temnix

What prevents this engine from applying a translucency effect to the character on a checked box? It doesn't even have to be a costume part, just a variable set.

Are you using e-mails to yourself as a cloud resource of Inspirations for all your characters? Confess.

No, how is that similar? Street Justice has specific builder and finisher moves, and only within the set, and with the builders making the effects of finishers stronger. Other sets have other ideas of combos. My idea here is a way to get out combinations of attacks that the player himself chooses from many different sets quickly for extra Endurance (they should apply defense debuffs, too, to be more worth investing in). I thought a little more about this, though, and I think attacks should be grouped not into punches and kicks but into High and Low, depending on their animations. After all, mixed martial arts are a valid fighting form. Every unarmed attack in the game would start from one of these classes and either end in that class or lead to the other. For example, as Brawl, Punch, Jab, Boxing, Heavy Blow begin from the shoulder level and end there, they would be labeled as High-to-High attacks in the power descriptions. Starting any of them would invite a sequel in any of the other High attacks the character has got that are already recharged at the time. So there is prizefighting. Crane Kick would also be a High-to-High attack, since it happens entirely in the air. But Haymaker would be a High-to-Low (the alternate animation should be adjusted to more of a waist punch) and open the choice of Low attacks instead, if any. Air Superiority from Flight, a power that is not, I suspect, very popular, would also be a High-to-Low attack, as would some of the descending kicks. Kick from Fighting and Shin Breaker from Street Justice would be Low-to-Low. Crushing Uppercut is an example of something that would open the High attacks menu from a Low start, and both Crosses look that way too. If my idea about progressing in other power sets after level 50 were accepted, veterans would have a chance for the widest variety of segues. All of these possibilities would get players thinking: is Haymaker worth using as a starter without any Low powers to continue to, to use Punch in the same set as a first or second attack, given that it often knocks enemies out, ending any combo, to use Rib Cracker for its transfer to High now or not when it's a builder within the set and you'll be continuing with different attacks instead of the finishers, the same for Savage Melee and its Blood Frenzy, how Assassin's Strike will fare in a combo for Stalkers who take Street Justice or Kinetic Melee, how effects from Radiation Melee and other energy Melee sets will play out here and so on. Many different fighting styles would be possible. I am for admitting any unarmed attack with hands or feet here, which should make powers like Mental Strike and Stone Fist that everyone probably respecs out of as soon as they can more attractive, but nothing for Claws (that set needs help), Spines, solid or evoked swords, psi blades, mallets, maces... nor Hand Clap or Foot Stomp either. Some of the animations for standard-looking punches can be reworked to lead to a different level. Why not change the elemental Fists to be hook-type punches to the liver, for instance?

You know how a second bar pops up when you leap up with Arcane Flight, with Translocation on it? Or Afterburner with Fly? The same kind of bar could float up when delivering punching moves. I'm thinking about all of the forms of boxing between the different sets: starting with Brawl (cool and unusual thrown from the left), then Boxing per se in Fighting Pool, Cross Punch later on, Flurry in Speed, most moves in Super Strength too (especially if you switch to the alternative animations there; Haymaker, Knockout Blow really look much more pleasant than with those top-down slams that are on by default and that all Super Strength enemies use, e. g. Family Muscle; switch some of them to the alternate moves, Homecoming), a few of the moves in Street Justice also. I think they ought to enable combos. It can be discussed and tested which are more suitable, e. g. Crushing Uppercut in Street Justice doesn't look like any uppercut from life, but on the whole, it would be great to engage in something like a real ring duke-out between these moves. My latest character is a strong, bulky Super Strength Tanker with boxing gloves on his mitts, and he don't do any kicks. Strictly pugilism. Of course, you could have a parallel system for kick moves. Another incentive to want powers from other sets, by the way. Dive into a Shin Breaker from a Crane Kick. Collect your punches/kicks today! The way I see it, the pop-up panel would appear when you started one of the eligible moves, if you had other valid powers to follow up with. If you clicked on one of those in time, you would next execute it faster than usual, but at higher Endurance cost. Maybe 50% more. The second move would also have the pop-up option, 100% higher, and so on, forming a chain. The punches would probably go off too quickly for the player to link up any more than two or three, though, since this is not a turn-based game... But this would be a way to compress a lot of damage in a short span for a good slice of Endurance. Either as an opening sequence in a fight or as a desperate last resort. Maybe for balance linking should work as an upfront Endurance payment, when you click the upper-bar button, rather than when the follow-up begins.

There is an Antimatter aura option, let's have an Antimatter Blast set. What would set it apart is interaction with other powers of its targets. As you all know, when animatter meets normal matter, both disappear in annihilation with a release of energy. The blasts here would have special effects on enemies who just used a power from Fire, Cold, Electricity, Energy or Negative Energy sets or who are in the middle of activating them. Meeting these emanations, Antimatter would create bubbles of annihilation where they stand, little motionless spheres that do damage over time as long as one is standing in them. All of the powers would take Interrupt Es, too, for a chance to disrupt enemies' power during activation time. It would be a special-purpose, anti-boss and Arena-oriented set primarily, focused on suppression. A separate set power would create a bubble at a target point directly. The ultimate power may be Sphere of Annihilation as a pet. My hat goes off to Dungeons&Dragons!

