Samuel_Tow
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Posts
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Joined
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Quote:Yeah, I remember hearing about that, myself. And even so, you can pump out more damage than your Assassin's Strike OUT OF HIDE with just those two powers. I highly suspect that a Scrapper pulling off a hide-less Assassin's Strike for even more damage so very often is overpowered. Any of these heavy-hitters are just SICK for Scrappers.Originally Posted by Leo_G
And that's the thing:
Energy Transfer does not crit. Look at the only critical hitting Energy melee set (Stalker: Energy Melee) and you'll see that Energy Transfer's crit is in the form of nullifying the self damage. It adds no damage to the attack however.
Total Focus only *partially* crits. I don't recall how much exactly but rather than 2x dmg, it's something like 1.5x dmg.
Look at what the two high-damage ATs have access to. Scrapper have 2.6 - 2.7 at most, while Blasters have 2.2 on a reliable heavy-hitter and 2.7 on their snipes. About the only power which breaks those boundaries is Energy Manipulation/Total Focus, at 3.56, but even then it uses the Blaster melee damage mod, which is 1.0, less than their ranged damage at 1.125. Nukes notwithstanding, high-damage ATs just don't do that much damage.
Here's an interesting thought, though. a Brute at his damage cap, given the same old 100 point damage attack is doing 950 damage (100*(100% base + 850% cap)). A Scrapper with it is doing 900 (150*(100% base + 500% cap)). This right there shows you the power of high base damage. -
Here's the thing - games that have good facial animation also have very limited faces. Champions Online, for instance, have animated faces, but... Well, they have AN animated FACE. Singular, as in, one face for the entire game. Two, if you count them as one male and one female. And you can try until you turn blue, you won't make a face into a different face unless you resort to goggles or face masks.
We, on the other hand, have something like 50 distinct faces, and even if people will claim they're all the same, they're not. They aren't just skins over the same model - each face is a different MESH. Even if you don't alter facial sliders much, you can just pick a different face.
Now, granted, if they can make all of our faces animate, including the bestial, noseless, mouthless and so forth ones, then by all means, go for it. But I would not want to see facial animation at the cost of facial customization.
Here's what I WOULD like to see, though - have our heads track our target in real time, at least for something like a 90 degrees arc around the centreline. Make me feel like I'm looking at the things I'm looking at. -
Spawn points are hard-coded into the map geometry. You're as likely to move them around as you are to move walls around, which is to say not very. However, I WOULD like to be able to pick specific spawn points for mission objectives. I'd like to make sure the boss is in the LAST ROOM, and just putting him as "back" doesn't always cut it. I'd like to put a boss in a room with enemies of his faction, so I'd like to put in a boss and patrols in the spawns of that room. The only way to do that now is to pick a map with few Back spawns and just jam-pack them with patrols and hope you exhaust the whole room.
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Quote:You can, but you need to be on a team to enable it.Originally Posted by The_Thorny_Devil
Can't you do that already?
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Well, you have a point, but this is related directly to events where Earth's status is somehow relevant. If a god comes to feed on US, then it makes sense he'd come to Earth just as likely as he'd go to some other alien's home world, and because we're a relatively technologically backwards species by sci-fi standards, that actually makes sense. But a sorta-god who wants to devour the entire dimension would have no reason to be on Earth to begin with. He could just as well be in the middle of empty space, on a barren planet, or even in the core of a planet somewhere. He doesn't need to seek us out so we can imprison him. He can just nuke us from orbit where we can't reach him and that would be that.
This is actually different from a sci-fi setting where Earth has spread outwards and colonised space, becoming a big player on the galactic scene. Then, like any super power, it would draw its own level of heat. But in City of Heroes, we aren't. We're just some backwater planet in the middle of nowhere. Why do these supreme evils come seek us out? Our gods are gone and just about anything that comes out of anywhere off-world has more power than our own local heroes, for the most part.
It's like a little armoured bunker in the middle of an open field that gets constantly hit by meteorites which never seem to land anywhere BUT on the heavily armoured, very resistant bunker, so you never see any craters. It's like evil constantly seeks out strong good so that it can be stopped.
