Techbot Alpha

Originally Posted by Dr_Darkspeed

The fact that it appears that we'll never get a female gunslinger set now is what I most dislike about it.

Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake

i was also giving you an opening to plug your skyrim character.

Though i really would like to hear about the steampunk set. its not a stylistic issue, its an issue with the feedback, one is clearly that the steampunk is bad, the other is that it is ok, good perhaps. thats not style, thats what the feedback actually means. and im not sure i'd consider it win/win, it was a hostile thread that got them to take the role of a abused shop clerk and ask us to clarify what the heck we actually want. i'm unsure how they won in this situation, they got abused, sworn at, called sexists and had their work thrown in their face, can they control their enthusiasm?

Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake

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Originally Posted by Arcanaville

Lets start the female customer respect train by not assuming all women have the same opinion on the gunslinger pack. Clearly they don't, just based on postings in this thread. And the fact a woman made them, and probably wasn't specifically thinking they were the spearpoint of a war against women at the time.

There's no question calling the pack a "gunslinger" pack was an error. There are *some* players that believe having a costume pack whatever it was called contain a male gunfighter outfit and a more frilly female outfit was also an error, but if it was an error, and not everyone agrees, that was an error in judgment, not a case of misogyny.

Not all women feel disrespected. Some men do. Lets try to keep some perspective.

Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake

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Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake

ok, honest question, is paragon supposed to NOT represent the iconic representations in comics? this is a question i keep wondering because people keep throwing around the barbarian set and the steampunk set as punching bags, and im unsure where they wanted them to go with them other than where they went. As barabrian goes, look at the representations of women in so called barbarian stuff, now, are we going with grace jones' conservative attire in the conan movies? the costumes of women in various pictures by frazetta and vallejo's drawings? how about xena's outfits, or the female barbarian in diablo, or maybe the female foresworn in skyrim? because barring xena's samurai costume, none of those representations were more modest than what we got, in fact the mmo based on the more iconic barbarian is the only one that im aware of in the us that allows female avatars to run around topless. either way, if you look at what we actually got its fairly tame relative to most representative works in the subgenre.

Steampunk is similar, do an image search in either google or yahoo for steampunk clothing. make a note of what you see there. outside of the dresses, which we cant have for aesthetic reasons, bet you see a lot of corsets..and thats with safesearch on. things get a great deal racier but still within the general aesthetic when off. the only thing i didnt see was the split skirt, but i saw that as a comprimise to the games issues with animating wearing long dresses rather than an intentional slight to women. I reiterate, this is just steampunk clothing. steampunk women bolsters my case even mroe about what the representative look is if you feel a need to continue on, and you will notice this is not "steampunk sexy" its just the general prevailing look in the sub-genre. note im not saying every single outfit is corsets and boots, but count em up, see what your numbers are, and tell me what the representative look for a female steampunk costume is.

So i guess my question is this. if there is a continuous theme that you can see in a set, something that comes up over and over again, are you asking the developers to self censor based on how an iconic look may be "sexy". Should they simply ignore those subcultures..or shoudl they purposely make non-representative costumes for fear of upsetting people?

Originally Posted by Kadmon

Oh I can. It's called Hammerspace. I fully expect, now that I've said this, that we will see dozens upon dozens of tiny "School Girl" characters using the Fusion Hammer in a comically anime fashion I'm playing a bit of Devil's Advocate here, since the stated purpose of the Stalker is massive ST damage, and Titan Weapons has the stated purpose of massive AoE damage. They don't really fit together well, is what I'm saying.

Originally Posted by CactusBrawler

Mutant "Well I make my clothes go invisble, why should my weapon be any different?"

Science "The moleculeur structure of this blade shifts when explosed to a current of two point three jiggwats, thus causing it to project a sub psychic perception field that makes me unnoticable"

Tech "See the engine on the end, it's an invisbility field projector kinda neet right?"

magic "This axe one belonged to Zars Turovich the famed headsman of Jorikstown who used to chop of the heads of those that had sinned during the night, due to all the blood it sheds it masks the wielders presence much like the hood of an exercutioner was supposed to."

Natural "I'm a friggin ninja."

Originally Posted by Kadmon

Titan Weapons isn't "Did you notice these bright green electricity bolts," it's "Hey, do you hear that ROARING JET ENGINE behind us?" or "What is that metallic scraping sound on every wall, floor, and ceiling coming up the hall?"

