same maps over and over again. If his arc were to be re-written with all the chaff stripped out and a solid storyline giving you a non-redundant reason to visit these "thousand worlds," then this is a positive change. Losing Unai's old arc is a done deal - it sucks and few people do it even now, and you can stick it in Ouroboros after the fact anyway. You lose very little and, even with a basic understanding of fictional writing, gain rather a lot - a decent arc with passable writing, which is still a massive improvement.

I'd say you're overthinking this a bit. My initial reaction to the question was "What's there to tell?" in the sense that his being a former sidekick and current freestanding hero is enough, but you have a point. We can do better. Let's see if I can make a story out of this no-story.

What I'm thinking of is something less... Elaborate. Your sidekick character, whom I will call "the Kid" to make things simpler, started out as somewhat of an intern for your hero, whom I will call "Damz" for the same reason. That's your beginning.

The Kid spent long years fighting alongside Damz, taking in his wisdom, his courage and his ability to handle overwhelming odds without panic or desperation. As the power and ability of Damz grew, the Kid found himself in a constant struggle to keep up. He wanted to help, or failing that, to at least not be a liability. For years, he always felt like he was holding Damz back, always having to be rescued and assisted. What the Kid never realised, however, was that while Damz was always growing ever stronger, the Kid himself had grown in power, as if almost unintentionally.

One day when his mentor was otherwise occupied, an old threat reared its ugly head. "The Villain" returned - an old threat the two had just barely vanquished years ago. With his mentor unable to help, the Kid despaired, remembering how horribly powerful the Villain had once been. Diving into action nevertheless, the Kid realised that the Villain's power had not grown at all since their last encounter, whereas the Kid was now significantly stronger. Making quick work of what was once an unbeatable foe finally opened his eyes to the fact that he, too, had become a hero in his own right. Not yet at the level of his master, perhaps, but at a level far greater than even his master had once been.

With the permission of Damz, the Kid chose to become a full-fledged super hero and to seek his own destiny. Damz had long since taught him all he could. It was time for the Kid to grow up and perhaps in turn teach the next generation of heroes a trick or two of the many he never realised he knew.

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How does that sound?