Adeon Hawkwood

Actually it's status as a real word is slightly questionable. While it is definitely used outside of the CoX context it doesn't appear on dictionary.com or in my copy of The Chambers Dictionary. Unfortunately I don't have a copy of the OED to consult . I think while it has been used a LOT in science fiction and has started to enter the public lexicon as a logical derivation of Empathy it hasn't yet officially entered the English language.

Or you could immobilize them and use ignite. Melts most bosses pretty darn quickly.

It used to do that. They changed it sometime ago (I think when dual blades came out) as part of making animation times for weapon sets shorter. Basically the old animations for weapon sets had a time equal to weapon draw + animation. The removed the weapon draw time from the animation times to shorten them but now you have the redraw penalty.

Yes, you can make a perfectly viable build that neglects your secondary. However a such a character is less useful to a team than one who uses all of the tools at his disposal and as such it will not endear you to plenty of people (admittedly there are people who feel that ALL defenders should play that way). Defenders are not designed as a non-combat AT they are designed as a hybrid AT that provides buffs/debuffs along with damage. As such a Defender who blasts alongside buffing/debuffing is bringing everything they can to the team while a Defender that only buffs/debuffs is not being all that they can be.

Personally, the way I look at it is that at the end of the day the only thing a team really needs is damage. Everything else is simply about allowing people to deliver more damage or increasing their safety while doing so. So if you aren't delivering damage then you aren't really helping.

Finally I will note for the "pure Empath" build is that beyond a certain point you're really just taking filler powers to avoid attacks. The pool powers are useful in moderation but they are intended to round out a build, not be it's focus. Things like the Stealth/TP combo are useful to the team but they are the sort of powers that are really more useful on a team member with more build flexibility (for example my Blaster has Cloaking Device and Recall Friend, my Scrapper has Recall Friend but not perfect stealth and relies on high defense to "stealth"). Similarly with Leadership (a pool I try to take on all my defenders) most defenders can fit at least some of it in while still maintaining a decent attack chain (a Dual Pistol defender is probably the only one where I think I'd have trouble doing that).

If you want a more support character I would recommend an Empathy/Dark/Dark. You should still slot your attacks for damage but Dark Blast is rather control heavy for a blast set so you're defendering while blasting. Taking Dark Mastery as your epic gives you Oppressive Gloom to allow you even more control and Soul Drain will help your damage if you have to skimp a bit on damage slotting (don't rely on it for all your damage slotting though).

EDIT: I suggest you read this thread in the controller section:
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=230039

Someone was pointing out that from a team point of view Controllers bring as much or more damage than Defenders along with buffs that are almost as good and more security through the use of controls. While there were viewpoints on both sides the general viewpoint was that yes, at higher levels Controllers are bringing slightly more to the team although once you stack more than 3 or 4 support characters it doesn't really matter what AT they are. However given that the main reason to play a Defender is that they do play rather differently to Controllers with blast attacks as opposed to control attacks and solo better at lower levels.

I skipped 'em entirely. I find Assault Rifle has enough AoE that it doesn't really need M30 Grenade and I find snipes to be pointless on any defender who will open with a debuff. I guess you could try and get the snipe in while they are focusing on the seekers but I much prefer to just run in with a PGT. Ignite on the other hand is a godsend for any Traps/AR defender who wants to kill bosses/EBs quickly (for that matter it's damn important for any AR Blaster who doesn't have strong melee attacks as well).

This is a serious problem for everyone unfortunately. Some market forum regulars have started running lower level characters with XP turned off to generate a bit of supply but it's a drop in a bucket. If you want more supply my advice is to ask the devs to allow merit/ticket rolls to be set to a particular level (in the same manner as direct buys). This would allow people to earn merits/tickets with their level 50s and then use them to generate level 33ish recipes. I have no clue if enough people would do it to bring up the supply but it would at least be a step in the right direction.

I knew I was forgetting something important.

I think a lot more of the complaints are to do with the fact that it "feels" clunky (due to long redraw/animation times) and the item that is supposed to be the big draw of the set (Swap Ammo) isn't really that great (Toxic Ammo is the most useful simply because no other blast set has that). Balance-wise it is ok but suffers somewhat due to the lack of Aim and the longish animation times on key powers.

I'm pretty sure that already happens. If you have the same mission that just got completed it's supposed to ask you if you want to complete it as well.

Assuming you believe me, Aett_Thorn and ParagonWiki then yes that is correct. As Ironblade points out from a practical point of view your average hit points per second is what really matters at the end of the day, the mechanics are interesting but don't really have an impact in general play. The only other thing I will note is that unlike healing abilities which restore hit points based on the base HP for your AT Regeneration restores 5% of your current maximum, so powers like Dull Pain effectively increases your regeneration rate in terms of HP/second but don't decrease the frequency of ticks.

Pssshhh, forget that I get unhappy about the lack of Adrenalin Boost. Mmmmmmm.... +100% recharge.

The one in game doesn't spell out how it works though. Look at recovery just below it, it also says it restores a percentage of your endurance every second. But if you take a character with no recovery bonuses (i.e. no set bonuses, no stamina etc.) you can easily see that you get an increase of endurance less regularly than once a second (it's approximately once every 4 seconds). Similarly with no regen bonuses you get a regen tick once every 12 seconds.

So increasing your max health or your regen increases the amount of hitpoints you get per second but the actual mechanics still restore 5% of your max hitpoints each tick, it just ticks more often.

If you don't believe me I suggest you roll a level 1, get him injured and check the regen tick rate then do the same with your scrapper.

You can manage reasonably well by spamming the AoE immob instead if you've got it slotted enough but I still agree with the sentiment. The ST immob is an important part of your damage as a controller (especially before you get the pet and your epic).