Hydrogen_NA

Apprentice
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  1. Just to let you guys know, disabling the all non-Microsoft services and removing the 5 other things in StartUp made my mouse lag problem go away. I'm not sure which specific service or TSR was buggin' it but it did suddenly start working just fine. Surprisingly, I'd say the graphics on I17 are quicker than the older versions.
  2. Howdy folks, I tried searching last night but couldn't find any definitive thread dealing with input lag. In my case, with the advent of I17, I've had two issues: A graphics/driver related issue (which was solved using the -useTexEnvCombine command parameter with cohupdater.exe) as well as a mouse input lag problem. The issue I'm having is the mouse pointer responds ridiculously slow both at the login screen and while in game. Everything else seems just fine. I've got normal keyboard response, I can move my character around, etc. but I'm having to use the touch screen on this laptop (ruggedized, hardened military laptop) to move the mouse cursor around as it's way too slow to respond on the touch pad. Are there any threads out there dealing with this issue already or does anybody have any suggestions?

    Thanks,

    Hydro
  3. Wow, that worked! I was able to get right in and it actually looked pretty good and moved pretty well!

    The mouse cursor is moving extremely slowly but I suspect I can fix it. Right on! Thanks for the tip.
  4. Is there any such thing as a barebone, default configuration setting or registry setup somewhere? If it's up on some complex setting I'd like to be able to get in to crank it all down or modify it outside of game somewhere.

    Am I the only ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 user with issues?
  5. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Tex View Post
    I17 includes a reworking/updating/tweaking of the graphics engine. Did you try my suggestions above to disable any overrides in the ATI Catalyst Control Center?
    Yep. I've tried nearly every setting change, Safe Mode and standard, as well as changing Acceleration settings in the Adapter settings. It's still doing the same thing: Black intro (splash) screen, grey background login w/ no visible text (same with password), yet audio and key inputs still work. Hmph!
  6. Quote:
    Originally Posted by British Battler View Post
    Hehe, sometime I feel like throwing my desktop, let alone my laptop haha, guess someone thought they might to and got an appropriate one in case they did
    Heh heh heh. Well I've used ruggedized laptops for the past 3-4 years due to my job as a performance car tuner. The ruggedized machine works well in the environments, bouncing around in a car, and when it's banging around in a travel back in the belly of an airplane. I can drop it, bang on the case and screen, all that fun stuff and it won't break. Shock-mounted hard drive caddy, touch screen w/ a stylus, lit up keyboard, terrific machine! It's also made out of die cast magnesium so it's hard as hell.

    http://www.gd-itronix.com/index.cfm?...ucts:GoBookIII

    I upgraded it hoping it'd play CoH for the heck of it and, to my surprise, it played it pretty well during I16. Just trying to figure out now why it's broke.
  7. Howdy folks,

    I've got a display problem as well. I17 basically broke CoH on my laptop. I run an oddball machine: It's an Itronix GoBook III which is a hardened, ruggedized machine used for military and outdoor use. This notebook's got an ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 w/ 64mb. CPU is an Intel Centrino 1.8GHz and 2Gb of system RAM. Even though I kept the Direct3D and OpenGL settings in the ATI driver set on high performance as well as the graphics set to Performance and advanced graphics set to 'Disabled' in game, it actually ran surprisingly well.

    Ever since I17 though, it's been broken. Basically, my symptoms are I get a scattered looking loading screen for a few seconds and then the screen goes totally black. The only thing that I can see is the login and password fields but they're grey and I cannot see any text I type in. The mouse cursor is also very, very slow to respond. Audio works. Just got squat on display. I experience the same symptom in Safe Mode, too.

    I've tried three different ATI drivers: the one provided by the laptop manufacturer, an Omega Driver, and then most recently the ATI Catalyst 10.4 driver using DH Mobility Modded drivers. With the Omega driver alone, I experience the "your car does not support ARB_" messages with the game crashing thereafter but with the other two I'm seeing the black screen.