Leadership is a great set. Possibly the best Pool set. But most of my characters steer away from it. You know why? Because if they take any powers there, they'll be doomed be surrounded by twirling droplets, shields and whatnots for the rest of their lives. Not only isn't there any-character explanation, especially when the characters do natural things like Street Justice, Willpower, Dual Pistols... but it's damn annoying. All powers need to have the option of effects disabled - including shooting bolts. If my character throws fire, it can be invisible fire. Maybe it's thermal. And it's very simple to include that option, unlike "Minimal FX," where you have to draw up special tuned-down versions. "No FX" just switches off the graphics and sounds. By the way, turn off that aggravating levitation whistle for "No FX" flying too. I mean Arcane Flight, maybe Fly. If I don't want twirling runes, don't subject me to the wheeze from Hover either.

I'm busy, so I'm going to keep this brief. Let others draw out and develop these ideas as they like. Keeping it short, I'm not interested in the post-level 50 future for my character where he'll only have Incarnate powers to look forward to. It takes an extremely long time even to get to level 50, no one has got many characters who have gone there, let alone beyond. All I've read about the Incarnate tiers tells me the abilities are pretty bland. There are some AoE damagers, some defenses, if memory serves, summons from the villain groups that we already know, and a diversification-bypassing power-up. I appreciate Cryptic/NCSoft and Homecoming's working to pave a future up there, but none of that sounds worth pouring months and years into. Especially if it involves going on Incarnate Trials with huge crowds of people. Besides, what kind of challenge could there be at that power level? To do what, shake the gods off Mount Olympus like pears off a tree? If you ask me, at that stage one ought to choose transcendence and continue to an existence with completely different goals instead of still trying to wade in the earth's sandbox in a giant's boots. In short, I'm not interested. What I would be interested in is taking on the abilities of other Archetypes. And Instead of far-out fights I can't identify with at all, I would like to see more early and middle-game content, deeper content too, and a way for my Veteran to relive the life on earth or still live it, but differently. A case in point: my most developed character is Street Justice/Willpower, and I would find it very nice to tap the power set of Regeneration or Invulnerability. I can think of two ways this could work, and they are not mutually exclusive. They could both be options for players at level 50. They wouldn't involve creating a slew of new missions or enemies or types of resources either. Maybe one story arc to introduce a choice between these options and the Incarnate path. As for balance, here is the long and short about it: if a power isn't so mighty that it wins every fight or so weak that you don't know whether you've got it, its balance is fine. We aren't weighing grains of diamonds here. The point of a game, or of life for that matter, is to be interesting in an advancing way, and if that is achieved without destroying the world, either is successful. The first option may be called Old Soul. Here your character discovers that he has lived before, and he gets to tap into that past life. You choose an Archetype and one of the primary or secondary sets open to it. It can be the same Archetype you already have, just not the same power set. And you get the option for taking on powers from there at the usual speed of progression: first the choice between two starting powers, at the next level-up you can pick the other from the pair, then two slots and so on. The powers are used at your current level, but you progress up the tree at the speed of a Veteran, so very, very slowly. If I wanted to draw on a Mastermind's set, for example, and get the basic henchmen, I would get 3 right away, but I would be a long time away from the first upgrade. At reaching level 20 in the recalled set I can make the choice again and recall another life and another set. What's good about this version is that the character gets to use all his high-level powers and still progresses up there to some quasidivine state. It would still require Homecoming to keep supplying high-level challenges, but I think it's considerably more interesting than gathering those threads. The second option is starting a new life. It's a Return to Samsara. Here you get to change all your costumes (bodies) for free, the sex, even take on a new name, if you like, and any permitted Archetype and combination of sets, except your old ones. You begin anew in Atlas Park or on Mercy as a 1st level character. The collected badges are still there, but otherwise it's a reset. The former life's powers are dormant until you rise to the level required to obtain them normally, and they function at the current level. So, if I played a Mastermind formerly of Thugs and now want to add some Wolves to the army (street curs, hey), I begin able to summon one Punk in addition to my starting puppy. The slots are still there when the powers wake up, but all the Es have gone to storage, and the minimum level restrictions will mean most of them will be unusable. Attuned Es are very weak early on. Gradually I will recall all of the other abilities. At reaching level 50 again I'll be able to repeat the trick and relive as another character and another. Recalled powers will make Veterans stronger than real newbies of their level, naturally, that's part of their reward, but enemies can be given special big bonuses vs. these reborn types to prevent them from quite burning through the early levels with their Hellions and Clockwork. What's good about this version is that you get to participate in adventures on earth for real instead of condescending to them in Ouroboros. Now, if Homecoming can bring themselves not to hand-wring over balance and just make things difficult for Veterans with whatever arbitrary enemy bonuses it takes, both of these systems could exist alongside the Incarnate option without needing a major overhaul of the game or tons of new missions or enemies.

