[Veteran Levels]

14 hours ago, SeraphimKensai said:

It likely won't happen because vet levels have gone up to 4 digits on some people's mains and there's no way you'd fit 4 digits in the spot in the main UI.

I believe what the OP is referring to is the message that pops up in the chat box. Currently, whenever you get a vet level, it always says:
"Your combat improves to level 50! See a trainer to further your abilities."

I dunno if that would be possible to display veteran levels, but it'd be nice. So upvote from me. Would be a nice QoL feature.

[What missions do you autocomplete?]

On 5/11/2021 at 6:27 PM, MrAxe said:

 

No way I'm ever skipping it. Its the only real form of mission variety that was added after I first played the game.

 

If the mission were updated so that the time between spawns wasn't so long, it'd probably be fun. As it stands now, though, they spawn too far away and so infrequently that more than half of your mission time is spent standing there doing nothing.

But wait, "fight other mobs in-between spawns" I hear you say! Well, that really depends on the character I'm playing on. Other stupid thing is the spawns don't announce their presence, or really make any indication at all that they've spawned, so running around fighting the other mobs, if you're not on a high damage character, risks them getting in the door and failing.

 

That's just my thought process on it. If you like it, go nuts. That's why the auto-complete function exists. If you like it, you can play it. If you don't? Skip!

[What missions do you autocomplete?]

There's only a small handful of missions that I label as "must skip." Most of the time, I only auto-complete missions when they are bugged, like having a mob get stuck in the wall. My list is as follows:

Stop 30 Fir Bolg entering door - Skipper LeGrange

Everyone skips this one, and for good reason. It's one of the most boring missions in the game. I usually don't mind tedium with fighting a bunch of bad guys, but the time between each wave spawn is so damn long and you end up sitting in this mission for close to twenty minutes.

Stop takeover of Salamanca - Buck Salinger

Another one everybody skips for the same reason as the last. You literally stand there for fifteen minutes, waiting for spawns to come, and there's no way to speed up the clock. I don't usually mind tedium in this game, but when I'm forced to stand in one spot and wait patiently for infrequent spawns to show up, I get rather annoyed.

 

Kidnap Workmen - Marshal Brass

I hate this map. I dislike outdoor maps in general, but I hate this one in particular, because enemies can spawn everywhere, not just on the ground. On the ground, on the rooftops, on the boxes, behind the boxes, outside the walls, on the walkways... and you have to try and find three hostages and then lead them back in order to finish. Trying to find these hostages is a nightmare, because as mentioned before, they can spawn literally anywhere, and you have to scour all three dimensions of this map in order to do it.

 

Get Wormy out of warehouse - Lorenz Ansaldo

I consider this mission bugged, because Wormy has a unique walking animation that causes him to stop walking and pause every few steps, and he will not start walking again until a couple of seconds pass. Also you're being ambushed by Longbow the entire time. So, you've got a hostage who has to stop to take a breather every few feet, he follows you very slowly, if you get too far he stops and waits for you to go get him again, and you're being harassed by enemies the entire time. Fuck you, Wormy, I'm leaving you to get arrested by Longbow.

 

There's probably a few more like that, but those are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head. I'll probably post more when I am reminded of them. 😛

 

[Post your best costume designs here!]

I want to preface this by saying I'm not nearly as good at design as some folks in here. I'm very "plain Jane" with a lot of costumes, sticking to similar costume "sets" and color schemes, but I went a bit farther this time and I'm really happy with how it came out.

Meet Low Point, my Ice/Icy Dominator. I'm particularly happy with this one because I didn't stick to any one set like I usually do, and found a bunch of good pieces that I mixed and matched into a good look for him. He's an unstable, nihilistic youth who developed super powers from a mutation, and is out to make the world just as cold and frozen as his heart is.

[Yomo's Whizbang Potpourri Extravaganza of a Giveaway!]

800,000,000. That's my guess. 😛

[How many Respecs do you use to get the build just right?]

My Night Widow I had to respec at least 7 times to make it work, but I finally got it right now.

