f13.net

Issue 8 Goes Live (http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=7081387&an=0&page=0#Post7081387)

Patch Notes (http://www.cityofheroes.com/news/patch_notes.html)

This issue includes Veteran Rewards.
For heroes, Police Band and Safeguard missions are the analogue to the villains' newspaper and mayhem missions.
Also, the Faultline CoH zone has been revamped.

From farther down in the patch notes, they have reduced the rewards from PvP zone missions to be equal to the non-PvP equivalents. In other words, they've removed an incentive to go there. Curious.

Edit: doh, should I have posted this in The News Thread? If so, oops. Mod away.

I didn't realize there were bigger rewards. I was curious about the pvp zones, given the relatively easy death penalty in Co*, but I always figured it'd be some kind of gankfest. And of course, a MM is a bit of an easy target.

I had only a few minutes to muck around in Co* after installing the patch, but I did get to make one character even gayer by adding angel wings.  They did a good job with animation for winged flight. 

Depending on server of course, the PvP zones tend to be sparsely populated. Especially zones other than Siren's Call. On my lowbie villains in particular, I used to look forward to reaching 15 so I could go do accelerated leveling in Booty Bay. The PvP zone access points in CoV are much more convenient than in CoH.

I was going to write more about it, but it's moot. Non-PvP zones have vendors, so they're the better leveling areas now.

Zog no unnerstand 'levelling'.

I8 deserves is own posts, says I.

Looks like I shouldn't have taken that month off from the game, as my goal to get level 50 before I8 has failed.  On the other hand, I've now the opportunity to start a brand new hero in order to fully appreciate the changes in I8... it just won't be a Kheldian. 

I'm thinking either another Scrapper or another Controller.  My issue with my existing Spines/Dark Scrapper is that I've since decided that Scrappers lacking single target damage focus defeat the purpose of being a scrapper.  My issue with my existing Illusion/Storm Controller is that I've come to realize that Phantasm damage isn't all that good (due to the illusionary component) and Storm does little to help that other than lay down a -RES rain.  Not that a Controller's damage will ever be good, but I might as well specialize on a character that does what Controllers really do: support a group.  My current one has an issue with scattering foes around in such a way as to make them hard to AOE nuke (the Phantasm's torrent and various weather effects).  I've since discovered that Wormhole is awesome enough to make up for Propel's freaking long animation uselessness.  I think I'll go Grav/Kinetics, or Grav/Radiation, fully aware that Singularities dont' do much damage but make up for that by being hard to kill and having their own built in repel fields.  Here's hoping that such alt-a-holicistic ideals don't kill the fun.

In other news, looks like a goodly part of my preloaded patch was corrupt, so I'll be getting into the game a little later than some.  Ah, what am I whining about, I'm home and most people are working right now.

No leveling needed for PvP areas in CoH, it automatically sidekicks/mentors everybody up/down to the same level.  About the only benefit is having better enhancements slotted.  But then, that's not what Hutch (and probably not Sky) is saying  - what Hutch was saying is that the PvP areas provided a place a higher risk for higher reward.  I seem to recall the developers talking about why they made the decision to remove the higher rewards from those areas... I think it had something to do with a stopgap measure to stop exploitation.

Yes, I was talking about using the PvP areas for faster leveling. You got a bonus to the xp rewarded for finishing the mission. I used to think that you got bonus xp for the mobs inside the mission, but nowadays I think that you just get bonus xp for longbow/arachnos anywhere, not just in pvp missions.

In any case, if they did make this nerf in order to stop exploitation, they got me cold. I had a stint there where I actually went to SC to pvp, and I've done the Shivan mission in BB a few times, but most of my time in PvP zones was spent leveling, specifically because of the bonus mission xp.


edit: because "expoitation" is not a word

I don't play for fast levelling. I play for enjoyable gameplay. I follow story arcs and don't worry about how fast I'm 'levelling'. If I ever did, I'd go play another game because this one would have been boring.

Silly me, I forgot the real plan was to go Blaster instead of Controller or Scrapper if I8 hit.  Blasters are pretty tough to play though, especially if I'm looking to make use of Defiance, better known as Ultimate Debt Temptation.

I'm a bit fuzzy as to what the developers actually said about removing the XP bonus for PvP areas, but I seem to recall that they were thinking that'd be a temporary thing rather than a permanent.  There is some incentive to PvP still, what with the temporary powers and SO awards and whatnot, but indeed I rather liked making more xp.

That wasn't the exploit.  They haven't detailed what it was, but the missions were intended to give a greater than normal bonus to experience due to the risk of traveling through the zone.  You weren't exploiting by going from mission to mission, that was the design.

And they have said that they're looking at ways to bring back that reward while still preventing the unspecified exploit.

I'm just glad they added radio missions for heroes  :-D
PvP zone mission was the fastest way to level if you really want speed over story arcs before these radio missions came along.
It wasnt' because of the xp bonus, but due to very very small travel time, the extra XP was icing on the cake. There is almost no risk from being ganked. Do one patrol and you get a stealth temp power for 30 mins. Use it to do 2 more patrols, then you can make calls, saving time going back n forth. Now pick your favorite mission type and repeat it over n over. Since everytime you exit your mission you have 30 second timer to call, set mish , reach the entry point before being ganked...you're 90% safe of the time. Especially if you have stealth/superspeed powers. I did BB till 25 in CoH cause I couldn't stand the long distance story arcs ( running 2 zones for 500 xp is really retarded ) but now there's radio mission, I may start making an alt just to have fun instead of being frustrated by the slow story arcs.

Afaik, the PvP zone exploit was:

1) have a high-level character sidekick a lower-level character

2) start a PvP zone misssion and almost complete it

3) have the lower-lvl player unsidekick

4) complete the mission.

The lower-lvl sidekick would then receive the mission complete reward at their lvl... plus the 25% bonus xp based on their sidekicked lvl. It was a cheap way of getting xp and one that wasn't easily fixable by the devs due to the way CoH/V handles mission rewards.

No, I never used this exploit, but that's what I've been told it was.

OH.

No, I wasn't doing that. I was just "exploiting" the fact that I was getting bonus xp for essentially no risk. Between stealth, mez protection, the 30 second timer, and the fact that I almost never saw any opponents, much less got attacked, it was basically free xp.

