Lycanus

wish we could get "student" as a job rather than just "professor".

be another month before I can afford this stuff, I think

but, still, have to wonder...

on their list of further boosters: bushy (fox, wolf, squirrel, etc) tails....tails that accept skin patterns....animated tails....

I have to comment about the Gold Digger comic here.


One of the best things about Gold Digger is that, if you wait long enough, practically every genre will show up somewhere.

Go to Jade, you have high fantasy with elves, dragons and trolls.

Want Streetfighter-esque martial arts, there's a professional league for that as well.

Space Opera and Space Warfare? The whole sequence with the trip to Stripe's homeworld.

Indiana Jones/Tomb Raider flavor...all through out.

Government agents and espionage...Agency Zero.

Gothic Horror - the Undead universe.

Gold Digger has it all...

And wouldn't be great if CoH did as well?

From Patch Notes:

"Character Origin Missions (Hero and Villain)
Where did Origins come from? How are they connected? How long have they existed? "

This is the first I've heard of this, anybody know what's up here? Are we getting more advanced origin-oriented storylines from our original contacts?

[ QUOTE ]
In this in depth look at the creation of the new zone "Cimerora," Ken Morse takes us behind the scenes and through the seven steps that brought Cimerora from concept to virtual reality.<a href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/node/33652">"Stretching the Genre: Creating Cimerora in City of Heroes"</a> not only features interesting insights from Ken, but also includes a new set of beautiful concept art and environment screenshots.

<a href="http://forums.tentonhammer.com/showthread.php?t=27943">Join Cody on the Ten Ton Hammer Forums</a>, to answer this question: Should a Greek and Roman inspired culture be included in a super hero game? Where can (or should) the CoH team go from here?

Join us in discussing this topic here:

Regards,

Ex Libris



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Greek and Roman inspired genres...let's see...

Wonder Woman's Island

The Olympians in both DC and Marvel

Countless Greek/Roman inspired villains and heroes in published sources.

The fact that most superheroes are extensions of the mythic hero archetypes.

Superman - Heracles
Batman - Odysseus
Spider-Man - Sun Wu'kong

etc...

I have no expectation to edit spawn points, but I'd like to see:


Map Tileset: Labs

Floors: 3

Floorplan 1: medium
Floorplan 2: small
Floorplan 3: huge

Primary Enemy: Crey

Patrols: Yes

Floor 1: 2 (Devouring Earth)
Floor 2: 1 (Devouring Earth)
Floor 3: 4 (Devouring Earth)

and so on....probably a bit simpler than that, but that's not all that complex itself...

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Even with limited options for customizing, things can get really inventive and detailed; look at some of the SG Bases people have made (even without using the floating item bug) and the base builder is pretty bare bones.

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You aren't even going to get that much customization. You're going to get a list of predefined maps and you're going to pick one. Then you go to the next step. Nothing that Positron said has indicated that you will get to customize it in any way, and way he did say pretty much rules it out completely.

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Actually, he said we'll be able to write dialogue. Which means we should be able to connect to a specific enemy and write words for them.

However, I have to say: devs: after doing this, you BETTER give us the ability to add surprises like ambushes and the like

indeed....there's a lot of space in the phrase "only create the kind of missions we already have"

there is actually a good variety of missions, unfortunately, the best and most challenging rarely appear save for more recent storyarchs

all I want is the ability to put in complications already existing:

patrols (set number...or number per floor)

ambushes (set number...harder to control since they tend to charge straight forward)

waves (set number and trigger)

destructible objects, especially destructible objects that explode for damage...


and also be able to set the type of mob of a named enemy....

I don't want to run a council mission where I'm writing a story about a warwolf's plot only to have the main villain be randomly determined to be a vampyr rather than the warwolf the storyline says he is.

Also, I hope to be able to put multiple enemy groups into one mission. And set whether there are ambushes between missions or not.

we're likely going to be able to set:

tile-set and/or basic size of the map

villain group(s) and a few story-important spawns...unfortunately, I doubt we'll be allowed to create our own enemy groups, but that would be interesting

dialogue

the presence of patrols, ambushes and waves (hope and pray...need more of these)

the presence of glowies and clue text

the presence of destructible objects and whether or not you have to destroy them or guard them

the final boss (would be nice to be able to design an Elite Boss, but I think AVs should be left to the devs)

************

If we are allowed to make our enemy groups....that would be...awesome.


************

in any case, this sort of system will require a bit of overwatch to avoid issues of profanity and other such situations...likely that will be covered in the rating system.

