New efforts!

[Goddangit]

PLEASE  EXCUSE THIS RANT...

[...snip...]

  This was the CONCEPT.. The build was around the concept.. The costume choices around the concept. The power choices around the concept.

  Its about the loss of a labor of love. Its about the loss of something special to me...

  So forgive me if I dont want to start over.. I will if I have to.. but dont call me greedy.. or selfish... or anything else because I would rather play with the creations that gave me a sense of satisfaction, joy and accomplishment..

   And please dont assume that because a certain character MIGHT have what you might consider a super IO'd crazy influence build that I am any less a player, and less of a concept builder and any less a member of the community..

[...snip...]

  Well I think my rant is over.. and thats all out my system... yeah.. I can breathe easier now..

     Thank you for your time and your support..

Great rant.  Glad you got it off your chest.  Only snipped for brevity and a central point.

There's room enough in this game for people to play however they like.  I usually did concept builds.  Yes, I could have picked better power sets in some cases, but it wouldn't have fit the concept.  My first costume for my namesake, someone laughed and said, "He looks like a construction worker!"  I said, "Thank you.  That's what I was going for."  The guy just got super powers that he's learning to use.  He doesn't have a flashy costume; just what he had on hand.  The flashy stuff comes later, after a trip to Icon.

I was always irritated by people picking apart my builds and offering unsolicited advice because I wasn't doing it "right".  I don't care how YOU play the game.  I only want that courtesy returned. 

[edit for typo]

[Super Firebug]

(snip)
My first costume for my namesake, someone laughed and said, "He looks like a construction worker!"  I said, "Thank you.  That's what I was going for."  The guy just got super powers that he's learning to use.  He doesn't have a flashy costume; just what he had on hand.  The flashy stuff comes later, after a trip to Icon.
(snip)

Sounds like my earth dom, a construction worker who'd accidentally gotten his powers when it turned out that a construction site harbored illegally-dumped medical waste. I was always irked that passer-by NPCs could have a real construction-worker hardhat, and my earth-mover couldn't. (That was one of my big costume gripes. Another was the lack of a cloth trenchcoat for my private eye; the leather one just looked wrong).

[Remidi]

PLEASE  EXCUSE THIS RANT...

  There is something that I feel needs to be said. Maybe its just bothering me personally but I have to get it off my chest. There is a sentiment not just here, but extending back to the game itself, the original forums, the Facebook pages etc etc that the "people" who made fully IO'd builds were all min/max people who didnt enjoy playing the game, but were these people who were only chasing numbers. Somehow there STILL exists this underlying premise that if you actually enjoyed PLAYING the game then you wouldn't mind starting over.

I understand you completely. All of my characters had stories.  They were all people.  I am a writer (semi-pro) and I adore creating characters that are as real as possible.  I had so many secret identities.  I had a middle-aged science teacher, a medical student whose father was disappointed he didn't get a football scholarship, a secretary secretly part of a mystic cabal, a soldier gone rogue, the spirit of an angry murder victim, a cute fairy that shot fire, and so forth.  So even though I spent a huge amount of time at Wentworth's, it was all in service to my character concepts.  For instance, my main was an emp/energy that I had IO'd in just the right way to make her awesome for both teaming and solo.  Her recharge was breathtaking.  (*sniff*).  So I want her back, because I spent a lot of time and effort making her stats fit the concept I had for her.

[Sullster]

I'd be ok with starting over with new characters. Rebuilding old favorites would give me more to do. After all, COH was more about the journey than the destination.

This!!!

As much as I would support acquiring the access to my fully kitted out main and alts for the 5 years I played it's not a priority for me, The Return of the Game IS!

I would happily re-roll my main and experience the journey again, happy with the notion that the game had returned.

[gypsyav]

I would vastly prefer being able to get my character data and account data back.

