Lycantropus

Horror, because of her outlook on it. Everything else could have been the superhero/villain origin story, but her lack of understanding and fear of it was what, in my opinion, makes it horror.

I think the horror story is about how all this affects her, and her inability to control it, and her fear of even trying to understanding it. I could see how many look at it in context of what she does with the powers as the acts of horror, but I always saw it as horror from her perspective. Sure, there's also the horror she has to endure with her crazy mother, the problems at school, then the horror the kids felt at the prom when she lost it, but I think the story was more about looking at this 'power' from her perspective.

Like The Shining. The kid had a gift, so did the father. What it did to the father is horror, and the boy seeing it all play out, also horror, and the mother who didn't understand any of it, yet another perspective of the horror being played out. For all the faults I can say about Stephen King, he is good at taking horror and looking at it from many layers and perspectives.

I will agree though; written the right way, a lot of super hero/villain stories could also be horror tales, and Carrie could have been a 'superhero/villain' story. It's all in how it's dressed up and the angle its told in.

Yeah I mentioned this very thing earlier in this thread

It seems like, so far, they're designing them to have the 'big bad boss' but they're not choosing or implementing them wisely. If say, Maelstrom is leading teams of D.U.S.T soldiers or something, and we have to take them down before we can affect Maelstrom, or he's getting a visually stunning feed into his Maelstrom Device (a-la Lord Recluse) that might work. As it is, it sounds like his can one-shot groups of players if they're not careful, and he's just tough now because... well... because.

Honestly, Cole gets favored by the well, that's great. There's no reason every lackey of his should become a powerhouse that can only be taken down by large groups. The power creep there would have to be enormous by the time we get to face Tyrant. What? Four full teams against a gold plated Reichsman that will one shot you with every attack, and AoE's constantly and has perma-Unstoppable so you only do 1-3 hp of damage to him and he has over 25k hp? Oh, and Dull Pain. (I did a Khan the other day, can you tell? )

The point is, Reichsman is really tough. Can take almost as long to fight him (and the 4 other AV's) as it takes to do the rest of the TF (and don't get me started on Barracuda's version). So based on what we've seen of Cole's 'uber' lackeys, and Reichsman is just another version of Statesman/Tyrant... How powerful is the big Tyrant fight going to be in comparison?

I'd rather see that energy put toward making something that should justify us feeling as weak, or 'coglike', just by sheer comparison of its magnitue, like that Ruularu fight.

I totally agree with this. Have the difficulty and rewards scale with how many folks you have. Start at the minimal threads reward and then scale up, and the chance of what thereof, the more folks that are there from the beginning to the end of the Trial. I wouldn't mind doing a scaled down Trial with six of seven people, knowing that all I'll get out of it at the end is threads... just so I can do them for the fun of it with my SG...

I also wouldn't mind doing a large scale one like we do now with 2-4 teams, if I knew the wait and headache would be balanced by the chance of greater reward. Even getting a BAF or Lambda together can take a half-hour or more, even moreso on the Keyes and Underground, taking into explaining the strategy and reluctance of others joining.

A 'heavy' Incarnate trial should be the current Underground one, or one where we face down Cole with all the power the Well has now granted him. Everything else at this point has felt more like a Tin Mage or Apex that just reqired more people.

It's been mentioned they're going to be making an announcement soon on solo and smaller team Incarnate content. I really look forward to that.

EDIT: Actually, do all the level shifts work in Tin Mage or Apex? I'm not sure. If they don't that would actually make them harder than the Trials with arbitrarily less reward...

I do too, and like the direction the stories in the trials are taking (after I get my bearings enough to understand them). Though I don't care much for the need to do them over and over again to really get anywhere...

