Lemur Lad

Awesome Hero 1, thanks. Just remember like we said, in theory the mission is fine, it's just that in practice it breaks down because of the overly fragile objects. I think it could be Fun, if all aspects worked right.

If you're interested, there are a few minor issues here and there within the RWZ arcs that we as players could list in a thread for you. Some of them have been covered here, but there are others.

The Doctor (and all Time Lords) are inherently psychic to one degree or another. In the Doctor it normally manifests in empathy and understanding of motivations, but at times he uses it for more profound examination (The Girl in the Fireplace, Fear Her). In the Master it manifests in profound magnetism that he normally uses as mesmerism or will domination.

The ArcAngel network magnified that ability to allow him to subjugate the population, at first by instilling trust, then later by feeding off their fear and channeling it back. The Doctor co-opted that passive energy when it was 'aimed' at him, and when most of the population was layering the power of their will on top of it.

Time Lords and their ability to regenerate is inherent, but can be smoothed over by outside sources of energy (usually a TARDIS). In this case, the Psychic energy reversed the changes inflicted on him by the Master.

In short, the "positive thinking" was just the focus of the latent energy of humanity. The Network was the conduit, and the Time Lords were the amplifier.

That's exaggerating, sorry. Buffs are great, debuffs too, but 99% of the over 100 ITFs I've been on bum rushed him, and that's with a pretty standard mixed bag of players.

It has more to do with the same phenomena that leads to Drunk Stagger foes that head off to the hinterlands. Once the AI makes a decision about where it's moving, it doesn't change that decision except under specific circumstances. So we have the Spectral run off, LJ decides to chase it. They both pick the same endpoint for their path and head to it, then the Spectral disappears. All within the space of less than a second.

My assumption is, that this problem is just as hard to fix as the drunk stagger for an escaping mob is.

Regardless of spawn size, the big breakdown in this mission comes from the way CoT Spectrals tend to work, and the way her AI works. Spectrals have the habit of Bolting on 5% hp. They fade to untargetable and fly off, then sneak back and attack a bit later. Problem is, if she's the one that is locked on them when it happens, she follows. Smaller spawns means it's more likely you can keep this from happening to her, but it's still where the mission breaks down most often.

Another mission that is often problematic is the rescue Lady Gray. If you're not careful the AoEs will kill her if you fight right near her.

As for solutions, there are some that are easier than others so I'll list them in what I think the Doability order is:

Dependent Objectives- If the generators were set so they weren't spawned until something else happened, it may be more unrealiztic, but it would give players a chance to examine and clear the map then have a handle on where to go.

Objects- Changing the rules for Defendable objects (those attacked by NPCs) such that they behave differently than Attackable Objects (those attacked by Players), then it would mean greater survivability and playability. There's 3 ways to handle that.
a) implement the Purple Patch Code wrt the objective level vs the NPC level. Right now they effectively con super gray in most cases because all objects have a true level that's very low. If they were set to con red or orange no matter what the relative levels, they'd take a fixed length of time (that is still a challenge but not suicide).
b) make all objects in essence 3 objects. An object that is destroyed is gone, how about if another immediately took it's place and cleared the aggro table? Set up the animations so that it gives a typical appearance (pristine, damaged, heavy damage, dead). NPCs would have to kill them 3 times, which would take more time.
c) change the Taunt cycles. Right now to get NPCs attack the Object puts out a weak taunt every X seconds. I think it triggers immediately, and if there was a way to create a delay to the Taunt power (only taunts after 60 seconds from spawn activation for example).

NPC AI and activation range- This would be a change that could borf a lot of other things, but if it's possible they could create AI scripts that don't activate as readily for the Object Defending spawns.

In the end, I'll say this mission has been problematic since Closed Beta for that issue. It infrequently comes up for discussion, but the problems remain. Here's hoping that before the devs dive into more improved complicated content, they take a look at things like this, and if the mission wasn't worth getting fixed for itself, they fix it by making a general fix that blankets everything.

If you look carefully and compare, you can see something we've been told by BackAlleyBrawler in the past.

That is, almost every animation is different for shield characters. Not radically so, but they are. Because of changes needed in arm angle to look right, a lot of things had to be re-scripted. There's also a lot of animations that didn't get done, try a bunch of emotes with your shield on. many of them won't work.

O portal is bugged lately, and interrupts all zone out teleports, Base, Wentworths, Pocket D, Mission, etc.

The activation is the same for all of them, and it's long to minimize any potential effect in PvP.

Free stuff is a slap in the face? Really? Give me a break.

The way current invasions are designed, none of that is necessary. Truly. If performance is truly an issue, then make an effort to change player behaviors. You don't need 4 full teams in one single area of the zone to succeed and get all the rewards. All you need in a single spot is a group that can kill enough foes quickly enough so that when the next cycle checks, the equation decides players are winning. When that happens, it sends a more potent spawn, and you get the bosses and elite bosses for the higher rank badges.

In fact, it actually quite often hinders badge hunting if you all gather in one spot. If you have what you feel is a competent team, head off to a different area and fight on your own. I guarantee you won't have to fight the lag, and understanding the system will give you success.

The "bread and butter" as you say isn't so much Monsters, at least for a lot of heroes. Street-level heroism is a much bigger deal for even some big name heroes (Daredevil, Spider Man). I'm of the opinion we have enough neglected monsters, but not enough street level heroic (or villainous) events. Hellion Fires and Troll Raves are cool (and could use an upgrade to take advantage of destructible objects like some King's Row spawns use).

Events like Vahzilock Body snatchings, Carnie Parades, Freakshow Freaklympic rampages, would be a lot more interesting and accessible for even small groups or solo heroes.

As for point #2, as Cap said, invasions are zone wide, and it's only player behavior that concentrates the action in specific spots. If you want a zone wide battle, wait for Halloween, or participate in a Ship raid in the RWZ.

I was against implementing the system when the upgrade was in the works, but since then I've become ambivalent. Sure people farm rep, and sure some people get butthurt by it (yes, you). But really, it's just more buttons to press on the forum.

I'm like BillZ, I like seeing people try to neg rep me for something that other people find positive, and I really enjoy seeing attempted neg reps from people who leave gray bubbles because they're persistently negative.

It's flat out not a big deal, and you need to calm down about it.

If you take the Black Helicopter Line from Cap, it brings you to Mercy directly across from Seer Marino, less than 100ft.

This is not unusual. It's normal practice for the OnMinimalHP powers to uprank the respawn, and it doesn't consider difficulty settings. There's not a lot can be done about it except to be very careful when killing those respawners and making sure they're mezzed when they reach the trigger point

As you can tell if you look at the post dates, this thread is pretty old. The concept of an EU Scoop was initiated back before the forum merger. Folks are still working hard on a new way to bring back the Scoop though.

Who said it isn't?