(I hate to bring them up here, but) With Thunderspy having pet customization...

[kelika2]

Just now, Lyrianna said:

 I generally have 5-6 different looks for most of my characters.

Still plenty of room here.

1.) Not all pets need to have a custom look, maybe you wanted a succubus or two instead of two big ole tier2 demons.  I personally want some clockwork (both praetorian and primal) robots or a bikini commando or turning my Thugs into Clowns to match my Carnies lore or maybe just revamping the tier1 zombies so they literally dont stall themselves when they fall an inch.  seriously go watch them operate a slight slope or stairs

2.) People might actually do the costume slot missions again.

3.) Not counting the ever raising cost of the fabled 10th costume slot, 9 slots are more than enough for most people

[Vysterion]

I used to mod CoH back in live and have an idea of how they accomplished this and why it only works on humanoids:

 

How does it work?

      Open and view the content of CoH client files using the pigg viewer, extracting the contents of the bin.pigg file or whichever one contained the costume parts (PARTSNAME) for player and NPC models. Once these files are modified and replaced into the right folder structure, the client will check the folder structure and replace any .pigg files which are represented in the folder structure.  You can modify character costume pieces which are called by the client to the server.

 

Why are they limited to certain models?

      There is a redundancy check for the length or size of the files when the game executes, which means any changes you make have to be the same number of characters as the original values. This restricts you to using the PARTSNAMEs that fall within a certain character length (IE: player models).

 

Why does it only work with humanoid characters?

      Non-humanoid characters do not have the normal number of values as humanoid characters... which means you cannot replace a non-humanoid PART with another non-humanoid or humanoid PART without breaking the visual effects of the rest of the game. Here's the list of values for humanoid characters (same as those in  our character costume slots):

• Pants
• Chest
• Head
• Gloves
• Boots
• Belt
• Hair
• Face
• Eye Detail
• Chest Detail
• Shoulders
• Back
• Right Weapon
• Neck
• Right Upper Arm
• Collar
• Broach
• Cape
• Aura
• Skirt
• Top
• Sleeves
• Cranium
• Jaw
• Left Weapon
• Two Handed Left Weapon
• Two Handed Right Weapon
• Tail

[Dixa]

costumes are not the biggest change.

 

the biggest, single biggest mm change is the hold command. you target one  of your henchmen, hit hold and they are all immobilized and immune to knockback. no more ranged pets chasing things down. obviously this means they will die in a fire late game regularly if you are not paying attention, and will not move at all until you toggle it off, use goto or team teleport. and you can't pick which henchmen to do this on - it turns it on for all which makes keeping your enforcers, punks, arsonist in check while the bruiser goes ham requires just as much micro management as not having this command does. 

 

the second, more minor change is a toggle that turns all of your knockbacks into knockdowns, but debuffs your damage a tad. 

 

they did the merc changes to bots as well almost identical - tier 1 have a cone attack and they get it immediately. probots get dispersion bubble but it's bugged they don't keep it up. assault bot still has it's brawl but also can summon it's own drones. however even with those changes their damage is still not on par with demons or thugs who have not seen any changes yet.

 

traps is...yeah. triage beacon is now a straight pbaoe heal every few seconds. web grenade is aoe. they combined caltrops and trip mine into one power that is insta cast. added turrets with a long cooldown for the capstone power. traps is basically an actual bunker set and you don't need a primary that heals itself or to grab medicine if you are like me and hate losing pets. other secondary's their heals got a minor aoe heal added to them like alkaloid in poison. nearly all of poisons debuffs are now aoe's. if the probots casting dispersion bubble was fixed, you could then take bots with any secondary and not give up cc protection. bots/poison would become the fastest killing mm combo in the history of the game - packs or single tough enemies. 

 

oh, and they moved all of the controller pets from 32 to level 1. controllers/doms are the true pet powerhouses there. they are here, too just a pain to level with for a while. 

 

honestly if pet classes are your thing, the other server is the place to play it however the AT is still one of the weakest when it comes to clear speeds and av kill times. 

[thunderforce]

On 2/29/2020 at 7:55 PM, OmegaX123 said:

...it kind of proves that it's doable, even if it is a hacky method via using your own costume slots and a tag added to the name of the pet. Do the Homecoming team have either a)an implementation of this in-game yet or b)any plans to attempt it?

I went to the meet-and-greet in London last year. Now, my memory of the occasion is a little blurry - there may have been beer - but I think what was said is that it would cause performance problems in highly populated zones because of the huge number of different costumes visible.

 

That might explain why it can be done on a server populated only by people who don't loathe 4chan.

[Dixa]

5 hours ago, thunderforce said:

I went to the meet-and-greet in London last year. Now, my memory of the occasion is a little blurry - there may have been beer - but I think what was said is that it would cause performance problems in highly populated zones because of the huge number of different costumes visible.

 

That might explain why it can be done on a server populated only by people who don't loathe 4chan.

 

don't understand the 4chan bit. the server has become quite busy given recent changes here and even I decided to try it out, but the global chat channels are TAME compared to homecoming. 

