That is all three of the 'ego' auras, with Kinetic Manipulation added on top. Each one adds a little more to the glow, and ends with a pretty awesome effect. Especially when used as an 'In Combat' aura. It flares up brightly when it initially starts. If I ever manage to obtain all of them on Ampula, I will be using them for this effect.
My primary concern is the obscene cost for the 'legacy' auras in general. At some potential market values, as I have seen Q go for 200 and less per 1 ZEN, that's 1,000 ZEN ($10 USD) per Aura. At the current market price (232 upon typing) it is admittedly a bit less at 863 ZEN or so, but that's still $8 for a single aura. We're already being charged a couple arms and legs and human sacrifices for the other questionite items (such as a similar amount for a SINGLE costume piece) and accumulating that amount normally would take a ridiculous amount of time and effort (if using a single character, 14 days straight of hitting the max amount will buy you a single aura). It is an obvious, and perhaps meant to be obvious(?) effort to squeeze money out of people. Auras should not cost more than a complete costume set or travel power. Especially not the Legacy ones.
I also feel that the Legacy ones should be free for Gold or at least LTS, but I don't feel as strongly for that as I do over the pricing. It's not important, but would be nice.
It would make sense to make them free for subscribers (and also for any freeform slot characters).
An archetype character can use the single free pick to select an aura that corresponds to their passive power, and get back the visual that used to be there - with a bonus option of turning it on permanently, or turning it off complitely. Even if that character retcons power selections, it'll still be locked to that particular passive skill forever.
A freeform character on the other hand can have multiple passives, and can change to complitely different passives through retcon - the whole concept of the character can easily change so that the original aura no longer makes any sense for the new concept and different powers. Making the legacy auras free for freeform characters would remove this issue.
I feel the aura slots should also either be open to subscribers (same as bag slots), or at the very least there should be an option to buy an account-wide slot, same as costume slots. This is a kind of option that you generally see made part of subscription benefit in hybrid model games (F2P with optional subscription). Nickel-and-diming subscribers is bad form.
At the moment, they've said bought Auras (like through Z-store) are account-wide, while additional aura slots (bought from Z-store) are character-bound.
I'd presume that dropped Auras will work like costume pieces (thus being Account-wide), since they said that the non-Legacy ones would be Account-wide, and that includes both dropped and Z-store ones.
And I disagree with mensar. Make the pre-order auras available through the Z-store. Pre-order-exclusive graphical bonuses are pretty much always a bad idea in a game so heavily based on visual customization, and they were a bad idea here. Then again, I'm also in favor of making the costume unlocks for vet rewards available from the Z-store.
Unavailable costume bits should only be limited to NPCs (like Dr. D or Defender or whatnot). People should like your costume because you did a good job designing it, not because you have an exclusive that they can't get.
And don't limit the number of auras you can use, besides the limits you already have in-place with the limitations on Aura slots. Though an intensity slider to use the different ranks of passives would be greatly appreciated.
Well thanks for that.
Now another thought came up what about team slotted passives? Since all slotted passives are having their aura off on default how are you going to know you are getting the team buff when you get near an ally using Medical Nanites, AoPM, AoRM (the slotted passives)? You can see the buff appear underneath your health/energy bars but having a graphical indication of having it on you would be nice.
If your support teammate stacked a bunch of auras on would those appear on all their teammates too?
Now another thought came up what about team slotted passives? Since all slotted passives are having their aura off on default how are you going to know you are getting the team buff when you get near an ally using Medical Nanites, AoPM, AoRM (the slotted passives)? You can see the buff appear underneath your health/energy bars but having a graphical indication of having it on you would be nice.
If your support teammate stacked a bunch of auras on would those appear on all their teammates too?
As far as I can tell, none of the auras from a support character show up on teammates.
That's testing by equipping:
Aura of Primal Majesty
Aura of Ebon Destruction
Aura of Radiant Protection
individually, then all at the same time, and testing to see if either I saw them on a teammate or a teammate saw them on their screen.
I guess I'm being selfish. WHy would I expect anything from them that shows how long I've been in the game? Why would anyone even care that I've been here 1560 days? It counts for absolutely zero now.
So.. I'm changing my tune completely.. give it all away free. Might as well. People aren't going to pay for it anyway so they might as well just enjoy it.
You're right, nobody cares how long you have subbed to this game besides you. If it makes you happy to see your subbed days, great. And news flash, it ALWAYS counted for absolute zero. It's a bloody video game. How many days one has subbed counts for NOTHING in life. This game is nothing more than a reprieve from one's daily stresses. If you really take it that seriously, then I feel bad for you.
To show that you've been around a while, how about you depends on your actual presence in the community instead of depending on in game items to show it off.
Besides, showing off something in game that others can never have (inborn tenacity and the other thing) along with items, action figures, juryrig boots, and other things makes people sour to you, not respect you.
Release it ALL! Let us be the super hero we want to be with the look we want.
You're right, nobody cares how long you have subbed to this game besides you. If it makes you happy to see your subbed days, great. And news flash, it ALWAYS counted for absolute zero. It's a bloody video game. How many days one has subbed counts for NOTHING in life. This game is nothing more than a reprieve from one's daily stresses. If you really take it that seriously, then I feel bad for you.
*** DANGER, LOGIC AHEAD ***
And yet, they make it worth something when they added "veteran" rewards, made certain super-rare items farmable back in the day, etc.
You're barking up the wrong tree by blaming me for something that the game created.
And anyone that says they don't believe in individuality that isn't using the "default" character costume needs to take a look in the mirror.
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All available action figures, check.
Hit the global cap, check.
All lore and event perks done, check.
All 1K mob perks done, check.
All nemesis mob perks done, check.
Break 20,000 perk points, check.
Complete all 5K perk points, stay tuned!
To show that you've been around a while, how about you depends on your actual presence in the community instead of depending on in game items to show it off.
Besides, showing off something in game that others can never have (inborn tenacity and the other thing) along with items, action figures, juryrig boots, and other things makes people sour to you, not respect you.
Release it ALL! Let us be the super hero we want to be with the look we want.
Well.. I'm sure you'll get your wish. That way all the new players will be happy and all the old players that have supported and paid into the game will leave due to having the things they worked for count for nothing.
We seem to be moving in that direction
This message brought to you by the superhero:
Bacon Overlord
All available action figures, check.
Hit the global cap, check.
All lore and event perks done, check.
All 1K mob perks done, check.
All nemesis mob perks done, check.
Break 20,000 perk points, check.
Complete all 5K perk points, stay tuned!
And yet, they make it worth something when they added "veteran" rewards, made certain super-rare items farmable back in the day, etc.
You're barking up the wrong tree by blaming me for something that the game created.
And anyone that says they don't believe in individuality that isn't using the "default" character costume needs to take a look in the mirror.
I like how you put quotes around veteran. Cracked me up. And ok, those days subbed were rewarded with more video game stuff.
Also, not once did I "blame" you for anything. Just calling you out on your crying over silly stuff, stuff that a vast majority wanted. You are simply in the minority on a lot of that.
And I don't know where you get the individuality stuff since none of that was even mentioned in my post you quoted. I guess that was somebody else's post I missed.
I like how you put quotes around veteran. Cracked me up. And ok, those days subbed were rewarded with more video game stuff.
Also, not once did I "blame" you for anything. Just calling you out on your crying over silly stuff, stuff that a vast majority wanted. You are simply in the minority on a lot of that.
And I don't know where you get the individuality stuff since none of that was even mentioned in my post you quoted. I guess that was somebody else's post I missed.
I'm sure it was funny.. why, I have no idea. I didn't invent the concept, I just was affected by it.. did my time, got my items. You know, how it was supposed to work.
You're call me out on something you can't possibly relate to. Good for you.
Of course the majority want it.. because only the minority had it and that's the way it was designed. Or they would have just given it away for free to begin with.... this logic just isn't working for you, is it?
That's always the way it works in the world. Or are you new here? The rich have money, the vast majority want their money. Do they get it? If they work hard for it.. it's unlikely, but they have a chance.
Same thing in games.
Want something? Get working at it...
Want that video game, music, movie? Go buy it. Downloading (stealing) it isn't an option unless you want to be a little criminal and end up arrested.
