Journal of a first-time MMORG player
By
187nut,
Posted on: 2005-01-20 01:10 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
Not having my computer for so long was horrible. I was only supposed to be down for a week and it ended up being closer to a month. I'm bald now.....I pulled out all my hair.
Tpull was no help of course, I think he enjoyed making fun of me while I was without the computer. At the same time tho he has payed for it. I know where he lives 
Entry 52
Sometimes I wish I lived in a different time zone, if only because there are some fun players on after midnight. After a few days in real life of not being able to play, I log on Ultra Meltdown for some fun. I get snapped up fairly quick for the Sister Psynapse Task Force, and it's a weird one. We start with eight players, and one has to leave. Business as usual. Then another disappears, and the leader drops without a word after halfway through. The five left are doing well, but our fifth suddenly says this sucks and leaves. Huh? Well okay, but the remaining four of us rocket through at a much faster pace. One guy logs back on when we're on our way to the final mission, but I guess our new team leader kicks him, because he sends a tell to the leader saying we stink. Why he thought he could log after being gone for more than half a TF without a word to anyone and log back on, I have no idea. At the end, Clamor goes down fairly easily, and I get to add another TF to my belt notch.
After a time logged off (real life keeps intruding, grr...), I go back in! Invite comes to do a Respec, and it's done properly. Meaning my team seek is not on, but I get a tell sent, rather than a blind invite. If I'm free for a Respec or a TF and they send a tell, I'll usually join in, it's a hint that they know proper etiquette. I'm a sucker for etiquette. I die a couple times, but overall our tank Lip Gloss keeps us safe. A Five-person team, me the blaster, Sub - Zero the controller, and two scrappers, Bill Smith and Paragon Hunter. Poor Sub - Zero, he has Super speed and nothing else, just like my healer CRM, it takes him forever to get to the Terra Volta reactor. I die once in there, and use my last Awaken. Sub - Zero gets pegged, and we're in the middle of a fight, so he goes to the hospital. Gah! The final wave is coming as Sub - Zero makes his way back. We leave one Sky Skiff up and let Lip Gloss run around taunting it until he gets back in the reactor, it doesn't take him too long after we've whittled the enemy down to one anyway.
Lip Gloss has to run, and the rest of us are chatting about various things when someone spots that Lucas is up. Well, we can't log without going after him now, can we? Don't look at your watch... I die a couple times and realize I should snipe only, anything else is certain death. For this much debt, there better be a badge in it! Yes, Ultra gets the second Devilfish badge, after CRM. Now if only Flashback can get here soon, so Martial Master can go back and join in the fun.
Okay, a TF, a Respec, and a monster badge. I can't go to sleep without at least planning a little of my Respec. Or doing it all the way, that is. Time to fix some of the problems when I tried to go cookie-cutter. I swap Hurdle for Health, to finally try the power out for myself. I plan to get Hover for vertical movement anyway, and Fly for the Shadow Shard. I am going to do something potentially risky and slot up Electric Fence, since it's almost up there on the Brawl index with Power Bolt. I want to experiment for a change with an unusual build, and finally try to make this power they stick you with from the beginning a little more useful. I'll skip Power Bolt for now, I can always snap it up later if I want. Charged Brawl comes back, so I don't need to get Air Superiority again; this is followed by Power burst, Sniper Blast, and Havoc Punch. We're going to do some blapper stuff after all. I can't resist Hasten and Super Speed, I love the speed. Can't help it. I'm addicted to speed. There, I said it! This still gets me to Stamina at 20, but with seven powers, and I even have a little experience with Havoc Punch on the test server. Aim, Build Up, and Hover come next. That way, I have some time before I decide how I want to slot Hover and Fly. Decisions, decisions. Slotting is actually the hardest. I can't give up all the slots I'm used to on this guy with my blasts for the blapper stuff. I just can't. I resolve to do a blapper later, and hold the melee attacks for when I have to use them. I'll still slot my other stuff first. The good news is I have Hasten, Stamina, Sniper Blast, and Power Blast fully slotted. The bad news is I haven't figured out how to slot anything more in Electric Fence!
I've got a global buddy Crenson who sent me a tell after reading this journal, and he has a high level Electric blaster, so I've been chatting with him for some advice. Finally I decide to just have fun with the build, and slot Electric Fence all the way up. Stamina goes back to five slots so I can put one more in Havoc Punch just for testing. I lock in my crazy ideas before I can change my mind. If this turns out to be as big a mistake, I'll Respec at 34, but I also want to experiment with unusual builds just to see what the survival rate is. And the fun quotient. I can't forget the fun! I set my title to the Legendary Ultra Meltdown, and skip the second title. I don't need to have two titles every time, just because they're available. Look at me, bucking convention. Must be because it's after four in the morning...
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
[ QUOTE ]
Must be because it's after four in the morning...
[/ QUOTE ]
Been there, done that. I can relate. 
There just aren't enough hours in the night to save the world! 
"Goodbye, Jean-Luc. I'm gonna miss you... you had such potential. But then again, all good things must come to an end..." -- Q
This thread delivers. And as a fellow first timer to the genre, I can relate to so much of it. I have to wonder about you waiting for flashback for MM to get the Devilfish badge. Other than actually being in IP when he spawns, I see no reason you can't get it. If you worry about xp distribution in the team, you could always examplar.
