Another Space

I'd rather see the Ice sets ported to Stalker. I like the idea of "Tanker and Stalker only" because they're so... dissimilar.

Just to clear something up: for scrappers, you get the AoE passive at 28 and the toggle at 35. So without upsetting the cottage rule too bad, simply swapping one of the other passive defense boosts with Lucky would give you marginal AoE defense (roughly 6%) at 4th or more likely, 16th. You would still have to wait until 35 for the toggle. This is why I propose redistributing the defenses in the toggles to be a bit more encompassing -- instead of Focused Fighting being nothing but +melee defense, it should be mostly melee defense with some thought given to the other defense types.

As for Practiced Brawler, I don't mind it. Though I'd like to see all click mez protections capable of working like break frees so you don't have to set them to auto as much. I'd also think it'd be neat to use it as an excuse for "fight conditioning preparing you for everything" and insert a very small amount of psi defense -- a small enough value that it should still be their "hole" even when double stacked. As for Fear, I actually like Fear holes. I just hate which sets do and don't get it (why is an invincible guy suffering from severe nerves while the dude who's just holding a shield is unshakable?)

I have a lot of problems thinking my ideas will be taken seriously when they're posted in a forum labeled "For Fun!" but I'm quite irritated at my SR scrapper running into AoEs non-stop a full 10 levels before getting an ounce of AoE defense.

It seems like they could pretty easily smooth out the benefits of SR to make it less painful. There are a lot of potential avenues, and the sacred cottage rule need not be violated.

Note that, in general, I deal with rounded, whole number for simplicity. At the end of the day, all values should add up to be what they are on Live.

Very safe and easy variations:
Spread out the positional defenses among the toggles.
For example, Focused Fighting gives roughly 14% Melee Defense. Why not make it be 10% melee defense, plus 2% ranged and 2% aoe? Likewise, Focused Senses would be 2%/10%/2% and Evasion would be 2%/2%/10%. It doesn't have to be those numbers, but the idea remains the same. You end up with the same defense numbers, but it's spread out some.

An even safer implementation of this idea would be Focused Fighting at 12%/0%/4%, Focused Senses at 0%/12%/4%, and then Evasion picking up the slack with 2%/2%/6%.

A shakier solution: simply swap Lucky's position (for Scrappers) with either Dodge or Agile's position. I can't see how this is a violation of the cottage, as all enhancements would remain as effective as before, just a defense to a new position.

Burning down the Cottage: combine Lucky and Dodge. A quick look at Shield Defense shows this to not be overpowered. Grats, you have a leftover power. Perhaps it could be a teleport or a mini-hasten, but I'd prefer it actually built a small cottage.

Bonus points while I'm at it: if Lucky's AoE defense were higher and Evasion's were lower (for example, +4% to Lucky and -4% on Evasion), Evasion could be turned into an offensive toggle. Afterall, it already is for Brutes. Why not go all the way and make it meaningful? Foes affected suffer from something like -recharge or -tohit. And making Lucky's value more meaningful means you can afford to turn off the new AoE toggle and not feel naked.

Yip. There's my rant.

I just figure it's a LOT of cut-and-paste. With all the expansion of the company from the time of power customization, I can only hope they're putting the man power into such an endeavor.

Just seems like most of the work would be done for them: take a few token animations from Brawl and plug them in for punch/kick animations. There must be something I'm missing to make it hard for them to uhh "inherit" Brawl's set of alternate animations for weapon=true.

Can someone tech/animation savvy explain to me why they can't replace Kick's animation with Brawl's "ranged weapon=true" animation? I'm quite sure guns and bows in hand always make Brawl execute as a very Kick-looking kick.

The same should be mostly the same with Brawl -- you can Brawl people with the butt of your sword. Seems like it would be possible to make each power remove redraw on some weapons while the other power removes redraw from the remainder.

I didn't expect such a well thought-out response to come so quickly. Thanks for that.

On my quick and sloppy Mids build, I'm actually skipping Shadow Maul and focusing on ST attacks, but I think actual play will show whether or not that'll be a bad idea.

