F****** Ski Slope!

I dont bother with these, kinda frustrating sometimes, kinda not.

But either way never enjoyable for me, so I dont bother anymore.

Good Luck to those trying & Kudos to those that got em.


JJ

I've found it very difficult - bronze and silver are easy but the gold is a real challenge especially on the bob sleigh run, and I desire that badge dreadfully

"You got to dig it to dig it, you dig?"
Thelonious Monk

Forgot that I had SS/SJ on my secondary build on my Shade. Switched builds and SS+CJ and I had Silver and then Gold in 3 runs. First run I fell off the sled run trying to adjust to the controls.

Thanks for the reminder, I don't think I would have gotten it without doing that. Or it would have taken me longer than I wanted it to.

Took me 3 hours last year to get the twitch skills down, got all six badges on my main. I have to say, that will probably be it for me.

Haven't gotten Gold yet but I've come pretty close.

The technical aspects already covered (SJ/CJ/SS/IR/NR), can I just say that using basic car-driving/racing game approaches is always good.

i.e. ALWAYS LOOK WHERE YOU WANT TO GO.

Never look at the thing you're trying to AVOID HITTING (sides of slope, barriers, obstacles after a jump).

Just glue your eyes to the center strip of slope and try to keep centered up.

Also, if you haven't experimented with different views, do. Try zooming all-the-way in to First Person view. Even if you're not better that way, it does give you a more exciting sense of speed and can be just plain fun!

I've found that zooming in slightly more than I do when I play is best for me, but all the way to first-person is a bit much.

Good luck skiiers!

The ski slopes aren't too bad for me... I was even getting into the top times for awhile (before some really good runners kicked me off, grrrr... still, I don't feel bad about my 20 second or so runs). It's the darn luge run that gets me. I ALWAYS get 51-55 seconds. Doesn't matter if I just have sprint and SJ on, or if I get SB'd by some random kin... never changes.

It doesn't seem to be a matter of the course, either. I'll sometimes jump over that one obstacle or drop below it, and I've taken both routes towards the end of the course. I always end up the same.

Well, to introduce my skills, I’m 42, arthritis in multiple joints, and I’m very VERY distractible. Yet, after 2 years, I got my gold in both runs. Now, some points might be incorrect, but this is how I did it. Do not take anything I post as absolute.

First off, I made my second build purely on the basis of the Holiday runs. Don’t use it for anything else.

Sprint = 1 RUN enh.
Why? = As backup whenever I have Super Speed off.

Flight = 3 FLY enh.
Why? = I can’t for the life of me use the air jets. It’s just 1 shade easier than the Shadow Shard ones for me… barely. And, you’re going to fall off the toboggan course… a lot. This allows you to get back on, and, at least, practise during the end of your run.

Super Speed = 3 RUN enh.
Why? = I hadn’t read this post until AFTER I had gotten both gold badges. Also, just on the off chance that the thread is wrong, it’s a backup.

Hurdle = 3 JUMP enh.
Why? = Stacks with Combat Jumping and helps for air control.

Combat Jumping = 3 JUMP enh.
Why? = Stacks with Hurdle and helps for air control.

Swift = 3 RUN enh.
Why? = For when I turn off SS at key points during the run. I know SS with 3 RUN caps me out, but having Swift helps when I want…

Ninja Run = No enh.
Why? = Well, I bought it for the “cool factor”, so why not. And, numbers wise, Sprint + Combat Jumping + Hurdle + Swift is pretty much Ninja Run + Sprint. Or close enough. Substitute one for the other for my examples.

General Tips

1-Doing 1 run as a try, really doesn’t help. Repetition is key. Unless you’re lucky or great with twitch control (in which case you really don’t need my input), you have to repeat a LOT in 1 sitting to get a feel for the course.

2-Once you get a badge, STOP. This is supposed to be fun. Celebrate your win. Do something else in CoH. Walk outside. See a movie. Let the last thing at the keyboard be a victory, not a victory + a fail at the next step.