The point is... taking something that people WORK for and just giving it away tends to not sit very well with the folks that had to work for it. It never does... But, as I'm one of the very few that have been here that long, I stand as the MAJORITY of the people affected in these situations.
As far as "crying" about it goes.. I hardly think mentioning the inequity of something would be called "crying" about it unless you were trying to get someone to stop talking and quietly get steamrolled so the changes, that benefit you, will be easier to institute.
Until, of course, they don't benefit you....
This message brought to you by the superhero:
Bacon Overlord
All available action figures, check.
Hit the global cap, check.
All lore and event perks done, check.
All 1K mob perks done, check.
All nemesis mob perks done, check.
Break 20,000 perk points, check.
Complete all 5K perk points, stay tuned!
I'm sure it was funny.. why, I have no idea. I didn't invent the concept, I just was affected by it.. did my time, got my items. You know, how it was supposed to work.
You're call me out on something you can't possibly relate to. Good for you.
Of course the majority want it.. because only the minority had it and that's the way it was designed. Or they would have just given it away for free to begin with.... this logic just isn't working for you, is it?
That's always the way it works in the world. Or are you new here? The rich have money, the vast majority want their money. Do they get it? If they work hard for it.. it's unlikely, but they have a chance.
Same thing in games.
Want something? Get working at it...
Want that video game, music, movie? Go buy it. Downloading (stealing) it isn't an option unless you want to be a little criminal and end up arrested.
The point is... taking something that people WORK for and just giving it away tends to not sit very well with the folks that had to work for it. It never does... But, as I'm one of the very few that have been here that long, I stand as the MAJORITY of the people affected in these situations.
As far as "crying" about it goes.. I hardly think mentioning the inequity of something would be called "crying" about it unless you were trying to get someone to stop talking and quietly get steamrolled so the changes, that benefit you, will be easier to institute.
I don't see them "giving" anything away. I see a company providing services for money. Whether the few elite paid for it back in the day, or the vast majority is paying for it now.
I'm glad they give the vet rewards all at once to lifers. It is a good enticement for people to buy it. It didn't affect me at all, I already had mine. But the fact of the matter is, if you pay for a LTS, you are pretty much pre paying for those days subbed. I think it's fair to get those rewards you paid for.
I don't know what is it I can't "relate" to. Because everything that you have described so far I went through in WoW. Putting in time in the game for multiple mounts only to have them unlock account wide is one instance. I didn't lose any sleep over that. I would have been playing the game either way.
Been around since closed beta. Would like to see the preorder auras opened up in some way, they're too cool to let sit on a minority of players.
Loving auras so far, was quite surprised at how it was handled and even more surprised at passives getting their fx stripped. Looking forward to seeing more options.
Guys, leave the speeches for the soapboxes. Let's try to stay on topic despite our disagreements.
As for feedback, I'm in agreement some of the others; The price for the legacy auras seem a bit steep. I'd be willing to go down to at least the Q equivalent of a costume pack. As for the prices, did they disclose how much the C-Store auras would cost?
Guys, leave the speeches for the soapboxes. Let's try to stay on topic despite our disagreements.
As for feedback, I'm in agreement some of the others; The price for the legacy auras seem a bit steep. I'd be willing to go down to at least the Q equivalent of a costume pack. As for the prices, did they disclose how much the C-Store auras would cost?
I haven't seen anything yet as to the c store prices.
As far as "crying" about it goes.. I hardly think mentioning the inequity of something would be called "crying" about it unless you were trying to get someone to stop talking and quietly get steamrolled so the changes, that benefit you, will be easier to institute.
Until, of course, they don't benefit you....
For reference, I've been subbed long enough to get Millennial Flight and all the intermediate rewards, and yet I haven't bought a LTS.
Unlocking of pre-order auras and vet rewards doesn't "benefit" me, by your reasoning, because I already have some of them (I only did one type of pre-order).
And yet opening that stuff up to all will benefit me (and everyone else) by making it so that more people can enjoy the things the game has to offer.
If your entire view of your ROI in the game is tied solely to what you have that others can't have, I feel sorry for you.
Try doing some stuff to benefit the community, instead of just sitting back and complaining that the masses are getting the stuff that makes you "special". Being "around" for four years doesn't make you "special", and it's not really "work", either.
I also feel that the Legacy ones should be free for Gold or at least LTS, but I don't feel as strongly for that as I do over the pricing. It's not important, but would be nice.
What they could do is tie legacy auras into vet rewards. Have a particular group of them linked to each step of the rewards. This would be a nice thank you for everyone who's been with the game for the last few years, and added incentive for people to go LTS who are considering it.
So far, I'm very disappointed with this. First off you removed the aura's from passive powers, instead of giving us an option to turn them off or suppress them, that way people who don't wanna use your new system can keep playing as normal. Bad choice, signature Cryptic oversight.
I'm annoyed that this content you expect us to preview and test is locked behind both Zen and Q walls. Hello? How can we test this for you is you don't give us access? I'm paying and one of my privileges is to test, and it's not just for my benefit but for everyone else AND yours, least you could do is make it so I can do it. Do you just want a repeat of the LTS vet reward thing or something similar?
*edit* rather than deleting the above comment, I'm keeping it and making a comment here. I felt so strongly about this that I commented before checking Debugger, seems you can get the slots unlocked (not the inventory though) and more free tokens, plus some other ones, I stand partially corrected. We DO, however, need to be able to test that the C-store and Q-store works. I seem to remember one of the Q-store travel powers unlocking when bought, but then allowing you to buy it over and over, not working as intended. So issues can still occur for these, albeit different. Help us help you.
I can not even see what the Zen costs will be, let alone check to make sure it works to buy them, or see if stacking aura combos crashes the game or anything else. And for the record I am just disgusted, but not surprised, at your Q prices. Let me get this straight. You took away the aura's we already had and locked them away in the Q store. And instead of making them somewhere between 11,000 and 50,000 in the store, so they would be within reach and as fair as some gear, which is more or less what this is but with a visual effect (and nothing else) you expect me to believe something that was previously free to all players (albeit one at a time per one slotted passive) is worth as much as a full travel power or a vehicle weapon of high quality? You didn't even meet us half way and make them as much as a mark one weapon, which STILL would have been insulting but at least it would have seemed less rude. News flash, these are basically costume pieces, which we already had and now you've taken away (I guess this is the new content we can look forward to now, stuff we already had taken away and "re-purposed" into a new feature we have to pay big Q and Zen prices for) and then resold to us at steep prices. What's next, taking the effects from travel powers and making us pay to get them back?
I like the idea of the aura system, but in true Cryptic fashion it's sort of half-assed and not very well thought or worked out right. Here's the deal. It's underhanded to take something you've already given us (for years even) then resell it to us, unless all current players can get them back for free (meaning only new players would have to pay and not current) or at least without giving us the option of continuing on as is without using this system, and assuming the one free token idea does go to live, I DO NOT think that counts. Many people respec or have more than one passive for different situations, you'd keep us stuck with one we didn't want and still force us to use your system. Also the Q store already has costume options, which this basically is just costume stuff, and they are only as high as 45,000 in Q, no more. Really, I'm not sure if you're just trying to cheat us, trying to keep us from using Q to buy Zen by making bigger sink holes for it, or picking random numbers out of a hat.
Here's what I see as an improvement. Give us an option to disable self passive aura's in the options menu, this allows us control over the ones we've already had (some payed for in AT powersets and subscriptions, we paid for the powers and what they do *that includes effects both visual and combat*), control over participation in this, and for those who just don't want ANY aura this covers them too. Keep the one free token when it goes live and DROP the prices to about 50,000 in the Q store. In this way you give everyone a small dip into the system for those that want to try it AND you have a less laughable price range for your glorified costume pieces.
In addition add a separate option to suppress OTHER players aura's for the same reasons it was added to City of Heroes back in the day (for graphic card reasons AND, in this game, keep annoying or loud combinations from getting to other players, decreases possible griefing) and make it so that once you slot an aura into the new aura slot and for as long as it's in there, it automatically toggles the suppress personal passive aura's option, that way people can't have a extra free aura to mix and match.
