Some new travel ideas (vehicle, and ant-style)
By
Ad Astra,
Posted on: 2009-03-30 10:10 in Suggestions and Ideas
Welcome to the forums!
Both have been suggested before -- especially vehicle travel. It's very unlikely due to graphical issues and other constraints on the game engine. However, I do find your particular implementation of it to be hilarious (in a good way). 
I was just going to make a topic on vehicles! However, I don't think they should be a Pool Power. Instead, there should be a new Garage building where you can go to have your vehicle built, repaired or upgraded.
Another idea I had was Car Chase Missions where you must use your vehicle to destroy/disable a getaway car before it leaves the map. However, you cannot get Car Chase Missions if you do not have a vehicle!
Oh, and I think you should be a minimum level to unlock vehicles. Level 20-30 or so.
to 
TO THE END!Villains are those who dedicate their lives to causing mayhem. Villians are people from the planet Villia!
The games called City of Heroes not Grand Theft Auto.
There are no known moving map objects that allow you to stand on them at this time. Making vehicles work would require them to get over this hurdle
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There are no known moving map objects that allow you to stand on them at this time. Making vehicles work would require them to get over this hurdle
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Heck, that would be sweet. Why have a car when I could just ride on top of a Yellow Line car from one end of Skyway to another? 
Tell that to Batman, the Fantastic 4, Ghost Rider, Wonder Woman, oh, and X-Men.
Not all heroes have the ability to run fast, leap high, teleport, or fly. So a vehicle transportation system isn't such a far fetched idea.
-socio
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Heck, that would be sweet. Why have a car when I could just ride on top of a Yellow Line car from one end of Skyway to another?
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I tried that when I first started the game thought it might be any easy way to get around at the low levels, but to no avail.
list me 1 superhero genre MMO that has this.
lets stop using movies and comic books to justify things. while i have no problem with them, as i read them and watch the movies, there is no continuum in them. stories change with the director/writer.
the raptor pack serves the purpose of getting around with a vehicle. also the zones aren't big enough for this. there isn't a need to ride around in a vehicle. maybe if there weren't any war walls and it was an open environment world, then yes i could possibly see this. but since the game isn't, i can't.
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This is copied from a post I made in general power discussion:
How about an Ant-style travel pool (would go great with Earth controllers)
1) dirt-piles: you dig for a moment, causing some dirt piles to form around you, providing some ranged defense. for a short while if you stay in place. (think of these as quick sand-bags).
2) earth-toss: low damage, accuracy reducing ranged attack that attempts to throw dirt into the enemy's eyes.
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OK. I can see those working. Then this:
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3) Dig: You burrow into the ground, allowing you to travel very fast (say, just a bit faster than flight, not far behind SJ), and avoid needing to go around things like buildings. enemies can detect you if you stay still, but only aoe attacks could even touch you while underground. Getting hit though, forces you back to the surface.
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... eh... ok, now you've got a mostly-untargetable travel power, and what about your own attacks/buffs/etc?
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4) crumble: While in Dig mode, you can open a hole under an enemy, causing them to fall partially into the earth. Foes sunk this way are held, and take some damage over time. you can also attack them while remaining underground. would make a good opening move against an AV.
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See 3. And what happens to the debuffs, etc. (since they, like you, are now untargetable by anyone up top) that others would have been putting on them? You've now made the rest of the team impotent.
Can't go for this as is, honestly.
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or how about vehicle travel:
1) headlights: summon vehicle to this location. it does not move, but it's headlights are on. this causes you to be able to see invisible enemies within a huge cone in front of it. Furthermore, you and your team get a small +ToHit if the enemy is within this cone. The car can be attacked, and enemies within the cone are (very) slightly taunted to the attack the car.
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um... okay... So you summon your car in the Terra Volta reactor. Or deep inside a cave. Or, hey, while you have a jetpack and are flying to catch, say, a Longbow Eagle that's running away. Or better yet, going through the Shadow Shard... I see a few issues.
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2) brake-fail: Your vehicle comes zooming across the screen, running over the targeted enemy with a screech. Damage is moderate, knockback is significant. has a looong recharge time. still useable indoors or wherever you are.
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Still usable indoors... see above. It'd just look silly.
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3) Vehicle travel: Your vehicle appears, you get in, your team can choose to get in also. you travel at very high speeds, and have a jump/boost about the height of a regular CJ+Hurdle jump, but your speed when you jump slows tremendously (ie, you have it, but don't want to use it too much). can only range attack from the vehicle, and all damage taken while inside is applied to all people inside the vehicle.