3-Do 1- again. (ok, I could do the cutesy thing and make every odd Tip 1-, but it really is the best thing you can do)

4-Put your powers tray customised for this run. Put all your toggle-able powers in 1 bar. You’re not fighting here, just skiing or tobogganing. The difference between 1 vs Alt-1, or moving your mouse just off the row, makes a difference.

5-Fly your first runs. Go slow. I’m not kidding. Get a good look at the course. If you’re reacting, you’re missing stuff. PLAN things. Get the feel of each turn. Don’t care if the timer runs out. You’re essentially getting floor-plans here.

6-If you fall or miss a gate, fly back to it, and continue from there. Once you know you’ve “blown” your run, feel free to experiment with turns, jumps, etc…

7-You don’t need to be perfect. You just need to not make a mistake. There’s a difference. If you’re trying to be the server best, yeah, you have to be perfect. But for that Gold badge, just don’t miss a gate, fall, or hit a side / rock. Everything else is just doing what you just did, but faster. If you do miss a gate, don’t “correct” or “catch up”. You can’t. Just practise the other gates as normal.

8-Never leave your finger off “forward” key (for me, it’s W) but use the mouse as well to look around and change your angle. Tap the Left or Right buttons if you need just a little “nudge” one way or another.

Ski Slope general points

Obviously, go between the gates, from one to another. For me, there were 2 tough spots I’d have trouble at.

1-The Gate 2 gates (or so) down right after the rocks on the left drops off.

It’s right after a steep fall to the right. If I stayed on the ground, I would often miss the gate by being too far left. If I jumped without jump powers, I had too little control to land on “the” spot. Any jumping powers helps a lot here.

2-The Final Gate

For some reason, I could never jump (again, without jump powers) to that gate. I’d usually overshoot it, and get it on my backward slide down.

Bronze Ski Badge

All you really need is Flight. You can hit every gate at full flight speed, and that’s pretty much a guarantee to get your bronze. Nothing more to it than that. However, once you have the bronze, on your next session, do it again “legit”. You’ll need it for later.

Silver Ski Badge

I used good ole Sprint + toggled Flight for the 2 “tough” Gates as above. I did the run legit till I hit the dropoff, then flew to that first trouble gate. Then detoggled flight, did the remaining run legit, then hit flight again for that final gate. It was close but doable.

Gold Ski Badge

Almost exactly as per silver, but use either CJ+H or NR instead of flight. It really didn’t take many runs to get Gold off Sprint + Ninja Run.


Toboggan General Points

You’re going to fall off the course. A lot. Deal with it. That’s why flight is a must. Even though your run is ruined, hit fly, go right back where you fell, and continue. Helps you keep “in the zone.” The more you toboggan, the better you are at it. You want to be more “on the slopes” rather than “on the ski chair” if that makes sense.

Know your options. Unlike for ski, you have 3 decision points to make your run.

Teleporter vs Hot Springs

I’ve found that the teleporter works far Far FAR better for me that the hot springs. On the hot springs, I tend to fly off into space, hit my head on the underside of the course, or, at best, pass what feels like 20 minutes in midair before I land on the far slope. Sure, the teleporter brings your speed to 0, but that’s why Super Speed (imo) helps a lot getting you back to full run speed.

Underpass vs Overpass

If you did your build like me, it’s Overpass, no question. In fact, if you have both CJ+H or NR, you might be able to jump and clear the overpass completely and land back on the track. I haven’t found the Underpass to be that much fast, and, 1 run out of 3, I faceplant right into the rocks, stopping me entirely and getting me stuck on the wooden rafters more often than not.

Long Circle vs Construction

Counter intuitively, the Long Circle is faster for me then the Hazard Construction route. Sure, the Construction route is shorter, but even with Jumps with no mistakes, the angles are such that I often lose a lot of speed doing the 1-3 jumps (depending on how many jump powers are on) needed to stay on track. Heading right on the Long Circle and constantly edging left is faster.

General inconsistencies

Sometimes I found the sides to be “sticky”. Good news is that you don’t fall off into oblivion. Bad news is that your speed is cut. Other times, the sides are “slippery”. You can stay right on the edge and stay at full blast for speed. However, one toe too far one way or another, and it’s kiss sky time. I wish I could say it has something to do with the graphics (fence vs no fence) but each spot in the course seems random.

