Looking back with fondness and respect for CoH, but its important to be forward-looking with regards to Champions as well. Champions has thirty-years of IP history - I just wish PWE/Cryptic-Studios would pull their finger out and give the Devs there at Cryptic-North the resources to bring some of it to it's online incarnation.
Community does go a long way to making the in-game (and forum) experience - but the studio that doesn't appreciate that and doesn't harness the enthusiasm of the fanbase will never achieve the game's potential.
Jeez,... channeling The Sphinx in Mystery Men there a bit I'm afraid, but I digress. :rolleyes:
Keeping a casual eye on City of Titans. You have to appreciate the passion there and I wish passion was all they needed. Time will tell.
..........................................
Dropping my knitting to buff you whilst hitting - Proudly protecting Millennium City's little ones since 2009.
I think I was moderately interested until I saw that it planned to use a subscription model with no LTS type tier available at all for backers. That's just not for me so, lost interest. Also, the planned 2015 launch is rather soon-ish.
This was my initial reaction as well.
I do wish them luck and I think this is a great thing for Champions Online as it shows companies like Cryptic there's competition for the market share on superhero MMOs, might make them step up their game. Maybe. Oh well, here's to hoping for good things for everyone!
I think it's completely irrelevant to the future of CO.
That's almost like saying Tesla is completely irrelevant to GMs future.
EDIT: Tesla knows what their doing so if you want, you can even downgrade to Fisker and the statement would remain true. I just don't see how events going on in your industry that you work in can be called "irrelevant" unless your not using the classical definition of irrelevant.
PVP is starving without rewards
1. Please give us Daily PVP missions that reward Questionite.
2. Please give us an exchange rate between Acclaim and Recognition so that PVP has access to all "On Alert" PVE rewards.
In absolute terms, CO has better graphics than COH -- better fidelity, higher poly count on objects, etc. I remember going back to COH after f2p (which was completely bungled, IMO) and looking at the tentacle of one of those squidbot Recluse things -- they are awesome robots, but the tentacles/legs looked almost 8 bit. Meh
That said, the _esthetic_ is something altogether different, and I can totally see people preferring COH's style.
Having prominently texture-based faces, for example, gave COH characters _way_ more character than CO characters have -- mad grins, young, old, so on. CO human faces are horribly bland.
Textures really helped make a lot of costumes look awesome, though were somewhat limited in resolution (and there were some big inconsistencies between old textures and newer ones). Auras are awesome, and CO STILL lacks them (except in some very limited ways).
On the flip side, CO stances, asymmetry, and wild diversity of gear you can put together is amazing.
But if we're going to talk raw graphics, DCUO is actually best.
What, you don't like the esthetics or gameplay of DCUO so it's not even a consideration?
Exactly.
Campaign: The Fenwick Cycle NWS-DKR9GB7KH
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
seriously, bitter CoH vets need to stop whining that CoH was better. CO is better at some stuff, CoH was better at some stuff. they both have/had their strengths.
That's almost like saying Tesla is completely irrelevant to GMs future.
EDIT: Tesla knows what their doing so if you want, you can even downgrade to Fisker and the statement would remain true. I just don't see how events going on in your industry that you work in can be called "irrelevant" unless your not using the classical definition of irrelevant.
If the CoT team somehow meets their kickstarter funding target in a month (they're still more than 50% away from meeting the target), then I see no problem considering them a presence in the industry to have some form of relevance to CO's future in the form of competition, no matter how significant.
I do wish them luck and I think this is a great thing for Champions Online as it shows companies like Cryptic there's competition for the market share on superhero MMOs, might make them step up their game. Maybe. Oh well, here's to hoping for good things for everyone!
The no LTS for backers was a requirement of Kickstarter IIRC.
Subbing looks to be basically getting a bigger stipend for your money for purchasing things which you will not lose when unsubbed so once you've got something you've got it for life.
If the CoT team somehow meets their kickstarter funding target in a month
They are currently at 175k of their 320k two days in.
This is my Risian Corvette. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
seriously, bitter CoH vets need to stop whining that CoH was better. CO is better at some stuff, CoH was better at some stuff. they both have/had their strengths.
CO has a better costume designer. Being able to make asymmetrical characters is something I wanted for a long time in CoH. Being able to choose several textures for each costume piece as well as four different colors per piece is much better than what CoH had.
CO has much, much better handling of respecs. I really like that if I mess up one power selection, I don't have to reselect all my powers and reslot them all from scratch. I often would just keep a bad power in CoH because I hated the respec process.
CO is fantastic for making "mix and match" characters, like a character who has both a sword and guns, or characters who can wield the power of multiple elements (say, a master of Earth, Fire, Air, and Water).
... and that's about it for me.
It had more character variety. The Freeform system gives the illusion of more variety, but in reality it forces everyone to take the same "best" powers: for example, every one of my characters has the same magic-based healing power regardless of character theme or concept, because it's the only really good self-heal available. Meanwhile, every one of my melee characters had a different healing power, all equally effective. Many had no heal at all because they didn't need one (thanks to having high regeneration, or tanking pets, or ways to lock down enemies, or what have you).
It was easier to make themed characters of various playstyles (for example, there's only one Fire powerset in CO, there were many in CoH, so only using Fire-based sets, I could use Fire for melee, armor, crowd control, support, and so on). I had two Earth-based characters in CoH: one was pure melee, one was pure crowd control. I can't make either of them in CO, because there's no Stone Melee, no Stone Armor, and definitely no Earth Control equivalents. I can throw rocks, that's it. Don't get me started on the sheer number of Electric-based characters I had on CoH, all different.
Support and crowd control abilities in general are much weaker in CO, with Support mostly limited to healing (rather than the force multiplier buffs and debuffs of CoH), and what few buffs and debuffs there are have durations in seconds instead of minutes. Dominator was one of my favorite classes in CoH, and there's no way to make anything like it in CO (especially if you don't want to make Mister Mental The Mind Master)
I seriously don't like that CO has very few cooldowns, because it means I'm basically just spamming my "best" power over and over, making the rest of my power selections useless.
