Neiska

Psst... I will share with you the horrible horrible truth of it. The secret of "Fast Travel", but you gotta kiss elbow promise not to tell anyone. Itsa S-E-C-R-E-T! Okay, here we go... this is what "really" happens when you fast travel -

I usually try to fit in fly out of the travel powers, because I use it for more than just getting from point A to B, there are some places where vertical is a concern as well. But there is one power I always have on my tray, regardless of AT, Powers, Build, Origin, or Inf Investment. So long as they are level two, I always always 100% of the time without fail have WALK on my tray. For RP purposes. It looks weird/ungainly even just flat running around.

@Diantane Here is what works for me personally. Granted, this wont work on all levels, but I am listing what makes me the most money to the least. 1. Farming. My main source of income is farming. I 3 box MMs and clear maps very fast (3 mins a map) and after an hour or so of farming each one has usually around 50-60 mil inf, plus whatever they managed to find. You can add another 10 mil per purple, 500k per rare/orange salvage. But the majority of my "selling" money comes from selling vast piles of level 50 white recipes to vendors. They are roughly 100k apiece, and I have finished up a farm session with 100+ of them on 3 characters before. I mean that's roughly 30 mil in just white recipes alone. The majority of yellow recipes aren't worth much these days. There are a few here or there but most of them are junk. So together they will have around 50 mil each in raw Inf for a total of 150 million, plus another roughly 30 million for a rough total of 180 million or so, thereabouts. This fluctuates a bit, depending on how many white, purple, and pvp recipes I find, but that is a good ballpark figure. 2. Converters. Converters always sell. They go for roughly 70-75k a pop, and you will find them constantly when you are 50. Now days I wait until I have a pile to throw them up onto the market. 3. Packs. You can sort of "gamble" using the winter/at packs. You buy them from the Auction house and get a random assortment of goodies. These can be character account items like EXP/Money boosters, recipes, IOs, and so on. Even brainstorms. You can convert the brainstorms into other things and sell them with all the rest. You then "flip" these and often net a profit. Though this isn't as profitable as it used to be. But you can still net enough from the IOs alone so that anything else after that is a profit. Luck is involved though, but rarely have I ever lost money. I have always made a profit or broke even. The trick to this method is patience. If you throw 100 things up on auction, don't be surprised if it takes a bit to sell. But, its a good time killer. 4. Catalysts. Similar to Converters, its special salvage you find at 50. Its what you use to turn Orange sets into the epic Purple stuff. They go for anywhere between 1.4 mil to 2 mil a pop, depending on how impatient someone is. Again, I usually save up a stack or so of them before putting them up. 5. Threads. Threads threads threads. Precious when you start out, but at the end, you could knit a scarf big enough to wrap around the world twice. You can use the them at a vendor to buy group inspirations and then sell them as people who run the endgame content use a lot of them. Don't be too fast to do this though as threads are non-transferrable, and you need quite a lot of them starting out. But eventually you will find yourself having a ton of them if you play the same character long enough. I have around 12-15k of them across multiple characters. Personally I wish we had more uses for them. 6. Stock Market Simulator. If you are patient, you can play the market game. The whole buy low sell high thing. But this takes a bit of time and experience to do, but it can be done. A few friends of mine are die hard roleplayers who play the market while they roleplay, and have never stepped foot in a TF, Raid, or Farm, and they are at INF cap. You don't have to be a high level to be absurdly wealthy in this game. Mostly what it takes is time. 7. Gambling. If you are feeling lucky, instead of selling your converters you can save them up and use to convert AT IOs from a cheap one into one high in demand. This is totally random however, but its only 1 Converter to reroll. You might turn an AT IO that is worth 6 or 7 mil into one worth 10-15 mil. Even more if you are gambling with purple sets. 8. Crafting. Instead of selling recipes/salvage, you can hoard them up if you like. Though this requires space and storage to do. You essentially save every bit of salvage and every high value recipe you find and craft them. For an example, if you have a purple recipe worth 10 mil and salvage worth 500k, you could spend the inf and other salvage to make it, and possibly turn around and sell that purple IO for 20 mil. This is especially good for the PVP recipes, as well as sets like Hecatomb, Ragnarock, Armageddon, and so on. This method is the "long view" though, but does give the most profit per INF spent. Personally I don't bother with crafting anymore as I could make more by farming than the time storing, organizing, crafting, and selling. But if you are patient, this is likely the most bang for your buck. 9. Merits. This is the standard money maker while leveling up. You complete story arcs or TFs and get merits at the end, which you can then turn into other salvage and sell. You wont be rolling in the moola like Scrooge Mcduck anytime soon, but it will pay for your leveling up needs with change to spare. 10. Base Building. If you are good at base building, there are some folks who pay INF for such services. Depending on the server, I have seen people shell out 1-2 billon for a skilled base builder to help them make their dream home. I have no experience in this myself however, but it is a note-able way to make money, if you are good with the builder. There you go. There are 10 ways to make some moola during your journey. I would like to add that a mistake some people make is as soon as they make 500m or so, they go out and blow it on their first build, and then find themselves in the first predicament as before. You can spend that 500m, and make much much more, and in a sense, bankroll yourself and your other characters/projects. As I mentioned before, you don't have to be level 50 fully incarnated out to make money. Mostly it takes time and persistence. I know some level 2's who have more money than I do, even though I farm and they don't. That's because they have played the market ever since HC launched almost 2 years ago. I might catch up to them if I cared to, but they play largely the same characters and I tend to like to experiment with alts, and try new powers and builds. Best Wishes, and I Hope this helps!