This isn't a bad first try, but this is definitely not a fair trade to losing access to something we've already paid for or just always had. The highlights here are you forcing everyone to participate, taking away something we've already had rather than making it an option, and then charging laughably high prices for it (the only things that are this high priced in the Q store *weapon mods, becomes, travel powers* all actually provide a REAL function in day to day play AND combat). All these are are cosmetic effects, which we already owned until you do this and this is unfair, and there for do NOT justify being MORE costly that the other costume pieces (which they unlock globally, can be used on ANY character you make on your account and ANY Nemesis you make, these aura's, are an item usable by only ONE character, bind on pickup) So these prices make absolutely no sense and are pretty insulting to anyone who stops a minute to think about it and compare prices.
P.S. Does your removal of slotted passive aura's effect NPC's and the Nemesis system? Have you even thought of that? With all due respect the Nemesis system seems to have issues and bugs as is, last thing that one of your best and unique features needs is one more problem. And what about the passives in Become items? Will those versions of the powers lose their aura too? Big mistake if the become supersedes the aura slots.
What they could do is tie legacy auras into vet rewards. Have a particular group of them linked to each step of the rewards. This would be a nice thank you for everyone who's been with the game for the last few years, and added incentive for people to go LTS who are considering it.
Yes, legacy auras existed before just as a tie in for slotted passives. It's only fair. And lower the Q prices of them. I'd say about 11,000 questionite seems fair. After all these legacy auras are bound to character.
What they could do is tie legacy auras into vet rewards. Have a particular group of them linked to each step of the rewards. This would be a nice thank you for everyone who's been with the game for the last few years, and added incentive for people to go LTS who are considering it.
That would work, although I'd say rather than link particular ones to certain vet time, give out free tickets at veteran stages. That way people could pick the auras that actually fit their character concept. Giving two tickets up front, and 2 more every 100 days would probably work.
2 at first should be enough for most builds, including dual passive ones, and having 2 extras every 100 days would help if you retcon your build from time to time.
Here's the deal. It's underhanded to take something you've already given us (for years even) then resell it to us, unless all current players can get them back for free (meaning only new players would have to pay and not current) or at least without giving us the option of continuing on as is without using this system, and assuming the one free token idea does go to live, I DO NOT think that counts.
Well, that's what we're getting. Personally, I don't see what the big deal is. If you want the old effect, you can use it. It'd be as if the aura system never even existed, only now you have the option of un-slotting the visuals without losing your passive. You're really not losing anything.
Well, that's what we're getting. Personally, I don't see what the big deal is. If you want the old effect, you can use it. It'd be as if the aura system never even existed, only now you have the option of un-slotting the visuals without losing your passive. You're really not losing anything.
Until you retcon your fire character into earth build. And of course this doesn't apply to begin with, to any character that uses - say - electric form AND invulnerability, to be able to fluidly move between more offensive or more defensive setup. Or say, fiery form and radiant protection - in which case the visuals can actually work as cue for the team, regarding what mode the character currently is in.
My biggest concern... the aura i have on radioactive cosmonaut is from aspect of the infernal, not pestilence, as radiation doesn't work with the maggoty effect, and so i don't see his Aura on there.
___________________________________
While she has been rescued
what diabolical mastermind
was behind the devious brain-napping of
the Volterrific Dr Cerebellum?
I have been looking at the interaction between always on/combat auras.
Generally it looks good--I have a black aura come into play during combat, and it overlays AND blends with the existing aura nicely.
Still, I wish the aura did not just snap on and off. Can't they fade in an out, like when a passive is applied, for instance?
Also, the "during combat" aura shuts off rather quickly, too quickly. It seems to be on a timer based on the last use of a combat power, rather than the character's combat status (as tracked by travel power throttling).
Put it this way: combat aura shuts off before my travel power can go back to normal speed. These should match.
My biggest concern... the aura i have on radioactive cosmonaut is from aspect of the infernal, not pestilence, as radiation doesn't work with the maggoty effect, and so i don't see his Aura on there.
I don't know if they are even removing the visuals from forms to begin with, so that may not be a concern.
As for the concerns about the legacy auras and retcons, I kind of have to agree. While personally I am glad that I will be able to use passives without having to deal with theme breaking visuals, I can see one's point who wants those visuals. I have to say that maybe they should just be free to everyone in some way. They are already free on live now, does seem silly to make one pay for that visual down the road if they retcon.
OR be able to retcon or exchange a legacy aura for a different free one for a small fee.
So my main issue with this is, I logged ontot he pts and.. I have no idea where any of these aura options are to test. I see no new tabs or items on the q-store.
So my main issue with this is, I logged ontot he pts and.. I have no idea where any of these aura options are to test. I see no new tabs or items on the q-store.
When in doubt on the PTS, check the Debugger outside of the powerhouse in Rencen
EDIT: Oh, and the legacy auras for Q are accessed from the auras tab of your character info UI.
This may have already been asked, but is there no head/hands/feet/full body option for Fire characters? I'd like to have just my hands be on fire, but I can't seem to find that anywhere.
I don't think what you see now on PTS is the end all for auras. I'l pretty sure that they will add more to the system later on, even if these are all the ones that are initially released.
They've mentioned they're planning to do more. These were "just enough" to get them out the door and into player hands for testing.
And I'm thinking the Legacy ones weren't as well thought-out because they're intended to be a stopgap so if you want the same look you had for character continuity, you can get it without much of a problem.
Characters should get one extra Legacy Aura token for each passive they have finalized in their build (ie: you've picked them and left the Powerhouse and would have to burn a retcon or spend globals to get rid of it) when this goes Live, though. To not screw over people that use multiple passives, etc
Also, for the guy that asked,
graphics from toggles (like Aspect of the Infernal) are still in-effect.
I think they should lower the price of legacy auras to at most 175k questionite. Other than that, I think these changes are good, although "in combat" auras should stay active for as long as the legacy auras on live do.
____________________________________
That Dork In The Suspenders, signing out.
I think they should lower the price of legacy auras to at most 175k questionite. Other than that, I think these changes are good, although "in combat" auras should stay active for as long as the legacy auras on live do.
175,000 Questionite for a per-character unlock is totally outrageous. If they're going to charge us 200,000 Questionite, it needs to be account-wide, like the travel powers. Otherwise, lower them to 45,000 Questionite like the other Q-Store per-character unlocks.
It seems to me they want to 'encourage' us to be using the new auras, the old effects from passives are only there for people who don't want to lose them. Of course you can go and buy each and every legacy aura for all your characters, if you really want.
I am far more interested in what new auras there will be and how we will be able to obtain those. Most of the stuff on PTS so far doesn't really fit any of my characters.
175,000 Questionite for a per-character unlock is totally outrageous. If they're going to charge us 200,000 Questionite, it needs to be account-wide, like the travel powers. Otherwise, lower them to 45,000 Questionite like the other Q-Store per-character unlocks.
Yeah, sorry. I meant at most 150k like the vigilante gear, although I would prefer something even lower than that. 45k like the Cyberpunk costumes would be lovely.
____________________________________
That Dork In The Suspenders, signing out.
I don't know if they are even removing the visuals from forms to begin with, so that may not be a concern.
As for the concerns about the legacy auras and retcons, I kind of have to agree. While personally I am glad that I will be able to use passives without having to deal with theme breaking visuals, I can see one's point who wants those visuals. I have to say that maybe they should just be free to everyone in some way. They are already free on live now, does seem silly to make one pay for that visual down the road if they retcon.
OR be able to retcon or exchange a legacy aura for a different free one for a small fee.
Well if they don't remove the effects of powers that will work well for my vampires who i don't want the regen aura on throughout all combat.
However if they put the effect i do use into an aura slot i could have it on while Radioactive Cosmonaut is riding his bike. However i have several characters i use keybinds to transform.. is there a way i can keybind the auras on and off so add those commands to my one-button transformation binds because if not then most of the characters that I would use auras on wont be able to.
___________________________________
While she has been rescued
what diabolical mastermind
was behind the devious brain-napping of
the Volterrific Dr Cerebellum?
Well if they don't remove the effects of powers that will work well for my vampires who i don't want the regen aura on throughout all combat.
However if they put the effect i do use into an aura slot i could have it on while Radioactive Cosmonaut is riding his bike. However i have several characters i use keybinds to transform.. is there a way i can keybind the auras on and off so add those commands to my one-button transformation binds because if not then most of the characters that I would use auras on wont be able to.
