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Effects Customization and How it will affect others

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jtpaull
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Effects Customization and How it will affect others

I thought this was a great point brought up in a different forum concerning power customization. If I make a character that is supposed to be the dark, brooding type, with dark powers, and someone else creates a pink bubble-gum themed character that casts pink bubbles/force fields, will we be able to turn off other player's effects on us? I mean, if I don't necessarily like another player's power customization do I have to just deal with it on my character?

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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Get used to pink bubblegum.

Get used to pink bubblegum. If she casts a shield on you it will be pink.

this is a job for RP.

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Cyclops wrote:
Cyclops wrote:

Get used to pink bubblegum. If she casts a shield on you it will be pink.

Is that sarcasm? I really hope we won't be forced to adorn other player's visual powers if we do not wish to. There should definitely be the option to 'turn off' other PC's visual power effects on your own toon from your UI.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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"No thanks I don't want that

"No thanks I don't want that protective field around me because it's pink! I'd rather get horribly hurt than be in a pink bubble!"

Like, is that the attitude your character's will have? You have a dark and brooding character, are they utilitarian enough to recognize the benefits of the effects while dealing with the displeasing aesthetics? Pretty sure if Batman was saved by Star Sapphire he wouldn't complain about the color of the thing that was used to save him. He might grill a Green Lantern over what green energy props they used but only to a "That thing? Really?" level.

I mean maybe having an option to turn off aesthetic effects on your character, but that would still probably only be on your screen, to everyone else they'd still be in the bubble. Which then the aesthetic toggle would only matter if you liked looking at your character unhindered, or you wanted to take a screenshot when there are other people using their powers around you.

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Project_Hero wrote:
Project_Hero wrote:

"No thanks I don't want that protective field around me because it's pink! I'd rather get horribly hurt than be in a pink bubble!"

Like, is that the attitude your character's will have? You have a dark and brooding character, are they utilitarian enough to recognize the benefits of the effects while dealing with the displeasing aesthetics? Pretty sure if Batman was saved by Star Sapphire he wouldn't complain about the color of the thing that was used to save him. He might grill a Green Lantern over what green energy props they used but only to a "That thing? Really?" level.

I mean maybe having an option to turn off aesthetic effects on your character, but that would still probably only be on your screen, to everyone else they'd still be in the bubble. Which then the aesthetic toggle would only matter if you liked looking at your character unhindered, or you wanted to take a screenshot when there are other people using their powers around you.

You misunderstood. Obviously I'm not saying to reject powers cast onto you, I'm saying turn off the visual effect from you UI if you so wish. Sure, everyone else would still see it, but thats not the point. The point is you should be able to play how you want...and if someone doesn't like your customized effect that lasts for a long time on your character, you should be able to disable the visuals, not the actual benefit of the power.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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I didn't misunderstand at all

I didn't misunderstand at all. The last part of my post specifically addresses what you just said.

My initial part was because you brought up a type of character. Which apparently had no bearing on the post and now I question why you even brought it up. This whole thread could have been summed up in one question "Will I be able to turn off other player's aesthetic effects on my characters?"

Which for me I don't mind either way, options are nice, but part of why I like Super Hero games is to see powers working together. If I'm teamed with a Green Lantern homage I want to see green energy constructs and bubbles, or just a green aura around my character. It helps my immersion I feel like my character is part of a world.

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jtpaull, I'm going to have to

jtpaull, I'm going to have to vote against you here. That players' visuals are part of their character. If they cast shield bubbles on you, those shield bubbles should be visible and they should be as THAT character wants them to be. If you don't like how they look, then you should ask not to be protected. You should not get the option of disabling another players' spells. That's all part of playing an MMO in my opinion.

However... having said all that. I also believe there should be graphics settings that account for the lower-end of the performance spectrum. And in those graphics settings, there would probably be one that disables advanced visuals and resorts to simplistic visuals for some of the more graphically intensive powers. I imagine shields may be among them and by minimizing their representation, you could de-facto get away with not having to see someone's powers if they are visually offensive to you.

Edit: Besides, I think it is far more entertaining to see a dark stoic manly-man's version of a vigilante being protected by a field of sparkly buttlerfies and grumbling about it all the while in his manly-man throaty grumble. And his partner, the teenage witch in a tutu, standing on a dumpster behind him having the time of her life shooting rainbows and glitter out of her wand.


