Vaudevillain

"Footsteps to your left."

"I hear it."

Dylan watched as Surfsup activated his character's ability and barreled through the wall. "OH YEAH!" Surfsup yelled. The enemy player on the other side twitched their gun and slapped off a quick round of fire. Surfsup crouched down and sprayed a burst from his submachine gun. The enemy player went down and Surfsup cheered. "Woo! That's how we do it!"

"Last two A site." Sweet Dream said.

"I'm rotating," John said.

Surfsup and John moved from their positions at the map's B site over to where the enemy had planted the bomb. As they neared the site John activated his character's ultimate ability to create two mirror images of his character. The two copies ran in a line towards the site, allowing John and Surfsup to flank from another route. Surfsup burst onto the site with his charge, breaking through a wall of boxes and unleashing a spray of bullets at nothing.

The last two enemies had holed up in a cubby near the bomb waiting. John prepared his flashbang ability and faked a defuse. The two enemies pushed out and John tossed the grenade into the cubby. Both enemies caught the full blast and could only spray wildly in the hope that they hit. But Surfsup had circled to the other side and with a quick burst of shots downed the last two players. John went back to defuse the bomb, winning their team the round.

The four friends were playing some quick rounds of search and destroy in SBA2 while waiting for Vert to finish server maintenance. Over the week all four had raised their rank to C in preparation for the coming patch. "So did Vert release patch notes or anything yet?" John asked.

"Not yet," Sweet Dream replied. "I heard they'll release it when the maintenance finishes.

"The quick and easy reputation boosting," John replied. "No way Vert'll keep that in. I hit C rank in like a day."

"And yet you still haven't come to meet up with us in Haven City."

"I figured I'd make a few more characters to see if there were some powers I liked best. Gonna stick with the first guy though."

"Oh dude what'd you get?" Surfsup jumped into the conversation between Dylan and John.

"Can't say yet. I told Dylan he'd see when we met up."

"I bet it's something awesome like heat vision or frost breath."

"Surf you think every power is awesome."

The group chuckled a bit as they started the next round. Dylan and the rest focusing on the game until the round ended. After it ended Sweet Dream asked Dylan. "So you make any of the gadgets we talked about?"

"Yeah a few. I focused on getting my minions equipped though."

"Dude, did you make the bulletproof underwear?"

"Wait Dylan you made bulletproof underwear?" John asked.

"No, I didn't make that."

"But dude what if someone aims below the belt?"

"Yeah dude, what if someone aims below the belt?"

"Then my bulletproof suit will stop it."

"What else did you make?" Sweet Dream asked, trying to move the conversation away from underwear.

"Some button grenades and a new top hat."

"Ooh, what's the top hat do?" Surfsup asked.

"I made it a little drone that goes around shooting lasers when I throw it."

"Dude sweet. You think I can surf it sometime?"

"Surf why would you want to? You already have a rocket board." Sweet Dream said.

"I mean wouldn't it be hilarious to see me on top of a tiny little hat like that?"

"Yeah alright I can see it."

Dylan looked over at the clock. "Hey its 2. You guys want to get in the game?"

Surfsup whooped. "Yeah dude lets do it! Get in game and steal us an alien mothership!"

The group closed out of SBA2 and switched over to World of Supers. Dylan laid down on his bed and placed the VIS on his head. The opening screen of World of Supers had changed to show a UFO flying above the city. Smiling in anticipation, Dylan selected Dr. Zlo and entered the game.

The first thing to greet him was a gigantic list of patch notes ranging from powers to gameplay mechanics. He took a glance down the list of powers to see if mad science had been nerfed. Luckily it seemed there hadn't been any major changes, only small fixes to some bugs. He laughed a bit at the one that allowed players to select themselves as an ingredient.

He scrolled down to the gameplay changes to take a look at the reputation change.

Over the first month of World of Supers, we've seen an amazing number of players joining the game to play as their favorite heroes and villains. However, it immediately came to our attention that our current iteration of the reputation system was too abusable for the villains. There is a saying in comics that villains act and heroes react and we've seen it play out inside the game. Heroes have a hard time gaining reputation in interesting ways while villains are freer to experiment.

