spidermonster_EU

On a slightly different note to the other thread about Mind/Empathy....

My main is on Defiant, so I'm going to use this weekend to level up my Mind/Empathy Controller that's in the teens on Union. I made him just to mess around, but enjoy the Mind powers I've got.

Empathy is really a nice addition, rather than a central part of the character - his focus is very much on the primary... so if I'm only going for a couple of powers from it - which ones would you reccomend? I'd like to keep Healing Aura (so I can heal myself) but which other one or two (for low-ish level play) I know that the buffs are the key if you're an empathy defender - but as a Control-heavy controller.... which few powers are a good choice?

spidermonster.

Broadsword/Dark is really good fun. It took a bit of getting used to the way it can be used very differently once you get Stamina and then for me it became different again once I got the wonder that is Oppressive Gloom. OG for the minons, combined with BS damage on the bosses and Dark Regeneration/Soul Transfer for emergencies makes BS/DA a pretty amazing combination for solo play. And the straight-up damage and pretty good protection/mitigation work well on teams and big boss-heavy spawns. Run in, get more aggro than you want, minions get disoriented, kill one boss, Dark Regen when you notice your health, kill another boss, clean up :-D

spidermonster.

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*Sigh* do the DEVs really want me to make only Robotics Masterminds? Do they?

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Even though they have the cutest stompy legs, my robots don't appear to like the kerb at the edge of the pavement or shallow steps much, and will just stand there, stuck, watching their glorious creator die in a hail of sudden aggro.

spidermonster.

I'd like to nominate Rock_Eagle's comic book covers.

They were ace.

spidermonster.

Hard-Boiled Nights in Paragon City

Name's Kruger. Joe Kruger. Detective Kruger if you're giving me an order,Kruger if you're a friend and just plain Joe if you're a dame. I've been in the PPD longer than most - seen a lot of things. This scar? Heh - don't ask how I got it. Let's just say that I didn't get any medals, but down in Kings Row - no one bothers me any more. None of those fancy metal suits or calling in Longbow backup. I've got a badge, a gun, and more experience than some hotshot kid who wants to stamp around in power armour punching gangsters through walls.

It was a night like any other March night here. Cold wind from up the coast, the kind of rain that gets under your collar and makes you think of hot coffee and a warm office. Anything compared to being out on the street, cleaning up after capes.

It was a warehouse on the edge of Galaxy City - big place, construction company. Not the Family, this company was too small-time for them. Local firm, I think I knew the guy who ran the place thirty years ago, but he's long gone. The Lieutenant called me down here - called when I was on my way home. I told him it was pot roast tonight, and that he could go to hell. He laughed - he knew what I was going home to was a scrawny old cat with bad eyesight and a cheap ready meal from the corner store. The wife walked out a decade ago, leaving me with an alimony settlement to make and a headache. He might be younger than me, but the Lieutenant is sharp. When it comes to hero busts gone wrong, I'm his go-to guy. Some of the guys on the team hate the heroes, some are like kids in a candy store and follow them around. Me, I think there's good and bad, just like with
anything.

This case though, it was mostly bad. Got to the place just as the uniforms were playing fast and loose with the crime scene tape. They'd half the block marked out before I got there. The warehouse roof was just smouldering now, rain doing a better job than the Fire Department. Fair's fair though- Hellions were having a wild party up in Steel Canyon and half the place went up, or so the radio said. Some rookie who couldn't even grow a real beard was trying to tell me his theory on what had happened but I gave him the trademark Kruger stare and he stepped back fast as you like.

Inside was a mess, a real mess. I'd seen it enough times before, big picture was the same but the details are always different. Some guys on the force would have written it up there and then, standing at the doorway looking in, but not me. The reason they call me "Accountant" Kruger is because I do the paperwork. Sure, I've had rough patches and -been- rough at times, but I've never just arrested the first guy at the scene, or taken things at face value. In this line of work, you need to keep your eyes open - especially with capes around.

The rookie beat cop tells me they've got security tapes of the incident, and do I want to watch them. I tell him to get me a coffee and wait in the warm somewhere - I always look things over first for myself before seeing what the cameras tell me. Don't trust anything except your own eyes. Not even that much sometimes.

The capes came in the front door, four or five of them. They must have met the first gangsters just inside the door, judging by the scorch marks on the walls and wrecked furniture. Hellions or Skulls most likely, nothing flashy - just good old fashioned street gangs with a smattering of superpowers for the guys in charge. But mostly just small-time thugs with baseball bats, kitchen knives and cheap imported pistols that blow up in your face. Small-time thugs who rushed a group of technicolour vigilantes throwing fire, bullets and who-knows-what back the way. Here, the gangsters ran into more than they could handle. Bodies are gone, but that's our amazing teleport grid for you. Great if you're in a car accident or want someone you've arrested taken away fast but useless if you want good crime scene work. Forensics do overtime these days, trying to piece things together.

