Creole Ned

Guys, don't derail this wonderful thread with arguments.

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The original strategy guide was essentially based on a design document. So it contains details on a number of events - particularly trials - that were never actually implemented, such as the Faultline Dam trial.

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The Dam trial was playable for a very short period. I never did it myself but I believe part of the requirement was for a team between a certain level in the same SG.

The trial itself was said to be rather buggy and involved Freaks attacking various objectives in attack waves. This technology was later transfered to the Respec Trial.

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This is not true. The Faultline trial was *never* implemented. There has never been a trial or task force of any kind in Faultine - not on the live servers and not in beta.

Taser and Revolver, could you take your argument to PMs? We don't really need yet another thread derailed into the usual back and forth that always happens.

Just a request is all.

Hard numbers for patron powers are good.

Hard numbers for ALL powers is better.

Not wading into the debate on the permanent nature of the patron powers except to express some concern over the precedent it sets.

Someone mentioned that in beta you could respec your AT in the Terra Volta trial. The beta didn't even have a Terra Volta trial. Respecs weren't offered until Issue 2, over four months after the game shipped and have never allowed you to change your AT.

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I just hope that the devs don't read this and decide to nerf aid self instead of boosting healing flames

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I'd like to do both, actually (and both my Brute and my Stalker use it!) But, alas, Aid Self isn't changing. Healing Flames, on the other hand, might get a boost.

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Aid Self has saved my fire blaster occasionally while soloing. Please don't change it. Not everyone plays melee characters with built-in defenses.

Screaming SWAT guy.

Good luck with your next project, Alexa.

It's actually mostly people with NCsoft who are leaving or being re-assigned. I have a hunch that the company is moving people over to Auto Assault since it's their next big title gearing up for release. Could be wrong, though, since everyone is deliberately coy about where they are heading off to.

AFAIK, Zeb Cook is the only notable dev to leave Cryptic recently.

Good luck wherever you land next, Arctic Sun. And don't forget your toque!

The question I asked Statesman via PM (sent January 13):

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Quick question about the status of skills, since it came up on the forums again...are they still under development or permanently shelved?

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His reply:

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Shelved.

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No specific suggestions from me (there are many excellent ones here already) but wanted to throw my support behind you, Curveball. Your original guide is one of the few I consider a must-read. Good luck with the update.

I'm not going to voice an opinion on the merit of making the Isolator badge available to characters created before the badge existed. I do want to convey how I see Isolator as different than other "special" badges.

Badges for Celebrant, defeating the Winter Lord and completing the Calvin Scott TF are all tied to specific events. Respectively, CoH's one-year anniversary, the 2004 winter event and a time-limited TF that moved the game's story forward with Malaise going rogue.

The badge for Isolator is not an event badge. It is available to every character created in the game, without restriction. But it was not put into the game until months after the game shipped, so any characters created before cannot get the badge. You can't go back to the tutorial, after all.

Players without Isolator didn't miss a special event, their characters simply existed before badges did. There is no fault here, the system simply wasn't in place at the time.

Is it reasonable for players with pre-Issue 2 characters to want some way to get Isolator? Perhaps, perhaps not. But it's not the same as asking for a time-limited event badge long after the event has come and gone.

I'm assuming Positron was joking with his "Will do" comment, unless the devs have been working on buffing monsters all along.

However, if he is that easily persuaded, may I ask that the promised reversion of knockback be put into the *next* patch? (the current "fixed" version sucks corn dogs)

Thanks.

Now CoH-compliant.

Comic book tradition!

Nope, coming this spring, I believe, possibly with Issue 7. Would make sense with the pistol scrapper shown in the video.

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I mean, I really don't care how skilled you are, your .44 bullets are not going to hit 10x harder than someone else's .44 bullets.

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No, but someone with the skill to reliably deliver that bullet to your head is far more likely to kill you than someone who's random spray is going to hit you in the arm instead.

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Except that bosses and lt's have actually had their accuracy reduced while minions were left alone.

Really, it's a game mechanic, nothing more. As Kali said, it doesn't require a "realistic" explanation, it's just the game's shortcut to making tougher opponents tougher.

Mind you, having a Hellion boss pull out a bazooka instead of a capgun with uber-damage *would* be interesting.

Kudos on all three things. You have made a lot of players happy with this list.

Keep the line of communication open and, hey, try asking players about proposed changes sometimes. You might get some useful feedback and save yourself programming time and effort by not having to go back and fix things. Just a suggestion.

You are indeed correct. I was looking at the wrong date when I typed that in. Mea culpa.

For those keeping score at home:

Game launch: April 30, 2004
Issue 1: June 30, 2004 (2 months)
Issue 2: September 16, 2004 (about 2 1/2 months)
Issue 3: January 4, 2005 (a little over 3 months)
Issue 4: May 4, 2005 (4 months)
Issue 5: August 31, 2005 (a little under 4 months)
Issue 6: October 31, 2005 (2 months)

Average time between issues: 2.91 months!

Hasn't it usually been that the issue goes to test a few weeks or so after a Features Update? If so, that would put Issue 7 on the test server probably near the end of February.

To arms!

(I couldn't find them either.)

You know, I've tried to get the Warden badge with my main in CoH and after reading the description for it, I'm pretty sure they left off a zero for the number of prisoners needed.

I did have a lot of fun working toward the badge when the water around the Zig was frozen, though. It was like Ice Capades with energy blasts.

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OK - here's the most likely outcome...

If you own both games, you get all options - the new CoV sets will be accessible for your heroes.

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This is welcome news. I might suggest that CoV's more neutral costume pieces be streamed into CoH in future updates (Issue 7, etc.) - there's no compelling reason to make them exclusive to a villain-oriented expansion. The skulls, spikes in the eyeballs and other darkity dark options can understandably remain the domain of evildoers.

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Uhm... who said they won't allow what costume options? The last official thing I read was that the two games would share 1/3 of the options and have the rest as unique to each side. I don't recall anyone saying which options will be for which game. Also, W_1 has said that some of the costume pieces on the beta server are being removed before launch.

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Currently on CoH test (Issue 6), none of the new costume pieces from CoV are available. Several existing pieces also seem to have gone missing (sneakers, for example).

A pittance to mollify us, nothing more.