OEM61

March 7

On 3/6/2025 at 5:03 AM, TheMoneyMaker said:

Intentionally "bad" can find a place in games. I think the most noteworthy example that comes to mind for me is Dan from the Street Fighter series with his much more limited attacks compared to main characters like Ken and Ryu. He is often considered the joke character, and yet some people learned to use him despite the shortcomings in his attacks. Of course, Dan wasn't useless, he just had limits compared to similar characters, notably the shorter distance on his ranged attack. I think the trick would be to find a counterbalance to the limitation. As an example, consider if you added a melee attack set for corruptors & defenders. The need for melee proximity would hurt such a character that's typically better off as a ranged attacker, so perhaps add a little more damage to compensate. Of course, that's just an example, not really a petition for melee defenders, which seems like something that should be done as a separate AT rather than trying to squeeze a melee peg into a ranged hole.

If Dan, when controlled by a random player, had just as much chance to win in a fight against another character controlled by a player of similar skill, then Dan was not "bad". Simple does not equal bad.
In CoH though, we already have "simpler" and "more complex" in the form of ATs overall. Blasters are "simpler" to play than Defenders, for example. A blaster doesn't have to consider where to apply debuffs for best effect, and group play for Blaster is much the same as solo play, where a Defender in a group is expected to monitor their teammates.

But in the event that Dan was "bad", and that any decent player using any other character would beat a similarly, or even more-skilled player using "Dan", then just because someone created a character in that game to 'steal' quarters* from some poor suckers that didn't know any better doesn't make it a good idea.

But hey, as long as we all know the deal what's the harm, right?

Well, first that assumes that everyone will "know the deal". It sort of assumes zero-growth. That the community is the community and no new people will ever show up. That everyone is fully aware that set X is a "bad" set.

Additionally, it would only have limited appeal. Any set is only going to appeal to so many people anyway, so to make a set that is worse than others, and that is what "bad" means unless we are redefining words here, would give it less appeal than any number of "average" sets they could create.

And, finally, it would only take a bit more work to produce an "average" set. To create a "bad" set is a waste of developer time and energy.

Goodness knows there are sets out there now that players think are "bad", and definitely when it comes to using them with certain ATs. No one seems to celebrate those. To the contrary. The people that talk about them either do so dismissively or they are advocating for change, to improve those sets.

* I have no idea if "Dan" existed in the old arcade game or if he came along later, but it doesn't really matter.

March 5

40 minutes ago, Ghost said:

Not only that, but we all know how it will end up.

Funny, bad set released. Everyone laughs, some play it.

6-9 months down the line, it will start

“fix these sets”

“they are low performing”

”it’s not fair”

And in the meanwhile people that didn't know any better when they made their toon will have a miserable time.

Not great game design.

March 5

On 1/24/2024 at 8:32 PM, ZorkNemesis said:

Stop the Ritual, which is a kill-all in disguise on a big map and mobs run for an exit. Automatic skip in my books, one of the few I do that with.

That one is horrible for soloers.

The wait at the portal can seem very long with no action at all between monsters showing up, but then if you go out to hunt the mobs you risk failure.

This is a mission I would like to see them redesign.

Set it up on a smallish map with the portal at the center and every 45-60 seconds a group spawns in. Might be a boss, might be a Lieutenant and a Minion, might be 3 x Minions. They want to go through the gate, we want to stop them. There would be 59 total mobs in the pool, and once we defeat 30 of them then we win.

March 5

The discussion might be fun, but I don't think that they should take the time to develop intentionally "bad" sets.

A Clown MM set might threaten to overrun the game and possibly destroy verisimilitude for some players, but if they are going to make it then they should make it comparable to other MM sets. Pie in the face as a power within such a set? Fine, but it has to be a decent ranged attack, stacking up with a Photon Grenade or Pulse Rifle Burst, for examples from Robotics.

It would make sense to slot such "gag" attacks into the Clown MM set. "Telescoping Boxing Glove", "Squirting Flower", "'Bang' Flag Gun", "Anvil that Drops from the Sky", "Pie Attack", whatever.