You do have a point, though. Toss a rock through a random dimensional portal and you hit a demigod in the eye every time. What's more, there seem to be people just sitting in front of their portals cheering and shouting "Open! Open! Open! Come on! Open!" so that as soon as we form a connection with their dimension, they rush through into ours like a stampede of cattle. Because... That's what they do, I guess. I wonder why the zillions of Nemesis-controlled dimensions don't have that problem.
But we're getting a little off-topic. -
Impish Kat described the process of saving pretty well. Everything you have saved auto-loads on every new character. Keep in mind this is one-side only, so if you save your red villainous interface, you'll load a red villainous interface on the next hero you make.
Also note that global chat channels don't always arrive in their proper tabs and sometimes all get limped into the first tab on the bottom, and sometimes end up not in any tab at all. It's useful to have a look at them to make sure you have them all in the right tabs.
As far as what I do, let the game auto-load my settings, rearrange my powers I get at the start in this order: Brawl, attack, other power, spring, empty space, empty space, Fortune Telling, Self Destruct, Jump Pack, Tempermanent power. Do the tutorial.
Once in the game, I grab all my veteran powers except the respecs, base items and Veteran sprints (VERY carefully avoiding veteran sprints). Then I rearrange my trays in the following manner:
Tray 1: all attacks, with Build Up, Aim, Taunt, Placate and powers of that nature where available. Usually attacks, usually from my primary. Masterminds get their three attacks and their secondary buffs there.
Tray 2: Brawl, Sprint, travel power prerequisite, travel power, "other" powers all the way to the back. That's where my shields go if I have them, or my melee attacks on a Blaster. Masterminds get their summons there.
Tray 3, from right to left: Rest, Jump Pack, three veteran attacks (whichever I've chosen) buffing pet, The Reveal power
Tray 4, from right to left: Tempermanent power, Pocket D VIP pass, Base Teleporter, Assemble the Team, cosmetic pet, Mission Teleporter, empty space, Fortune power, Self Destruct. Tray 4 is hidden, and I switch to it only when needed. -
I was quite amazed when I was browsing a hentai site and I came across a pic that I could SWEAR was right out of City of Heroes, right down to an almost perfect recreation of several costume items. I first caught the little Bat wings, and then it went from there. It was a nice pic, too.
I'm nor sure if I should be impressed or concerned that my first thought upon seeing an erotic picture was "Wait! I recognise those wings! Could it be?!?"
Browsing through the artist's gallery revealed that he was drawing his character from City of Heroes, complete with an... Interesting "Gratz on 50" pic. I wish I'd kept the link... -
Quote:Time to do that all over again.Originally Posted by BrandX
You lost the arguement when you didn't account for Brute fury, which puts them at more damage than a Scrapper, not to mention they have better defense than scrappers (more hit points, and the ability to obtain higher levels of resistance).
Brutes have a melee damage mod of 0.75. Scrappers have a melee damage mod of 1.125, which is 150% the Brute damage mod (0.75*1.5 = 1.125). So let's give the Brute a theoretical 100 point attack. With the same attack, a Scrapper would do 150 points of damage. With ~100% damage enhancement (it's 98.8% or some such, but let's call it 100%), a Brute would do 200 points of damage, while a Scrapper would do 300% (150*(100% + 100%)). A Brute would, therefore, need 50 Fury (100% damage buff) JUST to break even, at 300 points of damage (100*(100% base + 100% from enhancements + 100% from Fury)). With Build Up, a Scrapper would do 450 damage (150*(100% base + 100% from enhancements + 100% from Build Up)) whereas a Brute would only do 380 (100*(100% base + 100% from enhancements + 100% from Fury + 80% from Build Up)) To break even under Build Up, a Brute would need another 35 Fury, or 70% damage buff, giving him 450 damage (100*(100% base + 100% from enhancements + 170% from Fury + 80% from Build Up)).