I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

jtpaull, I'm going to have to vote against you here. That players' visuals are part of their character. If they cast shield bubbles on you, those shield bubbles should be visible and they should be as THAT character wants them to be. If you don't like how they look, then you should ask not to be protected. You should not get the option of disabling another players' spells. That's all part of playing an MMO in my opinion.

However... having said all that. I also believe there should be graphics settings that account for the lower-end of the performance spectrum. And in those graphics settings, there would probably be one that disables advanced visuals and resorts to simplistic visuals for some of the more graphically intensive powers. I imagine shields may be among them and by minimizing their representation, you could de-facto get away with not having to see someone's powers if they are visually offensive to you.

I wasn't as specific as I should have been. I was only talking about the visuals, not the power themselves. It never comes out as clearly as it is in my head. I only want the option to disable visual effects from my UI, not that actual power from being put on my character.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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jtpaull wrote:
jtpaull wrote:

I wasn't as specific as I should have been. I was only talking about the visuals, not the power themselves. It never comes out as clearly as it is in my head. I only want the option to disable visual effects from my UI, not that actual power from being put on my character.

You were specific and clear. I understood you perfectly. I just disagree that you should have the option of disabling other player's powers (visually).

But wait. Wasn't there something in CoX that enabled us to turn down brightness of all powers or something, because it was possible for players to basically customize their powers into an epileptic catalyst?


I like to take your ideas and supersize them. This isn't criticism, it is flattery. I come with nothing but good will and a spirit of team-building. If you take what I write any other way, that is probably just because I wasn't very clear.
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Yes, one could set one's own

Yes, one could set one's own preferences to minimize all displayed graphics on that machine. I don't think jtpall wants to affect another person's fun. He just wants to save his own eyes without having to wear sunglasses while playing.

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If aesthetic customization is

If aesthetic customization is a robust as we have been hoping then the ability to disable other players aesthetics on your screen is a must.

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Actually, as much as I love

Actually, as much as I love the customization we were allowed and will be allowed, I have to agree with the OP here. Most of the time, it doesn't bother me, but if that person has really obnoxious colored bubbles, or buffs, or whatever, it caused me a lot of discomfort trying to see through that in CoH. I think the option to turn down or off another player's aesthetic is more than reasonable client side.

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Depending on the particle

Depending on the particle effects allowed, being able to turn off visuals for *yourself only* could be beneficial for a number of reasons. In fact, being able to turn off your own visuals, if any, could be nice too, assuming "nothing" isn't an option during character creation/leveling.

I recall some issues with the sonic power set in particular, among others, and I also think that being able to turn off all visual effects would be a huge boon during large raids (like Hami, etc). It may well make the difference in some people with lower end systems being able to join in. Players with certain visual sensitivities and the like, as well.

I am generally always a fan of the more options, the better.

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Dark Ether wrote:
Dark Ether wrote:

Depending on the particle effects allowed, being able to turn off visuals for *yourself only* could be beneficial for a number of reasons. In fact, being able to turn off your own visuals, if any, could be nice too, assuming "nothing" isn't an option during character creation/leveling.

In regards to ones own powers then nothing should be an option for some power, primarily self-defense.

Quote:

I recall some issues with the sonic power set in particular, among others, and I also think that being able to turn off all visual effects would be a huge boon during large raids (like Hami, etc). It may well make the difference in some people with lower end systems being able to join in. Players with certain visual sensitivities and the like, as well.

Agree, and it would be even better if we could set it for "classes" of powers so that, for instance, we could choose to suppress all but continuous ground placed effects (both harmfull and beneficial).

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From the point of view of

From the point of view of "absolute realism" I wouldn't allow anyone to be able to arbitrarily "turn off" the visual effects of any power. If a power has a visual effect it should be visible to anyone who has working visual sensors (i.e. eyes).

But we must account for the fact that this is just a game, not "real life", so having the option to adjust things for the purposes of graphics processing or simple annoyance should be available. What I as the player see on my screen should be adjustable the way I want it to be. So we should have the option to block out the visual effects of powers we see on our own characters. This would only affect what I see on my screen - this would NOT affect any other players or what they see on their screens.

