Abraxus

Oddly enough, I've been told that before...in this very thread...by a Dev no less! 😆

Over the years of the original run, I had a few characters with SS. In a lot of zones, it was fine. But, for those with vertical terrain challenges (Faultline for instance), I found I had to augment it with something that would give me the ability to compensate. Jump pack, or additional travel power like Hover, or Teleport. I did those things, but finally just settled on either Fly, or Super Jump for the most part, so I wouldn't have to resort to those kinds of measures. When I've got something that intensely thematic, and that travel power works for it though, then so be it. Otherwise, I'm guilty of taking the easy path to get from A to B. 😉

Once we have resolution (one way, or the other) to the talks with NCSoft, I would expect to start hearing more about the future of the game, and the development efforts for potential changes/new content. Until then, I don't believe things will change too much, outside of fixes for issues that need more immediate attention. After things are solidified, so many things are possible! Some of which will thrill people, and disappoint others. In other words, just like it always was, and always will be. 😎

I use Fly as a travel power on the majority of my characters, except the ones that use the large, or huge body models. To me, those guys look ridiculous flying, so for them, I use Super Jump. When Afterburner came out, and I was finally able to make Fly a power that didn't suffer a speed deficit, as a trade-off for the relative safety it provided, I was ALL in! Suddenly, I wasn't always the last one to show up at doors, when the team had to traverse across the entire length of Independence Port, and I could still enjoy the view along the way. To me, it was the perfect add to the set, and given the information here, to know that you don't have to "three-slot" it to get more than acceptable speed, makes it even better! The only accommodation I had to make, was setting up a keyboard macro, that would turn on both Fly, and Afterburner, then shut them both off when I arrived. Otherwise, Fly would turn off, leaving AB on, and making me unable to do anything else. A few times (when it was new), I went into missions thinking the game was glitched, because my attacks weren't firing, and I couldn't do anything, only to find AB still running, and the "Only affecting Self" message in the corner of the screen. 😚

I'll share a memory, and it's a pretty recent one. Like last night recent. Synapse TF, being the "weekly", is not surprisingly being run every few minutes. I had just completed a run with a L15 blaster, who ended up L20 at the end, and it took only 1 hour 20 minutes. About that time, a friend got online, and wanted to run the same TF. Well, I had another character in that range that I wanted the badge, the XP, and the merits for, so I said "Sure". 15 minutes later, nobody had started one, so we formed it ourselves. Got a team of 8 very quickly. All good so far. A couple of missions in, someone went AFK, and never returned. Then a few minutes later, another member DC'd, and never came back. So, now we are looking at fighting on, with a team of 6, comprised of two Brutes, a Defender, three Dominators, and a Controller. Given the nature of the Synapse TF (which is that the majority of missions are "kill all"), we started feeling the "slog fatigue" at around the two hour mark. It was getting late on the east coast, where a few of our team members hailed from, and they were dozing off at their keyboards. But, we fought on! We didn't have anyone with Stealth/TP to find the bosses in the last few missions, and teleport us directly to them to save time. Nope. We slogged through it all to get to them. When we finally got to Babbage, we didn't have the damage with just the 6 of us to even make a dent! Fortunately, since he is outside, we were able to call for assistance from others in the zone. It took longer than is typical, be we finally prevailed. The final mission with The Clockwork King, slogged it through the lair, finally got to him, and took him down quicker than expected, given what happened with Babbage. So, at three hours, and 20 minutes, we were finally done, and feeling like we had earned every one of those 116 merits! It was not the finest example of an efficient, well balanced Task Force. But, it was a great example of perseverance, and dedication. It would have been easy for more to just say "You know, this is taking too long, and I'm done". But, nobody did that. They fought on, and prevailed. Not unlike the CoH community itself has done all these years since the game shut-down. The reason we are playing again at all, is because we never gave up hope, and believed against all odds, that someday, we would be back to tell stories like this again someday. I'll take playing a less than stellar Task Force experience any day of the week, over just being able to remember the good ones from days gone by.

The folks who believe this is all a nefarious plot on the part of anyone involved in these talks, are gonna think that, and nothing anyone says, or shows to the contrary is going to change their minds. If things go well, they will still be skeptical, thinking the bottom will fall out at any moment. If it falls through, they will say they knew it all along, and likewise be ready to run for the hills. For the rest of us, we will wait, watch, and react according to what we hear from the team, rather than out of pessimistic speculation, and we will just keep playing the game we love. It's really as simple as that. 😎

87.95 huh? I'm guessing that could easily have been just a rounded off 88mph, but that number harkens to other known properties, so I guess they wanted to avoid that. 😉

I'll take as much freem as possible please! ⚡

Having just completed the last of my 6 Incarnate T4 powers, I can attest to this personally! You want those Empyrean merits, and as many of them as you can get! The fact that you are awarded 20 (?) of them for each three Vet levels achieved is nothing to sneeze at, and without XP turned on, you are missing out on a free bonus/reward for your endeavors.

