Your mother was a hamster

In any game of a competitive nature there will always be some level of intimidation and taunting. This is perfectly fine. Psyching out your opponent is a long accepted tactic. It is ok to be upset when you lose and excited when you win. All of this in moderation though because when it becomes overused it falls squarely into the realm of Trash Talking.

What exactly is trash talking? Basically it is when another player has become annoyed with you for whatever reason and sends you messages to insult you. The reason could be any number of things. He could have just lost to you in a fight, been chased out of his hunting area, or maybe you simply did something he doesn’t like. Next thing you know you get this in your message box:

Rex tells you “man your such a loser”
Rex tells you “whats the matter cant beat me without a friend”
Rex tells you “I could have taken all of you out if i was buffed”
Rex tells you “hiding behind a tree is cheap”
Rex tells you “hey idiot im talking to you”
Rex tells you “hey idiot im talking to you”
Rex tells you “hey idiot im talking to you”
Rex tells you “hey idiot im talking to you”

Typical trash talk, complete with grammatical and spelling errors galore. Not all trash talk is going to look exactly like that. Sometimes it might be a lot worse and other times it might only be a single message. The universal concept is the same though. They feel bad about something and want to insult you.

If you trash talk, you are a loser, plain and simple. If you lost or got kicked out of an area then too bad, get over it. If you spam a bunch of insults it only makes you look like more of an idiot stick. Why don’t you instead turn that energy toward getting better so next time it won’t happen.

In the midst of a fight if you want to taunt your opponent then go right ahead. I personally don’t for a simple reason. The time spent typing a taunt or a response you should be using to attack or evade. I have gotten many kills because someone was typing when they should have been fighting. Ironically they will then trash talk you for killing them while they were typing because you know, I have a webcam on their desk that shows me when they are typing. A lot of the time people will trash talk about things they think are cheap mid fight. In AC, if you were to use a tree to deflect a War Magic Bolt and your opponent stops to call you a “tree whore” or any other random insult then that’s just trash talk.

Yes, I said tree whore. In fact in Asheron’s Call there is a great number of whore related trash talk. AC whores come in all varieties from gem whore to jumping whore to potion whore. I had one loser actually call me a healing whore. He was complaining that I was using health kits to heal myself. Later in the fight I was called a dodge whore because I was evading his war magic. I know it sounds ridiculous but there are players that do this.

A lot of misconception about trash talk is that it only occurs during or because of PvP and only from player killers. Much to my dismay I will admit that a fairly decent amount of PKs trash talk but it is definitely not restricted to only PKs. I have seen a great many carebears that trash talk quite a bit. Carebears will trash talk about a lot of different things. Mostly it will be because of kill stealing accusations or maybe doing something stupid in a group that got someone killed. But it really could be anything. Fact is though that carebears do there fair share of trash talk. Like it or not it is also safe to say they do more trash talking than the PK crowd does. Most people don’t notice when carebears trash talk because they themselves do it and don’t even realize it. When that noob pulls a con purple mob into your group and you start yelling at him. Guess what? That’s trash talk. As opposed to simply saying “Hey man please be more careful”.

The absolute worst kind of trash talk is the gloating trash talk. When you win a PvP battle or some other competition and you continually make fun of the other person. It’s not because of some inane sense of honor but for the simple reason that it makes you look like an idiot. If you win great, you got his items, gave him VP or whatever other reward there is. You just make your self look like an asshat if you have to send him a bunch of tells saying how bad he sucks. In certain situations I will say something like “Owned”, but when I say it I’m not sending that tell to the guy I just beat. Usually I will say it in local text (where he won’t see it because he just died) or as a tell to my friend to let him know what the outcome was. I won’t ever send a tell to the guy I just beat. I got his stuff, that’s enough for me.

How should you react when someone trash talks to you. Well there are really four ways you can react.

First is to report the person to the game’s moderators. This is the absolute worst thing you could ever do. It is the sign of a very weak player when he must resort to using GMs to solve a player-player interaction problem. As far as I’m concerned GMs should only be there to get you unstuck from places and take reports of bugged areas or features. Reporting someone is the epitome of carebearness.