    My guess is it's a driver issue but I just can't see how. Any ideas?
  8. Quote:
    Originally Posted by Smurphy View Post
    easy and not very eventful. Which of those 6 arcs do you consider the most difficult and the most epic? I didn't want to go through them all when I can start from the top and see how that goes.
    Hi Smurphy, thank you for taking the time to try the first hero arc out. In all honesty, it may be the arcs don't fit exactly what you're looking for. The way I designed the arcs, besides sticking strictly to storyline (SFMA-based) stuff and adhering to the elements therein, was to ramp the difficulty upwards with the latter two being the more challenging ones. For instance, "A Dire Threat" establishes a baseline setting, characters, protagonist and antagonist(s), etc. with the difficulty of it growing as the story delves more deeply culminating in a climactic ending at mission 5. I understand you're not particularly interested in story stuff but this better explains why it works the way it does. "A Dire Threat" is the first 5 of 15 of that hero-side TF with missions 4 and 5 being the two more difficult ones. Mish 5 specifically should have 4 AV's if I remember it correctly and ought to fit more of what I think you're looking for.

    The same goes for the other two hero arcs where they start fairly easy and then ramp up as you progress. The third hero-side arc ("Alpha and Omega"), however, is considerably more difficult with more AV stuff towards the end with the last mission being pretty challenging (if the difficulty is ramped up, that is).

    Overall, I would say the villain side TF is a bit more difficult but still follows the same sort of "ramping up" effect. When I designed the arcs, I stuck mainly to story-line theme stuff so it's taking a precedent.

    As far as the AV's that run off, that's always been a thorn in my side and I suspect it is for many of the AE designer folks out there. We don't seem to have much control over keeping them stationary even when we program in to be "Melee" over "Ranged" and remove their ranged attacks. I hope it's something the programmers decide to look at more closely because in AE there's not much more that hacks me off than an AV trying to run. It kills that "warrior spirit" thing.
  9. Hi Acoustics, I'm checking out your Mantisman Task Force. I have to say the custom mob costumes look terrific. Nice work.
  10. Hi Smurphy,

    I've read the rules you've listed and I think my two published task forces fit them.

    I started working on AE creation the first day it was released. I've written these two full TF's (15 missions; 3 arcs each) that've been published for some time. They're geared heavily towards SFMA (story-arc based) complete with custom character power sets for the EB's/AV's, character bios, end mission clues, mission intros, chronological time stamps, architect souvenirs, etc. They're about as detailed as they can get and have been meticulously edited for grammar and spelling. They're also tough and are geared towards 6-8 person teams with AV's turned on. They're meant to be as difficult as some of the more challenging TF's in the game and really give a team a good workout but are not so hard that they're impossible. No insta-kill farming stuff or mez-happy, stun-happy mob groups that quickly incapacitate your teammates. They include a mixture of the classical CoH/CoV mob groups (Circle of Thorns, Carnies, Freakshow, Longbow, Arachnos, etc.) as well as dutiful re-creations of some of our favourites like old-school LSSL bank missions, mayhems/safeguards, etc. I tried to make them run the gamut of mission types and styles so as to not create redundancy and leave the player bored. Both task forces are coherent, full of CoH/CoV lore, that start fairly easy, ramping themselves in difficulty, slowly but surely building up to climactic endings.

    Each of the TF's, inclusive of all 15 missions from their respective 5-mission arcs (3 arcs in each TF), take about 4-6 hours to complete with the difficulty settings cranked up. During my testing, when I was running them with mid-sized and full-sized groups over and over, I timed them. Just about every person I grabbed to help test them expressed their enjoyment of them. The only few who'd complained about them were ones that were looking for quick and easy XP that's typical of farming arcs.