The only risk is keeping awake, lol seriouly just bored of it. And after 5 newspaper mish I'm about ready to fall asleep.
My L35 Scrapper keeps meeting the same EM boss in Safeguard in two different towns, wtf is up with that. The bitch just hits some sort of high-resist form at low hp that forced me to run since I'm only doing 5-20 dmg per hit...

 After completing it once there's little reason for me to do it again though :( since I keep meeting that EM bitch

Yeah, when I say "Exploiting" I don't mean "playing the game optimally" so much as "using a cheap shortcut tactic".  Granted, there is a pretty fine line between them at times.  Personally, I wish the developers had gone with my zero xp debt in PvP zones (http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Board=Ideas&Number=6659997) idea.  Unfortunately some of the idiot message board users, whose apparent only gratification in life is to argue, decided to spin this combination of a needed PvP incentive and anti grief play measure in the direction of my simply suckering newbies into ganksville.  Ah well, I'm deluding myself into thinking any game developer does what they see on the suggestion boards unless they were planning on doing something similar already.

Rk47 - might need to lower your difficulty to the default level to do a Safeguard mission, as otherwise you might end up fighting a "supervillain" rank foe instead of a soloable one.  Bosses are one thing, supervillians are in a whole other league.

I have an overwhelming desire to create a "winged" themed character since my account qualifies for one and I've never had a flying toon.  Angelic or demonic, it doesn't matter to me.  Give me some ideas!  My current inclination is to create a diabolical mastermind who commands a wee regiment of minions from Hell.

Lets think about it Ape. Your choices are solders, thugs, robots (perfir ranged) and zombies (perfir melee). With wings and you wanting a theme I can only see a flying MM Necro with zombies minions. Zombies perfiring melee is a bonus but they are slow and stupid. But there tough and they take aggro well.

You forgot Ninjas. Granted, they majority of them aren't demons, but the Oni certainly is.  You could pretend the rest are demon ninjas and it would fit right in with Anime.

Your right of course. And ninjas perfer melee? Well I think they do.

you should try to create one that looks like one of the wizard of oz flying monkeys and call him Damn Dirty Flying Monkey.  I think a Dark/Regen scrapper.

Or go Villian and creating a Sonic/Dark corrupter called Damn Dirty Flying Howler Monkey

You'd have to abbreviate a bit.  I think CoX names top out at 16-20 characters.

20 characters.

The Flying Monkey Ninja name was open on Victory but I really don't need to create another character.  So, I switched my fire tanker The Solar Titan from super jump to flight, and gave her wings.  It fits the sun deity concept, anyway.  Acrobatics will be missed but Hasten replaced it and that's always a nice power to have.

Meanwhile I'm flipfloppin' around on the Heroes side of the Virtue server, attempting the usual exercise of trying to find a clear-cut superior archetype in a game that has balanced them all to sufficient equilibrium. :roll: If ever there were a reason to suspect I was obsessive compulsive, it's my alt-a-holism in MMORPGs.  I'm thinking maybe I should just settle for the blaster until 15, do the new Faultline content, then flee back to my Illusion/Storm Controller who is just 16 levels shy of 50.  I might not even be that patient and just say "screw Faultline" until I've unlocked my Kheldian.

...

Sorry, for a second there I confused this message board thread with my Blog.  Anyway, I'm enjoying Issue [8] so far.  The first safeguard mission gives me a handy-dandy Raptor Pack with 2 hours of flight fuel (just like the Villains) and combined with the Good vs. Evil jump pack that sure makes the climb to 14 easier.  I like how the bank robbers trail the dollar bills.  I soloed it easily enough on Heroic difficulty with a Blaster, but I got into an ugly newbie group last night that flubbed things terribly.  Choosing the wrong powers tends to hurt a hero's effectiveness somewhat, especially at lower levels, and our tank had only one tanking power and three pool powers.  My Blaster tanked better than him.  Safeguard missions have side missions to find just like in the villains side, and I managed to stop an arsonfor bonus time in one and find some charge-limited cryobands (ranged ice attack) in another.  My Sands of Mu veteran reward certainly helps with the damage output... at least when I have time to cycle it.  All in all, Issue [8] is a definate improvement, with the only sticking point being that players with less veteran rewards may feel they're at an unfair disadvantage.  Oh, and one my missions was broken, which is kinda worrisome.

[Edited to correct my issue issue as pointed out below]

It seemd to take me as long to go from 40 to 50 as it did to get from 1 to 40 with Doctor Fanboi, my main who is an inv/ss tank.  But I was going through a nasty divorce at the time and was drunk during most play sessions, so my perception then was a bit screwy.  NCSoft ought to use that as a slogan for CoH:  the grind ain't so bad when you're all liquored up!

Kheldians are nice but nothing too special.  I do like my 12th level warshade Dame Doom that I play sporadically, though.  The addition of quantum enemies in missions can be a bastard from time to time


Can I borrow your time machine?

Seriously, though, I only had time before work today to go through two police band missions in FF with my level 33 fire/fire tank, but I'm looking forward to trying out a safeguard mission hopefully tomorrow night.  I'm abit clumsy with the character now as it's taking some time to get used to hovering in combat.  I got rid of Burn when they neutered it way back when so there's no need to touch the ground. 

Flying fire tanks sound like most impressive fireballs indeed, but it's a pity that they were nerfed so hard.  I think it was all about the herding, another case where the developers thought, "Wow, people are making too much exp now" and took drastic measures.

Just as long to go from 40-50 as 1-40, you say?  Hmm, I think I'll trust your at the time drunken assessment and just stick with one of my lowbies.  Right now I'm deciding between a Sonic/Energy Blaster and a something/Regen Scrapper.  I'm driven back to the Blaster when I realize I've been down the Scrapper road before, but am driven back to the Scrapper when I realize how much more difficult soloing is when the only thing keeping you alive is a prompt defeat of one's enemies.  I either go for a proficient soloer or a risky one with more muscle.

The Blaster's up to level 10, but deciding on a Scrapper is a toughy for me.  I've got a Spines/Dark Armor Scrapper who's level 32, but I realized that I'm not really in favor of having nine toggles on my hotbars.  If it's avoiding toggles I'm after, 3 out of 4 Scrapper secondary sets are automatically disqualified: Regen it is, with the added bonus of never needing Stamina so I can play with pool powers some more.  I like my Martial Arts/Regen, but his AOE isn't quite enough even with a permanent Sands of Mu and it strikes me as being a bit monotonous taking down lots of minions with just one PBAOE attack and a tiny cone attack.  Maybe I should just bite the bullet and go Spines again, but Claws is another option... but neither really mesh well with Sands of Mu, so then it's back to Martial Arts/Regen.

