Jade_Dragon

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As far as I can tell, you can't rename/re-origin minions or LT's at all.

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Hm. You can assign a custom Minion or Lieutenant to appear as a Boss detail in a mission. I'm guessing you can't do the same with the regular critters, though, because the list you get to pick from only lists Bosses.

Perhaps you can use an Ally or Escort detail, and set it as Enemy? I've never tried that, (I've only ever used custom allies) so I don't know what options are available.

I know what I'd like to do. I'd like to rename a critter's group. I create custom groups to control what is selected for an Ambush or the group around a Boss or Ally, but that name then shows up in the target window. I'd like it to always show the same thing, even if I have two groups that change the ratio of what is picked, but I can't reuse the same group name. And I can't overload it like I can with a Boss name.

I've tried to do this with the current mission I'm working on, but for the most part I just put them close to the entrance, and avoid outdoor maps. Besides, I usually just surround them with enemies like they went in first and got cornered, and that's more of a challenge anyway.

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Powerful allies steal experience/tickets. Many powerful allies and it is like not playing at all unless all you want is badges. Best I've been able to do with making allies not overpowering is to give them a healing/Buff set with a Control primary. They will still do way too much damage (IMO) but they won't kill 2 out of 3 mobs per spawn anymore.

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This may be true, but it's also a lot of fun. A huge group of EB level allies beating up on everything that comes along can be mass chaos. And if you're just running a local mission, not publishing it, you don't get XP anyway, so you might as well do whatever is fun.

I'm being careful about my allies in my "real" mission, though. There is an ally for most of the arc, and she's Boss level, but whenever other allies are added, I am making them weaker, either Minion or Lt level. This puts more work on you as it takes effort to keep the allies alive, even if they're just on Defensive and backing you up. (Plus, your main ally is a really weak Controller like you suggested. Since she's portrayed as new to heroing and unsure of herself it fits the story)

For the final battle, I will have the allies show up right when they are needed, as an ambush on the boss. That should keep it from being too much for the rest of the mission, but give a fighting chance against an AV. Or at least, so I hope, I haven't tested it out yet.

In short, in a Mayhem Mission you don't get XP for blowing stuff up (or I'm pretty sure you don't) but you get more time to blow stuff up. And do other things, there are usually multiple missions, and you go on a rampage and destroy property to buy yourself enough time to do them all.

The hero side you have to stop villains from destroying things to buy yourself time. (Or rather, if you don't stop them you will lose time) Not really a bad mechanism, although Mayhem and Safeguard missions have been pretty difficult depending on AT.

First of all, make sure your screen is big enough to see the whole editor. I've found if I don't maximize it, the right side of the screen is cut off.

Then go into your custom group and click on the character you want to delete, in the list on the right. A button labelled "Delete" should appear to the right of his name. That's why I said to maximize the screen, if you don't, it might be hidden.

If it says "Base Group" or some such, that means you defined the critter as being in that group. Go edit the critter and put him in some other group. After you get through with all of that, you'll have to edit the mission to update the group list.

[edit] Ah, see you figured it out. Well, this post can be helpful for the information.

One way to do this would be to create a custom group, put your EB in it, sprinkle in some other Bosses, to make a group of about five, then set that as your ambush.

The drawbacks are, you can't control who's selected out of the group, so you might not get the EB, or you could even get two or more copies of him! The more other Bosses the less likely you'll duplicated your EB, but if you put in too many it will become too random that he will appear.

Plus, an encounter with an EB and three or four Bosses is likely to be too tough for just about anyone to handle. Lts or minions can't be used because they would appear INSTEAD of the EB if your difficulty is not at max. (And you're in a large group)

I know of no other way other than to just set your spawn to Back and hope for the best. Try using a smaller map, so Back spawn points are closer to each other.

Also, make sure you HAVE another "Back" on your map. If you're placing lots of objects, make sure your Boss and his linked EB are the first things you enter in the mission. That way if you have any collections or something set for "Any" they won't grab up the Back slots and force your EB to spawn in the middle.

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Natterlings have a power called "Merge" that allows them to combine with another Natterling to make a Bull Natterling. If you placed a Natterling as a player ally in the mission and it got hurt, it would combine... with the player. Killing it instantly.

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Wow, I wish I could had seen that. Thats funny..Anyone have a vid of that?. I wana see!

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This whole thing gets funnier every time I hear about it.

I'm guessing the mechanism is that the two critters commit suicide, and then spawn the new "combined" critter. Which is how it was killing the player. Man, but if I could be killed and come back playing a Zeus Titan... I'd even take debt for that.

Heheh, I find I spend more time editing the files than actually editing missions in game.

A lot of that is editing the critters, though, and because I'm trying to avoid the bug that makes the face sliders revert back to zero. And editing height so it matches my existing characters.

I'm fairly certain that there is such a project here, though, I just haven't had a chance to look for a link to it yet.