Second is almost as bad. Responding to the trash talk. The guy sending you the messages is obviously an idiot. It is highly unlikely you can convince him to change his point of view or opinion of the situation. Have you ever heard the phrase “Arguing on the internet is like the special Olympics, even if you win you’re still retarded”? It applies to this option 100%.

Third is using the /ignore command. Most games have a built in ignore system. You usually type in something like “/ignore Rex” and you don’t have to worry about the guy anymore. This solves the problem for the most part unless he has friends. You may start getting tells from a few new people now trash talking you for using the /ignore command. You can now use /ignore on them but most MMOs have a limit to how many people you can have in your /ignore list.

The fourth and last option is to ignore them the old fashioned way. When they send you the messages don’t respond to them. It might be hard to resist the urge to reply and tell them how stupid they sound but this is by far the best option. Basically by not /ignoring them but not responding either you will actually beat them at their own game. They will keep sending you messages but since you are not replying the only thing they will accomplish is aggravating themselves. You aren’t giving them the reward of letting them antagonize you. They will probably pester you for a minute or two but will eventually stop when they get mad enough. Not only did you get them to stop but you pissed them off more in the process. Two birds with one stone.

Not replying to trash talk is actually a lot harder than some might think. I am pretty good at it but I will give in every now and again. Dread Lord Bill on the other hand is a master at that. Someone could trash talk like crazy and he won’t ever respond. If he does the entire response will be something like “meh” and that’s it. Another variation I do of option four is to reply to everything they send but only with something like this “…”. Just three periods and nothing else. That’s a good way to annoy them into stopping as well.

To sum up if you trash talk you are a loser. There are a few ways to get back at trash talkers and beat them at their own game. The misconception that only PKs are trash talkers is indisputably false.

Just remember:

Shut Up And Fight

Color me red

Well, I am no longer able to view sites that are game related. A not so cool web filter is now preventing me from viewing any and all gaming sites. I can still manage to get tidbits of information from other sites but I am going to miss out on alot of things.

One thing I did read about though is how Marvel is sueing NCSoft and Cryptic over the game City of Heroes. They claim that it allows players to to closely create copyrighted characters from the Marvel world. PvP Online makes a pretty good arguement about the whole subject. www.PvPOnline.com

Basically Marvel is going into buisness with those fucking morons at Vivendi and SOE. Despite the popularity of EQ, it is still a total POS game. Not to mention that Vivendi and SOE are the two worst companies in customer service to ever exist.

Marvel is trying to finacially hurt Cryptic and NCSoft so that when thier game comes out the competition will be alot weaker. COH just won game of the year and is still dominating in sales. It was number one in sales until it was dethroned by Doom 3. The new DVD edition is expected to do quite well.

I don't have much time to write but I will end on this note. I hope that when Marvel gets its game on the market, DC Comics sues the pants off of them the first time someone makes a DC clone character.

Shut Up And Fight

Dr. Strangelag Or: How I learned to Start Bitching and Hate my Computer

I bought my current PC back in April 2001. Now, granted it wasn't top of the line even then. It's a 1.2 GHz Athlon Thunderbird, and currently has 256 MB of PC-133 RAM and a GeForce3 Ti500. I know, the RAM is especially low, but for whatever reason, even with the latest motherboard BIOS loaded, I have strange lockup issues with sticks of 512. I can't even use one slot due to a strange problem I had over a year ago. I had one RAM module short out, and since then any module in that slot isn't recognized. Blah.

Anyway, as a college student working part time - I don't have the cash to upgrade. I could probably finagle something, but I'm a cheap bastard. So I've decided to bitch about something I'm greatly annoyed with.

I started playing Asheron's Call in 2000, but it was released in 1999. The original system specs for it was a Pentium 166 (or 133, not entirely sure but its not fast either way,) 32 MB RAM and optional 3D card. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't my computer STILL way above the system reqs? I know they've added a lot of content and made the game much larger, but the graphics engine hasn't really changed.