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CREATE OWN MISSIONS?! Sweet!

I've had a great idea for a SG mission..basically the reward is a shiney base item that gives everyone in the SG a minor buff!

Sweet huh

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I've been off and on considering starting a thread in the for fun section: "Your character's TF" but now, I'll hold off, best to keep some things secret.

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I can’t tell you how excited I am for our game’s future, and although we have some major announcements yet to be made, one of the things I can talk about is a feature that we are planning. Similar in concept to our character creator, it allows you, the players, to create missions and story arcs for your characters and others to participate in. You’ll be able to pick the map, villain group, and objectives, as well as write the dialog and any clues needed for the missions. When you are satisfied with it, you can upload it and have other players across all servers play it and rate it. Fame will come to the players whose stories rate the best overall. It is features like these that we never dreamed of including when we first shipped, but are excited to be able to offer players very soon.



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Makes me ask one question....

when?

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Don't forget the easy-but-never-done hover over mob and knockback, which becomes knockdown.


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I'd forgotten that one. Most of the time I prefer knockback to knockdown, so I usually don't look for ways to turn it into knockdown.

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Practical applications: you mention juggling, but some bosses are best dealt with by perma (meaning repeated) knockup (Air superiority) or knockback (single target energy blast or manipulation, or Forcefield), where the boss has no time to attack between knocks.


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That's what I was speaking of when I mentioned juggling, actually.

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How about the usual storm tactic of AoE knockback and repel into corners, for clumping up mobs?



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A variation of delivery.

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How about synergy with AoE immobs?

-- Just some ideas.

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Immobilize cancels out knockback and since I was focusing on making good use of knockback, I wasn't thinking of that, since, often it doesn't even become knockdown once some immobilizes are applied.

A list of stories would be a good idea, I might try that.

thanks, I usually just give the info, but yeah I suppose presentation would help make people look at it

Knockback Types

Knockdown: one of the more preferred forms of knockback, knockdown does not change the target's position, but merely locks him in an animation for a few seconds. This is a soft control that keeps the enemy from triggering any powers without the player having move to chase the target.

Knockback: This effect propels the enemy in a direction away from the origin point of the power. How far the enemy flies depends on the impact of the particular power and the enemy's level. This has the benefit of taking the enemy out of the fight longer than knockdown, but also results in players having to move back into position to deal with the target.

Knockup: This is basically a vertical knockback, it has a combination of the benefits of knockback and knockdown in that the end-position of the enemy is not too different from the starting position and it takes the enemy out of action much longer than simple knockdown. The downside is that knockup produces a bit more random end-position than knockback does. Though the enemy will land near the super that knocked them up, they might land to the side, in front or behind...it is hard to predict. Most of the time, however, this is a minor concern.

Repel: Repel is not really a form of knockback, but it operates similarly and is used similarly as well. Repel is a toggle effect rather than an instant effect and it basically knocksback anybody that comes in contact with it. It is possible that the target’s already existent velocity affects the line and speed of their repel knockback. The benefit of repel is that enemies stay in melee range only for fractions of a second. The downside is that between the motions of the enemy and the player, that the relationship between target and point of origin changes frequently and makes the direction of knockback difficult to predict.

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Point of Origin: Knockback is applied in a straight line drawn from the point of origin (the super herself with a melee, PBAoE or cone effect...the target with a TAoE), and through the point of contact, the target. This is why AoE knockback attacks sound enemies in all directions and cone knockback attacks tend to produce a fanned spread of thrown bodies.

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Uses

Juggling: Juggling is best done with a combination of knockdown and knockup. The purpose is to keep foes off their feet. As long as they are off their feet they cannot trigger a power or other effect or move in the direction of their choice. You generally focus on one target when juggling. I have often used this with ranged characters to keep enemies slowed down and at a distance, with ranged characters, knockback works better.

Yo-Yo: A melee tactic mostly, this tactic involves continually throwing away a chosen target until you are ready to deal with him more permanently. This works best with melee-centric foes as skirmishers and snipers will simply stand up and start shooting you instead of wasting time walking back and attacking you in melee.

Delivery: A tricky tactic, but a useful one. This involves staying around the outside of the battle and using knockback to put people in the place you want them to be, usually right around the tanker or other melee types. This requires a degree of familiarity with your knockback ranges and some eyeballing of in game distances.

