This mastermind will be my first Praetorian. Possibly my first "Resistant" too. Now what secondary with that ? Fire, maybe ?

I played a random mish just two days ago, where I had to save an occultist going by the name "Clive Loveking".

These guys know their classics :D

Ahhh, the century-old debate... really, it's all a matter of what you're looking for in an MMO.

My personal experience on European Servers has taught me this :

Heroes, as has been said before, are more group-focused. A single hero will generally have a hard time doing anything before level 32-38 (by which time he gets his Ultimates and pwns the living hell out of anything < Boss), but a team of heroes seems to hold incomparable powers, with their well-defined roles. The whole definitely more than the sum of its parts.

Villains on the other hand, is more solo-friendly. Provided you don't get cocky and set your reputation to Un-freakin'-touchable, there's almost no mission you can't handle on your own (that I know from direct experience). What makes this possible is that they're more offensive than their Heroic counterparts. Almost every Heroic class has its Villainous mirror (excluding Epics, they're a whole other story, and The Mastermind, a story on its own), only slightly more aggressive. Not that they actually do more damage, but they're tailored for brutal gameplay. See, the Tanker's Special, Gauntlet, dictates that every blow he deals attracts a little aggro. The Brute, on the other hand, gets Fury : the more hits he takes, the harder he hits back.

This makes for a subtle difference in the mindset you play them in, too. Heroes, in some sense, can be played quite straightforwardly. A Tanker tanks, a Blaster blasts and that's that. Villains require a little more flexibility, all depending on the context of your game. A Brute teamed with a Dominator won't be the same as a Brute teamed with a Stalker.

So. As a hardcasual working type, I tend to prefer Villains myself. I can jump in the game and play straight from the beginning, group whoever asks politely afterwards, and quit after 30min-2hrs and feel sated. I DO play Hero, but I find it harder to be "forced" to group to have any hope of achieving something meaningful. I have to add, though, my personal feeling regarding the communities is that Heroes tend to be more outgoing and friendly whereas Villains are not that prone to offer grouping.

HTH

For a good example of what a superhero fight should feel like, refer to Batman: Arkham Asylum.

And he's Batman, FFS ! Just your badass normal, crazy prepared, somewhat psychotic hero. How do you think the likes of Superman or Wolverine would go about in this kind of situation ? Simple, just beat the brains out of anyone in two blows or less. That's how superheroes fight. Now, for "named", non-mook villains, it's a whole different story. But I side with people who think we should cut through small-time mobs like butter.

Originally posted by Comnitus

Originally posted by NeoDodge

Okay, this is ridiculous.

How  "open" is a "limited numbers", "only guys who paid for some crappy service beforehand" beta, really ?

No sh*t, Cryptic really chained failures of PR with this beta. If I wasn't already sold to this game, I would consider not even trying it. (I mean, if that's how they manage their community, what does that tell us about their dev team ?)

They will only let in as many as they can handle, obviously. You want the game released for free for a little bit, claiming it's an Open Beta?

Second, Cryptic didn't only use Fileplanet. They gave away 10,000 keys through Gamerzines, for free. That's how I got mine. 60,000 keys from that and Fileplanet combined, plus, most likely, more from other places I don't know about.

Yo, read me again. I told I'm buying the game anyway, I trust Cryptic that much that I'm trying their game no matter what a magazine or any fellow gamer may tell me about it, so frack that bit about me being cheap.

What annoys the hell outta me is that I and a crapload of other impatient gamers signed up on the very day the beta signup came online, only to be ignored for whatever reason we still haven't been told. That is NOT a good way to treat your prospective customers. Mind you, they could have taken 60k names out of that list for arbitrarity's sake, told me "sorry you didn't make it" and called it a day, I would have been annoyed, but much less than them trying to sh*t us into believing that they can not put a tracker for the client if they really wanted to save the bandwidth, or that they didn't have enough people who applied for the beta in the first place or whatever.

(still yes, the numbers thing bugs me a little, I mean, aren't they stress-testing the game anyway ?)

Okay, this is ridiculous.

How  "open" is a "limited numbers", "only guys who paid for some crappy service beforehand" beta, really ?

No sh*t, Cryptic really chained failures of PR with this beta. If I wasn't already sold to this game, I would consider not even trying it. (I mean, if that's how they manage their community, what does that tell us about their dev team ?)

