Did you know... The unofficial history thread
By
0zymandous,
Posted on: 2006-03-23 01:22 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
Did you know that players in any of the CoH Betas (Beta, Pre-order waves) were able to reserve a character name on all the live servers?
The character that was in the top slot at a designated time was reserved for that player on all the live servers for a period of time (a week or so IIRC). Of course you had to log into each server and create that character or you'd lose it after the time elapsed.
I still have my Beta character on several of the live servers 
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-that the name Rikti came from a conversation where I said "Rikki Tikki Tavi is a cool name. How can we get that into the game?"
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Whats sad is that i actually know who and what he's talking about which makes me feel extremely old. Admit it Jack, you stole the Snakes design from Nag and Nagaina (who i rooted for in the movie).
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Did you know...
...that 20th level Family used to spawn in Steel Canyon, shaking down Outcasts? (I miss them!)
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Did you know...
...that the 20th level Family that spawned in Steel Canyon would stand stock still and let player characters beat them senseless, and give them XP for it, to boot?
...that players would take advantage of this, under the unwritten rule of MMOGs that states: "It's not MY fault the developers haven't fixed it. They must not care too much if they haven't fixed it yet"?
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Whats sad is that i actually know who and what he's talking about which makes me feel extremely old. Admit it Jack, you stole the Snakes design from Nag and Nagaina (who i rooted for in the movie).
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My sister is only 18 and knows about Rikki Tikki Tavi... so it doesn't show much for our age. =P As for the Snakes, they moreso resemble the Yuan-Ti in the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Monstrous Manual... which has David "Zeb" Cook listed under Design Concept.
((yes, I'm aware that it strays from CoH into CoV D: ))
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Did you know that players in any of the CoH Betas (Beta, Pre-order waves) were able to reserve a character name on all the live servers?
The character that was in the top slot at a designated time was reserved for that player on all the live servers for a period of time (a week or so IIRC). Of course you had to log into each server and create that character or you'd lose it after the time elapsed.
I still have my Beta character on several of the live servers
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Well, the Beta Characters name. Not the actual character itself.
...And the whole thing was part of the infamous "Name Reservation Debacle".
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Poster: LiquidX
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Did you know...
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That the confirmation box for Teleport was added after players complained because various idiots were using it for griefing purpouses?
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Yup. SG buddy of mine was a pioneer of death by kindness. 
But killing a bad person is wrong..... Well after about 10 times. 
(Virtue/Champion) Neil Fracas: Inv/SS
(Virtue) Gideon Fontaine: MA/SR (Sc), Generic Hero 114: Ice/Cold, Marcus Tyler AR/En, Project F: Spines/DA (S)
(Champion) Jenna Sidal BS/SD, Generic Hero 114: En/En (Bl), Loganne Claws/WP (Sc)
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...And the whole thing was part of the infamous "Name Reservation Debacle".
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Emphasis on "Debacle".
Formerly Fx_10
It's like someone taped two ninjas together to make a giant ninja!
Founder of Team Awesome!
Official Justice Chairperson of Awesomeness
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Did you know...
That back in the Beta for CoH, Statesman once sent a monster after a group that tried to grief him (Not realizing who it was they were teaming with...)?
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Wasn't it something like he despawned brickstown and then spawned a Requim next to them?
Mind you, they had sk'd him, teamed with him, took him to bricks, and then kicked and unsk'd him from team in the red area of bricks, IIRC.
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I think it was something like he quit team, spawned Kronos or some other similar Giant Monster (back when they had levels... a lvl 50 GM!) and totally obliterated his former team.
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Anger States and you will feel the might of his Nerf Bat..
Or in this case, his Nerf Wand of Pwnage Summoning...
Statesman Gains 35 L33tness Points
Statesman's Current Score: 250 L33tness, 65 ZOMG, 99 LAWL, INTERNETS!
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Did you know...
That back in the Beta for CoH, Statesman once sent a monster after a group that tried to grief him (Not realizing who it was they were teaming with...)?
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Wasn't it something like he despawned brickstown and then spawned a Requim next to them?
Mind you, they had sk'd him, teamed with him, took him to bricks, and then kicked and unsk'd him from team in the red area of bricks, IIRC.
