Luminara

You have to wear the right apparel to understand certain thought processes.

You circle the square by square dancing in a circle.

All sentinel primaries have a damage-dealing single-target control. Fire didn't, so the HC team created one. The Repel is effective against a wider variety of foes due to the overall lack of Repel protection/resistance for critters, supplemented by a brief mag 4 Hold which shuts off toggles on just about anything short of an AV, and ending with a low mag KB, all of which work in concert to take an enemy out of the fight for several seconds. It's a stronger control, even if it is soft control, than would otherwise be warranted for a sentinel power. Personally, I prefer it to another bog standard Hold/Stun/Sleep.

The redraw revamp in the last update should've taken care of this. If Combat Teleport is forcing redraw, it's probably a bug.

This is an impressive first effort. The interface feels a bit cramped, but it's no worse than the current version of Mids'. Finding the pool power dropdowns took a minute because I wasn't looking for a horizontal scroll bar, but once I located that, it was easy enough. The pop-up tool tips obscure the dropdown menus, though, making it difficult to figure out what you're clicking on. Offsetting those would help. The two Details panes don't seem to serve any purpose, removing those would open it up a bit. I have no idea how to use enhancements with this planner, though. Clicking a slot (any click, left, right, Shift/Ctrl/Alt or any combination thereof) just brings up the power description. Clicking the power adds a slot (and there doesn't seem to be any way to remove it), clicking the power icon removes the power, and clicking enhancement icons on the power in the left dropdowns doesn't do anything, either. I can create a build right up to the point of enhancements, then it's a dead stop. There's also nothing for accolades, temporary powers or Incarnates. I know it's a work in progress, just mentioning it. It's functional enough to rough out a build already, which is seriously impressive. It's more responsive than Mids', and less resource intensive, two things that I really like because I always keep Mids' open in the background when I'm playing (i'll frequently stop in the middle of whatever i'm doing and fiddle with a build, just because something popped into my head). The lack of detail granularity (hard numbers on things like endurance cost, recharge time, etc) will send me back to that application for complete builds until this becomes more feature-complete, though. Oh, hell no, you have nothing to be concerned about. This is more than anyone's managed in almost twenty years. A web planner that can be used on tablets and phones is, by itself, an answer to a lot of players dreams. You should be proud, what you've built is a monumental step forward in Co* build planning.

If that isn't already porn, my brain is taking it in that direction right now.

There's a porn Romeo and Juliet, too.

If you haven't powered the router down and powered it back up since you got the laptop, do so. If you have multiple devices accessing the router, change the laptop's Wi-Fi channel to an unused one. Open the Task Manager and keep it open when the game is running. Alt+Tab out of the game when the lag begins and watch the Network column (click the column header to lock the focus on it). If you see something that isn't the game using bandwidth, that's the problem. Steam, Asus software, Windows Update (and Background Intelligent Transfer System, and Delivery Optimization (which will be hidden under Network... something, i'm blanking out and it's not running on my laptop at the moment)). If you have other devices connected when you're playing, tell them to fuck off for a while. That could be phones, printers, faxes, other computers, your television, etc. Co*'s network usage caps out at barely what ISDN used to provide (i use my phone as a hotspot and have a horribly weak signal (barely two bars), and my ping is only 180 when Verizon is throttling me, which is every fucking day after 5 p.m.). To get that kind of lag, you're either being aggressively throttled by your ISP, or you have multiple devices fighting over the same channel, or something on your network is blitzing the data line. The only time I see my netgraph do anything like that is when Windows is going banana balls with updates... which it really likes to do when I'm playing Co*, for some goddamn reason.

Probably. Disney has to protect the copyright on their Snow White. Well, someone made a porn version of Cinderella in '77 and... it is copyright protected (just checked).

The story is public domain (Grimm Fairy Tales). Go ape-shit with it.

