Aett_Thorn

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Sure, why not. This should really go in Jay's Costume Request Thread though. Jay won't see your idea unless it's in there, and Jay is the one you want to see your idea.

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Well, Jay or his little minion.

Ahhh...then /signed to the OP.

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They all work well with Inv.

You would need to further qualify your question to get a better answer (i.e. what do you want? damage, mitigation, aoes, single target, fast chain, etc ...)

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This. Invuln fits well with pretty much everything. Without knowing more about what you want, we can't really tell you too much more.

Invuln is kind of a basic Tanking set, and tends to do well with everything. Surely, some sets go better than others with other Primaries, but Invuln can usually do with about any secondary.

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Yet another prolific poster who doesn't actually read what he's posting to. Seriously?

We've been talking about the power "Taunt" , not taunt auras, which I believe I've already stipulated and commented on.


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My apologies. This is a problem of writing, especially on the forums. It's hard to tell the difference when people are talking about the power Taunt, and the effect Taunt, unless specifically pointed out otherwise. From what you were writing, it sounded to me like you were talking about the effect, and not the power. My apologies for misinterpreting.

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My posts tend to answer questions based on what you will *usually* (read as 90%+ of the time) encounter in the game, not the exceptions to the rule (although I do usually clarify that there are exceptions to the rule which I have done here).

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And that's fine. However, I am of the opinion that we have here, on the forums, a way to teach people how things work 100% of the time, and then share with them how it will usually work out in the end for that 90% of the time. Why do I feel this way? Because I don't want people coming back here and telling us that we lied to them, or claiming that something is broken, just because we didn't explain it well the first time.

Thus, why I try to cover all the bases up front. Yes, teaching how things work 90-95% of the time is fine. But why not also point out (since it doesn't take much longer) that that is what you're doing, and that there are other cases.

As an example; from your original post:

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The Taunt magnitude is almost meaningless as the power itself basically works like a control (you have to get into some extreme circumstaces where another toon is able to override your taunt).

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This is fine for most of the game, and covers it well enough. However, it's not really how it works. Why not, in this case, explain how it does work in all cases, and explain that in 90% of the cases, it doesn't really matter?

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Again the difference between playing the game on a regular basis and playing the game by numbers (and I know you've played the game plenty so I'm not dismissing your experience). Yes you are correct in that if you stood in the middle of Banished Pantheon and did absolutely nothing (just relying on your taunt aura), it would be very easy to pull agro from the Tanker. However this is the case with all mobs generally speaking the only difference being that with Banished Pantheon the slightest effects will pull agro versus doing your normal damage which will pull agro off any taunt aura if nothing else is done by the Tanker.

The essential noticeable difference (at least in my experience and to Sarrate's point) with Banished Pantheon masks is that the ability Taunt lasts shorter then normal. If I was going to quantify further (i.e. if this had been a thread about Banished Pantheon bosses) I would have also mentioned that agro is more slippier then usual when relying just on taunt auras + punchvoke.

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As Sarrate pointed out, I was wrong. It looks like BP Pain and Death Masks have a mag protection against taunt that is at 100, and 100% resistance to boot. This has generally been my experience with them. If the Tanker goes in first, then you're fine. You'll be able to hold aggro just fine. However, I have, on numerous occasions, not been able to pull one of these guys off of a Blaster who aggro'd them first. At that point, all I've been able to do is try to bring it down quickly.

If, without knowing that there were aberrations in the "Taunt acts like a control" department, I were to come across this, it would seem to me like Taunt (the effect) was broken, because nothing I could do, short of doing more damage than the blaster, would bring the mob's attention to me.

While they really are the only exception that I can think of off the top of my head, I thought it bore pointing out that there is a case where Taunt Mag is relevant. I was not saying that your initial synopsis was wrong, just that there are closet cases that can come up in normal play.

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Additionally (and also to Sarrate's point) while the internal documentation might have read Taunt works as a control, the fact that it actually *does* work as a control for over 99% of the scenarios in the game, kind of reinforces my point.

