Kosmos

• Eyebeams for at least one Blast set. Energy Blast is the obvious choice. Nova is the only power in the set that seems problematic for eye-based beam attacks. Electricity seems to offer no problems for eye-based attacks, so that would be my second choice.

• Low-tech animations/user power effects for the Medicine Pool.

• Animations to allow Crossbows for Archery and Trick Arrows.

• Complete the alternate set for Martial Arts so each attack has an alternate, and make the punches flow more smoothly.

It will check when you summon, and if it procs then it will affect you.

It will subsequently check for the pet any time they use a power that does Knockback/Knockdown/Knockup and will grant the +Recharge boost to them. However, all pet powers now ignore +Rech, so while they'll get the buff, it will do nothing for them.

These are the recommended specs for UM:

Recommended PC "Ultra Mode" System Requirements:

• OS: Microsoft® Windows® XP/Vista/7
• Processor: Intel® or AMD Dual Core processor or higher
• RAM: 4 GB RAM or more
• Video: NVIDIA® GeForce 8 Series (or higher), ATI™ Radeon® HD 2000 Series (or higher)
• Hard Drive Space: 6 GB Available HDD Space
• Internet: Broadband
• Input: Keyboard and Mouse

Let's see... Dual Core CPU? Check. 4 GB of RAM? Check. ATI Radeon HD 2000 Series or higher? Check.

His machine not only exceeds the minimum specs, it meets the "recommended" ones. Are these "recommended" specs questionable? Yeah, sure. (ATI Radeon HD 2000 Series? Seriously?) But you're way off base stating that his machine is below the minimum specs "period", as the devs say otherwise.

Get the full software suite for Catalyst 10.4. It supports the 54xx series (I doubled checked just to make sure), it's simply that the web site lacks the appropriate links.

Catalyst 10.4 download

Note that this link is for Win7 64-bit. If that's not right, back up to here and follow it down to the right version choosing your OS and "any" for the product. If you're unsure if it supports your card, check the "Release Notes" link. It lists the supported products (including the 5400 series) on page 3 of the PDF for the Win7 64-bit download.

Not unless the power also specifically grants Protection or Resistance to those effects. Damage Resistance, regardless of what type it is, just Resists that type of damage and Resistance Debuffs and that's it. The only Stone Armor powers that grant Status Protection/Resistance are Rooted and Granite Armor.

Now read the disclaimer in fine print at the bottom of the screen stating that the individual you have just seen is a paid spokesman and not an actual programmer.

As expected, the devs fixed the bug, threw tokens at the damage it did, left it to the player's to spend their own time repairing all their broken costumes (which actually can't be done in some cases due to costume parts that disappeared in I17), and downplayed the matter by making just two vague (and even somewhat misleading) statements regarding the issue.

Would it have killed you to include a statement that you're aware that the bug is going to result in a significant amount of time lost for many players and to say "Sorry for the inconvenience"?

Slow down and quit running people over in your rush to get GR out, or at least have the decency to apologize when you do trample someone in your haste.

I asked about this some time ago (when they updated the web site) and was informed by Lighthouse that it is indeed hard-coded.

Unfortunately, that appears to only to be only a fix for the cause, not the effects.

The devs coined the term to refer to a set of features and have stated it would be optional. Sticking to their implicit definition of "Ultra Mode"; unless they've redefined the word "optional", you are indeed supposed to be able to turn it on and off. So I think it's quite fair to talk about turning Ultra Mode on and off. What wouldn't be fair is to talk about switching graphics engines. Which is sort of what Evangel was suggesting when talking about ways to get back to the prompt asking if you want to enable Ultra Mode. Well, it kind of gave that impression anyway.

Can you turn the new graphics engine on or off? No.

Can you turn the Ultra Mode feature set on or off? Yes.

That looks an awful lot like the prompt you get if your anti-virus software quarantines the tempfile between download and application. Some AV engines think they see NewHeur_PE in CoH and do just that. I don't think clicking "OK" would work in that case though.

All that choice does is enable certain graphics settings (as Cap Fab points out). It isn't some magical fork in the client that can't be undone. Safe Mode, for example, sets all of your graphics settings to the minimum, effectively turning off UM.

I'd actually be surprised if he got the pop up asking if he wanted to enable UM given that his graphics card is from a 4 year old laptop and very unlikely to be seen by the client as meeting the requirements for it to ask.

Evangel gave a list of ways to turn off UM to assert that UM is optional. Then when I pointed out that Doc OBay Jr had run in Safe Mode and still crashed s/he responded by stating that you can't trust the software to do what it says it does. You can't have it both ways - if you can't trust Safe Mode to turn off UM then you can't trust the other methods either. And given that you can't assert that UM is definitely optional. S/he is simply making an incoherent argument.

