And the mask comes off.

[Goddangit]

This makes me feel a lot better at my many, many failed attempts at playing a Blaster. I just couldn't ever get them off the ground.

I sort of went with it by creating Captain Incompetent, an electric blaster.  When he would faceplant I'd start commenting on the floor.  "This tastes like Johnson's Wax!" or "I do believe this is Scotchgard carpet!"  Sometimes its fun to embrace the suck.

[Arcana]

I would say that this paragraph is pretty darn vague.

It actually isn't.

You acknowledge, and further agree, that You have no IP right related to any Account ID, any NCsoft Message Board ID, any communication or information on any NCsoft Message Board provided by You or anyone else, any information, feedback or communication related to the Game, any Character ID or characteristics related to a Character ID, any combination of the foregoing or parts thereof, or any combination of the foregoing with any Service, Content, Software, or parts thereof.

I claim I have no rights to anything I made in the game.

To the extent You may claim any such IP right(s), You hereby grant NCsoft a worldwide, non-exclusive, no-charge, royalty-free, sub-licensable, perpetual and irrevocable license and full authorization to exercise all rights of any kind or nature associated with such IP right(s), and all ancillary and subsidiary rights thereto, in any languages and media now known or not currently known.

Except, if I do have such rights, then I grant NCSoft a license to do whatever they want with what I own, although I still own it (non-exclusive means NCSoft isn't preventing others, like me, from using it).

It sounds confusing if you don't know copyright law.  In the US, copyright law runs on the principle of "copyright at birth."  That means in the past, if you wanted to assert copyright on something you made you had to file for copyright, like applying for a patent.  But when the Copyright Act was drafted, that changed so that by US law, the creator of something instantly gains copyright protection at the moment of creation.  Its not a right they have to ask for or assert.  The moment I made Lady Arcana in City of Heroes, I owned that character.  Had I been an employee of Cryptic, my employment contract could have said "any character you make in the game is considered work for hire and owned by Cryptic."  That's legal in the US: NCSoft would currently own that character (and why it owns every single thing every single devs added to the game, including characters).

But, because I was not an employee, they cannot just stick something in the EULA that says "anything you make when you play the game we own."  In fact, I think the EULA *used* to say something like that, and they changed it to what you quoted.  Why?  17US204a, aka the copyright transfer clause:

A transfer of copyright ownership, other than by operation of law, is not valid unless an instrument of conveyance, or a note or memorandum of the transfer, is in writing and signed by the owner of the rights conveyed or such owner's duly authorized agent.

Copyright law was changed partially to protect creators from what was seen as significant overreach by third parties in trying to take control of copyright.  There was a lot of "implied" ownership going around that was disputed.  This clause was intended to clarify that you can't transfer ownership by handshake.  You must draft a document that explicitly transfers ownership, and both sides must explicitly sign it. No "while you are sitting in Starbucks you agree anything you write on the premises we own."

So I do have IP rights; in fact I can't disavow them.  I can assign them to the public domain, but I can't just give them up automatically.  So because I do (in the US), NCSoft must ask for a license to use them, because they can't own them.  They can't ask for an exclusive license because legal precedent states that asking for an exclusive license is tantamount to asking for ownership, and so nice try.  So they ask for a non-exclusive license, but one that tries to assert they can do literally anything to your work at any time for any reason in any context.  You can still assert ownership rights, but you can't stop them from using your characters.

[LaughingAlex]

I sort of went with it by creating Captain Incompetent, an electric blaster.  When he would faceplant I'd start commenting on the floor.  "This tastes like Johnson's Wax!" or "I do believe this is Scotchgard carpet!"  Sometimes its fun to embrace the suck.

I really wanted to sometime make a redshirt character in city of heroes(making a redshirt in star trek online would be pointless), who died every mission after making some comment that usually preceded a quick cannon-fodder death.  Especially when someone had vengeance.

[Arcana]

I sort of went with it by creating Captain Incompetent, an electric blaster.  When he would faceplant I'd start commenting on the floor.  "This tastes like Johnson's Wax!" or "I do believe this is Scotchgard carpet!"  Sometimes its fun to embrace the suck.

On more than one occasion I suggested, not entirely jokingly, that Soul Transfer should be the Blaster inherent.  Would have made playing blasters a lot more fun for a lot more people I think.