I got in on one herding team back before the major nerfs, and I hated it even though we were getting insane exp gains.  I mean, I didn't need to do anything except stand over to the side.  Boring, boring, boring.


Well, keep in mind that ss tanks have only one area attack (foot stomp at 38), so I was pretty much confined to taking down one enemy at a time.  That combined with the fact I soloed the vast majority of time shows what sort of masochist I can be.  I imagine your controller would make out rather well now that police band missions mean not having to cross the city everytime you run a mission for that completion bonus.

One doesn't need to outline specific powers for me for me to know that Tanks are sloooow soloers.  Kinda like a Controller - sure, you could solo a Tank and only be in risk of dying if you're a bad player, but it'll take forever.  So indeed, I've much appreciation towards your masochism. ;)  Although Fire Tanks had it a bit easier than many others... at least pre-nerfing.

If it wasn't for Faultline I'd probably not bother starting over for issue 8.  But so long as I am, I'm finding a better alternative to my level 32+ Controller (Illusion/Storm) and Scrapper (Spines/Dark Armor).

Last night I made some progress in starting a hero that I know CmdrSlack is quite familiar with: the Dark Melee/Regen Scrapper.  What a solid hero, with powerful hitpoint and endurance regeneration capacity on both of his power sets.  By level 8 I'll probably be virtually unkillable thanks to Siphon Life and Reconstitution.  At level 10, I'll probably get Hasten and become twice as unkillable. :evil: This guy would make a good stand in tank, and I plan to grab the  AOE provoke pool power.  I have doubts that the DM/Regen Scrapper ever gets much in the way of AOE capacity, though.  That's probably the Scrappers' only real shortcoming, and quite deliberately so.

I'm still tempted to go back to my Sonic/Energy Blaster because I have to say that Blasters are pretty exciting characters to play.  They're essentially naked in the breeze, but blow stuff up real good.  Blasters do not suffer from issues of lacking AOE.  The appeal to go Scrapper is that I can actually survive the retribution for my onslaught.  That, and Scrapper's defensive aspects give them a group role other than just nuking.

I like a complex character, so I'm really looking forward to a Kheldian (despite the Quantum/Void death traps arrayed before one) and kicking myself for having a 12 month veteran reward and not a single level 50 hero to show for it.

One great thing about CoH is that you can't really make blanket statements about an AT because they vary so greatly depending on power sets, and further on slot specializations. My energy blaster (energy/energy, I'd drop the secondary in a second for some real crowd control like cold, melee knockback just doesn't cut it after 20 or so) has very weak AE powers. It's been a while, but I can only think of one I had by lvl 26, a cone with decent knockdown.

I've also had some alt-itis, but it doesn't last too long, especially since CoV. I was playing a rad/rad defender as my main alt in CoH, but he was pretty slow on offense, even if his primaries were great (and the best was nerfed later...). Rolled a rad/rad corrupter in CoV, basically a flip of the defender, and that's kinda cool. But also like the blaster in not being able to take punishment, so I rolled a claws/regen scrapper a couple weeks ago (a werewolf). Also tried out a brute. The MM is just such a great solo class, it's like trying to play other classes in EQ after playing a necro, it's just not as fun (imo!).

Well, they may have gone halfway on that.

Right now, you never get debt if you're owned by a player in a PvP zone.

If you get dropped by an NPC, you take debt inversely proportional to how much you got smacked around by players.

--GF

These new safeguard missions are pretty hip.  My fire tank did one in FF today and picked up an endurance bonus power that's supposed to last for a couple of days real-time, IIRC.  The police band missions leading up to them are most welcome as I was getting completely sick of endless freakshow ones being handed to me by the regular contacts.  Arachnos goons ftw!

Now that kilts are a costume choice, I need to break out my inv/ss tank and design one as close as possible to this:

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b2/Piper.jpg)

Why?  Are you Canadian?

No, but Rush is my favorite band.  Does that count?

I want to say no, I really do... but since Rush is also just about my husband's favourite band, too, and he IS from Glasgow and today is our anniversary so I'm feeling all lovey and mushy and stuff... I guess I'll say yes, it counts.  Mostly.

Ah, happy anniversary, then.


(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/2/2e/Henn_10.jpg/220px-Henn_10.jpg)

Newt wishes you a merry anniversary as well.  Mostly.

Gravity is still weak. Game's been out like what? Almost 3 years now?

Looks like every other patch to me.  :cry:

Easy! Ladies, gentlemens, and apeses, I have the pleasure of presenting Bagpipes:
(http://files.blog-city.com/files/J05/90775/p/f/bagpipes.jpg)

That's great.

 :hulk_rock:

Thank god he's got tights on under there.  Super Jump was suddenly going to become an offensive power...

Good job!  If you make the trousers a darker blue and make the shirt royal blue with a big white X on it, you will look very, very Scottish.  Does the sporran come with the kilt or do you choose it seperately?  They should make them hang a bit lower unless... well... even so, it should hang lower to give that impression.  You know?  Bigger too... you'll never fit a proper flask in that.

(this is NOT personal.  I am NOT asking you about your hanginess)

That took about 5 min. Probably take longer for a novice, but, a-heh, I know my way around the costume creator.
The point being that I didn't put any thought into the shirt. I should have put a burning comet on the chest or something. There's no option to say "Hot Rod".

There were two kilts, the one presented here, and one that was more tattered and rough-looking, but with no sporran (if that word refers to that baggie hanging off the front). Neither one matched Roddy exactly, so I went with the cleaner-looking one.

Rod Piper is on the list of alternate costumes for my Brute, Pro Wrestler. Right now he's vintage Hulk Hogan. I figured I'd use a different wrestler for each costume slot.

Here's some fun with the new costume pieces and invent emote.

(http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/dda_photos/solar01.jpg)

The Solar Titan contemplates Time Cube and realizes she's been educated stupid.

(http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/dda_photos/bushido01.jpg)

My new scrapper:  Baron Bushido

Do the wings move if a character jumps?  I think Jersey's dragon costume could benefit from the demon wings if so.

