Ultimo

So, when making my bases, I keep finding the same problem. There are no walls with doors in them. Specifically, we need a wall segment that fits across the standard 1 unit block, and goes from floor to ceiling, that has a normal, human sized door in it. We need one in a metallic finish, a wood wall finish... basically one for each general style of walls. For example, THIS wall section would work, IF it didn't have the broken hole in it, and it extended to the ceiling.

True. They might also use it as an alternative to the Hide animation. Right now, the character kind of clenches up like he's having bathroom issues. A smoke bomb to use the Hide power might be more appropriate for that too.

So, tonight I was playing my Stalker, Martial Arts/Ninjitsu (based on Batman). As I was playing, I noticed something I'd forgotten. He doesn't have Placate. I gave him Smoke Flash instead. The reason I dropped Placate is because of the animation, which is a Star Wars mind trick wave of the hand. It just feels out of character for the Ninjitsu set. My suggestion is to alter the animation for this to be some kind of smoke bomb, or sand in the eyes or something more in keeping with the more "natural" power set. It could be included as an alternative, so people who like the current animation can still have it.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Ya, I tried to choose moves that were at least close to the animation times. I mean, .83 to 1.07 is only around 2 tenths of a second. It might mean speeding up or slowing down the martial animations, but I can't imagine that would be too difficult.

Tonight I was playing a new character, he's a Mastermind with Ninjas, a set I've never played before. One thing I noticed was that he has no martial arts of his own. He has his bow, but the only melee attacks he can get are in the Fighting Pool (and Air Superiority), and they just don't LOOK right. So, I'm suggesting making some alternate animations for the fighting pool, lifted from the Martial Arts power set. My suggestions below are chosen for animation timing and for the "cool" factor of the moves. Boxing = Storm Kick Kick = Cobra Strike Cross Punch = Dragon's Tail Note, this is only a cosmetic thing, the effects of the powers would not change. I think this would be a welcome change, I can think of a few characters who might benefit from this.

If there is a purpose to the invasions, it's not being implemented very well, because the enemy never does anything to achieve their purpose... and never actually DOES achieve it. As for the latter point, it would only make the zone unplayable if it's implemented poorly. Suppose the zone in question is King's Row. Right now, you have groups of Clockwork, Vazhilok, etc. all standing around doing essentially nothing. My suggestion above is simply to replace those NPCs with Rikti, at a zone appropriate level (or non-level, as with the beaming in ones). You could have ships flying around, but they wouldn't be attacking anything, they'd be largely cosmetic (though, they COULD be attacked). Meanwhile, quest givers might be moved to "safe" spots, where the Rikti wouldn't find them, or some such. Players could still do their missions normally, but they might have to deal with Rikti mobs instead of the usual ones. The main hero of the zone (Blue Shield in King's Row) would have a set of special quest objectives open to everyone in the zone. It might include instanced missions, or zone missions (eg. defeat 1000 Rikti, which EVERYONE in the zone could contribute to, or take down the patrol ship (again, it would likely need everyone to participate). Eventually, one of these kinds of objectives might be completed, and the zone would reset. That at least puts some semblance of purpose in the event. Right now, if everyone ignores it, nothing happens. The Rikti don't do ANYTHING. But, this is just one quick idea off the cuff. I'm sure something better could be devised.

Well... the zombies could have a purpose, if there was someone summoning them. The Rikti are the ones that bug me the most. If they're weakening Earth's defenses, WHY are they doing it? They must have some other purpose that the "invasion" is in service of. For my part, I'd love to see the invasion have a result, if the heroes can't mount a sufficient defense. Perhaps it could be as simple as making the relevant zone(s) Rikti controlled, with all resident spawns of enemies being replaced by Rikti... heroes and contacts might also be replaced by Rikti, or might give different missions, specific to repel the Rikti garrison. There are other possibilities, I'm sure. Nemesis too, should have a purpose.

The only thing with the various "invasions" that I don't like, is that the various enemies aren't invading for any reason. They're just there to get beat up, then they go away. People say, Oh, they're here to beat up the heroes... but WHY? If they go into a zone and aren't opposed... what would they do then? Send troops to occupy the zone? Take out the local authorities? What? They wouldn't just throw troops into a battle without some kind of objective. They want to defeat the local heroes? Ok, to what END? I'd say the same for the snowmen (or zombies, or what have you). Give them a PURPOSE that they might actually achieve, and I'm all for it. Oh, and make them possible for everyone to fight. I thought I'd try helping out against Winter Lord in Atlas, and my Tanker character took half his health in one hit, from one of the snowmen. Not even the Winter Lord. There was just no way for him to get involved because as soon as he got hit even once, he had to run away (which with the host of slowing effects layered on him was nearly impossible to do).

On this subject, I've always thought it would be neat if the Mastermind had the option of summoning existing NPC groups, like the Skulls or Council, or what have you.

For tier 7, how about an oil slick? Kind of like the ice power that knocks foes down...?