So given the original example if I'm playing the "dark brooder" and someone casts a pink bubble shield on me I could set it so that I don't see it on my screen but that would not prevent it from being seen by any other player around me and it certainly wouldn't stop the pink shield from being cast on me in the first place.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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But then is it an all or

But then is it an all or nothing or case by case basis? If you turn it off because you don’t like one persons pink bubbles, are you then not going to be able to see anyone’s effects. Or can you essentially “mute” a specific persons visual effect, just like you can mute their audio

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Lothic
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Kiyori Anoyui wrote:
Kiyori Anoyui wrote:

But then is it an all or nothing or case by case basis? If you turn it off because you don’t like one persons pink bubbles, are you then not going to be able to see anyone’s effects. Or can you essentially “mute” a specific persons visual effect, just like you can mute their audio

Well this is a good question. There are several ways something like this could be handled.

It would obviously be easiest to provide one toggle switch that effectively shuts off ALL the visual effects from powers cast on you by other players but there's always the chance that you would just want to filter out -some- power effects, not all of them.

I guess another way this could work is that the Devs could provide a dedicated GUI that would let a player uniquely choose which powers to filter out, but to be honest that would be pretty convoluted and is not something I would seriously expect to happen.

A third alternative might be to allow client side mods to affect these things so that a player who really hated seeing powers X, Y or Z on their characters could uniquely specify those specific powers to be filtered out. This would give players who are super-serious about filtering out certain powers the tools to accomplish that without any of that getting in the way of anyone else who might not care either way.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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There will be an option to

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.


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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

So to be clear you're talking about providing one single toggle switch that will turn on or off ALL visual effects from ALL other players' powers? As I mentioned that would obviously be the easiest way to handle this from an implementation point of view but it will probably make it a hard decision for some players to decide whether to use it or not.

For example let's say you really, really hate the visual effects of only one or two powers and don't really care about any of the others. With a toggle switch like you're talking about a player's going to have to decide if they want to live without seeing ANY visual effects on them in order to stop that one or two they actually hate. That might be a hard compromise for some people.

I'm not necessarily saying the "single toggle for all visual effects" solution is a bad one, but it definitely has some significant pros and cons to consider.

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

So to be clear you're talking about providing one single toggle switch that will turn on or off ALL visual effects from ALL other players' powers? As I mentioned that would obviously be the easiest way to handle this from an implementation point of view but it will probably make it a hard decision for some players to decide whether to use it or not.

For example let's say you really, really hate the visual effects of only one or two powers and don't really care about any of the others. With a toggle switch like you're talking about a player's going to have to decide if they want to live without seeing ANY visual effects on them in order to stop that one or two they actually hate. That might be a hard compromise for some people.

I'm not necessarily saying the "single toggle for all visual effects" solution is a bad one, but it definitely has some significant pros and cons to consider.

It does, library of every visual effect to manually be toggled is mostly prohibitive to relaisitically ensure zero issues crop up and also to maintain.

This less about “I don’t like pink bubbles” and more of a performance issue. The concern over being annoyed by another players’ aesthetic choices is largely one of personal inconvenience which would be virtually impossoble for a dev to create methods to avoid every possible case of personal inconvenience in a game.

As oppossed to helping players maintain a level of minimal performance to which we should provide annexpectation of minimal peformance and thus also provide at least some means of maintaining it. In this case, the simplet solution being a single toggle to turn on / off other player visual fx.


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It would be great to be able

It would be great to be able to go into 'Options > Graphics' and set an XX% reduction on power effects. That would allow a little more tuning of the personal visual space than a simple on/off toggle. If you've toggled VFX off, how will you know that the BigBoss has activated his Temporary Invulnerability Sphere?

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Fireheart wrote:
Fireheart wrote:

It would be great to be able to go into 'Options > Graphics' and set an XX% reduction on power effects. That would allow a little more tuning of the personal visual space than a simple on/off toggle. If you've toggled VFX off, how will you know that the BigBoss has activated his Temporary Invulnerability Sphere?

Be Well!
Fireheart

Player only effects would be the option. Not world effects.


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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:
Lothic wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

So to be clear you're talking about providing one single toggle switch that will turn on or off ALL visual effects from ALL other players' powers? As I mentioned that would obviously be the easiest way to handle this from an implementation point of view but it will probably make it a hard decision for some players to decide whether to use it or not.

For example let's say you really, really hate the visual effects of only one or two powers and don't really care about any of the others. With a toggle switch like you're talking about a player's going to have to decide if they want to live without seeing ANY visual effects on them in order to stop that one or two they actually hate. That might be a hard compromise for some people.

I'm not necessarily saying the "single toggle for all visual effects" solution is a bad one, but it definitely has some significant pros and cons to consider.

