In a bind

Okay, I want to do the rotating taunt thing that Doyce has documented (and can be found in the full-blown taunt guide here), but do it as a macro, so I can replace the taunt power button in my tray. But the rotating thing looks to be set up as only for binds, not for macros. Is there a similar bind_file sort of mechanism for macros?

City of Alts!

Friday I played with my various alts on Triumph — taking each out for another spin and getting a feel for them, as well as creating the haughty Amethyst Queen (Broadswoard/Inv scrapper), who would be fun to play “in production.”
Actually ended up teaming up one of them — Captain Antares (Energy/Energy blaster) with another odd group of three or four others (the number varied, which was one of the odd things). That I was the oldest person in the group (older than the total of the others, I suspect) also made it odd. (When anyone asks, “How old r u?” it’s usually a bad sign.) Cap is another one I’d like to bring “live” onto Champion.
Friday night, Margie and I took Kazima and Torchielle out for a spin. Fun. Unlike previous instances, we felt a lot less “brittle” than before, and managed (both duoing and teaming up) to survive and thrive.
The Brunch-n-Brawl on Saturday has already been noted as another K&A show. Again, a lot of fun, some good XP, and some good teaming.
Margie and I got on again in the evening with Psi-clone and Amorpha, at last. We brought in Avocet on a mish (and kudos to him for bearing up with so much exemping down this weekend), then ended up getting pulled into a surprise birthday party for Callypsa. That’s not the sort of RP I usually get into, but it was fun enough, and it introduced PC to Lady Photon, which might develop into something interesting down the line.
2005-08-14_tv.jpgMost of yesterday was taken up with errands and house cleaning. We got on by 5, though, to run the TV Respec with Velvet and P-siren, as organized by Ode to Joy. Lord, what a slog. Team of 8, but everything, both prelim and at the reactor, was conning red and purple, and in copious numbers. Velvet was the sole tank — along with one controller (Mal) and one blaster (Avo), and everyone else a defender of some sort (Ode, Sun of Glory, Agent 12, Doctor Rune, PS). Crikey. A couple of deaths, mostly when we managed to aggro the entire control room (due to an anchor who ran riot through the place) and had to duke it out for what had to have been 10-15 minutes. After that, the core was almost anti-climactic. Double-bubble goodness and enough XP to nearly level Velvet. (PS was hampered in levelling by some griefer TPing lvl 52 Nemesis to the Talos train station. Yikes.)
(PB commented that there’d been a lot of griefing over the course of the day. Wonder if the Summer Kids are winding up their stay …)
Afterwards (and post-Kitten), we ended up on an odd team with Dr Awesome, Avo, and Zazi, along with … hmmmm, memory’s faded already. Anyway, Velvet was the sole tank again, and we rolled through some some missions without any real problem, getting Velvet through her last two bubbles to ding 28, the “Rage” level. Woo-hoo.
The irony about Sunday being a Velvet/PS day is that on Saturday night, during our one PC/A team (again, along with Zazi), Amorpha got the Nemesis staff. If we hadn’t had the Respec Trial already planned, we would probably have been focusing on those “mains” — and we will be, for the next couple of days (though we’ll have a late start tonight).

Level 18 Scrapper Looking for Feedback

As Dave said before, we dusted off Torch and Kazima today and had some fun. I’ve only run duo with Kazima since the Caverns and was more than a bit rusty. I also realized that since Dave and I duo so much I don’t have a good feeling for how well I play her on a team.
So, I would sincerely like your feedback/constructive criticism on my style of play. And even though running Kazima was the impetus for this post, input on all my characters is welcome.
Thanks!

CoJ Brunch-n-Brawl

Though the “Working Lunch” adventures of the CoJ today — as organized by Margie as of yesterday afternoon — was slow in starting, we eventually had a great group and some fun times.
2005-08-13_paladin.jpgDubh Bas was there, so we brought in Kazima and Torchielle. Other CoJ present were Girl Five, Tanker-belle, and Strete. We also had guest appearances from Empty Suit and Black Mynx.
Though we started out in the Hollows on the (perennial) Frostfire mish (that makes BD 49-and-2, I think), most of the time we were over in Kings Row, doing missions there against Vahz and Clocks and Hellions.
Both Kazima and Torchielle dinged (I think everyone who was along for most of the day did so). There was a lot of “rusty with this character, sorry, trying to remember the best tactics to use” around the group, since most of us were running alts that had been in storage for a while. Margie’s going to post separately about Kazima’s tactics.
For Torchielle, I was in hog heaven — lots of big groups of baddies (mostly conning from green to white), held in a nice tight cluster by a couple of tanks. I only rarely felt in too much danger, even after all of our Defenders left. I had much fun simply pouring flames of destruction onto groups and watching tons of damage numbers float upwards (including DoT).
On the way out of one KR mish, I was jumping to the next and saw a bunch of player reticles on an odd street corner. I dropped down — and saw a bunch of folks fighting with a giant clockwork … Paladin. Giant Monster. I’d read about it. Told the team. Broadcast on Coalition Chat. Started chucking fireballs …
And took the worst screen shot evah. Proof off to the right. I was trying to do too many things and having too may keyboard/finger problems. Bleah.
The battle probably took about a minute or two before he got dragged down hard. Didn’t get the badge, but did get about 300-odd XP (not shabby at 18th level) and had a blast (so to speak).
The whole party thing was a lot of fun, and kudos to Margie for organizing it.

