Zumberge

"Half A Horse" travel power when?

This is an interesting proposal and it's helpful that you provided examples and did testing. This would open up quite a few options regarding design, but the one thing that concerns me is how having players be two feet tall would affect PvP. Admittedly, I don't know if having the smallest character possible is part of the current meta; would anyone from Indomitable be able to chime in on this?

It's been a dog's age since I wrote for CoH, for obvious reasons, and recently I got an inkling of an idea that I felt like fleshing out. Wrote it in a bit of a hurry, and it's less about the hero and more about a level 9 minion, so not only do you not need to know who the other character is, you don't even need to care. (Also you can play "spot the reference" if you want to.) It wasn't supposed to turn out like this, Hoffer thought. The orders from on high - from an Arbiter, no less - were to explore a section of Faultline that had recently opened up following a shift in a particularly unstable section of earth near the dam. It was an exploratory mission, slated to leave at two at night and remain out until sunset, obtaining coordinates for further investigation. The idea was that the cover of darkness would shield the squad from prying eyes. It turned out that some Longbow members have infrared vision. Huntsman Tresca was the first to die, a beam of pure heat burning straight through his armor from above. Surprised and without orders, Hoffer and the other simply fired skyward at any motion or light they could see. It was a panicked din of shouting and gunfire as they tried to fight back, to escape, to do anything as they died one by one. A blast of heat and light erupted nearby, and he felt himself falling, ears ringing before he hit the cold, dirty water below. He flailed, righting himself before surfacing, gasping for air and reaching for anything to grab onto. One hand took hold of the rim of a pipe and he crawled in, shuffling forward into darkness as he heard voices above him. The going was slow and claustrophobic, but after some time he entered into a sewer tunnel, still lit by a few aging bulbs and mercifully empty of any of the other factions in the area he had been briefed on. One long, filthy walk lead him to an out-of-place ladder, and from there to a water-damaged basement that smelled of mold. He had no weapon, no radio, and the electronic components his helmet had been damaged by the explosion and water, but for the moment he was alive, and with that thought he lapsed into unconsciousness. Hoffer woke up stiff and hurting, sunlight streaming in from an uncomfortably large crack in the far wall. He was unarmed, exposed, and alone in a hostile city on his first mission outside the Rogue Isles, all in the name of a perfect, enduring future that was growing more empty and distant by the second. Maybe if he waited until dark he could head back the way he came and hopefully link up with another unit. Maybe if- A chunk of rubble bounced along the ground outside and he tensed up, holding his breath as he held as still as he could. A second later a figure came into view; a young brunette, a few years older than he, short-haired, in a blouse, jeans, glasses, and sneakers; at first Hoffer took her for a civilian, but then noticed some sort of green suit beneath her clothes. Longbow was bad enough as it was, but the heroes of Paragon City were worse, cut from the same cloth as most of the Destined Ones back home. They were maybe more predictable but no less dangerous; officers and veterans in Arachnos had no end of stories about how the vigilante population was barely kept in check by the city's laws, and even then they had to deal with invaders in the Rogue Isles pursuing their prey with a single-minded obsession and no concern for civilian casualties. He had heard stories of the scheming of Manticore, the hypocrisy of Statesman, and of innumerable "heroes" who considered a quick death to be a mercy few were deserving of. Hoffer had never seen Paragon City, much less been to it before now, but it sounded true. So it came as a shock when she carefuly stepped inside and held up her hands, softly saying, "don't worry, I'm not going to hurt you." Hoffer stared at her, jaw agape before shaking it off. "No, no, this is a trick." He glanced about, straining his ears to see if he couldn't hear some unseen persons closing in on him from elsewhere. "It's not a trick." She thought for a moment before lowering herself to the ground, sitting cross-legged on the soiled carpet. "I just want to ask you some questions." "An interr- this is an interrogation." "No, I'm just..." She gestured, giving a sheepish shake of her head. "...not from around here, so there's a lot of things I don't know. People have talked about 'Arachnos,' but... what is it? What's it about?" He wasn't sure what to make of the situation. Whatever she was capable of, she probably could have done it by now. If she knew he was here she didn't have to buy time for reinforcements to show up because he wasn't in much of a condition to make a quick escape. Yet here she was, politely waiting for him to speak. So he did. He talked about Arachnos and the Rogue Isles, their strength, their unity, the call Lord Recluse made for the Destined Ones and their role in a greater plan. Every so often she would ask about one thing or another, her tone more of curiousity than judgement, and if Hoffer said he didn't know or it was classified she accepted it without question. It was unusual, speaking to someone who not only genuinely didn't know, but a hero no less, the very person he was told stood in their way. Then she asked a question he wasn't expecting. "So why did you join?" The room fell into silence again as Hoffer internally debated whether to talk about it. Eventually the words came, slowly at first, then nearly spilling from him: His father was a dock worker, his mother a nurse. He was average in school, with no real talents that could get him a scholarship in a university either in or outside the Rogue Isles. There were so many ideas on what he wanted to do with his life and so many possibilities but was unable to act on them. Arachnos gave his life direction, order, and the chance to be a part of something greater. He didn't have to worry about what to do because it was decided for him. Again, she listened quietly and with interest, nodding sympathetically every so often and asking questions to learn rather than condemn. As he spoke, however, something felt more and more off, and he began to feel pangs of regret over what he had done. Joining Arachnos seemed like the right choice when he made it, but things felt more and more off the more he tried to explain why he did it. When he was done, it was what she said afterwards that struck him the hardest. "You wanted to be free from freedom." ***** Despite their claims, the detectives of the Paragon Police Department weren't so jaded that they couldn't still be surprised. Thus it came as a shock when one of the resident heroines escorted a nervous-looking Wolf Spider into the New Overbrook precinct, the soldier seemingly entering of his own volition. Stopping in front of the main desk, he looked over at her, who nodded reassuringly at him before he turned his attention back to the officer at the desk. "My name is Simon Hoffer, Wolf Spider with Arachnos. I've come to turn myself in." The officer stared at him for a moment before shrugging. "Alright." Turning to his computer he began typing. "Can I have the name of the arresting individual?" "Zoe," she said. "Zoe, right. You, uh, have a last name, Zoe?" "Yes." Silence. "You gonna tell me what it is, or...?" "No." He gave Zoe a look. "Okay. If you're bringing him in we can have you attend his trial when-" "I'm not testifying against him." The officer exchanged glances with a co-worker beside him. "Really." "I'll go to defend him, but I'm not going to try to make things worse for him. What's going to happen? You throw him in jail for a few years and then he comes out with no work experience and a criminal record? He made a stupid mistake, but he doesn't deserve to be punished for the rest of his life for it." "So you want to testify on the behalf of an Arachnos soldier." "Yes." "Jesus Christ," he muttered, typing, "buncha fuckin' weirdos in this city."