Note that this logic is not applied without thought (though possibly without foresight) : I'm still waiting for Mabinogi to reach European shores T_T

Originally posted by popinjay

 

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Originally posted by NeoDodge
In direct contrast, AION offers so many options at the creation screen; you'd be hard pressed to find another game that enables players to create a truly unique character.
Erm. Really. All trolling aside. Coming from a Managing Editor of a site called "MMORPG.com", that statement is a surprising denial of existence of at least two major MMOs out there for 5 years, and one that will surely come out before Aion does...
I'm speaking of City of Heroes/Villains, EVE Online and Champions Online here. I may be stretching it as far as EVE is concerned -and then again "walking in stations" may multiply the customisation options by ten sliders for all I know- but really, you should give CoH's character editor a try. You CAN make a pixie, an elf or a dwarf too ! And thousands of other things more, may I add. And I hear Champions' editor is devilishly more thorough on this.
Sorry about the "rant". It's somewhat off topic given the title of the article, but then the same title does not invite the kind of generalization that triggered my CoH-fan mutant genes.

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Aion character customization. As good as COH is, this is way better.

 

See for yourself.

Note that I don't deny the fact that Aion may offer one to ten truckloads of options more than what CoH has (Having been only mildly interested in Aion up till now, I actually had no idea and must thank you for enlightening me on this, though). I was just pointing at an "inaccurate" statement. Let's sum it up this way : "Quality or quantity aside, there ARE other games that enable players to create a truly unique character, and those aren't all that hard to find". Hell, with enough refreshes, I could probably shoot a screen of the article with ads of both EVE and CoH just next to it !

Oh, and sorry about the author/editor confusion. Didn't know the poster wasn't the writer ^_^'

[EDIT as the post quoted hereafter was posted while I was writing my answer. Anyone knows how to make a quote block, btw ?]

[quote]Well i have to say is "WTF are you smoking dude?" In no way is Champions Online customabitlity any way better than Aion's. First off Champions Online is cell shading which does make it look better than City of Heroes/City of Villians but in no way even compares to what Aion looks like. If you can compare them, then list the differences.[/quote]

May I "WTF?" you back ? I honestly see no obvious relation between customizability and cel shading. Semantics aside, well, I have no video nor first hand experience to back it, of course, but please read the article I linked to. It has a list of customization points which you will find informative (if your objective was to actually have a constructive argument in the first place).

I will add that it has recently been announced that players of Champions will be given the option of turning said cel-shading off. The resulting graphic quality will remain subject to personal tastes, but that fact kind of invalidate your statement.

In direct contrast, AION offers so many options at the creation screen; you'd be hard pressed to find another game that enables players to create a truly unique character.

Erm. Really. All trolling aside. Coming from a Managing Editor of a site called "MMORPG.com", that statement is a surprising denial of existence of at least two major MMOs out there for 5 years, and one that will surely come out before Aion does...

I'm speaking of City of Heroes/Villains, EVE Online and Champions Online here. I may be stretching it as far as EVE is concerned -and then again "walking in stations" may multiply the customisation options by ten sliders for all I know- but really, you should give CoH's character editor a try. You CAN make a pixie, an elf or a dwarf too ! And thousands of other things more, may I add. And I hear Champions' editor is devilishly more thorough on this.

Sorry about the "rant". It's somewhat off topic given the title of the article, but then the same title does not invite the kind of generalization that triggered my CoH-fan mutant genes.

Originally posted by Elikal

Originally posted by Milky

I really wan't that all impressed with it.  Kinda turned me off the game really.  The gameplay along with the graphics seemed to be outdated.  Looked like CoX just with more open, outdoor enviornments.

 

Yeah just what I thought. I mean the cel-share looks cool with the characters close up, but the landscapes look like from EQ2 lanch days or even DAOC. Landscapes are really awfully simplistic, given all the detail I got used from LOTRO and AoC and the like by now. Really looks like falling a decade back or so.

But then again, and that's one of the reasons World of warcraft (whch I personnally don't play) has managed to retain so many players, YOU DON'T NEED NO EFFING SUPERCOMPUTER TO PLAY IT !

Just as some other poster said, I'll take style against polycount anytime, cause I can't afford to buy a new computer every time a new so-called AAA title is released.

Besides, I suggest you take a look at games a decade old, see if the detail level is anything close to this. People seem to forget how quick the graphics technologies have evolved these last few years...

 Multibuilds, definitely. Double the flexibility (double the influence cost, too ), and definitely helps varying the experiences, too.

 Heh. I believe the issue is being adressed, if somewhat indirectly, through the upcoming Issue.

I'm pretty sure we'll see some wonderful stories written by our most devoted roleplayers when the Architect comes out. Maybe that'll never make up for the lack of "professional story-writer", but I'm ready to bet that we have some talented guys just waiting for the tools to be released to drown us in an epic tale of superhero adventuring !

Honestly, this game is probably one of the best to quit and return to three or six months later. With the "Issues" model, you will always have somthing new to try as they add new features and powersets and tweak the game somewhat regularly.

nope, you had to have an active account by the 21st apparently.