    Both of these TF's take place shortly before and during City of Villains being released. I cannot remember the Issue this was but it was in late 2005. The settings are mixed City of Heroes and City of Villains' zones. I've included probably about 25-30 custom EB's and AV's (as well as a few custom mob types) that are regular players of Justice Server complete with their custom bios and personalities that reflect how they are in real life. Some of those players were made into allies that assist in a mission while others were made into mission-completing enemies. These TF's intersect with one another in their story lines since they deal with the same characters. While the hero side I consider "canonical", one can also play the villain side and change the course of the history of that particular story in favour of the bad guys. For instance, the 5th mission in both TF's revolves around the day that City of Villains was released, enabling villains to be created (aka "released") from the Zig. During the Hero side TF, one plays a hero attempting to prevent the Arachnos break while defeating signature villains. But, with the Villain TF, the player in the story line is actually causing the prison break with Arachnos as allies. From there, the stories diverge. When playing the hero side TF, one feels like a true hero. When on the villain side TF, one feels truly like a villain.

    The TF's are "The Many Faces of Hydro's Heroes" and "The Many Faces of Hydro's Villains" which are centered mainly around the creation of all of the 'Hydro' characters I've made on Justice Server.

    The arc #'s:
    The Many Faces of Hydro's Heroes TF
    41066, Episode I: A Dire Threat
    72829, Episode II: Tumultuous Times
    210970 Episode III: Alpha and Omega

    The Many Faces of Hydro's Villains TF
    219429, Episode I: The Next Big Thing
    224793, Episode II: Minister Of Pain
    228570, Episode III: Made in Paragon

    If this interests you, I'd be happy to get your input and grading on them to see if they fit this play style you're looking for with respect to the contest you're holding. It sounds like yours is a lot like mine - challenging, evenkill, balanced but difficult tending towards enemies being slightly stronger, that sort of a thing.

    Thanks,

    Hydro
  11. The way to wipe this out is to prevent any Level 1 (or perhaps Level 1-3) character from sending tells or emails to people that are not on their global friends' list. This will make it more difficult for the rank-and-file, level 1 spammer from blasting emails and tells out shortly after creating a new character.
  12. Hey folks, I've decided to go ahead and put my training program in writing and provide it to you guys and whomever else online. This is my Elite Mastermind Training Guide and its purpose is to provide the necessary tools for the Mastermind to operate his or her archetype to its fullest potential. Although this training guide will certainly benefit the more experienced Mastermind, it is mainly intended for a younger target audience and those that are unfamiliar with Masterminds in general. The key focus behind this guide is to train those up and comers with the skills to operate their pets with precision control. While Mastermind builds and pet types (robots, ninjas, etc.) can generate a difference in control, those will not be addressed exhaustively with the exception of small snippets in certain pet control sections. It is my hope that any newly-built or seasoned Mastermind will find this guide helpful.

    In my opinion, the Mastermind is the most difficult archetype in City of Villains to play. But, on that same token, given a mastery of this archetype, it can also be exceptionally powerful not only from the standpoint of soloing but also as a grouped character. Masterminds, if properly built, can be the center of a group, giving support all the way from hold, confuse, and placate resistance to group heals and rez's. The power of the Mastermind ultimately rests with its pets and the full control of those pets. The bane of the Mastermind, on the other hand, is the lack of control of those pets especially in a group situation. As I have found in my experience of being a Mastermind, the problem that many people run into and complain about is with Masterminds that have uncontrolled pets in their groups. Many Masterminds fail to keep the proper leashes on their pets. This can lead to multiple deaths and all-out group wipes when pets "go wild" and aggro multiple mobs or groups of mobs. The solution to this is precision control as I've eluded to earlier. Now, my focus will go to the individual Mastermind that is currently in-game. Please read this guide straight through and do not skip ahead if this is your first time. Let's get started!


    [u]Preliminary[u]
    The first thing we need to do is take a look at the three already-provided pet control buttons. Under Powers on the Powertray, in the section 'Basic Pet Commands', we've got three buttons: Attack, Follow, and Heel. These three buttons may work for the first couple of levels of play, but they amount to a world of trouble. They need to be removed from the Powertray by right-clicking on them and choosing the option Remove from Tray. While they may have been intended to be a help to the budding Mastermind, consider these worthless.