Also, being in the center isn’t always the “sweet spot”. After the first drop off, there’s a big curve to the left, and, for me, the center wasn’t where I would be the fastest. Going to an edge, right on a snow railing, kept me going at full speed.

Bronze Toboggan Badge

Sprint is all you need. Just don’t fall, and don’t hit anything (cf Underpass rocks), and you should hit your time. If you are over, just do it over again, but faster. Really. That’s all there is to it.

Silver Toboggan Badge

Again, just like in Gold Ski Badge, you need some form of jumping. This just means that your overpass jumps are more tightly controlled, and you have a lot more “oops recovery” effect. Sorry to say, there’s no tactic for silver other than “go faster, jump higher.”

Gold Toboggan Badge

Unlike for Ski, to get gold, I had to do the course completely different. Super speed + all the toggles running meant that I kissed sky at that first turn, about half the time. The best way I found was as follows.

A-Get off the gate with small jumps. You want your feet to touch the slide only once or twice. This first part of the course WANTS you to fall. I can tell.

B-Once you hit the first gate, CJ, SJ, NR jump, SOMETHING JUMP to gate #2. At the speed I’m going, if I do a legit run, I hit the pavement every time. Instead, I jump from gate 1 to 2, never touching the course. From then on, I basically do the course “normally”.

C-On that large curve to the left after the first drop off, I hug the “rail” to the right as much as possible, then I do a hard left for the Y split to the teleporter. My finger is on heavily on “Forward” as I approach the porter.

D-As soon as I teleport, I go forward till I’m back to attack speed. At the Overpass / Underpass spot, I jump far enough to completely clear the overpass and land on the slide right after it. Basically, I bypass the whole damn thing.

E-From then on, it’s stay right, but curve left the whole time. I do little jumps when I feel out of control. Hit the gate. Collect Gold badge.

Now, it might all be in my head, but toggling on Super Speed during Straight parts and toggling it off for curved parts did help for everything except Gold Tobogganing. For Gold, I had Super Speed, Sprint and Combat Jumping on as toggles, with Hurdle on as an automatic. No buffs from anyone else. No nothing.

Of course, with so many movement powers, my build was toast for anything else, but I got both golds. And, if an old dude like me can get it, so can you.

So, in summary, make a build that has all the movement options except teleport, and practise a lot. If you fail a gate, still do the others “as if” you’re still trying to win the first time. Pick a set of powers / toggles that sits right with you, and adapt only the strategy as a whole. Meaning, don’t try to correct a mistake. Make a strategy. See it through. If it doesn’t work, try a new strategy. “On the fly” doesn’t work, at least for me, when the scenery comes at you at a million miles an hour, or so it seems.

And, finally, 2 hours in a row will help you a WHOLE lot more than 6 sessions of 20 min.

I hope you find the above useful.

Inertial Reduction is all you need for Gold on the Advanced Slope.

But when I happened to have received IR stacked 2 high... WOW! I had to be going faster than the RunSpeed cap (and since this is falling and not running, could very well be going faster than RunSpeed cap). Double IR was FAST and changing direction was instantaneous.

You haven't done the Advanced course until you've done it with IRx2.

Also, for you mouse/keyboarders out there, pullng your camera view back all the way makes the twitch reflexes more responsive.

So, I've been parking a Kin (Speed Skater on Virtue) on my second account atop the Advanced Slope and put IR on auto-cast. Slotted for recharge, it goes off about every 40 seconds.

I go AFK. When I check in now and then, I'll see /tells thanking me cause they made gold. I'll often have a mystery gift sitting in my tray. I've been doing this since the Winter Event started. Then I get this /tell...

[Tell] Name Redacted: [speed boost]. click on the words in { }s. for gods sake we dont want [inertial reduction].

Rude idiot.

I schooled him (without using language that would get me in trouble) in a /tell and set him on /ignore. Then I one-starred him with a playernote.

Too bad I can't smack an ice cream cone out of his hand.