[skoogmik]

Hey guys,

Have you seen the latest from Angelus Animi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTWXcAsMHo

[darkgob]

My first character was an Electric/Electric Blaster.  Regardless of what powers I took and how I slotted him (and even after I finally managed to get him to 50+1 - the game closed before I could get him any further), he was the weakest character I had, in terms of both damage output and survivability.  Even playing him on the Beta server for a while (which included a respec to give him powers from Sorcery) was only a marginal improvement.  He could barely handle x1/+0, and by the end I had him at x1/-1 (with Bosses turned off).

And, again, it's not like he was on SOs.  I had loads of IO sets, and my main attacks were all six-slotted.  I had, at some points, Tough and Weave and Charged Armor.  But nothing helped.  He was weak and fragile regardless of what I did.  He was so terrible that I never made another Blaster ever again.

So maybe one purpled-out Rad/Fire was decent, but I don't think that it means Blasters as a whole were decent.

Although I don't disagree with your sentiment, not being able to handle x1/+0 on a 50+1 IO'd Elec^3 Blaster (after the I24 buffs) is...kinda bad.  I always felt weak on my Elec^3, but I could certainly handle more than x1/+0 (I never got the chance to try him on I24 Beta :'().

[Azrael]

There's a reason that a lot of people liked playing CoH, a reason that even the original developers achieved by accident and didn't fully understand. The more you tinker, the more you risk accidentally removing that reason.

Words of wisdom.

The 'lightning in a bottle' captured nature of CoH's original development is true.  So much so, Cryptic couldn't replicate the 'Golden Goose' with Champions.

The gods had spoken.

Azrael.

PS.  As for blasters...a water blaster was sheer poetry.  No end drop novas...rinse and repeat fast recharge...and water corkscrew healing DoT?

*Be still his heart...*a flutter.

...now all we needed was those insta snipes...and revisions to all the other blaster sets...

...imagine having deflection or insulation shields as epic choices?

No you say?

Only like the charmed lives Scrappers had...

[Shadowe]

Hey guys,

Have you seen the latest from Angelus Animi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTWXcAsMHo

Niiiiiiiice!  ;D

[Azrael]

Brute.

+4, x8.

SS/Shield.

Game over.

Quick.  Devastating.  Well.  Against Council anyhow... :D

Azrael.

[BadWolf]

I think I tried +4/x8 with my FF/Bots MM once, but I found it too slow. I had survivability, but each group took forever. Give me +1/x8 and speed. :)

[brothermutant]

Mine was a Dark/Elec Brut and a Dark/SD Tank for solo fun. The Dark/SD was my lame attempt to do damage equal to my head of the league's SS/Fire Tank, BY-TOR. He could melt stuff so fast, it was insane. I thought the dmg buff from shield and the one for Soul Drain, plus all my def and minus def attacks would turn me into a killin machine, but only did well against the low spawns (minions to lts only). Anything higher than lts and it took forever to kill one. Still, I did survive like no one's business.

The Dark/Elec brute got better once I got the right IO sets in him. Otherwise his def was piss poor. He could really shine against anything doing S/L/E dmg though, and once they upped the elec armor set to get energize (?), my healin was amazing and so was the power cost of all those toggles.

Ah, good times.  ;)

[Pearl Dragon]

Hey guys,

Have you seen the latest from Angelus Animi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTWXcAsMHo

Fantastic! Angelus Animi, your videos are enjoyed by our whole family, and make us feel much closer to the game.  Now can you make a Halloween video? ;)

[Nyghtshade]

Fantastic! Angelus Animi, your videos are enjoyed by our whole family, and make us feel much closer to the game.  Now can you make a Halloween video? ;)

I love this video so much!  I laughed out loud when I saw Faathim dancing outside the Pocket D window.   ;D

[gypsyav]

I love this video so much!  I laughed out loud when I saw Faathim dancing outside the Pocket D window.   ;D

Now I have to go back and watch it again. I missed that. LOL

[Battlechimp]

Although I don't disagree with your sentiment, not being able to handle x1/+0 on a 50+1 IO'd Elec^3 Blaster (after the I24 buffs) is...kinda bad.  I always felt weak on my Elec^3, but I could certainly handle more than x1/+0 (I never got the chance to try him on I24 Beta :'().