A few twists of the corridor and I'm in a big loading bay - this is where it all fell apart for the heroes. Around the doorway into the room the walls are black with soot and I can taste smoke in the air. It was the roof above this room that had caught fire - I can see the cloudy night sky between the beams above. A few metres into the room is a heap of weapons - knives, a few cleavers, sledgehammers and baseball bats - like I said, street thugs. The weapons are all in a rough circle, with a clear space in the centre. The first time I saw an arrangement like that, it was my first day out on the beat, and the old hand I was with waited to see if I'd work it out. Back then, I couldn't. Now - I've seen it too many times but it still makes me shiver - and that's not just the draught coming from the
wrecked roof. One of the heroes, a big guy most likely, made a stand here. Either charging in ahead, or buying the others time to make an escape. He would have been surrounded, maybe twenty to one judging by the weapons - a real hero, or else real stupid. Looking at the state of the weapons, it was probably a last stand. It's always the big dumb guys who try to hold til the last. The smart guys are the ones ducking out the door and fetching their big, bad friends.

So I walk it through, step by step. The heroes come in blasting and punching, spread out into the room and find that they've got a whole convention of punks. Maybe it goes tense for a moment, but it's always the same story - you've got a bunch of goons, and a bunch of do-gooders. They stare at each other, someone says something dumb, then it gets messy.
The heroes gave a good account of themselves, I can see they beat the gangsters back from the doorway, and judging by the state of some equipment, they wrecked whatever the operation was here - low grade Superadine most likely. Kind of stuff that'll turn you pale green but leaves all the hardcore types to laugh at you. Something went wrong, maybe there were some older jacked-up gang leaders here, and about halfway across the loading bay, you can see things going wrong. There are bullet casings everywhere in a wide arc, and it looks like frost across a wall of crates on the other side of a conveyer belt. The thugs must have come at
them from all sides here, maybe with guys up on the gantries firing down.

Then it gets quicker - the heroes fall back to the doorway, and I can see the telltale dust outline on the concrete floor where one of them must have been yanked back to the hospital after taking one too many hits. My guess is the gunner - no bullet casings on their retreat route. Back at the doorway, the last piece falls into place - the roof wasn't an accident. Whoever was throwing fire around punched a hole in the roof for an escape - they would never have made it back down the corridors with gangsters on their heels. Several of the heroes took off into the air, leaving behind someone to hold the line while they regrouped or, more likely, just plain ran for it. Poor guy left behind maybe couldn't fly, maybe volunteered.
I'll never understand capes. They'll probably be back tomorrow night though, with extra friends, but the gangs are long-gone. They'll be in another warehouse by now, in another part of the city.

The rookie brings me a coffee, and takes me to the security office. The surveillance tapes agree with me, for the most part. It was the Skulls, after all that. Bunch of death-obsessed idiots doing it for thrills. The heroes look like kids, all dressed up and cocky - kicking in doors and trying to act professional. It was worse than I thought, in the loading bay. One of them goes down right away - walks in with her hands flinging glowing energy around and takes a sledgehammer to the face. Away to the hospital before she's hit the floor. That leaves them one down and it's like the gangs are having a party that the heroes crashed. And they don't take kindly to gatecrashers. You can tell the guy with the machine gun was the leader of the heroes, but when he goes down on the retreat back to the door, they fall to pieces. The fire-girl taking out the roof for a getaway
is the only sensible choice any of them make from when they get into the loading bay - everything else is wrong. Fighting their way in, trying to get back to the door, then that stupid, heroic last stand. The last guy makes a good account of himself - he'll probably go on to do well, if the
hospital patch him up. He keeps the Skulls busy until the fire-throwing girl and another of the guys have made their escape. Eventually sheer weight of numbers takes him down, but it's a good fight. If you like watching someone who knows they can't win.

I guess it's just another night for the heroes, just another mission to fight crime, injustice and all that. It was just another night for the criminals too - fighting a bunch of costumed vigilantes.

And it's still early in the night for me, and I've got to get across to the edge of Skyway City. A random vehicle stop turned into a pitched battle, and someone watching from the precinct thinks the same gang who were holed up here are now taking hostages and making demands. I'd like to get there before the heroes do - maybe get some answers. A flashy costume and snappy name doesn't add up to the same as good old-fashioned police work.

Just as I'm leaving, the rookie asks if I can get the fire girl's name if she turns up - she's just his type, he says. I tell him he's out of his league, but I know he won't listen. He'll learn though.

--

spidermonster.

I have a couple of short things to post actually - since I've got back into the game this last month, inspiration has struck. I'll get to it soonish...

spidermonster.

