The long, long, long awaited for Issue #7 Manifest Destiny is now on live servers. However, it is impossible to get on right now as they are, of course, experiencing "technical difficulties" (a term which NCSoft is getting trademarked with their logo). I'll probably wait until the weekend to log in.

Also, there is a new Prima Guide for CoH/CoV now on the streets. You can get a free Adobe Acrobat download of the guide and for $6.99, you can order a special three-ring binder to put it in (once you buy a three-hole punch for the printout).

Find the new Prima Guide HERE.

The three-ring binder can be found HERE (Note: Click on the binder to go to the order page).

Any word on whether the Prima guide has the numbers on powers (damage, recharge, etc.)?

I just got done taking a look at it and surprisingly, it does. NCSoft has been worse than the government at keeping those a secret; yet, they are in the Prima Guide.

It also shows you what badges are in-game and the requirements for getting them, too (along with locations).

WoW, now that's impressive! Regardless of how they obtained the numbers, that's awesome (er...as long as they're accurate).

For those who may not be familiar with CoH/CoV : Cryptic had the numbers locked tighter than fort knox. Instead of releasing figures for the in game powers, you would see descriptions like : Medium Damage, Long Recharge. The frustrating thing was that these descriptions weren't always the most accurate and didn't necessarily translate from one power to the next (I've seen "medium damage" that was on par with "high damage", and "long" recharge timers that did not jibe with each other, etc...very long recharge might mean 3 minutes for one power and 24 for another...and that's on the same toon - uber frustrating at times ). If you really wanted to make an informed choice on power selection and slotting, you had to leave the game and start digging through the CoH/CoV forums for answers to your questions (posted by other gamers who ran hours of tests to try to figure out damage as well as recharge). Even if the Prima guide didn't have anything other that the actual numbers on the powers, i'd still say that it's not only a bargain, but also a must have. Hell, i might buy one just for old times sake (note: this DOES NOT mean that i'm reinstalling the game...sorry, Rob).

Let us know what you think of i7 when you're finally able to play

No need to buy it....the .pdf file is a free download. You could, of course, pay $6.99 for the binder but then again, you'll pay $200 in printer ink if you try to print that thing out.

currently downloading it on my three computers. now if i can only figure out what's wrong with my media center, i'll be back to playing my four accounts . ..

wonder if i can still take out an AV with my toons?

Only if you bring a few Rad controllers to the party.

Seems now that people are experiencing major, major difficulty in taking down GMs. Took over 25 heroes, plus Enochi, a total of 30 minutes to take down Jack in Irons in northern Croatoa the other day. Also, the signature AVs that are spawning in Recluse Victory is taking a minimum of 40 heroes just to defeat them.

I think I read somewhere that they multipled the regen rate of a lot of the AVs by a factor of six.

Yea, us.

Don't worry....this topic has the CoH boards on fire right now, more so than ED ever accomplished. This will be rolled back extremely quick.

Rob

The rule went from 25% to 10% of overall health.

For example, Kraken has 10,000 hit points. You or your team needs to do 1,000 points of damage. However, if while fighting him he regens 2,000 health points (making it 12,000 total), you or your team would have to do a minimum of 1,200.

Quote: Originally Posted by Rob Only if you bring a few Rad controllers to the party. Seems now that people are experiencing major, major difficulty in taking down GMs. Took over 25 heroes, plus Enochi, a total of 30 minutes to take down Jack in Irons in northern Croatoa the other day. Also, the signature AVs that are spawning in Recluse Victory is taking a minimum of 40 heroes just to defeat them. I think I read somewhere that they multipled the regen rate of a lot of the AVs by a factor of six. Yea, us. Don't worry....this topic has the CoH boards on fire right now, more so than ED ever accomplished. This will be rolled back extremely quick. Rob

I've been diging through the CoH forums and reading the posts about i7...so in essence, after the massive rebalancing in i5 and i6, and including the changes made since then, they still are trying to balance PVE?!?

If some of these posts are accurate, then while doing an AV chain, you could have the mission difficulty cranked for the non-AV missions, but when you get to the AV mish, you'd have to turn down the difficulty slider for that mission. This would result in a cakewalk through all of the minions, but a stalemate at the AV. Is this accurate? If this is the case, then they just broke the hell out of PVE mission difficulty scaling in certain situations.