I bought myself a proc-type E that is supposed to apply a Power Up effect every so often, only it needs to sit in a power that takes To Hit Buff Enhancements. In all my Street Justice/Willpower possibilities I don't think I have any power where To Hit Buff can be slotted. If I want that effect, I have to take a power I don't need at all and don't mean to use, like that dart shooter from Medicine. Luckily, I have Medicine opened up long ago for the sake of Aid Self (bugged and doesn't go off half the time in a fight, by the way, even when not interrupted), so I don't have to waste a Pool pick on an irrelevant set, but that dart is useless to me. I am far past the point where weakening or boosting someone a little would be a tactic worth including. Yet I have to take either that or something else, probably equally useless, just for the sake of having slots of the right type for all those special-purpose Es. This gives me an idea: why not make a new, inherent, passive power simply for the purpose of accepting every kind of E? Don't let it do anything, only accept all that may be slotted. Let it start with just one free slot, like every other power, or even, if you want to be tough on balance, none. The player will have to devote some slots to it. But that will be a way to define one's approach. Put a slot there for something special that requires a Damage power instead of turning over one of the six slots in the attack powers you are actually going to use. Better than sticking it in Brawl, ja? You can always find SOME kind of power that allows Es of the right kind, my concern here is having to take lousy powers or useless pool picks just for the type. Call this Style or Approach or Idiom or Devotion or Planning or Strategy or Penchant or Conditioning or Prayer or Introversion or Hidden Pockets or Stratagem or Horoscope or Grudge or Amalgam or Fate Dice or Accent or Cake. Call it Omega, and may Incarnate Veterans smell my farts.

I like it. A good transition between the chest and the shoulder pads, too. What kind of gloves are those? They seem unfamiliar.

As I think back on the concept of CoH and the work Cryptic started doing twenty years ago, I can only applaud them for style and the ambition that was successful almost everywhere. How they took on the superhero subject, interpreted powers, the villain groups, the unique work on areas and, of course, the music, that's just wonderful. But that creativity is spread over a large surface, so it doesn't go deep anywhere. They represented existing a super-powered being in a convincing way, but living as one in a world that responds they didn't, maybe couldn't. Me, I want more interactivity: with people, with the environment... Putting out fires is nice, if you can find them. So is climbing to the roofs of tall buildings by the stairs, that's another convincing touch. But I want to be able to put some money in the hands of that lady who so tirelessly implores for donations for the children of Galaxy City. And can't I do something to, I mean about, I mean with, I mean for the homeless on the streets? A little influence should go a long way, or infamy when that's lacking. It would be good to earn points towards an alignment change with such things. But that's all more complicated, not so immediate. Immediately I want to feel that I exist in this world. Just as I want it to matter what kind of body I chose to have with sliders - if I'm slow, let me be slow, if I'm tough, let me be tough, and THEN the powers go on top of that, the same way I want to exercise my god-given right to smash stuff. What good is super strength if I can only punch people, and then only bad people, and not through a wall? Well, as it happens, a lot of that is possible without any technical changes. Not walls, but the potential for destruction is already there for just about everything else: cars, buses, trucks, barrels, dumpsters, power poles, those red-and-white air masts on rooftops... You only realize how many kinds of objects can be destroyed after you've been on mayhem or safeguard missions and explored in junkier places: the middle-south of Faultline, Boomtown, Freakshow's shanty fortresses everywhere, places where Rikti are supposed to have invaded. Then you see everything that you thought existed only as bright, shiny catalog models twisted, mangled and burned. In some of those missions you get to smash a few chosen brackets. The only question is, why do you have to leave the big world for it? I propose making a massive freaking sweeping change and turning all those objects destructible. All the cars on the parking lots, all the dumpsters, the power poles where that would make sense visually vis-a-vis nearby wires, the stone gargoyles and lions - and a million other things. Not just something here and there, like the Trolls' explosives specially placed, but all those other things around all get to go boom, interior fixtures including, and inflict some damage in a radius. Indoors, too. Tables, for example. If I shoot a lightning bolt at a table, it ought to fly into smithereens and hurt everyone around. And if objects don't have a midcourse, damaged-stage model, they can still shatter in the end and toss out wooden splinters, chunks of stone, straps of metal - all of those, we know, are available. Of course, in the big world these objects would regenerate in a few minutes. The cars would come back (preferably a different model, but that's an extra), the dumsters... and the debris would clear away. The Paragon City maintenance service works day and night. I should know, I had a character who started out fixing up after Clockwork before she was nabbed by the Council. As far as debris goes, we also know that some kind remains permanently or just about, and other kinds fade away, so there is some setting that controls that. The point of all this is to give players a real feeling that their actions affect the world and sometimes tactical opportunities: target the truck the Hellions were stealing the wheels off, make it blow, send them flying; throw a fireball in a side office a few enemies stand in, singe them and hit with debris from the smashed desk to boot; throw one in a room with a lot of vases, and those will burst and pepper everyone for a little lethal. There is nothing impossible about this. As far as targeting is concerned, it would be nice to have something in Options for whether objects will be included in cycling with Tab. Some players may not care about using the environment this way and not want to be distracted when switching quickly in a crowd. Plus, object names should be colored differently, though aren't they already in aquamarine? A bigger question is, should they take damage from everyone's AoE powers, or must they be targeted specially to be damaged? The second variant promises more precision and fewer unpleasant surprises, but the first has potential for much more fun. When tossing fireballs at the Damned who toss fireballs back, all next to a big tank of fuel, it should be no surprise to find yourself in the hospital. I think this interpretation, where you have to mind what is around you, would make the reality more real.