Scatter: This is a tactic for granting breathing space. When you want the enemy spread out wide. There is a lot of care to be had in using this tactic as normally a team prefers enemies to be clustered tightly together for the more efficient use of AoE effects. However, this is a good tactic to use when there are more enemies in the area than you want, or to clear the area around vulnerable teammates or objects that need protection (such as idols or science equipment).

Divide and Conquer: This is primarily a soloist tactic, especially for powersets that predominantly have single-target effects. The idea is to scatter enemies in one direction or another, trying to keep them all from clumping up and limiting your confrontations to one on one fights. Other controls such as fear or dizzy often are part of this tactic as those that get the most use out of it often have a small mix of control types. This involves a judicious and mixed use of Scatter and Yo-Yo tactics.

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Misuses

The misuses of knockback come in two predominant ways.

Lack of Forethought: This is the most common misuse and arrives when a power has, as a secondary effect, a degree of knockback. Good examples of this are powers such as M30 Grenade and Energy Torrent. Most of the time this happens when the Super just wants to do damage, and isn’t thinking about the full impact beyond just the immediate desire to do a great deal of damage. It is the lack of thought about the knockback that is the problem. The benefits or penalties of an action when there is no thought involved are random. Whether a result is good or bad is entirely a function of luck when there is no thought before hand. The Super involved simply does not completely understand the consequences of his actions and so will tend to produce bad effects as often as or more often than good ones.

Lack of Consideration: Knockback is fun. It is immensely fun to be able to send your enemy flying across the field of battle. It can also be useful, especially if a player wants to get an enemy away from him. However, if all he’s considering is his own needs, then it is very likely that he will be doing something that makes someone else’s job on the team harder. This is mostly a problem with players used to soloing more than teaming. This is also more a flaw of personality than understanding.

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Territory

Edges/Cliffs: A good place for a knockback soloist to fight is near a cliff or balcony. Knocking an enemy you don’t want to deal with at the moment off the cliff is a good way to force them to spend a long time trying to get back at you. The downside is that doing this will tend to mean that when they come back in, they will be in a shooting mood rather than melee one.

Walls: Given the right circumstance, a ragdolled foe can get his head or other parts of the body stuck in walls and other such terrain features, leaving them stuck for an extended time and helpless. This works best with flat, smooth walls as often what happens with cave walls and other uneven terrain is that the villain gets stuck in the wall and becomes impossible to hit with most attacks and also can’t move so you can’t draw him out.

Slopes: There are several surfaces in the game that a player or enemy will slide down given the right circumstances. These are excellent fodder for knockback for as long as the enemy is sliding he cannot attack just as if he were still flying. Also note that knockdown on such slopes will result in the enemy falling down the slope. This is especially useful in cases where the enemy are coming down a slope toward you and have the high ground, as even a simple knockdown effect will result in them sliding helplessly down to your feet rather than requiring you to go up to them and risk aggroing anything that might lie over the hump of the slope. This is the only time that a knockback effect will result in an enemy sliding towards the Super using the knockback.

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You are looking at tanking through the eyes of a tabletop gamer who uses attack templates and tape measures. The biggest tanking trade secrets are found in continuing to do so by also looking at what the enemies can do too. Now thats where we go from primary tanker basics as is your title and moving on. I like your guide.

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Yep, I only barely touched on adapting for the enemy. basically it was cones that got me, I basically got frustrated with telling people to stop standing behind me.

Thanks for the approval of my guide.

^_^

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This is the area a tanker can reach without moving from his chosen spot. This is going to be the most taunt-saturated area around the Tanker and, in most cases, among the safest places to be during the battle. For most tankers this is a 5 foot range and produces a 5 foot radius region of control.

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Quickie edit, not necessarily safest place to be but often the safest area to attack. I'll continue reading. The gauntlet radius is a radius about the attacked enemy not the tanker and can vary in feet for various time limits. The pbaoe taunt aura makes a lovely circle around the tanker.

I will delete this post in 10 mins.


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I deal with Gauntlet bursts later on. Early part about Melee Range is more discussing the aggro gained specifically for attacking a specific enemy, not Gauntlet, which hits enemies around the original target.

The are a number of problems that I have seen or heard of with regard to tanking. Some of these are due to the misunderstanding of the Tanker, but they are almost as often a result of a misunderstanding on the part of the non-Tankers in the team.

Primary Tanker is a mindset that takes a bit of getting used to as it involves doing things that may be considered counter-intuitive to the average player. There is a big difference in playstyle between a Primary Tanker and a Second Tank, and an even bigger difference between a Primary Tanker and a Scranker.