I'm don't like the blocking mechanic one bit. Trying to fit a perfectly-timed block into the middle of my no-cooldown attack flailing (or, worse, into the middle of my power charging) usualyl fails, and I usually get knocked down, or held, or immobilized, forcing me to stop flailing on my attack and start flailing on Z to break free.
There's too much "flailing" in general in CO, rather than the measured pace of CoH fights. I liked keeping one eye on my power bar, seeing what was coming off of cooldown, and deciding which enemy it would be best used on. It wasn't frantic spamming of one attack over and over, but it wasn't slow, either.
CoH had common ways to get full protection from status effects. CO doesn't have any status protection at all, just resistance. My CoH melee characters could not be held, knocked back, or stunned in any way, but my CO melee characters get knocked around like ragdolls regardless of how much "resistance" I have.
I don't like gear, or the CO stat system in general. I liked that you could just enhance your powers directly in CoH, rather than indirectly enhancing them with gear that may increase a stat that may improve one power. I wish that there were at least a place to buy basic gear in CO (other than the auction house; I mean NPC shops), so I could just go out and buy gear that enhances the stats I want to enhance, rather than having to hope for random drops or random mission rewards.
The Stat system even frequently works against one of the things I like about the game, mixing and matching. A guy with guns and swords couldn't be done in CoH at all, true, but in CO, it still can't be done well, because the swords' damage is based on one stat, and the guns' damage is based on a completely different stat, and there's no offensive passive or offense-based Role that supports both equally well. You have to decide which weapon you want to focus on (which defeats the purpose of having both), or you have to go Hybrid (and be mediocre with both weapons).
I hate that the majority of CO missions seem to be "Bear ****" missions, where you're just told to go kill twenty-seven of a certain mob type, or collect 50 items that they drop (and they don't drop 100%). CoH had a few missions like that (and I didn't like them there, either), but the majority of their missions were not. I could power through one Bear **** mission in CoH, because I knew the next one in the mission arc wouldn't be one. In CO, it's frequently Bear **** after Bear **** after Bear ****.
I liked CoH's difficulty sliders much better than CO's single slider, because I knew exactly what aspect was being controlled. You could directly set the level and number spawns in instanced missions. All CO has is Normal, Medium, Hard... what do those affect? I don't know. The game doesn't tell you.
I hate that the majority of XP in CO comes from mission completion. In CoH, a single Boss-level enemy was worth about as much as mission completion. (Minions were about 1/10 that, Lieutenants were about 1/2 that). In CO, defeating enemies gives a pittance. The only way to level is mission after mission after mission, rather than taking a break and hunting Bosses or something.
I miss Newspaper/Radio missions. I loved just being able to take a break in the storyline to go beat up a boss. CO's equivalent are given to you seemingly randomly (rather than letting you do them at will), and are basically just instanced Bear **** missions (and see above for what I think of those) rather than missions with a real goal (either "fight a boss", "find an item" or "escort a hostage"). I enjoyed Alignment missions for the same reason, as they were basically slightly longer Newspaper/Radio missions, but with more story to them. There's certainly nothing like CoH's Mayhem Missions (a timed bank robbery, with destructible scenery and side-missions that added time to the clock), which were hands-down my favorite mission type in the game. (The very last mission I did before the game shut down was a Mayhem Mission)
CoH had new powersets and updates coming out extremely frequently, with the pace only increasing at the end (and there were literally a dozen powersets that were found in the beta client but were not yet accessible in-game). CO added a couple of laser sword powers recently, but when was the last time they added powers before that? (To be fair, with Cryptic North's formation, this particular complaint of mine looks to be improving. I'm rather excited about most of what I'm reading about on the PTS)
I much prefer playing villains, and CO has no villains. Yes, the villain writing in CoH wasn't perfect, and often had you feeling like a minion of a minion rather than a Villain in your own right, but they were aware that players felt that way, and it was constantly getting better (one of the last mission arcs they'd written before the shutdown involved you starting your own supervillain group to compete with Arachnos).
CoH had much better options for non-subscribers, especially for former subscribers. CoH locked you out of a few things, particularly four of the classes; CO locks you out of the most basic aspect of the game, the freeform system. When I was between jobs and unable to subscribe to CoH, I still had fun with my Super Strength/Willpower Brute whose main restriction was being limited to basic enhancements. When I unsubscribed to CO, I was no longer able to play the characters I actually liked, instead being stuck with a character where the game chooses all the powers for me (and doesn't pick the powers I actually want - if I were putting together an Ice/Invulnerability character, it would have had Arctic Beast long before now, but the Glacier doesn't get it at all).
And last but certainly not least: CoH had a Mac client and ran at full speed on my five-year-old computer. Neither apply to CO. I have to turn the graphic settings all the way down (making it extremely pixelated) and close every other program on my computer to make CO playable at all, and even then it's still not running at full speed.
Is CO a bad game? No, of course not. I think it's the best superhero game on the market right now, and it can be fun in short bursts.
But it's not the game I really want to be playing.
Maybe CoT will be. Maybe it won't. I'll know in two years. In the meantime, I guess I'll play CO until then.
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
The Freeform system gives the illusion of more variety, but in reality it forces everyone to take the same "best" powers:
This is false. There are over 130 different builds in the link in my signature showing this.
Even only looking at my own, that's 30 builds which means there's 90 as I keep 3 different builds per character but only post the one I deem is most easily accessible....and there are over 30 characters I didn't post in any variation.
And last but certainly not least: CoH had a Mac client and ran at full speed on my five-year-old computer.
The Transgaming wrapper for Mac was anything but full speed on a five year old machine. Turning on even the lowest level of ultra mode had power being sucked from the battery because the AC couldn't supply enough power and running at conservative settings would bring the system up to damaging-over-time heat levels.
The first thing I did when I got a new MBP was to buy a copy of Windows to bootcamp to run CoH without melting anything.
This is my Risian Corvette. There are many like it, but this one is mine.
even if they meet their goal on kickstarter there are so many projects that have disappeared due to inexperience and mismanagement. For all intents and purposes, CoT is vaporware until there is a playable beta. Its an amateur game from an amateur "studio" and I really don't see PWE being at all concerned by it until it actually starts siphoning players from CO.
