shadowplay

when you say you replace "regular IO's at 50" does that mean you leave the sets at 35?

Also, can you mix and match levels within a set? Say, a lvl 35 Perfect Zinger chance for psi damage and a lvl 50 Perfect Zinger Taunt Duration, would those equal 2 parts of the set for the bonuses?

Thanks again

I've been playing for a long time, but like most folks took several breaks along the way. One of those breaks was during the implementation of IO's, so I admittedly don't know much about them. I've been doing ok playing without them, just using the basic invention IO's and SO's, but I've got a SS/Invul tank that I'm playing now that I love and I really want to dip into these set IO's that everyone uses.

I've got Call Me Awesome's guide to help me plan things out, but what I really need to know is, what level should I be looking to buy them at?

Should I wait till 50? I think I've heard some people mention that you lose set bonuses if you sidekick down to do TF's and stuff, so should I buy them at a lower level?

My tank is 36 now, should I start building my IO build now or do I wait till later, and if I wait, do I just stick with SO or try to get normal IO's now?

Thanks in advance

Maria slipped quietly down the back stairs of the King's Row Mission to her small basement apartment. She stepped inside without flicking on the lights, leaving it in inky blackness as she moved through, shedding what clothing she could as she made her way toward the bathroom.

The bare florescent bulb in the bathroom flicked on after a short sputter, its yellowed, artificial glare a harsh contrast to the rest of the still shadowy apartment. Maria crouched down to undo the laces on her boots and tug them off before standing and looking into the mirror. Reaching up with one hand she traced the edges of the skull tattooed on her face as it stared back at her, stark and white under the florescent lights. It was ugly. Terrible. She couldn't imagine ever having been proud of it.

Unable to meet her own gaze any longer she lowered her head and ran cold water in the chipped porcelain basin under the sink, cupping her hands under the tap and then splashing the water on her face. She'd worked all day and night on her contracts, even taken more then her fair share of the pro bono work and it was finally catching up with her. She was tired, sore and worn out. Doubly so since she was forced to work alone. The thought prompted a long sigh from her and another glance up at the mirror. Turning away from it, she reached to run the shower and started peeling off her gray leather suit.

The shower relaxed her enough to be able to sleep, but she unfortunately wasn't tired enough to fall immediately into a stupor. Instead she lay on her back, staring up at the yellowing tiles of her ceiling, unable to help but think. She'd often thought about getting her tattoos removed. They marked her instantly as someone to be avoided, or feared. She could make the money now that she was working, but she always seemed to find a reason to keep them. She told others they were a reminder of what she used to be and why she had to work so hard. In many ways, this was true, but not entirely. She had a good memory, and wouldn't ever forget how her gang had turned their backs on her, and their neighborhood, when they were needed most.

At times, she thought that maybe some small part of her was someday hoping to go back. She always shook that line of thinking off since... well... since it wasn't who she was now. She didn't want to have to live that way any longer. Maria often wondered how different her so-called new life was though... other then a change in victims. She still wore someone else's colors. Still hunted for victims. Still gained from hurting or stealing from them, in a way. Only difference was that now they were called criminals, and she had to take orders from someone else. Frowning at that she sat up suddenly and climbed out of bed, moving to rummage angrily through the kitchen in hopes of finding some food to distract her.

Maria leaned against the counter and pushed food around the container with her fork, looking small in the over-sized jersey she was wearing, and unable to pull herself out of the pit she was in. She'd been having more and more nights like this recently, ever since she'd come back. She'd given serious thought to leaving again, but knew she wouldn't be happy outside of the city. She was connected to it in a way very few people could truly understand. It had raised her and seen her into adulthood. She felt distant and distracted when she was away from it. Maria knew it was where she belonged. She'd been... scared when she had left before, but the promise of being with someone and being cared for had outweighed her fears. Obviously she'd been wrong since it was less then a month before she returned.

Glancing over at the clock and a lingering heaviness behind her eyes prompted her to move back into bed. Restlessly she fought with her pillows and blankets until finally exhaustion won out. Uneasily she slipped into sleep.

Maria often dreamed of the ritual. It was such an important part of her life that she couldn't help but relive it over and over again. Never in her life had she felt more accepted then that day. The event replayed in her sleeping mind now, and she watched as though she was floating above herself, the vision clouded by an occasional dark wisp of haze.