    Secondly, we need to get the Pet window up and set to Advanced mode if it is not already there. On your chat window, click Team on the top left and then click Pets once the Team window pops up. If your Pets window was not up already, it will be now. On the pet window, click Options and then choose Switch to Advanced Mode. This will allow the ability to choose individual stances and actions of each pet. Also, on that same window, click the two arrows until the pet toggles (to the left of their respective health/endurance bars) appears.



    [u]Part II - Creating Macros[u]
    Now that we've got the prelims out of the way, let's focus on replacing those three Basic Pet Controls with eight... yes, eight. For this, we'll need to have a spare powertray opened with 8 empty slots, if not all 10. I use powertray 3 since 1 and 2 are used for primary and secondary powers respectively as well as pool powers. Use whatever powertray you feel comfortable with.

    With the available, empty powertray open, let's make our first macro. It will be a test macro to get you familiar with macros in general. In your chat window, type the following:

    /macro Hi local Hi!

    Once this macro is created, it will place the button for that macro named Hi in the first available slot in your powertrays. Click it. It should make your character say "Hi!" in local chat, visible to everyone nearby. Now, let's add something to it. Right-click this macro and go to Edit. In the Edit window, go to the end of the macro text and add this: $$ emote wave

    The $$ in City of Heroes/Villains is used as a command separator. With these two dollar signs, you can stack multiple commands in a single macro to perform multiple actions. In this case, the Hi macro performs two commands: Displays 'Hi!' in local chat and should also make your character wave. For more practice, let's make another:

    /macro Dance emote dance

    Now, edit this macro and add the following: $$ local Shake it baby!

    Lastly, edit this macro again and add this at the tail-end: $$ petsay_all <em dance>

    This macro should now make not only yourself dance but all of your pets as well.

    Now that we've gotten the bare-bones of macro creation down, let's focus on the pet control macros that will replace the Basic Pet Controls provided in the game. Our first macro will be called AtkP. Here's the format:

    /macro AtkP petcom_all attack passive

    This macro tells all of your pets to perform two things: One, attack your current target no matter where they're standing as well as ignore all others. Once that target is dead, your pets will return to you, hence the passivity. Move AtkP into Slot 1 of your new, (empty) pet control powertray. To practice, find an enemy mob nearby and give AtkP a try. The tactic behind this approach of using attack passive is to focus all pets on one mob at a time instead of having pets run out of control at multiple threats.

    /macro FlwP petcom_all follow passive

    This is the Follow Passive macro. This macro instructs your pets to follow you and ignore all attackers as well as any nearby mobs. They remain passive to everything and will not defend you or attack any others no matter what they are doing. This is the ultimate in controlling pets as it keeps them on an exceptionally-tight leash. It does have its drawbacks as we will get into further. This macro needs to be placed in your 2nd slot of your pet control powertray. Both AtkP and FlwP will be your most commonly-used macros, hence their positions in slots 1 and 2.

    /macro Stay petcom_all stay passive

    This is the Stay macro. It instructs your pets to stay parked in their current position passively ignoring all other threats and targets. This can be a useful control to have if you want to split yourself off from your pets temporarily for reasons of pulling or checking around corners, etc. This belongs in the 3rd slot of your powertray.

    /macro Def petcom_all follow defensive

    This is the mother of all macros for Masterminds -- Guardian Mode. Since Issue 7, the Mastermind can morph from that of a flimsy "squishy" character into that of a tanker with unbelievable robustness, challenging even the best of attackers. Strangely enough, it's not provided in the game, yet it's the difference between life and death of a Mastermind in tough situations, especially in PvP. An explanation of Guardian Mode: what this defensive posture does is evenly split off the damage that you receive from attackers onto your pets that are in PBAoE range. This won't apply to pets that are a good distance off. This macro will go into your 4th powertray slot. When activated, you will see a white shield on a blue background next to each pet name. Give it a try by targetting a mob and aggroing it yourself, waiting for it to attack you back. When you take damage, notice how it is evenly divided up amongst your pets. They should also respond and attack the attacker in response. Guardian Mode will not be used as much in PvE as it will be in PvP. Since attacks in PvP can come randomly and without warning, it is advisable to leave this up as much as possible. In PvE, it can be handy to use when you are fighting a very powerful mob and want some added defense.