Gah, y'all are tempting me to resubscribe and I am only interested in playing around with the costume editor.

Fifteen months for wings.... Guess that leaves me with 7 or so months.

I think they only work with Fly/Hover.

Correct. Jumping/falling doesn't activate wings. There've been a lot of requests for more wing animations (random twiching while standing around, adding to emotes, jumping/falling, etc), so maybe the devs will take some time to put them in.

From the current testing notes:

• Wings will now animate while falling. For example: running off of something and falling or turning flight off while in air and falling.

• Wings will now animate while jumping.

Dammit!  Stop giving me what I want!

On the fifth day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

(http://glazius.tripod.com/CoH_grings2.jpg)

--GF

Only four rings?  Your true love hocked one.

Nah, there's five. Count 'em down the left side.

One of the possible winter temp rewards (lasts 12 days) in addition to the self-rez "Renewal of Light" (lasts for 8).

--GF

Don't try and fool us.  We're women.  We know our rings.

It's a tricky optical illusion, but I'm seeing 4.  Whether or not that means there's actually four or one of the rings is clipping another absolutely is hard to say.

Four. But Signe only thinks I'm a girl.

Please, don't bring it up anymore.  I thought you were a girl for a year.  I still feel betrayed.  You were a lovely girl.   :oops:  I miss you. 

I have no "dar" regarding anything, whatsoever.  Actually, I'm sort of glad I don't.  When people tell me their gender/age/race/nationality, I'm almost always surprised.  I am always confusing Asians and Hispanics.  They laugh at me.  Because of this, sometimes I don't understand film plots. 

Hopefully, I'm better at counting rings.  Definitely four.

I count 5.  Quit playing with my emotions!

I'm not a woman but I'm fairly attuned to my anima.   So, I feel qualified to count rings:
(http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/dda_photos/CoH_grings2.jpg)

I guess counting isn't my thing, either.  Someday I'll find my THING!

Two and three look amazingly similar.  Like, identical.

From that side it is the same ring. I count 5 as well but my Web site is down at the moment so I'm not going to bother with a picture. However if you count from the left edge you can clearly see 4. The missing ring is #1 on Ape's pic -- its left edge is obscured by the other rings.

Let's compromise and say there are 42,369.2 rings.  Is that cool with everyone?

Ah yes, Dirty Ape Ring Theory, I've heard of that.

So there not good at counting. But there nice people except for that damn dirty ape bit. Err ...well nevermind!!

I still confused by 2 and 3.

Hell, I don't know anymore.  I at first thought 2 and 3 were the same ring, but the curvatures are frontal.  So, I went with them being two separate rings despite the apparent joint on the right.   I'm probably wrong, though.  I often am.

1, 4 and 5 are obviuosly distinct.

that leaves the question of whether there is a 3.  If you look at 2, 3 first on the right, and then from the left, you'll notice that there seems to be some Escher-trick due to the lighting on what your brain will eventually realize are two distinct rings.  I'm convinced there are 5.

Ring 3 was on the grassy knoll.  That's my theory and I'm sticking to it.

Number 2 is tilted so that the side nearest the camera is high.

Number 3 is tilted so that the side nearest the camera is low.

Also their left hand edges don't match.

You four ring people are all crazy. Except Signe - who is covered under 'eccentric' or possibly 'zany'.

I enjoy hanging out at f13, including the Politics board.  I think it is a given.

So I don't see much in this thread about Issue 8 itself.  Seems silly to wait for 3+ months for an update to add police scanner missions to CoH, which is a duplicate mechanic form the CoV paper missions.  Plus throw in a few costume options that not everyone can use.  No one has send too much about the zone revamp either.  Like I have said in the past, I love this game, but it never really seems to change all that much.

Issue 8 is a pretty tame revision, even though it does pretty much change the way the hero side plays out since we're no longer hitting up contacts as much.  Faultline is a nice new zone, but so is Croatoa,  Stirga Isle, Peregrine Isle, ect.

So far as change is concerned, I think that Cryptic has done a pretty good job.  I mean, read all that (http://www.cityofheroes.com/game_update8.html).  About the only MMORPG that added more free content and gameplay additions since release was EverQuest 2.  Unfortunately, most of what they've added seems to be easily overlooked.

Looks like a pretty decent issue to me.  Now get back to counting the frikkin' rings!

Four.

[Baldrick] And that one. [/Baldrick]

I think someone swapped pictures - five.

I think I see the problem.  2 and 3 are overlapping in such a way that they look like the same ring, linked on the right side.

I knew Cryptic must have put 5 rings in there because it wouldn't be that much harder to do than 4 rings, but that picture does only have four rings if we're following standard laws of physics and the rings can't pass through eachother.

We need Reed Richards to help us understand the physics involved here.

I'd prefer Sue.

Not as easily overlooked as seven years of monthly to quarterly free content in AC1, it seems. :P

Did I hear a "Zing"???

I was referring to current generation MMORPGs, or else I'd probably have mentioned the original EverQuest and their 9+ expansion packs.

Not that those were free, of course.  Asheron's Call did release a lot of nice free content.  I like how they blew up one of their core cities.

Knowing my luck, we'd get Michael Richards.

CoX has come a long way since its humble beginning.  I dusted off my level 50 tanker last night, fiddled with a costume, and then took him to Recluse's Victory for some PvP.  Villains had a clear majority presence in the zone.  At one point, I had three brutes on me but unstoppable allowed me to fend them off for awhile then run away.  I encountered one of the brutes, a stone/electric, later in a one-on-one match that lasted about five minutes before I finally drove him into the ground.  That was alot of fun and the first time I got to see the electric defense set in action.

Aside from a desire for greater environment interaction and a reduced grind, I'm durned pleased with CoX's progress.  I started a month after release, taking a nine-month break earlier this year to try WoW.  I came back after receiving an e-mail advertising work on issue eight.  The image of winged characters reminded me that CoX has the strongest character customization of any game I've ever played.  Being a roleplayah at heart, that means far more than phat lewtz to me.  You can have any character origin and look you like in CoX and still not break game fiction.

I'll stick with the game for awhile more and see what else unfolds.  Maybe they'll finally introduce Hostess snacks advertisement missions.  I can dream, can't I?
(http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r191/dda_photos/hostess.jpg)

Thanks to human behavior 2 and an insane reading load, I'm barely playing, but sunday mornings are our SG's official get together time and I finally got in on one of the new hero missions.