I want a trial to face off against a Ruularu that stretches down into the shard as far as I can see, and as high into sky as I can swivel, moving toward Firebase Zulu and we have to stop him. Each body part (hand, forearm, upper arm, left/right chest, neck, and head are all 'seperate entities' that move in unison, have different effects and have to be elimiated while fighting off hoards of ruularu attending to him. Once you defeat certain parts you have to defeat a beefed up known Aspect of Rularu (Completion of the Right Arm: Ruladak the Strong, Completion of the Left Arm: Chularn the Slave Lord, Completion of the both Chests: Faathim the Kind- his heart awwww..., and _right_ before you defeat the Head, you must face off against a howling Lanaru the Mad before you can then finish it off). Everyone gets a jet pack that works like the Buoyant Membrane when fighting the Seed of Hamidon during the event. The big tactical decision would be which arm to destroy first. The right does massive damage, the left summons more and more minions to assist...

Anyway...

Now THAT sounds like an epic trial that I wouldn't mind feeling weaker against. This is at least part of the reason some of the Incarnate trials don't seem as 'epic' as they should, in my opinion. I enjoy them for what they are, but no, they don't make me feel powerful, and most of my SG mates pass on them alltogether because of the difficulty over fun (this includes Lambdas and BAF's for them). The Underground is the closest I've felt to a truly 'epic' fight in any of them so far, and that's because of the story involved and what we were fighting. A starting Incarnate trial should have us beating Emperor Cole down with the Well backing him. Everything so far should have been on par with Tin Mage or Apex, if I were working the storyline and how to implement it.

Just my 2 cents.

That seems to be the case. According to the Paragonwiki

I have no doubt they are the gateway for _any_ Asian influence in Paragon, including the Yakuza and any other Asian... interests.

Remember, Paragon is in a different world. A world where Rhode Island is their New York due to a few trade deals early on. A world where the mafia families had (or developed) mutant powers keeping them in their positions. In this world the Tsoo seemed to overtake the Triads and probably even the influence of the Yakuza at the time.

Something to keep in mind with your story. Hope I've helped!

EDIT: Spoilers!

In the upper levels she's seen with the Knives of Artemis. She may have been guided by them all along to be a new 'sister' in their ranks, though it is neither confirmed nor denied.

They did. You can run the new ones for 1 EMP merit over and over again, after you've gotten your 2 for the 20 hour window.

I think, in their mind, it is more about forcing the 'progression of the story' which I understand, but I also think for those folks that don't care or want 'more challenging' are now being forced into content they don't want. I have liked and enjoyed every single trial they've presented so far. I run them very rarely, but when I do I have no preference unless I'm restricted by time or patience.

Removing the EMP merits once every 20 hours from the easier trials means the fact that some 'shinies' are locked behind such content requiring those EMP merits (I mean emotes, CC emotes, costume pieces, and auras). That limit in the ability to obtain them by forcing folks to do the 'harder' stuff isn't right.

Again, I don't care. Actually I do, but not for myself. I've heard way too much complaining from folks that don't want to do the 'hard' stuff just for costume pieces that make them happy.

Forcing them to do it because they reach a critera they don't even pay attention to (and believe me, they could care less about incarnte powers) won't foster any good will on paying players who don't want challenge, but a pleasant casual playtime with their SG mates having fun and joking about what they're doing.

The folks I'm talking about don't even like doing the trials because it makes them have to 'work for it' and I can occasionally convince them to do some of the easier ones, because they want the costume parts.

They will NOT try harder. They will give up. If they get frustrated enough, they'll stop subbing and possibly even playing.

If they're going to gate more incarnate content behind EMP merits... Fine, but in turn, make the costume, auras, and emotes purchaseable at the market. They will readily pay hard cash for it to never have to run a trial EVER again. No. I'm not kidding. For a couple auras, I don't think it would matter how much you charge if it meant they'd never have to think about Incarnate trials again.

Just so you know, this is the fence I straddle. The 'me' who enjoys the trials from time to time vs the all but one or two of my SG mates who could care less and got ticked off and tired of running the weekly Strike Targets because it forced them to log in so we'd have the time to finish them in the evenings on our SG nights. I do trials alone in PuG's most of the time because of this.

