Tiny Tanks, Huge Support Characters

[FFFF]

Anybody else do this? I find myself often creating discordant characters. Huge characters who hang back at max range buffing the team and bloodthirsty, tiny gal toons who race to the frontlines.

 

 

Since there's no in-game banana for scale, here's a pic of Mo'Hawk during his tutorial.

 

[SeraphimKensai]

I have a wide variety of toons including small tanks and large support toons. Nothing I do intentionally (at least anymore, back on live I made small characters for PvP as they were tougher to target for click targeters). Now it's all about whatever concept I have at the time.

[Uun]

I have a tank with minimum height (and huge physique) but I don't have any giant support characters. In fact, I think I only have one very tall character. I find they obstruct my vision and find them troublesome to play. 

[High_Beam]

Nukems (in uniform) require smallest height on the slider so we have a lot of Tiny Tanks and Bitsy Brutes.  Its funny when you have to snorkel whenever you go int he water but at least you can look at Red Caps eye-to-eye.

[Healix]

The downside is that you always  get to look at Jack-In-Irons nether region....

[Yomo Kimyata]

I am very much into character immersion and try to match things, including size, with my conception of the character.

 

Unfortunately, this is a case where practicalities get in the way.  Very small characters very much annoy me with their field of vision.  Very large characters very much annoy me when I do the Faultline arc and I wear the arachnos costume and suddenly block the entire screen.  So in general nowadays I'm just going with the standard height in the costume creator.

[High_Beam]

37 minutes ago, Healix said:

The downside is that you always  get to look at Jack-In-Irons nether region....

Buffalo Shots are not fun!

[arcane]

I just run mini mode all the time.

[Frozen Burn]

One of my Favorite melee toons is a tiny pixie Titan Weapon/WP Brute that hovers all the time (yes, i know, that means no T9 primary unless I'm grounded, but I don't really miss the power).  It cracks me up to be so small with a giant sword and to beat up large baddies.  

 

My SG (when we were around) would run "Tiny-Toon Tuesdays" to show BIG deeds can be done with small toons.  Nothing like seeing a full team a large league of nothing but smallest toons possible running around doing TFs and Trials!  😄   

 

(I was excited about mini-mode until I saw it turned us into an ugly bobble-head doll.)  😞  

 

 

 

[Snarky]

sore spot.  one of the reasons i stepped back from CoH is the PA cost to create tiny toons.  I do not run/enjoy Aeon and will not pay a fortune for the privilege of getting PAs to purchase costumes.  

 

 

[High_Beam]

The hem line on that nurses skirt is all banged up.

[Frozen Burn]

10 minutes ago, High_Beam said:

The hem line on that nurses skirt is all banged up.

 

I keep telling her to go to the Icon tailor standing near her, but she's too busy triaging people, I guess.  

[GastlyGibus]

I've played around with this concept before, because it's fun to make characters that sort of defy the conventional appearance. So far, I've only done two, one AR/MM Blaster, and one Elec/Elec Defender, both using the huge model. The Blaster's concept is that he's a sort of robo-cop character, scientifically enhanced for psychic powers and super-human marksmanship who wears very bulky power armor so he can survive against super villains.

 

Spoiler

 

The Defender also uses the huge model, with the concept being that he was intended as a massive mobile power generator, but quickly gained sentience and learned to use his near-limitless energy potential for defense, and now works as a super-hero to help wherever he's needed.

 

Spoiler

 

I've thought about making a tiny tanker/melee character, but haven't thought of a concept I'd like yet. It's still a fun idea to play around with, though.

[blackhand]

My bio for one is very much an homage to the Hulk, though I change the name for copyright and all. But I made the bio out as if there was a running joke about her being a wee little brute. She is 4’6” normally and Hulks out at 6’. I have macrod costume changes of course. But that all started with me thinking Knockout Blow was funny on a tiny female character. 

Edited October 28, 2023 by blackhand

[Clave Dark 5]

I don't do this too much because I really don't like the way HUGE-ASS characters look; I worked in a comics shop during the 90s and it just screams Rob Liefeld "I don't know how anatomy works!" to me ha ha...  Most of my character are "fairly regular guy if toned" in nature, or sometimes smaller.  About the only sort-ofs I have are "very tall but thin-as-possible" characters, and even then only a few at most of those.