 

there is a single discord channel for 4chan type posting, that's about it. 

[Clave Dark 5]

Even a single channel of 4chan type posting is pretty bad.  That's saying your friend is racist only sometimes.

[thunderforce]

14 hours ago, Dixa said:

don't understand the 4chan bit.

Fortunately, that's not the important bit, and a bit off-topic - the important bit is "relatively low server population means MM pet customisation is more feasible".

[Dixa]

8 hours ago, Clave Dark 5 said:

Even a single channel of 4chan type posting is pretty bad.  That's saying your friend is racist only sometimes.

it's in their discord, which you're not obligated to take part of to enjoy the server or if you do, nobody forces you click on that channel. 

[Clave Dark 5]

On 4/17/2020 at 9:57 AM, Dixa said:

it's in their discord, which you're not obligated to take part of to enjoy the server or if you do, nobody forces you click on that channel. 

I saw enough problematic stuff slip past the game even Live, no way I'm going over there, believe me.

[Kartissa]

On 3/12/2020 at 1:05 AM, Zeraphia said:

they should ALL have female variations. 

Literally the sole reason I want to be able to customise my thugs. I don't really care if they keep the random(ish) costume selection that currently exists. I want my Arsonist to be a lady called Blaize, and one of my Enforcers to be The Duchess. Having either name attached to a man is a little off-putting. (Although I don't have anything against transgender people - it's just not how I see the characters)

[Communistpenguin]

I would be happy with some standardized presets. Personally, I want a thugs option where they are all guys in suits. 

[iluvpichu]

On 3/1/2020 at 2:06 PM, THEDarkTyger said:

So...their pet customization, what? Requires using one of my costume slots per pet? No thanks. That's just awful.

good thing its optional and you dont have to use it! some people actually want it, so i dont get why you would shoot it down for no reason.

[Neiska]

holy necrothread batman! 9 month old necro!

[Arbegla]

While I get the appeal of 'Well, that server did it!' it looks like Thunderspy is one of those 'power gaming' servers that don't really care about balance. Looking at those changes for Mercs, and Necro, there is almost no balance behind that. Letting you have soul Extraction as a toggle that just pumps out additional zombies? That have all the buffs of the zombies you already get?

Plus making all of the control AoE just screams power gamer unbalanced nonsense. You can already do some pretty stupid things with Masterminds in the right hands, and the changes they listed just make it so much worse.

 

I strongly vote no on using the costume model to have pet customization. I'd be much more likely to accept a 'Here is a list of the NPC-type mobs you can command with your Mastermind powers' and having you pick a subset of say, Family, Council, PPD, Banished Pantheon, CoT Demons, Praetorian robots, Skulls, Hellions, etc that have similar powers to what the pets would have, and using those models. Its not full customization, but at least its more diverse and you can have some females within the group.

[THEDarkTyger]

15 hours ago, iluvpichu said:

good thing its optional and you dont have to use it! some people actually want it, so i dont get why you would shoot it down for no reason.

Because it's a bad implementation?

[TheSpiritFox]

For pet customization I would honestly just be happy with like, 3-4 different visual options for each primary.  

 

Like, you could do Beasts but like, it can be wolves and lions, or it can be bugs, or it can be dinosaurs, or it can be idk what else. Robots just have like 4 different theme appearances, thugs they let you color customize so you can like pick your gang colors (and maybe even arsonist fire colors) and just like give us a few options for demon appearances. Also Ninjas are ugly as shit. 

 

On 4/7/2020 at 8:04 PM, Lyrianna said:

Bear in mind you only START with 6 costume slots. Which means you have to do at least one of the costume missions to have enough slots to have a single costume for yourself, and 6 slots reserved for your pets. So yeah, for a lot of people they wouldn't want to burn almost all their costume slots just to modify the look of their pets. I generally have 5-6 different looks for most of my characters. Costume, casual clothes, an alternate costume, dressing up nicely, etc. So sacrificing nearly all my costume slots for pets would be frustrating, and I'd much prefer a better way to do it.

 

I agree with this. I would rather things stay as they are than give up my costume slots for pet costumes. I generally have a minimum of 3 alternate costumes per character and its just like this. Costume, casual clothes, alternate costume, fancy look, robot look. With pallate swaps for powers like my fire blaster has a red fire costume, a white fire costume, a golden "holy" fire costume, a purple fire costume, a green fire costume, and a black fire costume.

[Mezmera]

On 4/4/2020 at 7:28 AM, Ry said:

For someone completely new to the term "Thunderspy" are they the 4chan server?

 

Make whatever association you will about them and whatever connotation you think being 4chan related even means. 

 

I recently gave them a try and within a day a few people found out I was new to their server and emailed me money to get me going.  I didn't have that happen to me on this server, although this was a while ago and I do feed new people money on this server, so it's good people on each side.  They may be cheeky but if you don't go around being offended by everything Thunderspy is just fine, they have their morality code just the same as here, one of their codes is not to come to other servers and trash them, live and let live pretty much.  