On the other side of the coin, I had a elec^3 blaster I was running +1 or +2/x8 even before becoming incarnate.  And my IO build, I'd call a bit haphazard.  I was lazy when IOs came out so my build was "what sort of sets can I fit in for some decent bonuses without requiring me to respec. And then there's also I tend to lean more towards concept over build.  So I did things like every attack that could take it, I put in the stun proc from the end mod set (can't remember the name off hand).  And with elec^3 that's almost every single attack :)

I remember running in a SG team, and after running a few missions, someone wanted to see what a farm mission was like since they hadn't done one before. One person had one, so we went in, the majority the team never having experienced one before.  Lots of death. I was on a low level def at the time (not even able to slot DOs yet)  I said I was going to bring on some who was a bit more durable.  Came back with my elec blaster. First comment I saw when I reentered the mission' "You wanted someone more durable and you got a blaster?"

Short circuit + power sink + ball lightning, everything was down to brawl.  After mowing through a few groups, I got the comment "OK, you weren't kidding about the more durable thing"

It is all anecdotal, everyone has a story of where they couldn't do something with one type of character, followed by someone who says they were a killing machine, a lot comes down to personal okay style and interest.  Like, I never could get the hang of playing a Kheld. Which of course means, someone will come along saying something like  "I soloed the AVs in the STF with my PB!" :)

[Ankhammon]

On the other side of the coin, I had a elec^3 blaster I was running +1 or +2/x8 even before becoming incarnate.  And my IO build, I'd call a bit haphazard.  I was lazy when IOs came out so my build was "what sort of sets can I fit in for some decent bonuses without requiring me to respec. And then there's also I tend to lean more towards concept over build.  So I did things like every attack that could take it, I put in the stun proc from the end mod set (can't remember the name off hand).  And with elec^3 that's almost every single attack :)

I remember running in a SG team, and after running a few missions, someone wanted to see what a farm mission was like since they hadn't done one before. One person had one, so we went in, the majority the team never having experienced one before.  Lots of death. I was on a low level def at the time (not even able to slot DOs yet)  I said I was going to bring on some who was a bit more durable.  Came back with my elec blaster. First comment I saw when I reentered the mission' "You wanted someone more durable and you got a blaster?"

Short circuit + power sink + ball lightning, everything was down to brawl.  After mowing through a few groups, I got the comment "OK, you weren't kidding about the more durable thing"

It is all anecdotal, everyone has a story of where they couldn't do something with one type of character, followed by someone who says they were a killing machine, a lot comes down to personal okay style and interest.  Like, I never could get the hang of playing a Kheld. Which of course means, someone will come along saying something like  "I soloed the AVs in the STF with my PB!" :)

So awesome when someone does something uncommon with a build and turns it into a surprise.

[Rejolt]

On the other side of the coin, I had a elec^3 blaster I was running +1 or +2/x8 even before becoming incarnate.  And my IO build, I'd call a bit haphazard.  I was lazy when IOs came out so my build was "what sort of sets can I fit in for some decent bonuses without requiring me to respec. And then there's also I tend to lean more towards concept over build.  So I did things like every attack that could take it, I put in the stun proc from the end mod set (can't remember the name off hand).  And with elec^3 that's almost every single attack :)

I remember running in a SG team, and after running a few missions, someone wanted to see what a farm mission was like since they hadn't done one before. One person had one, so we went in, the majority the team never having experienced one before.  Lots of death. I was on a low level def at the time (not even able to slot DOs yet)  I said I was going to bring on some who was a bit more durable.  Came back with my elec blaster. First comment I saw when I reentered the mission' "You wanted someone more durable and you got a blaster?"

Short circuit + power sink + ball lightning, everything was down to brawl.  After mowing through a few groups, I got the comment "OK, you weren't kidding about the more durable thing"

It is all anecdotal, everyone has a story of where they couldn't do something with one type of character, followed by someone who says they were a killing machine, a lot comes down to personal okay style and interest.  Like, I never could get the hang of playing a Kheld. Which of course means, someone will come along saying something like  "I soloed the AVs in the STF with my PB!" :)

Hail, electric brother!

Ahem. Remember when you could six slot short circuit with drains (math was a full drain of +1s, +2s took ball lightning on top of that) and was already inherently accurate? I used to map sweep freakshow in the back of Creys Folley. I found out later I was doing extra damage to them! Yeah, I'm observant.

[Goddangit]

Hey guys,

Have you seen the latest from Angelus Animi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTWXcAsMHo

Funny!

[Power Gamer]

Funny!

Funny and filling me with anticipation!

[Ultimate15]

Hey guys,

Have you seen the latest from Angelus Animi?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTWXcAsMHo

...Seriously, what a flipping epic video. I can't stop watching these, lol. Do we know if this Angelus player has lurked around these forums some? I want to give them an e-shake. Well done. Well done indeed.

Ugh. Are we there yet?  ;)