artic1337

Thanks, Bayani . . . and "Awesome to (2)!!!"

*gets back to work*

Any chance of getting the Shapes of (non booster*) capes put in a seperate drop down menu from Patterns?

Currently (as we all know), some cape Patterns are simply a different Shape than the standard cape (the feathered one, the torn and split ones, etc), while others are a Shape and Pattern (the radioactive one, for instance, has the Rad symbol and a rounded bottom, the Tribal has the pattern on the bottom and the nice flowing cut along the edge as well).

Would be nice to pick standard patterns like Stars or Checker on a non-standard cape. Like having a Stars 2 pattern on a round cut bottom cape . . .

I know not all patterns would be compatible with all shapes, but the costume creator is already built to not offer incompatible combos and some should be easy to offer right off the bat with others that need some tweaking added over time.

So, for instance, you'd have . . .

Capes --> Shape --> [Square Cut / Round Cut / Tribal Cut / Split Cut / Star Cut / etc] . . .

and then, depending on which Shape you chose, you'd have the various compatible patterns on a seperate drop down menu.



* I don't own any of the Boosters so I don't know anything about those capes.

Just started using DeviantArt a couple weeks ago (love the site!), tried some search-fu in their FAQ but wasn't successful. So, I'd figured I'd ask here; the best board on the forums and most likely home of DA gurus . . .

(1) Categories. How important is setting your category on uploaded images? I been putting my ActionBios (see sig) in "Fan Art > Cartoons/Comics > Digital > Games". Does that sound right? Should I even be concerned about real artists not liking my ActionBios in there?

(2) Upload Limit. Is there a limit to how much data a freebie account can upload to the DA servers?

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Nice guide, but line breaks are your friends.

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line breaks waste time periods and commas too

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This = not right


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It's a great example of Vahz aggression.

It's not a good example of any other kind.

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My point was that it's not even a good example of that since I can supply endless screenshots of that not happening. This may very well have been a "one-off" bug that was saved precisely because it was so unusual, but is now being trotted out as universal proof that mobs are insufficiently aggressive.

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here's 2 more "one-off"'s

one-off one

one-off two

I have 22 more one-offs if you'd like me to post those, too . . .

Right on! Thanks.

well, foo . . .

grats winners!

yeah they did

btw, what's "Amerika Korps"?

Not your typical "star spangled spandex wearing flag waver", the Military / Merc is the down and dirty grunt.

Junkyard says, "Yeah, patriotism is good for getting some paid holidays now and then, but today, I got a job to do, bub."

Let's see 'em!

Yeah, I thought this theme might be a stumper. I haven't really come up with anything, either.

Should I just start (yet) another Patriot/National thread?

(Wait, I got an idea . . . keep an eye out for a new THREAD by me)

ZERO influence/infamy awards for AE mobs.

Just got done burning a mix CD of old school metal songs.

Let's see your Heavy Metal / Rocker toons! Don't have any, myself, maybe ya'all can inspire me.

Those are amazing, I especially like Part 4.

What's the "C:/Program Files/City of Heroes/doublefusion" folder all about?

I'll second that "squee".

Awesome piece.

Don't know if Vista does anything funky, but in XP screencaps are saved to to "/screenshots" folder in your "/City of Heroes" folder . . . "C:/Program Files/City of Heroes/screenshots" by default.

I assume you're not taking character screen caps since you're asking about moving the camera (character screen caps get saved to your clipboard in XP so you have to alt-tab out to paste it into a graphics program).

You can remap it in Options --> Keymappings --> [VIEW] Rotate Camera

Hi Bayani (long time fan of your character by the way). I ran your Arc solo with a 47 Tanker on Unyielding.

Act 1

(1) mobs.
Like: Nice looking and interesting/varied powers. I really like the gi's and the eskrima bats. Powers wise, felt like fighting the Tsoo w/out the annoying healers and phasers. Good mix-up on the spawns, too. I like how each spawn had the same 2 types of guys with a 3rd wildcard, so I was both prepared on what to expect while still being wary of what kind of mob that 3rd guy is.

Dislike: Slows. Slows annoy me, I don't enjoy them at all. The quicksands, mostly. Fighting a boss with slows is ok, but having to crawl out of a slow patch every spawn is a pain.

(2) Objectives.
Like: The Weapon Schematic was well placed, felt like it was guarded by the 1st boss. The ambush after finding it was good, too. Maybe move the Weapon Schematic glowy over towards the area the boss was at so you don't have to fight the ambush on the small walkway.

Dislike: I would reduce the the number of crates to 1 (I'm in this for the action, not hunt the glowie). Place it strategically like the Weapon Schematic to lead the player to a key map location.