Originally posted by Amarsir

 

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Originally poseted by NeoDodge
The second use I see to this was whispered to me by my "greedy motherf*ck*r" persona : materials farming. Low level materials are always in demand by high level players. I've seen lucky charms, first tier whites my low level toons loot by the dozen, sell for 10K apiece (on Vigilance, CoH EU). A profitable source of revenue that goes down the drain once you don't fight the corresponding mobs anymore. Cap a toon at lv 15 and reap to your heart's content.

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Yeah but at 50 you make 10k per LT kill.
And that's the outlier with Luck Charm (which is valuable because it's in basic Accuracy recipes, and lowbies hate Magic enemies.) Generally speaking low stuff isn't worth much. Even the rare salvage barely sells for 5-10k.

 

Mid-level salvage is actually a much hotter spot, especially arcane stuff. It's not as high now as it has been, but Alchemical Silver has frequently been over 50k each, with Masterwork Weapons frequently getting up there. And again, you get more reward per kill directly too.

Your RP reason I can't disagree with. But anyone intentionally staying low to make money should check their math. (One exception might be staying below 30 or below 40 to get rare Proc drops, but even that I think isn't long-run efficient.)

 

 

Oh. Right. Thanks for pointing that out, this will spare me the hours of play it would have taken me to figure it out by myself

Well, at least you can still collect them and give them out to your SG 

I say we extend the concept. Being quite the badge hound, I'd love to see something like a "Protector of Atlas Park" badge for having busted 50 mundanes in the zone, stuff like that. With the possibility of badge-triggered missions on top of it, we have a winner, I say.

Holds the Pen with both hands wide open over his head while a catchy fanfare resounds in the background

Now all I have to do is find the Papyrus and the Precious Pearl of Pan and the way to the castle will be open !

Originally posted by GungaDin

Lord British moving on?  UO 2 FTW !!!!

Well, it looks more like "Lord British moving on from making games forever" apparently. Though I'd love to see UO2.

I guess it takes some lateral thinking to imagine what I'm about to point, but hey, I'm a fan of wackiness and bizarre ideas to begin with, just go with me for a while.

In the Comicverse, you have heroes for every threat. Be it the thugs at the corner of the street and small time robbers or planet-eating exotic-though-oddly-humanoid forms of life. Spiderman beats your average street mob every day for breakfast while the fantastic four don't give a sh*t about'em. So there you have your first reason to cap yourself. Get past level 20 and you never get to fight those street-level minions and lesser Supers again. Any supporter of roleplaying could see an opportunity in being given the possibility of being and staying a street-level Hero / Villain. Though the counterpart would be that for complete harmony of the schema, actual "cosmic monster fighting" heroes generally don't get through some street mob fighting phase before they become some überpowered destruction machine, and translating that to the MMO would mean allowing characters to start off at any level they'd see fit to their role. Maybe an option for the future ? Doesn't sound so insane to me (but maybe allow it only for players who have a lv 50 toon in the first place).

The second use I see to this was whispered to me by my "greedy motherf*ck*r" persona : materials farming. Low level materials are always in demand by high level players. I've seen lucky charms, first tier whites my low level toons loot by the dozen, sell for 10K apiece (on Vigilance, CoH EU). A profitable source of revenue that goes down the drain once you don't fight the corresponding mobs anymore. Cap a toon at lv 15 and reap to your heart's content.

There. Hope my somehow bent point of view was of use to anyone 

Originally posted by Bob_Blawblaw

Originally posted by Ludwix

"To thank our loyal Tabula Rasa fans we've prepared a little closing down gift. Any active paying player as of 10:00 AM Pacific Time on November 21st, 2008 will be eligible for all of the following:

* 3 free months of City of Heroes including digital client
* 3 free months of Lineage II including digital client
* Aion beta access (coming soon)
* Aion pre-order access (available in 2009)
* 1 free month of Aion including digital client (available in 2009)"

 

Hmmm these are some nice features/gifts, best connected with TR so far tbh. :P:P:P

 

Funny story.

Bought Auto Assault in the Futureshop (Canadian Best Buy) bargain bin for $5 one day... waited about a year to get around to installing it. A week later, it was announced that it was done. As a consolation gift, NC Soft gave out free Tabula Rosa games and COV/H games for free.

I didn't bother installing TR until about two weeks ago... now this, and I now qualify for 3 months of COV/H, Lineage 2, and this beta stuff.

I'd say that original $5 has gone a pretty long way!

I say you never install CoH or Aion for all of our sakes as gamers  (no, I don't care about Lineage 2)