TheLyle

Thanks, Posi, for sharing this information with us.

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Now the biggest pain in the butt Task Forces are most resoundedly the Shadow Shard ones. I talked with Manticore this morning about this and he agreed to rework these into shorter, more engaging, Task Forces in an upcoming issue (possibly 7 or 8, maybe sooner though). The badges for these "new" Task Forces will be the same as the old ones, so characters that get the Shadow Shard TF badges between now and when the new SSTFs come out won't have to re-do them again.

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I think this will be greatly appreciated. I look forward to hearing about the new Shard TFs.

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As long as I am a paying customer, I will always have the right to ask questions. Its called customer service. Every business has it, whether its some type of service, providing goods, or even a computer game. We are their customers, they listen to us. To say that the customer is not always right is ridiculous. Yeah, its an over-used cliche. But unfortunately, its reality. If you don't bend for your customers, someone else will. It's proven time and time again. For example, the company I work for just lost an account. We lost this account because they were not happy with quality. The customer complained and we tried to fix the problem. No solution was good enough for them, so they went to another company that had a solution for their problem. So spare me with the "There is no the customer is always right" bull.

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Again, I repeat the motto at my old company... "The customer is not always right, but the customer is always the customer."

IMO, Posi has taken a good step by explaining the hurdles in trying to datamine for these badges. That kind of open dialogue goes far into re-establishing trust with a cynical portion of the customer base.

Part of the problem, from how I'm hearing those upset (and I do think the yelling is getting a bit loud and melodramatic), is residual resentment over the end of souvenirs and how that was handled. The change in procedure was made without communication to us (invoking the same stealth-nerf reactions) and the rationale for the change (that the souvenirs were only being awarded to TF leaders and team mates had to petition to get it) came off as disingenuous in contrast to player's in-game experiences and (IIRC) not given further explanation or an apology. (I know there are plenty of posters who wouldn't be satisfied by an apology for the misstatement, but I think it would go far to placating more players who will go silent on the issue.)

I think some of this furor carries over bad feelings from how the souvenirs ended. The reward was taken away without a plan to deal with customers who may be frustrated with the change. A pre-emptive message regretfully outlining why the change was necessary would have gotten some outrage, but would have generated less cynicsm in the long run than waiting until someone was dissatisfied to deal with the change. I think that addressing that would help people deal with this a bit.

However, I think the biggest problem is that a lot of players (evidently) don't consider two of the four Shadow Shard Task Forces worthwhile content on their own, that they're only worthwhile if they can get a souvenir or badge for it. I hope this gets consideration because revamped TFs feel like new content, as much as new TFs.

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The only area where this does not exist is when a company corners the market in an area, and NCSoft/Cryptic is not the only game in town.

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I'm sure that's the cue for posters will tell you that NCsoft runs a far better MMO than SOE or EA....

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I'll pop in here so you guys have a new target.

The original Task Force Datamine took 3 months to finish. That was to go over 2 months worth of data.

We now have 18 months worth of data. We looked for a more effecient solution, but our estimates still come out at 2 years to datamine and get you your badges.

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That certainly makes sense. Perhaps a compromise can be found? It seems to me a good part of the frustration is that some people want to recieve some sort of keepsake reward for a Task Force. Souvenirs were an acceptable reward, but that was taken away without communication.

Instead of datamining the past two years, would it be feasable to datamine just to the point where Task Force souvenirs were taken away, so that you got either a souvenir or badge?

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But then the items wouldn't be exclusive and the stores wouldn't feel special anymore.

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I think Ryko wants it to be possible to buy four copies of the game and apply the four serial numbers to one account, like we could do with the CoH DVD.

Got to try the fire event a couple times... overall, I'd agree that this would be more fun with less recharge time and less effectiveness. If it's the only power that helps against the fire, you end up standing around watching that button slowly grow back, which quickly turns dull.

1) I'm curious about Axis America and The Council Empire... first off, why did Portal stop sending heroes to Axis America and to the Council Empire? Does that world still exist? Do we still dread the day Reichsman escapes?

2) Are there any plans to adress some of the aspects of CoH's story that have recieved complaints? Two examples that spring to mind are "The Rule of Three -- which some players feel is not a significant enough storyline to be a Task Force -- and various villain groups (the Tsoo, the Family) that lack closure?