Every other character? Maybe once, if even. Truthfully I don't even plan out my builds, I just figure it out as I go along, and that one respec is usually in the later game when I realize which powers work and which don't. Most of the time, as I'm leveling up, I get a feel for what my character is good at, what they're not good at, and make my power/slot choices based on that.

I'm no power-gamer by any stretch of the imagination, so admittedly, it doesn't take much to make me happy. I'm not out to min/max my characters, I'm out to have fun and do silly stuff.

[Slot Machine's Random Challenge - 2021]

I didn't even read the part about prizes, so I have no idea if I'm being tagged for that reason or not! I just did this for fun, and it did very much turn out fun. If you need my global, it's @Gibs.

 

Pacifist Unit is currently sitting at level 37, just got him into his Ancillary Powers. Went with Psionic Mastery for the extra stacking of confusion, and because it fits with his theme of "non-violent" heroism.

Cheers for the game, Troo! Here's Pacifist Unit with the imaginary squad. 😉

 

 

[Circle of Thorns Bosses]

15 minutes ago, KC4800 said:

Not exactly on topic, but I wish there was a badge for killing Super Stunners.

There is.

[Post your best costume designs here!]

On 4/16/2021 at 10:38 PM, First Player said:

 

Energy/Sonic blaster. The concept is he found a techno-organic alien weapon underground that forcibly grafted itself to his arm and he's unable to remove it.

 

 

I'm really loving the creativity I'm seeing from people with the asymmetrical costume options. Very well done!

 

Anyways, while I'm here, I'll showcase my newest Peacebringer, and a costume I'm personally very proud of. Blinding Radiance, the newest Kheldian to hit Excelsior.

[SG Questions...]

I can't answer which ones are "most popular" or not. As a fellow Excelsior player I can tell you Cosmic Council is seen a lot, mostly doing costume contests and their weekly "Really Hard Way" challenge runs on Saturday nights.

As for the purpose of SG's, I can say they aren't a necessity like they are in other games, nor are they as needed as they were on live. However, there are still uses, and there are still some "serious" supergroups that you can join. For example, my supergroup does "The Bus of Random Content" every week or so, where we roll the dice, pick a Task Force at complete random, and try to complete it in the fastest time. SG's with active members can also take advantage of group storage for salvage, enhancements, and the like.

 

At the end it really comes down to personal preference, and finding a supergroup that meshes with what you want. There's still plenty of supergroups for all kinds of things like Greycat mentioned: roleplaying, task forces, trials, costume contests, etc... They aren't necessary to enjoy the game, but they can still be very fun and handy depending on what you're looking for. Ask around the Excelsior forums, tell them what you're looking for, and see what turns up!

[Hero's Vs Villains]

2 hours ago, Zhym said:

(I mean, Scirocco in particular just won't stop whining about it)

Okay, so maybe I'm slightly sadistic, but Scirocco just cracks me up. You beat him and he's just... so hopelessly, utterly defeated in all of his dialogue from then on. It's honestly some of the funniest stuff.

"You do your work well, as always. I am certain that Vortigur will surrender his secrets in time. No one can resist. Why bother? All is meaningless, in the end."

Like, man. You just broke him. It's that kind of writing that makes me love redside over blueside. Blueside writing is just... "yay! You saved the day again! You're the bestest hero ever!"

[Hero's Vs Villains]

I honestly feel like the problem can be easily remedied by just forming teams of your own. Redside teams might take a little longer to fill up with seven other players, but there are a lot of players out there who do have villain characters. Once they see you posting your ad for a redside team, just give it a little more time, you'll be running with an 8-man group soon enough. A lot of people have villains they don't play because there aren't many teams. They see you in there advertising for a group? Some of them might say "Whoa, a redside group? Let me go grab my villain!"

 

"If you build it, they will come."

[Hero's Vs Villains]

There was also a reason that came up frequently in the thread linked earlier, the discussion for how to increase population redside. That reason was the issue of motive.

 

It basically boils down to this: while every hero has their own unique backstory and history, as well a reasons for being a hero, a hero's motive is mainly reactive. A hero reacts to situations that come up. It doesn't matter if the Council is raiding some lab, if the Devouring Earth are trashing some office, or the Circle of Thorns have kidnapped somebody, the hero is going to have a reason to go to all of those areas and stop it, because the hero's motive is to help people and save the day, no matter the circumstances.

