peterpeter

Wow! Thank you so much for catching that! The link was working fine last night. Then I changed the title of the comic from "mycomicbook_4183" to "City of Statues". I didn't realize that changing the title on Hypercomics would change the link. Since I already sent the link to NCSoft, I just changed the title back to "mycomicbook_4183" so it will match. Boy, I'm really glad you told me.

I had the same trouble with the pdf writer that a lot of people did. But I did get it up on the website. Here is the link:

City of Statues

I don't think it has a chance of winning, but I'm happy with it. Whew, I'm glad it's done. Wrestling images out of the game was tough.

Lots of great entries, guys! Those judges are going to have a tough time!

I'll throw in my two cents.


1) To me it makes sense for this to scale by level. At level 1, I think I could live with 50% accuracy. By level 50, I might expect close to 100% accuracy in this situation.

As a defender who has no defense, I would expect to be hit at least half the time.

2) If I have the maximum possible accuracy, then I should hit at least 95% of the time. As a defender, if someone else has the maximum accuracy, and I have no defense, then I guess I wouldn't expect to be missed at all. I don't think I'd want to be in that situation, though.

3) I wouldn't really expect to hit them much at all, but if I hit less than 20% of the time, I would start to get frustrated. Hitting below 10% I think I'd just give up.

On defense, I would expect to be hit maybe 1% of the time. I could live with 10% though, I think.

4) With us both at max, I would say 50/50 is as fair as you can get.

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** (excluding the State of Rhode Island,

I find that to be the most ironic 'exclusion' of all.

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I just stumbled across an article which may shed some light on this exclusion.

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In the United States, every state establishes their own set of rules for contests. Most states have the same basic rules, so most national contests are valid. Rhode Island is unique because the state law actually requires the company to file a legal statement before it can run a contest in that state. The statute, Section 11-50-1 of Rhode Island General Laws, reads:

"Any person, firm, or corporation proposing to engage in any game, contest, or other promotion or advertising scheme or plan in which a retail establishment offers the opportunity to receive gifts, prizes, or gratuities, as determined by chance, in order to promote its retail business, where the total announced value of the prizes offered to the general public is in excess of five hundred dollars ($500), must file a statement with the secretary of state."

The statute then details exactly what information must be included in the filed statement. In addition, the law requires the company pay a $150 filing fee. If a company runs a contest in Rhode Island, and fails to file a statement correctly, the company is actually guilty of a criminal misdemeanor!

For companies that want to run national contests, the filing fee alone means it's not really worthwhile to run the contest in Rhode Island, which has a fairly small population. When you add to that the hassle of researching Rhode Island law in order to file the statement correctly, very few national companies are going to bother. The term "retail establishment" is fairly vague, so it's not really clear if the law would apply to a non-retail Web site. It probably does, however, and for most sites, it's not worth the time to try to contact the state of Rhode Island secretary of state to find out.

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So if you live in Rhode Island, you should consider writing to your representative and asking them to ease the legal restrictions on contests a little bit.

Actually, I'm surprised they haven't done this already. When they were revamping the Hamidon encounter, I expected them to change things so that you couldn't effectively stack a single buff or debuff more than 10 times. It wouldn't affect regular teaming, but would make a big difference in the range of variables the devs needed to juggle when designing Hamidon.

Obviously, I was wrong.

Don't bother posting if you aren't going to help.

I think this is the message he was referring to:

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all i did was activate the initial install program which gives you the option to install the main program, the basic add on pak, and then down at the bottom in smaller letters the pdf writer program.

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I hope that helps. I haven't even installed the software. I don't have a script I'm happy with yet.

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I've heard there are unofficial emotes (like the waving, sitting, dancing, ect.). Could they be accessed and how?

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I'm not sure what you mean by "unofficial" but this wonderful list from Mantid should be everything you need.

My experience during the special RV event:

I decided to use the level boost to roll up a character I would never normally play to 40: a gravity/kinetics controller. I have no experience with the powersets or the archetype, so I'm sure I didn't do a good job. That said, I did have fun looking around the zone. I even single handedly conquered a pillbox! After Positron and the Brawler destroyed all the turrets for me. Then Mako came and killed me, which was also fun. I love seeing the signature heroes and villains around.

I logged in early this morning and found the zone empty, so I took over a heavy. They are slow, and I had trouble controlling it, but it's still cool.

Debt: I got a ton of it. I wouldn't want to try this with a level 40 character, or you'll never make it to 50. But after level 50, fun galore.

Mez: As a grav/kin controller, I didn't have any mez protection, but I didn't find it to be a problem. I was instantly killed every time I came within firing range of anyone or anything, even without being mezzed. Next time I might try a tank. A solo squishy is just suicide.