    /macro Goto petcom_all goto passive

    This is one of my favourite control macros. This macro will send all of your pets to a given location similar to how AoE powers are done. They'll travel to that location and then remain there in passive mode, unresponsive to any threats. This control is highly useful if you have melee-based pets and want to send them in directly to surround a target for melee-range attacking. This goes in your 5th powertray slot. Practice it by sending your pets to a mob and then initiating the AtkP macro.

    /macro FlwA petcom_all follow aggressive

    This is Follow Aggressive. It isn't used very often but can be handy in PvP situations where invisible targets (such as stalkers) are a threat. With a good build that includes Tactics for +Perception, this macro might come in handy. Otherwise, it won't be used often. This goes in the 6th slot of your powertray

    /macro Blitz petcom_all goto aggressive

    The Blitz macro -- I like this one. It's situational, however, in that it's not used often except in conditions where you're fighting much lower mobs, fighting with a large group of people against a very large group of mobs, or if you are looking for a way to retreat to Rest (by blocking a door, etc.). Blitz is like Goto except Blitz will set your pets on aggressive to attack any nearby target and search for other targets actively. They will respond to any targets until dead and will return to that spot. This macro belongs in



    [u]Part III: Keybinds[u]

    In this section of the guide, we'll cover the use of keybinds in City of Heroes/Villains as well as taking the next step from clicking macros on a powertray to moving at lightspeed with incredible pet control. Keybinds, with respect to what we're trying to accomplish here, is the use of keys to activate powers and macros in specific powertray slots. Keybinds serve many other functions within the game and if you're interested in learning further I recommend checking out the game's user manual. There's some fairly detailed functions and such that can be called by the use of keybinds.

    Our goal here is to be able to use these macros we've just made to control our pets with quick reflexes and precision that some situations in-game may call for. Part of our job as Masterminds is to be aware of all of our surroundings, especially when it comes to assessing the threats we're facing, as well as keeping track of what each pet or group of pets is doing. With our keybinds, we can do this very quickly and without incident if we're careful. With mastery, keybinds provides us the ability to even control individual pets to perform specific tasks, thereby allowing us to engage multiple mobs at once, or split some pets off to perform ranged attacks while others engage in melee combat. The sky is the limit here.

    We'll practice our keybinding with one simple exercise. We will take an otherwise "inert" key such as 'v' and use it to activate the AtkP (attack passive) macro in our 1st slot of our powertray. I will be using powertray 3 as the tray in our keybinds since this is what I and several other Masterminds use. In your command line:

    /bind v powexec_tray 1 3

    Powexec_tray is the function that is called to activate a power or macro within a specific slot # then tray #. As you may've noticed, the arguments needed for the function powexec_tray to operate are backwards. This initially threw me off as I expected it to ask for tray # and then slot #, but it's swapped and is asking for the slot # first and then the tray # thereafter. Keep this in mind when making other keybinds that use this function.

    Let's test this macro out. With your pets and a (hopefully not dangerous) mob nearby, hit your v key and watch your pets respond. They should perform the AtkP function: killing the mob, ignoring everything else, then returning to you.

