Talen Lee

If all TFs were designed to be desireable and fun, it would not address any villainside/heroside deficiency - there's more variety and a better spread, heroside, than there is villainside.

That said, I don't think that the redside TFs need all that much work, really. Most of them are really fun and interesting, and have an equal incentive to do them once. Once you start treating them as booster packs with a prize in them, the Cap Au SF becomes primary, and the Lady Grey one probably becomes second (just because it's only five missions.)

People are acting as if there's this crowd of perpetual level 2s who never get any arcane salvage drops, and as if the TO/DO/SO drops from before the market were somehow enough to sustain a character. From what I can see this is utter bollocks.

The market system, with its high priced lowbie goods benefits lowbies because they're the ones prompting the majority of the lowbie goods to hit the market.

I asked it before, and I'll ask it again: Do you use as much salvage as you get as drops?

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F) Power leveling – This reduces the amount of pool A and B recipes because the player that is side kicked/lackeyed is receiving drops that are not in the tier that they are in. This reduces supply in that tier and increases it in tier 3 and gives the player being power leveled drops that are potentially more valuable in terms of total influence than if they had been playing normally in their actual tier.

Solution – code drops so that drops received are based on actual player level rather than mob level. If the team is clearing out carnies for example the level 50 would be receiving prophecies and spirit thorns while the side kick would be receiving lament boxes and luck charms the side kicked/lackeyed player would also be receiving level 10 recipes worth a couple hundred inf rather than 100,000 inf.

Pros – creates items in the tiers that have shortages by forcing drops into native level. Has the potential to reduce the amount of inf RMTr’s have to sell by reducing the amount they earn while being paid to power level. Allows the mobs to be coded as simply arcane, tech or mixed and could allow different mobs in the same group to be coded differently. Rikti conscripts could be coded as tech while the Rikti Magus could be coded as arcane for example and CoT mages could be arcane while CoT guides and defenders could be tech or mixed.

Cons – does not assist in the production of Pool B recipes in any tier since Power Levelers reset their maps rather than complete the mission. Possibility of large amounts of recoding being required.

[/ QUOTE ]This is a brilliant idea, and also removes one of my current problems playing my 50s - If I exemp down, I divorce myself from any chance at getting purples.

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Happy that Mind/Psi has fewer issues than in the past. A part of me is *still* annoyed about the downgrading of the Shockwave animation and sound effect though.

[/ QUOTE ]waitwaitwaitwaitwaitwaitwait.

PSW used to be BETTER?

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Maybe Boomtown could just be made a villain zone, seeing as you heroes don't use it.

[/ QUOTE ]Will you people stop messing with my zones?!

Good grief, people are whiny.

Honestly, reading this info, my heart sank. I liked the hollows as that brutal, hard-edged threat where you learned to use inspirations, or you teamed, or you went to softer zones to do your work. I loved levelling fast off street-sweeping giant mobs. I really enjoyed the Hollows.

Now, it seems I'll be having to move to Perez.

I understand that these changes are for the best - they're for new players to have fun with the zone, new players to learn these things.

I'll just miss it. :\

I don't really want them having contacts. I like them as they are. Time spent giving them contacts is time wasted, to me, because the zones already give me everything I want: Jumbo-sized mobs of recognisable enemy types, with ordered resistances and defenses and specialities. Skulls and Hellions are about the same to one another, and the differences are in how you approach them.

Street-sweeping perez lets me gain XP at an appreciable clip without the onus of multiple zones (unless I'm planting a lot) and letting me feel like I have a gigantic tonker because I'm sweeping a hazard zone that scares everyone else away.

Maybe it's selfish of me.

Just something weird to me, but reading this thread, I get a lot of hate for Galaxy, Perez Park and Boomtown.

That's a shame, to me - I actually really like those zones, and happily take my heroes to them to solo, because it's an area where the kind of things I like to do are.

I don't know if I'm a corner case, but is it really that bad that these zones MUST be changed, when at least, to me, they're fine?

Behemoths do no mezzes, have invincibility as their big trick, no immobilizes, no holds, no stuns...

Yeah, not really comparable.

That's like, the first time I've ever heard of a stoner making something go faster.

I'm not going to trudge through this whole thing, but one thing that would actually excite me in Forcefield is if the ST Phase also did damage. The idea of crushing someone with a forcefield seems pretty intuitive to me - but alas, the defender cannae do such a thing.

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Caveat: There may be particular Defender or Tanker builds that could achieve a particular solo AV/H kill, but that is the exception, not the norm.

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Just as a note, I'm sure that there ARE Defender and Tanker builds that CAN solo many AVs without the use of inspirations. And a lot more with the reasonably fair caveat that the Defender may use Break Frees (only) since unlike MMs, Scrappers, and Tankers, they don't have both offense and status protection available.

[/ QUOTE ]I've seen a Rad/Sonic defender solo Adamastor.

Just saying.

So that's kinda a three-part combo, though. It's probably not significant enough to be 'an issue', as it were, but I do think that I need to shuffle powers around like that to compensate for a potentially backbreaking secondary effect is annoying.

I'm still not sure about what Strangler gets for its drawbacks

I'm not sure if this counts as an issue or not, but the set that thematically connects to Plant control has at least two major powers (Ripper and Thorn Barrage) that generate knockback.

