Adeon Hawkwood

A Mind/Empathy Controller CAN be viewed as an Empathy/Psi Defender with better mezzes and worse buffs/healing.

As I said before it comes down to focus. For a controller the primary focus is on mezzes and pets (if applicable) and the secondary focus is on buffs and debuffs. For a Defender the primary focus is on buffs and debuffs and the secondary focus is on damage with limited debuffing.

When a Controller selects a secondary they will generally look for one that best supports their primary when solo. Sets that focus on buffing allies (Empathy, Thermal, Force Field etc.) are a poor choice for sets without pets (or with low damage pets) since they don't benefit as much from their secondary while soloing. It isn't to say that these sets are bad for all controllers or even that the combination will perform poorly in all circumstances it is simply that when soloing these sets won't provide as useful a bonus as they would for a different primary. Fire/Empathy for example works well since you can Fortitude the Imps for more damage/defense.

When a Defender selects their secondary they are similarly looking for one that best complements their primary when solo. In general a Defender with a secondary that focuses on buffing allies will generally prefer one of the higher damage blast sets (Sonic or Archery in particular) since it helps compensate for their inability to use a lot of their primary while soloing. Conversely Defenders with a primary that boosts their damage but provides little mitigation (like Kinetics) will favor the sets with better mitigation (like Energy or Ice) since that will help keep them safe while soloing. The other consideration for Defenders is redraw. Some primary sets (like Empathy) encourage rapid switching between primary and secondary powers making Archery and Assault Rifle a poor choice as a secondary. Others (like Traps) encourage a style where you use a bunch of primary powers at the start of combat then focus mostly on blasting until things are dead which makes weapon based sets more practical. And of course for a Trick Arrow Defender archery eliminates the need to worry about redraw entirely.

Yep, it's a beautiful zone with a challenging enemy group and no one goes there because the missions are horrible

You know, I completely missed that when writing the post, D2 has just become the standard example I use of a player determined currency .


brophog02 covered this somewhat, but yeah the earning power of a level 50 is SIGNIFICANTLY higher than over characters. This is for a couple of reasons. First off is the obvious they do get more per kill. In addition level 50s still earn experience but this XP is converted into additional inf which almost doubles the inf they get per kill. Finally level 50 common recipes sell for about 100K each. So the earning power of level 50s is extremely high. Additionally people who play their 50s a lot (especially if they farm) are generally going to use that income to purchase high end recipes (purples and PvPs). This means that a portion of their income is effectively removed from the economy shielding prices on lower items a bit.

Well at the end of the day every Buff set is about keeping people alive. Some do it through reducing the damage enemies do via buffs or debuffs, some do it by increasing killing speed and some do it through reactive healing. Empathy uses a mix of 1 and 3.

My view is that it's mostly a matter of focus. For any character their Primary powerset should be their primary focus and their Secondary should be selected so as to complement it as much as possible. It's not a matter of comparing Mind/Empathy to Empathy/Psi it's a matter of comparing Mind/Empathy to Mind/Something Else.

If someone specifically asked about a comparison between Mind/Empathy Controller and a Empathy/Psi Defender then your comparison would be valid but in most cases people say "I want a Mind controller, is Empathy a good secondary?" In that case the answer is not really, a debuff focused secondary will synergize better with Mind than a buff based secondary will (this applies regardless of which buff based secondary is being considered). It's not that Emapthy is a bad set for controllers it's that for a Mind controller specifically it's a poor secondary since it doesn't support their primary purpose as well as other sets.

Conversely if someone asked "what's a good secondary for an Empathy Defender?" I wouldn't recommend a Mind/Empathy controller I'd recommend a Defender secondary (probably sonic for more damage).

Finally I'll note that some sets simply are more useful to one classes than they are for other classes. A good example is Willpower, it offers good survivability for all three melee classes but it has a very weak taunt aura. This makes Willpower a lot worse for Tankers than Scrappers or Brutes. A Willpower Tanker has to rely a lot more on other tools to fulfill his primary duty whereas a Scrapper or Brute won't care as much.

Ok, I will explain this one more time (and this time I really mean it).

There are two important values to consider when discussing Influence. The first is the absolute quantity of Influence active in the Economy (or total influence). The second is the absolute quantity of Influence active in the Economy divided by the number of active players (influence per capita). These values influence the Demand for IOs.

On the other side of the scales we have IOs. As with Inf we have both a total IO supply and the total IO supply divided by the number of active players (IOs per capita).

Let us assume an EXTREMELY simplified in game economy. It will suffice for an example, and I think it is reasonably obvious how to extrapolate from this to the real in-game economy. In this game a player logs on and automatically generates X Inf/hour and Y IOs/hour, for the sake of this argument all IOs are equivalent.

Let us assume that the developers wipe the server and everyone is starting from scratch. The players log in and play for a combined total of Z hours (it is academic how those hours are spread out). After this then there will be a total of Z * X inf and Z * Y IOs available for trade. Since all IOs are equal the market price of an IO is M = X/Y.

