The_Alt_oholic

Doms are a lot of fun. I play more hero than villain side, but I do like how domination works. My highest Dom is level 40+ something on a server that I rarely play on any more.

I don't have any permadoms, so I don't think it was ever necessary to be a permadom.

It's kind of like having permahasten, permaphase-shift (Man, do I miss that!), or purple IO's - it certainly isn't necessary to have them in order to play the game.

Well, as a min/maxer, you really aren't trying to "play the game". Instead you are just trying to "statistically take the easiest route to defeat the game". The min/maxer challenge is in breaking the system by finding the weak point. Often this is determined mathematically by number crunching. I'm assuming that you did not data-mine the numbers to determine this yourself, so you really didn't even learn to "mini/max" the system. If this is the case, someone else mini/maxed and you just are using the resulting information to take the easy way through the game.


You might only enjoy doing what you call playing by doing what you are calling min/max-ing. That's okay if that is the case, but the game and it's genre doesn't really make much of a difference. To put what I'm trying to say in perspective, I also do not think that players that are farming or power-leveling are playing the game. Also, when I'm working the market, I'm not playing the game.

To play a game involves the flavor - aka the genre. That is to say enjoying what you are doing because it is in that genre and is part of the spirit of the game.

This might seem harsh and confusing, but having a history playing RPG's (not to be confused with MMORPGs), which at this point seem to be called pen-and-paper or desktop RPGs, I have done quite a large amount of mini-maxing. I never went to a website to learn the tricks of how to find the best advantages in a game. I broke the games myself.

So the reason to give up on your statistically best set of powers and try another is to try to enjoy playing the actual game.

I can guarantee there are a whole lot of sets that are not the most mini-maxed, but I have great fun playing them. Yeah, even some that really numerically suck as regards to their calculated yield.

The current naming system allows a name to appear once on each server.
So presently TheNameICantGet can be associated with my account on Virtue, but another player can have TheNameICantGet on Freedom.
I do have the same name on different servers in the game. You can only have the name on Hero or villain side as well - so I have have a MyCharacter on Heroside Virtue - I can't have a MyCharacter on Villain Virtue but I could have a MyCharacter on Freedom Villian (in which case I couldn't have a MyCharacter on Freedom Hero as well) - which, in fact, is the case for me.

Your fix would throw a monkey wrench into the system across the servers, but I understand the angle you are going for from a single server stand point.
Also, this does not help the naming issues that some players are having - it just allows a player to have their same-name across multiple characters. Which may clear up some new naming clutter, but will do nothing to change my other character names that are still unique across all my characters on any given server.

I'm still for a random name generator being built into the game. (I don't have a problem with getting new unique names. And I'm not talking about crazy ones either.) I've posted on this before so due to forum rules I'm really not supposed to repost the info all over again, but, to cut to the basics, there is enough that the game knows about the character from the character creation system that it could draw off information to use to create character names based on the features of the character that has been created and only list names that have not yet been taken. Players could either pick from this list of name or enter variants of their own (to see if they are taken or not).
Seems a win-win, but it would take development time.

We know the basics of the standard "hero naming" conventions;

power/adjective-gender identifier
color power/adjective-gender identifier
power/adjective/name-number

Just to point out, all of these names would be against the EULA because they are referring to a Marvel Character. This would also include any crazy XxX HulK XxX or variant game-clan names.
We are playing a superhero game, but we have to keep in mind and respect the copyright of others especially as it can have an impact on our game. Marvel DID sue. DC could very well sue. The DEVs are actively trying to avoid getting sued over the use of copyrighted names so keep this in mind when creating characters.
It is not all right to use copyrighted/trademarked names in the game.

On this subject, the name of mythical/legendary beings can't be copyrighted/trademarked in the US (I don't know about other countries - aka even those that would have access to the NA servers). An example of this is Nike. Nike is the Greek goddess of Victory. Nike doesn't have a trade mark on Nike. Nike has a trademark on "the swoosh" logo. The same would go for Thor, Odin, Hercules, etc.
At the same time, naming a character Thor or making a "Thor" character that "looks like" Marvel's The Mighty Thor would be copyright/trademark infringement as you are in violation due to the visual intellectual property rights of Marvel and, therefore, it would be in violation of the EULA.