Entry 53
I keybind Aim and Build Up for the first time, so Ultra Meltdown can make room for all his attacks, and head to the store to load up on enhancements. Along the way, I pick on some poor Outcasts in Steel Canyon to try and break my habit of hitting a certain number for a ranged attack, since I don't have Power Bolt any more. After I'm loaded with enhancements, I simply have to test out how it works, and get a feel for things. Ugh, is Hover slow without its slots. Just my luck, I'm in that awkward place where my enhancements are all 25, I'm at level 26, and I don't have enough cash to buff up and still afford level 30 enhancements when I get to 27. This might be a bit of a grind. I'm enjoying the solo time as well, with my character though. I go Tsoo hunting, and find I run through a lot of END, but everything seems to work well. Then I go after some Ink Men, not realizing there's a yellow-con Underboss right there. Hospital. Oh, for any kind of status protection!
I'm tired, so it takes me a little longer to get everything lined up right, but after running for a bunch of courier and street-hunting missions, I finally get an indoor mission. I stop sniping and realize I can save time by using a couple melee attacks on the lower-ranked minions. I also realize I have Power Burst back, and I haven't even been using it. The only thing I'm missing in this build is my Power Bolt, and the melee attacks definitely do more damage than that. Even this is not a fair test, as the mission is old, and the boss cons blue to me. But since I'm rubbing my eyes, I figure I better quit while I'm ahead. Maybe this binge-playing is trying to make up for nearly a week of inaction?
I put together a team the next day for Ultra Meltdown, and after a while the team meshed so well, I made a visit to the people who spread vicious rumors about you. Got my difficulty slided up a notch. Ultra Meltdown seems to have a few contacts with old missions, so anything to make it more challenging. I level up a couple times with two different teams, but nobody says grats. Sometimes it's because people don't notice it, others it's because you're in the middle of the fight. It's strange how it's become such a part of the game, that it's like when you sneeze and the person next to you doesn't say "bless you." At this stage, I'm actually sensitive to the etiquette in other ways as well. Half of my team members throughout the day drop without saying a word. I'm not sure if that's because I'm in the mid-20s, or if this is common at all levels now. Others take the opportunity to say goodbye when they get knocked out, and I can relate to that. There's finally a break in the action, and you realize it's going to take a while to get back to the mission, and it's probably better if you log and go breathe some outside air.
I help a level 19 Controller get rid of her Vahz wasting disease. She's really appreciative, and I tell her all the xp-obsessive people have already left the team, as one person complained about a mission being too low and left. I had a different plan today for Ultra. Today was a day of beneficence, and if a lower-level player needed help, I would ask to Exemplar to him or her. Debt gets worked off faster, and I can earn a bit more Influence to buy Enhancements, and it helps out lower level players. No matter what you choose to do in this game, you just can't lose!
I was originally going to do this 'community service" with characters I got to level 50, but it works with pretty much any character that's high enough to Exemplar in the first place. I figure these levels are where a lot of people are obsessed with xp per hour, so if I spend a couple hours helping others, those people will pass me by, and I'll find other people who aren't so anxious. by this point, I know I'm going to level up fairly well, especially with my other characters the hardest time I'm having is with this Blaster, as a matter of fact, and I suspect that's mostly due to going solo and not getting my build quite the way I want it.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 54
Later in the night I log on solo, and get a hunting mission. If there's anything that's grind at this point, it's the hunt 30 missions. I go after some Freaks, and they're trying to jack a car. Hey, I just stopped other Freaks from taking that same car a couple minutes ago! On my third circuit back, sure enough, two more are there. They must really want that car. My fourth trip around, and five (!) of them are there. Aim + Build Up and an Energy Torrent later, they're all sleeping soundly. I get a blind invite and accept just to see what happens. Nothing. I type in, "Why are you issuing me a blind invite and not even welcoming me to the team?" No response. I quit. That was fun. Weirdos.
My slotting is a little off, but workable. By this I mean I can use Electric Fence all the time with one END reducer in it, but my Power Blast really could use at least one more slot. I slotted my Sniper Blast and Energy Torrent at the expense of the other attacks, and it makes the others not quite worth using most of the time. Overall, my squishy is dying about as often as I used to, so the Respec works. My hotkeys are a work in progress, as after I use Aim + Build Up, I tend to hit a wrong key that I have rigged to say gratz, instead of my snipe. I'm also twitching to use another range attack, but my Power Bolt is gone. I may have to bring it back after all. It doesn't feel like a complete complement of range tools without at least three ranged attacks. Electric Fence doesn't quite fit.
I get a tell asking to join a team, so I give it chance. The team lead is not too coordinated. We've got a mission we're practically standing on in Striga, but he heads to his IP contact to get another one. When some players quit, he wants us to wait until he gets two more to join. I could have done a whole mission in the time we're standing around. The healer of the team has Assault, but no Fortitude. They launch the fight without buffing the team. One casts Accelerate Metabolism, but doesn't catch us all in it. And one Tank just sort of... stands there. The AM wears off, but the healer doesn't use RA. Throughout all of this, no one dies, so I hang around out of a morbid sense of curiosity. Can this team make it through without a death? The other Tank is spamming his taunt more than any I have ever heard before now, so it might work. Plus, we're going up against super-slow enemies like Totems.