I skimmed through the whole thread, but haven't notice anyone mentioning this. It might help to these players who don't have very good gaming rig/GFX card. So here it goes...

It's been very frustrating at first for me to get slope badges during Winter Event last year. To the point that I originally thought about players dispensing IR as some sort of griefers With IR I couldn't stay on the slope even 10 feet.
Without IR, run was little bit better, I even managed to get bronze, and probably silver (don't remember exactly), but couldn't even come closer to gold time. At the same time I noticed that I couldn't precisely control my toon during the slide. I had keypress/reaction lag around 0.5-1.0 sec. For example, after I pressed spacebar, toon will jump with 0.5-1.0 seconds delay.

So I decided to play with GFX settings to see if it can make any difference.

In short, "3D Resolution Scaling" had HUGE impact on how responsive/nonresponsive game played during the slope slide. After dropping "3D Resolution Scaling" from 1600x1200 to 800x600, the 0.5-1.0 seconds lag completely disappeared, and I was able to precisely control my toon on the slope. IR/SJ/Zero-G Pack became essential and allowed control toon much better.


After making GFX adjustment mentioned above, I was able to get gold on my 5 toons in 20 minutes.

I also know 4-5 people who weren't able to get skiing badges until I recommended them to try adjusting GFX. After they adjusted their GFX, they got their badges with easy as well.

Last day for the event - Jan 12. Last minute pointers for anyone who is just returning home from extended holiday or still not pinned with gold (edit > referring to advanced slope but this works for the bunny hop as well):

- Kins are your bff4life. Interial Reduction + Speed boost + Ninja Run gets it every time. Even without SS, AM, Sprint, Swift, etc. So a gaggle of kins in Virtue were loitering, drinking, and taking turns boosting holiday spirits in Virtue PD1 last night. Consistently grabbed gold on twenty alts. We used the jingle pack to hover and wait out the timer before the finish line for silver and bronze. So that's it. I didn't have to switch builds like I did on my first two mains.

- Low level alts dragged without supersidekick. The kins were in their mid to high 30's. In order for my level 3 and 18 to gold, it required the SSK to charge up their speed a bit.

- If you don't have Ninja Run. Dunno. I suppose if your alt has SS or two kins but gosh I love that pack. If you jump straight up and back in the air, it's an beautiful back flip. Tres elegant.

That's it. We have a day left. GL to anyone who wants this and still doesn't have it. I might be on tonight and have two kins. If you're on Virtue, pm my global - @Ara

I didn't touch the ski slopes once this year. I find these badges infuriatingly difficult, and know enough not to bother with them. I just can't do it.

You really don't need a kin though; I'd forgotten all about alternate builds, but one quick swap to one of them and I managed to get Gold on all of them on all of my characters, and even managed on my Mastermind to hold the Union record for the normal slope for a day, at 16.31 seconds unbuffed. Just select Super Speed and Hurdle/Super Jump, and slot as many Single Origins into them and the basic Sprint as you can. SJ gives you the air control and the sliding speed on the flats, super speed helps correct mistakes and adds a little extra over all.

Aim the camera slightly downwards, so you can see the course ahead of you easier, and get the hang of turning EARLY; you want to slingshot around the course, not try and turn on each corner as you enter it. Here's a not-particularly good run, using just Super Jump on my main moo... notice I'm aiming just off the inner gate on every turn, so I'm aiming almost past it rather than through it;

http://www.mediafire.com/?xwing4xjjmq

You can also shave another second or more of the first drop gate by pointing 90 degrees to the left as you pass the gate on the very edge (the first left turn) instead of sliding further on. You can cut half a second off the drop after that by pointing hard left in mid air, and air controlling across to the gate, so you land and immediately slide towards the next gate.

Sadly I couldn't get a better run with the free FRAPS as the overhead it adds to my CPU meant I got micro second lags which threw me off the time. But the above is the basic idea... so hurry!

It's not the speed thing, I can't steer to save my life. I have great difficulty just crossing the start line.

The ski slopes are just about the only thing in the game I have absolutely NO interest in. I just can't see the fun in playing a forgettable twitch-style video game when I could be playing an MMO.