[WumpusRat]

My characters are based on a concept I have for them, and that includes how they look, how tall they are, etc.

 

All my D&D/Pathfinder immigrants are based on their game races, so their heights are pretty defined from the get-go. The tallest one is the giantkin barbarian. The shortest are the two halflings, and a gnome who's a couple inches taller than them. The two dwarves are built with the "huge" male body, cranked to minimum height and large physique, since I can't make a proper female dwarf using the female body -- the legs end up looking too long, even with minimum leg length. So I just go with the "small-huge" male body, put them in full armor, and they end up looking like proper female dwarves. Besides, nobody but other dwarves can tell male from female anyway, so it's all good!

 

I have a couple of very tall other characters, and a lot of short characters. But none of them really follow any sort of role/AT pattern with their heights. Just whatever I feel like for the character.

[Shenanigunner]

On 10/26/2023 at 8:14 AM, Healix said:

The downside is that you always  get to look at Jack-In-Irons nether region....

 

My primary reason for building any female alts, most of which fly. If I have to stare at spandex buns...

[lemming]

I tend to make my melee characters at least average height so that I'm not in the middle of looking at a bunch of butt.   Except for a couple that can fly...

 

Though looking at my costume files, my heights are pretty well at covering the range.  Not counting the few that have picked up mini costumes.

 

And OT, I think the measurement in the costume creator is off.   It seems like the base height is 6' and doorways are taller than in the real world.

[WumpusRat]

5 hours ago, lemming said:

And OT, I think the measurement in the costume creator is off.   It seems like the base height is 6' and doorways are taller than in the real world.

Well of course the doorways are taller, they have to be to account for the fact that there are 8-foot people walking around. Can't make Captain Meltdown, The Easily Annoyed Walking Nuclear Pile have to constantly duck under doorframes, after all. Otherwise he'd eventually bump his head and you'd lose a city block.

[Mjolnerd]

Nobody tell him I posted this here.

[Oubliette_Red]

On 10/26/2023 at 7:25 AM, Uun said:

I have a tank with minimum height (and huge physique) but I don't have any giant support characters. In fact, I think I only have one very tall character. I find they obstruct my vision and find them troublesome to play. 

 

On Legacy I had a Trapper with the huge frame at minimum height named... Land Mime.

 

[Psyonico]

My only thing about tiny tanks is that they can get lost visually in the thick of things.

[Clave Dark 5]

27 minutes ago, Psyonico said:

My only thing about tiny tanks is that they can get lost visually in the thick of things.

That's why one of my tanks as as tall as I could make him, I figured it was something of a public service...

[pawstruck]

I have to be the voice of dissent here... In my own mind, I just can't make these "discordant" characters and play them seriously. For me, the point of making a character theme is that their name, costume, and powers (and backstory, which I'm sure nobody but me reads) cohere to broadcast exactly who they are and what they can do. I want people to look at my hero and go "Ah, clever, I get it," rather than "lol."

 

P.S.: This is why I can't stand lots of recent superhero films. What the hell is going on with "The Marvels"? A Skittles-diverse trio of little girls wielding powers greater than atomic weaponry and enduring battles worse than the worst horror stories? My suspension of disbelief does break at some point!

[Snarky]

3 hours ago, pawstruck said:

I have to be the voice of dissent here... In my own mind, I just can't make these "discordant" characters and play them seriously. For me, the point of making a character theme is that their name, costume, and powers (and backstory, which I'm sure nobody but me reads) cohere to broadcast exactly who they are and what they can do. I want people to look at my hero and go "Ah, clever, I get it," rather than "lol."

 

P.S.: This is why I can't stand lots of recent superhero films. What the hell is going on with "The Marvels"? A Skittles-diverse trio of little girls wielding powers greater than atomic weaponry and enduring battles worse than the worst horror stories? My suspension of disbelief does break at some point!

I agree.  I do not do discordant toons to be anti-X  I do them to be Pro-X  

 

For instance, my Little Green Army man AR/Dev that i want the tiny Particle Aether costume.  That is a concept that cries out for the tiny costume.

 

But I wont pay for it, so it drove a bit of a gap between me and gaming.