Journal of a first-time MMORG player
By
187nut,
Posted on: 2005-01-20 01:10 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
[ QUOTE ]
The weird thing lately is that, on these radio missions, when I click on a glowie it tells me I have a clue, but theres nothing there. When did that bug start? Maybe Ill send a bug report next time Im on. Gah, who knows when that will be? Sooner, I mentally vow. Sooner!
[/ QUOTE ]
The clue auto-vanishes on mission complete. If you want to look at the item, leave some guys alive in the room if possible.
I suppose it really should vanish when you hit the street, but maybe that's not possible with the current radio/paper coding.
Up with the overworld! Up with exploration! | Want a review of your arc?
My arcs: Dream Paper (ID: 1874) | Bricked Electronics (ID: 2180) | The Bravuran Jobs (ID: 5073) | Backwards Day (ID: 329000) | Operation Fair Trade (ID: 391172)
Entry 148
Oh wow, real life kills all my plans again. Foot surgery in real life to remove some broken bone fragments has me at home with my feet elevated for three weeks, not able to move around much. By the time I hobble to the computer and find a way to prop myself up while still taking care with my feet, and Issue 12 has been released! No playing today, I let it download the new upgrade and check everything out. Ah, but the next day, I start to cycle through ALL of my characters. I start on Victory Server with Debt Leader, and choose a Shield Pet from the rewards. Its been almost five months since I played this character, so I start off a little clumsily, hitting the wrong numbers, and stopping to refresh myself on what all the powers like Radiation Infection can do. I clear a warehouse, nearly going through all my Endurance several times. Radiation really eats up your energy!
I cant resist trying to play a mission for each character, so I know this will take more than the measly hour I have to spare today, but tomorrow is another story. I even log in characters from my nephews and nieces, just in case theres a danger of their name being taken. I forget whether it depends on how long the player logs in, or how long since each character has been logged in. Its a mixed blessing, being away from the game for so long, because its not too boring to log in to all the different zones, with different characters at different levels, and run to the different missions listening to the neighborhood music.
I go hunting down some weapons that the Council have with my Warshade, level 5 Brane, and the first crate I open has canned vegetables. Really? The Council goons have to subsist on canned vegetables? I hope they at least get a good dental plan.. Stupid Quantums send me to the hospital twice. Grr! Im about to log off when I realize Im under attack, so I move and take out some more council goons who have decided they arent going to let me just take their weapons and leave without a say-so on their part. Meh, they dont get much of a say-so before they fall to the pavement. I log off again for real this time, two servers down, and nine more to visit!
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 149
The next day is about the same, but I manage to log on, and that in itself is a minor victory these days. On Triumph server, Klarion is trying to get to the right part of Perez Park to get at some Skulls. I use my Jump-Pack to skip along the trees
and miss-time the final jump, falling inside the wall. Purple Clocks clean my clock in two seconds. Hmm, I must be a little rusty. I do what I do with several other characters, and position him at the best place to start his next mission, sign off, and sign on another hero. Ooh, I get a blind invite; its been a while since I got one of those! The last one on Triumph server is Rebreather Man, and he gets to use his guns on a timed mission, just because I want to actually play a little bit, rather than just log in-and-out a bunch of characters. He gets sent to the hospital once, too. Meh, tends to happen at the lower levels, especially when you run up against higher-con foes.
The next day covers most of the rest of my heroes and villains, all except for Freedom server, which is pack-full of server activity. I take out a couple of the characters for a quick spin, my tank, Grand Champion handles well, and he looks imposing as he switches between his mace, the Ghost Axe of the Undead, and the Nemesis Staff. Some of it is not so fun, as I realize I spend more time running from place to place at this level than actually doing missions.
Ekato is my Ninja Blade Assassin on the villain side, inspiring fear in his black garments and mouth shroud. I havent used his weapons in a while, and they seem cool. Yet another reason I like to have multiple characters; its hard to get bored when you can sample almost any power at any second. He makes short work of some snake men and levels up, allowing me to experience the glut of inspirations that accompany a leveling. That was a fun idea! It adds another small element of the game for me to play, as I will try to time my leveling up against superior foes, so I can recreate those comic book scenes where the hero is fighting against impossible odds, but gathers all of his strength in one final rally, to come back and win it all. Weve all read it countless times, this bonus helps us to live it (so to speak).
Next up is Good Sport, my Trick Archery Defender, who happens to be in the Hollows, which now has new contacts and a redesign. I take the first new mission and get it done with a few minutes to spare, and that has used up my allotted time for the day. Just a few more characters to log in for the Entertainment badge, and then I can focus on just one of them and run several missions in a row.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
I can't imagine logging in characters just for a badge, but that's the life of a badger I guess.
Say tpull, how'd you like the Stalker buff? You didn't mention it. Did you even notice it?
The best comics are still 10�!
My City of Heroes Blog Freedom Feature Article: "Going Rageless?"
If you only read one guide this year, make it this one.
Super Reflexes: the Golden Fox of power sets!
WARNING: I bold names.
You know, I played my Stalkers very briefly, but the missions I ran went very smoothly. I hadn't considered the buff too much because they are low levels, so I just figured the level of difficulty wasn't that much of a challenge. But the missions did go quick...
