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Posts
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Some of the new Atlas Park missions send you to neighborhoods in the distant corners of the zone that I had never been to because nothing ever happened there before. Your contact in that neighborhood remains your contact for the duration of their arc, and then they send you to a contact in another neighborhood; it might be on the other side of the map, but when you get there you can stay there (unless you want to train or something).
Instead of being tedious and frequent, traveling gets to be a fresh experience. You're going somewhere new! As opposed to crossing an area almost in its entirety for the tenth time, to go in a random door. -
I was going to mull over some theories about divergent timelines and temporal mechanics but even though it makes NO sense...Quote:All I can think of now is Mender Silos shouting, "Scaring the little girl!?"
"I have an important temporal event to Mend yesterday morning at 9 o'clock! And I FORBID YOU to fly us into some whistle-stop pocket dimension! You hear me!?"
"Would you please be quiet? You're scaring Flower Knight." -
Quote:Your first contact in the tutorial is Officer Flint, who you have to talk to. The first thing he says to you is:The first thing your hero has ever done (assuming you did the tutorial) is blasted, with fire, fists or nuclear radiation, some defenseless people who have been contaminated by something (you don't know what at that point) and are driven to riot by the contamination.Quote:
We have a crisis going on here, and we need help desperately. Some thugs took an experimental drug thinking it was something else, and now they're trashing the area. We have to regain control to ensure the safety of the citizens. Quote:The Contaminated were once a small-time band of thugs who dabbled in the drug market, mainly to feed their own addictions. Looking for a cheap score, they broke into an abandoned Crey Biotech office building and found a forgotten stash. Instead of a quick and easy fix, what they found was an experimental drug now known on the streets as “Outbreak.” The gang members got the high they were seeking, and Outbreak spread throughout the neighborhood as quickly as its name implied. Quote:These thugs have gotten their hands on a mysterious drug that drives them mad.
Anyways, the Outbreak tutorial is being replaced, so I don't know what the point of justifying it was. -
Quote:I don't think that's exactly fair.Honestly, when the keepers of the lore say "Oh, we don't actually put the right information in the game, we just do whatever's convenient" then I can't see anything to do but throw up your hands and say "Fine. Whatever." and cease worrying about it.
If the owners of the game don't value the backstory or find it to be an obstacle instead of an asset then there's no use in being a player and trying to keep it straight or appreciate it or build your own personal game around it.
Maybe the button mashers are right and we should just stop stressing about it and get back to grinding levels. :-/ Apparently that's where it's really at.
What difference does it make if the Longbow are expecting BAB the Phalanx Member or BAB the Respected Hero? He's Back Alley Brawler. His purpose in the story is to be a hero with a reputation visiting the Isles and getting an Arachnos welcome for his trouble. The purpose of the mission is, "When heroes come here, YOU happen."
I guess I kind of look at mission arcs like episodes, and the best episodes in a series are often also ones that stand on their own - you can show them to someone who knows nothing of the lore, and they'll still enjoy it for its own merits. If you catch glimpses of content in this manner, how do you know if something is a continuity error or if you missed a few episodes that changed something? If a story is good, it explains what's necessary for its own self, so you know what everyone's role is for this story, regardless of what you missed or what the writers forgot.
I'm not a button masher. I just think mood and overall message are more important than details. I say, don't worry about it - but, because a good story is good in spite of inaccuracies. Not because grinding levels is "where it's really at." -
A widow's first costume must be their Arachnos uniform. At level 10 (as opposed to the usual level 20) they can earn their second costume which (like slots 3, 4, and 5) uses normal parts. More details here: link
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Mistake? Sounds like your standard fare when it comes to evil mirror universes. (Then again, what makes it squicky might go over the heads of those who don't know the family tree of the characters they're mirrors of.)
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Preview drivers from AMD for OpenGL 4.2 support: link
I have a newly-built system that's been doing fine with the latest AMD drivers and City of Heroes (except when Alt-Tabbing or trying to Quit to Character Select). I'll give this a try but I rarely have issues to begin with so whether I have problems or not probably won't be reflective of the majority of users [who visit the tech help boards]. -
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FWIW, I just completed the arc through Ouro and did indeed get his mask as a souvenir.
