This is a mod that can be added to your City of Heroes datafiles. It replaces the texture maps for various pieces of art in the base and office spaces in the game. Here, check out our base lounge seen through the "eyes" of Lora'Lai with the mods on my system.

Pretty nice, eh? Just want to stress that this is NOT something you will see if you don't have the mod on your system. You'll just see the normal generic artwork. This is client-side only. But if you do... Wow! Classy!
Here are some shots taken of various pieces throughout an office map mission.
Art 01
Art 02
Art 03
Art 04
Art 05
Art 06
These are just a sample. There are more, and a few I don't want to spoil for you. They're really quite cool when you aren't expecting them.
If you like, I can email you the files. Or you can go here and thank Electro for his fine work!-Logan
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"This kind of thing tends invariably to devolve into the kind of "No, Nakajima, THIS is true power!!" argument that only really works if you're yelling it from the cockpit of a giant robot . . ."
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I haven't enforced the 120-day rule in a while, but as has been noted in another thread, we're running up against the 75-member limit. So while I was on tonight, I checked the roster, and I am nominating the following individuals for removal from the group:
Aegis Sanctuary -- 230 days inactive
Silvery Silhouette -- 122 days inactive
(I hate to remove Aegis, as she was the first person I recruited for the revived Legendary and is still technically an officer, but she's been gone the best part of a year now...)
Queuing up for potential removal by the middle of next month:
BU-33CTP -- 109 days inactive
Nanaki -- 102 days inactive
If any of these characters are yours and you don't want them to leave the team, please tell me here and if at all possible log in to them to reset their inactive counters.
Otherwise I'll be removing them right away, or whenever their time comes.
Thanks.
-- Bob
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...The President is on the line
As ninety-nine crab rangoons go by...

Wow,what a busy day in Paragon this has been already.
Linky
The last time anyone put the words Marvel and Cryptic together in a new article waswell, the two parties announced that they had settled all litigation related to the suit Marvel filed against Crytpic Studios in relation to the game City of Heroes. Throughout the battle between Marvel and Crytpic, there were fans who suggested that the comic publisher and game studio needed to put their differences aside, and focus on creating a kickass massively multiplayer online game, a la CoH but set in the Marvel Universe, and using Marvel characters.
Fans who suggested that are getting the last laugh today, as it was announced at X06 that Cryptic will join Marvel and Microsoft Game Studios (their partnership was announced last summer) in developing a Marvel Universe MMO for both the Xbox 360 and Windows platform, and will allow seamless play for players on either system.
For us, this is a very exciting announcement for multiple reasons one of the first is that the Marvel Intellectual Property is universally recognizable, Frank Pape, Senior Director of Business Development, Microsoft Game Studios told Newsarama. We believe that it transcends the boundaries that currently exist on cross-platform on the two different audiences that you seem to find on both platforms. We believe that this can transcend that, and bring a new, fresh experience to the players on the MMO space on console, and Cryptic is our first choice, and the best choice we could have possible made to develop this game. Were very lucky to have had them sign on to develop the game. Theyve had a great track record in delivering MMOs such as City of Heroes and City of Villains both highly rated and highly successful games; as well as having games developed in a very timely fashion.
While the parties declined to discuss how former legal sparring partners turned into business partners (We call it water under the bridge, Pape said), it was suggested that Marvel and Microsoft were pursuing Cryptic.
There has been a very vibrant discussion with trying to get Cryptic to sign on as the developer, and both Marvel and Microsoft were very interested in having them become our partner, and thats been going on for many months, Pape said. The deal was signed a couple of months back, and now were ready to announce it to the world so everybody knows what they can expect to see out of the Marvel MMO. Its been going on for a while these things take time, but its time very well spent.
(more at the link)"Broad-minded is just another way of saying a fellow's too lazy to form an opinion." -- Will RogersGlobal: @Jimmy Amp

"Broad-minded is just another way of saying a fellow's too lazy to form an opinion." -- Will Rogers