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 150
I must look a site, perched at my computer with my legs to either side above the keyboard, on the desk to keep them elevated after foot surgery. Im walking around better and everything seems to be healing fine, but it makes it awkward to play the game too much. And here I thought Id be getting in three solid weeks of playing time! My arms go around my legs and under to hit the keyboard buttons, and I load Spirit of Paragon. Ive been reading my entire collection of Conan the Barbarian, and I have pretty much all of Marvels version into the early 200s, before it went south, so have a hankerin to swing some swords and try to decapitate people. Why no, comics dont make people violent, why do you ask?
It takes a little while to get into the groove, because ever since the server upgrade, I tend to have a lot of rubber-banding, but for all I know thats just my computer. The next few missions are mostly going to talk to people, deliver this item, etc. After trying to call my other contacts and getting the same type of missions, I resign myself to courier duty for fifteen minutes, running back and forth across the zones to get them cleared off my board. Its times like these that I want the grind to disappear and the game to move faster, and I SO want my Super Speed now! Those kinds of days make your brain start conjuring visions of an issue update that allows you to start a character off at level 14. The feeling fades away soon enough, but that is one of the drawbacks of an MMO like this: in other types of games, the action can be fairly constant and exciting. Here, after youve played the game and gotten a level 50 character, you can only run around at lower levels so many times before you have second thoughts about how much longer to continue playing.
I wait a couple minutes for the feeling to pass, and jump into some new missions that call for something a little more strenuous than just delivering a message. I play a game with my sword fighter, doing a Typhoons Edge attack that takes out two Clocks simultaneously. Awesome! Spirit of Paragon is slightly more fun than some other characters precisely because of the different effects you can create with the combination attacks, but when I add in the games I usually play with Martial Master, its a ton of fun. Thats where I attack the villains and get each of them down to low health, then see how many I can finish off at once with an AoE attack. Its very handy when facing certain Nemesis opponents to prevent their bonus upon dying from having any effect. As always, time passes to quickly, and I leave trying to calculate when I will ever be able to spend enough time in one sitting to truly satisfy me, yet at the same time realizing that many other things in life are worth it when they keep me away.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Speedy recovery and good health to you tpull!
And I know how fun animations can be. When on my MA/SR Scrapper I Eagle's Claw a mob to defeat and just then Practiced Brawler refreshes, causing my guy to give a victorious sling of the elbow, that's just one of the most fun things in the game for me and it's part of what keeps me playing him even after 50. The animations of MA and SR go so very well together. Not the best pairing mathematically, but thematic symmetry couldn't be better.
P.S. And yes, some of the missons on blueside really could use an updating. Think Fed Ex missions are frustrating? Remeber hunting 65 Carnies in PI? I'll bet you do, and it's my current frustration with the game.
The best comics are still 10�!
My City of Heroes Blog Freedom Feature Article: "Going Rageless?"
If you only read one guide this year, make it this one.
Super Reflexes: the Golden Fox of power sets!
WARNING: I bold names.
Entry 147
Has it really been a month since I had time to play the game? How depressing! The Spirit of Paragon is the choice today, maybe because I recently saw the trailer for the next Indiana Jones movie, and I feel like a bit of swashbuckling. My first mission is in a cave, and I get stuck a couple of times. The graphics make it look like I get caught on my top hat! After that I can get a bank mission, and I tackle it solo. No telling what will happen to tear me away from the game these days, no sense starting a group if I have to end it in ten minutes.
The AI of the villains is more fun these days, and when I knock out a Clockwork, he dangles from his mechanical ankle off of a fire escape. Then a gang member comes running up and jumps over me while Im battling his compadre. He jumps on to said fire escape, and when I knock him out next, he gets caught by HIS ankle, and awkwardly slides down. Hilarious.
The character chat is amusing too, as one guy runs by saying, Get a load of this loot. My fence is gonna name a boat after me! His partner looks like he's sitting on a box, maybe even playing with a musical instrument, but he pulls a shotgun on me fast enough when I step up to him. A short space away, after what seems like the fourth time Ive had to stop to Rest, a flying clock tries to hide in a tree. I shoot him with my Throwing Knives, and he drops out of the tree like a dead sparrow in real life from my air gun.
My girlfriend comes in from doing me a favor and tries to pull a trick on me. See, my car has an auto-lock, and every thirty seconds it activates. She tries to tell me that she forgot and left the keys in the car with the windows up, and it locked, so the keys are stuck in there. I keep on playing the game, and as I talk to her and tell her I dont believe her, I level up! 13, woo hoo! In the meantime, I let her know that shes hiding her left hand, and that means shes holding the keys. Nice try. I love her, but she needs to practice to get better at being sneaky. I keep playing, nonchalantly. Heh.
I level up, not really planning too much on where I place my new enhancement slots. I tend not to bother slotting them until level 15 anyway. The next mission has Trolls, and I use my Nemesis Staff on him exactly as he throws a chunk of sewer rock at me, knocking us both on our collective keisters at the same time. The weird thing lately is that, on these radio missions, when I click on a glowie it tells me I have a clue, but theres nothing there. When did that bug start? Maybe Ill send a bug report next time Im on. Gah, who knows when that will be? Sooner, I mentally vow. Sooner!
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp