Dr_Mechano

Well considering the Praetorian Clockwork costume perma-temp was given out at Herocon I believe it's people using that with funkeh names and some guy impersonating Emperor Cole (the shoulders are all wrong, I mean those a 'EVIL' Epaulets...Cole thinks he's doing the world a favour...only proper villains get to wear the evil version..).

Now the question, does he con grey to Positron?

*pipes up very, very quietly*

I'd be in support for global unlocks on the same account...but then I also support the anniversery badges being global...

If you've 'done the deed' once it shows that you're willing to put the time and effort in to earn said shiney so, as a bonus, let the costumes unlock to your account.

Interestingly WoW has a kind of 'account item' called a 'legacy' item.

Before you start moaning that this is an "If Wow does it..." kind of post here me out.

Basically they're versions of the famous old school item drops that can be bought with special merits dropped by the bosses of the heroic 5 man dungeons and the 10/25 man raids. These can be mailed to alts, their stats scale with level (they're ok at level 80 but nothing majorly impressive) and when one alt reaches a level of gear where they can be nicely replaced, you simply mail it to the next alt.

The armour available which actually change it's type at certain points, hunter armour is leather up until level 40 where they can finally wear chainmail, the armour will be leather until 40 and then change into chainmail once past that.

It takes a lot of hard work to outfit an alt using those legacy items but once it's done, it's done.

Since it does take quite a bit to unlock the various Taskforce or merit related costumes...why not turn them into global unlocks as well.

*quietly bows out of the thread*

There's also the other major problem with this.

Some mobs simply don't even spawn at the level 50 level range.

Regular old Clockwork are a 1-20 group, however Psi clockwork are a 40-50 group. So if you went back and did the Synapse TF all the enemies would stop at level 20 and con grey. Replacing them with the Psi Clockwork makes no sense whatsoever since the Clockwork with Psi powers are when the Clockwork King is at his full potential or atleast pushed to it (in the dimension where he wiped out everyone non-Clockwork or the LGTF where he's obsessing over protecting Peneople Yin from everything).

There is no real 'mob scaling'. I remember one Malta mission that has two Skulls gang members turn up in it (for comedy and to show the fact that Malta is a wide reaching and influenchal group), they're level 15 because that's the highest they'll go.

Not to mention if they did scale, most foes in the low to middle ranges are...well...pants. They have 1 or 2 attacks for a minion (gangs use revolver + brawl/sledgehammer/baseball bat), most lts are a one trick pony (shotgun, machinegun) and even the bosses don't get a huge amount of attacks.

So there's a shedload of work for not much gain. It would take a lot more work than, as you put it, could be 'added right away' because all the mobs would have to have two versions in order to be balanced to challenge a level 50 not just their native level ranges. This means completely redoing all the TFs except the mission dialogue.

Look at the AE.

Look how long and how much resources it took them to finally get it a way they wanted. Player regulating REALLY didn't work for the AE at all...

They went overboard trying to kill the farming to be fair and now it's reduced to the same level of usage as the Arena, a dedicate few really keep going but otherwise it's ignored by the community at large...atleast that's the impression I got personally, ever since they did the Issue 16 XP nerfs I only ever see one or two people in there at the most.

Now imagine the amount of abuse something like an ingame costume creator would suffer. Sure there would be awesome costumes and probably quite a few very good replicas of NPC only pieces but most of it would either be 'naked female' 'phallic hat' or 'stuff I threw together in five minutes as a test'.

Ooohhh that's actually quite good Havoc....

It's not a costume so zero complaints there (seriously costumes as vet rewards needs to stop, it just peeves off one set of people, makes another set feel smug and there's endless bickering about it...), it's not like the City traveller where people can complain it's 'overpowered' and it's quite useful for vet players...

I, sir, would like to subscribe to your newsletter!

Also find it quite interesting because my current cat actually had to learn to mimic the meow from the two other cats (one died at the ripe old age of 24 and the other moved with my mother when my parents divorced and split up to keep her company).

He hasn't actually mastered it...and never will. The eldest cat at the time had developed the 'old man meow' as I liked to call it. It sounded like the cat saying "Oh Long John" in Samuel's video but lower pitch and more like a grumble while the second eldest female cat had a petite, very femimine, mew.

When we first got our current cat he never meowed, only mewed, apparently he never had to, he had been an old ladies lap cat and got fed just by wandering up to his bowl. So one he's now in a house with two other cats, he picks up that in order to get out attention and get fed he has to meow.

So instead of the standard cat meow he instead developed this long, drawn out, breathy mew to the point where sometimes he doesn't make a noise and just breaths heavily at you or resorts to a short, sharp, high pitched mew.

Also cats are evil and studies show they domesticated themselves for their own benefit, not humans..

This is true, even within the EU community there were people who ignored the Requiem War, the Chronodyne plot and have ignore pretty much every big event that's happened because they feel it'd interupt things down at the Golden Girl statue.

I still find it amazingly silly that there were people who tried to actively ignore a ingame canon event which was happening them around them ("nope, those Rikti bombers totally aren't there..." "no every else isn't going into combat mode and teaming to defeat those non-existent teleporting Rikti...").

The heroes for people plotline got completely blown out of all preportion because some people took great offence at how an otherwise quite sweet petition (about how the people of Paragon should recognise the hard work of the non-super powered emergency services such as the regular PPD and a one day holiday put aside to recognise them) was written because it apparently made heroes out to be useless (which wasn't it's intent at all).

It's probably why such events are incredibly hard/impossible to organise US side as mentioned it'd be like herding cats.

Alpha I recognise the pain, I don't even know who the big hitters are in regards the SGs/VGs on Virtue, there's a crapton of smaller ones but very few big overarching organisations like the Corporation, Unity Vigil etc.

I don't take any credit for this at all, it was Omega_Chiefs theory and probably quite a good one.

The reason the RP styles of both EU and US have developed differently.

The EU is a constant universe both ingame and out when we refer to the Unionverse EU players aren't just refering to the wiki, the Unionverse is our RP universe within CoH. The shorter threads which are more action packed merely represent another chapter in the Unionverse storyline.

As such we've had huge events which affect the entire RP community, Requiem's war being one, the Heroes for People scandel which divided the entire hero community being another.

This has allowed personalities to establish themselves far better than it is on the US side. Just look at the stunts Dr Mechano has been able to pull.

1) Flooding streets with a designer drug, his nemesis and three supergroups went all out to stem the flow and eventually cripple his operation so much that the Family told him they weren't going to deal it anymore because it's too much hastle.

2) Target the 3 biggest Supergroups and target the 3 biggest villain groups, launching simultaneous 'attacks' (in reality harmless pranks) on all 6 while also remotely attacking a Bruce Wayne/Batman style heroes manor and taking out it's defenses with an EMP device. The reason for doing this, to prove nobody is untouchable and that nobody should be complacent. This one took a crapload of organising and discussing with each of the SG/VGs leaders and is the one I'm most proud of.

In the EU Forum RP has ingame RP affect and viceaversa, Dr Mechano's genetically engineered daughter (who still talks to him but remains strictly on the side of good) was questioned at length ingame by the various SG members as to what he was upto next. RP VG leaders are actually incredibly wary of signing Dr Mechano up because he's a known wild card, a lot of people don't like him and they don't need the heat it would bring by having him in that group but at the same time he's a high profile villain.

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While on the US side of things everything is less coherent and a lot more hodgepodge, there is no real shared universe outside of the RP threads that exist on the forums and each one is a universe unto itself. This is probably why each one of them is a long thread that's been going on for years, that thread is it's own RP universe set aside from anything ingame. The Virtueverse doesn't refer to a universe but merely the wiki.

This is probably due to the much larger numbers of RPers around. I've noticed that the threads in the forums are much more strictly GM'd due to the sheer number of people whereas the EU RP threads are much more loose and open because everybody knowns everybody and can trust one another.

US players have had to rely on the forums for their big ongoing plots whereas in the EU, everything both ingame and forums is just one big ongoing plot.
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Once again I take no credit for this theory it was made by Omega_Chief (though I wish I had come up with it myself...curse you Omy!) but it does seem to make a hell of a lot of sense.

Heh well I've already said what I'd like after the 'Origin' packs are finished.

A pack called 'Enemy Mine'.

It includes not complete costumes but parts used by NPCs, some parts would be restricted to gender (Carnival of Shadows mask and Bustier is limited to female for example) while others would be available to all (Freakshow cybernetic chest detail for example).

As mentioned these wouldn't be complete costume but there would a lot of parts, because of the quanity of parts there wouldn't be a power with the pack.

So what's your favorite CoH RP moment?

Well get the ball rolling I'll start with mine.
the tale of Ellie and the Ziggursky prison break.

All that happened in that story was acted out IC over mIRC, the tension built as there were hints of plans from various posts on the EU RP forums.

As one person said, "It's like the scene in Lock, Stock and two smoking barrels where three different groups of gangsters are all preparing to go after the same group of people, you get shots of all three loading up.." (I would link to it but the language used is NSFW).

You had the android hero Seven heading there to sort out Ellie's transfer from the 'hero' wing of the Ziggursky (reserved for heroes gone bad) into the general criminal populace. A team of Vigiliants (Unity Vigils androids) and her friend turned criminal Dr Mechano who had bought along the fugitive Wild Red for backup.

