Vanity Vehicles


Arthur the Wraith

 

Posted

Batman has the Batmobile, Wonder Woman has her Invisible Jet, and Ghost Rider has a flaming motorcycle.

I'm pretty sure there are lots of players would would be willing to spend some PP on a YOURNAMEHEREmobile. Plus, it would be a blast to put the armor some of these enemies wear to an unannounced crash-safety test...

I imagine it wouldn't be too much work to implement, given that there are already a bunch of Vehicles meshes already in the game, plus i'm sure you could borrow some of the code from an already existing travel power. Making them customizeable is a whole other story, though...

Would anyone else be willing to spend 200-400 PP or so on an Vehicle travel power? The Hover Board seems to be a big hit from what I've seen.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arthur the Wraith View Post
Batman has the Batmobile, Wonder Woman has her Invisible Jet, and Ghost Rider has a flaming motorcycle.

I'm pretty sure there are lots of players would would be willing to spend some PP on a YOURNAMEHEREmobile. Plus, it would be a blast to put the armor some of these enemies wear to an unannounced crash-safety test...

Let's see here's the cut and paste Memphis Bill made to save time in responding to this subject since it gets brought up so often and people simply refuse to use the Search tool before posting.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Memphis_Bill

Disclaimer

Yes. This is a cut and paste reply that I keep handy, as well as a quick bit of instruction on how to search. Neither are meant to cause fights or to be insulting. The search instructions are in, not just because forum rules say flat out to search, but to help you and anyone else reading this use the search tool effectively.

The body of the cut and paste reply is the way it is because we've seen these arguments numerous times before. They're a summary of the salient points that come up each time. They are not here to insult you, make you feel stupid or otherwise "bring you down a peg." Instead, they are meant as instruction and information. Please read through the points and the explanation behind them to see the issues that are commonly brought up in response. They may not always match your suggestion 100% - in fact, you may have explained around one or two of them - but they're there for consideration and refinement of your idea.

Yes, I do look forward to the time, with some of these suggestions, that someone not only addresses all the points, but does so exceptionally well. It'll probably be added to the end of the cut/paste reply, with credit. For now, though, read and consider the points. They really are just there to help you, and move discussion along to help ideas evolve.

If you're going to see this and say an "evil forum vet is just shooting down your idea," or "You think you're the last word because of your post count," you're wrong. Heck, if you say the second, you've just worried more about my post count than I have in the last four plus years. Tongue-in-cheek comments in here are meant as humor, not put downs.

Searching Effectively

1. Click on "Search" up at the top of the forum.
2. On the left, under "Forum(s) to search," select "Suggestions and ideas."
3. On the right, Keyword Search Terms. This is probably where your problem was if you did search. Try the following, exactly as typed:

+vehicle -"re: "

This will search for anything with the string "vehicle" in the title.The -re: portion of it removes replies, so you'll see the root of every thread that comes up, letting you see just how many threads there are on this. (The last helps for other subjects, as well.)

Be sure to put the space between the colon and last quote.

4. Click the "In subject" radio button. This is a search, not a cute blonde in a bikini. Here, you want to ignore the body.

5. Leave Username Search blank.

6. Date range, Newer Than, change the 1 to a 3, and the time to Months.

7. Result format doesn't matter. Click on "Submit."

The subject at hand: Vehicles.
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. There are also issues such as drift and "realistic" handling. We can go side to side, as mentioned, and make immediate right angle turns. Cars... not so much.

2. Movement, part 2.

Go stand in the road. No, not you personally. Take your character out and stand in the road, if you're heroside. Or even in the path of civilians. What happens? You get pushed. While not as big an issue with a motorcycle, perhaps, a car would have issues. What happens if two cars meet head on - yours and an NPC, or yours and another player's? Do you just pass through each other? Would you be satisfied with that very odd result? Or would you get stuck? How about those NPCs, can they walk and push your car, or are they walking through it? Neither answer is very satisfying, and intelligent, dynamic pathing is too computationally expensive.

3. 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.

4. 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?

5. 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.

6. 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 as generally envisioned aren't a spectacular idea for a travel power.
Further discussion

This I think merits a bit of extra commentary, honestly.