Yeah I'm not happy about that either. I've bought everything I need to so far, but it was a process I was... less than happy doing and it took me a long time to do it because farming them every day was just not an option if I wanted to continue enjoying the game.

I was kinda looking forward to the new trials as I don't mind them from time to time, and having more means not having to repeat the same thing over and over nearly as regular to feel like I'm making progress.

Giving us more options while removing others means more of the same grindy farm day in day out approach I can't stand, and if future content is to be gated behind 'purchase' with these EMP merits (like the new incarnate powers) This, to be honest, really blows. Having a wider variety means not having to do the same thing every day to get where I want.

PLAYERS WILL GRIND BECAUSE THEY HAVE TO (or feel they have to for the rewards) NOT BECAUSE IT'S FUN.

My VIP account is at tier 9, with all the Celestial items purchased, and no desire to spend the other 5 (soon to be 6) I have in reserve at the moment on temporary consumables. If my only benefit to being a VIP is access to grindy farms that, as more are added others will be taken away, I may resort to just paying for everything else and dropping my sub.

I have my hero and villain 'mains' that all they need to 'fill out' their current Incarnate powers is have 2-3 Very Rares drop on them, and the ability to send others threads through Astrals and Emperian Merits has made the attempts to get them... tolerable. I mean the drop rate has been so abysmal, I have bought everything costume, aura, and spiffy thing (don't care about recipies) and still they need those VR's. I've all but given up.

Now to find that they're adding more Trials only to trivialize a couple others out of their rewards...

I wish I bothered with Facebook so I could use that /e Facepalm emote I'd pay money for in the store...

EDIT: I understand that they're doing this to promote players running the 'harder' more 'challenging' content over just running the BAF and Lambdas over and over, but this also penalizes the players that don't do that and just run them casually from time to time. The fact that you can only get your EMP merit rewards every 20 hours from any one trial is enough. Removing that won't stop the ones who are grinding and farming them over and over, they do it for other things. It'll just prevent the more casual players with bothering with them if they need those EMP merits for something, removing more opportunites from them.

*the sociologist within me steps out*

The trick to that is, you would, in the culture that embraced such ideologies, fight for the right to be sacrificed. If you didn't, you wouldn't be a true (enough) believer and therefore wouldn't be the sacrifice. MOST cultures that embrace that philosophy idolatrize those who seek such transendence. They believe that their reward is in the afterlife or in the act of the sacrifice itself.

For example, the ancient Aztecs would hold competitions (yay, basketball!) for the one to be sacrificed. Funny thing is that, even today, I can guarantee that there are those who feel that giving their lives for some 'greater good' is enough to warrant their sacrifice (in various denomonations, political parties, and world-views around the globe).

Once you wrap your head around that. It seems a little scarrier or makes a little more sense, again, depending on your view.

I think if anyone were looking to take this up, a video capture device would be one of the most important pieces of equipment.

By and large at the end of the day, I have to agree with much of the sentiment in this thread. I'm not sure I would care why someone was saving me from something bad, as long as they were saving me. Having officers for friends and thinking of the pro's and con's of such an endeavour, I would still have to applaud anyone who makes an effort to make the world a better, safer, place.

I would love to see some sort of 'samaritan' registration sytem in place with the police that would train citizens on what their rights are, what risks they're taking by intervening in what ways, what they should and shouldn't do in those situations, what they legally can and can't do, with suggestions and resources they can explore further with.

And before you think it, no. I don't mean for costumed folks, for anyone. Folks that form neighborhood watches, folks that don't have a neighborhood watch but want to do something to help. Include CPR and other emergency courses with fees (that can benefit their local law enforcement agencies). There's a lot of volunteer work and such that provide similar resources through various avenues, but I mean having one something they can register for with local authorities. That way if some aggrandizing mask decides to step in, they can show the arriving police that registration (with their name on it) with their videorecorded evidence that will either catch the criminals in the act (or incriminate the would be vigilante who went against their registered training).