Our solution to this is twofold. The first solution we have is to introduce a weekly reputation gain for heroes. At the end of the week, all heroes gain bonuses to reputation equal to half the number of quests they took over the week. We hope that this change allows heroes to gain more freedom with the quests they take. In addition, we've expanded the list of hero's guild generated quests.

Our second solution to the reputation problem is to classify the different types of crimes according to rank. Villains will no longer be able to steal purses and steadily raise their reputation. After ranking up in reputation certain crimes will no longer grant successes. For example, stealing a purse or wallet is now listed as an F rank crime. Any player above F rank will no longer gain reputation for performing the act.

That said, we have no intention of limiting the free choice of players. We also realize that not every crime can be rated the same. Robbing a bank next to the hero's guild and robbing a bank in a sparsely populated district will have different levels of difficulty. To remedy this we have changed the reputation system to better fit the PvP nature of superheroes. This change affects both heroes and villains.

When two players of opposing morality meet, the reputation rank of all players and the quest they are undertaking will be taken into account and the highest rank will become the overall quest rank. So if an F rank villain is stealing a purse and a D rank hero comes to stop him the quest is updated to a D rank quest. We hope that this change allows for the same freedom as before and gives a correct assessment of the quest difficulty.'

Speaking of difficulty, many players have complained about how unsatisfying it feels to succeed in difficult quests. We've gone ahead and made a change to how reputation is gained to help remedy this. Previously, players would always gain one reputation success for each enemy they defeated; no matter their ranking. This meant an F rank hero beating an E rank villain netted one success despite the difficulty of the fight. Our new system should better reflect the joy of defeating a difficult enemy for large gains.

If a player of lower reputation defeats someone of higher reputation, that player will gain reputation equal to twice the difference in ranks. So for example an F rank player facing an A rank player has a five rank difference. If the F rank player wins they would gain 10 (5*2) reputation, rocketing them up to C rank. Players of a higher rank that lose against those of lower rank only lose reputation equal to the difference in rank (minimum of 1). 

Our goal is for this new system to create an equilibrium around C to A ranks. Much of World of Super's extra content is revealed at that point and we want players to experience the full breadth of the game.

Dylan took a second to look over the changes again. Vert was seriously responding to the complaints people had about the simplicity of the reputation system. On paper, Vert's idea seemed fairly effective. He scrolled down through the rest of the changes, stopping at another that caught his eye.

Secret Identities and Contacts.

When we initially created World of Supers, secret identities were a way to add a bit of flavor to your character. Since the focus of the game was on the superpowers, secret identities were locked behind a rise in reputation as a reward for players. However, in keeping to the realism of the world, we neglected to create spaces for players of each side to mingle. Our first solution to the issue was the introduction of neutral zones.

This change did not have the effect we intended. Players on the villain side disliked that they couldn't rob stores in neutral areas and heroes disliked that players could step over an arbitrary barrier for protection. As such we've changed the secret identity system to the new way to designate neutrality.

All players now have an option in their menu to toggle their secret identity and mask their hero or villain status. Once activated, players will be considered a normal civilian in the world. NPC troops from both sides will not attack and players can walk around the city without issue. Keep in mind that starting any fights will change your secret identity status.

We're also changing up how contacts work in the game. Previously, players of rank B or higher could talk to shopkeepers or other NPCs to find secretive contacts in the world that offered a variety of benefits. Players could find rare equipment, power upgrades, or unique materials by talking to these contacts. We've decided to expand on this system.

Players of reputation C or higher will now be able to find secret contacts around the world by asking around the various cities. We've separated the contacts into three broad types: Enhancers, Equippers, and Procurers. Enhancers are contacts that allow a player to add or change their powers for a set fee or special quests. Equippers will create armors and other gadgets for players that bring them the needed materials. Procurers will find unique materials for a fee.

Dylan liked this change. It meant he could go around the city exploring without worrying about heroes looking to attack him. The contacts rework would also make it easier for him to find materials like phlebotinium.

He skimmed over the rest of the patch notes, only glancing at the list of improvements and changes Vert made to their game before closing the prompt. With that done Dylan jumped into the game to meet up with his friends.

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