Just figure out three attacks and boosts that work with whatever they decide upon for their clowns (looks like MMs get 3 attacks, 3 minion summons, and 3 minion 'boosters' of some sort in their primaries) and make it a set. One that works on par with any other set.

February 17

Temporary fixes are just that.

A bunch of heroes crossing over in order to run missions to get an accolade before they go back to blue side is not a "fix". It gives red side players that want to participate in those same specific things a larger pool of players to work with for however long players are crossing over to do so, but I don't see it doing much to help with other things.

=============

Having "undercover contacts" for heroes means that some players will send their heroes over to red side to run the "undercover" missions and nothing else.

=============

Giving more money to players on red side means that a whole lot of people won't care because they have enough money for about anything and if they decide they want to start raising some more they log in a 50, make a lot of money, and mail it to the alt that needs money.

Because a 50 can make a lot of money fast.

I know that I am not offering much in the way of ideas, but I struggle to think of how you can make someone WANT to play a side that they may have already tried and didn't enjoy.

I only played red side back on live when an in-game friend wanted to play red side. If that friend and/or his son are still out there I do not know about it.

I have a toon sitting in red side right now, but I am only running Ouroboros missions for badges outside of, so far, the Efficiency Expert missions which I had to run live and mayhem missions which I ran for the exploration badges (and Lord Schweinzer for everything except PI). I should have a time-sensitive badge tomorrow when I log on and then I will begin the process of turning them back to the blue.
Down the line I know that I will dip back to red side for some more badging, but for now I have had my fill.

And all of these 'solutions' feel like more of the that

Offering players something that they can dip over to red side to get, and then they go back to blue, or something that they can just ignore with no great loss.

I like to play blue side.
I do not like to play red side.

There are things that can make me switch over temporarily, but I have not yet seen the thing that makes me enjoy playing the villain more than the hero, so I will always switch back to that side.

February 17

On 2/14/2025 at 7:49 PM, lemming said:

For me it's Dr. Advance with the gravity and singularity. Ether and Holo Man. Flambuex is another because she has a heal.

Yeah. Flambeaux not so much, but the other two, along with Holo Man, are public enemies 1, 2, and 3 when I am fighting the heroes.

Edit: And I have begun to target whichever of those is furthest from the villain army, because the closer they are to the villains the more likely they are to be severely damaged, if not KOed, after the first volley. So if Ether is hiding towards the far side of the hero formation then I might target her. If it's Holo Man then he gets it. Usually one of those two is far enough away to make them my first target, but if they both end up close then Dr. Advance gets it.

And for my hero, I usually target one of Misadventure, Mongle, or Savage Siren.

February 14

On 2/10/2025 at 3:52 PM, KaizenSoze said:

General advice to take out specific mobs which buff/support/heals to speed things up.

There are three villains that drop triage beacon and at least one shield gen. Good news is that they have weak healers, Fallen something is the primary healer.

Generally, fighting against the heroes is harder. As they have multiple good support sets. Ether needs to die quickly as she has both a single and AOE heal which she uses often. Holo man can really mess things up, because his phantom army will distract a lot of villains. This causes a lot of them to die or worse tie up one of the AVs, which leads to a lot of villains dying.

In general once any mob uses it's T9, unless you're doing psi damage just ignore them and let the AV/Heroes take them out.

I guess I should create a guide.

I know that when I play my "villain " (I'll be turning them back hero in a week or so. Just waiting out a badge right now), I make sure to set my sights on Holo Man right after I open the chat window with Positron but before I make a selection so as soon as the cutscene finishes I can open up on him.

January 23

Absolutely.

And I would support them at least considering giving the offending player a week off to think about their life choices.

January 22

Re: The OP - Sure. I can see where that could be useful for a lot of RPing. Always the question about whether it is at all an effective use of dev time, of course, but the idea is one I could get behind. It's not just some ERP thing or a super-niche case. A lot of players might find it helpful as an RP tool.

As far as comics phasing goes... It's phasing. It's a comic. I really don't think that people should think too much about it. My all-time favorite phasing character is Vision.
I am old, I do not read comics these days, but "my Vision" could, among other things, stick his intangible hand inside a villain's chest and start to solidify it, causing the villain great pain. It could quickly incapacitate minions and help turn a battle against a major threat or even be used to destroy some machinery.

