Biostem

We should bad punching bags because they teach you how to hit things. We should ban paintball, waterguns, and penises, because they teach you how to "aim".

You also have to look at the reverse; while the one tank w/ the vet rewards may very well be missing w/ his vet atatcks that aren't/can't be slotted, the other tank doesn't rely on them, and as such hits more often, and for more damage. Level 10 is a bad example, however, as the sheer scarcity of attack powers does make a difference. But, in the high levels, which is where most PvP takes place, people have full attack chains, and it is simply impractical to try to shoehorn the vet attacks in there.

I see what you're getting at, though: lets take this to some extreme. Imagine someone down the line w/ 5 years' of payed & played time on their account. Would they have 3/4/5 extra powers? Could they make it into a full chain then?

Perhaps a better solution would have been to introduce things like a "prestige brawl", which replaces your normal brawl. It'd be exactly the same as brawl, except maybe you attack w/ a buck knife, or brass knuckles; just a slightly different animation.

Personally, I think it's more a matter of the devs choosing things they already had in-game, and just changing a few variables. These were temp powers already animated and created...

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and lastly this is not a bug but a glaring oversight on I8 veteran rewards a system has been created to reward players for the length of time that they have had an active account. Awsome, more power to you. The bigger issue is that inevitably there will come a time when NO ONE will be able to use ALL of the features of the game. As time rolls on inevitably everyone will miss at least one payment period. and there is no option in place for buying missed time. Now I agree 90% of this stuff is nothing more than "cookies" extra costume parts etc.. but the powers add an interesting balance issue. with all the nerfs that have been done in the past and are planned in the future, to counter mind this by adding extra powers to only those who have had their account for x amount of months seems silly, I meen where is the balance in this?

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With all due respect, the vet rewards are there for peopel who have actually been playign for the length of time. These are purely a reward for, well, veteran players. Of course, my paying & playing 3 years may break down to fewer actual hours of gametime than your paying and playing for 3 months, but then again Cryptic doesn't get paid per hour of game played. It's also a sort of "carrot" to entice players to keep playing.

The temp power are not unbalancing at all. You cannot slot them, an don a character w/ a few levels under his or her belt, they will actually result in a less effective chain of attacks than a normal power would. Even in the case of controllers, who don't get direct attacks until APPs, they'd be better off taking a few pool power attacks. The only time I find them even remotely useful is in 2 circumstances: my lowbie stalker took the ghost slaying axe to fight all those damn CoT ghosts, and my ss/sa brute took sands for the times when he's slowed and waiting for other powers to recharge. I never had a problem leveling my othe rcharacters before the vet rewards, though, so I treat them as just icing on the cake and nothing more. Do you honetly think they will make the difference in the long run? Also, would you really be willing to pay for months if it gave you nothing but the vet rewards? How much is a permanant sands of mu worth to you? How much is a perm nemesis staff worth?

I still think that doms should get containment. When I think of "dominating someone", I think of getting the advantage over them, and then just exploiting the hell out of it. It's sort of like a boxer who, once he sees his opponent starting ot tire, summons up a bit more energy and really drills into the other guy. Doms shoudl be a sort of "hit them while they're down" AT - get 'em held, then beat the bejeezus out of them.

In fact, I'd say drastically reduce the duration of holds, also make them recharge faster, increase the damage, and add like some form of super containment. I go as far as to say that doms should have a damage modifier of like .20, but have their form of containment do like 8x damage!

In this new dominator, I'd still keep domination, but change what it does. It would still fill the end bar and give status protection, but it'd only last 30 seconds. It would make their hold unresistable. That's right - you hit dom and for 30 secs you are turnign AVs into statues. The downside is that after that 30 secs, you'd generate a sort of "super aggro" towards anyone you affected but didn't defeat.

Remember that the game basically keeps track of each costume part & color by some entry in a database. So, you may have had mask1 on the character, but w/ the additions it may be mask2 or something. So go by what you actually see in the costume creator/tailor, not what you see in the little snippet from the costume selection screen.

Here's my gripe: does the boost to gaining domination on a team in any way make that dom (if the only one on a team) more capable of handling an AV? And by more effective, I mean overcome the PToD. If the answer is no, then the buff was a failure.

Destroy the drug lab
destroy the evil robot factory
destroy the scrap before the clockwork get it
destroy the magical artifact before the CoT get it
destroy th ecrey cloning lab
destroy the illegal arms convoy
demolish the unsafe building

You can come up tons of instances where mayhem-type destruction woudl be done for a "good" purpose...

