How have you re-purposed powers?

I probably have more than just one, but the only one that comes to mind right now is Aliandri, my fire/em blaster. She was a Warlock in a DnD game I played in for a short while, and when I went to create her in CoH, I needed something to represent her Eldritch powers, and I didn't really feel like making her a human-form-only Warshade, so I colored the fire and energy attacks all a blackish dark purple.

I'll probably remember more later.

Nice ideas everyone.

I have a couple that work like that.


My Earth/rad controller is actually an angry volcano spirit goddess, so all her earth powers are recolored to look like lava/molten earth, and her rad powers are very dark greens/blacks to look like radiation from melting said earth over and over again (radioactive elements mainly)

i have a ice/kin melee tanker whose a water bender. Since the original Avatar the last airbender came out on nikelodeon i've wanted one, and with kin melee recolored a light light blue, it looks like 'water blasts' instead of kinetic energy.

My fire/fire/fire dom is name saked after my girlfriend. All her 'fire' powers were selected by my girlfriend, and are explained by her fiery temper.

my fire/fire/fire mage blaster is based off a very old DnD mage i made, who was so very sucidial wild mage who used to command over a city, and would routinely fireball it so the citizens would stay in line. Needless to say his fire attacks are all recolored varies colors to explain the 'wild magic' he wields.

These are the only characters that still exist, I have many others i just cant remember all of them.

Legionform, my Claw/SR scrapper has fly. hes not actually flying, you see Legionform isn't solid, hes made up of millions of nanobots. When he "flys" the nanobots, at blinding speed, reform the whole higher and higher, giving the appearance of flight.

Shattermask, my DP/elec blaster actually uses a dark magic that drains the lifeforce/power from enemies, it just so happens that this magic looks like lightning.

Soulrise, a KM/WP scrapper uses holy light that banishes evil and darkness from the soul of her opponent, the light has adverse effects on technology as well. her Willpower is that same holy light put to different use.

My /kin Controller is an imaginary friend. He makes the bad guys weaker and the goodies win because that's what his 'owner' percieves him to do. His kinetic powers use the subtractive pallette, but use bright primary colours, so they almost look like a child's crayon scribblings.

My /therm mastermind is kinda like a shell that gets possessed by a demon from time to time. Her thermal powers are coloured a psi purple, as it's meant to actually just be a demon's psychic powers.

Bane Wolf - this is my Science Dark Melee/Willpower scrapper. He was experimented on as a child by the Crey who had managed to get hold of some Council Nictus Fragments. They managed to create this Galaxy/Warwolf Hybrid. His Dark Melee abilities (which I have tinted slightly purple) are actually his Galaxy Nictus abilities and the Willpower is there to represent the strength of the Warwolves.

Angel Divine - this is my Fire/Energy blaster. His powers have all been coloured bright white/yellow. He is actually meant to be weilding light energy in either concentrated strikes (e.g. Energy Manipulation) or burn them (Fire Blast).

Psychic Whisper - this is my Sonic/Pain corruptor. He has been retconned from being a Sonic/Mental blaster and his Pain powers have been coloured slightly pink to represent that he is using his mental powers to heal people or hurt people (he is a mutant so his powers have evolved).

Chiller Insect - in both incarnations of this character (originaly Ice/Earth tank, now Willpower/Ice tank) his ice powers are actually a chilled secretion that he produces naturally.

Rendraka, Apocalyptic Jester, Devil Divine - in these three cases there Radiation powers have been recoloured and are actually just magical energies which they control.

Jade Dragon Disciple - This Plant/Kinetic controller has had his Kinetic powers changed so they are a bit more earthy/planty colours as it is actually life force energy he is manipulating rather than kinetic energy specifically.

Halloween CarnEvil - This Mind/Fire dom has had her fire powers recoloured in various different ways. Although it is fire it is actually not really and is a psychic projection of fire, her psychic powers strong enough to make people believe they are being burnt and actually cause physical pain/damage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zwillinger Quote: 16. Has Paragon Studios redefined "player" to require your mouse to subscribe separately from your keyboard? If your mouse has greater processing power than your gfx card, the answer is yes.

I've used recolored Dark Blast as Lovecraftian deep ocean magic, complete with drowned corpses and horrid pseudopods.

I've also used Plant Control as spiky tentacles of unpleasant inquisitiveness.

My Warshade isn't a Warshade. She fights crime by channeling fish ghosts.