For villains, it's quite different. It's a lot harder to write content for villains because, while they share the same intricacies and backstories of heroes, a villains motives are primarily proactive. The villain doesn't react to situations; the villain creates situations of their own, and a each villain's motive differs drastically. Let's say I get a mission redside: some contact wants me to go beat up a Council boss. What if I don't want to? What if my villain doesn't have beef with the Council? Maybe my villain is after chaos and destruction rather than money and infamy? It becomes much more difficult to write content for villains this way, since you have to take into account every player's own unique motives for being a villain.

For me, personally, this isn't a problem. I can usually work around these things and invent a reason for my character to do it, even if it doesn't "fit" with their motivations, but for other players it's not so simple. Some players get really invested in their characters, and it becomes jarring to suddenly have a contact give you a mission that your villain would never have a reason to do. For heroes this issue never really comes up, because like I mentioned before, no matter what the situation is, the hero's motivation is always to save the day and protect the innocent. For villains, they each have their own reasons. Some villains want money, some want power, some want carnage and destruction, and some have a personal vendetta against society. Their motives are all different, and thus their actions differ as well, and it becomes more difficult to properly get into character for a villain when working within the confines of a video game.

[Hero's Vs Villains]

13 minutes ago, Herotu said:

But the zones are all extremely similar to one another. There's no way you can refer to them as "Unique". 

I don't know about enemy variety, but because the zones are so generic I don't really notice much variety in the dockworkers or builders or goldbrickers attacking me.

Internally, the offices are much MUCH more interesting (and yes I know it's just a skin-job) than the vanilla game had, but later missions blue-side had some good variety in them, too.

Skyway City, Kings Row, Steel Canyon, Talos Island, Brickstown, Galaxy City, and Atlas Park are, at least to me, just generic "cities with skyscrapers." The only visually distinct zones I can think of blueside are Independence Port and Founders Falls, and IP has the unique dishonor of being so goddamn huge I never, ever want to go there. If I'm playing redside, and I'm in any of those zones, I hardly ever have to look at a map because the zones are visually distinct and unique. Blueside I never remember where anything is because everywhere I look it's just more "generic skyscrapers."

You can have your opinion. If you like blueside, go for it. I'm not saying people who like blueside are better or worse. I'm stating my reason for preferring redside.

[Hero's Vs Villains]

I've always been an avid defender of redside, and I'm usually on there myself trying to get teams started. Many of the reasons stated here are, unfortunately, accurate, but I believe the biggest part of it is the simple human nature of conformity.

 

"Everyone else plays heroes, so I'll play heroes too."

 

I, personally, love redside far more than blueside. The content is written better, the missions aren't nearly as annoying, the zones are cool and unique, and the enemies are more varied. But some people just prefer heroside and feeling like a "good" character more, which means hero population is usually higher. Because of that, the majority of the people who don't have a preference for one or the other gravitate to the place with more people.

[Soldiers of Arachnos! A series of replacement arcs designed for VEATs, by Gibs! (Arc details inside!)]

So, I made a thread about this already, but it was a little while ago, and rather than going back and editing the original thread and necro-posting, I've decided to make one single, uniform thread for all entries into this little project of mine. So without further ado, here we go!

*ahem*

So, one of the common complaints heard about the Villain Epic Archetypes, the Soldiers of Arachnos, is that their special story arcs kind of suck. And honestly, I agree with them. It is pretty sub-standard writing, and a really boring, forced way to try and explain why everyone is calling you a "Destined One."

With that in mind, I had an idea, and I'm sure others have had it before. Why not use the Mission Architect to create a new, better story for Arachnos Soldiers to play? So that's what I'm doing. There are two arcs so far, and I plan to add more as I go along. I am always open to having feedback, and if you've got some ideas of your own, I'd love to hear them!

The story so far...

[Arc ID: 31187] Soldiers of Arachnos - Part One: The Arachnos Insider.

After being sent on a suicide mission and left for dead, Alan Desslock has been looking for an agent to be his inside operative, and you're just the candidate.

