Blood Red Arachnid

So, to take advantage of the sales for Circle of Thorns and Carnival of Light bundles, I went to go buy them. However, I cannot buy them, and the game gives me the following reason:

"Your purchase cannot be processed. You may already have purchased the item, or the product is not available in the quantities you specified."

However, I have bought neither of these costume sets, and I am only buying 1 of each pack. Now, my question is this: Is anyone else having an issue like this? Or if there is some obscure mistake I have made, is there any way to remedy it?

That is definitely something that is true about this game (OP). A lot of the games have this problem for several reasons:

#1: Required class system. I hear sometimes in will stand around forever while waiting for a "healer" to join so they can go. Or a tank, or something like that. CoH is quite flexible in that respect.

#2: Level restrictions. CoH has the sidekick system and has lower limits on certain content, but otherwise it is come one come all.

#3: Equipment requirements. CoH is based around SOs, which basically means that you can play through it without uber optimizing with particular IO sets and 1337 building skills.


And so finding a team is really easy. Of course, there is the discussion going on about team leaders. This is something that I noticed, and actually a habit I developed through life. In school, all the way back to elementary school, whenever there was some group project where the team needed to decide on a project or a name or something, they would all turn to me with the dumbest look on their face, pleading "Save us, Blood!" in their eyes. I'd ask them what they think, and then silence. I'd ask for ideas, and silence. If I said nothing, the entire time would be filled with awkward glances at each other while we waited for someone to say something. That someone would, of course, turn out to be me, because I cared about my grades a bit and no one else was going to.

And this translated into the same thing in the game. I'm a frequent trial leader not because I excel at it, but because I don't like waiting around for someone else to start a trial. Ditto with TFs/SFs, and even once or twice Mothership and Hammi raids. And there really isn't a more grand explanation than that. I learned that if you want something done, you've got to do it yourself. Players in the game do have this timidness about them that makes them not want to lead anything. It's like videogames carried the spectator effect over from real life into them. So, for content that I am not familiar with to content that I am well versed in, I give it the good ole' college try. Usually it works out.


Something that I do hear a lot from players is this: "But I don't know how to lead a group!". This truly is the burden of the wise. The fact is that there isn't any special class or secret instruction that lets you lead a group. What leadership is, at it's best, is just using common sense to resolve an issue, then telling other people what to do. It's problem solving where you tell other people how to solve the problem as well, and deal with the people who refuse to listen. So, to make a short list on how to lead a group...

Step #1: Know what happens. If you don't know, then find out somehow (google it, youtube it, do it once while not leading, ect).

Step #2: Know what to do when stuff happens. If you don't know, then find out somehow. If you can't find anything, then you'll have to problem solve.

Step #3: Take initiative to start whatever it is you want to lead.

Step #4: Tell other people what happens.

Step #5: Tell other people what to do.

And that is basically it. There are some minor details to handle as you go on, but those are essentially all that is needed when you are leading a group. Probably the hardest part of being a leader is when something goes wrong. Then, you have to do the whole "what happened, what should I do, tell the group" thing rather quickly. That, or fail and then learn from the mistake for the next time. After awhile, from seeing other people do things to doing things yourself, you start to develop that leadership skill.

As far as some of the escher girls I've seen, Penny isn't too bad. Something that I find is missed is that a lot these poses aren't to be "held" at all. If anything they are pictures that capture a split second of action. Penny's pose, in particular, is a strike that is lurched back and about to release. In real life this position is held for a tenth of a second, since it is subsequently followed through with the strike. Now, it isn't exactly a proper form for a true punch, since anyone who reels back to launch a haymaker like that is usually defeated by a quick jab to their exposed face, but nonetheless I've seen many man-slap fights pull those pose for a half second.

My biggest issue is that Penny yin just doesn't look good at all. Her outfit tries to be everywhere at once, and it reminds me of something my graphics artist teacher taught me: If you try to throw too much into something, you just end up drawing attention away. People will take one look at it and just go "Ugh!". Like when a woman puts on way too makeup, or when a guy wears a raindbow colored shirt and pants.


As far as the actual poses go, I do have a tolerance for how disproportionate someone can look, and that tolerance is quite... high. I just don't see half of this stuff unless someone points it out to me. I suppose that is the advantage to just kind of taking things as they are. But on occasion I will see something that breaks my sense of geometry. Call it shallow, but I like the side boobs + butt look.