Not Sure: The mission window said to "Not let Kapitan sound the alarm". My fight with him was just that, a straight up fight . . . didn't notice anything happening with him trying to sound an alarm.

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Act 2

(1) Mobs.
Like: I love Arachnos mobs. Good choice.

Not Sure: Strength of patrols/ambushes (especially the wave of back-ups the final boss calls). I ran this solo with a 47 tanker and I had to use all my powers and a lot of inspirations (was really fun!). Don't know how well a more squishy AT could handle it solo. Maybe make the hostage a fighter/helper (is that possible in AE?).

(2) Objectives.
Like: The trapped graphics on the hostage are very cool.

Dislike: The final objective(s) was confusing. After freeing the hostage I led her to the exit thinking the "Defeat Chapman to escape" would be an ambush on the way there. Had to back track 2 floors to finish the mission. Maybe I missed some mission text or something, but the small mission objective window made me think it would be a "stop the escort from reaching the exit" encounter.

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Act 3

Short and sweet. Good wrap up to a fun arc.


This was the 1st AE mission I've run. I didn't really know where to leave mission comments in game, sorry. I did get a Star Rating screen, though. Gave ya 4 stars. I had to dock you 1 star for the slows (did I mention I hate slows?).

*woops, moved my review to other thread*

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A Rikti flower

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I don't even . . .

Are we playing the same game?

For the longest time I never did any "arts" with my characters because, frankly, all the screenshots I took were crap (I can't draw). But recently I've got stung by some passing muse or something and starting cranking out these things I call ActionBios and a big part of my producing them has been a purposeful attempt at taking better screenshots.

Here's some of the techniques I've come up with . . .

(1) Location. Unless you have a location in mind for a specific effect, find a nice wall. My best screeenshots are taken in front of flat, non busy, walls that my toon stands out from. Background skylines, traffic, mobs and players, and other hubbaballoo can really detract from a screenshot unless you've purposefully chosen it as part of the overall effect. Also, there's no need to spend an hour finding a good location. Log in, take a look around and use the first thing that draws your attention . . . there's a lot of really good looking spots in the game. Example

(2) High Speed Screencapping. This was my breakthrough "aha" moment. Put your finger over the Print Screen key, activate a power, and spam that Print Screen key for all it's worth. You're pretty much guaranteed to capture your character's animation and particle effects in a screenshot that wows your socks off. I never realized just how beautiful and comic booky the game's particle effects were until I started doing this (screw that other game's hype about comic booky graphics).

Check this Action Bio out to see what I mean. I did no post screenshot processing (other than cropping and resizing image). It looks like a panel strip straight out of a glossy page graphic novel if you ask me.

Note on powers: Some powers are just downright awesome for High Speed Screencapping. Personal buffs (Build Ups) and heals, for example. Also, for melee toons, the PBAoE attacks are nice. Especially since you can activate them without having a mob mucking up your shot. The 4 panels on the right in this Action Bio were made by High Speed Screencapping the PBAoE attack in Dual Blades. Awesome poses.

(3) Camera Angle. Now that you have a location picked out and have mastered High Speed Capping (which takes all of 2 seconds to master) you need to be aware of camera angle. Don't spam out 100 screencaps all from the same camera angle! Move that puppy around. Drag it down to ground level for those intimidating shots, swing it around to at least 2 different postions to keep your screencaps unique from each other . . . use the force, Luke.

Personally, I find that camera angles focused on my toon activating powers are a lot more interesting than screencaps focusing on affecting mobs with powers. Ranged attacks usually go from very little particle effects to blinding overkill on mobs very quickly. But for getting good action shots of melee toons you've got to get in close and personal. I've found placing the camera over the shoulder behind the toon to be a pretty reliable technique. Melee Example

(4) Bloom. I'm a big fan of Bloom and Depth of Field effects, but I know many people aren't. Not realy crucial to good screenshots. Most of the time it's very subtle and not very noticable, but when it is it's really nice. For example, the effect on this toon's hair in the lower left panel of this Action Bio is very subtle yet really nice.

(5) Break your Rules. Once you begin to rely on techniques you've developed, be sure to break them every once in awhile. Most of the time this will just result in crap, but every once in awhile you'll get an "aha" moment.


Not being able to draw my characters has always bummed me out, but making these bio pages out of in-game screenshots has finally let me add a personal touch to 'em and bring 'em to life. If anyone else wants to add some tips to this thread I'd love to hear 'em.

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EDIT: due to the fact that these remarks are being taken out of context in another thread, they're removed.

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this thread rools

Ouch.

Back to FanArt for me.

Thanks for the info, Umbral. But, I'd still find it interesting if the devs could data mine how many Broad Sword / Katana builds have Slash / GC . . . I'd be surprised if it was over 1%.

Herf Parry says, "Diving Avalanche . . . woah"