It does, library of every visual effect to manually be toggled is mostly prohibitive to relaisitically ensure zero issues crop up and also to maintain.

This less about “I don’t like pink bubbles” and more of a performance issue. The concern over being annoyed by another players’ aesthetic choices is largely one of personal inconvenience which would be virtually impossoble for a dev to create methods to avoid every possible case of personal inconvenience in a game.

As oppossed to helping players maintain a level of minimal performance to which we should provide annexpectation of minimal peformance and thus also provide at least some means of maintaining it. In this case, the simplet solution being a single toggle to turn on / off other player visual fx.

I get that you consider this toggle switch more of a "graphics performance improvement" feature than a "player preference filter" feature and that's fine. I just think it's worth mentioning that even CoH provided client mods that allowed the visual and audio effects from specific powers to be filtered out for the sole purpose of alleviating the "personal annoyance" from those specific examples.

For the record I plan to play this game on a relatively high-end machine and I typically don't mind seeing the visual effects of all the powers that are affecting my characters so I'm probably going to be the very last person to ever use your "performance toggle" in this case. ;)

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:
Lothic wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

So to be clear you're talking about providing one single toggle switch that will turn on or off ALL visual effects from ALL other players' powers? As I mentioned that would obviously be the easiest way to handle this from an implementation point of view but it will probably make it a hard decision for some players to decide whether to use it or not.

For example let's say you really, really hate the visual effects of only one or two powers and don't really care about any of the others. With a toggle switch like you're talking about a player's going to have to decide if they want to live without seeing ANY visual effects on them in order to stop that one or two they actually hate. That might be a hard compromise for some people.

I'm not necessarily saying the "single toggle for all visual effects" solution is a bad one, but it definitely has some significant pros and cons to consider.

It does, library of every visual effect to manually be toggled is mostly prohibitive to relaisitically ensure zero issues crop up and also to maintain.

This less about “I don’t like pink bubbles” and more of a performance issue. The concern over being annoyed by another players’ aesthetic choices is largely one of personal inconvenience which would be virtually impossoble for a dev to create methods to avoid every possible case of personal inconvenience in a game.

As oppossed to helping players maintain a level of minimal performance to which we should provide annexpectation of minimal peformance and thus also provide at least some means of maintaining it. In this case, the simplet solution being a single toggle to turn on / off other player visual fx.

I get that you consider this toggle switch more of a "graphics performance improvement" feature than a "player preference filter" feature and that's fine. I just think it's worth mentioning that even CoH provided client mods that allowed the visual and audio effects from specific powers to be filtered out for the sole purpose of alleviating the "personal annoyance" from those specific examples.

For the record I plan to play this game on a relatively high-end machine and I typically don't mind seeing the visual effects of all the powers that are affecting my characters so I'm probably going to be the very last person to ever use your "performance toggle" in this case. ;)

You are correct that mods may be jsut the way toward ultimate customization and ideally be the way to ensure avoidance of all visual inconvenience.

CoH actually didn’t provide client mods, it was unofficially supported by the studio, but entirely up to players to mod their own pigg files for audio and visual.

The only case I know of that modding resulted in an account ban was when someone posted their nude-body mods on the forums. Smart enough to mod, not so wise in showing off their skills.

In the past we talked about providing an actual mod tool. At this point, I am uncertain to any official mod tool for players. But I know there is positive sentiment toward player-side mods. Just if bot supported by us through an official tool, the obvious disclaimer of user beware should apply. And of course there will likely be a ToS about mods being within the realm of acceptable when it comes to anything directly posted on official game forums.


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Hopefully we can get some RP

Hopefully we can get some RP mods like WoW has if they don't come standard. By the way I'd love for such things to be standard.

"Let the past die. Kill it if you have to."

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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:
Lothic wrote:

I get that you consider this toggle switch more of a "graphics performance improvement" feature than a "player preference filter" feature and that's fine. I just think it's worth mentioning that even CoH provided client mods that allowed the visual and audio effects from specific powers to be filtered out for the sole purpose of alleviating the "personal annoyance" from those specific examples.

For the record I plan to play this game on a relatively high-end machine and I typically don't mind seeing the visual effects of all the powers that are affecting my characters so I'm probably going to be the very last person to ever use your "performance toggle" in this case. ;)

You are correct that mods may be jsut the way toward ultimate customization and ideally be the way to ensure avoidance of all visual inconvenience.

CoH actually didn’t provide client mods, it was unofficially supported by the studio, but entirely up to players to mod their own pigg files for audio and visual.