The other sect leaders had lead her into the ritual area and strapped her to the table. She laid perfectly still as the did, not struggling or even wincing as the cinched the leather straps of the old hospital gurney tight on her wrists and legs. She could remember feeling so nervous at being helpless... it was a state she wasn't accustomed to. The sect leaders began chanting and calling out. It was a blur of noise and clamor as their pitch rose. One stepped forward with a long, full syringe. If the color wasn't indication enough, she could almost smell it... superdyne. With careful reverence he slammed the syringe into her breast, right above her heart and injected the full syringe... a dose large enough to kill several men, much larger then her. Maria's 3rd person vision faded more now, the haze closing in on the scene as her restrained form twitched sightly, the superdyne beginning to affect her. As the haze nearly obscured the entire scene, she could see another sect leader approaching her, a long knife in his hand... he raised it above her heart just before all went dark.

Everything was black. No light, no sound, no feeling but, Maria knew she wasn't alone. A slight, cold breeze passed over her. She shivered but in the void was desperate to feel it again... to feel anything. The presence approached closer, circling around her slowly, like a curious shark. Outside of the dream, she huddled up, he covers already cast aside fitfully, and moaned. The sound carried over to the dream and the presence stopped, almost in shock at the sound. A rush of cold air flowed over Maria as the presence speed closer to her. As it did, she knew that it wasn't cold... it was the absence of heat. The absence of anything. Nothing. Oblivion.

Thousands of senseless whispers poured over her, questioning, trying to discern what she was and why she was here. The voices seemed to come from everywhere, but Maria could feel the presence in front of her, occasionally darting to the side, or her back, as if examining her. Gradually the whispering subsided and she was left in silence again... apparently satisfied with its examination, the presence floated silently in front of her. It seemed like an eternity waiting. Suddenly, as if it had always been there, there was a woman's face.

She saw it for just the briefest of instants before it was gone, and although she could never put the description into words, it was always burned onto her mind. So beautiful.. so perfect. Nothing like that could exist on this earth. It wasn't possible. She was as angelic as she was terrifying. The woman's lips turned upward into the slightest smile before she vanished from Maria's sight. She could feel this presence pushing closer to her, almost unbearably cold and non-existent. She wanted to cry out, scream, but she was stunned into complete silence. Maria felt the presence lowering her head and press her lips to her chest where she had been injected. The pain was unbearable and caused her floating form to jerk violently. So violently that she was snapped back to the real world. The heavy leather straps had been snapped into two as she sat upright gasping for breath and looking around the room wild eyed. Unable to full comprehend what had just happened it was all she could do to try to breath and hold onto to the last thing she experienced before being forced back to the world of feeling and light.

"My favorite," Death's softly whispered words echoed through her mind.

Maria's eyes snapped open as she sat upright in bed, her mind not yet having fully let go of the dream's memory. Her breathing slowly steadied as her eyes focused. No gurney. No candle lit ritual. No Skulls. Just her simple, aging, basement apartment below the Mission in King's Row. Maria pulled herself out of bed on unsteady legs and made her way to the bathroom. She pushed her sweat soaked hair from her face and stared into her skull-clad reflection.

Sometimes, she wished she could go back.

Id recomend the Nemesis Council. They are a wonderful group of roleplayers and coalition members with us While not fully mutant, I still suggest checking them out.

Nemesis Council

[ QUOTE ]
9. Read guides by people who haven't played the character past level 10.

*that was my intention for this, not to be funny, but sick of people posting guides, without hard numbers or playing the character to 50.

[/ QUOTE ]

Being LvL 50 isnt a magical antidote to stupidity. Plenty of people out there that have "maxed" out characters that I wouldnt trust a guide from if my virtual life depended on it.

RP Villian Group

The Leviathan Order

Leader: Drago Vitolovitch
Recruitment Contact: Drago Vitolovitch, Vielyth or posting on our forums
Synopsis of the group:

(From our Forums)

As long as there have been Men, there have been entities wishing to prey upon their excesses. Man is unique amongst all of Creation's creatures, as only he has the imiagintion to become truly, utterly preverse.
~Antolicus, Priest of Neptune and Praetorian of the Order, 23 BC

The Order is a group of affluential and wealthy individuals that seek to facilitate excesses and indulgence. On their surface, the group appears to be little more then desire peddling hedonists, a modren day Hell Fire Club for the wealthy and elite. For the right price, they will provide a member with anything they desire. No request is to perverse or strange. While this certainly leads to the attraction of many sexual deviants, this service is hardly reserved for only carnal desires. Once admitted to the Order, members can expect to be provided with anything they wish... as long as they can meet the price.

