je_saist

Honestly, punctuation would help me understand what you wrote.

Let me see if I got this straight:

Yes. You have an Intel Integrated Graphics chip.

The City of Heroes game has not crashed for... some amount of time.

The game played fine last night.

***

Okay. In today's patch, the 5/4/2010 patch, a potential fix for forced low shader quality on Intel graphics cards was pushed to the Live Servers.

Apparently the developers had not gotten enough feedback from Intel Integrated graphics users on the Test Server, and the patch to re-kuldge the game to allow Intel Integrated graphics to handle higher shader modes really did re-kludge the game engine.

So, what we need you to do, is go here: http://help.ncsoft.com/cgi-bin/ncsof...p?p_faqid=4654

File a ticket and give them your hardware information. If you aren't sure about your exact hardware specifications, read this thread: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=219502

The x1600 series cards was released across 2005-2006 and was ATi's last OpenGL 2.0 card before they moved to OpenGL 3.0.

To put this in perspective, the $70 RadeonHD 5570 graphics card actually has more shader power than the most powerful x1x00 series card, the x1950 XTX. The $40 RadeondHD 5450 actually has more shader and texture power than most of the x1600 line up, and more shader power than the best x1600, the x1650 XT.

So, in today's games, your graphics card would probably be outrun by something actually cheaper than a modern PC game.

Well, honestly, no. You don't need a new graphics card. There actually is a bug right now with some animations and effects causing a dramatic slowdown in input reaction. There's also been other reported problems with input delays from third party programs. So if you can be patient, some of the issues might work themselves out...

or not.

ATi/AMD retired the x1x000 and previous OpenGL 2.0 cards a little over a year ago. While they put out a quarterly driver update... it's pretty much just the 9-3-1 driver re-wrapped with no real improvements / modifications. So if there's a driver issue at hand, it probably won't be addressed by AMD/ATi.


I'm not sure I could tell you that it's a problem with your graphics card alone.

What I would do is start City of Heroes up in safe mode. When clicking on I agree from the second launcher window, there's a little box that says Safe Mode. Put City of Heroes in Safe mode, and see if the problem continues.

just guessing, Intel integrated graphics chip?

making sure you could actually get into the account.

Thing is, when you get that particular error message, either the login server is down, a port being blocked, or the account is disabled. So, basic troubleshooting. While some particular in-game servers are crashing, the login server itself still seems to be accessible on a general basis. So we can be pretty sure it's not the login server. If you can access the account via plaync.com, we can be pretty sure that your account access is not blocked.

So, the last step is take a look back at your firewall and system configuration, since we can be pretty sure the problem isn't on the server side.

What... firewall are you using? Some software firewalls, like Norton and McAfee's software firewalls... don't actually disable the firewall even though they tell you they are disabled. Some software firewalls will also lock down ports that were used by a particular program if that program was determined to be a virus or malicious piece of software. I am aware that some of the past couple of patches were flagged as malicious software, so that could be an issue. You might also need to check for other potential firewall conflicts, such as Microsoft Windows Firewall being activated when / if you turned a 3rd party firewall off.

Off the top of my head, this really is sounding like a Norton or McAfee issue, but I've also seen this kind of problem with Kaspersky.

this is going to sound like a stupid question, but can you even get to www.plaync.com and login to your account there?

No. They do not get them all at once.

Why not?

Well, if you want the technical reason, it's roughly a twofold aspect:
A: because the engine isn't built like that
B: because the design of the game isn't like that

From the first aspect the developers do have an amazing line-up of tools available to them. They can attach multiple events to each other inside of the game. Ergo, adding in a vet reward is as simple as linking the amount of time since the account was activated against a reward unlock.

Applying multiple unlocks based on multiple un-played amounts of times would require a non-insignificant amount of new code. As players can purchase game-play times in increments of 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, 12 months, and 14 months through the store, as well as augment the time with booster packs or NCSoft time cards, there's a large variety of ways that the developers could track time paid for. Accounting for all of those methods would require a seriously bloated database and tracking system.

***

From the second aspect, the design of the game is to reward players for... playing the game. The developers don't really have any control over whether or not somebody who pays for 6 months... plays for 6 months.

As such, the Veteran rewards are one of the only fair rewards in the game. You get them as you reach the amount of time with your account active. It's equal for everybody, and nobody can abuse the system.

***

Now, while there are some things the developers have said they will never do, such as AT respecs or Power-set respecs, I'm not aware of any flat statements that the Veteran reward system will not be revisited.

The suspicion is that the Veteran system won't be revisited in this game because of the number of players that already have high veteran status, and the sheer amount of coding work that would be required to make any changes to the earning system. We don't have any straight proof of this, but nor do we have any indication that a revamp of the Veteran Rewards is on the table for consideration.

My personal opinion is that when Going Rogue ships, some of the development team will be tasked towards designing a true sequel to City of Heroes, the already registered for legal reasons, City of Heroes 2. I personally suspect that a sequel title would implement veteran rewards in such a way that you can choose which veteran reward you get in certain classes.