I prefer more frequent, but smaller updates. I'm of amind, though, that these larger updates are significant enough to deem beign mentioned on a video game website's review page, which is extra advertisement and keeps the game "alive" in terms of those looking to pick something up.

Perhaps the reason we don't get more frequent, smaller updates, is because if we did, no one (other than pre-existing players) would care that "CoH patch 79658" was being released...

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I like Flight, simply because it is the lowest Maintenance. Click the toggle, press auto-run and go AFK for a few minutes or chat with my SG.

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I'm sorry, but is this a sick joke? Seriously, are you listing this as a positive? I mean, anyone can slow down if they want to. I could stand around and chat, then sj, tp, or ss to my destination.

That's like saying "I like fire armor because it really let's me appreciate the newer ragdoll effects and I notice all those wonderful psi attacks".

Doesn't this seem off to anyone else?

You want people to like fly? Add in some epic feeling aerial combat. Give hover a resist to -fly. Make having true, unrestricted 3d movement actually mean something.

Other than GV, which used to require me to use my flight temp powers for easy navigation, there's never been a reason or a place where fly would have been more useful than sj or tp. Now w/ the GvE jump pack, I will only ever take fly if I'm tight on powers but want air sup (since it's such a great attack).

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The problem is this; we're talking about a group of professional programmers. In practically every other profession, there exist deadlines. I do not think it unreasonable to expect projects to be completed by a certain date.

Software development just doesn't work that way. Software isn't written according to schedules and isn't completed "on time". That's why release dates tend to be fluid and never announced far in advance.

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Software certainly IS written on a schedule. Cryptic just chooses not to do so. Don't think for a minute that if it meant losing their jobs, or getting a raise, that it wouldn't be done on a set date. If the military needs a piece of software by a certain date, it gets done. I'm not saying they have to forget their lives and become hermits - I'm saying they should set realistic deadlines and stick to them.

There should be "major items", which are things that are a priority for an update/issue, and must be completed by a certain date, and there should be "minor features", which are like-to-haves that can be shed if time becomes tight.

I've done my fair share of programming, and when i do it I setup an outline before I even start coding. I set goals for what MUST be done, and make that my priority. Other things, like tweaking menus or little niceties, become secondary.

My point is this; give us something concrete, and show the players that you're willing to give us a commitment.

The problem is this; we're talking about a group of professional programmers. In practically every other profession, there exist deadlines. I do not think it unreasonable to expect projects to be completed by a certain date. Sure, things may need to be cut, or features adjusted later, but get the product put there. I, and I'm sure a good portion of players, would prefer a reliable release schedule, even if it contained less stuff, than some up-in-the-air "it'll be out soon".

I mean, if they can't do that, then stop hyping a feature or addition that won't be out for like 3-4 months. I'd rather not know about, and eagerly await, a release that may or may not even be coming out.

Seriously, how well do you think "we'll get to it soon" would go over anywhere else in the professional world?

I'm not making light of the task ahead - it is indeed quite involved. But, by the same token, the game could have easily been made more modular in the beginning, thus allowing new powersets, animations, and the like, to be added more easily.

But this is a business, and the lack of certainties or commitment concerns me.

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I honestly think the solution is quite simple:

1. The devs need to commit to a deadline for all future tasks. Tell me when this fix or that fix will be implemented, and assure me that whatever needs to be done to achieve will be done. If you (the devs) can keep to a schedule like that, then faith in the dev team will be restored.

2. Make all decorative and non-functional aspects of a base cost inf, NOT prestige. Give each member of a SG/VG a "free" room of their own to decorate. This would use personal inf, NOT prestige.

3. Give a big prestige bonus for each member of a SG/VG on a team, beyond the 1st; heck, make it a multiplier. If a bunch of missions are run w/ all SG/VG-mates, reward them for working together.

I was in my local Walmart on 10/8, and the GvE box was there w/ the other videogames. I bought mine online, though, since I just wanted the in-game items.

I like the costume pieces, and the 2 powers are quite useful. I rolled a stalker, and the jump jet let's me circumvent the tall cliffs in mercy. I rolled a WS and found it very helpful if I mistime a tp jump. It's also great for anyone since it gives you that little bit extra if you miss a jump (especially in the shadow shard).

The pocket d power is less useful for new characters, as it seems to have to actually get to pocket d by normal mens first - it's disabled at first (even after you get out of outbreak).

My only suggestion would be to add a pocket d portal in the starting zones; though it may be intentional that the devs don't want that. It migh talso be useful to simply have the jump pack appear to always have the thrust on when off the ground, as some don't think it is doing anything in level flight, (read: not pressing the spacebar), while that isn't the case...

