New efforts!

[Arcana]

Have any of you guys/gals tried out Issue 24 beta when it was open to VIP members?  If so, how was the Martial Combat secondary set for blasters or the Martial Assault for dominators?

Also did you like the changes from Issue 23 to Issue 24?

The martial secondary for blasters was pretty good.  Even better before Arbiter Hawk fixed Power Thrust, when it was epic.

Overall, I liked the changes to blasters in I24, between survivability, crashless nukes, and sniper changes.  Also, Bio Armor was going to kick all the ass that existed.  It was going to make Willpower look like a wet firecracker. 

I guess its lucky for all of us that the devs never really seemed to fully trust my defensive set analyses, at least prior to launching a set.  Or rather, their development model relied on objective beta test datamining, which is usually better than qualitative analysis or subjective guessing, but when it came to defensive power set performance my analyses were always objectively accurate.  In the case of Bio Armor, there was me saying it was fantastic, a few players saying it was pretty good, and most saying (if anything) it was good but problematic or just a bit above (or a bit below) average.  Which means, if the beta pattern held, players were about to get a gift from the gods.  I actually made those videos specifically because the consensus was that Bio Armor might look good on paper but in practice it didn't hold up well in actual combat.

[skoogmik]

To Arcana:

Looking at your video "Bio Armor Tank vs +5 Rikti...   Did your bio armor consist of 5 rikti tied to you and you used them as your armor?      I couldn't spot your character at all!

[Moonlighter]

The martial secondary for blasters was pretty good.  Even better before Arbiter Hawk fixed Power Thrust, when it was epic.

Overall, I liked the changes to blasters in I24, between survivability, crashless nukes, and sniper changes.

I leveled a Dual Pistols/Martial Arts blaster on the test server, as well as a few other blaster. It was tremendous fun. I was dubious of the changes on paper, but blasters were much more fun in play.

Moonlighter~

[duane]

A 5th level for a number of pool powers was the key item along with new story BEYOND Praetoria.  I was incredibly looking forward to new pool power options based on the archetypes.  I thought it was a cool concept and long over due.  ...naturally any opportunity to make a new character.

[Arcana]

To Arcana:

Looking at your video "Bio Armor Tank vs +5 Rikti...   Did your bio armor consist of 5 rikti tied to you and you used them as your armor?      I couldn't spot your character at all!

It actually looks like I slipped away when they weren't looking and they are just swinging at nothing, doesn't it?  In fact, that's a level 32 Bio tank with nothing but common IOs.  Which means literally *anyone* could have built that basically right out of the box.  The sad part about both videos is that not only am I using either SOs or common IOs, I'm not even using all of Bio Armor's defensive powers.  Although the tank has it, it doesn't use the tier 9 which was a) strong and b) crashless.

Best part, when you don't need that much defensive strength, Bio Armor had the ability to use adaptation to shift to an offensive mode where Bio Armor loses some protection but gains some offense.  Not a huge amount, but it would make Bio Armor tanks easier to solo without losing the ability to become indestructible with the push of a button.

[blacksly]

I guess its lucky for all of us that the devs never really seemed to fully trust my defensive set analyses, at least prior to launching a set.  Or rather, their development model relied on objective beta test datamining, which is usually better than qualitative analysis or subjective guessing, but when it came to defensive power set performance my analyses were always objectively accurate.  In the case of Bio Armor, there was me saying it was fantastic, a few players saying it was pretty good, and most saying (if anything) it was good but problematic or just a bit above (or a bit below) average.  Which means, if the beta pattern held, players were about to get a gift from the gods.  I actually made those videos specifically because the consensus was that Bio Armor might look good on paper but in practice it didn't hold up well in actual combat.

I looked at the numbers for Bio Armor and also spit out some soda. It looked stronger in most situations than any other defensive set while also providing damage and -Regen powers. I would have been seriously surprised if they went live with the set without lowering the numbers somewhere (maybe a lower level of Regen).

[blacksly]

Have any of you guys/gals tried out Issue 24 beta when it was open to VIP members?  If so, how was the Martial Combat secondary set for blasters or the Martial Assault for dominators?

Also did you like the changes from Issue 23 to Issue 24?

Martial Assault was a really nice damage set, but had no "special" ability like Power Boost. Basically a high-damage S/L with some toxic damage, and a good mix of single-target and AoE attacks with good activation times. Fire Assault for "normals", basically.

[Noyjitat]

You have confused me, how did Architect Edition kill the game?

It didn't...

[Arcana]

I looked at the numbers for Bio Armor and also spit out some soda. It looked stronger in most situations than any other defensive set while also providing damage and -Regen powers. I would have been seriously surprised if they went live with the set without lowering the numbers somewhere (maybe a lower level of Regen).

Part of the problem is that many people seemed to have a very negative view on absorption.  People's perceptions of absorption mechanics were completely disconnected from what the mathematics said, but most CoH players tended to distrust math (of course, part of the problem there was that many players' posted math was highly questionable, and most observers could not distinguish quality numerical analysis from people just making stuff up, so distrusting posted math wasn't entirely without merit).

