Ukase

Just my opinion with isn't worth much - but I see no need for a scrapper to have a taunt aura. Sounds like the OP just needs to roll a brute or a tank.

Clearly, you're mistaken, or imprecise in this comment. There definitely is one thing that you did get right - it's a playstyle thing. Some people enjoy the play of doms and/or controllers more. Which is fine. But to say they solo a hell of a lot easily than a corruptor or a defender? That's only the case if you mean more slowly/safely when you say "hell of a lot more easily".

The actions on the AH that I see make me ask a lot of questions, as there seems to be very little logic to it. Sometimes, the "buy it now" seems to be at play. Sometimes, it's an extra 0. Sometimes, there's a badge pursuit. But usually, people are just lazy and/or ignorant. They don't even consider comparing the price between crafted and not. The same folks that spend hours making their costume who tend to be the ones who complain about the price of IOs don't know/care to check the market. Love those people. It's their ignorance/laziness that has helped me amass my little pile of influence.

Probably a new thread might be better for this question - but what if HC got a license to legitimately run CoH? I mean - it's worth asking, isn't it? Could streaming be allowed then? Would they charge money then? If so, would we expect new content on a routine basis? Would they then chase the non-legit servers with C&D, or leave them alone? Would a meaningful portion of the current players here now leave for the free servers if they did start charging money? I wonder how all that would play out. Conversely - suppose there is a day in the future when NCSoft says, "No, you can't legitimately run our game." Serving C&D papers at that point would be easy. Does the "Whack-a-mole" then begin?

Are you able to get the accolades - Atlas Medallion/Marshal, TFC/Invader, Portal Jockey/Born in Battle, Freedom Phalanx/High Pain Threshold, etc? I'm thinking no. Wonder if the HC devs could do something about that.

Well - you had knowledge of that first "2" (the youtube video). It's the first I've heard of it. I'm pretty good at math, I just need to know where the numbers come from.

Clearly it works as well as the holders of the IP are willing to work it. All about the dollars and cents. But how I think it works is irrelevant. What is relevant is we have a party that is basically creating a place for us to play this game with code they didn't develop or publish. I can't say who took it - but HC along with other folks have copies of the code, and most have changed it in some fashion. And for some reason, streaming the game makes HC believe their efforts to legitimize the game would impede that process. What more needs to be said? I'm simply saying that NCSoft hasn't stated anything to my knowledge about streaming. I figure if someone is stating such, maybe they've seen something I haven't. Just wanted to know where/what. That's all.

So...HC is okay with hijacking it - but not okay with folks streaming it. This is what I have a hard time wrapping my head around. I do get that HC would like to find a way to legitimize it. Makes sense. Then they don't get in legal/financial trouble, assuming there's risk of that. I am not an attorney, I can't say with certainty one way or the other. And, given the way things often play out in court, I don't think any attorneys would be comfortable stating anything with certainty. I do get that HC - as the ones who have given up much of their time, knowledge, skills to allow us to play here, we should abide by their wishes to not stream. Fine. Personally, I have no desire to stream or see any streaming. What I don't get is how this policy has any bearing on "Talks" which are almost always under some kind of NDA, and things are kept so hush-hush, we have no way of knowing if any talks are actually taking place at all. That said, it costs me nothing to trust HC at the moment and accept their word at face value. I don't have to understand why. It doesn't have to make sense. Ultimately, it's none of my business. But if you're gonna say it's NCSoft - I want to know what you read that stated, "NCSoft asked us to stop the streaming in order for us to do...etc. " It's simple to say, "It makes sense to not do it. Let that sleeping dog lie." But that's not really the same thing to me.

Gee, a Master of Underground in one run! Must have been a Humdinger of a time!

I don't accept this. There's no evidence to suggest NCSoft has anything to do with the policy. Kindly give a source, please.

This amused me.

The marketer in the real world recognizes Christmas to bring folks in the store to increase sales and profit. The marketer in CoH? I think they'd get more out of just dropping random Winter-Os and packs and inf on other characters in game. But...what the heck do I know? The more I think I know, the more I realize I don't know much at all.