Reasons: Limitations are necessary to create both a minimum expectation of character performance and to restrict maximum character performance. A common approach to creating this kind of limitation is the "skill tree", in which moving up one branch cuts off access to another branch entirely, or limits how far the player can move on that other branch. Developers place certain skills/powers/abilities in key locations, thereby guaranteeing that characters will always meet their minimum expectation of performance, which is the baseline they need to create content and ensure that said content will never be "too hard" for anyone. Correspondingly, this tree structure also allows them to restrict players from accessing all of the "best" powers, which prevents players from trivializing content. While we have a more freeform power selection system in Co*, the same basic design model is applied, and applicable. Our characters are forced to meet minimum performance expectations via mandatory T1/T2 primary/secondary selections (Co*'s minimum performance expectation is "can deal damage"). Maximum performance expectations are restricted in a variety of ways, one of which is "You must have Pool_Power R, S or T before you can select Pool_Power U or V". Without restrictions like this, developers can't create content which can challenge top performers without instantly crushing bottom performers. Without both minimums and maximums of character performance, content cannot be balanced, and it is that balance that is of utmost importance. Every other balance metric is measured by this one. It's not about which archetype has the fastest time on pylons, or which primary, or which secondary, or even which attack chain, it's about the pylons being both defeatable and having the potential to defeat characters. That's why HC has been selectively bringing the lowest under-performers upward, they've raised the minimum performance expectation and are aligning aspects of the game to match it. That's also why HC has nerfed the strongest over-performers, the power sets and powers which single-handedly trivialized content in one way or another. The prerequisites gating access to T3-T5 pool powers are one of the limitations which ensure that content balance is possible. Not to frustrate players, or impinge on creativity, or because devs are dicks, but because they're part of the design approach which allows development of content. Class dismissed.

Translation: SEND NUDES PLZ

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Let's see... Sense of entitlement ✔️ Easily offended ✔️ Issuing rules for how others can speak ✔️ Demands an answer from the developers ✔️

Some people want something for nothing. That doesn't mean they should get it. An educated, knowledgeable minority who understand the game's design and balance requirements and raise valid objections when an uneducated, ignorant minority (the few threads i linked for you don't represent a majority, no matter how hard you spin it) calls for unbalanced changes based entirely on a sense of entitlement. False equivalency. You aren't the vox populi. You don't know how frequently anyone does anything, as you don't have access to the metrics and tools used by the HC team. You're not even using the tools available on the forums to gather data to support your assertions, you're just slapping your opinion down and calling it gospel. In point of fact, there's been very little power creep, and what almost everyone means when they mention power creep is the broader availability of set IOs. That availability was not an unintended surge in power creep, though. Neither Cryptic nor Paragon intentionally tanked the game economy with the desire to use that as a restriction on set IO availability. Had either of those development teams set the economy up properly, instead of allowing players to generate unlimited inf* for years before introducing anything to spend it on, the general use of set IOs we see now would've been the standard in the original run of the game. They weren't designed and implemented to be incredibly rare, or restricted to the unique and special few who could afford them, and the fact that Cryptic and Paragon both leveraged their monumental economical fuck-up as a limitation on set IO availability doesn't mean it was the right decision, or even a good one. Their eventual capitulation to their failure with the introduction of reward merits, followed by the Incarnate system, which was founded on the same design philosophy as set IOs but without the economic disaster acting as an impediment, is proof that they recognized and were learning from their mistake. Now that we can play with set IOs more freely, we're experiencing the game as it was meant to be played, rather than staggering under the unintended and artificial restrictions imposed by the failed economy. The notable power and power set changes the HC team has been making, to which some point to and decry as power creep, have all been done with the explicitly stated intent of raising the bar for everyone. The HC lead representative, @Jimmy, said unequivocally that 3 +3 minions was the new baseline. With that baseline as the target, we have not, in fact, experienced a monumental surge of power creep over the past few years, we've only seen powers and power sets which were incapable of meeting that baseline brought up to par. That's standardization, not power creep. Yes, some people point to the old Emmertism, "One hero should be equivalent of three +0 minions", and insist that anything above that is power creep, but that's hollow logic based entirely on a refusal to get with the program. The world has moved forward, the game is moving forward as well. We can't even reasonably refer to amplifiers as power creep because they're optional. Like inspirations, they're there if you choose to use them. They're not automatically activated the instant you exit character creation. They're not mandated by any content. No-one's twisting your arm to force you to use them. The use of amplifiers is a choice, and if they make the game "too easy" for some people, those people also have the option not to use them. The one change which can be accurately denoted as power creep was that of catalyzation being made not only a standard function of the player market, but also easily done by the player via significantly increased drop rate. That removed certain restrictions which controlled IO usage and can be considered a very minor form of power creep, but, in all honesty, this game was never that hard before we could run willy-nilly with catalyzed IOs. I tanked AVs and soloed GMs with a defender who had no Defense, no Resistance, no status protection, no-one propping me up and no IOs in Issue 5, using pool melee attacks. Having catalyzed IOs now isn't making the game that much easier, it's just opening the door for players who couldn't or wouldn't test the game's limits before. But none of that really matters because this entire topic is and has always been a non-starter. The HC team has already said that they're sticking to the core design philosophy and intent of the original game. Choices, and limitations which force choices, are a core part of this game, and balance is still enforced by the development team. You are never going to get unlimited power and freedom from making choices on these servers. If that's what interests you, try another server group.