Designed for Arachnos Soldiers, level range of 1-10. No special bosses, one custom ally, four missions total.

 

[Arc ID: 39268] Soldiers of Arachnos - Part Two: Manifest Destiny.

After your mission rooting out an Arachnos mole, Desslock is calling in the favor you owe him, and the implications might be more grave than you thought.

Level range 10-15. One boss and one elite boss with custom powers, scaled appropriately for the level range. Four missions total.
 

More to come soon! Stay tuned!

 

As stated before, any and all feedback is welcome and appreciated. I will be editing this thread in the future for any further additions based on feedback and critiques. I'd love to know what you guys think! 

 

Here are the known issues with the arcs that I've found. These are problems that I've found in testing that I do not know how to fix. If anybody has any advice or solutions, please let me know! This section is here so players know that I'm aware of them. It will be updated as well if any new unintended issues arise. 

 

KNOWN ISSUES: 

1. Part two, mission 3: ally to rescue starts in the "held hostage" animation, despite not actually being a hostage. 
2. Part one, mission 1: Ally sometimes spawns in the middle of mobs, doing nothing until the player finds them. Associated clue for finding them is given at mission start before finding them. 
3. Part two, mission 2: hostage and captors fire all dialogue at the beginning of the mission, despite being on the second floor. 
4. Part two, mission 4: the unique "snake infested Arachnos" base set fails to load the snake-skin props normally found in the map until the final room, causing it to look like a regular Arachnos set.
5. Part two, mission 3: allied hero fights the PPD despite being a hero. 

 

[Slot Machine's Random Challenge - 2021]

So, we're supposed to update at level 30, right? So, here's an update!

 

Pacifist Unit, the level 31 Illusion/Sonic Controller.

My god why haven't I tried illusion sooner? I don't think I even touched the Controller AT for a while. Back on live I only had one controller at 50, my first-ever character, a Mind/Empathy 'troller, and he was fun. Now, with my first controller in... who knows how long, I'm starting to remember the fun I had with my Mind Controller back on live.

Gave him two new costumes, because I still like to pretend this is live and only give myself costumes at 20, 30, etc...

 

Screenshots:

Spoiler

 

Sonic Resonance is also pretty fun to play. It became a lot more fun once I realized you can cast Disruption Field on your illusionist decoys. It kind of sucks only having two whole entire attacks that deal damage, but plentiful use of Deceive is pretty easy to solve that problem. Of course, that's only when I'm soloing, and I've been running teams with him for the entirety of his career. So far, I'm having a lot of fun!

[Report Typos Here!]

Laura Brunetti, hero contact in Independence Port.

 

"They have been a plague on this for many, many years." On this what? This city? This planet? This dimension?! Tell me, woman!

"...date back to it's founding..." Should be "its," not "it's."

[Slot Machine's Random Challenge - 2021]

I gave this a whirl. I only rolled for one character, not three.

Roll #1: 25 - Controller
Roll #2: 77 - Illusion Control
Roll #3: 63 - Sonic Resonance

Thought of it for a bit, went with it. So far, I'm having fun with it. Somehow I've never gotten around to trying out Illusion Control, and I'm liking it so far.

Meet the Pacifist Unit

 

Since virtually none of his abilities do any direct physical harm to people, I came up with idea of a "pacifist" type of hero. The working backstory I gave him is this: facing disaster after disaster in public relations, Crey decided to go for a strictly non-lethal form of self defense using illusions and sound waves to pacify enemies. Thus, they came up with the "Pacifist Unit." Of course, Crey is still evil, and they had evil plans for this "non-violent" suit of armor, so a researcher with a conscience stole the suit and now goes around doing hero work.

Got him to level 18 so far, and I'm enjoying it quite a bit. I'll see what it's like at 30 and update here. Thanks for the cool idea!

[Custom Dual Pistols]

There's a handful of sets that give you the illusion of custom colors, but without them actually doing anything. Dual Pistols is one of them, as well as a large amount of other "weapon" based powersets.

Though I did notice that, for tankers at least, customizing the colors on weapon sets will affect your Gauntlet inherent, and change the colors of the taunt effect that appears when attacking enemies. If other AT's have similar kinds of effects, I could see the colors applying to those as well, but nothing comes to mind at the moment.