Renowned for their lavish bacchanalian parties, the Order is easily dismissed as a playground for the rich and bored. To most laymembers, this is all it ever will appear to be. However, behind all of the wild parties, the lustful provisions, and desperate wanting lays a much deeper, darker truth.

The Order is truly a cult, built around the service of dark powers. As the years have progressed these powers have changed name and form, but always maintain the same symbolism; The Dragon. Destructive, greedy, and always hungry for more, the Dragon is the heart of the Order's power. It has been known by many names and faces, but always has it had the Order to serve it and ensure that it has an ample supply of pain, desperation, and lust to feed from.

The current head of the Order is a young Russian by the name of Drago Vitolovitch. His family had served the Order for generations upon generations, so it is of little surprise that a Vitolovitch has finally risen to power. Coming from a family steeped in power and Dark Magic, Drago is a driven and determined man. Only recently has Drago decided to move the Order from Europe to America, and although a costly decision in terms of membership, he feels that the possabilities in this country are endless. The Rogue Isles were a natural choice to begin their work.

OOC Comments:

I very much would like the Order to be a group of mature, roleplaying gamers that understand that while we are roleplayers first, there is NO reason that we cant also enjoy the game to its fullest. Doing missions, strike forces and even base raids are all possible and the experiance can only be enchanced via roleplay.

At the current time our application processes is very informal, generally consisting of spending a bit of time with myself or another member to get to know you and filing out an application on our new forums. Once we have a good base of members though, I plan to make recruitment a bit more strict. Im not interested in quantity, but quality.

Please feel free to contact me, or any member, at any time if you have questions.

Thanks!

[ QUOTE ]
First Strike Security, one of the few groups that does the heroic biz -and- pays its employees rather handsomely. Well, the boardmembers, at least. I think Slip gets free meals and a turkey on thanksgiving..

Hee.

[/ QUOTE ]

I pay slip pretty well when he isn't quiting or being docked cash for being moody

Emo scrapper.


Roger is busy, you know, running the company and all. I suppose that qualifies as a job.

I look almost as good in plastic as I do out-of-the-box...

Almost.

~Roger "Contact" Chase, CEO First Strike Security

First Strike Security is in complete support of The Midnight Avengers.

Thank you,

~Roger "Contact" Chase, CEO First Strike Security

To the interested party,

If you feel that your background meets with our expectations and corporate image, please feel free to look into First Strike Security.

You can visit our offices in King's Row, or our electronic forums located HERE

Thank you for your interest, and good luck

Sin.

~Roger "Contact" Chase, CEO First Strike Security, Inc

Contact stood at the front window, his hands neatly folded behind his back as he looked out over the street and awaited their arrival. He had taken two Operatives off of a patrol and stationed them inside the house to better cover the entrances and exists.. he hoped what ever was going on was worth the loss in time and money.

As he saw the group approaching he taped his com and informed the operative to unlock and then reseucre the door, after they had entered.

Contact turned from the window and sat down in one of the chairs in the sparsly furnished room, awaiting their entrance.

Contact looked at Deth for a long moment, folding his hands behind his back neatly. He did know her pretty well, and she was a bit at war with herself... even though she showed surprising control. It would also be interesting to see how Fox reacted if he hired her... He mused his over as she moved to turn away.

"Deth," Contact put his hand lightly on her shoulder, stopping her. "I'm sorry but... I see many assignments involving Fox and you in your future." He smiled at her.

"I've been waiting for your application. Come inside and we'll get you squared away."

It was decided by a majority of the pre-release community that Virtue would be the unofficial RP server.

What does that mean? Not a whole lot really.. Its INCREADABLY unofficial.

There are a lot more RP'ers here from other servers, but not everyone on Virtue Roleplays (nor should they be hassled about it.) Announcing Virtue as an unofficial server just gave everyone who was interested a focal place to gather.