If I could pick one to get back, I would prefer my account data (vet and market unlocks, game edition codes, costume con codes, etc.). My characters can be recreated, half of the fun for me was making characters (that's why I had over 100 characters and only 5 50s - one of which was my ex's and another of which was PL'd via level pact). It would make me very, very sad to lose my account data. Very sad. I spent an embarrassing amount of money on City of Heroes. :-[

I would start over with nothing if it came down to it. And I'd spend money to get much of the account stuff back. But I would be very, very sad panda. :'(

This.

When I started playing CoH both my husband and I were working and we had a decent amount of disposable income for the game. At one point there were 3 fully paid subscriptions in my house, one for each of us. Our son's account probably had over half the costume packs released before Freedom. I think I had all but one of them on my account.

That's not to mention the costume packs/pieces I bought in the market. I know I didn't have all of them as I was using my stipend to purchase anything at that point.

And the reason for that was the company I worked for went out of business and we were down to one income. I'm still without work as my skill set was very specific to the company I worked for and anything more than a basic subscription would be hard for me to pull off. This would mean I wouldn't be able to recreate the costumes for a majority if not all my characters as I would no longer have the packs I purchased.

Is this a deal breaker for me? No, I'll still play even if I have to remember what my character's costumes looked like back when I first started playing, before any of the costume packs had been released. And I'll deal with losing all the anniversary badges from the first onward.

If only character data was available and no easy way to tie it to an account than I would be all for starting everyone over. And yes I do have the Sentinel+ files for every one of my characters but I realize the problems they could cause in a live game. I would rather have to rebuild my characters than have major glitches introduced to the game and screw it up for everyone.

[Felderburg]

I used to scour the AE for any and all Willy Wonka related arcs. I played them all. I miss them.

I laughed out loud at this. Not at you, just at the idea of searching for those particular arcs. It's so silly (in a whimsical or other similar positive synonym way).

Speak for yourself. I'll be disappointed if my characters are gone. If I can't get them back, then the time I spent building them up will have been wasted. I will have to think twice if I wish to recreate them and build them up a second time.

If the game doesn't come back, will that time still have been "wasted"? Or will you have gotten enjoyment out of it regardless?


Side note: It's pure coincidence I'm quoting two separate posts from the same person. They just happened to catch my eye.

[LaughingAlex]

I almost posted something that should have probably been on virtueverse just now, since people were speaking of character themes and all that.  Heh.

[Samuraiko]

I used to scour the AE for any and all Willy Wonka related arcs. I played them all. I miss them.

Now I have this mental image of Dr. Aeon singing "Pure Imagination..."

No, I am not making a video of it.

Crap.

Yes, I probably am.

GODSDAMNIT!

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

[FloatingFatMan]

Now I have this mental image of Dr. Aeon singing "Pure Imagination..."

No, I am not making a video of it.

Crap.

Yes, I probably am.

GODSDAMNIT!

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

Whoohoo!  This is a MUST SEE!

[Taceus Jiwede]

I loved Min/Maxing.  I always have in every game and every character.  Its what made me love my characters in CoH.  Always to be a little better but not for competition, for my self.  I wanted my character to be the polished gem I always wanted it to be.  I spent billions and billions of influence on my blaster.  Redoing my build, getting exactly the way I wanted it.  Slightly less energy used, slight more damage dealt.  It gave me a reason to always play my main and to always know it could be a little better.  Its not a pride thing or competition thing even I just wanted to keep growing, keep moving forward, always have a goal to reach.  I don't understand this hatred towards min/maxing.  I earned that influence, I spent hours and hours and hours getting hero merits, running task forces, getting accolades, crafting IO's or playing the market for sets.  What's so wrong about making your character the best it could possibly be?  Of course I want my characters to always be better, I expect it from my self to improve day by day I expect of my characters too.  I don't hate people who don't min/max, I don't think they ruin the game do what is fun to you.  So why is what we find fun so bad?

[Cinnder]

Based on Ironwolf and Codewalker's assertions that voicing our opinions here can help inform the buyers, I'll add my viewpoint.