I think powers change depending on the AT they are taken with. As an example, the Tanker vs Brute vs Scrapper vs Stalker comparisons, the Brute often stands apart due to Fury and Damage Buff interactions. For Melee: Generally I have found both Radiation Melee and Claws balanced. Claws is more focused on speedy attacks with a fantastic AoE at a very low level. Radiation is slower, but its energy. It has a great single target and area damage, and is also one of the few Melee powers with a Damage Aura, plus it has the Contaminated mechanic. I also found Katana to be oddly satisfying, and was one of the smoothest 1-50 journeys I have experienced. Personal Melee favorite: Radiation Melee For Armor: Shield is great, with not only defense but CC as well. But it cant be taken with everything. Invulnerability is also very good. Bio Armor is also very good with its different stances, and its regen/absorb mechanic makes it very effective at all damage types, something not all armor sets can enjoy. Bio Armor only gets better with recharge, so it pairs very well with recharge melee sets. Personal Armor favorite: Bio Armor.

If you multibox, I have found it is actually faster to 3 box Masterminds than it is to play 3 Brute farmers. The reason being you can engage so many more targets at a time. I did a write up awhile back and have been performing tests for roughly half a year with Masterminds. Here is a link - I've been able to clear maps in 3 minutes. My fastest 3 Brute team was 4. The Brutes were easier to manage though. But for sheer speed, Masterminds win, at least for me.

I like boop noodles...! 😪

I have had all kinds of roleplay, from normal day to day teaching another super being how to make the perfect meatloaf and program their entertainment center, to visiting a friend in the hospital whom is recovering, to planning a bachlorette party with a friend. Not all rp need be epic in scope. But we have had more important things as well, which also combined as learning the lore for some as we discussed the various wars and invasions over the years, the whole praetoran thing, and more. So, a bit of everything really. From "how many eggs again?" to "And on that day we set aside our differences as the sun stood still.." and everything inbetween.

Several well made and spoken points all around. Thank you everyone for your input. I do agree that the "how" is just as important as the "what" where rp is concerned.

Thank you for your composed and thought out reply @Llewellyn Blackwell, which I do appreciate. But I respectfully disagree with some of your points. But I will simply summarize them by simply asking what you would consider "over the top" or "too much?" I mean, if everyone is Neo/Superman/One Punch Man/Captain Marvel levels of untouchable, how would even minor threats exist for very long? I do agree it makes for stale interactions and roleplays. I regularly find myself clubbing with beings of deity-levels of power and usually find myself thinking "So you are a demi-god, basically. Right? And you what.. spend your free time hanging out at clubs, sipping cheap booze and using bad pickup lines? Shouldn't you be off you know, fighting some galactic war/answering prayers/creating worlds/creating life kinda stuff?" My main concern about such beings is a lot of the times, that's all they are. A power level. No personality, no goals, no journey. A lot of them rarely create roleplay and instead only react to it. A lot of the time when roleplaying with such characters it feels as if I am roleplaying by myself. They ask no questions. Endure no hardships. Have no obstacles to overcome or current goals they are working toward. They often interact by giving blunt single word answers, which add little to the scene or story. Which makes me question the entire point of them being there. But I do agree that I usually don't go to great lengths to involve them in whatever else I got going on. Again, thank you for your reply. I do appreciate it.