I think what happened is that they forgot all about the AVs that spawn inside missions and was thinking solely of the ones that are spawning in Recluse's Victory. They wanted a team of more than 12 to be able to take them down but when they wrote the code, they forgot that "except for mission AVs" part.

Also, they've complained for two years over at those boards to institute a zone-wide event (with the exception of Hami). I think that they just took the shortcut and changed the GMs to make it a zone-wide event.

However, in doing so, they violated one of their core principles....that no one AT would ever be absoultey necessary in order to play the game. Now, if you don't have a couple of -regen heroes on your team, you might as well forget running any AV door missions.

Looks like it's even worse than that...Rad -regen seems to be vastly more effective than the other -regen classes. What's even worse is that 500 posts of the now 1500+ on this subject were made while i7 was still on test. This is a game breaking issue for lvl 40+ toons. All i can say is wow...just wow

That's pretty much what everyone is saying. I had posted in the Test Server thread saying that if this thing goes live, no one is going to be able to play against them.

Yeah, Rad trollers are going to be the 'in-thing' now....think I'll go roll one tonight and see how many team invites I get...:geek:

Quote: Originally Posted by Bubby That's pretty much what everyone is saying. I had posted in the Test Server thread saying that if this thing goes live, no one is going to be able to play against them. Yeah, Rad trollers are going to be the 'in-thing' now....think I'll go roll one tonight and see how many team invites I get...:geek:

Bwahaha...you could call it "research" for the powerlevelling poll

PS
thanks for turning me on to that thread...it's immensely fun to read it (only because i don't have any toons that this effects )

Come on....you know you've got a secret, deep, dark desire to return to "City of Heroes"....

hahahahah...i7 has reminded me why i quit in the first place
Come, Rob....join the darkside that is WoW. I'll hook you up with all of the swanky addons that you'll ever need! (just in time for the 1.11 patch to break the hell out of all of them :sneaky: )

Seriously, though...after what they've done to the game, and after playing an MMO that does have crafting professions and a ton of stuff to do other than just grind, it just ain't gonna happen...i really like the loot based system in WoW, and i really detest what the devs have done and continue to do to COx (sorry, bro )

Heh I haven't played CoH much ever since my media PC stopped running (still have yet to figure out why . ..). Just managed the SG and a few other things but I've been playing guild wars for the past three weeks. Now with that game, its annoying to get a team together because you absolutely have to have monks on your team for any mission . ..
Think I'll come back to CoH and see how it goes. Lucky for me, the two fire/kins and the earth/rad I use all have -regen so hopefully that will be enough to take one down. I'll have to see this saturday after my finals.

One of the game designers, _Castle_, just posted (about half way down page 182):

"Just an FYI, we're going back and retesting the AV changes over the next couple work days. Based on that we will almost certainly be making some changes. "

You know, I actually almost agree with making the AVs and GMs outside of missions (with the exception of the Kronos spawn) nearly impossible to beat.

What I don't agree with is the absolute requirement that a couple of -regen toons are needed and the pathetic XP that you earn as a result. Yeah, you get a badge but so what? You only get the badge once.

Here's what they should do...

Crank the -regen rate down to a .4, lessen the effect of -regen on the GM, give out an insane amount of XP (anywhere from five to 10 times what it is giving now), and perhaps a temp power drop. I guarentee that you'll have dozens of folks running to Indy Port with chopsticks in hand for a little sushi. Who knows? Maybe even throw in an accolade that gives a bonus.

With the changes we've got now, they went in opposite directions. Impossible to beat and very little reward. I'm glad that Castle made that announcement. This has had a bigger effect on the game than I5/ED ever did.

The sad thing is that this the second time that they've tried a move of this nature (first was in i3 with the Boss Buff). Sometimes they get things really right, but then the other shoe always seems to drop.

Quote: Originally Posted by droeblek9 The sad thing is that this the second time that they've tried a move of this nature (first was in i3 with the Boss Buff). Sometimes they get things really right, but then the other shoe always seems to drop.

I think the failure happened when they decided to use their own "special" toons in testing this new move. Yeah, if I had access to powersets that they have, I'm sure that I would have kicked some butt, too. After all, Positron's "special" power pool is.....you guessed it, radiation.

They should be forced to play a couple of hours every week with a normal toon in a PUG. Maybe that would open their eyes somewhat.....but I doubt it.