The first thing we have to consider is the areas that a tanker maintains control over.

First is the Melee Range.

This is the area a tanker can reach without moving from his chosen spot. This is going to be the most taunt-saturated area around the Tanker and, in most cases, among the safest places to be during the battle. For most tankers this is a 5 foot range and produces a 5 foot radius region of control.

Further out we have the region of the Taunt Aura. (The circle here should really go further out, but this still works for a basic diagram to a degree...it gets the basic idea out.)

The taunt aura of most power sets extends a little bit further beyond the tanker's melee range. This is the second most taunt-saturated region around a tanker and is still heavily taunt controlled as most taunt auras cycle rapidly. For many tanks this is around 10 to 15 feet in radius, but I'd trust more to 10 feet in radius than 15.

Past the taunt aura radius is the Point Blank Radius. (again, the circle should be bigger, oh well.)

For most tankers this goes out at around 15 feet. Some of the smallest PBAoEs aren't much larger than the radius of the tanker taunt auras others will extend 15 or even 20 feet out. The largest PBAoE's however, are things like Consume which are mostly for a purpose other than damage or taunt. (Though I will admit to using Consume for taunting purposes once or twice). Also note that SS's Hand Clap should not be considered for Taunt purposes. Hand Clap is designed to give you and your team a bit of breathing space when you need it, it is not designed to help you keep Aggro.

Those ranges translate into Aggro Control Zones.

The melee range has the most control because any enemy there is subjected to melee attacks, taunt auras and PBAoEs. Thus they are constantly getting hit by taunt effects.

Further out, the Taunt-Aura range is a little less saturated, but the quick cycle of the taunt auras and the occasional PBAoE attack of heavy damage means this is still a fairly well controlled area.

Beyond that, in the PBAoE radius, only the PBAoEs hit enemies here, and it is here and beyond that a Tanker will find the most need for Taunt. However, too much focus on this region will give a tanker minimal effect on the outer areas while severely impacting the inner circles of control. In general, a tanker should extend their look out that way only if a particular enemy is giving your team trouble. Mostly, that region will be for the controllers, blasters and Torpedo scrappers.

If the tanker does need to intervene, the temptation will be to move towards the point of trouble, but unless your central circles are mostly clear, this is a bad idea. In moving, you are the most likely to lose aggro from the enemies on the region you are moving away from. Instead, this is the case you want to save taunt for. Taunt once and go back to cycling through the enemies around you.

One should not focus on just one opponent when Primary Tanking.

Gauntlet is an excellent tool, and focusing on one opponent limits you to just One Gauntlet Burst.

This enhances one section of your central circle, but leaves others less touched and risks more leakage. Even if you account for Incindental Gauntlet Bursts produced by PBAoEs and (possibly) Taunt Auras. You are still limiting your effective taunting saturation by repeatedly hitting someone that you have probably firmly under control.

By comparison Cycling Gaunlet Bursts enhances the effective taunt-saturation of both the inner and second circle around you. The diagram here only showing how much more taunt saturation you get with cycling through five targets. Also note that these gauntlet bursts overlap with each other and help to keep up the aggro on enemies they may just barely be about to break aggro.

Understanding this lets a team have much better aggro management.

AoE effects from Defenders, Blasters and Controllers, for the most part, should be kept in that central area of control so that the aggro is less likely to hit the user of that AoE. On the outer edges of the tank's control, AoE should give way to single target effects directed at places of trouble.

Defenders with a lot PBAoE heals, buffs or debuffs will want to stay close the tanker in that center circle as they are less likely to steal aggro from there.

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There are specific situations, however, that a tanker and a party should be aware of.

The first is the AoE Death Zone. (The AoE Death Zone is the whole set of circles, not just the first.)

If the enemies you are fighting use a great deal of area effect attacks (such as when dealing with Nemesis), then you should make sure that there are no squishies near you when you start the attack and when try to taunt attacks toward you. Otherwise, regardless of whether you have aggro or not, the AoE will kill the squishies around you.

Likewise, Non-Tankers need to be aware that the current enemies are using a lot of AoE and need to remember not to crowd around the Tanker in these cases.

The second situation is the Cone Death Zone.

This is mostly a concern with Archvillains and Giant Monsters that either have massively damaging cone attacks or cone attacks that lay down status effects or debuffs. Some common enemies (like BA Totems) also have very dangerous cones, but in general you're only going to be worrying about this situation with AVs and GMs.