3) If CoV players will be able to fight Minx, will we see cross-overs between the two games with CoV contacts showing up in Paragon City?

4) IMO, there's just not enough Carnies in the game, any chance they may get a hazard zone of their own?

5) Any chance of more multi-dimensional content, hopefully giving some depth to the discovered worlds?

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The stealth changes perhaps make the least sense of any of the I5 changes we have seen so far.

It doesn't make any practical sense that Stealth, Cloaking Device, or whatever should shut off simply because you attack. Thematically this change makes no sense at all.

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Well, I think cutting the defense makes sense from an RP standpoint with Stealth powers, since I think of them either as a skill at moving to not be noticed or like Gypsy's camoflouge power. Once you're seen you still have an advantage, but you can still use the ability to your advantage.

OTOH, powers like steamy mist and smoke grenade I would expect to hold more of the bonus, since it doesn't go away. However, a good foe would know how to adjust for the reduced visibility, though I'd expect smoke grenade to do worse than steaming mist for being more opaque. OTOH, I'm always surprised that smoke grenade doesn't aggro mobs since it looks like something you would notice in the game.

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I did say one other thing - that dropped Enhancements are useful only for what you can sell them for - because everyone purchases their Enhancements at the store (or at least most of them).

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The big problem with dropped enhancements is that there are so many types of enhancements (first filter for TO/DO/SO, then filter for origin, then filter for something applicable to your powers, then filter for the right levels) that the chances of a drop are pretty low.

However, the advantage of them is that they come in levels that aren't multiples of 5.

A huge isse with enhancements for me is that ever since I2 (and this has been re-enforced a couple times) I worry about the game's difficulty being designed for players who get SOs at 22 and, therefore, to be able to stay in the game I have to be able to get SOs at 22... so none of my alts use TOs at all, hoarding that influence for level 22.

With contacts, part of the problem is the interface. The window doesn't scroll smoothly and DOs and SOs take an effort to figure out what's good for what... I might as well find someone who I can just expect to have it all instead of spending all that time scrolling and right-clicking just to figure out if that contact has what I need.

Perhaps one way to make contacts more relevant would be to have them sell midpoint enhancements? So a 25-30 contact would sell 25, 27 and 30 enhancements... or maybe just 22 and 27? OTOH, what would be really neat (but probably a coding nightmare) would be if contacts could re-sell enhancements... so if I sell Althea a level 22 magic damage DO because I'm natural, if another person asked what she was selling, that DO would be among the options... though such a feature would require a better store interface.

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About hasten however....I see the point of having it. I generally suffer til around level 30 without it (since it's a pain without having it 6 slotted with SOs....at lower lvls, I never know WHEN I should click it. So I avoid the power til late when I have slots to slot it with SOs.)

I shall use the example of my Electric Blaster buddy here. He said, when he was without hasten...he would open up with "Zapp" his snipe....then he'd use his lvl 1 "fast recharge, low damage" power....then his lvl 2 "medium damage, slower recharge".....and then he'd be out of ranged attacks being an Electric Blaster. He wouldn't use Zapp in battle, too long animation that can be interrupted....and it was lvl 1 blast....lvl 2 blast.....*wait for a few seconds til lvl 1 blast recharges*

He said, he began using "Ball of Lightning" EVEN if there was only one mob left...Stamina WASN'T the issue, it was the fact he was STANDING THERE without anything recharged. Hasten now brings his powers back fast....including unique and powerful blasts/buffs....like Thunderous Blast. Who doesn't want a super blast to recharge as fast as possible ?

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Thank you. That's why I find Hasten necessary for certain powerset combs. My controller was in his mid-20s before respec'ing hasten in and before that I'd alt-tab in the middle of battles because after a certain point, only Spectral Wounds was appropriate to use in battle and there was such a long wait in between.... hell, I alt-tabed through solo battles.

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A couple of other points from Statesman's Lecture/Q&A at Origins...

1) Concerning the ability to change the color of the effects of your powers, Jack immediatly had this one word answer "Soon". Said farily emphatically.

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Cooooool.

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3) I liked his comment concerning Ghost Falcon: I would replace him with a chalk outline. It isn't that Jack doesn't like stores, he just doesn't like the fact everyone can get the same things at them. If he had to do it all over agin, he would have left all enhancements available thru contacts only, with only certain ones being available thru certain contacts. And not just one kind of origin type, but I got the impression maybe only certain types (like maybe enhanced damage, but no enhanced accuracy).