It would seem that some are either desperate for inf, or are just trying to be strangely helpful. Or maybe they're dim-witted. Can't say. Several of the Superior winters are selling for less than the non-catalyzed. It's not just a one-off as far as I can tell. Several of them across all sets are selling for less than 5M. When I think about how much a catalyst sells for it makes me question the intellect of the seller. But, things don't have to make sense to me to be fun for someone else. I thought about buying them to see how cheaply I can get them, but I already have more than I need. I think it's only fair to leave something for the up and coming marketers. But I sure would like to know why they're selling them THAT cheap.

So..you've bought them. Some of you - a ton of them. One friend said he got 10 billion worth. His strategy - sell the winter Os at the going rate - which seems to be 6-12M, depending on time of day and which ones. It wasn't but a couple of months ago, even the Entombed, the red-headed step-child of Winter-Os (just an expression, no need for the red-heads to bash me) were selling for over 20m. I ask you - is the bird in the hand (the sale today or tomorrow for 10m) worth 20M 6 months from now? The market is a fickle beast. So many packs, so many winter-Os are not necessarily "in circulation", but are in player's email/base storage/ah slots. If HC continues to discount winter packs in December for the foreseeable future, are enough in circulation to keep the price as low as it is now? Only time will tell. Some of our more clever, sinister marketers are already trying to determine a winning strategy - loosely defined as that would be different for many of us. I think some are buying up these winter-Os at the current sub-10M price, hoping to double their inf 4-6 months from now. Not a bad strategy, if it comes to fruition. Others will keep a stash just to try to market pvp it a bit to keep the prices low. It's going to be interesting!

that's hilarious. I lol'd.

I never worry about people who give more information, provided it's accurate. But - for responses that seem to attack you - there's only one solution - ignore them. I don't mean put them on ignore, simply don't acknowledge their response. And FFS, don't let other people impact how YOU feel. That's craziness. You're trying to be helpful. Take comfort in that and let the rest slide off your back. Life is too short to give other people influence over your mood. Only you control how you feel. Seriously.

I did this yesterday with Super Speed. But I take SS at level 4 on every character. My guess is that you took it too late to be able to use it at the level of the CoT.

While you seem to want all characters to be able to complete a story arc for a great award. Which is fine. But if you take away the invention system, you take away a lot of options and make the game far more dull, every AT with the same powersets would be more cookie-cutter than they are now. It would be a bad, bad move and most people would leave the game if you took away the Invention system. At least, that's what I think. I could certainly be wrong. These arcs that would award these "super-merits"...how many alts does the average player have? How many times do you expect folks to run these arcs for all those characters? No, I don't think a super merit is the way to go. But - when I think back to live, they introduced the hero merit, which was awarded at the end of SSA arcs if you chose, or when you finished a morality alignment mission. So, we have that in game already. It's just the merit vendor is asking for too many merits. Simply reduce those merit requirements, and problem solved...maybe.

This is a fantastic idea.

There is one issue I have with this challenge. Blasters have been buffed far beyond what they were in live. Higher HP, a regen/recovery aura, and who knows what else. Tankers have been changed recently with higher damage cap and target caps - but no dumpster herding like back in live. No multiple sets of imps or PA for controllers. And of course - should I dare mention regen? lol So many things have changed that at least some powerset/AT combos would not equate to the old days, no matter what you did. I suppose a blaster could skip the aura...<shudder> All in all, a very fun idea that I will try..soon.

@Yomo Kimyata said thing so much better than I ever could. I vaguely recall the term fungibility from an econ class a zillion years ago, but I doubt I could use it properly in a sentence, despite my knowing at a gut level how to make inf in this game easily. I would suggest something as mundane as a badge for an inf sink. Philanthropist -- You have given and it doesn't hurt. Give 1 million inf away to 50 different global accounts. Altruist - You have given until it did hurt. Give 1 Billion away to 50 different global accounts. (this one could be classified maybe like bug hunter and not count towards badge totals.) Unfortunately (or not) - SG leaders that host costume contests would likely be the primary winners in this category, despite the inf potentially coming from the entire SG. Still, I believe some of the more wealthier folks are avid badgers as well. Perhaps reducing AH slots would be a way to go, with a way to buy them back at some ludicrous price. 50 Million per slot. Of all that Yomo states, he's right about at least one thing. The enhancement converter is out of control.