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The full syntax is:
/cc_e [costumeSlotSlot#] [emoteName]

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I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that this command canNOT be used with any emote but those defined for costume changes. Which, conveniently enough, start with "CC", I notice.

Are the emotes usable outside of costume changes? (Can I just type /em CCSpin?)

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3. Same technique with an ambush at 75%...unless you can make one at first damage, I forget (also not a mission goal).

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Oo, yeah, cool, he calls in his friends.

It sort of satisfies the idea of a mission goal, only just the leader of the team needs to be defeated.

I didn't know you couldn't set a Boss as Single.

Shouldn't it be possible to create an Ally, set him as Single, then set him to Enemy? (or Rogue if that fits the storyline) You won't get the running dialog as he drops in health, though.

I've got one. The arc I'm currently working on is "real", the villain has hacked the AE server to threaten his archrival. You get caught up in it. When you rescue the hero that is your ally, she hacks into the system as well, and contacts you through the "Contact". So she's keeping in touch with you using the Contact as a communicator. When you free other characters in the arc, they'll also speak through the Contact.

To further explain why you don't just meet this real person, I said that the malfunctioning AE is rematerializing her in different AE buildings, so she never knows where she's going to be when she exits.

Oh, that's what that Base Group means.

I've realized that all critters have to have a Base Group when they are created. This is the group that will appear under their name in the game, and it must exist. (If it doesn't, the group will be created even if it doesn't have its own file)

You can then put the same critter in another group, but its Base Group will always be where it "lives". So yeah, changing it will allow you to remove it from this secondary group.

I need to edit the Base Group of a lot of my characters.

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technically there will be 3 seconds without DS from the cast time, but DS is basically perma out of the box (at least according to red tomax) so there is no reason to slot recharge in DS (masterminds excluded) or stoney unless they're dying a lot.

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Voltaic Sentinel is the same way, and it can't even be killed. So hopefully this is something that will be looked at. Sparky and Fluffy were both made so they could not stack, so perhaps the ability to slot Recharge should be removed from them, and the long duration pets as well. (Henchmen MMs already have had the ability to slot Recharge removed)

The MM version of DS or any VS that isn't perma would be left as current, of course.

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Is it possible to make a story with the last room have say 4-6 different bosses/AV/EBs in one group...similar to the LRSF last mission and have that groups defeat be the mission complete goal?

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From what I have heard (haven't done this, myself) there are two ways:

1) Make a Custom Group that contains only Bosses. Then create a Boss encounter and set both the boss and his surrounding allies to that Custom Group. This should force the whole group to be Bosses. (Although you might want the Boss himself to be from another group so you don't duplicate him)

2) Use the same technique as above to create a Patrol. (But I think a Patrol can't be a mission goal)

Unfortunately, neither technique lets you choose what Bosses will be in the group. You can probably be fairly sure you won't have any duplicates by making a large enough Custom Group, but you can't say, "I want these five Bosses to be the final encounter". If you tried that, you would likely get a couple of duplicates instead of the ones you want. Or that's the way I think it works.

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Kheldians (which is unfortunate since you cannot use kheldian powers for custom critters, and can't use most existing Khledian critters because of their costumes; as such there's not much I can do with the ideas).

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I'm going to see what I can do with Energy Melee/Force Fields (Dark Blast/Dark Armor or Miasma for Warshades) and a bunch of Novas and Dwarves from the Nictus villain group. If you could make a foe "respawn on defeat" to make him turn into a Nova or Dwarf that would be great. For now, I think just mixing up the types should work, at least as well as it does in "real" missions. (Usually if you run into a Kheldian in a mission, he's either in Nova or Dwarf form)

Don't forget the Galaxys, too, although we can't get to their powers. (So we can't change their costumes) And I guess Awakened PPD are in there somewhere.

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As far as I know, yes, this is correct. The critter is the critter is the critter. Now, I don't think it actually changes them IN the arc until you edit and republish, but that may have been just me getting in ahead of the server's slow update one time.

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Thanks. Yeah, I think you can get around it by making your edits and saving the arc and then putting the critter back the way it was, but I was hoping it wouldn't change the original, so then I wouldn't have to remember what it was.

I'm settling for making backup copies of different versions, but that introduces its own headaches.

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Sounds workable. **takes notes**

Good lateral thinking, folks.

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I've been thinking about ways to handle this, too. I want an ally to be captured by the boss, but then turn around and fight back, causing him to lose power. So it's kind of the opposite thing, instead of making the ally stronger, the villain is despawned and replaced with a weaker one.

The best I could come up with is tying the boss's respawn to his defeat, but I can't currently do that either. I could spawn an Ambush, but he'd have to have cloned himself.

Anyway, good ideas.

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I am creating a single mission to test just how much punishment my Inv Tanker can take. Is there a way to change either the number of Minions (beyond difficulty) or the level of a Custom Enemy?