Anything that wasn't proportional and temporally invariant - meaning, anything that didn't work like resistance - was something that few players had an intuitive feel for.  This affected defense, this affected regen, and this wrecked havok with players' perceptions of the utility of absorption which did not have an easy closed-form mathematical

I know they were thinking of tweaking downward, particularly after I posted those videos, but I think it was going to be a small tweak like Willpower got when it went live.  I don't think the devs could even tweak the set down to Willpower levels because doing so would require literally removing whole powers.  Part of the problem is that it was tricky to simultaneously cut defense in a way that was meaningful under defensive mode without making some powers so weak they violated the "don't make powers so weak people simply don't take them at all" rule created when Invuln's passives were buffed.  I thought of a way to do that, but my suggestion(s) would violate the internal rule of "tweak, don't overhaul" powersets once their design was locked in past internal testing.  Dramatic changes had to be completely revetted by internal Q&A, and that wasn't going to happen fast enough.

[Soul Resonance]

I hate to distract from the conversation, especially with something as repetitive as this  however, I feel I must say this.

With all this talk of I24 things, coupled with the amazingness/nostalgia that is PC, I feel the urge to play growing  ..and, I know, "no news...good news..etc"..I just...I don't know..hope to maybe hear something..y'know, to let us know they(NCSoft) didn't forget about us..

[HEATSTROKE]

I didnt like the way Bio Armor looked.. so sadly.. I probably wouldnt have played it...

[Surelle]

I hate to distract from the conversation, especially with something as repetitive as this  however, I feel I must say this.

With all this talk of I24 things, coupled with the amazingness/nostalgia that is PC, I feel the urge to play growing  ..and, I know, "no news...good news..etc"..I just...I don't know..hope to maybe hear something..y'know, to let us know they(NCSoft) didn't forget about us..

Sign up for the "ZOMG something substantial finally happened!" automatic email alert pinned to the top of this very subforum.  Then if anything ever becomes of any "rez CoX" efforts, you will be emailed about it.

That's really all there is to say.  Sorry!

[Remaugen]

It didn't...

Exactly my own feeling, I really enjoyed AE for a while there.

[Aggelakis]

I didnt like the way Bio Armor looked.. so sadly.. I probably wouldnt have played it...

Bio Armor had a "no poop cover" setting, didn't it? You just had tendrils or something. Am I misremembering entirely?

[Arcana]

I didnt like the way Bio Armor looked.. so sadly.. I probably wouldnt have played it...

Given how many things Bio Armor could take on simultaneously, when would you ever see those effects?

[Rejolt]

Almost everything in issue 24 beta was awesome. Even the wth awesome power thrust glitch that acted like a cross between mind control's Tk and a slow motion Matrix backwards gunshot reaction.

I had so many blaster revamps and ideas pouring at of me. If CoH had ended with us never knowing what was in 24 I could have walked away so much easier. "We had a great run" was replaced with "Nooooooo! That was coming!"

Martial Assault was THE set to give archery, dual pistols its thematic due. Martial assault looked silly but if they ever gave doms illusion contol I can only imagine the Naruto clones would have a field day with PAs and that big arse throwing star.

The only news I've heard about legacy talks is poor shape of 23 disc image and i24 beta is off the table. While these memories are awesome, i24 is not happening for us unless some rebuilds it for us from scratch.

[Cailyn Alaynn]

I hate to distract from the conversation, especially with something as repetitive as this  however, I feel I must say this.

With all this talk of I24 things, coupled with the amazingness/nostalgia that is PC, I feel the urge to play growing  ..and, I know, "no news...good news..etc"..I just...I don't know..hope to maybe hear something..y'know, to let us know they(NCSoft) didn't forget about us..

They haven't, and indeed the talks do actively continue.

[syntaxerror37]

Bio Armor had a "no poop cover" setting, didn't it? You just had tendrils or something. Am I misremembering entirely?

As well as being color tint-able, you could indeed suppress the visual effects of Bio armor, even on a power by power basis. 

[Angel Phoenix77]

They haven't, and indeed the talks do actively continue.

For me this is enough just knowing they are still talking. I  understand there are those who want a yes or no, but things like this takes time.

[Suspicious Package]

You have confused me, how did Architect Edition kill the game?

I think the game took a bigger turn for the worse when PVP was added.  The game wasn't originally designed for PVP and it was my feeling that wedging it in with a crowbar started us down the road of balancing powersets against one another, enhancement diversification, AOE target/damage limits, etc.  To me, most of these changes were an attempt to allow different archetypes and powersets to compete head to head in PVP.

I started playing a superhero MMO to be super.  I enjoyed having 6 fire imps or herding huge groups with a fire tanker and dropping burn.  I think the wide difference between abilities and survivability in various builds in the early game also encouraged teaming.

...just my 2 cents