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No, those were two separate occurances. As I recall, one happened as previously described; a team sked States, then left him high and dry in a very purple area, so he spawned a monster on them. The other occurence happened when a group of characters in their mid-20s were taking on the level 30+ enemies in Brickstown, and they were sending tells to Positron and Statesman about it, in kind of a "Hey Dad, look what I'm doing!" way. They responded by despawning the zone and spawning a level 40 AV near them, as if to say "Oh yeah? Try this on for size!" From the way I recall it, the AV in Brickstown was all in good fun.
Issue 16 made me feel like this.
Warning: This poster likes to play Devil's Advocate.
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- the Enhancement Diversification system was actually suggested by a forum poster rather than created from scratch by the devs?
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on a related note....
Did you know ....
- My very first forum guide to FF/Psy Blast was ripped to shreds (circa i3) for recommending players slot their secondarie attack with something other than damage . I'm unable to locate the original post, but I had received many PM's reguarding my slotting choice as being "stupid" and "unrealistic". Who knew one day we'd be slotting 2Acc/3Dam/1sleep in Will Domination. 
-The Elite-[50's]Va'Leria�X'hian�Stormy Monday�Radical Burn�Mo'Mentum�Heat-Source�Professor Blaze
-World Wide Evil, Inc-[50s]Soulfire�Perma.Frost�Kold Soul�Foxphyre�Pitch-Black�Corrupt Fusion�Cassanova Brown�Tyler Thorn�Iron Siren�Solaura�Fortunauta Wade�Look'Alike�Arctic Engineer
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Poster: LiquidX
.
Did you know...
.
That the confirmation box for Teleport was added after players complained because various idiots were using it for griefing purpouses?
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Yup. SG buddy of mine was a pioneer of death by kindness.
But killing a bad person is wrong..... Well after about 10 times.
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Did you know.....
that you could work your way UNDER the glass floor of the main entrance at Atlas city hall by teleporting. And that griefers would/could then teleport you down there leaving you stranded until a Dev came and rescued you.
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Poster: LiquidX
.
Did you know...
.
That the confirmation box for Teleport was added after players complained because various idiots were using it for griefing purpouses?
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Yup. SG buddy of mine was a pioneer of death by kindness.
But killing a bad person is wrong..... Well after about 10 times.
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Did you know.....
that you could work your way UNDER the glass floor of the main entrance at Atlas city hall by teleporting. And that griefers would/could then teleport you down there leaving you stranded until a Dev came and rescued you.
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Did you know....
On trimuph early on, we crashed(other servers may have as well) and when we logged back on everyone was stuck inside the ground. It took the devs and other heroes with tp to get us out.
My avatar is a picture of my lvl 6 mastermind in Atlas Park posing next to Ms. Liberty who had just trained him in hover. When you got hit with that bug you could run around Atlas like a hero, fighta ll the villain groups, but like people said the police drones would just send you back to mercy island. If you were nimble and quick you could get past the drones and visit Ms. Liberty and even the MAGI vault.
There was a time when the glowie objects didn't make any kind of noise. You had to physically see the objects. There was alos a time when there were problems with the glowies being invisable. You could hear them but not see them. You would have to "feel" around with your cursor to see when it changed into a hand to click them.
Stores only used to sell the "power 10" enhancements. Your DO stores only sold DO's of the power 10. The First level SO stores for the 25 and 30 lvl enhancements sold all DO's but only the Power 10 SO's/ you couldn't buy a full set of SO's until the contact stores at lvl 30. They then changed the contacts to sell the other enhancements outside the power 10, but they were more expensive than if they could have been bought at a store.
Accaboom
level 50 Fire/Storm Controller
Prince of the Knights of Destiny
Victory
Accagloom
lvl 50 nerco/poison Mastermind
Overlord of the Knights of Destruction
Victory
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2) The Hydra in Perez used to be farmed for xp. 8 man teams would be constantly hydra hunting in the lake.
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Also, Hydra Spit attacks used to have a very short range. During Beta it wasn't uncommon to see several Blasters, and even some Defenders, "hover-sniping" the Hydra in total safety.
I "believe" that Prisoners also had no ranged attacks and were farmed in much the same way, leading to the reduced XP and the implemtation of ranged attacks on all villain groups. Several Beta testers would use these groups of Prisoners as testing grounds to try to get some damage numbers on differing powersets and attacks. (I still miss SlayRide's posts.) Hopefully, one of the other beta people will correct me if I'm wrong.