The Freeform system gives the illusion of more variety, but in reality it forces everyone to take the same "best" powers: for example, every one of my characters has the same magic-based healing power regardless of character theme or concept, because it's the only really good self-heal available.
I have to take issue with this. It's simply not true. This game is very easy and you don't have to have the "best" powers to be viable. I use a wide variety of self-heals and don't have any trouble at all.
1. money for server.
2. money for maintenance
3. money for devs.
4. money for upgrades.(because people will ask)
5. If they are using any CoH code, money for IP.
6. money for rent for building to hold people and office space.(becasue once its running people will want a professional game)
7. money for customer service people
8. money for accountants for tax purposes, you are getting money in, you will be paying company tax, anyone gettingpaid, payroll tax,
9. legal fees for your TOS & EULA and enforcing it, or for people who fall foul.
10. electricity, computers, training upgrades, leave, all the other BUSINESS costs. becasue despite the fact that it is being run by COH fans, it will be a business.
11.
advertising,
keeping peoples interest in playing the game,
keeping people working on the game - full time
and now for the big one,
Why are you posting this notice here?
Hoping to get more people to see it and donate?
Again. This KS isn't about marketing the game at this point. It's about letting people know they have an engine selected, have the preliminary work done to make sure what they want to do CAN work, and now they need to take care of the opportunity costs involved with getting the development project going.
Which is basically software and the engine license.
And they're not using the Cryptic engine or any CoH code.
They wanted facts. Fact is, CoH had more players and was making more money. It also had a way more active DEV team (the joke has been that CO didn't have one )
Fact is, CoH had more players and was making more money.
Is this an actual fact, or are we just assuming it to be the case? I thought we didn't have access to CO population #'s and profit but I could be wrong.
The rumors were that it was still profitable. The only actual official mention of it was from NCSoft, and they said no it wasn't. Probably depends on if you believe them.
I thought we didn't have access to CO population #'s and profit but I could be wrong.
We don't and never have. It's always been speculation, some of which was based off of trying to glean and extrapolate possible numbers from publicly accessible company financial reports. In other words, guess work.
They wanted facts. Fact is, CoH had more players and was making more money. It also had a way more active DEV team (the joke has been that CO didn't have one )
See, those things don't make it "better". And you're right. It wasn't entirely whining. There was also a large portion of posturing.
The Transgaming wrapper for Mac was anything but full speed on a five year old machine. Turning on even the lowest level of ultra mode had power being sucked from the battery because the AC couldn't supply enough power and running at conservative settings would bring the system up to damaging-over-time heat levels.
The first thing I did when I got a new MBP was to buy a copy of Windows to bootcamp to run CoH without melting anything.
I didn't say it ran at full speed at the highest settings. Of course I didn't have Ultra Mode on. But I could turn the settings down enough so that it did run at full speed.
No matter how far down I turn CO, it doesn't run at full speed. The game's graphics settings are currently so low that it looks like a SNES game, but it still sputters and hesitates for a second when I try to turn left or right.
This is false. There are over 130 different builds in the link in my signature showing this.
Even only looking at my own, that's 30 builds which means there's 90 as I keep 3 different builds per character but only post the one I deem is most easily accessible....and there are over 30 characters I didn't post in any variation.
Are you sure you linked to the right topic? That topic has a big explanation of how you should build characters in general, but no actual builds, let alone 130 build examples. Even so, you clearly missed my point, which was that for each function (especially healing), there is a "best", and little reason to take anything other than that "best".
For example, there's only three real click self-heals in the game (Resurgence, Bountiful Chi Resurgence, and Conviction), and if none of them fit my character's theme, then what do I do? I have to say "screw theme" and pick the best heal of the three (generally Resurgence). So all my FF characters have Resurgence, even if they're not in the least bit magical.
It's not like CoH, where my Invulnerability character had Dull Pain, and my Earth Armor character had Earth's Embrace, and my Energy Aura character had Energize - heals that were both powerful and appropriate for the character theme.
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
Even so, you clearly missed my point, which was that for each function (especially healing), there is a "best", and little reason to take anything other than that "best".
This is entirely an Achiever outlook and doesn't really apply to anyone else. You don't need "best" in this game at all. That's just what you WANT.
Resurgence is not necessarily magical. It's also in Bestial Supernatural set, which has little to do with magic in theme, save for a name. Unless you make a werewolf with it.
Theme-wise Bestial doesn't really fit with other Supernatural sets and probably is in this framework only for mechanic purposes.
CO sets don't define theme as strictly as CoX sets. Unless a power has a very distinct visual FX (yuck, AoPM, yuck, just fugly) it everything can be recolored and made looking appropriate in more than one theme.
I didn't say it ran at full speed at the highest settings. Of course I didn't have Ultra Mode on. But I could turn the settings down enough so that it did run at full speed.
No matter how far down I turn CO, it doesn't run at full speed. The game's graphics settings are currently so low that it looks like a SNES game, but it still sputters and hesitates for a second when I try to turn left or right.
Are you sure you linked to the right topic? That topic has a big explanation of how you should build characters in general, but no actual builds, let alone 130 build examples. Even so, you clearly missed my point, which was that for each function (especially healing), there is a "best", and little reason to take anything other than that "best".
For example, there's only three real click self-heals in the game (Resurgence, Bountiful Chi Resurgence, and Conviction), and if none of them fit my character's theme, then what do I do? I have to say "screw theme" and pick the best heal of the three (generally Resurgence). So all my FF characters have Resurgence, even if they're not in the least bit magical.
It's not like CoH, where my Invulnerability character had Dull Pain, and my Earth Armor character had Earth's Embrace, and my Energy Aura character had Energize - heals that were both powerful and appropriate for the character theme.
Now I love/loved CoH...but the freeform system is definitely a plus for CO.
Healing powers are really a bad outliner for whether or not a concept works or not...because they can really be played off differently.
For instance...my character isn't actually "healing" when I use resurgence or conviction. They are "digging deep" and lasting longer.
As for the "no reason to take other powers besides the best"...that's really a to each their own thing.
Concept...for me...is why I take other powers besides those that would be considered "the best".
I don't spam my best power because of concept and theme.