I have incredible video lag issues on Singularity Caul. I guess it's because there's so many textures and particle effects there. If I go into the central volcano, it becomes an unplayable slideshow. Even staying out of there, in some parts I can barely move. Since this happens to a lot of people, it's not a big issue.

But now when I go onto, say the Obsidian Plains, or even into the Sclavus Temple, I have to turn the graphics settings down to prevent the video lag. It gets infuriating to play a game from 1999 with a system much higher than the reqs and have such issues. Note that I can play some much more curremt games such as WarCraft III (I know it's two years old) with nary a hitch.

I guess it's just that Turbine has a really system intensive graphics engine, and doesn't know how to compress their textures very well. Maybe if anyone was left of the original team who had the slightest clue of how to use the code this wouldn't be such an issue. Then maybe I wouldn't have to turn the damn game on wireframe mode to play it decently (slight exaggeration). Then again, being the ignorant fuck that I am about programming maybe I should just shut the hell up. I'm just pissed.

Then there's those odd occasions (more and more common, though) where my computer refuses to load the operating system on bootup, and tells me that the "Operating System is not found." Yet if I hit the reset button, it loads without a problem. Ugh.

Somebody buy me a computer.

Support John Kerry?!

I understand that the main purpose of this blog is the concern of state of the MMOG. However, I find it difficult to simply stand by during this day of election. I have seen a good number of people concerned of the economy, at the hands of George W. Bush.

I admit that the current condition of the economy is not good. The major corporations are not willing to spend their money on the workers, thus vastly decreasing the purchasing power of the working and middle class. As a member of the working class, I greatly feel for those effected. I personally have virtually no savings for the future. Are the conservatives at fault? Absolutely not.

Witness NAFTA! Supported by Democrats, NAFTA allows corporations to send their work overseas, at the cost of the American workforce. The cost is cheaper for corporations to spend their money in the international market.

Kerry is not concerned for the American worker. He represents a force which is more concerned with the state of the world. Invade Iraq with a supposed "World Coalition?" Shouldn't we be more concerned with the state of our own nation?

Bush is concerned with tax cuts to the rich? News flash, people. The rich already pay most our our taxes. Tax cuts benefit everybody, from our richest to our poorest, who barely pay taxes as it is.

Kerry has promised NOTHING. His statements land on boths sides of every issue. He is afraid to take a stand on ANYTHING where the results have yet to be seen through.

The main issue here is with the economy. Blame Bush for the current recession, and you refuse to recognize the past. Our mid-nineties boon was based primarily upon tech stocks. Love or hate Microsoft - Clinton's lawsuit against them (Damn Janet Reno!) had a HUGE impact upon tech stocks. When Microsoft's stock went down, so did virtually every tech stock connected to it. Thus our economy declined. Was this Bush's fault? A resounding NO! Clinton begain this behavior, while the shortsighted American public blamed it on Bush's administration.

The economy of US is more reponsive upon actions of the Federal Reserve. Blame Greenspan before you blame Bush. But even Greenspan has a number of years before his policy has an impact upon the American economy.

If you are voting on the basis of the Iraq war, note that Kerry is not going to end it- rather to continue the campaign as he sees fit. You want our boys/girls home? Better to stick with someone willing to give our soldiers the means to survive, rather than Kerry's vote to deprive them of $87 billion to survive and continue.

Let it also be noted that Clinton began a campaign against Hussein, a campaign that would have ended in war - since Hussein decided to oppose every UN resolution upon his regime. Essentially, the US was going to be forced to take this type of action regardless of Republican/Democratic leadership. Kerry is not our way "Out." He doesn't even claim to be.

As such, I'd like to exclaim my support for our troops. Their bravery has surpassed mine or anyone else who inhabits this country without being in the military.

Dread Lord Bill.

Clap On, Clap Off: The Complete Guide To Toggles 1.0

Introduction

In City of Heroes there are three different kinds of powers, click powers, static powers and toggle powers. This guide will be addressing the toggle powers. As of 28-Oct-04 all the data in this guide is correct. However be aware that Cryptic might change some of the values in future patches. I will try to update this guide as new information becomes available.