It was fun. It was a lot of fun. It seemed far more chaotic than the mayhem missions on the villain side. I think that was because chaos is the aim villainside and here, I just couldn't think of what to stop first. It seemed to have a lot more options. We kept hitting different vandal groups and villains and getting door submissions up until time ran out. I had a ball.

The thing I really wish for is for that to be in an actual city instead of in a mission zone. Combining these with a MMP PVP zone would be a load of fun. Even if it were done with a sort of battlegrounds setup.

Has mission reward xp been increased lately? It seems to be much higher than I remember it?

Also, as others have said, I'm finding safeguard missions much more fun than advertised on the official forums etc, and more fun than the mayhem equivalent - though also much easier than mayhem missions. I don't think I've ever failed one so long as the group has understod the incredibly complex 'go directly to the bank' instruction (so about a 70% success rate so far). Tricky business.

The safeguard mission clearly isn't about the bank, it's about what you do with the rest of your time. I never even got into the bank by the time they nailed it. (Teleport kept bouncing me into the glowy walls.)

The rest of it is what makes it fun.

But the bank based organisational test - ie. will this PuG understand the instruction 'go to teh bank', is what stops you getting kicked out after about 2 minutes.

It's a very appropriate test, since once you get going, the mission is only fun if your group can deal with the idea that they have to travel to vandal/side-mission star every time it pops. If your PuG can't get to the bank you might as well get kicked out, since the rest of the mission won't be much fun in that case.

Did it in a 6 man group - they throw some insane amout of enemies at you.

Ya, having done villain and now hero. It took about 3 tries for me to figure out what is going on. Watch the map and respond. It is really fun, i enjoy mayhem but the hero's got the best serving.

It's interesting, but a lot of hero players are complaining about the difficulty of the safeguard missions. It's not the "stop the bank robbery" bit that is hard, it's all the rest of it. This is because the current AI settings see the street mobs aggro from a lot further away, meaning you can't (as you can in missions) ignore the street mobs and hit the objectives. The mobs won't let you.

Solo you might be able to avoid mob attention through your normal tactics, but due to the number of mobs spawned by teams (and the fact that each player has a chance to draw aggro onto the rest of the team) you end have having to fight a lot more battles. This makes these missions a bit more interesting to me. I don't know if I like it yet or not (especially since PUG team wipes = end of team) but it certainly adds a breathless component to doing the safeguards.

On the other hand, death means little, since every safeguard map has its own "hospital". You die, you click the button and reappear, ready for the short trip back into the action.

Right now, I think that post-bank your team has to take a turtle attitude - stay close, take out the mobs who attack you and move with care towards the vandal hotspot. I'm going to test this theory in later safeguard sessions.

Lazy players.  If the street mobs get in the way, defeat them.  I can't tell you how many parties I've had absolutely blow up because everybody wants to rush straight to the carrot.

In the safeguard missions, if you don't go straight to the carrot, the carrot will rob the bank and head for the exit. Good luck stopping him, if you're stopping to fight the street mobs along the way.

Yeah, but that wasn't the issue.

This is the key, I think the people who find it hard are the people who don't play with a map in the corner at all times, or who just don't understand how the map works.

On the villian side I refuse to admit I'm even eligible to pick up a mayhem mission unless I have a group of 4 or less, and everyone seems competant; on the hero side I'm comfortable just shouting at people coaching my respected fellow heroes who don't figure it out immeadiately.

You have 5 minutes to get to the bank before the villain starts in on the vault. Most of the missions drop you pretty close to the bank to begin with so you only have to deal with a few groups of street mobs to get there.

The trick is setting your overall difficulty down (onoes teh cardinal sin!) so that your team can steamroll a single street spawn instead of having to take it slowly and carefully.

--GF

I was just running police missions solo in Brickstown with Solar Titan, my 33rd level fire/fire tanker.  I had difficulty set on tenacious so I could get bosses at the end.

When I got the safeguard mission, the bank robber turned out to be Giga Watt with his nasty endurance drain punches and a seemingly-everlasting power that reduced my damage to single digits when I got him to 1/4 health.   He was regenerating faster than I could damage at that point.  I died three times (I finally get to use Rise of the Phoenix!  Yay!) as the new-fangled Healing Flames only works when you have endurance.

Despite my best effort, Giga Watt made his getaway and I got a nice amount of debt.  How embarrassing.

I should add that some reports of wackiness in safeguard missions have been reported - like robbers teleporting / spawning at the front door after the vault has cracked and escaping with the cash.

However, if you are willing to turn the difficulty down AND spend 5 minutes organising your team for what is going to happen when they enter the safeguard, it isn't that hard to successfully complete.

It's been my recent experience that doing any mission with a team that is set on Heroic difficulty (ie the easiest) draws out complaints, however.

Can you solo a Safeguard mission at Heroic?

Depends on your archetype, specific powers, level, and skill.

My Blaster had no difficulty soloing safeguard missions on heroic at 8-12.  I had some closer calls but pulled through okay.

A Defender or Controller could probably solo them okay pre-20, but by the time they reach 20 their damage output would have fell enough that they'd probably have a hard time getting where they need to be in time.

A Tank may or may not have the same problem as a Defender or Controller in this regard.

Scrappers can solo anything.

Specific powers can this rule of thumb a bit, and player skill does matter to some extent.

I'm an Illusion/Kinetics Controller -- the more mobs around me the merrier.

Maybe.

It depends if you run into 1) an Elite Boss you can't kill solo, or 2) a map full of spawns who aggro from too far away and stop you from getting into the bank. Complaints have been long and loud about Nemesis (who do knockback damage) and Malta (who immobilise / stun) who keep heroes locked down long enough for the villains to get away.

I believe if you have flight or can keep to the rooftops, you should at least be able to get past the street spawns and into the bank.

Do the street mobs automatically see through stealth/invis like ambush spawns? If not I can presumably get past with some combination of Superior Invisibility, Super Speed, and Inertial Reduction. And Sappers are an Illusion Controller's best friends :-D

I haven't tried rooftop travel yet in a Safeguard mission, but in the Mayhem mission for Peregrine (and maybe FF too), there were Longbow Eagles who would pop in and pursue you, if you flew too close to the top of the bank.