The freeform system allows me to play that way...while also allowing others to spam one attack that they consider the best.
We don't and never have. It's always been speculation, some of which was based off of trying to glean and extrapolate possible numbers from publicly accessible company financial reports. In other words, guess work.
Is it just rumor when the head guy says it was making a profit?
This is entirely an Achiever outlook and doesn't really apply to anyone else. You don't need "best" in this game at all. That's just what you WANT.
I don't need a heal often, but when I do need one, I need a big one, and I need it right then and there, and Resurgence is the only one of the three that actually accomplishes that (BCR is a heal over time, so doesn't give me the health boost I need right when I need it; Conviction is a tiny heal that often doesn't give me the health boost I need at all). That's why I take "the best", not because I'm an "achiever", but because it's the only power that does what I need it to. CoH had multiple powers that did what I needed them to.
Also, that paragraph was as much about being able to make themed character concepts around multiple playstyles, and that still is not possible in CO. In CO, if you want to be fire-based and only fire-based, then you have to be a ranged DPS type character, because there's no fire-based melee, armor, healing, support, CC, or anything else, just ranged attacks and a passive that boosts ranged fire attacks. If you want to specialize in crowd control, then it's Telepathy or nothing, becusee there's no crowd control sets themed around fire, or ice, or lightning, or darkness, or gravity, or anything else. THAT'S what I mean by lack of variety.
I guess technically Resurgence is not a "magical" power, which is why I can vaguely justify it, but it's still in there with Supernatural, just as I have to delve into Power Armor just to get Invulnerability (which should really be in with Might, since it's a standard Brick - in the non-CO sense - power).
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
This is entirely an Achiever outlook and doesn't really apply to anyone else. You don't need "best" in this game at all. That's just what you WANT.
Wrong. That's what everyone wants. That's why you see "My theme character can't beat this mish-mash of powers character because they have no theme or concept, just picked all the awesome powers and built around it to make it work."
That's why people keep complaining to nerf this and nerf that.
When what I'm trying to "Achieve" involves not dying, and Resurgence is the only one of the three that actually accomplishes that (BCR is a heal over time, so doesn't give me the health boost I need right when I need it; Conviction is a tiny heal that often doesn't give me the health boost I need at all), then, yeah, I guess I'm an "Achiever".
No, it sounds like you want one specific thing that does exactly what you want when you want it to. You're not "forced" into it, it's a choice you're making, as opposed to learning to use the other powers that work just fine (just not well enough to suit your specific wants and exactly the way you want).
I also like using attacks that are more powerful than my Energy Builder to do damage with, too. Does that also make me an Achiever?
No, Capt. Hyperbole, of course not. Now if you'd said "I HAVE to have this power on everyone because it's the best!" then yes.
Wrong. That's what everyone wants. That's why you see "My theme character can't beat this mish-mash of powers character because they have no theme or concept, just picked all the awesome powers and built around it to make it work."
That's why people keep complaining to nerf this and nerf that.
That part is patently nonsense. Don't even bother trying to cite a source on it.
Wrong. That's what everyone wants. That's why you see "My theme character can't beat this mish-mash of powers character because they have no theme or concept, just picked all the awesome powers and built around it to make it work."
That's why people keep complaining to nerf this and nerf that.
Oh, you're talking about pvp? Well there's your problem
I don't need a heal often, but when I do need one, I need a big one, and I need it right then and there, and Resurgence is the only one of the three that actually accomplishes that (BCR is a heal over time, so doesn't give me the health boost I need right when I need it; Conviction is a tiny heal that often doesn't give me the health boost I need at all). That's why I take "the best", not because I'm an "achiever", but because it's the only one of the three that does what I want it to.
I also like using attacks that are more powerful than my Energy Builder to do damage with, too. Does that also make me an Achiever?
I guess technically Resurgence is not a "magical" power, which is why I can vaguely justify it, but it's still in there with Supernatural, just as I have to delve into Power Armor just to get Invulnerability (which should really be in with Might, since it's a standard Brick - in the non-CO sense - power).
In the end it does not matter where the power is. It'd freeform. You can take whatever power you want and make it work with whatever concept you have.
I have a toon who uses Sun powers, so I pull stuff from Fire, Force and Celestial. Color hue them all the same color and Bam! You cant tell them apart. Problem solved, whtr is the big deal?
Invulnerable belongs in power armor as much as it would in Might, and if making a might toon you can still take it. I do. I have an Invul tank with the majority of his powers coming from might.
I also use Resurgence on the majority of my toons, it kicks ****. But for my Energy toons or dex toons I almost never take it as it generally under performs for those toons.
That's a ridiculous statement, no matter what you're applying it to. I mean, right here, it's obvious that's not what I want, and I know there's quite a few people out there like me. Especially in a comic superhero game, not everyone's a gamer. Some of us are just superhero geeks out having fun.
That's why you see "My theme character can't beat this mish-mash of powers character because they have no theme or concept, just picked all the awesome powers and built around it to make it work."
Ugh, PvP. This, like CoX, is a game that doesn't care about that. It's an afterthought bone thrown to that particular interest group.
That's why people keep complaining to nerf this and nerf that.
Why in the world would you conflate some people with everyone?
Okay guys, a bit of explanation on what I said and meant and whatever.
A) There is no true "better" game. As it's been pointed out I never said that Champs was the better game. That would be stupid because it's just my opinion.
I've had it up to my buttocks with people coming here, to this game's forum, and talking about how "their game was better" and they're "only here because no other good options." Honestly, it's irritating. Imagine someone coming to stay at your house, and they constantly prod you about how much better their house was than yours, and that they don't want to actually stay at your crap house, but do so because there's no other option for them.
I joined the CoX channel in-game to support and help out the guys who were new to the game and needed some guidance. I left the CoX channel because it became the "CoX is better and I'm only here because I have no other options" channel, filled with a bunch of bobbleheads agreeing with each other incessantly.
I'm tired of it.
If what I said was hypocritical in any way, I really don't care. I ain't perfect, so whatever.
This is entirely an Achiever outlook and doesn't really apply to anyone else. You don't need "best" in this game at all. That's just what you WANT.