The only case I know of that modding resulted in an account ban was when someone posted their nude-body mods on the forums. Smart enough to mod, not so wise in showing off their skills.

In the past we talked about providing an actual mod tool. At this point, I am uncertain to any official mod tool for players. But I know there is positive sentiment toward player-side mods. Just if bot supported by us through an official tool, the obvious disclaimer of user beware should apply. And of course there will likely be a ToS about mods being within the realm of acceptable when it comes to anything directly posted on official game forums.

You are correct - to be perfectly precise CoH didn't technically "provide" mods as much as provide the CAPABILTY to allow players to create their own client-side mods. And yes it was always on a sort of "don't ask, don't tell" basis where the Devs of CoH never publicly talked about it and provided absolutely no technical support for it. I would simply hope that CoT would be able to provide a similar infrastructure for that kind of thing.

For what it's worth I did dabble in client-side modding in CoH but I wasn't the one dumb enough to get myself banned for it. ;)

CoH player from April 25, 2004 to November 30, 2012

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jtpaull wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Cyclops wrote:

Get used to pink bubblegum. If she casts a shield on you it will be pink.

Is that sarcasm? I really hope we won't be forced to adorn other player's visual powers if we do not wish to. There should definitely be the option to 'turn off' other PC's visual power effects on your own toon from your UI.

It's called, don't get buffed by other players.

Seriously, if Green Latern shields Batman and he says "I hate your green shields and what they make me look like" then he can go around unshielded and stay protected by plot armor :p

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Brand X wrote:
Brand X wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Cyclops wrote:

Get used to pink bubblegum. If she casts a shield on you it will be pink.

Is that sarcasm? I really hope we won't be forced to adorn other player's visual powers if we do not wish to. There should definitely be the option to 'turn off' other PC's visual power effects on your own toon from your UI.

It's called, don't get buffed by other players.

Seriously, if Green Latern shields Batman and he says "I hate your green shields and what they make me look like" then he can go around unshielded and stay protected by plot armor :p

So I can't want the buff without the potentially absurd visual effects that might go with it? CoH had the ability to more or less fix this issue, that's all I am asking about. If someone creates a unique effect for their power where rainbows and pink unicorns dance around your character for the entire mission, you think it's ridiculous that someone might not want to see that on their character, even if everyone else still can? I thought this was about "play how you want, ultimate customization, etc". It would only be through my UI...other PC's would still see it. But the player shouldn't have to if they don't want to.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

Is this ALL visual effects? Or just other PC's visual affects? I'm no coder but would that be difficult? To add just one more toggle, so you can choose to either 'turn off' all effects or just other player's effects, that way you can still see just your own?

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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jtpaull wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

Is this ALL visual effects? Or just other PC's visual affects? I'm no coder but would that be difficult? To add just one more toggle, so you can choose to either 'turn off' all effects or just other player's effects, that way you can still see just your own?

The largest impact of performance ehen it comes to visual effects is other players’ visual effects. The toggle would therefore apply to player vfx. FFXIV has this option for example.

We can also include an option to disable personal fx by camera range (like the old game did) to reduce impact of lerdormance when the camera is too close to the player’s character.

Of course another possible option can be include to a max particle count setting for fx in general.

Again, these options are more about helping players with performance issues rather than “i don’t like how that character’s powers look”. That issue may be dealt with via client-side modding. See above posts regarding that discussion.


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jtpaull wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

Is this ALL visual effects? Or just other PC's visual affects? I'm no coder but would that be difficult? To add just one more toggle, so you can choose to either 'turn off' all effects or just other player's effects, that way you can still see just your own?

It would probably be relatively easy to have two toggles: One toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers cast on you by other players" and a second toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers self-activated by the player themselves". So if you wanted to turn off ALL visual effects produced by ANY player (you or others) then all you'd have to do is switch both toggles.

Obviously it would be nice if we get a Dev to comment on that idea. ;)

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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

Is this ALL visual effects? Or just other PC's visual affects? I'm no coder but would that be difficult? To add just one more toggle, so you can choose to either 'turn off' all effects or just other player's effects, that way you can still see just your own?

It would probably be relatively easy to have two toggles: One toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers cast on you by other players" and a second toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers self-activated by the player themselves". So if you wanted to turn off ALL visual effects produced by ANY player (you or others) then all you'd have to do is switch both toggles.