I'm kinda with Codewalker on the importance of restoring our data.  If CoH comes back without all my chars, items, and vet rewards, I'll probably still play it, but only as a stop-gap till City of Titans comes out.  And I won't be willing to pay nearly as much as I used to as a long-time subber.

If they can by some miracle restore everything to the way it was at shutdown (and I know that's a longshot) then it's much more likely that I'll play CoH and CoT in parallel and be willing to pay for both.

Just my 2 inf.

[LaughingAlex]

Based on Ironwolf and Codewalker's assertions that voicing our opinions here can help inform the buyers, I'll add my viewpoint.

I'm kinda with Codewalker on the importance of restoring our data.  If CoH comes back without all my chars, items, and vet rewards, I'll probably still play it, but only as a stop-gap till City of Titans comes out.  And I won't be willing to pay nearly as much as I used to as a long-time subber.

If they can by some miracle restore everything to the way it was at shutdown (and I know that's a longshot) then it's much more likely that I'll play CoH and CoT in parallel and be willing to pay for both.

Just my 2 inf.

I do hope we do get our characters back to.  While I am fine with not getting my characters back, I do prefer ideally everyone does, if possible, get there characters back.  I hope I was clear on that earlier.

[CoyoteSeven]

If the game doesn't come back, will that time still have been "wasted"? Or will you have gotten enjoyment out of it regardless?

I am not going to re-build up my virtual sandcastles only to have them knocked down again later. You know how many purple and pvp sets I'd managed to collect among all my level 50 characters? My WP/DB Tank was totally awesome and had a spiffy costume to boot.

There's a reason why I made so, so many backups of the SC4 metropolises I created. Two gigs worth of add-ons. I wish it had been compiled as a 64-bit application. But that's another game.

<Sour_Bill>Not making the same mistake twice.</Sour_Bill>

[Minotaur]

If you're worried about the economy, you could even go as far as stripping influence or carried inventory (recipes and non-slotted enhancements) during the import process.

Yup, this would be the best way to go, simply strip the characters and award them an amount of influence equivalent to the number of slots x the most expensive type of standard enhancement they can use at their level (damage? TO/DO/SO) so they're playable.

[CaptainHonor]

I could care less about the data, been playing the game since 2004 and to be honest I just want the game back, characters can be rebuilt  and if you think NCSOF is handing account information and character data, keep dreaming.

To the team that is trying to get the game, thanks so much for trying to get us the city back and don't compromise that over data, I hope they are ignoring this thread and just focusing on getting the game back, because the greed in this thread is real.

[LaughingAlex]

I could care less about the data, been playing the game since 2004 and to be honest I just want the game back, characters can be rebuilt  and if you think NCSOF is handing account information and character data, keep dreaming.

To the team that is trying to get the game, thanks so much for trying to get us the city back and don't compromise that over data, I hope they are ignoring this thread and just focusing on getting the game back, because the greed in this thread is real.

I do agree getting the game back is a bigger priority over saving the characters in the big picture.  It really depends, know?

[CoyoteSeven]

To the team that is trying to get the game, thanks so much for trying to get us the city back and don't compromise that over data, I hope they are ignoring this thread and just focusing on getting the game back, because the greed in this thread is real.

That's nice. I'm greedy because I'd like to have all my stuff back, but you're all honor and purity because you just want the game back regardless. Like, grr, I must be evil for some reason. How about next time you not make yourself seem morally superior over a videogame somehow? Perhaps? Just a suggestion.

[DragonCommando]

I would vastly prefer being able to get my character data and account data back.

If I could pick one to get back, I would prefer my account data (vet and market unlocks, game edition codes, costume con codes, etc.).

+1

[FloatingFatMan]

I would like my characters back.
I would like my account data back.

Neither are a deal breaker for me.  I want the game back FAR FAR FAR more than I would like the other things.

[Odimodus]

I'm starting to think that if they do get old account data back and restore previous characters that we should have two servers, one for the old characters and things of value, and another for only newly rolled characters and vet rewards, non sellable stuff. Again, that's assuming they get the old account information.