Any arguments in support of either, or you think thinking just makes it so? I didn't say anything about the sex choice, mind you, but, of course, women are nimbler and more resilient than men, who are stronger and tougher. There is no reason whatever why this would not apply to superheroes. Or does Black Widow punch through walls? There is She-Hulk, but she is hulky. Of course, in both sexes there may be some small superheroes with unusual strength or who leap between buildings on short legs, in short, where their abilities aren't completely limited by their body, but that is where superpowers come in. A short-legged character, I proposed, shouldn't run or jump well naturally, but he may have Combat Jumping or Superspeed or another power to offset his starting point. That, in a nutshell, is the entire concept of superheroes as they were originally conceived - that they are regular people, maybe even invalids or puny, but with something extra, from an investigator's talent to flying, that lets them go beyond and achieve. It's the American way! Now how did this turn into a situation where, instead of being surpassed, reality is la-la-la denied the way you and others here are doing? @Triumphant It is pleasant to read a response from someone who is not a low-effort nay-sayer. These sliders would add a new layer of complexity, that's true. Well, what is the problem? All the mechanics you mention already bring accents: Enhancements, Incarnate powers, Accolades... Having a body that matters should have been the first layer among them. So players may not like being budged from the primitive situation they are used to. Big deal. The game was stupid, and it was made smarter. They'll love it before long anyway, they always do. Still, this change should be announced well in advance, and characters made until D-Day excluded from the changes, with the option to let the player click a button and agree to convert them (irrevocably). Later characters should not get the choice, however. Reforms for the better should never be optional; we must only be very sure that we do change for the better, and prepared to make adjustments if we are mistaken somewhere. And in this case the reform would only bring players back to a basic starting condition. As for Homecoming, they may be running this business as a non-profit hobby, but that excuse only goes so far. Serious money leaves for their maitenance costs from players' wallets, and more important, they command the free time of thousands of people. They haven't done anything with that power but condemn players to more senseless time-wasting - to grinding in one dull challenge after another. There are no learning opportunities, no role-playing choices to express a personality, no making players face, as in this case, the limitations of their physical condition - and the question of how, and whether, powers ameliorate it. Just time sinks, one after another, for badges and vanity. Like other MMOs, CoH has wasted millions of hours of people's lives for very little, and all that Homecoming seems eager to do is make them waste some more. That borders on selling opium. Here is a heads up: the more of someone you are in a virtual brag fest, the less of anyone you are in reality. If this argument goes through to Homecoming, I want to suggest something about implementation. It is possible that in this engine buffs and debuffs and other effects can't be applied on the Body page. Maybe there is no way to make smooth, analog changes there that would translate into exact corresponding permanent adjustments. Homecoming still struggles with costume-piece limitations, after all, and it is possible that there is just no natural way to turn slider changes into stat adjustments dynamically. In that case this system, at least, could work: record the slider parameters somewhere after character creation/"Customize your appearance"/tailor and make the stat changes only discrete, i. e. instead of "+0,33%" on the slider bar, let there only be so many increments of "+1%." These values recorded, apply the changes as autopowers from the game's master script, or global script, or what it is called that always runs in the background. For example, IF Size = +15 AND "Size-changed" = 0, THEN apply Perma-power "Size+15" AND Set "Size-changed" = 1. The Size+15 power would delete the effects from other Size powers and apply its own. This would be repeated for all of the sliders. It's not an ideal way of doing this, but it can go around an absolute impossibility of factoring in the body settings directly.

The first part will only apply to min-maxers. I don't know if you are one, but please don't consider myself such. The second part, alas, is the price of relevance. Your look is you, and it is your choice of reality to inhabit.

I once had a conversation in General about the purpose of stores that sell single and dual-origin Enhancements: Cooke's Electronics, Image Inc. and the others, now that all shopkeeper NPC sell those Es. The change made those wonderfully designed and interesting stores obsolete. Someone wrote: "Left to their own devices, players will eventually optimize all fun out of a game." And Homecoming people think like players too. After all, they are only modders, not creators. Almost all they offer is convenience: command line shortcuts, Null the Gull... The least they can do to keep those stores occasionally visited is to improve their buying and selling prices by a good amount, let's say 25%. And let them sell Es of any level, up to 50. That will help out poor players to get by without selling their Merit Rewards. Even better, let those places and only them buy Inventions - of any kind. As specialized stores, they are uniquely qualified to take those off players' hands.