4) insurance increase: You summon your vehicle, and set the self-destruct mechanism. it takes 10 seconds to arm, and the explosion is devastating. can only be used once every 24 hours, but doesn't actually make the car unusable for the other powers.
vehicle travel would be way cool. maybe as a power that needs to be invented.
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You get a cut-paste reply!
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Vehicles as travel powers. This gets brought up a lot.
Short answer, don't expect it.
Long answer:
There are a lot of problems with the idea.
1. Movement.
Forward and back,even turning - ok. But you can do things that a vehicle can't - such as strafe (direct side to side or angular movement.) It doesn't work with a vehicle.
2. Terrain.
Not every place has roads, or even makes sense for "off roading." Go look at Founder's Falls. Go look at Crey's Folley. Or Eden. Try to get to the north islands in Talos. What, do you have a kubelwagen? Look at the Pit in Sharkshead. Try to use your travel power (car) to get up to some of the doorways in high caves. Cars and motorcycles would be more like Superspeed - horizontal movement, period. And look - I'll be blunt - flat out *stupid* tied with, say, Combat Jumping or Superjump.
3. Combat.
You get ambushed on the way. How do you fight? Just have your powers blast out of the rolled up windows? How do you buff or debuff? EVERY power would need a new animation. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. Then you want people with motorcycles instead of cars. Redo ALL the animations AGAIN. And they still wouldn't make sense - how do you use Footstomp in a car? Or Stalagmites?
4. Customizing.
Yeah, it would come up. Not everyone would want a sports car, or a mid-70s Buick boat, or an exotic, or a minivan, or whatever else.
5. Making "sense."
This was touched on in terrain - how do you get across water? How about the Shadow Shard? And if you want downright ridiculous looking, go do the heroside 25-34 Respec. Look at the Sky Skiffs inside of rooms or the reactor room. It makes no sense and looks *ridiculous.* Something that, yes, the devs try to avoid.
That's just a quick overview of why vehicles are a *lousy* idea for a travel power.
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list me 1 superhero genre MMO that has this.
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Geez, way to pigeonhole the genre. Most MMOs are fantasy or scifi in style. Superheroes are a bit of both, don't you think? I can be a mage, or a robot, or a mutant, or a mad scientist, or a an average joe. But I kinda can't list a super hero genre MMO with this seeing how they're limited.
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lets stop using movies and comic books to justify things. while i have no problem with them, as i read them and watch the movies, there is no continuum in them. stories change with the director/writer.
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Whats the continuum here? We have static, repeatable story lines (arcs, TFs) with few variations (papers/radios/MA). Our powers change, new powers are added, other things are added too. The entire basis of CoX are on super hero comics and movies and the entire genre. Our expectations are base on what we know and see. What we want is based on what exists in comic culture, but not in CoX.
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the raptor pack serves the purpose of getting around with a vehicle. also the zones aren't big enough for this. there isn't a need to ride around in a vehicle. maybe if there weren't any war walls and it was an open environment world, then yes i could possibly see this. but since the game isn't, i can't.
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Subjective subjective subjective. You say the raptor pack is enough, thats your opinion. Its stagnant and only available as a temporary power. Adding the jump pack, raptor pack etc. as costume options for flight and leaping add variety. Other explanations for the powers other than everyone has them are needed. SS? Some people like the glowy running bit. Others do not and would prefer some graphic or object to explain it. A skateboard, a moped, a cheetah. It adds variety and flavor to the citizens of CoX. No longer would they be in 1 of 5 categories for travel, but they would be a little more unique.
Additionally, other ways to travel would be nice, e.g the ant thing (conceptually cool).
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Another idea I had was Car Chase Missions where you must use your vehicle to destroy/disable a getaway car before it leaves the map. However, you cannot get Car Chase Missions if you do not have a vehicle!
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I liked this idea (except for the being in a vehicle of your own part). Personally I think it would be nice to have a battle like they had in the second matrix movie where you're standing on the top of a vehicle. Falling off could work much like the shadow shard, the whole floor could be an animated texture and you would fight enemy mobs that teleport in while you try to protect (or disable) the vehicle you're on top of. Would be even better if special enemy vehicles could come after you like a malta black van.
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Another idea I had was Car Chase Missions where you must use your vehicle to destroy/disable a getaway car before it leaves the map. However, you cannot get Car Chase Missions if you do not have a vehicle!
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I liked this idea (except for the being in a vehicle of your own part). Personally I think it would be nice to have a battle like they had in the second matrix movie where you're standing on the top of a vehicle. Falling off could work much like the shadow shard, the whole floor could be an animated texture and you would fight enemy mobs that teleport in while you try to protect (or disable) the vehicle you're on top of. Would be even better if special enemy vehicles could come after you like a malta black van.
