Archive: Sister Flame (What My 6-Year Old Has Learned From CoX)

[Hyperstrike]

User's handle was _Wyll-

 

02-19-2008

Dug it out of the Wayback Machine!


 

Quote

As I sit here to wait for the servers to come back up, it struck me that I could write a little post about Sister Flame.

Sister Flame is the online handle of my middle daughter, currently six years old. She's been playing City of Heroes since she was 4 and 1/2. It was only over the last year we began to team together with my two accounts and have a lot of fun. I thought I let you know what Sister Flame has learned from CoX.

(1) Flame Learned To Read

At the tender age of five, I let Flame play on my second account on my laptop beside me. For a while, I had to tell her what the train destintions were, what the NPCs were saying and what the villains name were.a

It was only mere months before Flame didn't need my help anymore. We were playing one summer evening and I noticed that she wasn't asking me to read things. I looked over at her screen and watched her for a bit. I was intrigued she knew where to go.

"Need any help reading, honey?" I asked.

"Nope. I can read nope. That says Atlas Park and that says Steel Canyon. Those are Clockworks, but I like calling them Clickey Clacks." she replied quite happily.

Her teacher was quite surprised at the headstart she had on her reading skills. When I informed the teacher that Flame's headstart was the result of playing a superhero online game, I got the weirdest look. Oh well.

Now, at six, I can hear Flame reading slowly over the mission text and the NPC dialogue. She cannot type yet, but if we get on a team together, I usually do the talking for both of us.

(2) Attitude Matters; Not Age.

From time to time, I get a little impatient with my daughters. I do recall the one evening I was unwell, but Flame wanted to play CoH and wanted to get on a big team.

"I'm too sick to play, so you'll have to do it by yourself." I told her, thinking that she'd never figure it out or get booted quickly if she did get invited to a team.

I laid down on the bed and closed my eyes to rest. Twenty minutes later, I stretched and asked Flame how she was doing.

"Good. I am in a big team." she told me.

"Oh yeah?" I asked.

"Yep. People keep joinging, but I think they're playing soccer." she says.

"Why is that?"

"I keep seeing the word 'kick'."

I rolled off the bed and scrolled back through the chat. Apart from several comments about Flame's excellent control and attack with her Fire Blaster, I see several conversations/arguments with some idiots who joined the team and did something really stupid. Most of them wound up being kicked by the leader. I also notice that every so often, Flame has written 'ty'.

"What's the 'ty' for?" I asked.

"Thank you. You type it sometimes. Everytime I see 'Flame', I type it. They like it."

I watched Flame play for another twenty minutes. No one in the group had a clue to her age and she played her role as any good team member should: waiting for 'Go' or 'Ready' before attacking, saving her Rain of Fire for large groups and giving inspirations to thoes that needed it.

Finally, I had to type a message for Flame.

"Thank you all for the team. This is Flame's dad. She has to get up for Grade 1 tomorrow and needs to go to bed. She says you were all great."

I still love typing that message and watching the responses. Most are 'lol' or 'what?!'. One time, a player typed 'Wow. I wonder if my poodle could play.'. All in good fun.

(3) Playing Coh Is Just Like Playing House a.k.a Imagination Is Power.

Flame has always had a decent imagination, but it has improved a lot since she has been playing Coh. She likes to spin stories about her toons and give them a backstory. This has translated well to her schoolwork when she has been asked to do creative writing assignments. She has also developed a healthy curiosity into some of the groups in CoH. Some of the things she has asked me are:

"Why do Skulls hang out in Perez Park?"

"How come the Clockworks don't attack cars or make nasty cars to attack people?"

"Why are Trolls green?"

"Where do the Outcasts get their power?"

Now, she makes up toons with funny names (to us anyways), but good backgrounds. Among some of her mains are Takes Care Of Pets (A MM with two mercenaries: Cat, Dog), Takes Care Of Bats (A PB with Bat Wings) and of course, Sister Flame (a Fire Blaster with her partner, Brother Frost [me]).

So, if you ever run across a Fire Blaster named Sister Flame on Freedom, chances are its my daughter havign fun, but learning many things at the same time. Feel free to team with her, but don't be a "poopyhead" (her words, not mind).

Ciao!

P.S. She is working on her typing skills, so if you see her say "Go", "Go", "Go" about twenty times, don't worry. It's only 1 of about 100 words she can spell.

 

CoH_Sister Flame Farewell.docx CoH_Sister Flame Thread.docx

Edited September 6, 2020 by Hyperstrike

[Lines]

❤️❤️❤️

 

Well now I'm going to call them Clickey Clacks too!

[Hyperstrike]

Wish I knew how to get in touch with him.  Invite him and Sister Flame (who'd be about 18 now) back.

[EmmySky]

I hope they are here somewhere!

[nightroarer]

Believe or not, I remember that post! It was a great story. You are bringing back memories from the way back machine. 🙂

[GM ColdSpark]

Nice find and glad it's gotten a little pin now (not my doing - thanks GM Tahquitz). As someone with a 6 year old myself I've pondered whether to let him get stuck into CoH, it's certainly very tempting.

[Twisted Toon]

23 minutes ago, GM ColdSpark said:

Nice find and glad it's gotten a little pin now (not my doing - thanks GM Tahquitz). As someone with a 6 year old myself I've pondered whether to let him get stuck into CoH, it's certainly very tempting.

Go for it. It's never too early to start them on the Hero path. 🙂

 

[Coin]

Awesome, I loved reading the original post way back when 🙂

 

Scary thought though, looking at the other posts like farewell and some simple maths, Sister Flame will b about 18-19 years old now!

 

Damn, I feel old 😞 

[Hyperstrike]

17 minutes ago, Coin said:

Awesome, I loved reading the original post way back when 🙂

 

Scary thought though, looking at the other posts like farewell and some simple maths, Sister Flame will b about 18-19 years old now!

 

Damn, I feel old 😞 

Maybe she's taken up with Reformed Frostfire and they live together in his ice ramp lair!

[PeregrineFalcon]

In April, 2019, Sister Flame's father posted on the Facebooks CoH Survivors Public Group.     https://www.facebook.com/groups/CoHSurvivors/permalink/2172650202820633/

 

He talked about them all playing CoH together again.

[Hyperstrike]

On 9/7/2020 at 4:37 PM, PeregrineFalcon said:

In April, 2019, Sister Flame's father posted on the Facebooks CoH Survivors Public Group.     https://www.facebook.com/groups/CoHSurvivors/permalink/2172650202820633/

 

He talked about them all playing CoH together again.

Thanks for this!  They haven't posted in a while, but I made sure to shoot him a PM.

 

[RogerWilco]

What a nice story.

[Hyperstrike]

And now for the cognitive dissonance.

Sister Flame is now (or is about to turn) 21.


*GET OFF MY LAWN!*

 

Sorry, was reflexive...

[Turgenev]

On 7/23/2021 at 12:06 PM, Hyperstrike said:

And now for the cognitive dissonance.

Sister Flame is now (or is about to turn) 21.

 

[Hyperstrike]

On 3/27/2022 at 10:29 AM, Turgenev said:

And this is guy here is a supergroup leader with two of his own sidekicks...

[WanderingAries]

Wow, I remember these kinds of threads back then. I used to run with family groups frequently somehow and it was interesting to see things evolve.

[Dynamo-Joe]

Any word on Sister Flame and her family? Would love to see her post about re-discovering City of Heroes!