Techwright

You mean the Teenage MUTANT Ninja Turtles? Because Teenage Natural Ninja Turtles and Teenage Science Ninja Turtles just don't have the same ring to them.

I suspect the "clean lines" look is what sold the judges. I know from past discussions that some prefer there to be more than 2 colors in a costume, so in that sense I'm surprised, but I've pulled off a couple of 2-color costumes and still get stopped by gawkers. I think those also appeal due to "clean" lines. There's some great feedback on this thread. Were this still the "live" game, I'd be pointing out the thread to the costume developers saying something like "See? Take note: Less spandex, more leather, and up-to-date fashions."

Yes, but does it have an immortal Scottish-accented, Spanish-named, Egyptian metallurgist as mentor? I suspect not. Sooo...

Really enjoyed this discussion of the topic, Sir Myshkin, though all contributions so far have been good. (Nice looking costume, Troo, though I'm confused how that makes an answer to the OP. Still, great balance of white, gold, and pastels.) Happy to hear more views on the OP, and the bonus question is still out there: Does a shift in anyone's costuming tastes since COH premiered now affect how they judge others costuming choices during costume contests?

No yellow/brown or yellow/blue spandex. No tight shorts worn over the rest of the costume. NO Capes! Have these and other costuming decisions brought to the big screen over the past 2 decades dramatically affected your choice of character costuming? I remember capes being a big thing early on in COH, especially since there was a mission to earn the right to wear them. Now I see fewer of them and more leather-type looks probably than classic spandex. Did X-Men movies and Edna Mode really get into our collective superhero costume psyche? Or have there been other influences, like say anime & manga, or even just real-life fashion changes? What drives people's superhero costuming tastes, and what, if anything has changed for your approach to costume design over the years? Bonus Question: Does any change in your thinking affect your decision making when viewing a costume contest?

I've no idea what's involved for devs with inserting an arena into the landscape, but it seems to me that a low/medium accessible arena could only benefit that overpass wasteland of meh buildings known as Skyway City. And hey, looky there! You've got the road system to handle sports-day crowds.

I'd heard several fans comment that the Ori storytelling just wasn't up to the Goa'uld level of stories. The problem, of course, is that they've eliminated all the System Lords. I've long thought the solution lies in taking a page from SG: Atlantis, specifically the Asgard. If you want Goa'uld, bring in an offshoot never seen before. Specifically, a group of Goa'uld who didn't care for Ra, packed up their bags and headed far, far away (back to that in a moment). Now they are returning, perhaps having learned of the vacuum created by the System Lords' demise, and true to their nature, have parasitically acquired technology to rival that of the Four Races. As to where they've been, somewhere beyond the normal Milky Way Stargate system. I was made aware a few years back that the Milky Way is not entirely on its own. Apparently there are dwarf galaxies intersecting or immediately adjacent, and that they're mostly red star galaxies. Red stars imply ancient worlds to sci-fi writers. I'd suggest that these wandering Goa'uld investigate one or more of these, and find their new tech and power there, either by conquest or finding long dead societies and retro-engineering their works. That raises the stakes for SG command who have Asgard tech, but now find the playing field at least leveled.

I know "The Incredible Hulk" was retconned into the MCU, but I thought they kept well clear of adding the Ang Lee movie?

Who is your favorite hero? Steve Rogers/Captain America. I have a deep affinity with the Greatest Generation, and Rogers exemplifies their character. Phil Coulson and Peggy Carter would be close seconds, though they're mostly developed in the TV shows. There was that Marvel One Shot with Coulson, though... Who is your least favorite hero? Probably Captain Marvel. I tend not to like overpowered characters. I prefer characters with limited powers tested and tried in extraordinary ways. For that reason, I don't always like how the Hulk is portrayed in other works outside the MCU, but at times, including in the MCU he's seen to be a vulnerable character mentally/emotionally, and that kind of balances things out. Thor might fall into that category too, but in MCU his emotional rollercoaster kept him interesting. Who is your favorite villain? That's a tough one. MCU has been criticized for not fleshing out most of their villains, and I think there's some justification for that. He wasn't developed enough, I'd really hoped for a multi-story arc, but I'd probably go with the Red Skull. Arnim Zoloff was pretty interesting too. Who is your least favorite villain? Faux-Mandarin Trevor. Such a wasted opportunity and with Ben Kingsley right there! I also didn't much care for the interpretation of Zimo, too "emo" for what I know of the character, though at least they didn't glue a Mushmouth mask to his face. ("Zimo the Emo"?) I do, however, look forward to his reappearance in "Falcon & the Winter Soldier" Here's hoping they get it right this time. Also Strucker was criminally underused, and Ultron was a joke. I really expected a cold Terminator-like presence with him. Did you notice he had steel lips that moved? Who is your favorite actor? Tough one again. Probably Chris Evans, though Hayley Atwell and Clark Gregg were, just as their characters, right up there with him. Honorable mention goes to Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane. Who is your least favorite actor? Brie Larson What is your favorite movie in the MCU? Probably "The Winter Soldier", though I have a great love for "The First Avenger" as well. What is your least favorite movie? Probably "Thor: Dark World". I can barely remember it. Every other MCU movie I recall.