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Yes, it does, but, to be honest,t hat doesn't make it right. Why not explain how it actually does work, instead of how it looks like it works? I guess that was my main argument.

But hey, the OP got their question answered. So this is all kind of moot anyways.

So, I'm going to ask another question here at the end of this mostly meaningless post:

Has anybody done any looking into of Threat degradation? I ask because I noted some interesting things last night on the STF, mostly between the tanker and me against the AVs and stronger opponents.

Now, at level 54, the AVs will only get 39% of Taunt's duration on them. At level 50, with Taunt's base duration lasting 45 seconds, and a recycle time of 11.67 seconds, unslotted, Taunt should still be up for 5.88 seconds (probably about 5 with Arcanatime factored in) even after it cycles (so, 5 seconds of stack time).

Now, also at +4 to me, the Scrapper, and a willpower at that, my aggro aura should only have an effective time of 0.4875 seconds. Meaning that it's less than the time I would need to stack it.


Now, with those two things being what I know (assuming that neither of us had slotted for Taunt, and I know that I didn't), here's what I actually saw:

The Tanker, while Taunting at range, as long as he kept Taunting , was holding aggro well enough. However, if he missed a Taunt cycles for even a little bit, aggro quickly fell my way. After I noticed this, I was trying to time when the Taunts would come by counting. Thus, when one was missed, I could tell right away that it was past time for it to have been applied. It was usually about a second or two after this that I would have the AV turn to me, who was in melee. now, according to my calculations above, the 5 second overlap should have had me covered on the aggro front. Even 2 * 1,000 should have beaten out 0.4875 *1,000 * Damage. But, for some reason, it wasn't.

Is this part of the threat degradation, that it's wearing off before the full Taunt duration?

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When someone uses constructive criticism I usually don't act so rash. Not many people here seem to know how to use constructive criticism. For a brush up on it what it means is before you say something negative you say something positive. Or another way is when you say something negative you give it a positive spin.


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That is NOT constructive criticism. Constructive criticism means that you give somebody reasons behind your criticism, so that they can build off of it.

Examples:

Idea: I have idea X

Non-constructive criticism: Idea X is bad

Constructive criticism: Idea X is bad for reason Y and Z.


By giving somebody concrete examples of why you think an idea is bad, it allows the original poster to take those into account, and develop ways around them that address the issues that the other poster pointed out. As such, the original poster builds on their ideas.

Constructive criticism in no way means that somebody needs to give a good for every bad about an idea.

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Either that, or the MAG isn't working quite as Castle described to us.

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I am quite sure that it doesn't. Based on what we know about how Taunt works now, there's almost no reason for Taunt Mag Protection to even be in the game. There are only a few things that use it, and they get Taunt resistance as well, which should work out just fine anyways.

Taunt Mag, except in a very few cases, has no reason to be there. I would imagine that there is something else going on behind the scenes that we don't know about.

Even in controlled testing, Taunt didn't seem to always work out as advertised. I really would not be surprised if the Taunt Mag was somehow changing things behind the scenes.

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we NEED the Frostfire map in ae its a pretty sweet map (and the half pipe is really fun XD)

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Pretty sure that you can buy it with tickets.

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Because in my opinion if vehicles ever were introduced you shouldn't be able to attack from it. if you ever could attack from the vehicle it would only be if the vehicle itself had a weapon and if the vehicle had a weapon it would somehow have to have hit points. And an exploding vehicle might kill it's occupants.


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Okay, here's my problem with this.

You want a new feature. Said new feature will be MORE restrictive, in pretty much every case, than the current feature. Then you want to ask people to PAY for this new feature, just so that they can have it, when they have a better feature now for free. How are you going to get people to pay for this?


Current travel powers:

1) Allow you to fight with them, with limited movement suppression
2) Allow you to access almost every area of the game world
3) Can be used both inside and outside of missions, with some being of limited usefulness inside missions
4) Don't potentially kill you
5) Don't require new development time


Vehicles:

1) Would not allow you to fight or defend yourself
2) Would highly restrict where you can go with them
3) Can be used only outside of missions
4) Can potentially kill you
5) Require new development time


Again, why should the Devs spend time making something like this?