Obviously it would be nice if we get a Dev to comment on that idea. ;)

That sounds like the best option.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

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jtpaull wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Brand X wrote:
jtpaull wrote:
Cyclops wrote:

Get used to pink bubblegum. If she casts a shield on you it will be pink.

Is that sarcasm? I really hope we won't be forced to adorn other player's visual powers if we do not wish to. There should definitely be the option to 'turn off' other PC's visual power effects on your own toon from your UI.

It's called, don't get buffed by other players.

Seriously, if Green Latern shields Batman and he says "I hate your green shields and what they make me look like" then he can go around unshielded and stay protected by plot armor :p

So I can't want the buff without the potentially absurd visual effects that might go with it? CoH had the ability to more or less fix this issue, that's all I am asking about. If someone creates a unique effect for their power where rainbows and pink unicorns dance around your character for the entire mission, you think it's ridiculous that someone might not want to see that on their character, even if everyone else still can? I thought this was about "play how you want, ultimate customization, etc". It would only be through my UI...other PC's would still see it. But the player shouldn't have to if they don't want to.

First, I hope a power of that description is never in the game :p

However, as for the play how you want. Yeah, first step, don't play with someone with such a stupid power graphic :p

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Hey, shooting rainbows has

Hey, shooting rainbows has been in comics for decades.

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You forgot the pink unicorns

You forgot the pink unicorns dancing around you at the same time :p

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If such an aesthetic is in

If such an aesthetic is in the game I will make a character -just- to use such an amazingly silly thing.

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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

There will be an option to turn off others’ effects. This will only affect what you see. This isn’t mainly for those affected by performance issues, not about “i don’tmlike the pink bubble gum effect”.

That comes with the territory of being an mmo where choice is provided. A single option of on / off is the simplest solution with the least impact on upkeep and coding specific effect libraries to be toggled.

I approve of this option.

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I am less concerned with

I am less concerned with performance issues or just not liking the look of buffs on my character. I can turn down all effects for performance or ask not to be buffed.
As Crimsonomen20 said, it's the obnoxious or obscuring powers that I want control over.
Presumably you picked your own powers aesthetics and can change them down the road if they bother you. The same can't be said for others choices.
Effects like Storm's Hurricane or Sonic and Force Fields bubbles could block your view in tight areas. This could be easily compounded on if the Hurricane wasn't wind but now a Fire storm swirl due to aesthetic decoupling. Or maybe the Bubbles were a strange grid like pattern. Then there are the power aesthetics that can become annoying like some of Dark Miasma's sound effects, Illusion's Flash or Cold Domination's Ice Shields. In small doses these are not a huge problem but with decoupling you could have a constant darkness power howl or get a massive headache from the strobe effect that comes from the flash aesthetic being applied to all powers.
Sure you may be playing Disco Stu the superhuman Cool so the constant musical note with accompanying flashes and Icy bubbles might make sense. I want you to have that option. But I also don't want my screen to be filled with sight blocking ice bubbles, need a bottle of meds for headache inducing flashes and ear plugs to drown out the constant single musical note.
An MMO is already an assault on the senses which is part of it's fun but when you add something like aesthetic decoupling it can become too much to take even if you discount those who deliberately try to be annoying.

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Hence the simplest solution

Hence the simplest solution for us is to let players toggle other player sfx.

The other is to ket players mod on thier own if they want to get down to specifics of a type of particle effect.


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Lothic wrote:
Lothic wrote:

It would probably be relatively easy to have two toggles: One toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers cast on you by other players" and a second toggle to deal with "visual effects produced by powers self-activated by the player themselves". So if you wanted to turn off ALL visual effects produced by ANY player (you or others) then all you'd have to do is switch both toggles.

I fully support this. While I will probably want to see everyone's diverse power visuals applied to themselves, if my own custom effects (on me) or my costume get obscured by other's powers, that would be a disappointment and detract from my own ability to customize. I'd really like to have that middle ground choice of "others' powers on me - hide", "others' powers on others - show" through these two toggles (or a "brightness" slider for each of the two types of effects, even better). This setting seems to be the second or third most likely choice of players - after the "show all" default choice, and maybe the "hide all" choice for performance reasons - and in my opinion would be valuable to offer in the base game.

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I'd hope the majority of

I'd hope the majority of players see me like I see my self or very close.

