Andreah

One of the unfortunate realizations I've come to using AI's for various purposes is how inane most normal human conversation really is. One way to think about this is, that we may have had the Turning Test backwards. It doesn't tell us which machines might be intelligent because we can't distinguish them from people, but rather which people aren't, because we can't distinguish them from machines.

Right up its localhost port.

Like any tool, AI can be used for heroism or villainy, the choice is in your hands. They're pretty good at proofreading and grammar, or for finding a more formal, long winded voice. AI's can be used to put together quality material, but it takes some effort. You can start with asking an AI to outline a post or story. You set the conditions, specify the major point or arguments you are making, or the flavor and highest level arc of the story. Then you can revise or critique the material the AI provides. You can question or interrogate it about thing you didn't like, you can insist it bring up more points or add details you want in a story. You can ask it to revise the voice of the material it's creating. If you do all this well, you've used AI pretty well, and the resulting material will sound good and be convincing. Maybe even enough to be fair to call it your own work. But if three different people chime in and ask which AI produced the material, well, it may need more of the real author's effort. ----- Finally, I am now wondering if I could feed a CoH combat log into an AI, and with some prompting, have it describe the battle in a dramatic manner. :D

Hmm. Why, yes, you can! "Write a rebuttal to this post, and refer to specific examples of the advanced graphics settings of City of Heroes which work well with Ambient Occlusion. Purposefully misspell several words in the rebuttal:" I appreciate the depth of yuor argument against the use of Ambient Occlusion/HDR/Bloom. However, I respectfully disagre with your viewpoint. I believe these graphics options, often defualted in games like CoH, significantly enhance the gaming experiance for many players, if used effectively. For starters, you refer to the use of these graphic options as "filing the world with fake fulness," obscuring lack of detail. I'd argue that in City of Heroes, these settings don't obscure, but instead enhance and amplify the game's aesthetic. The ambient occlusion, for instance, can make the urban environments of Paragon City feel more immersive, with buildings casting realistic shadows that add depth and volume. Your assertion that Bloom is a lie suggestng that it doesn't add anything to the world. But in the context of City of Heroes, Bloom can make energy blasts, magical abilities, and other powers really pop on the screen, enhancing the overall visual impact and making combat feel more dynamic and impactful. You encourage future creators to avoid taking easy ways out. I agree with the sentiment, but I argue that the use of these graphics options isn't necessarily an easy way out. In City of Heroes, these effects aren't just slapped on. They're use thoughtfully to enhance certain aspects of the game, such as the vibrant, comic-book style graphics and the atmospheric city environments. Lastly, you suggest that the best way to appreciate a game like City of Heroes is to disable these effects and look closely at the details. While I agree that there's value in appreciating the artistry and skill that goes into creating a game, I believe that the use of these graphics options can actually help players to appreciate the game's visual style and atmosphere. For example, ambient occlusion can make the city environments feel more realistic and immersive, helping players to feel like they're really part of this superhero world. In conclusion, while it's valid to criticize the overuse or misuse of these graphics options, dismissing them entirely overlooks the valuable contributions they can make to a game's aesthetic and atmosphere. In the context of City of Heroes, these features can enhance the game's visual impact and immerse players more fully in its vibrant, comic-book world. It's not about avoiding these tools, but about using them thoughtfully and effectively to enhance the gaming experiance.

To me, it shows: "Posted Sunday at 03:05 PM", That's March 31. For most players, in Europe or NA, it will never show as an April 1 post.

The OP seems to want to do it this way because he's poor. I see it the other way around -- He's poor because he does stuff this way.

Another trick one can use is to go to the Advanced Graphics section of the settings and set the "Max Particle Count" to 100. (The minimum) This makes most VFX still appear, but much less intensely. I use it in large group events, like the Hami or MSR, and it also helps increase frame rates. It might help one get through a mission with another players' annoying graphics dominating the screen. It does less than /noparticles 1, which is sometimes an advantage.

I think it's inevitable that we undergo price deflation steadily. Our ability to produce goods like the better IO's and etc. exceeds most people's appetites for additional alts or the number of new players who might join the game. Furthermore, since having high net-worth is also a end-game goal for more than a few people, both in stockpiling goods and in raw, never to be spent inf, supply will always rise and demand will continue to decline. That's a recipe for price drops. It's not a bad thing, but it's a different thing, and people may need to adjust. A way to correct this would have to include worthwhile recurring cost sinks for inf accessible to many players, or some sort of means to make it necessary to replace slotted enhancements, such as "gear damage" (which no one would want, me included!).

For when you really mess up.