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Forbin is worth repeating on this idea, I think:
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The games called City of Heroes not Grand Theft Auto.
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Altoholic - but a Blaster at Heart!
Originally Posted by SpyralPegacyon
"You gave us a world where we could fly. I can't thank you enough for that."
my reasoning for the superhero genre mmo was that, and i don't care how many times people say it isn't the reason, everyones underlying rationalization is :World of Conan Hammer Warcrafting" has this why can't we.
while your examples of superheroes that use vehicles to get around is somewhat arguable, they didnt use their vehicles to get around all the time. in fact some of the x-men don't need to use a vehicle to travel at all. as for your ant idea, if you have ever been "underneath" the zone maps you would see there is no way to dig under the streets. theres nothing there but empty space.
as for trying to use the "power effects" as a arguing point, you fail. for the people that dont use the power trays because they have their powers binded to keys on their keyboard, it lets them know what is running and what isnt. the glow from SS could be the friction your causing on the ground. gives it that "lighting the ground on fire cause your moving so fast" feeling.
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list me 1 superhero genre MMO
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Seems like kind of a flawed limitation, there. It's kind of like 'proving' restaurants don't offer seafood by asking me to list a single restaurant that serves salmon patê, but it has to be within a 1-mile radius of my house, or it doesn't count.
Edit: Had form open for a while.
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and i don't care how many times people say it isn't the reason, everyones underlying rationalization is :World of Conan Hammer Warcrafting" has this why can't we.
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Or what about the MMO NCSoft published that was about cars? Or the other one they published with giant rideable mechs? Heck, even EVE is supposedly coming up with a way to get off your ship, which has the same net effect.
No. There are plenty of games that have had vehicles, not just the big three current fantasy titles.
ok, the superhero genre thing aside, to give the blunt straight forward answer i feel matches this request: the game engine can not do this. there end of thread. if we can't ride on top of vehicles do to restrictions, what makes you think we'll be able to ride in them?
i think Bill has a sticky on this, i just cant find it right now.
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my reasoning for the superhero genre mmo was that, and i don't care how many times people say it isn't the reason, everyones underlying rationalization is :World of Conan Hammer Warcrafting" has this why can't we.
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You're wrong. You may assume the basis of the rationale is because WoW and what ever other mmo's have personal transports, but because there is existing precedent for personal transportation in Super Hero Genre Comics that there is a chance we could get it, even if its a gfx effect.
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while your examples of superheroes that use vehicles to get around is somewhat arguable, they didnt use their vehicles to get around all the time. in fact some of the x-men don't need to use a vehicle to travel at all.
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Like Iceman? Yea, that'd be a cool way to travel too. But they don't just have one form of transportation. Sure, some fly, others don't. Some leap, others don't. Some teleport, others don't. Some run fast, others don't. Some can't do ANY of those things. Cyclops isn't gifted with any travel powers, is he? No. He did ride a motorcycle though, since he wasn't always going to use the blackbird as you point out.
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as for your ant idea, if you have ever been "underneath" the zone maps you would see there is no way to dig under the streets. theres nothing there but empty space.
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Thats the present. Once upon a time, there were no Rogue Isles... but they were added.
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as for trying to use the "power effects" as a arguing point, you fail. for the people that dont use the power trays because they have their powers binded to keys on their keyboard, it lets them know what is running and what isnt. the glow from SS could be the friction your causing on the ground. gives it that "lighting the ground on fire cause your moving so fast" feeling.
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Could be, but then everyone who takes SS got the same power from different origins with the same effect. Maybe they don't burn up the road. Maybe they do. For the record, there is no 'burn' marks left by SS, only a glow at their feet that trails.
and, what the heck do power trays have to do with this?
Because riding "in" a vehicle is an entirely different kind of thing than jumping on top of one and riding along with it.
Bill posted his standard reply earlier in the thread. But what's kind of funny is that even in it, he already addresses some of the vehicles that are already in the game. Why's it any more ridiculous for a player to have, say, a Longbow Flier and fly it around to wacky places that it doesn't make a lot of sense to go to than it is for a Longbow to do it?
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Another idea I had was Car Chase Missions where you must use your vehicle to destroy/disable a getaway car before it leaves the map. However, you cannot get Car Chase Missions if you do not have a vehicle!