Personally, I agree with you, Safe Mode should turn off UM. The problem is that turning off UM doesn't seem to make the I17 client behave anything like the I16 client in terms of system requirements. That's really Doc OBay Jr's complaint. Right now it is pretty clear that I17 eats CPU cycles as if it has a tapeworm, regardless of what your graphics settings are. Whether that's because of some UM component that can't be opted out of, or some other change in I17 I don't know. Either way it isn't what the devs said was going to be the case.

Yet you assert definitively that Ultra-Mode is optional.

Well, for the first time ever... I feel compelled to say it... lrn2read. That's his first post in this thread. He is crashing in Safe Mode, which not only supposedly turns UM off but puts you in crayon mode graphics.

No, but per PM, TV is looking into it.

Am I the only one who reads these minimal Known Issues lists they release and conjures an image of Comical Ali from the Second Gulf War announcing that the Americans are being driven back to Riyadh while behind him we see a platoon of American M1 Abrams tanks cruising past dozens of burnt out Iraqi T55 wrecks?


When I first entered the programming field as a student over 25 years ago I was presented with a number of rules from the department head regarding known bugs and patch notes. There was no formal documentation about these rules. So I wrote up a memo as a sardonic joke - knowing the boss would take the creation of specific categories of bugs seriously while all my co-workers would get a laugh.

Recreating it from memory, and shortening dramatically (I spent several hours polishing it then, rather than just minutes here), it went something like this:

Bugs are to be placed in one of 5 categories.

Category A - This is any major bug we already have a fix for. These go in the Known Issues list at the top, so that when we put out the fix with Patch Notes so promptly it will seem like we're really on the ball.

Category B - These are minor bugs of little consequence. We list these in Known Issues to pad the list and make it seem exhaustive to hide the fact that we're deliberately leaving stuff out. Don't list all of the little bugs at once, as we want to keep some in reserve in case we need padding for future lists. However try to list enough that any readers will get bored by reading about these trivial things before they get to the Category C bugs.

Category C - These are the major bugs that we can't deny the existence of without destroying our credibility. We list these in the Known Issues only because we have to. Put them near the end of the list with just a handful of Category B issues after them. Hopefully only a few people will notice them there. Try to word them in an arcane manner so that those who read them may misunderstand them and also to make them seem extremely difficult to solve.

Category D - These are major bugs we know about, but can plausibly deny the existence of, or at least our knowledge of their existence. As long as we can, leave them off the Known Issues list. If we develop a fix put them on the Known Issues list as Category A, declaring as believably as possibly that we just now learned of their existence. If we don't have a fix but can no longer deny their existence then move them to the Known Issues list as Category C, again disclaiming any previous knowledge of their existence.

Category E - These are the bugs we don't know about. Don't list these in the Known Issues. (Yes, he actually told us not to list bugs we don't know about. He meant bugs we knew existed but couldn't nail down a definition of, but that's not what he said, so "We have another Cat E" became a standard shop joke.)


Now, having written this... do I post it? Ah well, hopefully Avatea has a sense of humor. Think about the comedy skits where the anchors read whatever is handed to them and view these Known Issues lists as the equivalent of saying, with a deadpan expression, "It's Sunday May 2nd, and I'm not wearing any knickers."

Check the sources of your DDR, they "fixed" Grant Cover so that it's DDR and Slow Res are no longer enhanceable.

Count the powers you do have when Ex. At level 20 you should have 12 (plus inherent and temp powers, of course). If you have less than that then there's a problem. If you have 12 then you did indeed take Fly after level 20. Probably through the use of a respec.

How in the world does this statement...

... possibly get interpreted as clearly stating anything at all about complexity and risk?

I had the results of hours of effort disappear. I consider that real harm done. I begrudge having to spend my time redoing power customizations instead of playing the game.

For all we know some bright individual may come up with a clever scripting solution and repair all the damage as if it never happened. I really doubt it though. The cost and risk involved in a such a fix will make the obvious idea of just throwing tokens at this very seductive.

What I want, by making noise and repeatedly asserting the point, is to make sure that the decision makers know that isn't a real fix. It's just a subsidy to the players, who would then still ultimately pay for the fix with their time - it just wouldn't cost them in-game resources as well. My hope being that when it comes time to decide how to handle this they'll think twice about taking the easy way out and reconsider some of the options (if there are any) that don't entail a waste of players' time.

Sorry, but you wrote two different things. Which is it? Do you think they are going to choose to wipe out all the power customization done on slots other than the 1st between I16 and I17 because they don't want to wipe out changes done since I17 was released? Or do you think they are going to leave the effects of the error in place because they are afraid they can't readily repair the damage safely? The two aren't the same, and to say you are doing something for the first reason when you are really doing it for the second is "spinning".

(Btw, handing out a free month to those affected - which may well be everybody - could cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars. That's out of the question.)