They don't seem to concentrate on the Shamans first, as I'm used to. I start picking them off myself, at the risk of getting their attention. A red-conning Totem sets his sites on me, and I back up. The healer, who has been hanging back with me the whole time while I snipe, doesn't follow me. Instead, he types in, "Can't heal when you run." If he'd gone after me for two seconds, he could have stopped my health from going red, instead of typing to chastise me. I know from playing both a healer and a blaster, sometimes a blaster simply has to run. I also know from being CRM that a good healer can chase a member every now and then if the rest of the group is doing okay, I don't let teammates die just because they get a little separated from the herd when a red-con goes after him.
One of the tanks and someone else dies in a fight that takes forever. I notice on one mob, the scrapper of the team actually hangs back more than I do. Weird. Everyone is still not focusing on the Shamans, and their effects prevent me from sniping. So, I buckle down and turn into a blapper, running up to them and going all out until they're down. It's amazing how long it takes seven people to take down a mob. RA and AM just aren't coming up. It's only because we have two tanks that people aren't dropping left and right. The tank runs in and taunts an attack on us that ruins my snipe, so I run into melee again and proceed to take out about five Shamans, while everyone else flops around like fish on the ground or hits the Totems. The tank taunts from right in the middle of our group, inviting a mass attack from the next Totem. This is just utterly amazing by now. It's like watching a car crash, you can't turn away no matter how horrible it is. And despite it all, only two deaths. In the final mob, I tackle each Shaman in turn, keeping my eye on a flopping tank, who is still targeted on a Totem. Ehh, I should have stayed solo. The group breaks up as soon as we're done, and I go arrest Dr. Goldsmith solo, in less than fifteen minutes. Well, considering last night's teams were so good, and today's earlier teams were decent, I was due for a so-so experience, wasn't I?
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
While your teaming experience may be so-so occasionally, your journal entries are always great! Please keep sharing.
~Yydr
Entry 55
Trying to do Circle of Thorn missions solo as Ultra Meltdown is hard! I even activate my temporary power that is supposed to protect me from harm, but the ghostly spirits attacking me send me to the hospital easily enough, even with it on. Does this thing work? Team seek does no good, there's no one available, except a level 29 scrapper who joins and then says there won't be any xp in it for him. I tell him to never mind, I'll find someone else willing to help. I can't be upset at that, if he doesn't want to Exemplar or something, I don't want to hold him back. As a hero, if someone is actually asking for my help, I try to do it if I can, even if the xp is crummy. But I know I have already cast myself as an ambassador for the game of sorts, while others are in it for maximum xp gain. Plus, I actually do try to do what a super-hero would do, so I'm thinking if Robin went and asked Superman for help, Supes would jump in no matter how much easier it was for him. I am so corny sometimes... Nobody else answers my call. I stock up on candy and try again. Yup, the temp power doesn't work at all here. I retreat before I die. Am I going to have to lower the difficulty setting so soon after I just raised it?
I snap up a guy from the recent Respec, Sub - Zero, and send a tell to Zeus Prime, asking for help, since time is so low. We head on in and start tackling things, and I notice Sub clicks on a blinkie. I've got one temp power from the mission, and I know there are two, so I ask him not to click on the blinkies, since I would like to get the powers. He types in, "lol," and that's it. When he clicks on another, I send him a tell, and say seriously please don't click. He says he already got a power, and I type, "thanks for nothing," in my normal sarcastic way. He takes offense and quits the team. What I did not know was that he got the temp power in the first blinkie he clicked, and he knew I had the second one, so that was why he kept clicking on the rest, he knew it didn't matter anymore. But when I made my comment, he took it seriously and got offended. I track him down after the mission and talk to him about it, because he was so cool on our previous Respec, I'm wondering what is up. We get straight that I had asked him too late, he already had the power, and I understand he took my comment a little too seriously, and we make up. Im feeling good about this, since often someone will do something and immediately put you on an ignore list. Every so often we have to remind ourselves that this is just a game, and it's really better to make friends, rather than walk away pissed off because someone did something like "steal" one of "your" virtual powers, or take a comment too personally. Sub - Zero was willing to talk and to listen, and I was willing to apologize for my part and ask if he still wanted to hang, and that little bit of effort keeps a cool friend, as opposed to doing the /ignore bit, which is really easy. Makes me think we should have an additional message when we go to do it, that says, "Are you sure? This is just a game,' or something like that. After we make up and talk about the game and life and stuff, I tell him it's cool that he was willing to talk rather than walk away. Then I type in, "Will u marry me? Rofl" We start laughing and part on good terms.
Oh, the mission? Zeus Prime and I each got knocked out once (did the Devs push the extra squishy' button on their control pad when they made us?), but we found the rest of the artifacts and destroyed the two altars, and took out the boss. Then we took down the goons around him and made a circuit of the cavern, taking down everyone we found. We were tackling the final bad guy in the cavern when the clock ran down. Mission failure! Oh, but we were soooo close. That was exciting. It still gave me 500 xp and took off 500 debt, so I'm thinking I only lost out on maybe 1000 xp.
I go on the warpath to get the most out of my Sands of Mu, and notice that quite often, the attacks occur, but the animation doesn't. This happens with both Charged Brawl and Bone Smasher a lot too, where it looks like I'm just standing still in front of an enemy, and they get knocked to the ground or convulse in an electric seizure. Hey, it would be neat if we could just make them twitch like that with our minds. I get shoved around by citizens on the street as I line up for a snipe on a Consigliere. I don't care if I don't have status protection, and I know I can't alpha strike him yet. I'm working on a one-two punch attack that I can still carry out, even if he's surrounded by goons. It works this time! I may not have SR, or the hit points of a Scrapper, but I can still take calculated risks. It's part of the fun I have when solo, to really test how far my character can handle a situation at each level of development. Even a blue-conning Consigliere can clean my clock, so that one's always a risk.