Should Strangler give a stronger -kb effect than other STHs?

I have to echo that the Giant Monsters deserve something extra to make them worth killing at all. That may be another issue entirely, but as it is, the IO system coming in has a chance to make the change subtly.

Yes! Let's pat ourselves on the back for our Indieness, rather than attempt to get game balance addressed!

Moloch watched Bec leave the common room, then, as nonchalantly as he could, leapt upon the chair like a puma, quickly pulling the browser towards his destination at speed. With a furtive caution reserved only for underaged porn-site rips, Moloch cracked all his knuckles, and got to work... now, where was that submission page... quickly clicking his way through the links, he blinked in surprise at the browser's request. PostData? What the hell is that?

With the wings of ignorance, Moloch pressed 'okay'. With the eyes of unthinkingly rude, he read. And with the mind of the teenaged male that saw lesbianism everywhere it turned, connections were drawn.

Well, this sucked.

Clearing his throat, Moloch, cast adrift on a mediocre metaphor pertaining to his own overactive imagination, cracked his knuckles again and settled in to write.

Dear Valor;
I've recently found that I've found myself attracted to two-

Moloch paused.

four

Pause.

Several women,

Pause.

two women. One is an exotic older woman, with a motherly air and that sting of unapproachable celebrity - a real icon of heroic behaviour, and with a smart, fun personality that seems to burst from her every public work. The other is clever, refreshingly blunt, and has a great accent. But while I thought one was very attainable, it seems now that she's actually interested in, of all things, the other woman! I'm really confused here - should I try, and hope that sheer force of will can overcome the barriers before me - that of the whelming of celebrity, or the problems of my other crush's alternative sexuality, or am I just doomed and should look elsewhere as it is?

Signed
Scaled Heights in Galaxy

Whelming. That was a great word. Looked really intellectual, and it's not like anyone knew it was wrong or anything, right? And Scaled Heights. Man, that was awesome. Porn stars wished they had his sense in naming.

Moloch hovered. Bec hated it when people hovered. Her professors had had the habit of doing that, since to a man, they'd all been very worried about somehow annoying the prodigy amongst them. Usually, a hard stare, or a prolonged pause, was enough to communicate the message. Not so with Moloch. The boy was impervious to such things. Vexing. And he paced. Oh, how he paced - always seeming to hit the right not-quite-creaky-enough-to-warrant-handyman-attention board in the common room, circling around behind her.

No wonder his kind kept to deserts normally.

"Lochlan," she spoke, her accent - a dignified Quebecois - ringing in the room. "Are you waiting for something?"

"Well," he paused in his hovering, pacing, creaking manner. "I -" he paused again. "No, don't worry about it." he said, turning back to his symphony of irritation.

Bec sighed, turning to the keyboard once more. He'd been like this since breakfast. Perhaps he was worried that he'd embarassed himself a little too much? With a thought process that ran faster than light, Bec dismissed that idea. Of course not. If Moloch had an upper limit on how embarassed he could be, he'd have struck it well before now. No, this was something else.

Bec cracked all her knuckles, fire dancing under her skin, and rested her finers on the keys. Sentences were composed, paragraphs created, and a short novella of a question - with references, footnotes and illustrated diagrams - coalesced in her mind, before the vicious, brutal axe of socialisation was applied. Every time Bec wanted to communicate in any but the most superficial way, this was the result - she knew nobody had the time she did to think things through the way she did... and so, she had to collapse her thoughts down into words, little ugly, workmanlike things that squatted on the page, standing in the way of meaning. She much more preferred music - its purity and clarity could be appreciated regardless of language, at least.

Dear Valor,
How essential, in your experience, is the common, high-school socialisation paradigm? To wit, boyfriends, girlfriends, competition and the classic social strata displayed on numerous drama programs - are these things, in any way, reliable yardsticks to use, to give one an idea of how to 'normalise' oneself?

Signed,
Rising Star in Galaxy

Rebecca paused, surveying the letter. Too high-brow, but then, she also felt it was too short. Vexing. Something was needed to bring this down. A point of commonality... oh, wait, that would do fine - it would help link the work to the typical fare printed in the magazine, and serve the task of flattery as well. After all, it wouldn't be called flattery if it was genuine.

PS. You are hot.

Moloch paused, holding up the newspaper to Laurel, over the breakfast table. Paper met with the bacon in the middle of the table, while normal conversation ensued around them. Of course, there would be a lull, just as Moloch spoke. Such is the vice of dramatic timing.

"See, Laurel, that is a milf." He said, tapping the picture by the column.

A lengthy pause settled on the table, during which Moloch realised everyone had heard that.

"I mean, you know, theoretically. Just saying, for Laurel's... look, just shut up." the reptilian snorted, setting up the newspaper like a fort, eating quietly behind it.

And on the other side of the paper wall, most of Project Corona did their best not to snigger too obviously.

"Moon wand power makeup... Activate!"

Angel, don't take this the wrong way, but England looks really like he's trying to pick up there. And I don't mean his mace. ;p

/signed

I know not if this has been mentioned, but:

Detective Frasenbacker is a reference to one of the best Canadian Shows Ever.

Thank you.

This Is All.

Yeah; the /Fire changes are nice (especially for the tanker, with the healing flames upgrade), but is it possible to get more adjustments to make Fire more in line with the other sets defensively?