A Brute would, therefore, need 85 Fury JUST to break even with a Scrapper going full tilt, and at least 50 Fury to break even with them under normal conditions. And a Scrapper can DOUBLE his damage on a lucky critical, which a Brute plain and simple cannot match. A critical Total Focus or Energy Transfer can get into the thousands of hit points of damage on a Scrapper. A Brute can kinda sorta measure up if he's going full on Fury, which is both hard to achieve and hard to maintain. A Scrapper can do that and more just rolling out of bed. -
Quote:When I posted this, I actually attempted to band together the people fighting the banners. All of Kings Row had six people, and five were on my team. Most of us were in our teens, and we got curb-stomped into next week. Not fun.Originally Posted by KaliMagdalene
On Champion last night, people were going from zone to zone, wherever it was. Level 50s in Atlas, King's Row, and the Hollows taking these down. I think that's the expectation.
A while ago I spotted an event in Steel Canyon, Checking a whoall revealed six or seven people. I didn't bother to try. And I still have yet to see people fighting at a banner unless I brought them with me.
That's OK, though. To each his own. It just kind of sucks, because the event looks like it's cool, but the damb critters are too tough for a low-level Blaster to make much difference. I can barely kill a MINION, and I get killed all the time. -
Quote:So my suspicions that the pic was so huge it broke the horizontal and a mod slashed it down to a thumbnail might have some truth to it. Hmm...Originally Posted by EU_Damz
Thats wierd, yesterday it was a HUGE screenie
His AE tickets were 666 and had 2 extra trays full of temp powers [obviously the ToT ones 
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Edit: Is it too late to try and convince you all that we only saw it because we have super vision and are true superheroes? -
I wish I could be bored of it, but I have yet to see people actually taking part in the fight against the banners, and as such I have not had a chance to even begin experiencing it.
On the other hand, that stands to strong evidence why people suggesting events impact zones permanently, or until players band together to fight them is full of fail - players can't be arsed to attend every single event as it occurs, and that's quite normal. I don't, and I feel no shame in it. -
I play this game to beat ups stuff, watch my cool characters as they beat up stuff, and get levels. In that order. I see no reason to powerlevel, because that just destroys the sense of progression. There's no point in growing up to be strong if you were never weak to begin with.
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Quote:Brawl Index was a pretty bad way to measure attack strength, because Brawl itself varies between the ATs. It's a melee attack, so it keys off the AT's melee damage mod. It's also not a good scale damage, at 0.36, so comparisons to it are awkward, at best.Originally Posted by Primantiss
Well put, (going from memory here), But back when we used the BI index weren't the heavy hitting Tanker powers (Like KO Blow) Almost 10? While the most massive scrapper attack at the time (Head splitter) was only 6 or 7.
Scale damage, on the other hand, is global. It's an attribute of a power BEFORE any AT attributes are taken into account, so you can compare powers independently of the ATs that use them. That's very useful for the purposes of proliferation comparisons.
For reference, Scrapper "heavy hitters" tend to be very low on the damage scale. Scrappers have:
Head Splitter at 2.6
Eviscerate at 1.99
One Thousand Cuts at 2.35 and
Midnight Grasp at 2.76 (I'm surprised at this!)
Greater Fire Sword at 2.28 (plus an 80% chance of 1.0 more, which doesn't critical)
Golden Dragonfly at 2.28
Eagle's Claw at 2.28
Ripper at 1.7 (plus 80% chance of 1.0 more, which doesn't critical)
By comparison, let's look at Brute sets, which have, identical sets notwithstanding:
Total Focus at 3.56 plus Energy Transfer at 4.5
Seismic Smash at 3.56
Knockout Blow at 3.56
That, and the Tanker weapon sets still have bigger heavy-hitters an more sustained damage, which:
Cleave at 2.76
Clobber at 2.92
Now, the thing with this comparison is, it doesn't hold true for the entirety of a Tanker's set. It only holds true for one or two powers. The rest are regular melee damage scales. This creates a particular sort of duality, where you will have one really big hitter that comprises the majority of your shock damage, and a bunch of piddly attacks you can use as filler. Energy Melee was absolutely absurd before the Barrage fix, with Energy Transfer and Total Focus doing almost twice as much damage together as the rest of the set, only being compounded by the fact that you'll use them with Build Up anyway.