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Also, Taunt is not really like a control. It's a mathematical value in a long string of values for a total Threat determination.

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Which is how I understand it, but that mathematical value has no affect on duration?

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The Mag effect from Taunt has no effect on the duration. There are several display value oddities when it comes to Taunt and Taunt-like effects. However, the enhancements ARE increasing the duration of the Taunt, just not being displayed as such.

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You're being obtuse and overly nitpicky.

For all intents and purposes Taunt does mean you don't have to worry about agro. I have yet to have another toon pull agro from one of my Taunts and the only times I've heard of Taunt being overridden is when its done outside of the range of the Tankers AOE *and* a crazy burst DPS toon is on top of the mob.

In fact, it works so much like a control that for *years* Castle was reporting it as an unoverridable control.

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Really? Because my MA/WP scrapper was stealing aggro from an Invuln Tank against AVs in the STF just last night. Mostly due to damage. Granted, the Tanker was relying on his aggro aura. But just his Taunt value alone, on the aggro aura, should have been enough to hold the aggro. It wasn't. My damage was much higher, so I ended up stealing the aggro.

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This is what happens when you try to play the game from these forums instead of actually playing the game.

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Ahhh...the "your experience does not match mine, so you must not play the game" argument.

Listen, we don't agree on things, but I do play the game. Stop trying to dismiss arguments that you don't agree with. I have seen in-game, several times where Tanker aggro has been lost. Is it rare? Yes, it sure is. Is it possible to do? Yes, yes it is.

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P.S. - Banished Pantheon Masks resistance shortens the duration of a taunt. As far as I can tell it has nothing to do with magnitude unless you're just relying on a taunt *aura* or a side swipe by Gauntlet to maintain agro which is silly.

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Banished Pantheon, at least used to, have 4.0 Taunt Mag Protection, meaning that all of the 3-Mag Taunts would not be enough to deter them from attacking a squishy who got their attention first. You'd need to combine Taunt effects to get them off the squishy.

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The infos are just inconsistant and a tad misleading. Taunt enhancements add to the duration of your taunt. That's the main focus of enhancing "taunt". The mouseover shows you the salient bonuses with enhancements in place while the "detailed info" generally shows you base numbers adjusted for level.

The Taunt magnitude is almost meaningless as the power itself basically works like a control (you have to get into some extreme circumstaces where another toon is able to override your taunt).

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Taunt Magnitude does have a couple of places where it can come in handy to know about it. The one I know about most is the Banished Pantheon Masks, who have higher than average Taunt Mag Protection. A single Taunt may not get their attention.


Also, Taunt is not really like a control. It's a mathematical value in a long string of values for a total Threat determination. Just Taunting somebody does NOT mean that you will hold aggro, especially if somebody is able to put out a lot of damage quickly with a debuffing set.

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In game it still has a base accuracy value of 1.00, which is a bit on the low side if it's not an auto-hit power.

[/ QUOTE ]Even autohit attacks have an accuracy value. And 1.0 accuracy is standard; essentially 1.0 * (YourTohit - TargetDefense), though that's extremely simplified. To be on the low side, it would have to be something like 0.9.

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And the BAse Accuracy on auto-hit powers is irrelevant. They could be set to 0, and the powers will still auto-hot

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Mmm...auto-hot powers.

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http://wiki.cohtitan.com/wiki/Threat

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Hm. There seems to be something off about that formula they give. If you have no taunt effects, then your final threat calculation would be zero. We know that's not the case.

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And if there's no debuff effect, it would also be zero, which we know is not the case. If you have a non-damaging effect, it would also be zero, which we know is not the case.

THe formula is the best information that we have gotten. Most of those values floor at 1, meaning that they will keep the threat level of the other values. We don't know if (TauntDurationRemaining * 1,000) floors at one, or a much lower value, in order to keep aggro values low for anyone without a Taunt effect.