And Dominator Earth Assault with the Crystal theme and blue/white coloring looks like ice-covered rocks, which works well for Comet Assault.

I have Abyssnaught, my fish-man. He's an Earth/Rad controller where the Earth is colored like coral, and Radiation is colored to look like water.

My main created way back in October of '04 was based on a character concept that pre-dates this game. The only problem was that his Energy blasts were blue, and not green. I got to fix that when this feature was finally added.

BC Skunk, my plant/fire dom.

colored the fire breath to all white to make it look like thick white smoke, much more thematic now.
Then colored the plants all different psychadelic colors to match his theme lol.

he's what I did (well 2 of 'em anyway)

Libertire's Shield - Concept was a invulnerble martial artist. Started out as a MA/Invul scrapper before GR. Re-purposed her as a Invul/Kinetic Melee Brute afterward. KM being treated as a rare Chi-based martial art form she uses in combat.

Ms GravKin (soon Ms PsiKin-or something like that) - Original concept was a mutant Grav/Kin controler before GR. Re-purposed as a Grav/Energy Manip Dominator afterwards (with a change in BG to that of a ex-Seer). both Grav & EM represenint mental powers (hince the possible name change).

Setting aside things like coloring Energy Manipulation to match the default Electric Blast, here are some of my more notable efforts:

- On Grimpen Meyer (Sherlock Holmes fan [the Grimpen Mire is the swamp in The Hound of the Baskervilles] and mud-man), Earth Assault and Earth Control are recolored with the Lava theme to look like greenish-brown swamp muck with green, tainted water or weeds flowing over, through, or around it. Incidentally, I like to pretend that this character gets stronger when standing in tainted water; Sharkhead Isle was very homey for him.

- Drosselmeier, an Illusion/Kinetics controller, uses both the ability to monkey around with time (Kinetics) and magic that is often based on "impossible" gadgets. Most of his powers are colored a pale grey and a dark purple, to keep them subtle, but his Phantom Army is dull gold on slightly brighter gold. The Decoys are magical, mechanical automata rather than illusory projections.

- Reefwarden, an aquatic Ice/Mental blaster, has both sets recolored to suggest sea water, though they're still supposed to be "ice" and "mental powers." A quasi-exception is his World of Confusion bubble; while it's the bounds of his short-range psychic defense aura, it's also meant to look like a bubble of water. Part of the enemy confusion, as well as their tendency to dash right out of it, is due to their suddenly finding themselves wet.

- Stenchor, Evil-oid Lord of Odors, a DP/Rad corruptor, is a tribute to '80's cartoons. He is a humanoid skunk, and his Radiation powers are colored a disgusting yellowish brown using the subtractive palette. Essentially, he emits various stenches that weaken his enemies and sprays his allies with pheromones that speed them up or help them heal, while incidentally requiring them to wash their costumes after teaming with him.

- I remember having a terrible time picking sets for the Dampfjaeger, a Nemesis automaton stalker, back when he was created four or five years ago. I finally settled on Claws as his primary, deciding that even though Dark Melee looked like smoke, I couldn't rationalize away the giant skull of death from the AS or the ability to pull life out of enemies. I ended up with Energy Aura for a secondary, since I wanted the concept of a skeleton that was hard to hit but folded easily if you landed a blow, and I didn't want to use SR for some reason. Once IO's came in, I regretted going with EA over SR, but when customization came in, I recolored the Energy Aura to a faint white, which makes it look like a cloud of steam, perfect for a Nemesis gadget. So it turned out to be the right choice in the end.

- Speaking of steam, I've recolored Fiery Aura as Steam Aura on two characters. In both cases, the idea is that the fire damage (and other fire effects) come from the superheated steam rather than direct burns. One, Right Track, a Fire/Energy tank, is a crimefighting, anthropomorphic steam train. His powers are "bright steam," using Bright Flames in a dark grey color. This is one of my favorite uses of power customization ever; I even sometimes find myself calling out, "Healing STEAM!" when he uses Healing Flames.

- The other steam character, Industrial Revolt, a DB/Fire scrapper, is a mash-up of two ideas I've been kicking around for a long time: a 19th century thug (a la Gangs of New York) and a fanatical guy in a power suit trying to wipe out capitalists. I wanted his powers to look more evil and menacing than Right Track's. I think of his armor set as "Sooty Aura." While a few powers look the same as Right Track's, some use Dark Flames, in more or less the same faint grey color, which gives the look of a cloud of soot when they go off.