City of Heroes feels like a dream to me. The subdued world walks on, waves, honks and drives away while brightly-colored bodies float by, sometimes in queues, like strung balloons, headed to some offscreen, abstract goal, like hunting poor Babbage or raiding the mothership for the umpeenth time. So different, yet so the same. The game is more like a fantasy about being a superhero than being a superhero in a fantasy. I enjoy it as far as it goes, but the only way it's going to feel less like an illusion is with deeper mechanics - a number of new features to give it relevance, it connect the player to the world he inhabits and consequences of his choices. And the first place (or maybe the second place, after Origin) where those mechanics can come in is the Body screen. CoH is something of an exception among character-centered games in that there are no individual statistics, no place to choose Strength or Constitution or Stamina or Charisma. Now, I don't know how to bring in mental stats there, but the body sliders are the pefect place to commit to a physicality. Taller or smaller? Slimmer or thicker? Longer legs or the opposite? It should all matter. True, heroes and villains can be so weird that the obvious choices don't always apply. A small character may be forged of impervium or a huge one may be some kind of cloud of gas. But appealing to that would be a very lazy excuse to pass by opportunity. The sliders, as anyone can see by dragging them to the extremes left and right, represent a spectrum, and the far ends really are something else: where the shoulder girdle is so broad that the arms practically fall off the clavicles or when the body is thin like a blade of grass. I think every slider should represent a duality of statistics, with the place around the center being neutral, but moving away meaning more of one and less of the other. I'm not going to propose any particular numbers, they will have to be found in testing, but for this to be worth bothering with, the far ends should make a significant difference, say, +-25% of the standard. Players should be able to focus their characters in the direction they want. Here are my ideas about what the sliders might represent. Height, i.e. size: <--- Bonus stealth, ---> More hit points It is natural that smaller characters should be harder to notice. Give them a modest permanent visibility bonus so that they might risk fighting or running by enemies closer that usual without attracting attention. But they would be fragile for all that. On the opposite end, characters towering to the full 8 feet should take less spotting but more killing. (They tend to be clumsy and difficult to control, too, which this bonus would compensate for.) Physique <--- Defense, ---> Damage resistance Slimmer characters would probably find it simpler to dodge attacks, but muscled hunks have meat shields in every place. Neither bonus should apply against Psionic, which aims for and tears at the mind. Players can tune for very different fighting styles here, either adding to the advantages from powers (a muscled Invulnerability character) or compensating for their shortcomings (a slim one with the same set). Shoulders <--- Smaller personal space, ---> Longer melee reach I am only guessing that it is technically possible to make characters occupy less space in the world, squeeze through narrower doorways, arches, chinks and so on, but it probably is. No shoulders to speak of, though, is counterindicated for punching, slashing, swiping et cetera, though these characters could still do well with ranged attacks. On the opposite end... time for an anecdote: I enjoy my Katana character very much, but I wish her reach was just a foot or two closer to what I saw with Titan Weapons. Broad shoulders should do that, but the bonus (and the penalty) would not apply to kicks. Chest <--- More Endurance, ---> Resistance to status effects It's difficult to come up with benefits of having a flat chest off the bat. Forward placement in a new-age fantasy casting? But long-distance runners usually have little up there, both sexes, their litte machinery whirring tightly all in one place. On the other extreme, a vast, profound abovewaist hall of sighs should clear status effects sooner. Except Psionic again. Waist <--- Broader auras, ---> Regeneration Gourmands rejoice, here is something for you: a solid girdle of nutrients (in the form of extra capacitors, if you are a robot or something) will help you on a rainy day. Meanwhile, Hellions, Tirailleurs and Knives of Artemis have been coming out in Sex Addicts Anonymous that they have been driven to some heroes' taunting more than to others' for motives of ulterior nature... Auras, taunting, damaging and otherwise, can be really annoying if they extend too far, although, I suppose, other players may want them reaching even farther out. And here is their chance, if they agree to a worse regeneration. Hips <--- Protection from immobilization, ---> Protection from knockdown Unless it's telepathy, they have to lasso you around the hips to glue you down. And those legs in the "Henry the VIII" pose are a sturdy prop. Legs <--- Higher melee damage, ---> Faster running and higher jumping There is a reason heavy swingers usually have small legs, and it is not just that they pumped up the arms but neglected the lower body. No, mechanically the shoulder girdle produces the more force, the shorter the time in which the impulse from the hips reaches it. However, such bruisers make poor runners and jumpers. The melee damage bonus should apply only to attacks from the arms, not kicks. All of these pairs can be thought of differently or the bonuses moved around, but notice that, in any event, I avoided primitive oppositions like "less Endurance, more Health." A bonus to kick attacks somewhere here would be nice. The important thing is not to overcomplicate this system, though, or be so fearful with an extra percentile point that the result will be an unimportant meh. Rather let it give large bonuses at the extremes, to which most players won't go, and leave it do its job. So player who wanted to make the meanest close-combat monster would be able to produce a giant, bulky as a bus, with shoulders at opposite compass points and dragging knuckles on the ground. Of course, anyone checking out such a character - at the Arena, let's say - will know that he's going to be easy to hit, occupy an acre of space, run like a snail and jump like a penguin. It could be possible to trap him in a tight corner or shoot at him from above. PvE enemies would spot him from a mile away, too, given line of sight. Want a sneaky spy instead? Make a tiny, unnoticeable thing that can filter behind pipes and through railings and defend with ranged attacks if discovered. And so on. One can imagine different body types for different uses, and that is where costumes come in. Sliders that matter would give meaning to costume change and encourage making more than one. Players could have costumes, i. e. shapes, for different occasions: something heavy for hard fights, something long-legged and slim to cross an area quickly. This would all be subject to role-playing considerations, of course. Not everyone is going to have alternate forms, especially Natural heroes. But leave that to players. And after all, isn't the reason Dr. whatever would turn into Mr. Hulk was because the other form was rather bigger, stronger and unkillable? Costumes can already be changed only once in 30 seconds. But forbid changing them in combat to keep players from suddenly getting bonuses. Changing to a more suitable form in advance of a fight or sneakaround, though, if the character has such a spare, would just be clever thinking. If the shoulders are so broad that one gets stuck in a sewers' doorway, it is time to press K. When the character background allows no very different shapes, this will be a test to separate the role-players from the power-gamers. Finally, I suggest giving more extreme values of these bonuses and penalties to the Huge form. Huge men (and Huge women, when Homecoming gets around to making them) are already somewhat freaky, even while their body is like a cloud, plays no role. Well, push them farther in that direction and invite players to embrace their inner Huge.

