houtex

Just reminded of this topic... The other day I happened to get "The Mists". Would have thought that one would be gone, but nope, MINE. 🙂 Made her a shadowy storm/storm corruptor. Thought it a good idea. Heh.

Geez. Y'all been busy! I want to say thank you for all your efforts. I don't know exactly how they'll work for me, but I'm definitely looking forward to seeing Brawling Humiliator in the big ol' mech lookin' Tier 2 costume one day, completely wasting it just throwing hands. 🙂

This is an historic day. There should be a badge or something. 🙂 Congratulations to the Homecoming team! May NCSoft be forever lenient to the City's denizens.

Another couple in the list of 'whuut, NOBODY before me?' names happening along in a providincial sorta way... which is not to say that indeed someone might have, then deleted or whatever, but pressing on... First there's Crispy Jane. Fire Energy Blaster. Woulda thought someone would have gotten that one, with Doom Patrol's 'Crazy Jane' being a thing, but hey, I won, so yay. But then... I just can't hardly believe it myself, but I gotta 'cause I'm lookin' right at it: Blazer Glory. Fire/Fire Blaster. And yes, he wears a smart blazer. Nice dark blue one. Although I was kind of tempted to go with the early Bon Jovi look. 🙂 Perhaps I will if the right costume contest comes forth. 😁

Dudes and dudettes. DUDES. And dudettes. I have acquired maybe the greatest name ever. EVER. You ain't ready for it, but here it is: The Joy of Planting Well, admittedly, I'll have to wait until I can add the 'the' to it because I screwed up and you can't back up once you say 'lemme in the city' in the creator, but still. Bob Ross wannabe lookalike who can't paint, but can garden, and got mutated so he can garden anywhere, including gardening his gardening so he can garden while he gardens. 😄 Oh, and throw thorns. Anyway, excited am I that wasn't taken. Yay me! Carry on. 😁

Updates from my last post in May... Because why not? 🙂 I have acquired and use the following since then on Excelsior: Glean. He sucks. Literally, enemies go down from his just standing about. 🙂 Still kinda can't believe nobody else got this one. Super Jump. You can guess what his specialty is. That nobody got this is amazing to me. The Tase. Only uses the Taser. Yeah yeah, I know... Political Man. Ill/Sonic Controller. He's a villain, naturally. 🙂 Punch One. So... maybe you've heard of some comic out there...? And on Everlasting, I got Gobstopper One. I really thought that would have been taken. Someone has 'Gobstopper' of course, but still. Okies, that's all I got today, laters!

In 19 BBY, a crack commando unit was forced to exile during a military coup for the crime of not committing to Order 66. These men promptly escaped from the field of battle to the underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them....maybe you can hire... The Bad Batch.

Billy. That. Will. Happen. I have *no* idea how the heck that's gonna work. I'll probably have to roll another test character to figure it out how, but it's happening. 😄

TL;DR: I got names out the wazzoo, so skip if you just don't wanna read it, it's cool, carry on. So this is a topic I didn't know about, and so at this late date, my post will be long because I wanna talk a lil' story about it. Sorry in advance. These are all on Excelsior, btw. That I got the following mains in after getting a late start 'round here was really nifty and surprising: Ruby, Cerise and Rose Dawn, the Dawn sisters. Figured one would be gone, but nope. Thing of Bigness. Surprised at that not being taken. Nuclear Tigress. Very surprised at that. I mean, it's just a great name, you ask me. Brawling Humiliator. Kinda figured someone would just do that, but yay. Endolith. I really honestly thought one of y'all would get that. Couldn't get these mains: Chillsea. Which is fine, I made Anu Moana which means 'cold ocean' in Hawaiian. Or close enough I hope. Throw Stuff. So instead I got Throws Stuff About. Works for me. My new creations that surprised me were these: The Dependent. Imagine what that's about, but yeah, nobody? K. 🙂 Frequency Kenneth. I mean, that REM song, and... it's not taken? Nifty. The Tase. I figured someone with electrics would get this... no? Ok, I'll have it. Kneesweeper. I would have thought this was a given for a martial arts character. So there ya go. My lil' list. Of course, getting 'Moo Goshdarnit', 'Crabtabulous', 'Glean' and 'Firesticks' were somewhat surprising too. But then I'm always pleasantly surprised when I come up with something appropriate and it happens to be available! Yes, I rotate through them all, they get used. Different wants/needs different days, yes? *nods with altitis issues...* Sorry again for the long, and thanks for readin' if you did!