I was thinking it'd be an end-heavy build, but I didn't even notice stalkers lack Dark Consumption. At least with an ST focus, and a gameplay style of methodical (and not exactly fast), I can expect each spawn to take the 30 seconds needed for Invoke Panic to ready itself again...

I do have another question to add to my already large list, though: do offensive toggles suppress while Hidden? Because Cloak of Fear may be very problematic if not. The activation time is horrendous.

I know tankerminds use the Presence tree's taunts. Do any builds ever go beyond that? I was looking at Invoke Panic and thinking about creating a fear-based build. What I'm thinking about so far:

DM/DA Stalker.
Focused Accuracy epic, with IO slotting heavily emphasizing global accuracy. I'm not great with IOs, but it's my hopes that with enough global Acc, I can slot individual powers with less acc (excepting the horribly inaccurate Presence powers) and make up for deficiencies with those saved slots.

Assassin's Strike open has a high potential to fear a spawn, followed by Invoke Panic's PBaoe to stack with Cloak of Fear, using Touch of Fear (and even Intimidate) on bosses.

Is this fear overkill in so many situations that Invoke Panic is still worthless while having no effect on higher tier opponents (such as EBs/AVs)?

Is there a better way to go about this? A better AT? This is the concept phase for a character I haven't even created yet. I don't care about a character that adds as much damage as possible and is the very definition of efficiency. I want a mildly optimized character with a neat style of play that's not frustrating to play.

Additional weight that should be considered: such a build would probably be mostly for solo (where rains of fire and shield charges won't be making it all moot) and will take quite some time to come to fruition.

Thanks for your time, etc.

side note: i might have to make this character talk in a gruff voice and train in Tibet.

Well, he said Julia because that's already the name of the one in.... whatever that zone's called that I'm always dying in.

Jeeze I'm bad at doms.

I'm not sure how much this matters at page 36, but did someone remember to mention claw swipes coming from the fingertips early on? 'Cuz we need it.

I'm just happy I can finally play Shield Defense characters without feeling like I'm cheating. Pre-update, having a powerful SD character was like bringing a rocket launcher to a knife fight and then bragging about how much better you are afterwards.

If you're simply copying the Energy Melee layout bit-by-bit then yes, I'd rather a whole new energy manipulation theme than a whole new powerset. Melee archetypes don't need a "No FX" energy melee -- that's called Super Strength. That said, I would like to see a more natural secondary. But I'd be mighty sad if it were just "look! we made a cooler looking EM!"

In the meantime, I set my EM to bright theme, both colors to the darkest gray on the selection list. The small resulting glow is just fx for fx' sake. i.e. broadsword/willpower dude uses build up. fireworks fly around him. we know it's just comics effect, not him.

Could just give Energy Manipulation the "No FX" treatment and call it a day. >.>

I play FFXI. That game is loaded with hide-and-seek quests, mini-games, and mazes. All of it is required to get some bit of cool loot.




I've never met a single player who enjoys any of it.

Ok, first, that's not Dispari's character. Dispari re-photoshopped the OP's picture.

Second, at risk of looking like an idiot... am I missing something? What's Corruptor-unique about this?

Sprint, Hurdle, and Ninja Run.

I ran around Cap Au Diable for... ever. Not even killing stuff.

That is all.

Everything Super Reflexes (actually, a lot of the defense sets have inherent issues which cause them to be incredibly flimsy for the first half of the game).

You mean to say that if they added an offensive component to sayyy Power Shield, that it'd run the risk of detoggling and costing a defense build a significant portion of defense?

Assuming that's what you're getting at, yes. It's a problem. But not too big of one. When you're sneaking, you shouldn't be getting attacked too much anyway. Could also be offset by adding a combat-suppressed portion of defense to Energy Cloak (like the Concealment power pool abilities).

Though it's true -- No matter what power a taunt aura were to get added to, it'd be odd and feel strangely tacked on (hi2u, Brute Evasion).

Could always put it in Energy Cloak. I'd laugh. Players everywhere would cry.