I have a character that uses it, and the animations take too long (a lot of waving and swinging of arms). As I say, he's a hit and run kind of character, kind of a speedster, so the slow animations don't work. As I say, I'm more or less settled on either Martial Arts of Street Justice, I just can't quite decide which. I'm LEANING toward Street Justice. The animations seem quicker, the attacks hit harder, and he gets a couple of AOEs while Martial Arts only gets one. On the other hand, Martial Arts is a little more kicky, which suits a character who flies, because his feet would be closer to the enemy when he's above them. More, it does get a Defense bonus from Storm Kick. However, the attacks seem to be a bit slower, and do less damage. So, I'm a bit torn.

Honestly, I solo most of the time, if I actually had to do any real tanking, he'd likely stay in melee range. I'm speaking conceptually when I say he'd stay at range (though, if it's an outdoor map, I might use a hit and run strategy, flying by with an attack (slotted for taunt), then getting out of reach, using a ranged taunt, then doing another move by, and so on). I did look at claws, but there wasn't a version of the claws themselves that I liked, so I decided to pass on the set. I tried Savage Melee too, but the animations don't work well with the wings.

So, many years ago, I made my own comics. One of the characters was called the Condore (not sure why I spelled it with the e on the end...), and I'm trying to recreate him for the game. His combat style was similar to the Angel, since he's based on him. Winged, he would fly by, get the attention of the enemy, then avoid their attacks from a distance while his teammates took them out. To me, that's a TANKER. I've created him with Super Reflexes (ie. avoiding attacks), but I'm having trouble deciding on an offensive set. I've kind of narrowed it down to Street Justice or Martial Arts, but I can't quite decide which to use, and I thought I'd seek opinions here (as I often do). Which is better for a flying character? The animations can look wierd on Martial Arts, but Street Justice also has some wierd animations with the wings and everything... Does one synergize with the Super Reflexes better than the other? What advantages are there between them? Any thoughts are welcome.

I looked into that, but couldn't find any actual NAME for the Thunderbird. I'll consider these, there are some cool choices there.

Possibly. As I think of it, there might be a hyphen.

Many of my characters use Brawl, usually because they have a weapon in their other hand (eg. Shield, Mace, Sword, etc.) and Brawl doesn't put it away to attack.

Actually, I have a character named Storm Eagle on Excelsior. I'd be willing to give it up for you, but I'd need to figure out a new name for the character. The name he really SHOULD have is Thunderbird, named for the native American mythological bird, but of course, I can't get that name. If you have an alternative suggestion, let me know, and I'll free up Storm Eagle for you.

Ya, that's why I'm making this suggestion. If it's going to drop enemy AVs to make them EBs, etc., then it should also drop ALLIED AVs so they're EBs as well. Having groups of one more serious type hasn't had them appear as anything lower than they would appear on their own. For example, I have a group of enemies for a WW2 story in which they're all created as EBs. Whether they appear alone or as a patrol (for example), they appear as Bosses (since I have AVs and EBs turned off in my difficulty settings). But again, that's my custom characters. I haven't tried it with the game's own groups (I'm not sure there are any groups that are all AVs or EBs... perhaps the Freedom Phalanx? I'll have to check that).

Hm. In that case, what is going on with my custom characters? As I said, they're all created as Elite Bosses, but they're appearing in missions as Bosses... unless they're cast as allies, in which case they appear as Elite Bosses.

But wait... Last night I played my WW2 story on the AE, and the enemy bosses (all custom characters) appeared as Bosses, even though I had created them as Elite Bosses... meanwhile the allied custom characters all appeared as Elite Bosses...

So there's a whole separate version of the AV? I thought it just scaled down their abilities. That would certainly explain why all my custom characters don't scale. In that case, perhaps the best suggestion is to just scale the AVs and EBs back? I don't relish the idea of making duplicates of all the characters I've made for AE... and they wouldn't appear in the missions properly in any case.

So, I've had issues in the past trying to make missions with enemies that are balanced, so I often add allies to missions to help the players if they're being overwhelmed. However, a problem has emerged, and I have a suggestion to correct it. If I put an enemy in a mission of EB or AV rank, the game will 'downsize' them by one rank, depending on the player's difficulty settings (ie. if the player has so chosen, AVs would appear as AVs, but otherwise they would appear as EBs). The problem is that the same does not happen with ALLIES. So, suppose I make a mission with a custom AV, and I add Citadel to the mission. The AV will spawn as an EB, but Citadel would remain an AV, meaning he'd stomp the supposed AV boss villain with no difficulty (trivializing the presence of the hero). My suggestion is simply that the coding that reduces the power of AVs and EBs be applied to both Enemies and Allies.

What kills me is, one of the names is even spelled incorrectly. Condore was a character from my youth, when I made comics, but clearly didn't yet know how to spell. The one that continues to sting is the Canadian Shield, which was my main, more or less, back on the live servers.

Well, they've implemented the naming policy, 8 minutes ago now... and sadly NONE of the names I hoped to get are available... alas.