This is exactly true. I have a roster of over 70 characters and none of them have any sort of "best build." I superstat Recovery all the time, that should show you how much I care about "best."
Are you sure you linked to the right topic? That topic has a big explanation of how you should build characters in general, but no actual builds, let alone 130 build examples.
You are aware that there are multiple links in my signature right? I simple mouse over would show that there are four of them...one of which is blatantly labeled "freeform builds directory". That said, seeing as you glossed over that, and reading what you just posted about powers and healing...nothing more to say from this gentleman on that topic...
A "choice" between three powers where only one of them does what I need it to do (a big heal when I hit the button) is not really a choice at all. If you need a car that goes 50 MPH and you're offered the choice between a car that goes 50 MPH, a car that goes 20 MPH, and car that goes 10 MPG, then would you really say you have a choice?
I guess that so many people are so focused on one item on my giant list of things that I thought (key words: I THOUGHT) CoH did better than CO (and apparently deliberately misunderstanding that one item to be solely about heals instead of about character building and character playstyle) that all the other items on my list are okay?
Here, I'll explain what I mean about "lack of variety" again:
In CoH, if I wanted a character who used, say, Fire and nothing but Fire, then that wasn't the last step in my decision. It still left all playstyles open to me. I could have Melee characters with Fire Armor and Fire Melee. I could have ranged characters with Fire Blast. I could have support characters with Fire Manipulation and Thermal Radiation. I could have Crowd Control characters with Fire Control. I could even, to stretch the theme slightly, have Masterminds with fiery whips and demon pets (though, to be fair, those pets were only about 1/3 fire, 1/3 toxic, 1/3 ice). I could make multiple "all-fire" characters and have them all play completely differently.
In CO, if I want a character who uses fire and nothing but fire, then... I'm done. The Fire framework is all I can choose from, and ranged blasting is all I can do with that character. If I wanted to make even two "all-fire" characters, they'd play almost entirely the same.
THAT'S what I mean by "lack of variety".
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
biffsmackwell backs me up:
This is exactly true. I have a roster of over 70 characters and none of them have any sort of "best build." I superstat Recovery all the time, that should show you how much I care about "best."
I've only got a couple of dozen, but I pay almost no attention to "builds". I choose powers by what looks like it might be cool and fun and what fits the character (with a small amount based on the synergy, but I've ignored that several times) I don't feel the slightest "nerfed" on any of them.
Comments
Community does go a long way to making the in-game (and forum) experience - but the studio that doesn't appreciate that and doesn't harness the enthusiasm of the fanbase will never achieve the game's potential.
Jeez,... channeling The Sphinx in Mystery Men there a bit I'm afraid, but I digress. :rolleyes:
Keeping a casual eye on City of Titans. You have to appreciate the passion there and I wish passion was all they needed. Time will tell.
Dropping my knitting to buff you whilst hitting - Proudly protecting Millennium City's little ones since 2009.
@Mothers_Love
I'm actually seeing an O-face... is there... something wrong with me? o.o
The point you're trying to make is wrong. You're mixing up subjective and objective.
As to your "it didn't have to come to this"... sure... but if you didn't want it to come to this, then why did you start the whole process? .-.
He's quite clearly stating that neither of them can be FACTUALLY stated to be better than the other, hence your question is invalid.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
oh my gawd STAWP IT!! LOL
My Amazon author page
How to build a freeform character...the Kenpo way
Demon Keypo's Building Guide
Freeform Builds Directory (Last updated: 04/23/2016)
Serving since September, 2009 / 65 Characters, 63 Level 40's
Would you like mayonnaise on that? uwu
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
This was my initial reaction as well.
I do wish them luck and I think this is a great thing for Champions Online as it shows companies like Cryptic there's competition for the market share on superhero MMOs, might make them step up their game. Maybe. Oh well, here's to hoping for good things for everyone!
Consolidate the currencies! (Please!)
Does your Champion have a theme song? (share it!)
Got a funny in-game screenshot? (share it!)
Please fix the Overdrive energy unlock! (Should help promote thematic build diversity!)
That's almost like saying Tesla is completely irrelevant to GMs future.
EDIT: Tesla knows what their doing so if you want, you can even downgrade to Fisker and the statement would remain true. I just don't see how events going on in your industry that you work in can be called "irrelevant" unless your not using the classical definition of irrelevant.
PVP is starving without rewards
1. Please give us Daily PVP missions that reward Questionite.
2. Please give us an exchange rate between Acclaim and Recognition so that PVP has access to all "On Alert" PVE rewards.
In absolute terms, CO has better graphics than COH -- better fidelity, higher poly count on objects, etc. I remember going back to COH after f2p (which was completely bungled, IMO) and looking at the tentacle of one of those squidbot Recluse things -- they are awesome robots, but the tentacles/legs looked almost 8 bit. Meh
That said, the _esthetic_ is something altogether different, and I can totally see people preferring COH's style.
Having prominently texture-based faces, for example, gave COH characters _way_ more character than CO characters have -- mad grins, young, old, so on. CO human faces are horribly bland.
Textures really helped make a lot of costumes look awesome, though were somewhat limited in resolution (and there were some big inconsistencies between old textures and newer ones). Auras are awesome, and CO STILL lacks them (except in some very limited ways).
On the flip side, CO stances, asymmetry, and wild diversity of gear you can put together is amazing.
But if we're going to talk raw graphics, DCUO is actually best.
What, you don't like the esthetics or gameplay of DCUO so it's not even a consideration?
Exactly.
Wicks and Things: NW-DI4FMZRR4 : The Fenwick merchant family has lost a caravan! Can you help?
Beggar's Hollow: NW-DR6YG4J2L : Someone, or something, has stolen away many of the Fenwicks' children! Can you find out what happened to them?
Into the Fen Wood: NW-DL89DRG7B : Enter the heart of the forest. Can you discover the secret of the Fen Wood?
There was no whining in that post.
If the CoT team somehow meets their kickstarter funding target in a month (they're still more than 50% away from meeting the target), then I see no problem considering them a presence in the industry to have some form of relevance to CO's future in the form of competition, no matter how significant.