Thank you @_Kai_, answers my question. Depends on the crowd you hang with!

Oh for sure, travel time, contact/request mission time, team gathering time, then you have the escort missions where you aren't actively killing things. That all adds up, where farms are almost nonstop combat. Which is why I asked. I was wondering if there were different drop values, or if it was other activities being slower than farms with kill times kind of situation.

I agree with several of your points hon. But I will try to expand - The multidimensional thing, well, the 2 people who did it essentially were like "this is only one of our bodies. whatever you do we just replace it" sort of angle. So they were effectively, immune to anything done to them. That is a pretty simple explanation that they gave. Most multi-dimensional folks don't play this card. But it did stand out in memory, sort of an "i win any argument/obstacle" card. Sure, bloodlines are a thing. Half dragons, sure. Half or even full demons? great. Werewolf? go nuts. But I have seen people roll like 8 or 9 things all into one. Half-half-half-half-half etc. Well, just how many "halves" can you have? To my mind, the more you added, the more "Watered down" features you would have from each thing, and you might very well end up weaker, not stronger as was implied. You wouldn't usually get the "cream" of everything you added in games.

Personally, I wouldn't object to Open world and AE being balanced. But this is not the first time I have heard of AE getting higher rewards than other activities. Is there a source for this? I am genuinely curious as to the details. If its a kill speed/travel speed thing, or if Mob A vs Mob B of exact same level/rank drop different values. There is also things such as party size too. So there are lots of variables. So is there actually any Wiki/HC post or source that says that, or is it just people guessing? Asking respectfully, not being snarky.

Oh, I am talking about a full level 50 with full sets slotted and such, some builds still have END problems. Even with the proc slotting and such. But already gotten some answers that will help. Working on a new Shield/Energy Melee tanker now.

I think you are misunderstanding me. I know and RP with people who are members of the skulls, hellions, etc. I am fine with that. What I meant is like, someone claiming to be equal/greater than established leaders of such factions, not the foot guys or even the lieutenants, but like, the leaders/organizers/founders of such organizations. Essentially inflating their importance in the organizations. I mean, how would you react to someone suddenly showing up claiming to be an Overlord of Rikti or Nemesis's right hand man? (had both happen)

I would call being a blood relative of Statesman, or Miss Liberties BFF Godmodding, yes. Any sort of intimate or insider relationship with established storyline NPCs would be overboard in my book. @PeregrineFalcon - I know, that is a thing. But my point was here in HC, is there a general level of power that's accepted, or is it pretty much anything you can imagine is allowed, as far as the rp community is concerned. How much is "too much" for the general community I guess is the question, because as Coyotedancer demonstrated, people have different ideas of what is and is not Godmodding.

Thank you for the responses. I usually do slot the Proc stuff like preventative medicine, paneca, numa, performance enhancer on all my characters. But taking my Shield Stalker as an example, or my Widow, they are both DEF capped with varying levels of resistance, and still get clocked, even when they are 45% defense to just about everything. @arcane - I perfer to not rely on things like ageless for 2 reasons. 1. in case i decide to run lower level content and I wont have access to it, a build can fall flat if it relys on it as a crutch. And 2. I perfer having a tool like ageless in the off chance of dealing with enemies like sappers, or END drain situations. If your build relies on Ageless to perform normally, then it may not be enough when you need more in some circumstances. @Erratic1 - Your point only goes to highlight precisely how little experience I have with the Invulnerability set! But yes, no END tool, but most sets don't have one either. But I didn't think of Dull Pain.