A Mr. Untouchable is hunting wolves and vamps for the badges in Striga, and asks if I will help. He is a level 21 Tank, and he knows how to herd. As a matter of fact, he herds better than anyone else I've seen in the game. It's obvious from his playstyle that he has a higher-level character, and he confirms that. I'm not sure why there has been such a huge outcry against Knockback on the boards, I use it to great effect here. Energy Torrent's Knockback works great with Tanks! He Taunts, and once he sets them up, I bowl them over like tenpins, catching most of them in my blast radius. He's running around to herd different groups anyway, and he's a lower level, so it's not like he's going to do much damage before I knock them away. It's a match made in heaven. I can understand why in larger groups this might be a problem, but with groups of three or less, it's very beneficial. I wonder why nobody ever mentions that on the boards.
After some good hunting, we try to go after the Maestro, and I sidekick him. We get to the AV in the base, and I chew up all of my candy, including four CABs. No good. We end up watching as he slowly regenerates, because we just can't do quite enough to take him out. I recruit some people, and we get Green Nomad, Cosmic Hunter, and Baby Sitter to come on over and lend a helping hand. Everybody's really great, and we joke as we play. Maestro doesn't stand a chance now.
Another grief on the boards that I think I have concluded is false is the melee attacks. The Devs knew what they were doing with melee attacks for Blasters. If I take out one guy with an alpha strike, just one or two remaining guys can't get to within melee distance of me. When that happens, you've got to be able to deal with them. It's especially useful when solo. I'd rather have a powerful attack or two up close to finish these guys off than have everything invested in range, which doesn't help by the time you're in your mid-20s, unless you slot range enhancements in your attacks. I end up in melee more often than I want, so I'm going to say that the Devs have planned the powers out relatively well, although there really should have been at least one little defense power somewhere in the primary or secondary sets. If I could change one thing about Blasters, it would be to give them some type of force field or energy absorption before the Epic pools, I could come up with a different one for each power set.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Would love for you to make an alt on Protector and run some missions with us crazy Puma riding, Pie flinging, Protectorians. 
View the story of W.A.R.F.A.C.E. and Septimus Bane here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6785073/1/Meus_Profiteor#
my email chrismfears99@yahoo.com
I agree! Why should the other servers be blessed with your presence instead of our comfy little home?
"Goodbye, Jean-Luc. I'm gonna miss you... you had such potential. But then again, all good things must come to an end..." -- Q
I do happen to have one character on each server, I may have to call for a vote on which character I dedicate myself to next. At some point, I promise to list all my characters and which servers they are on. How's that sound?
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 56
I go to hunt some Family and get ambushed. Oh joy, we've reached that stage of the game. I'm not sure how the mission difficulty slider affects things such as ambushes. I've got my back turned engaging a different group, so I am defeated in short order. How embarrassing! Nobody higher than a white-con. After I do some street-thrashing, I go back to the contact and get a hunt Sky Raider mission next. Ambush again, only this time there's five of them, and yellow-cons mixed in. Two Family, but five Sky Raiders? There's another hero nearby, I may have picked up his ambushers as well. I use all my green candy, and take out all but one, and start running. Man their range is good! I manage to get a snipe off and paste him, with maybe five hit points left. I'm guessing Health is actually making a small contribution to that. On the way to get some Thorns, I pass through an open area in Talos to the north. Oh, it's where the arena is going to be! I hadn't traveled over it before now.
A lot of my habits from being a Scrapper are still heavily ingrained in me, so I do tend to bite off more than I can chew with Ultra Meltdown. I do so well taking out a solitary orange-conning Devouring Earth, I get greedy and go for a snipe on one in a group. I get held and sent to the hospital in short order. I simply have to relearn to fire and retreat, or at least go in with some backup. When I played Ultra months ago, I had just gotten into a good pattern of knowing exactly when to fall back a few paces, and when to run screaming like a little schoolgirl. Now I have to start those fighting habits again when I'm solo. I try to be a little safer in Terra Volta, after losing half my health in attacking a pack of Sky Raiders. I start picking off Freaks, and I use Hover as well. But I get caught. Stupid power lines! I can't go higher, and they get me again.
Back from the hospital, I'm wondering how the Raiders can peg me when I've already sniped and moved away. I remember sometimes the shots just follow you around a corner, but I'm around two corners by the time their attacks catch up with me, and one of them never ceases to knock me on my back. I start to be a little safer, though. Then, Godcry sends me a tell about a mission in Striga at level 29. With the way I'm performing right now, at level 26 with level 25 enhancements, I could use a good team, so I join in. I only hit my gratz hotkey by mistake twice. I'm getting better! We do a couple of good missions, and I level up to 27 finally. Almost get rid of all my debt as well, and I was near the debt cap for my level. As we finish the second mission, I tell them I'm going to go buy all the level 30 SOs I can get my armored mitts on. A couple people talk about how good the team was, and our healer mentions it's the best team she's been on for a while. A couple people say they're adding everyone to their friends list. Everyone!