Verisimilitude

This isn’t happening in CoH (as of yet), but I expect it’s a trend that will continue in the online gaming industry: ad placement in virtual environments.

After updating my version of SWAT4 to the latest patch from Vivendi, I soon discovered that the game was phoning home to grab posters to place in the enviroment of the game’s levels. Not only did it do this for every level that was played, but it also informed the advertisers of how long each poster was viewed, and by which gamer. Expect to see this kind of advertising and brand placement becoming standard fare in the very near future.
Now, I don’t know that this is an intrinsically evil thing. My biggest worry, in fact, is that it will cause a hit in performance. But it’s still vaguely … disturbing.
(via J-Walk)

Out of control

Statesman on various Controller issues:

We reduced AOE hold durations and increased the recharge times in order to prevent perma-holds in large groups. The single target holds remain quick, however, and with slotting, allows a Controller to hit one target, recharge, hit another, before the first one wakes up.
Well, hopefully more than one. To that extent, PC’s actually not in bad shape. Most of my holds are singletons — I never took Flash or Flare or whatever the multi-blind is. Indeed, my main “holds” are Blind and Deceive — which, it sounds like, have not been screwed with.

We decreased the # of pets because of their overwhelming power compared to some others. However, we added new pet functionality – permanence and going into elevators – to make the pets a little more Controller friendly.
Elevators? Elevators?! They can go through elevators, too!? Cool!
Hmmm. How about portals, too?
The number of pets isn’t such a concern to me, since I just got my first Phantasm and haven’t been trying to summon more than one. Indeed, one is sometimes more than enough. And, oh, yeah, Fred rocks.

Some Control powers in other sets were overlooked and still had the original values. We’ve been fixing those one at a time. A Controller should still be the best at holding!
Unless that holding is large group holds for too long a period.

AE limits on the # of targets – that’s something I’m still analyzing.
If the duration is going to be reduced and the recharge increased, don’t also reduce the number of targets. IMO.

Definition of the Controller’s role: that’s straightforward enough. Hold! I posted descriptions of my own Grav/Kin tactics. I’d fire off either Wormhole or Gravity Distortion Field to take some of the group out of the battle from the start. Then I’d selectively aim at others that were outlying. Note that I let the Tankers and Scrappers go in a few moments before hand to take the brunt of the initial aggro.
Always a good idea. Unless you can Deceive.
Now, let’s talk about Invis …

Fred-be-gone

Phantasms are great — until you don’t want them any more, and instead stand there appalled as they barge into the next group of Evil Bad Guys just as you were trying to set them up …
And with I5, Phantasms stay up (according to the release notes) effectively as long as you want (until you zone, die, etc.).
In a move that makes me feel slightly better, States has announced …

I’ve seen many, many requests for an ability to unsummon pets…We’ll add more later, but for now we have a slash command:

/release_pets
Cool. Now Fred the Phantasm won’t be energy blasting past my shoulder that horde of Purples while I’m making my first Deceive attempt. Now all I need to do is reslot the Attack Rate so I can summon them quickly after I’ve banished them.
Now, to what “add more later” means … will this be a click option on pets? Or will there be other pet controls (someone on the board suggested “attack $target,” “stay,” “guard $target,” etc.)? Maybe, now that our AoE “control” powers are being so weakened, “controller” will represent our control of our pets …

So ding-y together …

Got Psi-clone up to 33 yesterday. First level where, suddenly, we drop out of the “power/2-slots” pattern. Knew it was coming (I have PC planned out to 50), but it was still … somewhat surprising to be offered three slots.
The other thing that’s changed is a more intentional effort by Margie and me over the last week or so to do more teaming outside of our duos. Last night ended up (after some SG Leadership Stuff) doing some missions with Strete and Zazi. It’s interesting the changes in tactics and dynamics (not to mention the difficulty in shouting “Don’t go over there, that wandering Fire Thorn Wielder isn’t by himself!” when two of the four party members are not in the room.
Teaming is slower, but does make the dynamics of different missions a bit more variable. Good stuff. And it makes the Empathy side of things with Psi-clone all the more useful.

