VileTerror

Maybe not entirely helpful of me, given the context . . . buuuuut you -can- get Born in Battle and Marshal outside of PvP zones. By switching sides and becomes a dirty hero, and earning Portal Jockey and Received the Atlas Medallion Badges. Both of which you can earn before level 20 with a little help from friends!

I think it mostly had to do with how much they tried to ape Battlestar Gallatica's "gritty" cinematic style more than anything. The drama in Universe wasn't the issue. I think the pointless close-ups and hazy film just pushed what could have been a serious character drama in to the realm of the supreme melodrama, without the accompanying campiness to justify it.

And Farscape comics. And Firefly comics. ... don't think there's any Lexx comics, though. Yet, none of them came up in the four pages of discussion there. It just dawned on me . . . Amanda Tapping and Christopher Judge deserve special recognition for being lead cast for the entire duration of the series. Neither Shanks nor Anderson pulled that off.

I go to thinking . . . what events in my life took place to cement my identity as a geek? Well, as it happens, there are probably some pretty significant factors which lead to that. I'm odd. Not one to fit in with normal folks so well, geek culture of the '80s and '90s provided me with characters and scenarios which were appealing to my not-terribly-well-socialized self. My mother was a huge fan of J.R.R. Tolkien, Frank Hubert, and the original Star Trek. When The Next Generation became a thing, she made DAMNED sure that my sister and I would watch every episode with her. Likewise when the Dune miniseries came out. And while she enjoys going to see movies all the time, she made certain that we all had tickets for opening night of each of the Peter Jackson Lord of the Ring films. Some of my earliest memories are gaming memories. I remember mucking around with my dad's home office 386 while he was away. We didn't have any actual games at first, but we had Broderbund PrintMaster. I would use the pixel art editor to map out what I imagined as sidescrolling levels for an imaginary Batman game (as the Tim Burton movies had a pretty profound affect on me back then). It would be a few more years before I actually programmed my first QBasic program, though. And, of course, when Doom came out . . . hooboy! That's when my passion was cemented. An older kid from school let me have his 3.5 inch floppies of Doom 2 with the CAD, WAD, and DEF editors. I didn't have the artistic skill or patience to finish my total conversion, but I did made dozens of maps; some of which I'm still pretty proud of . . . if only I could find my old Zip Drive and a SCSI adaptor to retrieve them all. How about you? All of you. Why are you a geek?

An Archery Control set would also be pretty stellar! I mean, I'd really like a Tactical Grenade Control set too, and if they end up being the same powers with different animation; okay, fine. But both of them being their own thing would also be super awesome!

Frankly, if all future story content follows that as the minimum standard of quality, we'll have a very excellent future!

The new arcs are the Level 25 to 30 Vigilante-only and Rogue-only content that was written by holymittens. https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/10968-feedback-new-story-arcs/

Since GM Widower demanded it (with threats of zatnikatel blasts, honest!*), here we have the Stargate thread! The original 1994 movie was great! Absolutely fantastic for its time, in fact. It's easy to see how it wound up with a series just three years later. A series filmed in Canada! (hurrEh!) While Jack O'Neill quickly became a big departure from O'Neil, and as much as I really like Kurt Russell as an actor, I have to say that Richard Dean Anderson just -made- the whole SG-1 series for me. His dry irreverence with moments of intensity was so perfect. The way the other cast bounced off of his performances was an absolute riot! While I grew up on Star Trek (The Next Generation, specifically), SG-1 was a pretty big influence in my life when I started to get in to the games industry. I still remember my team crowding around one of our peer's laptops to watch the return of Daniel Jackson on a copy of the episode that he had ripped. While not everyone was a huge fan of the series, there was plenty of laughter at seeing a naked and bewildered Michael Shanks. So! What about you? (GM Widower specifically) *(not honest) Also, seriously: https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/14107-switch-the-video-gaming-board-to-general-gaming/ This should probably just get renamed "Geek Cultural" for the amount of comic discussion actually taking place here so far.

Kiiiiind of totally veering off course of this thread's intended subject . . . but I'd say don't discount the usefulness of forum-based communication. This format has persisted for decades for some pretty solid reasons. Other modes of communication may show up, but forums still provide meaningful and useful forms of idea expression.

Oh yeah! And the "Event does not exist" message flooding error. That would be nice to have addressed.

The AoE doesn' penetrate line of sight barriers. You can also summon Henchpets in a specific order, upgrading before summoning the last one(s).

Ah; thanks for the update! Appreciated.

I'm sorry, but after Abridged, I can't handle the English dubs any more. Recoome is just characterized so much better by Marc Soskin and Team Four Star.

How about GM Sijin? Used to see Sijin all the time in-game on Everlasting. Lately, not a peep.

Being able to choose which Henchpets you upgrade is also a valid tactic, and making the upgrades Auto would remove the capacity for that.

Counter proposal: Leave the Powers as-is, and make new, mutually exclusive Powers available in the same set, a la Sentinel Practiced Brawler and Master Brawler.

Just watched the first episode of Picard. I like where this is going. I like how they're giving some broad stroke world building. I -really- like Patrick Stewart's performance. I like the dreams. Not so hot on the flimsily-justified "twins" thing. I can handle that in a setting where quantum physics has been tackled, that a single cell can be used to manufacture something bigger . . . but why twins, other than a plot contrivance?