I hit the science store in Talos, knowing I've yet to get either of the two possible Science contacts that can get me the other SOs. I'm going to have to load up on what I can. Tonight my goal was to burn through as many of my piddly hunt x' missions as I could to be introduced to one of those contacts. I'm not there yet. I run out of Influence anyway, but I do manage to get Accuracies and Recharges everywhere I need, and Damage into my Sniper Blast, Energy Torrent, and Havoc Punch. Electric Fence and Charged Brawl get the short end of the stick. It's probably a good thing I had so much debt, it gave me the opportunity to slow down and earn more Influence, which I knew I'd need. Now it's time to genuinely test out my Respec build, since I'm halfway-decently outfitted, so to speak.
I do a hunt 30 Thorns mission, swimming out to the northern islands of Talos. I can one-shot white-cons with my snipe again, and with Aim and Build Up, I can almost take out a Mage. If I can get my last enhancement from a 27 Damage to a 30, I think I can one-shot him too. I get all 30, but decide to tackle a group of seven white-cons. I snipe one, take out another, then have to run off the mountain. This gives me time to snipe again, take out a second with my Sands of Mu, and use my final candy Respite. The remaining three I take out, but I have to use a CAB to keep up, since my Stamina is five-slotted with old DOs. Much better overall!
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 57
Diamond Cut finally has a new computer that works, and we head straight into the Moonfire Task Force, firing on all cylinders. We end up with a team of seven, and four of us have heals! The Blaster dies. I was heading to heal him, but I was blocked by something. Probably the head of another healer! I don't know what everybody was doing, but I know he was in the front, and he was closer to the back for the rest of the evening. I was just embarrassed we had four healers, and somebody still died. As the night progresses, I make a couple jokes about how there aren't enough healers on the team. One thing I notice, the more I use Super Speed, the more I like Super Jump!
One player drops at the end of Task Force Starstruck, but we just grab a Blaster and head right into the Ernesto Hess TF next. We are now Task Force Paradox! Funny coincidence, I had been running around a night or two back thinking how cool it would be if I could knock out the Council's radar stations, so I thought the missions were neat, and the maps were also refreshing to go through. One player who had obviously done the TF before kept asking if we wanted to TP to the end to just take out the boss and move on. I guess I can understand that type of thinking, but for the most part I kept the team together, because it was my first time through these and I wanted to see as much as I could. Also, experience from previous task forces tells me that every time the team splits up, someone ends up taking a dirt nap. Diamond Cut laughs at that, but most of us bite the big one as two of our number are somewhere else. In another mission, the subject comes up again as the same person rushes to the end of the mission. We let it go this time, but we're also fighting a mob, so Diamond Cut tells her to TP everyone else first, leave me and him for last. So she tries to TP me first. I'm glad we can refuse those now. I repeat that I go next to last and DC goes last, and it gets done right this time. On the way out of another mission, I forget where we are exactly, jump over a wall, and right into some Council guards who are much, much higher in level than I am! Ouch!
This is a mixed feeling Task Force (Paradox indeed!), because I know we had a couple "veterans" in the group besides DC and I, but every time I let things play out when someone was down, I had to step in and ask for someone to get to safety and TP the corpse to safety. If I had been barking orders as soon as it happened, we could have had them rezzed and back in the battle faster, but I wanted to give the team some rope. After another dirt nap of mine, I relayed the order of TPs to take place so that each of us could rez another in turn. Instead, I'm one of the last teleported, and instead of a rez, I get an Awaken, which delays my ability to Rez. Overall not too many deaths, and we got the job done, but it was nowhere near the flawless Synapse TF from earlier. There's also a trick at the end of Hess that results in one last death for me and DC, but after two seconds of thinking about it, I figure an easy way I could have avoided it. The debt doesn't last too long anyway. We must have played for almost six hours that night. We were so beat. But we beat the deadline for doing the Hess TF, since we knew it was going away as soon as Issue 4 came out (Note: at the time I had this mixed up with Calvin Scott's TF. The Hess TF is stilll there, don't get scared!). This seems different from other MMORGs, as far as I can tell. A good group mission, but it's only here for a small amount of time, and then it goes away forever? Just to advance the in-game story? Interesting! I think I like it, but all my poor alts who aren't high enough to do it...
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
[ QUOTE ]
I had to step in and ask for someone to get to safety and TP the corpse to safety.
[/ QUOTE ]
Of course if CRM had Recall Friend he could have tp'd that person to safety himself instead of asking. I keep telling him that tp is a great addition to a defender's powers, but he doesn't listen.
Okay, Red is a big stinker! We have a long-running joke about this, as we go back and forth telling the other he should get Recall Friend. It seems not a mission goes by without one of us saying, "If you had TP, I'd be there already." We rib each other about it daily.
In all seriousness, he's the first to missions most of the time, and he navigates maps better than anyone else I've ever seen. He is gonna be so impatient when my new character has to tank nex!
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Entry 58
On again the very next night, as Diamond Cut and CRM tear a path of destruction through Paragon City, arresting the ne'er-do-wells nonstop. Okay, we stopped for dinner, but then we went right back to work again! We clear the missions for my Contact so I can buy other SOs, for things like running speed. "I am so stupid," I tell DC. "I bought Stamina SOs. He laughs at me, since he knows this is the first character I've been successful without having the Fitness line. I actually bought them out of habit! For this reason, DC still has influence, but I go broke. 