"Vehicles" covers a lot of different ground for different people. Some only consider cars/jets/motorcycles vehicles. Others add jetpacks, wings and the like. Much of the above considers cars and similar sized vehicles, with nods to motorcycle type vehicles.

Jetpacks and such, I don't see happening as travel powers. As costume options for Flight? Or as invented pieces that interact with Fly, similar to wings? Absolutely - but they don't need to be a separate travel power for that. I'm all for more jetpack and wing (or combination) designs. Besides, there are so many "temp" jetpacks, I don't see introducing yet another one as really being feasable - just my opinion.

But vehicles - cars, specifically - as a travel power, have issues.

One way to have them "somewhat" work.

For all that, I know some people *would* still like to pull up in front of a mission. So how do we do it?

A temporary power, based on the same tech from the Mac/Valkyrie pack Mission Teleporter. The temporary power would:

(a) be an invention - dropping from enemies. (A reward, because you saved... well, we'll get to that,)

(b) be a single use each time - you can only hold one at a time, not one of each, one total.

(c) use rarely used salvage, because... it's rarely used, and cheap. No Luck Charms here.

(d) come in multiple varieties.

How does this get around the various issues?


Terrain - It doesn't pass terrain. It just arrives.

It follows the same 'rules' as the mission teleporter - it's not indoors, doesn't go to contacts, etc. Just mission doors.

Customizing - It's not "your" vehicle. It's a temp power. You've called a cab, limo, or other transport.

Power animation - since you're skipping the space in between, no powers can be used 'til you arrive anyway.



The varieties?
- Limo: Stereotypical slightly stretched black limo.
- Checker cab: The classic yellow cab.
But hey, since the games switched to the new business model maybe the devs will put some thought into addressing these issues and get something out on the market.

Quote:
I imagine it wouldn't be too much work to implement, given that there are already a bunch of Vehicles meshes already in the game, plus i'm sure you could borrow some of the code from an already existing travel power. Making them customizeable is a whole other story, though.
SCR applies.


 

Posted

Oh, I didn't know. I'll remember to search next time. >.<


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arthur the Wraith View Post
Oh, I didn't know. I'll remember to search next time. >.<
It's been an often suggested idea for almost 8 years and sometimes threads turned ugly as tempers flared.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Arthur the Wraith View Post
Wonder Woman has her Invisible Jet
A number of my characters have invisible vehicles. You just can't, well, see them.


_________
@Inquisitor

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr_Morbid View Post
A number of my characters have invisible vehicles. You just can't, well, see them.
Thread winning detected


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Originally Posted by Zwillinger View Post
GG, I would tell you that "I am killing you with my mind", but I couldn't find an emoticon to properly express my sentiment.
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Originally Posted by Captain_Photon View Post
NOTE: The Incarnate System is basically farming for IOs on a larger scale, and with more obtrusive lore.

 

Posted

ALTHOUGH

it could be possible to make, with the current tech and restrictions:

a hover-rock, hover ice shard with trail, tornado travel power, OR [*here's where it becomes relevant*] handleless-motor-scooter/T-board/Wave that is in the shape of the hoverboard, but with two wheels, and acts basically like the slide temp power. or a more aero-winged hoverboard, a hover-cloud, other aerial travel devices.

so no full on vehicle, but there are still plenty of potential options we could get if they look into it and hear us shout loud enough. but of course, it will be for a price :/


 

Posted

You know, while hunting for exploration badges/accolades on my rocket board, I realized something: I wouldn't mind having a flying car that's basically a shapeshifting version of the Rocket Board.

No, it doesn't have to be a special vehicle with it's own powers beyond flight and looking like a car. I don't need it to be able to take a rocket at point blank to be a super mobile.

It's a car, it flies, it has apparently infinite fuel, and let's me subvert rush hour traffic jams. That's perfectly super enough for me, thank you.

Though It might be a head scratcher why my normally generous hero won't let his friends and even family into his new, super tech sedan. Maybe he's got a @#$%ish side I don't know about but either way, it's fine with me that I can't do much else with it besides fly around because I can't do much else with the Rocket Board either and I have a blast riding it around and sometimes use it to escape mobs, actually. (My parting thoughts always being: "@#$% your @#$% I had a rocket board!")