Read the story and I hope you enjoy it.

Hmm did it once on Union.

We came in at a respectable 4 hours 15 minutes.

And now that I've done it...I shall never do it again...on any character...

Those TFs need a major revamp.

Well considering that Samuel is using Castlevania: Symphony of the Night as his basis then well it makes sense to have a vampire with a sword since Alucard was all about the swords in that game (as have every other 2D Castlevania since).

Swords are refined weapons of the aristocracy of those years gone by, so it makes sense that a Vampire, who is often the refined noble hiding the savage beast within, would use a sword, especially if he has flair with it.

Hmm let's see....

Well from the Castlevania series you've got:

Alucard: Well the changing into a bat thing, thanks to the SCIENCE! booster pack we can now change sizes so you could simple make one costume a very small batlike creature and go 'bamf' into that whenever you want to use fly...heck set up a keybind/macro for it. I would probably say go Broadsword or Katana/Dark Armour because...well virtually every protaganist in the Metroidvanias is a sword user (unless you're playing Aria of Sorrow or Dawn of Sorrow extra mode as Julius Belmont).

Dracula:Your classic 'one winged angel' type of boss in 99% of the Castlevania games. His powers are generally teleport (either the snazzy kind or the disperse into bats and reform kind), raise his arm and fire 3 fireballs at you and the occasional area effect spell. Of course going monstrous in his second costume allows pretty much whatever the heck you feel like really...Probably best to go Fire melee/Dark Armour Brute since Dracula is usually about as subtle as a brick to the face in the Castlevania games.

Carmilla: Vampire Sorceress extraordinare and tends to ride about on a skull or attack you with just her mask crying deadly bloody tears of acid. Considering she's a 'throw magic at it' kind of vampire rather than a 'I vant to suck you blood' kind of vamp, pretty much any ranged damage set will do. Or you can take her second phase from her Rondo of Blood appearance and make her a backside kicking, martial arts using demoness.

Olrox: Teleports, monstrous form, dark magic...he's pretty much a lesser version of Dracula.

Elizabeth Bathory: Draculas Neice and commands fire, earth, water while also able to turn into Medusa, so she's basically Carmilla with more 'oomph'.

What...I'm a Castlevania fan...yes I know there's loads from the N64 and the modern 3D games but bah! I'm giving a run down of the most famous ones from the 2D ones.

Interestingly players can become Boss characters in CoH however it's very limited set of builds that can pull this off.

My Bots/Traps is only 32 and barely slotted for IOs BUT she already feels like a 'Boss with Minions' type fight that tends to crop up in the scrolling beat'em up genre. Anything under an Elite Boss (which are meant to be the mini-boss of the CoH world) barely causes her to flinch. Once she's fully IO'd out to have range defense soft-capped and a few other things, she'll be fully capable of taking on the 'final boss' grade foes that are Giant Monsters on her own.

Sonic/Rad defenders/corruptors, Illusion/Rad Controllers, Dark/SR Scrappers/Brutes can all be atleast end level boss type power since they can all take out AVs.

Actually I'd laugh at that...

"Super Amazing Man shall be forever remembered as a caring, if easily distracted individual. Instead of helping his team during their daring raid, his superhearing caught the moaning yowels of his cat on the wind. Thinking that this was the last time he'd see Mr Tiddums, he returned home to find that his poor feline had been sick all over the new shag carpet and was feeling poorly. He rushed him to the vets with all the superspeed he could muster, the vet diagonised Mr Tiddums with merely an upset tummy from some Crey catfood and was fine to return home. Dropping Mr Tiddums off at his sister house, since he couldn't stand the thought of leaving the poorly feline on his own once he was gone, Super Amazing man rejoined the group with the simple words, "sorry guys...cat was sick..." from there he bravely went to his heroic death...

...the statue of him has been comissioned with Mr Tiddums cradled in his arms as he made his superspeeded dash to the vets, showing that not all heroics require a man to save the world, sometimes, just caring for an ill feline is enough..."

Hmm could have sworn the Tsoo we're allied with the Warriors, I swear you occasionally see a Tsoo training a group of Warriors in Talos Island.

Yes the Warriors really do get the short end of the stick. They hit FAR harder than the Freakshow and, as mentioned, are the most dangerous mob at that level range. It's only in their story arcs (like the new heroside one from the Midnighters) do they get any kind of 'oomph' but out on the streets their clearly just derided and bullied.

If I was a better writer I would probably make some AE story-arcs myself that run through those level ranges featuring the cartel wars but...eh...I'm not that great a storyteller.

With regards why the Skulls and Hellions are probably downplayed.