But it would kill anyone. It would block and sever the cardiovascular system and generally destroy tissue and bone and whatever organs that might be in the way.
It should also damage Vision's hand/arm. His 'synthezoid' body would be affected by having outside tissue, blood, and bone inside of his body when he began to solidify, to say nothing of metal or other such material.

But it's a comic book.

Vision is (pr at least was) one of my favorite characters. I do (did) not care that his powers "shouldn't" work like they do. I just want them to "work right" inside of the narrative. They established how they work, so just roll with that.

January 21

2 hours ago, Michiyo said:

The HC Wiki should be up now, and I'm moving the FBSA wiki files over now.

I was just about to go to bed and thought I would check before I did so.

I was just coming here to report that it was working for me.

Thanks again for taking care of the site.

January 21

57 minutes ago, Shocktacular said:

I'm still getting the "404 - not found" error. Is this on my end or is it still down?

Still down for me, too.

January 21

2 hours ago, Michiyo said:

I tried to prestage a migration of database and server configs but the prestage went ahead and also moved DNS to the new server. I'm having to wait for a VERY large database to move before I can migrate the actual files to the new server, I have no ETA but it'll be up as soon as I can get it.

Thank you for the effort and the update.

January 20

2 hours ago, Gobbledigook said:

They are doing villanous activity so they should be arrested for their villainy and the arresting officer should get xp. Immersion breaking really.

The medication that could stop the villain doing his dastardly deed but rather assists the villain to continue. They are not innocent as they are part of an evil organisation.

Worth some xp if not just for immersion.

Come on.

How much XP something gives is not part of "immersion". It is an outside element. It is a player thing, not a character thing. Has nothing to do with "immersion".

A character, RP-wise, obviously knows that practice will improve their skills and combat will hone their combat abilities, but they do not have a concept of how much XP an opponent or mission gives them, or how many XP they need to get to the "next level".
But in-game? That character could just stand inside the entrance to a mission while other players do all the work and gain XP all the same.

XP and immersion are on entirely different planets.

And not awarding XP for Surgeons doesn't "interfere with the actual game".

Play. Have fun. But if the only fun you have is measured by how many XP you got out of it, then don't fight Surgeons. No one makes you play that content.

January 10

On 1/8/2025 at 1:27 PM, ZamuelNow said:

For analytics, I'm curious: How many supergroups/villain groups were registered? How many AE arcs were created? What were the most and least populous zones?

How would you measure "Most popular zone"?
Would that be "Most player-hours spent there"? "Most distinct characters that visited that zone during the year"? "Most players in the zone concurrently at any point in the year"?

I can't help but think that AP would be the winner of most player-hours spent, and it seems all but impossible that it wouldn't win criteria 2.
Criteria 3 might be more in doubt as, though AP is still going to be a contender, some raids may bring enough people to another zone to offer up some competition.
But maybe I would be surprised.

=============

I notice that over half of every Mastermind created this past year has one of three primaries. MM has never been my favorite, but I started thinking of a Mastermind idea and it was also one of those three. I'll probably make it later this year. Might not get too much play, but I'll at least try and get it made.

I would like to see the complete list of ATs, though.
I know that some of these lists could get too long if you included everything. Primaries and secondaries add up fast when you consider all of the ATs, and then possible combinations are multiplicatively larger still, but there are "only" 15 ATs, so a full list wouldn't be too long.
I notice that there are some Stalker sets that made least popular primary and secondary, and it makes me curious where Stalkers fall on the AT popularity list for the year. Were these just particularly unpopular sets, or were Stalkers as a whole relatively unpopular?

EDIT: Obviously Stone Melee for Stalkers is specifically unpopular, since only 377 out of at least 8,117 chose it, and if the total number of new Stalkers was 8,117 with 18 primaries to choose, the average would be just under 451 but I am still curious as to how many Stalkers there were total.
Anyway...