Hello Forums, First off, I want to say far be it from me to dictate to another player who/what/how to roleplay their character. That said however, it seems like there are more and more "Ultimate POWAH" sorts of characters as of late. And so I am curious if other people tend to run into characters that tend to be over the top, in terms of "power level", and how they interact with such people. Here are a few examples off the top if my head, what I am referring to. And yes, these are all very real examples that I have run into. - Existed before time/A Bajillion years old. - Can punch a healthy star hard enough to make it collapse into a black hole. - Automatically knows the thoughts/emotions of everyone within a 10 mile radius. - Knows every spell/get out of jail or problem card on a whim. - Their super power was literally, to be better than everyone else in every way. - Utter immortality/immunity to everything. - Can warp reality at a whim. - Multi-dimensional/immune to any negative/hampering effect in "this" reality. - Questionable "Bloodlines" that seem way over the top or that don't make sense - Half Dragon, Demon, Angel, Vampire, Star-born, Werewolf, all rolled into one. Isn't that just a bit... much? - Related to/knows X famous NPC/Monster/Group etc. Now to me personally, some of these are just a bit over the top. I mean, first off if they are level 2, then they haven't actually accomplished that much yet, despite their backstory. But to me overpowered characters is.. well, boring. I mean, where is the development? The obstacles to overcome? The trials that cause bonding and friendship? If you are an entire super league all on your own, then what's the point? For me, I usually give my characters a weakness or negative. My main character, well she's a cyborg that's super great with technology and robots. She may not be as powerful as others, but where she shines is she can be different each fight. She can literally swap parts and go from a melee specialist to a tanker to a support character. From an OOC perspective that was my IC reason why she was different classes. ICly, it was all the same "person", but OOCly I was learning the game and powersets, and I didn't want to loose my roleplay or friends I was making in my journey. She is settled on a main setup now though, a robot mastermind. But her drawback? Magic. She's 100% absolutely clueless when it comes to anything magic, be it races, people, items, spells, all of it. To her magic is rabbits from hats and card tricks. She relies on her friends for any and all magical problems and challenges, but in turn they rely on her for anything tech related, like resetting their microwave clock, setting up their new phone apps, and fixing their printer. I do have 1 "immortal" character, but not in the Divine sense. She can die, she simply doesn't stay dead. She is more or less similar to highlander. Physically? She's a normal human. It isn't difficult to put her down. The trick is "keeping" her down for good, that's the hard bit. I only use my characters as examples for context here. But I am really wondering if its just me, or are some characters essentially full on Omnipotent Gods just walking around, and if so, is that "too much" or "over the top?" I mean, where is the acceptable line drawn, as far as roleplay is concerned? I have no qualms against Strong or Super Impressive powers. But if that's all there is to a character, I usually find them boring and dull to interact with. Either from them being so aloof ICly, or having a lack of common things to relate on with one another. Again, I want to stress that I don't tell others how to RP their character, its their character. But honestly, some if it seems just too much. And I am hoping there is a sense of Plateu out there on HC that everyone generally deems is acceptable, in roleplay. Otherwise, it can just be Godmodding. So, is it just me? Or what do you do with the Superman/One Punch Man/Genku/Mary Sues/Joes?

Hey Forums, I have a question regarding power pairings. When I'm making a character for end content play, I usually try to pick powers with some sort of HP or END tools built into the set so I am not reliant on Incarnates to make a build work, or even worse, Inspirations. (I hate having to rely on consumables. They should be a bonus, not required to make a build work IMO.) But when I read builds such as Broadsword/Shield, or Street Justice/Invlun, such pairings have no such tools. I am contemplating on making a Shield/Energy Melee tanker, but I am worried about the lack of HP and END tools. So here are my questions - You are going to take "some" damage, its unavoidable. Even with DEF/RES cap, some damage is going to get through. With some sets like Bio, absorb/regen is plenty to take care of this most of the time. Other sets have built in Heals. So how do other armor sets deal with juggling HP and END drain unless you are relying on Melee Hybrid for the RES/Regen boost, Ageless or Rebirth Destiny, or popping green and blue candy. So how do you manage this? I rarely see Tankers take something like, Medicine Pool, even on sets with zero built in self healing. Even fewer have built in END tools to speak of. I do have a Dark Armor brute who takes very little damage, and what she does take she heals back herself. Rarely does she have to use her Heal, but it's still there if she needs it. But I doubt all sets are capable of this, healing damage purely with their natural regeneration. Or am I mistaken? I have zero playtime on a tanker with Shield, Invulnerable, and so on. My tankers have largely been Radiation, Dark Armor, Bio Armor, and Electric. My only experience with Shield is with a Elec/Shield stalker, and she is constantly END starved, and I don't want to be a tanker in a same situation. Thanks bunches in advance. TLDR - How do you manage Hitpoints/Endurance when taking Primary/Secondary powersets without any built in tools?