Personally, I'm excited about the possibilities that this could open to the Devs, to the game, and ultimately, to the players. Fingers crossed for a speedy, and positive outcome! 🤞

Then, of course, there's that! 👆

I haven't heard of any such talk. If such a thing happens, there are always accommodations made, and they will be announced far in advance of any such changes. Relax man! Just play, and enjoy until you hear something concrete. 🙂

Ok, you're a skeptic. 😉 Everything else has yet to be proven either way, until it is. Prior to that point, we got nuthin'.

The other faction were those screaming for transparency. However, they weren't specific on that desire for transparency, in that it should be limited to only those things that won't potentially make me anxious all over again. 😉

I think a legitimate case can be made for both sides of the argument. Never gonna please everybody, no matter what they do, so it becomes a matter of which faction you run afoul of in the end.

Yup! I think said exactly the same thing a few pages ago. But, whose counting? 😉

How about the earnest desire for them to be as transparent as possible, as they always said they would, without violating the terms of their negotiations? They aren't trying to upset folks. They are trying to amp them up over something they obviously consider to have a good chance for success base on what they KNOW, and we don't. I know it's our nature to be cynical after all the previous attempts, but the game already being out in the wild really does change the balance this time around. Whether it's enough to make a real difference, we don't know. But, it's got a better shot than any previous attempts due to that fact. So, perhaps a little "glass is half full" perspective. There does appear to be some cause for it in this case.

I'd have to agree with that too! As much as I'd hate to see anyone forced even further underground, I know that there are segments of the community that will never jump back onboard, regardless of the legitimized status, and they will head for whatever corner of the internet where they can exist, far from anyone's notice. Those divisions arose shortly after the first public SCORE server was set-up, and subsequently shut-down after a false C&D spooked the hardware owner. That is about when the Reddit, and 4Chan servers arose, and folks disaffected by their perception of the Homecoming effort migrated there. Whether their reasons were legit, or not, I doubt most of them would reconsider in the face of whatever changes come about after the terms of the deal are made known.

I can't argue with that, because I don't know for sure that will be the result. It certainly could be, but we won't know, until we know. I suppose that, if this is successful, and is recognized as the only "officially" sanctioned server, that could very well mean issues for the others. If it does, I hope we can find a way to prevent that from becoming a divisive problem, but we'll have to deal with it when we know for sure.

I wish I could give assurances, but I'd be doing exactly what I'm advocating against, which is speculating without any actual facts, or drawing conclusions based on the past. While the past does inform the present, and future, historical perspective does not necessarily predict the outcome in either case. There are just too many variables involved which are unknown to us, and will greatly affect the outcome. So, just keep on doing what you've been doing, and we'll all get there together. 🙂

Perhaps because it's 7 years later, there are very likely a lot of new folks involved from the NCSoft side who were not around for other similar negotiations. And, most of all, previous attempts did not enjoy the advantage of the game being out in the wild already. Before, all of the leverage was theirs. This time, it's not. They can find a way to benefit by the new landscape, or spend eternity chasing down rogue servers. One of them sounds like a better way to go, from any business perspective. The other does not. It's totally up to them which way it goes, but the reality is, the genie cannot be stuffed back in the bottle, no matter how hard they might try. If they do decide to go that route, that will just force players to more underground servers, with much smaller populations. But, the game will not just disappear because of anything they do ever again. Edit: I gotta be faster on the trigger! Two people already posted a shorter version of this, and the point is already made. Damn it! 😉

I know it's human nature to assume the worst in the absence of fact. I have been doing my level best to remind folks that they don't have to give into that fear. You can't help but feel it, but you don't have to act based on it. We can't control how we feel about a thing, but we definitely have control over how we react to it. That part is voluntary. So, I'm encouraging folks to feel as they will, but not to lose hope, and act before the facts are know. That's all. I have also tried to inspire folks to not assume that they know exactly how things will come out, based on what they "know". At this point, the only folks who KNOW anything for sure, are the folks involved with these talks. Outside of that, there are no hard facts. So, it becomes difficult to take seriously those comments that would portend to predict the outcome, based on their perspective of the situation. It's just not a thing. So, while they talk, let's all play like we've been doing, and the answers will come when they will. Then we can rejoice, or run for the hills. In either case, it will then (and only then) be justified.

Boredom on a rampart can fuel much speculation? So, apparently, can participation in a forum topic, concerning things near, and dear to our heart, in the absence of complete information . 😉😎 In any case, the game is here, we are playing it, and nothing has really changed for the time being. When we know the facts, I'm sure we will all have our own take on what it means for the future, and can base decisions, perspectives, and opinions on those facts. But, we ain't there yet.

Nice thing about the topic of character export is, we know it has been done before for one of the other servers. When one of the other servers shut-down, and folks were being transferred to another, there was collaboration between the groups, and they made it happen. Plus, the mechanism for transferring from one shard, to the other on Homecoming would have to be at least a subset of this procedure. So, it's not unprecedented in the mechanics. Just a matter of if it is viewed as feasible by the Dev team to make available upon request.

I think we all have the highest hopes for how this will go. But, all we can do for now is be patient, keep the faith, and keep on playing!