There's a timed mission, but I ask DC if he wants to test himself and do another whole mission first, then try to beat the clock on the timed. I used to do it with Martial Master to spice things up when I was solo. He agrees, and we have no problems. Later he ends up taking two missions and they both end up timed. On our way to the second mission, I say I'm taking bets on how much time we'll have left over when we finish it. DC says we'll probably only need twenty minutes, probably, and he's about right, but I think we finish it closer to fifteen minutes. We're coasting through Invincible missions and wondering if this is really the highest notch they could give us. I mention maybe we should stop doing missions and just go find some purples for a challenge. Instead, he starts herding a little in a Sky Raider mission full of orange- and red-cons. He races around the top deck, gathering everyone in the room as they whomp on him. I jump in as his health bar goes to red, and start taking collateral fire myself. I start alternating heals and buffs, and drag out Absorb Pain a time or two, even. We finish off all of them, at full health. He speeds away, asking me how I liked that. That was fun! Let's do it again! It was even more fun since he didn't tell me he was going to do it, so I had to notice his change-up in tactics and react fast to keep him alive. He's lucky I'm his friend and want to keep him alive, if I was of lesser integrity, he would have been face-planted so fast his costume would have skid marks. Maybe we can find a squishy to invite along that will give me more fun things to do. As an Invul Scrapper, my heals seem superfluous much of the time. But I know he's glad I'm there when it counts, it's an awesome blast to be playing the game with my best friend.
We both level up to 29, and I go put my final slot in Healing Aura, and another so I have Hasten three-slotted. I'm loving being able to do a build without feeling the absence of the Fitness line. DC is going faster than ever, knowing the maps to the missions like the back of his hand. I'm terrible with maps, and this is my first MMORG, while he's done a few before this, so I don't think he realizes exactly how much he rules the game already. He knows he owns it, so to speak, but from my observation point, he's moving even faster than he did as Red Haven, which makes me wonder if Regen is really better than the Invul I'm watching now. At least with a healer on hand to keep him out of serious danger. We play until we're beat, and he gets to go to sleep, but I still have to type this dren up for the Journal while it's fresh in my mind...
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
In my "not so" humble opinion, an Invulnerability Scrapper with the support of a "healer" will seem more powerful than a Regen Scrapper with the same "healer". The Invulnerable one will take less substantially less damage (due to inate resists and defenses) and your healing will give him the recuperative powers similar to a Regen. Very few powers can provide the Regen with resists and defenses. So the Regen will be at a disadvantage.
When playing on a team composed of two AR/DEV Blasters, an Illusion/Empathy Controller, and my Regen Scrapper, I told the defender [paraphrased of course ], "I'll take Fortitude. However, concentrate your heals on the Blasters, keep them alive. If I need healing, I'm already dead."
This was right before I jumped into a spawn of 20, +2 Nemesis Jaegers with a Sniper in the bunch.
Needless to say we were victorious. The Nemesis didn't fare so well
"Goodbye, Jean-Luc. I'm gonna miss you... you had such potential. But then again, all good things must come to an end..." -- Q
Entry 59
Diamond Cut calls me and says there's an anniversary Respec for all of us. I get so excited, I run in and Respec Ultra Meltdown, but I do it almost entirely wrong. I keep the Fitness line, and ditch Hasten and Super Speed. Groan, not again! I realize what I've done as soon as I hit finish. I'm broke, with no contact yet from whom I can get SOs for Stamina. And S Speed and Hasten at least gave me a little defense, and now I have none. I took Fly again, which I love for this character, but it's a little slow. The slotting on Electric Fence is gone, it was fun for a while, but not quite efficient enough to keep. Instead, I 6-slot Power Bolt, Power Blast, Sniper Shot, and Havoc Punch. This way I can one-shot a white-con with my snipe, run in to take out another with my Punch, and then take out whatever third enemy is there. It's nice to have my Bolt back, but without Hasten, my sense of timing is off, and I keep pressing for my Blast before it cycles. And with no speed, it takes a looong time for me to get close enough to my next foe to face-plant him with Havoc Punch. Sigh. Gonna have to take Hasten and S Speed for my next two levels. Hey Devs, I need another Respec...
I get chain-held a couple times on a Banished Pantheon mission. It's timed, so I stop to grab help. On the Team Seek menu, I invite a Tank, but he declines. I'm never sure why people have team seek on if they turn down the invite without a word. Half the time I send a tell even to the people on Team Seek, but I don't want to pester him with questions, so I resolve to finish this myself. I'm up against yellow-con Shamans and orange-con Totems, which would be fine if I wasn't down to a sliver of health, and then I miss three times in a row, sometimes with Aim and/or Build Up going. Grr. When I'm through getting Martial Master and CRM to 50, I'm gonna have to find a partner for Ultra Meltdown. I resign myself to switching my mission slider difficulty back down to the lowest setting.
Part of it is my character concept, I know. I refuse to have Stealth with this guy, and I don't quite have enough room in the build for Fitness and Fighting, so Tough is out. Half the time, I'm dying from villains at range anyway. Level 27 seems to be the toughest part of leveling a Blaster for me, personally, as far as I can remember. Last time I died so much was when Martial Master was hunting solo around level 17. I have a little sympathy for some of the board-talk, since the mob can shoot their regular attacks just as far I can shoot my snipe attack. I figure I need to group more, or at least solo down at the lower difficulty level. I have actually been looking for teammates to group with the entire time, but it's been a dry well for this level, and one above and below it, whenever I'm online. That happens occasionally. One thing I notice, CRM gets blind invites four or five times a night, Martial Master gets two to four,... my Blaster never gets any. Period. I wonder what that means?
