Shenanigunner

Undo the nipple nerf. /thatisall.

It there's anything dumber than a Kheldian dwarf running emotes, I'm not sure what it is. The Michael Jackson dance is especially hilarious. Or just putting the big clanky thing in "Walk" mode. It's like a little kid determined to stomp on every step.

So here's my packaged solution for anyone who finds a Kheldian too difficult to manage/master at the UI level. 1. Visit Null the Gull, pull your TP power/s out of the pop-up tray, and have him disable it. 2. Create the following macros: /macro_image BlackKnights_Fade "Human Form" "powexectoggleoff Dark Nova$$powexectoggleoff Black Dwarf$$goto_tray 1" /macro_image BlackKnights_GrantCover "Nova Form" "powexectoggleon Black Dwarf$$goto_tray 9" /macro_image BlackKnights_Resistance "Dwarf Form" "powexectoggleon Black Dwarf$$goto_tray 8" 3. Arrange your trays as follows, with any small variations you like. I always swap out Athletic Run for Sprint, you may prefer something else. I always keep Rest in Tray 1/Slot 10, for keybind reasons. Again, your option. I use a pair of binds to drive TP powers, use whatever works for you. My three shield powers are on movement-auto-fire. HOOMAN SQUID DWARF And, I maintain small separate trays for all the added TP powers, and the BadgeDRADIS icons. Use or ignore, as you prefer. You can now switch forms and roll the primary tray with one macro click among those three in the top tray. I also bind those commands to my extra mouse buttons, something that works for me: CTRL+BUTTON4 "powexectoggleon Dark Nova$$goto_tray 9" ALT+BUTTON4 "powexectoggleon Black Dwarf$$goto_tray 8" CTRL+BUTTON5 "powexectoggleoff Dark Nova$$powexectoggleoff Black Dwarf$$goto_tray 1" ...adapt as you like. I can throw in a bunch of standard support binds I use for TP, Rest etc. but that's the basic — and to me, very simple and easy to manage — Kheld control system. Here's my doubled-up quick-TP bind, which works on the Q key but does not work on double-click, very annoying: Q "powexeclocation cursor Shadow Step$$powexeclocation cursor Black Dwarf Step" LeftDoubleClick "powexecname Shadow Step" CTRL+LeftDoubleClick "powexecname Black Dwarf Step" ALT+LeftDoubleClick "powexecname Shadow Recall" Oh, and substitute powers for PBs, of course. Missing here, I should note, are five or six of my "standard" binds found on most of my alts... because K's just don't need them. 🙂 So if anything, I find the UI for Khelds a little simpler than most...

Up your pedantic... I mean, I up your pedanticism, then: Human/base form has 6 combat powers (through 20), 2 TP powers, 3 shield powers. Squids have 5 combat powers, plus the form power. Dwarfs have 5 combat powers, plus taunt, plus TP, plus the form power. Since the only powers that need "careful" management are the primary-tray combat ones, none of these should be overwhelming to manage or master, even as the human stacks up powers the way pretty much all ATs do. The form, TP and shield powers can easily go on secondary trays, macros, binds, whatever. The ONLY complex thing about Kheldians is essentially managing three alts in one. And even as someone who gets all bind-y on things that don't really need it, I have fewer keybinds on my Kheld than any other build. So again, while acknowledging that the 3-in-1 makes the AT a challenge to play effectively, it's not because of some mess of keybinds and macros and their management. Unless — and I figured this out as I went — the solution being attempted is stacking powers on a single primary-tray macro. Using a "T1" to fire all three Tier-1 powers, "T2" to fire all three Tier-2 powers, "T3" to make a bad sequel... wait, wrong thread. And you simply don't have to do that or have to "manage" all that complexity to play a Kheld. Anyone who's gotten overwhelmed by trying to over-customize the UI simply went the wrong way on this. Three simple macros to rotate form and primary tray, and you're done. You can even pre-write/pre-load it so it's ready to go before you get your alternate forms. Down the road tweaking and management: none. Detailed post on the technique follows. I know it's not all original, but it might be worth adding my little tweaks to the knowledge pool.

Just a snapshot the breeder got while lying on the grass with the puppies. One of my favorites.

I'm baffled at these kinds of claims. Each form of a Kheldian has up to about eight powers, nearly all attacks, which fit nicely in the primary power tray and can be actuated with the muscle-memory 1-0 keys. Why do players think complex binds and macros and so forth are needed and make the AT so overwhelming to play?

It's a bit complex, but the basic method is to use a combination bind on W: W "+forward$$powexectoggleon Instant Regeneration$$bindloadfilesilent wjack-B2.txt" So when you hit W, you move forward as normal (and no, there's no delay or glitching), a power is toggled on, and a rolling bind file is loaded. The rolling file in this case contains: W "+forward$$powexectoggleon Integration$$bindloadfilesilent wjack-B1.txt" So W is now loaded with a different toggle-on command and ready to load the next rolling bind file. (In this case, there are only two; I have alts with 5 or 6.) You do have to write a careful set of rolling bind files for each power in the chain, but once done, it works without further hassle, and any dropped toggles are switched back on within a few seconds of movement. In cases where you have all toggles dropped and need them back pronto, you just tap W several times quickly. Full details in the Guide.