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Quote:
Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow View Post
City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

 

Posted

We got a rocket board, didn't we? Who's to say there aren't other such powers in the works?

Heck, a rocket cycle /lightcycle /really well tuned motorcycle could work as a togglable superspeed variant of the flight powers. and it might disable other powers like the other vehicle powers do. (rocket board and flying carpet)


you could have it all
My empire of dirt
I will let you down
I will make you <3

 

Posted

Shhhhhh!

If it happens, a bunch of grown men type heroes/villains will be rolling around in My Little Pony Mobiles (Kioshi ).


"Forum PvP doesn't give drops. Just so all of you who participated in this thread are aware." -Mod08-
"when a stalker goes blue side, assassination strike should be renamed "bunny hugs", and a rainbow should fly out" -Harbinger-

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Party_Kake View Post
We got a rocket board, didn't we? Who's to say there aren't other such powers in the works?

Heck, a rocket cycle /lightcycle /really well tuned motorcycle could work as a togglable superspeed variant of the flight powers. and it might disable other powers like the other vehicle powers do. (rocket board and flying carpet)

You guys do remember that when Rocket Board was released the devs asked us for a list of alternatives we'd like to see.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by CrazyJerseyan View Post
Shhhhhh!

If it happens, a bunch of grown men type heroes/villains will be rolling around in My Little Pony Mobiles (Kioshi ).
Heck, given the upcoming Coyote transformation travel power, we could potentially just turn into actual ponies.


Goodbye may seem forever
Farewell is like the end
But in my heart's the memory
And there you'll always be
-- The Fox and the Hound

 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Tenzhi View Post
Heck, given the upcoming Coyote transformation travel power, we could potentially just turn into actual ponies.
Only the F2P players would get this power, and then VIP players would be able to ride'em.


"Champion (the Community Server... or GTFO) is like a small town where everyone knows each other's names, for better or worse." -kojirodensetsu.
"If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." - Maslow's Hammer

 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Arthur the Wraith View Post
Would anyone else be willing to spend 200-400 PP or so on an Vehicle travel power?
Yes, I sure would

Who knows, maybe the developers would finally attempt to implement this to earn money... In any case it's better than releasing the Magic Carpet which seems very similar to Rocket Board.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by scorpius View Post
Yes, I sure would

Who knows, maybe the developers would finally attempt to implement this to earn money... In any case it's better than releasing the Magic Carpet which seems very similar to Rocket Board.
You aren't going to see anything but variations of the Rocket Board for the forseeable because, that's what players were asking for and what the devs have implied they are working on when they specifically asked players what variations of Rocket Board they wanted to see next.


Now it is possible we might see the addition of jet packs either as travel powers or new costume pieces because they don't interfere with how powers work.

Personally I'd prefer them as costume pieces than actual powers because it allows us much more freedom when designing costumes. Rocket Boots animate when Fly is activated so the same thing can be done with jet packs.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by scorpius View Post
Yes, I sure would

Who knows, maybe the developers would finally attempt to implement this to earn money... In any case it's better than releasing the Magic Carpet which seems very similar to Rocket Board.
The advantage of the rocket board and flying carpet is that the entire character and the costume can be seen. With many cars and planes the character is inside and can't be seen (like those Sky Raider bosses, who suddenly fall out and evaporate when their small planes are destroyed).

Since players go to great lengths designing costumes, it makes sense to implement new travel modes that allow those costumes to be seen first, because characters will still retain their individuality. If everyone is sealed up in bat-planes and hornet-cars, they'll all look the same.

And you know the first thing everyone is going to say is that it's great, except it would be so much cooler in red, or black, or two-toned metallic blue...


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rodion View Post
The advantage of the rocket board and flying carpet is that the entire character and the costume can be seen. With many cars and planes the character is inside and can't be seen...
That's a good point, though I'm just mostly interested in a motorcycle. That way my char will still be visible.

I don't think the colors will be a concern though, the Rocket Board only has one color too but it's fine.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by scorpius View Post
That's a good point, though I'm just mostly interested in a motorcycle. That way my char will still be visible.