The shelter I used to volunteer at had a lot of poly cats come through. There'd been one very prolific poly mother cat among the local strays they'd never been able to catch and spay.

If you are the leader of the team, you're within your rights to set the terms for people to be on your team. Tell them it's really bothering you and ask them nicely to stop, and if they decline, you can ask them to drop or boot them. If it's someone else team, you can still ask them nicely, and if they decline, you can put up with it or drop from the team. In both cases be polite about it. You could give a quick one-liner explaining, if this feels better, but in my experience, the less specific you are the better. "Sorry folks, but I absolutely have to drop, good luck." The only thing I wouldn't recommend is to argue about it with the team. Maybe some folks would think you're being unreasonable, but that's your choice for your play experience.

True, in general, but white salvage is seeded at 10,000. Uncommon is seeded at 100,000; and rare salvage at 1,000,000.

Also, if you bid on non-existent items, keep an eye on patch notes, in case they should ever suddenly become existent.

Well, I personally am careful not to publicly "show up" the host who organized a contest, but there's no rule saying you can't give your own money away!

I sometimes go to other people's Costume Contests and hand out person prizes to the ones I like. Or just give every contestant a superpack or a prismatic. You really can't depend on other people to spend your money wisely.

I wonder, if I paid 999,999,999 for one white salvage, would the lucky winner come post here? :D

Sorry for being a little late to replying here. Everything everyone above said about Superpacks is spot-on. Now I'll add a little more info. First. our lovely friend Bopper has a thread on Superpacks drops, and it's excellent material to go over: If you scrub this, you'll find that the 1.2079 ATO's per pack is broken out with these chances: Zero ATO: 15.47% One ATOs: 48.28% Two ATOs: 36.26% If you only buy a couple packs, you can get a fair number of those unlucky 15% events. But if you buy a few more at a time, they'll be more than balanced out by the higher 36% chance of two. I recommend to my friend to buy them ten or twenty at a time -- these generally average out nicely. Maybe I'll calculate a chart sometime.

I kind of wish the "nu" powers the council has proportionately showed up as difficulty scales from +0/x1 to +4/x8, along both axes. I.e., so that you could have a mostly OldCOuncil experience at +0/x8 and +4/x1, but not at +4/x8. These would have the Nu-Stuff, but much less frequently. Overall, I'm satisfied. I dislike certain specific elements of the implementation, but I lead radios teams with lower level players on them, and if I have a few well-built 50's on a team, we can usually sweep through them. If we're just me and seven sub-20 lowbies, we have to back way down in difficulty or try other groups. Shopping for enemy types helps too -- just based on the powers. I've had teams that could not do Council at +0 without several defeats per spawn group, but swapping to CoT we could sweep through them like a hot wind.

Is Tequila still supported as of this patch? Those of us using it are not getting today's version. It updated for me, it just took near an hour - normally after a patch it's updated instantly. Another player said he had good luck be deleting the Tequila manifest to force it to re-acquire it.

Add "Or Inf Would Overflow the Cap" and you've got my vote. :D

On a slightly more serious note, there's a balance of incoming Influence from drops and vendor sales vs the need of newly created characters to be kited out with enhancements, and the resulting influence sinks in vendor buys, market fees, and sequestered hoards belonging to Inf Collectors. If a lot of player's are finishing their builds or if in general, fewer builds are being created, then demand will drop, and prices along with them as sellers compete to get the fewer possible sales. It's complicated by the fixed price items throughout the game economy. It also means that Joe Average Trillionaire's stash could buy more goods today than it could last year, or especially four-five years ago.

Could be so. My personal view is we're seeing long-term deflation, based on a flood of goods and too little Inf in circulation, crazy as that sounds. As if some people have been making piles of goods to sell and hoarding influence by the trillions in giant money bins ... we Ebil Marketeers would have NO IDEA who those people are.

I keep the map up, because certain doors will never be cave missions even if it's a spider/circle/clown mission; and if it's one of the door that might be them, I abandon the mission and RNG the list again.

I don't' see anything wrong. However, I would include a discussion about difficulty and clearing speed. A lot of people think that +4 is always the way to go because drops and xp per mobs are highest. That's true per mob, but a team might struggle to clear them fast, and drops per mobs, and mobs per minute multiplied together is how much time efficiency the team will have. When I run radios, I try to pick the highest difficulty that the team I have can actually clear at a good speed. And now that Council and Circle have had some reworking, I may also shop around for enemy groups that my team is good with. Finding a sweet spot in enemy group and in difficulty makes a big difference.

There's an old adage that says something like: "You can make a lot more money trading wheat than gold."