Also? I am curious as to what Power Pools, Ancillary Pools, and Patron power sets were most popular. I guess I would measure that as characters that had one or more powers from that set. Whether someone had one power from the flight pool or all five, they would count as 1.

January 7

It's all a matter of personal opinion.

There are a lot of mixtures that are possible, and "plus tech" is a very common crossover.

Each player just has to decide if they think that the "natural" aspects of the character are more central than the "technology" aspects of the character, or whatever mixture they think is there.
Consider that the game defines the Science origin as "You earned your powers through the benefits of modern science, either through experimentation or by accident".
Meanwhile, Mutation is defined as "Your powers are derived through genetic manipulation or evolutionary alteration".

I may be wrong here, but purposeful genetic manipulation certainly seems like scientific experimentation to me, and evolutionary alteration could come from scientific experimentation or an accident.

So just make the call using whatever criteria you think matters most.

I am sure that some people pick an origin because the inherent attack is their favorite, they just picked at random, they think that one origin is "cooler" than the others, or that they wanted to fight or avoid a specific group of enemies that one starting contact will steer you to.

December 31, 2024

I have my art collection on a bookshelf.

I kept the old guides that they made in notebook form for expandability that, to my knowledge, never happened (they made a CoV guide with its own notebook as well, but there were never any extra pages for either produced that I recall).

I sold my CoH/V Heroclix. The ones that came in the collector set plus the old original capeless Statesman that was a "convention exclusive" piece. I kept one or more versions of a few of my favorite heroes and villains but the vast majority of my Heroclix collection I sold off.
I am living rather far away from where I used to play, and when I got disabled the money just wasn't there any more.

I am pretty sure that I did eventually throw away my CoH and CoV boxes and discs, though. It doesn't seem right considering what I still have, but I did not see them where I keep those other things at. They may turn up one day.

December 25, 2024

I know that Hot Feet, the T9 Fire Manipulation power for Blasters, requires that I be on the ground to activate it, but after I toggle it on I can deal some damage while merely being "close" to the ground. I can hover over the heads of enemies and deal damage. Not so high up that they can not reach me, but noticeably off the ground. If I am higher up I notice that enemies will drop down out of flight. No damage from the power but still a very useful effect.

I think that "close enough" should be the standard. Nothing should require someone be completely grounded to use. Even characters with earth-based powers are shown in comics using them while flying (Terrax, Geo-Force, and Terra to name a few).

December 24, 2024

5 hours ago, Videra said:

You felt the need to bump this week old topic, which has already been resolved, why? Necromancers these days, I swear.

Last post before mine was Friday. I posted Monday.

I didn't realize that two days made up a week, or that a two day gap was some sort of major necro.

December 23, 2024

Maybe an unpopular opinion, but I am not in favor of any individual memorials. Especially if it is someone that was pretty much only about in-game things.

There are multiple servers. People over here probably never heard of people over there, yet there that hero (or villain, or Praetorian) is walking/standing around.
And even if someone might have encountered that player, they may not have encountered whatever character is used as their "memorial avatar".

Make a memorial plaza, Put it somewhere convenient; Somewhere visible. Don't stash it in some far corner of Talos Island. Either make a single monument and put it in Khalisti Wharf or make two monuments; One in AP and one in Port Oakes, I think it is? The main villain zone? I lean towards the latter as I think that Khalisti Wharf just doesn't have enough going for it right now. The entire zone feels like an "out of the way place" to me.

My ideal would be three statues. Think like a triangular pillar with a hero standing with their back to each side, so they form a triangle themselves.
One female, one male, one large male. Each body type represented. The female hero would be in tights with a cape and a "domino mask", and then one of the males would be in tights with a cowl-type mask covering his hair (or lack thereof) and the other would be in some sort of armor costume (or give someone else the cape, or give the female the armor. They could make it a player vote if they wanted to. Not the point here). They could make it three lined up in a row if they thought that one or two of the statues wouldn't get enough exposure because of the location or that everyone would just go to click on the plaque so that was the only statue people would see.