Until then, CoT is irrelevant period.
The no LTS for backers was a requirement of Kickstarter IIRC.
Subbing looks to be basically getting a bigger stipend for your money for purchasing things which you will not lose when unsubbed so once you've got something you've got it for life.
They are currently at 175k of their 320k two days in.
CO has a better costume designer. Being able to make asymmetrical characters is something I wanted for a long time in CoH. Being able to choose several textures for each costume piece as well as four different colors per piece is much better than what CoH had.
CO has much, much better handling of respecs. I really like that if I mess up one power selection, I don't have to reselect all my powers and reslot them all from scratch. I often would just keep a bad power in CoH because I hated the respec process.
CO is fantastic for making "mix and match" characters, like a character who has both a sword and guns, or characters who can wield the power of multiple elements (say, a master of Earth, Fire, Air, and Water).
... and that's about it for me.
It had more character variety. The Freeform system gives the illusion of more variety, but in reality it forces everyone to take the same "best" powers: for example, every one of my characters has the same magic-based healing power regardless of character theme or concept, because it's the only really good self-heal available. Meanwhile, every one of my melee characters had a different healing power, all equally effective. Many had no heal at all because they didn't need one (thanks to having high regeneration, or tanking pets, or ways to lock down enemies, or what have you).
It was easier to make themed characters of various playstyles (for example, there's only one Fire powerset in CO, there were many in CoH, so only using Fire-based sets, I could use Fire for melee, armor, crowd control, support, and so on). I had two Earth-based characters in CoH: one was pure melee, one was pure crowd control. I can't make either of them in CO, because there's no Stone Melee, no Stone Armor, and definitely no Earth Control equivalents. I can throw rocks, that's it. Don't get me started on the sheer number of Electric-based characters I had on CoH, all different.
Support and crowd control abilities in general are much weaker in CO, with Support mostly limited to healing (rather than the force multiplier buffs and debuffs of CoH), and what few buffs and debuffs there are have durations in seconds instead of minutes. Dominator was one of my favorite classes in CoH, and there's no way to make anything like it in CO (especially if you don't want to make Mister Mental The Mind Master)
I seriously don't like that CO has very few cooldowns, because it means I'm basically just spamming my "best" power over and over, making the rest of my power selections useless.
I'm don't like the blocking mechanic one bit. Trying to fit a perfectly-timed block into the middle of my no-cooldown attack flailing (or, worse, into the middle of my power charging) usualyl fails, and I usually get knocked down, or held, or immobilized, forcing me to stop flailing on my attack and start flailing on Z to break free.
There's too much "flailing" in general in CO, rather than the measured pace of CoH fights. I liked keeping one eye on my power bar, seeing what was coming off of cooldown, and deciding which enemy it would be best used on. It wasn't frantic spamming of one attack over and over, but it wasn't slow, either.
CoH had common ways to get full protection from status effects. CO doesn't have any status protection at all, just resistance. My CoH melee characters could not be held, knocked back, or stunned in any way, but my CO melee characters get knocked around like ragdolls regardless of how much "resistance" I have.
I don't like gear, or the CO stat system in general. I liked that you could just enhance your powers directly in CoH, rather than indirectly enhancing them with gear that may increase a stat that may improve one power. I wish that there were at least a place to buy basic gear in CO (other than the auction house; I mean NPC shops), so I could just go out and buy gear that enhances the stats I want to enhance, rather than having to hope for random drops or random mission rewards.
The Stat system even frequently works against one of the things I like about the game, mixing and matching. A guy with guns and swords couldn't be done in CoH at all, true, but in CO, it still can't be done well, because the swords' damage is based on one stat, and the guns' damage is based on a completely different stat, and there's no offensive passive or offense-based Role that supports both equally well. You have to decide which weapon you want to focus on (which defeats the purpose of having both), or you have to go Hybrid (and be mediocre with both weapons).
I hate that the majority of CO missions seem to be "Bear ****" missions, where you're just told to go kill twenty-seven of a certain mob type, or collect 50 items that they drop (and they don't drop 100%). CoH had a few missions like that (and I didn't like them there, either), but the majority of their missions were not. I could power through one Bear **** mission in CoH, because I knew the next one in the mission arc wouldn't be one. In CO, it's frequently Bear **** after Bear **** after Bear ****.
I liked CoH's difficulty sliders much better than CO's single slider, because I knew exactly what aspect was being controlled. You could directly set the level and number spawns in instanced missions. All CO has is Normal, Medium, Hard... what do those affect? I don't know. The game doesn't tell you.
I hate that the majority of XP in CO comes from mission completion. In CoH, a single Boss-level enemy was worth about as much as mission completion. (Minions were about 1/10 that, Lieutenants were about 1/2 that). In CO, defeating enemies gives a pittance. The only way to level is mission after mission after mission, rather than taking a break and hunting Bosses or something.
I miss Newspaper/Radio missions. I loved just being able to take a break in the storyline to go beat up a boss. CO's equivalent are given to you seemingly randomly (rather than letting you do them at will), and are basically just instanced Bear **** missions (and see above for what I think of those) rather than missions with a real goal (either "fight a boss", "find an item" or "escort a hostage"). I enjoyed Alignment missions for the same reason, as they were basically slightly longer Newspaper/Radio missions, but with more story to them. There's certainly nothing like CoH's Mayhem Missions (a timed bank robbery, with destructible scenery and side-missions that added time to the clock), which were hands-down my favorite mission type in the game. (The very last mission I did before the game shut down was a Mayhem Mission)
CoH had new powersets and updates coming out extremely frequently, with the pace only increasing at the end (and there were literally a dozen powersets that were found in the beta client but were not yet accessible in-game). CO added a couple of laser sword powers recently, but when was the last time they added powers before that? (To be fair, with Cryptic North's formation, this particular complaint of mine looks to be improving. I'm rather excited about most of what I'm reading about on the PTS)
I much prefer playing villains, and CO has no villains. Yes, the villain writing in CoH wasn't perfect, and often had you feeling like a minion of a minion rather than a Villain in your own right, but they were aware that players felt that way, and it was constantly getting better (one of the last mission arcs they'd written before the shutdown involved you starting your own supervillain group to compete with Arachnos).