No alternate costume when I fought him. Do I have his shades and just call it a mask? Maybe he wears one of those little domino masks under the big shades? -
In the "Brawling with the Big Boys" arc from Crimson Revenant, the overview/first mission briefing reads:Quote:The Longbow in the base talk about being excited to meet BAB, so he must be the visiting Phalanx member, right? There's no mention of any other signature characters in the arc.
Arachnos has learned that a member of the Freedom Phalanx is visiting Crimson Cove. Naturally, this can't be allowed to happen. Arachnos could give the job to their own Operative Rutger, but they know this one has to succeed. So, wisely, they have come to me. And, knowing your talents, I have come to you. Together, we can take out the Back Alley Brawler.
Then again, the souvenir for the arc is Back Alley Brawler's mask. I see shades. But I don't see a mask as part of his costume... unless the final mission has him in an alternate costume. -
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A revamp of the trial(s) would be nice, if simply changing the spawn timer doesn't have an acceptable effect.
Maybe the tech used for Rikti/Zombie invasions could be adapted? Or the Protest event in Praetoria? As an outsider I don't know if the stuff used there could work in Terra Volta or not, but it can't hurt bringing it up in the off-chance the idea hasn't been explored before. -
Quote:They gave a specific time for it to start. (6PM for me in Chicago, I think.)A show of hands of how many will try and log in tonight? Even though they clearly indicate it starts tomorrow?
But I might as well try. Doesn't take very long to load, I've got the beta client on my SSD. -
I still have an issue: the new Death Mage is too awesome for a mere boss. Must be upgraded to Elite Boss.
I may have to change my signature link, though. And it was such a fun song.Edit: Or I can just add a link to this thread!
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Sure, a store can call their lists whatever they want, but I'm used to "wishlist" meaning something you can share with others so they can buy the items on it for you, and "watchlist" meaning your own personal list of items to watch in case of sale. (On that note, do you receive a notification if a wishlist item is on sale? If not, this wishlist is getting less and less useful.)
I want to spend my money here, Paragon. Please find a way to make that happen. -
Having zone access behind a paywall would trouble me. If it's a worthwhile zone to play in then those who pay for it will be there - instead of being in a zone that new/free players are in. So instead of the paying customers showing off the benefits of paying for stuff in front of others (being free advertisement) they're hidden away. (Alternatively, the new zone will be empty despite being well-designed because there's so much more activity elsewhere, creating a perception that no one plays in the new zone which starts a vicious cycle.)
I mean, my two most-played characters are a vigilante and a rogue, just so I can go join any team at a moment's notice. Bring players together, don't separate them! -
Quote:Not everything will be accountwide. The market overview page explicitly mentions that dual/team inspirations are character-specific. The enhancement tray expansions and purchased costume slots are account-wide.Forgive me if this has been asked before, but will all the purchases be account wide rather than character specific?
For example if I buy the rocket board or ninja run is it going to be available to every toon on my account?
Powers like ninja run are currently account-wide and so I expect they'd continue to work that way. The teaser image of the store has a costume item on it, and the description mentions it unlocks for all characters. The dual inspiration in the picture, however, doesn't mention whether or not it's for one character (we know from the detailed overview that's how it'll be, though). When in doubt, it'd be better to assume it's character-specific and ask before buying. Hopefully some kind of legend will be available to quickly, visually tell account-wide and character-specific items apart. -
We've seen no indication that it's marketing/legal that has the issue; Zwill said "Customer Service nightmares", with Customer Service capitalized like the department that handles missing account items. When certificates/vouchers went live, global services had to be taken down for emergency maintenance later that day, so I'd be more inclined to believe they want to get the core of Freedom up first before worrying about additional parts. (I've been accused of being an optimist, though.)
But we've just got that one line on the issue, so we don't know one way or the other. I'm all for trying to get them to discuss it a bit more. Then we can target our expositions on the real issues against it. -
Quote:Got information on that? I've seen another post from a red_name that said that buying for others would potentially be a public relations/custoemr relations nightmare.Quote:We're not planning on "gifting" functionality at launch. There's about a million Customer Service related nightmares with this functionality, and while we definitely recognize it as an oft requested feature, it will not be available.
It's a shame though - I'd love to run at least one costume contest where the prize is a store gift. I'm too impatient to marketeer or grind alignment merits to award PvP IOs, but spending $10 to reward a fellow player's creativity is more appealing to me (and heck: cheaper) than buying someone a drink.
