Angelstar

The ding and interface bugs are great news as the "silent dings" were really starting to get annoying, especially on level 50 dings, but please just hurry putting the difficulty sliders back into place on TF's and sorting the AV level issues next.

So, I had a look at the challenge settings and to be honest they really aren't that useful. The buffs don't seem to effect enemy survivability so the same attacks that dropped the wimpy white conning mobs still drop them, they hit a bit harder but without the buff of being higher con to weaken our effects they don't survive.

So I turned to the debuff players challenge setting in the hope of helping, -ACC, -Dam, -Mez in hefty chunks. Some builds are going to virtually ignore this, 50% global accuracy buff is far from unreasonable so the IO'd toons are fine but at lower levels and/or on an SO'd toon -50% can be absolutely devestating.

The problem is that it's so binary at 50 with a high powered toon the challenge settings create very little change against everything but AV's and at lower un-IO'd levels it's way too much, far more than the difference between a +1/+2 mob. It's not just enhancement levels where the difference comes in, a team backed by an Emp/bubbler is fine, if they're relying on control or to-hit check buffs/debuffs they can be crippled.

I don't think it's impatience either, it's been a while since this "temporary fix" went live (it went on training room a month ago but I don't know when it went live) but i've watched and heard the interest in TF's drop in that time because of the lack of challenge and the nature of the buffs debuffs mean that unless you start cherry picking what members/toons can sign up the odds of at least some members getting frustrated as the debuff turns them into an observer increases.

They aren't even a stopgap measure due to their nature and inability to be adjusted. +1/+2 mean that a non-optimal team could have a decent challange without worrying about composition. Now you either have to be bored by +0's, or start dictating team composition. The sliding scale of difficulty was one of the best things about the game, you could tailor your experience to the power of the team and the game is severely lessened by losing it on TF's.

Wasn't sure which forum this belonged in but I guess the original cause is a bug so, meh.

Questions in the title, it's getting a little uninspiring running TF's on mega wimpy difficulty and while it's still possible to run normal content or flashbacks the TF's made for a nice session of play where we knew pretty much how long people needed to commit for, we got a nice merit reward at the end and it made a good SG event at +2-4 mobs or even running a max difficulty run to really give our toons a decent run out.

At the moment though a half decent team sleepwalks though them, if your team happens to contain a high powered poewerset combo or heaven forbid a heavily IO'd out character or two then it's rare you even see anyone take damage of note, let alone be defeated.

Has there been any word of a fix on this? Combined with wacky AV's levels in regular/flashback content it's hard to find content that sits at the right difficulty (ie not one shotted by shield charge and not containing a +4 AV)

To be fair I16 has introduced a family sized bucket of bugs both old and new so at the moment they're probably snowed under with wierd mob levels, mission doors that aren't doors, off map glowies and all the other stuff on top of the "normal" bugs during an iron out phase.

I'd imagine (hope) things will pick up again once they get a new build in place and iron out some of the ones that are taking up all their GM/customer support time.

Not to excuse what is a very bug heavy issue, but it might go some way to explaining why support is seemingly a little thin on the ground atm.

Definatly a problem.

Level 23 team on protect Steel Canyon Bank, +2 setting 8 man team, Level 25 mobs, level 28 Silver Mantis, cue another team wipe

Yup, it has a chance for each person hit, i use it as a health top up on my TA/A defender in poison gas. It's not gonna save you if your taking direct damage but if you take a bit each mob as an enemy or two escapes the trollers/tanks it can be handy just to whack a few hp back on.

Yeah, I made a post about this in the bugs section, there's definatly some very odd things going on with AV levels at the moment.

So it's something a couple of our SG events have run into possibly to do with the currently buggy difficulty settings.

AV's aren't scaling to the level of the mission in some cases.

First we ran the Tina Macintyre arc and with a level 44 team fighting 45/46's were doing fine until we ran headfirst into a level 49 Anti-matter AV wall.

Then a few nights later we try and run Mender Lazarus's arc in Oro, 37 team set to +2's, so we're getting 39/40 enemies, fine. Then in the second mission Nosferatu spawns, who can be a pain anyway, sadly he also spawned as a level 41 AV and one shotted a chunk of the team with his AoE. Cue spending ages trying unsuccessfully to take down a healing +4 AV before giving up and going back to normal missions.

Anyone else finding some very odd level scaling going on with their AV/Heroes. We've dropped in bug reports and petitions but I thought I'd see if other people are finding similar things.

I personally love TF, the 1-shot stun on Bosses is something I wouldn't trade in, I find it overkill against anything smaller but it can be nice to flatten minions in a single blow...
Admitedly it's not as handy in larger teams where AoE rules supreme but in tank-less crews or those low on control in general it's a valued addition that also happens to deal hefty damage to the thing you want to stop punching you in the face...

Was a great night of PvP on Sunday, pretty evenly balanced at around 7-10 a side with the heroes having a slight numerical advantage and villains playing hit and run and MM baiting.
Sadly then a handful of Empaths showed up and paired with the swarms of Ice or Fire/NRG blasters pretty much put the whole event on hold as the villains were forced to withdraw in the face of overwhelming hero advantage (the +15% damage buff for them in the zone wasn't helping either) and I left at about 5pm, did things pick back up after that? and more importantly when are we doing it again!

I'm really not feeling the scrapper love, always been a squishy player but thought a full team of scrappers would be good fun.
I'll be retiring starstrike to the deleted bin over the next week so I wont be continuing the ST I'm afraid.
Sorry guys.

