Best badge for your character?

While playing last night someone asked me how I had gotten the badge I was "wearing" at the time, and I told them it was just a random Exploration badge I had picked up that sounded good for the toon I was playing. This made me think about badges again for the first time in a long time.

When they were first rolled out I thought they were to some extent pointless, then I heard about Accolades and the Accolade powers, which made more sense. Later it occurred to me that some badges that are harder to get do, in some way, identify you as more of a "pro" if you have them (like wearing the 5 year Veteran badge for instance). Some are so hard to get that they're somewhat rare anymore to the point that people wouldn't know what you had to go through to get them, like "Charmer", which sounds like something out of the Spring Fling event set, but is actually the successful completion badge for doing the Abandoned Sewer Trial. That trial is not easy to do, hard to get a team for, and most people have never heard of it because there's no really obvious in-game mechanic that points you to it, as far as I know. It's just one of those things that you either know about from 5 years ago when it was "hot" or you don't because you're new. Later on it occurred to me the it would make some of my toons more "flavory" if I just always wore a badge that seemed to fit them well.

I remember long ago waking up early on a Saturday morning once or twice just so I could solo rocket launches in Warburg to get the "Rocketman" badge for my one "space guy" toon. For the most part, I only did that because I felt at the time that "Rocketman" was like the PERFECT badge for that character to have. Then I later noticed that they made "Rocketman" a Goldbricker minion name or something (I don't play redside a lot). In reality, the one exploration badge I was wearing on my other toon last night might just be the perfect badge for him as well, and I basically got it by accident. He's a wild westy undead gunslinger with Pistols/dark sets and and the badge in question is "Man of Vengeance", which seems to fit him well, because why is he dead but still walking the Earth meting out justice? Because he's a Man of Vengeance, that's why.

So, I ask you, what's the perfect badge for your character, and why? Is it obvious by looking at the toon, or is it to do with details you'd only know from reading the info?

Most of the Winter Event badges work pretty well for Frosty Femme. There are a few tech based ones that I like for Wrecking Gear. Patriot works for my various patriotic themed characters. There's almost always a perfect badge out there for whatever your character's concept is.

I'm fond of Seeker of Monsters from the Hollows for my character Riley Grimm. With a name like Grimm, it sort of follows and it does tie in to her bio/origin of her hunting the Red Caps.

I don't really have a single favorite badge title. On my main badging characters I actually use /settitle binds to give each of my costume slots a different badge title that applies directly to that outfit. Because of that I don't even bother with the standard "title adjectives" that you can set with the trainers.

I always choose badges that relate to my characters' personality or background. I don't use badges to boast of my accomplishments. If anyone cares about that, they can just look at my Badges tab on their own.

- My Crab Spider is my main character and has traditionally worn the "Big Spider" badge, though I have more recently changed to "Webmaster".
- When I made a Troll character, he ran out and got "Just Said No to Superadyne" the instant he was high enough level to enter all of the zones, and has worn it ever since.
- I have a Mastermind who's a disgruntled Crey employee, and I try to keep him logged out in the Crey building in Nerva (doesn't have the badge yet).

I'm amused to have "Honorary Peacebringer" on my Warshade, but I think it'd be funnier if I had a Peacebringer.

** "Profiteer" on my mercs/TA MM who is actually NAMED Profiteer

** ""Chaotician" on my walking Pauli effect Mind/FF controller, Cluster Flux

** "Positron's Ally" on Sorina Tavarisch, who according to my novel THE COURSE OF SUPERHERO ROMANCE is dating none other than Positron

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

Right now I'd have to say Master of Lambda Sector, which I got last night and is my first Master of badge ever. I've always kind of avoided Master runs because I know you have to be very careful and do things exactly so, and I guess I'm always afraid of being the one to screw things up. Which is odd I suppose because I think of myself as a smart vetaran player who can follow instructions, and I have characters that are very well IO'd. I can tank an ITF in my sleep, on some characters I could probably solo it, but I've never actually attempted a Master run for whatever reason.