Now what happens if the number of players drops by half? This means that the total amount of playing time will also decrease by half. We shall call this Z' = Z/2. Therefore the total quantity of Inf will be Z' * X = Z/2 * X and there will be Z' * Y = Z/2 * Y IOs. Since the reduction in INf and the Reduction in IOs is the same proportional rate the market value of an IO is STILL X/Y. So the number of players has no effect on the in-game market value of items.

Now, suppose that the number of player-hours remains at Z but instead the developers double the rate at which players gain influence (a crude approximation of what happened with I16). So we have the new rate X' = 2 * X. given this the amount of inf generated is Z * X' = Z * 2 * X, however the rate of IO generation is still Y so there are only Z * Y IOs available for trade. The market price of IOs is therefore now 2 * X/Y.

As a final example, let us assume that play-time decreases to Z' = Z/2 and the Inf rate increases to X' = 2 * X. The Inf available is Z' * X' = Z/2 * 2 * X = Z * X while the IO supply is Z' * Y = Z/2 * Y. The market price is therefore still 2 * X/Y

The conclusion to take from this is that market values are based not on the total quantity of players, nor on the total size of the market. But on the rate at which influence (demand) and items (supply) are being generated which is completely independent of the size of the player base.

Ok, that is about as simple as I can make it. If you still don't understand then read the wikipedia article on Supply and Demand. If you STILL don't understand after that all I can suggest is take some classes in economics. I am done attempting to explain this to you.

Ok, I will try one more time to explain this in very simple terms. When you buy soemthing on the market only 10% of the inf used is destroyed. That effectively means that every inf you earn defeating enemies can be used 10 times before it is removed from the economy. In other words, to fund a 2 billion purchase only 200million of that needs to be "new" influence to keep the economy stable. If I make a 2 billion purchase only 200million inf is destroyed and needs to be made up by combat. It doesn't actually matter how the 200million enters the economy, whether I'm the one earning it or if someone else does it. As long as 200million enters the economy somewhere it will be stable. If less enters the economy then we get deflation and prices drop, if more enters then we get inflation and prices go up.

In other words 10 times more influence travels through the market than is actually generated as "NEW" inf.

Whether inf is "new" or "old" is functionally irrelevant where player to player prices are concerned. What matters is the change in the amount of inf per capita. It matters very little who actually owns that inf as long as they are using it. If they aren't using it due to either lack of interest or because they quit then the inf is effectively removed form the economy.

Mathematically the change in inf per capita for a given time period is represented by:
(Inf generated by combat - Inf removed by Inf sinks)/number of active players

The first two terms are both functions of the number of players in the game so when the devs increased the amount of inf being generated by combat then the inf per capita for a given time period will increase irregardless of any change in player numbers.

At this point all I can really say is go and study some economics.

EDIT: Against my better judgment I will try one more time to explain. Let us assume for the sake of an argument that you can actively measure the amount of inf going through the market of two successive days. We will call these values A and B. Now on Day1 IOs sell and a total Inf of A passes through the market. Now on Day2 more sales happen and an amount of Inf equal to B passes through. How much Inf has to be farmed (F) on Day 2 to allow for this to happen? Assume that everyday 100% of the available Inf passes through the market.

Now we know that on Day 1 A Inf passed through the market so the amount of inf going into day 2 is already 0.9 * A. Therefore F = B - 0.9 * A

In actual fact it's more complicated than this but you get the basic idea. The amount of inf being generated doesn't have to cover all the transactions, it just needs to cover the increase plus the amount destroyed by the market in the previous day.

This is absolutely irrelevant. If we assume that the player population is declining (I disagree but for the sake of an argument lets go with that for now) then that means that the demand for purples is shrinking at approximately the same rate as the supply and therefore we would expect prices to remain remain constant and for the supply to move at about the same rate.

Ok, you are looking at this purely from the point of view of one player, you have to look at the overall point of view. Even if it takes a single player months to farm 2 billion Inf it probably takes the entire player population less than a day. You only see the rate at which inf enters the economy through you, but for market trends you need to consider everyone.

First off you are correct that the market removes money from the economy. However the only money it removes is the 10% transaction fee, the other 90% remains in the economy. Given that prices are definitely inflationary at the moment I think we can say with some certainty that in actual fact more Inf is entering the economy than is leaving it. In other words most of what you are seeing on the market ISN'T new money, it's old money that is moving around.

With I16 the devs drastically increased the rate at which inf entered the economy (effectively a demand increase) without any change to the rate at which IOs entered (supply remains constant). This had two effects. First off there was more demand for IOs which tends to lead to higher prices and secondly the inf sinks (particularly the market fees) were no longer taking out as much inf as entered the economy. This lead to higher prices being charged and thus inflation. I'm not going to get into the actual mechanics of the change because I'm not that good at explaining it (at least not without a whiteboard). But if you are interested there are plenty of places on the web that explain it, I'd start with wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflation

Read my earlier post again. The markets are inflationary because people are getting more Inf per kill than they used to. Since the main inf sink in game is the market fees and these scale based on the amount of inf being generated it should eventually stabilize at a higher price point than before. So regardless of whether the number of players is increasing or decreasing the Inf per player IS increasing and that causes inflation.