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I've found that if you set Ambushes and Patrols to Hard, they will often be set to the highest level available for the mission. Outside of setting your Difficulty, though, no, there's no way to change that actual range of levels.

You might also try Ramp Up, Front Loaded or Staggered in place of Flat. I don't know this for sure, but I suspect Flat just averages out the level of foes in the mission. With the other types, you will get weak foes, but you'll get stronger ones too.

Finally, just set Custom Foes to Extreme. (For Bosses) That won't raise their level, but they'll deal out more punishment. Give them two attack sets, too. (Two Melee, or Melee and Ranged/Assault)

Just a quick question to make sure I understand this. If you edit a custom character in the MA, it will change anywhere you used that specific critter in a Custom Villain Group or Mission, right? You cannot, say, save the critter file to a CVG, copy it to another CVG, and then go in and edit the critter's stats only for that CVG. You would have to create a whole new character (critter file) with a separate name.

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Force Field set to Extreme. The player will spend the majority of the mission just waiting patiently for Detention Field to fade from the enemies.

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I know for a fact an Elite Boss with Force Field gets Detention Field on all levels. I think it's rank that determines if you get it, not difficultly.

Amusingly, Sonic Resonance does not get its Sonic Cage. Out of only FOUR powers.

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There are numerous core animations (animations that are shared between all player characters) that would be problematic with attempting to add full length robes to our current player model skeletons. [...] This is not a limitation because of Martial Arts. It’s an issue with all player characters.

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Yeah, I have a female character that in her original concept had a full length (and very tight fitting) dress, and it's very clear it just wouldn't work just with simple running. Even the midlength skirt we have (which was introduced with the Secretary costume set) still pushes the limits of the way fabric really stretches.

That said, I'd still love to see it. Even if it has to be some variation of capes, and perhaps split on the sides or something.

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Well, I vote they fix the detailed info before "fixing" any more powers. How are we supposed to make decisions on slotting if the only easily obtainable information is lying to us?

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The problem is that the information being given is TRUE. The pet's recharge IS being increased. It's just, none of the pet's powers use this recharge.

The most logical solution to this inconsistency is simply to not report the value. It doesn't matter what it is, its effect will always be zero. So for any pet, don't have a place for recharge. Of course, that would require altering the code that displays the stats of a critter to differentiate if it is a pet or not. If you manage to distinguish that, then you might as well just report the value as zero.

Either way, you're talking about further complicating the Attributes interface. And remember this is why the devs didn't want to report these values at all. If you don't UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY MEAN, the Attributes are useless to you.

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I Say this because I'm conserned about my Earth Pet and my Dark servent Pet.

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Your Dark Servant Pet will recharge more often. YOU will have YOUR power to summon your Dark Servant Pet recharge more often. That is the way it has always been and it is always the way it has been intended for it to be. If you are a Mastermind, Recharge is quite helpful since MM Dark Servant takes longer to recharge than the Corruptor or Defender version, but even they will be able to have their Dark Servant up more often.

Your Earth Pet will also recharge more often, but since it is an effectively infinite duration anyway, that doesn't matter unless you exit a mission and reenter it really quickly, or if your Stoney gets killed before it recharges. In that case, if you slot Recharge in the power, it will be ready faster, and thus be more useful to you.

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Recharge from set IOs. And no, its far from overpowering, if making it much worth it at all at this point.

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By that standard damage is an inheritable buff but Enrages, Aim, Build Up, and Defiance do not increase Voltaic Sentinel's damage. I was wondering about things like Accelerate Metabolism, Fortitude, Speed Boost, and Adrenalin Boost. Does Voltaic Sentinel inherit any of those?

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I cannot tell you for sure, but if the former is true, that VS doesn't inherit Build Up, then likely it does not inherit Hasten or other buffs either. Note that AFAIK VS is untargettable so if it inherits AM, Speed Boost or whatever, it would get it from its parent, NOT by being hit by the effect itself.

Although I wonder if VS did inherit Build Up, if it would effect VS for its full duration, or only for the first 10 seconds after it is summoned?

The problem seems to be not buffs or inherited buffs in this case, but Recharge slotting. AFAIK, this is a different mechanism, so the two are unrelated. (Inherited buffs are inherited as the power, but slotted Enhancements aren't powers and aren't inherited in that way)

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I still have fond memories of Suspended and all those little adorable little robots.

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Oh, the robots. I loved Poet. He was almost as hard to understand as Sensa.

Actually, once I'd beaten the game, I spent hours going up to every little thing in the game and having each robot describe it to me. It's like that fable about the blind men trying to describe an elephant.

(One secret to the game, though, was that once you learned how a particular robot referred to an object, you could use that name any time, even if you started over. So if there was an object that one robot described too vaguely, or with too long a name, you could use another robot's name for it. Whiz was quite useful for that since he referred to everything by its library database number)