I do not think that Samuel_Tow intended to condone the use of variant names of licensed characters in the game. I am just making it clear that it isn't okay to do so.

So your answer is that if you are in the "in crowd" that you should get to participate, but anyone outside of "the in crowd" knowing about it would ruin your experience?

Another reason for me not to like players that feel that they are L337.

I was on Freedom yesterday evening.
I even think it was during the time frame that this "event" was going on.
I saw an alert about a Rikti invasion in Galaxy, so I went there. There was an inordinately low number of players in the zone fighting the Rikti considering that I was on Freedom. The other players on the team made comments about this as well.
If I'm right, and I was on during this "event" then the event announcement system told me to go some place that the "real even" wasn't happening!

So yeah. I'm definitely for in game alerts that let me know that this kind of "special event" is going on.

I'm sure there was probably some chatter on the Freedom-centric global channels, but as I play on all the channels - I don't have enough global channels to have personal channels on every server and the global channel system isn't really set up to monitor specific channels per server even with the tab system (one is the data flow issue, the other is the way that the system handles the channels across multiple characters )
So related to that fact is my character/side/server jumping alt-itis. If I was on a different server, I would only know that it is going on by monitoring the forums. I don't monitor the forums while I'm playing as it takes up extra system resources that the game needs to be using to run faster.

So apparently I'm also saying that we definitely should have a system to alert those across the other servers (across the NA servers if on an NA server and across the EU servers if it happens on an EU server).

This is very much akin to the Warbug PvP free-for-all that went down with DEV involvement on Triumph (I can't even remember exactly when it happened).
There was no server announcements other than those of us that yelled out on the [Help] channel that the event was going on - there were probably people talking about it on their Triumph-based channels (but see my issues with this listed above).
With the recent change to the [Help] /help channel to [Help] /hc channel (yeah, I'm a vet, so it seems recent to me), many players don't know how to use the [Help] /hc channel ...
(maybe due to the issues with not being able to set up [Help] /hc as a chat channel in the chat system - /hc in the chat systems give you access to the global channel /hc which is not the [Help] /hc system - this has been pointed out before - so you can't set up the [Help] /hc channel and use the "A" active tab function of the chat window. I'm still actively sending out the /hc to use the [Help] channel, use /hc [message] message. In fact, while I was on Freedom last night, several more peopel were having issues trying to use the [Help] /hc channel. The [Help] /help channel used to be very active. I still think that this change was a very bad idea. I was a change to cater to new players that were too lazy to figure out that their was a help feature in the options menu and a detriment to everyone else that already had an active account and knew how to play the game. Since the [Help] channel is one of the few channels that a trail player can use - I still say that fixing this issue should be VERY IMPORTANT.)
...while others actively snub the [Help] /hc channel for use of their personal and often private global channels.
I seriously think it was a bad idea to change the [Help] /help channel. Even worse was not to fix the issues with the [Help] /hc channel that have occurred due to the change.

The fact is that CoH is now only limited by our own creative input.
The AE has seen to that.

If you truly want your character to live in their own comic, then we have the tools to write it to be exactly the kind of adventures that you think your character should be having.

I'm pretty sure that AVs and scenarios can be created that will be a challenge to any character that can be build in this game.

I'm not excited about End Game content.

I'm certainly not going to delete all my characters that are under level 25 tonight.

I don't need to point out the fact that some of us forum goers have been pointing out the fact that players should not be so obsessed about spend their time power-leveling and farming because THERE IS NO END GAME in CoH.
Well, this pretty much kicks us someplace that might be censored if I use a term for the exact location.

We have been patiently explaining to players that they should enjoy the game as there is no need to rush to level 50. I guess this release bursts that bubble.