 

Within the first days of playing there I found out I was playing with their powers dev testing their new shotgun attacks.  That's pretty great to just randomly play with the person adjusting your powers.  

 

I don't play MM's but I'd think the option of being able to craft your own henchmen's look would be fantastic even if you do have to use a few of the 10 costume slots you get, it's better than not even having that option.  

 

Edit: 

I also didn't realize this topic was this old and necro'd

Edited May 5, 2021 by Mezmera

[MTeague]

7 hours ago, Arbegla said:

I strongly vote no on using the costume model to have pet customization. I'd be much more likely to accept a 'Here is a list of the NPC-type mobs you can command with your Mastermind powers' and having you pick a subset of say, Family, Council, PPD, Banished Pantheon, CoT Demons, Praetorian robots, Skulls, Hellions, etc that have similar powers to what the pets would have, and using those models. Its not full customization, but at least its more diverse and you can have some females within the group.

 

I do think having a curated selection of alternate looks per Primary tree is in many ways easier to control. 

• Removes "Hey, he can totally customize his mercs, why can't I customize my demons?"
• Makes it more possible to have the *very* slightly different looks for each minions.... Unbuffed.... with T1 buff... with T2 buff.  No good way to do that on 100% customizeable henchmen.
• would allow for greater theme enforcement.  "you picked Mercenaries. Explain to me how the headless cheerleader costume work with that?"
• makes it more possible to ensure weapons better mesh with the skeleton/frame, that powers activate from the correct height, and so on. 

But I also think there will be a very very strong desire for full customization. Forever.  It will  never really go away.  People will always still want it.  And with Phantom Army / Mirror, people are going to say "look, we *know* it's possible....".

[Shadowsleuth]

22 hours ago, MTeague said:

 

I do think having a curated selection of alternate looks per Primary tree is in many ways easier to control. 

 

I like the list of alternates @daveyfiacre & @gameboy1234 came up with using enemies that already exist in-game:

 

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/9713-mastermind-pet-clones-andor-female-minions/page/2/?tab=comments#comment-88013

 

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/15343-mastermind-pet-customization/page/3/?tab=comments#comment-227532

Edited May 6, 2021 by Shadowsleuth

[TheSpiritFox]

On 5/5/2021 at 10:37 AM, Arbegla said:

While I get the appeal of 'Well, that server did it!' it looks like Thunderspy is one of those 'power gaming' servers that don't really care about balance. Looking at those changes for Mercs, and Necro, there is almost no balance behind that. Letting you have soul Extraction as a toggle that just pumps out additional zombies? That have all the buffs of the zombies you already get?

Plus making all of the control AoE just screams power gamer unbalanced nonsense. You can already do some pretty stupid things with Masterminds in the right hands, and the changes they listed just make it so much worse.

 

I strongly vote no on using the costume model to have pet customization. I'd be much more likely to accept a 'Here is a list of the NPC-type mobs you can command with your Mastermind powers' and having you pick a subset of say, Family, Council, PPD, Banished Pantheon, CoT Demons, Praetorian robots, Skulls, Hellions, etc that have similar powers to what the pets would have, and using those models. Its not full customization, but at least its more diverse and you can have some females within the group.

 

Yeah I agree. Besides loathing 4chan culture, I don't want to play on a server that's basically rebalanced MMs to be able to destroy all content single player because hey it's a small pop server people expect to spend alot more overall time soloing things so we're gonna make you overpowered for it. Some of the changes I've seen on thunderspy are just like what i would imagine balance would look like if you were making a server just for yourself to fuck around in and be a literal god. 

[High_Beam]

I like the changes to the pets in Mercs there.  Troops moving into melee range was quite simply contrary to what they were supposed to be; removal of melee alone and replaced with some low yield range power would make Mercs better, Bayonet charges are just not a thing any more.  Spinning the medic off as a separate things I like as he cannot attack which makes him essentially a buff power or a different take on the Hell On Earth, Gang War separate pet summons.  I am not so keen on the whole Commando summoning soldiers, I would rather he get more shoot in his arsenal.  But yeah.  As for customization of looks, I agree with pretty much everyone in this thread about not tying it to costumes (though I am not a costume person) and it not being kluged together.

[Raikao]

On 7/4/2020 at 2:28 AM, Kartissa said:

Literally the sole reason I want to be able to customise my thugs. I don't really care if they keep the random(ish) costume selection that currently exists. I want my Arsonist to be a lady called Blaize, and one of my Enforcers to be The Duchess. Having either name attached to a man is a little off-putting. (Although I don't have anything against transgender people - it's just not how I see the characters)

 

Would make me play Thugs for sure. Female Bruiser crushing fools between her thighs. Female T1 medic for mercs, female spec-ops, etc.

 

Yeah being able to choose a different body type would go a long way. Just having options would be great. I'm not I'd want full on costume editing for pets. That could turn into a lag nightmare real fast if you give them all auras and effects or whatever.

[Talionis]

Maybe a dumb question but can you add additional costume slots easily to the code?   If you could then a good solution would be to just give more costume slots to everyone or at least masterminds.