In a game full of supervillains, the real crime was that you didn't get a Bug Hunter badge for your selfless inquiries into game exploits.

Oh my god I need this set in my life yesterday. Thank you.

GM redside bias confirmed, expecting five new blueside zones in i26 to balance this out. But seriously, the Rogue Isles have a nice design. (Stream of consciousness rambling follows.) The terrain is more interesting and varied; there's a sense of city planning in the urban parts, but unlike Paragon where you've got modern city design techniques where everything is orthogonal, there's more irregularity to the Rogue Isles, with people building from the shore inward. Kings Row looks old in a 70's Detroit sort of way, but the outskirts of Cap au Diable feel older. Buildings and roads conform to hills because they didn't have a choice in the matter or the means to level it out. With how they're designed the redside zones almost tell a story in and of themselves. On top of that there's a sense of verticality with the design that you really only see blueside in Skyway City. Instead of just square steel and concrete monoliths that really only just take up space you have catwalks and staircases up walls and around pillars, which also ties into the whole "building on islands, space is at a premium" thing. Despite this the zones never really feel cramped; honestly, they're pretty big. I really should make a super speed villain at some point because ground level absolutely bears exploring. Apropos of nothing, I'd honestly say that despite Grandville being absolute hell for super speeders, it works as an in-universe "Triumph of the Will"-esque propaganda piece. Plus the atmosphere is more... I don't want to say "dark" because that has connotations, but more dirty and somber, constantly overcast. The grimy industrial aesthetic that pops up all over appeals to my love of 90's FPS level design.