Would the classified ads section do?


WANTED: Brutal thugs to pummel superheroes!

Are you aged 18-30, often found lounging against walls idly clenching your fists and punching one hand into the other? Villainous enough to commit crime, but not evil enough to be s upervillain? Why not join up with a notorious Mastermind and see the Rogue Isles with your friends? Bring your family and travel across the Isles and even to Paragon City perhaps..
Gun, molotov cocktails and matching outfits provided.
NB: I am a h34l0r so you will COME TO NO HARM! Not like with other Masterminds! I value my brave henchmen!
If interested reply to Doktor Destruktion: Box 20543

CALLING ALL VAHZILOK!
Organs! Get your limbs and organs here! Hardly used, and mostly bullet free! I have a near-endless supply of organs, limbs and occasionally whole bodies for collection, all from young men in the peak of health. Name your location in the Rogue Isles and I will bring to you! Occasional superhero-caused damage but usually only superficial. Name the amount and I will provide!
Contact Doktor Destruktion: Box 20543

spidermonster.

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Has anyone taken manuvers on a Bots/Traps MM that can comment on it?


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Actually I have - but I only got it about a level ago and it's hard to tell if it does much with just TOs in it. Thanks for the other advice though..

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Oh and a Mastermind is a team.


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As I am learning :-) I got a mission that said "you should bring around four team-mates". I brought three angry robots and got by just fine...

spidermonster.

Hi

I've just started playing CoV (after a year and a half of messing around with hero alts) and have currently got a Robots/Traps Mastermind up to mighty level 11.

I have a couple of questions though... hopefully someone can offer advice:

1] Is the Leadership pool as good as it sounds for Masterminds? I took the first power, Maneuvers, since it sounded neat but looking at the others.. it looks like if I ran all of them except Vengeance, my sinister metallic henchmen would be fairly uber... Muah ha ha.

2] Sort of following on... if I end up running three of the Leadership powers, will I be so short on Endurance that I have to go for Stamina? Now, I'm not one of these "stamina is essential for all builds" people... sometimes it's nice to have, sometimes I can do without.... but how much of a chunk of endurance do those three toggles running at once take up? Will I be able to run those, summon/equip etc my robots and blast occasionally?
If the Leadership powers can be offset easily with an endurance reduction enhancement or two, that'd be handy...

3] Compared to CoH, I've had a lot less blind invites even from 1-10 in CoV. Is this just the nature of CoV, or do people not like teaming with Masterminds? I've already found the cute little metal guys get in the way at times (No - THROUGH the doorway, not just standing in it clanking! Bad robot - no equip for you!) Not that I object to a lack of blind invites, mind....

Thanks

spidermonster

It's not a high level moment but...

I was soloing that Striga mission where you have to destroy the vampyri tranformation pod things. I was pretty tired, and didn't realise immediately that when you run up to them, the pods start creating vampyri.

So on my second pod, I just started hitting the two vampyri who were lurking sort of behind the pod. An annoying run of misses from me and hits for their stupid health regen and a lot of spamming parry because I was trying to drink a cup of tea at the same time and I killed them pretty slowly. Once they were dead, I took out the transformation pod..... except it had been steadily creating vampyri while I was fighting, so it disappeared in an explosion leaving me with with minimal endurance and what turned out to be a room with double handfuls of angry vampyri.

Of course, being a scrapper I just needed some red and blue inspirations, turned on Death Shroud and after some crunchy broadsword action there was a bit more space. Admittedly, I finished the last vampyri guy by turning off my toggles since I was so low on endurance it was embarassing. But those darned vampires didn't get me.

spidermonster.

I'm a bit sleepy so won't be posting my build, but my BS/DA is currently level 26... I won't be getting Stamina until level 28 but so far it's not actually been a -huge- problem not to have it. It'll be useful, for sure... but solo I'm pretty fine as long as I have a blue inspiration or two in my tray just in case. In missions where I don't need my Mez protection, I'm laughing ;-)

spidermonster.

I hope that the good citizens of Paragon City don't think badly of me for making such strange new friends, thought Principal Boy whilst hanging out in the park one afternoon...

Image link

spidermonster

Straight outta Paragon, another masked flyer
More Skulls I smoke, yo, my level gets higher
I'm an uber dreck farmer and you know this
But the n00b l33tspeaker don't show this
But I don't pop a CaB, I'm make my moves
If not with the boombox, from griefin the n00bs
Just like killin', the definition is 'arrestin'
And when you go down on yo knees it's called 'restin'
Toggle your armour in a minute
I find a good task force, I go up in it
So if you're at a show in the front row
I'm a call you a camper or fake hero
You'll probably get mad like a villain is supposed to
But that shows me, man, you're composed to
A crazy PLer from tha street
Attitude down cause I'm tearin up town
BA Brawler controls the automatic
For any blind inviter that starts static
Not the right hand cause I'm the hand itself
Every time I pull a power off the shelf
The security is maximum and that's a law
ST-8 spells States but I'm the man
See, coz Recluse is the villain
The definition is clear, you're the witness of a killin
That's takin place without a clue
And once you're on the scope, your End is through
Look, you might take it as a trip
But a hero like States is on a gangsta tip
Straight outta Paragon...