... that Enervating Field used to do damage? It wasn't all that great, but I recall sitting on the War Walls in SC during beta with EF running on a Family Lt., with him running away from me when he couldn't do damage to me, circling around agro'ing anyone he went near, then coming back for more with the other villains following him. Between Moonbeam snipes and the DoT from EF, I could kill the LT's and others with no risk, so of course, they had to remove it.
... that at one point in Beta, the agro range was tweaked overly much which would result in every mob in a group agro'ing even on a long range snipe? They'd also cause the groups around the corner to agro as well, so you could somethimes have 4 or 5 entire spawns agro'd before you could get more than 3 attacks off. Luckily, this was a case of the dev's over-tweaking the settings to see how things went then dialing it back to a relatively more acceptable setting.
... that Smoke Grenade had a misplaced decimal that caused massive debuffing (400% ?? 200% ?? can't remember the number)? Before they found the misplaced decimal, SG was considered over-powered so they added a To-Hit roll, so that you would miss someone standing right next to someone you hit. This made no sense due to how a real Smoke Grenade would work. THEN they found the mis-placed decimal and corrected it. However, they left the To-Hit roll on the power making it essentially useless. You could also stack your own SG's multiple times, which they also removed, which most players agreed with, except for those that had six-slotted it for recharge. Remember, there was no respec at that time so you were stuck with the slotting.
... that I'm too tired to think of any more of these right now?
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
Did you know that in beta, higher level players felt so compelled to act like a superhero that when passing low level mobs assaulting citizens in Atlas Park they would attack the mobs and save the citizens. This led to a debate on the beta boards about kill stealing and wether higher level characters should be attacking mobs in lower level zones and thus prevent the lower level characters from patroling.
Did you know that in beta before they developed the system that allowed multiple instances of the same zone that when the population of a zone hit a certain level all of the mobs would disappear to prevent the server from crashing.
Did you know..
That Assault Rifle didn't always have Burst, but did have a power called Tranquilizer Dart which was a Snipe Sleep (only without the damage)?
Voltaic Sentinel used to be stationary?
Tesla Cage used to be a Sleep?
So did Freeze Ray (Bitter Freeze Ray wasn't, thus explaining why Ice Blasters have two holds)?
Spines were once called 'Quills'?
Temporary Invulnerability was once a click buff?
Resilience (from Regen) was once called Resist Disorientation, a toggle, and had only a large Disorient resistance to it?
Hoarfrost (Ice Armor) used to be a Smashing/Lethal/Cold/Fire resistance power?
Rooted used to (mistakenly) boost your Endurance Regen to phenomenal levels?
Dark Miasma once didn't have a pet (Black Hole was the level 32 Power), and used to have a power called Chill of the Night which was a PBAE damage aura and to-hit debuff?
Personal Force Field was once total and complete invulnerability, basically making it a toggle Phase Shift without the walking through people or stealth? Nemesis' Personal Force Field is set up like this.
There once was a big four of Force Field powers? Deflection Shield, Insulation Shield, and Refraction Shield, the last of which protected against Energy/Negative Energy?
Force Field powers were once useless against Psionic Attacks, like they're supposed to be? (Adding in defense to Ranged/Melee/AoE powers has kind of reverse-nerfed this, stupidly).
Force Bubble was once supposed to "distorts enemy attacks", which I guess means provide a defense against ranged attacks?
Fulcrum Shift was once called 'Kinetic Transfer'?
Fallout was once a power you used on yourself when you were defeated in combat, meant to be a final victory from beyond the grave? So was Vengeance.
Steamy Mist was once two powers, Steamy Mist (which simply provided Fire, Energy, and Cold resistance), and Fog (which was simply team stealth)? This is why the defense boost on Steamy Mist blows; it was originally just the kind of wimpy boost you get from a stealth power. Also, Fog (and Steamy Mist) used to slow the caster, but not his allies. Freezing Rain replaced Fog.
Many Controller Single Target holds were the fifth or six power in the set? Char was called Soot, and Gravity had an advantage in that it's ST Hold was the third power in it's set. Propel was the 7th, however. Blind was 2nd in Illusion, but instead of Phantom Army Illusionists could only summon the same Decoy that Phantasm summons.
At one point, there wasn't a Flight ceiling?
Swift was called 'Quick'?
The Concealment pool went Invisibility, Stealth, Grant Invisibility, Phase Shift?
Super Leap was once Leap and Long Jump, the former being the height of a jump and the latter being the distance?
Team Teleport was an interuptable power that disoriented all persons involved?