I always did find it annoying how I can't make a good swimwear for my male characters like I can the females. For women you have several bikini bottoms along with slit mini skirts and other "tinY" bottoms. I can make a standard one piece, a bordeaux look or however that word is spelled, a rather decorative two piece, ect. But for guys, you either have the booty shorts or if you are subscribing for long enough the boxing shorts.

That was a theory I came up with a long time ago, long before trials were released. They may have changed a bit... But regardless that is my attempt to explain something that essentially makes no sense. I mean, that's how you'd do it: You find what else is different between the servers other than performance, and extrapolate if that is what may be the cause.

Of course, you also paint a very different picture of Virtue trials than the one I am familiar with. As far as my experience goes, failing a trial on virtue is quite rare, sans UG and to a lesser degree MoM. This was, however, before the Magi was released so that track record may have changed. Also, I still see recruits for trials asking people to have +3 with IO sets frequently.

That is also something I found perplexing about Freedom. It's like, over there they talk about builds and maxing and power choices and stuff all day and yet they are worse at the game at virtue.


I have a theory. The unofficial RP server has players who play through the stories and get levels slower, and thus learn how to play their toons more effectively through time. Freedom is a lot more prone to farms and power leveling, where a player really doesn't get a feel for their character at all. Because of this, people on virtue with their RP and erping and all that, are much more capable at combat because they are more aware of what their characters can do and the weaknesses in them.

It seems like a simple fix. Just make it so the taunt effects of the enemy have a much longer recharge than they do now. That way, after a second of confusion, you settle on only one enemy.

I vote for whomever entertains me. Since they both entertain me, I vote for both.

I always supported the idea of underwater fighting. But the issue is that it'll be really hard to do.

First you have to make an AoE based auto-power that acts like flight while in water, except with a different animation. Then you have to tweak various animations that are already in game from their flight stance to their underwater stance (at least those that don't fit already). Then you have to come up with an explanation as to why it is your toons can hold their breath for hours.

Though if they're willing to do all this I won't stop them.

Glad Toonami is back.

That last episode of Deadman Wonderland disturbed me a bit. Gunfire I can get, pendulums I can get, but when it gets to the point where people are dissolving to death in a corrosive gas... squick.

But at least the shows have teeth now. The death and gore is done as a serious part of the show, instead of the wanton gore that occupied the other shows for comedy. That stuff just isn't funny to me, but at least it sets the tone of the show. Though if every episode is going to be like that I may find myself just tuning out.

In loving memory:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z4m4lnjxkY


Normally I don't care when celebrities die, but this one I do. It's weird.

I... really don't get it either. It seems too random, and I have a very hard time finding something to be funny when there's no link between the two things.

It was a misunderstanding. It happens. No need to point fingers and go "who said what" all over the place.

Side rant: I hate my computer's auto-correct. I'm not sure how to turn it off, but I am tired of words like "for" becoming "form". If I misspell or mistype a word, just give me the squiggly lines underneath so I can go back to correct my mistake instead of replacing the misspelled word with the incorrect one. Now, to deal with the topic at hand:

Other people have pointed out how J_B's reasons don't quite make sense. It's like, you want to play a toon that looks like a brute and behaves like a brute but it can't be a brute... Anyway:

The biggest issue with storytelling in the game is that the game design is so adverse to story telling. The only way to get everything out of an arc is if you are soloing it. The contacts that give information on the missions before and after the mission are nearly impossible to read unless you are the team leader. The clues given in mission require you to stop everything and read them to get the story. The in-mission contacts are a race to finish the dialogue, but not too quickly or else the contact will go away and no one else can talk to them. Souvenirs are a nice way of wrapping things up, but those break immersion and aren't truly effective methods of conveying the story since to get the story you have to slog through the missions with no idea what you are doing. Even then, some souvenirs contain information that wasn't actually covered in the mission, such as the praetorian souvenir that gives the history of the destroyers.