The Lambda run was fun and a challenge. On the first run we took goatee-Babs down with just a minute of time left. On the third run, because I hadn't rebooted my computer after several hours of play and two straight Lambdas, things got a little wonky and I was stuck in perpetual "down" mode, which prevented me from jumping or flying up, and when I flew forward it was at half speed (and ground level) and when I stopped I'd drift backwards constantly if I didn't turn fly off. Made the run past enemies in the labs quite an adventure, and then during the fight I had to hospital at one point and only got back over the walls because they are sloped, so I could fly into them and "climb" them. Then with 3 minutes left Babs jumped up on that one platform in the corner, and I couldn't get up there until I figured out that by flying backwards I actually gained a little altitude... so everyone's wailing on Babs, trying to bring him down before time runs out, and I'm flying around backwards and then dropping down onto the platform and missing it twice. I'm sure I looked quite impressive. ^_^

But nobody has to know that when I wear my badge. And we did drop him, again with just about 1 minute to go.

Using some /settitle magic, I gave Nalrok Ath'Zim the 'Behemoth Overlord' badge. >:]

Oh, I've used "Free Costume Change" as a badge on certain characters for ages. Makes me laugh.

Temporal Fighter for the temporal energy perceiving/manipulator. Sadly, everytime I reroll I have to wait till lvl 40 (I believe) to get it.

I have a number of characters on whom I have found very fitting badges, some by accident (Phalanx Falcon, below, was actually the first character on whom I found the "Phalanxer" badge). Here's a few I can remember off the top of my head.

"Lord of Winter" for Winterminal
"Cold Warrior" for Wintervention
"Manticore's Associate" on my Arch/Dev character who is supposed to be Manticore's apprentice.
"Bright Star" on my intergalactic peace-keeping PB
"Phalanxer" on my Shield/SS tanker, Phalanx Falcon

I am having to go villain to get the spider's kiss badge or sumin :<

But I like my MoTPN badge because it is hard and I get a lot of tells asking me how I did it.

I'm a stickler for having the right badge, just for the name.

My latest character is a magician's assistant - I ran the Terra Volta respec twice to get "Assistant".

An old Force Field Defender of mine had a permanent force field 10cm from her skin, so arresting 100 family bosses was a priority to get "Untouchable".

I did the "Enterprenuer" day job for another character, and so on.

My favorite badge is "Praetor," followed by "Mayhem's Prodigal," "Moral High Ground" and "Knows The Truth."

Dragos Bahtiam - Wild At Heart (will change to Here Be Dragons when he goes dark)
Deamus the Fallen - either Demonic or Heart of Darkness (or that one for finishing Dr Graves' final arc)
Operative 19650917 - Crab Spider Longfang (until that was broken... :<)
Operative 19921124 - Night Widow (...Ditto)
Praetor Raidix - Dancer With Death (KM/Nin Stalker)
Altimus Omega/Onega - Time Lord - That Day Job Accolade for the Shard
KC Prime - Energized (TW/Elec brute)
Senator Filibuster - Fair and Balanced/Crooked Politician/Spin Doctor
Baron Von Tesla - Customizer (Bats/Tarps)
Agent Josan - Full Spectrum (Maybe something else soldier related)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shubbie Im very good at taking a problem and making it worse.

I was so happy when I could finally crossover to redside with my Blaster Mr. Science and grab the Master of Science badge from Cap. Pretty much the only way the devs could make a more fitting badge is if they made "SCIENCE!!" as a badge.

...Get on it, devs.

I've used...

"Full Spectrum" for Astral Prism, a Rad/Rad Corruptor with powers color-coded to every basic shade of the rainbow. (Previously, it was the more punny "Spectral.")

"Heart of Light" for my Warshade, who survived an attempt by the Council to forcibly imprint a Nictus by being that committed to being a hero.

"Meticulous," "Qualified," and "Professional" for a former special-ops soldier who worked their way up to leader and coordinator.

"Rule of Three" for a character who has two heroic siblings.

"Unsubtle" for an Electric/ Controller who almost constantly wears bright yellow.

"Words of the Warrior" for a proud warrior-type who apparently has a habit of speaking in oblique metaphors, often about the nature of life and death.

In short, every character I have for any length of time sponateously grows a backstory. At some point, I always go back to the master list o' badges and see what badges might be especially fitting for any one character.

I never actually said mine, lolz. Here goes:

My newest toon, the undead gunslinger Tin Star Jonny Ozark wears the "Man of Vengeance" badge, which I alluded to.