Letter from Positron
Letter from Positron (Matt Miller)
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
Hey everyone!
Im coming up for air to let you know about some of the impending stuff happening in the City of Heroes and City of Villains games. Its been pretty crazy around here getting Issue 8 ready to hit Training Room, and we hope we can bring you all some exciting news about that in the very near future.
By now you may have read about Cryptic Studios and Microsofts upcoming new venture and we at Cryptic want to assure our loyal players that we and the good folks at our publisher, NCsoft, are fully committed to City of Heroes and City of Villains. We have a full team of programmers, artists, designers, and producers devoted to creating and maintaining the best experience in the City of world of games. This team is, and will remain completely separate from other teams working on other games at Cryptic. Like fantasy, sci-fi, and simulation, comic book heroes is its own genre, capable of supporting multiple titles. City of Heroes was created with a single purpose: bring the world of comic book heroes alive. With that in mind, Cryptic is investing resources into our City of team to fully realize its own unique vision.
Id like to start out by mentioning Issue 8: To Protect and Serve. This is a hero-centric Issue that finally levels the playing field between Heroes and Villains. We have a ton of stuff being added with this issue that will please a variety of players. It begins the multi-year storyline that continues next year with Issue 9 (title to be announced). I9 brings with it a huge new gameplay system: Inventions. Players will be able to craft Enhancements and Costume pieces for their characters using recipes, and salvage that they find while adventuring.
Issue 9 will also have Statesmans Task Force, the Hero equivalent to the Recluse Strike Force. Both of these mission chains are designed for eight max-level characters and have some of the best rewards in the game.
Issue 10 is a ways out, but it will bring us an update to an old familiar villain group. This group will have their power center altered and bring about massive changes to the game as a whole. Heroes and Villains will find themselves banding together against a common threat.
We will begin to reveal our plans for Issues 11 and beyond over the next year or so. We feel confident that you will be as excited about our plans as we are!
So as you can see, we at Cryptic and NCsoft have great plans for the future and want to keep making the City of games exciting and fresh. Our motto going forward is Listen to the players and give them what they want (within reason, of course). Expect a lot of oft-requested features and ideas to be implemented in the upcoming issues!
Sincerely,
Matt Miller (Positron)
"Broad-minded is just another way of saying a fellow's too lazy to form an opinion." -- Will RogersGlobal: @Jimmy Amp

"Broad-minded is just another way of saying a fellow's too lazy to form an opinion." -- Will Rogers

Yep, the title gives away what I think this song will do. A bonus is that cause it was released sometime 1995, Doug should have a copy in his helmet.

You know, it's really a wonder nobody's done something like this yet. I mean, it's really rather obvious, when you think about it. There's been various hints and all in some fics, but that mainly involved the Kyuubi.
Not here. Nope. Where's the fun in that?

According to this story on the Register, historian Stephen Lawhead has put forward a theory that Robin Hood was actually a Welshman.
After I read the article, I realized that it could resolve the biggest problem that Bob mentioned in GURPS Robin Hood - the noble/commoner dichotomy. The Welsh Robin is described as being the son of a nobleman, robbed of his birthright by the Normans in the 11th century. The earlier Robin Hood legends make no mention of the noble Robin. So, the commoner Robin might have been in Nottingham, while the noble "Robin" would have been in Wales a couple of centuries later. Oral tradition conflating the two stories may have lead to the mess we have today...

(Edit to fix typo)
-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

"If you ever run out of ideas, have someone come through the door with a gun."
- Raymond Chandler
"If you put a gun on the mantlepiece in Act 1, it must be fired no later than the end of Act 3."
- Anton Chekhov
Any more?

We've got some new faces in The Legendary channel that I'm not recognizing... either they are folks I'm familiar with who've changed their nicknames, or they're folks who are friends of channel members on other servers... or they could be inactive, ORIGINAL Legendary from before Bob's tenure as leader....
Like: Pan Pope. I see he/she's on almost all the time, but they never respond to global chat messages...
There are a few others as well... though I'm sure at least one of those is ChibiKonatsu's brother....
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

It was a simple thing, really: thick, creamy paper, engraved with a bit of good news. It was also trouble, and Mace Mac Hine knew trouble.
To be fair, he did not know that it was going to set off a chain of events when it was discovered by one of his "Teammates" in the Infamous after he dropped it. Especially since he had no intention of doing so. Heavy injuries from a battle with the Marcone Family after it was delivered to him made his intentions moot.
The innocent little paper sat wedged behind the medical pod in the Infamous' Super Base, its message waiting for the next person to pick it up:
THE Mac Hine and Emily Nagurski Heisman

Are pleased to announce the upcoming nuptials

of their respective children

Minuet Mac Hine

and

Orenthal Bronko Heisman