Looks like things were more expensive, and INF was harder to come by then. Still, was just wondering. I am sure there are many reasons why. Supply, demand, player numbers, ways to get INF, so on.

I didn't play live, it was before my time. But I am curious as to what the prices now are compared to what they were then? Not sure if they had the same tools like AE that we do, or methods of getting INF, so the comparison might not be fair. But still, am curious as to what an average purple might cost, an average AT might cost, and an average winter set might cost. We haven't gotten any new purple sets they didn't have back then, have we?

Personally, I get a warm feeling when I imagine CoH having a smaller, yet more passionate community. Despite our bickering sometimes. It really goes to show just how great CoH is after all this time it still boasts a community of people who return to it as their main game entertainment when given the options available now, as well as after so much time passing. To me CoH is a game that will always stand apart from the rest. Sure, things might have been done better, but it's done a lot of amazing things too. I mean, even in present day we still boast some of the biggest character options in any game anywhere, which was years ahead of its time. So a smaller, but more dedicated fan base. I could be wrong of course, but I like to believe so.

My highlights is going to page 4 and seeing several level 50s I have not touched in a year, log into them only to find things on the auction house, 100 sold things, a tray full of purple enhancements, or piles of money that I had entirely forgotten I had.

My thoughts for what they are worth. 1.) I have seen some people say farming is bad. My honest reply is, why is it bad? Farmers do more than just mindlessly grind away for money/exp, and they have several positives. They spend more money into the economy. Moving wealth is always a good and healthy sign for a community. And for those who use the AE often have several characters that eventually, all require enhancements. I would bet that AE users/Famers make up a sizeable chunk of auction house activity. Without such persons or such a high turnover of new characters, the market would grow stale due to supply out growing demand. "Everything would be cheaper!" you might say, but that also would devalue INF more than it already is. At least currently there are some INF sinks and uses, and demand. Plus, with such demand a new player or At without much in their pockets can get lucky, find a purple, sell it, and be largely set for themselves all the way to 50. Without the AE this might not be possible, or at least, the flow of money might slow to a crawl. Some like myself "Shadow Sponsor" events. Just last week I went to a smaller SG hosting a rp event, so I came in and ordered a Bloody Mary, and donated 1 billion to use as they pleased. Some of us host events as well, such as costume or origin story contests. And a lot of the time unless INF is involved, people wont come. Also keep in mind that people can have multiple accounts, and all that "1 billion CC at Atlas" money has to come from "Somewhere", and considering the frequency of such hosted player events, vs the time required to accumulate such numbers in the "open world", I would bet that the vast majority of money for such events comes from Farming/AE. No one is going to make that much INF doing open world stuff in a month, much less week. So without the AE you might very well see a noticeable drop in such events, or at the very least, their rewards. Many folks like myself like to build characters, and no that isn't always power builds either. I have made builds based on theme, roleplay, or even purely chose ATs and Powersets purely for visual effects sake to use in small RP events, just to add that extra spice to them. I know it's not much, but we use the tools we have. And farming is a great tool for those of us for whatever reason like to try many things. For some of us we have already played through the stories a few times now, and don't want to go through all the time for a build we want to try for whatever reason, only to hit level 38 and go "Op! well, that didn't work!" or "Eh.. I'm just not feeling this, Imma try something else." If we had to go through the monthly effort to level up a character each time in such a diverse game, I suspect many players would suffer Burnout. Personally I would have likely moved on long ago. It is also a tool. You can pick your damage types on different environments. Want to see how well you do vs fire enemies? How about toxic? Psi damage? Against things higher level than you? Want to try and beat up a GM solo? You want to play but don't have a lot of time to do it? Or have to step away often when real life calls? Then AE is a great option. Another thing I would like to highlight is that you never know who is sitting at the seat of another character, and this is true of all games. One friend of mine who shall remain nameless only has one hand and is missing fingers on that one