Doctor_Gemini already addressed that Zwill was responding to two topics, and topic #2 was more character slots which Positron apparently liked. -
Quote:It adds an element of planning to your incarnate build. When you choose a component you have that component, which can only be used in certain recipes. You can't just build up a reserve of Incarnate Components and then spend your way through a random tree. You have to know which abilities you want, which determines which components you choose. This becomes more pressing when it comes to rare and very rare components: they're either created from a large reserve of Empyrean Merits, or are a rare reward. Your selection becomes a commitment with consequences.In fact, Incarnate Components don't even make sense to me from either a flavor standpoint or a mechanics standpoint.
Whether or not build-planning and inventory-preparation is something one finds fun varies from person to person, though. It's kind of old-school. (Anyone remember when the grand-daddy of RPGs required specific components for each and every spell?)
Quote:E Merits could have just been distilled down into large number of A Merits. For that matter, why do we even need A Merits? It all converts down to x Threads anyway.
Admittedly, Astral Merits do seem more superfluous. Everything in the Astral store could be bought with threads (Astral price multiplied by 4). Alternatively, every thread-based component could be bought with Astral Merits (thread price divided by 4 - and they're all priced at multiples of 4 already!) However, with no way to turn threads into Astrals, threads are only good for the crafting aspect of the Incarnate system and on their own are awarded randomly. Astrals are awarded consistently for specific actions during a trial and have a store. Perhaps the next set of slots will have a new basic component (let's just call them Incarnate Sparks to have something to visualize) but the trials awarding sparks will still award Astral and Empyrean Merits, too. In that case, Astrals would be more than just the bundles of threads they are now. Playing the old trials would slowly earn a still-useful currency; maybe you want to play something else for a change of pace, or help out a group that's still working on the first 5 slots. Being able to earn Astral Merits would enable players to play old content without feeling like they're not earning anything useful. Hopefully that's the reason for doing it that way! Otherwise there's not much reason to have both threads and Astrals. -
Deprecating Hero/Villain Merits and adjusting the costs of Reward Merit items doesn't take into account the loss of alignment-specific currency for changing alignments. It also means the rogue/vigilante alignments can build currency and then change to hero/villain to spend it 1:1 on items in the alignment-specific store, which I don't think is how the system is intended to be used.
Architect Tickets are part of a practically self-contained world, so I don't see that contributing to currency proliferation. It'd probably upset people more if AE granted general-use currency other than Inf/XP. Some people would be happy if AE didn't have any rewards, but not every AE arc is a farm. Players would be less likely to try stuff in AE if there weren't any rewards for doing them. I'm also pretty sure AE tickets can only buy recipe rolls, not specific recipes (which Reward Merits can buy).
Hero/Villain Merits aren't an issue until level 20. Also, free players won't have access to the tip system. Premium players would need to buy Going Rogue.
Vanguard Merits aren't an issue until level 35.
Shards, Threads, and Incarnate Merits aren't an issue until level 50. Also, only VIPs can make use of Incarnate content. There's been no indication that you can buy Incarnate access as a Premium player.
Since the currencies are introduced gradually as you play, I doubt it would be overwhelming. Also, the new tutorial is supposed to include a section on using the new store, taking care of the Paragon Points thing; and there's a Tier 1 for Paragon Rewards that even a new account will have, so I imagine using a Reward Token will also be part of the tutorial. -
It's interesting that a 9800 GTX had trouble with it. I had a 9400 GT that also had the issue, but I've since upgraded to a different card and the warehouse is neither absurdly bright nor laggy anymore. I wonder if there's something GeForce 9-series cards lack, that the 400 series and Radeon HD 5000 series have and allows them to handle the tile properly? (I upgraded to a Radeon HD 5750. I'm not sure if the 4000 or 3000 series have this problem or not.)
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Quote:I would have thought Arbiters would be more clever, like bringing their grandparents to the present and "sending" them to "brilliant" doctor via the medical transporter?That's probably one of those things that would cause the Arbiters to go back in time and kill your grandparents.
"Gramps, I thought I killed you! Why do you look so young? Did I always have tentacles..?" -
Quote:That's because of: [link]The teleportation isn't even the most amazing thing about it! The really amazing thing about Paragon City's medical system is that the average hospital stay for a near-fatal injury is ca. 11 seconds.Quote:
Once they get there, they find themselves rejuvenated by hospital beds that repair damage at a cellular level using a system inspired by the Rikti transmogrification vats.