[ QUOTE ]

Well if you consider the rule that exist when exampling. If you slot all lvl 50 IO's, then if you enter, WB, SC or BB ( lol BB) then these sets won't take effect. So it's already implemented to some extent.

[/ QUOTE ]

For me this was a great first step, however what i think it lead to is a situation where characters are further specialised by being enhanced for a specific level of combat (all level 33's for Sirens etc)
Personally i think the inclusion of the set bonus-less zone/arena option could do nothing but help increase the PvP community. The IO'd set users can avoid the place like the plague and the casual players have a place to build up there skills and knowledge in a place where all things are still not equal (when are they ever) but at least it's a place where the SO's PvP newbie with the more "lol PvP" build can feel like with a bit more luck/planning he might have actually landed the kill.
Hell, if they think that, some of them might even hang around long enough to get seriously into it and "graduate" to more hardcore PvP...

While i'm not a serious PvP'er I understand where cognito is coming from, i myself have found myself visiting the zones less often since the advent of inventions builds for some of these reasons.
I'd disagree that PvE's dislike a level playing field, the difference between the 500m inf IO empath and an SO'd scrap IO user is negligable in PvE, the content was aimed at the SO level and thus while the IO'r is superior the SO's hold their ground.
In PvP the difference is considerably greater, the PvE combatant goes into the fight at a huge disadvantage before skill is even factored in, doubly so when you start including FotM builds.
The purple sets I fear will only increase this divide as the "hardcore" PvP community will no doubt grind and farm for so as to gain access to it which puts yet another strata of performance between them and the "casual" PvP'er.
Yes the PvP put in the time for his build, but that will not bring the casual player back for a repeat game after he is flattened without landing a hit against the math-hammered FotM that flattened him. Even if they do stay around a while, start learning their way around PvP they will still get hammered because of the difference in build and enhancements.
CoX could once claim PvP wasn't about the "phat loot" builds but inventions has changed all that and i personally find it rather appropriate that they chose purple for their "epic" inventions.
Complete disabling of IO's would be a step backward and isn't the solution, but maybe making one of the zones and making it an arena option, set bonus free could certainly help to provide a place for the more casual PvP'er

So I'm finally going down the route of trying out a stalker and it poses the question, does TpFoe break the hide status?

gonna be 15 mins late, start without and i'll send a tell when i get on

Reassuring, it was just getting rather frustrating that even with 5-6 players either side the opportunity for some good team PvP was being lost as everyone ran around solo playing the opportunist.
Was a little worried i was gonna have to go roll one of them melee type jobs

I'm hoping that my experiences are a result of bad timing, but it seems to me like the solo culture is taking over in Zone PvP.
Several times in the last week I've logged into the various zones for a bit of light hearted PvP to end a session and each time team requests are met with a complete silence or flurry of rejested invites. It saddens me that Sirens seems to have become Scrappers and Tankers against the Stalkers all running solo while Warburg is a no go zone of small 2-3 man teams where if you didn't come with a team you'll likely not find one.
Anyone else noticed this? Or as I'm hoping, have a just had an unlucky PvP week?

In a desperate attempt to break the mold for having stamina I find myself looking at my Electric/Electric brute for inspiration.
Anyone tried/has thoughts on the Validity of Using Conserve Power, Power Sink and Power Surge as a combo for end management and dropping stamina?
Figured it wouldn't be so bad since I'd already have two of those powers anyway and by adding in conserve and tough to replace the fitness pool it should make me considerably tougher, assuming my blue bar doesn't croak and die every 20 seconds...

Edit: This is without a unique +recovery IO, no way can I afford one and until I get lucky and one drops I figure I'm going without.

I originally went down the psychic road for my defenders epics, but i find myself looking enviously at the effects of Power Build Up from Power Mastery, how exactly will it effect my bubblers shields?
Are any shields applied within the powers duration at enhanced effect for the duration of the buff or the duration of build up? Also would i be able to trigger Dispersion Field just after and recieve and enhanced protection from it? Does it effect tactics/assault/maneuvers if so could you do the same as for dispersion field?

Yeah, I'd be up for Eye too, might be a more rounded Brute in that one.
Even with the AV resistances Duray must have felt like hell with 5 debuff sets on him, chalk it up!

Stalker and an AoE Brute.
Brute handles crowd control and aggro, Stalker pops up to handle those annoying boss level enemies that AoE's don't cut it for.

I'd be up for this as well, Emerald Cat, 50, Fire/Emp Controller

Finally got my Broadband active again, turns out my scrapper is level 9, so i'll defintaly let her gather some dust until 24th so she's not too far ahead...

I'd be interested in this one assuming it's not the Sunday which i wouldn't be able to do, Monday nights good tho.
Plus not starting till then will give me time to get my net connection sorted, stupid BT. It'd be:

@Emerald Cat, Scarlett Starstrike MA/SR
Ill hold off using her until we start teaming.

I'm currently working on one of these and i must say it works a treat in the role of enemy neutralisation. Not only can you start throwing around debuffs to cripple large chunks of the enemy mobs but paired with Choking Cloud and Short Circuit you can get in among the mob and nuke their end and hold some of them as well. You will need stamina though or slot rest so you can use it after every fight...
You may find yourself a little short on damage but thats what teamates are for.
Works a treat on those Mastermind types too