I don't think you will be able to key bind the auras on and off, at least not based on the current PTS build, since they have to equipped into aura slots like you do gear. Perhaps a way to do that with different builds though?
However i have several characters i use keybinds to transform.. is there a way i can keybind the auras on and off so add those commands to my one-button transformation binds because if not then most of the characters that I would use auras on wont be able to.
Same here. I use keybinds and not builds. I hope they release a set of console commands for auras too.
Also, it would be nice if there was a toggle in the options for what changes with builds: costume, powers, devices, gear, etc. Being able to switch build costume changes off would make me so happy. But so would console commands for auras. Auras are so awesome, I want to be able to change them like my costumes.
I don't think you will be able to key bind the auras on and off, at least not based on the current PTS build, since they have to equipped into aura slots like you do gear. Perhaps a way to do that with different builds though?
Same here. I use keybinds and not builds. I hope they release a set of console commands for auras too.
Also, it would be nice if there was a toggle in the options for what changes with builds: costume, powers, devices, gear, etc. Being able to switch build costume changes off would make me so happy. But so would console commands for auras. Auras are so awesome, I want to be able to change them like my costumes.
I was wondering the same, if it was possible to switch between costumes with different (or no Auras) locked onto each, on/off, the whole transform deal. Couldn't make it happen myself on the PTS. Maybe upon release? Would seem like a good next step for Auras, with costumes and builds...
As they're currently implemented, auras are build-specific. You can have one build with an always-on aura and another without it. I'd like to see an on/off button for auras that are equipped in the persistent slot.
175,000 Questionite for a per-character unlock is totally outrageous. If they're going to charge us 200,000 Questionite, it needs to be account-wide, like the travel powers. Otherwise, lower them to 45,000 Questionite like the other Q-Store per-character unlocks.
No, making them account-wide would not remove the issues. It's unlikely that you want to have an army of fiery form characters for example. If you are retconing character B, and you already have character A who uses particular theme (fiery form as an example), it's more likely that you make your character B something new. This would still force you to buy extremely spendy aura unlock for every new theme you retcon to.
It would also create a problem with the free tokens - you can't make the free token unlock account-wide option, because then you could just create/delete/create/delete characters to unlock every option. It would still be possible the way it was suggested in another post I believe - make the passives default to their old visuals, and make auras override that - e.g. if you equip any aura, it will disable the visuals from passives. And put a free 'empty' aura in store, which anyone can claim from there.. slotting that aura would disable the default visuals, without adding a new one.
Problem here would be the way powers are implemented in CO - to create different visual, you need to implement it as a separate power (f.ex. internally aura of radiant protection with zero point advantage for different visual is a separate power, as are all the different ranks - 1, 2 and 3). I'm not sure if making an external factor like an aura to override the visuals from a power would even be possible.
Based on this I believe there's a reason why legacy auras are per-character unlocks, even though I can't say I like it. I still feel the best way to handle them would be to give every character 2 free tickets, and another 2 for every 100 day vet stage.. and lowering the cost to something more reasonable, I'd say 40,000 at the very most (that's 5 days worth of Q refining). Well I guess I could go with 45,000, but only if combined with the above free tickets as vet rewards.
For subscribers that would mean that over time you'd be likely to have enough free options to accomodate any retcons you make. If you absolutely must, you could get an extra one for high, but manageable price.
For silver accounts it would mean they get 2 free auras for character - one for permanent and one for in-combat slot, or just to use two different looks. And again, they could get more with manageable, if a bit steep price.
Also, make aura slots either open up as vet rewards, or make them obtainable as account wide unlocks - many of the people who have been around for years, have dozens of different alts, you can't expect them to buy the slots separately for each and every one.
175,000 Questionite for a per-character unlock is totally outrageous. If they're going to charge us 200,000 Questionite, it needs to be account-wide, like the travel powers. Otherwise, lower them to 45,000 Questionite like the other Q-Store per-character unlocks.
200,000 Q for an aura for a SINGLE character? That's like $10USD, are you people seriously out of your effing minds? That's absolutely obnoxiously ridiculous.
Do.
Not.
Make a single, per-character, non-transferrable item the same cost as an account-wide permanent use unlock.
That is all kinds of dickish. Not everyone has the time to grind up that much Q if they want a second aura, and not everyone has the funds to buy the Z necessary to convert. It's financially unbalanced and a middle finger to those of us who play more casually due to life circumstances or a playstyle that isn't centered solely on the hunt for Questionite. (I personally fall under both aforementioned umbrellas, but even if I didn't, it's still a jerk thing to do.)
Someone accidentally picks the wrong aura with the free token? Whoops, sorry, that'll take a month or so to get the money for. Retcon a character and the flaming aura you had before doesn't fit your new ice-throwing powers? Better start grinding. Or delete the character and make a new one so you can get your token back. (Hope it's not a character you have history on.) Or just pay ten bucks! Better than spending a month farming Q instead of experiencing the actual game! It's only money, right?
It's never "only money".
Either make the legacy auras account-wide and give each account one free token (at that price, it's still too much, but less of a middle finger to the average user), or lower the price to something that doesn't effectively penalize users that don't have the money to throw at you or minmax a character and spend a month grinding Q to get one non-transferable aura for. Particularly if there isn't a cheaper visual equivalent to match that isn't "legacy".
Even then, I can see that concept being used for travel powers (which have some slight functional differences) but glow effects? You're honestly going to make a separate "dude's on fire" visual so you can sell the original for ten bucks? Did someone up there look at Blizzard's 25 dollar mounts and decided "THAT'S a GOOD IDEA, let's charge out the nose for an aesthetic component! Even better, let's not give them a less expensive but visually similar equivalent!" Or is the person in charge of this idea the same one that decided the best thing to do with vehicles was three versions of the same four things with different colors each time?
Whatever you do, just... not what it appears you're going to do based on the information available at this time. Please, not that.
You know what, I can't help but wonder why this even going in this direction. We already HAVE costume items with aura's attached to them. Crowns, eyes, boots, gloves and such. They've already shown us it doesn't have to have anything to do with or any effect on powers. All they have to do is expand on that, adding a drop down menu to every costume slot or something, and then let us tint them like everything else. If we've got to have aura's over expansions to the Nemesis system (I know it's been said they don't wanna do anymore with it *old team I think* but they SHOULD), more bug fixes, or bringing back REAL crafting, or heck even a new zone or new GM's or even a revamp of the current GM's, then I'd much rather them do something around COSTUME'S themselves even if it took a little more time to say, add a 5th costume color slot to every part just for aura's.
This way we'd be able to pick the type of aura's we had access to and what color it was and WHERE it was. Most of the Legacy ones are just full body, what if I just wanted the aura from Firey Aura on my hands? On top of that, then aura's could hopefully perform more like costumes, being account unlocks when bought and used and justify a Q store cost of around 45,000 to 50,000 as well as some being rare drops.
Cause here's the bottom line. There is NOTHING you can do to justify the slots being character only, AND taking away the aura's we've already owned, AND charging 200,000 Q for each and every one. I mean, if you thought those are ok I can't wait to see what you think you're going to charge for those slots, aura inventory space, and for new aura's you will be adding to the C-Store.
EDIT: Come to think of it, since you took away the aura's we ALREADY HAD, renamed them Legacy Aura's for your project, how about you do the decent thing and make those "Legacy Aura's" FREE. Until the day this goes live and you take them away, we already had them, so the only fair thing to do is to automatically give everyone access to reclaiming all the "Legacy Aura's" for free as many times as they wish (possibly a unique limit of one per character of the same type) like you can some things in STO (so you know you CAN do this, it's possible) and do it as a curtisy to your players. You can charge whatever you want for anything NEW you actually make at that point, but just taking away our passives aura effects, and repackaging them to sell them back to us is not only rude and disrespectful (especially in price), but it's NOT very creative and kind of a cop out. Why make new ones to use in those slots when you could just reuse old ones and over charge us. In fact, just leave the passives as is, forget this Legacy junk and just remake BETTER versions of the passive aura's and sell them as sets. I mean, why would I pay 45,000, let alone 200,000 Q to get Invulnerability's aura back when you can barely see much out of the "shine" like aura effect, when you could actually MAKE a NEW version that's brighter, flasher, and more worth some sort of price, and frankly this would work very well into a costume creator revamp than some sort of half worked stand alone set up. Then we could pick body parts, tinting, the effect, intensity, and MORE than this current "project" will actually let us do. I mean I saw that there are some that go on hands and feet, but what a joke. Each one is a character bind item that will take up a slot apiece, which you have to buy each slot per character before you can even use them.