I have never played CoH as the situation I am in prevents that. However I will buy it and play it feverously when I get back to the good ol’ U S of A. The math used to calculate the power functionality and the hidden complexity of the character creation and template design is what draws me to CoH. I have made dozens of templates for my future characters. To maximize the potential of my characters I needed to know how to calculate toggle costs. After a week or so of research I found all the information I needed. I now present that information for others to use.

Contents

What is a toggle
Managing your toggles
Combat support
Toggle power and recovery numbers

What is a toggle

Toggle - A power that does not have a duration time. It will continually drain a small amount of endurance until it is shut off. A toggle may be shut off manually or will shut of automatically if the player runs out of endurance, is hit with a toggle stopping status effect (Hold, Disorient, Sleep), or the target mob is killed. The cost of a toggle is measured in an endurance per second drain.

Endurance Per Second (EPS) – Amount of endurance lost or gained on a by second basis.

Managing your toggles

A toggle is nothing more than a power that stays on. Instead of draining a certain amount of endurance when used, it slowly drains endurance while it is activated. You can run many toggles at once but doing so may cause a hindrance to your EPS gain. In fact if you run to many you won’t gain any endurance at all and will lose endurance. The combined EPS loss of all your toggles will be referred to as total drain.

The natural recovery rate for all players is 1.67 EPS. There are several powers that can increase your EPS gain. Stamina, Quick Recovery, and Accelerate Metabolism are just a few. The combined effects of these power and natural recovery will be referred to as total recovery.

You find your total recovery by adding all the powers that increase your EPS gain to your natural recovery rate. Since you can add recovery enhancements to certain powers you will have to use the enhancement equation to find the exact amount that each power will give. There is a list of the toggle power costs and endurance recovering powers at the end of this guide.

The equation for endurance recovery gain is:
Base Gain * (1 + Number of Enhancements * Enhancement Modifier)

Stamina has a base gain of 0.42 EPS, so slotted with 3 even SO enhancements will look like this:
0.42 * (1 + 3 * 0.333) = 0.90

If you only had Stamina 3 slotted then your total recovery would be 0.90 + 1.67 = 2.57 EPS

After you find the total recovery you need to find the total drain. Because toggle powers accept endurance reductions you will need to figure out the adjusted cost for each power after the enhancements.

The equation for calculating toggle cost with enhancements is:
Base Cost / (1 + Number of Enhancements * Enhancement Modifier)

Stealth has a base cost of 0.38 EPS, so 3 slotted with even SO enhancements will look like this:
0.38 / (1 + 3 * 0.333) = 0.19

Super Speed has a base cost of 0.54 EPS, so 3 slotted with even SO enhancements will look like this:
0.54 / (1 + 3 * 0.333) = 0.27

Total drain is 0.19 + 0.27 = 0.46

To find your net EPS rate subtract the total drain from the total recovery.
2.57 – 0.46 = 2.11 EPS

If you have Super Speed and Stealth running permanently you will have a constant gain of 2.11 EPS.

I created an excel spreadsheet that will calculate all of this for you. It might not be the best design but it is functional and I included a lot of other very useful information in it as well. It can be found at:
http://www.geocities.com/laportejd/CoH.xls

Combat Support

I like the idea of creating a character that only runs permanent toggles. I don’t want to turn them on or off any more than necessary. To do this you must pick a group of toggles that you can run at the same time and still maintain a combat reliable amount of EPS gain. I consider anything greater than 2 EPS acceptable but depending on how costly your character is you may need more. If you know what the endurance cost, activation and recharge times of your powers you can figure out how combat effective your setup will be.

During combat you will use the most endurance. By calculating your net EPS gain you can figure out how many attacks you can do before pausing. Remember even though you can string powers together you must still wait the activation times. During this time you will still gain endurance. If a power has an activation of 4 and your net gain is 2 then by the time the power is done you have lost the endurance for using the power but gained 8 endurance from recovery.