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
Extra-long 4th of July Task Force Entry!
Entry 60
The next day, we log on early and go to do the Calvin Scott Task Force, before it goes away. Bice is on again, so he comes along, natch. Another Peacebringer, Khel Orbit joins, as does Lavita the Blaster, and a Blaster who shall remain nameless. The Nameless Blaster keeps asking for a Tank, despite my telling him DC will tank. Then he calls out for a healer?!? "Ahem. I AM a healer..." Mizz Storm joins us as a Defender, and our last member is Lord Miz, who turns out to be a Tank. An eight-person team!
I tell Mizz Storm my primary heal is DC, and ask if she can have Lord Miz as her primary. She says she can cover everybody. Really. On our way to the first mission, the Nameless Blaster tells me I should take the Fitness line. DC is already calling me on the phone, can't stand this guy. We're laughing at the idea that he's telling me what powers to take, but I know DC has little patience for incompetent people. On my way back to the contact for our next mission, the Blaster asks if we can hurry it up. This is gonna be a long Task Force...
It takes a couple missions before I spot our name. We are Task Force Hope! How appropriate. I had told DC this would be more of a challenge for us, because we went straight from being at the top-tier levels for a TF down to the bottom rungs. The Calvin Scott TF is for levels 30-35, and I'm only 30, DC is 31. We were even, but he kept running around, "just getting badges," and "setting us up" for getting the story arcs that give us other badges. Except I find out later he also went and did all the NPC Store missions from Brickstown and Founder's Falls. Only the necessary missions, hmm? I remind myself to refresh his memory of the pact he decided to announce himself, that he wouldn't play so much without me. But later, not now.
Needless to say, on an eight-person mission, Mizz Storm couldn't cover everybody. DC jumps on a catwalk, and I follow to keep him alive. I realize there's no way I can jump down to heal others and get back in time for DC, but we're dropping slowly, one by one. I call for a retreat, and stay until I see DC withdraw. Not enough, when he's out of my sight, DC takes a dirt nap. I regroup with the three of us alive, and we hold our own until the small group attacking us is down and out. I start passing out Awakens and rezzing people, and I repeat, yet again, for people to follow the lead of Diamond Cut. "He's faster and the best at navigating the map," I tell them. They all fall into line this time. Funny what a little debt does to people. I love a Task Force!
The Nameless Blaster keeps running back when he's hit, way out of the range of the others. Every other time I got to heal him, I have to backtrack a little to catch him in my heal. I don't say anything, since it's not costing anyone his or her life yet. We keep going up against a ton of purples, though, so there are a couple more deaths. The lovely Mizz Storm, who declared she was all the healer we needed, quits without warning, even though one of the first things I always say before we start a TF is," The only thing I ask is that you stay, do not quit until the end of a mission." Meh. It's fine, really, her statement kind of tipped me off, so I half-expected it. She wasn't bad, just had unrealistic expectations. But often those people do not stick it out with you.
Whenever I have to consider kicking someone from the team (a rarity), I send a tell to all members, to ask for their vote, yea or nay. It has to be unanimous. I see some warning signs for the Nameless blaster, so I do a pre-check with DC in case we get in a rush later, partly because I already know what his answer will be. "Gone." I stop there, though, because I want to give him one last chance. It works well, as he seems to have gotten it out of his system. He's not whining about our other healer being gone, he's not bothering others to speed up, and he's not offering his sage advice on how to play other people's characters. He must have gotten it all out of his system, because now he's mostly just playing. He's just not going to be on a team with us in the future, that's all. That doesn't happen very often, and I'm glad to still be able to say that in this game.
Throughout the various missions, I get to be more active, since I'm the healer. I'm liking the character more and more as I provide the keys to survival for most of these large groups. I'm also revising my slotting plans to figure out the best ways to buff others, rather than slotting my attacks. Oh, I'll still slot my attacks, make no mistake, but I'm starting to wonder how much more effective I can make Fortitude and Adrenalin Boost, when I get that power. Absorb Pain is coming in handy a few times, so once again I'm glad I chose the power. It's not used every mission, but when it does, it truly makes the difference. The Nameless Blaster for some reason gets it into his head that it would be a good idea to sidekick me. I tell him no, but he offers anyway. I decline the offer and say no again, and he replies, "whatever." I wanted to make this as big a challenge as I could for me, having a full team to heal while I was the lowest-level member. The only time I died was against the AV, and a sidekick definitely would not have helped any there. I'm not gonna kick the guy, but he's finally starting to annoy me almost as much as he annoys DC. DC sends a tell that he never gets invited to one of our shindigs again. I laugh, but I have to agree.
I think everyone's debt is gone by the time we get to the last couple missions, and disaster strikes. Brickstown is lag city, and my computer freezes as I go to zone into Crey's Folly. I manage to log back on, but I can't be leader anymore, which means I can't read the text, which wouldn't be so bad except this TF is going away! Argh! I do love my flavor text. Why couldn't this happen on any other TF? The good news is DC is the leader, so I don't have to worry about someone messing things up. I log back on, and he knows he can't transfer it back to me, but he reminds me I can read the text under the "i" on our map/navigation menu. It's not the same, but I take what I can get. He also sends me on the courier mission to Azuria, so I get to read that text. He's such a good friend! I figure I'll just ransack the boards for the rest of the story later.