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Aaaarrrgh, so in order to get enhancements we'll need to keep a chart handy and figure out what contacts are good for what before we agree to talk to them? Ack, my head hurts just thinking about this... I really don't want to need yet another stack of paper to help me play this game.

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Stamina- So in other words, he's gonna leave the base system BROKEN and force some AT Builds to give up 3 power selections for Stamina just to be able to WORK? I guess not even CRITICAL issues get the attentions they needed let alone Quality of Life issues...

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Ahem...

YOU DO NOT NEED STAMINA. The "requirement" of Stamina is simply in your head. The Necessity of Stamina has been greatly exagerated.

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Depends on your powersets, IMO. My MA/SR scrapper can't make it through a battle the tougher mobs (playing a solo mission on heroic) without running out of END while running only one toggle at a time... even with two End Reduction DOs in the toggles.

I hate teaming with him because he's always out of END in battles and I end up trying to find ways not to be obviously hiding away from battles because I don't want to be asking for an END break after every battle.

Something is wrong there, IMO.

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I'm sure there's a middleground between "breezing through missions on Invincible" and "how come my blood is all outside of me?"!


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When has this dev team ever found a middle ground with anything? Status Effects? No. -Regen? No. Boss upgrades? No. Endurance Useage? No. Kryptonite type Enemies? No. PvP? No.

Just saying.....

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Agreed, I think some of the frustration with "nerfs" and other changes is that they're rarely small changes... for example, boss changes in I2 increased boss' power AND hit points (while also rolling out the difficulty slider) -- and when they got rolled back the power was rolled back AND taken out of heroic missions. As a tendency, changes to the game tend to be frustrating because it feels like a negotiation where the seller opens with an extreme high offer in order to get us to end up at a high end price.

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I dunno. The stores gives a sense of a city. That business if being transacted there. Removing the stores... well, I supose you could put some NPC contacts there, just like the ones in Bricks and Founders, but people already have a heck of a time finding those guys... why confuse them in the 20s?

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Agreed, considering that I've had to go to the boards and a fansite to figure out how to get my SOs, I'm afraid this will go farther to widen the gap between the min/max-ers and the more casual players.

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Although it would be nice if my own culture, beyond ninjas and anime, was well represented, creating a zone based on Momotaro seems impractical, at best. If they had made a zone with shaggy monsters, and called them Japanese shaggy monsters, heck, that would have been cool with me.


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Hey, you already got the tentacle monster and the matching schoolgirl outfits.
Even if it was not called a japanese tentacle monster.
A Kitsune showing up in some missions would be way cool though. Especially if you could not know if it was going to help or annoy you

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I think the tentacle monster and the schoolgirl outfits would qualify as 'anime stereotypes' instead of the cultural referencesthe poster would like to see.

A Kitsune would be very cool, tho. It'd be cool to see the undeveloped wildlands next to Croatoa turn out to be filled with Shinto-style nature spirits... it'd be Princess Mononoke in Paragon City. (Or maybe a "Save the hostage Totoros!" mission?)

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Heck, as someone of Japanese descent, I'm happy when Japanese people even get to portray Japanese people at all, much less get any cultural elements correct. Japanese people were so happy to see a Japanese person playing a Japanese person in Star Trek, we didn't even care he had a name no Japanese speaking person can pronounce.

Of course, one of us did crash the Joy Luck Club, but the sad part is I doubt all that many people noticed.

Although it would be nice if my own culture, beyond ninjas and anime, was well represented, creating a zone based on Momotaro seems impractical, at best. If they had made a zone with shaggy monsters, and called them Japanese shaggy monsters, heck, that would have been cool with me.

They probably would have been shaggy ninja monters, though.

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I hear you, though I sometimes wonder if the problem is that there isn't much interest in Japan? (Aside from the Momotaro candy I found once.) Do they take stuff like Momotaro for granted? I've wondered why there's never been any manga stories translated into english that played upon some of those great folk tales. Is that a judgement made by the American publishers or is there disinterest in Japan?

Sigh either way, 'cause Momotaro's pretty cool. I'd love to see something inspired by those great folk tales in the game... heck, I'd like to see anyone not named Miyazaki get that inspiration.