Battle Axe and War Mace are the exceptions. They are sorta-clones of Broadsword, so they are built like it, practically following the same model but replacing Slice with a VERY big, very strong cone and replacing Parry with very high-damage attack. In the case of Battle Axe, it's the set's second-heaviest hitter, and in the case of War Mace after the reworks, the game's strongest single-target attack out of a weapon, Assassin's Strikes notwithstanding. That, and both sets deal slightly more damage on each attack than Broadsword does. They do come with balancing factors, though, such as Battle Axe being very slow and War Mace actually being somewhat weaker in terms of direct damage, so if we're looking at Scrapper ports, these are a good candidate. They would probably outshine Broadsword in pure damage, but Broadsword still has more speed and more utility.
It's funny to think of Broadsword as the lower-damage, faster set, really
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Quote:Is it odd or predictable that most of us present here will cite examples to the contrary? After all, remember the big furor around wings to get them to flap while jumping and teleporting.Originally Posted by ToySoldierZolgar
This example is not a valid one.
Yes, there are species of birds which have wings but cannot fly.
But 99% of people who make characters with wings intend them to be able to fly. Ergo it falls under the same heading as "My character is *blah* and doesn't need to breath."
I, myself, have two characters with wings who don't fly that I can think of. One is a teleporter, who uses his wings only to hold up between teleports, but doesn't have Fly. The other is "fallen angel" style girl who has burnt wings which are useless for flight, but aid in gliding and leaping, as well as serving as representation of her shame.
Which brings up another interesting point - wings flap when you fly. If it's just a simple as enabling flight underwater, I GUARANTEE that those vigorously flapping wings are going to look mighty stupid underwater. I don't care if I turn my brain down to zero, I'm never going to be able to look past a wide-area, light-weight structure moving through water broad-side first at THAT speed. That's like trying to drag an open parachute underwater and and still move at several times running speed.
You know, one thing I always missed in very fast travel on land in City of Heroes was any feeling of air resistance. Granted, the engine limits us to around highway speed, at best, but even so, I've always wanted to see a bit of a rush of air as you super super-run, a bit of a feeling of impact when you super-jump off the top of a huge building, or, heck, even a bit of a shockwave when you hit the flight cap. One of my favourite things to do in Rollcage, for instance, was to just floor it and watch the heat and shockwave build up at the front of my car like I was going to leave the planet We lack that in City of Heroes. We even lack a proper super run. We just have the same jogging jiggle, even at the same speed of footstep, only we slide along the ground faster.
Well, if it bugs me that we lack these things in air, it'll bug me MANY TIMES MORE that we lack these things in water, because in water, you WILL see these effects at any speed of motion faster than walking pace. Water resistance is far greater than air resistance, which is probably one of the two key factors that DEFINE water (the other being buoyancy) in terms of a gaming environment. You swim in it, and you move slower and with more effort through it. Without those, it's not worth having it in the first place. The Grandville and Cimerora quasi-underwater locations are a perfect example of everything that's wrong with the system. -
Quote:The big thing with electricity is shocking yourself, and likely the reason you see electrical users shocking themselves is likely some carry-over from how robots in certain fiction fry themselves out for so much as stepping in a puddle (that's literally how Dexter lost one giant robot).Originally Posted by Energyman
As for powers that don't work underwater, we've seen Superman use heat vision underwater without much complaint. Hurl boulder would be fine if there was a sea floor/cliff/Atlantian road you were near. Water is a good conductor of electricity and for the life of me I've never understood why thowing water on an electric based hero hurts them when they use thier powers, yet most other heroes are immune to their own powers. You don't see a fire based hero getting hurt if they walk into a burning building. Sure some of the powers would look odd, but since you're "magiced" on entering the zone that's one way to explain it. Add in power customization and not all fire is actually "fire" conceptually anymore.
However, Hurl Boulder just cannot work. It's not a question of needing a bottom (which in itself would take away from the point of an underwater zone, but eh), it's a question of how fast things can travel through water without creating shockwaves and experiencing severe drag. That's also why every underwater fight scene you see in movies that isn't completely CGI or cartoon is slow and delayed - every motion in water experiences SIGNIFICANTLY more drag than in air, to the point of throwing large objects at speed is simply out of the question. There's a reason why supersonic bullets shatter into metal shavings upon impacting water.