I would like to say -- as a veteran player that started in Issue 1 and has kept an active subscription since then -- that I do not feel that End Game content is critically important to the longevity of the game or the game in general. In fact, I think that End Game in itself says something with those two words alone.

I certainly hope that this does not mean the End of the Game as I love it.

It is my feeling that the community in CoH is different from that of some of the other large MMORPGs simply because there is no End Game. By-and-large the core CoH community has always been a friendly and helpful lot. I've seen that community take a lot of hits over the past year.
When the AE was released -- bent over with it's pants down on the ground --, a different sort of player was attracted to the game. I'm sure that some money was made by attracting the kind of players that this drew to the game -- like ravenous sharks -- and then hitting them with a 10-ton ban hammer once the cash was in hand. I'm not saying that this was intentional.
I'm saying that "critical" End Game content seems to be chumming the waters for that same sort of predatory player.

Like I said, I can't say that I think it bodes well for the game to attract this kind of player, but it is not my company though I would say that this is my game.

This is the only MMORPG that I play. I've tried and heard about others, but none of them were any good as far as I was concerned and the behavior of players as certainly part of the issues that I have had with some of them.

I love this game. CoH is my MMORPG.

I really don't want to see turned into a game that I detest and I decide to quit playing because the form of fun that I have come to love about this game is gone.

I do understand that some are very interested in profits, and the profits seem to be with the power-leveling farmers, noob-hating gankers, and RMT/goldfarmer-supporting L337 players.

In a 4-color world of superheroes, I often hope there is a chance to rise above this petty monetary system - but that is only because it is a dream world ... because in reality global capitalism sucks for a majority of the people on this planet.

Well, here's hoping for the best. Maybe this End Game content will be something that will bring a new sense of team play and bright tomorrow.

Maybe I'm just depressed in general today, but things suddenly seem a little darker to me...

Hold still!
I'm trying to shoot you with my healing arrow!

Definitely a good catch on that one!
Come to think of it. I don't think I've been in combat in a PvP zone since the SSK system hit.

And, yes, the PvP playing field needs plenty of "making it more even/leveling the playing field".

There's the info that I would have given.

Virtue is the unofficial RPG server.

Justice is the unofficial Oceanic server (time zone).

Part of what you want to do when picking a server is not just look for highest population - unless of course you are from another MMO and are just here to grind - then by all means go to Freedom. They seem to be completely grind-tastic for the most part. Freedom is also farmer heavy, so if you are into that, that's the place for you.

City of Heroes doesn't have what gamers call an "End Game". The game here is the adventure of playing a super powered being with other super powered beings and learning how to make weird power combination work.
Seriously, learning how to fight with a team that has powers that you have never seen before is great fun.

I would suggest making a character on Justice or Infinity. Though they aren't he most populated, they might be a little more accepting of less knowledgeable players.

When I first started out, I made 2 characters on each server (leveled all those characters up to at least level 5, I'd say to play them to 10 theses days due to the speed of leveling), and now my character slots are full except for one slot that I added recently. This gave me the ability to jump around servers to find the ones that I like (I like all of them, but Freedom and Virtue have very much been on my bad-side of late) and also to find out what kind of archetypes and power sets I liked. I pretty much found out that I wanted to try more power set choices on the various archetypes.

I have the most combined character levels in this order: Virtue, Freedom, Justice, Champion, Infinity, Triumph. The others are around half or less combined level-wise of either Virtue or Freedom.

So if you have a bad experience on one server, I would try another before going back to that server. By the time you get back, the players that you were having issues with on that server probably won't still be in the same level range.

Uh, well, I don't feel the inf pinch. I start slotting up IO's at 15 or 20 - depending on how fast I'm leveling and if the components I need to buy are selling at what I consider to be a reasonable price at the time.

I do play a "good" number of hours per week. I don't know what large is.

I don't play my level 50's very often. (I rarely transfer inf across characters. Any inf transfers I do tend to be to sg mates or random team mates that haven't been been playing for very long)

I am apparently a marketeer.