Giving folks an 'honest' avenue for doing such work might take some of the stress off of local law enforcement, while giving them a much needed hand in overpopulated, understaffed areas... But it's late and I'm tired, and it's just a thought

In Batman's case, I agree, it makes perfect sense, and the look fits the look, and its rationale in the comics, so it equals out.

I've seen pictures of the new Superman: Man of Steel coming out. So far not as impressed as I'd like to be visually. However, for who knows whatever reason, I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt. I won't' jinx it and say "It can't be worse than Superman Returns".

Visually I think Christopher Reeve put the spandex argument to rest before Spider-Man. Even with the padding. He pulled it off and looked good doing it. It' not that it can't be done, or even shouldn't. It's another one of those 'layers' I'm talking about. I actually liked the Green Lantern CGI outfit. It helped blend them into the (mostly) CGI environment, and like they even said when they were making the movie, it's made from the ring... it shouldn't look completely natural. Excuse or not, I can accept it because it makes sense.

On another note: It seems MARVEL is knocking it out of the park (referring to the properties under their control) with their movies, while making limited headway in the animated industry. Conversely, outside of Batman, Warner's movie adaptations have been met with very mixed results. However, their animated empire with Bruce Timm at the head, is probably the best run of superhero animated works ever made (while this is mostly my opinion, it seems backed up by many others).

What's the difference? What if they did like I said, and made Green Lantern: First Flight directly as live action vs. what they wound up actually making?

Watch it again and try and picture it live action before answering. Would you complain about the plot holes of his introduction to the ring? Would his waving off his entire connection to Earth with a "I'm taking an extended vacation, I'll call you later" be as aceptable? Folks keep talking about look, which is important, but what has to be done in live action that can be ignored in comics or animated, and why?

I'm sure filmmakers want to know this as much as I do help 'em out!

Great replies everyone. That's all a part of it. In this case, I honestly thought they would have done better with Jessica Alba playing Electra (her dark hair, eyes, and... *shudders* exotic look would have made more sense- Yes I know Greek vs Hispanic but whatever) and had Jennifer Garner, who would have looked much more natural with the blonde hair and blue eyes they tried to work on Jessica... Anyway I think it would have been a better approach. However, it's hard to find female action stars that would have taken either role before the genre started really hitting mainstream. This factor, too, is a part of what I personally can forgive. Though I agree, when he took on the persona of Dr. Doom, his voice should have changed some... or something.

Plus, there's a lot I could have, and would have, overlooked in the 3rd X-Men movie if only Phoenix had actually 'flared up' in her classic Phoenix pose. No, I'm not kidding. I could have swept a lot under the rug and forgiven a lot of continuity issues for that one, well done, FX scene. I bet deep down, a lot of other folks feel the same way.

The topic I was thinking of goes even deeper than that however. The writing and presentation is just as big an issue as the visual queues, and that's where things get really muddy. Because the trick is appeasing the both hardcore traditionalist nerdragers, and the more 'mainstream' and daresay 'sensible' folks.

I really, at no point in the X-Men series, did I want an encounter with the Shi'ar, and introduction of the Starjammers and that whole galactic mess within the context of a movie. We're already asking people to believe in mutants. Getting the audience to get into that in a worldly perspective, then in the course of 2 hours or so getting them to buy into a whole galactic conflict that only loosely is needed to explain any other elements of the story like the Danger Room and the modified Cerebro... well you can see where I'm going (I hope).

On the other hand I do wish they had Charles look at Juggernaut and have him nod and say "Cain" and have Juggy smile and say "Charles". Maybe something about "how's mom?" or something- at the very least have someone say "you two know each other?" and one of them replies "we go way back..."

That's also important- the little things- the attention to detail that can really offest the experience and 'suspension of disbelief' the film-maker asks of us to accept to make the movie enjoyable to us.