And again - it's a question of looking right. Having your fire burn bright and big and flickering in water the same as it does in air would look so bad it's impossible to describe. Even the GI Joe move, which kicks any sort of believability on the *** 10 minutes into the movie, still has underwater explosions produce boiling clouds of bubbling steam, not just fire burning while surrounded by water. You can't get away with the "invisible bullets" that guns use in air. In water, you NEED bullet trails even if they can shoot as far and hit as hard as they do in air. Electricity, on the other hand, is practically invisible in water, and that's making a massive assumption that you can aim it at all. Fire would need to sizzle and bubble. Explosions would need to appear and sound different.
There are a LOT of things that don't look or act in water as they do in air. Making them act the same with just the tint of water is BAD and would make a really crappy, unappealing zone. If we want an underwater zone, we need a zone that looks, feels and plays underwater, not large cave that's sort of blue-ish and and you can fly inside it. -
The event still seems to be SOL for the low levels, especially Kings Row. There's never anyone there to take part in it, and the monsters are BRUTAL when you're this low level. From where I'm standing, this isn't doable in Kings Row at all.
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A lot of that you can accomplish by just saving your options, chat and windows files, so they auto-load on new characters. Controls, windows, chat tabs and channels, window sizes and scales and general options are all savable.
Granted, temporary powers are not, and taking and assigning them is always a pain, as is the fact that, while the game will remember where you put the quick-monitor window, it won't remember what you put in it. -
Quote:Summoning up a shield as a weapon isn't really an option for a weapon-less set at this point, but I can certainly see giving a few sets left-hand attack animations to emulate shield bashes. That, and wasn't the new Super Strength Knockout Blow perfect with a shield?Originally Posted by Star_Seer
Now that we have alturnate animation options they could just add a few shield bashes in as options for some of the melee sets.
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Quote:The thing is, that gigantic Assassin's Strike critical is sort of the flower in the crown of a Stalker. More than that, though, that much damage outgoing from an AT with as much defence as Scrappers just sounds like too much. Stalkers already skirt the line. A Scrapper with this much damage is just TOO powerful.Originally Posted by Leo_G
So a Scrapper would be able to pull off what a Stalker can. Why is that an issue?
That's actually a problem with all Tanker sets, and why we see so few of them on Scrappers. Tanker sets are built around the expectation that you'll have a low damage mod, so they do these incredibly high levels of damage and have these big AoEs. Given to a Scrapper, these sets would not only overshadow just about all classic Scrapper sets, but actually push the AT as a whole too far up the power curve. Stone Melee, Super Strength and Energy Melee have this problem, and while Battle Axe and War Mace can be kind of said to, as well, their balance is actually lot more common to what a Scrapper typically has. -
Quote:Here's the thing: The hardest two-shot a Martial Arts Scrapper can pull off is Eagle's Claw + Crane Kick. Eagle's Claw has a scale damage of 2.28 and Crane Kick has a scale damage of 1.96. That's a combo altogether of 4.24 scale damage.Originally Posted by AresSupreme
Yeah but iv'e seen scrappers twoshotting with MA now, and 4 shots with BS. Why not give scrapper EM? Can't be that bad.
The hardest two-shot an Energy Melee Scrapper would be able to pull off is Energy Transfer + Total Focus. Energy Transfer is scale damage 4.5 and Total Focus is scale damage 3.56. Together, you have 7.86.
First of all, that's more than a Stalker's Assassin's Strike. A regular Assassin's Strike is 2.5 scale damage for the attack, and another 4.5 scale damage for the Assassination critical, for a total of 7.0. Currently, the only people who can pull off an Energy Transfer + Total Focus are Brutes, Tanks and, yes, Stalkers. Brutes have a damage mod of 0.75 and Tankers have a damage mod of 0.8, so both lag behind Stalkers, who have a damage mod of 1.0. Scrappers have a damage mod of 1.125, so they would do even MORE damage with that combo. Not only that, but JUST Energy Transfer deals more damage than Eagle's Claw and Crane Kick combined, and Total Focus comes close.