Follow the example:

Your net recovery after stamina and toggles is +2 EPS

You use the following 3 attacks

Power	Cost	Activation
Punch	8	2
Kick	10	3
Throw	14	2

Starting with 100 endurance

You throw a punch:
This will reduce your endurance by 8 or 100 - 8 = 92
The activation time is 2 so by the time punch is done you gain 2 * 2 = 4 endurance
The new total is 96 (92 + 4)

Then you immediately do a kick reducing your endurance by 10 or 96 - 10 = 86
The activation time is 3 so when the kick is done you gain 3 * 2 = 6 endurance
The new total is 92 (86 + 6)

Then you immediately do a throw reducing your endurance by 14 or 92 - 14 = 78
The activation time is 2 so when the throw is done you gain 2 * 2 = 4 endurance
The new total is 82 (78 + 4)

Assuming that all the recharge timers are now done you can start the combo again. You would look at a drain of 18 for every 3 hit combo. This would allow you to perform 5 combos continuously without stopping. Fill in your attack powers, their activation times and costs and you can figure how much you will lose and gain in combat.

Toggle power and recovery numbers

Below is a list of all known toggle power costs. Most of this information was taken from a thread on the main CoH boards located here.
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showflat.php?Cat=&Number=1139647

There is some data missing. If you would like to help in finding this information go to the official thread on it, follow the directions for testing toggle cost and make a post with the data you get.


Endurance Recovery Powers

Natural Recovery	1.67
Stamina	0.42
Quick Recovery	0.56
Accelerate Metabolism	?

Toggle Power Costs

Inherent
Sprint	0.35

Concealment Pool
Stealth	0.38
Invisibility	1.51
Phase Shift	2.98

Fighting Pool
Tough	0.22
Weave	0.20

Flight Pool
Hover	0.22
Flight	2.03
Group Fly	?

Leadership Pool
Maneuvers	0.45
Assault	0.45
Tactics	0.45

Leaping Pool
Combat Jumping	0.08
Super Jump	0.54
Acrobatics	0.32

Speed Pool
Super Speed	0.54
Whirlwind	1.15

Devices
Targeting Drone	0.35
Cloaking Device	0.29

Electricity Manipulation
Lightning Field	?

Fire Manipulation
Hot Feet	?
Blazing Aura	0.75

Ice Manipulation
Chilling Embrace	?

Fiery Aura
Blazing Aura	?
Fire Shield	0.38
Plasma Shield	?

Ice Armor
Frozen Armor	?
Chilling Embrace	?
Wet Ice	?
Icicles	?
Glacial Armor	?
Hibernate	?

Invulnerability
Temp Invulnerability	?
Unyielding Stance	0.28
Invincibility	0.28

Stone Armor
Rock Armor	0.35
Mud Pots	1.13
Rooted	?
Brimstone Armor	?
Mineral Armor	?
Crystal Armor	?
Granite Armor	?

Force Field
Personal Force Field	0.38
Dispersion Bubble	0.75
Repulsion Field	?
Force Bubble	4.59

Storm Summoning
Snow Storm	0.76
Steamy Mist	0.76
Hurricane	0.94

Kinetics
Repel	?

Radiation Emission
Radiation Infection	0.58
Enervating Field	1.48
Choking Cloud	1.21

Dark Miasma
Darkest Night	?
Shadow Fall	0.75

Ice Control
Arctic Air	1.46

Fire Control
Hot Feet	?

Illusion Control
Superior Invisibility	1.42

Mind Control
Telekinesis	?

Spines
Quills	0.73

Regeneration
Integration	0.77
Instant Healing	1.54

Super Reflexes
Focused Fighting	0.38
Focused Senses	0.38
Evasion	?

Dark Armor
Dark Embrace	0.39
Death Shroud	0.71
Murky Cloud	?
Obsidian Shield	?
Cloak of Darkness	0.39
Cloak of Fear	?
Oppressive Gloom	0.12

Conclusion

Thank you for reading my guide. I hope it was useful to you. I would also like to thank everyone who provided me with the hard data for this guide including everyone on the Official toggle cost thread. In the event I get a copy of Visual Basic, I plan on making a program dedicated to managing toggles. If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions then feel free to contact me at:

Xidrablog@yahoo.com