Their thugs, plain and simple, yes they've got magical might going on at the high end but they're the initial enemies as they're a Street gang. I've never seen the Skulls and Hellions as 'cheery' they don't do anything that is designed to be amusing except lampshade facts like they've been hammering away at a door/car for hours. They're your basic street thugs and compared to the world threats that are the Circle of Thorns, Arachnos or the Council/5th Column (all available at low levels through to high levels) they're pretty much small fry and only a danger to Paragon.

They're also still decidedly 'human' with not much magical might as the other magical powered, mostly human low level group (Circle of Thorns who, atleast Redside, has summoned demons and ghosts among their ranks) and not as much raw firepower as the human tech group (the Council has it's Super Soldier Serum, robots and a bucket load of tech to throw at things) or as diverse as the 'all round annoying at low level' human group (Arachnos which seems to throw almost everything they have at you from the word go...).

The Clockwork and Vazhilok are either completely or 90% non-human in their group.

It is interesting that the are only two early enemy groups to get any closure are the non-human or formerly human ones, the first being the Clockwork (through the Synapse TF) and the second being the Vahzilok. You never meet the leader of the Hellions (not even sure who the leader is of the Hellions...) and the leaders of the Skulls are somewhat lackluster for supposedly being powerful dark magic users and probably necromancers.

As mentioned the Trolls/Outcasts storyline in the hollows ends in a Trial that almost nobody runs, you only meet Tub Ci when you have to rescue him villainside.

There's this whole inter-cartel war that never really gets explained either. The Hellions/Outcasts/Tsoo form a cartel which ships magical artifacts and the Rage drug. The Skulls/Trolls/Family form a cartel which deals in gun running and the Superdyne drug. These two factions hate each others guts yet apart from the odd brawl between opposing sides mobs in zones and one story arc there's very little to do with it.

Personally I'd like to see each cartel have their own ongoing storyline which runs through each of the mobs respective level ranges (1-10 (Skulls/Hellions for low level, 10-20 Outcasts/Trolls for the next tier and 20-30 Tsoo/Family for the last) about this huge intergang war.

Actually one of my characters will tend to slip into a mild scottish accent. 'dinnae' (didn't) 'ya ken me?' (you understand me?) have often caused problems for people when RPing because...well let's just say I have Scottish family and I have trouble understanding them when they go at full pace with all the Scottish slang terms being thrown around.

However I did, much to my discredit I suppose, adopted a broad Yorkshire accent while in America...was kind of interesting to see the looks of confusion I got when just talking. However much to my surprise my normal South London accent caused almost as much confusion because Londoners tend to speak very quickly, clip their words AND throw in the bit of odd cockney rhyming slang to go on top.

Like asking 'to have butchers' at something comes from the slang butchers hook, which means look. Or we throw in pop culture references like 'ooh that's a bit of a Brucie bonus' (you win one internet cookie for guessing where that comes from IF you're not a native of the United Kingdom).

Hmm...well this is a turn up for the books...

You Scored as Lawful Evil

A Lawful Evil person is someone who respects laws, customs, or traditions, but will try to bend them to suit their own needs. These people have little concern for others they hurt, being intrinsically self motivated. Despite this, they value order and obedience to authority.

Lawful Evil
75%
True Neutral
65%
Neutral Good
60%
Chaotic Good
55%
Lawful Good
45%
Chaotic Evil
45%
Neutral Evil
40%
Chaotic Neutral
40%
Lawful Neutral
30%

Personally quite worrying but then I don't put much stock in these internet quizes...

Interesting...

...as mentioned there was the 'Trial of Dr Mechano' waaay back when on the EU RP forums. Formerly a villain Edward Johnson aka Dr Mechano had always found it hard to adjust to working under the 'heroic way' of life.

This is was part of an over arching plotline and Edward had seen the risk to life that a group of Freakshow were willing to go to and that they had better be stopped, permenant fashion than simply be carted off to the Zig.

To that end he butchered an entire sewer maps worth of Freakshow and remained unrepentant to it, claiming he was administering 'the Lord's justice, higher than that of man and that, as sinners, these men must be punished.' He made no qualms and didn't fight the arresting officer.

Under a court of his peers, a Meta-human jury he was found guilty of murder (yes we actually RP'd out the entire trial ingame, complete with courtroom base and the prosecuting attourney was really a Nemesis Automaton kept in place by Nemesis to deal with troublesome heroes) because the amount of force warranted was above and beyond what a police officer would have had to use in that situation, Edward easily had the option of knocking them unconscious, slapping a Zig Tag on the offenders and letting them be teleported out but he didn't, he beat them to death with his netherenergy empowered hands.

According to the background lore a Superhero is held to the same strict standards as a Police officer, in that the death of a criminal is only warranted if there was no other way to bring the situation to a close without further risk to the wellbeing of the public.