as well. Yet he plays. He may be slow, but I think that's pretty amazing. Using myself as another example, in another game I used to be a high end raider. But I ended up quitting because as time went on it became less and less fun because I am in fact deaf IRL, and more and more fights and tools such as DBM are sound based. In a new fight that you have only read about, with so much going on at a time, its quite easy to miss a flashing word or warning. And I don't hear the loud kaboom or alarm blaring. The results from that were disheartening and depressing to say the least. For those who consider the farmers here "toxic", I can only politely gesture to the Raid Community in other games where people are called out for not gearing to the umpteenth degree or not min/maxing to be .0032% more effective. (And yes, I have had that argument before.) How does this relate to CoH? (Whom I hasten to add, does have a more friendly and welcoming raid scene than other games!) Well, on your random TF groups, its very much go-go-go-go where everyone assumes everyone already knows everything. My friend I mentioned no longer does TFs, because he is too slow to keep up or contribute. By the time he gets there, the fight is over and the "Mission Completed" flashes overhead. This is nobodies fault directly, it's just how it is. But that is why he told me he plays AE things more than open world content. He can fight AVs and GMs there. He can go at his own pace. He controls the game interaction, and can play with whom he wants to. And I think that is okay. Finally, like it or not it's something to do. Sometimes, its just quiet. People are standing around quietly roleplaying, or no one is doing missions/tfs etc. So instead of going around the world, you just load up an AE to play until a friend logs on in an hour. Its a timesink, and its a good one. 2. ) As far as the Farm Channel itself, well, I would like to point out to those who might be unaware, that there are Farmer Discords out there. There is far more activity there than there is in the LFG channel, at least where farms are concerned. There are many folks who run entire farm groups and you ever even see or hear them. And until I just mentioned them, some of you might have never even known they were there. And topics like these are why. Farmers aren't mustache twirling villain's in the dark, nor are they economical masterminds whom seek to dominate the value of your INF. (Its funny but some of the richest folks I know are level 2-5. They are the die hard rpers who and play the markets between their rp, and have never stepped foot in an AE, TF, or Raid.) Now do I think a Farm Channel is required? No, not really. I see all kinds of things in all of the channels. From mistells to embarrassing emotes. While I am not personally bothered by such things and laugh sometimes, I can understand how some might see them as aggravating or irritating. But I think a Farm Channel would further divide the community, which I don't see as a good thing, but I would urge people who feel in such a way to use the tools already provided such as the Ignore tool, if they feel so strongly about it. But for those who are arguing that Farms don't belong in LFG, I would ask why not? Looking for Group is empty of context. It isn't the "Looking for Task Force" channel, or the "Looking for Raid" channel. Its the "Looking for group" channel, which is used for people to run TFs, Raids, Paper Missions, Story Missions, or just run around the open world. But Farming is Grouping. For someone to make that argument about Farming not belonging with the other activities and was singled out by itself, makes me wonder if the heart of their argument is really "Farming isn't legitimate play." For those arguing for the removal of AE, I would like to highlight that AE is keeping a good portion of folks still around, people who do more than only just AE farms. And the AE being removed would do more harm than good. That, and I strongly oppose the entire mentality of "People who don't enjoy the game exactly as I do are wrong." In closing, the proposed Farm Channel itself, well, I would consider it an issue, but a minor one, and hardly worthy of such measures, particularly when tools such as the ignore and closing or moving the LFG tab already exist. This goes doubly so for the size of the staff, which is indeed a volunteer staff, whom I would rather see them work on more things such as bug fixes or additional powersets and content. Just my thoughts about it. Best wishes to everyone out there, wither you Farm/Use the AE or Not. P.S - An afterthought. One thing I would support would be adding a PVP channel. While I am not a PVPer myself, to my limited knowledge those who do enjoy hardcore PVP do not have any such tools or channels to find others of a like mind. And I believe that such a channel might attract others who enjoy a similar gameplay. As well as finding others whom also enjoy that kind of gameplay can be difficult, from what I understand. So a dedicated PVP channel may help with that.

Thank you!