I enjoy the market. I do not enjoy Roleplay. I say that to say that HC's version of City of Heroes is genuinely a City of Options. I am grateful for these options. And it's not lost on me that more than a few folks don't want to spend their time farming, crafting, converting to subsidize their alts. I belong to a fairly large SG. Within that SG I frequently notice that people are farming. A lot. Players that you wouldn't think would bother with farming because they seem to enjoy teaming so much. But they farm. Why? Because they have alts, of course. A few may actually enjoy it. I do not, except every now and then. I do it for the inf. Mainly the inf I can make from the market with the drops I get. All because of the converter. Even though it would pain my characters a bit - and many other players as well, I think converters are making the accumulation of influence too easy. They help create a greater separation of earning between the marketer and the non-marketer. And the range of difference isn't going to get any smaller. My billions will eventually parlay into a trillion. It may take me a year, but I will get there if things are left unchecked. I could almost make the case I'd be there already if I didn't give so much away. So why is this difference relevant? Because if people in similar positions as mine were to choose to, we could literally buy every defensive IO recipe and crafted IO, attuned IO to drive up prices. If I chose to, I could literally buy every converter on the market. I might have to pay more than I'd like, but I could do it. 50,000 converters x 100,000 inf = 5 billion. (roughly) Easy, no sweat. Even at 2x that, I could do it. And then - place bids to keep buying them. I can stash ..10k on each character, right? It's not like I wouldn't eventually use them. Granted, with winter packs being on sale, more folks would drop converters on the AH, but I could easily bid on them and gobble those up as well. Obviously - I think this would be a jerk move, so I'm not going to do it. I just would like there to be some fair way to prevent this ability. I just don't know that way. (and no, I'm not going to mindlessly give away all my influence)

Not through the chalet. But you can definitely reach them.

Man, how do I put this... For one, thanks for explaining this MMO mindset. I can't imagine it. It doesn't make sense to me. But - I'll trust that it's at least somewhat representing reality. I've known in-game friends that have gone and returned. The thing is - if they are so whimsical to only feel like jumping in every 2-3-4 years, then clearly, the game isn't that important to them. Seriously. We all have words. But actions speak louder. They show they don't care that much by not playing. So why should those that do care be cut off from what they think will be a great thematic concept? In truth, now that I think about it, it makes sense. Going from new content to new content, keeping things interesting, fun, etc...I suppose it is more understandable after I think about it. Still, 2-3-4 years? If the only thing that's keeping them from logging in is the lure of another game or two, or three or 20... You bring up an interesting point about reputation around a character's name. I notice a large number of players use a "naming convention". A word used in each character name, like Shadow Reaper, Sun Reaper, Snow Reaper, that kind of thing. Most every character would have the name Reaper in it, making it mostly clear that Shadow Reaper is the same person behind the avatar as Sun Reaper. And if they are inclined to lead various trials and tfs, and are competent at it, if someone else comes along with a Reaper variation, it can be confusing to the other players. Unfortunately, I don't see any way to resolve that other than to suggest people use more obscure terms to identify themselves with for their global. I wish I had a solution. I don't. But I did appreciate your perspective. For me, though - and only me - I think if you log off HC CoH and don't return routinely, you should have no expectations. Routinely is vague, defined differently by many. I think once a month would be reasonable, but to be more inclusive, 4 years would be as wide as I could go, given I have no idea how deployments and other types of service would impact access to opportunities to play. If I were to discount military service, I'd say 3 months at the most. But that's just me thinking about me. I'm glad I'm not the one to make the decision.

A fair point. My military experience was 88-92. I assure you - while computers did exist, there were no internet cafes around - so I've literally no idea how easy/hard it would be for military to do something like that. I do like the notion of an email keeping things going for them, but I would wonder how many folks might just use that if they weren't in the service. I can't see HC folks asking for documentation to prove such a thing. For 98% of our player base, I think the honor system is sufficient. Just wonder how many names the 2% are sitting on, lol.