Doctor Roswell

Statesman DIES?

Thanks for ruining it for me. Jerk.

tl;dr: A checkbox on the LFG tab allowing a player to choose whether they want the "first available" team, or whether they'd rather wait for a full one.

My Case For It:
The Team-Up Teleporter/LFG tab is one of those things that's a great idea, but just a hair shy of really being good for anything. Would most DFB runs really be any different if it started through a regular contact who sent the group to a regular door? Either way, formation of ninety-plus percent of them would still be exactly the same: Whoever's starting it spams Broadcast and any applicable global channels until they've got a full team, then they start. Kinda makes the "queue" part worthless, for both the people on the team and anyone waiting in the queue who just got bypassed by a pre-formed team. Your best option is still to stand around Atlas and wait for one to form.

And there's a lot to be said for running most trials and TFs with a full team. More support/damage, better XP, tougher spawns, whatever.

I've run Drowning in Blood twice now. The first time, I used the LFG tab and, after about five minutes, I got the prompt that the trial was ready. Clicked the green button, and so did two other people. One didn't, so we wen't back into the queue and continued to wait, because even a single person declining meant we were under the minimum required for the trial. A few miniutes later, I was placed in the trial with three other people. We made it to the end, then team-wiped twice before it became clear we weren't going to win and people started dropping out. The second time, I joined a pre-formed team in Atlas Park. Eight people altogether. We pretty much steamrolled it, though the bosses were still fairly challenging.

The point is, with the queue sending us in with the minimum number of players, it was a failure. When we basically bypassed the queuing system by pre-forming with the maximum number of players, it was a success. Does this mean every minimum-sized team is going to fail? Of course not. But it's certainly more likely than on a full team.

Letting us actually go do things while we're in the queue is a good start. The next step is to not make queuing obviously worse than pre-forming, even for pick-up groups.

So here's what I propose: A checkbox on the LFG tab allowing a player to choose whether they want the "first available" team, or whether they'd rather wait for a full one.

Didn't one of the devs say a while back that we could probably expect any of the new Tsoo pieces that would work for players to eventually be available in a costume pack similar to the Circle of Thorns one? I swear I remember someone saying that.

I'd like this too, though I'd point out that it would have to be two bars: one for Physical and one for Psychic IXP. Even if it replaced the normal XP bar altogether, some characters (brutes and dominators) would have five different bars on their UI.

As a workaround, as soon as one of my characters hits 50, I /bind i "toggle Incarnate" to make it less of a pain to get to that all-important Incarnate window.

I'd be happy with just being able to see the NPC's friggin' health bar without having to click on them. Add them to the team window so I can see when they're in trouble!

Maybe an indicator on the compass, too, similar to the "team leader" star.

Or! OR!

Bring back the old "my mentor is getting too far away" thought balloons. "Lady Jane is in trouble! I'd better help her!" when she hits 50% health or her threat level goes past a certain threshold or something.

I wouldn't mind seeing a setup almost identical to the old distance-triggered sidekick-warning balloons for non-combative NPCs, too, so I don't leave them in the dust. If the first one could also trigger the activation of a Sprint power in the NPC, too, all the better. Seriously, can't they at least try to keep up?

To be fair, all it said was that they're not launching "with" I22. I haven't seen any confirmation that Staff isn't coming this month. So unless I missed something, all we know for sure is:

• Staff Fighting isn't part of I22 and never has been. (Because it's a purchasable, you-can-only-use-it-if-you-buy-it-from-the-market powerset and not part of any specific issue any more than Titan Weapons or Street Justice were.)
• It wasn't mentioned one way or another in War Witch's letter in which she outlined, in somewhat vague and non-specific terms, the planned releases for March.

None of that technically adds up to "no Staff Fighting this month," though I admit it could be taken that way. I still wouldn't be at all surprised to see it for sale on the market the day I22 goes live -- it still wouldn't technically be part of the issue, and something new will probably go up for sale on that date.

Creating free accounts and the /friend command are both viable workarounds. But a workaround is not the same thing as a solution.

I really wish they'd move it back to the character-select screen instead of (or in addition to) the character creator. To me it falls under the same heading as the (very, VERY welcome) ability to adjust graphics settings from the login screen coming in I22.

I'm starting to think they should just replace the entire "Player Questions" forum with a redirect to the wiki.

I'm not sure about Jail Bird offhand. But there is still a way to get Isolator: Ouroboros. The initial "tutorial" arc for that (from Mender Whatshisname right in front of the portal) sends you back to a modified version of Outbreak -- complete with exemping you to level 1. Supposedly there's also a single Infected (EDIT: Not Infected, Contaminated. The Infected are all over Mercy Island and are a different group altogether) that spawns once an hour in one of the PvP zones that you could farm, too, but I recommend the Ouroboros method.

I don't particularly want a sash.

That said, I also don't not want one, and since it's been requested over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over on a near-constant basis for the last seven years or so, I don't understand why we still don't have one. Seriously, devs, what gives? The people obviously want a sash, and it's so simple there's no good reason at all not to cough it up already. I promise it'll sell better than a Pilgrim hat or fireman's helmet, at any rate.

I'm still not entirely sure I understand the justification for Focus and Shockwave with standard claws. It sort of makes sense using the Vanguard models, but with what basically amounts to knives....

It's always been one of those things I just sort of accepted and tried not to think too hard about.

To combine suggestions from the last two posts -- what about assigning "falling" damage to enemies based on knockback distance?

There's no limit that I've ever heard of, but it's possible that the "character" and "account" versions are listed separately in your Powers tab, and might have to be added to your trays as different powers. You've likely got 19 of one version and 1 of another (which will work the same, but have to be in different places on the list for back-end reasons). Open your Powers tab and make a thorough check through the third column; my guess is there are two listings for it.