I honestly don't know what Castle could do to mitigate that. Certainly I would like to see a Scrapper wielding Energy Melee just for the sheer awesomeness this would produce, but I just know we won't ever see this much concentrated awesome. Energy Melee has too much spike damage and too much reliable hard control. -
Quote:Tankers have a melee damage mod of 0.8 and Brutes have a melee damage mod of 0.75. The 0.65 you're thinking of is the Defender ranged damage mod.Originally Posted by DMystic
Tanks have a .75 damage mod iirc and a metric ton of HP.
Brutes start at .65 damage(i think) and have to use fury to build up to good damage. Their Hp is somewhere between Scrappers and Tanks. -
Quote:See, this I like. I'm not sure I'd like it in terms of playstyle, but I'm pretty sure I'd like the atmosphere and ambience if that's how things go. That sort of thing is what games with underwater elements use to make these elements interesting. Tomb Raider had limited air supply and no weapons aside from the unreliable harpoon. Half-Life had limited air and only handgun and crossbow. Red Faction DID have unlimited air, but then the guy protagonist was in an environment that didn't have breathable air in the first place, so that made sense. These environments were restrictive, yes, but they were COOL because of it.Originally Posted by Forbin_Project
Dungeon and Dragons Online has some believable underwater effects and swimming animations (it ignores the type of armor being worn tho) however powers/spells can't be cast underwater. Living creatures have a counter to measure holding their breathe and a character drowns if it reaches zero. It also distinguishes between character races that breathe and those that don't. If a race doesn't breathe it can stay underwater indefinitely.
See, this I like. A "tempermanent power" (or even an inherent power) like the Ouro portal is a VERY good idea. That way, if I should have the ability to breath underwater as a character trait, I can take that power and pretend I had that ability naturally. If I DON'T have a reason to be able to breathe underwater naturally, then I can take the power and claim I was given a device to do so. I'd leave the power without an effect and let people pick how they look when they swim based on their costume choices. Or, even, give people a brand new costume slot that you automatically switch into when you activate the power. Or give an option to take the power with a bubble helmet. The options are many, but the basic structure is there.Quote:That's why I suggested they should make a new power that players get when they first enter the underwater zone. Do it like they did with the Oro Portal. They can make it an inherent power that can't be slotted, and it's always active. We already have plenty of powers that can't be slotted and others that are constantly on.
But, again, that solves the problem with air. The problem with powers isn't something that we can solve as easily. It probably CAN be solved, but I just don't see the effort I'd envision it requiring ever being justifiable. -
Quote:Or how the people responding to him are getting his information. 666? Temporary powers? The whole thing is, like, 80x60. Did a moderator resize it or something?Originally Posted by KaliMagdalene
Yeah, a very tiny thumbnail. I have no idea what the OP is talking about.
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Quote:I gotta' admit, it would really suck to get a "Game Over!" screen as you're walking about because a dimension-devouring god appeared in Andromeda and the aliens there were unable to stop him. "Game over, man! A god ate your dimension while you weren't looking! Sucks to be you!" Yeah, that wouldn't be a lot of funOriginally Posted by Balanced
See, we're just making assumptions here. Maybe these cosmic-level threats are more common than we realize, and our comics are just the local papers covering local events. Who's to say that Shhhhk'mr'he of Niphrolous IV (for example) haven't defeated half a dozen dimension-devouring demigods? Or that heroes on Kithrak Prime aren't out there responding to calls on the police telepathic amplifier and stopping low-end gangsters from getting their hands on devices that can slice, dice, and julienne the fabric of reality?
Personally, though, that's one reason I like the Shadow Shard. It's another world, weird and wonderful and so very different from our own. I made a whole thread about outworld characters and locations, and I actually have to say - I enjoy these stories a lot. I may be from Earth, but one of my favourite premises ever is watching ridiculously human aliens living on a strange planet battling even more ridiculous bad guys. This just has a sort of unmatched mystique and novelty that placing an alien invasion in the suburbs of New Jersey just can't match.
(Incidentally, that's exactly what the live-action move of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe does) -
Right, so the event needs coordinated attacks across all banners at the same time? Well, there go my efforts to contribute. Let's hope someone is recruiting next time that happens.