All in all, while I never really understood the appeal of power customization before it came in, it's become one of my favorite game features.

Re-colored Skunk Lass' fire/rad powers to a dark mustard yellow to make super skunk spray. Aside from that just set my natural/tech character to minimal FX.

I have a DM/Shield brute called Sludgemouth. Uses the manhole cover for his shield. And I've recolored dark melee with greens and oranges for a lovely approximation of toxic melee.

Edit: not sure if this fits the OP's definition of "repurpose" but I also have an Osage ill/storm controller. The phantom army is explained as the spirits of his ancestors, with dark colors to differentiate them from the other pets. And the phantasm colors are tweaked to bring out the twinkling constellation of his particle effect. He's supposed to be a spirit of the sky people.

Aeropunk - Storm/DP def with a steampunk/dieselpunk/magitek theme. He uses the flintlock model of pistol as an "airgun" that fires non-lethal compressed directed gas attacks at his foes (with slight modifications for supercooled, superheated, or noxious gas rounds). For reasons that unknown even to him, Aero can generate localized fortean phenomenon, including spontaneous dust storms, rains of gear oil, smogfields to conceal himself, and dust/grime devils (not sure what to do when he gets to lightning storm though).

Selene Dioscuria - MA/SR scrapper. The SR is played as spatial disruption, spatial hypersense, and teleportation/flash steps to avoid damage. Because her abilities warp space (and light, in the case of her stalker version), all of the powers are recolored to match "light warped" versions of whatever her costume colors are at the time - so when she moves it looks like she has distortion effects following her. Her MA is just MA, but I do narrate that her Martial Arts appear completely impossible and impractical as she's learned just from watching video games and movies =)

Even more that I keep suddenly remembering:

Illumineer, Ill/Rad troller. Semi-steampunk, a scientist in the field of "electromagnetic radiance and its effects on the human psyche." Basically, light-based: the debuffs from Rad are meant to be just another offensive application, like her Spectral Wounds and Blind powers. Megafun.

Cordycepsis, a mutant who controls fungus... specifically the mind-controlling fungal parasite she picked up in a jungle somewhere and *****-slapped into submission. I've given her the most disgusting, rotted costume I can conceive, and colored her powers (mind control/thorny assault) to match. Thorns were chosen because the Cordyceps fungus, which does exist and fortunately only infects insects, looks like this when it takes over a host.

Caffiend, a disgruntled barista who Just Can't Take It Any More. Energy/Kin corruptor, both sets colored dark brown. I doubt any further explanation is required.

Hell I repurposed a whole race - my main Peacebringer isn't a kheld, he's actually a sort of power cosmic/pheonix force/spellfire composite. As for my primary character WarMain- toughness = kinetic dampening field generator.

My Ill/Rad Puzzling Evidence can transform into various cryptids. When he becomes El Chupacabra, all his powers turn deep red for the blood he is exsanguinating and manipulation. And white powers for his Yeti form, etc.

My Bots/Dark mastermind Lu-C4 manipulates nanoswarms, hence the back clouds.

I wish I made my Earth/Storm troller after power customization. He would have been a poop wizard! Yes, I am gross.

Now I just need to figure out how to color Plant powers to look like candy, so i can imprison foes in licorice whips!

Aurumaton, my Energy/Energy blaster with all powers recolored in gold. It's an android constructed mostly from gold who fires streams of half-molten gold at its enemies. And as gold isn't the toughest of metals a squishy blaster seemed appropriate

Pain Dom colored to match Leviathan mastery, so that it's all "psychic" energy. After hanging out with Mako, Agonus altered his psychic blasts so that they resemble sharks.

And I like the look of coloring an Energy Shield the same color as default Fire Melee, so that it looks like the character has formed a sword and shield from fire.

Gravity control and Kinetics synced for all purpose Telekinesis.

Dark Melee and Fire Aura (I think with the Fire option instead of Flame) can be synced up pretty well to pass them both off visually as the same energy type of your choice.

And Earth Control (using crystals) and Storm as all purpose "magic," as there's a similar cloud-like graphic effect to both powersets.

And I have a character with Energy Melee colored to match Pyre Mastery, for a different way to do Fire Melee. (After the character was already leveled and the concept was in need of an overhaul to cover NRG's drawbacks.)

good luck D.B.B.