This is also one of the biggest issues I encountered while making AE arcs. During the few playthroughs of my first arc, I would get players who would admit they have no idea what is going on, even though I had clearly spelled out that information in the mission text and clues. Being built for a team, the sad part is that most of the players aren't going to get the full story since they won't stop and read the clues, the mission text, and the descriptions for custom characters.

The devs are doing better, though. With cutscenes and public chat bubbles, it is now possible for players in a team to take part in the story without having to abruptly hold up everyone so they can read a clue or race to the story contact. Though what I think is the most effective and yet underutilized tool for story telling in the game is the gameplay itself. The maps, the enemies, and the enemy's strength themselves can be an effective tool for conveying emotion in the game's content.

Currently I don't play the game for rewards. I play the game for other things. The closest I can come to playing the game for rewards is when I want to try and accomplish something on a toon and for some reason I don't have the wealth or resources on me to actually do so. Then I'll play the game for some of the rewards... for a few days at most. Then I have what I want, and I can continue playing the game as I want.

What I generally play the game for is exploration and experimentation. The only time there would truly be nothing left for me to gain is after I have gone through every mission in the game and played every powerset in the game.


But if we were to assume that happens, then there are a couple of things I would probably do. First, I'd make more AE arcs. Second, I'd give RPing a try. Third, I'd see how far I could push my toons regarding in-game content. Fourth, I'd go badging. Fifth, I'd still probably play through a lot of the game with other players since the gameplay is good enough.

Something isn't sitting quite right in my head:

Why is it that tankers would be the ones that have high damage and high durability, instead of just having brutes fill that role? If the issue is that you want an AT to be like another AT, then shouldn't you just go with that other AT?



O.K., with that out of my system... I have been kicking around an idea for a bit. Something I noticed is that, when IOing out, there are really only very few things you can build for to get peak performance: Defense, Recharge, and healing/regen to stretch it. Sure there are other things like accuracy and status duration, but no one really builds towards those to achieve incredibly strong toons. The damage boosts given out in all of the IO sets themselves are pretty darn pathetic. Soulbound Allegiance, for example, gives a 4% damage bonus; the maximum that you can get out of any set bonus, and only 3 very unrelated sets give that 4% bonus. From there, all the bonuses are 1%, 2.5%, 2%, and so on. If you slot enough +damage into your build, you might hit around 25% damage boost, which is the equivalent of one small red inspiration.

Defenses and recharge can give so much more bang for their buck. Slotting for damage boosts seem insane, especially given that those boosts will most likely end up on top of the regular enhancement slotting (which will get you a little over 90% for a total of 190% damage) along with build up or aim, as well as Assault or any other boosts you may get from teammates. It just isn't worth it. But what if... it was worth it? What if the damage bonuses were large enough that slotting for bonuses would meaningfully contribute to how quickly you killed enemies?

I imagine that if we were to roughly triple or double the damage boosts that IO sets can give, then this would allow us to create a new stat that we can build for: damage. It'll allow us greater customization in our toons: instead of building just to be durable, you can build toons you think are tough enough to do more damage, thus putting them on par with other AT's in that respect. You could make a stalker or a blaster really have high output in sacrifice for making them a lot less durable or have low recharge so their attacks aren't on rapid fire. The most important part would be how you could take a tanker, then give them something like a permanent 45% damage boost, giving them greater offensive power.

The biggest issue I guess would be that damage bonuses could overlap with the others, letting you build up to a toon that has both a 45% defenses and damage boost. I haven't given this a masters level depth of research yet, but a quick ctrl+f search reveals that nearly all of the damage bonuses are alongside of some kind of defense bonus. That might be worked around, or it might be that there's a much more effective way to balance IO slotting than just making the damage boosts higher.






Something I've noticed while playing my tanker is that he is pretty darn indestructible. My other melee toons, IOed out and everything, don't even come close to what my tanker can pull off on a regular basis. As to what is necessary really depends on what my team is currently made up of, as well as the current difficulty level of the content. Though a lot of teams don't need a tank to hold aggro, through the sheer randomness of the game plenty of teams do need a tanker to hold aggro. There have been occasions where I will end up on a team that has a few blasters, a mastermind, and a stalker, and a defender. There have been cases where I would end up on a team where almost no on has a direct form of mezz protection. There are also cases where it is a long mission and the best way to beat it is to split up; a tactic which needs great aggro management since you now are working with only half the team. In these cases, it is great to have a tanker on board. I also think we are looking at end game a little too much. A lot of players will wait until the later levels to IO out their toons due to IO set choice limitations, higher bonuses, and availability of slots to put sets in. With SOs or basic IOs being prominent until endgame, the innate survivability of tankers is of great importance in lower level content. I will also frequently see brutes who are in a squishy phase where they are built mostly for damage and don't have IO defenses to save them.