When facing such enemies, the Tanker needs to grab aggro and move around to the AVs back. This should make the AV/GM turn his back on the non-tankers and prevent the non-tankers from being exposed to its cones. Technically, the non-tankers could move around behind the AV/GM, but, in general, it is easier to move one character than 4 or more without unfortunate incident.

This is important Tankers. When fighting GMs, make sure there are NO squishies behind you. Likewise, squishies, make sure not to stand behind the Tanker. He will not act as a shield and block part of the cone. I can't count how many times this could have saved a person a death while dealing with Lusca.

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In relation to Primary Tankers, other ATs have specific Melee Areas of Operation that I would suggest.

The purple oval is the area that I would suggest for "Torpedo Scrappers". Torpedo Scrappers being those Scrappers that are designated specific targets to prefer over others. In general, as a Torpedo, I would still hesitate to range past the tanker's region of control, but if the ranged ATs are in trouble or otherwise occupied, then you should make brief forays outside. Going too far, however, risks drawing unintentional aggro from nearby spawns and making a bad situation (otherwise you wouldn't be diving so far) worse.

Second Tanks can also be called Apprentice Primary Tankers. They have the concept of aggro control, but still tend to fixate on defeating opponents as adverse attracting attention. Likewise, Second Tanks forget that movement risks losing aggro, and will tend to jump at new flanks before a current flank is finished. Secondary Tankers take some pressure off the Primary Tanker and the Controller, especially if a flanking action happens and someone needs to hold a battle off until the team as a whole has a full handle on the situation.

Satellite Scrappers are generally AoE heavy scrappers, though Scrankers fall in this category too, that walk through the region of the Tanker's control and cut down whatever they run across. They are different from a Second Tank in that their task is elimination not occupation. They are supposed to focus on and defeat enemies, not bounce around.

Satellites and Second Tanks should also be responsible for leakers that pass through the Primary Tankers aggro zones.

Likewise there are suggested Ranged Areas of Operation

Dependent on Power Set choice, some Blasters, Defenders and Controllers (I'm hesitant to include them, but for some it's true) are of more use when close to the battle than they are far away. In this case, they should try to hug close to the tank (assuming no AoE threat) so as to be close to both enemies and friends. Other ranged figures should hold back, close enough to fall under healing and buff auras, but preferably in outer edges of the Tanker zones of control.

In most cases, they will want to be behind the tanker, but, as stated previously, against AVs and GMs the more secure and safe place should be facing the Tanker and standing behind the enemy.

Next year, please add more variety to the ToT stuff, please.

Treat: have someone step out and emote giving or throwing treats to the ToT'er (the emote of opening the present could work for that). Perhaps make it models of famous NPCs (people in costumes). Be funny to have Lord Recluse step out and give you an Inspiration and then walk back in the door.

Trick: more variety of enemies, please:

masked slashers - a la Friday the 13th and Halloween (could use variations of the Tsoo Ancestor Spirits...they have the mask at least)

evil knights/animated armor - a la Scooby Doo (could use Warrior Earth models)

little green men/aliens - Rikti with minimized height scales...or monkeys with ray guns

leprechauns - could use redcaps

don't remove the old monsters, of course, but just add new ones.

I still hope this thread happens some day.

Though, with mixxing and matching IO sets...we're getting close to this.

Just going to need to find some way for those sets to change the auras and effects.

time for a bit of thread necromancy, can anybody give me these files?

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I'm just curious if the dual wield set has axes available. I mean, dual wielding axes could be pretty dern groovy, and would still maintain the look of lethal damage.

Cyclone jack

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I asked about that in PM.

No axes for Dual Blades...

Don't work with the animations.

This means no Axes in exchange for Broadsword and no Broadsword in exchange for Battle Axe

Also no dual maces which makes me still a bit holding off for my wererat paladin (but I have a wererat assassin wielding a broadsword, so that's not so necessary)

[ QUOTE ]
Alright, I didn't read all 40+ pages. Anyway, has there been any clues as to where these Oroboros Bases will be situated? Will they be set up in low traffic zones like Galaxy and Skyway, or dropped into Talos like everything else?

[/ QUOTE ]

Talos Island, yes.....

Paragon City Mall

hmm, I hope the weapon customization allows us to do the following:

Use Battle-Axe power set but have the graphic be a broadsword

Use Broad-Sword, but have the graphic be a katana...or axe...

etc

no worries, was just grousing really...

kind hoped I'd make it this time having a Medusa-themed heroine