Of course it is right and proper that those who contribute more get more. That was the reason for the prestige store in the original game. You have already heard contrary opinions from some very obtuse people here, though, and Homecoming is committed to some imaginary idea of freebie communism - as if even under communism people would not all have to work to share in the benefits. It's just that prestige perks should have been implemented differently, more magnanimously, for example, being mostly different rather than more powerful. There may not be a regular power that does both Energy and Toxic damage, but one could be fashioned exclusively for players who help, a good power but not overwhelming, with original special effects and sound. There wouldn't be anything unfair about that. And six months later, say, these exclusives would pass into common domain. But you shouldn't expect a reasonable conversation about this here. Homecoming is a group of modders, nothing more, with peculiar modders' notion that you can run a project on voluntary enthusiasm - well, of course they didn't make the game. And many players balk at the idea that those who pay "outside" the game world deserve something more than they who pay "inside" with time spent in the game, without realizing that when they play, they only play, not work. They have only played when they took the character to level 50 and optimized the Es and fought in trials and so on, even though it was a lot of grinding, without contributing one bit. They think they are improving the bed by sleeping.

The missions in this game are often a torture. Sometimes it is only because of old graphics, weird surfaces and confusing polygons, but often it is because of poor design like bending tunnels one has to squint at the map to follow, vast areas irrelevant to the mission's objectives, infinite waves of reinforcements, overpowered enemies popping up out of nowhere twenty feet away (to run up to the character and instantly explode - that's my favorite). Reusing maps is a part of the problem and produces much boredom. Besides that, many maps are simply too big. It isn't fun to plow through three enormous levels to get to the end objective, let alone clear them out. Compared to this early missions are compact and lovely. Mission objectives, too, need to be unequivocal: if the character needs to find a computer file, don't make it turn out that every enemy has to be put down as well. What Homecoming with their limited resources ultimately needs to do is call on players who have designed so many Architect missions to draw up new maps and fix egregiously bad design. They will jump at the chance to contribute. I can think of five more particular changes to make missions less confusing, dreary and in turns onerous and infuriating. 1) Footsteps for all creatures. At the moment only player characters make sounds while running or walking. Even a huge Warwulf prances over the terrain like a phantom. Though most enemies stand still, some do saunter back and forth. Hearing their footsteps would make finding them to complete mission objectives simpler, spice up combat and help make the world less of a lonely illusion. Pedestrian NPC should also clomp, adding to the ambience. 2) Innocents to be rescued (hostages, scientists etc.) should make noise the same as glowies. In their case yelps, shrieks, sobs, moans and terrified chatter of teeth makes sense. 3) There should be two versions of both this sound and the glowie hum, one louder than the other, and the Options menu should include a choice of which set to play. That way objectives can be found more easily without subjecting the neighbors to an audial Let's Play. 4) A prestige power called Divining Rod should orient the character in the direction of the nearest glowie or NPC, regardless of distance across the map. He can triangulate from there. 5) Another should announce the player character's presence to all enemies within a good range. This can take the form of a bugle, trumpet, best of all a war horn. The effect, reaching through walls, would not taunt the enemies, but it would count as an attack, making them, as usual when attacked, swarm towards the player from every unnoticed gangplank, cornice, crook of the tunnel, back side of dead end and so on. P. S. I have also suggested before to link Architect missions at random to entrances without missions, "You cannot enter" ones, at some probability. That way a hero/villain will always find something to do by rapping on a few doors, checking a few sewer grates and manhole lids. As I imagine it, the entrance would show a brief description as an invitation, like "You see some Hellions loading suspicious crates," and if the player declined the adventure, that mission would be rotated out and the entrance "emptied" to this character for some minutes, to avoid picking-and-choosing. He would need to search around for another for a new roll on the wheel. Internally it should be an opt-out system, the box checked by default when uploading a mission to Architect. Missions with, let's say, 3-star ratings and better on Architect would qualify, and the author's name would be displayed somewhere on the minimap and in the completion message. Ideally the character would get to rate the mission at that point. In that way talented designers would get more exposure among players not interested in the environment of Architect.