I don't know if there were similar threats awaiting in lower-level mayhems, and I don't know if they're in Safeguards at all. But it's worth bearing in mind  :evil:

Since you brought up "merry"... I think we get the winter event tomorrow.

Just sayin'....

Street mobs currently have increased perception, no word on whether this is working as intended or not. Superior Invis + Super Speed should be enough to hide you, though.

As for the mission itself, I ran one on Rugged with my fire/trick arrow controller and had few problems. Heroic should be cake since all the "side mission guards" are going to be lieutenants instead of bosses. Just make sure and pack a couple of lucks to handle the first few volleys at the bank.

--GF

Indeed we do.  Supposedly, the random gifts (aside from inspirations and influence) this year are:

Snowball
Snowbeast
Jingle jet
Santa cap

Earmuffs become a costume option simply for logging in during the event time frame, IIRC.  The rest is up to Lady Luck.

Also: teams of 5 or more who ?click a present / open a mystery gift? have a chance of spawning Winter Lord, the Giant Monster from the Christmas event two years ago.

Also: there is a special zone linked to Pocket D which provides a Christmas mission and will allow you to go skiing.

Are these events still just on Test or have they copied some of them over to the regular servers?

The patch is on live, but they flip the switch sometime on the 14th.

LOL I have 30 free tailoring sessions on my character -- they must have been handing them out like candy during Halloween while I was away -- and that doesn't even count the extras I got from the Veterans reward.

The winter event is live.  Pocket D and the ski slope are lagfests, as well as a wretched hive of scum and villainy in the chat channels, with too many players present.  Fortunately, the winter mission itself is an instance.  I didn't have time to complete the mission but I did get to fight some of the Tuatha De Danaan Yogurt warriors on ice with both myself and my foes sliding all over the place.  That's actually pretty funny to watch, though it gets a bit frustrating after awhile.  Fortunately, hovering slightly above the ice negates the slip-n-slide effect.

I used my no debt present and I got debt anyway.  Dammit.

One little quest... I thought there would be more.  There seem to be more doors in the Winter area than quests.  And the quest is pretty easy.   :|

Previous players have complained about long events that give badges, because it means they have to do it 60 times to make sure every alt they have gets the reward.

So, most event badges can be earned with little time investment.

Why do people treat games like they're some some of competitive job?  I don't think I'd bother playing if it felt too like too much work.   It's why I don't raid, everyone gets overly serious.

Schussing down the slopes kindled no joy in your heart?

Not even a little?

I don't know you anymore.

--GF

Debt insurance is 50% debt, at least that's what it usually means.

I loved the swishing around.  I spent hours doing that and jumping on geysers.  I should have read the info I received more regarding the debt... I just read the silly forums.  D'oh!  They decided to move up the presents, too.  We'll have them on the 18th instead of the 21st.  Yay!  I'm playing with a villian at the moment (global name is still Signe) and both sides can team for the Xmas event, even thought it's pretty easy.  Maybe turn the slider up a bit when you have a team to make it a bit more fun.

Also - this event is in phases so maybe they'll have some different quests or something.  I don't understand all the doors if they don't do anything.  I need more festive costume pieces!

Cool.  Now I'll be able to hunt presents before I have to hit the interstate roads to risk Death so I can celebrate Birth with my family.

As a warning to others:

Due to the different ways that summoned pets are apparently treated by CoH/V, there is a bit of an grief technique that is currently happening within the Pocket D. Those Villains who have patron power pets can summon those pets and then log off. Normally, a pet would disappear along with its owner, but apparently that is not the case with patron power pets - instead, these guys hang around and treat all heroes as hostiles.

Which sees a lot of low-lvl heroes (ie everyone below 40) at risk of being one-shotted by someone's lvl 50 Mu Adept. I'm sure that it started off as an accidental discovery, but such things never stay accidents for long.

It probably won't be fixed before the end of the Winter event, so all I can expect is for the devs / mods to issue warnings about what happens if you exploit game mechanics.

FYI.

If you get killed by one of those you don't get debt do you? I.e. it doesn't suddenly treat the pet as a generic hostile NPC when the owner logs off does it?

Ahh, brings back memories of the days when controller pets used to remain alive and became aggro to everything if their owner left the zone, with hilarious consequences.

In other news, I'm officially bored of the Baby New Year mission now.

Hopefully the day will come soon when I can convince a group to set a different mission.

I've picked up about 15 presents now and all but 3 had monsters in them.  That's not very festive!  Here, Merry Christmas, Hope you die.   :|

I'd log in but my computer is being festive. As in, hey, go do something besides playing games. And by that I mean crashing.

Damn computer.

Is the game trying to tell you something?

YOU'VE BEEN NAUGHTY!

 :-D

Well, at least you weren't in a team of more than 5 at the time. Flying around Faultline with a newbieish rad defender and people were calling out the Winter Lord every 10 minutes or so.

Radiation Emission + Sonic Blast = _totally_ broken against Giant Monsters. No regen and double damage (through stacked resistance debuffs)? Goodnight, Irene!

--GF

WOW, You are not kidding. What an offender!! Thanks, just what I was looking for and a healer to boot.

This is broken. Way better than a corrupter. Sick damage, healer and buffer debuffer at lvl 8??

You'll find that sick damage to fall off pretty heavily by 20.

Hasten, Accelerate Metabolism, and Amplify take care of that for me.

But the best part about being rad/sonic is that radiation debuffs don't wake anything up.

--GF

You know, you can make a sonic blast/radiation emission corrupter too.

--GF

I'd imagine the defender version is stronger though.

You'll get the radiation powers earlier, which is probably important than getting more sonic blast powers early.

And defender +buff/debuff, -damage will cancel out for your output, while at the same time give more bonuses to your team than a corruptor who doesn't have the modifiers.

Radiation is a great power pool for debuffs. My level 16 (iirc) defender was rad/rad. Having sonic would have been great. But the debuffs are what made it great, so I imagine the defender would be better than the corrupter, except maybe the bonus damage on the corrupter.

If anyone is playing with a character on Virtue, I still have Holiday Cheer to give away.  I think heroes and villians can give it to each other in Pocket D.

I gave my holiday cheer to my pet by mistake. He didn't get any cheerier. That kinda sucked. Some random person gave me a cheer and I got a temporary holiday jet pack. It's kinda nifty.
That sounds dirty.