Let's all just call them avatars then...

We all know what somebody means when they say toon, character, hero, villains etc. If you dont know, well you'll learn soon enough!

Not an ideal solution, but buy new end reducers and over-write the ones you already have slotted. Do the same for any and all endmods you have - overwrite the existing ones w/ new ones. It shouldn't be too bad since you're level 40, so you'll have a good amount of inf. Again, not an ideal solution, but I've heard it helped w/ other people. Also, if possible, check your end bar before using seismic smash, and immediately after. Obviously it'll be off by a few points, as there's natural end recovery to account for, but it can't hurt.

I played as my 50 em/da brute yesterday, both as a normal 50 and malefactored down, (to 25 in bloody bay and 26 as a malefactor), and didn't notice anything noticeable.

I'm a little confused: if MoG wears off before the blinking icon for it appears, then isna't that a bug? Isn't the whole point of introducing the blinking icon feature to notify you whena power is about to wear off? Are there effects of MoG that we're missing, that actually persist past the perceived end of the power's effect? If not, then this IS a bug & needs to be fixed...

I think the best solution would be to give Doms a weak status protection power in their secondary, so they can use their assault powers and not have to cower if a hold misses...

You really need to take a breather. Relax, take a break, and put things into perspective...

How long has windows been out? There are people that rely on that for business, etc, and since windows 1.0 in 1980-something, there have always been bugs. It doesn't surprise me in the least that there are bugs in this game. Is it right that the game crashes? Should we be bowing before the devs? No on both accounts. This is no different than i1 smoke grenade having the decimal in the wrong place.

That would be cool, but I think that if you look closely at the flash arrow head, it's actually a flashbulb. Still, it's feasible; no less so than a group of enemies having a bright flash go off and still just standing around like nothing happened...

A couple of things:

1. Crey agents were using the pistol model thug MMs get long before Longbow ever existed.

2. A semi-auto, magazine-fed pistol makes more sense for an urban thug than a revolver. Why they went ahead and gave the tier 1 pets some odd dirty-harry monster revolver is beyond me - they should have given the thug MM and the tier 1 pets black 9mm's and be done with it. At least, then, they could have the mag-tossing upgrade make sense (except for the bruiser, who doesn't use guns).

3. Reusing models and animations just make sense - but at least give us a recolor (like having black pistols instead of silver). It's also a videogame staple (Scorpion and Sub Zero, anyone?)

4. Where are the f*&#$ing trenchcoats!!?? *takes a deep breath*

Ok, I'm good now...

Please just let me know what AT you'd prefer. My 26 rad/rad is very poorly built, so the best bet would be the scrapper, PB, or the kin/rad. Please let me know what time & where on test we're meeting and I'll be there unless something urgent pops up...

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The problem is, the Night Widow's smoke grenade is much more powerful than the player version.



The Night Widow's Smoke Grenade is exactly the same scale for both Perception (-90%) and To Hit debuff (-0.5) as Smoke Grenade (and Fire Controls 'Smoke' and Trick Arrow's 'Flash Arrow'.)

The issue you are describing of critters being aware of you even after you blind them is the same problem Stalkers have with Hide -- once you have Aggroed a critter, it always knows where you are, despite Stealth or Perception changes. It's how our AI has to work, currently. It is something I'd like to see changed, but it is 'difficult.'

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Ok... so then a change neds to be made to the mob version of smoke grenade. Once a mob attacks a player, the entire spawn should be visible. That is, in effect, what happens for mobs. You'd liel to see it fixed - excellent... but until then we're playing on a vastly uneven field. No player power can blind enemies with the kind of effectiveness that nightwidow smoke grenade has. This is not just a minor inconvenience, it's downright overpowered.

Perhaps, like I stated earlier, just make smoke grenade a targetted AoE, so you can at least get out of the area to be able to see again...

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Or you're not willing to devote half of your powers on power pools, thereby actually not taking many of the powers in the set.

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Yes... we know there are gaps in the status protection of the powerset... welcome to what every fire/ tank, /dark scrapper, or /fire & /dark brute has had to put up with. Most stalker secondaries also lack KB protection.

Is this right? Is this good? Heck no... but you basically have to adapt or look elsewhere for your armor set.

I have a 50 kin/rad defender, a 50 PB, a 26 rad/rad defender, a 40 merc/dark MM, etc that I can contribute... just let me know where and when (if I'm not working I'll be there)...

...this begs the question - what were those guys from the i7 trailer that looked like cowboy bankrobbers, with trenchcoats, dusters, masks, and dual ingrams?