Most of my suggestions have been aimed at adding imagination or encouraging players to socialize other than in these small, fizzy, fission teams of anonymuses that pool together for a task and then dissolve again. The latter would really take adding new mechanics to the game, mechanics that would make characters feel more than masks floating along in the wind. Something for real role-playing that would matter, big-time features. But small details can help create a living world too. And here is one idea: show the messages that players send to each other in channels as chat bubbles that everyone nearby can see, in other words, include Local in them. That would encourage nearby players to respond, if they think they can help or have something to contribute, not everyone is watching all of the channels all of the time. And having more bubbles around would make the world less silent. It is a strange telepathic pantomime that attends popular places, around Lady Liberty, for example. A whole crowd is standing around, several of them probably typing away, and not a "sound" anywhere except for that plump lady asking for donations for children of Galaxy City off-screen. The supergroup channel would be excluded, with only "..." appearing in the buble, and the same for private messages. But if it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done right, and it would be better for messages in different channels to appear in differently shaped bubbles. Keep the rounded square for Local, Supergroup and PMs, but make Global, for example, round, Broadcast jagged, let LFG be rhomboid (more like an ad this way), Help with zigzag top and town and so on. Communication other than in Local should involve emotes too. Here it would be good if Homecoming contributed a few new ones, though I don't know how good they are at making characters execute complex motions and drawing new virtual objects. The original emotes are exceptionally expressive (everyone should have all his characters dance the Pop Dance for a few minutes). To be optimistic, chatting in Help could involve the emote of tapping a message in Morse on a portative radio transmitter. Global - use the typing-at-laptop emote. Broadcast - shout through a louspeaker, and let's convert all text there to CAPS and make these bubbles visible everywhere in the area. Supergroup - speak into a walkie-talkie. Private messages - fold a paper plane and throw it, and let the recipient catch it, if he is nearby. That would draw more attention to receiving PMs. I have been sent local messages many times that I ignored because I paid no mind to the little background beep, and who knows what they contained? Compliments on my superb costumes, at least. LFG could wave two big checkered flags, like in Formula 1. I don't think there are so many messages in the same place at the same time yet that becoming lost in bubbles would be a concern. That would be a healthy problem to have. As it is, chilly and indifferent silence is more of a challenge among the mute supers who clomp past each each other on the way to the next grind.

1) A Spear power set. 2) A proper set for the Whip, with customizable appearance: whip, lash, barbed wire, chain, rope, poi, morningstar... It could focus on circle attacks, tripping enemies up, sending them spinning and jerking them close. I have made a Mastermind with Demon Summoning who won't take any demons, just pick the powers for the whip. But it would be good to have an entire set. 3) Several voice sets to choose from for both sexes. They only require a few sounds each: grunts for jumping, for collapsing, for kata, not many more. This should be a sufficient variety: Child/Thin, Young Male A, Young Male B, Gruff, Raspy/Old, Supernatural Whoosh, Supernatural Undead, Beast, Automaton, Robot and Mute. Because when Mak Men of the Fifth Column fall with a gasp, that's silly.

Your reasons for editing SO suffice, bro, that you can edit without giving any! Try it! About lyrics: sometimes you hear them correctly, but lyrics found somewhere on the Internet give a wrong version. I used to be perplexed by this, because I had assumed that the lyrics are provided by the music companies or the artists, but actually what you get on those lyrics sites is just what someone's ears have caught. In Gorillaz' famous "Clint Eastwood" I was sure I had the first line right, "I'm happy," the "am" drawn out to suit the meter, but online lyrics tried to make me think it was "I ain't happy." I was adamant, because that would not have made any sense. When I realized how dubious those websites are, that gave me a little ground for pride.