(snip)
something around COSTUME'S themselves even if it took a little more time to say, add a 5th costume color slot to every part just for aura's.
This way we'd be able to pick the type of aura's we had access to and what color it was and WHERE it was. Most of the Legacy ones are just full body, what if I just wanted the aura from Firey Aura on my hands?
(snip)
Wouldn't need to tie it to costume pieces directly like that. Rather, you could make a new tab to costume creator, with drop-downs for accessible auras. I'm not sure if that would be a good idea though, it depends on how you think about auras. If you think about them as strictly cosmetic appearance thing, then sure. But if you think of them as visual manifestation of your powers, then having them tied to costumes isn't the best idea.
Regardless though, the auras could have had separate 'slots' for head/arm/chest/legs. It's possible though, that this would have caused problems due to number of emenating points - if you stack 4 different permanent and 4 different in-combat auras, and you'd have 4 separate locations due to this, you'd already come to combination of 32 localized auras for single character. That might put too much of a stress to the system in long run.
Except we're talking about them taking those "visual manifestations" of our powers out of them and selling them back to us as expensive "visual costume items." Frankly this should be set up the same way it was back in City of Heroes, another Cryptic game, which I think this games engine is based. Aura's were a part of the costume creator, in it's own category, and eventually got expanded to allow you to pick body parts and tint them. Mind you, you couldn't mix and match them, but that's where adding them to the costume creator here could give us that greater freedom than CoX ever could and far more than they are trying to do right now. I love the idea of aura's, heck I love the idea of any new, good content and especially anything that gives us more options or creative freedom, but this....this whole system of taking things we already had to sell it back to us, per character, at high prices then charging us real money per character to use all those slots seems like a desperate cash grab, rather than an effort to add a new and exciting feature to a game we care about.
I'm not sure what you're getting at. As is there are 4 perma and 4 in combat and there are some aura items that target certain body parts. I'm sure if we talk particle count as well as sound, there could already be some 8 part aura combos that would be a stress on the system, not to mention possible effects on other players. I'll be fair here, unless they added aura's as another section to the costume creator all it's own, which isn't what I was suggesting, you wouldn't be able to mix and match on the same location, but you'd have more control over how the visual worked (slider for glow or intensity, or even size, color of it, what type it is). You could mix and match around the body as a whole, but even if they choose to stick with this current implementation, which frankly seems a weird way to go about it in my opinion, I'm sure we can all agree that the cost is too much, the loss of passive aura effects is disappointing, and everything being purchased or bound to ONE character at a time is very unreasonable.
Wouldn't need to tie it to costume pieces directly like that. Rather, you could make a new tab to costume creator, with drop-downs for accessible auras. I'm not sure if that would be a good idea though, it depends on how you think about auras. If you think about them as strictly cosmetic appearance thing, then sure. But if you think of them as visual manifestation of your powers, then having them tied to costumes isn't the best idea.
Regardless though, the auras could have had separate 'slots' for head/arm/chest/legs. It's possible though, that this would have caused problems due to number of emenating points - if you stack 4 different permanent and 4 different in-combat auras, and you'd have 4 separate locations due to this, you'd already come to combination of 32 localized auras for single character. That might put too much of a stress to the system in long run.
Well first off, I agree with most points. When new options are added for a price, the new system should provide everything that used to be there for free, for free. To be fair I think that's what they were attempting - and for archetypes it does work like that. They probably just didn't think it through far enough to realize the implications this has for multiple passives or freeform retcons. And that most certainly needs to be addressed before this goes live. And I've already stated my opinion about the ridiculous cost of 'legacy' auras.
I think the main reason this was implemented the way it is (additional equipment slots that are limited to auras), is ease of implementing. The system seems to pretty much recycle old code - all the way to locking the aura slots based on if the main inventory window is open or not. Devices with custom visuals were already there (Inborn Tenacity et all), so basically all the parts were ready.
Having this tied to costume creator would probably be a lot more complicated to implement, and my guess would be there's lack of resources to do it in any timely fashion.. not to mention the potential for bugs that would result. In long run, yes.. it could provide a lot more freedom in many ways, but as it stands now, we'd probably still be waiting for it to come around in 2015.
And yes - I was talking about adding locations (head, chest, arms, legs) on top of current 'mixable' auras.. which would quadruple the number of individual auras. If you limited the number of simultaneous auras to 1, then the issue would go away.. but you'd also have lost much of the flexibility - for example, use orange tinted dark aura in permanent slot for 'smokey fire', and add fiery form to 'in combat' slot to make it flare up when you enter combat. Things like this might be troublesome in system that was tied closely to costume creator.. but they were (except for tinting) possible already in the old system, so taking them away now wouldn't be good either. It would be possible to implement in costume creator, with a system with lots of pulldowns and options.. but then you'd be looking at a complex system again - which translates to difficult and costly to implement, and prone to bugs.
Lessee... how I'd see it implemented as part of costume creator. Add 'aura' tab to costume creator.. originally one, but able to purchase individual and account-wide extras (similar to costume slots) up to 4 maximum. Each aura lets you select the type from pull-down menu that holds all the unlocked auras. Second pulldown to select when aura is active: 'always, in-combat, never'. Another pulldown selection for area it covers, 'cloud, body, individual parts'. Four checkboxes that are grayed unless you select 'individual parts', which allow you to select head, torso, arms, legs. Slider for intensity, glow and size for each part, and either separate one for 'global' selections (cloud, body), or those could use the torso one. Color selector for each part. Legacy auras, and possibly some others, might omit some of the selections (f.ex. locked to only 'body' area, missing glow, etc.), and the size/glow/intensity/color selections could be per-aura instead of per-part. That's off the top of my head. Implementing it might take five days, five weeks or five months - or five years while the team creates a new game engine.. I really have no idea how flexible (or not) the current game engine is. I never played CoH or CoV so I have no idea how similar the implementation there was.
Except we're talking about them taking those "visual manifestations" of our powers out of them and selling them back to us as expensive "visual costume items." Frankly this should be set up the same way it was back in City of Heroes, another Cryptic game, which I think this games engine is based. Aura's were a part of the costume creator, in it's own category, and eventually got expanded to allow you to pick body parts and tint them. Mind you, you couldn't mix and match them, but that's where adding them to the costume creator here could give us that greater freedom than CoX ever could and far more than they are trying to do right now. I love the idea of aura's, heck I love the idea of any new, good content and especially anything that gives us more options or creative freedom, but this....this whole system of taking things we already had to sell it back to us, per character, at high prices then charging us real money per character to use all those slots seems like a desperate cash grab, rather than an effort to add a new and exciting feature to a game we care about.
I'm not sure what you're getting at. As is there are 4 perma and 4 in combat and there are some aura items that target certain body parts. I'm sure if we talk particle count as well as sound, there could already be some 8 part aura combos that would be a stress on the system, not to mention possible effects on other players. I'll be fair here, unless they added aura's as another section to the costume creator all it's own, which isn't what I was suggesting, you wouldn't be able to mix and match on the same location, but you'd have more control over how the visual worked (slider for glow or intensity, or even size, color of it, what type it is). You could mix and match around the body as a whole, but even if they choose to stick with this current implementation, which frankly seems a weird way to go about it in my opinion, I'm sure we can all agree that the cost is too much, the loss of passive aura effects is disappointing, and everything being purchased or bound to ONE character at a time is very unreasonable.
Are you guys removing visual effects we already have and then selling them back to us? Do you need help with ideas that would generate revenue without disrespecting your playerbase?
Comments
It would make sense to make them free for subscribers (and also for any freeform slot characters).
An archetype character can use the single free pick to select an aura that corresponds to their passive power, and get back the visual that used to be there - with a bonus option of turning it on permanently, or turning it off complitely. Even if that character retcons power selections, it'll still be locked to that particular passive skill forever.