The AV in the final mission takes a ton of us down, and we use our Awakens and rez to try again, but we face-plant another time. Lord Miz points out he's the only one who hasn't died, and he's the Tank. I joke about everybody letting him die, and he cracks back about the heals are going to stop, while I send an emote about whistling nonchalantly. It's a pretty good group, overall! I ask everyone down to go to the hospital, and by the time we get back, the AV is fully healed. We gather together and I buff the heck out of everyone (not as nasty s it sounds). Clear Mind is a savior here, and to think I was considering a Respec out of it. "Blasphemy," Khel Orbit says. I say, "Ok, let's rock," and we take the guy down with no more casualties, in a well-coordinated attack that handles him quite nicely. Somewhere in there, I level up to 31! I petition the Devs for a souvenir, since I read you have to in order to get it for the Calvin Scott TF.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
I have read all of your post and look foward to more. I set it to go to my e-mail whenever theres an update. I would do this too but I'm not as good with names.
Hey, thanks. Actually, at this point in my writing, I just started writing down the names during a break during a Task Force. Easy to remember who did what later when you're dealing with names like Crazy8s and Mandibular Man, as opposed to three 'Mikes' and two 'Tinas'...
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
I am always amazed by the ability of a crappy player to switch back and forth between not so bad and so bad I want to kick them. I am convinced the bad times are when they are munching too much candy, caffiene or beer.
Thanks for the journals, they're a lot of fun.
[ QUOTE ]
DC is already calling me on the phone
[/ QUOTE ]
FYI. Team Speak works great. My SG has had to play without it for a week. It's been a very long week!
I know! DC actually has it, but my USB port doesn't work right now. I have to wait for my new computer to be built, and then it's probably going to be Teamspeak all the way. Should be ready in less than a month!
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp
With my comments about CoV and Issue Updates, you can probably figure out about how far in the past I'm writing. Since I am posting more frequently, it's getting closer and closer to real-time.
Entry 51
Okay, I freely admit it now, I'm an addict. Diamond Cut's computer is down, he's getting a new one, and he's had so much bad luck with it, it's not even funny anymore. So while I tease him mercilessly, and we invent a new term that's worse than Murphy's Law, I log on Ultra Meltdown and work off all of his debt. I join one blind invite for the heck of it, and it's not the greatest group, but nobody dies, either. I'm getting spoiled, I think, after all of the great teaming. A normal team isn't good enough anymore, I want the fun that comes with great teams. Or just like a high school student who hates mediocrity, if I can't get an A, at least give me an F. If I join a terrible team, at least I'll have another war story, a nightmare or a tale of triumph in helping them to improve. The worst thing is to be in an unremarkable team, with nothing to report about them, I might as well go solo. Some of it is the chatter, this group was mostly radio-silent, but not because they were pedal-to-the-metal, attacking all-out and non-stop, they just didn't have anything to say. It's hard to enjoy the interaction part of the game when everyone on the team is like that.
The next night, I take him to level 24 finally, and get my Build Up back, after losing it in my foolish Respec way back when. I notice that when he kneels to Rest, my character looks like Darth Vader, and I make a note to ditch his cape on the regular main costume, it just doesn't fit. I'll do it when I have money, my characters are always broke at this level. I complete a story arc, and feel let down when the reward is only a DO at this level. Ultra Meltdown is Energy/Electric, so I'm acutely aware of some of the dislike for Knockback. When I'm solo, it can save my neck, but in a group, I find I'm saving it for the end, and using it to finish off a thug or two. It's not as exciting as using it to knock a vast group of baddies on their collective rears, sending them flying and enjoying the massive doses of numbers floating above their heads. Makes me wonder if I should slot it any more, or just keep it as more of an emergency button, to sweep back someone who gets too close. I'm still recovering from the bad Respec choices I made, so I should be slotting up my two bread-and-butter attacks more anyway, get them back to where they were, before I worry about anything else. That, and maybe finding Respec team and undo some damage to my beloved Blaster.
I'm feeling a lot of love for CRM with my use of him, but Ultra was the second character I created, and the energy attacks are great animations. I think I'm always going to enjoy using this character. Each one has a slightly different personality that I assume, and it depends on the archetype. With CRM, it disturbs me when somebody falls in battle. As Martial Master, I jump in-between my teammates and the bad guys to take the hit for them if they get in trouble. Ultra Meltdown won't jump in the way, but he'll use his best Knockback power to take the heat off an ally in trouble, and blast for all he's worth to put the thug out of commission quickly. It occurs naturally with the powers you have, but I'm wondering if I can figure out how to roleplay a character out-of-archetype, so to speak, and not automatically slip into certain behaviors just because I'm playing a certain AT. Something to experiment with later.
I've got about 30 names picked out for City of Villains, depending on what powers we can choose. It will be interesting to see how many of them are already taken, since I plan on developing most of my characters as soon as the game is available. It will probably take me a day or two just to set up my costumes and names, who knows when I'll start actually playing? I'm feeling a sense of anticipation now for both Issue 4 and CoV. We just need Diamond Cut to get his new system first, because I read somewhere the Hess TF is already going away with the Update, something about the storyline moving along, and I haven't done it with a single character yet.
I have an idea! No wait...it's just gas.
Hellscorp