Weekend update

Well, not actually much to update. The Blogathon kind of sucked it all up — early to bed Friday, all day blogging Saturday, big nap on Sunday, and early to bed Sunday, too.
Did have some fun helping Mal ding to 50. Also played the Azures, which is always a joy. Mr. Azure got Jump Kick at the last level, which does much better than Brawl in terms of damage (and knockdown), but which has the world’s goofiest animation.
Margie, whilst I was busy, spent a lot of time on Test, as well as doing badge collecting. It was nice having her stay up late with me on Saturday, and nice that she had “something to do” while I was busy typing.
On the Dev front …
… the NPCs in Escort missions will be faster (if not necessarily smarter). Other NPC/Ally types of stuff are slated, if not for I5, then for the future. (Interesting comment in that thread about the new value for Team Teleport and Team Fly with these sorts of mishes.)
… Blaster Defiance is being buffed. That fits in with the comments I’ve read previously on it. Looking forward to seeing how it works with Torchielle.
… Some graphical bits and pieces from Test, including NPC highlights (Margie commented on this the other day) and stores on maps (missing labels, but that’s a known issue).

“You, sir, have an illness”

Or at least that’s what Avo said when he notice me with yet another new alt.
2005-08-03_fazenda-araware.jpgIn this case, both Margie and I have them. New alts on Champion.
On the left is Margie’s, a creature named Araware, a “dust spirit” of some sort (she can provide more detail) who happens to be a Spines/DA Scrapper.
On the right is mine (and the trigger for this change), Fazenda. A stage magician, who actually performs her tricks (and protects the city) with impossibly high-tech gadgets. (Insert mysterious backstory here.) As a hero, she’s an Empathy/Energy Defender.
Fazenda existed as one of my “pilot” characters over on Triumph for a few months before I got a sudden yen for an Empathy Defender. (It’s been a common secondary for my Controllers, and it’s my second production Defender, after Truly Unstable. Well, there’s another, but she’s not in public as yet.)
Since we don’t have server transfer, that meant a couple of characters had to be retired. For me, the answer, sadly, was Sister Chinook — fun backstory on her, and I liked her outfit, but the Ice Controller thing just never quite solidified for me (so to speak), nor did I ever find a compelling voice for her. It’s a shame to have one of Puck Bunny’s countrymen leave, but that’s how it goes.
Margie decided to drop SC’s cohort, Toxic Sister, since she was looking to do another spine scrapper anyway.
Easy come, easy go (of 9 and 10 levels of character), I guess.

Glutton for punishment

There are folks who are “unlucky in love” — for whom romantic involvements involve going from failed relationship to failed relationship.
It occurs to me I might have some insight into that now — because I am “unlucky in Pick-Up Group.”
Today’s example was yet another PUG in the Hollows with Lynn. Utter disaster. The mobs were conning too high, but that didn’t stop us from going into the breach — complete with an idiot blaster sniping targets in the middle of the massive mobs of trolls.
Three deaths. Yikes.
Finally quit off to the hospital.
Went back to Steel. Managed to kill myself again.
Wandered back from the hospital. Got a tell from one of the guys from the PUG. Felt sympathetic. Should have known better. Teamed. It was the idiot blaster. Who then proceeded to spend all of his time (a) in a store, and (b) afk.
So I dropped the team and sneaked away, then headed onward.
Erased a pip of the debt by the time I was through, but … yeesh.
Perhaps an intervention is in order.
Why do I do it? Because, there have been times, in the past, when I’ve gotten involved in PUGs that were simply faboo. Great times. Great XP. Success after success after success. Play time for as long as I could, levelment and merriment.
It’s the memories of those rare — but real — experiences that keep me coming back over and over again.
Even if I keep having disastrous love affairs PUGs as a result.
Though I did have an earlier good adventure with Lynn that made up for it a bit.

On Lurkers

I know you’re out there.
A month or so back, someone approached Velvet (I think it was) in a train station. The conversation was along the lines of, “I know you. You have that blog …”
Then I got a PM on the forums today from Liberty Bill, saying he enjoyed the blog. He then expressed surprise when I told him he was welcome to comment.
Granted it’s not, upon reflection, completely transparent to a new user that anyone visiting here can comment. You just need to register, meaning you have to set up an identity in Typekey to sort of establish that you are a human being, not a spambot, and then sign in. The instructions are actually down in the comment section, but maybe not obvious.
It’s painless, commercial-free, and secure. And free, of course.
Once you’ve done that, you can comment away. And, in fact, you are welcome to.
It is odd, though. The folks who comment here are all (with the exception of the two individuals mentioned at the top of the post, and the former only comment once, I think) people I know in RL. Having virtual presences show up here is to be expected, but still a bit different. (At least for this blog.) I haven’t kept it a secret, nor have I publicized it (though if anyone clicks on the “www” button beneath one of my posts on the Alliance forum, they come here). It’s just been hazy barrier between the IC and OOC world, as much in my own imagination as in reality.
But now I can’t get over the feeling now that there are others, just out of sight, watching from the shadows (a la The Mark of Gideon). So, if you are … comment. Say hi. Set down and chat a spell.