Remidi

Another former Pong player. I'm 58, which means I'm old enough to have watched Dark Shadows after school.

People are buying things in a free game? ... My brain hurts.

It was my understanding that the negotiations were to make sure NCSoft doesn't start sending lawyers after us. Our side's job is to prove we're harmless and throw enough at them to convince them to leave us alone. To think that they are going to somehow resurrect the game on a commercial level is... well, there's a fine line between optimism and delusion.

Not to throw cold water on the idea-fest, but do remember we are talking about a group of volunteers. Any deal with NCSoft is not going to include them hiring a new development team. We are not going to get new issues several times a year. I would be perfectly happy with no server wipe and the occasional new thing, with maybe some revamps of old stuff thrown in here and there.

I'm pretty happy with things as they are. All I want from NCSoft is for them to leave us alone to play our game in peace. However, there are a few things that would be nice. 1. Continue the lore, like the Coming Storm. 2. Complete the Incarnate System. I hate to leave things half-finished. 3. Continue having "no thanks" options like Null the Gull. For instance, there are people who would like base raids to return. There are others who view base PvP with utter loathing. So you could have that SGs that wanted PvP could be flagged to earn prestige so they could buy defense/offense items. Non-PvP bases would be like they are now. 4. Speaking of bases I continually live in hope that we can eventually have more than 18 storage items per base. Like I said, I'm good now. If the game didn't make a single solitary change from this day forward, I'd still be playing.

To be fair, I doubt this issue is a priority for NCSoft. Somewhere, someone has been assigned to deal with those weirdos in America who want to play a dead game (their attitude, not mine). We'll just have to be patient.

I keep my salvage because A-I'm lazy and like having things at hand, and B-It gives me a kick to make a rare IO for only the crafting price because I already have everything I need. My biggest change has been with set IOs. I used to hoard nearly everything with the attitude, "But I might have a toon that needs it someday!" Now, what with good drops and prices that aren't in the stratosphere, I sell a lot of them. If an IO isn't in one of my current toons' build chart, it is gone. I mean, I just checked and my L25 alt has 700 merits. With recipes that used to go for 200 or 240 merits going for 50, I can get what I need pretty easily.

Ah, yes, on topic. Well, my plan is to keep playing the game until they tall us something definitive. I must say, however, the continuing work on the beta server is very encouraging.

Funnily enough, I once had this problem for a character that wasn't a copycat or homage. I once had a fire/fire blaster named Lord Pyroclast. His costume was a red and yellow armor, and I used a mask. I kept getting people who said, "Nice Iron Man ripoff." Now, I didn't think his armor looked like Iron Man's. It was red and yellow, yes, but not patterned to look like his at all, and I didn't use a helmet. My solution? I wrote a bio about how he built the armor in his uncle's scrap yard, and spent all his time in classes to teach him how to craft the parts. I finished it up with "bet you thought I had to be some rich guy to be able to make armor like this, huh?" Never got an Iron Man remark ever again.

Funny, I'd like the reverse. I had a character with a helmet, but eventually switched to hair because I didn't like staring at the back of her bald head below the helmet. I even tried using the steampunk lace collar, but it didn't go up high enough.

Well, this was obviously a long time ago, but the costume was as close as a newbie could get - I think this was still in the no capes until L20 days - and the name was something screamingly obvious like Bat Guy. And for those asking if they actually enforced it, I can recall seeing genericed characters running past on several occasions. ETA: I saw lots of people get away with the other rule against characters based on something offensive. I saw toons named after porn stars, sex acts, and once, Hitler.

I confess that I never dug into mechanics back on live, because I didn't have the time or energy to chase the expensive IO sets. Now, however, I'm trying to build more knowledgeably. So, for a self-confessed idiot like me, will someone tell me how accuracy works into the fast snipe scenario? Because all the snipe sets include accuracy, not to hit. Will this help, or will only to hit bonuses work to boost damage?

The PW people have said that the site is open source, and they have no problem with Homecoming making a copy specific to our conditions. The GMs are in agreement that we need our own wiki. So what besides obvious things like Sentinel info would you like to see for our version of PW? For me, the first thing would be that about 95% of the base building information is no longer correct since we don't have to earn prestige. This section could be greatly simplified. And in the personal-bugaboo category, I would completely redo the contact pages. I would move all the who sends you to who dialogues down to the bottom. For some parts of the game where you have multiple contacts all covering the same content, that section can be massive. You scroll and scroll and scroll and oh hey, finally information on the missions! Another change is that any mission that is timed, has a timed element, or automatically sends you to a timed mission upon completion need to be marked with big honking red letters! Actually, anything that makes a mission different from the norm needs to be indicated in an easy to find way. So, what do you want to see in a Homecoming Wiki?

I remember warning a few just-out-of-the-tutorial newbies that they needed to start a new character. I never reported any of them, but they were so blatant I knew somebody would. "Dude, your name and costume make it obvious you're Batman." "Yeah, but who will notice?" "Um, I noticed." "Oh. Right."

Don't worry! Rex was safe, and now he's back to play with us.

I agree that 'stabbing in the heart' is too personal and ascribing malice where there wasn't any. Back when the live game folded, this was going around, and I think it perfectly describes the situation. NCSoft blithely thought that, like some other game communities, we would go chase the latest new shiney. They seriously underestimated the depth of feeling of the CoH fanbase.

Even worse, the True Healer build - all empathy powers, only the required secondary starter power, the Medicine pool, any pool with team support powers, and never, ever any power that did damage.

And Disney is especially vigilant because they trademark *everything*. Copyright expires, so to prevent their characters from becoming public domain they use trademarks. The whole subject can get very tricky. A fight between heirs allowed Sherlock Holmes to fall into the public domain, but some later stories still retain copyright on details only in them. Thank goodness CoH doesn't have to worry about that sort of scramble.

Wonderful. I had no idea, since I don't fool much with the LFG function. I suppose I should grab my friends and check it out.

Does this set ever drop? Is there a way to obtain it other than the market or merits? Or should I wait to see if our new devs run the event they came from?

Not in cases like that. Disney pointed out that by having their characters on the sign, etc., people could think that Disney was somehow connected to the day care center. A very different kettle of fish than what we are talking about with CoH.

I know they do for trademarks, and I guess it was sloppy to lump them in together. But that's why you hear those stories about stuff like Disney telling a day care center they can't have Mickey Mouse on their exterior. They have to protect their trademark, even for small things.

Personally, I'm grateful that the PTBs gave us a heads up. I had seen references to the Titan Network talking to NCSoft, and was worried Homecoming could be left out in the cold. This lets us know we're in the game. ETA: I should say that I always loved the tools and info that TN provided. I just have a lingering itch from old forum battles. I prefer to play solo/duo, and back then there were people in TN who felt you should be forced to join an eight player team just to cross the street. That was years ago, and they may have mellowed on that point.

Okay, a couple of points. First, a lot of you have the wrong licensing model. You are thinking in terms of software, when the issue is intellectual property. Think of it this way - when you walk into a store and see an Elmo doll, Sesame Street did not make that doll. They sold a license to a toy company that allows them to use the Elmo intellectual property to make Elmo dolls. Games are the same way. The negotiation is over letting HC and/or others use NcSoft's IP without being sued for violating copyright and trademark laws. Second, those laws. In the US, if a company does not defend their trademarks and copyrights, they can be considered public domain and the company loses the right to them. Therefore, NcSoft had to do something if they didn't want to surrender the game completely, which no sensible company would do. Negotiations gives us a chance to keep playing our game.