Late 70's or early 80's Chevy Malibu. 4th gen, can't remember the year. It was a long time ago. I drove it from Florida to Missouri in... 1996, I think, and the transmission died a couple of weeks later. Well, all of the forward gears died. I drove it in reverse for about 5 miles to get it home. Called a shop, $200 for a used transmission, installed. The used transmission out-lasted the engine, which finally gave up and died in 2001 or 2002, which was after another long trip, from Missouri to Virginia.

HC is (still) negotiating with NC for licensing. In the interim, we apparently have NC's tacit permission to play, as long as there's no profit being generated. So yes and no. We're in a grey area of legality.

That road is hilarious. I'd say that the guy who painted that had to be the same one who built the Shed of Doom, but I don't see any screws hammered in. Must've been his cousin.

I actually tried to refuse. Twice. They insisted. They're good people. There was also some self-interest motivating them, since there was a concern that my transportation situation might become untenable at some point. That was what convinced me to accepted the offer. A Japanese van that needs a little TLC is infinitely more reliable than a cheap Chinese motorcycle. I don't estimate more than a few hundred dollars to take care of all of the things I listed (i can flush the transmission and replace the drive belt components myself... could do the tires myself, too, but i'm just not going to! i'll pay for that labor). Even if it only makes it to 200,000, that's still several years of use for the investment. If it's still going for another 100,000 miles, it will have outlasted me. Here's to hoping yours lasts as long! 🍻

One of the families I work for gave me a 2004 Honda Odyssey a couple of weeks ago. Just gave it to me. Actually, since they left $0.46 in change in the coin holder, they paid me $0.46 to take it. It has 172,000 miles on it, the transmission warning light is intermittently active, the timing belt has never been changed and two of the tires have slow leaks. The transmission is overfilled by at least 1.5 quarts, and when I took it for a drive in the rain, it didn't give me the warning, so I'm working on the theory that heat is causing the fluid to expand and causing a pressurization sensor to freak out, or the fluid loses viscosity as it expands and triggers another sensor (it's not red any more, so it's definitely old fluid). A flush (drain/refill/drive, repeat twice more, then refill to proper level (the transmission holds 8 quarts, but only drains 3.5, so multiple drains and refills are necessary to circulate all of the old fluid out)) will resolve that problem, either way. Ironically, the potential for transmission failure is why they gave it to me. Apparently, transmissions are expensive now (last time i had to replace a transmission, it was $200), but after going over it, it looks like it just needs some basic maintenance. The timing belt probably doesn't need to be changed, but the linkages and attached components would (they're more likely to fail than the belt is). Can probably get around to that at my leisure (before 200,000 miles). The tires will have to be replaced (pulled a piece of shale the size and shape of a .44 slug out of one and plugged it, but if that could puncture the tire down to the steel cord, it's overdue for replacement). There's a tire shop ten miles away, and they do it cheap, so I can afford that. Everything else is fine. They took care of this van. Slapped Farm Use tags on it (legitimately, since i work at two farms), yanked out the back seats (single, don't need room for 7 people and better gas mileage with less weight) and I'm all set. Still rather have the Corbusian or Geoff. Driving a Jeremy Clarkson original (for the mile it went before exploding) would be awesome. But a free van is okay, too.

You can. Right-click on the map to set a thumbtack. Thumbtacks add a to the map, set a waypoint in the nav window and show the distance to the waypoint in the zone or mission. Right-click on the to remove it.