From 1892 to 1966 an annual dress ball was held for the students of L'Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris, the famous arts school of France. Admission was restricted to students in the four ateliers of the school: painters, sculptors and others, and the managers were from the school itself, as gay (which means merry) and ribald as the students themselves, but also strict in their standards. Gatherings of characters in City of Heroes sometimes remind me of that event, also carnival-esque, except for its officially prohibited but really common nudity from both sexes. After the first few years, every ball was dedicated to some historical theme. There were tableaux vivants, dancing, champagne, beauty contests and general revelry. The women who attended, artist models a lot of them, painted their bodies underneath costumes, and the costumes would eventually come off to everyone's delight. The men were often not far behind. The ball lasted through the night and poured out in a winding procession across Montmartre. Towards the morning, somewhere by Louvre, they revelers would disperse. Here we have a Roman senator with a purple strip on the toga, a Japanese woman, a knight kissing on horseback, a Gavroche of a boy under a hoplite's shield, someone who looks to be from the secret police of Venice flirting with an Indian, maybe, - and a contemporary policeman watching from the curb, And below is a bill from one of those events - dedicated to Ancient Egypt, I guess. The French says something like: "Beauty, come with us to marry the pharaoh. Don't be afraid to ride to Abydos in a scant Thebian costume! The Committee." (Notice the hairy calf of the pharaoh.) Wikipedia quotes an instruction from the organizers: "Bal Des Quat-z' Arts, Moulin Rouge, 21 April 1899. Doors open at 10 P. M. and close at midnight. The card of admission is absolutely personal, to be taken by the committee before the opening of the ball. The committee will be masked, and comrades without their personal card will be refused at the door. The cards must carry the name and quality of the artist, and bear the stamp of his atelier. Costumes are absolutely necessary. The soldier—the dress suit, black or in color— the monk—the blouse—the domino—kitchen boy—loafer—bicyclist, and other nauseous types, are absolutely prohibited. Should the weather be bad, comrades are asked to wait in their carriages, as the committee in control cannot, under any pretext, neglect guarding the artistic effect of the ball during any confusion that might ensue. A great "feed" will take place in the grand hall; the buffet will serve as usual individual suppers and baskets for two persons. The committee wish especially to bring the attention of their comrades to the question of women, whose cards of admission must be delivered as soon as possible, so as to enlarge their attendance — always insufficient. Prizes (champagne) will be distributed to the ateliers who may distinguish themselves by the artistic merit and beauty of their female display. All the women who compete for these prizes will be assembled on the grand staircase before the orchestra. The nude, as always, is Prohibited!?! The question of music at the head of the procession is of the greatest importance, and those comrades who are musical will please give their names to the delegates of the ateliers. Your good-will in this line is asked for—any great worthless capacity in this line will do, as they always play the same tune, "Les Pompiers!" The Committee—1899." Here is another illustration from the early days, as usual soul-piercingly unattainable in its artistry and mastery: The balls evoked indignation in polite society, of course, and sometimes ended quite sadly. A very popular model, Marie-Florentine Roger or Royer, known as Sarah Brown for her red golden, "Celtic," tresses and a milky white skin, was arrested for nudity at the 1899 ball. When her whereabouts proved impossible to establish, it was concluded that she probably committed suicide, which led to wide rioting by the students in Paris. It is her levitating, chagalesque, in the first picture. The tradition of the ball, as I said, ended in 1966, which to my mind sets a definite date in a period that I had approximately felt to be the last days of human fun. It was around that same year that in America the Blue Meanies chased out the Yellow Submarine, and they have ruled ever since. We have plenty of them on these boards, too, and the irrational fear Cryptic, NCSoft and now Homecoming have of any suggestion of nudity, the whole hypocrisy and disgrace of the "T" rating, are part of that. As far as I am concerned, I would have liked to see those heroes and villains who mingle in Pocket D to do something more than stand around and flash their special effects. Around them everywhere stand NPC that imitate life and relaxation. The players, to prove that they are living, could at least start a boombox or do some dance emotes or try a party game. Or chat in Local, at a minimum. But maybe they feel shy, don't feel that they may. Well, you may, people. You may start anything you can. The tradtion of carnivals around the world is rich and profound. Those who want to find out a lttle more about this ball are welcome to consult the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bal_des_Quat'z'Arts And if someone knows that tune they played, "Les Pompiers," enlighten me.

So I made this evil surfer dude called Whoa Betide, right? He is a Water Blast/Storm Summoning Dominator who wants to turn the planet from 3/4 water to 4/3. And he has Prestige Sprint: Power Slide on, swirling underfoot, and Slide as his running stance. But how is he supposed to surf through the air everywhere, if Hover makes him either float vertical-like or fly like Flight? Tell me that! Now if he could soar in one of those other stances, he'd be, like, so much truer to his old name - Noah.

Couldn't this be circumvented by supplying a simple text file for every costume listing all of the pieces involved in it and the colors used so that the player has a blueprint for rebuilding a costume from scratch? It doesn't take long to rebuild a costume, as long as you quite remember which parts you used and how they were colored and with what patterns. That kind of list could probably be generated automatically - like the list of powers and their colors on importing, where the changes to all powers are contained. If Homecoming can generate this kind of inventory for every existing character and send the lists out over in-game e-mail before setting down to alphabetize things, players could take care of things on their own side. Give them free tailor sessions, obviously. It's an unpleasant part of housekeeping, but the overhaul would be worth it. And as for adding more parts, can't the sequence problem be solved with some clever renumbering? If the parts go by 1, 2 and so on, insert them as 1.1 and so on?

Why is a text file a security issue? Any browser will offer saving passwords. They are even saved at e-stores and e-banks, although there one usually has to add some extra identification (at least here in Russia; I don't know about the United States, but here all and sundry want to know your phone number to send you confirmation codes, and when you start giving that, expect to begin getting spam calls). I don't believe that a hacker's program could not access these stored passwords. Also this game is free to play, completely at the moment. That has the advantage of making everything in an account impossible to steal, because it has no value. Nobody can buy in-game items with my password, at most someone might vandalize the character roster and waste my respecs. As evil as that would be, access becomes a non-issue if the "Save password" checkbox is accompanied by a disclaimer somewhere. It is a theoretical risk which is mine to take, like all risks.