If you give the players the power to switch off specific effects they dislike, the devs will begin to not care about how many flashy explosions they put on screen since the responsibility of balancing "coolness" vs "enjoyable" just passed from the devs to the players with "we give you the ability to choose to deactivate what you dislike, so we don't care anymore and we can make the flashier game ever". That is bad, devs must keep to worry about balancing the game in all aspects, including visual ones that affect playability. The players who decide to cut something out with mods/options must be a minority in the end or something is wrong with the game.

Let's also remember there should be a customer support (or suggestions section), if really a power is considered in need to get a change because it hurts the eyes of many players, or create non-sense chaos, you should write a ticket to the developers so the game gets improved for all at once.

I'll tell you why it is important to get the slow solution "for all" instead of the instant one "for your self": because this is not just an rpg, this is a MMOrpg (some of you seem to forget about this here and there).
It's crucial that players that are close to each other experience the same world, since those players are supposed to also communicate about that world (and must not find out that while a player sees blue water another says it's red). As I said everything is fine about exceptions, if those remain exceptions, and customization is not always a good thing since players need to be forced on track sometime to keep the game enjoyable for the majority.

Final, I like the Lothic's final solution enough with a couple of buttons instead of one, two are still an heavy decision for the players, so to keep those who put the effects turned-off to a minimum (the minority that really needs it). But I'd be fine with one button to switch all effects on-off too, for the same reason (I will probably NOT use it and hope for the devs to fully accomplish their work, to be good at balancing visual effects on screen or reactive if many players suggest so; we don't need a "Final-Flash-Vegeta-Blinding-Explosion" for each power, just the top tier ones).

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Tannim222 wrote:
Tannim222 wrote:

Of course another possible option can be include to a max particle count setting for fx in general.

I've seen this implemented and it works very well at showing off the game without melting the graphics card.

And while a single toggle PC visual effects off is okay, I would prefer a multi-step or slider rather than a simple on/off. I still want to see the other person's powers, but I don't want to have an epileptic seizure because of their blindingly white strobe effect in the dark subterranean lair map.


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I'd throw in a vote for

I'd throw in a vote for "everyone sees the same thing, deal with it." with exemptions for hardware performance issues, of course.

If everyone on my team comments about the weird blessing that so-and-so does, and you (and ONLY you) can't see it/act like it isn't there, then I think we'll all treat you differently from that point on.
"Oh, that's Barry, he lives in his own little world."
"Yeah, I don't know why they let him on dangerous missions."
"I'd ask, but he probably can't even tell we're here right now."
That would be the realistic response to someone who doesn't see what everyone else sees. A bit mean, yes, but realistic.

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Huckleberry wrote:
Huckleberry wrote:

And while a single toggle PC visual effects off is okay, I would prefer a multi-step or slider rather than a simple on/off. I still want to see the other person's powers, but I don't want to have an epileptic seizure because of their blindingly white strobe effect in the dark subterranean lair map.

This particular "epileptic seizure" example drives home a point that I'm not sure people like Tannim have fully thought about. There are some people here who are downplaying the "annoyance factor" related to this issue but due to the types of customization and aesthetic decoupling options we'll have in this game there's a serious chance there'll be many people creating visual effects that'll be borderline grief-worthy whether by accident or even on purpose.

To take your example further a person might make a power with a "blindingly white strobe effect" without any overt attempt to grief his/her fellow player. But once they start tossing that power around it might prove to be incredibly annoying to everyone by complete accident. Worst still there will likely be people out there who'll take advantage of the new options and decide to come up with a customized power with a visual effect designed on purpose to be as visually distracting/annoying as possible.

As I mentioned before I'm the type who usually likes to see everything happening in the game so I would likely not want to use a binary toggle that would completely filter out people's power effects on me. On the other hand like you I don't necessarily want to be blinded by either an accidental or deliberate hyper-annoying power effect. So the idea of the "visual power effects toggle" being talked about here being implemented more like your "power brightness slider" suggestion is appealing to me. If I could set it so that other players' power effects on me were say like 50% or 25% normal brightness then I could still see them without being overwhelmed by them. This slider could also serve the purpose of being a "graphics processing regulator" if the 0% setting acted like Tannim's binary toggle. Two birds - one stone.

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I'll point out again that's

I'll point out again that's it's not merely annoyance. Certain colors, combinations and flashing can cause serious side effects, usually unintended. I think it's a safer, and thoughtful idea to put in such a feature to minimize effects.