Great guide... it has had me dreaming of the day when I could attempt it.

However, with the current decoy bug, do you think I could still manage to battle Terra, my first AV?

I love this game!

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Celebrant WILL BE a veteran badge in a year or two. Just be patient.

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And we do have a few veteran badges from the Halloween event and Winter Lords... something I realized when I did the respec TF and a teammate noted that my character was the oldest for having the Halloween bages that the others didn't have.

'course that requires these events to not be repeated with the same badges.

Too bad there's no badge for the Calvin Scott TF. That'd be a very cool badge to have once I4 hits.

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You are talking about two different generations of Teen Titans. Cyborg, Raven and Changeling were part of the "New Teen Titans" that George Perez penciled. By then Aqualad and Speedy had moved on, but had not yet become Tempest and Arsenal (current names).

BTW, Starfire's sister was Blackfire (Komand'r). Oh, and Raven's demon father was Trigon.

Oh, and to a previous post - Wonder Girl was most certainly a sidekick. I know she was WW's sister, but she was still her sidekick.

Man, am I a geek...

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Well, technically, Wonder Girl as a sidekick was a continuity error... the original Wonder Girl wasn't Wonder Woman's sidekick but Wonder Woman's adventures as a girl but someone got mixed up and thought she was a separate character and thus she teamed up with the Titans.

...or at least, so John Byrne claimed in justifying all the muck he did to the character.

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FYI - I'm a HUGE kaiju fan (giant monsters).

I collect all the figs, the theatrical posters, etc.

I've got Godzillas from the past two movies all around my office. And a Godzilla: Final Wars mousepad (theatre only).

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Then pleeeeeeeaaaaaaase let this mean that giant monster and robot fights/playable characters are at least an idea on a stickynote somewhere down the line... >.>

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We need an event where the heroes of Paragon City learn the consequences of failing to defeat Archon Bruckholder.

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The killer mimes gotta be true...

I mean... c'mon... who doesn't wanna be a Killer Mime?!

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Actually, I have on good authority that it's a half-truth.

CoV will actually have Killer Memes. They ask you gimmicky questions nonstop until you run out of breath.

Which of the following 450 books have you read, started reading or thought about reading?

Put your iPod on shuffle, what's the first five songs?

I'm happy to be happy, are you? Or are you sappy?

Please name 100 things you love about comics.

Oh, man, I've got to prioritize the characters I've got to get to level 20 asap...

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Clearly the most important news is that there will be "coats with tails".

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Hey, I am positively giddy about the coat with tails. My spy guy will be able to get the level 20 costume he's been dreaming of.

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I don't purposefully present myself confrontationally.

People disagree with me and somehow take it personally when I debate their viewpoints with my own.

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From the original post:
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And almost everyone that responds in support of the idea has an avatar from an anime series.

"Oh just have some faith, you might like it." "Oh you just haven't seen good anime."

Blah blah blah. I mean really, I've been hearing this style of argument since I was like....4 and I didn't like asparagus and my grandmother assured me that I'd like it if I just tried it.

So I guess what I'm saying here is its great that some people are getting what they want. But the whole "Just try it, you'll like it" argument isn't very fair. Its 25 years later and I still don't like asparagus yanno.

Its not very considerate to tell people that they're "lucky to be getting anything at all." when your greatest wish has been granted.

Its sort of like gloating. Really.

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Then your response to someone with an anime avatar:

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You don't care that someone else might be dissapointed because you are not. I on the other hand, are more considerate of people around me, so I do care that some people might be dissapointed.

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Do you realize that you start out by accusing those who disagree with you of being selfish, self-centered and callous?

Starting at the point that you do, do you see why some people may have taken your post personally?

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I figured the dangerous ground was when you copied the powers of one single hero or villian.

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The Teen Titans fought some magnetism-using baddie (Polaris?) so DC has one, too. For Gravity, I can only think of two Marvel villains, some dude the X-Men fought early on and that Brotherhood mutant who died of a heart attack when they teamed with X-Men to fight that super-Sentinel. Assault Rifle? Only the Punisher comes to mind. Etc.

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And Wally West has a crazy ex-girlfrend with magnetic powers, who goes by the code name of Magenta... dunno if she's still around, but last time I read a Flash comic she was causing all storts of trouble behind the scenes.