A freeform character on the other hand can have multiple passives, and can change to complitely different passives through retcon - the whole concept of the character can easily change so that the original aura no longer makes any sense for the new concept and different powers. Making the legacy auras free for freeform characters would remove this issue.
I feel the aura slots should also either be open to subscribers (same as bag slots), or at the very least there should be an option to buy an account-wide slot, same as costume slots. This is a kind of option that you generally see made part of subscription benefit in hybrid model games (F2P with optional subscription). Nickel-and-diming subscribers is bad form.
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Well thanks for that.
Now another thought came up what about team slotted passives? Since all slotted passives are having their aura off on default how are you going to know you are getting the team buff when you get near an ally using Medical Nanites, AoPM, AoRM (the slotted passives)? You can see the buff appear underneath your health/energy bars but having a graphical indication of having it on you would be nice.
If your support teammate stacked a bunch of auras on would those appear on all their teammates too?
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As far as I can tell, none of the auras from a support character show up on teammates.
That's testing by equipping:
Aura of Primal Majesty
Aura of Ebon Destruction
Aura of Radiant Protection
individually, then all at the same time, and testing to see if either I saw them on a teammate or a teammate saw them on their screen.
They get the buff, but not the Aura.
I'm...pretty okay with this, truth be told.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
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The user formerly known as Dr. Sage.
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You're right, nobody cares how long you have subbed to this game besides you. If it makes you happy to see your subbed days, great. And news flash, it ALWAYS counted for absolute zero. It's a bloody video game. How many days one has subbed counts for NOTHING in life. This game is nothing more than a reprieve from one's daily stresses. If you really take it that seriously, then I feel bad for you.
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@Benevon
Leader of Super Serious Brooding Vigilantes
Besides, showing off something in game that others can never have (inborn tenacity and the other thing) along with items, action figures, juryrig boots, and other things makes people sour to you, not respect you.
Release it ALL! Let us be the super hero we want to be with the look we want.
*** DANGER, LOGIC AHEAD ***
And yet, they make it worth something when they added "veteran" rewards, made certain super-rare items farmable back in the day, etc.
You're barking up the wrong tree by blaming me for something that the game created.
And anyone that says they don't believe in individuality that isn't using the "default" character costume needs to take a look in the mirror.
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Well.. I'm sure you'll get your wish. That way all the new players will be happy and all the old players that have supported and paid into the game will leave due to having the things they worked for count for nothing.
We seem to be moving in that direction
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Complete all 5K perk points, stay tuned!
Come see me on steam (be friends, drink fine wines, clink glasses and KILL STUFF ONLINE!)
I like how you put quotes around veteran. Cracked me up. And ok, those days subbed were rewarded with more video game stuff.
Also, not once did I "blame" you for anything. Just calling you out on your crying over silly stuff, stuff that a vast majority wanted. You are simply in the minority on a lot of that.
And I don't know where you get the individuality stuff since none of that was even mentioned in my post you quoted. I guess that was somebody else's post I missed.
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@Benevon
Leader of Super Serious Brooding Vigilantes
I'm sure it was funny.. why, I have no idea. I didn't invent the concept, I just was affected by it.. did my time, got my items. You know, how it was supposed to work.
You're call me out on something you can't possibly relate to. Good for you.
Of course the majority want it.. because only the minority had it and that's the way it was designed. Or they would have just given it away for free to begin with.... this logic just isn't working for you, is it?
That's always the way it works in the world. Or are you new here? The rich have money, the vast majority want their money. Do they get it? If they work hard for it.. it's unlikely, but they have a chance.
Same thing in games.
Want something? Get working at it...
Want that video game, music, movie? Go buy it. Downloading (stealing) it isn't an option unless you want to be a little criminal and end up arrested.
The point is... taking something that people WORK for and just giving it away tends to not sit very well with the folks that had to work for it. It never does... But, as I'm one of the very few that have been here that long, I stand as the MAJORITY of the people affected in these situations.
As far as "crying" about it goes.. I hardly think mentioning the inequity of something would be called "crying" about it unless you were trying to get someone to stop talking and quietly get steamrolled so the changes, that benefit you, will be easier to institute.
Until, of course, they don't benefit you....
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Complete all 5K perk points, stay tuned!
Come see me on steam (be friends, drink fine wines, clink glasses and KILL STUFF ONLINE!)
I don't see them "giving" anything away. I see a company providing services for money. Whether the few elite paid for it back in the day, or the vast majority is paying for it now.
I'm glad they give the vet rewards all at once to lifers. It is a good enticement for people to buy it. It didn't affect me at all, I already had mine. But the fact of the matter is, if you pay for a LTS, you are pretty much pre paying for those days subbed. I think it's fair to get those rewards you paid for.
I don't know what is it I can't "relate" to. Because everything that you have described so far I went through in WoW. Putting in time in the game for multiple mounts only to have them unlock account wide is one instance. I didn't lose any sleep over that. I would have been playing the game either way.
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@Benevon
Leader of Super Serious Brooding Vigilantes
Loving auras so far, was quite surprised at how it was handled and even more surprised at passives getting their fx stripped. Looking forward to seeing more options.
As for feedback, I'm in agreement some of the others; The price for the legacy auras seem a bit steep. I'd be willing to go down to at least the Q equivalent of a costume pack. As for the prices, did they disclose how much the C-Store auras would cost?
I haven't seen anything yet as to the c store prices.
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@Benevon
Leader of Super Serious Brooding Vigilantes
For reference, I've been subbed long enough to get Millennial Flight and all the intermediate rewards, and yet I haven't bought a LTS.
Unlocking of pre-order auras and vet rewards doesn't "benefit" me, by your reasoning, because I already have some of them (I only did one type of pre-order).
And yet opening that stuff up to all will benefit me (and everyone else) by making it so that more people can enjoy the things the game has to offer.
If your entire view of your ROI in the game is tied solely to what you have that others can't have, I feel sorry for you.
Try doing some stuff to benefit the community, instead of just sitting back and complaining that the masses are getting the stuff that makes you "special". Being "around" for four years doesn't make you "special", and it's not really "work", either.
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What they could do is tie legacy auras into vet rewards. Have a particular group of them linked to each step of the rewards. This would be a nice thank you for everyone who's been with the game for the last few years, and added incentive for people to go LTS who are considering it.
I'm annoyed that this content you expect us to preview and test is locked behind both Zen and Q walls. Hello? How can we test this for you is you don't give us access? I'm paying and one of my privileges is to test, and it's not just for my benefit but for everyone else AND yours, least you could do is make it so I can do it. Do you just want a repeat of the LTS vet reward thing or something similar?
*edit* rather than deleting the above comment, I'm keeping it and making a comment here. I felt so strongly about this that I commented before checking Debugger, seems you can get the slots unlocked (not the inventory though) and more free tokens, plus some other ones, I stand partially corrected. We DO, however, need to be able to test that the C-store and Q-store works. I seem to remember one of the Q-store travel powers unlocking when bought, but then allowing you to buy it over and over, not working as intended. So issues can still occur for these, albeit different. Help us help you.
I can not even see what the Zen costs will be, let alone check to make sure it works to buy them, or see if stacking aura combos crashes the game or anything else. And for the record I am just disgusted, but not surprised, at your Q prices. Let me get this straight. You took away the aura's we already had and locked them away in the Q store. And instead of making them somewhere between 11,000 and 50,000 in the store, so they would be within reach and as fair as some gear, which is more or less what this is but with a visual effect (and nothing else) you expect me to believe something that was previously free to all players (albeit one at a time per one slotted passive) is worth as much as a full travel power or a vehicle weapon of high quality? You didn't even meet us half way and make them as much as a mark one weapon, which STILL would have been insulting but at least it would have seemed less rude. News flash, these are basically costume pieces, which we already had and now you've taken away (I guess this is the new content we can look forward to now, stuff we already had taken away and "re-purposed" into a new feature we have to pay big Q and Zen prices for) and then resold to us at steep prices. What's next, taking the effects from travel powers and making us pay to get them back?