I hope if you do come to virtue, you have an enjoyable time and find a lot of people to share your stories with.

Thanks,

Contact emerged a from the offices a few moments later, summoned to the front again by one of his Operatives. This was proving to be an excedingly busy day.

"Yes, Ma'am, what can I do for you," Contact said, regarding Deth from behind his slightly darkened lenses

OOC Sorry... I missed this post initially, thanks for point it out

Contact had floated away from the scene quiet some time ago and was busy working over some Warriors for a contractual obligation.

He loved fighting Warriors.

He'd cleared out the rest of the warehouse and had just began interogating the last concious thug when his cell phone chirped. Contact let the camo-clad Hewer fall to the floor in a heap and snapped his phone open crisply.

"Chase here," he said, floating a few meters off the floor. "Activate house D? What the hell Fox... just turn the deadbolt. Its a house not a secret lair," he laughed into phone lightly.

"Alright, alright... I'll have an operative clear the place and swing by to make sure everything is ok. Just let me," he trailed off for a moment, seeing the Hewer make a break for it. He thrust his hand forward at him, telekineticly sending him crashing through a crate of delicate vases.

"Let me clean up here and I'll meet you there," Contact canceled the call and arranged for an operative to clear the house and prepare for their arrival.

Do they come in any other variety?

The operative nodded quietly at Jack and rolled over to where his rifle laid. He quickly slung the multi-weapon over his back and drew the rife up, taking sight on Jack's target.

The crack split the air and a fist sized hole appeared in the small Cog's face. In a smooth motion he drew back the bolt, expelled the shell and raised the rifle back to his shoulder, scanning for his next target.

<clicks his tongs at Jack>

Gonna getcha... gonna getcha...

I've registered, same board name as here

FSS has a few late nighters... feel free to look us up sometime. I know that Ill be on a more night-time schedual soon...

I'll drop by, I could use another board to camp while at work

Consequently, is this board specific to a server or are most of the participants from a certain server?

Thank you,

Yes, but not outside of 2-3 people included in the stories. I often send out official FSS memos via email to people in the company contact needs to speak with, who dont happen to be around at the moment.

Overall though, I LOATH this games (lack of) communication system. Its way to hard to speak to people outside of teams or supergroups and far to difficult to find them if they arent on your friends list.

Dragon's one of our converts apparently

People complain about KS'ing everywhere, and I think that if the whining was equal to the actual problem, there'd be no gangers left to be KS'ed, if you catch my meaning, heh.

I can count on one hand the number of times I was KS'ed on Virtue... and I just moved on. Its not worth the hassle for a handful of gangers you can just find someplace around the corner.

As for the number of Role players vs non-roleplayers... that's a hard figure to dispute or even discuss. You can't tell if someone is a Role Player or not just by looking at them, and some people only role play with friends or in team channels.

I believe that virtue has an active "community" of role players, and can speak first hand that several other grounds have contacted FSS about cross over events (AKA the Spetznaz thread, for example.)

I think its skewed at the lower levels, since you have a lot of people with no invested interest in there character clogging up limited resources... it tends to make unpleasent people even more unberable. Most of the random roleplay Ive stumbled across has been of the 10+ variety. Characters are more stable and invested in then, and people have some of the powers they imagine that there character would have.

Anyway, like I said... feel free to look us up if you come to virtue, or drop by our IC/OOC boards HERE

Firstly, people are probably going to yell at you and be generally trolly... Don’t let them get to you, because your concerns are valid and presented maturely.

Part of the problem, I think, is that people have varying levels of role-play experience and expectations... and a lot people get way to wrapped up in what happens in game. Anytime you role-play something more then a friendship (and sometimes even then...) things can get a little weird, esp. if you and your character are drastically different.

My method of solving this is to be very upfront with people, and be sure that those I play with often establish a certain OOC rapport with me as well. I’m not really interested or looking for long lasting RL friendships, but talking ooc about stuff from time to time is a nice dose of reality to remind people that you aren’t your character. In addition to that, if any sort of In-game relationship does develop, I try to be very clear about what it is and isn’t... normally things like that sort out the people with issues and those that just want to tell good stories, (even more "mature" ones.)

Its tricky you know, but I think being upfront is the best policy for everyone involved. If they are going to blow up and be immature about it, better to do that sooner rather then later.