Oh, yeah, Steele? What about: https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/14626-badges-for-the-badgefiend/

GASP! A contender to the throne!

To fix geometry issues, you'll need something like 3Ds Max or Maya. There's an opensource 3D modeller program out there too, if memory serves, but it's quite limited compared to the two professional suites. Or maybe I'm confused. I sucked so much at 3D modelling that I rather permanently shelved that. You would also need to read up in OuroDev about the proprietary nature of City's 3D assets. AND THEN there's the rigging and animation . . . I mean, I -can- 3D model, but it takes me a month to do what some other people can bang out in a couple of nights. But when it comes to rigging and animation; hoo! I am le suck. On the 2D plain we're looking at something considerably easier (by my reckoning, anyway). People swear up and down about Photoshop/Illustrator, but I'll recommend the GIMP. It's free, opensource, and does everything you -need- from a graphic art program other than quality vector work (haven't found an Illustrator analogous opensource project yet, sorry). You'll also want a Pigg viewer to get in to the game files of City. The aptly named "PiggViewer" is the only one I know of, but there might be others floating around too.

I think that the reasoning is from the fact that Confront is nearly never touched under just about any circumstances, while Taunt is used by plenty of Brutes and Tankers to do exactly what it's meant to. Taunt is fine where it is. It gets used. Confront is presently a "no-brainer skippable" Power for all Scrappers.

I apologize for still failing to express myself precisely enough to get to the core of what I'm asking here, Jimmy. There appears to be a disconnect. You said that you had to give the same answer three times; that tells me that I'm still failing to express the question in an unambiguous way. The question I'm ultimately trying to ask seems to be a step removed from the questions I've apparently been communicating. I also apologize that I've said some things which I have apparently done some harm with. I do not want to cause undue stress or waste your time; I know you're stretched thin on a volunteer endeavour. If it's of any help, the urgency my language may imply isn't meant to push an immediate response beyond "I hear what you're saying, and considering it" (which, of course, is a platitude, since without an active line of communication for error correction, we get in to this sort of scenario anyway). Something, upon reflection, I clearly didn't think through thoroughly enough. I guess that's another "+1" point toward a CR or GM position that can help filter and translate. I thank you for taking the time you have here, and your request to be patient is echoed in the other direction as well. With the addendum of "continue." As some other users have expressed, there is a social energy tax which these exchanges can exact. I do appreciate your commitment and the time you've spent engaged here. Thank you. I would like to know where I'm going wrong, so I welcome feedback from any observer or participant (either here or in private) on how to choose better language; words that are impactful to the point, rather than to negative feelings. I do not want to waste any Dev time or energy on trying to sort out my failing (though naturally, I welcome their feedback as well). For example, I am not intending to sound as though I am making demands. I want to be able to explain the benefit and the importance of the level of cooperation I'm proposing. That could be a good place to start.

Seems I phrased my statement poorly. Let's try this: What harm does it do when someone mistakes a plan as a promise?

We're not in a publisher-dictated developer studio paradigm any longer. We're a community with MANY talent people, with skills that can compliment one another. We're poised on the precipice of OpenSource greatness. The more open discussion there is, the more information that becomes available, the less room there is for uninformed rebuttals. Things can only improve with more information flowing more freely. Even if there's ultimately very few people making the final decisions; they can be more informed themselves by sharing their information with a wider audience. It's an upward spiral. Share knowledge to gain knowledge. The only context where secrets play out to someone's advantage is when it comes to manipulation. a.k.a.: Marketing. That's why publishers have been so adamant about driving this narrative to developers that it's somehow in their favour to keep secrets from the end users. OpenSource development has demonstrated that keeping the userbase informed allows for some terrific advantages in ensuring progressive design iteration. Expanding and diversifying the userbase does that as well. We have a level of transparency on the donations that's pretty damned good. I want to see that level of transparency spread further.

I don't like to make blanket statements, particularly about people. I do it more often than I should, and I know it's a terrible habit for a lot of reasons . . . *sighs* BUUUUUT Some people are just going to misinterpret anything. Doesn't matter what's said, or how; it won't be received by everyone the way the original speaker/writer intended it to be. With that said: A "roadmap" isn't a series of promises, and the chance that anyone might treat it as a promise should not prevent the use of a "roadmap." The benefits of having documentation of plans and intent are clear and undeniable. Even if they aren't set in stone, they provide context and history which allows for greater depths of discussion when things inevitably change. I find it incredibly unlikely that there isn't any kind of internal documentation of plans between members of the Homecoming Team, even if it's informal. I think the entire community would benefit from having that documentation publicly available. I harp on this topic often enough, so I know I'm failing to make my case. It would be wonderful to have a chance to sit down and hash it out, and figure out where the blockage is happening. What's needed to make the improved communication a reality? What are the specific reservations? What can be done to provide sufficient mitigation to presumed risks? I'll acknowledge the possibility that I'm wrong ... but all my experiences up to now lead me to conclude that secrecy in this sort of context is invariably more of a detriment than a boon compared to open and clear lines of communication regarding intent. If there are risks which I'm not aware of, I welcome the opportunity to be educated. I steadfastly hold, though, that "people will assume it's a promise" is not (at all) a reasonable potential risk.