I have a couple of old CoH beta guides on my HD which I'm lifting all of these facts from?
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There was a time when the glowie objects didn't make any kind of noise. You had to physically see the objects. There was alos a time when there were problems with the glowies being invisable. You could hear them but not see them. You would have to "feel" around with your cursor to see when it changed into a hand to click them.
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Once, the glowies didn't stop glowing even after you'd interacted with them. Some did, but the majority didn't. After I3, the glowies stopped glowing once you interacted with them, but they had also stopped producing sound. This was a bug, which was fixed in a subsequent patch.
Current main:
Schrodinger's Gun, Dual Pistols/Mental Blaster, Virtue
Avatar: Becky Miyamoto from Pani Poni Dash. Roulette roulette~
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There was a time when the glowie objects didn't make any kind of noise. You had to physically see the objects. There was alos a time when there were problems with the glowies being invisable. You could hear them but not see them. You would have to "feel" around with your cursor to see when it changed into a hand to click them.
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Once, the glowies didn't stop glowing even after you'd interacted with them. Some did, but the majority didn't. After I3, the glowies stopped glowing once you interacted with them, but they had also stopped producing sound. This was a bug, which was fixed in a subsequent patch.
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And the sound they used to make was annoyingly similar to the Targeting Drone sound.
Did you know...
A specific origin type needed to be cautious about choosing Atlas Park as thier starting city. Thier first contact would introduce them to Jose Brogan. He was nigh impossible to find. The compass arrow that is supposed to direct you to your contact did not work for him. He subsequently became better known under the moniker Jose "Broken".
Did you know...
in CoH beta you couldn't get the second power in power a pool until 8 lvl's after you got the first one
There was originally no enhancement tray above the power tray. You had to open up their enhancement management window to see what youhad, which could leave you open to attack. If you didn't check, you could be carrying the maxiumum and not know it.
At first, there were only two power trays: the main tray and the alt tray. The alt2 tray was added later.
To add to somebody else's chat window comment: the chat window was not at all customizable. Not only were there no tabs, but the channels like broadcast, request, local, team, etc. showed up in one place only and could not be changed. I don't think it could be resized in any way. There was also no global chat mechanism.
For several issues the maximum influence you could trade was 9,999. It was a lot harder to transfer large amounts of influence. And you had to click on little arrows for each digit instead of typing in the amount.
The exit mission button was added as a quality of life feature. It used to be that once you completed a mission, you had to run all the way back to the entrance to leave.
Toxic damage did not exist at first. A number of attacks, mainly spines DoT, Vahzilok attacks, and hydra spit did untyped damage, which was unresistable. This is why there is no toxic defense (apparently it is hard to recode defense to add a new type). I don't recall the specifics, but I think certain Vahzilok attacks did fire damage instead.
In the beta for CoV, the zombies in the mastermind powerset were clones of the Banished Pantheon zombies, minus the helmets and glowing chest symbols.
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The exit mission button was added as a quality of life feature. It used to be that once you completed a mission, you had to run all the way back to the entrance to leave.
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Incorrect. As far back as late beta, which is when I jumped aboard, you could exit the mission just by clicking the MISSION COMPLETE text in your mission window. I guess this quote shows why they added the button. 
Did you know...
That you used to still hear the sounds from the game after minimizing or alt-tabbing out? This was incredibly useful for people waiting for AFK players by listening to the "chat" sounds. I'm still miffed that they "fixed" this.
Wow, blast from the past. I remember all of this
Here's a couple of fun facts:
Did you know you used to be able to stand with your back to a wall, zoom all the way back, and have the camera poke through it? From there, all you had to do was Teleport to any location in the newly visible Void to get under the map. This was stealth-fixed in issue 2.
Did you know that after they "fixed" it, you could still get under? All you had to do was type /camdist 999999999999999 and your camera would break through the walls to clip into the Void. Again, all you had to do from there was to place your TP marker on one of the many abundant positive spots under the map and click away. This was fixed after an incident I had with a GM and later Valdermic, as well as because of the many people that found out on their own and used it extensively on Test when the Arena was still being developed. Nothing like a dozen people going /em dance underneath the floor to incur the wrath of the devs.
As for a hilarious mis-tell, click here.
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-that the name Rikti came from a conversation where I said "Rikki Tikki Tavi is a cool name. How can we get that into the game?"
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you showed our age on that one.