E.G. : 3 month reward is a costume set... but you get to pick the costume set

Again, I don't have any proof that a CoH2 is in the cards. The CoH engine has shown remarkable scalability, and has carved out a steady niche in the available MMO market. Ergo, there's no rush on the part of NCSoft or Paragon Studios to pull an Everquest 2 and get a new client out the door.

*groans* Oh yeah, the memories of why Mepis stopped using a Ubuntu base years ago come flooding back.

You need at least the header for your installed kernel. That would be kernel 2.6.31 by default. So you want to download the 2.6.31 header files.

http://paragonwiki.com/wiki/Super_Booster_II:_Magic

https://secure.ncsoft.com/cgi-bin/St...tem&item_id=89

You should also go here: http://help.ncsoft.com/cgi-bin/ncsof...p?p_faqid=4654

and file a bug report for this problem.

Okay... from the information posted, you do have the most recent driver available for your platform.

So, now I need more information.

• Are you running any Ultra Mode options in the client? I know you said you aren't, but, could you just make sure that everything is set to Stencil Shadows, Medium Water Quality, no reflections, no ambient occlusion?
• What resolution are you running the game mode in?

Now, your sound looping problem may be giving me a clue here. In the first post you said that the processor was a Core 2 Duo E8400. Now, off the top of my head, if you bought that new back in 2008, you probably have an Intel Chipset based motherboard.

Have you tried updating the drivers for the motherboard?

added.

You already addressed the key point here. Most of the issues are solvable by drivers update or just basic maintenance. Since this is the vast cause of issues with Issue 17, and since players were encouraged to join in an Open Beta and make sure they had the hardware /drivers to handle Issue 17, NCSoft / Paragon Studios is not really burdened with a responsibility for any free time or refunds.

Well, first of all, Issue 17 was released on April 28th.

Second, it's not exactly an industry secret that Intel doesn't make GPU's. This is called Caveat emptor, or in english, beware buyer. Given that most modern games don't even bother attempting to support Intel's GPU's, that the developers take any time to do anything for Intel chipsets is a standout feature.

There's also an additional issue that the developers can only really test a limited amount of hardware. Unless you, personally, went onto the Test Server, and unless you, personally, filed a /bug report that the Intel Fix in the patch notes did not work for your Intel Graphics card, you really don't have any position to say anything. All you can do right now is file a /bug that the Intel fix didn't work as expected on your particular Intel chip, and wait for more tech work to be done.

There is yet another issue that is related to timing. One of the reasons why Ultra Mode was shipped 2-3 months in advance of the Going Rogue release was to give the developers time to work out all of the hardware kinks and engine issues across all of the various platform capabilities. I hate to use the term, but it's just common sense. There hasn't been an update to the City of Heroes game since the City of Villains expandalone that changed as many underlying game systems. I'm sorry, but if you expected everything to be absolutely perfect from day one on launch of Ultra Mode? And if you expect the publisher and developer to give you kickbacks for the product not being absolutely perfect? You don't understand how the game is developed. I'm not sorry for saying this, you don't.

Again. Did you actually log into the test server and file a bug report that it was not working on your platform?

No? Shut up.

Hmm. Technically this is true... but it goes back to the driver update issues. Most of the ATi issues have been / were addressed by simply updating to the latest Catalyst Release, 10.4.

Nvidia? Well, come on. Nvidia has the industry's worst drivers, period. I know at some point Nvidia was regarded as having a good driver record, but... that was several years ago.

Soo. let me get this straight. You are comparing a graphics chip that the rest of the gaming industry openly mocks... to a PS3 and an Xbox 360. I'm nor sorry for saying this, but... I don't believe a word of what you typed here.

I don't think the original poster is referring to the champion / justice / west coast server drops. I just busted the original poster in another thread for whining about Tier 1 tech support doing their job properly. Since the poster didn't get the "Oh Yes Tech Support Sucks they should do something right now" replies that thread was looking for, it looks like the player is trying to advance his "I've been wronged and you know it" mantra by another method.

Um. I have lots of reasons for saying that. I could start with the developers stated belief that the existing Energy Manipulation is already too melee heavy for a blaster. I could start with the developers already stated design goal for further manipulation sets to follow the Psychic Manipulation model. I could start with the point that anybody who really thinks that Martial Arts makes for a Blaster Secondary power set does not, I repeat, DOES NOT, understand the archtype or the design goals of the manipulation sets.

This really isn't unknown information. It's been out there for several years now, and Positron / War Witch / Castle haven't shown any sign of re-visiting the concept.

http://zerias.blogspot.com/2010/02/c...tall-kde4.html

http://zerias.blogspot.com/2010/02/c...of-heroes.html

http://zerias.blogspot.com/2010/02/c...roes-test.html

***

Remember, Transgaming are also the guys the run the CoH Macintosh Client, so Cedega support is as close to "official" support you are going to get right now.

Also, take a really good look at some of the pictures in this thread: http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=219534

Quite a few weren't taken under Windows or OSX.