Anyone with a toggled build that doesn't use the 'auto fire' movement binds to retrigger them all as needed is... leaving XP on the table. 🙂

My only additional thought here is that I was in squid form both times and didn't think to switch to hoo-man mode. Not sure if there is some bug with squid-clicking or if it was a case of the clicky box being obscured, oddly located or tiny because of my alt form.

Problem solved: yep, don't use command slashes in, er, commands. 🙂 But I use this command instead: F8 "ah$$toggle salvage$$toggle recipes" ...which toggles the auction house, Recipe and Salvage windows as a set. Might not work for everyone but you usually want at least one of the junk windows open at the same time, unless you only buy. (Me, I'm an orange seller.) Open all three windows and find a nice placement. I find putting Auction to one side and stacking Recipe and Salvage next to it works. Then F8 will open and close all three, unless you're in a mission or base. And for the macro crowd: /macro_image DayJob_WentworthsTeleport "Auction House" "ah$$toggle salvage$$toggle recipes" ...which uses the now-essentially-defunct Wentworth transporter icon. Change up if you're still hoarding WW TP charges. The triple toggle can occasionally get out of sync but I found it wasn't really worth having separate open and close commands. Just close any open windows and it's back in sync.

I'd like to see a cancel button for this. I have one alt who has something like five First Ward/Night Ward contacts and I have no intention of running anything Gold Side or in that bizarre zone. Won't go away.

Yep. After 50,000 missions, I know the ropes. The fundamental bug here seems to be that I couldn't click on the blue Tsoo. Twice. I will make a note to run this mish with my next lowbie.

Pretty sure it used to disappear after the summoner used it, so... I guess the time diff isn't too bad...

Nope. Tried every reasonable option both times.

The acronym has been decoded, but not the cultural matrix. AARP is an activism/benefits group for the gray-haired crowd in the US. Among other things, they are infamous for sending lots of "join us" mail when you hit 50. Sort of a rite of passage no one wants to achieve.

Older than anyone so far. Knocking on 50 when I was a launch player. 'Nuf sed. I recall establishing that the early Live player base was heavy on 35's or so and tended older than that. Not a kiddies game, then or now.

So I am soloing my new squid (WS) and at 16 I get the Graham Easton mission "retrieve Hong Shub Snoo" (or whatever). I run it. When I get to the last room I click on the glowie, obtaining my very on Hong Swub Ptoo (or whatever). And surprise, surprise, two "Enraged Tsoo" attack. I defeat one... and the other goes blue-reticle and proceeds to follow me around as I clear the room, his tornado swirling. Can't complete mish. No foes, glowie clicked, enraged Tsoo following me around on hands and knees, generating a duplicate "me" arrow. A third "me" arrow and a foe arrow in the last room; nothing there. Exit and return; no change. Quit. Run the mission again today, leaving the glowie for last. Two Enraged Tsoo show up. I beat one down, he turns blue, other one vanishes. Same bizarre result as above. No, there were no remaining foes (it;'s a pretty small map). No, there were no more directives. No, the two phantom map arrows didn't represent anyone, downstairs or in the overhead crossover. I finally just completed the mission. Is this a squid thing I don't understand?

Understanding is a three-edged sword: your side, my side and the concept that forum posts are not all written specifically for/at you. 🙂 'Minds me of a really old joke: A Victorian adventurer advertised for people to join his next expedition to the wilds of Arabia. A little man came into his office. "Ah, so you're here about the ad? the adventurer asked. The little man nodded. "So, you've been to exotic locations? Africa? Brazil? Mongolia?" "Oh, no," the little man said. "I've never left Queens." "So you're a linguist? You speak Arabic, Farsi, Urdu?" "Oh, no," the little man said. "I just speak a little Yiddish." The adventurer scratched his head. "So you're a good organizer... can buy supplies, manage pack horses, travel, accommodations?" "Oh, no," the little man said. "My dear wife handles all that, and I am allergic to horses." The adventurer gave an exasperated sigh. "So, then, why DID you come in today?" "I just wanted to let you know," the little man said, "that on me, you shouldn't depend."

...until your framerate in, say, Atlas Plaza crashes to single digits trying to manage 16M colors for all the clotheshorses. 🙂 I have no objection to the suggestion, but even as a designer I don't find myself limited by the current color options and I wouldn't want to trade game performance for more fun in costume creator. (I also note that there's often only a loose correlation between the color patch and the result; I often have to use three or four different swatches to get an all-matching result.) If there's no performance hit, I have no objections at all.

Can I just point out that no one can really see subtle color variations except in the costume creator and load screen? Is it worth loading up the game engine with a broader pallette management just so we can tweak our own view a little bit?

From the throwing crap at the wall file... What about a system where you trade hit points for powers? That is, start with tank level hit points, and pay an HP price for every power you choose? Take Placate, it costs five hit points. Take some monster AoE, 30% of your hit points.

I'm in. I don't know why, but I find the Carnival one of the most fascinating villain sets. They'd make a great Mastermind set.

“Let's go nerfin' now, everybody have a cow, come on another TF with meeee...”

Oh, four Pete's sake...

Only further comment: I am not sure if the game creates a window file unless it's told to (with /wdwsave)... so don't nobody go 'way with the idea that this will work from the same alt unless you've saved the info. If you have, you shouldn't need to even switch alts to pull off the fix.