And an excellent guide it is, Dwimble. I was going to put a link to it, but you beat me to it. As far as I can recall, this has always been a problem. Partly it's because CoH tends to attact less experienced gamers. Partly it's because we heroes can so often succeed without tactics, although that's a lot less true now then it was a year ago. Communication and patience are both in short supply. People are content to throw themselves into the fight, die, try a couple more times, then either succeed through attrition or just give up. Using tactics is just too much work for most people.

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Am I the only one who can't resist clicking on the gift inspirations as soon as you get them? I just can't wait to see what it is.
The few minutes I was actually on and able to play I found 3 naughtys and 2 nice. The gifts were both gift of power.
I'll save some eventually......I hope. Still haven't turned on my jingle jet yet.

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I'm pretty sure the 30 day counter on the jingle jet starts the day you log in and receive it. It doesn't matter if you use it or not, it will still vanish in 30 days. And if you don't log on to receive it by January 2nd or so, I don't think you'll be able to get it at all.

I knew the whole werewolf thing was going to be an overdone cliche, so I decided to get it out of my blood during beta. I rolled up a huge, furry gray werewolf. I thought about SS for a primary, but swinging a big stone club felt more primitive, so I went Stone. For a secondary, I've already done invuln and fire, stone/stone wasn't very werewolfy... I wound up with Dark. It was so much fun, I'm still playing Zevon live.

Well, the NDA is lifted, so I thought I'd resurrect this thread and start filling in some answers. Turns out that some of these were dumb questions, really, but what the heck.

1. Game is officially scheduled to be released on Oct 31, 2005. When will it actually be released? Ask me the day after it's released, and I'll tell you.

2. When will beta start? It started. End of August, as I recall. Open beta will probably start within a week or two.

3. The new archetypes:
Brute: powers like a tank, but reversed, attitude like a scrapper on PCP, hands down my personal favorite AT. Fighting --> Fury --> SMASH!!!
Stalker: powers like a scrapper, attitude more like a stealthy sniping blaster. They sneak, do huge damage, and then deal with the consequences as best as they can.
Corruptor: Powers like a defender in reverse, but without that namby pamby empathy nonsense. More debuffing than buffind. A solo Offender's dream come true.
Dominator: Heavily armed controllers, without that defender nonsense.
Mastermind: A whole new ball game. Henchman galore, plus attacks and support powers. Expect to see City of Masterminds for at least a few months after release.

4. Powersets: mostly recycled from CoH, actually. Some are new, some are tweaked. My favorites: Stalker ninjitsu defenses, Dominator plant control, Traps for Masterminds and Corruptors, and every Mastermind primary.

5. Origins are unchanged.

6-7. Griefing. All of the usual stuff, like Training, or teleporting someone into a bad spot, can still happen. PvP opens the door to ganking, though the devs are trying not to let it open too wide. The main defense against griefing is still /petition and banning. The code of conduct is not changing to allow griefing just because people are supposed to be villains now. There are some special PvP penalties around reputation, but I don't know how that works yet. So far I'm sorry to say that people seem less friendly in CoV than they are in CoH. Hope that gets better when it goes live, but I can't imagine why it would.

8. Villains receive missions in the same way the heroes do, and the missions are very similar. Instead of recovering a stolen diamond, you steal it, but either way you are fighting through a bunch of guards and clicking on a blinkie. There are some new mission types, which will probably work their way over to CoH in time, but I haven't seen anything too radical. There is a newspaper which functions like a contact, but gives you some more control over what missions you take.

9. Only Masterminds get Henchmen, though there are some temporary pet summoning powers available. Henchmen (robots, zombies, ninjas, or mercenaries) are summoned like pets, but can be controlled much more precisely. You can tell them to follow you, or attack your target, or go to a targeted location, and you can set them to be aggressive, passive, or defensive. You can give orders to all of your henchman or just one at a time, or one group and not another. There are three levels of henchmen, usually called minion, Lt, and boss. At most, you can have three minions, 2 Lts, and 1 boss.

10. Proactive. Well, you can choose which mission to take from the three offered by the newspaper. You can choose to engage in PvP. Otherwise, I don't see a lot of difference, at least in the lower levels. The mission text is a little bit different. Less, "bad guys stole X, go get it back." More, "Hey! There's an X! Why not go steal it?"

11. Bases. Each supergroup can have one base. They aren't cheap. They have only recently been enabled in beta and they are still buggy, but it looks like you have huge control over how they look. They can also do cool stuff, like offer inspirations, or help you travel from zone to zone. The new crafting system is all connected to bases, and you do need to own CoV in order to set foot in a base. PvP: You can do instant raids with anyone who agrees to it, at any time, with no stakes (no xp debt, no item destruction, etc). Or you can go on a real raid, in which case you don't know who you will be fighting, though you do know when, and there is a chance for an item of power to change hands. Items of power give benefits in the PvE game to all members of whatever SG has one.