[Battle Ax?]

I'll give the same answer I give to every question about powerset performance. There are no bad sets. There are only good sets and great sets.

Battle Axe is one of the good but not great sets. As others have noted, it's not the best, not by a long shot, but keep in mind that's coming from a perspective of min-maxing, which is not necessary in this game to be effective. Sure, you won't be putting out as much damage as other tanks, but that doesn't mean it's bad or worthless.

My best suggestion would be to roll one yourself and see how it fits for you. 

[The Weird Animations]

Ah, that crouch/walk thing enemies do. I call that "The CoH Shuffle." It's the latest dance craze in Pocket D!

In all seriousness, the two biggest things that bothered me way back in the day were the animations for "Punch" and "Haymaker" from Super Strength. I don't know what world you're living in where a Haymaker looks like that, because it doesn't look like any fighting move I've ever seen. Punch isn't even a punch. It looks like someone angrily slamming the counter because the bartender got their drink wrong. The new animations are better, but still wonky and weird, and it's the only reason I've avoided Super Strength as a set to this day.

 

[I'm coming home]

I found out about homecoming the same way, except I had a dream about CoH and I decided to look it up online for nostalgia, only to find these servers existed. 

 

Best dream I ever had, honestly. XD

[My questions about servers and a million other things as a returning enthusiast!]

17 minutes ago, Aeroprism said:

Using this awesome thread again for another quick question:  Are there unlockable costume pieces? I saw someone pass by yesterday and thought "this is EXACTLY" what I need for my Beast MM character so I went to the trainer, hit the Customize Appearance thing and I've looked and looked, never found it.

 

This is keeping me awake at night.

There were on live, but Homecoming removed the unlock requirements for all costume pieces, so you have access to virtually everything from the get-go.

I say virtually everything, because the only thing you actually can't use is the Crab Spider backpack, unless of course you are an Arachnos Soldier who went with the Crab Spider path.

[It doesn't "pay" to play a support character]

So, a couple things to point out for the OP.

 

On 9/7/2020 at 6:54 AM, Diantane said:

New Defenders that are playing their character like a weak blaster and not concentrating on their character's primary skill set. Tanks also do the same. Lots of attacks but can't "tank" very well.

 

So I created a few "dedicated" characters. Like a tank that is built for defense only. One that can take the punishment of an alpha strike. Only had the weak, unslotted, unused first attack and the strong and slotted taunt skill. Also had tough, weave, combat jumping (7 defense toggles in all). This one was a Willpower tank.

 

Also when I play defenders, It is focused on the primary skills (not the weak blaster). He is complete support to the team.

 

Here's the problem. The way the mechanics of the game works (that I have noticed), is that you get little to no influence or loot unless you are causing DAMAGE! After playing my tank and running a team for seven hours straight, I end up with 60,000 influence and 3 TO's. How could I possibly enhance my character with this pitiful return? Most of my slots are empty and the rest have level 15 IO's (this at security level 26). This isn't going to work. My dedicated tank that everyone loved...... has failed. He won't be able to perform as he once did. To protect the team from almost all incoming damage.

 

Now to help fix this problem I am starting to train offensive skills (the higher tier ones), but it will be a long road ahead because I can't enhance them very well. My skills won't have the correct level IO's until 35 or 40 should i decide to play him at all. It might be better to make a DPS character and die a thousand times due to the "holes" in the group.

First thing, this is all completely false. Defenders using their attacks are not "weak blasters." In fact, the argument can be made that they're more beneficial than blaster attacks, since Defenders will get more use out of a power's secondary effects. The -ToHit debuffs from Dark Blast, for example, will be significantly more powerful on a Defender than a Blaster because of Defender modifiers. As a Defender, the primary function of your attacks is not to cause damage, but to debuff enemies and make them easier for your team to handle, thus filling the role of support rather well.

With Tankers, there's a similar secondary use to their powers that's not directly stated, and that is the inherent taunt that comes with every Tanker attack. The Tanker's inherent ability of Gauntlet casts a short AoE taunt effect on critters within range with every attack they use. A Tanker running in fists flying will hold aggro significantly better than a Tanker just using Taunt, because every single one of their attacks is also taunting enemies.