In order: Apparently, if this and Brawling Humiliator are any proof. Yes, it does appear that way and yet... strangely enough... I've got it working pretty good actually. More on that later. *I* did not make a costume. More on that too: --- Ok, four DFB runs and a little street sweepin' in Kings Row later... It... works? Pretty good? For me, anyway, there's caveats to be sure... So what I did is I rolled a Sentinel. A rifle/ninjitsu one. Why not. The Arrows were the faster, but I didn't wanna do that, so I chose rifle. Reason being I wanted as minimal effects going on, which I've notice in, say, my mind controllers/dominator you can see the effects as they use their powers. I also turned the FX down to minimum in the Ninjistu. So I see all around me in front, but nothing of me. Very good. I then 'made' the costume, except I didn't. I held my left hand over my face as I hit the 'random' button a whole bunch, stopped when an overly obnoxious aura like that plant one didn't show up, hit next, did the above fx reduction, hit next, send it to outbreak. Still covering my eyes from seeing my monstrosity I'm sure it is, I zoomed in to first person and left it there. Then adjusted everything as I do, and I then went in and played around with the keys/mouse settings to ensure I didn't hit 'B' to switch from FP and back or anything like that. Once satisfied I... started doing the thing, Zhu Li. I went through the tutorial, rescued Mirror Spirit, didn't bother with the isolator badge for this one, got into AP, immediately went into DFB teaming. And then... I heard it. "You have pink roaches." Well, ain't that special. Since we all know the rando does pretty much all the same two colors, that can mean only one thing. I have a pink overall coloration. Which is fine, just not my first choice for a color. I bet it's bright hot pink too. Dunno, ain't seen it. ...until I accidentally zoomed out, and then I know not only was I pink, but I had a medieval helm on. So there's that. Dangit. I quickly zoomed back in, and that's literally all I know about my character's look. I'm thinkin' he's gonna easily win some costume contest, eh? 😛 --- So that'll be fun. As to the gameplay, it really does work. Because I used a range character, not a scrapper or such. For the most part, I just stay away, back up, whatever to keep them in the view. If they sneak up behind me, well, my days of playing Quake or L4D and such have paid off, I spin about and get 'em, as I back away from 'em. There is a caveat and that's the blind sides out of my view. Underneath, overhead, sides and back. Basically everywhere but up front. Found that out during the Hydra head bit of DFB. Couldn't see I was in danger and got pitched up in the air. Fun. I modified my strategy to not stare at the hideous Hydra and just moved forward constantly, shooting 'from the side' if you will as I circled the Hydra. Can't hurt me if I'm movin'. And that worked well, not even the Spawn hit me. But yeah, markers like that or strafing runs or such that you'd see zoomed out in 3rd person are not gonna be visible, so I'll have to keep that in mind. I'm sure it's gonna get miserable quick, but for now, level 9... It's actually not as terrible as I thought it'd be! ...so far. We shall see. Well, I will anyway. I'm sorta thinkin that he's gonna be miserable because I rolled an awfully thought up character makeup, and not the FP itself. So I'll obviously have to work him up to 50 anyway because masochist. Which we already confirmed earlier. 😄 There ya go. A new insanity, watch me go crazy and stuff.

As per my usual, thinking of weird things to do in CoH/V/GR... this showerthought occurred. Can one play first person only in this thing? What would that be like? Would it be good, or horrible? Torturous? Insane? But it's me. Guess what I'm doin', and that right soon. XD Thing is... a Scrapper/Tanker/Brute/Stalker would be impossibly 'busy' on the screen, what with having to be right up in people's faces to do anything, so.. probably not one of those? Teaming would be... interesting. I'm sure it'll be fine... >.> Thinking a ranged character might make sense for this. Still gonna have bad guys in mah face here and there, but that's just life in the first person lane. Probably need a crowd control, so maybe a dominator or controller, perhaps a defender or maybe one of the others... Just thinkin'. As usual. Thoughts/suggestions are always appreciated, even if it's to confirm my insanity. 🙂