As for handling it in character, or saying that guy is off in his own world, is quite frankly mean. The person might just not like all the effects flying about, gets easily distraced, or has other issues. For someone to ostracize them, especially in a roleplaying capacity, boggles me. Most of my characters didn't go around, commenting on the state of buffs. Rarely did one say "Why am I glowing blue?". I always asked if the power was supposed to be strange or noticeable first before making such comments in character. Just seems rude otherwise.

I myself can suffer migraines from eyestrain due to many factors, but bright flashing lights and constant loud noises are near the top of the list. I had few flashy heroes that I could only play in small doses because of such effects.Again, I stress that even if not for a medical reasoning, one should be allowed to tone down people's powers on their own screen. No one even has to know, you can still see icons about the buffs, I presume.

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I’ll certainly list the

I’ll certainly list the option of other player particle fx slider on the qol features list for js to go over. I want to stress that often in these cases, the sinple solution is best for both dev and player.
For the dev side, because we have to test to find any and all outlying issues that each consitional slider may cause.

The player side can cause the problem of one setting works in some cases but not for all cases. And having to constantly adjust to find the “sweet spot” can be result in frustration. And in most cases, when players encounter frustration with settings and game performance issues (including ones medically related), blame gets laid at the devs’ feet for not properly testing and resilving said issues in sufficient time frame. The player time frame being yesterday.

Which is why you often see cases of on / off and not tons of different sliders for such things. I’ll list it. We’ll consider it and in doing so, weigh our options against our resources in development time.


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Hum... a middle choice could

Hum... a middle choice could be find too :
1. What about a toogle on/off for "show super team FX only" (i.e : ON : do not show the world people's fx, show just my team's FX - i.e : me only if i'm alone). That could be an average way to help people to not have too much FX launched around.
2. Speaking of that, a slider for "don't show FX (which emission point is) after this distance from me" could also be another way to help people to adjust effects without too much test to do.


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Seems the simplest solution

Seems the simplest solution would just be not to put in any animations that are seizure worthy in the first place. Other games that allow some customization don't let you pick certain colors, like white, as well. If you don't put the offending things in in the first place, then there's no conflict between people seeing different stuff. It just doesn't feel like a multiplayer game if each player is seeing something completely different. If you want that, there's plenty of single-player games. But yeah, simplest solution is just don't put things like "strobe light" in as an effect in the first place.

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Just get a yellow aura, and

Just get a yellow aura, and combined with the pink effect, you will be orange.

Orange ya glad I was here to settle this?

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I don't want to limit other

I don't want to limit other peoples customization because my eyes can't handle it. A strobe effect isn't necessary to cause pain to some. If I'm the only one that sees something different, I fail to see how that bothers another player. As an avid roleplayer, if someone comments something I can't say, then, if we were roleplaying, then I would politely ask what the effect is and roleplay accordingly.

I'm not sure how everyone seeing different things is a problem. With client side mods, it will most likely be the end result; people will not see the same things on the different screens. All I'm asking for is a toggle, or a slider to reduce brightness, particles, and offset some effects, like a possible strobing effect. It's not just for me, either.

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BiotopeZ wrote:
BiotopeZ wrote:

Seems the simplest solution would just be not to put in any animations that are seizure worthy in the first place. Other games that allow some customization don't let you pick certain colors, like white, as well. If you don't put the offending things in in the first place, then there's no conflict between people seeing different stuff. It just doesn't feel like a multiplayer game if each player is seeing something completely different. If you want that, there's plenty of single-player games. But yeah, simplest solution is just don't put things like "strobe light" in as an effect in the first place.

That would be the most difficult solution.

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I agree with Brainbot.

I agree with Brainbot.
Also I'm glad to be able to turn off the effects of other players abilities on my toon because I always hated being covered with ice in COH.

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Brainbot wrote:
Brainbot wrote:
BiotopeZ wrote:

Seems the simplest solution would just be not to put in any animations that are seizure worthy in the first place. Other games that allow some customization don't let you pick certain colors, like white, as well. If you don't put the offending things in in the first place, then there's no conflict between people seeing different stuff. It just doesn't feel like a multiplayer game if each player is seeing something completely different. If you want that, there's plenty of single-player games. But yeah, simplest solution is just don't put things like "strobe light" in as an effect in the first place.

That would be the most difficult solution.

Which would most likely boil down to everyone being at minimum graphics quality since the difference between min and max is big enough to "trigger" this difference between what players see.

As for seizure inducing strobes specifically, it's easy to make sure that individual effects can't trigger it but very hard when you have several people firing off effects.