I don't think the colors will be a concern though, the Rocket Board only has one color too but it's fine.
The problems with a motorcycle is that it's a ground vehicle and have been explained in Memphis Bills cut and paste.

If they do it like Rocket Board then you will have no access to any other powers while the bike is active, and you won't be able to attack or defend yourself from 99% of the NPC's in the game.

Then there's the movement issues. Motorcycles can't move sideways or strafe like characters can.

Let's not forget terrain. It would look stupid to see a motorcycle swimming.


Now the possibility does exist for hover vehicles/bikes as vanity travel powers. They can strafe and move sideways, they can ignore terrain, and they can simply fly above NPC's if like Rocket Board all other powers are locked when it's being used.

And most importantly if done as a vanity power they wouldn't have to rewrite every single power in the game to work from a sitting position in a vehicle.


 

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This plz ^


 

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@Forbin_Project

Oh of course, I meant it as a vanity travel power.

By the way, can someone please tell me how long ago was that cut-and-paste excerpt that everyone keeps referring to originally posted on these forums?


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by scorpius View Post
@Forbin_Project

Oh of course, I meant it as a vanity travel power.

By the way, can someone please tell me how long ago was that cut-and-paste excerpt that everyone keeps referring to originally posted on these forums?
Bill's had that for many many years, and he's updated it several times to keep it current. (I think the first time I saw it was back in 2005) The original post has been long lost in the history of forum purges and migration to the new boards.

The reason it has stood the test of time is it sticks to the core issues that need to be resolved in order for vehicles to work.

Oh and the reason I keep harping on the differences between regular travel powers and Vanity is because there are a lot of other people that would prefer to use their powers like a regular travel power.


 

Posted

How about hitchhiking ... I would still like to ride with the CRAZY drivers in PI


 

Posted

When they ever get around to putting this game on a console system like a PS3, Xbox for example then we could get this. Saint's Row, Driver and some of the others have it where you steal vehicles in game and then can customize them.

So yea my Colonel Confederate would love to ride around on a Confederate Hellcat ,but it isn't gonna happen unless they stick this game on a console system like how DC Online is. Haven't played it because no system. With how they went Free to Play. It's surprising that they don't consider sticking this on a Playstation, Xbox or Nintendo and have us VIP's pay for special content and privileges. Like a Need For Speed Underground styled content for racing each others vehicles, or see who runs faster, or flys faster through an obstacle course.

Potential is there for vehicles ,but not on the PC system I don't think.


 

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Colonel-Confederate View Post
When they ever get around to putting this game on a console system like a PS3, Xbox for example then we could get this. Saint's Row, Driver and some of the others have it where you steal vehicles in game and then can customize them.

So yea my Colonel Confederate would love to ride around on a Confederate Hellcat ,but it isn't gonna happen unless they stick this game on a console system like how DC Online is. Haven't played it because no system. With how they went Free to Play. It's surprising that they don't consider sticking this on a Playstation, Xbox or Nintendo and have us VIP's pay for special content and privileges. Like a Need For Speed Underground styled content for racing each others vehicles, or see who runs faster, or flys faster through an obstacle course.

Potential is there for vehicles ,but not on the PC system I don't think.
HAHaHA ... those games are coded for driving has right of way. this game, Peds have right of way. They would have to recode the game reguardless of what system it's on.


 

Posted

Quote:
Originally Posted by Colonel-Confederate View Post
When they ever get around to putting this game on a console system like a PS3, Xbox for example then we could get this. Saint's Row, Driver and some of the others have it where you steal vehicles in game and then can customize them.

So yea my Colonel Confederate would love to ride around on a Confederate Hellcat ,but it isn't gonna happen unless they stick this game on a console system like how DC Online is. Haven't played it because no system. With how they went Free to Play. It's surprising that they don't consider sticking this on a Playstation, Xbox or Nintendo and have us VIP's pay for special content and privileges. Like a Need For Speed Underground styled content for racing each others vehicles, or see who runs faster, or flys faster through an obstacle course.

Potential is there for vehicles ,but not on the PC system I don't think.
And we're back to the Standard Code Rant.




My sarcasm meter must be broken cuz I can't tell if he's joking or serious when he says he thinks the reason we don't have vehicles is because the game wasn't made for console systems.