My Peacebringer is the aforementioned "space guy". He's all human, and all of his costumes are very "space", (can't wait for the "spaceman" costume stuff to roll out...) he wears "Rocketman, as I said.

My fire blaster is a calliente south american gurl with red and yellow bird wings and a bikini, so for her I decided on "Dance Legend" which is the exploration badge at the door of the old dance club in Steel Canyon. I feel like she'd be popular in the dance floor pretty much any place.

My main, Radiac, is a rad/rad def and is still not really wearing a badge that I feel fits his backstory in any really significant way and I'm still looking. Is there a "Radioactive" badge? I don't even know, I'll have to look.

My stone tanker, Mud Marine, is a military dude with Stone/stone sets, a camo outfit, has a trademark cigar-and-mirrored-sunglasses combo, and wears "Battle-Hardened" as his moniker, but I still haven't found a dadge I like that fits as well as that title does. His backstory is somewhat Rikti related, so I generally use Vanguardy stuff, but I switch back and forth.

Got a character called "The Big Thing". His badge is "The Next Big Thing".

Rose Dawn, the third Dawn Sister, found "Luscious" in the RWZ, and that stuck. Heh.

Can't remember any of the others off hand... I'll come back when I gander at them and report in.

I know the accolades are really helpful for toons, but when it comes to badges, I tend to look down my list, find one that seems to fit the toon, set it for his/her badge title and forget all about them. I don't have tons of time to play so badge chasing feels like busywork that takes away from my 'real game'.

I'm usually on the lookout for the perfect badge for each character I play. Just a few that I've hit so far are

"Woman in Black" for my Alien Loathing Corruptor, who, as it happens, dresses all in black.

"Woman Scorned" for my Widow who has been trying (unsuccessfully) to catch Recluses' eye for years.

"Celebrity" for my Controller who actually makes a living as a popular street performer.

"Technophobe" for my Blaster who works for 'the office of inadvisable technology'

and, perhaps the most perfect, for my Corruptor who, when she's not being a Super villain, actually works shifts in the ER in Cap Au Diable. Her badge... "Physician"

I don't know about a perfect badge for everybody, but there are a lot to choose from.

My favorite is still Mist in Moonlight's... He's a Peacebringer, and his gig is pretty much all about being the brightest, shiny thing in the entire history of bright and shiny things. He's absolutely blinding. He wears 'Heart of Light'.

His mate, Shade in Shadow, on the other hand is that dark-winged, dark-hooded, black-costumed stalker in my avatar picture. She wears a title that suits her equally well... 'Eyes of the Dark'.

My fortunata's badge title is "Misbegotten." She is a half-human-half-Rularuu escaped product of mad science, and while not quite an eldritch abomination, definitely a Thing That Should Not Be.

My ill/rad controller's title is "Forward Thinker." She's a time-displaced suffragette and mad scientist.

My time/sonic defender and grav/kin controller are two versions of the same character. He's a Midnight Squad sorcerer, born in 1919 and still essentially living in the 1940s, who maintains immortality by tricking enemies out of their own lifespans. One version of him has the title "Old Timer," the other "Old Fashioned." Come I22, "Old Timer" will be replaced with "Time Saver." He has also been "Midnighter Archivist" in the past (he's a librarian).

My stone/energy tank was once a stone/SS tank, but a Terra Volta trial gone horribly wrong changed his powers rather more significantly than it should have (this is just his backstory; I never rerolled anyone) and now he glows in the dark. He's "Irradiated."

My Zombies/Poison MM is Ebolavirus-themed. He's "Plague Carrier."

My Pistols/Time corruptor wears a red trench coat and broad-brimmed hat, and is named Double-Dealing Diva (google that if you're not sure what song it's from). She's "Unethical Tourist."

Lastly, I have three Mender characters who, like Tesseract and Lazarus, are blatant expies of time-travelers from other sources. From one of these two sources, we have Mender Zeal the dark/dark corruptor with the title "Dark Omen," and Mender Epoch (pictured in my avatar) the bots/fire MM with the title "Time Machinist." From the other source we have Mender Lathrop the kin/elec defender who I could only wish I could title "Doc" and still have him remain blue, as he should be.



Lastly, I always think of Mender Lazarus as having the badge title "Glimpsed The Abyss."