I like the idea of the aura system, but in true Cryptic fashion it's sort of half-assed and not very well thought or worked out right. Here's the deal. It's underhanded to take something you've already given us (for years even) then resell it to us, unless all current players can get them back for free (meaning only new players would have to pay and not current) or at least without giving us the option of continuing on as is without using this system, and assuming the one free token idea does go to live, I DO NOT think that counts. Many people respec or have more than one passive for different situations, you'd keep us stuck with one we didn't want and still force us to use your system. Also the Q store already has costume options, which this basically is just costume stuff, and they are only as high as 45,000 in Q, no more. Really, I'm not sure if you're just trying to cheat us, trying to keep us from using Q to buy Zen by making bigger sink holes for it, or picking random numbers out of a hat.
Here's what I see as an improvement. Give us an option to disable self passive aura's in the options menu, this allows us control over the ones we've already had (some payed for in AT powersets and subscriptions, we paid for the powers and what they do *that includes effects both visual and combat*), control over participation in this, and for those who just don't want ANY aura this covers them too. Keep the one free token when it goes live and DROP the prices to about 50,000 in the Q store. In this way you give everyone a small dip into the system for those that want to try it AND you have a less laughable price range for your glorified costume pieces.
In addition add a separate option to suppress OTHER players aura's for the same reasons it was added to City of Heroes back in the day (for graphic card reasons AND, in this game, keep annoying or loud combinations from getting to other players, decreases possible griefing) and make it so that once you slot an aura into the new aura slot and for as long as it's in there, it automatically toggles the suppress personal passive aura's option, that way people can't have a extra free aura to mix and match.
This isn't a bad first try, but this is definitely not a fair trade to losing access to something we've already paid for or just always had. The highlights here are you forcing everyone to participate, taking away something we've already had rather than making it an option, and then charging laughably high prices for it (the only things that are this high priced in the Q store *weapon mods, becomes, travel powers* all actually provide a REAL function in day to day play AND combat). All these are are cosmetic effects, which we already owned until you do this and this is unfair, and there for do NOT justify being MORE costly that the other costume pieces (which they unlock globally, can be used on ANY character you make on your account and ANY Nemesis you make, these aura's, are an item usable by only ONE character, bind on pickup) So these prices make absolutely no sense and are pretty insulting to anyone who stops a minute to think about it and compare prices.
P.S. Does your removal of slotted passive aura's effect NPC's and the Nemesis system? Have you even thought of that? With all due respect the Nemesis system seems to have issues and bugs as is, last thing that one of your best and unique features needs is one more problem. And what about the passives in Become items? Will those versions of the powers lose their aura too? Big mistake if the become supersedes the aura slots.
Yes, legacy auras existed before just as a tie in for slotted passives. It's only fair. And lower the Q prices of them. I'd say about 11,000 questionite seems fair. After all these legacy auras are bound to character.
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That would work, although I'd say rather than link particular ones to certain vet time, give out free tickets at veteran stages. That way people could pick the auras that actually fit their character concept. Giving two tickets up front, and 2 more every 100 days would probably work.
2 at first should be enough for most builds, including dual passive ones, and having 2 extras every 100 days would help if you retcon your build from time to time.
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Well, that's what we're getting. Personally, I don't see what the big deal is. If you want the old effect, you can use it. It'd be as if the aura system never even existed, only now you have the option of un-slotting the visuals without losing your passive. You're really not losing anything.
Until you retcon your fire character into earth build. And of course this doesn't apply to begin with, to any character that uses - say - electric form AND invulnerability, to be able to fluidly move between more offensive or more defensive setup. Or say, fiery form and radiant protection - in which case the visuals can actually work as cue for the team, regarding what mode the character currently is in.
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Generally it looks good--I have a black aura come into play during combat, and it overlays AND blends with the existing aura nicely.
Still, I wish the aura did not just snap on and off. Can't they fade in an out, like when a passive is applied, for instance?
Also, the "during combat" aura shuts off rather quickly, too quickly. It seems to be on a timer based on the last use of a combat power, rather than the character's combat status (as tracked by travel power throttling).
Put it this way: combat aura shuts off before my travel power can go back to normal speed. These should match.
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I don't know if they are even removing the visuals from forms to begin with, so that may not be a concern.
As for the concerns about the legacy auras and retcons, I kind of have to agree. While personally I am glad that I will be able to use passives without having to deal with theme breaking visuals, I can see one's point who wants those visuals. I have to say that maybe they should just be free to everyone in some way. They are already free on live now, does seem silly to make one pay for that visual down the road if they retcon.
OR be able to retcon or exchange a legacy aura for a different free one for a small fee.
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EDIT: Oh, and the legacy auras for Q are accessed from the auras tab of your character info UI.
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They've mentioned they're planning to do more. These were "just enough" to get them out the door and into player hands for testing.
And I'm thinking the Legacy ones weren't as well thought-out because they're intended to be a stopgap so if you want the same look you had for character continuity, you can get it without much of a problem.
Characters should get one extra Legacy Aura token for each passive they have finalized in their build (ie: you've picked them and left the Powerhouse and would have to burn a retcon or spend globals to get rid of it) when this goes Live, though. To not screw over people that use multiple passives, etc
Also, for the guy that asked,
graphics from toggles (like Aspect of the Infernal) are still in-effect.
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175,000 Questionite for a per-character unlock is totally outrageous. If they're going to charge us 200,000 Questionite, it needs to be account-wide, like the travel powers. Otherwise, lower them to 45,000 Questionite like the other Q-Store per-character unlocks.
I do not like that my character is stuck in a crouch position when the TP is active.
Is it possible to make that into an aura?
Does anyone else like the aura of other TP (But not the pose)?
I am far more interested in what new auras there will be and how we will be able to obtain those. Most of the stuff on PTS so far doesn't really fit any of my characters.
Yeah, sorry. I meant at most 150k like the vigilante gear, although I would prefer something even lower than that. 45k like the Cyberpunk costumes would be lovely.
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Well if they don't remove the effects of powers that will work well for my vampires who i don't want the regen aura on throughout all combat.
However if they put the effect i do use into an aura slot i could have it on while Radioactive Cosmonaut is riding his bike. However i have several characters i use keybinds to transform.. is there a way i can keybind the auras on and off so add those commands to my one-button transformation binds because if not then most of the characters that I would use auras on wont be able to.
While she has been rescued
what diabolical mastermind
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I don't think you will be able to key bind the auras on and off, at least not based on the current PTS build, since they have to equipped into aura slots like you do gear. Perhaps a way to do that with different builds though?
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Same here. I use keybinds and not builds. I hope they release a set of console commands for auras too.
Also, it would be nice if there was a toggle in the options for what changes with builds: costume, powers, devices, gear, etc. Being able to switch build costume changes off would make me so happy. But so would console commands for auras. Auras are so awesome, I want to be able to change them like my costumes.
I was wondering the same, if it was possible to switch between costumes with different (or no Auras) locked onto each, on/off, the whole transform deal. Couldn't make it happen myself on the PTS. Maybe upon release? Would seem like a good next step for Auras, with costumes and builds...
No, making them account-wide would not remove the issues. It's unlikely that you want to have an army of fiery form characters for example. If you are retconing character B, and you already have character A who uses particular theme (fiery form as an example), it's more likely that you make your character B something new. This would still force you to buy extremely spendy aura unlock for every new theme you retcon to.
It would also create a problem with the free tokens - you can't make the free token unlock account-wide option, because then you could just create/delete/create/delete characters to unlock every option. It would still be possible the way it was suggested in another post I believe - make the passives default to their old visuals, and make auras override that - e.g. if you equip any aura, it will disable the visuals from passives. And put a free 'empty' aura in store, which anyone can claim from there.. slotting that aura would disable the default visuals, without adding a new one.
Problem here would be the way powers are implemented in CO - to create different visual, you need to implement it as a separate power (f.ex. internally aura of radiant protection with zero point advantage for different visual is a separate power, as are all the different ranks - 1, 2 and 3). I'm not sure if making an external factor like an aura to override the visuals from a power would even be possible.
Based on this I believe there's a reason why legacy auras are per-character unlocks, even though I can't say I like it. I still feel the best way to handle them would be to give every character 2 free tickets, and another 2 for every 100 day vet stage.. and lowering the cost to something more reasonable, I'd say 40,000 at the very most (that's 5 days worth of Q refining). Well I guess I could go with 45,000, but only if combined with the above free tickets as vet rewards.