12: You can fight NPC heroes, especially Longbow agents, but not as much as you might expect.

13: Interaction with other NPC's is the same as in CoH. You can't hurt them or mug them or anything like that. They just ignore you unless you click on them, and then they say something snide.

14: I can't believe I had so many questions. Now I'm even more impressed that LR took the time to answer them all, even if most of his answers were teases. Anyhow, geography. CoV is set in the Rogue Isles, off the coast of Paragon City. There are places which overlap. They are all PvP zones. Four of them, I think. Each also has optional PvE content to do, but it's pretty dangerous to wander around in a PvP zone. I think there are also CoV missions where you can enter an instanced mission which is set in PC proper.

15: PvP. Can happen in arenas, supergroup bases, or PvP zones. You can skip the arena and miss nothing if you don't like PvP. You can do a lot with a base without getting into PvP, but if you do PvP than you might win some advantages in PvE from having one or more item of power. You never have to go into a PvP zone, but you will miss some interesting PvE content if you don't. I don't think there is ever PvP in missions, and it's never random or unexpected. You can pick your opponent in the Arena or in instant base raids, or have random opponents in PvP zones and regular base raids.

16. Villains have the same body options as heroes, but a ton of new costume options. Pirates, monsters, lizardy stuff, tons of chains and skulls. It's pretty cool.

17-18: Enhancements and Inspirations are identical to heroes, though the inspirations might have different names. I forgot to look.

19: Loot. Sort of. You can get dropped salvage sometimes, and use it to build stuff in a base. I'm not sure exactly what you can build, though.

20: XP gain is the same for villains as it is for heroes. No xp from PvP.

21: Infamy instead of influence, but no practical difference. Bases are paid for with prestige, not influence/infamy. You gain prestige the same way, but only when you are in SG mode.

22: I guess the goal is to prove yourself to Lord Arachnos, and then help him take over the world. And then, presumably, to off him and rule the world yourself.

23: Yes, CoH and CoV are on the same servers. If you have both games, you get 12 slots to divide up between heroes and villains however you want.

24: Same power pools in both games. Don't know about the epic powers yet. Level cap is still 40.

25: Jail. Not that I've heard about, but it wouldn't surprise me to see something like the cell blocks in the Council and CoT missions.

26: They have announced that CoH and CoV each cost $15/month, but having both is still just $15/month. No extra cost.

You've done so much work on the backstory, but I feel like we only get to see bits and pieces. How about adding an "about this contact" sort of link to all the trainers and task force contacts?

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An example I've given many many times, now, is that CoH and CoV are like Pokemon Red and Pokemon Blue.

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I'm sure that's a wonderful analogy for people who have any idea what you are talking about. The bottom line is they haven't answered this question yet, and given the contradictory things they have said, I don't think they have even decided on an answer yet. Even if they have made up their minds, they might change their minds during beta, or even later.

These are villains. How about a pain based set? Maybe a destroyer secondary, with debuffs? Crippling pain would be a single target hold. Recall injury would be kind of like phantom wounds, doing temporary damage as the victim relived a traumatic injury. Maybe even have it double the effect of the last damage the victime received, as they feel the pain of it all over again. Torture, which causes a target to switch sides temporarily, to escape from being tortured. Works like confuse. And a mass torture too, I guess. Agony could be an AoE accuracy debuff. And so on. I guess that sounds more like a control set. Whatever.

A superstrength powerset that has things like "smashing people into the floor" instead of "clapping your hands really loudly".

Poisons. Dark magics: Voodoo, cursing/hexing. Traps: clamping jaw beartrap for damage + immobilize, falling net for a hold, tripwire explosives, the old poisonous snake in a keyhold trick, leading up to the top level Death Trap power, where you chain Adam West upside down over a boiling cauldron of acid while a rabid rat chews through the rope and you go outside for a cigarette.

Just for fun, I thought I'd put in what answers we have gotten so far.

1. When will it be released? (Can't really be answered until it's actually released, but still deserves to be the #1 question.)

A: Sometime this year.

2. When will beta start? (see above)

A. July (ish)

3. What do the new archetypes mean?

A. Brute and Stalker are tankish scrappish meleers. Dominator is controllerish. Devastator seems to be an Offender. Mastermind is presumably pet oriented.

4. What are the powersets?

A. Mostly unknown. Ninja sword, regen, archery, trick arrow, sonic blast, sonic buff/debuff are all confirmed. Dark fire, I think?

5. Are villain origins the same as hero origins?

A. yes.

6. How will people be able to grief?

7. How will griefers be dealt with?

8. If villains can receive missions, what are they like? What are the different types?

A. Basic structure is a lot like CoH, but there should be some new mission types and some villanous twists.

9. Minions: how do you get 'em, what can you do with 'em? What do they look like? How do they act? etc, etc, etc.

10. What does it mean when they say villains are proactive?

11. Bases: how do you get 'em, what can you do with 'em? What do they look like? How do you attack/defend them? Do you need to own CoV to get one? etc, etc, etc.