They would all be standing, head down, arms down in front of them, clasped hands or possibly if one of them had a sword they could be resting their hands on that as it was point-down into the ground in front of them. Just going for somber, reflective, and/or respectful. If they felt that "Sword raised", "Fist in the air" and "hands on hips" would be good to remind people of the living heroes then that's their call.

Then there would be a plaque in front of them with some kind words that memorialized ALL the fallen.

Because some players will pass quietly. No one will know. Maybe one or two people might wonder where so-and-so disappeared to and go one about their business.

But they matter, too.

December 20, 2024

2 hours ago, SaxyGuitar said:

This doesn't work as well, but would be nice in addition to the other change.

For example you cant scroll to look at the enhancements at the bottom of the list if you have alot. So if it was just this you'd still find yourself dragging enhancements into the enhancement tray.

The other issue is if you have more enhancements then you have Enhancement Tray spots. You'd still find yourself dragging enhancements out of the Tray and in to the Tray. If you did it.

Still might be better then what's there already.

You propse double-clicking each enhancement instead of dragging them. I propose a single button to not have to double-click every leftover enhancement.

Of course there are other things that they could do, but there is nothing in your suggestion that would work where my suggestion would not.

You = Double click an enhancement in the "holding area" to place it in your tray.

Me = Click a single button to move as many of the enhancements in the "holding area" to your enhancement tray as possible.

Whatever I can not scroll to see you can not scroll to see.

If I have leftovers then I can now drag some enhancement(s) out and drag the other(s) in. I still saved myself a lot of clicking and dragging.
If there are still some enhancements that I can not see (I do not recall how many enhancements are visible in the holding area) then you can not see them after double-clicking what you want.

In either case a scroll function could come in handy, but I would rather stash 70 with one click and then sort through the remainder, clicking and dragging them in or out of the tray, than double-click 70.

December 20, 2024

I'd just go with a single button "add rest to tray" option for what I don't slot.

If there isn't room then it would slot what it could and leave the rest and then you'd have to figure it out after that.

December 20, 2024

I don't see any harm in this, though I think that maybe rather than holograms they could just open up a full-screen image of the character in question, like clicking the I.D. option for your own character, and then rather than the personal information it could have the quote (possibly with a fair bit of room, like the character background) along with the character name, origin, and AT.

The hologram angle, where players could project the character into the game, could create some very crowded spaces. Even if the holograms couldn't be clicked on, they could still create a lot of unnecessary visual clutter.

And not to derail the topic, but I am opposed to any individual memorials going forward.

Create a single memorial for fallen heroes and another for villains, or make a single memorial and put it in Kalisti Wharf. Let people that want to pay respects to a departed player gather there to pay respects.

Like I said, I don't want to derail things, so that's all I am going to say about that.

Oh, and rather than just giving the card to players I think that players should be able to click on a character and "request business card" so they could get one that way.
In case they wanted to know more about some hero they teamed with or even just saw on the street.

It wouldn't be a literal request. You click, you request the card, you get the card. I wouldn't want to actually bother people, but I might want their card for whatever reason.

Hopefully it wouldn't be used for evil.

December 20, 2024

I have looked for some information, but a search brings back so many hits that the result is a great deal of searching and not finding the answer I am looking for.

Basically...

1 - If I am level 40 and the enhancement is part of a 1-30 set, will it work at 40 or is it capped at 30? I mean the raw numbers (you know... +18.5% accuracy or whatever) of the enhancement.

2 - What about set bonuses for that 1-30 set? Is there a circumstance where I will lose them?

3 - If I am level 20 but the enhancement is part of a 30-50 set. Will the raw numbers of the enhancement(s) go down to level 20 quality or will they just not work at all because I went too low?

4 - And now for a level 30-50 set. Is there a circumstance, say exemping down to level 20, where I will lose the set bonuses?

5 - Am I correct in my understanding that level 50 only enhancements/sets will work no matter what level I exemp down to?

I am just trying to figure out all the conditions where an enhancement / set might fail me.

Thank you.

December 13, 2024

15 hours ago, tidge said:

I'm not particularly engaged with winter events, but I think they are fine as-is.