Granted, I do think that tankers could do with some improvement. They are very durable, but they also lack the flair that other ATs have. They are also not the best at aggro management. I also think that brutes can do a little too much, having a higher damage output with similar caps to tankers. Though it makes more sense on a spreadsheet to nerf brutes a bit, the community backlash would be quite fierce over that. I would just like to think outside of the box and try to find a way to improve tankers in a manner that isn't just making them more like brutes.

I would say we went past missing and have gone full on "missed". To advertise that facet of City of Heroes after it has been touted as part of GW2 would come off as a smaller MMO going "but I have that too!". Right now, I suppose the best we could do is, while NCsoft is talking about GW2, see if they can sneak in a mention about how GW2 has some elements that were experimented with in City of Heroes; another NCsoft game. Whether or not NCsoft will due that is a whole other ballgame.


I have always myself encountered problems whenever I try to advertise this game by word of mouth. It seems like everyone I talk to is doing their best to try and find a reason not to play this game. I've heard things like the following:

#1: "Wait, isn't that game old? I don't want to play an old MMO." Yeah, this doesn't make sense, but it does to whomever says it.

#2: "They've already made a newer one. I'll go play that".

#3: "You play a super hero? So you don't fight dragons and stuff?"

#4: "You only have spells? How are you supposed to fight stuff without an auto-attack?"

#5: "I don't want to play a game where I can't play as Wolverine."

#6: "You can play the game as any AT? Well, then what's the point of playing anything then if you aren't important?". This one... infuriates me.

#7: "I'm not going to play a game without skills/stats I can train and level up".

#8: "Why can't I websling?"


And so on. Of course, you try arguing with them but it is mostly pointless since their mind is made up beforehand. That, or they just circle back to one of the other numbers on the list. I'm certain that this game would be a lot more popular if more people would give it a shot. But all of the newcomers I see play the game just looking for a reason to abandon it.


EDIT: Addendum on #6: Players will also complain that there is no set race in the game in a similar vein.

I suppose one of the reasons why I want some harder material and turn up the difficulty on all of my runs in the game is because the death penalty in this game is so low. The game I'm playing right now is runescape, and if CoX had a punishment similar to RS (lose all of your enhancements), then I would put the game at -1/x1 and never move from that difficulty setting. Even RS is loosening it's death penalties significantly, because they have eventually discovered that in an economy based off of extremely rare takes-months-to-afford items having those items be easily lost due to the unforgiving random number generator or shoddy servers is a horrible game model.

The closest thing that CoX has to that are Purple and PVP IOs, and even then it doesn't take months to earn the cash needed to buy them. Why, with a few trial runs you can get enough astrals in a day to buy several in-demand sets to give yourself several hundred mil so you can buy a purple IO enhancement or two, and the benefits of these enhancements are only marginally better than the lower tiers. Most of the wealth that I earn in the game is happenstance earnings since the gameplay isn't based upon wealth.

The difficulty itself isn't too punishing, either. In worst case scenarios where you come across a merger of 3 groups with annoying things like sappers or S.W.A.T., you can buy a couple of inspirations (4 purples, for example) that will let you become all but invincible for half a minute. A few more, and your damage output increases greatly. Should things be too hard you can lower the difficulty and restart the mission, or continue on afterward if you are in a TF/SF. There are very few moments in the game where you are truly stuck where you are at that cannot be solved without better coordination or planning, and most of the content can be accomplished by a team consisting of any ATs and Powersets given that the player isn't incompetent with slotting SO's or higher.

I definitely want to spend more time in the overworld doing stuff. I wrote a couple of very lengthy posts about this subject in prior topics:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showp...6&postcount=10

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showp...&postcount=115


They're kind of huge, though.

It is likely that the dev's haven't figured out a good tanker change yet. Can't announce what isn't there to announce.