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I liked this idea (except for the being in a vehicle of your own part). Personally I think it would be nice to have a battle like they had in the second matrix movie where you're standing on the top of a vehicle. Falling off could work much like the shadow shard, the whole floor could be an animated texture and you would fight enemy mobs that teleport in while you try to protect (or disable) the vehicle you're on top of. Would be even better if special enemy vehicles could come after you like a malta black van.
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Forbin is worth repeating on this idea, I think:
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The games called City of Heroes not Grand Theft Auto.
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I'll have to double check with someone thats actually played the game, but I don't think they have battles on top of vehicles in GTA. However I'm sure I could see spiderman or Iron man fighting someone on top of a truck or any number of other superheroes for that matter.
So thanks for repeating what I already read, but its relevance only applies to the original idea posted by someone else. Not the take that I brought up.
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ok, the superhero genre thing aside, to give the blunt straight forward answer i feel matches this request: the game engine can not do this. there end of thread. if we can't ride on top of vehicles do to restrictions, what makes you think we'll be able to ride in them?
i think Bill has a sticky on this, i just cant find it right now.
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The thread isn't entirely stuck on just vehicle travel, but other ways to travel as well. Game engines evolve, things change. Complacency with the status quo deters evolution.
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I'll have to double check with someone thats actually played the game, but I don't think they have battles on top of vehicles in GTA. However I'm sure I could see spiderman or Iron man fighting someone on top of a truck or any number of other superheroes for that matter.
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Spiderman HAS fought on top of cars and trains and trucks! So have other heroes... Its not uncommon.
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The thread isn't entirely stuck on just vehicle travel, but other ways to travel as well. Game engines evolve, things change. Complacency with the status quo deters evolution.
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Thank Eris, somebody who finally gets the point of the Suggestions forum.
the biggest reason against vehicles that i can come up with is the fact that we have closed zones where the other MMO's have open worlds, which causes the need for vehicles. other then the game engine cant do it, and this engine is old. they would need to use an highly updated version to maybe make this viable.
use the search function. vehicle threads pop up once a week at least. read them before making a suggestion.
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use the search function. vehicle threads pop up once a week at least. read them before making a suggestion.
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Sharker_Quint, please stop repeating that. You yourself clearly have not. The counter-arguments you're giving have already been brought up in those threads and were addressed (and for many, dismissed) -- and yet we're having to repeat them for your benefit. It's not productive for you to repeat "search!," and hypocritical besides.
i see what you're trying to do jack, and it isn't going to work. telling me that giving reasons why not again and again is so wrong and someone who posts this topic when there are several other threads about this is so right is just so wrong. the search fu works both ways. obviously you still have a chip on your shoulder when i disagreed with the changes you wanted to make to FA.
This is copied from a post I made in general power discussion:
How about an Ant-style travel pool (would go great with Earth controllers)
1) dirt-piles: you dig for a moment, causing some dirt piles to form around you, providing some ranged defense. for a short while if you stay in place. (think of these as quick sand-bags).
2) earth-toss: low damage, accuracy reducing ranged attack that attempts to throw dirt into the enemy's eyes.
3) Dig: You burrow into the ground, allowing you to travel very fast (say, just a bit faster than flight, not far behind SJ), and avoid needing to go around things like buildings. enemies can detect you if you stay still, but only aoe attacks could even touch you while underground. Getting hit though, forces you back to the surface.
4) crumble: While in Dig mode, you can open a hole under an enemy, causing them to fall partially into the earth. Foes sunk this way are held, and take some damage over time. you can also attack them while remaining underground. would make a good opening move against an AV.
seriously, new travel pool sounds like fun.
or how about vehicle travel:
1) headlights: summon vehicle to this location. it does not move, but it's headlights are on. this causes you to be able to see invisible enemies within a huge cone in front of it. Furthermore, you and your team get a small +ToHit if the enemy is within this cone. The car can be attacked, and enemies within the cone are (very) slightly taunted to the attack the car.
2) brake-fail: Your vehicle comes zooming across the screen, running over the targeted enemy with a screech. Damage is moderate, knockback is significant. has a looong recharge time. still useable indoors or wherever you are.
3) Vehicle travel: Your vehicle appears, you get in, your team can choose to get in also. you travel at very high speeds, and have a jump/boost about the height of a regular CJ+Hurdle jump, but your speed when you jump slows tremendously (ie, you have it, but don't want to use it too much). can only range attack from the vehicle, and all damage taken while inside is applied to all people inside the vehicle.
4) insurance increase: You summon your vehicle, and set the self-destruct mechanism. it takes 10 seconds to arm, and the explosion is devastating. can only be used once every 24 hours, but doesn't actually make the car unusable for the other powers.
vehicle travel would be way cool. maybe as a power that needs to be invented.