    Now on to the fun part. What we will do here is create four keybinds based on the pet control macros AtkP, FlwP, Def, and Goto. The other four (Stay, FlwA, Blitz, and AtkA), since they are more exceptionally used, don't require a keybind unless you prefer to have one. I'd just as soon save the keys and use them for other, more useful macros in the future. For my pet control macros, since I use the four arrow keys to control my character's movement, I find it easy to use the numeric keypad. I use 1, 2, 4, and 5 for my four commonly-used pet control macros. Here's how I set them up:

    /bind numpad1 powexec_tray 1 3 (this will attach numeric key 1 to Attack Passive)

    /bind numpad2 powexec_tray 2 3 (binding numeric key 2 to Follow Passive)

    /bind numpad4 powexec_tray 4 3 (binding Guardian Mode to numeric key 4)

    /bind numpad5 powexec_tray 5 3 (binding Goto passive to numeric key 5)

    I initially used 8 of the numeric keypad keys for all 8 pet macros but found myself using some of those slots for things like individual pet control (in the case of my Thug Mastermind I control Hydrosmash, my bruiser pet, with one of those keys), recall friend and teleport foe macros, and the like. Depending your tastes, however, you can bind whatever keys you'd like to your pet control macros. When in doubt, test the key first to see if it has an inherent game function. And, if in the event that keybind gets loused up, you can go into Options/Keymapping and repair it. In the next and final portion of this guide, I will get into pet specific commands, pet emotes, and reveal how I control my bruiser pet, Hydrosmash, like a real brute with a mind of his own both in combat and in social settings.

    Other keybinds can be made by going to Menu/Options/Keymapping.

    Part IV: Extras, to continue, will conclude this training guide.



    [u]Part IV: Extras[u]
    In this section, I'll go over all of the finer details concerning specific pet controls like making them speak, perform emotes, and doing individual pet commands. This will be in no particular order.

    We'll start with pet emotes. They are very simple. All pets, with perhaps the exception of the Robotics Mastermind, can perform all of the emotes that the player character can. They can dance, cheer, roar, and the like. For our test, let's make a macro that will make our pets dance:

    /macro Dance petsay_all <em dance>

    Notice the one difference between this macro and the other pet control macros -- the function petsay is being called. In this game, there are two major pet functions: petcom and petsay. Petsay can be used a variety of ways:

    Petsay_all - All pets will speak the given text or perform the following emote
    Petsay_name (pet name) - Specific pet name will perform the action (note: pet name must be one word and cannot contain any spaces
    Petsay_pow (class type) - Pets of this class (such as thugs, bruiser, enforcer, oni, jounin, etc.) will perform this action

    The same holds true for the petcom functions: petcom_all, petcom_name, and petcom_pow. If you are creative, you can use these to create keybound macros to control groups of pets to perform specific functions, such as sending your two Jounin ninja to attack one target, the Oni pet to attack a 2nd, and all of your Genin ninja to attack a 3rd.

    For those of you Masterminds, such as myself, that use the Teleportation pool power line heavily, check these out:

    [i]/macro TPFoe say Bringing $target to the beat down! Incoming Teleport Foe!
    [i]/macro TPFr say

    The use of 'say' instead of 'local' will yield text that is being displayed in your currently-selected chat channel, whether it be local, global, broadcast, say, etc. So, before executing these, make sure the rest of the world doesn't see them by mistake.

    How do I make Hydrosmash, my Thug Mastermind's Bruiser pet, talk, perform actions, and act in combat like a brute with a mind of his own? Easily. It's all in the macros and the keybinds. I have a few specific combat macros for him to help control the use of his ranged and melee attacks. The bruiser pet, in this specific case, is a Super Strength brute, possessing nearly all of the SS attack primary power line with the exception of Taunt. At level 32 with the Tier 9 Upgrade Equipment power, he has the ability to hurl a rock (ranged attack) and that particular attack sometimes tends to take prescedence over his melee attacks. At range, he will prefer to Hurl instead of run up to the mob and perform Jab, Haymaker, Knockout Blow, etc. So, what I do with Smash is capitalize on his damage potential and aggro-keeping ability by having his own commands:

    /macro HSGto

    I hope you guys enjoyed this guide and found it of use. If so, please respond and let me know! Also, any criticism or questions are welcome. Let me know where I can improve on this guy or append it in anyway. Thanks again and have fun playing the Mastermind!