I don't understand why you would need a new serial code. Have your brother change the billing information to your billing information, and you should be all set. You'd even get to keep all of your characters.

Serial codes are one-time deals. Once one is used, it cannot be used again. The only way to get a new one is to purchase the game again. There is no way around that if you want a full account (well, unless you're given a code by somebody else that bought it).

The client is just the game itself, and has nothing to do with whether you have a valid serial code or not. You could quite literally download the game client, update it, go into the game, and not be able to access it because you don't have a valid login.


If you are going to start a brand new account, you will need to buy a new serial code.

If you want to Debuff/buff and Blast, then either a Defender or a Corruptor is for you. It's pretty much exactly the combination that you want.

Also, just FYI: we call them Archetypes here (AT for short).



Welcome to the game and to the forums!

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Define "most."

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Agreed. Here is the list of melee sets:

Spines*
Claws*
Super Strength*
Stone Melee*
Energy Melee
Fire Melee
Ice Melee
Battle Axe
War Mace
Dual Blades
Katana
Broad Sword
Dark Melee
Electric Melee
Martial Arts


4 out of 15 is not "most" by any stretch of the word.

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Question, and I think I know the answer, can a Hero/Villain name be changed once the Toon is active?

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Yes, but it's going to cost you money. You can buy rename tokens from the NCSoft store. There's a link to this in the character selection page when you log in.

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Finally, do some vet badges take longer to show up? I just recently passed my 6 month enrollment period and I still didn't get a vet badge. I did send a bug report in and they are looking into it. I am not sure if is based on actual calendar days or the actual day you signed up, which form me was Jan. 3rd, 2009.

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Did you get your 3-month Vet reward? If so, it might take up to a day or two for the game to recognize that your past the date you should have received it. Other than that, support should be able to help you.

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Love the Avatar enhancement, Aett!

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Thank Vanden for that one.

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Just asking, but I thought AAO was about the same taunt value as RttC. So it's aggro hold would be weaker than most other auras.

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It was, when the set was first released. This was fixed to be on par with the other sets.

Just gotta kind of piece it together from the plaques that are out there.

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he was a human? humans have a fairly uniform size

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He was a mutant. And was very, very, very large.

He picked apart building rubble with his fingers, clapped out a large fine, and lifted an entire gathering of people onto his shoulders to escape a poison gas cloud. I'd have to say that makes him pretty large.


However, he also had a wife, so I'd have to assume that that relationship would be quite strained if he wasn't able to shrink down in size at least most of the way.

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i need shivans because i have missions i cant complete without them.

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Let me guess...

Faultline (Kurse and Nocturne), the Zombie Cooties arc (where you can no longer complete it without defeating Doc. V), and possibly the Hollows?

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er, wait... what? Is the mission with Doc V no longer droppable? Or do you just mean that the good Doctor has been added to the mission completion requirement?

Thank goodness I now make sure my characters have two story arcs open before trying to get the Plague Stopper badge so I never see the arc with Doc V anymore. I always hated getting those darned Zombie Cooties. I used to just drop the last mission in that arc to finish it without having to deal with Doc V.

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I did the good doctor arc on War Drums just about a month ago, and he was able to leave the mission once he got all of the glowies. He took down Dr. V anyways, but I was able to complete the mission without that. When did this change go through?

There is no currently game-legal way of creating MA arcs and missions off-line.

Shield has Against All Odds, which is the Taunt Aura. I'm not sure how you missed that, but it is there in the set. As such, it holds aggro as well as Invuln does (well, a little bit better, because the extra damage will increase the threat value).

I've got a Shield/Mace Tanker that I love. Definitely a fun combination.

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Sigium i'm fairly sure the Atlas statue isn't actual size.

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You are right it isn't life size. The statue is a miniature 1/35 scale.

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Yup. I believe that Atlas could go from normal size to Gigantic size, as he saw fit. Either that, or he was just Gigantic. He's bigger (or could be bigger) than the statue in Atlas Park.

It's a picture of a large ceiling-mounted decoration that seems to have the sun and planets in it.