I don't sell my drops; I use them.

So I guess I'm about 50/50 as far as that list goes and still no inf pinch.

I agree that the benefits to SSK far surpass the detriments. Of course, this doesn't mean that the system can't be improved.

An option (a radio button on the team window) for the leader to declare the team "an event team" - which would automatically deselect the current mission and make the team the level of the highest level character on the team. If a team mission is selected then the "event team" status would turn off. If the highest level character on the team dropped on an "event team" then the team would become the level of the next highest character on the team.
That would pretty much solve the problem, right?

Where do I sign up for this mythical bank account that pays 8.5% interest per month?

I think it would be best to leave vehicles out of the game.
I understand why some players would want them, but then players want to have horse, etc. as well.
I think it is best not to open this can-of-worms and continue concentrate on individual superheroics in a team environment. The game does this well.

The ones (that I read) that aren't certainly show that the OP has no clue about the current PvP situation.

(... and, no, I didn't read the whole post .. by the time I reached the point of how it makes sense to allow level 50's to crush level 18's ... I pretty much gave up reading any more ...)

Anyone that says that the lack of balance between characters should be increased really doesn't get it. PvP is not far across the archetypes even before you add allowing level 50's all their powers (and bonuses for their level) to fight a level 18. The lack of balance that already exists in PvP is one of the major problems.
Adding PvP only IO's was one of the worst ideas ever. I can only see it as a way to placate the few players that actually do want to farm in PvP zones ....err... I mean PvP. It certainly does nothing to help the balance issues.

I mean seriously, as a player that has not played PvP you want to enter a PvP situation with your level 18 and get two-shotted by every level 50 that rolls by between your rez's?

I didn't think so, you just wanted to be the level 50 stomping on the level 18's.

Put the shoe on the other foot while thinking about all things PvP, and you'll come closer to what will make players want to PvP.

I seriously do not think that anyone wants to have no chance of defeating their opponent. Running into someone that I can not defeat in PvP does not make me want to PvP; it makes me want to avoid them. If the idea is to make PvP enjoyable for all archetypes and levels, all characters must have the ability to defeat their opponents; otherwise, for one player there is no risk and for the other player there is only a matter of running or holding off falling/dying as long as possible (which may also include running).
The archetypes and power sets are disbalanced at a core-level. This is obvious in PvE, and, in PvP, any difference becomes amplified.

Many people have played one incarnation or another of Streetfighter. The characters have different powers, but, in the end, they are fairly balanced.
You are never in a situation where you are picking a character that will never have any possible hope of defeating the opponent.
You must rely upon your skills in manipulating the character. You can not rely upon your character having a certain power-gamer build, archetype, power sets, and enhancements that you have spent time to amass.

To me one of the other main PvP issues is that the confrontations do not have a "comic book" feel to them. That is to say, they aren't happening in the kind of situations that one would expect to encounter superhero/supervillain combat. To me, the current non-arena PvP situations are very military game in nature and do not match up to the kinds of confrontations that happen in comic books.

After taking time to memorize a lot of recipe stuff, I would really prefer that they didn't change things around.

Also, there I think there are other things that deserve more attention.

I'd much rather be able to pull up a window that list of components that I'm missing from the recipes that I have on hand.

I would rather the recipe book to hold recipes than grant memorization to fellow sg/vg members.

I also think it is more likely that the DEVs would allow recipe storage before cross-character/sg/vg badging.

Being able to leave recipes in base storage for a higher-level character or one that is less economically-challenged to craft and leave in storage for the others is a great idea.
I don't mind it being a small amount of storage (limited to one table per base and limited to 10-15 recipes), but any amount of storage of this type would really help smaller and less coordinated sg/vgs.

I don't even try to Sole AVs. EBs - yeah sure.
However, I don't like passing up fighting AV's. Running into an AV while solo is a good sign that getting a couple of team mates might be a good idea.