My villains are on Virtue, but I haven't really been playing lately, I've got maybe another week left before it lapses. Trying to finish up some old games!

I'd take it, but I'm afraid when I open the present it'll be a penis sombrero.

My global name is still Signe.  Just like me.  What's wrong with a penis sombrero, anyway?  It keeps the sun off your head.

SHUDDUP, SKY!  YOU KNOW WHAT I MEANT!

A penis sombrero just isn't useful for me.  I have to use the regular sized ones. :rimshot:

 :roll:

One day City of Villains will add titanium codpieces.  Then you'll be sorry.

I hope your name is Llava on the global thingy.  If it's not, I've invited some poor stranger to be my friend.

You invited some poor stranger to be your friend.  My name is Contempt on the global thingy, because that's my main villain's name.

Oh no.  I hope he's not lonely.   :|

He's not anymore.

Who is Shreddin' Ski?  Is that someone here?  Or is it a "new" friend?  (eek)

It's me, been trying out a dominator-plant/plant and have had fun so far.  I play at wierd hours, since I'm a night shifter.

I thought it might be you.  (especially since you're my only global friend again... hehe)  I tried to send you email, too, but when I do, I lose my mapserver.  Oh well.  Anyway, my villians are mostly on Virtue and my heroes on Victory.  I've been doing the villian thing lately.

Global chat name is @1969jimbo

Characters on Virtue (Villians--easy for my old ass to remember)

Shreadin' Ski--Plant/Plant Dominator
Secrett Agent Mann--AR/Kin Corrupter
Boom Bugg--Fire/Rad Corrupter

Characters on Freedom (Hero's)
Smilin Joe--Axe/Inv tanker
Rescue Shrike--Archery/Kin Defender

I've been playing for 30+ months and only have a level 18 to show for it  :-D  I have a serious case of Alt-itist, that or they ought to reduce the grind...

That's okay.  I've been playing off and on since early beta, mostly on, and my highest is 35, I think.  Anyway, I had already sent you and Contempt a global friend thingy but maybe it doesn't work?  You seem to be on my gloabal friends list at Jimbo1969, but Contempt never responded or maybe didn't get it.  Neither did that stranger I accidentally invited.  I still have Batnet on, too.

How does Batnet work in CoX?  Isn't it supposed to be a global chat channel we can join and talk as a group?  Dang I've been having too much fun running around that I forget how to play video games...

You just join it as a regular channel.  I don't think there's any permissions set up and I don't think it's private.  It's been in my list of channels for ages and ages.  I'm the only one left though.  Sometimes I chat to myself.

It's just "Batnet"?

Global handle GlaziusF, I play regularly but mostly with themed supergroups. I have, uh, 2 50s and a 45 and a veritable brace of lowbies and midbies.

--GF

I've mostly been on Guild Wars lately, so I didn't log on until last night. However, I didn't get any invitation.  Next time I'm on I'll send one to you, we'll see if that works.

Anyone remember how to change the global chat handle? I can't find the option anywhere. Hittnng chat handle int he menu just tells me what my handle is.

Try kicking the computer.

You can only change it once ever.

And it seems to reset to be equal to the next character you log on as if you don't play for a while.

I guess I'll always be the Cosmic Anomaly. Fitting, actually.

Hey!  UnSub is famous!


 Look!  (http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setview/features/loadFeature/1059/gameID/3/page/1)

I was just thinking the other day how hunerous it was that MMOG developers make games they themselves don't have time to play.

Thanks for the heads up Signe - I also got an RMT question in. Both were me trying to come up with a non-CoH/V question that was better than the standard "when is I9 coming out and what is getting nerfed?" ones.

In a related note, Warcry is having an Ask a Dev (http://coh.warcry.com/scripts/news/view_news.phtml?site=36&id=67436) series. If you want to ask Positron something, post it on the CoHW forums. Next dev in line is Statesman.

(In the interests of disclosure, I write the "A View from Atlas Park" column on CoH Warcry.

...

Yeah, I'll show myself out.)

I read it, although you went beyond "belated" for the Winter Event.  :-P  I just figured you were in church.

As a player who is just coming back, I am having tons of fun in I8. The police scanner is cool, and the Safeguard missions are quite awesome. Any other changes I should look for?

Somewhat unrelated, but I love that they are redoing the winter event stuff. Especially the winter lords. My buddy and I, a 12 MA/Regen scrapper and a 12 Grav/Kin controller had tons of fun jumping into a fight with a Winter Lord in King's Row. The guy was purple, but we were still able to do stuff to him. I have no idea what level those things are, but with us 2, plus a bunch a ton of other lowbies below level 15 (some even 5 or lower), we were eventually able to take him down. It was pretty sweet, as most other people were fighting this giant from the ground, while my buddy and I lorded over them with the jetpacks we still had from a safeguard mission.

Giant Monsters are your level + 5. I think the Winter Lord was balanced so that he wasn't too destructive in the lower level zones.

Giant Monsters con 5 levels higher.

However, they're fought using a special mechanic. When you hit a giant monster, you are its level. When a giant monster hits you, it is your level. The only thing you have to watch out for with giant monsters are the ones who summon things, because they'll be the level of the target and not scale at all. So if there's a 50 fighting Bad Mr. Frosty, the snowball he gets hit with will turn into level 50 snowbeasts.

--GF

Ah, so that's how my lowbie controller could fight the Winter Lord, or how my 29 scrapper was able to help out with the giant octopus in Independence Port. I was even able to SK my scrapper buddy up to 28 from 13.

Also why a level 50 Scrapper can't just come along and solo a giant monster.

Yeah, I was slack in my explanation. Thanks for clearing that up.

long time lurker, first time poster :p

globals are @Magpie Mouse and @Calamity-Cassie.. yeah, two accounts.. I picked up a CoV CE after cancelling my DDO preorder after trying the beta :p


I have many levels of alts (I like alts!)

I think we've picked up another Canadian!  YAY!   :-)

where?  :-o

(http://www.sqi.gu.edu.au/kimages/Buttons/Square/Keys/Gold/up_arrow.gif)

*vanish*

Magpie Mouse on Virtue?

Think I've heard of you.

Maybe somebody nice will give us a sticky for global handles.  Maybe it'll be Trippy!