For subscribers that would mean that over time you'd be likely to have enough free options to accomodate any retcons you make. If you absolutely must, you could get an extra one for high, but manageable price.
For silver accounts it would mean they get 2 free auras for character - one for permanent and one for in-combat slot, or just to use two different looks. And again, they could get more with manageable, if a bit steep price.
Also, make aura slots either open up as vet rewards, or make them obtainable as account wide unlocks - many of the people who have been around for years, have dozens of different alts, you can't expect them to buy the slots separately for each and every one.
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This. This so much. 200k is ridicules.
Not.
Make a single, per-character, non-transferrable item the same cost as an account-wide permanent use unlock.
That is all kinds of dickish. Not everyone has the time to grind up that much Q if they want a second aura, and not everyone has the funds to buy the Z necessary to convert. It's financially unbalanced and a middle finger to those of us who play more casually due to life circumstances or a playstyle that isn't centered solely on the hunt for Questionite. (I personally fall under both aforementioned umbrellas, but even if I didn't, it's still a jerk thing to do.)
Someone accidentally picks the wrong aura with the free token? Whoops, sorry, that'll take a month or so to get the money for. Retcon a character and the flaming aura you had before doesn't fit your new ice-throwing powers? Better start grinding. Or delete the character and make a new one so you can get your token back. (Hope it's not a character you have history on.) Or just pay ten bucks! Better than spending a month farming Q instead of experiencing the actual game! It's only money, right?
It's never "only money".
Either make the legacy auras account-wide and give each account one free token (at that price, it's still too much, but less of a middle finger to the average user), or lower the price to something that doesn't effectively penalize users that don't have the money to throw at you or minmax a character and spend a month grinding Q to get one non-transferable aura for. Particularly if there isn't a cheaper visual equivalent to match that isn't "legacy".
Even then, I can see that concept being used for travel powers (which have some slight functional differences) but glow effects? You're honestly going to make a separate "dude's on fire" visual so you can sell the original for ten bucks? Did someone up there look at Blizzard's 25 dollar mounts and decided "THAT'S a GOOD IDEA, let's charge out the nose for an aesthetic component! Even better, let's not give them a less expensive but visually similar equivalent!" Or is the person in charge of this idea the same one that decided the best thing to do with vehicles was three versions of the same four things with different colors each time?
Whatever you do, just... not what it appears you're going to do based on the information available at this time. Please, not that.
This way we'd be able to pick the type of aura's we had access to and what color it was and WHERE it was. Most of the Legacy ones are just full body, what if I just wanted the aura from Firey Aura on my hands? On top of that, then aura's could hopefully perform more like costumes, being account unlocks when bought and used and justify a Q store cost of around 45,000 to 50,000 as well as some being rare drops.
Cause here's the bottom line. There is NOTHING you can do to justify the slots being character only, AND taking away the aura's we've already owned, AND charging 200,000 Q for each and every one. I mean, if you thought those are ok I can't wait to see what you think you're going to charge for those slots, aura inventory space, and for new aura's you will be adding to the C-Store.
EDIT: Come to think of it, since you took away the aura's we ALREADY HAD, renamed them Legacy Aura's for your project, how about you do the decent thing and make those "Legacy Aura's" FREE. Until the day this goes live and you take them away, we already had them, so the only fair thing to do is to automatically give everyone access to reclaiming all the "Legacy Aura's" for free as many times as they wish (possibly a unique limit of one per character of the same type) like you can some things in STO (so you know you CAN do this, it's possible) and do it as a curtisy to your players. You can charge whatever you want for anything NEW you actually make at that point, but just taking away our passives aura effects, and repackaging them to sell them back to us is not only rude and disrespectful (especially in price), but it's NOT very creative and kind of a cop out. Why make new ones to use in those slots when you could just reuse old ones and over charge us. In fact, just leave the passives as is, forget this Legacy junk and just remake BETTER versions of the passive aura's and sell them as sets. I mean, why would I pay 45,000, let alone 200,000 Q to get Invulnerability's aura back when you can barely see much out of the "shine" like aura effect, when you could actually MAKE a NEW version that's brighter, flasher, and more worth some sort of price, and frankly this would work very well into a costume creator revamp than some sort of half worked stand alone set up. Then we could pick body parts, tinting, the effect, intensity, and MORE than this current "project" will actually let us do. I mean I saw that there are some that go on hands and feet, but what a joke. Each one is a character bind item that will take up a slot apiece, which you have to buy each slot per character before you can even use them.
Wouldn't need to tie it to costume pieces directly like that. Rather, you could make a new tab to costume creator, with drop-downs for accessible auras. I'm not sure if that would be a good idea though, it depends on how you think about auras. If you think about them as strictly cosmetic appearance thing, then sure. But if you think of them as visual manifestation of your powers, then having them tied to costumes isn't the best idea.
Regardless though, the auras could have had separate 'slots' for head/arm/chest/legs. It's possible though, that this would have caused problems due to number of emenating points - if you stack 4 different permanent and 4 different in-combat auras, and you'd have 4 separate locations due to this, you'd already come to combination of 32 localized auras for single character. That might put too much of a stress to the system in long run.
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I'm not sure what you're getting at. As is there are 4 perma and 4 in combat and there are some aura items that target certain body parts. I'm sure if we talk particle count as well as sound, there could already be some 8 part aura combos that would be a stress on the system, not to mention possible effects on other players. I'll be fair here, unless they added aura's as another section to the costume creator all it's own, which isn't what I was suggesting, you wouldn't be able to mix and match on the same location, but you'd have more control over how the visual worked (slider for glow or intensity, or even size, color of it, what type it is). You could mix and match around the body as a whole, but even if they choose to stick with this current implementation, which frankly seems a weird way to go about it in my opinion, I'm sure we can all agree that the cost is too much, the loss of passive aura effects is disappointing, and everything being purchased or bound to ONE character at a time is very unreasonable.
I think the main reason this was implemented the way it is (additional equipment slots that are limited to auras), is ease of implementing. The system seems to pretty much recycle old code - all the way to locking the aura slots based on if the main inventory window is open or not. Devices with custom visuals were already there (Inborn Tenacity et all), so basically all the parts were ready.
Having this tied to costume creator would probably be a lot more complicated to implement, and my guess would be there's lack of resources to do it in any timely fashion.. not to mention the potential for bugs that would result. In long run, yes.. it could provide a lot more freedom in many ways, but as it stands now, we'd probably still be waiting for it to come around in 2015.
And yes - I was talking about adding locations (head, chest, arms, legs) on top of current 'mixable' auras.. which would quadruple the number of individual auras. If you limited the number of simultaneous auras to 1, then the issue would go away.. but you'd also have lost much of the flexibility - for example, use orange tinted dark aura in permanent slot for 'smokey fire', and add fiery form to 'in combat' slot to make it flare up when you enter combat. Things like this might be troublesome in system that was tied closely to costume creator.. but they were (except for tinting) possible already in the old system, so taking them away now wouldn't be good either. It would be possible to implement in costume creator, with a system with lots of pulldowns and options.. but then you'd be looking at a complex system again - which translates to difficult and costly to implement, and prone to bugs.
Lessee... how I'd see it implemented as part of costume creator. Add 'aura' tab to costume creator.. originally one, but able to purchase individual and account-wide extras (similar to costume slots) up to 4 maximum. Each aura lets you select the type from pull-down menu that holds all the unlocked auras. Second pulldown to select when aura is active: 'always, in-combat, never'. Another pulldown selection for area it covers, 'cloud, body, individual parts'. Four checkboxes that are grayed unless you select 'individual parts', which allow you to select head, torso, arms, legs. Slider for intensity, glow and size for each part, and either separate one for 'global' selections (cloud, body), or those could use the torso one. Color selector for each part. Legacy auras, and possibly some others, might omit some of the selections (f.ex. locked to only 'body' area, missing glow, etc.), and the size/glow/intensity/color selections could be per-aura instead of per-part. That's off the top of my head. Implementing it might take five days, five weeks or five months - or five years while the team creates a new game engine.. I really have no idea how flexible (or not) the current game engine is. I never played CoH or CoV so I have no idea how similar the implementation there was.
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