So I've been looking at some of the control sets I never had a chance to see much in action in Live and Elec Control caught my eye thanks to having an AoE confuse on a very reasonable cooldown. I was originally going to ask solely about how that performed but then I figured that it would just be more timely to ask about all the stuff that differs from other sets. So here we are. Jolting Chain - It's mass knockdown on an eight-second cooldown which, sure, probably isn't great, but is it even worth using insofar as both a) soft control is soft control, and b) you can put a Force Feedback set and proc in there for the chance of +recharge? Conductive Aura - Pine's has no endurance cost listed, and considering that it gives you recovery it's a gentle encouragement to get closer to the action. Is any aspect of the recovery or drain significant, though? Static Field - It appears to be a -speed -recharge patch, but how long does it last, and does the sleep effect proc continuously over its duration, i.e. can a single enemy be put to sleep multiple times? Synaptic Overload - It's a chain AoE, but if you shoot it into a mob, can you reasonably expect that (barring things like resistance and bosses requiring mag 4 mezzes for them to take effect) most of the mob will be affected? I guess the question is, how effective is it? That last one is probably going to make or break it because I really like AoE confuses you guys.

Last night I did a LGTF with a titan/dark armor brute.... .... on my broadsword/dark armor scrapper. If it matches the concept, it's not impossible to play Titan/Dark. It's impossible to make the character anything else.

"You have 1,023 characters to make sure everyone knows the tone and history of the character you're creating." This is where legends are born. (No TinyURL or Pastebin links, though. That's cheating and nobody's gonna look at 'em anyway.)

I went on record at some point saying, quote, "Bio Armor requires a manual. You know that scene in the beginning of Mobile Suit Gundam when Amuro is piloting the robot with the book on his lap? That's you." There's a lot going on in the set, but having vulnerability to -Recharge, -Defense, and -Regen in exchange for it? Sure, that's a good deal. Later sets taking more attention also feels like the dev team learned the ins and outs of what they could do and got more ambitious with mechanics. (Frankly when you see that happen it's a good sign because it means they're learning.)

People pulling other mobs on top of you when you're already fighting one. It's absolute chaos and I live for it. Old supergroup on Live had a Spines/Regen who pulled that crap on us all the time, and I think we kept him around because he kept us on our toes.

Oh, okay. Thank you. Of course the argument isn't "get rid of Void Hunters and quantum guns," it's to give people the option to choose for themselves whether they want them around.

They object to the addition of enemy types to non-Kheldian mission arc mob spawns that serve as a deliberate hard counter to HEATs, when both the VEATs don't have similar issues, and when Kheldians aren't so powerful that they warrant the addition of such enemies to keep them in check. XP and inf don't factor into it; quantums and Void Hunters replace enemies in mobs, they aren't added to their numbers, and even if you do get more XP for punching quantums and Void Hunters it's a pittance in the long run and arguably not worth the risk. I can't speak for everyone, but for all the teams I've been on that have encountered Shadow Cyst Crystals, nobody has expressed happiness. Nobody goes, "oh boy, we can get a lot of XP from this." They all just silently regret their life choices.

You say that's silly but the concept of e.g. a giant animated possessed demon sword flying around taking people out on its own agenda is pretty awesome. Like, fuck, if I ran into you on a team somewhere I'd roll with it. Absolutely.

Take all this with a grain of salt, but here goes. I think after the very informative post about Broadsword Stalkers, The Powers That Be are going to be very careful about what powers they proliferate. I want to say at this point that Battle Axe is comparable to Broadsword (Axe was kind of like the Tanker equivalent of it, right?), and Mace in turn is the smashing damage equivalent of Battle Axe's lethal; and that Stone Melee is comparable to both with regards to damage, animation, and recharge time. Certainly not exactly the same, but in the same general neighborhood. So Scrappers probably won't be wrecking things too badly if they got their hands on Stone Melee. That's fine, it's a good set; very single target-oriented but has nice feedback to the hits. Stalkers getting them... well, it's gonna be the same problem as Broadswords. Titan Weapons especially so, since we already know that giving them high-damage powers when they can crit basically on demand doesn't go over so good (Energy Melee was a mistake). Plus perhaps you could argue that it's not a thematic fit? All said, one of four things is probably gonna happen: 1. Status quo remains. 2. Scrappers start hitting things with rocks. They may not be getting smarter but they at least kind of look like they are. 3. Pandora's Box has been opened with a broadsword. Stalkers get axes and maces so you can pretend to be Garrett from Thief if he hit people over the head so hard with a truncheon their skulls were driven into their ribcages. 4. The seventh seal has been broken, and ninjas strike from the shadows with railroad crossing signs.