Wait!  Where is Trippy?  He's always here and now he's not.  I get nervous when he's not here.

I'm here, don't worry.

(http://forums.civfanatics.com/images/smilies/thanx.gif)

Might have Llava. I -thnk- I've seen Contempt once in Sirens.

I don't PvP that much anymore. Most of the folks I was with there left a long time ago, and I respecced Magpie out of Leadership, so
she's not the stalker hunter she was before. About the only zone she's good for now is RV  :roll: (Nelson: hah hah!)

My villians are all on Virtue, too.  I want to get al least one villian to 30.  I' way too lazy these days.

I think I've seen you only once or twice in game, but you're fairly popular on the Virtue official forum.

I think I've seen you both one or twice.  I don't play a lot lately, but when I do I play on Virtue on one of my eleventy bajillion alts. Global @Gothika.

So is the rumor on the invention system that it's in for I9 still?

I am trying to convince my weekly game group that they should give CoH/CoV a shot.  I figure that with a dedicated group, it'd be almost perfect as far as advancement speed and whatnot is concerned.  ETA - I think that stuff like inventions and bases may sway them is why I'm asking, basically.

Currently, yes, inventions are in for I9. All reports are that it'll be an all-new system using all-new drops so everybody starts off even.

Also, there's a patch on test that drastically scales back base rent. Your smallest plot is free, and that's probably all you're going to need if you're planning on making one night a CoH night.

--GF

CoV also works very well as a weekly game. That's how I'm playing it now. Two nights a week with my supergroup friends.

Eh, does CoX even do server transfers? No one here seems to play on Freedom.

You can transfer US -> EU but not any other combination. Which is weird because they've had the infrastructure in place to support server transfers for as long as the Test server has been around.

Yeah.. it's funny.

I'm not a hardcore poster or anything. And I can get irritable there  :roll:

I guess I'm lucky to have been playing since nearly the beginning on Virtue and hung out with all the long-time players.


Also helps that Magpie is sickeningly cute and has a stuttering tic :p

You may not be able to transfer US - EU anymore - I think they announced they were finishing up that service.

As for server transfers, I believe that is more of an NCsoft barrier than an actually code barrier.

So uh....no one plays on Freedom, right?

I remember there were a few people who mentioned Freedom here but I don't remember how long ago.  There isn't a huge amount of us who still play.  Almost all our f13 MMO days have been put in the Good Ole Days catagory right now.  We mostly seem to be all talk and no action these days.

I still play Freedom once in a while with my heroes, Big Gulp and Commander Slack used to play on there too...not sure who else used to play on Freedom.  One nice thing is Freedom is usually full of people, so getting pick up groups is pretty easy at all hours of the day and night.

It looks like my weekly gaming group is going to be moving to CoH...I just have to convince 'em that server choice is so crucial that I should be teh one to pick.....

The f13 crowd seems to spend a lot more time and energy "critically evaluating" MMOG's than they actually do playing them. I remember playing with some of these folks in EQ2 and they all vanished within a couple of weeks. 

I was there long enough to boot everyone else out of the guild.  Err.  I mean long enough to watch Lt.Dan boot everyone else out of the guild.  :-D

Lots of time to sit around at work posting, not alot of time to play games. I think we got an f13 group together once while I was in BC there :) Using the bank to trade stuff was handy, though. I didn't even group once last time I played CoV...now git off mah lawn!

Hell... even when people were playing the guild chat was as idle as IRC. 

A bunch of anti-social gaming geeks the lot of you. 

Slack you all going to play Hero's or Villian's this time?  I think the old super group is still around that your dark/dark scrapper was in, heck Big Gulps guild is there too.

Heroes, apparently.  That was an easier sell. 

We basically got tired of DDO, especially when we didn't have everyone able to make it -- once you get past a certain level, it's just impossible to do runs without a healer or tank. 

I don't think its that.  Even if there are 2 dozen of us in the guild, it won't last.  We all have different schedules.  We all play at different rates.  What are the odds that we'd have have enough people with similar levels and prerequisite classes needed to form a group.  Even when we tried set a time to get together, it just felt like work.

I have always wonder about a game that was purely guild advancement. No matter what your schedule your could jump in and work with the guild.  Too many individual objectives get in the way of what should be the goal of playing a fun game with friends.

It was more than that... even when there were like 12 people on in EQ2 the guild chat was dead silent.  I wonder if most people here are really just single player gamers that play mmogs so they can legitimize their complaints.  The social stuff is what I enjoy most about mmogs.  I've always called them irc/aim with graphics.

Hey, if you happen to convince them all to roll heroes on Freedom, look me up. I have plenty of characters on the server and would be happy to help fill out a nice group with whatever you need. I might not be able to make your schedule all the time, but I'd be willing to try.

Wow, all of my characters are on Victory.  That's odd.

Are most people who play from here now on Freedom?

ETA -- Just rolled up a newbie on Freedom -- Kinetics/Archery defender (don't ask I was fooling with powersets).  I named him The Contrarion, just so my battle cry could be "O RLY?"  Ah, it's good to be resubbed to CoH.   :-D

Most of mine are still on Victory but right now I'm playing on Virtue. 

Look me up, my global name is Starzos (yeah I misspelled it and I'm unable to change it  :|).

Will do!  I need to figure out all kinds of CoHey stuff that I never learned like global chat and whatnot.

I don't mind playing multiplayer, but I don't like to chat while I'm playing. Ok, I don't really like to chat. It's not that I'm antisocial, I just don't care for it, especially in the very limited time I have to play games. As I've said, if it weren't for a web-friendly workplace, I would post here maybe twice a week. I'd rather be doing things than talking about things. Doesn't have anything to do with single player gaming, imo.

Slack: yea, you were on Victory ;) Barrister, iirc. I'm inactive now, but my heroes were on Victory and villains on Virtue.

I've got about 80 alts on victory, including Rang Rang, the golden farmer and my own version of Deadpool, 'cause hey, it's Deadpool.

If you're ever playing him, let me know, my archery/devices blaster, Dr. Engrish could use the like-named partner.

OMG, I want to make a regen scrapper called SumDumGuy and join you guys.

Try Sum Dum Gai.

Looks more authentic.

I made Princess of Pwnage on Triumph yesterday. Played for about 4 hours....and got to level 12.

Amazing.

If only every weekend was double experience weekend.