 

Finally, INF earned from defeated enemies is not at all based on damage dealt. This is 100% false, otherwise door-sitting and farming wouldn't exist. If you are on a team, any defeat made by any member of your team will evenly distribute all EXP and INF to every player on the team. Even if that Blaster one-shot a minion all by themselves, everyone on the team gets credit for the defeat. There is no participation threshold for INF or EXP. All EXP, INF, and drops are evenly calculated for every member of the team. Drops are the only instance where there will be variation, but once again, drops are based on random rolls and not on participation. So for example, if a recipe has a 10% chance to drop from an enemy, and the Stalker on the team defeats the enemy in one hit, every member of the team will roll that 10% chance for the recipe, and it may even be awarded to more than one player.

All of this was designed to prevent kill-stealing, last-hitting, participation thresholds, and certain AT's being easier or harder to level on purpose. It's all intentionally designed this way to make the game fun for everyone, and to prevent arguments over loot, exp, inf, and what have you.

On 9/7/2020 at 8:32 AM, Diantane said:

If a tank is not concentrating on his job, part or all of the team could wipe. You name me any mmo where a tank can go off and kill stuff like a DPS without wiping the team.

 

LOTRO, WOW, etc. A tank is a tank - period! (unless just solo leveling)

 

The tank must keep other defenseless characters safe (blasters, PB, MM, defenders, controllers, etc. Plus melee that put most into their DPS (no defense)).

As others have stated, City of Heroes is not like any other MMO you've ever played. It's for that reason this game has such a dedicated fanbase, because there really isn't any other game like it on the market. And as stated previously, Tankers hold aggro better when attacking, and in some instances can even be very good DPS in their own right. My Bio/Claws Tanker is a DPS monster, and that's without sacrificing any of his survivability. 

 

With this game, you eventually run into a point where you cannot take any other powers except for your attacks, and by the mid 30s, you'll have so many enhancement slots you won't know where to put them. I always pick and slot my attacks as a Tanker, and it doesn't harm my survivability in any meaningful way. In City of Heroes, a Tanker that is not using their attacks to generate aggro is not tanking as effectively as they could. Run in there and punch things! Make the bad guys mad! You're a TANK, and tanks are just as capable at offense as they are at defense.

On 9/7/2020 at 8:34 AM, Diantane said:

Maybe the developers nerfed being able to collect loot at the door and that hit non-damaging characters as well.

 

If I get an equal share of the loot, then why did I only get 60k inf and 3 TO's after 7 hours of doing tons of missions with a group of 5-8 players? If they got the same, then all of those characters will go broke and stop playing the game because their character can't perform correctly.

 

I've got about 30 characters with a maximum level of 26. Most of them have less than 3,000 influence. The highest has about 50,000. The game just doesn't give rewards very well anymore.

And this is one point where I will actually agree with you to an extent. If your gaining INF solely from defeats, then yes, you're going to have a bad time. This is why a lot of players in this thread are giving guides to using the Auction House. One of my only complaints with this game is that INF from defeats is so negligible in the early game that you're pretty much forced to use the market.

 

But, despite that, the market isn't incredibly difficult or complex to learn, and you don't have to be a super-savvy marketeer to make decent cash off of it. On all of my characters, in the early game, I craft and sell all recipes and IOs that I can't use and sell them on the market. You'd be surprised at just how much INF you can make by just selling your drops at low price on the markets. My Fire/Fire Blaster on redside already has like 30 million INF in her account at level 25, and that's all from just selling drops. I'm not converting or using merits or buying things to flip them, I'm just playing the game and crafting the recipes I find to sell on the market. Even just a single piece of rare salvage sells for around 450K on the market, and I use that money to fund all of my enhancements and slotting.

 

Once you get higher in level, the INF you get from defeats increases significantly, but in the early game, I will concede that INF generation is pathetic outside of selling drops. Luckily, selling drops is super easy and trivial, and you can make yourself a multi-millionaire in INF from just selling drops on the market. The guides posted here are super helpful, and I would recommend reading them to get a better understanding of how stuff works.