But the topic is about Regeneration under-performing both in general, and specifically compared to another set - Willpower - which largely does what Regeneration was originally created to do, in addition to other thing. Regen's niche is occupied, and it is not balanced. (In any case WP's gimmick is more that it's a little bit of everything: More health, regen, recovery, resists, and defenses all layered on top of each other with the hopes that something's gonna run into at least a little trouble with dealing damage to you, with the main drawbacks being a lack of a direct heal and the fact that you're not really a silver bullet against any particular enemy group or damage type.)

I remember when nobody had a handle on how to play Stalkers, so you ended up with people performing Assassin's Strikes, running away from the mob and waiting until they were re-hidden, then coming back and ASing again before repeating the process. Either that or performing an AS as an alpha before the Brute took aggro or the Dominator laid down control. Also, when the hold powers in Control sets had cooldowns short enough that you could easily use them on every mob. ...and when Dimension Shift was just a phase shift on a mob that put them in time out for a bit and confused the team because nobody could hit them. ...and travel powers at 14.

Judging from the power tool tips, how Spectral Wounds works is not entirely unlike other powers with delayed effects: It deals damage on activation, then several seconds later applies a heal to the target. It's not entirely unlike attacks with a knockdown component that activate a half-second or so after the initial damage. I'm trying to figure out how to implement IH like this compared to how other powers work, though. It's theoretically possible, but that's based around trying to reverse engineer an idea solely going off of how things are explained in power tooltips without actually seeing the code. EDIT: Or what jack_nomind said, yeah.

That one was me, back in the day. Plant/Kin/Stone, in a constantly fluctuating state of "this was the worst idea ever" and "this is the best idea ever." I did the original Posi TF with two other SG mates in the early levels and we coasted through it thanks to Spore Burst and Seeds of Confusion. Originally her translucency effect was done with Stealth in the Concealment pool and it was kind of kludgy, but at the end I got an Unbounded Leap: Stealth and we all took it as a sign that she was meant to be. Stuck it in Combat Jumping and it worked like a charm. Ended up overtaking my Scrapper as my main. A joke costume for her also lead to the creation of a seven-foot-tall Swedish metalhead nanomachine colony that was matte grey and like, 1800 pounds, but that's another story.

Regeneration's Fast Healing provides some -regen resistance, but then again, Willpower's does that too. Though it also has stun resistance and recovery which would come in handy with the Imperious Task Force and... not really sure where else, because you're not often getting hit with mag 16 stuns. I'm at a loss as to what to suggest to make Regeneration more comparable to other defense sets, but the idea that it could be revisited and rethought is a valid one, especially in light of the changes that were made to it to adopt it to Sentinel. The burst damage weakness should still be an element - I do like the original development team's tenet that every power set should have a weakness of some sort, or just something it doesn't do well at all - as should the reactive nature of it, like click heals, but beyond that I don't know what to say. tl;dr, good idea, but I'm too dumb to help.

This is the most adorable thing I've seen all week and I've been watching videos of cats.

So how it is, is that I get ideas for characters and end up writing their bios ahead of time for when I feel like rolling something new. Right now I've got a half a dozen of 'em in reserve, with a few more that got deleted along the way. Downside is that there's no screenshots; upside is that I can just copy-paste text instead of cropping screenshots and uploading them. Case in point: ...and there one that got ditched since I couldn't figure out a good angle for them in the setting without the co-star of the story she originated from, and because I heard Savage Melee on Brutes was a little naff. ("Warning - while you were typing 21 new replies have been posted. You may wish to review your post." JESUS CHRIST)

Had the idea recently that since there's quite a few anachronisms in the game already, that villains would use Usenet with dedicated newsgroups (like soc.crime.rogueisles.moderated) to plot and plan meetups. The idea was that a low-traffic system that doesn't have a centralized server would allow it to go relatively unnoticed in the surveillance state of the Rogue Isles (and you could probably use a slightly out-of-date computer for it, making it cheaper to replace if you need to slag the thing with thermite for... reasons). Also, instead of a character that's behind the times, it's old villains grumbling about Eternal September.

No. (I'm not trying to be rude or crush your dreams here, but you said it yourself: Petless MMs are bad.)

I'd rather take Energy Melee over Fiery Melee (or Savage Melee, as mentioned elsewhere) insofar as you can at least stack stuns on something to keep it from attacking you. The thought of engaging in a battle of attrition with e.g. an Elite Boss with no ranged attacks or control on an AT not particularly known for its sheer melee power is... not appealing.