You gotta Brawl and find out! 🙂

...for the MOST EXCELLENT Brawl enhancements I discovered today! My street sweeper Brawl/SR Brute houtex certainly had a TON of fun with it, being his only offense and all. 😄 Please don't turn it off... Pretty please? With sugar and whipped cream and a cherry on the top with a side of whatever else you want with that? 'Cause Brawl being this stupid awesome is just... well, awesome. I understand if it can't stay, though. For sure just wanted to praise and thank yas! 👍

A few times. Here and there. Less and less as BH got progressed. He was kind of hard to put down, to be honest, once he got the heal posse goin'. (Heal posse is what I called the 15-20 minions that would follow me around providing healing power due to... um... whatever the power that does that in Willpower set...) I'd start with a couple, then not defeat them and they'd follow... I'd target mostly LTs, Bosses, and the occasional GMs like Fake Nemesis when he came into the zone, stuff like that. Then later as he got to 50+ and incarnate, well, he'd just stand at a Rikti Pylon and they'd just go at it, him punching the pylon, the pylon trying to take him down... Fun lil' standoff. Sappers were to be taken out immediately, of course, can't have them shuttin' me down. Cimerorans were the only real problem other than that (and AVs, GMs, and such) because of their ability to put so much -DEF on him, but he did ok with them. Frequently I'd just leave him sitting in the middle of a posse, get up, do something, come back... and there he was, just being pummeled on but nothing happening. All the heal, all the endurance, ALL THE THINGS, including Psi defense. Brawl only lets you go full defense as you can get. As far as difficulty? Ain't no difficulty when you're street sweeping no missions. That said, somewhere about 20-25ish? I was intentionally going after +6 everything possible, and as big a group as I could get in. Multiple bosses and lieutenants, and I'd hit the LTs first then the bosses, which mitigated damages faster. Unless there was a sapper or such. It was kind of a power trip, to be honest. 🙂 BH died quite a few times for The Honoree. That mission was much difficult. But I kept at it. Eventually figured it out and got through it solo! Then there was whatever mission where you're going after Chimera. He was the most difficult thing I did in the game. This mission went on start to stop for an hour for BH. Chimera went from a +0 EB to a +3 EB, and let me tell you, he was *tough*. But the map was big enough I could escape, rethink, try something else, almost but not quite be defeated, retreat, keep trying... and then I figured it out. The first part took me 30 minutes of goin in, back out, resting up, go again to get it figured out, then it took another 30 minutes of constant technique, almost dyin', but at the end I won, and man. I was exhausted. Oh, and all without a heal posse either, which was really difficult. The technique involved running in, *smack*, running out so Chimera couldn't draw and hit me but once. Which BH could heal pretty quick. Over and over. Wait for a Hasten, Build Up and... uh, been a minute, something else though... to recharge, smack those, and when those were on I could go in an whittle him down until they ran out with impunity. Then back to the jumpin' around. Repeat until Chimera is toast. So yeah. That was my greatest ever accomplishment in the game. Soloed Chimera +3 EB with Brawl. Woot or something. Heh. Although you'll just have to believe me, no video or witnesses, and I ain't doin' that again. 😛 /Others did witness several Fake Nemesis GMs in Atlas that got Brawled. 🙂

So... I just found this after our lil Pinnbadges convo and invite. *waves howdy and hiccups* I had to come in here after I searched for 'brawling'. Bill, you madman. 🙂 I approve of the swipe, it wouldn't be a character of yours without claws. 😁 Congratulations, and gawrsh, I'm sorta embarrassed... 🥴 Just to flesh out the speculations, as this isn't my thread... BH was indeed street only, no teams, no missions, no contacts. He teamed exactly once during his rise to 50+ Incarnate but that was for a badge and his XP was turned off for the event. Thinkin' big monster of some sort. Once the badge was achieved, XP was turned back on, and I swear to all that all XP earned was all brawl. As to why? Man builds. Remember those? And of course that South Park episode in (the game what's name shall not be mentioned) happened,.. Well, a dude goin' about using brawl only and his willpower to defeat the bad guys? And doin' it street sweepin' style only? THAT's a man build, no guns or staff or such! So... yeah. Just figured I'd go and do that to see if it could even happen that it'd get to 50... Turn out, yes. Yes it can. 🙂 It also turns out it's very zen as well. Meditative. Calming. Just goin' about the day kind of thing. See the city, beat up bad guys, think about meadows... But like you say, Bill, don't do this kind of thing. It's an insanity. 🤪