CoH had much better options for non-subscribers, especially for former subscribers. CoH locked you out of a few things, particularly four of the classes; CO locks you out of the most basic aspect of the game, the freeform system. When I was between jobs and unable to subscribe to CoH, I still had fun with my Super Strength/Willpower Brute whose main restriction was being limited to basic enhancements. When I unsubscribed to CO, I was no longer able to play the characters I actually liked, instead being stuck with a character where the game chooses all the powers for me (and doesn't pick the powers I actually want - if I were putting together an Ice/Invulnerability character, it would have had Arctic Beast long before now, but the Glacier doesn't get it at all).
And last but certainly not least: CoH had a Mac client and ran at full speed on my five-year-old computer. Neither apply to CO. I have to turn the graphic settings all the way down (making it extremely pixelated) and close every other program on my computer to make CO playable at all, and even then it's still not running at full speed.
Is CO a bad game? No, of course not. I think it's the best superhero game on the market right now, and it can be fun in short bursts.
But it's not the game I really want to be playing.
Maybe CoT will be. Maybe it won't. I'll know in two years. In the meantime, I guess I'll play CO until then.
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
And that's why I like villains.
11 minutes after you posted that, they're at $176,039/$320,000. That's over 50% by my count. After only 36 hours.
@flamingbunnyman in game. Formerly @Roderick in City of Heroes.
I wonder if that is before or after tax return.
Handle: @drgmstr
"Embrace your dreams"
Come Check Out My PRIMUS Database Page!
This is false. There are over 130 different builds in the link in my signature showing this.
Even only looking at my own, that's 30 builds which means there's 90 as I keep 3 different builds per character but only post the one I deem is most easily accessible....and there are over 30 characters I didn't post in any variation.
My Amazon author page
How to build a freeform character...the Kenpo way
Demon Keypo's Building Guide
Freeform Builds Directory (Last updated: 04/23/2016)
Serving since September, 2009 / 65 Characters, 63 Level 40's
Like I said, when they actually do meet their target to kick things off, then I'd consider them relevant.
The Transgaming wrapper for Mac was anything but full speed on a five year old machine. Turning on even the lowest level of ultra mode had power being sucked from the battery because the AC couldn't supply enough power and running at conservative settings would bring the system up to damaging-over-time heat levels.
The first thing I did when I got a new MBP was to buy a copy of Windows to bootcamp to run CoH without melting anything.
I have to take issue with this. It's simply not true. This game is very easy and you don't have to have the "best" powers to be viable. I use a wide variety of self-heals and don't have any trouble at all.
Again. This KS isn't about marketing the game at this point. It's about letting people know they have an engine selected, have the preliminary work done to make sure what they want to do CAN work, and now they need to take care of the opportunity costs involved with getting the development project going.
Which is basically software and the engine license.
And they're not using the Cryptic engine or any CoH code.
"Champions-Online and Star Trek Online contained hundreds of hours of mediocre content!"
and "nothing was polished".
--Jack Emmert
*pat pat* Then you need to learn to read.
They wanted facts. Fact is, CoH had more players and was making more money. It also had a way more active DEV team (the joke has been that CO didn't have one
Is this an actual fact, or are we just assuming it to be the case? I thought we didn't have access to CO population #'s and profit but I could be wrong.
We don't and never have. It's always been speculation, some of which was based off of trying to glean and extrapolate possible numbers from publicly accessible company financial reports. In other words, guess work.
My Amazon author page
How to build a freeform character...the Kenpo way
Demon Keypo's Building Guide
Freeform Builds Directory (Last updated: 04/23/2016)
Serving since September, 2009 / 65 Characters, 63 Level 40's
See, those things don't make it "better". And you're right. It wasn't entirely whining. There was also a large portion of posturing.
I didn't say it ran at full speed at the highest settings. Of course I didn't have Ultra Mode on. But I could turn the settings down enough so that it did run at full speed.
No matter how far down I turn CO, it doesn't run at full speed. The game's graphics settings are currently so low that it looks like a SNES game, but it still sputters and hesitates for a second when I try to turn left or right.
Are you sure you linked to the right topic? That topic has a big explanation of how you should build characters in general, but no actual builds, let alone 130 build examples. Even so, you clearly missed my point, which was that for each function (especially healing), there is a "best", and little reason to take anything other than that "best".
For example, there's only three real click self-heals in the game (Resurgence, Bountiful Chi Resurgence, and Conviction), and if none of them fit my character's theme, then what do I do? I have to say "screw theme" and pick the best heal of the three (generally Resurgence). So all my FF characters have Resurgence, even if they're not in the least bit magical.
It's not like CoH, where my Invulnerability character had Dull Pain, and my Earth Armor character had Earth's Embrace, and my Energy Aura character had Energize - heals that were both powerful and appropriate for the character theme.
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
And that's why I like villains.
This is entirely an Achiever outlook and doesn't really apply to anyone else. You don't need "best" in this game at all. That's just what you WANT.
Theme-wise Bestial doesn't really fit with other Supernatural sets and probably is in this framework only for mechanic purposes.
CO sets don't define theme as strictly as CoX sets. Unless a power has a very distinct visual FX (yuck, AoPM, yuck, just fugly) it everything can be recolored and made looking appropriate in more than one theme.
Now I love/loved CoH...but the freeform system is definitely a plus for CO.
Healing powers are really a bad outliner for whether or not a concept works or not...because they can really be played off differently.
For instance...my character isn't actually "healing" when I use resurgence or conviction. They are "digging deep" and lasting longer.
As for the "no reason to take other powers besides the best"...that's really a to each their own thing.
Concept...for me...is why I take other powers besides those that would be considered "the best".
I don't spam my best power because of concept and theme.
The freeform system allows me to play that way...while also allowing others to spam one attack that they consider the best.
That is variety...and it's not just an illusion.
VARIANT
"Nearly all men can withstand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."
-Abraham Lincoln-
Oh, posturing. You mean like the OP did. *nod nod*
Is it just rumor when the head guy says it was making a profit?