Darn, if I could find that instrumental version of the original that was released..... then the internet would have a whole new level of terror once I worked out where I could borrow a microphone from.
I'll get back to y'all on that.

Word. Word indeed.

Being white and middle class, gangsta rap is of course my kind of music. Actually, I can't stand the stuff, but I get bored really easy. So, to the tune of Straight Outta Compton by NWA... I present "Straight Outta Paragon"

Apologies for the awkward stiltedness of some of this - it was done rather quickly:

*ahem*

Straight outta Atlas, crazy mask named Statesman
From the gang called heroes of Paragon
When I'm called off, I gotta lay down a debuff
Don't kill the anchor, bodies'll all be hauled off
You too, boy, if ya mess with me
Arachnos are gonna hafta come and get me
Super flyin', that's how I'm goin out
For the newbie hover fans that's showin out
villains start to mumble, they wanna rumble
Mix em and cook em in a pot like gumbo
Goin off on a Freakshow like that
with a taunt that's pointed at yo pets
So give it up smooth
Ain't no tellin when I'm down for an emote move
Here's a PVP rep to keep yo dancin
For the win cause I'm the boss Statesman
Crey Pistol is the tool
Don't make me act the txtspeakin' noob
Me you can go toe to toe, no maybe
I'm knockin Stalkers out tha box, daily
yo weekly, monthly and yearly
until them dumb base campers see clearly
that I'm down with the Vanguard V-G-D
Boy you can't mess with me
So when I'm in your neighborhood, you better /em yell
Coz Statesman is as mad as all hell
As I leave, you know I'm not far gone
but when I come back, boy, I'm comin straight outta Paragon

One of my friends plays Counterstrike a lot. Others play a few different FPS or stealth games. Their claims of "skill" mostly come down to fast reflexes and having a very fast computer system. Oh, and knowing the levels inside out.

I don't have fast reflexes, nor am I great at pixel perfect mouse movements. One of those could (in theory) come with time, the other I am never going to be able to do for a variety of reasons.

I am very glad that PvP here isn't along those lines... although my (limited experience of it) pretty much backs up the original statements.

If someone in a PvP zone was giving it the whole "ph33r my m4d sk1llz!" routine then I would probably snigger a bit, but give them the benefit of the doubt. There is limited skill here (like you say, knowing builds and powers) but there is that little bit. And not being a complete klutz generally. I spent ages practicing running and superspeeding along the top of fences in-game because I thought it looked cool, and superjumping across power lines.. ;-) All skill, of a sort.

Anal well-being concerns -everyone-! He's doing good work.

"Bridger had recently been spotted in a series of commercial for Anusol, the haemorrhoid cream, where he espoused the necessity of anal well-being for effective crime fighting."

I almost choked to death laughing at that.

The vast majority the copyright violating heroes that I've seen have been claws/* and usually claws/regen.

Mostly with purest EULAium claws and an EULAium skeleton, and a healing factor.

When I first tried CoH at a friend's house, around I2 time, we logged into the tutorial. Literally within a minute, three or four Wolverine-clones ran past (followed by Captain Kirk, curiously enough)

I can't speak for the actual use of the powers ingame, though, but others already have.

Overlander 242 - would obviously have "Circling Overland" by Front 242 as his theme, since that's where the name is from

Constance Planck - "She Blinded Me With Science" by Thomas Dolby

erm, dunno about the rest.

Awesome :-)

As an aside, whenever the mobs shout about capes, tights or masks... I always want to shout back "But I'm not wearing those!"

This is funny, not least because I've -seen- heroes in outfits that bad on the streets of Paragon City.

What random costume button do? *click* MY EYES!

I meant to write a lengthy thing about a hero going crazy because he could "see" the game mechanics like you've got in this.... but I think you beat me too it, bah :-)

Nice work.

... superjumping around Bloody Bay for the first time with my Inv Tanker, laughing as the turrets dotted about do tiny amounts of damage, then leaping slap-bang into the middle of the Villain base by mistake, where a lot more damage happens very, very fast. *thud*

No! Please, no!

I don't get to play much at the moment, and Christmas Day is the only day I can definitely say that I'll be online.. and if there's no one fighting.. well.. it'll ruin Christmas!