A. Supergroup can buy 'em for much influence, plus rent. Lots of variety in appearance. Base raid demo from E3 is described elsewhere.

12. How do you interact with NPC heroes?

A. You beat them up! Yay!

13. How do you interact with non-hero NPC's?

A. Same as CoH. This was probably a dumb question.

14. How does CoV overlap with CoH in terms of geography?

15. PvP: a million questions. When, where, with whom? How do missions and minions enter into it? If you avoid PvP, how much content do you miss out on?

A. 4 PvP zones to start with.

16. Costumes, etc: What kind of body size and shape options do villains get? Costume options?

A. Wolf heads, lots of skulls, barbed wire. Looks like fun!

17. Will villains have enhancements like heroes?

A. Yes

18. Will villains have inspirations like heroes?

19. Will there be loot?

20. How do villains gain xp?

A. same as CoH

21. Do villains have influence? Or what?

A. Infamy. Same difference.

22. What is the the goal for the villains? Besides leveling up, what are they trying to do?

23. Will CoV share CoH servers?

24. What power pools do villains get?

25. Do PC villains ever go do jail?

26. Monthly pricing for CoV, and for CoV+CoH?


Some of them still haven't been answered really. And we have some good new questions, which I can't think of off the top of my head.

The new comic is set in the past, right? So does that nix any chance of cameos? I hope not; it was a nice prize, even if the odds were pretty long.

I see there are lots of parents around here. Anyone happen to have the May issue of Parents magazine still sitting around? I'm on page 139.

/em applauds wildly

It would be cool to have the trainers and TF heroes act like policebots, though. If anything reaches them, they just casually blast it out of existence. The problem is that it would give a huge motivation for people to train bad guys right into a bunch of unprepared heroes who are forming TF's or leveling up. Eventually the novelty might wear off, but it would still be an ongoing problem I think. Too bad, because it would be very very cool.

I think this is a great idea. So, what is the simplest possible way to implement it? Right now, if you walk away from the keyboard, your character will eventually turn AFK and then, after 15 minutes I think it is, vanish. How about this: if you log out while in your superbase, your character stays in there, effectively AFK, until you log back in? Just like being AFK, if you are doing an emote, then you keep doing the emote while you are away.

Problem: Base raids. Solution: many have been suggested. I think the easiest might be to have AFK characters vanish when the base is raided, or else give them the invulnerability that an NPC would have, but whatever. I think this is a surmountable obstacle.

Motive: This isn't just a fun, silly, idea. I think it's really important and here's why. In SWG, you can have player housing and even player cities. Of course, even hard core players are logged out more than they are logged in, and most people don't spend more than a few hours a day logged in. The result is that every city, even the biggest, busiest, most vital ones, look and feel like ghost towns. It is depressing and demoralizing. Superbases could turn out the same way, which would be sad.

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As for the Coralax being good, I believe States said no EAT's until after CoV, so they could be good, bad, or both.

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I'm voting for both, like the Kheldians. Shark dudes for the bad guys and dolphin dudes for the heroes.

Yes, he needs a nickname, and quick. Babelfish to the rescue! Hmmm, "another programmer" in Portuguese is "um outro programador". Programador doesn't sound bad. Reminds me of Matador. In Russian, it's something I can't pronounce. "друг& #1086;й прог&# 1088;аммн& amp;#1080;к". That first word looks almost like "pyro". Pyro Programador! Errr, we can do better. Let's try translating from English to Portuguese to French to Greek and back to English. That gives us (drum roll please)..."other programmer." Well, that was a bit of a disappointment. Ok, how about...

this website : put in "another programmer" for name, and we get...The Itching Seahorse Man. Or The Itching Seahorse Lady, as the case may be. Hmm. Let's try again.

This website suggests "The Chafing Flake". Ugh.

Ok. One last try. This website here suggests...Scary Dude, for a guy, or Light Snake, for a woman.

Well, if Statesman doesn't know his name, he is probably just cannon fodder anyhow. Might as well just name him "Red Shirt Guy" and then Lord Recluse can kill him on stage to kick off the CoV beta.

I really don't think the devs promised a free respec with each release. In fact, I think they said the opposite. Of course, they might give one anyhow. I expect a lot of people will ask for one. I think the idea of having the level 50 respec be repeatable makes sense.

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All earned respecs must be redeemed in person with Jack Wolfe.


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Huh. I had no idea. I remember the problem they had on test, and I knew how it worked for the freespec. I didn't realize they left it like that for other respecs. Well, that saved me from a bit of confusion the next time I /respec.