I don't need a heal often, but when I do need one, I need a big one, and I need it right then and there, and Resurgence is the only one of the three that actually accomplishes that (BCR is a heal over time, so doesn't give me the health boost I need right when I need it; Conviction is a tiny heal that often doesn't give me the health boost I need at all). That's why I take "the best", not because I'm an "achiever", but because it's the only power that does what I need it to. CoH had multiple powers that did what I needed them to.
Also, that paragraph was as much about being able to make themed character concepts around multiple playstyles, and that still is not possible in CO. In CO, if you want to be fire-based and only fire-based, then you have to be a ranged DPS type character, because there's no fire-based melee, armor, healing, support, CC, or anything else, just ranged attacks and a passive that boosts ranged fire attacks. If you want to specialize in crowd control, then it's Telepathy or nothing, becusee there's no crowd control sets themed around fire, or ice, or lightning, or darkness, or gravity, or anything else. THAT'S what I mean by lack of variety.
I guess technically Resurgence is not a "magical" power, which is why I can vaguely justify it, but it's still in there with Supernatural, just as I have to delve into Power Armor just to get Invulnerability (which should really be in with Might, since it's a standard Brick - in the non-CO sense - power).
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
And that's why I like villains.
But "making a profit" doesn't necessarily mean it was making more than CO, and at least to NCSoft, doesn't mean it was making "enough".
Can you confirm this (some type of link to a public statement)? Because, yes, this is exactly the rumor I was referring to.
Wrong. That's what everyone wants. That's why you see "My theme character can't beat this mish-mash of powers character because they have no theme or concept, just picked all the awesome powers and built around it to make it work."
That's why people keep complaining to nerf this and nerf that.
No, it sounds like you want one specific thing that does exactly what you want when you want it to. You're not "forced" into it, it's a choice you're making, as opposed to learning to use the other powers that work just fine (just not well enough to suit your specific wants and exactly the way you want).
No, Capt. Hyperbole, of course not. Now if you'd said "I HAVE to have this power on everyone because it's the best!" then yes.
That part is patently nonsense. Don't even bother trying to cite a source on it.
Oh, you're talking about pvp? Well there's your problem
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
In the end it does not matter where the power is. It'd freeform. You can take whatever power you want and make it work with whatever concept you have.
I have a toon who uses Sun powers, so I pull stuff from Fire, Force and Celestial. Color hue them all the same color and Bam! You cant tell them apart. Problem solved, whtr is the big deal?
Invulnerable belongs in power armor as much as it would in Might, and if making a might toon you can still take it. I do. I have an Invul tank with the majority of his powers coming from might.
I also use Resurgence on the majority of my toons, it kicks ****. But for my Energy toons or dex toons I almost never take it as it generally under performs for those toons.
That's a ridiculous statement, no matter what you're applying it to. I mean, right here, it's obvious that's not what I want, and I know there's quite a few people out there like me. Especially in a comic superhero game, not everyone's a gamer. Some of us are just superhero geeks out having fun.
Ugh, PvP. This, like CoX, is a game that doesn't care about that. It's an afterthought bone thrown to that particular interest group.
Why in the world would you conflate some people with everyone?
A) There is no true "better" game. As it's been pointed out I never said that Champs was the better game. That would be stupid because it's just my opinion.
I joined the CoX channel in-game to support and help out the guys who were new to the game and needed some guidance. I left the CoX channel because it became the "CoX is better and I'm only here because I have no other options" channel, filled with a bunch of bobbleheads agreeing with each other incessantly.
I'm tired of it.
If what I said was hypocritical in any way, I really don't care. I ain't perfect, so whatever.
This is exactly true. I have a roster of over 70 characters and none of them have any sort of "best build." I superstat Recovery all the time, that should show you how much I care about "best."
Did he happen to point out how much of a profit? That might be the part that counts.
Isn't it even more ironic when you're surrounded by people who chose something else, and yet they don't find the game even remotely unplayable?
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
Wait that isn't ironic, that's just stupid.
Handle: @drgmstr
"Embrace your dreams"
Come Check Out My PRIMUS Database Page!
So... it's come to this >:|
Go... Pizza! I choose you!
My super cool CC build and how to use it.
You are aware that there are multiple links in my signature right? I simple mouse over would show that there are four of them...one of which is blatantly labeled "freeform builds directory". That said, seeing as you glossed over that, and reading what you just posted about powers and healing...nothing more to say from this gentleman on that topic...
My Amazon author page
How to build a freeform character...the Kenpo way
Demon Keypo's Building Guide
Freeform Builds Directory (Last updated: 04/23/2016)
Serving since September, 2009 / 65 Characters, 63 Level 40's
I guess that so many people are so focused on one item on my giant list of things that I thought (key words: I THOUGHT) CoH did better than CO (and apparently deliberately misunderstanding that one item to be solely about heals instead of about character building and character playstyle) that all the other items on my list are okay?
Here, I'll explain what I mean about "lack of variety" again:
In CoH, if I wanted a character who used, say, Fire and nothing but Fire, then that wasn't the last step in my decision. It still left all playstyles open to me. I could have Melee characters with Fire Armor and Fire Melee. I could have ranged characters with Fire Blast. I could have support characters with Fire Manipulation and Thermal Radiation. I could have Crowd Control characters with Fire Control. I could even, to stretch the theme slightly, have Masterminds with fiery whips and demon pets (though, to be fair, those pets were only about 1/3 fire, 1/3 toxic, 1/3 ice). I could make multiple "all-fire" characters and have them all play completely differently.
In CO, if I want a character who uses fire and nothing but fire, then... I'm done. The Fire framework is all I can choose from, and ranged blasting is all I can do with that character. If I wanted to make even two "all-fire" characters, they'd play almost entirely the same.
THAT'S what I mean by "lack of variety".
"It is unthinkable. But such is the nature of villainy, don't you think? To do the unthinkable, to challenge the impossible, to conquer all before you and make destiny your own." - Ghost Widow
And that's why I like villains.
I've only got a couple of dozen, but I pay almost no attention to "builds". I choose powers by what looks like it might be cool and fun and what fits the character (with a small amount based on the synergy, but I've ignored that several times) I don't feel the slightest "nerfed" on any of them.