Yes, this. Perfect fit for the Hollows, and it expands the Igneous usage just a bit. I always saw them as under-utilized. GiMo & GaMa? I don't see why not. If we can have Babbage in a TF as well as in Boomtown, why not Koago? That said, if it really is important lore-wise, just duplicate everything that's Koago, and slap another name on it. Maybe change the skin color slightly. Second GM, problem solved. EDIT: a thought just occurred to me. Not sure if the Hollows is really the place for this or not, but blue side doesn't really have a GM like Ghost of Scrapyard, that is, one that walks a beat surrounded by fightable NPCs. Might be interesting to have an Outcast GM surrounded by Outcasts patrolling the city sections of the zone, especially if he has a few monster class Outcasts near him, that we'd have to clear first.

These sound more effective as some of the powers listed just throw dirt around, not bone. I'd be inclined for "talker" or "whisperer", like "Bone Talker" or "Death Whisperer". I was hoping for "bonado". Field of skeletal arms reaching from the upturned earth. If you wanted to use the Creepers wireframes, then have these unnaturally long arms formed of many bones stacked and with bony hands at the end to erupt from the upturned earth. Alternatively, and hilariously, you could have a field of bone legs rise up unexpectedly and repeatedly, and boot opponents, causing a knockdown effect. A couple of other thoughts: You could have a multi-strike range power function like a small scale Incarnate Ion lightning strike. Instead of hitting 40 guys though, more like 5 to 7. If you're going to be a bone whisperer, have a sharpened shard of bone rapidly strike targets like Yondu's arrow in "Guardians of the Galaxy". Maybe toss in a short hold to act like a shocked paralysis after getting struck. Bones don't have to be just humanoid. We've got wireframes for animals as well. Why not temporarily summon "Pet Cemetery", where a host of canines and/or felines run chaotically around, effectively damaging and knocking down enemies. It might function a bit like "gang war" but designed for a controller, not a mastermind. Actually, I think this power set would pair very well with one someone listed in detail back in the original game: chain fighter. Wish I had a copy of that concept layout from the original forums. Of course, you'd have a ton of Ghost Rider clones cruising around.

Sounds like fun!

That's one of those "Remember When...?" moments right there. Server maintenance used to take much longer.

That, Croatoa, and Eden. I can't tell you how many times I'd wished day jobs included "lumberjack" and would come with a temp power of chainsaw. Hmm, come to think of it, that'd work pretty good on the Vahz and Banished Pantheon, too. One can always run the Imperious Task Force if one has the urge for nictus crystals. (But yes, I liked those as surprises as well.) ___ Remembering when there were few, if any, limitations on Tsoo sorcerers, and your team would stumble into a nest of them in a filled, large room. I remember early on, it took a mildly experienced team 3 hours to clear a large room there were so many sorcs healing each other.

Um...yeeaah...but I really need a proper coin-op laundry and a 1-hour martinizing dry cleaner to open somewhere in the city. Surge is killing me with his elite cleaning fees.

I believe we need to tap new "markets". Open a server in India. Every time you call customer service or receive a telemarketing call that begins "Hello, my name is Bob", and it clearly sounds like Bob is likely talking to you from a certain sub-continent, let "Bob" know about the game and invite him and his friends to check out the India-based server. Rinse and repeat when "Steve" calls about aluminum siding 10 minutes later. Then with "Candy" when she calls 20 minutes later offering a 1 week contract tech job in northern Nunavut. Then "Lou" when he calls seeking donations to save the golden long-proboscis mosquito population in the Congo. Etc., etc. That's nearly 1.4 billion new recruits, right there.

I remember having something like that happen in the original game. I don't recall all the details now, but I remember being totally confused (and hence, a tad worried) as a top tier player swooped up my lowbie, ran me through top level missions (resulting in my first encounters with Malta and other higher level groups), and giving me the influence needed to get the enhancements to keep up with my rapid leveling. When I asked why, they simply said they liked doing nice things for lowbies. This is a major component of why people keep wanting back into the game 8 years after it closed. By and large, our community is the best.

Having played my fire/kin controller very casually to 50 utilizing standard crafted fare, I'm now in learning mode to improve him by using sets. What fire/kin builds I've been able to find surprised me with how they're treating Increased Density. On several builds, it is non-existent. On the remaining builds, it is either a 1 or 2 slot power. From far back in the original game, I'd been told that a good fire/kin should hit his teammates both with Speed Boost and Increased Density as a defensive boost. As a result, I should triple slot I.D. for damage resistance, and add a slot for endurance reduction. These builds I'm reading seem to fly in the face of that teaching. Was I misinformed, or perhaps, since I left the game a couple of years before it's end, was there a change that negated that mindthink? And what is probably the best way to look at it now? As a side note, I'd love to see more fire/kin builds to study. I'm not looking to solo, exactly, I'm looking more towards a build that can lay waste to the end game content while still having the tools to support my team.

Being completely ignorant of how modding costumes might work, I have a question. Would a modded costume element only store/appear on the local computer? In other words, would the other members of my supergroup see my character as an odd mish-mash of costume parts, no matter how wonderful it look at my end? If so, I'd think that'd be a costume contest killer. Don't get me wrong, I'm really hoping it is otherwise. I was just thinking tonight how many chest emblems I could have used that are not currently in the game. (I'd been thinking of creating an earth controller and was disappointed that nothing resembled a mountain or hill.)

That title is nearly a Monty Python movie comedy sketch.

If I indeed have thalassophobia, I blame Peter Benchley. Well, him, and John Williams.

Hmm...I just learned today what I have.

Yes...but which people?