I have a friend that hates... HATES... the X-Men movies for that reason. After discussing it at length with him, all it would have taken for him to accept the entire series was during Xavier's montage explaining the academy in the first movie, was to include scenes of the original X-Men and saying "We've had many students over the years... etc etc.." nodding to the original, team and their stories. Even introducing Hank in the 3rd one wasn't enough because they didn't acknowledge the original team until then. Of course this get further muddied by the "First Class" movie, that I honestly enjoyed, but I couldn't get him to watch without a gun, rope, and a chair involved at this point.

Heck, Captain America's my all time favorite personally, and if I can forgive the 90's movie about him, even though I wasn't fond of it, I guess I can overlook anything

I'm glad I was vindicated years later with MARVEL's new movie about him, but back then I was happy they even tried. Another important thing to remember about such movies before they hit the 'mainstream'. Some of us were just happy something was made that wasn't totally horrible. Now we can be all picky and 'above it'.

Thank you, Steampunkette, for putting what I've wanted to say into words far better than I could. Anything I have thought of to say so far would only be flame bait for those who don't get this. I'm kind of aggressive like that.

Thank you, and as you said, good luck Phoenix Jones.

I would record every episode!

See, this makes sense to me too. They already have (or had) some kind of distribution network going with the paid time cards, they could (presumably) use that, or something similar. I also agree having store presence would likely generate a lot more revenue as well, especially with the holidays coming up.

Ahhhh, someone else who remembers the "Better ******* Blaster's" Guide

Back in the day, being a Blaster meant surfing the debt-cap to victory!

That's... awesome, one of the best ideas I've read in a while, and wish that had come to mind before I made my StJ/SR Brute I just made the other day.

That's okay though, I really think that's a great idea and, no offense, will use a concept like that at some point while making it my own.

Yaknow, that actually didn't occur to me the whole time I was leveling up my Ice/KM Tank, though it makes a lot of sence in retrospect. I just knew I loved the set because I could get the AoE while still Hovering

Having played the same character to 50 with Ice/SS and Ice/KM, I have to say I like the KM one better. Even taking out the having to land to do Foot Stomp aside, I just have more fun with the set.

The Shadow Shard is probably one of the neatest conceptually, with a ton of work put into its design and backstory... and then has sat in a lingering malaise ever since.

Either they have really big plans for it, or it's one of the biggest awkward elephants they have hiding under their rug.

People have asked many times for it to be made hero/villain Co-op, for the trials to be revisited, for Fathim the Kind to GET A PANCAKING PHONE... all to no avail.

Yet they recently added more exploration badges to the zone, so they obviously haven't forgot about it... go figure. o.0

Also: Hero Corps did use to charge for changing difficulty. I'm actually glad they took that out, though I understand your point.

This... may not be far from the truth. During the Freedom Phalanx novel, his beloved Monica is dying. Without her, even with a daughter and grandaughter, he considers retiring and maybe even leaving the Earth and humanity behind (they intimate in the novel they know of other worlds/races at this point).

Richter is a German name. If Monica or her father decided that the Nazi party had the right idea (remember folks didn't know all the horrible stuff 'til later) how hard do you think it would have been for Monica to convince him that it was the right idea?

At that time in his life he had a certain... moral ambiguity... that would have had him supporting the Nazi's just as easily as becoming a hero... for Monica's sake.

Also, maybe Stephan didn't drink from the well in this reality. He would have stayed at Marcus' side, if just to ride Cole's coat-tails to power. In this reality, he was a sympathizer to the Axis cause (Fascism, but Arachnos wasn't really picky, they just started in Italy). How hard would it have been, seeing as how the betrayal never took place in this scenario, for Stephan to convince Marcus they were the way to go?

There's a number of different avenues that would have made it easy for that younger, more amoral, Marcus Cole to choose a different path.

EDIT: Oh! Necroed thread? I didn't notice 'til after I posted. However, I think it's an interesting conversation, and hadn't seen this thread before I don't think...