Originally Posted by Kadmon

Right, simply put, I don't see Titan Weapons as a terribly stealthy set, doesn't really fit with the whole stalker idea (it's an AoE-centric set, Stalkers are meant to be, and are truly becoming with I22, the ST damage kings, queens, presidents, and really the entirity of the ST damage Senate, Parliament, etc.). I won't out and out say that it's a bad idea, just doesn't seem like it fits to me. Like they're taking a Fusion Hammer to get the square peg into the round hole. It'll be a much larger round hole at the end of it, and the square peg might not exist anymore afterwards...

That one got away from me, I think. Regardless, I'll take the "wait and see" approach for this one and stop rambling. It's early and I've only just had my coffee.

Originally Posted by rian_frostdrake

you HAVE to be joking.

Originally Posted by ClawsandEffect

Your tier 9 should be called "Kill Me Now".

Your HP drops to 100, but your resistance is capped and you are soft-capped to everything. Why does that sound so familiar?

Oh yeah, it's almost identical to the old Moment of Glory, which most people skipped because it SUCKED.

Imagine fighting an enemy group that has a large to-hit buff available to it. Like, oh, Nemesis or Devouring Earth. Pop your tier 9 while fighting DE, hit the floor 0.652 seconds later.

Actually, I'd like for the devs to make this set for you, just so you can see how horrible it would be for yourself.

And on the flip side of things, if you were to give this set to a tank it has the potential to be incredibly overpowered. Capped S/L resistance, and 60-80% resistance to everything else? Sounds like Granite without the movement or recharge penalties.

Add in the fact that a tank can soft-cap defense with IOs even if they have no defense to begin with, and you have a broken set.

Originally Posted by SilverAgeFan

Not if they want costume microtransactions to work as a solid revenue model...

Originally Posted by Bosstone

I think that is a fantastic analogy, actually.

We were expecting and wanted Fusionette/Fusion. Instead we got Fusionette/Faultline.

Originally Posted by Captain-Electric

I have to go back to work, but for now, all I'll say is that I hope we all enjoy our forthcoming homogenous outfits. The community wins!

Originally Posted by Snow Globe

I see why people are upset. The players are being told that their feedback is getting listened to, and then the next set has even more of the same problems.

Originally Posted by Obsidius

Prove it.

Also, their Facebook page proved to fare no better in regards to critical feedback than the forums (and their supposed limited scope).

Originally Posted by Captain-Electric

This is exactly what I expected when I voiced my opinion and stressed that the art team should listen to the community but avoid giving them the steering wheel. There are minority biases in the "Gender Equality" thread that do not reflect the tastes of the game's wider audience. All you need to do is log into the game to see it.

Of course a broader selection of choices would be great, but if the art direction wasn't ALREADY phenomenal in City of Heroes, I wouldn't be here. The community should pick its battles more carefully "going forward", and if a sea change does occur, I won't blame the art team.

Originally Posted by DeviousMe

Oh, I see how it is. Other flavors of insanity ain't good enough for ya, hmm?

Well, take care. Looking forward to when you come back - and you will come back. They all come back...

Originally Posted by DumpleBerry

This just in, Devs surprised to find that water is wet.

Originally Posted by Frostbiter

"Zwill states that they will be starting to 'port over' male pieces to the female model rather than making female-only pieces with future costume sets from here on out."

This kind of sounds snarky to me. So the plan is to do away with female specific pieces altogether?

Originally Posted by Commander

Zwil, please take no offense personally as I mean none. But, in truth, most costume pieces CAN be copied and pasted to the new model. The thing is, every single costume "design" can be carried over. Just that in some cases, a model/frame/geo might need slight adjustment.

Case and Point:

Female version of Male Gunslinger



As you can see, by editing the .costume files you CAN make female versions of the male costumes. The only bump is that you have to find a pre-existing ".geo" file to closely match the male version. Now, in reality, every costume piece can be switched around if there was a suitable male/female/huge version of the ".geo" file.

And once one version of the ".geo" file is made, you don't have to totally remake a new .geo file for every body type. So, actually, if someone there "Ctrl+C" then "Ctrl+V"'d each .geo and slightly edited it for the gender (ie. chest) then the work is 3/4ths done already.

Would it be time consuming to make new .geo's for each new costume set? Hell yes. Would the players pay TOP dollar to have a little more work go into each set? Hell yes!

I realize everyone there goes on to the next big thing rather quickly, but sometimes putting in that little extra effort is what really make the payoff that much more worth it.

/2cents