As mentioned, it would be a horrible idea to change the presents to only be level-appropriate. As of now, if players want to grind opening presents (and also, defeat winter horde in open world) using lower level zones that are mostly ignored is incredibly convenient and has minimal impact on other badgers.

That's been an attitude since forever. There is a wide spectrum of attitudes on this point! Early in the Homecoming era I had a level 47 fighting fires in Steel Canyon that endured no shortage of nasty chat from a level 50 who insisted I pass him the star, because "I'm level 50". What a maroon that guy was.

This is just my personal experience: If I've leveled/chosen power picks for a character in something like an organic way, exemplaring down to the mid 20s on a level 50+ to fight a zone-appropriate Giant Monster with a team is usually not a big deal, with the primary exception being that Lore pets can add beaucoup extra damage, which is probably the most important non-debuff for giant sacks of HP. There is a subtle point about Masterminds who will lose all their henchmen upon getting exemplared down, so the best thing to do with MMs is IMO to invite them to a league first, and then make sure they don't end up on a team lead by a lower level.

Maybe, but I am not familiar with setting up leagues. I'm sure it's no big deal, but I have just never done it.

But yeah. Some people will always want to be the highest level, some may be fine with anything that is at least their current level, and a few might be fine with anything that is a "zone appropriate" level. For giant monsters and such, anyway. TFs are a different animal.

But like I said, I don't really blame them. I just think that quitting without even checking on the plan is a bit of an overreaction.

December 12, 2024

6 hours ago, mechahamham said:

Leading Lord Winter's Realm below level 50 is punitive:

I don't make any secret of the fact that I simply *do not enjoy* the Incarnate game, but that's another thread. That doesn't mean that it's impossible to lead teams and leagues if your character is not Incarnate or even if you're not 50.

However, trying to keep a league together long enough to start Lord Winter's Realm when you're not level 50 is an exercise in frustration. A significant number of people who are interested in joining the league simply bounce when they see the league leader is not 50. From those who stay, there's a constant demand to "Give the star to a 50", even before the event starts.

Perhaps the most frustrating experience I've had with this trial was with a player who I truly believe was trying to be helpful. However, they were also dismissive and demanding. After they joined the league I was building, they started demanding to lead the league since they were 'already 50 and lead everything anyways'. It seemed like one of those situations where a person is condescending without realizing it. Regardless of if they meant to treat me like small child or not, they still managed to.

What I'd really like for Christmas is a 4-person trial. I adore Dr. Kane's and Summer Blockbuster, and I believe I'd still adore them without their awards. I'd love a Christmas Double Feature to play in theaters 3 and 4. Help John McClain kick Hans Gruber off of Nakatomi Tower or assist Kevin McAlister in booby-trapping his house to defeat the burglars. The award doesn't need to be equivalent to an Overwhelming Force IO, but it'd be nice if it was about the same as the award for Lord Winter.

All events are not for everyone, and that's... okay... if a bit sad. I think that with a very minor bit of tweaking, the Christmas Event could be a LOT better for most players.

3 hours ago, mechahamham said:

Also, at what point did players start thinking they were instantly going to die if there wasn't a 50 leading the team? (Incarnates. It happened when Incarnates dropped.) I feel like the level scaling mechanic needs a big billboard in front of Atlas City Hall explaining what it does and doesn't do. Or maybe Mender Tesseract needs a 'Level Scaling Tutorial' under her name in Ouro.

A day or two ago I sent out the call to take down a Winter Lord in Independence Port. I was a 22 or something like that.
Someone comes into the zone, asks to help fight the Winter Lord, I invite them, and they immediately quit, telling me that they were not going to fight at that loss of level.

I would have passed the star, no problem, but since I had spotted the monster and sent out the call, I expected that I might get some tells asking for an invite and I couldn't invite anyone if I wasn't the team leader.

People want their full power. Exemping down will cost them options and possibly some enhancements, and if they do not need to sacrifice those things then why push the issue?

It isn't that anyone expects to instantly die, it's just that they do not see a need to limit themselves for no reason, and there is absolutely no reason beyond what some other player might think is "more fun".

Not really a great selling point for most other players that just want to fight the monster and move on.

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