Yuo aren't being forced to play with 10 year olds. You are being forced to play in an environment that the majority of parents would consider reasonable for their 10 year olds. If you want to play with older people then there are plenty of ways to do that, the obvious is to find a SG that caters to older players (yes they exist). Now your actual complaint is that the server environment is set by the mods to be suitable for 10 year olds and personally I have no problem whatsoever with that. I don't care a lot if people want to have stupid names with sex or drug references but it does irk me and so I support the policy of disallowing it.

This. The only advantage I can see to an 18+ server is that it would keep the people who want to be immature (irregardless of age) away from me.

It follows the same trend as other comparisons Defender vs Corruptor comparisons. The Corruptor does about 15% more damage with the ice powers (plus scourge) but the debuffs are at about 80% strength compared to Defenders. The exceptions to this are Caltrops (which are identical) and Trip Mine/Time Bomb which do significantly more damage for Corruptors since they get the Blaster versions of the powers.

Well, I think my second post did a better job of explaining why being able to unslot enhancements would be a bad thing for the in-game economy but I'll also answer this question. Whenever you play the game and defeat enemies you earn Inf which is injected into the in-game economy. Additionally since only the most basic enhancements (SOs and common IOs) can be purchased from vendors most inf is used in trades with other palyers and remains in the economy after use. The purpose of Inf sinks is to remove some portion of that Inf from the economy to compensate. In an ideal world the amount of Inf removed in this manner is exactly equal to the amount generated. Obviously in real life this isn't the case and the sinks will remove either more or less than the amount generated. The difference between the amount generated and the amount removed is what causes inflation or deflation (a change int he buying power of 1inf). If you removed all Inf sinks from the game then the amount of inf would only increase and this would lead to hyperinflation, more Inf is generated everyday but without a sink to remove it the value of each Inf declines rapidly. After a while (I'm not really sure how long it would take) you'd end up with a situation where Inf was essentially worthless for player to player trade. Once that happens players will either switch to using some semi-common item as a form of currency or just switch to straight barter. I don't know if you ever played Diablo 2 but that is basically what happened there: gold was worthless so the player economy was based on the Stone of Jordan, a unique ring that was duped in sufficient quantities to make a viable economy.

Not entirely true. Purples and lower rarity IOs are similar to substitute goods (they obviously aren't strict substitutes). As the market price for purples goes up fewer people are willing to buy them and the demand for set IOs that slot in the same powers increases.

You are correct, enhancements aren't technically an Inf sink, I was using "inf sink" as a generic term for anything that removes value from the economy. Enhancement sink would be better but saying "slotting enhancements is an enhancement sink" sounds a bit silly. The point I wanted to make was that the limitations on the ability to unslot enhancements serves to (effectively) take enhancements out of circulation. In the case of SOs this isn't actually doing anything, the SOs sell for their purchase price during a respec so the value actually remains in the economy. But in the case of the more valuable IOs and HOs the value is lost. This helps to maintain the value of lower rarity IOs (and especially common IOs) and HOs since people will tend to buy new rather than slotting an old character. It has less impact on the higher value IOs and HOs since people will tend to respec several times to recover the value rather than buying new.

If people could remove enhancements freely the value of common IOs would drop dramatically. Most people would maintain a few sets of mid-level ones for leveling alts instead of crafting a new set for every character.

*sigh*. Check the link, then check this one


Also incase that isn't obvious enough, my actual opinion of traps:

I would say it the other way around. Traditionally RPGs have been a lot more about resource management than shooters. In shooters the only resource management is ammunition, and normally only ammunition in the clip at that since spare ammo is easy to find. RPGs on the other hand tend to have a lot of different consumables and different gear sets and managing them to avoid running out at the wrong time or having the wrong gear on at the wrong tiem is a major part of the game.

in any case I'll say no for pretty much the same reason as everyone else. There are precious few inf sinks in the game and the current market seems to be inflationary as it is. Given that I'd rather not eliminate one of the few inf sinks the game has.

Not the General crafting badge, that would imply that you were useful . I think it should be Professor and Monitor Duty (you spent your on duty time sitting around doing nothing). The Accolade power is Impressive Solo an AoE placate that applies an immbolize and "only affects self" to you with an animation based on the sing emote.

Yes it would, personally I'm going with Electrical Mastery since it sorta works (electric close defense system) but my personal preference would be for a Gadget Mastery epic along the following lines:

1. Wide Area Web Grenade (but with a larger radius than the Arachnos Soldier version)
2. Cryo Freeze Ray (maybe with a higher damage scale like Dominate though)
3. Body Armor
4. Targeting Drone (although we'd probably get the Scrapper version )
5. Gun Drone

I'd actually like LRM Missile as the fifth powoer (either replacing Gun Drone or dropping Targeting Drone and moving Gun Drone down one tier) but I don't see that happening unfortunately.